M. K. Hume [King Arthur Trilogy 04] The Last Dragon Read online

  The priest said nothing. For once, his mobile features became blank and unreadable and he followed Gawayne’s warrior, who expressed his disgust for his new orders by scowling blackly at his charge. The two men retreated from the small forecourt and Bedwyr heaved a sigh of relief. He realised he’d been holding his breath.

  ‘Well,’ he sighed. ‘If that’s a priest, he’s a . . .’

  ‘Horse’s arse!’ Bran added his curt opinion. ‘What an argumentative son of a bitch!’

  Gawayne agreed. All his instincts told him that this priest was unsuitable, impossible and lacking in any of the necessary qualities of compassion, tact and decency. But he possessed his uncle’s capacity to read a man’s nature through his outward appearance, and it warned him that Lorcan ap Lugald was not as he appeared at first sight. The cleric was a parody of a drunken, filthy failure, but something told the king that Lorcan was dissembling, or hiding his true self.

  ‘What’s worrying you, Gawayne? Something about that man has wormed its way under your skin.’ With his usual perception, Bedwyr had placed his finger on Gawayne’s reservations.

  ‘His hands are scarred, callused and very large,’ the king said reflectively. ‘Did you notice how hard the muscle is on that skinny body? It’s not a very priestly characteristic. I smell a warrior under that stink.’

  ‘He suggested he’d been to Rome,’ Bran added. ‘He’s a mystery, this priest, and he makes my palms itch.’

  ‘He bears watching.’ The Master of Arden spoke firmly, and Gawayne knew his friend’s opinion was set in stone once his mind was made up. ‘I don’t trust him, but we only want him to christen the babe, so we don’t have to spend much time with him.’

  ‘Should we send him packing?’ Gawayne asked. ‘Why keep him around if we don’t want him close to our women?’

  ‘I’ve not decided . . . not quite,’ Bedwyr said slowly. ‘He’s . . . a bit of a puzzle. He seems twisted by something or someone, hence his aggression and his sarcasm. He doesn’t give a fuck what we think. He’s not a problem for us, but I’m curious about him.’

  ‘Then we’ll wait until he scrubs up. At least he’s broken the routine of the day,’ Gawayne decided, his bad temper washed away by his inquisitiveness. He was ever a man who was amused by the extraordinary or the inexplicable, and this priest was an enigma that tweaked his desire for entertainment.

  ‘He’s provocative, deliberately so,’ Bran muttered, as the three men strode away to compete against each other in a quickly arranged test of archery skills, a weapon with which all three men were relatively unpractised.

  They had been enjoying an unequal contest, in which Bran’s younger eyes gave him a decided advantage, when Arthur wandered into the courtyard where the servants had set up a target on a heavy bale of straw. As Gawayne had not learned archery among his wide-ranging warrior skills, precautions were always necessary, for the king’s shots were invariably wild. With his deteriorating eyesight, he was likely to hit anything but the target.

  ‘Forgive me for interrupting, Father, but there’s an odd man wrapped in one of the servants’ old robes shivering in the forecourt. He wants to know where you want him to go now that he is clean.’

  ‘Hmn! Just when I was starting to understand how to aim the fucking thing.’ Gawayne tossed his bow to a hovering servant with a grin. ‘What did you think of him, Arthur?’ Belatedly, he realised he had interrupted a conversation between father and son, so he apologised for his want of manners – again.

  ‘No, Gawayne, there’s no need to apologise,’ Bedwyr said calmly. ‘Your question was sensible.’ He turned his attention to the boy. ‘What did you think of the man, Arthur?’

  ‘I like him,’ Arthur answered readily. ‘I don’t know why, because he was rude to me and treated me like a little boy – which I’m not! But I do like him. He’s a funny man, and much of his rudeness is his way of making a jest. I think he’s very sad inside where no one can see it.’

  ‘That’s not the description that immediately leaps to my mind,’ Bedwyr responded drily. ‘But your opinion is interesting, lad, and I’ll bear it in mind. Come, gentlemen, let’s see if the priest’s personality has improved now the dirt has been removed.’ As he packed away the archery equipment, Bedwyr spared a thought for Arthur’s perception. Long ago, at the battle of Moridunum, Arthur’s father had seen through Bedwyr’s rage and instability to the man who cowered within, after years of slavery under Saxon masters. Did Arthur have the same sensitivity as the High King? If so, the boy’s opinion was very important.

  The three men strolled back to the forecourt, their good humour much improved by their afternoon of pleasurable competition. The sight that greeted them was amusing.

  A servant had found a large robe of homespun in an indeterminate shade of brown, and the priest had belted it with a length of rope and tied his rosary to the thick cord for safe-keeping. Another pouch of leather was tied at the other side of his waist, and Bedwyr presumed that Lorcan kept his few personal possessions within it. Sandals protected his large feet, and without the disguising cowl his face was exposed to the view of anyone who cared to look.

  Stripped of layers of accumulated grime, Lorcan was younger than the lords had expected. In fact, while he was a mature man, his face was almost unlined. It was neither handsome nor ugly, but it was full of character in the planes and bones of its strong features.

  Black eyebrows arched over equally black eyes that snapped and crackled with intelligence. His nose was long, with flaring nostrils, and his mouth, which was wide with a thin upper lip, was saved from a pinched, miserly appearance by a fuller, almost voluptuous lower lip, at odds with the deep creases that scored the face from the sides of the broad nostrils to the corners of the mouth. As these wrinkles were the only marks on his face, their depth spoke of disappointment and prolonged sorrow rather than age. A firm jaw completed a face that scowled at the three nobles with a forthright and unfriendly expression.

  The priest’s body was less remarkable but equally puzzling. Bedwyr had met many servants of Jesus, including the current Bishop of Glastonbury, but none had possessed such overall control of their muscles as was evident in this man. Gawayne, on the other hand, immediately remembered the late lamented Lucius, former Bishop of Glastonbury, who had saved the life of the infant who would grow to become Artor, King of the Britons. Brave Lucius had concealed the sword and crown of Uther Pendragon for Artor to find and redeem at considerable personal risk. Lucius had also possessed the Bloody Cup, which had almost torn the tribes to pieces in civil war. Unlikely as it seemed, the bishop had been a Roman aristocrat during his youth and had become an officer and a skilled fighting man before he eventually gave his life to the Christ. Somehow, this unprepossessing man reminded Gawayne of Lucius.

  ‘Have you ever been a warrior, Father . . . Lawrence?’ Gawayne asked with greater courtesy than anyone present expected, including Lorcan, who eyed the king narrowly as if he expected some kind of trickery under the polite language.

  ‘Call me Lorcan. I’m living in these isles now, so my Celtic name sounds better than other names I’ve used. Yes, I was a fighting man for a time. How did you know?’

  ‘It takes one to know one,’ Gawayne replied evenly, refusing to rise to Lorcan’s bait.

  ‘Tell us about your history, Lorcan,’ Bedwyr asked, taking his lead from Gawayne and speaking more reasonably than he felt. ‘I’m not being nosy out of vulgar curiosity. We all prize Lady Elayne and her daughter more highly than gold, and we would prefer to know the history of any man admitted into their presence.’

  ‘I’m cold, my lord, and I’m hungry. I haven’t eaten since your man took me into custody,’ Lorcan retorted. He was obviously moderating his tone with some effort, causing Bedwyr to flush at his lack of consideration for one who would expect to be treated as a guest.

  ‘Come into the hall then,’ he said quickly. ‘I’ll arrange for one of the servants to find some bread and meat and a mug of ale for you. Our hospitality sho
uld also extend to some cheese and fruit that will put a smile on your face. We’ve forgotten the courtesy due to a priest, Lorcan, and for that I apologise.’

  The three men ushered Lorcan into the hall, where a fire had been lit in the central fire-pit, and offered him a stool at one of the long trestle tables. A guard lounged unobtrusively against a wall within striking distance, alert to any signs of danger to his masters. Arthur found a stool at the end of the same table, and Lorcan winked at him conspiratorially while he waited for his food. Bedwyr’s eyes narrowed in suspicion.

  Two servants brought in a hastily prepared meal from the kitchens. A large bowl of porridge was placed in front of the priest, as well as a generous serving of honey, a real luxury in any household. A heel of fresh bread, newly baked that morning, a cut of venison, a small slice of hard cheese and a handful of nuts completed the meal. Then, joy of joys, a foaming mug of ale was placed in front of him. Without awaiting permission, Lorcan attacked the food and drink with the intense appetite of a half-starved man. When Arthur refilled his mug, he looked up from his meal and nodded his thanks before returning to his food with a hungry man’s gusto.

  Gawayne felt a twinge of guilt that no one, especially his warrior, had considered the priest’s most basic of needs when he was first brought before the kings. ‘When did you last eat?’

  ‘I was about to start my first hot meal in three days when your man insisted that I leave with him. I’d even paid for it, but he was very impatient and persuasive. I could smell the food, and would have killed for it if he hadn’t persuaded me that we were leaving immediately whether I liked it or not. You think me a drunkard because I arrived in a robe that had been soaked in ale. But what you don’t know is that your warrior tipped a full jug of ale over my head. I seethed throughout the long ride here, and I was out for blood when we arrived. What can you do to me for speaking the truth? Kill me? Cut out my tongue? Go to it, then!’

  ‘Let’s presume we’ve just met,’ Bedwyr intervened, for Lorcan’s abrasive resentment was already causing Bran to raise his chin aggressively, while Gawayne, who was trying very hard to be understanding, was in danger of biting off his tongue in an effort to stay silent. ‘We have been at fault, but some blame also lies with you for your lack of respect and your crudity. You desperately needed a bath, my friend.’

  Bedwyr’s change of tone caused the priest to grin. Good, Bedwyr thought. He has a sense of humour to go with his bad temper, so he’s not entirely an oaf.

  ‘We have need of your services, priest, so I’d like to encourage better communication between us,’ Gawayne added evenly. ‘Perhaps you could explain your history to us, Lorcan, son of Lugald. Meanwhile, we’ll drink ale together and chat. Who knows, we may find gainful employment for you so that hunger is no longer an issue.’

  Lorcan was puzzled. He understood that Bedwyr was desperate for a priest to christen his newly born babe, but he couldn’t see a reason for the Master of Arden to need his services for any length of time. ‘I’ve nothing to hide, so ask what you will.’

  ‘Let’s start with your birthplace,’ Bedwyr suggested, careful to keep his face neutral.

  ‘I was raised in a fishing village to the north of Dublin in the state of Midke near to thirty-four years ago, give or take a year or two. My father was a blacksmith, much sought after because his knives and ploughshares kept their edges and his fishing hooks were masterly. Simple folk have simple needs, you see. There was a monastery built on a small promontory at the far end of the village, a grey stone place, not very large, and ancient by the measure of memory in my old home. My father would care for the monks’ animals and sharpen their tools during the winter. When I’m drunk and maudlin, I still remember the smell of peat fires and the heat of the forge, like a flame licking against one side of my body while the cold chilled the other.’

  ‘You were fortunate. A simple life is no bad thing,’ Bran said slowly, for Lorcan’s story had touched him. Bran had never known a life without complications and his inner soul sometimes longed for the simple world which peasants inhabited so phlegmatically.

  ‘We were luckier than most, for my father was never subject to the danger of drowning as were the fishermen who followed the shoals of herring in their flimsy coracles. Nor did we starve when unseasonal rains rotted the crops in the field. Aye, we were more fortunate than most. When times were hard, we never wanted for food, for men paid for my father’s services with barter. I can still smell the fish in the curing house and taste the salt of the ocean in the air.’

  He paused and Arthur ran for another jug of ale and refilled everybody’s mug, even stealing a cup for himself, although all the children were familiar with Elayne’s instructions on the use of homebrew, albeit her products were safer than water. Lorcan thanked him with a pat on the head, marvelling at the thick texture of the lad’s spiralled curls.

  ‘Fortune is an odd thing, masters, isn’t it? We had enough to eat, but only just, for my poor mother was a good breeder and bore twelve living children. I think my father often prayed that some of us would die, but God was stubbornly good to us, although we were never quite satisfied after any meal. Mother wasted away when I was five, after bearing my youngest brother, who perished with her. Do you know, I can’t remember her name? She died of weariness, I swear, being worn out and old by the age of thirty, with only a few teeth left in her head. I’ve already lived longer than she did. The babes had taken everything from her until she was scarcely a person any more – just a shapeless machine that created new life.

  ‘Anyway, after she was put under the ground, we scarcely missed her except for the cooking and cleaning. I had no talent for either, nor could I fish or coax plants to grow. My father decided I should go to the monks, so one day he took me to the monastery and I didn’t leave its walls for ten years, by which time I was nearly sixteen years old.’

  ‘You’ve had a hard time of it, then,’ Gawayne commented.

  ‘Not really, masters. I was well fed, and the monks found that I had some intelligence, so they taught me to read and write. I laboured over my letters for the whole ten years, but I was rarely beaten and I found comfort in the crude stone and wooden sculptures of Jesus and the saints. I realise now that I was happy then.’

  ‘Yet you left,’ Arthur piped up, his childish voice causing Lorcan to raise his mobile eyebrows in surprise at the boy’s impudence.

  ‘Yes, lad, I did. I left with my master and a delegation that had been invited to travel to Tolosa, or Tolouse, where churchmen from many countries had gathered to shape the rules of the Holy Roman Church in the west. The Merovingian kings ruled their Frankish lands in splendour, but Tolosa belonged to the Visigoths. It was where I first saw the Pope, although as a minor cleric my sole task was to copy out my master’s speeches and the long arguments over church doctrine.’

  The three lords remained silent. In truth, they were stunned that their simple fishing expedition had caught such a prize as this man. And in the small town of Letocetum, of all places!

  ‘Apparently my skills in copying Latin were superior to most of my peers’, or so I was told when a church lord, a cardinal from Rome, demanded my services. The monks of my order were very flattered that a pupil of theirs was chosen for preferment, so I was handed over like a trifle or a gift that would win influence for my master with the church hierarchy. I was excited to see Rome, the place where Holy Peter died and the martyrs had perished for the glory of the faith. I was as a child among those wondrous souls.’

  ‘You sound bitter, Lorcan, yet the places you have seen are remarkable, considering your age,’ Gawayne said. ‘Of all the men I have ever known, only Myrddion Merlinus travelled more widely than you, and he was a healer, so more doors opened to him than to other men.’

  ‘Yes, I saw Rome in all her filthy decay. I met great men and evil men before I passed my seventeenth birthday, and I was too young to see that vice can flourish in the most holy of places. Ultimately, I ran away after two years and hid myself in Mo
nza, north of Milan, where great mountains loom over the landscape and are perpetually shrouded in snow. I worked as a field servant while my hair grew out, and then I married a woman and bought fields of my own with coin I earned through hard labour. I was happy with my beautiful wife and my two babes for several years, but the wheel turned and war came to the north once again. Old Italia is racked with constant warfare. Petty kings and barons appropriate any land they can steal and, in turn, have it snatched away from them.’

  ‘Did you lose your lands, Lorcan?’ Arthur asked softly, his face shadowy with sympathy. Lorcan shrugged, but his shoulders hunched as if from a remembered wound.

  ‘Aye, I lost everything in one bloody night. My wife, my little ones . . . all dead in the ashes of our house. The raiders thought I was dead too.’ Lorcan grinned like a wolf and his canines seemed very white and sharp in his dark face.

  ‘Over the next four years, I found every one of them. I killed them all – seventeen of the bastard sons of whores. I knew nothing of war and death when I started, but like my talent for languages, I found I had a gift for violence too. Later, I became a mercenary and took red gold to fight for any side that paid in coin. Sometimes I’d change sides, and later return to my original employers. And when my lust for revenge was finally satiated I realised I had become exactly what I hated most, and my conscience afflicted me with a wound that wouldn’t heal.

  ‘Once again, God showed me his mercy and I was taken in by a priest who was neither particularly good nor very kind. He had a wife and children, you see, a secret family contrary to all the rules of the church. He helped me to become sane enough to pass for a man rather than a monster. Although I had broken my vows, some ties cannot be forgotten and I donned my cassock again. He shaved my head into the tonsure and I was born again as Father Padraig, an Irish priest far from home on a pilgrimage to the holy places.’