Content Warning: This guide and the source material contain graphic depictions of war, violence, and sexual violence. It also uses ableist language and outdated and offensive language relating to mental health conditions, which is replicated in this guide only in direct quotes of the source material.

Derfel Cadarn, now an old man living in a monastery, will record the tales of Arthur, even though the local priest wants all memories of pagan times to be forgotten. The monks are awaiting the arrival of Queen Igraine, who is coming to pray for a male child, though she also comes to hear stories from Derfel. She has been to the monastery before and has already given him materials with which to record his stories. Bishop Sansum would surely object, but he cannot read or speak the old language, so Derfel and Igraine tell him they are transcribing the Gospels. Sansum comes in and subjects Derfel to questioning, and Derfel remembers a time when “he bowed to me and kissed my sword, but now he is a saint and I am nothing but the most miserable of sinners” (5).

Derfel begins his story in the year 480 in the Christian calendar, at Caer Cadarn, where the High King Uther’s daughter-in-law is in labor.