Arthur 1/2,
A Medieval Parody
By Jim Robert Bader
(Inspire by the Works of Rumiko Takahashi & Thomas Malory)
472 AD-East Cornwall, Roman Province of Britannia
"Hmmm, this is bad," murmured Merlin Ambrosias, greatest of all Wizards in the lands of Greater Britain, "That Uther boy has definitely screwed up royal this time. Now the question is, what do I do about it?"
He stood upon a high precipice staring out at a scene of carnage and slaughter that surrounded Tintengel Castle, present headquarters of the King's Royal army. Said Castle had been under siege for the past several weeks, but Uther had managed to turn back the tide by mounting a heroic charge at the enemy lines, driving back the forces of King Uriens and King Lot and thus giving time for the boat being loaded with royal passengers to escape into the evening fog, to go where only Merlin knew, thus insuring that something could be saved from the otherwise near total disaster.
Disaster because Uther had rashly gone and gotten himself killed, now the only problem left was the unresolved matter of the King's infant son, whom Merlin had managed to spirit away at the last moment. It was by mischance that the boy had failed to reach the ship destined for Avalon, and so he would not find safe refuge in the land of the elves with his three older half-sisters.
Igraine would look after her daughters, and the note Merlin had given to her would insure that the Lady of the Lake herself would see to the care and training of the girls in the Old Ways of magic and mystery. Their part in the struggle to bind the wounds of the nation would not begin for many years hence, but at least they were beyond the reach of the enemies of their two respective fathers. Duke Cornwall and King Uther had many such enemies lining up to claim the crown, but without Uther's sword they could not claim the legitimacy of Kingship. That right belonged to the royal line alone, and at present there was only one heir, and Merlin had him.
"I always knew those two would end up badly," Merlin sighed as he turned to regard the sleeping youth, who appeared to be a fairly ordinary child roughly five or six years of age, dressed in peasant rags rather than the finery to which he was accustomed. Igraine's son by Uther, who had cuckolded his longtime friend in the din of night by use of Merlin's magic. Uther had claimed the child legitimately, even though he had been conceived on the night of Cornwall's untimely death (Merlin cursed the caprices of fate that Cornwall had slipped and fallen off his horse during a hunting accident, which he was pretty sure had not been arranged in secret by Uther). The problem was that Cornwall had been away in Scotland fighting the Picts when the boy was conceived, and anyone who knew how to count months knew that Cornwall had been betrayed by Uther. This had weakened the King's prestige in the eyes of his subject, hence the rebellion that had resulted in his demise, bringing the whole matter of guilt and betrayal full circle.
And now the question for Merlin was, "What in the name of the Lady do I do with this scrawny infant? Granted he's a King by birth, but until he can handle himself with Excalibur he might as well have a bullseye painted on his chest and his face on a wanted poster!"
Mumbling to himself wasn't getting the old wizard anywhere, so he did what he always did when faced with a daunting problem, he sat down and pulled out his pipe to smoke some hallucinogenic tobacco. Hobbit Hash always calmed his nerves and let him see things no ordinary man could see (which in many cases was a very good thing). He figured a good vision would help him to think more clearly, and just as he was about to light a puff he paused, feeling a disturbance in the Ether as though the boundaries of time and space were in the process of being violated.
Violated by somebody other than him? Unthinkable! Merlin turned his mind around to view beyond the pale and caught the sight of a hurtling body moving from the past towards the future. Intrigued by this development he opened his awareness to the body and cast a mental net to fish it out of the Hypersphere.
A moment later a body plunked down on the grass before him, a heavyset man of indeterminate age who packed more than a little excess weight to his frame, but was otherwise very toned and well muscled. This man all but landed on his head but straightened up into a sitting posture, wearing a very soiled looking robe with a pair of glasses covering his eyes while his head was covered in turn by a white silk bandana.
"Where am I?" the man asked in a language Merlin could not identify, but with a wave of his staff the old Wizard cast a spell to confer on this man the gift of languages, and pretty soon he was able to speak and understand Welsh like a native.
"Greetings, stranger," Merlin remarked, "Pardon my interrupting your journey, but..."
"Master!" the stranger replied, and then he bowed down before Merlin as if prostrating before a King, his voice whimpering as he said, "I hoped never to see-I mean, I never thought I would again be in your humble presence..."
"Ahem," Merlin replied, "Perhaps you're mistaking me for somebody else you know?"
The man peeped cautiously up as if afraid that a jest was being played upon him, but when he saw honest curiosity in Merlin's eyes he began to sit up, more visibly relieved, "Thank the Kami...I mean, you're right, I thought you were somebody else. Obviously I was mistaken, so if it's all the same to you I'll be on my way..."
"Not so fast!" Merlin tapped the man on the chest with his staff, "I said I wasn't who you thought I was, that isn't to say I'm not somebody else equally important. The name's Merlin, Merlin Ambrosias, and I'm a wizard by trade, just in case you didn't get the hint from my robes or this skull cap."
"Merlin?" the strange man asked with a puzzled expression, "As in the legends of King Arthur?"
Merlin's eyebrows climbed by a fraction, and then in a low purr he murmured, "Legends you say? Tell me more about this..."
Ten Years Later:
"Oh man, I am never trusting you again, Uncle Genma!" complained a travel-worn girl in wollen attire, "What kind of a Moron goes into a place called 'The Cursed Springs of Orkney,' then winds up eating the table feast being held for my cousin, Bradamante?"
The oddly colored bear trudging along at her side seemed too tired to respond, other than to make a low growl signifying resignation. Of course the girl understood the meaning implicitly and said, "Oh no, I'm not letting up on you this soon! Now while we've got that terror chasing after us, not to mention that boy who turns into a Wild Boar! And where the heck are we going anyway?"
The bear made more curious sounds, to which the girl reacted with surprise, "We're going to the Castle of Count Leon de Grace? Whatever for?" another pause and then the girl blinked and cried, "You've gotta be kidding! You mean my sisters are there? Well, why didn't you tell me that before, you old fool? What do you mean you made a deal with Count Leon? What about his daughter?" another, longer pause, and then the girl's voice climbed by an octave, "ARE YOU CRAZY-?"
"What is it, father?" asked Guenevier as she sat in the room alongside the three sisters who were visiting from Avalon.
"Good news, my sweet child," said Leon de Grace, beaming proudly and looking ready to cry like an old woman, "A good friend who once saved my life from a terrible creature is coming this way with his son, the future King of all Britain! He has pledged the boy's hand to you as his legal guardian and the two of you are fated to unite the land, thus fulfilling the prophesy handed down by the Great Merlin."
"Prophesy?" Guenevier looked stunned and her hands closed tightly on the fabric of her dress while she absorbed this revelation, then gasped, "You what?"
"The King?" said the oldest of the three sister, the lovely Vivian, to whom the other two sisters deferred from more than politeness, "Oh my...how exciting! We're finally going to see our long lost brother again, isn't that wonderful news?"
"Oh yeah," said Morgan, the middle child of the three sisters, a crafty, sly-
looking girl who had a reputation for palace intrigues, "That's great news all right. Let's hope he's got what it takes to pull it all together. We've had too many wars with all the Robber Barons hacking it out in their stupid turf wars."
"Big deal," shrugged Nimue, the youngest of the siblings, "So he's mom's long lost son, he's still that rotten Uther's brat and I don't see why we should be so happy about him coming back into our lives. It's not like he can walk on water or change the flow of the rivers or anything like that."
"You're forgetting, sister, that the King and the Land are as one," Vivian gently reminded, "As he grows so the land will prosper, and if he fails so the land will perish. That's why things have been so poor of late, we haven't had a king in charge of the land, and the land itself feels his absence."
"Let's just hope he does have the stuff to wield Excalibur," Morgan remarked, "The last thing we need right now is some stupid villager who doesn't even know which end of a sword is pointed. I'm not so sure I trust this character who's been looking after him the last ten years. I mean...really, what do we know about some guy named Saotome Genma?"
"We know that Grandfather Ambrosias chose him to look after little Arthur and to see that he was kept safe against those who would seek to harm him," Vivian said with perfect confidence and bearing in her tone, "I'm sure by now he's an accomplished Warrior who can unite the land and bring peace to the lands of Greater Britain."
"Oh right," Morgana sniffed, "Like being a Warrior makes him perfectly suited to bringing peace. Still, if he's good enough as a fighter he might be able to break a few heads and get the attention of the Barons. Maybe he could use a good financial advisor. Councilor to the King, has a nice ring to it, don't you think?"
"Why are you getting so interested in him?" Nimue asked, as she studied her reflection in a hand-held copper mirror, "He was just a baby when we left, we probably wouldn't even recognize him after all this time, and he's probably forgotten all about us."
"If you're not interested in him, Sis, then why are you primping?" Morgana asked in wry amusement, "Trying to make a good first impression?"
"It couldn't hurt," Nimue replied, turning to give her middle sister a cute look, "You might even try for something other than looking like a gypsy fortune teller."
"I don't understand something," Guenevier frowned, "Why did you engage him to me, father? Why am I expected to marry this boy that I've never even seen, and why did you wait until now to tell me about it?"
"It was necessary to keep the facts concerning the young King's existence a secret until now," Sir Leon replied, "As for why, to make you Queen of all Britain, of course. A King must have a Queen, after all, and you are as suitable a young flower as any in the land. I have seen to it that you have the finest education that can be afforded to a young lady of your class and breeding. I'm sure you'll make the new King a wonderful wife and...what's that racket?"
The others turned to hear the sounds of a commotion, and Morgana stood up to say, "I believe it is coming from the castle gate house. Perhaps our brother has arrived, shall we go greet him, sisters?"
"Oh my," Vivian remarked, "Do the guards know that they're to expect company, Sir Leon?"
"Oh dear," Leon remarked, "I was going to inform them to expect company, but maybe Genma and the King have come in a disguise to hide their identities. Either that or he's been splashed with cold water. I had better see to it that nothing improper occurs to mar their arrival..."
The guards at the gate to Castle Leoness de Caballard were hardened veterans accustomed to many strange and terrifying sights, but at the moment they had special cause to be alarmed, for the creature confronting them looked like a bear with black and white markings, yet it walked on two legs and had a struggling girl slung over its shoulder. The bear was simply standing in front of them as if awaiting formal announcement.
"Stay back!" one of the two men said as both extended their spears in a threatening manner.
The bear did not look impressed as it contemplated the threatening spear tips. Instead it moved like a blur with one paw lashing out, and suddenly the men were holding quarterstaffs with the pointed ends sheered off as cleanly as if struck by a blade. Understandably this did not lessen their nervousness as they gave back a half step and shared a mutual look of horror.
"Would you let me go already?" the girl on the bear's shoulder complained, "You're scaring them, Uncle Genma!"
The bear did not attempt a reply, instead it turned its gaze upward, spotting the guards thronging the castle ramparts, and it came to a decision. At all at once it leaped high into the air, easily cresting the twenty foot tall towers as the men there scattered both ways, clearing the path as the bear went completely over the wall and came down inside the courtyard.
The girl managed to work her way loose during the landing, then stood clear of the bear and growled, "You satisfied now? We're here, you stupid old man! Now we..."
Of a sudden they noticed that there were a great many guards flanking them in the courtyard and some of them had bows already knocked with arrows and pointed in their direction. The bear just glanced at them and remained where it was standing while the girl took in the numbers arrayed against them.
"Put up your arms, my men!" a loud voice called out, drawing the girl's attention towards a tall man with long dark hair dressed in Roman style armor with a family crest on the brooch of his crimson robe, "These two are not to be harmed! They are guests of my estate and are to be accorded all due respect during they stay at this castle!" He lowered his volume and smiled broadly, "Greetings to you, old friend. I see still have a way of making a grand entrance. And is this young fellow he whom you have kept company for these many long years?"
The girl straightened up and bowed towards the man before saying, "I'm called Wart by some, sir, but you may call me Prince Arthur."
"Well now," said a girl with dark purple hair who stepped into view, dressed in a long dark green gown that gave her a sultry appearance, "He's cute, and certainly well mannered."
Arthur blinked then said, "Is this your daughter?"
"No," said a harsher voice as a tall blonde girl stepped into view, "I am! My name is Guenevier, she's just your sister, the Princess Morgana."
"Morgana?" Arthur reacted in surprise, looking at the girl with purple hair again and said, "But..."
"Long story, Bro," the girl replied, "You like the hair? It's a gift from Avalon. But you two must be tired from your journey..."
"Oh yes," said a much taller girl with long and lustrous brown hair in a sky blue dress as she smiled at Arthur in a motherly fashion, "And it has been such a long time for you, dear brother. You seem to have changed a little yourself with the years."
"Vivian?" Arthur took the heavenly vision in with a long and careful study, barely able to remember a much younger girl who had cared for her brother when he was near to being an infant.
"And what about me?" said a third girl with light brown curly hair who smiled in a cheerful way as she added, "Or has the dirt of the road clogged your head? You look like a gypsy vagabond instead of a prince."
"Oh," Arthur said, "Nimue. Long time no see, Sis."
"Steward!" the tall man snapped his fingers, "Some hot water for our guests. You'll be wanting to change back to your real self, friend Saotome, now that your years of wandering are finally at an end."
"Make that for two," Arthur sighed, "I could use some myself. I would have taken a hot bath before coming here but Uncle insisted we make time, so I'm...not quite all together."
"Oh?" Morgana asked as she approached her brother with a sultry look, then halted when something caught her attention that made her lose her smile all together.
Arthur felt the weight of her scrutiny and shuffled in silence until the steward appeared with a steaming pot of water that had been taken straight from the kitchen. He hesitated when he came near to the panda, and in that moment of indecision Arthur just sighed and took the pot from him, then half-upended the contents over her head and waited for the inevitable transformation.
There was a gasp from all around the courtyard as Arthur now passed the remaining contents of the pot over to the panda, who emptied it on itself and changed to the human form of Saotome Genma.
Morgana was doing a slow pan up and down the transformed boy, gradually coming to focus upon his beautiful blue eyes, and it was like watching the mists part over a lovely field of flowers. Her smile, while still calculating, held unusual warmth for a familial greeting.
"Oh my," Vivian said in surprise, "A material transformation. Are you under some form of enchantment, brother?"
"You could put it that way," the boy's voice even sounded manlier as he hooked a thumb towards Genma, "Uncle here took us on a little shortcut through the lands of Orkney after causing a little trouble with my relatives there. Seems like some Fairy Magic from the Old Days still lingers in that region, and part of the curse I fell under mirrors the same enchantment Uncle has lived under for as long as anyone's known him."
"It's true," Genma adjusted his glasses, "An amazing coincidence, I know, that he should just happen to fall into the same kind of spring as once affected my only son. Cold water triggers the curse, hot water reverses it. There is one other who also became affected when he and Arthur got into a fight over that misunderstanding with Bradamante..."
"My Cousin from Gaul, Lancelot," Arthur growled, "It was a really stupid and pointless argument over the use of a bridge, and as a consequence we both wound up cursed. I think he holds it against me, and he's still wandering all over the countryside trying to pay me back for his troubles."
"Lancelot?" Vivian replied with a start, "Lancelot du Lac? Oh my...he was a student in Avalon. Whatever was he doing in the Orkneys?"
"Like I said, we were visiting our cousin Bradamante," Arthur sighed, "Can we go inside and finish this? My shift's all wet and I could use a change in clothing..."
"Quite right," Sir Leon replied, snapping his fingers as he addressed his steward, "Have the things I prepared for our guests laid out and ready, and be sure to have the maids clean their present garments, and after they are finished bathing and readying themselves they will attend with us at a feast I have commissioned in their honor."
"Very good, My Lord," the Steward replied, eyeing Genma's worn Gi with clear distaste and thinking privately that he would have it burned and buried within the hour.
"I'll help out in the kitchen, my Lord," Vivian smiled, "I know some wonderful recipes that I'm sure your cooks will be willing to try out."
"I can help you with your bath, brother," Morgana offered helpfully as she hovered a bit too near to Arthur's shoulder, "I'm sure you could use some help with your backside..."
"Ah...huh?" Arthur blinked, wondering at the odd behavior in his middle sister.
"Christ on a Cross, can you get any more disgusting?" Guenevier sniffed at Morgana, who merely stuck her tongue out in her direction.
"Ignore the Church Prude," Morgana murmured in a sultry purr as she hung near to her brother, "Gwen has this thing against boys our age. I, on the other hand, don't have a problem, which reminds me, Bro...did you know it's the custom in Egypt for a King to marry his own sister? Rather interesting, isn't it?"
"Marry my...what?" Arthur blinked in growing alarm.
"Ignore the man-trap," Nimue snorted, "What can you tell us about dear Lancelot? He was such a sweet boy before he left Avalon. Do you think he might be stopping by anytime soon to pay us a visit?"
"Who knows?" Arthur shrugged, "It's hard to say with him. That boy has no sense of directions."
"Very true," sighed Vivian, "A quality that he shares with his father, King Malburn Habiki. That's how I think he came to be lost to us in the first place, and before he had fully completed his Druid training. I guess the call to Knighthood was much stronger than we imagined..."
Genma just glanced from one face to the other, sensing a familiar pattern in the air, and he also sighed, but for very different reasons. He needed a drink badly and hoped these Barbarian Englishmen had lots of scotch stored in their cellars as he was very sure he was gong to need it...
"Oh great," sighed an armored figure on horseback, "Now where do I go? Which way is it to Kent? You'd think somebody would spell it out with the road signs in something other than Latin."
Her name was Tristan and she was the daughter of a landless nobleman, but at present she was disguised as a man and was calling herself Sir Tristram after her late older brother. The reasons for hiding her gender with both practical and numerous, not the least of them being to hide from certain parties who were presently seeking her out. She turned a glance back towards her sole companion, the lady Isolde, and said, "Looks like we're lost on the road someplace, my lady. King Mark of Cornwal will have to wait a bit until we can get our bearings. We'll stop at the first village we find and ask for directions."
The demure blonde sitting on the second horse just nodded politely and seemed resigned to letting Tristan take them wherever the fates led. She was not exactly enthusiastic at the prospect of meeting her new husband and any delay in getting there was welcome, even if the bandits who jumped the rest of her escort had been a touch too much of a surprise for her liking.
Tristan was also thinking about the bandits, and silently cursing their names at the thought of how they had caused such a delay in their mission. They had also killed every member of their party who knew anything about these roads before she had managed to dispatch them with her broad axe. Tristan had reckoned those fools to be light work against her skills with her family's ancient weapon, but they had been dangerous enough to slaughter all the other fighters hired to bring Isolde safely through their territory. Too bad for them that Tristan had been personally trained by her warrior brother.
The thought of Tristram brought a sad smile to her face. She missed him terribly, but ever since she had begun using his name to fulfill their family obligations she had sought to bring only honor to his memory. It felt good to be worth something to her family than be a constant reminder of her one and only failure. Ever since the boy she had been betrothed to had run off with his thief of an old man, Tristan's days as a woman had been all but numbered. Her father was a devout Churchman and believed firmly in the rule that Marriage was forever, which by extension of his logic meant that betrothal was the same thing as a marriage. That her vanished fianc e was some kind of royal heir only added to the intrigue about him, and while Tristan still felt a knot of anger in her gut at the thought of her abandonment she could not help but also feel a strange wistfulness at one of her few attempts at honest friendship.
Her grip tightened on her reigns. If she ever set eyes on young Wart again she was going to chop him into very thin slices and serve him to the hounds. Didn't he know that women abandoned by their betrotheds were effectively ruined for life as women could not inherit property under Roman Law? Her family was therefore destined to end broke and penniless unless Tristan could win back their honor and gain the right to re-marry. So long as Wart lived her chances for a future happiness were virtually non-existent!
Well, it was not as if Roman Law amounted to much in these lawless times, and Rome itself was being threatened by the Visigoths while Britain had its share of trouble with the Saxons. The Old Ways were gradually making a return in spite of attempts by the Church to stamp out their influence. Ancient Celtic law not only gave women the rights they lacked under Christianity but even mandated that women be given a say in aspects of society presently forbidden to them. Small wonder the old ways held great attraction for her as her lukewarm attachments to the Church had been strained by time and hard experience...
Tristan snapped out of her internal reverie, becoming aware that the bridge that she and her companion were about to cross had another occupant, one who stood directly in their paths looking up with annoyance as if not having noticed them until that very instant.
"Excuse me," said a young boy with a heavy Gaulic accent, "I'm lost, do you think you can direct me to Castle Leoness de Caballard?"
"Caballard?" Isolde looked questioningly at Tristan.
"What do I look like, a Forester?" Tristan shot back, "You're blocking the way. Do you think maybe you can move for a bit to let me and my friend here pass?"
"Sorry," the stranger said as he continued forward.
"Are you deaf, or stupid?" Tristan growled "I said get out of our way, not continued forward."
"Huh?" the stranger asked, "I'm sorry, my Gaelic isn't all that good. I'm from across the sea and a place called Joyous Guard..."
"I don't care if you were raised in a pig-sty, you Jackass!" Tristan shouted as she finally lost her temper, little minding the odd looks that her blonde companion was giving her on the sly, "You're in my way, now move it! This is a public bridge and you're blocking the road, so unless you've got title to charge toll I suggest you clear the way and let me pass!"
The stranger frowned, "Why would I do that? I've just as much of a right to cross a bridge as you do."
"He has a point, Sir Tristram," Isolde reasonably pointed out, "We can delay in our quest for Castle Cornwal long enough to allow a stranger to our shores to make passage."
"That's not the point, Lady," Tristan said as delicately as she could, "Once you start giving ground to every guy you meet they start to think that they can walk all over you. It's a point of honor to decide who goes first, and besides, you're the one he should be giving way to. A lady of your standing shouldn't come last to common rabble."
Isolde colored slightly at the compliment and glanced down, wondering what to say and why being in the presence of this too-handsome young knight was affecting her like a convent raised virgin?
"I don't mean any offense to either of you," the young man said, "But I'm in a hurry, so let me by. I don't want to hurt you...
"Oh, is that so?" Tristan reached for her double-bladed axe, "Well, then maybe you won't mind contesting me for the right of passage? I could use a good workout, and you look like you might be good for short tumble."
"Excuse me?" the young man's eyes widened almost in panic.
"Not like that, stupid!" Tristan pointed to a nearby hill, "I mean we fight! Over there, if you're man enough to face me."
"I'm man enough," the young man squared his shoulders and raised his heavy quarterstaff, "And my name is Lancelot."
"Sir Tristram," Tristan replied, once more employing her brother's name as she got off of her father's horse and the two of them proceeded to square off at the designated place of confrontation.
Isolde looked at her companion with some concern, for the other man had a strong seeming character about him and was also dressed like a warrior, though his plainer arms seemed more travel worn, more seasoned. She demurely followed and waited patiently with the horses while the two young warriors squared off, axe against a thick wooden pole-arm that looked like a two-inch diameter cable.
Ten furious minutes later the two stood with weapons locked together, axe immobilized by heavily knocked quarterstaff, toe-to-toe with neither one willing to concede an inch of ground. Tristan was making the appraisal that she had badly underestimated the young man's strength and ability with a staff, but her skill with axe was standing her in good stead. No one had ever lasted this long against her, though, and that in itself was more than a little alarming.
"You fight pretty good," he said without much strain in his voice.
"Thanks," she grunted, "So are you."
"I still have to get to Castle Leoness, though," he remarked, "So please don't take this personal, but I'm going to have to end this."
"Huh?" Tristan began to say, "What do you...?"
All at once the young man hunched down and brought his staff lower to the ground, forcing Tristan to do likewise with her axe in order to maintain the rude stand-off, but to her considerable surprise he suddenly raised his staff with such speed that Tristan was taken by surprise and swiftly found herself being catapulted up over his head, tumbling into the branches of a nearby tree as though she had been flipped end-over-end like a kitchen pastry.
"Sir Tristram!" Isolde called out in alarm at seeing her protector being so rudely upended.
"Thanks for the work out," he said as he set his quarterstaff at an angle, then, turned around and starting walking back to the bridge, "Maybe we can do this again some other time?"
"Huh?" Tristan asked as the world stopped spinning around her head and she realized her rather awkward position, "Hey, come back here, you Jackass! Where do you think you're going?"
"To Castle Leoness de Caballard," he called back to her as he crossed the bridge and headed back down the very same road he had just come by.
"But Caballard's in that direction," Isolde pointed to the opposite stretch of road that she had just come by, then she blinked her eyes and said, "Do you have any idea where you are going, Sir Lancelot?"
"Uh...not really," the man paused and glanced back her way, "And I'm not a knight just yet, though my father is a Lord in Joyous Guard..."
"Then why don't you travel with us for a while?" Isolde asked him, "After all, we're going in the same direction...at least partway."
"My lady?" Tristan reacted with dismay as she managed to finally climb down from those branches.
"Oh, I wouldn't want to put you to any trouble," Lancelot responded.
"Oh, no trouble at all," Isolde smiled enchantingly at Tristan, "Right Sir Tristram?"
Tristan started to voice her objections but thought better of it when her resolve wilted before the vibrant blue eyes of her blonde haired companion. Grumbling under her voice she replied, "Just stay out of my way and try not to get lost. I won't come after you if you do, you got that?"
"I understand," the man nodded, "And I won't be any bother."
"I'm sure of that," Isolde said pleasantly, then indicated the horses as she extended the reins to Tristan's mount and asked, "Shall we be going? It's getting close to nightfall."
[I wonder why he wants to go to Leoness?] Tristan thought to herself as they started out on the road again with their newfound companion, [This guy's got no sense of direction, but he's stronger than he looks. He fights well, and he's not bad to look at...]
She shook herself, wondering where that last thought had arisen from, then deciding his reasons for traveling it were probably none of her business. Cornwal was her destination after all, and finding her way to that with the lady Isolde would be enough of a project. [This Lancelot character had better not put me to any trouble,] she resolved, [Or I'm going to give him a piece of my mind about how to fight with a lady.]
But Lancelot was not her real objective over all...War was, and once Tristan finally found that boy she was going to gain some much-needed satisfaction...if-
she reminded herself-he was still around for her to flatten, him and a certain guy who was enchanted to turn into a black and while bear, assuming nobody else had already beaten her to the punch in their own quest for vengeance...
Continued.
Comments/Criticism/Camelot Nerima: shadowmane
And thus Genma affects the destiny of yet another legendary hero, but how will he find his way back home at this rate...and will anybody miss him if he doesn't? Tune in again when Arthur tries to pull together an entire nation under one banner, but will he manage with all the suitors and enemies converging on the budding Kingdom of Camelot with the intent to kill, marry (or both)?
X
If you wish to check out my other works, Please check out my Fanfiction webpage at: . or it's mirror site at: ~ All related chapters of this series can be found there along with my other works.