For King & Country (31 page)

"Forgive me, my dear, for being so obtuse. At least"—he caressed her cheek fondly—"I will have the pleasure of your company on the road south."

Covianna let her gaze smoulder. "I cannot think of anyone I would rather travel with, Myrddin."

He cupped her chin, lifting her face to meet his lips. He then breathed against her ear, "It is, alas, a long journey in the company of others."

Covianna whispered back, "Even an overcrowded
taverna
has a stable, and stables have hay lofts and not even the stableboys stand guard on a dark and empty hay loft."

He laughed aloud. "I haven't been in a hay loft in..." he paused to consider "... it must be twenty years, if it's a day. It wasn't until after I'd tumbled her that I decided to marry her."

Covianna, who disliked—intensely—any reference to Emrys Myrddin's wife, swatted him in seemingly mock ferocity. In truth, Covianna hated Myrddin's wife, who was not only alive and likely to outlive God himself, but was an intensely suspicious bitch, nosing around in Covianna's affairs whenever both women happened to be in the same city. Which was as infrequently as possible, making it difficult to find time to pump Emrys Myrddin for everything he could teach her—including how to apply one's own ambition and make it look like another's idea, or how to salve the affronted intellect of the British kings who were, in Covianna's opinion, among the dullest, stupidest men on the earth.

Myrddin grimaced. "My apologies, Covianna, I will forget and mention her. I will make it up to you on the road south to Caer-Badonicus."

You'd better believe you will!
Covianna snarled under her breath, while smiling with the fondness of a mildly irritated mistress. Men, even those with Druidic training or Emrys Myrddin's keenly incisive mind, were by and large a stupid lot, driven by their gonads more than their brains. Aloud, she murmured, "I must go and see that my medicines are properly packed and stored."

"We will meet, then, on the road out of Caerleul."

Covianna slipped back into the great hall and spotted Artorius deep in conversation with a group of grey-haired kings and their younger sons. The Dux Bellorum had removed his sword and sheath, neither of which were in evidence. A swift search of the hall found no trace of the weapon, so she slipped away to the room Artorius and Ganhumara had shared.

The young queen was not in the room, although an appalling amount of clothing and jewelry was scattered carelessly like peacock feathers thrown down in the barnyard mud. From beneath one of Ganhumara's exquisite silk gowns Covianna spotted the tip of Artorius' scabbard. Covianna slipped the lovingly forged blade from the scabbard, letting Caliburn itself drop to the bed again amidst the riot of silks, furs, and kashmir wool imported from far Constantinople.

The sword, she left behind, leaving Artorius with nothing but naked steel between him and a ruined reputation. The power of Caliburn was not in the Damascus pattern-welding so coveted by wealthy, high-ranking officers, but in the sheath—and Covianna intended to remain in possession of that for a long time to come. Laughing softly, she hid the scabbard in the folds of her skirt and slipped away to her own room to hide it amongst her remaining baggage.

Intrigue, she sighed happily, was nearly as delicious a sport as murder. Particularly since those she planned to embroil in her nasty little web would—if all went well—end up deliciously dead.

Caer-Gretna wasn't much of a village, Brenna thought sourly as their horses plodded through the gate in the town wall, taking them toward a fortress that might have been better dubbed a mud hovel. It was smaller, even, than the mile forts along the Roman roads through Gododdin and Strathclyde, and boasted a garrison of ten soldiers, their plump wives, and a gaggle of scrawny hens and equally scrawny children vying for the same patches of dirt to scratch in. The town wall overlooked a long, low slope to the sea, where Solway Firth, its waters turned luridly crimson by the slanting light of the setting sun, lapped against tidal mud flats and a short stretch of sandy beach where fishing nets had been strung up to dry overnight. The tidal flats and beach stank of mud, dead fish, and human waste.

You want us to sleep here?
Brenna asked with a note of dismay she could not hide.

Morgana sighed. It is safer inside the walls than it would be further along the road, where there are no forts at all to protect us should an Irish raider and his crew decide to strike. I enjoy the smell no more than you, but I prefer my sons and I to wake tomorrow still among the living.

There being no argument to counter that, Brenna tried to breathe shallowly until her nostrils accustomed themselves to the pervasive stink. The little garrison was, at least, kept scrupulously clean inside by the commander's wife, whose reaction to royal visitors was to fly into a frenzied state of agitation that soon had the entire town in an uproar, bringing in foodstuffs to be cooked, properly comfortable beds from the hamlet's wealthiest residents, even a keg of ale from the
taverna
, into which Lailoken happily disappeared with his harp and flute uncased and ready for the evening's merriment.

Morgana wisely suggested they allow Caer-Gretna's women time to work uninterrupted on their evening meal and guest quarters. Medraut followed Lailoken into the little
taverna
, smiling and eager for a bit of fun after the strain of the week at Caerleul, while Morgana's sons, carefully chaperoned by their guards, joined the village boys in a game involving wooden hoops, sticks to keep them rolling, and at least a dozen eager, panting puppies which kept darting underfoot as the boys ran and shouted. Morgana, feeling a need for more solitude than the
taverna
, the garrison, or the children could offer, sought out the little village church, a rough-hewn structure of planks and logs cut from the surrounding forest.

She stepped into the chilly, dim interior, where a low table to one side supported a few flickering candles. There were no pews, no chairs, just a long, flat floor made of smooth-worn sandstone, an altar of finely carved wood, and a riot of paintings on the wooden walls, half Christian saints, half pagan symbols left over from earlier beliefs that could not and would not be set aside in a mere handful of centuries. Morgana observed the proper form, going to one knee in genuflection, crossing herself while facing the altar, then pulled her fur-lined cloak more closely about herself for warmth and walked slowly toward the front of the little church, needing the balm of silence it offered. So much had happened in such a rushed blur of days, she had not yet been granted the luxury of simple grieving for her husband.

When the tears began to well up, Morgana sank to the floor, leaning against the carved wooden rail separating the altar from the rest of the church, and cried in deep, gasping grief. She wanted Lot Luwddoc's arms around her, a foolish desire, since even his arms would not have kept the threat of war at bay, but she had felt so very much safer when lying beside him. The decisions she had made for Galwyddel and Ynys Manaw had been so much easier when her husband still lived.

She'd felt secure in the knowledge that she could always turn to someone as familiar as she with the heavy responsibility of command, and with the sometimes desperate necessities one had to force upon one's people, to protect them from greater harm. With Lot Luwddoc dead and Artorius riding south into war, Ancelotis at his side, Morgana had no one left to share the burden of decision with, no one left to calm her fears in the night, no one to whisper, "It will all come right, you'll see it will."

Was she wrong to pursue alliance with Dalriada?

The Irish invaders had already struck at Galwyddel repeatedly, landing on her shores by the hundreds, eager for conquest and rich farmland, until Morgana's
cataphracti
had managed to drive them northward, toward easier conquest against the Picts. Was she signing the death warrant of Galwyddel, giving it to Medraut to rule with Irish
foederati
as kinsmen? She had not yet found an answer when the village priest, who lived in a small hut behind the church, stepped into view through the rear entrance, halting in surprise when he saw her leaning against the railing, lost in helpless weeping.

"Oh, my child," he murmured, hurrying forward, "how long have you been here, alone and crying in the dark?"

She shook her head, too choked to answer.

He knelt beside her, stroked wet hair back from her face, gathered her into his arms and simply rocked her like a child, allowing her to weep out her grief against his shoulder. At length, with the worst of the emotional storm spent, she simply leaned against him, breathing quietly and feeling absurdly safe once more. He murmured, "We heard the news, these seven days past, of Lot Luwddoc's death and the call to council. Know that we grieve with you, Queen Morgana."

She managed to dry her cheeks with one hand. "I am grateful for it."

"How can we of Caer-Gretna help?"

She managed a smile, surprising even herself. "You have already." She sighed and sat up, pulling herself together again. "It is a poor time of year for the necessity, but we must look to refortify every fortress in Galwyddel. It is our task to hold the northern and western borders secure, as war is breaking out in the south."

"The Saxons again."

"Aye. Sussex and Wessex, both. You've heard the news of Penrith?"

"We have," the priest growled. "Godless bastards, they are, Queen Morgana. They'll not take Caer-Gretna by such surprise."

"Nor any other village of the Britons," she agreed. "Word has gone out in every direction to leave the harvesting and the fishing to the smallest children, for the men and women of Britain are needed for the heavier work of rebuilding stone walls and forging weapons."

"Troubled times, indeed. There is little here to protect, but even a humble priest knows from Caer-Gretna a band of raiders could strike deep into Briton land, doing enormous damage."

"Yes. You must organize the people to do whatever the commander of the garrison needs done. I will speak with him before the night is out."

"The tithes to the church, small as they are, will help buy iron for the forge. We've a good smith in Caer-Gretna, with three strong sons and a good, strapping daughter, as well, all learning the trade from him."

"Put some of that coinage aside to buy grain, in case of siege. With the armies of the Britons riding south to war, our coastal towns will be at greater risk of raid than ever before."

"It shall be done."

"There is little more I can ask than that." She sighed and pushed herself to her feet, grateful for the priest's steadying hand. "I thank you for the comfort rendered."

"It is harder to bear grief when frightened people look to you for strength and guidance. But you descend from kings and queens of iron strength and the well-tempered will to survive. Galwyddel rests easier, knowing the daughter of Gorlois has the task of leading us when war looms on the horizon."

The comment struck unexpectedly deep, hurting her heart with the knowledge that she was preparing to hand the Galwyddellians to an untried youth, in a risky gamble for safety. "I will do what I believe best for Galwyddel. Whatever comes, try to remember that."

"A promise I will gladly keep. Here, you're shivering, pull that cloak tighter round yourself." He tucked the edges firmly together and warmed her hands in his own, rubbing them briskly while she battled to blink back more tears. "There. Go now, go and find a warm fire and eat a good supper with your sons beside you. Drink a mug or two of ale, it will help you sleep."

Her lips twitched in a faint smile. Advice from a novice to a master healer—but welcome, nonetheless, for its gentle concern. "I'll do that. Thank you."

She left him to tend his guttering candles and found her way back to the garrison, where the mouth-watering scents of a major feast wafted through the evening air. Shortly, she and her children were served up a good, hot meal, insisting that the garrison officers and their families share the repast, and spoke of Britain's danger and Caer-Gretna's need to arm and defend itself. In that odd way men have of greeting trouble with a certain inexplicable air of excited anticipation, the garrison commander and his men launched into a voluble, animated discussion of precisely what was needed, where it could be obtained, and who was available to procure it.

She left them to their happy plottings and retired for the night, exhausted and bruised in body and spirit. The dawn and another day's grim reality would come all too soon, as it was.

Trevor Stirling hadn't visited the Yorkshire Dales in years. He'd come with a school group long ago and remembered being deeply impressed by the broken country of towering limestone cliffs, deep and mysterious caverns, glacier-cut gorges, and rugged karst topography. When Stirling and the
cataphracti
following Cutha's trail thundered down into Ebrauc, he was deeply dismayed when the mud-churned trail led straight into the wild tangle of broken, eroding rock that comprised the roughest country to navigate by horseback anywhere in England. The stony soil did wonders for hiding the bastard's tracks—doubtless why he'd chosen the longer, more snaking route toward Dewyr. Every time they came to a feeder stream or intersecting gorge, they had to pause and waste valuable time searching for signs of Cutha's party—a muddy hoofprint on a streambank, horse dung, broken branches in the scrub.

In contrast to his earlier lightning assaults on villages and farmholds, Cutha's tracks now assiduously avoided what few settlements there were tucked away into the Dales, bypassing even tiny hamlets like Malham. He followed, instead, the Pennine Way down to the River Aire, which eventually burst out of the broken country in a froth of rain-swollen whitewater and spilled down into a gentler countryside that would one day see the cities of Halifax and Leeds rise to prominence. The river roared along, spilling over into wide water meadows where thousands of waterfowl clamored for food and mates.

The marshes bred mosquitoes and midges, as well, which plagued them by night, whether they stopped for an hour or two of sleep or pressed doggedly onward. What sounded like—and might well have been—several million frogs turned the marshes into a drum-roll chorus of territorial challenges and peeping, bellowing, bell-throated calls for females of their own particular kind. Stirling, unused to the countryside in any case and certainly unused to a countryside not yet denuded by pesticides, urban runoff, and heavy-metal pollutants, had never heard so many frogs in his entire life. It sounded at times like the night would crack wide open under the onslaught of so much raw, primeval sound.

After a race of nearly two hundred kilometers, they arrived at the mouth of the River Ouse, where it dumped flood-stage debris—swirling brown water, snags of deadwood, uprooted trees—into the Humber. They stopped on the muddy bank, staring in dismay at the barrier, for the river was clearly impassable without a ferry—and the ferry lines had been cut, from the far side. Cutha, reaching the far banks of the Ouse at least a day, perhaps two days, ahead of them, had left the ferry boat stranded on the eastern riverbank, along with what looked sickeningly like a dead ferryman sprawled in a puddle of black blood. Carrion crows were once again in abundant evidence, a sight which still had the power to turn Stirling's stomach.

Ancelotis cursed long and loud.

Young Clinoch muttered, "Surely we can cobble together another ferry?"

Before Ancelotis could answer, a Saxon patrol appeared on the far bank, marking the line where Ebrauc gave way to Saxon territory in Dewyr. The appearance of that patrol forced them to admit defeat. Cutha had outrun them. To attempt further chase would be to precipitate immediate war with the Saxons of Dewyr, which the Britons could not yet risk. The bitterness of it tasted like poison in the back of Ancelotis' throat. Clinoch snarled a few choice oaths himself, before turning back. "I've defenses to build," the boy said in a harsh, weary voice, "and men to send south with the Dux Bellorum."

"Aye." Ancelotis spat to one side. "We're both of us a long way from home. I'll take word to Artorius, myself, that Cutha reached Dewyr ahead of us." That decision, at least, brightened Stirling's mood considerably. Any number of fatal "accidents" could have befallen Artorius by now, with Brenna McEgan watching for the chance to complete her mission. And the chaos of preparing for war would present her with many excellent opportunities to strike, with Artorius distracted and not expecting treachery from a Briton. Stirling's sense of urgency had begun to affect Ancelotis.

"I'll ride by forced march back to Caerleul," he told the others, "traveling light and fast. Half my
cataphracti
I'll send home to Gododdin to strengthen the hill forts along the northern borders. The other half, I'll send on to Caer-Badonicus, for Cadorius and Melwas will need every sword arm and strong back they can beg or borrow. You can bet whatever you care to wager that Sussex will mobilize for invasion the instant Cutha arrives home, and it won't take him long, by sea. Spread the word northward, as you ride, that Cutha has made good his escape."

"That I will," Clinoch muttered. "Beginning with King Gergust of Ebrauc, should yon bastards"—he nodded toward the distant shore of Dewyr and its armed Saxon patrol—"decide to launch an attack across his border to distract us from the greater threat to the south."

Stirling, impressed by the lad's grasp of tactics, was immediately informed by Ancelotis—somewhat peevishly, since they were both tired—that Briton royalty learned such things from infancy.
Princes and their heiress sisters study Greek histories of Alexander the Great and they read Julius Caesar, both the
Gallic Commentaries
and his
Civil War,
to learn the art of winning battles from warfare's greatest masters. How else do you suppose Artorius learned his trade as Dux Bellorum? Emrys Myrddin and Ambrosius Aurelianus spent years teaching Artorius, alongside my brother Lot Luwddoc and myself, drilling into us the tactics and strategies that lead to victory, even against greater numbers than your own.

I meant no insult,
Stirling apologized, even as a fierce glow of pride in his ancestors had begun to suffuse itself through his conscious awareness. A dangerous glow of pride, as he found himself identifying ever more strongly with the Briton cause, his loyalties shifting like quicksand between the future he was trying to save and the past he was beginning to identify as something worth defending against all comers. He had joined the SAS from a sense of patriotic honor, after all, determined to defend "king and country" to the best of his ability. The longer he stayed in Artorius' Britain, the shakier his definition of "king and country" grew.

In the twenty-first century, such notions were diluted by other distractions, by larger loyalties as a subject of the British Empire and a member of a world community that had set itself in opposition to tribal violence and terrorism. In the sixth century, Stirling's larger loyalties were fading away, increasingly insubstantial, half-remembered dreams, while the raw immediacy of his new reality—where a man's honor and personal courage were often all that stood between loved ones and brutal death—tugged at him with almost irresistible strength.

As miserable as the trek from Carlisle to Humberside had been, the journey back was infinitely worse, with nothing but saddle galls and shaken loyalties and defeat to carry back with him.

Emrys Myrddin and the kings of the south sped rapidly along the dragon's spine, rousing the men to arms as they passed town, village, and farmhold. And as they rode, day by miserable, rain- swept day, Myrddin began to develop his plan for defending Caer-Badonicus. He had been to the hill fort only once, but his was an excellent memory and he had been watching men wage war for more than fifty years. He knew how leaders thought, had studied the histories, understood very well indeed, why Alexander of Macedonia and Julius Caesar had won victory after victory. By comparison, the Saxons they were soon to face were little more than yelling apes, baboons with swords and thrusting spears and no concept of strategy other than overwhelming an opponent with sheer numbers.

That, of course, was Britain's chief problem: the sheer
number
of the barbaric creatures. Still, Saxon ignorance was an advantage to be used and Myrddin had a fair idea how to go about exploiting it. Hard riding took them deep into the southlands, where unseasonal autumn rains were even heavier than they had been in the north, destroying crops and threatening the countryside with starvation over the winter. Little wonder King Cadorius and Sub-King Melwas were all but frantic, facing such a winter with such neighbors about to come calling at their borders.

Emrys Myrddin and the kings of the south skirted the eastern end of the Cotswold Hills to enter a countryside thick with ancient monuments, places like the monolithic barrow dubbed West Kennet, with its mass graves hidden deep within the mound, and the mysterious Silburis Hill, a man-made tower of white chalk blocks rising more than a hundred thirty feet into the air. By riding cross-country from one great monument to the next, a man could follow the ancient ley lines Myrddin's Druidic instructors had named the "dragon lines," conduits of energy that wound, braidlike, through the region, touching such places as Caer-Aveburis and Stonehenge, where immense circles of standing stones had sat since the beginning of time, erected by a people so ancient, not even the Druids could recall their names.

The dragon lines snaked through more than a dozen such ancient monuments left by the old ones. Emrys Myrddin might not know who had built these holy places, but he understood very well, indeed, their deep impact on the minds of those who lived near to them. He and Uthyr Pendragon and Ambrosius Aurelianus before him had used that awe to forge ties of alliance between widely scattered tribes of southern Britons. It had worked so well, Emrys Myrddin had spread the concept north and east and west, throughout the whole of Britain, literally creating one people united by a commonly held identity.

It was, Myrddin knew, his greatest legacy to the people of Britain. And now he must fight to save that legacy from foreign destruction.

There was no mistaking Caer-Badonicus for any other hill in Britain. Even Silburis Hill was a mere child's toy, compared with Caer-Badonicus. Its windswept summit, a broad, flat stretch of land fully eighteen acres in area, towered five hundred feet above the Salisbury Plain. Broodingly immense against the stormy grey rainclouds scudding past its flanks, Caer-Badonicus was a natural fortress, crowned with ancient and crumbling walls, an earthwork fortification so old, not even Emrys Myrddin had ever heard its original name. During the long centuries of peaceful Roman rule, hill forts like Badonicus had fallen into ruins, no longer necessary to safeguard the people of the surrounding plain. The wheel of time had turned, however, and walls were needed once again. Emrys Myrddin was here to ensure that the walls they built were the strongest, most protective walls ever built by Briton hands.

The future of an entire people depended upon it.

And upon him.

Keenly aware of the pain Atlas had felt of old, Myrddin squinted against the downpour to study the profile of the hill rising up from the flatlands. The wind whipped through the crowns of mature trees at the summit, lashing them with brutal fury. As they drew closer, he spotted several white-water cataracts where rainwater poured off the hillcrest, surging and spilling its way down the steep, bramble-covered slopes.

It gave him an idea.

"I want to get right to the top," he said over the sound of rain and wind.

King Cadorius of Dumnonia grimaced, while the younger Melwas of Glastenning, in whose territory Caer-Badonicus actually lay, turned to him in visible dismay. "
Now?
In this driving downpour?"

"Aye, now. We'll be fighting the Saxons up there in conditions just as bad."

Covianna Nim, as bedraggled and mud-splashed as the rest of them, frowned. "I doubt we'll get the horses up that, not in this muck. That's a good thirty- or forty-degree slope and if ever there was a road to the summit, it's long since grown over and vanished."

Myrddin chuckled, which startled Cadorius and Melwas into staring. Accustomed to the limitations of most men's minds—and particularly those of kings, several of whom he had tutored personally—he explained with the same patience a mother reserves for her child: "The fact that there is no road works in our favor, for the Saxons will have just as hard a time reaching the crest as we will. Even
without
the nasty surprises I have in mind."

They did, indeed, have to leave the horses behind. Slogging their way through mud, through freshets of runoff that cut eroding gullies into the hillside, past wild brambles and outcroppings of native bedrock that scraped the hands and left the footing slick and treacherous beneath their feet, they climbed steadily toward the storm-lashed clouds. Panting, pausing to rest now and again, they finally scaled the summit, standing beneath a towering oak for protection from the wind-whipped gusts of rain.

Clumps of mistletoe, the "Druids' weed," had shaken loose from the oak's boughs, littering the ground with dark green leaves and clusters of tiny white berries, along with larger limbs snapped off by the storm. Blocks of stone lay piled haphazardly where work had already begun on the refortification, work interrupted by the rain. That, alone, would have to change. They didn't have time to wait on niceties like cooperative weather.

The view from the summit was impressive. Myrddin squinted against the rain, shielding his eyes with one hand while absently pulling his sodden cloak tighter around his shivering frame. Pacing off the distances, he walked the ancient walls, surveying the entire hilltop, while the king of Dumnonia and Melwas trailed along in his wake. Covianna remained huddled beneath the oaks, shivering and trying to stay out of the wind.

"We'll want circumvallations," Myrddin said at length, "several layers of them, right around the summit." He pointed, then knelt to retrieve a small branch, sketching what he intended in the mud, using his cloak to protect the muddy drawing as best he could. "My suggestion is five walls, at a minimum, arrayed like this, and we'll need shelters for a good-sized armed force to hold out against siege. Barracks, arms rooms, privies, stables for horses and livestock, pens for chickens and goats, shelters for womenfolk and children, for they'll need shelter behind strong walls when the Saxons come marching from the southeast, else they'll repeat Penrith on a grander scale."