Peredur and the Dog-Heads by Oliver Fosten
It was only autumn, but a brutal chill was creeping through the air. The wind’s icy fingers slipped underneath armor and quilting alike. Perhaps that was simply the way of the world here, Camelot having been at their backs for weeks. With the sun at its apex above them, warming him from within, Gawain had distributed his spare hood and gloves between Peredur and Lancelot, though he retained his green girdle. Peredur once asked if he could earn something similar through a tournament or questing. It was obvious from his frown that Gawain was displeased with the question, though he’d yet to explain why. Cai never grew cold, even when they were all forced to sleep outside and woke up coated in rime. Having grown up in temperate woods with mild winters, the endless sleet threatened to chafe Peredur to the bone as they pushed northward.
King Arthur’s orders were to trace just how far the newly conquered lands extended past its Germanic neighbor. Once they reached the point where the Danish language fell out of common use, they were to turn back to report their findings. It would be a lean, frigid assignment, but straightforward enough that Peredur was able to slip inside the expedition party without too much convincing. It hadn’t even been a year since he left the only home he’d ever known for Camelot, and he never missed an opportunity to practice his tilts or swordsmanship. Lancelot vouched for his rapid progress, Cai losing interest in complaining about his potential presence alongside them once Gawain made it clear Peredur wouldn’t be replacing him.
He missed his mother and their cottage, a proper bed, and meals that weren’t smoked half to death or felt like chewing apart gravel. Despite it all, he was far from displeased over his inclusion. There was an infinite amount of world outside his familiar woods, and he was starving to experience as much of it as he could grasp with both hands. Lancelot praised his enthusiasm, though he would regularly warn him to remember his decorum when eagerness superseded sense. He knew Lancelot was in the right, but it was near impossible to help sometimes. When Peredur was in a good mood, Cai would compare him to a chatty magpie and when he was in a poor one, Gawain told him to hold his tongue. His saddlebags were starting to bulge with dried flowers, bottles of colorful sands, and small baubles he obtained from villages eager to earn favor from their new liege lord. Gawain told him to ignore their strained smiles and furtive whispers, and so he did. Their lodgings were always comfortable enough, though Cai never slept during their stays at various inns, eyes always sweeping across the room long after the hearth fire crumbled to coals.
Cai may have been able to stay awake for an ungodly amount of time, but that didn’t mean he enjoyed it, and if he didn’t, neither did anyone else. To avoid riling him up, Gawain and Lancelot had long since fallen into silence, Gawain occasionally noting landmarks and other details on a wax tablet as Lancelot let his head tip back and eyes close, taking purposeful breaths as if searching for something sweeter in the air than the winter sting. Peredur wondered if he was praying, and then if he himself was praying often enough. Another thing that Lancelot had imparted upon him was that, at the very least, one should always pray for the health and wellbeing of others.
“Bridge around the bend,” Gawain announced.
The shattered quiet startled Peredur enough that his mare shied for a moment, leaving Cai scoffing as he spurred his own mount ahead. Lancelot waited until Peredur soothed his horse and nudged her forward before taking up the rear, blinking almost sleepily. It was no mystery why so many women liked Lancelot. Though his hair was dark as a raven’s beak, nose long and cheeks hollow, his kindness shone through his eyes. Even Cai generally avoided picking fights with him. Gawain was equally courteous and more than a little handsomer than the rest of them, though unlike Lancelot, when women drew close and whispered in his ear, Gawain didn’t humbly request they choose a different favor from him.
Peredur’s view of the bridge sharpened, though he immediately wished he was still blissfully ignorant of the state of the path before them. The river blocking their way wasn’t sprawling, just enough of a bother to necessitate the stone bridge. The trouble was the bridge’s sagging arches, the stone pathway they supported worn from a once noble curve to a nearly flat surface by countless feet. Gawain only had to throw a stone in the water before he turned back to them with a knitted brow. Fed by cascades of mountain runoff, the river was too swift to collect ice, and deep enough in the center to be pulled under.
“There’s no safe crossing without the bridge.”
Cai crossed his arms, greaves grating against his breastplate. “Worried about a little cold water?”
“Yes, and you should be as well,” Gawain replied without humor.
“Even so, there are no recent tracks on the road,” Lancelot observed. “This bridge hasn’t been used for some while and that begs the question why.”
For a long moment, the only sound was the wind whistling through the scrub brush and fresh snow sitting atop the permafrost. It would be one thing to cross the bridge without the weight of horses and armor, but neither were things that could be left behind. Try as Peredur might to help the other knights decide what ought to be done, no idea worth saying entered his mind. His mare had a better chance at thinking of something sensible to do. As if in agreement, she snorted, blowing a misty puff of air out her nostrils.
Peredur reached out a hand to stroke her neck, and it was then she began to shift anxiously in place. His first instinct was that he’d startled her, but she wasn’t the only horse to flatten their ears or paw at the ground. Gripping his reins in one hand, Gawain signaled for caution before letting his free hand rest against his sword pommel. Steady hoofbeats and sharp rasps of conversation grew louder and louder until the source of the sounds and the horses’ anxiety freed themselves of the concealing treeline.
“Worry not. That bridge has stood for decades, and it will continue for decades more so long as you don’t all pile onto it at once.”
Peredur counted at least a dozen knights on horseback approaching the bridge from the opposite direction on their side of the river. Their mounts were shaggy, squat beasts, but more interesting was the armor gleaming in the sun. Aside from chainmail, some of the knights wore steel scales sewed into leather and worn over gambesons. While their weapons remained at their side or slung across their backs, twitching hands were strategically placed to snatch them up in an instant. What Peredur couldn’t look away from, however, was their faces.
Aside from what lay behind the nose and cheek guards, the rest of the face was visible from behind their helmets. Instead of familiar features, the knights all possessed long, hairy snouts like a wolf’s. It was difficult to tell, as they were all in the saddle, but they must have ranged in size from that of a fresh squire to more than a head above the tallest man Peredur knew. The fur he could see had a wide range of color among the knights: white, tan, deep brown, gray, and black along with split-tones and mask-like patterns. Most alarming were the pointed teeth revealed as a few of the knights let long, pink tongues loll out of their mouths.
“Easy,” Lancelot murmured, maybe to his horse, Cai, Peredur, or himself.
If Gawain was concerned, it couldn’t be read across his face. “Hail! Who are you who traverses through King Arthur’s land in armor and weaponry?”
The knight at the front of the group had thick black fur over his elongated face and a harsh voice that caught along the consonants. “Right now, merely travelers, my fellow knight. We seek no quarrel, only to return to our homeland. Once we cross that bridge, you shall not see us again, if you’ll excuse us.”
“We also must cross that bridge, which now rightfully belongs to King Arthur. Since we are among his retinue, it is our right to cross first.”
“Yet we bear the heavier burdens. Besides, we were long prepared to cross while your number still appears busy discussing if you would or would not.”
“Curs, this land belongs not to you. Defer to the rightful authority, or we’ll see which of our smiths forges the superior steel,” Cai declared.
Despite the cold, Peredur began to sweat as multiple sets of lips peeled back over those enormous teeth. A guttural rumbling seeped through the air, though it ceased the moment the lead dog-head held up his hand, seemingly identical to a human’s from the shape of the gauntlet and more than able to utilize armaments.
“Your people certainly have a way of welcoming strangers,” The dog-head remarked. “Regardless, I propose a compromise. Let us indeed test our might against one another in a good-natured game.”
“Depends on what the game shall be,” Gawain said with narrowed eyes.
“A duel between your best fighter against mine, on foot. The first to yield cedes the right to cross first.”
“I will accept-” Cai began.
Gawain glared at him. “No, he won’t.”
If Cai wasn’t their choice, Peredur didn’t bother to volunteer himself. Just because he could hold his own during training didn’t mean he was ready to represent King Arthur in any capacity, official or unofficial. That they were up against dog-heads was just another reason for him to hold his peace. Lancelot turned languidly.
“Gawain?”
“Go ahead, Lancelot.”
With a nod, Lancelot slid down from his horse, the hoary ground of the riverside crackling under his boots as he retrieved his sword and shield. A few deep barks were exchanged before one of the dog-heads broke off from the group to approach. All else stepped backward, forming a rough circle around the contenders. Even with Lancelot’s easy grace, the silent, fluid movements of the dog-head left him clumsy in comparison as both drew their swords and hefted their shields. Lancelot was the finest knight Peredur could imagine, but worry began to knot his stomach. While Lancelot would never betray the set rules of the duel, the same couldn’t yet be said about his monstrous opponent. He bowed his head in a gesture of respect, which the dog-head returned. Niceties concluded, both sank into fighting stances, focus narrowing until the world around them faded to nothing.
“Watch closely, Peredur,” Gawain whispered.
The chosen dog-head made the first blow, rushing forward like a juggernaut. His sword collided with Lancelot’s shield, the strength of the slash leaving Lancelot gritting his teeth. Before he could finish the parry, the dog-head struck again, steel shrieking as the swords locked at the hilts. Lancelot freed his sword and leapt backward, leaving the momentum of the dog-head’s strike to carry him off balance before rushing back in with his weight behind his shield. In any other situation, it would have been a finishing move that would topple the foe and leave Lancelot to claim victory.
Yet the dog-head withstood the blow, knees hardly buckling. Nearly face to face, the dog-head snapped their teeth into the air in front of Lancelot’s exposed face, a hair's breadth away from being relieved of his nose. Unfazed, Lancelot struck his pommel against the exposed edge of the dog-heads shield before they could recoil from the feigned bite, the shield flying out of reach before wobbling and settling against the hard ground. With a snarl, the dog-head gripped their sword with both hands.
Lancelot shrugged off blow after blow with his shield, the space around him and the dog-head scattered with flecks of paint chipped from his shield’s crest. While Lancelot’s arm began to quiver, the dog-head showed no sign of their brutal exertions, having more than enough air left in their lungs to stay on the offensive, growling all the while. The two came together in a tremendous clash like a thunderhead breaking, and Lancelot’s shield finally splintered. He cast it aside, now evenly armed against his opponent.
“Come on, Lancelot,” Cai muttered with none of his earlier fire towards fighting the duel himself.
In a move like a whirling dancer, Lancelot’s whole body arced into the swing of his sword, his strength catching the dog-head in his spiral. A sword fell to the ground in a clatter, and Peredur gasped like an over-fed tournament spectator. There was too much shock among them for even Cai to criticize him for the outburst. The dog-head held Lancelot’s arm behind his back, bending him over at the waist with the foreign blade to his throat. A tremulous breath escaped his parted lips before a ghost of his usual amiable absence returned.
“I yield.”
The dog-head didn’t release him from the ungainly position to fall, sheathing their sword to steady him with that hand as the other released the grip on his arm. Once again upright, Lancelot took a few breaths as he took stock of the makeshift tourney field, noting where his sword and the remains of his shield lay. Facing his opponent again, Lancelot removed his helmet. The dog-head remained still for a long moment before returning the gesture, shaking their head once they were upright to return their fur to its grain. Also freed of the helmet, their ears perked upright, a soft cream color against the dark fur around their eyes and muzzle.
“An admirable fight, good sir,” said Lancelot as he straightened his back.
The dog-head looked to his leader, who offered some yips and woofs of translation only for the dog-head’s ears to flatten against their skull, teeth peeking out behind their lips as a rumble built in their throat. Lancelot’s smile wavered.
“I see I have offended your knight.”
“That you have. Look again, sir human. Our people don’t insist upon arbitrarily dividing ourselves as yours do,” The leader directed.
While Peredur couldn’t identify what the dog-head was implying, Lancelot did, or maybe just made the proper leap in logic.
“I offer my sincerest apologies, my lady. The only way I could be more shamed in this moment is if our Queen and King were here to witness my folly.”
He bowed again, this time noticeably deeper. There was another brief exchange between the dog-head and her leader. Once they’d finished, her brow relaxed, ears standing upright once again. The leader let out a throaty sound that might have been a laugh.
“I take it the lady forgives me?” Lancelot asked.
“She does, although she would be more impressed by demands of a rematch than flowery words,” The leader replied.
Gawain let out a rare chuckle. “A woman after my own heart.”
“How interesting. Different as we may be, there are likely many similarities between us as well.”
“I would hope so. Your champion fought well, worthy of a mighty king. Who is your liege?”
“No one,” The dog-head answered Gawain. “Our kind doesn’t believe one being can stand above all the others and still serve them justly. Thus, we live in groups like these. Some farm, some smith, and what have you. We come together when we need to in order to barter, but otherwise don’t start squabbles between packs.”
Gawain hid most, but not all, of his grimace. “I see.”
Lancelot didn’t wait for Cai to think of something to say. “Would you mind if our young friend asked a few questions about your kind? He hasn’t seen as much of the world as we have, and I can only imagine what he must be wondering.”
While Peredur was doing no such wondering, his body demanding he remain on his guard against these bizarre creatures rather than concoct a cultural comparison, he couldn’t entirely blame Lancelot for the quick deflection. Between Gawain’s undying loyalty to the crown and Cai’s lack of tact, the conversation desperately needed to be directed away from the dog-heads’ methods of governance.
Peredur stuttered a few times before pulling at the first inquiry that presented itself. “Is it strange to you that we have pet dogs?”
The leader’s amused chuffing returned. “Not particularly. A friend of mine once had a pet monkey. Does that bother you?”
“No, I suppose not,” Peredur answered, though he had only a vague idea what a monkey was from an illustration in a book, and those tended to take massive liberties with their subject’s appearance.
“Do your kind have tails?” Cai successfully interjected, mercifully redirected to silly, if slightly invasive, questions.
“No, knights have our tails docked for safety in battle. Do yours?”
“Certainly not!”
“We do easily get cold, having such sparse hair compared to yours,” Lancelot amended.
The dog-head he dueled put her hand on the leader’s shoulder, communicating her message with a whine.
“What did she say?”
“She asks if she might have a kiss from one of you to take back with her as a souvenir of sorts. A novelty from another people. Since it wasn’t agreed upon before the duel, there will be no dishonor in not obliging her. The choice is yours.”
Before Lancelot could provide his consent of dissent, Gawain stepped forward. Though the request had likely been aimed towards Lancelot, the lady knight seemed to take no umbrage with Gawain taking his place. Standing nearly eye to eye with Gawain in stature, she obligingly bowed her head. Gawain’s fingers slipped through the tufts of fur around her ears as he pressed a kiss onto her muzzle. In turn, the dog-head buried her nose in the crease of Gawain’s neck, making him shiver. If Peredur was somewhat off-put by the scene, he could only guess at Cai’s take on it.
Lancelot cleared his throat. “I’m surprised you know our language.”
“A few of your missionaries wandered close to our lands, and a friend of mine got curious. While I agreed with him that it would be useful for some among our numbers to learn a human language, he’s the only one who went so far as to cast aside his name to worship your deity,” The leader responded, nose wrinkled at the recollection.
“You don’t approve?”
“He can do as he pleases, but I have my concerns over human influence coming from inside our communities while your King conquers those closer and closer to us. Let it be known to him we desire peace, but also won’t hesitate to defend what is ours.”
“We’ll tell him as such.”
The leader nodded his dark head, one ear twitching. “It is time we parted ways. Safe travels to you all. I hope someday we’ll meet again as friends.”
“Same to you.”
They watched as the dog-heads crossed the bridge in single file, each waiting until the horse in front of them had all four hooves on the opposite bank before taking their turn. As they promised, the bridge shed some dust here and there, but remained upright. Once they were all together again, they set off towards wherever home was for them, a few taking final glances in their direction. Gawain waited until they were far ahead of them before giving the order to resume their journey along the opposite path the dog-heads took.
None of them talked until noon was waning, and Gawain asked for his hood and gloves back. Even then, the items were returned to him without sound. As they continued on, glances would sometimes be shared, though Cai refused to look Gawain’s way at all. Though Peredur was practically spilling over with the need to unpack their shared experience, the reins in Lancelot’s hands drooped as he gave his stallion his head, trusting him to follow the others while he lost himself within his own thoughts.
“Was her fur soft?” Peredur finally questioned Gawain, the question finally bursting from between his lips.
Gawain nodded, letting out a hum at the memory. “Very soft.”
“I know it’s important to be friendly and courteous, but is kissing ladies, even dog-head ladies, always a part of going on quests for the King?”
The fog Peredur’s words produced hadn’t yet dissipated before Gawain frowned.
“Watch yourself, Peredur. When a lady asks for something as harmless as a kiss, you ought to give it to her.”
Cai smirked. “A tenant of chivalry Gawain never betrays.”
“She more than earned it,” Lancelot said, apparently listening after all. “Knight or otherwise.”
Gawain looked in his direction. “You didn’t exactly jump on the opportunity when it was offered.”
“There wasn’t any time to.”
“As I said, when a lady asks,” And then he added a few seconds later. “And there’s no husband around.”
Lancelot didn’t reply, his gaze rising to the horizon as the sun set fire to the ashen hilltops. It would be dark soon, and Peredur pondered upon what manner of beings he would someday dream of as an old man fortunate enough to have seen a world once hidden by gargantuan trunks and sprawling canopy.
“I wrote this piece for my Arthuriana class final. While I was and am proud of it, it's hard not to think of it as a piece of indulgent fanfiction, even if everything King Arthur is well in the public domain. There's also the quasi-furry stuff that can feel a bit cringe-inducing. As a result, I buried it away in my Google Drive after the semester ended. With my love for the source material as strong as ever, though, I believe this story deserves a place somewhere in the world.”
Oliver Fosten is a genderqueer monster-lover from the Pacific Northwest. When they aren't writing, they can be found pouring candles, playing video games, or with a cat in their lap. For more content both fresh and familiar, check out their twitter @oliver_fosten.