The Quest of the Fair Unknown (6 page)

"There is another possibility, sire," said another of the standing men. This one wore robes of red and gold and had on a funny hat.

"Yes, Bishop Baldwin?"

"This could be a miracle of God, given as a test to your court."

"What sort of test?" the king asked.

"A test of faith, trying whether your knights will risk themselves in the perilous seat and thus earn the blessed sword."

Clerk Geoffrey cleared his throat again and said, "Excuse me, Your Holiness, but I believe you'll find that the word is not 'seat,' but 'siege.'"

Bishop Baldwin looked irritated and said, "And what does 'siege' mean, clerk?"

"It's from the French," the clerk replied. "Both archaic and common, actually."

"I didn't ask where it's from; I asked what it means."

"It ... it means 'seat.'"

Bishop Baldwin rolled his eyes and turned back toward the king, but the clerk kept talking. "But I should point out that the word 'perilous' is not spelled correctly in French, where it should be written with a different final letter."

"Nobody cares, scholar," Bishop Baldwin said. "O king, I suggest that we give these wonders a trial, to see who has the faith to face a miracle of God."

"And what if the chair and the sword are anointed with a poison that will kill those who touch them?" the king asked mildly. "I do have enemies who are capable of concocting such an ointment, you know. They would love to deprive me of some of my greatest knights."

"Again I say, it is a test of faith," announced Baldwin.

"I say throw them both in the cellars and forget about them," said Kai. Then all the knights began talking at once, each explaining his own view to anyone who would listen. In the hubbub, Galahad stepped out of the cluster of standing courtiers, walked quietly over to the sword, took it by the hilt, and drew it smoothly from the stone. The noise began to subside. Then Galahad stepped up to the chair and sat in it. For a moment the chair glowed with an orange light, then all was still.

King Arthur examined Galahad. "That appears to solve that problem," he said softly, stern eyes resting on Galahad. "What is your name, son?"

Before Galahad could answer, the clerk, who had walked over to examine the chair and the stone, gave a sharp exclamation. "Look, sire! The message on the chair! It's changed!"

"Changed?"

"It's a different inscription, sire! It says, 'This is the siege of Galahad, the Haut Prince.'"

King Arthur looked at Galahad. "Is that your name?"

"It is, sire."

Then another voice spoke. "Did you say 'Galahad'?" Beaufils looked around to see a tall man with glossy black hair and very broad shoulders rising to his feet.

"That is my name," Galahad asserted again.

"What is it, Lancelot?" King Arthur asked, turning to the knight who had just stood.

"Galahad is also one of my names," the knight replied. "A family name. Who is your father, Galahad?"

"I do not know for sure. Like my friend Beaufils, I have come to this court to find him. He is a great knight who sixteen years ago was enchanted into believing that my mother was the woman he loved most in the world. When he woke and found that she was another, he rushed from the room and never discovered that he had begotten a son."

The knight called Lancelot looked very sober. "What was your mother's name?"

Galahad looked Lancelot in the eye and said, "Do you not know?"

"Elaine?" Lancelot whispered. Galahad nodded slowly. Lancelot looked at him for a long moment, then said, "And are you indeed my son?"

"If you are that knight, I am."

King Arthur looked from Galahad to Lancelot, then smiled. "If this is so, then it is a cause for rejoicing. We came to discuss two marvels, and we discover a third."

Immediately the room burst into sound, as all the knights exclaimed over the wonders they had seen. Beaufils smiled. It hadn't been hard for Galahad to find his father at all. When the hubbub died down, the king reached from his chair to Galahad's and formally welcomed him to his court. "I shall watch your future with interest," he said. "After all, few knights have come to my court so highly recommended as you."

Bishop Baldwin said loudly, "This is indeed a mark of God's favor, that so young a knight should achieve his miraculous tests and sit in the Siege Perilous! Surely the Spirit's blessing is strong upon this great king and his court!"

Just then, as if prompted by Bishop Baldwin's words, a strange light began filling the room. Beaufils looked around but could not see where the light was coming from. Indeed, it seemed to come from everywhere equally, because there were no shadows. It was as if light had reversed itself: instead of shining outward from one source, it was shining inward from everywhere at once. No one spoke.

Then, as Beaufils breathed deeply of the strange light and the eerie silence, a new sight appeared: a golden platter, like one of the great dishes that had held food for the banquet, but empty. No one carried the platter; it appeared over the center of the table, floating like an airborn dandelion seed. Then, slowly, it began to move around the table, stopping in front of each knight for a moment before moving on, and everywhere it stopped, a plate of food appeared on the table before that knight. When it had gone all around the room, it returned to the center of the table, floated for a moment, then rose to the ceiling and disappeared, like a wisp of smoke.

"A sign from God," whispered Bishop Baldwin.

No one answered for a moment. Then the red-bearded knight, whom King Arthur had called Gawain, said quietly, "Out of curiosity, has everyone else been served the one food that he loves most in the world?" All the knights nodded.

Then the room shook, and a great voice from everywhere said, "This is the Grail. He who finds it will find all he truly desires. It is a quest."

For a very long time after the voice faded and the platter that the voice had called the "Grail" disappeared, no one spoke or moved. At last Beaufils, who had watched the apparition with wonder, said, "Well, that was certainly exciting. Does this sort of thing happen often here at Camelot?"

No one answered, but his calm voice seemed to break the spell that had fallen over the room. The knights began blinking, rubbing their eyes, and shaking their heads, while beside Beaufils, Bishop Baldwin sank slowly to his knees, touching his forehead and shoulders and belly and muttering to himself, just as Sir Breunis Sans Pité had done in the woods. This evidently was a way to pray, but Bishop Baldwin didn't look very peaceful—in fact, he looked terrified. Galahad, on the other hand, was radiant. His eyes gazed at the ceiling where the Grail had disappeared, and his face glowed with wonder and excitement.

King Arthur broke the restless silence. "Well, my friends, today has certainly been a day of wonders, each more astonishing than the last. I'm glad that we're already assembled, because I need your counsel." He paused, smiled lopsidedly and said, "To put it simply, my friends, what did all that mean?"

"The voice called that dish a Grail," one knight said. "What's a Grail?"

A knight with a neat brown beard and a serious face leaned forward. "My liege?" he said.

"Yes, Parsifal?"

"I have some experience with this matter myself, and that did not look like what I know as the Grail."

King Arthur looked surprised. "What experience is this, Parsifal?"

Parsifal looked across the table at the red-bearded knight named Gawain, hesitated, then said, "It was a quest that I followed many years ago—a test that I failed once and then, by grace, was allowed to try again."

"And you've never spoken of this quest at court?" asked the king.

"No, sire. The test I speak of took place in an enchanted castle, in a ... in a different world from this one."

Beside Beaufils, Bishop Baldwin rose slowly to his feet, and Beaufils heard him whisper, "Sorcery!"

King Arthur asked, "And you encountered the Grail in this enchanted castle?"

"Yes, sire. The Grail is a magical stone that provides food for every banquet in that castle."

"A stone, you say? Not a serving dish?"

"That's right, sire."

The knights spoke in hushed tones to one another while the king frowned thoughtfully. Parsifal waited in silence.

"Then do you say that this vision that we all saw is
not
the Grail?" the king asked.

Before Parsifal could reply, Bishop Baldwin stepped forward. "This is nonsense, sire. We have all seen that the Grail is a serving dish, and the voice of God Himself has told us so. Even if Sir Parsifal believes he is speaking the truth, of which I am not at all certain, he is mistaken. Whatever foul, magical object he may have seen can have nothing to do with this holy Grail."

This seemed so silly that Beaufils had to laugh. All eyes turned toward him, and King Arthur said, "Beaufils?"

"I'm sorry to disturb your council," Beaufils said, still smiling. "But it
did
seem so funny."

"What did you find funny?" asked the king.

"The idea that this Grail had to be one thing or the other," Beaufils explained. "Well, doesn't it seem silly to you? Parsifal says that the Grail he knows provides food, and the Grail that we saw did the same thing. How many other things do you know that do that? The two Grails seem more alike than different, don't they? The only way they're different is how they look, and that can't be very important."

King Arthur smiled, and Kai gave a rumbling laugh. "He's not just a pretty face, I see."

Bishop Baldwin looked at Beaufils very sternly and seemed about to argue further, but then the scholar, Geoffrey, cleared his throat again.

"Yes, Clerk Geoffrey?" King Arthur said.

"Your Highness," Geoffrey said, bowing, "perhaps I may be able to help somewhat. The word 'Grail' is not entirely unknown among scholars."

"What do you know of the Grail?" the king asked.

"It is an ancient word, although its origin is still disputed by many. Some scholars, noting that in some documents it is spelled with a double 'a'—that is, g-r-a-a-1—suggest that its origin should be sought in some heathenish Germanic tongue, such as that spoken by the Alemanni or the Visigoths, of which the Roman historian Tacitus has given us so thorough a description. If so, it is proposed that the word should have the meaning 'bowl.' This, however, has been disputed by many other scholars who are themselves regrettably German, and whose objectivity must thereby be held to be in some question."

Beaufils stared at Geoffrey, fascinated with the droning sound of his meaningless words. It was like listening to a very repetitive night bird sing as you went to sleep. Kai lowered his chin into his hands and stared glumly at the table in front of him.

"It should, however, be noted," Geoffrey said, "that a minority viewpoint considers the word to have sprung from a corrupted spelling of the French word
grêle,
which I hardly need say refers to a hailstorm or even a hailstone. I find Sir Parsifal's suggestion that the Grail is a stone to be a significant correlation to this reading."

Beaufils met Gawain's eyes, and the knight grinned at him. "This is what
I
meant by education," the knight said.

"Have you ever heard anyone say so little for so long?" muttered Kai.

Geoffrey ignored them both. "And finally," he said with a flourish, "there is the late view, held by most reputable scholars to be spurious, that the Grail is a vessel of religious significance. Indeed, the monastery just over the hill from Camelot, at Glastonbury, claims to have been founded by none other than Joseph of Arimathea, he who gave a tomb for Our Lord in Jerusalem, and at Glastonbury they say that when Joseph came to our land he brought with him a vessel containing some of the holy blood of Christ. This vessel the monks of Glastonbury call the Holy Grail, or in the old French, the
San Great
Rearranging the letters of these words, though, one finds a secondary meaning:
sang real,
which is French for 'True Blood.'"

Beaufils smiled broadly, "Oh, I get it," he said. "It's like a word game! How clever!"

No one paid any attention to Beaufils, because Bishop Baldwin had grown very excited and was shouting, "At last we know! It is the Cup of Our Lord's Last Supper! Containing the Holy Blood!"

Geoffrey looked pained and cleared his throat again. Beaufils wondered if his throat got sore from all that gurgling. "As I
thought
I had made plain, most scholars today find the religious interpretation of the word to be pure fiction. To put it bluntly, we think the Glastonbury monks made it up."

"Nonsense! You saw it right here, didn't you?" Bishop Baldwin declared, dismissing the clerk with a peremptory wave of his hand. "My liege, God has sent this quest to you. You must send all your knights out at once, to find this Holy Grail!"

A babble of voices followed this pronouncement, but one by one the knights grew silent and turned their eyes toward King Arthur, who did not appear to Beaufils to be very pleased. At last the king said, "What do you say, my knights?"

Gawain rose to his feet. "Arthur, I don't know what this vision means, whether this Grail is holy or unholy or neither one, but this I know: we have received a call to adventure, and I have never refused that call before. I will seek this Grail."

One by one other knights rose to their feet, until well over half of them stood with Gawain. As each new knight stood, King Arthur's face seemed to grow sadder. "I seem to be losing most of my knights," he said at last.

"I'm staying here," announced Kai.

"I, too," added Parsifal. "I've already found my Grail, after all."

The other knights who had remained seated nodded. One of them was Galahad's father, Lancelot, who said, "I will stay with you as well, O king."

"No!" exclaimed Galahad, shocked and disappointed. "Not you! Is my own father afraid of this quest?"

Lancelot turned his head and looked at his son calmly. "If you wish to think it, my Galahad. But think what you will, I shall remain with my king. As for you, do what you think best."