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The dreams always begin the same way—racing through a labyrinth of twisting trees draped with moss, in woods so thick that no light can reach the forest floor save for a slim beam of moonlight illuminating the faint outline of footprints. The memory of those cloven hooves, pressed against the soft earth, are the only trace of the creature that Palamedes can ever find, and yet he can never shake the feeling of being followed, and looks into the darkness with the anticipation of seeing eyes peering back. He runs for what feels like hours, following the distant baying of the Beast, and the woods begin to narrow into a dark tunnel, leading him straight into the clearing. Here, the grass is thick and lush, and it surrounds a small lake as smooth and clear as a pane of polished glass—a world left wholly untouched, silent, and sacred.
For a moment he only watches, before he lets his guard drop and lowers his bow, even as his hands shake—and in that moment, the silence is broken, and everything shatters.
The first time Palamedes dreams of the Beast is soon after he takes another man’s life for the first time. He spends three weary nights alone and on edge, seeing the dead man’s face every time he closes his eyes, and as much as he tries to quiet his uneasy thoughts, the only time he knows peace is when he eases himself into the comfortable familiarity of praying Isha, a brief respite from his bitterness. Drowsy, irascible, he slips in and out of sleep with the changing shadows, and the next thing he knows, he is someplace cold and damp—where the trees shiver in the wind and the sun does not deign to shine, and even the earth seems to be the wrong color. And he is not alone.
The creature in front of him is all sliding coils and painted spots, with sheaves of arrows and broken blades sticking out of its body like spines. Its hide is soaked with blood and its abdomen is distended—it twitches as the Beast hisses in pain. It stills as its gaze falls on him, and they stare at each other in silence.
Does it hurt? he asks without speaking.
No, it says, though its mouth never moves. Not now—now that I know that you will be the one to do it.
Do what? He can’t tell if he’s thinking its thoughts, or if it’s thinking his thoughts for him—he doesn’t know which would unsettle him more. Outside his body, hears nothing but a cold, dead silence, for these are thoughts that are not so much heard as felt.
You are seeing my death, the Beast replies calmly. As I am seeing yours.
He takes a step back, but levels a cold stare at the creature. Who are you, and why do you seek me?
I am Agony. I am Death. I am the past you regret and the future you fear. I am the one certainty that every living soul knows and dreads. It is your duty to follow me.
What happens if I refuse? he asks guardedly.
Then the Quest shall fall to another.
He looks at it long and hard. But what are you?
The Beast turns a golden eye towards Palamedes. I kill kingdoms and eat the entrails of kings and princes. All things must end, and there is nothing you can do to prevent it. And then the snake rears its head and with a sharp flex of its twisted neck, his vision goes black.
A thousand lives and deaths are woven into the tapestry of his dreams. He’s had his head crushed under the Beast’s heavy hooves, been choked and strangled by its thick coils, drowned when the weight of his armor pulled him underwater. He’s been grazed by its fangs, and writhed with his nerves aflame with the pain of hot knives digging into his flesh. He’s died trying to scream through a throat torn open.
But he has one dream where he sees the people he loves meeting their own grisly ends, and he would gladly relive his thousand deaths that never were, if it meant he could forget the things he saw that night.
Haven’t you ever wondered who will inherit the Quest when you fall? the Beast asks him the next time they meet.
His blood runs cold at the thought.
Your youngest brother worships the ground you walk on. I believe he would take to the hunt willingly on his own. I wouldn’t have to do a thing.
“Stay away." Through his simmering rage, Palamedes forces the words from his throat, with all the venom he can muster. “I swear on my own life that I will destroy you if you ever touch him.”
What makes you think I haven’t already? it asks.
He strikes a rough blow in response, and watches as the Beast’s fur grows red with blood. His sword hand is shaking as he holds the blade against its neck. “Your custom may have been different in the past, but this Quest shall be mine and mine alone. It will end with me. I promise that much.”
The Beast makes a noise that almost sounds like a laugh. Is that an oath, whelp?
“Yes—but not to you. I pledge my oath to my brothers, for they will be the ones to bear the burden of the hunt, should I fail.”
But how will you know when the Quest ends? the Beast asks.
“When I have your head in my hand, and your body split to collops at my feet,” and as he speaks he presses the sword’s point against the Beast’s glistening scales.
You know nothing, the Beast says, and it almost sounds as if it pities him. This is not a fight that either of us can win. We are mere specks of sand, clinging to the hands of those more powerful than us. The death of you or I will only feed that power.
“Then why am I plagued by your presence?” he asks, aghast. “Go on your own way, and be free of it all.”
I am bound to fate as much as you are, it says quietly, before it bares its fangs and lunges.
The Beast is sick, Palamedes realizes after a time—that, and starving, and exhausted, and as furious and desperate as he is. And he knows that means it’s weakening.
I am famished, the Beast whispers to him one night. I feel a hunger deeper and older than any kingdom. The next time I see a man, I’ll pluck out his heart with my long sharp fangs, and eat it whole while it’s still nice and hot. The snake head regards him coldly, with a look that can only be described as withering. I’m surprised you don’t offer up your own, it fairly sneers. After all, you’re usually quite quick to give it away. Why don't you tell me the tale of Tristan and Iseult, of souls star-crossed that live only in dreams? Or is love-sorrow your stalwart sole companion?
He grits his teeth but holds his tongue, for he knows better than to take the Beast's poisoned bait.
I wonder whether you will die from love or from hate, the Beast continues, its soft tones dripping with disdain. You of all people could understand what it is to be eaten alive from the inside out. Every moment I am alive I feel the teeth gnawing away at what life I have left. Even as we speak, my entrails are being ground to gristle, my bones picked clean. Such a burden it is to be flesh and blood. So far you know nothing, it says, and then it spits at him.
Roots spread out where the Beast’s venom meets the soil, and Palamedes is not swift enough to escape this death. Hazel saplings sprout from the earth and bind themselves to his limbs, scraping his skin as he struggles against their hold. His senses are quickly overpowered as garlands of honeysuckle entwine around his neck and down his arms, and the flowers press against his nose and mouth and eyes until he is drowning in falling petals and prickling leaves, choking on the cloying scent of nectar.
His mind has become a maze unto itself, but he is starting to see that it is of his own making. He and the Beast both know that his presence in his dreams is what shapes them. Dark days blur into warm nights, and Palamedes can't always tell one from the other, but there is one way to know for sure—a scrap of knowledge he keeps locked behind a door that even the Beast cannot reach.
The night is so dark that he can’t see a thing around him, so he sits on the soft earth and curls up with his head in his hands. Somewhere, he can hear a child trying, failing to hold in their sobs. He knows it would be pointless to call out—it’s just a dream, after all, and he knows nothing good will be waiting for him. He has no choice but to let the time pass, and as he listens to the child weeping, he tries to will himself to become a part of that impenetrable dark. He imagines it draping over him like a silky shroud, until he is invisible.
Something slithers against his leg for a moment, and then the sensation is gone.
The child holds their breath for a moment, before they succumb to quiet, feeble whimpers.
Palamedes has been trying not to pay attention, but he can’t help but feel a reflexive jolt of worry, and before he can stop himself he imagines what he would do if he had had this dream all those years ago, when his home was still in reach, and that brings up its own tangle of bad memories.
When he tenses at the touch of cool scales grazing the back of his neck, he decides that he’s had enough.
“Don’t you have a good death for me tonight?” he whispers through gritted teeth.
It is yours to find, the Beast says simply, if you wish it. But first tell me about the child.
“How am I supposed to know anything about that?” Palamedes snaps back.
This is your dream, the Beast points out. There must be a reason for it.
“I did not make this,” he retorts, and he thinks he feels a hint of bristled fur brushing against his arm.
Is it you? the Beast asks. Just a lonely child afraid in the dark? Is it one of your brothers? You have failed to protect your family before, and you will fail to do so again. Is it one of a thousand lives you haven’t saved and never will? One of many, slaughtered like animals and burned to ash?
He pictures his anger being whetted to a sharpened point, and then he feels a sudden weight against his thigh. His fingers fly to the spot, and he finds a dagger hanging heavy on his belt, where there hadn't been one before. He barely thinks about it; he grips the hilt tightly before plunging the blade into his heart, just so he can end the dream on his own terms.
“Know that I’m not afraid—not afraid, only aggravated,” Palamedes spits out, as his body shakes and his tunic becomes soaked and heavy against his chest. He drops the dagger, and it is swallowed up by the earth. “I do not fear you. I just want to wake up.”
He gets no reply. But as he sinks into the ground, he begins to drift out of the dream, and before everything fades away, he realizes that the child has stopped crying.
He knows it's the last dream when he sees it.
In the shade of a massive oak tree, the Beast lies on its side amidst a nest of splintered arrows and broken spear-shafts. Its belly is grotesquely distended, the flesh beneath its hide rippling with every one of its slow breaths, but Palamedes almost thinks it looks noble and balanced, as if it's resting in the attitude of a hart couchant. When the Beast lifts its head at last, and opens its mouth, it speaks to Palamedes in his own voice.
“What do you remember of your father’s kingdom?” it asks.
Palamedes swallows. "The scent of jasmine flowers," he says finally, only to see the sky darken above them, as the air is suddenly choked with ash and grit.
The Beast flicks its tongue and turns a glassy eye towards the billowing smoke. “Liar,” it hisses.
Palamedes feels his eyes water and sting, and he presses his fingers into the corners of his eyes. “I remember,” he begins, but his lungs are burning and he starts to cough. “I remember the mosques.” His voice is hoarse, and he grits his teeth as he struggles to breath. “They were beautiful and peaceful—the courtyards quiet under the blue sky.”
The Beast only lashes its tail and watches as it waits for him to continue.
“Showing my little brothers how to play shatranj. The cat that would curl up by the window to sleep during our lessons. My tutor teaching me to play the oud.”
“You keep lying,” it says, almost too quietly to be heard in the roaring wind. “Why? Why would you lie now?"
His sweat and tears trace paths through the streaks of dust on his face, but he shakes his head, and tries to regain the composure to continue. “The palace in the city—our beautiful home. Baba taught me how to ride my first horse. Taught me about strategy. Taught me how to hunt-”
The wind and ash abruptly slough away, and all that’s left is an oppressive wall of heat, and the faint, distant crackling of fire.
“Enough,” Palamedes says sharply. “I do not lie. That is what I remember—what I choose to remember. Yes, there is more, but I think you already know it.”
Dark plumes of smoke curl around the two of them. The Beast doesn’t move, just watches with glinting eyes.
“You insist on reminding me of what I’ve lost,” he continues, his voice ragged and harsh. “Every word a lashing, a mockery of who I am and what I stand for. And it seems I shall never be rid of you. I do not know what I have done to deserve so cruel a fate. What do you want me to say? That returning to my home now would be like seeing the corpse of a loved one laid out to rot in the sun?”
His fury overtakes him, and he raises his voice. “Do you think my faith never wavered during that time—that I never wondered why this would happen to us? I fought hard to keep my faith in the darkest time I have ever known, and I would hardly surrender it now at the urging of a few contemptible men—those I can only pity for being so weak-willed that they will never,” he spits out the word just as his voice cracks, “never be able to fathom how the bond I have with my God and my people endures, and remains unbroken.”
He coughs again on the acrid air, and wipes the faint flecks of grime off his face. “What’s strange is that I do remember the scent of jasmine flowers. It wasn’t a lie at all. They were such a simple pleasure, one that scarcely crossed my mind beyond a stray thought while out walking. And now I shall never know that small joy again. All the finest roses in Logres could be in arm’s reach, and still I would desire that distant memory of jasmines.”
“Remember that in the days to come,” the Beast says, and its voice is almost soft as it lifts its head. “No matter what happens, spare the time to think of the jasmines.”
Palamedes does not answer, and the fire and smoke slowly ebb away. All is still, and for a moment the only sound that can be heard is the long, labored breaths of the Beast.
“Fear not,” it says at last, and its voice is beginning to sound less like his own, and more like many voices woven into one. “I am not the horror you seek. I am only a messenger. Some before you have called me an omen.” The Beast’s bulging belly begins to quiver slightly.
“Some before me?” Palamedes asks faintly.
The Beast flicks its tongue. “There is more to the world than the realm of Arthur,” it says, a touch bitterly, before it shudders in pain once more.
“Show me what you see,” he commands, and he doesn’t wait for a response—instead he reaches out with hands that aren’t his and pulls the images out of the serpent’s mouth, until the strange sights flow around them both like water.
He sees the color of a long, dark night choked by smoke and ash, a path paved in bodies and the scattered embers of a broken pyre, wild-eyed horses with scarlet-stained fetlocks, an endless plain watered with blood, the distant shouts of scavengers as they root around the dead like dogs, broken sobs echoing beyond the mist, a quivering sleeve of white samite drenched with muddy water flowing down in rivulets, clouds of silt rising as something bright and silver drops to the earth in a world that glitters beneath dark silken ripples.
The Beast’s chest is heaving, and it shudders and spits. “Do you understand now? Do you see what I am?”
He nods, too frightened to move.
“Something is coming. A tragedy, one far greater and more monstrous than anything you could ever conceive of. I will not live to see it, but you will.”
“War,” Palamedes murmurs, and his hand instinctively wanders to the hilt of his sword. “But surely this land has seen war before.”
“This goes beyond a war—the fall is just the beginning of a very dark time, one that would seem to be a night without end.”
“But it will end?”
“You will not die before you see the dawn.”
He lets out a shaky breath. “A blessing or a curse?”
The Beast’s hooves scrape at the earth as it struggles to rise, and its tail lashes back and forth impatiently. “For now, it is an omen and nothing more. But in the coming days, what was once only smoke and visions will become flesh and blood. Every passing moment brings us closer to that long night. You must be ready.”
Its belly lurches, and Palamedes can see that the Beast is crying, its golden eyes shining and wet.
“Do you want to know what I see when I look at you?” it asks. “I see you wounded from all sides—an ambush, most likely, by two or more men. A miserable way to go. But no one’s death is a fixed thing.”
“But what can I do?” Palamedes asks. He can see the roiling, heaving movement of long-limbed shapes straining taut inside the Beast’s swollen belly, and he clenches his trembling hands into tight fists.
“Ask yourself what you’re willing to die for—what you cannot live with losing. Remember the jasmines—then do what you will.” The Beast’s body shakes, and it spits wet strands of blood and venom to the earth. “Now run. Run fast and do not look back.”
He obeys, even as he hears the baying of the hounds begin, and even as the sky splits and tongues of fire begin to swallow the trees around him. He keeps running until he wakes up—the endless maze of trees drifting in and out of his mind, his ears still ringing from the sound of a howl unraveling into a hundred wounded cries.