I turned and headed for Camelot.
Chapter Forty-seven
Despite everything, I took a moment to stare at the real Camelot. According to Rosier, it hadn’t been called that until the thirteenth century, when some French poet decided he liked the name. In all the older texts, Arthur’s main seat was Caerleon, the sprawling stone-built city of the Romans, originally designed to house the six thousand soldiers of the Second Legion Augusta.
And looked like it still did.
On my left was a bustling port town, where white stuccoed buildings with red terra-cotta roofs sat side by side with thatched Celtic structures. Straight ahead, peering over some rooftops, was the old Roman amphitheater, its multicolored pennants shining brilliantly even on an overcast day. To the right, above a rise of ground, were the turreted stone walls surrounding the old city, built by the Second Augusta to withstand tribes of warring Celts. And, finally, on a hill overlooking it all, were the tall gray towers of a castle.
I teared up unexpectedly, I didn’t know why. Something about seeing a legend in the flesh, so to speak. Or maybe it had to do with the way the late-afternoon light hit the city, glinting redly off marble arches and sparkling fountains, and adding life to the gold paint someone had used to carefully pick out the scrollwork on centuries-old porticoes.
Of course, there were other things the light hit, too. Like the many-times-patched plaster that was crumbling yet again; the rusted, salt-encrusted ironwork meant for a drier clime; the wooden roof tiles that had been carefully shaped and painted to resemble the terra-cotta ones that nobody could get anymore; and the once proud Roman road cutting through it all, its surface now pitted and potholed. It looked like a city trying to recreate the splendors of the past, but not getting it quite right.
Yet that didn’t seem to matter so much. In fact, to me, it just made it all the more impressive. Not Hollywood pretty and unbelievably clean, like the only Camelots I’d ever seen, but like people had lived and fought and loved and died here.
Maybe because they had.
According to Rosier, the cracks in the plaster weren’t artistic license but mended bones, the rivers of rust below the old gutters tears of blood, the broken cobblestones fractured teeth. Rome might have built this place, but it hadn’t defended it. It had up and left one day, with almost no warning. Leaving the local people, many of whom thought of themselves as Roman, too, after centuries of its rule, high and dry.
And prey to every invader with a boat and a sword, and every hill tribe looking for plunder.
Until Uther, with his uncouth swagger and keen mind, and a grandfather who’d served in the Roman cavalry. And a son, born in the city his father had bled for, and dedicated to the same goal: holding civilization together. And, for a while, they’d actually pulled it off.
Just like in the stories, the old fortress had become the base for cavalry units trained in the Roman style. And while not quite the knights in shining armor of the fables, they were devastatingly effective against the disorderly foot soldiers of the local chieftains. The revolts that followed Roman withdrawal were put down, the Saxons repulsed, and for one brief, shining moment, peace had reigned. An era that must have seemed truly magical to a people rent by war both before and after.
An era the world would remember as Camelot.
“Girl! Are you deaf? I said get out of the way!”
It took me a second to realize that the guard was talking to me. He was one of a group of soldiers who’d run up to help the beleaguered sailors. While I was just standing there, dripping, in the rough woolen dress and cloak Augustine had whipped up for me, to approximate female attire of the period.
But not female attire of the wealthy, I guessed, because I got a cuff to my ear when I took too long.
I got out of the way.
And scrambled up the hill to the shade of an oak tree, where a Medusa snarl of eels was lying in the dirt. They were waiting to have their skins stripped off by a curly-haired boy who did not appear enthusiastic about the work. But not because of the bloody eel carcasses, which he handled with the indifference of long experience.
But because he was missing what looked like the greatest medieval faire ever.
And so I stared some more. I’d heard the sound of a crowd from the pier—music playing, hawkers calling, people talking—but had thought it was coming from the city. And maybe some of it was. But the teeming mass in front of me was plenty big enough to account for it all on its own.
The walled city on the one side, and the port town on the other, had a grassy gap in between them. And that, plus the open land along the river, was clogged with people. I’d hoped to catch up with Rosier and help him locate Pritkin before Billy got back, but how was I supposed to find him in this?
How was I supposed to find anyone?
Everywhere I looked there were tents and performers and overly excited dogs. There were drunk adults and laughing kids and gap-toothed old women selling mead. Over by the city walls, an archery contest was going on, with regular roars of approval from the crowd. Closer in, a swarthy type with a hooknose and a wand was painting stories in the air with fire: battling knights and fierce dragons and a princess in a tower. And a little way off, a couple of enterprising guys had rigged up a clay oven on a cart, so they could sell fresh-baked pies to the crowd.
The pies smelled heavenly, to the point that my mouth started watering, but I had no money. So I pulled out a pouch I’d slung around my neck, because I couldn’t afford to be hungry right now. Although cranberry nut bars seriously lost out compared with fresh-baked meat and bread.
Only somebody else didn’t seem to think so.
I looked down to see Eel Boy staring longingly at my snack. For a kid who worked at a food stall, he wasn’t exactly overfed. The arms and legs under the rough tunic were thin, and the cheeks, while not sunken, lacked the expected layer of baby fat. I glanced at the burly guy on the other side of the tree, stirring a pot of stew, who looked like he ate all the leftovers, and who wasn’t paying us any attention.
Then I crouched beside the boy. “Want one?”
He looked from the peeled bar to me and back again. And licked his lips. But he didn’t take it.
“It’s yours,” I said, and took out another, after putting his on the edge of my dress.