Battle Ballad of the Royal Knight

By Robert Murray

King Elias Pendragon, now armed with Excalibur and firmly established as the ruler of Camelot, is suddenly faced with conundrums that no sword can conquer. Shanista, daughter of a thwarted usurper and love interest of the first knight of the realm, is on trial for the attempted murder of former Queen Guinevere. Is there a way for this matter to be resolved to the satisfaction of all parties involved? Or will Shanista be the next woman to tear apart the court of Camelot?

Elias is expected to form a marital union of his own. Torn between conflicting emotions, will he accept Belinda, the logical and expected choice as his wife and queen? Or like Sir Lancelot, is he hopelessly in love with a woman who is already betrothed to his closest friend? It will take the new King and all his councilors' wisdom to successfully navigate these imminent issues and domestic controversies.

Meanwhile the Vikings of Scandia have united, mass producing the most dangerous weapon from the Roman world, and are equipped with enhanced metallurgy and a terrifying navy. They are subjugating the continent of Europe, which cries out to Camelot for assistance. Will King Elias be able to rally his country in time to meet this enemy on neutral ground? Or will Pendragon's kingdom be the next to fall to the northern pagan menace?

All these questions will be answered by Battle Ballad of the Royal Knight, the third installment of the critically acclaimed Camelot Chronicles series, written in melodic verse of joyful gravity. Step through a portal into an English Renaissance as engaging as anything History can provide.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Page Publishing, Inc.
• Release date: Sep 27, 2023
• ISBN: 9798887935577

Book preview

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Battle Ballad of the Royal Knight

Robert Murray

Copyright © 2023 Robert Murray

All rights reserved

First Edition

PAGE PUBLISHING

Conneaut Lake, PA

First originally published by Page Publishing 2023

ISBN 979-8-88793-547-8 (pbk)

ISBN 979-8-88793-557-7 (digital)

Printed in the United States of America

Table of Contents

Notes By The Author

Retraction from The Lion of Camelot: Camelot Chronicles Volume 2 (Line Number 673 on Page 38)

About the Author

Now we shall continue the chronicle

Extending what is now canonical

With our renewed lyrical wizardry

With no need for hat that is conical.

We shall breathe life into the withered tree

And civilize the abominable.

With God, what can I summon to my side?

Righteous knights behaving chivalrously?

Villains doing the unconscionable?

A Pendragon's first night with his shy bride?

Let us begin in the middle where we

Left off in our previous history,

Of how slyly Shanista the spy lied,

But she was that sweet burst from a berry

That could win a devious victory

Over lord Martain who, with a sigh, cried:

"My queen, you cannot dare to outstare me!

For my duty, I could no fitter be.

Not one soul that did recently fly died

Because my negligent mind went airy."

She was not pleased with the delivery,

Guinevere all but stabbed him with eye knives:

"And yet you have let Satan ensnare thee!

She compromised the kingdom's protection,

Naming my royal person as high prize!

Targeting where we were least prepared! We

Could have sputtered and suffered subjection!

I will not order her death. I will die wise.

It's said you give an order errantly

When you know it will meet in rejection.

King Elias will now be idolized,

I just recommend she be arrested

Until it all receives his inspection."

Then the queen egressed with a mighty stride

From the presence of those she detested

As evidenced by her snide inflection.

Bard Varnell would not again likely glide,

Enemy numbers was what he quested,

A signal fire announced their coming,

A stir unmatched by Aphrodite's thighs

Being unveiled, not one saw and rested,

Sprinting, for they would not dare mere running.

He was never one to spare pricey buys,

So his wings were the ones he selected,

An item he should not have feared shunning,

For the waxy glue was not waterproof,

And from the last use, they were neglected.

He plummeted and did not spare grunting

When he crashed hard into mother earth's roof—

The treetops; the wings were now defective.

He had been in this forest, hare hunting,

Yet his neck was in another, worse noose,

Surrounded by the presence of wood folk.

He had recently learned of the monk King's

Return. "Don't try to take your brother's loot,

If you come to the castle I should hope

All your cups will be filled as you chums sing

In perfect timing with your lover's lute.

Casting for letting me free's a good vote,

To the thought to murder me let none cling."

One of the wood said, "How you hover? Shoot!

That's more than a simple feller could hope

To hear about. Have some deer and dumpling."

Grounded, what Varnell could do was recruit,

So he gathered several dozen bowmen

Who did not wish to see the realm crumbling.

Many were nearby as the King rebuked

The horde in a tone to hush an ocean,

The raiders removing their helms, stumbling

From the light in their eyes, now resolute

With a will to serve beyond corrosion,

By a sense of awe overwhelmed, humbling

Their pride, leaving their inner devil mute.

The King felt phenomenal emotion,

How he was now obeyed without grumbling,

With glowing aura to settle disputes,

Outshined the mere nominal devotion

He received before, without the famed sword.

Men who do not in battle revel, droop,

To their foes a comical implosion,

As they lop off the place where the brain's stored,

The tale told to tones from a speckled flute.

He looked to signs from God for an omen,

To his being the fervent prayers came, poured

Out from his soul. "Of the two, who's the wife?

Who looks, who cooks, who can craft a poem?

Who can, when there's a river from rains, ford

The stream? And will she bring the rudest strife?

I cannot expect some magic potion,

For these are the bonds and yokes that chain lords,

And to fail the test is to loseth life.

I cannot stop the thoughts of Rosamund

As fair Belinda walks through the same doors

And agrees when I think the music's nice.

The lady Belinda is so jocund,

But with a poor wife could I not gain more

Warmth? He who marries loveless chooses ice,

For even if a woman grows rotund,

Her familiar wisdom and affection

Appreciates, does not reduce in price,

That is why my rhyme echoes Rosamund.

I will venture out with a collection

Of the bravest men they recruit as knights,

Always hunting so as to slow the funds

Spent on our progress, or say: ‘inspection

Of the national defenses,' so she,

The Queen, comes at me with no show that numbs

Me into a deep state of dejection

Until her manner makes me feel cozy.

Before I pick, I want to know this one:

Rosa, I must put her to the question.

Will she be a queen or a weak toady?

I do love Bel', and I fear a David

May rise in me, and within my breast win.

I must be no tyrant, but speak boldly,

Warlike, but never to spear what's sacred.

Still, my soul holds onto this impression

Of this girl who to the King preached holy

Homilies which were on his mind pasted

As he sallied forth on his daring quest.

Who can cajole, console, and enfold me

In poetic love with no line wasted?

It does not need to be a baroness,

I shall be bound to her till our souls flee

To Heaven's kingdom on our climb hasted

By God, no longer trapped in barren flesh,"

Said the King. Before the tale grows moldy

And stale, let us find answers evasive

On a road where two feared knight errants met

To exchange news from about the kingdom,

From solitude their manners abrasive,

Alert, though there was no apparent threat.

Each man wandered with no certain income;

Both spoke and were by candor elated,

And neither one's nostrils were flaring yet;

So it's possible that we might win some

Profit and be by glamor sedated,

Just so we might escape the glaring debt,

And thus hoist the sail when the right winds come

Before the waves leave us inundated.

"Lord Martain was in the fray, scaring sets

Of Picts by the Clyde who have now been stunned

Since they have been quite propitiated.

Ladies in court now wear their hair in decks,

Camelot's true knights do not sin in fun,

But a growing group has simulated

Some of their practices, but bastardized

The message and has thereby dimmed the sun,

Obstructing what they had emulated,

And by recruiting have metastasized."

King Elias was out to spin the sum

Of corrupt knights being venerated

For the mere martial skill that wrath provides

To absolute zero above the ground,

The sixth commandment he contemplated.

He caused neither a twig to snap, nor sighed,

Feeling the holy divine love abound,

He approached where the ghosts congregated

With his perfect step, his well-practiced stride.

No natural pressure could budge a sound

From the young monarch blooming in his prime,

Who held excellence without massive pride,

No negative adjective smudged a noun.

There were now new foes looming to define

An amalgamated generation,

And Elias would not begrudge the crown:

A harp needing no tuning to refine

Its fitting place in the orchestration,

The most attuned ear would not drub him down.

Lord Varnell rode a horse beside the fine

Runner hefting an enormous blade in

The royal grip all hailed when judged aloud.

With no grail he was still denied divine

Insight and enlightened cogitation.

He knew his duty, to see it through he

Went out knowing God would provide the sign,

Faith was not practiced with moderation.

"Varnell, of your men, only a few flee.

I approve the plan your mind designed

To train the knights to fight in formation.

There are not many world leaders who see

To fixing how a soldier's spine's aligned,

They are not addressing his privation.

I say, give him the diet that grew me.

If we can't grow crops here we'll find the clime

We need with rich soil and hydration."

"Your Majesty, do not misconstrue please,

I, Varnell, am merely a rhyming mime,

Fabled Lord Martain is the architect

Of the vast war machine that can do these

Mighty feats, whom none are denying climb

The high heights. What if Noah's ark was wrecked?

Their return must proceed the first dew freeze,

Or men will fall in the snow, dying blind

Shortly after the harshest darkness sets."

The King said, "This peripheral menace,

Which has a mask, and what's behind's rapine,

As long as it still lives, my heart is vexed.

They shall make the unlivable endless,

But a radiant sun in time will shine

And then another thirst will parch us next."

Varnell gave a thoughtful look, and then this:

"Sire, I just read in Polybius,

That when a legion and phalanx are pressed,

The legion is too much to contend with.

It's as if I have been perfidious,

From dismal defeat my larynx is stressed.

Time is of no value once we spend it

On incorrect pursuits oblivious

To the truth. Now we are doomed for certain,

Obeying obsolete martial tenet.

Oh how faithless Fortune is pitiless,

There is a premature, looming curtain,

Any can fall from a burst appendix,

Any open wound is insidious.

Sire, why isn't your booming curse an

Arrow in my ear? Why this eccentric

Mad laughter? At least a lascivious

Lout would clout me. Is this a diversion

From fear, or has madness been cemented

In your psyche by spirits hideous?

Suffering from some sort of incursion

And being left much worse than demented?"

The King answered, "It's battle giddiness!

Of the two, phalanxes, I prefer 'em,

Here one shall fit the style I invented.

I am cavalry, if I whinny it's

Due to oneness with the universe in

All things to which the divine assented.

Until I sin, greatness within me sits

Stabbed into an alabaster pillar.

No necessity to rhyme prevented

Communicating the tempest's abyss,

In it I became a master killer,

But realize death is to be lamented.

Caught off guard by an eccentric ellipse,

The final puzzle at last bewilders,

And we must pay our bodies as penance.

Pardon, but I had to vent it a bit,

I was somehow drunk without the millers

When you whined and cried with every sentence."

In war he could become intemperate,

However, in peace could be a builder,

Even when the weather was inclement.

The bridge the High King approached was narrow;

The air could have been a flower wilter,

He thought he would need to be insentient

Not to feel threatened, foes worse than callow

Ruined earth over which he was the tiller,

And now it must be his royal penchant

To weed what was making his field fallow.

Until there was no value in silver

Brigands