Bruce’s body and moved his torch close to the dead boy’s face. It was covered with red-black blotches.
“You brought this, Arthur. My son or yours, he is dead, and you are the cause of it. The Great Queen Morgan warned us years ago that you would be the end of England.” He opened Bruce’s cage and eased the body out. “We are all dead men. It is your doing.”
Merlin spoke up, loudly and, he hoped, forcefully. “There are no reports of plague this far west, Marmaduke. No one in our party has any signs of it. Plague is not what caused his death. It must have been something else.”
“Rot. Look at him.”
He placed the boy’s body back in its cage and turned to one of his men. “Build a pyre.” Then he turned and glared at Arthur and Merlin in their cages. “My boy is not the only one who will burn on it.”
Another of this lieutenants said in alarm, “We have a rat by the tail, Marmaduke. Provoke it and it will bite. Their men will try to rescue them.”
“If they do, you are to kill them at once. I will make sure their men understand that.”
“What difference will that make? If they are going to be executed anyway, what will their soldiers have to lose by trying to save them? You are only giving them more reason to try.”
In the torchlight it was clear that this was a new thought for Marmaduke. The effort of thinking showed in his features. Finally he barked, “Don’t confuse me,” and began to stomp off back to the main part of the camp.
“What shall we do with the boy, Marmaduke?” one of his men called.
He turned and exhaled deeply. “Leave him here for now. The pyre will be ready soon enough.”
Merlin called after him, “If it really is the plague that killed the boy, you are most unwise to leave his body in the open.”
Marmaduke halted for an instant, turned and looked back at them and muttered, “What difference does that make? We are all dead men. All England will die.” He kept walking.
Merlin looked at Arthur. “Everyone says you are a military genius. Even Britomart endorses that view. Just look what your genius has brought us to.”
“Be quiet. I’m thinking.” Arthur barked the words impatiently.
“Like Marmaduke? Perhaps the two of you could get together and compare notes on the way intelligent leaders behave.”
“Merlin, if you don’t stop needling me, I’ll-”
“You will what? Come, Arthur, make your best threat. What will you do? Burn me alive on Bruce’s pyre? Arrangements for that are already being made.”
“Stop it, will you?” Arthur lapsed into silence for a moment, then said, “If only Bedivere-”
“Yes, if only Bedivere.”
Arthur glanced at the distant end of the camp, where there was a large clearing. His men were being held there. For the briefest moment he thought they might break loose and come to his rescue. But they were badly outnumbered-and unarmed. For them to try anything would be tantamount to suicide.
Half an hour later, amid considerable fuss, a small carriage pulled into the camp. It was jet-black, pulled by four black horses. It glistened in the torchlight. And it was riding low, as if it was carrying something very heavy. A small contingent of lightly armed guards accompanied it on horseback, all dressed in black. The two caged prisoners watched it, more than curious. Arthur said, “My sister. I should have known she wouldn’t stay at Camelot.”
“Morgan? I think not. That carriage is too small for her taste. So is the guard. She likes things extravagant.”
“It is she. It must be. She will not permit them to harm us.”
“No, of course not. She would never permit anything that might result in her taking the throne.”
“Stop it, Merlin. She is my sister.”
“Exactly the point.” With more than a little distaste he muttered, “Nobility. Besides, look at that carriage. It is riding low. It must be burdened with some enormous weight.”
“Morgan-”
“It cannot be Morgan, Arthur.”
The carriage pulled to a stop just at the entrance to Marmaduke’s “palace.” Its guards lined up ceremonially outside it. Slowly the door opened. Something large and black appeared at the door, then stopped.
“What on earth-?” Merlin strained to see.
It soon became apparent to him that what he was seeing was a woman, a terribly fat one. She tried to exit the carriage, but the door was too narrow for her. Two of her soldiers took her by the hands and pulled, and finally she managed to squeeze her way out of the coach. Heavily she descended. She was wrapped in black robes. On a slimmer woman they would have swirled and billowed, as Morgan’s always did. On this woman, they were as tight as anything.
Merlin turned to look at Arthur. “Morgan, is it?”
“Be quiet. I’ve never seen a human being so heavy. She makes Marmaduke look petite. Who on earth can she be?”
“There was mention of a witch of Paintonbury. At a guess, I would venture that is she.”
“Witch.” Arthur turned the thought over in his mind. “No, that cannot be.”
“In the name of everything human, why?”
“Look at her, Merlin. She’s fatter than Marmaduke. Witches, they say, fly on their broomsticks, but no broom-stick ever made could support a burden like that. How much good black cloth must go into her robes?”
Merlin chuckled and watched the woman as she took a few ponderous steps toward Marmaduke’s palace. But she was spared having to walk too far. Marmaduke came out and walked to meet her. Compared with her ponderous movements he seemed almost sprightly.
When he reached her, Marmaduke extended his arms to embrace her. She did likewise. But they were too large to be able to hug each other. Instead they bumped stomachs lightly, rubbed each other’s arms, then stepped quickly apart.
They exchanged a few words, and Marmaduke pointed to his two caged prisoners. The woman looked and frowned. One of Marmaduke’s men brought out the Stone of Bran. She inspected it, nodded in approval, and the man took it back inside.
Then the two of them walked toward the cages. Slowly.
Arthur gaped. “Is it possible they hold such a creature in reverence here?”
“Once you have trained people to accept the fantastic without evidence, you can make them accept anything. Religion. Superstition.” Merlin watched them as they approached. At one point the woman became stuck in the mud and had to be pulled free. “On some of the Greek islands they dig up ancient statuettes of the fertility goddess. You should see her. She makes even this creature look dainty.”
Marmaduke and his companion approached the cages. He said to her, “Here they are. Arthur and his advisor Merlin. The gods have been kind enough to deliver them into my hands.”
Slowly the woman spoke. She seemed to have trouble digesting what Marmaduke had said. Her voice, when it emerged from among her multiple chins, was deeper than his. “Kill them at once.”
Marmaduke seemed shocked at this. “Surely not. Not now. We must wait until dawn and sacrifice them to the rising sun and the god whose soul it reflects.”
She squinted; she thought. “You are right, Marmaduke. The gods would be angered by an improper sacrifice.”
“Who wouldn’t?”
Merlin found his voice. He peered at the woman and asked, “Who are you?”
Casually, unfazed, she told him, “I am Lulua. I am known as the witch of Paintonbury.”
“And may I ask,” he went on in an equally casual tone, “how many hens it takes to feed you each morning?”
“Merlin!” Arthur tried to make his tone stern, but he couldn’t resist chuckling. “You must be polite to this woman. Even if she does want us dead.”
Merlin chuckled. “You be polite to her, then, Arthur. I do not have enough politeness in me for such copious amounts of flesh.”
Marmaduke ignored this. He told Lulua, “They have brought plague with them. My son Bruce has died of it.”
Slowly, as if thinking was an effort, she responded, “Plague. The Great Queen has sent us word of it in the south. This is the first I’ve heard of it reaching this far into the heartland.”
“Would you care to examine the body?”
She shuddered. Sympathetic vibrations set in, and her entire anatomy became animated. “That is a job for an undertaker, not a priestess. The body must be burned.”
“Yes, Lulua. My men are making the pyre even now. We’re planning to burn him at dawn.”
She narrowed her eyes. She was thinking again, and the struggle showed. Finally she said, “Burn these two on the pyre as well. England will be well off without them.”
“That was our plan.”
“If they carry the plague…” She shrugged. Again thought came with difficulty. “If they carry the plague, they will have to be burned anyway, eventually. The sooner, the better.”
“Yes, Lulua. What about their men? And their servants? There are more than fifty of them.”
She frowned. Once again, thinking seemed to come with difficulty for her. Finally she pronounced, “They must all be killed. See that they are guarded most carefully. If one plague-infected man should escape…”
“Yes, Lulua.”
Arthur had listened to this exchange with mounting alarm. “Obviously, you don’t know who you’re dealing with here.”
Marmaduke laughed. “With two fools in cages. You will be surprised at how quickly the wood burns, and with what heat.”
Arthur was not about to be intimidated, not to let it show. “Do you forget who my companion and advisor is? He is not just any petty courtier. He is Merlin, the greatest sorcerer in Europe.”
“Arthur! I am no-” Merlin began to protest.
But Arthur cut him off. “This is no time for false modesty, Merlin. Be quiet.” He turned back to Marmaduke and Lulua. “You know the stories. You know his reputation. This man, who has permitted himself and me to be made your prisoners, is the man who made the stones march down from Ireland and form themselves into the monument at Stonehenge. The man who brought life back to my dead squire, to unmask the boy’s killer. You are dealing with a greater power than you know.”
Marmaduke seemed taken aback by this. But Lulua only smiled. “Let him make his cage dissolve, then.”
Arthur kept up his bluff. “He will. And your copious flesh along with it.”
“Bid him do it soon, then. Before dawn, if he’s to do it at all.” She laughed. Her body vibrated. “Whatever power he possesses cannot be a match for the power of the Good Goddess.”
She turned and walked off. Marmaduke followed in glum, confused silence. As they were leaving, Merlin heard her say, “I want you to prepare a nice, big breakfast for me. Beef. Eggs.”
Arthur whispered to Merlin, “There cannot be enough hens in Paintonbury.”
Merlin chuckled. “Have you ever seen anyone fatter? But Arthur, did you have to bring up my supposed magical powers? That was foolish.”
“If we can’t prey on their superstition, we are lost, Merlin. What other weapons do we have?”
“It ill becomes me to tell a king ‘I told you so,’ Arthur, but you were warned about the dangers of traveling this way. By Bedivere, by Britomart, by nearly everyone. What would you suggest we do
