Merlin's Gold

Merlin's Gold - Chapter 14 - A Penny for Your Thoughts

Chapter 14 – A Penny for Your Thoughts

Tintagel was in mourning. Their vibrant young queen had died in childbirth, King Mark visibly breaking down as he proclaimed the news from the high balcony above the Inner Bailey. His son and only heir had been stillborn; his wife following their child into the shifting mists of the netherworld.

Since the event, Mark had all but disappeared from public view leaving his Sheriff to run the town, which laboured on, subdued under its banner of black, the midnight dark flag flying from the highest tower of the castle.

Mark was a good and popular king, considered a fair and just man by all but the small criminal fraternity who managed to survive in the shadows. He had once passed a specially minted copper coin to all the children in the town, a gift to celebrate his wedding to his beautiful young wife, something Percival had treasured until he'd had to use it to pay for his mother's burial. He still remembered the dark and kindly eyes as the king had passed over the coin, seeing the fresh copper glint in his grubby hand.

Things had changed since then. Now Percival sat in the lee of a door in abject misery, trying vainly to find comfort enough to allow sleep. Winter approached and he knew he was going to be in trouble. His tenth summer had just gone, but for the first time in his young life he was utterly alone. His mother had died in the summer of some sort of wasting disease, and without her able to earn the odd copper he had no food, no shelter, and no hope. He had taken to stealing to support himself, and hated the fact he had to, terrified the town guard would catch him. He was well aware of what his mother had been, the other kids endlessly taunting the bastard: son of a whore. He'd heard the whole gamut of insults and had become virtually immune to them. His mother had loved him, that had been all that mattered, but now he was lost, and alone.

Wrapping the thin sack more tightly around his shoulders he tried desperately to think. He was tired, cold and wretched, but had kept himself as clean as he could, bathing in the cold grey sea, knowing that if he lost himself completely he would truly become the animal the other children suggested he might be. Percival played absently with a dagger he had stolen from a merchant. It was plain but well made and had already been used. His anger had got the better of him when he had turned on one of the older boys who had been taunting him. He'd narrowly missing cutting the boy, but put a deep slash in the boy's coat. He knew tomorrow they would come for him, knew he would have to fight as he'd always had to fight. His blue eyes blazed in the silvery darkness; fighting was the only thing he knew now, anger was the only thing that sustained him and made him feel alive.

He shivered and turned at a sound echoing down the alley. Footsteps; halting, staggering, and inconsistent. He looked out from his shadowed corner to see a large man meandering along the alley, having just left one of the local Inns. Light from the alehouse window briefly illuminated the man's features as he passed, and Percival was startled to see the haggard and grey face of his King. Grief was plain to see on his bearded face. The king had been crying and was now drunk, a staggering shambles of the man he once had been.

Percival looked at him in horror, stunned to see the man's decline from vital, caring monarch to street drunkard. Wondering whether to approach, he sat in statue-like indecisiveness in his doorway, until another movement caught his eye.

Two darkened forms were stealthily approaching the king from behind. Entirely wrapped up in his own private misery and inebriation, the king was utterly unaware of his surroundings, or his peril. The silvery flicker of moonlight on a naked blade from behind the king ended the boy's indecision, and he leapt from the doorway, shedding his thin covering, shouting in warning as he raced towards the king.

"My King, behind you, 'ware thieves!"

The King's head came up from his chest at the shout, and he spun around clumsily to face the two thieves who moved towards him. Drawing his sword from its scabbard he faced the men, weaving drunkenly in the confines of the alley.