If I Could Tell It

Cadbury Castle, Britain, 645

Morgain was still missing when Austin woke me up the next morning there. That also meant that the tournament was still canceled. And tomorrow was supposed to have been the finals. Maybe we just were not going to have a Winter Solstice tournament this year, all because of my sister’s stupid choices. Sometimes people just did not make sense.

“Can I sleep for a bit longer?” I asked Austin, I sat up in my fur laden bed and looked at the sunlight that was seeping in through the stained glass windows in the cobblestone walls. “Everything I would have done is canceled.”

Austin looked at me a moment, as if thinking. “I suppose so my lord.”

I thought it was strange that he still used my titles even though he had literally been dressing and feeding me for a year and a half now.

Austin was fourteen and he started his service to me when he was thirteen and I was eleven. I do not know where his parents were from, only that they had died somehow and then from one way or another he got to be my manservant. He was very skinny, with thin shoulders, and devoid of any muscle or fat on his body, he had a gaunt pale face and a swipe of foxtail red hair rested against his forehead. Freckles covered his entire body like a plague.

I liked Austin. He was one of those people that tend to be very quiet and reserved and they just went along and did their business without being noticed. He never talked back to me and I cannot remember him saying a single thing bad about anyone. He was a nice person to see first thing in the morning.

“I think you should just call me Arthur from here on.” I told him, as I laid on my back and adjusted my hair on my pillow. “I do not want it to always be like I am better than you.”

I noticed Austin stiffen. Maybe saying that it was always like I was better than him was not the right wording. “If you wish.”

I smiled. Maybe I could begin to eliminate the silly rank system in place, very slowly, but eventually something might come of it. I closed my eyes, having felt accomplished, and turned over onto my stomach to try to sleep.

I think that living both here and there might be making me more tired than if not. I suppose I am awake for twenty-four straight hours in a way. I never seem to be so tired that I cannot function though, I just feel like I have developed love of sleep, and I can fall asleep at almost any time I want to. There may have been taking more of a toll on my body than I had once suspected.

Arthur

It is funny how one moment can change a person’s life forever. One event can send someone spiraling down into a never ending pit of despair and depression. It can alter a person’s values, how they see the world, each and every time they even think about something their perception will be skewed. Ten seconds can make or break the fragile reality that is a human soul. The next ten seconds may very well be the most important ten seconds of your entire life. What if you had to choose if your worst enemy lived or died in the next ten seconds? What if you had ten seconds to save the person dearest to you? What if you failed?

Cadbury Castle, Britain, 646

Morgain never came back after she disappeared that Winter Solstice. No one ever heard from her. We had no idea if she was dead or living in Avalon or was a slave to the Saxons. She could have tripped on an arena stair step, fallen beneath the stands and died of starvation for all we knew.

My mother blamed my father. She said it was his fault that Morgain had run away because of the way that my father mocked her and treated her so poorly. My father denied every word of it and escaped to his chambers away from my mother and the rest of the world every chance he got.

I am decently sure that Lancelot blames me for Morgain running away. He thinks that if I would have gone with him that morning in my tent then we might have found her and stopped her from leaving for good. I think that Lancelot might have loved Morgain, the deep love, between a man and a woman. He never confessed that he did, but after how upset he had gotten after she left, I had my suspicions.

All the while, through the drama in Camelot of the queen’s daughter running away and not returning faded, the war with the Saxons raged in both the south and the north. More and more men died on both sides, and yet neither of the two groups would surrender or suggest that peace be had.

I had turned thirteen on March twenty fifth, the Tuesday of last week. My mother came into my chambers after the feast that my father, through no idea of his own, had thrown for me. I was in the middle of undressing when she came in, and I quickly pulled on my dressy over tunic that I had worn for the feast. She sat on my bed next to me and held my hand.

“Arthur I know that quite a lot of things have been going on lately but I still want to do this for you.” She had said to me as she pushed my hair out of my face.

“Do what?” I asked, I looked everywhere but her face. Sometimes making eye contact with people made me uncomfortable.

“Give you this.” She pulled out a dark steel ring from the folds of her dress and set it in the palm of my hand.

“Thank you” I said as I examined the ring. It looked like a very long, thin, steel piece of metal that was wrapped around itself over and over again until it formed a perfect ring without ever having any loose ends.

“It is made of meteor iron.” She told me. “The lady of the lake gave it to me when I turned twelve, just before I left to marry Morgain’s father, Gorlois, she told me that I was going to pass it on to someone very important when I felt it was right.”

I nodded. Something in the back of my mind told me that this was some sort of huge honor to be receiving this.

“When you look at this I want you to remember me, and my people, and that they are a part of you as well.” She told me, she picked up my right hand and slid the ring onto my ring finger. It was so big that it slipped off. She laughed. “I think that you will grow into it, for now wear it on this cord.”

She handed me a deer hide strip of leather and tied the ring onto the cord. Then she hung it on my neck. It fell in between the two sides of my chest.

“I know you will be a great king Arthur.”

Somewhere near the Lake of Avalon, Britain, 646

I woke up in the forest.

I knew it was the forest because when I looked up all I could see was a canopy of green spring leaves. It was quite serene actually, the grass beneath me was cool and dewy beneath my back and I could hear the faint rustling of leaves from a cool wind. In the distance there was the faint trickle of a running stream. I could have lied there for hours being perfectly content.

I did not remember the night before, there or here, nor how I had gotten to be lying on the forest floor. I did not mind though, somehow it felt as if I had been lying here forever.

“Thank goodness you are awake!” Lancelot’s dark face and hair appeared in my vision, blocking my view of the forest canopy. “For a moment I thought that you would sleep forever!”

“Where are we?” I asked, ignoring his enthusiasm.

“In the forest”

Yes Lancelot I can see that. “But why are we in the forest?”

“The Saxons…” He trailed off for a moment. “They attacked Cadbury Castle.”

I shook my head. That could not be true. Cadbury Castle was the ultimate stronghold, Ambrosius Aurelianus had made it himself. It was impossible for it to be taken over by invaders.

“Where is everyone else?” I asked, if Lancelot and I, two thirteen and fourteen year old boys had escaped the Saxons, then my mother and father and a few other people must have.

“There is no one else.” Lancelot told me softly. His eyes looked like pools of melted dark chocolate and his skin like creamy toffee. Lancelot had the complexion of a smooth chocolate bar. He helped me to my feet. “I am sorry Arthur.”

I looked at the ground. It was covered in tiny white flowers. They looked so pure and innocent. I stomped on them with my boot. “How come I do not remember any of this?”

“The physician made me give you a poppy seed potion.” Lancelot looked down at his boots. “And then you passed out. Gawain helped me carry you out here.”

Gawain? I thought Gawain hated me. Maybe underneath his arrogant exterior and devil-may-care disposition there really was a bit of compassion and appreciation for me allowing him to stay in my closet for several months.

“Oh…” My mind was still a bit hazy. My thoughts felt sluggish and my emotions lethargic. “Where are we again?”

“I am not exactly sure.” Lancelot looked around at his surroundings as if he had not actually got a decent chance to look around being so preoccupied with making sure I was alright and not going to die. “Somewhere on the other side of Avalon. We have never been here before.”

Gawain and Lancelot carried me farther than I imagined. I must remember to thank them for bringing me out of the way of harm.

“So now what?” I asked. I probably should have been a little more visibly upset about the fact that my home had just been taken over by invaders, but in my mind, I figured there was nothing I could do to help it by being upset so might as well assess the situation and find out a way to help solve the problem.

“I...I do not know” Lancelot sat with his legs crossed on the ground, crushing an array of wildflowers as he did.

I looked around. There were deciduous trees all around us and the forest floor was a carpet of soft green grass and white flowers. There was no sign of any human civilization anywhere around us, and all we could hear was rustling leaves and the faint ripple of water in the distance that must have been Avalon.

“I do not think we should try to go back home now.” Lancelot reasoned. Duh. “We should probably look around and try to find food and shelter before nightfall. We could be out here for a while.”

I nodded in agreement. If Saxons really had taken over Cadbury Castle, that meant that the main headquarters of the British government and military were neutralized, therefore we had almost no one left to come to our rescue. Unless the highlanders in the North decided to become our new best friends, as would be said in America: We were screwed.

Lancelot stood back up, he left an imprint in the flowers that he had sat on. Without discussing it we began to walk toward the sound of the water in utter silence, each of us listening intently as not to go off track.

“Something just glimmered.” Lancelot said, putting his arm out in front of my chest so I would not continue walking. I could almost see the clearing for the lake up ahead.

“What?” I asked. I noticed that Lancelot had no sword at his side and I sighed. We had no food, shelter, or weapons. And Gawain had apparently abandoned us.

“Over there” He pointed to the left of the way we were heading toward the water.

I looked in that direction. He was right, the sunlight from above was reflecting off of something. “Should we see what it is?”

“Why not?” He asked. “It is not like we are in a hurry.”

We changed our trajectory toward the shiny spot to the left and walked at a slightly faster pace in that direction. As we got closer to the “thing” that was shining brighter and brighter I noticed a faint gold sheen coming from it. Then it became apparent that the faint gold sheen was coming from the golden hilt of a sword.

I frowned, what was a sword doing sticking straight up in the middle of nowhere? And a gold hilted sword at that. Those were expensive.

When we were about ten feet away Lancelot and I noticed something. The sword was encased inside of a rock. And not just any rock, it was a giant mass of almost pure white stone, a boulder, as opposed to the fine white pebbles that graced the shores of Avalon. The golden green sunlight dripped from the canopy of the trees to coat the rock and the sword in a layer of bright light. It was beautiful.

I looked at Lancelot, he looked just as awestruck as I was. As if we were communicating without using our words we walked forward toward the sword in unison. We stopped when we were less than two feet away.

“What do you think it means?” I asked.

“I am not sure” Lancelot said. “But we had better not mess with it. It could be a Druid altar.”

“The last thing we need now is Druids after us.” I agreed. Druid people were ruthless, and often times considered insane for their strange practices.

I came a little closer to the boulder, it was almost taller than I was and the rough surface would make perfect handholds. I grabbed hold of two niches in the light stone, planted my foot near the base of the rock and hoisted myself off of the ground. Then, feeling confident, I climbed up a step further.

“Arthur stop!” Lancelot said frantically. “You do not want to break it!”

“I am not going to break it!” I yelled back at him, frustrated at his lack of confidence in me.

“Arthur you just tend to break stuff...a lot.”

“I just want to get a better look at that sword!” I said and climbed a step further, I could reach out and touch the shiny steel blade if I wanted to.

Lancelot sighed and I heard him take a step back. I pulled myself up to the slightly flatter top surface of the boulder and sat about five feet off the ground, looking at Lancelot. The vibrant sword glimmered behind me.

“Nothing happened. See?” I taunted him. “Everything is fine.”

The concerned look still did not fade out of Lancelot’s face. “Arthur I just have a feeling that this is a bigger thing than you just being an idiot.”

I frowned. One, I was offended that he had called me an idiot. Two, I was offended that he had told me that I broke things a lot. Three, I needed to prove to him that I was capable of not breaking the sword or the boulder that was its rocky sheath. So I stood up.

I felt so tall and powerful standing on top of that boulder with the sword encased inside of it. As if I really was destined to be king. Nothing could stand in my way, I was bigger, taller, more successful than all of my enemies.

I grabbed the hilt of the sword as a handle so I would not fall. It was cold on my palms and the complicated welded designs pressed into my hands comfortably.

“Arthur be careful!” Lancelot shouted at me.

That was when I fell.

I did not blame him for my fall, but he definitely did contribute to it with his startling shout.

I stumbled a bit and with my hands still quite attached to the sword, my feet slipped out from under me and I hit the rock hard on my back. It hurt, bad and I felt like my spine was cracking under the pressure of my body and the hardness of the rough boulder. Then I felt the boulder’s surface scrape across my back and the next thing I knew my tailbone felt bruised from the hard grassy ground.

I groaned and Lancelot picked my head up from where I hit it on the rock when I fell. I looked to the left. My hand was clenched tightly around something, a gold and steel something. It was the sword that had been inside the boulder.

But that was impossible. The sword had likely been inside its rocky sheath for probably thousands of years. Sure I was strong for my age, but it would have taken a demigod to pull the sword out from something that had been made around it.

“Arthur you broke it.” Lancelot said, half kidding.

I looked up at him through a lock of hair and glared. He was right though. I had to find out some way to get the sword back inside of the boulder before I had Druid people coming after me.

I sat up and brought the sword in front of me to examine it. I set it on my thighs.

The gold hilt was beautifully crafted with tiny raised lines making swirls and knotwork in an elaborate pattern that seemed to fit in my hands perfectly. Slightly thicker black knotwork laced over the silvery steel blade growing up toward the point from the hilt like a vine. The blades on either side of the sword looked razor sharp, as if one touch would slice deep into flesh. I was lucky that the blade had landed off to the side of my body when I fell.

“Are you alright?” Lancelot asked me and stuck his hand out.

I took it and he pulled me up. “I think so. My head just hurts a little.” I looked at the sword in my hands. “What am I supposed to do with this now?”

Lancelot shook his head as if to say he did not know.

“Maybe if we take it to Avalon.” I thought aloud. “If we leave it on the shore the Druids might find it and understand.”

“Maybe.” Lancelot was strangely nondescript.

I just looked at him a moment, confused, then decided not to push it with him and left him in his quietness.

It only took us about five minutes to reach the treeline to the bright white shore of Avalon. Our boots made crunching sounds on the pebbles as we approached the water. The water lapped lightly at them and made soft splashing sounds.

“Who are you?!” A voice rang out from across the shore. Lancelot and I both turned our heads to the left, where it had seemed it was coming from.

A short figure in a huge green cloak was running down the shore towards us. I looked at my friend. “Should we run?”

Lancelot shook his head. “We better just talk to him.”

The green cloaked figure reached us and turned out, as expected, to be much shorter than me and even Lancelot. He only came up to my chest level.

The boy looked around our age, other than his apparent shortness, and he had very short black hair and dark caramel skin. His features were lean and sharp and his dark eyes were intelligent although devoid of warmth. The green cloak that was softly flowing around his body was much too big for him and made out of a burlap like material that I had never seen before.

“Who are you?” He repeated myself.

“My name is Arthur and this is-” I started but the boy immediately cut me off and grabbed the hilt of the sword in my hand.

“Where did you get this?!” He snapped at me. I held on to the sword and pulled it back.

“I found it.” I said defiantly and lifted my chin. Lancelot elbowed me in the side.

“You found it?” The boy was practically seething. “That sword has been encased in stone for centuries and you just happen to find it?!”

“Now would be the time to tell him the truth Arthur.” Lancelot leaned over and whispered to me. “Before he curses us or something.”

“Well actually I was sort of...ah...I sort of fell and…” I thought for a moment. I did not want to tell him the real reason that I had gotten the sword. “I pulled it out of the rock.”

“Oh I am sure you did. Some dirty blooded Christian boy just happens to pull Caliburnus from the stone. I suppose you want to kill me with it now too.” Sarcasm dripped from his voice like drool. I noticed he used the words dirty blooded to describe me, just as that girl I had met on Avalon had done.

I looked at him sideways. “I did pull it out.”

Well sort of I thought. Technically my hands were holding the hilt when I fell over and it just slid out.

The boy stared into my eyes as if he was looking for something. I took a step back. Then he did the same with Lancelot and Lancelot also took a step back.

“Are you sure you were not the one to do it?” The boy asked him without obstructing his intense eye contact with him. Their dark eyes were almost the exact same color to the point where it was hypnotizing me.

Lancelot shook his head quickly. “Arthur definitely did it. I am not so stupid as to break your...altar.”

“Altar?” The boy asked, he shook his head as if disregarding Lancelot’s comment. “You just look so much purer. More faerie.”

He was right about that. If he was talking about Druids as in the dark coloring of the faerie folk, Lancelot was much purer than me. My skin was as white as a sheet and my hair was a bronze-gold color that could never have been considered dark.

“Hold out your hand.” He commanded me. I complied and the boy succeeded in taking the sword from me. I noticed that we still did not know his name.

He felt along my palms and my fingers and rubbed my callouses and looked closely at the little arches on my fingertips that were my finger prints. He set the sword in my hands and stared as if in disbelief at the perfect puzzle piece fit. I saw him grit his teeth in frustration.

“It is you.” He glared up at me. “I never thought it would be a dirty blooded Roman in all my years of training and yet here you are. Some protector you ought to be.”

“What am I?” I asked, utterly confused at the situation. I noticed that I had momentarily forgotten about the chaotic war that was destroying my home.

He ignored my question and continued to glare up at me. I glanced at Lancelot and he shrugged. The boy shoved the sword back at me and I slid it carefully into my belt. “Who did you say you were again?”

“Ah...Arthur.” I scanned his face for anything that might give me the slightest clue about his own identity.

“Not your name you idiot!” I was not exactly sure what I had done to make him so mad. I had fair features? He did not seem so upset with Lancelot. “Where you are from! Your title! Your parents!”

I looked at Lancelot again as if to ask if I should tell him who I actually was. He shrugged again. Not helpful. I decided that I probably could not make him more mad than he already was for no apparent reason.

“I am from Camelot.” I said slowly, still looking at Lancelot as I spoke. “And my father is…” I thought for a moment. I knew that Druid people seriously hated my father. I did not blame them, I hated him and he had not killed my family and friends in order to promote himself. “…Uther Pendragon…high king of Britain.”

“You!” And then he shoved me. Hard. “You are the reason that sword even exists!”

I felt my stomach rage. I stepped back and took a deep breath. I had to keep my temper under control, I had a feeling that this boy could do very very bad things if I made him mad enough.

“I hate him too.” I said softly, swallowing down my rage.

The boy and I locked eyes for a moment. I did not let my stare waver. His dark eyes softened first and I saw some of his anger leave him. He sighed. “I suppose you cannot choose who you were born to.”

I nodded. I agreed with him. “Can you please explain to me what all of this means now?”

“In time.” He said, looking down at his light brown moccasins.

“Can you tell me your name at least?” I asked him. I needed something to call him besides “the boy”.

“Merlin.”