The Chronicles of Artie; Girl-King Of England Born

Chapter Five; Arturia - A Family Resemblance?

You know, after all this time, I think I'm finally starting to feel like a King. Whenever I take my throne above the Table, whenever the people ask me for boons, whenever I look at myself in the mirror in my fancy royal clothes, it feels almost like I'm a different person. Not old Ector's girl, not the Princess Knight, not even Artie. I feel like the King.

Only I'm not too sure what that actually means.

Anyway, funny story. I was just getting ready for bed last night when one of Merlyn's owls flapped right through the window. Ever since he built Camelot for me, I've always dressed myself alone, so no-one was startled. Except me, but I don't count because I'm the King. Good thing I don't have a nurse any-more. Or any ladies-in-waiting. If I did, I have a feeling I'd have to start lying again.

'Gee, I have no idea why this owl is here. It's definitely not what Merlyn does when he wants to see you, though. That'd just be silly.'

Which is good, because the owl was trying to eat my ear, and the King—that's me—has to be the most honest person in all the realm.

Even though I'm pretending to be a boy.

I followed the owl out the castle to Merlyn's tower. The guards tried to stop me leaving at first, but then they realised who I was and kinda bowed away. It's in a different place every night, Merlyn's tower. You can only see it by moonlight, and the door is always invisible, and you have to tap the stones in the right order to get in, and the stairs are always just a bit higher than you'd like them to be. His owl flew right up them. I wasn't too happy about that. Sometimes I wish I had wings, like an owl or an angel, but then I think about it. How would I fit them on the throne?

When I got to the loft Merlyn was sitting on his chair, looking out the window and humming. His owl joined its owl friends in the rafters. You'd think Merlyn reads a lot, but he only has one book, a great big one with beautiful illuminated pages. As you look at it the colours melt into each other like stained-glass snow, and the words drip into other words in Latin and Greek and a hundred other tongues. The book was still there, on the table in front of him, but it was shut and locked. Shame. I wanted to see it again.

"My liege," said Merlyn.

"Hey, Merlyn."

I looked around for a chair and couldn't find one, so I hopped on his table instead, legs dangling.

"So, what'd you call me here for?"

"I did not call you, my liege. I invited you, and you came. Remember, remember, forget it never -"

I tilted my head.

"What?"

"That you are King," he finished.

I like to think Merlyn has two voices. One of them is his serious voice, when he stands up to prophesy or scold or cast a spell. The other is his distracted voice, when he seems lost in something that hasn't actually happened yet, or something that did happen, or something that probably won't happen but just might. Most of the time he's distracted, but sometimes I can hear hints of his serious voice in there, like chunks of steel in cotton. He was like that yesterday.

"Well, of course I'm King," I said. "I mean, you did crown me. How am I supposed to forget that?"

Sometimes I wonder if he's putting it on.

"It was not I who crowned you, my liege, but Fate. For any head can wear a crown of gold, but only Fortune's favoured keep both, all things told. Heads and crowns are the bane of kings."

"Funny," I said. "I could've sworn it was you who put that old thing on me. There was a flash of light and everything. Are you sure you're not remembering it wrong?"

He looked right at me and smiled. It's not a very nice smile, Merlyn's - feels far too thin and distant, like he's waiting for the whole world to get the joke he hasn't made yet.

"You speak truth, my liege. But you see not the deeper things, which are my boon and bane. Future-sight and past-sight, rhyming riddles made: who can know save he who lies in the eternal glade? And yet, my liege, for you the glade is still far off."

"I don't get it."

"You will."

I'm going to keep this diary peach-pristine, and then I'll get it out in a few years, and I bet I still won't get it. And then I'll make Merlyn take it right back.

"So, where does God come into this?"

Merlyn's smile sharpened like a kitchen knife.

"Who am I to speak of God, King Arthur? You know what they say of my parentage."

"That your mother was a sucker-bus? Nah, there's no way that's true. If you really were demon-spawn, I'd have to chop your head off, and I don't want to. Besides, how is that your fault?"

Merlyn's eyes grew very hard and very bright, like fresh fishes'.

"You speak truth, my liege. Be he yeoman or earl, heathen or Christian, no man can choose his birth or blood. Thus the blood of the Pendragon runs through female veins."

I thought of blood, and of destiny, and of a big juicy roas...

I'm hungry. Back in ten, Diary.

Okay, I got bread and the leftover partridge from dinner. Sir Lemon is the best. I guess I'll continue on the next page. Now for second supper.

"...Female veins," said Merlyn.

I thought of blood and of destiny, but not a big juicy roast. King Uther, my real dad. He died real hard, but not before giving baby-me to old Ector. I still don't know how to feel about Uther, by the way. The old man didn't sound like a very nice person.

"If I had a brother," said I, "I think this whole business would be a lot easier."

Merlyn smiled. I peered at him.

"I don't actually have a brother, do I?"

Merlyn smiled.

"I mean, a real one, not like Sir Lemon."

"I can assure you, my liege, that you have no fruits whatsoever in your family tree, or on it."

See, Merlyn may always talk like this, but he usually sneaks a yes or no somewhere in there. I smelt a rat.

"Alright, Merlyn, no more riddles. Give it to me straight. On your troth. Pinkie promise. How many sons does Uther have?"

"None," said Merlyn, but he didn't take the pinkie. I stuck my tongue out at him and kept it there.

"Okay," I lisped, "then how many children does Uther have? Just checking."

"Two," said Merlyn. "The girl Arturia Pendragon, and her older sister, Morgan le Fay."

I almost bit my tongue off.

"Ow! Wait, wait, wait, wait, wait."

Silence reigned for twenty seconds while I pulled my hair, tapped my toes and gave my thumbs a good twiddling. The owls hooted, like they were enjoying the show. Finally I threw my hands up in exasperation.

"Say something, Merlyn! What are you doing?"

"Waiting," said Merlyn calmly.

"I have a sister?"

"Yes."

"I have a sister."

"Yes."

"I have a sister!"

"You seem very surprised," said Merlyn.

"Well," I yelled, "I don't see why not, you smarmy custard-face! Because if I do have an older sister, then why in heck isn't she the Queen?"

Trust me, you could've fried two eggs and a pheasant on my face. And then Merlyn said, taking his time, forming his words with the care of a copying monk:

"Well."

I threw the book at him. It stopped in mid-air, ruffled itself in a huff, and flopped down on the bed.

"You said I was the only one who could do this!"

"You are."

"Why?" I demanded. "You'd better have a good explanation, Merlyn."

"A woman," said Merlyn with the air of a falling axe, "cannot be King."

I'm not sure where my hands were at that point, but I think they were somewhere between my gaping mouth, my heaving chest and my are-you-actually-serious eyes.

"I will explain, King Arthur," said Merlyn, fingers crawling up and down the spine of his one thick book. "As you no doubt know, Uther was a hard and bloody man, with hard and bloody men under him. When such men grow old and useless, they drown either in melancholy, or choler."

I winced. I could still remember the screams on Badon Hill.

"But your father had been an exceptional warrior," said Merlyn, "and so he choked on a slurry of both. He knew very well that his nobles would never rally under a woman, no matter who her father was. Rather, they would tear her apart like mangy dogs, and then set on each other, and fight with locked jaws over the shreds of the kingdom. At the same time, he had to preserve the rightful power of the line Pendragon—power which he knew his daughter Morgan did not have. That was the melancholy."

"Power?" I echoed.

"The furnace of prana that even now burns within you," said Merlyn. "It is the birthright that allows you to wield the brand Excalibur, and to bear the sheath Avalon. Lesser men would die trying."

"Alright," I frowned, still not entirely sure how to feel about this whole thing. It was like something old and insidious was tying a knot with the insides of my eyebrows. "What was the choler?"

"Uther disowned your sister Morgan, stripped her of her titles and lands, rent her royal robes and drove her from the palace in rags and tatters. He forbade any of his nobles from giving her succour on pain of treason, forbade any man from marrying her, and banished her name from every church, monastery and schoolhouse in the land. She was twelve. Her mother died of grief."

"...Ouch," I said, because there really wasn't anything to say. Even worse, I felt like this was somehow my fault. Then, after a few moments: "Didn't anyone do anything?"

"What could they do against Uther?" asked Merlyn. "He was a greying wolf, true, but his teeth were poisoned with rotten meat. And he had many wolves under him, young and ravenous. Do not underestimate your father, King Arthur. It was he who held the nobles together for decades on end, and at that time they were not yet fat on graft and usury. Compared to their fathers, the barons you fought are sacks of flour."

"Even Lot of Orkney?" I asked.

"Perhaps not," conceded Merlyn. "Then again, Orkney is a king—but we shall get to him later. The Church did excommunicate your father, so he had a few monasteries burnt just to show them their place. That said, I would not be surprised if your sister Morgan did find a refuge in holy orders during those terrible years. Sanctuary is a powerful thing, and there are precious few with the stomach to trespass on holy ground. Perhaps that will change in years to come."

Still the same knowing smile. Shuddering at the hint of blasphemy, I asked, "What did Uther do?"

"He came to me," said Merlyn. "Uther begged me to use my magicks to infuse his seed with the male essence, and to give him a son. He asked me to ensure that the child inherited the power of the Pendragons. I suppose he heard the rumors of my parentage, and assumed that I had experience with unnatural births."

"Do you?" I asked. The night seemed very cold all of a sudden.

"No more than anyone else born after my fashion," said Merlyn with a breezy lilt, "which is the thing, is it not? I took a drop of dragon's blood and mixed it with his seed. At the place where the leylines meet I chanted under the red moon, broke the back of a black goat with an aspen cross, smeared the red-white drop on a new-plucked mandrake root, and then ate root and goat together raw."

"Ew," I said.

"Women's magic," agreed Merlyn. "Absolutely disgusting."

"It didn't work, did it? I mean, Uther didn't get what he wanted."

Merlyn looked me up and down.

"In a sense," he said, "he did not."

"Oh," I said, and for once, I saw what he meant.

"You are the child born of that cursed night," said Merlyn, "Uther's promised son. It is good that he gave you to Sir Ector before rage overmastered him. He might have slain you otherwise, or done worse, reminded of his withered line with your every coo and gesture, and poor banished Morgan, whom he had loved. Part of the ritual worked: you have in you the ancient power of the Pendragons. You can tell which part didn't."

The owls shuffled and cooed.

"Who was my mother?" I asked quietly.

"Not even I know everything," said Merlyn.

"Why did I have to be a boy?" I asked again.

"Uther's pride was not the only reason. Neither was mere custom. Do you think the people would not accept a Queen? Nay, England has had queens before, and will have queens hence. Morgan was robbed. But I saw that he who pulled the sword from the stone was rightwise King of England born, not Queen, and my foresight does not lie. Perhaps there is a reason, hidden by God in an age to come."

I sat down against the wall and put my arms over my knees, remembering Caliburn's bright blue hilt, and how right it had felt in my hand, sliding from the stone like samite on powdered skin.

"Why wasn't I a boy?" I whispered.

"Fate," said Merlyn, his eyes hard and bright as diamonds. "Call it the will of God, if you must, but the Stoics called it Fate, and knew that no man could escape it. Do not sulk over what you cannot change, my liege. In the sight of all you are a man, and that is all that matters. My glamours hide your sex from view, and there is no-one on this island who can overcome them... save one."

I still felt miserable, but this made me look up.

"I thought no-one could out-magick you. Who is it?"

"Your sister," said Merlyn. "Uther should have waited for her to come of age."

I stared at him. The thought was beginning to form, but I didn't want it to finish.

"You had the ancient power foisted upon you," said Merlyn, "ripped from its roots by goat and mandrake and dragon's blood. Morgan has the birthright in truth, and when it reared its scaled head with her first monthly flow she awakened to ungodly power. She is the wife of King Lot of Orkney, and a witch of vast wiles and deep sorceries. She will not rest until she destroys you and ascends to her rightful place on the throne of England."

I looked back down, wanting nothing more than to give up the throne there and then, stomp on my crown, grab Kay by the arm, and run all the way back to the Forest Sauvage. Back to Ector, the man who had treated me like his real daughter, the man who had gout in both knees and sang loud drunken songs after boar-hunting. Not like Uther, the dead King who had thrown his firstborn daughter out and tossed his second away. I could feel his bloodstained arms in the walls, reaching past my chest, hands gripping the crown of my head like a filigreed vise.

"You're Merlyn," I said in a tiny voice. "You built this whole place for me, all of Camelot. Can't you stop her?"

"Your sister's power is such that I cannot be certain of overcoming her, were we ever to meet in a duel of magecraft. Not only that, she is a witch, and witches do not fight face-to-face. Their magicks are subtle as spiderwebs, and a good deal more complicated. Nay, most likely Morgan will try to unmask your true sex, and turn the people's hearts against you."

"Then what can I do?" I asked helplessly. "All I'm good at is hitting bad guys with swords."

"There is a way," said Merlyn slowly. And he smiled his pale wan smile, leaned in close, and told me.

It is I, the narrator! And no, you are not seeing things, this really is an update. The next few chapters are lined up, at least, so don't worry about me vanishing just yet. Onward!