King Vogt and the Guardians of the Round Table
I. The Battle of Lake Erie
Introduction
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
II. The Quest for the Holy Grail
Interlude
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
III. The King of the Wind
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11. Sir Griffin stood with the blade of his sword resting against the neck of the samurai kneeling before him. Murakami’s two-handed katana lay a few paces away, its black blade still driven into the dirt where it had landed. The sounds of the skirmish had drifted deeper into the woods, leaving the road strangely quiet.
As the samurai bowed his head, awaiting the final stroke, Griffin studied the eyes that lay behind the horrifying mask until he was certain. And then Griffin spoke.
“You know… I didn’t recall you at first, with your black armor and that hideous mask. But when you dropped into your stance, I knew that I recognized it. I’ve faced you before in Japan. But over there they didn’t call you Murakami… they called you Murakami-sama… Lord Murakami.”
Murakami was silent a moment. Then his hand rose slowly and removed the mask. “Yes, Sir Griffin,” the samurai answered quietly. “We faced one another several times on the battlefields of my homeland. But you have bested me here and now I kneel in the dirt, captured and disgraced.”
“There is no disgrace in this defeat,” Griffin said. “I spent three years in Japan. There, I learned that honor on the battlefield can only be won by facing an honorable opponent. You gave me that opportunity today, and for that I am grateful. I cannot execute a master.”
With that, Sir Griffin lowered his blade from Murakami’s neck. He then walked over to where the samurai’s katana was sticking out of the ground, pulled the long blade free, and walked back with the sword held reverently in both hands.
“I trust that you will not use this against me again,” he said, and bowing his head, he returned the weapon to its owner.
Murakami bowed even lower, and gratefully received the katana back…
Elsewhere, Sir Gavin Williams had pressed on alone, taking on all attackers, his ‘C’ blazing as his flail whirled in wide, furious circles, clearing out the Black Sox with ease. A Black Sock raised his shield, and the spiked head curled over its rim and dropped him where he stood. Another Black Sock lunged and was instantly disarmed by Gavin’s rattling chain.
Williams didn’t stop to count. He drove on through the trees, deeper and deeper into the darkness, the light of the Grail leading the way. And all around him, wherever a Guardian fought, a golden ‘C’ burned in the shadows. The drumming that had been building since the first golden ‘C’ ignited was now pounding at a feverish rhythm throughout the forest like a war drum.
The battle was almost won, and both the Guardians and Black Sox knew it. But as the last grains of sand trickled through the hourglass, there was another battle taking place where the light was defeating the darkness…
In the Euclidean Stair, the fifth and final round had only just begun, tied at 2-2.
King Venable waited on his platform, broadsword in hand, glaring up at the distant landing where King Vogt stood. The same place he’d started every round.
“Once again,” Venable growled, “we begin as we always do. You, hanging from the ceiling like a bat, and I—”
But then he stopped. Something had changed. The ‘C’ on King Vogt’s chest, which had glowed before, was now blazing like a golden sun, its light flashing off Excalibur’s blade. The light was so intense that King Venable had to shield his eyes just to look up at him. And then… staring down at Venable… King Vogt jumped.
Back in the woods, Sir Gavin Williams stood in a ring of the fallen. Twelve Black Sox lay sprawled in the leaves around him, groaning, dazed and disarmed, a few already crawling for the safety of the trees. But the Black Sox who had fought elsewhere in the woods had regrouped, and now ten suits of black armor came out of the shadows.
Williams lifted the flail again, the chain hanging heavy in his hands. But before the Black Sox could strike, four figures stepped out from behind him to take the lead: Sir Sabrowski, Gaddis, Smith, and Ramírez.
“Rest, Sir Gavin,” said Sir Sabrowski. “We’ll take it from here. You’ve fought hard enough.”
The Black Sox charged. Ramírez let the first one come. As the man lifted his sword to strike, Ramírez dropped down to one knee, and then rose sharply with both hands locked on the hilt of his sword, driving the point through the man’s chin guard. The force of the blow lifted the Black Sock up off his feet, his body flying through the air, landing limp with a heavy and lifeless thud.
Beside him, Sabrowski, Gaddis, and Smith met the rest of the charge shoulder to shoulder, and the Black Sox went down one after another until only one remained. The lone Black Sock retreated nervously until he backed into a tree, his sword shaking.
Panicking, he turned to run, but just as he did, Sir Cade picked up one of the fallen Black Sox’s swords, and — launching it like a javelin — pinned the fleeing Black Sock to the trunk of the tree, making that his final resting place.
Williams swung the chain of his flail over his shoulder and surveyed the clearing filled with Black Sox lying in the leaves, and one more pinned to a tree.
“Did anyone keep tally?” he asked. “I’ve lost count.”
King Venable raised his gauntlet against the glare that bore down on him, squinting up through his fingers. Though he could barely see past the blinding light, he suddenly realized that something was terribly wrong.
It was getting closer.
Then the glare shifted, and through the blaze he saw a figure — a man falling headfirst across the great cube, the radiance of the Grail streaming behind him — with Excalibur thrust out before him like a lance.
“You’re mad!” Venable screamed as King Vogt hurtled toward him. “The fall will kill us both!”
The light roared down on Venable, and he flinched, curling behind his arm…
And then the world stopped.
Venable could not move. He was frozen in a half crouch, one arm still thrown across his face, staring up in horror. Slowly the blinding light dimmed, and he could finally see King Vogt clearly — suspended mid-air above him, with Excalibur’s pointed tip resting on the white crown of Venable’s black helmet.
Venable stared dumbfounded. But then he found his voice.
“You have completely lost your mind!” he raged, still frozen. “If you missed me, the fall would have killed you.”
King Vogt, still suspended above him with Excalibur triumphantly extended, calmly answered. “The Eye told us the rule when we got here: in this realm, no one can die. And if you were on the floor and I was on the ceiling, like you claimed, then I didn’t have to leap across the space… I only had to fall.”
Venable had no response. Then the Eternal Eye drifted into the center of the large open space King Vogt had just crossed, rotating slowly. Its enormous gaze fell upon the two frozen kings.
“A touch… upon the crown of King Venable… A point… to King Vogt.”
It paused.
“The point total… is three… to two… King Vogt… has won the Euclidean Stair.”
As the Eternal Eye announced King Vogt the winner, a swirling blue vortex opened on the stone landing where he had begun each of the rounds, and both kings were released from their paralysis. As King Vogt felt the gravitational pull of the portal that would free him from the Euclidean Stair, King Venable stared with resolute horror at the Eternal Eye, realizing the fate that awaited him.
Venable looked at King Vogt, holding his gaze. His face hardened, refusing to show fear. “Tell my Black Sox what happened here.”
But just as the pull of the vortex threatened to drag King Vogt across the space, he reached out and caught King Venable’s gauntlet in his.
“I’m going to make sure you can tell them yourself,” he promised confidently. Pulling Venable in close, he warned, “Hold on tight. That thing isn’t going to let us go willingly.”
Then, holding Venable in one arm, King Vogt reversed his grip on Excalibur with the tip pointing down — and the two kings pushed off the platform. As the vortex pulled them across the space and they fell past the Eternal Eye, King Vogt plunged Excalibur’s tip into its center.
The blade pierced the cornea, the membrane splitting and peeling back as the vitreous fluid spilled forth. The Eternal Eye let out a horrendous scream:
“WHAAAAAA! WHAAAT HAVE YOU DONE?!”
The Euclidean Stair began to shake, platforms tearing loose from the walls, stones falling in every direction — and as the space collapsed behind them — the two kings were swallowed by the portal.
There was a brilliant flash of light in the middle of the clearing where Sir Gavin and the others stood, as the two kings tumbled out of the portal onto the forest floor.
King Vogt rolled to one knee, Excalibur still in his grip, the blade dripping clear fluid onto the dirt. Lying flat on his back beside him was King Venable, staring up into the branches. Venable sat up to see the battlefield he was now returning to: the drumming had stopped and twenty-six golden ‘C’s blazed in the dark, with the defeated Black Sox army lying sprawled around them. He looked up at King Vogt who was now standing, and at the twenty-seventh ‘C’ on his chestplate — and knelt before the King.
One by one the other Guardians came out of the trees and gathered around King Vogt: Sir Messick and Sir Hedges, Sir Kwan and Sir Bazzana, Sir Adell and Sir Halpin. And then out walked Sir Griffin with the captured Lord Murakami, his samurai helmet now tucked under one arm. Even the archmage, Willis the Wise, reappeared — who had seemingly vanished, but was certainly off influencing the battle in ways only wizards know about.
The victorious Guardians stood in a ring around King Vogt, with the vanquished Venable still bowing at his side.
“King… Vogt,” Venable said, raising his voice so that every Black Sock stirring in the leaves could hear. “I would have been left in the Euclidean Stair with that monstrous Eye, if you hadn’t pulled me out of it. I must thank you, and pay tribute to your heroics. You saved me from a fate worse than death.” He stood, and looked King Vogt in the eyes. “I now understand why they call you the once and future king. You will find no opposition from me in your quest for the Commissioner’s Trophy.”
At that, the Guardians of the Round Table let up a raucous yell that made the forest tremble.
“Your thanks are accepted,” King Vogt replied.
“Then let me repay you by telling you what we learned about the Commissioner’s Trophy,” Venable said. “Rumors have it that the Trophy is stashed amongst the treasure of a Blue Ice Hydra, in a large cave on the shores of a treacherous ocean. To get there, you must sail from the Bay of Tampa. The shipyards there should have a fleet for you and your Guardians of the Round Table.”
Venable glanced back at the woods before giving King Vogt a final warning. “But you should know that you aren’t the only ones seeking the Commissioner’s Trophy. There are others hunting for it too.”
King Vogt sheathed Excalibur and looked around at his Guardians of the Round Table — twenty-six golden ‘C’s beaming back at him.
With a champion’s determination, King Vogt called out to his knights: “Then we ride for the bay!”
The Guardians rode hard for many days, until at last the forest thinned, the air turned salty, and the road dropped toward a wide green bay glittering in the afternoon sun. At the water’s edge sprawled a boatyard, with half-built hulls propped on timbers, stacked coils of rope, and gulls wheeling overhead.
The Guardians rode down into the shipping village, and King Vogt reined in his horse at one of the docks where a fishing boat was unloading its catch. The crew hauled on a great net slung from a wooden crane. The fishermen opened the net and something enormous slid out, landing on the dock with a heavy slap: it was a giant devil ray, its two great wings spread across the planks and its whiplike, barbed tail trailing off the edge.
The knights stared. Sir Halpin let out a low whistle. “That’s nearly as long as three men lying head to toe!”
“Don’t mind that,” one of the fishermen called over. “They get bigger ‘en ‘at.”
The Guardians made their way to the shipyard where King Vogt found the shipwright who sold the ships. But when Vogt explained to him that they needed a fleet of ships to cross the ocean, the old man’s face went pale.
“Cross the ocean?” he asked, worried. “You’ll not like what you find out there. There’s rumors of a band of crusaders sailing these waters searching for the Commissioner’s Trophy. Word is their captain struck a deal with a Demon of the Deep — a monstrous beast with four eyes and a tail that crushes boats to pieces. Supposedly he sacrificed some of his own knights to the sea-beast in exchange for a fleet of enchanted ships. They say that nothing on the sea can touch them now, so no one wants to cross their path. I haven’t sold a ship in weeks.”
“We aren’t afraid,” said King Vogt.
“We’re the Guardians of the Round Table!” Sir Hedges declared, thumping the ‘C’ on his chest, his grin as wide as ever.
The shipwright looked at the long line of Guardians behind them and sighed. “Well, I can build you a fleet. But it’ll take a few months.”
“We don’t have months,” said King Vogt. “We are on a sacred quest to claim the Commissioner’s Trophy. We must leave at once.”
The old man scratched his whiskery beard. “Well… I do have a fleet of four small whaling ships. They’d be big enough to carry your whole crew.” He cleared his throat nervously. “But people balk at the color of the sails… it’s a strange color.”
“The color of the sails?” Sir Rocchio asked. “What do you mean, it’s a strange color?”
“Well, most folks want white sails on their ships. It’s a clean look. But these aren’t exactly the typical shade of white most people like.”
King Vogt’s jaw tightened. “I’ve a quest to finish. Stop dancing around, and tell me what it is.”
The shipwright looked up at the sky sheepishly, then down at the planks beneath his feet, and then out at the ocean before finally looking back at King Vogt.
“Do you like red?”