The armies gathered on the plain of Camlann. On one side, King Arthur with the loyal knights of the Round Table. On the other, Mordred with his allies and mercenaries. Father against son. Uncle against nephew. Briton against Briton.

It was summer, but the air was as cold as winter. Ravens circled in the sky, as if they knew a feast was coming. The very earth seemed to weep for what was about to happen. On the night before the battle, Arthur had a dream.

In the dream, Arthur saw Sir Gawain — his loyal nephew, who had died weeks earlier, wounded in a smaller battle against Mordred's men.

"Uncle," said Gawain's ghost, "do not fight tomorrow. If you fight, you will die, Mordred will die, everyone will die. Wait one month: Sir Lancelot is coming with his army to help you. Wait."

Arthur woke in a sweat. Was it a warning? A true vision? In the morning, he summoned his counselors.

"Perhaps we can avoid this battle. I will go to meet Mordred under a flag of truce. We will negotiate."

Some knights protested: negotiate with the traitor, never. But Arthur was the king.

"There has been too much death. If I can save even one life, I will try."

Mordred, to everyone's surprise, agreed to meet him. Perhaps he too was tired. Or perhaps he had fears of his own.

Arthur and Mordred met between the two armies, each with a few knights as witnesses. Before going, though, Arthur gave a strange order: if anyone saw any sword drawn during the talks, for any reason, they were to sound the trumpet and attack at once. Mordred, without knowing it, gave his men the very same order.

The meeting began tensely.

"Uncle," said Mordred, using the title with irony, "what do you offer?"

"Peace," Arthur replied calmly. "You may keep the lands you have taken. You will be a count, respected, rich. But you will acknowledge that I am the king."

Mordred hesitated. It was a generous offer. Perhaps too generous.

While they negotiated, something terrible happened. An adder — a small venomous snake — slid through the grass and bit the ankle of one of Mordred's knights. By instinct, the knight drew his sword to kill the snake. The sun flashed on the blade, and both armies saw the drawn sword. The trumpets sounded, and from both sides rose the same cry: treachery.

And so, despite every attempt to prevent it, the battle began.

It was madness. Knights who had eaten together, laughed together, fought side by side, now faced each other to the death. Arthur fought like a lion, and Excalibur shone in his hand. But for every enemy who fell, a friend fell too. Sir Bedivere, one of the last loyal knights, fought at Arthur's side, and Sir Lucan, his brother, guarded the king's back. Mordred also fought furiously: he had none of Arthur's nobility, but he had courage and skill.

The battle lasted the whole day. The sun rose over two armies and set over a field covered with the dead. When darkness finally fell, only three men still lived on Arthur's side: Arthur himself, Sir Bedivere, and Sir Lucan — and Lucan was wounded unto death. On Mordred's side, only Mordred remained. One hundred thousand men went into battle. Four survived.

Arthur saw Mordred across the field, leaning on his sword, wounded but alive.

"My lord," begged Sir Bedivere, "the battle is over. Let us go. We can recover, gather our strength."

But Arthur pointed at Mordred.

"While he lives, the kingdom will be divided. While he lives, there will be war. This must end today."

Arthur took up a spear and walked among the dead, toward Mordred. Mordred saw him coming and took up his own spear. They met at the center of the battlefield.

"We can still stop!" Arthur shouted. "We are the only ones left. It does not have to end this way."

"Yes, it does," Mordred answered. "One of us must die. There is no other way."

And he charged at Arthur. Arthur blocked the blow and struck back. Wounded and exhausted as they were, the two fought with all the skill they possessed. Then Arthur saw an opening and drove his spear through Mordred's body. Mordred screamed — but with his last strength he pulled the spear deeper into himself, so that he could reach Arthur, and struck the king's head with his sword.

They both fell.

Sir Bedivere and the dying Sir Lucan ran to Arthur. Mordred was already dead. But Arthur was still breathing.

"My king," Bedivere wept. "Live. Please, live."

Arthur opened his eyes. There was a terrible wound on his head.

"Lucan... Bedivere... my faithful friends... my hour has come."

At that moment Lucan, wounded unto death, breathed his last and was gone. Arthur wept quietly for his faithful knight.

"Bedivere," said Arthur weakly, "carry me from here. Carry me to the water."

Bedivere carried his king across the battlefield, past all the dead, until they reached a lake.

"Bedivere," said Arthur, "take Excalibur. Throw it into the lake. Then come back and tell me what you saw."

Bedivere took the sacred sword. But when he looked at it — so beautiful, set with jewels — he could not do it. He thought it was too precious to be lost, so he hid the sword and went back to Arthur.

"What did you see?" the king asked.

"I saw... I saw waves and wind," Bedivere lied.

"You lie," said Arthur, gathering his strength for one last command. "Excalibur is magic: something would have happened. Go and do as I ordered."

Bedivere returned to the lake. This time, with tears in his eyes, he threw Excalibur into the water. And then something miraculous happened.

A hand — a woman's hand, pale and beautiful — rose from the lake. The hand caught Excalibur, brandished it three times in the air, and drew it down beneath the waters. The Lady of the Lake had taken back her sword.

Bedivere ran back and told Arthur everything.

"Then it is done," the king whispered. "Now... now carry me to the shore."

Bedivere carried Arthur to the edge of the lake. And there, through the mist that was gathering, came a boat. In it were three women dressed in black. As they drew near, Bedivere recognized the first: it was Morgana le Fay, Arthur's half-sister.

"Brother," said Morgana softly, without anger, without triumph, only an endless sadness. "Come. I will take you to Avalon. There I will try to heal your wounds."

"Morgana?" Arthur recognized her. "You... who were my enemy... you come to save me?"

"You have been many things to me, Arthur," she said. "An enemy, yes. But also a brother. And in the end, family is family. Come."

Bedivere laid Arthur in the boat with all the care in the world. Arthur held the knight's hand.

"My faithful friend... thank you. For everything."

"My lord," Bedivere wept, "will you return? Camelot needs you. The kingdom needs you. I need you."

Arthur smiled faintly.

"Perhaps. They say Avalon is a place of healing and mystery. Perhaps I will sleep there, and be made whole. And perhaps, when Britain needs me most, when hope seems lost... I will return. Do not say the dream is over: say that it sleeps. Do not say the king has died: say that he waits."

The boat began to drift away, disappearing into the mist. Bedivere stood alone on the shore, weeping, watching until the boat was gone. The last knight of the Round Table. Alone.

And so Camelot ended.

The great hall stood empty, and the Round Table lay cracked and broken. Guinevere, when the news reached her, became a nun and spent the rest of her days in prayer. Lancelot, when he learned of it, also withdrew from the world and lived as a hermit. The dream was over.

Or was it?

For Bedivere did not keep the story to himself. He told it. He told of Arthur, the boy who drew the sword from the stone. Of the Round Table and its noble knights. Of the quest for the Holy Grail. Of love, betrayal, war, and sacrifice. And his stories were told and retold, generation after generation, down through the centuries.

Camelot the place fell. But Camelot the idea never fell. The idea that strength must serve justice. That everyone deserves a voice. That we must protect the weak and stand up for what is right, even when it is hard. Those ideas live on in every person who chooses to do good — they live on in you, too.

And what of Arthur?

Some say he died in Avalon and was buried there. Others say he still sleeps, healed, waiting. And some say he returns, in ways we do not expect: every time someone stands up for a friend, every time someone tells the truth when lying would be easier, every time someone chooses to forgive instead of taking revenge.

There is a place in England, Glastonbury Abbey, where they say Arthur is buried. The gravestone, before it vanished centuries ago, bore these words:

The king that was... and the king that shall be. It does not say "died"; it does not say "ended" — it says "shall be". Because Arthur is not only about the past. He is about the future, too.

And so, dear reader, our journey through the Arthurian legends comes to its end.

We saw Arthur born in mystery and made king by drawing the sword from the stone. We saw the birth of the Round Table and met its knights — Lancelot, Gawain, Percival, Galahad, Gareth. We followed the quest for the Holy Grail, met Merlin the great wizard and Morgana, the sorceress with a divided heart. And we watched Camelot rise and fall.

It was a journey of magic and wonder, of love and betrayal, of hope and loss — of imperfect heroes trying to do what is right. These stories are not only about people who lived long ago: they are about who you can become. And when you fall, because we all fall sometimes, you can rise again, learn, and try once more.

If someone ever asks you whether Camelot really existed, you can smile and answer: it exists whenever we want it to.