Dagonet the Fool is the royal jester of King Arthur. An extremely loyal, though cripplingly cowardly man, Dagonet's foolishness was legendary, even able to bring a smile to the stalwart King Arthur with his antics. Often the subject of ridicule and mockery, Dagonet didn't care so long as he could bring smiles and happiness to people's lives.
Knighted more so as a joke than anything, Dagonet was actually fairly adept at using swords, though his greatest feats in that regard were killing a disloyal treasurer in a duel and surviving an attack by Mordred after a prank at her expense. Still, his devout loyalty to the King, even in the final days of Camelot, his minor proficiency with weapons, and his status as a legendary jester qualified him for the Throne.Sir Dagonet the Fool was one of Arthur’s most loyal and surprisingly cunning knights who often portrayed himself as a dullard and simpleton all in an effort to make his king smile. Though never a member of the Round Table, there was no doubt he was a man who loved his king.
One day, Dagonet found Lancelot had, exhausted from battle, fallen from his horse into a nearby lake, his hand still tangled in the reins. To both help and make what he believed a good first impression, he led the horse, Lancelot dragging behind it, into the court and presented him as his prisoner to both Guinevere and Arthur.
That day, Dagonet witnessed the King’s smile, and he knew this was where he was meant to be.
Offering his services, Dagonet sought to prove himself to the king as one worthy of knighthood. So, he participated in a tournament, bringing his friend Helior along as he believed it would be fun to compete against him. The prize for winning the tournament was the hand of the daughter of the lord hosting it. Just as with his King, he fell in love the moment he saw her.
Winning the tournament, Dagonet and the woman married, but, unknown to him, his friend had also fallen for her.
After a month of marriage, Helior stole his wife away, causing Dagonet to go on a frantic search for them. After two months, he finally found them, but discovered that, in his anger for her not accepting him, Helior had killed her.
After killing the man he once called his friend, he aimlessly roamed the countryside, picking fights with knights wherever he went as though to alleviate his grief. However, he managed to win every single one of his fights, catching the attention of the King who had all but forgotten about the man who had dragged Lancelot before her.
The King found him just after another victory, half-naked, his hair unkempt, and dirty beyond recognition. Dagonet, seeing the King, snapped out of his grieving haze, and realized how he looked. He told the King to come no closer, as he did not wish the King to see him as he was. However, the King came down from her horse and approached the man, giving him the second smile he’d ever seen from her.
“You are truly a fool, Dagonet.”
He was knighted then and there, gaining the epithet he would be known by as well.
Dagonet would spend the next years devoting himself to serving his king and, more importantly, making her and his comrades smile. He could care less if he was seen as a fool, as he’d already been seen as worthy by the person he admired the most.
Dagonet would not only show his loyalty and good nature during his time as a knight, but also his surprising intelligence and cunning. He was often allowed to handle the King’s resources, such as money and distribution of troops, in aid of his ruler when they were unavailable, doing so very effectively. At one point Fole, the Royal Treasurer and one Dagonet discovered as stealing from the treasury, tried to pin his crimes on Dagonet. However, Dagonet was able to not only reveal the truth, but no one believed Fole due to Dagonet’s fierce loyalty to the King. This led to Dagonet challenging him to a duel and killing the treacherous treasurer.
On one quest with his fellow knight Edern ap Nudd, they both took on the false names of Grime and Eger because Dagonet said, “I feel this will be a story to remember, but not a story for a Fool”.
During this quest, Edern would be wounded fighting a cursed knight. Seeking to defeat the one who harmed him, Edern sent him to retrieve a weapon passed down in his family that no one had been able to wield. Dagonet discovered the reason was because it required someone to give up their identity, becoming one without a name and reputation.
Grime unsheathed the weapon without hesitation, and Dagonet was deemed worthy to wield Egeking.
Using this sword, he killed the cursed knight, taking his shield as a token of proof.
Another feat Dagonet is known for is, at the request of a fellow knight, taking Mordred’s armor and fooling King Mark. However, as Mordred never took off his armor, Dagonet waited until Mordred was asleep to steal it, removing it without awakening them. It was then that Dagonet noticed Mordred’s “true” gender, but he thought nothing of it. Mordred was almost as loyal to the King as he was, though he was curious as to why she looked so similar to the King.
After the jest was complete, he replaced Mordred’s armor on her person without her being any the wiser. …Until word got around and Dagonet nearly lost his life to the furious knight. However, using his quick wit, he managed to convince her it was so dark he could hardly see his hand in front of his face, let alone hers. Though she accepted this answer, she never truly forgave Dagonet.
However, those days of humor and chivalry could only last so long, but even as the trust of her knights and her people divided, Dagonet never lost faith in his King. In the final days of Camelot, Dagonet watched as Mordred, who he had deduced was the child of the King by some unforeseen means, began a revolt in the kingdom.
As the knights and people divided and fought, Dagonet desperately tried to return the kingdom to what it once was, wishing for his King to return to the peaceful Camelot she had fought so hard to obtain. To see her smile at him once again for being foolish. To be the star shining brightly for him in both day and night. To be the music he would dance to in her presence. To be the King who trusted a Fool.
But he would fail. Fighting Mordred, trying to slay the knight he once believed devoted to his King, Dagonet was no match for the Knight of Treachery. Still, as Mordred berated him and cursed the king he served, kicking Dagonet viciously in the face, the Fool simply laughed at her.
“Did you hear the music of Utopia? I heard it playing, and I could not help but skip to its rhythm.”
Mordred left him there, dying in the dirt and mud, and Dagonet’s only wish was to see his King one last time and hear the music of heaven. But he could not, and all his King would find was a Fool once more covered in mud.
“I am thy fool, and I shall never make thee smile again.”
Truly, a fool till the end.