BY SOPHIA HELMKAMP

The tournament-field was bright in the midday sun, bright from the sweet-smelling grass to the keen lance-tips to the golden walls of Camelot. All seemed set for holiday and the pennants snapped in the breeze—but the people knew what the pennants did not, and an awful stillness had gripped all present. Not a voice was to be heard. 

For this was no tourney, nor a typical challenge of knightly honor, nor even the far more rare but still ordinary trial-by-combat. Sir Lancelot, the First Knight and Champion of the crown, held the field in defense of himself and Queen Guinevere against the twin charges of adultery and treason—and the one who had made the accusation was the King himself. 

Since the combat-trial had been announced, all of Camelot had been furtive yet eager in speculation. What had happened behind the walls of the castle? Why did the King make the charge now, when such had been suspected—and ignored—for years? Above all, which knight would take up the impossible challenge in the King’s name? For the Champion was himself the opponent. Sir Gawain, some speculated, one of the old guard and the King’s own cousin. Or Sir Bedivere, perhaps—or Sir Kay, by right of kinship. Every knight of the Round Table was proposed, his chances discussed. Some even whispered, in low voices in taverns late at night: what if Sir Galahad should return from bliss to visit Heaven’s judgment upon his wayward father? For he alone of all the knights had ever unhorsed the Champion; Galahad, and—

But that was unthinkable. 

All of this had been discussed long ago. Now nothing gripped the people of Camelot but still, silent dread. The Queen sat between two knights with her face pale but set as stone, and Lancelot, in all his shining armor and gallant colors, seemed as a statue on the field. Slowly, slowly, the sun moved toward its zenith, and at last the church bells rang the hour. 

As the last toll died away, three figures approached the field from the castle. The herald, standing to attention to announce Sir Lancelot’s challenger, faltered and squinted at the group. The figure on the right was Sir Kay, the seneschal, and on the left was merely a squire, but the shield of the helmeted knight in the middle was unmarked. The squire detached himself from the group and trotted toward the herald, speaking quickly to him in a low voice. The herald visibly startled, recovered himself, glanced at the knights, then turned toward the field and called in a voice as powerful as ever but shaking as a herald’s voice has never shaken, 

“In the matter of the trial-by-combat of Queen Guinevere and Sir Lancelot on the charges of adultery and treason against the crown, the challenger has come. He is Sir Arthur, son of Sir Ector of…” 

But his words were lost in the uproar that rose from the crowd as a wave. The queen, stoic up until now, let out a cry that was heard even above the general clamor, and Lancelot, who never in all his long years of fighting had shown fear at the sight of man or beast, blanched. 

Arthur, as he was now revealed to be, sat unmoving. 

Eventually the noise died away, and the crowd waited to see what would happen next—for the ordinary proceedings seemed utterly out of the question. And, indeed, into the ensuing silence came the clank-and-rattle of a man-at-arms, and Lancelot dismounted from his charger. He walked slowly to the centerline of the field and dropped heavily to his knees. 

“My liege,” he called, voice dry as dust though his face was pale, “of the calumnious charges laid against myself and the Queen, treason is the most grievous, and I stand here to disprove that charge upon my body. Yet in the very disproving shall I not commit it twice, thrice over—a thought,” and here his voice finally wavered, just a touch, before he ruthlessly schooled it back to blankness, “that neither I nor the Queen can bear?” 

In the silence that followed these words, Arthur removed his helmet, handed it to the squire, and, undeterred by the frantic-though-whispered protestations of Sir Kay, rode toward his kneeling knight in the center of the field. 

“Lancelot,” Arthur spoke, and though his visage was calm and noble his voice carried all the pain of the grievous wound he had suffered, and Lancelot blanched anew. “Think it not so. On this field you will be fighting not your king but merely a fellow knight. So stand on your feet, return to your horse, and face me as the one you have wronged, and the one who caught you in that wrong.

“People of Camelot,” Arthur continued, addressing the crowd, “it has long been customary for kings, though they lead their men to battle, to forego answering private quarrels upon their own bodies—this for the better preservation of peace and security of rule in the land. Rather, it is the right and privilege of the Royal Champion—or, in his absence, any knight—to assay all such challenges on the King’s behalf. Many times have my loyal knights fulfilled this role for me. Yet today I will not ask,” his voice grew firmer, “another to stand substitute, not in such a case as this, and against such an opponent. For the Champion himself is accused by the crown—none but I should stand against him. 

“Yet what Sir Lancelot says is true: innocence of treason cannot be proven if treason is committed in the very proving. Thus I fight today, as I was introduced, not as Arthur King of Camelot, but as Arthur second son of Sir Ector of Sauvage [2], younger brother of Sir Kay the Seneschal, merely a knight of the Round Table. And as such, it is my right and privilege,” and if there was a wry twist to these words in the King’s voice, none could blame him, “to challenge Sir Lancelot, King’s Champion, that the honor and trust of the crown have been wrongly afforded him, and his knighthood wrongly bestowed—that he has betrayed his oaths of fealty to his liege-lord in a most base manner, in his adultery with the Queen—that the Queen Guinevere is guilty of the same, and of breaking the most holy vows of the marriage rite made before God and man—and that these crimes must be answered for before the King and all the people. As God is my witness, I ask you now—abide by the ruling of this combat. For justice and order must prevail in this land, else all we have built has been in vain, and this union of Albion, and this brotherhood of the Round Table, naught but child’s play and fool’s fancies, and no rule of Right and Law at all.” 

In many previous settings, such a speech had generated applause and adulation, for King Arthur was loved by his people, and his dedication to such principles well-known and well-admired as the foundation of the kingdom’s greatness. But here, on this field, the First Knight stood not at his King’s side but before him in challenge and guilt. 

This was the possibility none had been able to contemplate. It was too awful for cheers; it was too awful even for words. 

Yet the form of the thing must go on. The herald signaled the trumpeters, who blew the call that summoned the rest of the Round Table knights to stand around the tourney-field as arbiters and witnesses, and as a hedge of arms and armor that would hold the two combatants to the trial until a judgment should be reached. Arthur and Lancelot returned to their places and readied for the joust; both had command of themselves now, with jaws set but limbs loose and supple in preparation of the fight about to commence. 

As all this was occurring, the Queen was speaking frantically to her knight-guard until a message was sent to the King. Arthur heard it, and, again ignoring Kay’s pleas, rode slowly around the edge of the field until he stood near her seat. 

“My lord,” the Queen began, with feigned composure.

“Sir Arthur,” the King interrupted, stern where with his knight he had been merely hurt. 

“Sir Arthur,” the Queen started again, her discomfort visibly almost overshadowing her sorrow and fear, “please reconsider. Even in this situation, you cannot leave the land leaderless. The High King cannot risk himself so!” 

“The High King cannot do otherwise. And if I should fall—your innocence and Lancelot’s would be upheld, and Camelot would not be leaderless, for you should still be Queen. And doubtless,” here the King’s voice sank so only the Queen and the nearest knights could hear, “before long, the land would not be kingless, either.” Arthur’s voice broke on the last word, and he turned his horse swiftly away. But Guinevere halted him once more. 

“Arthur,” she said, and now her voice held none of regal strength but only the plaintive cry of grief, “Arthur!” She stepped forward, reaching though she could not touch him through the rank of knights and his proud war-horse. “If you will not hear the Queen and supplicant, let me speak now as woman! as wife! yes—even wife who has wronged you! Do not do this thing, nor make me watch this travesty. My love for you was never a lie, and Lancelot, whatever else he may be, has long been as family to the both of us! I could not bear if he…or if you…” Guinevere’s voice caught, and she let out a sob, burying her face in her hands. 

Slowly Arthur turned to face her. Then he, too, dismounted heavily. The knights parted for him, and he reached for Guinevere, gently moving her hands and taking her chin in his gauntleted grasp. She stilled, beautiful even in the tears of her pain, and his face filled with suffering to match hers. 

“Guinevere,” he said, lowly, “I cannot. It is not I that forced this confrontation, nor I that prolongs it now. There can be mercy in justice—you know that. End this! Lancelot will heed you.” But the Queen’s face filled with fear and her gaze strayed to Lancelot, and she closed her eyes to the King’s earnest look. Arthur sighed and dropped his hand. “Then who should fight in my place, for the sin that you and Lancelot have committed and I refused to believe? Kay? Gareth? Gawain?” Arthur’s voice grew stronger, sterner again. “Who would you condemn? Nay. Were Galahad himself here I would not ask it of him.” Then the righteous anger again drained from him, and he raised his hand once more, this time to brush a wisp of hair from her wet cheek, steel against skin. “You are my heart’s-desire, Guinevere. But that is not enough.” Dropping his hand, he mounted and rode away, and the tears streamed unchecked down the Queen’s face. 

Once again, the two knights prepared for the combat. Arthur, less composed now, settled his helmet back on his head, received a keen-tipped lance from his squire, and rode to the starting position, his actions mirrored by Lancelot at the opposite end of the field. All was now in position. The crowds stared in wordless horror, and the only sounds on the field were the Queen’s muffled sobs. 

The herald’s voice rang out, the flag dropped, and the two warhorses thundered toward each other. No one breathed, save the two jousters, and more than one knight watched with clenched hands and anguished eyes. 

Closer—closer—zing! both lance-tips skidded off shields brought up expertly to deflect them. The crowd breathed again, and the two chargers swung back around. Arthur, not glancing at Kay’s white-lipped face, dropped the lance and received another from his squire’s shaking hands. 

Once again the flag dropped and the air was filled with the thundering of hooves. This time—crash!—both lances hit squarely in the center of the shields and shattered. The horses’ strides stuttered as they absorbed the blows. The riders reeled but kept their seats. From the crowd, a few scattered cheers sounded but were quickly silenced. 

Again—the pounding thunder, the terrifying speed. Almost, through helmet-slits, the crowd could see eyes narrowed in concentration—fully caught up in the combat, the rush of wind and the glint of sunlight on polished edges. 

At the last moment both riders adjusted their shields—shifted their weight—redirected their lances—and, with the resounding clang-and-crash of steel-on-steel and the startled screams of bystanders, the combatants were hurtled from their saddles. 

For a moment neither moved, and the very wind seemed to hold its breath. Then Lancelot, then Arthur, staggered to their feet, and stood, breathing heavily, facing each other across the mangled swath of grass where they had fallen. The herald’s voice, still wavering, called the end of the joust with no clear victor and the beginning of the swordplay. The squires retrieved horses and lances and shields, checked armor, and asked solicitous questions—but the two knights merely stared at one another, unmoving and silent save for their slowing breaths, and eventually the squires left. 

The crowd was murmuring now—the terror of seeing both King and Champion fall in the last pass had loosened their tongues, though not fully. The Queen, though she had clenched her fists so hard her nails almost drew blood on her palms, sat straight-backed and regal once again; tear-tracks streaked her cheeks, but her eyes were now dry. 

The field, cocooned as it was from the shifting crowd by the motionless knights, grew almost unbearable in its calm. Still the combatants did nothing but breathe; still the tension grew. The herald’s task was for the moment complete—from this point on, none would interrupt the proceedings on the field until one opponent or the other should be vanquished. So they breathed on, and none interfered. 

Finally, Arthur drew his sword—and loud it seemed, and startling in the field’s stillness. He took a step nearer, then two, and raised the sword in salute. Lancelot began to copy his movements—then stopped, frozen, sword half-drawn. One by one, the knights in the outer ring abandoned their disciplined stances in consternation, shifting in place or turning to their neighbors with disbelief in their eyes. The crowd, less familiar with weaponry, took longer to realize—but soon the mutterings and whisperings turned frantic as each demanded of his companions answers that could not be given. 

For the sword the King bore was not Excalibur, blade of legend and symbol of the King’s authority, but an ordinary sword. 

From his salute Arthur shifted into a battle-ready stance then stilled, waiting for his opponent. And eventually, slowly, Lancelot also saluted, then advanced, step-by-step. 

The men’s eyes locked from behind their helmets—each gave a shout—and with movement almost too fast to see and a clang that silenced the residual mutterings in the crowd, the battle was joined. 

And now, the worst of the initial horror faded, the behavior of the crowd began, ever so slowly, to become more familiar. Spectators watched, riveted, as blows were exchanged by the foremost swordsmen in the kingdom. Noblemen, squires, and others who knew something of the business praised thrusts and parries to their neighbors or shouted approbation and encouragement to the battling knights. A battle it was—and yet less a battle than a dance, powerful and beautiful and deadly. The King and his Champion, perfectly matched in skill and speed and experience, each knew the other’s counterstrikes almost before he knew his own—the echo of countless sparring matches, countless battles fought side-by-side and back-to-back. They were two hearts united in vision and love and loyalty—

Loyalty in all but this. 

And the knights, who knew their King and his Champion best of all, saw it: the deadly intent behind the fluid grace, gleaming points driven toward flashes of unprotected skin—the jarring note beneath the music of the swordfight these two had always played in perfect harmony. 

Back and forth across the field they fought, engaging and disengaging, giving ground and taking it, now circling each other warily, now locked in furious combat. The knights’ eyes followed them with unblinking intensity, until—

Lancelot, moving forward, struck out with one of his signature combinations of thrusts and parries, something few knights had ever evaded. 

But Arthur immediately countered and, in the strange intimacy of that battlefield, let out a huff of laughter, almost as though against his will, something as instinctive against this knight as the parry itself. 

“That one, Lancelot?” he asked as he swung into position for the final block, “Did I not…” but he faltered and hissed in concentration. The blades skidded against each other as the knights stumbled together in a moment of ungainly imbalance: they struggled, and Lancelot’s sword came away crimson. 

“Arthur!” he cried. He made a motion as though to reach his off-hand toward his friend but quickly replaced it on his hilt to catch a strong stroke from the King, whose eyes suddenly flashed. 

“So, you cry out to me as a brother,” Arthur bit out, pressing his advantage, “whom you would protect from harm. Where was that devotion when—” he cut himself off, disengaging from the interlocked swords. 

“Arthur…I…” Clang, crash—Lancelot blocked two powerful swings. 

But the ire bled from Arthur’s face as quickly as it had come. “I am not sure,” he murmured, “I want to hear it.” 

Lancelot bit back his words, and for a few strokes they said nothing. 

Cautiously, the knight began again. “That is…” he paused. “Not Excalibur.” 

It was almost a question. Arthur snorted, not replying. 

“It is not your sword,” Lancelot continued, now speaking with inordinate haste. “That parry—you almost missed—I would not…”

“Would not what?” the other scoffed. “Would not have me disadvantaged, noble Sir Lancelot? No!” He checked himself. “No, I am sorry. If it eases your honor, I did not lay it by merely for your sake. Excalibur is the Kingsword, and today”—he smiled mirthlessly—“I am no king.” 

“You are always king!” Lancelot countered with startling vehemence. “You are always my king! It is not something you can…simply…set aside, as you have done your greatest weapon before…before a battle to the death! Mother of God! It is…such folly!” 

“Folly?” Arthur’s voice now dripped with the fury that backed his thrusts. “You speak of my folly? Speak instead of your treason! Your disloyalty! Your betrayal of all that is chivalrous!…and noble!…and right!” He punctuated each word with a vicious stroke, and the ringing of steel-on-steel echoed to the stands. Closer, the surrounding knights shuddered—not at the sounds of battle, but at the wrath in the King’s words. “Of your oaths!…of your King!” His voice cracked, faltered, dropped. “Of…of your friend,” he finished with anguished precision. 

And, for a moment, the combat halted. Neither moved, but for the heaving of breasts disturbed by exertion and emotion. Lancelot’s face was a picture of misery. 

“Why, Lancelot?” whispered Arthur, as they began circling again on well-practiced feet. “Why did you do it?” 

“For love,” the knight said at last, and his voice shook. “For love of Guinevere.” 

And, bitterly, Arthur laughed. 

Time seemed to stand still as the King and Champion fought on the field. The sun moved slowly but shone just as incongruously. The breeze intermittently spread the pennants and tossed Guinevere’s hair in her eyes that remained fixed on the combat. The crowd shifted and murmured, then stilled, then shouted at a thrust or parry. The knights held their positions with clenched stoicism, and Sir Kay closed his eyes in defeat at his brother’s anguished words. 

The day wore on. Then—a true stumble. Feet slipped on the grass; a weary and wounded leg shook beneath the King’s weight. Lancelot, face now shuttered in hard battle-lines, pressed his advantage. The crowd stilled in horrified silence. 

A heartbeat, and Arthur rallied. Stroke—stroke—strike! Scattered cheers, as the borrowed blade caught Lancelot full across the ribs. He gasped, staggered with the force of the blow, and fell to his knees. Arthur raised his sword for the killing stroke—hesitated—

And, in the blink of an eye, Lancelot’s blade slipped under his guard, through the gap at his armpit—and slid home. 

The two men’s eyes met, horrified and resigned. The sword pulled free. Arthur fell—fell—and was caught by the arms of his friend, his killer. 

All around, the silence was impenetrable. Half of the knights had started forward as the King fell but stilled, now, unwilling or unable to interrupt. The Queen’s face was frozen in a rictus of contradictory emotions, anguish dreadful on her delicate features. 

But at the center, blind to all else, Lancelot desperately fumbled at gauntlets and helmet-straps with hands that shook as they had not shaken through all that awful match. The King heaved for air around the wound; blood, light and frothy, spilled from his side and the corner of his mouth. 

“I’m sorry,” Lancelot breathed, stricken. He cradled the King’s head in his hands, flinching away from his knowing eyes. “I’m sorry,” he repeated, voice tight with remorse and eyes falling shut to the tears that slid down his cheeks. They flew open again as the back of the King’s fingers brushed his face. 

“Lancelot,” Arthur gasped, “it is…forgiven.” 

Then his hand dropped to the ground and his body relaxed in that dreadful parody of sleep. 

And, voice breaking on his King’s name, Lancelot wept. It was over. 

In the stands, the hush slowly gave way to sounds of grief. Of the knights in the ring, some stood with hard faces, maintaining the dignity of their position even in the face of this tragedy. Some abandoned dignity entirely, falling to their knees or clasping their brother-knights in their grief. And, for some, rage began to gather behind eyes wet with tears, and it was only the King’s words and their own honor that restrained them from throwing their gauntlets at Lancelot’s feet. 

The herald, aghast but dutiful, raised his voice for the last time on that dreadful day. 

“Hear, my lords and ladies, and you, knights of the realm, and all the people gathered here, both great and small: in accord with the law of the land and the outcome of this trial-by-combat, Sir Lancelot and the Queen Guinevere are declared to be innocent of all charges raised against them—released from all retaliation and repercussion associated with those accusations—and free to reclaim with honor their rightful stations. May God bear witness to these things, and,” his voice, already shaking, nearly broke entirely, “may He have mercy on us all.” 

At the herald’s words, Sir Kay’s face hardened, and the seneschal who had never truly been a warrior stripped off his glove and strode, purposefully and wrathfully, toward the field. He approached the now-ragged ring of knights, his progress unhindered—until Sir Gawain laid a brawny arm across his chest and shook him, hard, by the shoulder. 

“No, Kay,” he said, voice rough with sorrow and anger. “I want it as much as you do. But…” 

“It is so wrong!” the seneschal growled. “Declared innocent—God’s blood!—it is a farce! You know as well as I—Lancelot and Guinevere are guilty as sin—and I knew…I knew…” his voice caught on a sob, wrath and grief comingled, and he turned his face away. 

“I know,” Gawain intoned, and his restraining arm shifted to clasp the other in a tight embrace. “None did more for him than you, Kay, these last few days. He wished for none other. Now let his words, and his law, stand. Let something be left of his dream. And,” his voice dropped lower, almost inaudible, “let us strive to be worthy of it.” 

Kay shuddered and was silent. 

Across the field, the Queen stood from her place; the knight-guards, at the herald’s words, had stepped away from her side. Her hands were twisting in front of her but she forced them to her sides, stepped forward—then stopped, almost paralyzed, at the nearly sacrosanct stillness of the field where the First Knight mourned his dead King. But he was hers, as well: her King and her husband, and she pressed forward, haltingly, breath stuttering in her throat as she moved toward the scene that would make real the tragedy. 

Yet barely two steps had she taken when Lancelot lifted his tear-streaked face from the King’s breast and looked toward her. 

Their eyes met—shame and sick relief; blame, both cast and carried, and a flash of the old fire; and grief, shared but only made heavier by the sharing, for they had been the cause. 

Lancelot gently laid Arthur’s body back on the grass, brushing his eyelids closed and folding his hands across his breast. Then he stood, slowly, painfully, and staggered toward Guinevere. She met him halfway, and he dropped back to his knees at her feet. Her hands twitched forward, then drew back to clench uncertainly at her sides. 

“Lancelot,” she began, “are you…”

“Forgiveness,” he interrupted, abruptly tipping his head back to look her straight in the eye once more. “His last breath, and he offered me forgiveness—I, who dealt the mortal wound.” Lancelot’s voice was breathless with awe and shame. “I, who did him wrong.” 

“We who did him wrong,” the Queen whispered. “Oh, Lancelot. Oh, God…”

“Have mercy,” the knight finished. Then he collapsed on his side, catching himself with a grunt of pain, and curled an arm protectively around his abdomen. 

“Lancelot!” the Queen cried, dropping down beside him, then glancing around frantically. The court surgeon, who had slipped onto the field to attend the King’s body once Lancelot had left it, quickly made his way toward them. 

“Here, Sir Lancelot,” he said gruffly, kneeling down. “Let me see.” The knight hissed in agony but complied with the surgeon’s touches. Yet all the while his breathing quickened and shallowed, and when the surgeon sat back his face was grim. 

“I am sorry, my lady,” he said, looking to Guinevere, and though the censure in his eyes was real the sympathy was as well. 

“No,” she breathed, and cupped the knight’s pale cheek in one palm, grasping at his hand with the other. “Not both of you…” 

But he was shaking his head weakly, and gasped between breaths, “It is justice…we nearly ruined it…Guinevere…keep it alive…” 

She clutched at him. “My penance?” she asked through her tears, disbelief and acceptance warring in her voice, “to hold Camelot together, though it would tear itself apart? Though my King and my Champion both be dead,” she heaved in a sob, “and the knights and people despise me?” 

But he could not answer, merely squeezed her hand feebly—all that was left of his once-marvelous strength. And she sat, holding him desperately, until the life drained from his eyes and the shuddering breaths stilled. Then, even as he had done with Arthur, she closed his eyes and laid him on the grass, arms crossed over his chest, and stood. 

Pale she was under the strong afternoon sun—shaky and tear-streaked, her beauty nearly washed out in her sorrow and the daunting specter of the task ahead. She made her way slowly toward the bier that held the King—for the surgeon, with nothing to do for Lancelot, had returned to tending Arthur’s body. The knights bearing the litter paused at her approach. 

She gazed down at the man before her—the man she had betrayed, but not in hatred, and loved, but not enough. She raised his hand and kissed it carefully, reverently, then just as gently kissed his unfeeling lips. 

“I am sorry,” she whispered, though his ears could no longer hear her nor his tongue forgive. “I will keep your dream alive, my lord. I swear it.” 

Then she stepped back and curtsied deeply as the knights bore their burden away. 

And, in the coming years, Queen Guinevere would keep her oath. Though the seat of the King remain forever empty, the Round Table would never fracture; though the edges of the kingdom crumble like sand through her fingers, the city would never fall; and though the beauty fade from her cheeks now lined with sorrow and none ever forget her role in the tragedy of King Arthur’s death, in the end she would be known less as the adulteress and more as the wife who, repentant, had done at last her duty before God and man. 

But the people mourned their king, and the land itself with them. Sir Bedivere, entrusted with Excalibur before the combat, threw it back into the lake of Avalon from whence the King had drawn it so many years ago. A glistening arm caught it and drew it unharmed beneath the waves—and, somehow, he knew: when Albion’s need was greatest, Arthur would return, and at the coming of the Once and Future King the land and the people would rejoice, and the sun would shine once more in splendor on the towers of Camelot. 

~

Endnotes: 

[1] Title and summary quotation modified from “The Passing of Arthur” in Alfred Lord Tennyson’s Idylls of the King. The original reads, in context: “Then spake the King: ‘My house hath been my doom. / But call not thou this traitor [Modred] of my house / Who hath but dwelt beneath one roof with me. / My house are rather they who sware my vows, / Yea, even while they brake them, own’d me King’” (lines 154-158).

[2] In TH White’s The Once and Future King, Sir Ector’s castle is called the Castle of the Forest Sauvage and lies in that forest. Absent any other known appellation for Sir Ector, this one is used as an homage to White.