If I Could Tell It

Colorado Springs, America, 2008

History was the best class of the day. This was mainly because of our teacher, Miss Karote. Miss Karote was only twenty-five years old, which was young for a teacher here. She was short, shorter than me, (which was one of the reasons I liked her) and she had a bright red-orange pixie cut that did not even come to the tips of her ears. For that reason most everyone called her Miss Carrot. She was very skinny and she looked like if someone was to blow on her hard enough she might just fall over. Her personality, however, was the exact opposite of her delicate looks. Every time a student talked in a disrespectful place she slammed a worn metal yardstick against the whiteboard, followed by a tally on the participation sheet.

The participation sheet was just a piece of paper that all the teachers had with the names of their students on it that the teachers recorded how many times we did something wrong on. Every time you spoke out of turn, or slept in class, or were leaning back in your chair, or writing curse words on your desk it was a tally mark. No one knows what happens to the tally marks, or why we get them, it was more the idea of the tally just meant to scare the students into doing the right things I think. Ty said that at the end of year, however many tallies you had, that was how many times Miss Karote whacked you with her metal yardstick. I knew what it was like to be whacked with sticks by teachers, and I did not enjoy it. So I did everything I could to avoid getting little purple tallies next to my name.

Miss Karote took a blue marker and wrote the word Aquaduct on the whiteboard. Then she wrote the word Coliseum under that, and then Gladiator and then Jupiter and then Empire.

I was in the third row back from the board so I had to lift my head to see above the girl in front of me.

“What do these things have in common?” She asked the class.

Rome I thought. Jupiter was the King of The Gods in Rome, or used to be anyways, now most of the people in Rome were Christians.

A girl in the front who seemed to know about everything miss Karote taught raised her hand.

“Hailey” Miss Karote pointed to her.

“They’re all things from Ancient Rome.” She said proudly. Then in usual Hailey fashion. “Just so everyone knows, an aquaduct was how they moved water from one place to another.”

“Right.” She agreed. “We’re going to spend the next month learning about the Ancient Roman civilization.”

That sounded interesting. I already knew quite a bit about Rome since some of my family had come from it and Father Patricious always told me about what it was like to grow up there during my Latin lessons.

My grandfather, whom I never met, came from Rome. His name was Ambrosius Aurelianus, he was the one who technically started the war against the Saxons. He was also the first one to defeat them and invoke a period of peace that lasted about fifteen years. That did not last long though. He went to battle with them again and then he died in battle, leaving the problem to my father. Who I assumed would leave the problem to me.

Miss Karote pulled the large world map down from the roll it was in over the white board. She took her metal yardstick and snapped it over Italy.

“This is where the great city of Rome was.” She said. She ran her hand in all directions over the area around Italy. “And this is where the Roman Empire was.”

The Romans were a conquering people. That was how they got to Britain. I suppose if it was not for the fact that they were greedy and wanted more land I would not be alive. Or maybe I would be, but I would probably live on Avalon and be a wizard. Or maybe I would paint myself blue and practice cannibalism and be a Pict. It was probably a good thing that the Romans came, at least for my sake.

“I want you to get into groups of four, we are going to do an activity.” She said.

I turned around and looked for boys from football to group with. Helix was diagonally from me to the right and he motioned for me to come to him so I got up and sat on his desk.

“We still need two more people.” I said, looking around. A couple girls were sitting nearby, I was pretty sure one of them liked Helix too because she giggled and started whispering to her friends whenever he looked in her general direction.

“Trinity and Sequoia are staring at me again.” Helix complained. It felt more like he was bragging.

“They are the only ones left without a group.” I commented, they saw that we were analyzing them and they looked away.

“Fine whatever.” Helix said and stood up out of his chair, underneath I could tell that he was happy for their flattery though.

Helix walked over to Trinity and Sequoia and started talking to them. Who knew making groups could be such a political hardship?

“Arthur!” I heard Miss Karote harshly yell my name. I turned my gaze to her. “Get off that desk!”

I practically sprung off the desk to the floor in fear of a tally mark and/or a whack from that stick.

“Graceful” Helix laughed at me, coming back with the two girls that would complete our group of four.

“Shut up.” I said and glared at him.

We moved four desks together and all sat down to face miss Karote who was quite outwardly irritated with us.

“Thank you” Miss Karote said, half sarcastically, and most likely directed toward our group.

“Carrot needs to calm the heck down.” Helix commented to me from across our table of desks.

“Mr. O’Krier.” Miss Karote slammed her stick onto the whiteboard and I cringed, I almost felt that stick slamming into the tops of hands. “That’s a tally for you.”

Helix leaned back and rolled his eyes. Everyone was looking at him.

“Don’t roll your eyes at me young man!” She commanded him harshly.

“I didn’t!” He defended himself. Everyone totally knew he did.

She made another mark on the participation sheet and recomposed herself.

“We’re going to do an activity that demonstrates all of the groups of people that the Roman Empire conquered” She began. Well I knew all about that. “First, I am going to assign each group a different civilization.”

She held up a blue velvet cinch bag. “I need one representative from each group to come up and choose a civilization out of this bag.”

“Arthur” Helix decided for our group. Maybe he thought that I would have the best statistical luck.

Trinity and Sequoia shrugged.

At least our group did not get into a fight about her got to draw the slip of paper out of the bag. Really it seemed silly that some of the groups were.

Miss Karote slammed her stick. “Please form a line up here.”

Most of the people rushed up to the front so they could be at the front of the line. That really did not make a lot of sense though. It was statistics, no matter where they went in line they could not control which civilization they received. People could be so stupid sometimes.

Hailey was in front of me and she read her civilization out loud to the class. “The Celts.” She looked at Miss Karote. “The Romans didn’t conquer the Celtic empire, I thought they were the barbarians that brought it down.”

I cringed at the use of the word “barbarian” it was a choice word of my father’s to describe the Old people.

“Haven’t you ever heard of the Druids?” Miss Karote asked her.

“Like wizards and stuff? Of course!”

“The Druids were a part of the Celtic empire, and the Romans did conquer them.” Miss Karote said. “You’ll find out about that. Now go sit down.”

I already have found out about that. And it is terrible.

“Your turn Arthur.” She smiled at me and opened the bag. I reached my hand in and grabbed a slip of paper.

“The Ancient Greeks.” I read.

“Sparta!!” Helix yelled as if the only things the Greeks achieved was that one group of fairly violent people.

Miss Karote did not choose to pay any attention to Helix’s comment. “That will be an interesting one.”

I nodded and took my seat at our desk-table.

“Each group will be researching their civilization and how the Romans affected their culture. Then you’ll present that civilization to the class as if you’re a part of it.” She explained, she went around the room and passed out a rubric. “I expect all of you to dress up and say a few words in that culture’s language.”

Everyone in the class groaned, dressing up was not something middle school students generally preferred.

“Then the group that has the Roman Empire, raise your hands.” A group near the front raised their hands. Miss Karote smiled mischievously. “Will “conquer” you”

The bell rang and everyone hurried to gather up their things, without bothering to put the desks back in order. Or waiting to hear a dismissal from Miss Karote. That was one thing about American people, they had very little respect for their authorities and people’s property.

“I’ll finish explaining the project tomorrow!” Miss Karote called as the students rushed out the door.

I stopped before exiting out into the hall. I smiled weakly at her. “Thank you Miss Karote.”

She smiled back, in my opinion thankful that at least one person appreciated her project. “You’re very welcome Arthur.”

I smiled awkwardly one last time and then left her classroom.

I think that one of the reasons I am decent at American football is because I am not afraid of pain.

I am not afraid of pain because of there. Because every single time I do the slightest thing wrong I am hit or whipped or slapped. So when another boy hits me or tackles me it does not hurt so bad.

American boys seem to have an apparent aversion to pain. I think this is because their disciplines often consists of taking a technological device away rather than an infliction of pain. I suppose this makes sense, I do not really have anything there that my father could take away from me. Well maybe he could take away food from me and starve me. I must not give my father the idea of starving me, although I doubt he has not already thought of that.

I also do not have an aversion to hitting anybody else. This is because I think that most people, especially American people could probably do with a bit more hitting. It is a way for me to take out my bottled anger, which I suppose I have a lot of because things seem to frustrate me more than other people. I am not sure why this is, maybe it is because other people do not seem to see the inherent stupidity of which most people carry with them.

We had just finished the chant that we did after each practice and before and after each game we played when Coach Hunter came up to me as I was walking off the field toward the parking lot in front of the school.

“I think you have some real potential Arthur.” He told me, placing his hand on my shoulder. This made me edgy, I do not like it when people I do not know very well touch me. Actually I do not really like anyone to touch me.

“Uh thanks.” I said, I shifted from foot to foot.

“Well it’s good you’re on the team.” He told me, this was beginning to get more awkward than I think it was intended to be.

“Yes.” I must keep my words short and concise.

“See you tomorrow then.” He told me.

I nodded and without looking back hurried to the parking lot where Miss Marion was waiting for me.

Arthur

I think that most people who know me think that I am insane.

I really do not mind, it is only thoughts after all. I suppose it is my fault that they think I am insane after all. I never should have told anyone about America. I should have kept it in my head and never told a single soul. But really, that is much more difficult than it might be perceived to be.

I do not think it is perceived to be difficult to others because they see it as something that began in my head so it should very well stay there. Or they think that I made it all up like a bard telling a tale of how someday the world will be presumed to be round. Because if people do not understand something then it is nonsense to them. It makes very little sense for the world to be round because the ground that we walk on is flat and no matter how far we walk or ride on horseback the ground will remain flat. So if I were to tell someone that every time I fell asleep at night I woke up in a land across the seas more than a thousand years in the future that would be sort of like telling them that the world is round.

I think that may be another reason why I like circles, because I can relate the circular shape of the world and people not understanding it to there. To America. To my supposed insanity.

Lancelot told me that he believes me.

I do not think he was telling the truth. I think he only said it for my sake, so that I would not be alone. But I am alone. I will always be alone.

Cadbury Castle, Britain, 645

Tournaments happen four times a year. Spring equinox, summer solstice, autumn equinox (Beltane, which is sort of a harvest festival), and Winter Solstice. They generally last around four days and after finals, on the last day, there is a feast where the champions are recognized. The competitions generally consist of six different events, jousting, quarter staff, mace, archery, swordplay, melee, and the free event which is where all sorts of people with all sorts of weapons compete.

I have competed at each of the four tournaments in swordplay and melee since I was ten years old when my father first forced me to. I was never very good at any of the other events, and my mother always pleaded with my father not to have me compete in the free duels because that was where the most men were killed or seriously injured.

That was another thing about tournaments. It was fine for someone to kill another person for the entertainment of the crowd. I suppose that each person who entered the tournament knew that they could be killed though so in a sense it was their own fault for entering. Unless they were me. I did not get to choose to enter or not. I was forced to put my life on the line.

The first day of the tournament was always the worst. That was the day that the most people died. It was because the more barbaric of the competitors got out on the first or second day because of lack of toned skill so they did the most damage they could on the days that they were in. After the first two days the violence seemed to die off a bit because it was mostly noblemen from there out.

Technically you could kill someone of high rank in a tournament if you wanted, but that would most likely result in making quite a few enemies so it generally was not done. For example if someone were to kill me (although I doubt my father would mind) they would have definitely invoked the wrath of my mother and of the whole of Britain, as there would be no more heir to the high king.

Today was December 18, 645. The first day of the Winter Solstice tournament. It had been over two months since I had slain the dragon and Gawain had come to Camelot with me.

I had told my mother that Gawain had come back with me from my “trip” to Meredith in hopes of becoming a servant at Cadbury Castle. Thankfully she did not recognize him as her nephew although I am sure she had her suspicions. We decided that he could keep his name as Gawain as long as he never mentioned Orkney, or his parents to anyone. Well except for Lancelot. I told Lancelot. In my defense I tell Lancelot everything though, even about things that happen there. He is a very good listener, and he is very good at keeping secrets. I know that Lancelot will never betray me.

Gawain kept his head down well for the most part, aside from his occasional arrogant speech about things he had supposedly done. I do not think he did most of them though, after all how could he have taken down a Saxon warrior when I could easily beat him when we fought with wooden broomsticks?

I let him sleep in the firewood closet next to the cobblestone fireplace at the far end of my room. I had made Austin drag a cot in there and I had taken a couple furs from under my bed for him. Austin was one of the many who I think thought I was positively crazy so he did not question me. He just did as I asked.

I am not sure what Gawain does during the day. He leaves in the morning after I sneak him food from my breakfast and then he comes back for me to sneak him food from my supper. I think that he may be getting drunk in the village below Cadbury Castle, he acts that way after all. I am not sure where he would get the money to buy ale though. Maybe he steals it.

Austin is my squire for tournaments as well as my manservant. I consider him my friend. I am not sure if he thinks of me the same way. In my mind I am not better than him and he is not lesser than me, I need him to help me, and he is one of the people “grooming” me for my imposing kingship. Someday I will have a job to do, even if not a job I prefer, and he is helping prepare me do that job.

I think that my tourney armor weighs about sixty pounds. I do not think that I could fight in much more than that. Maybe when I am older. My tournament sword only weighs about twenty-five pounds and that was even a bit heavy to swing.

Gawain came out of my firewood closet while I was in the midst of having Austin strapping my armor on.

“Leaving so soon?” I asked as he ran his hands through his hair in front of a wall mirror.

“Going to compete.” He said simply.

“At what? Bragging?” I asked sarcastically.

“Funny.” He said back sarcastically. “At free.”

“Have fun publicly dying.” I rolled my eyes at him.

“Turn.” Austin commanded me and I complied, he strapped a shoulder plate on.

“When I win, I am going to buy my own village with the prize. Then you will not have to see me anymore.” Gawain glared at me.

I glared back. “Oh but I would miss you so much.”

Austin paid no attention to Gawain and greased my hair back with olive oil. Ick. I suppose it kept it fairly out of my face though.

“Goodbye Arthur.” He said to me, and with a flip of his silky black hair, he left.

There was no exciting beginning to tournaments like one might think. I suppose that people did not want to compete in fake fighting so much when there was a real war going on. Maybe after the war is over there will be. We just went to our tents in the field behind the arena next to the palace and waited until it was our time to compete.

The order of the events of each day was always the same. Joust, mace, staff, sword, free, melee. That meant that my two events were toward the end of the day. It would be at least five hours, around one, before I was up to duel sword.

“Arthur.” My mother lifted the red tent flap and appeared inside the makeshift room. I was sitting on a chair analyzing the marks on my hands from Father Patricius hitting my hands with his stick. There were little purple bruises and red marks all over them combined with callouses from my sword training on my palms.

“Yes mother?” I looked up at her. Her soft auburn red hair was pulled out of her face in one thick braid down her back.

“I wanted to come and wish you luck before you compete” She said, she wandered over next to where I was sitting.

“Thank you” I said, I looked at the ground.

“Are you nervous?” She asked me. She absentmindedly put her hands on my shoulders.

“A little…” I trailed off. “I suppose I am more afraid of what Father will do to me if I lose.”

“He is only bluffing.” She said, her hands moved from my shoulders to my hair where she smoothed my grease covered mane back against my head. “You know how he is…”

I did not look up at her. I did know how he was and I was tired of being whipped and yelled at for speaking out of turn or tripping in the hall. He probably would not kill me for losing the tournament, but he would find some way to inflict pain upon me and make my life miserable.

I sighed.

“I love you Arthur” She told me.

“I love you too” I replied because that is what you say when someone tells you that they love you.

Lancelot is best at jousting. I suppose that this is ironic because of his name, lance-lot, and lance is the very thing used in jousting. It is a bit interesting to watch him joust because he is small, smaller than me, and he is dwarfed by the size of his lance and the horse that he is riding atop.

He still manages to knock the other man off, more often than one might think, despite his small stature. He uses physics, I would think, as I learned in Science class there, to push the other man off. Only Lancelot does not know what physics are because he has never been to America and heard any of the theories, and as many times as I have tried to explain advanced Mathematics or the process of a valid experiment, he still does not seem to understand it.

Lancelot won his first joust against someone I did not know. The person did seem to be a short man however, and not a boy, at least five years older than Lancelot. At least he was off to a good start.

Kay was competing at the tournament as well, only in staff. I saw him as I was walking to the well in the center of the field of tents to fill up my leather wineskin with water. I looked at him and he pretended as if he did not see me as he had done since that day in Meredith when I confronted him. I never told anyone in Camelot about the dragon. I figured that they would simply think I was making it up, as they had thought when I told them about my avid “dreams” of America. I did not need to further validate the suspicions of my insanity.

I did not see Gawain in the tent field, or in the arena stands. It was as if he had disappeared. Maybe he was camped out in the woods behind the field, waiting for the time to come when he would compete in his free event. I did not even know what weapon he was going to use, he had none of which I had seen. Maybe he would use a metal pole like some barbaric warrior, I doubt he could win with that, just get himself injured.

Gawain did seem to have some supply of money, of which I knew not, that he was drawing his funds from. He had to be eating somewhere during the day, I doubt the table scraps I took to him would be enough to sustain him through the day. I think he may have taken on a job or an apprenticeship, at least that would explain where he hurries off to each day.

I was walking back to my tent from the well when I met the woman.

“Do you have any money?” A feminine voice asked me, I looked to my right.

“Well no” I said truthfully. I looked the woman up and down. She was plump and seemed to be bursting out of her too tight scarlet dress. Large breasts hung out of the top of a half laced corset and her lips were ruby red with carmine. Her white-blonde hair was long and hung freely beneath her waist. “Not with me at least.”

“Oh well that is such a shame.” She said. The woman came very very close to me and pressed her large overflowing breasts against my arm.

I did not like this. I do not like it when people touch me and I especially do not like it when strangers touch me. I also did not understand why this woman was touching me with her breasts as if I was her baby and she was trying to feed me. I just stared down at her in shock.

“I could give you such a lovely time.” She told me smoothly, her voice silky and warm. She continued to press her breasts against my arm, I inched away slowly.

“How?” I asked suspiciously. Maybe she was a witch and she wanted to sell me a magic potion that would make me lucky or excessively happy.

“Oh well you know.” She walked her fingers up my shoulders. I did not know, and I am not sure that I wanted to know. I wanted her to stop touching me is what I wanted.

I moved her hand off my shoulder. “I-I think I will be going now.”

“You must be bent” She frowned. Bent? What did that have to do with her creepily touching me?

“For your information I am not bent.” I informed her. Then I lifted my chin and walked away. I ran away from her once I was sure I was out of her sight, that woman scared me.

My father and my mother sat side by side in the covered section of the stands. Morgain sat next to my mother who was on the left of my father. She looked absolutely miserable.

I was waiting at the gateway into the dirt arena where I had a perfect view of my father’s hard stare toward me. I felt as if he was taunting me, telling me that there was no way that I could even win one duel. I had been training at least four hours a day since my father told me that I would be punished if I did not win the tournament.

I had definitely gained muscle over the time that I had been training so intensely and it also helped that I had grown over an inch in those couple of months. Now I was five feet and seven inches tall. I had gotten much better at fighting, I had began to incorporate my mathematics into it as well. I found that if I could knock my opponent slightly off balance and I could deliver one last blow to them, then they would topple over and gravity would do the rest. That was the goal in tournaments after all, to knock the other person to the ground to the point where you could kill them if you so wished

Last year I had made it to the semi-semi-finals. I was shorter then though, and less muscular. I also did not have my father’s punishment floating over my head then.

The two men from the previous duel exited the arena. Neither of them had been hurt. The person announcing things announced my opponent first and he walked out into the arena. I did not hear his name, a wave of nerves had drowned me. My heart was beating in my ears. It felt a bit like when I fought the dragon, that same adrenaline rush that overwhelmed my body and made me feel like I needed to do everything ten times faster.

The person announced me as “Prince Arthur Ambrosius Pendragon, heir to the high king of Britain.”

That made me even more nervous and on end. Partially because of the mention of my middle name and my Roman Grandfather and partially because of the announcement of my someday becoming the high king of Britain.

I was practically shaking as I slowly walked into the arena. I tried to keep myself composed. I heard cheers from the stands for me. I reminded myself that it was not as if I would be killed in this fight. Nobody would kill a twelve year old boy that was basically the entire future of the country. At least I did not think they would.

I set the point of my sword in the dirt and put my hands on the bronze hilt to keep it from tipping over. I watched my opponent do the same.

He was an average sized man with a slender figure and shoulder length curly brown hair. His eyebrows were thick, and they looked like two caterpillars lost on his face. His eyes were a deep chocolate, almost the same color as his hair and I could feel him sizing me up as I was doing with him.

We both looked at my father, who through his unwavering glare at me, gave us the signal to put our helmets on and bow to one another.

I slipped my helmet on over my greased hair and stared through the slit for my eyes at my opponent’s feet. He had on dark brown knee high boots with a bronze buckle near his ankle. I had a moment of wondering if he liked that buckle. I wanted a buckle on my boots like that.

I heard the sound of a deep drum. The fight was beginning, I bowed my head, and leapt back. I had found that it was best if I went on the defensive in my fights. I was more strategic than aggressive anyways. It was harder for me to strike first because I was not so strong, however I could use my opponent’s strike against them.

My opponent jabbed with his sword at the left side of my chest. I caught his blade with my own and with both hands flipped his sword over, knocking him off balance, just as I had planned. My actions were no longer functions of my mind. They were purely muscle reactions that seemed to be going without my command. I spun on my heel and planted my foot into my opponent’s breastplate while he was still off balance. He fell to the ground and I stood over him with my foot on my chest and my sword pointed at his neck.

I looked up at my father. He looked down at me critically. I knew he would find something wrong with my performance even though I had won in no time at all.

That was the first time I had ever taken anyone down that easily. At first I thought that it might be that my opponent was very bad at fighting. I doubted my skills. But then I saw his crest on his dirtied tunic and I saw that he was from a southern kingdom that was famous for their agile swordsmanship. Maybe I really had just become better due to my often and intense practice.

My father pointed to me to judge that I had won and I slowly walked out of the arena, my heart still beating in my ears and the flow of adrenaline unwavering.

Arthur

I have not told anyone in America about there. This is because I do not wish to become known as insane in both places. Maybe someday I will meet someone that I know I can trust and we’ll never betray me and then I will tell them.

I hope that when I marry I will have a wife that I can tell about there. And I hope that she does not see me as crazy as everyone else has done. I have dismissed the idea that there is anyone else like me who also has the experience of there. I think that if I hope then I will only disappoint myself.