The Extraordinary Adventures of Alfred Kropp (Alfred Kropp #1)(58)

“I’ve got the Sword now,” I said. “Doesn’t that make me the master?”

“Do you claim it?” he asked mockingly.

I looked at it on the bed beside me. “No. But that’s the point, I think. Nobody can. You could wait a thousand years, ten thousand even, but nobody can really claim it. I think that’s where your boss has got it all wrong and why the knights kept it hidden all those years, maybe even why Arthur had to die. It’s not something you can own.” He wasn’t getting it. I asked, “Where are we going?”

“Did the master not tell you? To Dundagel, now called Tintagel.”

“Oh. What’s in Tintagel?”

“Camelot is in Tintagel, and the caves of Merlin.”

“Sure,” I said. “That would make sense.”

Then I picked up the gun and shot him in the left kneecap.

He yelled and pitched forward onto the floor, wrapping his arms around his knee. I grabbed Excalibur from the bed beside me.

“In the name of Saint Michael!” I yelled, and brought the Sword, flat side down, toward his head. He didn’t even see it coming. I hit him in the head with the broad part of the blade and he went still.

I knelt beside him and pressed my fingertips against his wrist. He wasn’t dead. I remembered what Bennacio had told me after he dispatched those two thralls in the forest back in America: You would not pity them if you knew them as I do.

“Well, Bennacio,” I murmured as I unhooked the dragon pin to remove the gray cloak. “I know what they did to my father. And I know what they did to you and to the rest of the knights, but at some point somebody’s gotta say enough. At some point all the blood and guts have to dry up.”

Underneath the cloak the escort had concealed one of those black-bladed swords. I searched his pockets and found a set of car keys.

I hooked the black sword around my waist and twisted the belt around so it hung on my right side. I slipped Excalibur into the other side of my belt, to hang on my left side. I threw the gray cape around my shoulders and hooked the dragon pin, then looked at myself in the mirror. Sir Alfred of the Castle Screws-up-a-lot.

I stepped over the escort, opened the door, looked both ways before going into the hall, and closed the door behind me.

I took the back stairs to the main floor, praying there was a back door to the place. The Sword pooched out of the cloak on the left side, and its shape was kind of obvious.

The stairs ended just to the right of a glass door that opened onto the parking lot. I slipped outside and walked around, looking for the escort’s wheels. There was a black Lamborghini Murciélago parked in the handicapped space right by the door. I knew it was the right car before I even tried the key. These guys liked their cars.

I couldn’t sit with both swords jutting out, so I pulled them from my belt and laid both in the small backseat, throwing the gray cloak over them. I cruised the lot once before leaving, to see if any spooks or other black robes were hanging around, but saw nothing suspicious.

I had no idea where Tintagel was, so I pulled into the first gas station I saw, though apparently it isn’t called gas in England; it’s called petrol. The clerk gave me a funny look when I walked through the door in my gray cloak with the dragon-shaped pin.

“And what are you supposed to be?” he asked.

“The heir to Lancelot, the greatest knight who ever lived.”

One of his eyebrows went up and I said, “Yeah, it’s a stretch. I’ve been having a heck of a time with it.”

“If you’re Lancelot, I’d hate to see Guinevere.”

“I didn’t say I was Lancelot. I’m descended from Lancelot.”

“Oh, right. And I’m the Queen of bloody Sheba.”

I told the clerk I needed a map of England and asked him where Tintagel was.

“Tintagel? That’s in Cornwall.”

“About how far is it?”

“Around two hundred miles.”

He spread the map open on the counter and showed me where Tintagel was, on the southwest coast.

“Now here is Tintagel Head,” he said, pointing out a spot on the map right by the Atlantic Ocean. “Lots of Yanks go there. Spectacular view, sits on a cliff with a three-hundred-foot drop to the sea.”

“Is there a castle there?”

“Some ruins, yes. Not much to look at. King Arthur’s castle is the legend, but you know that already, of course, being the descendent of Lancelot. Did you know he wasn’t British? He was French.”

“Was he? Well . . . très magnifique. Nothing but ruins there, you said?”

“Above, yes. Now, in the cliffs directly below is a cave they say was the sanctuary of Merlin, the king’s wizard. Some say when the tide is out and the wind begins to blow from the sea, you can hear the ghost of Merlin wailing for the kingdom that was lost—if you believe such things.”

“Oh,” I said. “You bet I do, mister.”

“Of course, sir knight,” he said. “You would.”

46

So I drove to Tintagel at ninety miles per hour, expecting any minute to hit a roadblock or to see a helicopter gunship swoop out of the night sky and take out my tires. But nothing like that happened. I tried to think. I really needed a plan. In fact, this was probably my last chance to come up with one, but all I felt was naked, like I was caught up in a tornado, every scrap of clothing torn away, na**d in the screeching wind with nothing to hold on to.