The Secret of Excalibur

there?’

‘We should, although we won’t have a huge amount of time to look around before it gets too dark. Where are you staying, by the way?’

‘London,’ Mitchell told her.

She looked horrified. ‘You’re going to drive all the way back to London? Oh, don’t be silly, it’ll be the middle of the night before you get there! I live in Shepton Mallet, it’s only about ten miles away. You can stay with me tonight, I have a spare room. And a sofa,’ she added to Mitchell. He appeared less than impressed at the prospect.

‘Are you sure?’ Nina asked.

‘Oh, it’s no problem. And how often do I have the discoverer of Atlantis at my house? It’ll be an honour.’

‘In that case, we accept. Don’t we, Jack?’ He grunted noncommittally.

‘Brilliant! Okay, we’d better get going.’

Shadowed from the sun, the southeastern face of the Tor was colder, more ominous. The steepness of the hill meant the tower above was now completely out of sight, and even Glastonbury itself was blocked from view, adding to the feeling of isolation. The chatter of sightseers was gone; apart from the croaks of distant birds, the only sign of life was a lone cow in the field below, completely oblivious of the visitors.

‘This is where the marker stone must have been,’ said Chloe, looking at the map again.

Nina examined the hillside. It seemed no different from the two other spots they had already searched. ‘If the tomb’s here at all, it’s got to be near.’ She took her steel peg and stuck it into the earth. The others followed her example.

They searched for ten minutes, twenty, finding nothing out of the ordinary. The sky beyond the Tor gradually took on a salmon-pink shade, slipping to a vivid orange as the sun neared the horizon. Another five minutes. Still nothing.

Then—

Nina’s probe stopped abruptly, only four inches beneath the surface.

To begin with, she didn’t react. It wasn’t the first rock she’d found. Instead, she withdrew the peg and tried again, six inches away. If it were just a stone, a small change of position would be enough to miss it.

But the peg stopped again. Four inches deep.

She moved again, tried again. Four inches. Pushing harder, she heard a faint clink of metal on stone through the soil. ‘Hey, guys,’ she said, feeling a growing sense of excitement, ‘over here.’

‘What?’ Mitchell asked as he and Chloe joined her.

‘Something quite big. Could just be a rock, but it seems very flat. Help me see how big it is.’

They stabbed the pegs into the Tor, moving further apart. Every attempt stopped four inches deep, until they had covered a width of over four feet. Checking perpendicularly, whatever lay under the soil was just as tall.

A square.

‘There’s no way that’s natural,’ muttered Nina, seeing the pattern of holes marking the object’s edges.

Chloe took a trowel from her pack. ‘Here, let me.’ She knelt and scooped out several clumps of soil from the centre of the square, working more carefully as she got deeper. The tip of the trowel scraped against stone. She exchanged a look with Nina, then widened the hole, brushing loose soil away with her hand.

What lay beneath the ground was clearly man-made, smooth and flat. But that wasn’t what set Nina’s heart racing. Instead, it was a word, inscribed in the stone.

MERLIN.

Chloe sat back, stunned. ‘Blimey.’

Nina brushed more of the soil away, revealing additional words in Latin. ‘“The wrath of Merlin”?’ she translated incredulously. She snatched the trowel from Chloe’s hand and hacked at the hole to widen it. ‘No, wait. It’s part of a sentence. “... the wrath of Merlin, which strikes -” ’ More frantic digging. ‘ “- which strikes only those who see his face. Those who know the truth may find ...” ’ She fell silent, amazed.

‘What?’ Mitchell demanded. ‘What does it say?’

Nina looked up at him, awed. ‘“Those who know the truth may find the tomb of Arthur.”’ She placed her hands on the ancient stone slab, barely able to believe what she had discovered. ‘It’s real. It’s actually real.’

Nina held up her hands. ‘No, really, I couldn’t eat another thing.’

‘Are you sure?’ Chloe asked. She pushed a plate towards her guest. ‘Another slice of cake?’

‘No thanks, really.’

‘Some ice cream? After Eights? Cheesy nibbles?’

‘No, thanks!’ Forced to abandon further excavation by lack of light, they had covered the exposed stone with soil once more and driven to Chloe’s house with the intention of returning to the Tor the following morning. Nina looked round at the door of Chloe’s dining room, through which she could hear Mitchell talking. He had told the two women that he needed to make a phone call, though Nina suspected he was really trying to escape Chloe’s constant offers of more and more rich, fatty food.

Chloe regarded the last piece of cake hopefully. ‘You don’t mind if I ...’

‘Help yourself !’

Mitchell came back into the room as Chloe slid the cake on to her plate. ‘Oh, all finished? Shame.’

‘You can have this slice if you’d like,’ Chloe offered. ‘Or some ice cream? Cheesy nibbles?’

‘That’s okay, thanks!’

‘Who were you calling?’ Nina asked, just as her own phone rang. ‘Oh, excuse me.’ She took it from her pocket, seeing Chase’s name on the screen. So he’d finally deigned to speak to her, had he? ‘Eddie?’

‘Hi, love.’ He still sounded glum, but at least he was no longer angry. ‘You okay?’

‘Yeah, I’m fine. What about you?’

‘Better than I was. Listen, there’s something I need to tell you, but I want to do it in person. I’m about to get a train back to London.’

‘Back? Wait, where are you now?’

‘In Bournemouth. There was something I had to tell Lizzie as well. Are you still at the hotel?’

‘No, I’m, ah . . . in Somerset.’

A pause. ‘What?’

‘I came to Glastonbury.’

‘What?’

‘No, listen, we found something! There’s something underneath Glastonbury Tor. We think it’s King Arthur’s tomb - we found the entrance!’

Another, longer pause. Then: ‘For fuck’s sake, Nina!’ The verbal explosion was loud enough for her companions to hear. ‘I told you not to go!’

‘Yes, and I told you you don’t tell me what to do, Eddie! We’ve got a job to do, remember - finding Excalibur? Well, that’s what we’ve been doing.’

‘We? Is Jack there?’

‘Yes, Jack’s here,’ Nina snapped. She glanced at the others. Chloe, embarrassed, was regarding a clock with intense feigned interest, while Mitchell had a questioning expression. ‘For God’s sake, Eddie. Is that why you’ve been so territorial with me when he’s around? You might as well have been cocking your leg.’

He fumed silently for a few moments. ‘Look, just get back to London, all right? I still want to talk to you.’

‘It’ll have to wait until tomorrow. I’m staying here overnight.’

‘With Jack?’

Nina ground her teeth in frustration. ‘Yes, Eddie, with Jack.’

‘That’s it, I’m coming up there. Lizzie, I need to borrow your car.’ In the background, Nina heard Elizabeth tell him in no uncertain terms that he couldn’t have it. ‘All right, I’ll get a bloody taxi! Where are you?’

‘Eddie, you’re being completely ridiculous - look, I don’t even want to carry on with this conversation until you