Chapter Thirty: Peers of the Round Table
Guardians of the Twilight Lands -- The Sixth Book of Unexpected Enlightenment
“Those aren’t knights,” Sigfried objected the next morning. “They’re old!”
Rachel and Sigfried peered out from behind a topiary dragon—a huge serpentine creation involving numerous yew trees—on the lawn in front of the Gryphon Park manor house as they watched the arrival of the Peers of the Round Table. Siggy crouched with his back to the drive, presumably examining everything with his amulet. Rachel knelt beside him, peering through the bushy green branches of the yews. They watched an immensely old Irishman, whose long, tangled beard still retained a hint of its original red-gold color, totter from his carriage to the house. Two of his numerous red-haired progeny flanked him as he walked, ready to prop him up.
“Not all of them,” Rachel replied, “though I’ll give you the Duke of Tara. He’s two hundred and thirty-nine.”
“Two hundred-thirty-nine?” Siggy echoed. “Didn’t know geezers could get that geezy.”
“The Wise can. Two hundred is about the limit for most, but some live to three hundred.”
“That’s…really old.”
Rachel paused. “Why are we crouched behind a bush?”
“I wanna look before they see me,” replied Siggy. “People act goofy when they meet me for the first time. They ask for autographs and want to know all about the dragon I slew. I want to see the knights before I have to answer questions. I thought there’d be armor.”
“Armor’s crunchy,” offered Lucky. “Not tasty at all.”
Rachel shook her head. “They’re not knights; they’re peers.”
“How are they the Round Table, then?” Sigfried lay back on the grass.
The day was unusually warm for March and unexpectedly sunny. It had not rained in over a day, unusual for Dartmoor, so the grass was dry. Looking down at him, lying so comfortably, Rachel found it disorienting to remember that Sigfried could see just as well while lying on his back as she could peering through the greenery, probably better.
“The Round Table is our ruling body of the Wise,” said Rachel. “They meet around the Round Table, which is the same one King Arthur used. The Round Table meets once every seven years. Lords and knights—men with the title sir, not armored warriors—and even a few elected members come from all over England, Wales, Scotland, and Ireland. In some cases, if a lady or a dame holds the title in her own right, then she comes. During the other six years, the business of the Round Table is conducted by a council of ten. Those ten include the Peers—the eight highest ranked lords: seven dukes and a marquis—and two Visitors.”
“Visitors? Like tourists?” asked Sigfried.
“Do they pick a new visitor every year?” asked Lucky. “Did someone eat the old one?”
Rachel sighed. “Sorry, Lucky, no one’s eaten them yet.”
“That’s a shame,” Lucky replied so seriously that Rachel laughed.
She said, “The two Visitors represent the monarchy and Underhill.”
“Underhill?" Siggy asked. “That’s fairies, right? Are we going to see a real fairy?”
“A fairy knight, even,” Rachel smiled, “but he’s not here yet.”
“Are the fairy knights small or big? Bigger than a mouthful?” Lucky looked hopeful.
Rachel shook her head. “He’s one-quarter human.”
“One-quarter the size of a human?” asked Siggy, “or one-quarter of him is human?”
“The second,” Rachel replied. “He’s big.”
“Giant big?” Siggy asked hopefully.
“Not that big,” she said apologetically. “Just not tiny-sized.”
Siggy scowled. They still had not been to see the giants, and it bothered him. “I thought the Parchment of Coffee decided what happened to the Wise.”
“I assume you mean the Parliament of the Wise in Cathay?” she said, after thinking for a moment. “Parliament decides large matters, policy that affects all the Wise. The Round Table decides British issues.”
“Like what?”
“Well.” Rachel thought back to newsglass articles in her memory library. “How much strangeness are the Unwary allowed to witness? What to do with Unwary who can see through obscurations? Those sorts of things.”
“What happens to Unwary who can see the Wise?” asked Siggy, sitting up.
“Sometimes, they are invited into the World of the Wise. Sometimes not.”
“What happens if not?” asked Lucky, trying not to look too interested or too hungry.
“I don’t know,” she said softly. “I suspect their memories are wiped.”
She was quiet for a moment. At some point, she realized with a heavy heart, she would have to outright admit she actively disapproved of the way the Wisecraft treated the Unwary. She had not yet entirely reached that point. It was hard to condemn the Agents whom she so admired.
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