Mad as he was, he hummed and crooned

With the trees in a timeless song

Until a cry stilled bird and beast;

A cry he knew was wrong.

It came, like fate, from the road that led

To Beyond and from Before

Where four stout knights had cornered a prize

They menaced with scorn and sword.

A lady fair with chestnut hair

And skin of lily and rose.

Lord Malack leered as he gripped her arm.

“Now what do you propose

“I do with this little flower lads?

Pluck it now or claim my bride?”

“Your demand for my hand,” said she,

“King Arthur has denied.

“And too, he might ask what sort of a knight

Would accost a maid on her journey?

Only one who knows he can’t win

Her fair at the harvest tourney.

“After all, should the Queen send a champion . . .”

Lord Malack scoffed in disdain,

“I should fear some woman’s knight?

There’s a dozen that I retain.

“Yet why should I wait when I have you here?”

“I’d sooner marry a toad!”

She cried.  He wrenched at her arm.  She winced.

And the madman stepped to the road.

“Leave her alone.” The words splintered off

Like ice from a frozen door.

The knights spun about, then laughed as one

At the ruin which lay before.

Hardly so much a man it seemed

As a shamble of twig and leaf

With a bird’s nest that trembled above one ear.

“Kill him,” said the chief.

The other three moved coolly in,

Glad for a little game.

What happened next, though the Lady tried

She could never fully explain.

“Twas like a dance of surpassing grace

But instead of ‘with’ he went ‘through’.”

It ended with two men broken on trees

And the third cut wholly in two.

Somewhere deep in the wildman’s eye,

A spark had caught and grown

Surer and firmer, he spoke again:

“Leave the lady alone.”

The black knight cursed and threw the maid

To the mud, then spurred up the road.

“The tourney will be here soon Elaine.

I will have the prize I’m owed!”

The Lady trembled amid the blood.

The madman had turned away,

Her palfrey beckoned . . . but “No,” she said.

This was a debt to repay.

The haggard pair arrived at her home

With the madman led by a thread,

And a tale for her folk so thrilling it eased

Their sense of looming dread.

But soon they were laughing instead of cheered,

For at meal he crouched on the ground

And fought with the dogs for a bone.  By morn

He was naught but the Lady’s Hound.

And this left little hope at all.

Left no one to come to her aid

But a cousin fetched from the abbey school

And all but untrained with a blade.

The months blinked by ‘til Elaine rode off

With cousin and Hound to her fate,

To find the Queen had indeed sent hope:

A knight, not good, but Great.

Sir Gareth.  A young man famed in song

For mighty deeds at arms,

Yet just as renowned for his kindly heart,

His merry cheer, and charms.

‘Twas a match of which a maid might dream.

Gareth could make her free.

Or might have done ‘gainst a dozen knights,

But Malack had fifty-three.

Fifty-three killers, paid for in coin,

And sworn no quarter to give.

All other men they’d frightened away

But these two, who’d be lucky to live.

Still, fear was a foe Sir Gareth could best.

How he’d last was only a guess –

A dozen bouts would be bad enough! –

But he’d try: he could do no less.

The trumpet’s blare stilled boast and bet

“Sir Gareth, stand to review!

Your first bout shall be: the Lady’s kin!”

There was nothing that any could do.

The knights rode off to each side of the List

Giving time for the crowd to applaud.

Sir Gareth made ready, but the Lady’s kin . . .

Well, even his seat was odd.

He sat less ‘on’ than somehow ‘inside’

Like a figure drawn from song;

A centaur born of man and mount

With an arm that was eight feet long.

They charged, and the iron finger twirled,

Then touched its foe on the breast.

Gareth soared like a leaping hart

And crumpled to a rest.

Weeping, the Lady raced to his aid.

She cradled his head from the ground.

Lord Malack loomed over her back and scoffed,

“So much for the Table Round.

“Now, Elaine, you’ll learn your place.

You and perhaps the Queen.

And as for Arthur’s ‘noble knights:’

Well, now can the truth be seen.”

The Lady’s cousin knelt at her side,

And sighed as Gareth groaned.

Then Guinevere’s favor plucked from his belt

And said, “Leave the Lady alone.”

Lord Malack paled, “I know that voice.”

Sir Gareth coughed on the ground.

And even the tears of Elaine were stilled:

She too knew the voice of her Hound.

“You’re that madman, the one from the road!”

He shook with rage as he spoke.

“Well, I’ve fifty-three knights, and this time . . .”  He paused,

For Gareth had started to choke.

It turned to a chuckle, and then a laugh.

Lord Malack uttered a curse,

At which it swelled to a mirthful roar

That threats could only make worse.

Finally Malack could stand no more.

“You can play the fool now my friend,

But fifty-three knights is fifty-three knights

And Elaine will be mine in the end!”

A ghost of a smile touched the face of the Hound.

He  turned and strode back to his steed.

The Lady leaned close to Gareth and asked,

“So is he a knight indeed?”

Sir Gareth grinned and asked for her hand

To help him from where he’d been hurled.

“Find us some seats,” he said with a smile,

“I wouldn’t miss this for the world.”

Fifty-three killers, paid for in coin,

scattered all over the clay.

And one false knight who would not fight

But fled like a cur from the fray.

And thus my tale of Elaine, the Lily

Maid of Astolot,

Whose kindness saved a weary soul,

And who wed Sir Lancelot.

Twasn’t long ere she bore him a son

Though to court he’d gone away

But the songs of good Sir Galahad

Are tales for another day.