The King Arthur Trilogy Read Online Free Page A

they were carried along by a river in spate. The snow had been swept from the tournament field outside the city walls, so that it was like a greenlake in the white-bound countryside; and all round the margin of the lake were the painted stands for the onlookers and the pavilions of those who were to take part; blue and emerald and vermilion, chequered and striped; and the crowds were gathering thicker every moment, and all among them horses were being walked up and down, their breath steaming on the cold air. And it all seemed to Arthur, fresh from his forest country, to be as beautiful and confusing as some kind of dream.
    But just as they reached the tournament ground, Kay discovered that, with too much eagerness and too much anxiety, he had left his sword behind him at the inn.
    ‘That is my blame,’ Arthur said quickly. ‘I am your squire, I should have seen that you were properly armed.’
    And Kay, who had been going to say that same thing himself, could only say, ‘It’s over late to be worrying as to whose blame it is. Ride back quickly and fetch it and come on after us.’
    So Arthur turned his cob and began to ride back the way they had come. But now he was going against the flow of the people, and when at last he managed to reach the inn, it was fast locked and shuttered, and all the people of the house were gone to watch the jousting.
    Now what am I to do? thought Arthur. There will be jests and laughter if Kay comes to the tournamentwithout a sword – and yet how am I to get one for him in this strange city and with so little time to spare?
    And as if in answer, there came clearly into his mind the picture of a sword that he had seen earlier that morning, standing upright in a stone in the garth of the great abbey church close by. I wonder what it is there for, and if it lifts out of the stone? he thought, and found that he was already urging his cob that way.
    For the strange thing was that in the moment that he thought of the sword in the stone, he forgot its meaning and why the tournament had been called. Maybe that had something to do with the passing beggarman whose strange golden eyes had met his for an instant as he turned his cob from the locked door of the inn; for assuredly if he had not forgotten, he would never have thought of trying to get it out of the stone, even for Kay his foster brother …
    When he reached the garth of the abbey church he dismounted and hitched his cob to the gate and went in. The fresh snow lay among the tombstones, and in the midst of the tall black sentinel towers of the yew trees the pavilion glowed crimson as a rose at Midsummer; and the sword stood lonely in its anvil on the great stone, for even the ten knights were gone to the jousting.
    Then Arthur took the sword two-handed by its quillions. There was golden writing on the stone, but he did not stop to read it. The sword seemed to thrill underhis touch as a harp thrills in response to its master’s hand. He felt strange, as though he were on the point of learning some truth that he had forgotten before he was born. The thin winter sunlight was so piercing-bright that he seemed to hear it; a high white music in his blood.
    He drew the sword from the anvil in one familiar-seeming movement as though from a well-oiled sheath. And he ran back to the gate where his cob waited, and made all haste back towards the tournament field. The crowds in the streets were thinning now, and in only a short while he reached the place where Sir Kay had turned aside, sitting his horse in a fret, to wait for him.
    ‘This is not my sword,’ Kay said, as Arthur thrust it into his hand.
    ‘I could not get in, the place was locked up – I came on this one by chance, in the abbey garth, sticking in a great stone –’
    Kay looked at the sword again. He was suddenly very white. Then he wheeled his horse and began thrusting through the crowd towards Sir Ector, who had ridden on ahead. Arthur followed hard behind.
    ‘Sir,’ said Kay,