Christopher Golde

The Gallic King through his Celtic right arm
Seeing the discord of the great Monarchy;
He wil cause his sceptre to flourish over the three parts,
Against the cloak of the great Hierachy.”

Nostradamus                     Century II

          Chapter five
         The Magician

  Date:         1066 AD                                         Location:   Southern England

 

It was as if thunder shook the city walls, as more than one thousand foot soldiers marched in disciplined rows across the drawbridge and through the giant metal gates into the sacred city. The occupants of the city were mostly local farmers that had moved behind the walls for protection, and they watched in awe as the troops flashed past, column after column, in their brilliant gold body armour, The evening sun filtered through the open gates, reflecting spectacularly from the weapons and shields of the marching soldiers in a blinding spectacle that was pure regimental power.

Young and old waived their arms and whatever else they could find, as they lined the streets cheering home their protecting force. The stony-faced professional soldiers marched on into the city along the winding streets, no doubt happy to be home from their lengthy campaign.

At the rear of the marching foot soldiers strode twelve fine white stallions, eleven of which were also draped in gold chain mail, each ridden by a knight bearing a body-length shield. Each shield bore the image of an animal and was inscribed with symbols to identify the family of the shield-bearer. The twelfth rider, who rode at the front of the other eleven, wore the armour of brilliant silver and stood out immediately from the rest. Where all of the other knights on horseback wore open face helmets, his was completely shielded from view by a visor. The visor, shaped as the head of a giant bird of prey, sprouted a plume from a long silver spire.

The silver knight was known to the locals as the Phoenician and although it was rumoured he originated from a land far to the East across the sea, little else was known about him. All they knew for sure was that he and his knights protected their lands and gave them shelter from danger. To his men, he was Artoreuos, their General, and their King.

As the Phoenician and his golden knights entered the city, the giant metal gates slammed shut behind them. The crowd, when they, at last, saw him, erupted into a deafening roar of genuine jubilation. In response, the silver knight lifted his silver lance high into the air as a salute of victory and to this, the crowd yelled even louder.

As his ever-faithful army marched ahead along the winding streets of the city, Artoreuos looked up the hill to his left and saw with pleasure his castle. Its spires seemed to pierce the clouds in the sky above. This most welcome of sights was his home, a home he had not seen for more than a year now. The road they marched, wound its way around and up the hill on which the castle sat. It took almost another hour before at last; he could see the front gates, open and welcoming.

As the marching troops of gold approached the castle, they peeled off and formed a guard of honour for the knights on horseback to pass. It was indeed a spectacular sight, thought Artoreuos, and fitting for his finest warriors. On entering the courtyard, all the knights dismounted and waited obediently for their king to invite them to enter. Courtesans took their tired horses off to stables to bathe, feed and refresh. 

Artoreous strode between his most trusted knights and pulled his fearsome visor from his head. His long blonde locks of hair fell to his shoulders, and his brilliant green eyes flashed in the evening light. The Phoenician was a tall man of about six and a half feet, with massive shoulders that bore effortlessly his heavy body armour and the twin double-edged battle axes that were harnessed across his back. His skin was darker than that of most of his men and his eyes had an ever so slight Asiatic look. He was an exceptionally good-looking man and most women swooned in his presence.

“Well my friends, we are home at last,” he said aloud, as he walked between them towards the open front door. There was a murmur of sincere agreement. “Tonight we will feast, but first my loyal guardians, we must consult the orb.”

At that, Artoreous walked to the giant doors of the castle and entered, followed by his favoured knights. The doors opened to a large outer hallway, with arched stain glass windows and no furnishings other than two long wooden benches against the inner wall. Without pausing, he strode immediately along this corridor with his visor still beneath his giant arms and his knights following silently behind.

Staff from the castle stood obediently still, heads bowed, as he and the knights passed, obviously quite familiar with this ritual of their lord. At the end of the corridor, they came to a large, double wooden door. Standing alone and resolute in front of the door was a huge warrior with arms defiantly folded across his chest. The warrior, whose head was bald and chest was bare, carried a blade known as a giant Saracen in his folded arms. He stared blankly at the approaching knights and made no attempt to move.

Artoreous marched straight up to the guard and stopped within a blade's length, removing one of the double-edged battle axes from his back. With the other free hand, he held his visor behind his back and the closest of the knights, known as the ‘The Lion’, took it into his care. Without releasing his own eyes from the blind stare of the giant, he brought the axe to centre and took hold of it in both hands as if ready to attack.

The giant did not move and remained where he was, blocking access to the door. Artoreous raised his battle-axe above his head, then without pause, swung towards the giant in an arch which would surely remove his head. With blinding speed, the giant’s crescent-shaped blade left his chest and met the path of the axe with a clash of metal so loud; it caused some of the servants nearby to drop to their knees. Both King and protector, remained in their battle stance, both weapons as if welded together, remained at odds.

“To a foe, you are the protector of the Orb,” said Artoreous, to the giant, without breaking his stance, “to the King of Camelot, you are his trusted guardian.”

At these words, the giant pulled back his blade and fell to one knee head bowed.

“My King, forgive me,” said the guardian, without raising his head.

Artoreous smiled and relaxed his stance, returning the battle-axe to his back strap.

“My blind protector of the Orb, rise. You continue to do well not to trust even your senses, as magic and treachery are rife,” said the King, slapping the blind giant on the shoulder. The protector of the Orb rose and with head bowed, stood aside and pushed open the door behind him. The two knights, known as ‘The Bear’ and ‘The Lion’, looked at each other and smiled knowingly. Artoreous walked into the room and as ‘The Lion’ passed the giant, he looked up into his blind face and nodded approvingly.

‘The Lion’ was the King's most trusted and longest-serving knight, and more than any other man there appreciated the guardian. He knew that the faithful warrior had originally lost his sight serving their King in battle. It had been Artoreous himself that had taught the giant to fight as well as any seeing man, and then appointed him to guard the kingdoms most precious treasure, ‘The Orb’.

‘The Orb’ had been discovered fifteen years previous in the local forest and brought to this castle, which at that time, had been owned by a local knight. There it sat, in the castle's courtyard for another five years, tempting warriors of fortune to remove the sword of stone from the spherical rock. It became a legendary challenge over those years, and eventually, it was said by the locals, that whoever moved the stone sword, would be the next King. That was when Artoreous arrived, riding mysteriously from the forest with five well-armed knights and the giant in his company.

From there, legend had become reality, and when Artoreous removed the stone sword, the knight had knelt before him and offered him his castle. Artoreous accepted the offer as if it were his born right, and over the ensuing years, enlisted the services of eleven brave knights to serve by his side.

As all of the Knights filed in past the giant, ‘The Lion’ looked up to see what was left of the evening light streaming in through the lead glass dome that was the ceiling. He loved this magical part of the castle and was in fact, the only other knight as well as the giant that had served Artoreous when the room was first built to house the Orb.

It was completely round, and the only furnishings were twelve, grand, high back chairs that were positioned in a circle around the centre of the floor. As 'The Lion' followed Artoreous around the twelve chairs, he admired the paintings on the walls that depicted an epic battle scene. The mural was one continuous montage that circumnavigated completely the entire room, and allowed the viewer, to feel that they were indeed standing amidst the conflict. In the painting at the far end of the room, flew the banner of ‘The Phoenician’, and beneath it, Artoreous in his most magnificent visor, both battle axes are drawn, challenging a black knight on horseback to one side, and a giant dragon to the other.

As the knights circled the ring of twelve chairs, each came to his own banner hanging down from the ceiling and stood to wait for their Supreme Commander to give the order to be seated. At the centre of the circle of chairs, elevated on a flat crystalline substance, was a large black orb made of a metallic looking stone. Protruding from the orb was what seemed to be a sword, also made from the same strange stone substance.

Artoreous stood by his chair, waited till all his eleven knights were by theirs and then indicated for them to be seated. He remained standing until all took their place, then, walked over to the Orb.

“Brave Knights of the round room, again you have proven yourselves worthy to the realm of the Phoenix,” he said, as he looked about at each of the eleven seated knights. “Once again, we have done the work of ‘The Orb’, and we are now back all as one, as promised. The Orb has taught us righteousness and truth in a world that faces constantly an imminent threat posed by the forces of evil. Our ‘Isle of Angels’  will one day, as promised, be a great and good power in the world all because of your brave sacrifices.”

At that, there was a unison of agreement from the knights.

“Before we rest a much-deserved rest,” he continued, “we must first seek instructions from ‘The Orb’ as to our next campaign.”

With those words, Artoreous took one more step up to the Orb, took hold of the stone-like sword, and pulled it towards the ceiling, then moved back to his chair and was seated. Once the stone sword was removed, a sliding noise immediately emanated from the Orb and it instantly began to change its shape. In a complex singular movement, the whole orb seemed to shuffle like a deck of cards, and the once roundness of it flattened out and spread around the room, right up to the very precisely positioned knights sitting in their chairs. Once all the movement had ceased, what was now left, was an enormous, round, black stone table, at which were seated, twelve medieval knights.

The King looked with satisfaction at the table and reached over, putting his hand on a portion of the table knowingly. At his touch, a light emanated from the centre of the table, and a human face appeared that was visible, yet at the same time, transparent.

“Great Magician” began Artoreous, “we have returned from the quest you had prepared for us, and now William is King and our task is complete. In what way can we serve your future needs and when?”

There was a significant pause before the head, which had long white hair, pointed beard and bushy eyebrows spoke.

“My King, you have done thee well, but now you should rest because it will be another year before your services, and those of your knights, are required. My warning though is to not at this time be complacent, as these times are unstable, and you must be on your guard. Bring as little attention to your kingdom as possible, or there will be those that would make every effort to destroy you, especially from Rome.”

Artoreous already knew this well and had kept his profile almost at legendary status, in order not to attract attention to their cause.

“Your next mission will be you’re most dangerous, and could very well cost you your kingdom,” the voice continued.

This immediately sparked concern among the Knights, and there was some murmuring among them, which Artoreous quelled immediately.

“You will be expected to carry an important message away from the holy land to be placed in safekeeping for three hundred years,” continued the voice. ”This message will bring light to a dark world and your quest will become legendary. This will be the Holy Grail of all your quests and your knights must be prepared to make the ultimate sacrifice, as some will die, or face persecution unendurable for most. You must condition them personally Artoreous. Now go and rest, you have much ahead in the next year. Seek more information from me in six moons hence.”

At that, the light and the face disappeared, and once again, the table made a strange sliding noise, as it reshuffled and began to revert to its shape as a ball. Artoreous stood and walked over to the orb, placing the stone sword back into its position.

“You have heard the Magician speak,” he said grimly, turning about the room and speaking to his brave knights. “We have much to prepare for, but for tonight, let’s feast, then rest and concern ourselves with this future as it approaches us. Now go, we will feast at dark”

There was general agreement, as most were too weary at that time to face the darkness of the message from the Orb. All of them had faced death on many occasions, so it was of little concern to them when it could be more than a year from now. They all stood and left talking freely as they went. Artoreous stood looking at the Orb, clearly not at ease with the message.

From behind him came a voice. It was ‘The Lion’, his closest friend and companion.

“It worries you, my King,” he asked, knowing that it would be unusual for Artoreous to actually confirm a fear to anybody.

“My dear friend,” he said, turning to face the kind, smooth, good-looking features of his most trusted friend ‘The Lion’, “there is something new in this message that I sense. I fear this may be our last campaign.’; but let’s not worry about that now,” he said, turning and slapping his giant hand on the knights back, “let us prepare to feast, and perhaps have some womanizing.”

At that, both warriors laughed aloud and walked from the sacred room. The door closed behind them, and the giant resumed his vigil of guarding its entrance.

Inside the room, all was not as still as would be expected. Once again the orb was moving. It was performing complex calculations and prepared astronomical charts that would make up a message that in another three hundred years if Artoreous and his knights were successful, would help a scientist by the name of Copernicus, change the world from dark to light.