On the oath-taking day, I requested the services of Bishop Anscopius and an ancient stone altar disused for more than a hundred years. Anscopius’ reliquary rested on a little stand and contained (by repute) the toe bone of St. Paul. To the other side stood the small altar, its concave top fitted with hot coals, a dish of incense to one side. Beside me flared my brave new banner, the gift of Guenevere and her women: a red dragon’s head on a field of white.

Despite fires on the hearths, the great hall remained late-winter clammy and cold, nor was it warmed at all by Anscopius’

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disapproval of the pagan altar. With his piercing blue eyes over an aquiline nose, he peered at me like a stem old hawk.

“Count Arthur, this is sacrilege.”

“But some of the men are not Christian, your grace. If they’re asked to swear on life, it must be by something they hold sacred.”

Anscopius shook his mitered head. “Men like Trystan who

believe in nothing.”

“He has the greatest admiration for the Church, your grace.”

Anscopius was not to be buttered. “I daresay; like a work of

art in someone else’s house. And you, Count? I have not noted

fervent piety among your attributes. By which of these will you

swear?”

“By Holy Church,” I said, adding with a straight face, “Surely 1 am as devout as your own prince.” And that was that. The razor rather than the ax.

My men arrived in twos and threes. Freed from military custom, they dressed to personal and often arresting taste. Trystan was in scarlet, Gareth in blue ‘and brown under the remnants of his legion gear. Lancelot looked as usual like a monk, somber dun robe under the black cloak. Gawain rumbled through to a place in front, resplendent in fox-trimmed green. Plain Bedivere wore his legion leather and old cloak, and I thought, I must make him a gift of something for occasions like this. Behind my captains the dozens stretched away to the doors, a sea of clashing color, furs, here and there a battered legion helmet with its discouraged horsehair crest.

When I rose to speak, the stamping, shuffling hall grew quiet. Someone harked from the back: “Trib—I mean Count Arthur, is’t true we’re free to go home?”

“As if you had one,” someone jibed.

“You’re all free to go,” I called. “But hear me at least. You know I’m a plain-spoken man. Some say a little too plain.”

A mutter of wry laughter.

“I want you—every man of you—to stay with me. We’ve built a force such as Britain’s never seen, and all of us had a part in it. The emperor says, and these are his words, that we are Britain. So I ask you now, who will be Arthur’s man to come with him to the midlands?”

“That’s Saxon country now, most of it,” Gawain puzzled. “Who’s raiding?”

“We are!” I let the words ring through the hall. “For the first time since they came here, we raid them. The emperor has

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promised Prince Maelgwyn and his Catuvellauni their ancient home this summer.”

Young Lord Pwyll stepped forward, an arrogant Dobunni, one of my own countrymen. “I hold no friendship with Catuvellauni, and themselves the worst cattle thieves God ever created. They’re your enemies too, Artos.”

“Pwyll, I serve my king. I have no tribe. That will be understood before any man swears today. I go to the midlands for Ambrosius. It won’t be the battle you knew here. No flags, no glory, not very dangerous, not very clean.” I ran my eyes over the crowd of them to measure their reaction. “Because we will take no prisoners of any age or sex. Understand that now. None.”

No one moved, but a few glanced at each other, appalled.

“So if there’s any man too tenderhearted for that, he can leave now. He’s not sworn. The door’s still open.”

A sibilant murmur as the men shifted about, weighing the meaning. Fire eaters, most of them, they were being offered something meaner than fire.

“And mark me further about your oath. The man who offers his sword to me takes it back as simple lord-comite. Whatever title he bears at home stays at home. While he rides with me, he’s combrogus, companion, equal with all his brother lords.”

Pwyll spoke again. “You expect us to put aside our right of birth to become common knights like the Saxons. Why should we? It’s stupid.”

“Not too stupid,” said Bedivere. “They’re winning.”

Only Trystan found that amusing, but then Tryst was known to giggle over the Book of Revelations.

“We need to learn every lesson we can while there’s time. When Saxons serve a chief on a particular boat or raid, all personal quarrels are put aside on forfeit of life. As we swear today, I promise by that oath that any man who draws a sword against his brother while serving with me will suffer death or banishment.”

Now the heads really wagged and the tongues buzzed busily. I brought it home to them in a simpler way. “When you go home, you can carve each other to your hearts’ content. But do it in my camp and it’s your lot. Nothing’s plainer than that.”

The hotter heads found this wanting; others, like my captains, knew the simple necessity behind it. A brother must be a brother. We had no other intrinsic strength. At my signal, the old bishop came forward.

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“Anscopius will now give benediction and instruct us in the gravity of our oath.”

Leaning on his heavy crozier, Anscopius signed the Cross. “In the name of the Father, the Son and the Holy Ghost. The blessing of God and Holy Church upon this endeavor. My young men, there is no more solemn compact in Christendom than the oath binding lord and man. You take it with no reservation or you perjure, there is no middle course. Your oath clasps you to the very Hand of God. Consider not only the gravity but the particulars of this oath. You are of different peoples with different laws. This oath, sworn on the most holy relics, supersedes all and binds you personally to Count Arthur. No tribal law or loyalty may come before your bond to him. Weigh carefully, then.’ Not only are you sworn in this world, but in the next as well.”

“Now,” I sang out, “who’ll be the first to join me?”

Two stepped forward together, Gareth and Bedivere. Each hesitated politely for the other, then Gareth moved aside.

Bedivere stood before me. “We being oldest friends, he let me go first. Need you and I swear, Artos?”

“We more than others, Bedivere, and rest bound to it. Give me your sword.”

When I held the blade across my open palms, Anscopius asked, “Bedwyr ap Gryffyn, how will you swear?”

“By God and Holy Church.”

Bedivere knelt while I stated the questions of the oath. Then he rested his hand on the reliquary, repeating the quaint words of the Dobunni.

“I, Bedivere, the son of Gryffyn, swear that, head and foot and all in between I am your man, to obey your laws and look to no other lord for increase. That I will be brother to my brother lords and hold faith with none but you saving only God. I swear by God and Holy Church.”

I placed the sword in his uplifted hands. “I create you lord-comite in my service. Rise, Lord Bedivere.”

He was the first who was the oldest and most faithful friend. To hear himself named lord momentarily robbed Bedivere of his decorum. “Well, damn all,” he mumbled.

“And accept one more task as well.” I lifted the banner from its iron socket, held it out to him. “Carry this for me.”

So much all at once was too much for my open-hearted friend. “Your standard, Artos?”

“Haven’t you always carried it, one way or another?”

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All this murmured between us, no one else heard. A good thing because Bedivere’s feelings were too much for him. He blinked and looked down at the stone floor, then grasped the standard firmly. “Well. Well, now. My da won’t be half proud, will he?”

“Stop sniffling, idiot, and stand on my left. We’ve men to swear.”

And all through the day they were sworn: Gareth mac Diurmuid, Trystan of Castle Dore, Ancellius of Clermont-Ferrand—even Pwyll, despite his earlier cavils. One by one they rendered their sword, swore on their deities. Their hand brushed the reliquary or dropped the pinch of incense. Two hundred odd in all, grooms’ sons like Bedivere and men born far above me gave up their past for a future and became simple knights with only the blazon of their shields to tell them apart.

Not all of them liked or held with me personally, an illegitimate upstart from Severn, but they trusted my law and my heart. For these Gawain said it best as he knelt to swear.

“Na, hear me, Pendragon. You’re a deavin’, sly little swick of a Dobunni, and I do swear naught beyond the letter of my word.”

I lost my hand in his huge bear paw. “But you came, Gawain meqq Lot.”

“Aye.” He whisked the longsword from its scabbard light as a butter knife. “Because, damn you, you’re right.”

. In the summer of that year, Arthur who was yet only count or dux bellorum, went into the lands east of Severn and harried the Saxons and everywhere his arms prevailed. The people of Britain came forth in gratitude for their deliverance, for they had seen in all their days no fairer company than Arthur and his knights.

Now Arthur was by nature merciful and wished to spare the heathen despite the king’s stern order. But they were hardened and unrepentant and fleered at his grace. Then Arthur, being much wearied by war, lost patience and delivered them all to be killed.

Anon came a young and comely woman of the heathen with a child at her breast, and said, “Most noble lord, if there be no mercy from you, I fear me there be none in the world. I do beseech you spare my child and me, for certes such as we can do thee no harm.”

Then spake Sir Lancelot thus, “As to the king’s command, natheless we are Christian men, and if ladies cannot look to such as us for grace, where then shall they seek in all Britain. As boon, I beg you let her go.”

And the woman wept pitiably so that even Sir Trystan the paynim was moved to sue for her release. And so did the faithful Sir Bedivere and mild Sir Gareth as well, so that, enrounded by his fairest men all pleading mercy for the woman and child, Arthur then