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fat apple of the rich; the artisans in gold and enamel whose work was the glory of the Church.

My combrogi settled and married, bore children and flocked back to court on my command in surges of strength and color. The whole west and north felt a stirring of hope, of new beginnings fashioned from old dreams. In the ruins of Gaul, even in Rome, they began to hear the reviving heartbeat of their old province, and to returning envoys they said, “Tell us of Arthur and Guenevere.”

When 1 want to remember without sadness or pain, those first years are best. Gwen and I walking by the river, watching twilight turn the water to purple and ink against the wheat-colored far bank. Listening rapt when someone near started a song, taken up by three or four or a dozen others—music the Saxon will never know. O Lord, give to Thy servant a voice. And He did. To the birds, He gave the lark. To man, the Briton. In such a place as Camelot the years can pass quickly, and they did.

Wheel of sunlight and shadow turning, and with its revolution, the face of the world changed. In the lost east of Britain, moss and weeds grew over Roman villas while the eastern land took new names like Bearruc Scir and East Seaxe. Yesterday’s chief became today’s king. The West Saxons crowned Cerdic. •• “And thus they dignify themselves,” fumed Guenevere whose royalty descended from Boudicca in the days of Nero. “That miserable thief a king!”

“He’s royal as I am, Gwen.”

“Rot!”

“And he gets the job done, that’s what counts to Saxons.”

She hacked aggressively at her breakfast pears. “He’s a jumped-up barbarian who killed my people and sacked my home. Should I call him equal because he’s learned to eat at a civilized table without embarrassing his host? Oh, he has a veneer of charm, and I know you like him—eat your eggs before they get cold— but that shouldn’t keep you from pushing him into the sea. Arthur, are you listening to me?”

“Sorry.”

“What are you reading?”

“Letters from Rome. Have you seen them?1’

Letters from Odoacer, love letters to Britain that made the ! older princes remember imperial times, dress nostalgically in the

t of their faded senatorial stripes and balk me in council just

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long enough to lose our initiative with the Saxons. Masterly letters with just enough promise and veiled hint of power to see how the wind blew over Britain. To test our strength or the lack of it.

“And that’s just what he’s doing, make no mistake!” I strode around the council table, pleading with each man—Cador, Marcus, Caradoc, Maelgwyn—as I caught his eye. “The time to move east is now while the people are full of hope, but I can’t do it with cavalry along. Whatever we take we have to occupy.”

“All the more reason to wait for Roman reinforcements.” Marcus rose from his chair, tall and gaunt, watchful eyes shadowed by beetling brows. “These letters are not only from Odoacer, but from Lucullus, the son of Ambrosius. How can we doubt their sincerity?”

I stopped pacing. “Lucullus hasn’t spoken Brit since he was ten years old. He lives in Laurentium with both his lovers, a sweet young girt and a cherubic boy. And if that’s not sufficient indication of his ability to change directions rapidly, reflect that Lucullus was envoy for the last emperor of Rome before sidling up to Odoacer. A biddable man who’ll do what his master tells him. So much for the native son.”

I stood behind Marcus’ chair. “Prince, no one stands to gain more than you by stronger ties to Rome, which means Roman galleys to protect your shipping. I’ll listen to an agreement for protection of trade, but I won’t put a knife in their hands and bare my neck.”

Maelgwyn agreed with Marcus, though for vaguer reasons. “I’d like to see them come back. Not only the legions but the culture, the permanence. Our children grow up ignorant now.” He shifted his corpulent bulk in the chair. “Let Odoacer’s legions sail up Severn, then we’ll talk about the east.”

“Odoacer’s legions!” I slouched into my own chair at the head of the table. “Do you think we’re unique? That what happens here happens nowhere else? If there’s a whole legion anywhere, could they ship to Britain any faster than Cador or Trajanus could budge their fanners from home? Fat chance, boyo! The world is changing, my lords. Be so good as to glance out of doors at it now and then.”

Guenevere caught my glance—with me to the hilt, but warning: a little less rhetoric, a little more reason.

Kay toyed with his stylus, running stubby fingers through his

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beard. “They’ve made no firm promise of help, and I doubt Odoacer could mount an effective force right now.” He touched his fingertips together, thinking aloud. “But say he could. Are we foolish enough to think he does it for nothing? Here’s your east coast back, call again when you need me?”

“That’s occurred to me,” Cador mused. “But meanwhile, a policy of open but watchful friendliness costs us nothing. We should wait and see. As for the east,”— he shrugged—“I can do nothing now.”

“It’ll be harder the longer we wait,” I countered wearily. “As for Rome, their only profit here is a tributary province, and that we are not. They might have left us the tools, but we built the house.”

Marcus wouldn’t swallow that. “He wouldn’t dare ask for tribute!”

I shot back, “The Saxons didn’t dare with Vortigern till they had a knife at his throat!”

They didn’t see the knife in the Roman ploy. Not conquest but control. A legion in Britain meant a hand on our rein. They might retake the east, but for whom? And under what conditions?

Still, Maelgwyn was wistful. “My grandfather used to tell me of the old days. The law, the peace, the security. Finest schools in the empire. Seventy years ago we were begging them to come back. Arthur, at least listen to their offer.”

“Eagerly—from behind a tall fence.”

“On a high hill,” added Kay.

And on and on through the afternoon. Deep in their hearts, they knew the Rome they remembered or had heard about was gone. But they could still conjure with the magic of that name. They saw the villas restored, peacocks strutting through manicured gardens, the sculpted fountains and ponds: Cupid peeing to the replenishment of languid goldfish. The last remnant of old empire still intact, ready to become a center of the new. Luxury, riches, power. A dream like the Grail, and dreams die hard.

I listened, thinking desperately: What would Ambrosius do? Rome was like a parent that turned her child out to fend for itself. Then, old and feeble, she begged our love once more. No, the sun rises on tomorrow, not yesterday. We couldn’t go back.

“Is there not a full legion in Gaul?” old Caradoc wondered, rousing himself from reverie. He knew and cared very little about Rome, but felt he ought to say something as oldest prince of the Council. Long ago some scrap of information must have

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found its way to rustic Astolat. “That of—what was his name— Tiberius, yes, that’s it. Perhaps he could help against the Saxons.”

“My good lord,” I said, “Lucius Tiberius is up to his patrician arse in Franks. In a year or two, he’ll call Clovis king.”

Cador observed, “Our young emperor is admirably informed.”

*‘A part of your taxes go to keep him so, father.”

Guenevere knitted serenely a little apart from our group on a chair specially cushioned to ease her pregnant weight, but missing nothing. “This business of Rome is like the seducer who couldn’t bed the girl without a solemn promise of marriage, and we all know that sad ending. If we take Odoacer to bed on a promise, we’ll find ourselves had and left. For Cerdic, the man is Arthur, the choice is yours, and the time is now.”

‘ Her father demurred. “I can’t. My own taxes are barely dribbling in.”

“Shame, father. You collected in full last month.”

His composure fled for a second. “And how does my queenly daughter know that?”

“We pay to know. As you taught me.” Guenevere inspected the uneven stitchwork plied by her needles and rose cautiously. “You must ail excuse me now. The doctors say I must rest, and it’s far past nap time.”

As with Ambrosius, the issue was a draw between myself and the Council. I kept Rome at a wary distance, but the princes refused my war until it was too little and too late. You wonder why our music is so haunted with sadness. We are perverse. We love lost causes. We love losing.

Little Gareth panted up to where I stood alone on the ramparts and thrust the dispatch at me.

“From Prince Peredur, sir. The courier said it should come straight to you.”

I leaned against a crennel, not interested but skimming over Peredur’s precise Latin. It seemed barely more than routine. Someone was raiding Votadini villages and peculiar circumstances showed in each case. Suggest I send an observer, et cetera.

There were more important problems. Guenevere’s pregnancy was vexed with complications. The doctors cautioned her not to rise at all. Beyond that, Trystan had disappeared on the Saxon borders, long overdue. Maelgwyn held out scant hope for his survival. Between wife and lost friend, my heart wasn’t with the northern news. Brude’s savages butchered each other every day; what in hell could I do about it?

Still, if Peredur thought it warranted a single observer—

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“Gareth, send me Bedivere. Have him meet me here.”

He squinted in puzzlement. “Sir?”

“Are you deaf? Get Bedivere. Now.”

“In a trice, good lord, had my horse wings. He’s gone home this last week.”

My mind was still on Guenevere; she had looked drawn that morning. “What?”

“You gave him leave to go, sir. His little lass is down with colic.”

And myself so used to the man called the right hand of Arthur, I reached with it before realizing it was gone.

I’ve talked very little about that man so close to me our shadows merged as one. At my side from boyhood, sweating with me to learn sword from Uther’s men, the same roads, the same battles, cold meals shared out of the same clay dish, the same fortunes from the beginning. And finally slipped away to a life of his own in a moment so full of cares, the busy emperor didn’t notice his shadow was gone.