Normal Family Read online

  Neets watched Bryn walk away. “He’s a Gawain? My Bryn’s your son?” she said, not bothering to hide her surprise, or the my come to that.

  “Of course he’s my son, but as far as Bryn’s concerned his name is Lewis and so is mine. Please remember that. I’ll explain everything when we get back to the house.”

  “This beacon we tipped over,” I said pointing at the still smoking embers, “wasn’t that a wrecker’s signal?”

  “It was, but not intended for ships to see,” said Gawain. “It was a false one intended to bring me here. The wreckers wanted us far away from their real beacons, which I suspect are farther down the coast near Rhossili, so they set up false beacons and got one of their people to quietly spread the word that it’ll be lit. I had no choice but to come here. One day I’ll catch them and stop their murderous activities. That’ll also be the day I avenge myself on the Black Knight for what he did to me and my family.”

  Before we could ask him any more questions Bryn returned with the horses, one of which I presumed was obviously his own from the way it nuzzled his cheek when he caressed its ears. Neets selected a beautiful piebald leaving me with the reddest, smallest and calmest horse I’d ever seen. It was a donkey and for some reason I couldn’t comprehend I reckoned I’d got the best of the bunch. Gawain remounted his stallion, and we got on our horses with varying degrees of skill.

  “I’ll explain more when we get home…” he looked at Bryn, “to all of you, I promise.” Gawain spurred his horse into a trot and the three of us followed close behind intent on not getting lost in the rain-sodden darkness.

  Neither Neets nor I had been within several feet of a horse in ages, and bloody horses have a knack of knowing when a rider is out of practice. The mounts Bryn selected for us played Whoops, nearly went over the cliff then’ and ‘Sorry about the thorn bush and the low hanging branch plus Honest, I didn’t see the rabbit scrape I tripped over, and their favorite, look at me, I can stand on my two back legs and paw the air. I vowed to give my donkey a good talking to when we got back to Bryn’s house.

  Once the horses and donkey were safely stabled and scolded (though I did tickle my donkey’s ears so he’d know I didn’t really mean it), we all made our way into the large manor house and were welcomed by Mrs. Jones as though she hadn’t seen us for months. She found a change of clothes for everyone, sat us down in Gawain’s study and fussed around until she was sure we had food, drink and warmth from the roaring log fire.

  The study was more a room where Gawain could relax and not be interrupted than a private library for contemplation. There were bookshelves, though most of them were stacked with novels intended to entertain rather than to educate and the central point of the room was the large hearth rather than a desk. None of us felt we were invading his privacy, but that we were welcome guests.

  Gawain looked at Neets and me and smiled with sincere pleasure, even though his carefully constructed cover had been blown. He was now going to have to explain to us what he was doing in Port Eynon but, more important, he needed to break it gently to Bryn that his father was not who he thought and was actually from the previous millennium and a Camelot knight to boot!

  “It’s good to see both of you again, it really is,” said Gawain, as he carefully pushed a smoldering log deeper into the fire, sending sparks high into the chimney and giving the room a cheery Christmas warmth, “and before you ask me what I’m doing here I’m going to ask you the same question.” He laughed. “After all I am the magistrate and Lord of the Manor as Bryn will tell you and as such I have more right to be here than you. Let’s face it, it can’t be a coincidence we all met up miles and years from anywhere.” He crossed his arms and smiled with the charisma we remembered so well.

  I broke first. “We’re chasing a load of weird coincidences dressed up as purple herrings…”

  “Red,” whispered Neets. “You mean red coincidences and soused herrings.”

  “… and that’s about it,” I continued, ignoring my cousin’s interruption. “We’re not really sure what’s going on except that I’ve been dragged round loads of places in time and seem to have picked up some pretty undesirable things, like your Bryn for one, not that he’s all that undesirable, and a weird statue of some sailor Lord or other.”

  “Statue?” Gawain showed more than polite interest.

  “Yeah, I took its place on this great big column thing, and I tell you it was bloody cold up there.”

  “Statue?” Gawain repeated the word as though the rest of my explanation counted for nothing. He prodded the fire again absentmindedly. “Tell me what it looked like and where it is now.” He stared into the flames.

  “It’s in Merlin’s cave if you must know.” I was annoyed that Gawain should consider a statue more important than me. “It looked like a tall bloke with an arm missing and a patch over one eye. Oh, and he had a weird hat.”

  “Excellent,” said Gawain, “and you say his eye patch is still in place and the rest of him is intact.”

  “Yeah, he’s got three limbs and one eye if you reckon that makes him intact. He’s also taking up far too much room in Galahad’s restaurant.”

  “My apologies to my old friend Galahad,” said Gawain. “You do mean the Sir Galahad, the one who found the Holy Grail?”

  “No, the one who founded the Olé Grill restaurant chain,” I said with a little huff. “Blimey! Everyone wants him to be some sort of romantic hero and all he wants to be is a famous restaurant owner.”

  My memories of Camelot were mainly of rain, mud, cold, wind (mostly because of the food), leaky buildings, and smells. How on earth people got this idea of knights in shining armor rescuing maidens, killing dragons and finding Holy Grails all over the place completely beats me. All the knights I knew were either fat, extremely old, half mad or reinventing themselves as business men of one sort or another.

  “Very well, I suppose I’d better explain how and why I’m here.”

  “Now there’s a thought,” I mumbled.

  “I came here after the Black Knight,” said Gawain. “You remember him? He tried to overthrow Arthur and laid waste to half of Camelot.”

  “We remember,” said Neets, “and we’ve already come up against him here, or at least Tersh has.”

  I gazed at Gawain and saw the familiar trustworthy features. “And now you’ve set us a puzzle because we not only know the Black Knight and what he’s like, but we had you nailed as being him, or rather him being you. Everything pointed to it. The wrecking, smuggling, murders, and some of what Bryn said sort of wrapped it up. So both you and the Black Knight are here?”

  “Oh yes, he’s here and he hasn’t changed. He arrived about a year before me and lost no time in terrorizing the area with a new gang of thugs. I’ve done what I can to stop him, but he has spies everywhere. He knows what I’m planning almost before I do and all I’ve really managed is to slow him down a bit.” Gawain paused. “In return for which he killed my wife Marie and deprived Bryn of his mother.”

  “How did you both get here?” I beat Neets to the question by a microsecond. “We all saw your armies fighting outside the walls of Camelot and you defeated the Black Knight in single combat. The classic White Knight versus the Black Knight fight. You brought him into the castle. We all saw you. So how come he wasn’t strung up like he deserved?”

  “Between the castle gates and the dungeons my men were attacked and the Black Knight was set free. I told you he had powerful friends, but even I didn’t think they’d attack inside Camelot itself.”

  “But we all know he was executed. We saw it happen.” I was puzzled.

  “We couldn’t afford to let anyone know he escaped and was still alive, so another condemned traitor agreed to dress up as the Black Knight and take his place.”

  “What? Just like that?” said Neets. “The man volunteered and you didn’t break his fingers first?”

  “Certainly not! We’re not animals,” said Gawain. “Normally the condemned man’s estates would b
e confiscated leaving his family homeless, but I promised him his wife and children would keep their home and be given a pension for life. Furthermore, I made sure his death was quick and he suffered as little as possible.”

  “That must have been a great consolation,” I said with a hint of sarcasm.

  “He was a multiple murderer,” said Gawain. “He knew what his fate was going to be and he considered himself fortunate.”

  “So what happened to the Black Knight?”

  “I traced him to his hiding place in Camelot and nearly captured him. We fought and he was so good I thought I’d met my match, but eventually I began to get the better of him and as I was about to beat the man, he jumped out of a window and disappeared into the alleyways. The strangest thing, though, I grabbed his hair as he jumped and the whole lot came away in my hand. The man was completely bald!”

  “We know,” I said. “We’ve seen him here twice.”

  “So he escaped again,” said Neets with a tut. “Typical.”

  “Typical of him, or typical of me?” said Gawain with what sounded like genuine interest.

  “Typical of a man!” said Neets, though for the life of me I couldn’t think why she said it. It was most unlike her and far more like something Marlene would come out with after a couple of whiskeys on a Friday night.

  “Well, at least I’m a man,” said Gawain with a laugh, “and you, Unita, are no longer a girl. You’ve become a beautiful young woman who would make any handsome lad proud to have on his arm, and I’m including my son.” He nodded towards Bryn who was busy sorting papers and possibly just out of earshot.

  “You’re kidding?” Neets said with a gasp.

  “You’re kidding!” I gagged very quietly. There’s never a vomit-bag lying round when you want one.

  “Over the next few days,” continued Gawain, “rumors came from all over Camelot as to where the Black Knight had gone, most of which I could discount, but one was worth investigating. One of my informants claimed to have seen him going into the workshop apartments Merlin used to have in one of the castle’s towers. I checked and sure enough he was there, but instead of fighting me he laughed, jumped through a shimmering ultraviolet archway and disappeared.”

  “It must have been one of Merlin’s experimental Time Portals!” I said. “And you followed him immediately?”

  “No. I had no idea what had happened. I just knew he was no longer there and I could have been following him to certain death. I asked Merlin to explain about the archway and she – yes, I know her little secret – agreed to send me to wherever the Black Knight had gone, although she couldn’t guarantee the time would be accurate.”

  “So you arrived a year too late?”

  “Yes.”

  “But how come you and the Black Knight both ended up with Portals?” A bloody good question by Neets for a change and wished I’d thought of it first.

  “The Portal Merlin was experimenting with was her first portable one and the Black Knight took it with him. Merlin knew this and allowed me to take one as well. As she said, it was only fair. Not only was it portable, it could also transport things remotely,” he looked at me, “like you and a certain statue.”

  I looked at Gawain as he played with the pommel of his sword and stared into the fire. “So what happened when you got here?”

  “The Black Knight, his name here is Schwartz by the way, had set up his wrecking and terrorism gang about a year before I arrived and it took some time before people accepted me as a local and friend. Meanwhile Schwartz went from strength to strength and there was little I could do about it. Then two years after I met and married Marie, Bryn was born and my beautiful wife was killed by Schwartz. His murderous wrecking and smuggling got worse and I was a defeated man.

  “But I thought you ran the smuggling,” I said.

  “Up to a point, certainly what you might call the legitimate smuggling that benefits the local community, but Schwartz runs everything else and has a small army protecting him.”

  “Gawain,” I started… me and my big mouth again. “May I ask how Bryn’s mum died. Nobody’s ever really said.”

  “I believe Marie was killed by Schwartz as a warning that I should stop interfering in his activities. His men ambushed her one night as she was riding her horse back home from visiting friends and scared the mare so badly it bolted over the cliffs into the sea. We never found any trace of her or the horse. Any witnesses were bribed into silence by Schwartz, but one or two people who know me well told me what happened and I…” He stopped suddenly and turned round. “Bryn!”

  While his father had been talking, Bryn had walked quietly up behind him and now stood face to face with a man who must have seemed a stranger to him.

  “Bryn, I didn’t want you to hear it this way,” said Gawain. “I’ve wanted to tell you ever since your mother died, but it was never the right time and I was afraid you might take the law into your own hands and go after Schwartz. I didn’t want to lose you as well.”

  “You lied to me all these years!” Bryn shouted. “You told me mum had died when her ship got smashed on the rocks in a storm. You told me!”

  “And if I’d told you the truth would it have helped?” said Gawain, trying to hold back his anger. “It wouldn’t have brought Marie back and I would have had to tell you and probably everyone else the truth about where I come from.” He looked calmer. “But now these two girls - sorry, ladies - have, yet again, become involved in my life, so now would seem the right time for you to know everything and for me to put a stop to Schwartz once and for all.

  “And revenge?” I offered hopefully.

  “Of course!” said Gawain who laughed without humor. “Revenge for the death of my Marie and for ruining Bryn’s life. But also revenge for the poor villagers and their families that Schwartz senselessly murdered in Camelot. They lost everything while he escaped to cause more trouble here.”

  “Are you really my father?” asked Bryn. “I don’t care about Schwartz and where he came from, but I do care that nothing I believed about you is the truth. You’re a fraud and that’s all you are!” Bryn turned, slammed the study door and ran out of the house with tears streaming down his face.

  Gawain was about to follow, but Neets put an arm out to stop him.

  “Leave him,” she said gently. “He needs time to think and what he’s just heard won’t make that any easier. Leave him for half an hour and then I’ll go to him. I think I know where he’ll be.”

  I cast a sidelong glance at my cousin. Even I quite fancied Bryn in a hunk sort of way, but it didn’t take much to see Neets was smitten big time. All the telltale signs were there… stars in the eyes, quiver in the voice, volunteering for impossible missions, trying to impress the future father-in-law. Poor cow, I thought, I’ll deal with her later. I turned my attention back to Gawain.

  “So, how do you reckon to smash the Black Kni… sorry, Schwartz then?” I said it with what I believed to be overpowering tact and diplomacy. “Kick him where it hurts, take him back to be executed in Camelot, or just kill him?”

  “I’m sorry?” With difficulty Gawain turned his attention away from the disappearing Bryn. “It’s not as simple as that. If I did take him back to Camelot then I’d be changing history, and if I took him anywhere else it could leave an unexplainable Schwartz-shaped footprint. Besides the Portals that Merlin gave us are one-way only. They won’t return us to Camelot. We can go anywhere else, but not Camelot.”

  “One of Neets’s temporal anemones,” I said. “So what are you going to do then?”

  “Win, my young friend,” said a grim Gawain as he unsheathed his sword. “I’m going to win and end this once and for all.”

  Neets followed Bryn at a discrete distance and unseen by both of them I brought up the rear. I quickened my pace and being younger and a lot more athletic managed to get to the Salt House before either of them and crouched under a bush that gave no shelter from the rain, but at least hid me.

  I watched Bryn as he s
lipped and staggered over the seaweed-covered rocks. Knowing the area like the back of his hand probably didn’t help much in the dark, because like most people he could only describe the back of his hand as being pink, a bit hairy, and covered in veins. He reached the grassy slope that led to the bottom of the cliff and stood for a moment gulping in air, while behind him was the shape of the Salt House, though now there was no eerie light shining from inside. The look on his face told me the pain he felt at being lied to all these years by the only parent he knew and his stomach must have been churning. He began to look very, very lonely as he sat on the soaking earth.

  A muffled cough behind him was ignored along with so many other noises in the wind. Neets laid a hand on his shoulder and sat down beside him. For a couple of minutes she said nothing, presumably hoping that Bryn would break the silence, but he seemed too deeply absorbed in his thoughts and unless they were going to sit speechless until dawn it was going to be up to my cousin to make the first move.

  “Your father loves you,” she said eventually.

  “I know,” said Bryn.

  “He must have wanted to tell you everything so many times, but having lost his wife he wanted to keep you safe from any harm. He couldn’t bear to lose you too.”

  “I know.”

  “But you’re going to the Black Knight, to Schwartz, aren’t you?” Unita sounded pretty certain, but it was still a question. “You’re going to betray your own father.” She spoke without emotion as though explaining a minor plot in a book.

  Bryn looked devastated. “You think I could do that? You of all people.” I waited for the next ‘I…’ bit, but he didn’t say it.