Authors: Paul Bannister
The grey Standing Stones of the ancients stood silent, enigmatic and lonely on the rolling green plain, a vast circular ditch and bank, a henge that contained concentric rings of rock that seemed to Myrddin to focus power directly from Luna, goddess of the moon and death.
The sorcerer had been here before, but he still felt the power of the place as rode alone towards the sandstone sarsens, an outer circle of gallows stones, each made of two uprights and a lintel, that surrounded the double-walled crescent of 80 upright blue stones. These he knew had come from 60 leagues away, brought by music, dance and magic. The Druid’s eyes flickered over the megaliths that could only have been erected by giants and then his focus went to the awful altar stone, around which crowded the spectres of the young women and children sacrificed there over the millennia.
This giants’ ring was, he knew, a place of such power that even the gods regarded it with respect. It was one of very few places in Britain suitable for the task he needed to do, and he had the first instrument of that task wrapped in soft leather in the saddle bag fastened before him.
Myrddin had come to the Standing Stones to give the ancient golden Torc of Caratacus to the gods, a part-payment of tribute that might bring back their favour to Britain. He slipped from his mount and took the leather saddlebag and a short-handled Roman military shovel, leaving the beast to lower its head to crop at the turf on the side of one of the several burial mounds that stood close by.
The entrance to the mound, he noted, had been walled closed with flat stones and faced directly at the henge. “Very close, must be important, probably a chieftain’s last resting place,” he told himself as he looped a hobble around his horse’s fetlocks. “After all, this is a gateway to the Underworld.” He patted the beast. “Don’t go anywhere, I don’t want to have to walk back,” he murmured. “Have a nibble, I’ll water you shortly, there’s a river over there.”
“I am Myrddin,” he said loudly as he walked away from the burial mound and down the broad avenue of the dead, an avenue that he knew was aligned precisely with the rays of the midsummer sunrise and of the midwinter sunset. He spoke again to the sandstone sentinels. “I am the son of no father, sired by a spirit. I come here respectfully.” The sorcerer had been to the henge before, to sacrifice and celebrate the seasons with his fellow Druids, and he had experienced the mysterious sound and air pressure phenomena that the stones could generate.
On some of those previous ceremonial occasions, the Druids had employed two pipers, each playing a twin reed flute and facing each other inside the stone circle. The wave of sounds from the music reinforced or cancelled each other as they met, in a pattern determined by the stones’ placement. The sonic waves gave the chanting, circling priests and dancers a flickering sense of invisible barriers or eerie stillness standing between themselves and the pipers as they moved inside the vast stone crescent.
At a ceremony on a dusty evening when the summer sun was low, Myrddin had also observed that dust motes illumined by the light were dancing in an ordered pattern that synchronized with the music. The dust effectively mapped the clashing sound waves, and he had quietly filed away the observation. It matched a sound phenomenon he had twice noted elsewhere, once in the great chamber of Maes Howe in the northern islands, and again at a magical ceremony at the Bru-na-Boinne passage grave in Hibernia. A bell sounded at the centre of those places gave off concentric circles of sound that faded and increased as they crossed each other. One day, the sorcerer could perhaps make use of this knowledge.
This day, however, there were no pipers, no dancers, no other Druids, just the tall figure of Myrddin in his scholar’s grey robe, striding with his leather bag and his shovel to the towering upright that shadowed the smooth altar stone. He murmured a prayer to Mors, god of the dead, and to Luna, goddess of the Moon, and rested a hand on the massive green-purple sandstone upright. There was sufficient gap between the rear of the altar and the headstone upright for him to squeeze down and, with difficulty, to dig a hole in the gravelly soil under the altar. When he was satisfied with its depth, he took up the leather bag and gently opened it, unwrapped the bundle inside and carefully placed the golden Torc of Caratacus on the smooth surface of the altar stone.
The ring of twisted gold gleamed in the dull light and the sorcerer marveled again at the craftsmanship that had gone into the crescent of precious metal. Some long-dead genius had hammered strips of red Welsh gold onto an ingot of a triangular cross-section, then twisted the whole thing on itself in beautiful spirals. Each end of the half circle was adorned with the small head of a bull, and the two sets of horns were cunningly designed to lock together like a clasp and hold the ornament securely around its royal owner’s neck.
Finally, the craftsman or another artist had embossed the circlet with a runic design which Myrddin guessed was an incantation or inscription of power, perhaps to Mithras, deity of the bull and of the soldier. He ran his fingers gently over the treasure, communing with the spectres of Caratacus and Boadicea, the Iceni queen who scribes had recorded wore a “great twisted golden necklace” into battle as a symbol of authority and mystical power. Under his caress, the gold seemed to the wizard to glow momentarily, and he smiled. The power was there, the offering was a potent one. He re-wrapped the circlet and readied it for its resting place.
Grunting with effort, the sorcerer wriggled into the cramped space between altar and upright monolith and placed the leather bag and its precious contents into the hole. He carefully refilled and tamped all down to leave no trace of disturbance, although he knew that no humans would dare to search in this feared, sacred spot and the stones he placed over his excavation would keep the leather bag safe from any small animals that might sniff it out. Almost certainly, a sacrificed human still lay under the altar stone and would act as a guardian until the time came. The sorcerer murmured an invocation to the hapless sacrifice, and straightened up. The Torc was now in a proper place of great power, a respectful offering to Britain’s gods.
Now Myrddin had to gather the other two elements, a sword of power and a spill of royal blood that could bring potency to the site. Perhaps then, the gods would return, and with them Britain would again find its old glory.
The sorcerer walked westwards down the avenue of sarsen stones towards his grazing horse which, hobbled, was still near the small burial mound. He looked thoughtfully at the walled-in entrance to the ancient tomb and hefted the shovel in his hand. Myrddin was an expert necromancer, he had no fear of the dead and indeed he called on their help from time to time. These local people of the plain had been buried with beakers of honey mead, long since dried and gone. It might be time to refresh one of those beakers, make some incantations and call on its owner for help in sending his message to the gods.
Myrddin caught his horse, and rummaged in his saddlebag for a small, stoppered flask. He pocketed it, then turned his attention to the entrance to the barrow. First, he carefully cut away a wide strip of the carpet-like turf, rolled it and put it to one side. He pried the point of his shovel between the revealed stones and soon made a gap that allowed him to begin pulling the ancient stonework away. In a steady hour’s work, he created an entrance to the long-sealed grave mound and slipped inside to conduct some business.
Gimflod the smith looked carefully at the beautiful small pyramid-shaped jewel nestled in his hardened palm. “An elfstone, you say?” he asked, weighing the purple-yellow crystal. Grabelius nodded. “Very rare, very powerful. Can you incorporate it safely in a sword hilt?” The big smith turned the stone over. “Maybe it would be best to put it into the pommel.” Grabelius nodded again. “That would be fine.” He turned to Milo, who was standing at his shoulder, eyeing the forge. “The nail, my prince?” he said quietly. Arthur’s son fumbled at his waist pouch and produced a carefully-wrapped package. He untied a string and unrolled the soft leather to reveal a nine-inch iron nail. “This is one of the nails used on the True Cross. Bishop Candless sent it just yesterday to the Treasurer’s House. I collected it for you.”
Gimflod nodded. “I heard there had been an important messenger in Eboracum,” he said, “so this is what it was about.” “Arthur wishes you to incorporate this nail in the sword blade,” said Grabelius. Gimflod waved a hand airily. “Easy enough,” he said. “It’s just a bit more iron in the bloom.” He caught Milo’s eyes and their unspoken question. “You want to know how I make a sword,” he said, happy to be able to display his knowledge. The youth was eager. “Yes, please,” he said.
“I take iron ore and melt it, that gives me a bloom, which is what we call the lump of iron. It’s like a sponge, with a network of channels inside, all of them filled with molten glass from the impurities in the ore. Hammering and reheating drives out all that, and when it’s gone, I shape the iron into rods. You need five rods to make a blade. You heat them, twist them together and hammer them flat. You fold them over and hammer them some more. A lot. Each hammer blow super-heats the spot, and friction-welds it and eventually, you have steel.”
He demonstrated, smashing his heavy hammer down on an ingot that was by the forge and sparks flew, landing on Milo’s fine white linen tunic. The smith reached out a dirty hand to brush the embers away and Milo smiled for the first time in days.
“Mother made this for me,” he said, indicating the beautifully-worked garment with its gold thread and a single blood-red ruby at the throat. “Best not get soot on it, Gimflod.” The smith looked embarrassed, coughed and continued as if nothing had happened.
“Using those five rods give the blade strength, and the braided mix of iron and carbon creates a distinctive swirling pattern in the finished blade. When that’s done, you grind a channel down the centre to reduce weight and also to make the blade stronger.
“Then you get busy with a file and create the cutting edges. After that, comes tempering the blade. Get it glowing hot, then plunge it into a bath of boiling salts, before you quench it in oil, which lets it cool evenly so the blade doesn’t fracture or warp. I repeat the tempering process, and use layers of clay to coat the blade except for the edges. you want them harder than the rest of the blade, to hold sharpness, but you want the rest of the sword to flex a little so it isn’t brittle. “
Gimflod took a swig from the leather wineskin he kept hanging by the forge bellows. “A good sword will bend a little, a poor one will be too hard and can snap under pressure. When I made Exalter for your father, he had a couple of special demands. He wanted it longer than the standard 24-inch Spanish Sword of the old Roman republic, and he wanted elements of both the shorter, broader Pompeii and Mainz blades to be incorporated into it.” He paused, proud of the weapons he had made, and especially delighted with the famous sword Exalter.
“I had to make the blade with two slightly curved cutting edges and a tapered point and I had to create a longer ricasso than usual. That’s the unsharpened part of the blade just below the guard. Arthur wanted it longer so he could use Exalter two-handed. The guard sits right above that ricasso on the shoulders of the blade. You set the guard snugly on the shoulders, slip the handle over the tang of the blade and the pommel locks everything together.
“I also put in a small ring on the hilt to protect the finger you wrap over the guard as you pull back after thrusting. And, I made sure the pommel was good and heavy. It’s bronze, and you can use it as a club, but it’s really a counterweight for the length of the blade. The whole sword weighs about three pounds and about half of that is in the handle and pommel, which gives you a nicely balanced weapon.”
Grabelius glanced at Milo and grinned. The youth was focused, engrossed in the details the smith was telling him. Gimflod caught the glance and looked down at the elf stone he held. “I’ll make a special bronze casting for the pommel, hollow it out so this can be fitted inside, with a small window so you can see it. This,” the smith casually picked up the nail Milo had reverently placed on the bench and Grabelius realized that Gimflod was pagan and the so-sacred relic that Candless publicly venerated was just another nail to the ironworker.
“This,” said Gimflod, “I’ll incorporate as a small band in the ricasso. Tricky,
but it’ll weld right in there.”
“Arthur wants this sword
quam
primum
,” said Grabelius. “I’ll be as quick as can be,” said the smith, “but it will likely be two weeks.”
“Good,” said Grabelius, “I can collect it on my way south, after Milo gets back to King Kinadius.” The legate was escorting Kinadius’ designated heir, Arthur’s son Milo, to the Pict overlord, and the pair were carrying tragic news.
A scant month earlier, Milo and his young bride Sintea had left the kingdom north of Hadrian’s Wall to attend festivities at Arthur’s stronghold, but the girl had contracted plague and died. Grabelius suspected that the treaty which Kinadius and Arthur had sworn in blood might now be under threat. The Pict had agreed to peace when his daughter married Arthur’s son, and had further agreed that the young couple should rule Alba on his own death.
Grabelius had experience of the broken promises of the Picts and was wary that Kinadius might choose to abandon the treaty now his daughter was no longer alive to benefit from it. He resolved to end his journey north at Dun Pelder, where Arthur’s longtime ally Bishop Candless was building a cathedral. He could find what the canny bishop knew and whether he could raise a fighting force should one be needed. Grabelius sighed. The ways of kings could be difficult, and deadly, so they must plan ahead where possible.
He kept his fears to himself, and merely indicated to Milo that they should ready to leave in the morning. “I will go to Dun Pelder to see Candless, and not follow you to Kinadius’ stronghold,” he told the youth. “I’ll take just two troopers with me, the rest will escort you. It is important that you give the sad news to the king as quickly as possible. I shall not follow you, I must report to Arthur first.” Milo understood, and at first light the next day was booted and armed, horse saddled, all ready to leave.
Despite the gloomy morning light, Grabelius noted that the boy’s eyes were reddened from crying and his sympathy went out to him. The young couple had been so tender together, and the plague had snatched away the bride in the full flower of her beauty. “There are a lot of tears in Britain today,” he murmured to himself. “The pestilence spares nobody.”
Aloud, he said: ”May the gods speed us safely on our way, my prince. This is a sad time.” Milo stared at the cavalryman, blinked and lowered his head, unable to respond. He jerked his horse’s head around and spurred out of the gates, not wanting others to see his grief. Grabelius sighed and rode after him, the troopers clattering along behind him. He at least would not have to be a messenger of death, for the young man under his care had that awful duty. Three days later, the duo parted company. Milo went on to the court of Kinadius, to give him the dreadful news of his daughter, while Grabelius turned east to find a pilgrims’ destination and a canny clergyman.