Shadow of the King (59 page)

of repugnance and nausea. Stunned, he repeated, “You bitch.”

Morgaine flinched at that stark loathing, but held her head high, defiant. “I

wanted to keep you here. I knew of no other way.” She clasped her hands,

twisting the fingers through and through each other. “You do not love me

enough to stay for me alone.”

Abruptly, Arthur was on his feet. “Love you?” he bellowed. “How could I

love you? You are as corrupt and tainted as ever your witch mother was. You

disgust me!” The outrage was swelling with the full force of realising who she

was and what she had done. “Was it her idea,” he sneered, “for you to get with

child by me? Was it her way of destroying the memory of our father?”

Morgaine had stuffed her fingers in her mouth, her eyes stared wide in

horror. Her breath was quickening, sickness rising to her throat. “I do not

know my father!”

With loathing thick on his voice, Arthur told her. “You are Uthr’s daughter,

as I am his son. Did she not tell you?” He took the bridle down from its peg,

buckled it again onto the horse, fetched the saddle, led Onager from the byre.

Gweir was dragging one of the bodies by the legs, taking it to the fields for

burial, Medraut sat hunkered before the house-place door, alarm and confusion

plain on his young, anxious face. “Bring my cloak from the house, boy, and

your own,” Arthur commanded him. Obedient, Medraut scrabbled to his feet,

ducked inside the dwelling.

Morgaine had followed Arthur outside, weeping silent tears.

“The boy comes with me.” Arthur said. “I will not leave him to the mercy

of your evil. Gweir, leave that scum for the ravens to clear.” The young man

nodded, dropped the dead man’s legs.

Morgaine did not know what to do, what to say. All she had wanted was

to keep Arthur with her. She was not like her mother, oh she was not! She

had not understood everything that had happened, for it was all tumbling

too quickly, too much, too fast. The Saxons, this British man—who was he?

Arthur…Uthr.
Uthr was my father?
Arthur was going out the gate, leading

Onager. Was leaving.

She grasped the one thing that made sense to her, shoved all else aside to the

back of her mind where she need not, yet, think upon them, those cruel things

Arthur had said. Thought only of the thing she had planned.

“It is pointless going after her. She will be dead,” Morgaine announced

boldly. “These Saxons would have attacked her first, realised you were not

S h a d o w o f t h e k i n g 3 5 7

with her, and come to find you. Finish you.” She tipped her head, daring

Arthur to contradict her.

Arthur glanced at Gweir, who was shaking his head, spreading his hands. “I

followed the dead one in the byre from the woods, stayed with him as he met

with his companions, then trailed them here.” He caught his breath, gasped

fearfully. “Jesu!” he yelped. “They split into two groups—I naturally followed

those coming here…Jesu!” he repeated, “Gwenhwyfar!”

But Arthur was already a step before him. He dropped Onager’s reins, was

running from the yard, through the open gateway, yelling, “Where is your

horse, Gweir?”

“Just around the bend of the track.”

“What road was my wife to follow?”

Gweir answered as they ran, explained the trail Ider had expected to take.

The horse was as Gweir had left him, the dun, a native pony of Britain crossed

with the blood of the desert breed. Not as tall as Onager, but as brave-hearted,

almost as fast.

“Bring Onager and the boy,” Arthur ordered. “Follow as fast as the horse can

manage!” He was in the saddle, heeling into a gallop.

Morgaine was left alone with the pain riding high, billowing outward,

engulfing her. He was gone. Arthur was gone! How was she to bear it? And Uthr

was her father. Her mother had demanded she lay with her own brother?

Gweir, too, had gone; he had put the boy up into Onager’s saddle and

leading the horse, set out to walk where Arthur was going. Morgaine was alone

with only the dead for company. The dead, those who had come to murder

Arthur. And she had brought them here. A Saex sword, short-bladed, stained

with blood, lay on the mud of the small, rutted yard, its blade glinting in the

late afternoon sunlight. She went to it, picked it up.

Old Livia, coming up to discover the cause of the noise that had drifted down

the quiet valley, found her, new blood draining from her open wrists. As well

that Livia was also a healer. And one with more sense and skill than Morgaine.

Sixty-Two

The going along the first, upward-winding, rutted track was slow,

Arthur having to keep the dun to a frustrating trot in many places. At the

road he could push faster. Already Arthur’s back was aching, his thighs sore. It

had been a long while since he had ridden such a horse.

There were few travelling the road, especially at this late part of the day. With

the overrule of Rome gone and the ever-present threat of thieves and barbarian

raiders, traffic had dwindled. Once, the Legions would have marched up this

road led by the Caesars themselves. Couriers, with their urgent-carried messages;

trundling ox-drawn wagons laden with army supplies or weighted with goods

of trade, cloth, wine, pottery. Civilian carriages, the lighter, two-wheeled type

and the heavy, family four-wheelers. The fast, extravagant chariots. Arthur put

the dun into a canter, knowing he was corn-fed and fit, capable of keeping the

pace for several miles.

Evening was approaching, enveloping dark spreading rapidly from the east,

eating the last of daylight. They—she—could be anywhere! Had she joined this

road yet? Could some delay have kept her behind? Would she still be in those

woods? Would the Saxons, following, be hurrying or dallying somewhere,

waiting for their companions? All these thoughts, fears, and worries bursting

through Arthur’s mind as he rode. Gweir was certain they would not have

delayed longer than this morning. Even riding at a sedate pace, she would have

come up, out of the woodland, have reached this road…

More dark, then light. Ahead, a glimmer of yellow, voices, laughter. A tavern,

a stopping place! Arthur slowed, as the dun was dripping sweat, breathing hard,

but keen to go on, loath to walk when a more exciting pace was offered.

He danced through the gateway, head snaking, nostrils blowing. Several men

were about, tending horses, unloading a heavy ox-wagon. Their heads came

up together at the clatter of Arthur’s sudden, wild appearance, the innkeeper

himself coming down the steps, wiping his hands on his apron.

S h a d o w o f t h e k i n g 3 5 9

“Hail friend! You travel with some urgency!”

The dun was fidgeting, refusing to stand still, pawing the cobbles,

swinging round.

“Does a woman, a British woman and her escort, stay here the night?”

Fool question, she would not stop this early onto the road.

The keeper shook his head, and then offered the finest words Arthur had

heard in many a while. “No, but she rode by, happen an hour past.”

“And Saxons? Have any fair-haired Saex passed this way?”

The man stroked his beardless chin, shook his head, “We see a few Franks

and Burgundians. Saex, you say? No Saex.” He spat a globule of spittle to the

ground. “Don’t think I’d be inclined to serve Saex.”

He gestured with his hand, indicating north. “The lady now, she was a

handsome woman.” The man shook his head, a pity she and her party had not

stopped. They seemed of the wealthy type, he could do with such trade. Here

was a second chance. Although this man’s dress seemed not so affluent, it belied

his accent and way of command “Will you dismount? Rest your horse, take

wine and some stew, my wife has prepared a…” He scratched at an itch behind

his ear, sighed. Arthur was gone.

Sixty-Three

My lady?” Ider’s voice was soft, so it did not carry further than

it ought. He brought his horse beside Gwenhwyfar’s. “There is a horse

coming behind. Fast.”

Gwenhwyfar could not see her captain’s face in the darkness; the moon

had not yet risen and although the silvered starlight was enough to follow the

straight road, it was not sufficient to illuminate detail. For all that, she knew he

was concerned. Ider did not fuss unnecessarily.

“An urgent messenger?” she offered. “A lover late for his assignation?” She

laughed, irony in the sound, “Or the outraged husband?”

Ider’s guffaw was low. “Any of those. Equally it could be a Saxon.”

“Or Gweir.”

He nodded agreement, but his voice was not convincing. “Aye, or Gweir.”

Why would Gweir be pushing his horse so fast in the dark? “I suggest we pull

off the road, let him, whoever he is, pass.”

Gwenhwyfar agreed, as she was in no hurry. They had walked the horses all

this distance, ambled, almost. Really, she had no care what happened.

They got off the road and into the concealment of the trees barely in time, for

although the tattoo rhythm of the hoofbeats had sounded distant, the rider was

soon upon them. Ider grimaced at the man next to him, who jabbed his thumb

downward. It was Gweir’s horse, but the rider was not Gweir. Llwch already had an

arrow knocked onto his bow, barely waited for Ider’s brief, but sharp, command.

Arthur heard the sound, so familiar, the whistle of an arrow in flight. He

yanked at the dun’s mouth, hauling him to the left, cursed as the barb found

its target in the same instant as the horse lost balance. Horse and man tumbled

downward, the animal skidding along the road’s surface a few yards, Arthur

crumpling into a heap.

“Mithras bloody God!” he yelled as he scrambled upright, sword already to

hand.
Saxons
, he thought,
Saxon ambush
.

S h a d o w o f t h e k i n g 3 6 1

Ider’s men exchanged glances, emerged, leading their horses, but Gwenhwyfar

was ahead of them, leaping across the ditch that drained the road, up the

embankment, running, legs, cloak, and hair flying, screaming Arthur’s name.

She slithered to a halt, breathless and fearful.

“Jesu and all the gods! Are you hurt?” Her hands were already fumbling at

the arrow shaft in his upper arm, her eyes searching frantically for any other

hurts, found the bruising but nothing else. “What in all hell do you think you

are doing, scaring us so?” The reprimand came sharp. “Bloody fool,” she added.

The men had come forward, were sheepishly gathering at a discreet distance.

“Who shot this arrow?” Arthur demanded as he shooed Gwenhwyfar’s

fussing hands aside and broke off the shaft as close to the flesh as he could.

“I did, Sir,” Llwch confessed, twisting his horse’s reins in his fingers, thankful

the dark hid the deep, embarrassed blush to his skin. “We thought Gweir’s

horse was stolen.”

“Llwch. I might have guessed. You always did have a bloody bad aim.” The

Pendragon was laughing, relieved to have found them—her unhurt, unharmed.

The men laughed with him. Llwch was superb with a bow: he claimed he

could hit a bat’s wing blindfold.

Awhile to bind Arthur’s arm and tend the cuts scored on the dun’s legs; more

would need be done come first light, but this would do for now. Arthur talked

as they worked, telling in brief, concise words of the Saxon attack, his suspicion

that more were following. “They’ll catch up, watch for a few days, take us at

night, while we’re camped somewhere.”

Ider grinned. The moon was rising large and lovely, hanging above the trees

marching twenty paces back from each side of the road. He signalled for two of the

men to find a suitable camping-place, hidden, yet from where they could watch.

Hitched his sword belt more comfortable. “They’re in for a surprise then.”

Gwenhwyfar put her hand to Arthur’s chest. “Us? We?” she queried. “You

are staying?”

Arthur placed his hand over hers, took her fingers, brushed her lips with his

own. “If you’ll consent to have back a fool?”

Her answer was a returned kiss, more lingering, more urgent. As they

broke apart, he said dryly, “I have to stay. Someone must teach Llwch how

to shoot straight!”

Sixty-Four

October 472

Bedwyr sat on his horse, the reins loose between his fingers, one arm

resting across his thigh, his men, ten of them, sitting, perhaps not so seem-

ingly relaxed, behind him. Eadric the Saxon stood on the track before them,

his axe casual across his right shoulder. The women and the boys he had sent

into the house-place. As well Cuthwin was no longer here to witness this day’s

bad work, as well that the fever had taken him to a better place three months

back. He shifted the weight of the heavy axe, his eyes still not losing their hold,

locked into those of Bedwyr’s.

“You will need fell me first,” he stated, “before you take my harvest and

burn my farm, as others of your kind have been doing to the south of here.”

Bedwyr eased his behind deeper into the saddle, his fingers pulled at the