When the wedding ceremony was over, one of the servants guided the guests to go towards the King's hall for the wedding feast.
As Emery, in the guise of Arthur, walked into the hall, one of the Logress golden knights who survived the bloodbath approached him. Although the knight walked with a slight limp, he was relatively unharmed. Emery whispered a few words to the knight, before joining the crowds for the wedding feast.
Gwen was a perceptive woman; she was smart enough to realize that something was wrong, but she seemed to have decided to keep quiet for now. However, Emery could see it clearly, even though her smile still seemed as brilliant as ever for the guests, her gaze told him she was up to something.
When the crowds were distracted, Gwen glanced at him, wordlessly asking for an answer. To which Emery could only say.
"Please, be patient."
Emery gave a short speech for appreciation just to keep up appearances, and the feast started. The king and now queen of Logress sat at the main table, facing hundreds of guests. The smell of delicious food and high quality drinks wafted in the air, while servants hurried back and forth to meet the guests' demands. As the guests ate and talked, the joyous air could be felt, but it was lost on Emery.
Once again, Emery used his spirit reading and enhanced senses to ensure nothing went wrong. He noticed the Longress knight had started to subtly move in and bring some of the suspicious people he pointed before away from the feast one by one.
Emery could also tell that there were some who tried to escape in the middle of the night. But the Logres knights were prepared, surrounding the whole hall. As soon as they tried to escape, they were being captured instead.
The people at the feast however didn't notice anything and kept enjoying themselves.
"Congratulations to the new King and Queen of the Logress Kingdom!"
Abe shouted enthusiastically and raised a cup of wine. From his flushed face, it was clear he was a little drunk. Nonetheless, his words were sincere.
The ceremony went on for another hour, until Emery saw Gaious enter the room from the corner of his eyes. It was a sign his task had finally ended. Before he left his seat, he told Yvain not to leave Gwen from his sight at all.
But, before Emery was about to leave, the new queen of Logress had lost her patience. She glared at him and said. "I will come with you, I insist."
Not trying to make a scene, Emery just nodded. They left the room and all the guests turned even rowdier. They were laughing and smiling thinking the two newlyweds were unable to wait for spending their first lovely night together.
Emery could only sigh in his heart, slightly smiling at the audience, before quickly leaving the hall.
The two of course did nothing of the sort and followed Gaious into one of the castle basements, into a dusty secret hall.
When they went inside, there were the 5 golden knights facing a dark, dusty cell illuminated only by a few dying torches. More than a dozen captives were chained and locked up inside the cell.
"W- what is going on here?!" said Gwen in shock, Yvain also entered the room and was quickly alarmed seeing the many prisoners. They bore minor cuts that had been treated as minimally as possible, only to ensure they remained alive, but not well enough to escape.
At this moment, a figure came into the room looking really pale and being helped by Sir Gawain teh Logress Golden knight, who just returned from a scouting mission in the north.
"Uhugh, I will explain" The figure was no other than Arthur Pendragon. He was pale and his steps were shaky, bandages covered his whole bare torso and arm.
Seeing two identical Arthurs in front of him, Yvain was shocked, Gwen however not so much.
The truth was she already sensed it since the beginning of the ceremony. Gwen had been suspicious since Arthur first walked towards the altar. At first, she only noticed the sudden change of outfit that bothered her, but then there was Emery's weird actions and suspicions. Finally, the way Emery held her hand and kissed her left very few doubts in her mind.
Gwen approached Arthur and asked "What happened?", while checking on Arthur's condition. Meanwhile, Emery decided to dispel his [shapeshifting] form and return to his original form.
Arthur said "I am sorry Gwen, it was a disaster, I did what I thought was best, Merlin ended up helping me."
It was such devastating news, so many lives were lost.
She once more stared at Emery, there was a certain thought that passed her mind, but the current problem was far too crucial for her to think about other matters.
Arthur took a seat and told her what he and the men had found out from the captives.
Just as predicted, their first plan was to kill him and the golden knights; afterward, they would come crashing to ruin the wedding in front of everyone. This way, they would strike fear in the nobles and by extension the citizens. It would end up making Logress and the other kingdoms lose all hope for the coming invasion, which would presumably force them to surrender without even a fight.
But with the death of Maleagant and the swift capture of all the involved golden knights they had no one to lead the operation in Logress anymore.
"Thank you Emery for saving me and saving us once again" Arthur said and all the other surviving golden knights felt the same.
"Unfortunately, from the information, we gathered from these captives and from Gawain, with or without the Golden knights they will commence attacking at the same time… tomorrow"
Arthur took a deep sigh when he said "A total of combined forces of 30.000 men from the north and the east."
The words quickly shocked everyone in the room, as a combined force of Logress, Gangani and Demetae would not even reach 10.000 men. That was assuming all nobles would come and bring their soldiers with them.
Arthur looked toward the gloomy crowd and said.
"Do not let it break your spirit! Hear my orders. Pull out all citizens and soldiers fighting on the border back to Camelot. Send messages throughout the 7 kingdoms to call for our bannermen. Within 5 days all are invited to join us in Logress against the invaders. we will have one decisive battle here outside of the Camelot."
Arthur hoped that many would come, after all, if Camelot fell, so would the rest of the kingdoms.
The king of Logress started to give out tasks for everyone in the room.
Sir Bors and Sir Dagonat The golden nights of Gangani kingdom would return to speak to their kings, also Sir Galahad of the Demetae kingdom convincing them to send as many knights as possible.
Other than the looming war, there was also a matter of the Golden Knights who were also involved in the killings, making Arthur uncertain about the responses of the two allied kingdoms. Meanwhile, the Cantiaci Kingdom had been far too quiet. In this time of uncertainty, the flagrant lack of displays of loyalty only worried him even more.
Emery also planned to return to the fey village, it was at this moment Sir Gawain added him a piece of information.
"Master Merlin I am afraid we spotted the witch you were looking for with the northern tribes."
It appeared it was true, Meave was involved in all of this, now Emery had no reason not to join the war.
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Written by Avans, Published exclusively by NovelFull,