The gray fortress of Caerlon rang with the clamor of shouts and curses, the snorting of horses, and the clatter of metal on wood. Inside it warriors fought a mock battle with blunt swords. One side, wearing green strips of cloth tied around their arms, slowly pressed the other side back toward the stone wall.

            Leading the greens rode a young man, helmetless, whose dark hair was cut above the ears in the style Arthur had favored. His resemblance to Arthur was striking. At twenty, the softness of youth had gone from his face, while training with sword and spear had hardened his arms and shoulders. But enough of the child remained in him to be delighted at the noise and sights and smells, the excitement of the mock battle.

            Like a bee among blooming thistles, a small troop captain flitted back and forth between sweating warriors. “Them’s shields, you bastards,” he shouted, “not oat cakes! Carry them like that, the Saxons’ll pick you out of your saddles like maggots out of apples.”

            The young man grinned. A few hundred like Gwythur, he thought, and we needn’t fear the whole Saxon confederation. He dealt a stinging slap to the shoulder of a new recruit with the flat of his sword.

            As the other team was driven in confusion against the wall, the troop captain let out a shrill whistle, calling the drill to a halt. Disappointed, the young man glanced at the late-afternoon sky, measuring the daylight left.

            He wiped his face with a sleeve and trotted over to the captain. “Can’t we go on, Gwythur?”

            The captain pulled off his helmet, exposing a face as weathered and rugged as a granite ridge. He shook his head. “They’ve put in a good day, Lord Irion. At least they’ve learned enough to ride to the latrine without falling off.”

            “But there’s an hour of daylight left.”

            “The recruits are tired. When they get tired they start repeating mistakes. We’ve got tomorrow. And you should be wearing your helmet.”

            “Somebody knocked it off.” Irion rubbed his head, wincing. “I guess they’ve learned more than I thought.”

            He turned his horse toward the gate and followed the weary riders out into the early spring green of the Gwent countryside. To the east the old Roman road plunged into the valley of the Usk, then ran arrow straight toward Caerwent, the capital of Gwent, eight miles away.

            Up the road the fortress rumbled a wagon, bright blue and ornately carved, pulled by a matched team of bays. As Irion emerged, an old man seated next to the driver waved at him.

            “Uncle Ynyr!” Irion shouted. He trotted his horse over to the wagon as it creaked to a halt.

            Honorius, magistrate of Gwent, gathered hi toga and climbed gingerly over the side, groping for the step with his foot. A breeze lifted a wisp of white hair and teased it across his bald head.

            “Did you journey well?” Irion dismounted and helped his uncle to the ground.

            “I’m not dead, but I’m ten breaths short of it.” Considering the small frame from which it emerged, Honorius’s voice was surprisingly deep, like thunder trapped in a narrow valley. His Latin was pure. “When I get back to Caerwent I’m going to parboil my behind in the baths.” He reached the ground and stretched, pressing his hands into the small of his back.

            Irion studied his uncle with concern. Since his mother’s death eleven years earlier Honorius had been his only family. “I’m glad you’re home. I didn’t expect you until next week.”

            “I didn’t expect to be back until next week. But there’s no point sitting in Maelgwn’s mead hall twiddling my thumbs. So I left.”

            “King Maelgwn didn’t see the need for an alliance?”

            Honorius snorted. “Maelgwn doesn’t see the need for his own belly button.” He smoothed back the feathery wings of hair above his ears. “Have you a moment to talk?”

            “Of course. Let me turn my horse out.”

            “I’ll walk with you,” Honorius said. “I need to put some life back in my legs.”

            Irion’s mail shirt clinked as they walked toward a rock-walled pasture that plunged down the long slope toward the river. As the old man hobbled beside him, the breeze fluttered the hem of his toga around his ankles. “The truth is, Irion,” he said, “I failed. Maelgwn has no intention of agreeing to an alliance, even though we have three other chieftains committed. It won’t upset him if the Saxons destroy the smaller British kingdoms one by one.”

            “Does he think they’ll spare him?”

            “He thinks he’s secure in his mountains. And he would rather rule a Britain ten miles wide than serve in a Britain that extends from ocean to ocean.” Honorius acknowledged Gwythur’s salute as the captain rode past. “To be thirty years younger and able to ride a war-horse,” the magistrate said. “Perhaps then I could forge an alliance the way Arthur did.” He sighed. “But then again, I’m no Arthur.”

            The pain Irion felt at the mention of the name must have shown in his eyes. His uncle glanced at him and quickly changed the subject. “How goes the training?”

            Irion shrugged. “The recruits are enthusiastic. There just aren’t enough of them.” He stopped at the pasture gate and began to unfasten the saddle cinch. “The eagles built Caerleon for an entire legion of six thousand. We rattle around in there like dried peas in a gourd.”

            Honorius cleared his throat. “Irion…” he began, and stopped.

            The youth waited, watching his uncle to see if he would scratch his chin, a sure sign he was about to broach an unpleasant subject. Honorius scratched his chin and Irion repressed a smile.

            “Irion,” the magistrate repeated, “you know the war band has been without a tribune since Balon’s death.”

            “Aye. But Gwythur drills them as well as Balon would have.” Irion jerked off the saddle and set it on the wall. With a brush he began to curry the sweat from his horse’s back.

            “Perhaps,” Honorius said. “But with the Saxon threat increasing daily, the war band needs a permanent leader.”

            “How about Gwythur?”

            “Gwythur’s not of noble blood. The council of elders wouldn’t accept him.”

            Irion tried to think of someone else the warriors would follow as tribune, but he knew there was no one else as qualified as the veteran captain.

            “The council meets in two weeks,” Honorius said. “I’d like to place your name before them as the next tribune.”

            Irion stopped brushing. “Me? That’s not possible.”

            “Why not?”

            He glanced at his uncle. “You know why.”

            “I’ve watched you, my boy,” Honorius said, ignoring the comment. “You’re a born warrior and a natural leader. And I trust you. I need someone in that post in whom I have absolute confidence.”

            Irion gazed out over the river valley toward the far ridge lost in mist. During the rare moments of his childhood when he had allowed himself to dream, he had sometimes imagined being a great warrior leading the British against the Saxons. But as soon as that vision appeared, he always stifled it. He knew that he would never lead a war band. “You know the council won’t accept me,” he said. Bitterness lent a sharp edge to his voice.

            “They will if I demand it.”

            “You think they’ll tolerate the son of Medraut, the murderer of King Arthur, leading their warriors?”

            Honorius nodded. “Most people don’t hold the sins of Medraut against you, Irion. They accept you for what you are.”

            Irion said nothing, absently rubbing his nose, broken in a fight when he was twelve, the year he had been sent to his uncle to be raised, the year after Camlann. There had been many fights then, because everyone had taunted him, and he had usually lost. Although he could not hide the evidence of the beatings, he had never told Honorius the identity of his attackers, not for fear of worse beatings, but from shame that they had happened at all; that he had brought them on by being who he was.

            But there had come a time, after one particularly painful attack, when he swore he would never allow himself to be beaten. Irion persuaded Gwythur, an old friend of Honorius, to teach him how to fight with his fists. Soon he excelled at it. Gwythur also taught him the basics of sword and shield, which Irion spent long hours practicing.

            And the bullying had stopped, at least physically. But as he grew many of the townsfolk of Caerwent, especially the nobles, found other ways to torment him. He had learned to hide his anger when he was belittled and snubbed, often taking refuge in the barracks with Gwythur and his warriors.

            “I don’t agree, Uncle,” he said. “Many people will never look at me without seeing my fa—Medraut. Brennus, for one.”

            Honorius grunted. “Brennus cannot stand and make wind at the same time. Leave him to me. He doesn’t have the votes to oppose me in council.” He cocked his head and looked at his nephew. “Is it the opinion of the nobles that bothers you, Irion, or are you afraid of your own ghosts?”

            Irion turned away. Yes, there were ghosts. He knew he had nothing to do with his father’s treason; he’d been too young even to be certain what was happening. But Medraut, people said, had been evil itself. And if his father was evil, he was the seed of evil. He had grown up waiting for the darkness to surface, wondering if he could control it when it did.

            “However much a baby snake would rather be an eagle,” he said, “it will still have scales when it grows up.” He slapped the horse on the rump more sharply than he intended. The animal started and bolted through the gate.

            Honorius raised his eyebrows. “We’re not speaking of snakes. You also have the blood of Arthur, and of Uther Pendragon and of Ambrosius before him. Never forget that.” He laid a weathered hand on Irion’s shoulder. “I believe in you, lad. I know you have doubts about yourself, and I wouldn’t ask this of you if the need weren’t so great. Think it over and we can talk again later.”

            Irion nodded in dumb misery. He watched as his uncle hobbled back to the wagon. Medraut, he knew, had become a captain of Arthur’s war band at the same age. Was it all going to happen again?

The term ‘escapist’ is harder to get a handle on. I asked him what he meant by it, and he said, “It’s obvious, isn’t it? King Arthur, Lancelot—those are fairy tales. Bedtime stuff for kids. They have no relevance to the real world.” 

We could get into a debate whether a legitimate function of literature is to help correct problems of society (I happen to think it is), but that’s another topic for another time. And yes, of course, there is no shortage of problems to deal with. Let’s face it, society is sick. The more important question, it seems to me, is why it’s sick. Why do we do all those destructive things we do to each other and to the environment?  

Perhaps one reason is that we’ve lost contact with what and who we are, and with our place on the planet. That has happened, Joseph Campbell pointed out, because the old myths we used to live by are no longer relevant, and we haven’t yet invented new ones to take their place. As he said in The Power of Myth, we’re standing on a whale, fishing for minnows. When we look out from ourselves to examine the problems we see around us, those are minnows. When we look inward, we see that we are the source of all the problems. The function of myths is to help us look inward.

But what exactly is mythology? According to Karl Kerenyi, one of the great scholars of Greek mythology, it’s a body of material dating from time immemorial that deals with origins, foundations, primordial causes that remain imperishable. To novelist Thomas Mann, mythology was the foundation of life, the timeless pattern, the religious formula to which life shapes itself because its characteristics are a reproduction of the unconscious. Those characteristics are projected outward in tales of gods and heroes, journeys to the underworld, and heroic battles.

Our ancestors didn’t put these stories in mythological form to escape reality, to merely entertain each other; they simply had no other way of expressing timeless truths. To our modern, science-oriented minds, myth-embedded stories may seem silly, so we dismiss them as quaint relics of primitive minds with no relevance to our modern problems. Those who have been specially trained to understand mythology, such as Campbell and Kerenyi and Mann, know better. But how about the rest of us? Judging from the runaway popularity of The Lord of the Rings and the Harry Potter series, we, too, sense there is more to myths than escapism.

I tried to explain to my friend that this is why I write stories about Guenevere and Arthur and Bedwyr and Lancelot. He wasn’t convinced.

“I’ll stick with real literature,” he said.

“Have you read Thomas Mann’s Joseph and His Brothers,” I asked.

“No,” he said on his way out.

I guess there was no point in asking him if he’s read The Lord of the Rings.

CAMLANN

Arthur, High King of Britain, wearily glanced at the piece of broken spear in his hand and cast it aside. Shading his eyes against the dying sun, he looked down into the valley. The green turf, now smeared with red, lay torn and gouged by hundreds of horses and littered with the victims of the battle. The day had been warm, a summer day with a playful breeze that fluttered the standards of the gathered princes of Britain. It tugged at their cloaks and ruffled the manes of their horses, the kind of breeze meant for hunting the red deer or hawking in the uplands, not for dying in a nameless glen near the River Cam.

            Sweat lathered the chest of Arthur’s albino stallion and dripped down its legs. Its flanks heaved. The King, gray haired and blood spattered, scanned the battlefield.

            At Arthur’s side, the bearer of the red-dragon standard raised his war horn and sounded three sharp notes, rallying the surviving Companions for one last charge. They came to him as they could, many of them wounded, and gathered into a tight wedge behind their King: Cei of the fiery hair and fierce demeanor; Constantine, Prince of Dumnonia, Arthur’s cousin and chosen successor; Rhuawn and Lucas and Gwalchmai; and the others who had remained loyal against the forces of Medraut.

            Last came a dark-haired warrior riding without his reins, guiding his horse with his knees and unspoken will. His shield arm was cradled in his lap and bound tightly to stem the flow of blood from his severed hand. As he galloped past the body of a slain warrior he leaned far over, gripping the sides of his horse with his legs, nearly touching the ground with his sword hand. He seized a spear from the grip of the dead man and came back atop the moving stallion.

            Curbing the horse back on its haunches, he presented the spear to Arthur with a flourish. “Even a bear cannot fight without claws, my lord”.

            The exhausted King looked at him with gratitude and perhaps a little awe. “They say, Bedwyr, that you could gentle the wind to ride, had you a saddle to fit her.”

            “No, lord.” Humor gleamed behind Bedwyr’s drooping eyelids. “I need no saddle.”

            Arthur tested the point of the spear with his thumb and returned his attention to the battlefield. Bedwyr followed his gaze. Near the river a larger band of horsemen waited for the King to carry the battle down to them, for the slope of the ground was against them. They wore the black and gold of Medraut, Arthur’s son, and some carried on their shield the red-horse standard of the West Saxons.

            “Ceawlin still lives,” Arthur said, pointing the spear at a blond chieftain with a huge mustache and horned helmet. “There, under the red horse.”

            Bedwyr soothed his horse’s neck with his right hand, trying to ignore the increasing dizziness from loss of blood. “He’s evil, that one.”

            “And Medraut, you see any sign of him?” Arthur squinted against the glare.

            “Aye. In the center. There.” Bedwyr looked sideways at his King, who seemed to have aged a generation this day.

            Arthur nodded, then turned to the other Companions. “Come, then! We’ll fight such a battle that the bards will sing of it for a thousand years. For Britain!” He set his spurs to his stallion and raced toward the center of the waiting rebels below.

            “For Arthur!” Bedwyr drew his sword and plunged down the hill into the shadows. With hoarse shouts the rest of the warriors followed.

            The clash of spear against shield rattled across the valley. Arthur’s charge broke the rebel line and carried his warriors through the gap.

            Unable to free his spear from an enemy shield, Arthur drew his jeweled sword, Caliburn, and wheeled to slash his way toward Medraut. The sword flashed and shimmered, seeming to draw light from shade. Beside him Bedwyr reached the rebels’ standard-bearer and hacked apart the black-and-gold flag.

            The King found his son, who turned with a snarl and viciously swung his sword at his father’s head. With a bell-like ring Caliburn parried the blow and for an instant the two men stared at each other, hatred in Medraut’s eyes, sorrow in Arthur’s. Then Medraut drove his shield into his father’s face and the swords swung again.

            Medraut thrust toward Arthur’s stomach. At the same instant the High King’s horse stumbled and the parry went wide. The thrust slid under Arthur’s shield and drove deep into his abdomen. Medraut wrenched out the sword and shouted with victory, but his eyes widened as Arthur laughed. He hesitated and Arthur summoned the last of his strength to bring Caliburn down win a high arc, cleaving him between the neck and shoulder. Medraut tumbled dead from his horse.

            The rebel war band, seeing their leader fall, broke and fled. Enraged but outnumbered, Ceawlin shouted threats of vengeance and led his surviving Saxons at a gallop eastward out of the valley, pursued by Constantine’s warriors.

            Caliburn slipped from Arthur’s fingers and he slumped. He would have fallen but Bedwyr reached him, held him in the saddle, and guided him toward the trees. There he dismounted and helped the King to the shelter of a tall rowan tree, where he laid him gently on the ground. He retrieved Caliburn and slid it gently into its scabbard.

            Arthur’s face was ashen with the hue of death, but his eyes opened. As Bedwyr pressed his cloak against the wound to staunch the bleeding, Arthur clasped his hand weakly, holding it to the hilt of Caliburn. His voice was a whisper and the young warrior bent low to hear it.

            “Here the dream dies. The gods foretold this day years ago.”

            “Rest you, my King. Don’t try to speak.”

            Arthur shook his head, the movement barely visible. “Caliburn’s time has ended. Know you the lake west of here?”

            Bedwyr nodded, puzzled. “I know it, my lord.”

            Arthur paused, seeming to marshal his fading strength. Then he said:  “Take the sword and cast it into the mere.”

            Uncertain that he had heard correctly, Bedwyr made no move to leave.

            For a moment, Arthur’s eyes focused and he smiled at the young warrior. “You, Bedwyr, of all my Companions, have been closest to my heart. I would not have our parting come this soon, but fate wills it. Go no. I entrust Caliburn to you.” His eyes closed and his hand relaxed from the Companion’s wrist.

            Bedwyr swallowed back the hardness in his throat. “Aye, my lord.” He bent and kissed Arthur’s forehead, then unbuckled the King’s oiled leather scabbard.

            Toward them rode Lucas, Bedwyr’s brother, slumped in his saddle, arms held against a crimson stain that spread outward on his tunic. He slid from his horse and stared down at the King in disbelief. “How does he?”

            Bedwyr shook his head.

            “They’re dead,” Lucas said. “All of them. Gwalchmai and Rhuawn. Cei. Even Cei. His stallion was hamstrung by Ceawlin and fell on him. All the Companions are gone.”

            Bedwyr scarcely heard him. “Watch over the King for me.”

            He mounted his war stallion and set off at a slow trot toward the marshy lake that received the waters of the River Cam. His shield arm had gone numb and he felt weak with shock. Across the high saddlebow he cradled the sword Caliburn with his right arm.

            At the edge of the marsh he stopped and slid from his saddle, Caliburn gripped in his right hand. Mud sucked at his feet as he splashed through the tall marsh grass to the edge of the lake.

            For a moment he stood gazing down at the great sword. Two golden serpents twined down the leather hilt. On the pommel a single amethyst gleamed purple as if it had a life of its own. Holding the scabbard between his legs, Bedwyr gently wrapped his fingers around the grip and drew Caliburn from its sheath. It warmed to his hand until it seemed to become part of his flesh.

            No, he thought, I’ve heard Arthur wrong. He could not have meant for me to destroy this weapon. If he recovers, he’ll have need of it.

            He slid the blade back into the scabbard and, gripping it tightly, stumbled back to his horse. He turned the stallion and set it pounding back toward the battlefield.

            As he approached the rowan tree, Bedwyr saw shapes moving in the shadows among the dead, and once heard a shriek. Looters, staling gold and jewels from the dead and murdering the wounded. He had to move the King to safety.

            Arthur lay still in the pallor of approaching death. For a moment Bedwyr did not see Lucas and he felt a flash of anger at him for leaving the King unattended. Then he saw his brother, slumped at the base of a spear. Dark blood stained Lucas’s cloak and matted the grass around him.

            Bedwyr slipped from his horse and knelt over Lucas. His brother’s body was already growing cold. One hand gripped the spear and his sightless eyes stared down the hill, still guarding the King.

            Bedwyr shut his eyes against the sting of tears. Forgive me, little brother, he thought. I shouldn’t have left you.

            A groan made him turn. Arthur stirred and in a faint whisper asked for water. Bedwyr took a flask from his saddle and put it to the King’s lips.

            After Arthur had sipped he spoke, his voice stronger. “Do not weep for your brother, Bedwyr, or for me. You can save neither. Did you obey my order?”

            Bedwyr hesitated, glancing at Caliburn on his saddle. The King should not be burdened with such matters now. He would explain after Arthur had regained his strength. “Aye, lord.”

            “What did you see?”

            “See?” Bedwyr thought a moment, but remembered nothing out of the ordinary. “Only a pair of marsh fowl.”

            Arthur searched the last Companion’s face, his gray eyes showing sadness. “You betray me as well, Bedwyr? Go now, and do as I ordered. Cast Caliburn into the mere.”

            The King’s head fell back and his eyes closed. Another shriek sounded from the battlefield. Arthur had to be moved to safety and his wounds tended quickly or he would die. The sword would have to wait.

            Bedwyr fashioned a litter from two spears and Lucas’s blood-stained cloak, lashing the ends to his horse behind the saddle. Then, ignoring the pain of his mutilated arm, he dragged Arthur to the litter and set out slowly eastward.

            He had no plan, only that he must find help for the King. As the horse made its way out of the valley and along a path that wound through a dark forest of beeches, Bedwyr’s mind wavered on the fringes of darkness.

            When awareness returned he found himself at the edge of a shallow lake, larger than the mere, with reeds growing far out into the water. In the center of the lake an island jutted from the glassy surface. Bedwyr knew it: Ynys Afallon, the Isle of Apples, sacred to Christians and Druids alike.

            In the fading light a coracle made its way toward them, poled by a black-hooded figure. Another, smaller figure sat in the bow. As the boat whispered into shore Bedwyr got down from his horse, half falling, gripping the saddle to keep himself upright. The two figures stepped from the boat.

            “Who are you?” He fumbled for his sword.

            “Peace, Bedwyr,” said the smaller figure in a woman’s voice, dark and musical. “We mean you no harm. I am here to receive my brother.”

            “Morgan,” Bedwyr stammered. “I’m sorry, lady. I didn’t recognize you. How knew you that Arthur has been gravely wounded?”

            She did not answer but went directly to the King and, kneeling, touched his forehead gently. “I fear you’ve delayed overlong, brother,” she said. “My healing skills will be sorely tested.” She beckoned to the hooded figure. “Come, Barinthus.”

            Morgan and Barinthus untied the litter and carried it toward the coracle. As they passed by Bedwyr, still leaning bewildered against the horse, Arthur opened his eyes. Caliburn glinted faintly in the twilight.

            “Remember my command, Bedwyr,” he murmured. “Give me your oath you will obey.”

            Bedwyr nodded as the world swam around him. “I swear, my lord.”

            Morgan and Barinthus eased Arthur into the boat and climbed in. Barinthus began poling away from shore.

            Bedwyr stumbled to the water’s edge. “I would go with you.”

            The only response from the boat was the suck and splash of the pole lifting from the mud.

            He watched the coracle float away. “I pray you, my Lord Arthur, don’t leave me.” He forced the words from his lips in a shout, but they came out only in a ragged whisper. “Where will I go? What will I do?”

            For a moment there was only silence. Then Morgan’s voice drifted back to him. “Take what comfort you can, Bedwyr. His time has passed, for now. Yet it may come again.”

            He watched the boat until it was out of sight. Then he sank to his knees in the mud and rocked slowly, cradling his arm in his lap, and wept.

            How long he remained that way Bedwyr did not know. A clink of metal brought him back to awareness. He started and glanced wildly around for a weapon, but the noise was only the horse shifting its weight in its sleep. Bedwyr remembered Caliburn and rose stiffly, staggering until he found his balance. He pulled himself onto the horse and turned him back toward the mere by the battlefield.

            Dark had fallen when he reached it, but a full moon provided enough light for him to see. He dismounted and splashed to the water’s edge, Caliburn in his hand. For a moment he stood, his eyes fixed on the dark line of the far shore. Then he drew back his arm to throw the sword.

            Instead, his fist opened and Caliburn slipped from his grasp to fall into the wet grass. Bedwyr’s cry of anguish shredded the silence and sent echoes shivering across the lake.

            “No!”

            Two mallards took flight with a rush, their wingtips poking holes in the moonlight surface of water.

            “He may live, or there may yet come another.”

            Bedwyr unclasped his own sword and hurled it as far as he could into the lake. Then he bent and picked up the dripping Caliburn and walked slowly back to the horse.

            Near the grazing animal an ancient bog oak survived the encroaching marsh, its gnarled shape black against the silver light. Riven by lightning in some long-past storm, the trunk had fissured and only partly healed. On impulse Bedwyr stumbled over to the tree and thrust Caliburn deep into the crack, pushing it as far as his arm could reach. Then he stepped back and looked carefully. He could see no sign of the hidden sword.

            Aimlessly, consumed by pain and grief, he rode away from the lake.

Charles Schulz