The Siege of Camelot’s Keep

The floor shuddered. Copious coughs stirring clouds of dust issued from all sides, billowing among us lads like only clouds can. The wall shook again, this time escorted by the cheerful clattering of debris from above.

“We can’t take much more of this, mates!” someone yelled.

 

I thoroughly agreed with the man’s sentiments, though unfortunately all I had left to offer at the time were just a nod and a look of what I hoped was steel, stern determination. Motivation is key in these sorts of situations, they say.

As it happens, the sound of one’s commanding officer’s speech taking on the tone consistent with those of the glass shattering variety does bode rather well with men’s spirits in certain situations. Say, when circumstances included a play, stage and no certain risk of loss to life and/or limb to anyone in the very near future, then yes, one’s commanding officer’s voice shattering glass is well accepted.

Current circumstances did not, however, include a play, nor a stage, and there was very certain risk of losing one’s life and limb, and fairly soon from the looks of things. The men’s frail morale was better off without my voice to help break it, along with what was left of the windows.

 

Sir Kurzalot, thankfully, was not so afflicted.

“Accursed dwarves!” he bellowed, “I will HAVE AT THEE! I WILL...”

The rest of us were spared the knowledge of the dwarves fate as the door buckled again, throwing him down on his knees. Undaunted, he smeared the blood off his visor and clambered up and pushed his shoulders against it once more.

 

“I told you before, they’re not dwarves, they’re gnomes,” Sir Aquerat grumbled. A fresh impact on the other side threw down him away as well. He returned unperturbed, adjusting the lenses on his nose, “There’s a difference. The heads are smaller and...”

“They look like little people,” Sir Mohrawn interrupted, “Tiny little people with little white beards.”

Kneeling, he peered through one of the cracks in the door.

“I think they want to be friends with us,” he observed, brow furrowed in grave countenance, “I counsel that we consider an alliance with them.”

“Someone remind me why we brought him with us?” I muttered.

“He slipped in before we could get the door fully closed, m’lord,” Sir Aquerat sighed, “And we couldn’t push him out in time, so here we are.”

 

“They’ve taken the walls, Sir!” the lookout called down. The last I had seen of young squire Hoppluz, his frail limbs had been wrapped with impressive dexterity around the flag pole that jutted out of the side of the tower.  From the sound and direction of his voice, it seemed that, surprisingly and against literally all odds, he still prevailed.

One would have commended the lad on his courage for enduring in the face of danger for as long as he had. Another would have probably noticed that the stairs leading to the tower weren’t technically stairs anymore, and that beneath the protruding pole was a sheer drop on all sides.

Clearly, the only choice the young man had in the matter was death, by either stray arrow or gravity. Seeing as how he was rather opposed to both, and vantage being the only asset still in his possession and of use to the cause, coupled with his own predisposition to please any and every man in a suit of armor, it seemed only natural that he throw himself, metaphorically speaking, into the task at hand.

 

“That’s it, no point in fighting anymore,” Sir Myseri sighed, “We might as well give up and get it over with.”

“How about we just feed this worthless inbred rust-armored coward to them and be done with him?!” Sir Kurzalot suggested.

“If it wasn’t for the severe conditions of chronic being-outnumbered-ness, mate, I’d vote in your favor,” Sir Bhoistres agreed.

Sir Myseri sighed, halfheartedly swiping at newly collected spittle residue over the side of his helm.

 

Sir Bhoistres leaned back to peer through the ceiling, now boasting the structural integrity of Swiss cheese, and espied the tiny squire, still clinging to the angled pole for dear life.

“How many of us are left on the outside, lad?” he bellowed.

The squire twisted around to cast eyes on the keep.

“What was that?” he called.

Sir Bhoistres obliged him.

Squire Hoppluz reiterated his request. This went on for a little while longer.

“Doomed,” Sir Myseri moaned, “We’re doomed.”

“Calm yourself, man,” Sir Khumferanz reassured him, “The end isn’t here just yet.”

The words were hearty and much needed, and much more inspiring when one chose to ignore the rivers cascading down Sir Khumferanz’s rotund visage, and especially the way the balls of his eyes seemed just about ready to pop out of their sockets like a pair of fatally obese marbles on extremely unhealthy diets.

The valiant efforts of his plate armor deserved praise, as well. Straining against the pressure from within was a feat of incredible fortitude on a daily basis; the fact that they had even now resisted the sweet temptation of spontaneously disassembling in the face of his hyperventilation was beyond commendation.

 

The squire’s gaze shifted away from the keep and to out beyond the walls.

“Looks like they’ve run out of boulders to throw!”  He announced, “Still advancing, but no more boulders!”

“Breathe easy, Sir Khumferanz,” I said, “You just might be right.”

The others sighed in turn, and alternated mopping wet brows with wetter kerchiefs.

“That is some measure of good news.” Sir Aquerat readjusted the lenses on his nose.

 

Ten seconds were all the time we were allowed to be relieved.

“Wait...wait look out!” Hoppluz yelled.

It was one of those calls of warning that gave you no warning whatsoever. An eardrum traumatizing crack of shattering stone heralded a fresh impact against the outer wall, throwing the six of us back to the floor, where the debris welcomed our return with open pointy bits.

“What was that, then?!” I demanded.

 

“Watch out, m’lords,” the squire called, “They’re climbing into the catapult buckets, and... and they’re rolling into balls. They’re lobbing themselves at the walls!”

It was news to make a grown man reel. Reel we did, though it was more physically in response to more shockwaves courtesy of the enemy than mentally in response to the news.

“Surely the impact would make corpses of them?” Sir Khumferanz demanded, his bulk literally flexing and waning in time to his inhales and exhales.

Gleeful high pitched laughter worked its way through the arrow slits, fading with the pattering of little feet as the live ammunition raced back to their catapults for more.

“I would assume not so much,” Sir Aquerat informed us, “Unless, of course, corpses can laugh like that.”

 

“Camelot is doomed this day,” Sir Myseri reminded us kindly.

No one talked him down this time. Sir Khumferanz sat back, the pace of his respiration rendering any form of speech near impossible, even as Sir Kurzalot muttered under his breath, the pace of his abuses rendering any form of respiration near impossible. On the other side of me, Sir Aquerat leaned back against the battered door, helm on the floor by his side, polishing his lenses with an air of peaceful finality.

Sir Bhoistres adjusted the straps on his shield, silent for what had to be the first time in his life. Sir Myseri had taken off his helm, and with the dust settling on the sheen of sweat, his face bore an eerie passing to a stone statue of peacefulness.

And as for Sir Mohrawn... well, Sir Mohrawn still had one eye on the crack in the door, and we could overhear words sounding suspiciously like “trust”, “accords” and “bouncy” muttered under his breath.

 

For all the adventures we had shared and all the battles we had fought, it had finally come down to this. I knelt before them, my brothers, and I finally let the exhaustion take me. Amid the shuddering explosions and the falling rubble, I released the hold on my emotions, letting the rage come, then the frailty of helplessness, and sorrow. Loss shook my foundations, even as much as the gnomes shook the Keep’s.

 

It was then, when our last hope was crushed, when the finest moments of our lives flashed before our eyes, (bundled with a few other moments we wished we’d rather forgotten long ago), when light finally returned to us.

And rather quite literally, as it happened. It exploded into being, dazzling brightness dead center of the destroyed hallway, agony to us all who had been in this darkness for the best part of an hour or so.

 

“Could you turn that down a bit?” Sir Myseri’s voice alone prevailed above the yells and screams of anguish, a feat that came of being well experienced in the ways of torture, “If that’s heaven calling, I’d rather not be blind when I answer.”

“Sorry, sorry,” Merlin called out, his voice an echo from within the luminous halo’s depths, “The trans-dimensional pathways get dark this time of year. Just a second.”

 

The glare waned, and yet the light remained, emanating from the very resplendent robes of our savior. His beard, thick and long, laughed at us with its infinite wisdom, and his eyebrows welcomed us as old friends.

“Oh, good, you’re still alive,” Merlin said, twisting to pat off the trans-dimensional dust settled on his rear, “To be quite frank, I was rather expecting to see most of you to dead by now. Some,” he added, raising an eyebrow at Sir Mohrawn, “more than others.”

Sir Mohrawn, finally having something intriguing enough closer to home than the gnome encampments to fixate on, spun around and threw himself flat against the door, eyes wide and face grim.

 “Worry not, my brothers,” he whispered, sotto voce, “There is a new person in our presence. He may be dangerous, but we may be able to form an alliance with him.”

“Mate, how many times... that’s Merlin,” Sir Bhoistres sighed, “Why do I even bother?”

 

The relief flooding through my veins bade me take notice of them, and I paid heed.

“You took your time, Merlin,” I said, “but thank Excalibro you’re here.”

It was excruciating a task indeed to haul myself back onto my feet, yet I managed to limp forward, steadying myself as the floor shook for the umpteenth time.

 “Tell me,” I whispered, “Tell me you found what you were looking for.”

 

The Wise One’s beard smiled down benevolently at me.

“Indeed I have, old friend,” he proclaimed, flinging aside his cloak, “Behold, thou salvaged souls! Our salvation!”

 

Sturdy fingers gripped my arms from behind as Sir Bhoistres and Sir Mohrawn helped steady me. Together, the three of us stared at the shallow, flimsy oblong box. Holding it aloft in both hands as if displaying the Holy Braille, Merlin beamed at us and at the rest of my Knights as they peered over our shoulders.

When a full five minutes had passed and none of us had made a move or spoken a word, he dropped his smile.

“Really?” he said, with what some would have said was a certain amount of exasperation, “None of you have ever heard of chess before?”

 

Behind me, my Knights exchanged glances. As tempted as I was to join them, I knew that my place as their commanding officer was to look deep into Merlin’s eyes and hold that gaze for as long as I could without blinking. When I felt more than saw that their gazes had, one by one, turned to me, I knew it was time to ask the question that needed to be asked.

“What,” I asked, keeping my eyes focused, “is chess?”

 

Merlin lowered the box, closed his eyes and slowly tilted his head back till he was facing the ceiling. We waited patiently till he was done, having witnessed these bouts before, usually very soon after he had asked us a question and we had failed to reply. It usually lasted no more than a few minutes, where he tilted his head back in silence, eyes closed. On occasion he had passed a hand over his forehead, and at other times he had shook his head repeatedly, mouthing what had been said was the word ‘I’ silently.

 

Being all powerful and carrying so much knowledge was a burden to be borne and we understood the mental strains that such power brought with it. Not one of us spoke, until, as expected, he finally returned from his ritualistic seizure with the customary sigh and shake of his head. And when he started speaking, it was the same as all the other times; slow and loud.

 

“This…” he said, “Is chess. It is a... pastime, if you will, a relic from the realms beyond. These foes outside, they are weapons Morgana stole from the same realms.”

“Those creatures are weapons?” Sir Aquerat demanded, horrified, “But... they’re gnomes! They can’t be...”

“It’s a manner of speaking,” Merlin said, closing his eyes again, “To make this fast, Morgana tapped into the trans-dimensional force and brought them here. She genetically enhanced them and bred them just to destroy Camelot, and by extension, you. You lot wouldn’t be such an immense loss, but Camelot needs saving nonetheless.”

 

“Genna-what?” Sir Mohrawn blinked and let go of my arm. I watched as he reached up to open the hinged cover at the side of his helmet and scratched at the spot underneath. There was a tale to this hatch, of how it used to be when Sir Mohrawn habitually took the liberty of removing his helmet in the midst of battle to better scratch at his head when something confused him. Since he was very often confused and the Knights had grown fed up of lugging his unconscious body all the way back home, the weaponsmith insisted that it “was all fun and games till the Mohrawn took an arrow to the eye”.

Admittedly, we might have all been better off if an enemy soldier had taken the initiative at least once to use the pointy bit rather than hit him with a blunt instrument, but since we had kept waiting for that to no avail, the smith went ahead and custom crafted that helm himself.

 

Why this memory came back to me in the midst of Merlin’s complicated explanation on how chess worked I cannot say, but by the time I had turned back to him with my full attention again, there was a square checkered board hovering in midair between us, and on his hovering square were placed tiny figurines. Being the commanding officer that I was, I dared not ask him to explain again and undermine the hope of my men, so I nodded and pretended to understand as he continued to speak.

“... so since I’ve altered the pieces to reflect the images of both us and our enemies, it will give us a bird’s eye view of what’s happening out there.” Merlin said, busying himself with placing more pieces on the black and white squares.

“But we already have a bird’s eye view,” Sir Aquerat protested.

A loud wooden snap interrupted him from the outside and far above, trailed by a long drawn out scream. We seven collectively winced as it cut out abruptly.

“Bird’s eye view, that’s a definite advantage we could do with,” Sir Aquerat nodded and waved a hand, “Do continue.”

 

Merlin shook his head.

“Morgana is controlling them using a bead and a vial of catnip,” he said, hurrying around the board, a small pouch grasped in his wizened fingers, “The magic from this board can override her commands, and we just might be able to take control of the gnomes for long enough to make them turn on her. Just maybe, using this, we should be able to defeat them from inside this very Keep.”

Back into the little pouch he plunged his hand and out into the light he drew out a fistful of more figurines.

“It is imperative that once a piece has been put into play and linked to a host, it will NOT be taken off the board,” Merlin continued, “The consequences of such an act…”

 

Again he was interrupted, this time by a loud joyous whoop. The whooper reached his epitome at the wall, sending forth a fresh shockwave that tripped Merlin up. Out of balance, his fingers let go of the pouch and fell, scattering the little figurines far and wide.

“Oh, bother,” he muttered, stooping down to pick them.

In the brief half second that he was bent over, Sir Mohrawn reached past us and plucked one of the figurines off the board.

“What manner of sorcery is this?” he wondered, examining the intricately carved white and grey robes and the diminutive yet proportionately long, wavy beard, “It is miniscule and yet so full of life. Perhaps we might negotiate with them and...”

Merlin stood back up again faster than the way he had arrived.

“No, don’t touch that!!”

Startled, Sir Mohrawn let go of the little robed man, and this was the moment when time slowed. We watched it fall, twirl and fall some more for what seemed an hour and a half.

It hit the rubble strewn floor, bounced once, twice, and came to a standstill. The little grey beard had broken off and lay abandoned a few inches away.

We stared in silence at the little figurine on the stone floor, and no one said a word even as it flickered and vanished into nothing.

“Um... Merlin...?” I began, looking up.

It should not have been a problem enlisting his services at that moment. Unfortunately, Merlin wasn’t with us anymore.

 

The floor began to shake again, and this time, it had nothing to do with rolled-up catapulting gnomes.

“What was that he said about the consequences, earlier?” Sir Aquerat wondered aloud, gaze on the hovering checkered square, now pulsating an alarming shade of green.

“I don’t think he quite finished his sentence, mate,” Sir Bhoistres reminded him.

“Ah.”

The board was spinning now, green bolts of lightning striking the floor and the ceiling above. Cracks ran up and down the walls, drawing themselves into the stone ground. I watched as the closest one ran between my feet and slowly began to grow wider, even as chunks of stone and dust fell from above.

“Well, mates,” Sir Bhoistres sighed, “Looks like we’re checkered.”

Sir Mohrawn nodded thoughtfully.

“Aye,” he agreed, “That’s a check, mate.”

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