An Excerpt From: The Shards of Arthur’s Shield
By: A.B. Timothy
Thomas’s boots ran over cold, slick, and muddy turf as it changed from urban foot paths to the more wild floor of the woods. The sky disappeared overhead as he raced into the trees. Just before he crossed the treeline, he spotted the pale woman again. It was certainly dark enough for her to be out, but it still seemed early. The timeliness of her appearance did not faze Thomas; however, instead, he called out to her, “Run, Miss! Get out of here!” He only spared her a glance and a swiping hand of warning. He hoped she would get out of there, but she just stood her ground and watched him approach the treeline. Thomas gave up on her and turned his focus back on the path before him. She began to sing: “Arthurus, rex occidentis.” Thomas gave her another glance, and her mouth was still not moving, even this close, but that was the same voice he heard every night.
The way wound before him as he jumped over branches, slid under foliage, and pushed through weeds. After a minute of brushing, Thomas was shocked to hear his foe still pursuing him. Thomas questioned how that man had even managed to slip through some of the spots he had. It did not matter; what mattered was escape. “Arthurus, rex sepultus,” the siren kept singing.
Thomas slipped and fell face-first into the brush and only managed to turn over in time to see his foe breach the bush with a swipe of a sword. “There you are, you little rat, no one likes a rat in their backyard!” He brought his sword down, but it sank into the mud as Thomas had rolled away. The young man stood quickly, gathering a fistful of mud as he did.
“Can a rat do this?” Thomas threw the mud in the man’s face and took off into the brush again. He heard the man curse and roar in rage, and he knew his mud had made its target.
Thomas hopped over another fallen tree and pushed deeper into the woods. He could not remember ever being this deep before. He did not recognize the trees and only knew what general direction he was heading. He had passed his last established landmark a few strides ago. “Surge, Domine Matutinae,” the voice sang.
How had she been keeping up with him, and if she could keep up with him with enough breath to sing so sweetly, why hadn’t she come to his aid yet? Would she? Thomas decided he would not count on this clearly ethereal being. The thought crossed his mind to circle back, maybe try to get the jump on the bandit, but something called him deeper into the woods.
“Surge, Mundus Vocat.” The words swam through Thomas’s mind, confusing him and dragging him further into the forest. The young man feared for his life. The armed bandit behind him, an unknown world in front of him.
Thomas stopped only long enough to catch his breath in a clearing. The moonlight shone down from above and painted the scene in a silver glow. The young man’s breath caught in his lungs. The grass, only moments ago green, was now coated in the moon’s silver; the trees, which had been changing color, now shone; and the little stream that ran nearby had pricks of light jumping into Thomas’s eyes. This place was strange, almost holy. It was as if God cut a hole in the trees just for this small meadow. To emphasize the thought, a head appeared to rise from the water, and if Thomas had not recognized it, he may have screamed and run for his life towards the bandit. The head in the water rose further, just enough to imply an entire woman underneath the surface; it was the pale woman, the siren. She opened her mouth and raised a hand from the water. The hand pointed at a small hill in the center of the clearing. She sang the words, but he knew them. Not what they meant in whatever language she was singing, but the words fell into the depths of his soul, and he knew them, “Tua ferrum manet.” That’s what she said, but in his heart, Thomas heard her sing, “Your sword awaits.”
Cold, muddy, bruised from his fall, and bleeding from a few different places, Thomas limped forward. A breeze rushed through the clearing, and from the hill several dozen leaves were blown. This revealed a rod of iron, clad in leather. The rod had a puck of wood on the bottom, and a first-quarter moon’s shape of wood on the top. He recognized the grip; this was the same grip he had been training with for the last half-month. Ideas of what this sword meant or why it was there came only much later, when Thomas was back at home, dry and safe. In the moment, however, all he knew was he had access to a weapon and his assailant drew closer. He wrapped his fingers around the blackened-with-age leather and gave it a tug, but it did not move.
The hilt was as rigid as a dead man, and the ground did not even shift. Thomas could hear the man who wanted to kill him draw closer, so he tried again. This time, he gripped the hilt with two hands and pulled with all of his strength, but nothing happened. The sword remained buried and unwilling to move. Thomas looked at the woman in the stream with panic in his eyes. The woman sang again, but this was a new line he had not heard before. The tempo was wrong, the notes were different, a new song? Why would she start singing something unfamiliar now? Then he noticed that her arm was still raised. She was pointing at him, but when he stepped to the side, her finger did not move; she was pointing at the sword, singing a new song.
“I don’t know those words,” Thomas pleaded. “I only knew that other line because you’ve been singing it to me since I was a child. Can you,” he struggled with the sword again, “can you even understand me?”
She sang the words again, and Thomas remembered his training. Before even lifting his sword, he needed to empty himself. He breathed in deep and as he exhaled, fear, doubt, pain, cold, sound, sight, language, and self left. He worried for a brief moment that he had gone too deep; what if he couldn’t recover himself this time? But then that worry was gone in the next breath.
The next time the lady in the stream sang her song, Thomas listened, free of even his own language. These words, this language, felt ancient, like something he should know as easily as he knew how to breathe. “Memento palmae meae, gladii potestatis, et esto liber.” The words meant nothing to Thomas, but being so empty, they filled his whole being. He tried once more to pull the sword free in his own strength, but still, nothing happened.
The words came to him once again, and Thomas breathed them out, allowing the memory of the pronunciation to vibrate through his vocal cords. He was never a singer, but if he could do that again, he might have become a bard later in life. The words sung from his lungs into the air and vibrated the sword. “Memento palmae meae, gladii potestatis, et esto liber.”
The ground shook and almost threw Thomas to the ground, but his grip on the hilt steadied him. He pulled again. This time, at the end of his effort, when he gave all of his strength, the sword was released, and it slid free of the earth below. Lightning cracked across the otherwise clear night sky, blinding Thomas for a moment. The man raised the sword high into the sky and smiled. As the blindness cleared, he saw the sharp blade shining. The sight filled him with a warmth he had never felt before. Like someone was holding a torch to his stomach. His face was split by a smile that would not end. The silence of the moment was broken by Thomas’s hearty laugh. This was the best thing that could have happened to him. A sword given to him when he needed it most.
