The Fabled Third is now published

 

The Fabled Third is now available directly from the publisher: Click Here  and from the usual online outlets. Take advantage of a weak Australian Dollar and buy direct from my website: Click Here where you will also find samples and background information.

Summary.

Following the outline of Laȝamon the priest’s late twelfth century version, The Fabled Third is the story, in verse, of Uther Pendragon’s attempt to rule what’s left of the Roman province of Britannia in the late 5^th /early 6^th Century. His British subjects are more interested in squabbling over their privileges than in working together against the increasing numbers coming to plunder the ailing province. 

 

Gorlois Duke of Cornwall, a survivor of the previous regime, resents Uther, is resistant to royal authority and is looking for an excuse to renounce his oath of allegiance and go to war. An equally resentful Merlin, banished from the court, is plotting his revenge.  

 

The women are caught in a struggle for precedence and power, knowing the consequences of failure are horrifying. Ygrayne, the wife of Gorlois, has seen what happens to the wives of defeated rulers. Knowing that her husband can’t beat Uther, she too is plotting. 

 

The book begins when Gwydion, a British storyteller, arrives at Uther’s court. Uther is in need of a bard. He challenges Gwydion to tell three stories, for three different audiences.  Versions of Gwydion’s stories will later be collected in ‘The Mabinogion’ but as he becomes involved in Uther’s struggle to rule the province, the first two stories are easy. 

The third is the problem.