“Perhaps sooner, rather than later?” Merlin asked. “I see a transport has touched down recently as well. From a tiny star called…” he frowned as he read the name over and over. “I cannot make it out.” He held out his little screen for Pellinore to read.
“Call it Benwick,” Pellinore said as he studied the name. “That will be easiest for you. They are a wonderful race all involved with music. They usually sing, in their way, to communicate. Their throats are like golden clocking-bards.”
“Mockingbirds,” Merlin mumbled in correction as the humans chuckled at the mistranslation.
“Too many alike words your language has, I think.” Pellinore clasped his hands behind his back and raised his head high to hide his embarrassment. Uther could see none on his face though.
“Merlin, make a note to send a party to Ban and his Benwick acquaintances. And send word back to that man we made judge to send a draft out for law-men.”
At last, they were at the foot of the mountain. Ector piloted the craft as far up the side it would go and they had to do the rest on foot. Soon they would build mountain craft that could handle the steep slopes of Camelot’s mountains. The Avalonians were hard at work teaching the earthlings how to handle and craft their mechanisms to conquer the land faster.
The march wasn’t far and a general gasp came from the audience when they saw Excalibur buried up to its waist in the mountain, charred and wounded.
Pellinore stuttered and sighed in his own language’s expressions before he said, “I have heard long stories of the wonders of Avalon!”
“Long have you heard stories,” Merlin corrected. “It is what we are known for.”
“But where is this Avalon?” Ector asked. “I’ve taken a lot of astronomy classes and it’s never on the maps.”
“Avalon hides,” Igrain said as she moaned and sat down after looking at the monster. “The planet cannot often be found except by the ones who may communicate with it.”
She at once wished she hadn’t spoken that secret. Uther’s eyes immediately lit up with greed and desire. The Avalon technology would be his ultimate war machine if he could harness even a fraction of its power. And to know the location of the planet? He tried to not say intergalactic reign even to himself.
“Merlin knows where Avalon is,” Uther joked. “You’d tell me if I asked, right?”
When Merlin didn’t reply, Uther’s face fell and he quickly changed subjects. “I want to take Excalibur back to Pendragon.”
“What?” Igrain said suddenly, slight disgust in the corner of her lips. “You named the city after yourself?”
“I am in charge right now. And if it wasn’t me, then it would have been Constans, or my father.
“Now,” he reached out and touched Excalibur’s finger to active it and attempt to break it out of the rock. He held his hand there, hoping the machine would recognize his DNA. Nothing happened.
“What’s wrong with this thing, Merlin?” he said and slapped it. “Why won’t it ignite? It had battery and fuel when I left it.”
The party waited in silence as he tried again. When that didn’t work, Uther pulled himself up onto the mecha and touched the cockpit windshield. He pressed his hand there and willed it to open. It didn’t move or glow or even hum.
“Merlin?” Uther growled. “You said we had a psychic communication. A blood binding or whatever. Why doesn’t it work?”
Merlin opened and closed his mouth twice before he answered. What he had to say would not come easily in the present audience. “Perhaps your genes are too diluted.”
“What?”
“From the, um,” he had never been so flustered before and it was partly humorous. “From the healing, of course. From your battle wounds. Your DNA is not pure.”
Seeing where Merlin meant to go with that, he backed down. “I see, but surely the Avalonian genes will not interfere?”
Merlin shook his head. “It was made for a Pendragon. Not a being of Avalon. It is simply our technology.”
“Ah!” Pellinore exclaimed, the leaves on his hair and body spinning. “I know this. When another life is in existence that is more pshychonetically compatible, the machine will sometimes reprogram itself to synch with only that one person’s emitted brain patterns, canceling out the other previous match.”
Uther felt himself almost throw up with fright at that. Only one new existence in the whole world had a Pendragon’s DNA and perhaps even remotely close mental patterns: the baby in Igrain’s womb.
Ector adjusted the goggles on his head. “I’m sorry, but what are you talking about? Is this something our new military needs to know about?”
“Must be out of fuel!” Uther added quickly as he leapt down. “Never mind Excalibur, there are other fine mecha back at the castle. And we have other things to do.” He helped Igrain up and back down the mountain to the transport.
“What will you do now, Uther?” Pellinor asked as they zoomed through a gap in the purple mountains to the other side. The space between the mountains cooled quickly and the sound amplified against the sides, echoing back and forth in a storm of sound.
“I need all of Camelot to be united,” Uther began. “I will make laws, a government…”
“But how?” The alien’s strange strands of hair flapped in the wind and sounded like autumn leaves rustling.
“I will have an army. And I have your aid and you can help me gather outer planets.” A mysterious smile broke his face. “If you must know, I will take the stone circle where the D.R.U.I.Ds meet. When I have that, I will have my own D.R.U.I.Ds reprogram it to send out telecommunication to them.”
Pellinor’s black eyes blinked. “You will control their minds?”
Merlin looked up at this, his eyebrows pulled up in mild worry and inquiry.
“To an extent. They are a great commodity and I cannot afford to have them roaming about.”
“And if your people do not
