The Bloody Cup (27 page)

The chasers sensed an advantage and drove their equally weary horses after the Celts. One warrior charged at Balan’s mount and, drawing level, slashed wildly at Balan’s back with his sword. Without checking his mount, Balan bent low over its neck and avoided the deadly sword thrust while drawing his own blade. Then, with daring worthy of Artor himself, he checked his horse for a moment so that the Saxon warrior began to draw past him. With deadly precision, Balan buried his sword in the Saxon’s back.

So great was the forward momentum of the galloping horses, that Balan’s sword was ripped out of his hands. The Saxon swept past him on his wild-eyed horse, pinned upright by Balan’s weapon. With a whoop of triumph, Balan swept on, driving his exhausted horse up the steep slope.

Suddenly a concealed pit, one of Artor’s traps, yawned at his horse’s feet and Balan only just managed to swerve his beast in time. The rest of his troop continued up towards the crown of the hill without mishap. Behind them, Saxon cavalry disappeared into collapsing screens of sapling, leaves and dry grasses - and the screaming began. Balan wanted to block his ears to shut out the dreadful sounds of impaled horses and dying men. Then Artor appeared, on foot, in full armour of a striking, blood-red colour. Around the High King was a line of warriors and bowmen, their eyes set and grim.

‘Even before I had dismounted and begged a blade from a Celtic bowman, the Saxons were upon us,’ Balan stated matter-of-factly, ‘and our arrows were mowing down the forward cavalry.’

‘How very fortuitous,’ Modred said blandly, his smile just a little too wide.

‘Your sneering does you no credit!’ Balan snapped.

‘Really, Modred,’ Wenhaver reproved him, ‘you should show some respect towards our warriors. Balan is correct when he says that we sit safely in Cadbury because of the wars fought by my husband.’ Her rosebud smile was as warm as ever as she tapped him lightly with the silver stick of her fan, but the disdain that coated her words took Modred by surprise.

‘Please continue, Balan,’ Wenhaver ordered and pointedly turned her back on Modred. ‘I shudder with fears for the safety of my husband.’

Now both men looked puzzled. Neither was accustomed to hearing the queen voice words of concern for the High King’s welfare. Both men wondered fleetingly what new game Wenhaver was playing.

‘King Artor annihilated the main Saxon force when he enticed a direct frontal attack. By keeping our cavalry concealed at the rear, they were convinced we were vulnerable. I suppose they believed that they were using our own tactics against us, and that we were at their mercy. But the pits and traps set by Artor surprised the first wave of attackers, while Artor’s foot soldiers held the line. Once the Saxons were committed to making their attack, our cavalry was unleashed from their hiding places to chop the Saxons into bloody strips of meat.’

Wenhaver’s courtiers clapped joyously and a wine cup was pressed into Balan’s hands.

‘Let us drink to Artor. Long may he reign as King of the Britons,’ Balan shouted. He raised his wine cup into the air and the assembled company repeated the toast. Even Modred exhibited patriotic zeal.

‘What were our losses, Lord Balan?’ Lady Elayne asked quietly, and the faces of Wenhaver’s women fell. Women understand that even victories are costly.

‘The Saxons all perished, Lady Elayne, and there will be much weeping in Anderida in the weeks to come. We burned their bodies so their widows would see the smoke above the forest and know the Celtic answer to their attack on us. Those few Saxons who fled were hunted down.’

Balan squared his shoulders and broke the little bubble of silence that had opened up around his words.

‘As for our own losses, Artor won the victory, but good men went to the shades before their time. Ulf of Caerleon, who was a survivor of Mori Saxonicus, perished with some thirty of our archers, while twenty of our cavalrymen will come home to their families in funeral urns. But I know that our dead would count their sacrifice worth such a stunning victory. After the battle, King Artor spoke to the living and to the wounded in praise of our dead, and he told them that every sacrifice contributes to our survival. As is his custom, coin will be sent to the families of those who were killed or wounded in the battle, for the king will never allow wives and children to starve. Nor will he allow old mothers to wander the roads, starving and homeless. Such is the wisdom and the love that our king gives to us.’

‘The loss of any young man is very sad,’ Wenhaver murmured. ‘But why did the Saxons venture out of Anderida after so many years? They must have realized what the outcome could be. Have they so many men to lose?’

‘We can only guess, my lady. A number of freed slaves have told the High King that the Saxons were convinced that their cavalry would place great pressure on our borders. They believed our warriors would be forced to retreat, and allow them to gain control of more of our land. By all reports, their settlements need more farmland to provide for their growing populations. I don’t wish to frighten the ladies, but the Saxons will come again, because they have no choice.’

Even Modred looked subdued and all the good humour in Wenhaver’s bower fled away.

Battles were subsequently won at Ratae, where Balyn distinguished himself with reckless courage, while Artor’s forces continued to skirmish with the Saxons for all of that unseasonably mild summer. The king’s golden touch hadn’t deserted him. In those combats where he raised Caliburn, the sword of kingship, and where the Red Dragon banner snapped in the summer breezes, Saxons died and the Celts carried the field.

From Ratae to Anderida, the crows and ravens gorged. As always, where Artor rode, death followed, for the king used an arsenal of strategies to bring the Saxons to ruin. In one battle, cavalry and archers harried the Saxons like a swarm of bees, until the enemy was driven to a river and the Celtic foot soldiers pressed forward to leave the Saxons with no place to run.

Later, at a ruined Roman fortress near Ratae, Artor winkled the Saxons out of an impregnable position by poisoning the wells with rotting corpses. While neither Balyn nor Balan approved of such methods, there was no doubt that sick Saxons were easier to defeat and Celtic casualties remained minimal.

As Artor increased pressure on the Saxon invaders, they were forced to beat a strategic retreat back towards the east and the south, and to their respective sanctuaries. The Jutlanders, in contrast, nibbled surreptitiously at the lowlands near the Wall, sinking in roots that would last for a thousand years.

Artor called his captains to Venonae fortress to discuss strategy. The motley group sprawled around his rooms and talked desultorily.

‘The Saxons are like ants,’ Bedwyr growled, his dirty campaign boots resting on a scarred table in Artor’s war room in Venonae. ‘They build a nest and dig in to strengthen it. Then, when they’re ready, they scatter and extend their network, further and further into Celtic lands.’

‘In some ways, it’s even worse than that,’ Gruffydd said, ‘because the Saxons are starting to apply military strategy rather than relying on brute force. Bugger me, but the bastards are even starting to look like us, except that they’re so damned big.’

Artor nodded in agreement. ‘You know we’re just putting off the inevitable. We’ll never dislodge them from our island now that they have such a foothold.’

Galahad looked disgusted, as if sickened by a rancid smell. Gawayne dozed on a hard seat after the long ride to Venonae, while Taliesin examined his hands from his position in the corner of the room.

‘True Celtic hearts can drive the invaders back into the sea, my king,’ Balyn protested naively. ‘All we need are a few more troops and a united faith in the justice of our cause.’

Artor sighed irritably. ‘You’re wrong, Balyn. The Saxons, Angles and Jutlanders are here to stay, so we must be realistic. They’ve lived in Britain for a hundred years or more, so they are Britons now, not invaders. A united enemy attack by them would finish us. Once all our young warriors were slaughtered, they’d annihilate the people. Saxon kin from across the waters constantly reinforce our enemy while we must grow our own warriors. It takes time to turn a babe into a man.’

‘But the barbarians intend to sweep away our gods, our towns . . . our whole way of life,’ Balan whispered with a genuine shadow of fear in his grey eyes. ‘We’re fighting for our survival.’

‘Just so, Balan,’ Artor agreed. ‘And they’ll probably succeed in the end. We’ve been protecting our Celtic way for as long as I can remember. And my greatest wish, as it was for Myrddion, Luka and Llanwith pen Bryn, is that our enemies become more civilized before the days of the final conflict. Perhaps we should cultivate the Picts. We would both be stronger if they joined with us, but the Picts will never forgive us for stealing their lands in the distant past. Perhaps, like them, we will be forced to retreat to the wild places where we will taste the bitter bread of poverty and drink the sour water of defeat. But even then, the Celts need not wither and disappear. On days like this, when my shoulder aches from the old arrow wound taken at Mori Saxonicus, my mind can imagine no future for my people. But tomorrow, if I have no pain, my spirits will rise and I will remember that such sacrifices cannot be in vain. Celtic hearts will live. The question is, where?’

‘How can you continue to fight the Saxons when you doubt our ability to win the war?’ Balyn asked, his face shadowed with unhappiness. He was shaken to the bottom of his soul by Artor’s brutally honest assessment of their future. He had always believed in the invincibility of his father’s people, and he had never considered that the infrequent forays against the Saxons were anything but an exciting opportunity to initiate young Celtic warriors in their first blooding. Never, not even during his blackest moods, had Balyn considered that the will and cleverness of an old warrior, backed by loyal troops who were ready to die to the last man, were all that stood between the Celtic people and slavery.

‘What’s the alternative?’ Artor smiled wearily. ‘I would do almost anything to end the Saxon menace, once and for all, but I don’t believe it is possible. Where would the Saxons go if we drove them out of these isles?’

Balan looked puzzled and held his tongue, but Balyn hazarded a response.

‘Couldn’t they return to their own lands? The Saxons must have come from somewhere.’

‘Aye, they did. But if you travelled across the narrow Saxon Sea, you would understand that other tribes from the north and west are moving inexorably southwards. The Saxon homelands have been overrun by another people who won’t permit the original inhabitants to return, just as the Picts, who once stood where we do, were overrun by invading Celts. We drove them out of their lands into the cold wastes that lie beyond the Wall.’

Balan nodded his head in understanding, but Balyn pursed his lips in denial and his grey eyes were angry and hurt.

‘Balyn, you cannot close your mind to what is real. This is now the Saxons’ homeland. We can either share it with them, or one of us must leave.’

‘Not us!’ Balyn swore. ‘Never the Celts!’

‘I hope you’re right, Balyn.’

At this point, Gawayne roused himself. Any other vassal would have been embarrassed to have dozed off in the king’s presence, but Gawayne simply laughed at himself. Artor did not begrudge him his rest after weeks of physical exertion and vigilance. Gawayne had always been able to shed his cares like a discarded snakeskin.

The Otadini prince had used his father’s warriors to teach the Jutes a stinging lesson at Eburacum, where so much Celtic and Jute blood had been spilt in the past fifty years. The swamps had run red, instead of green, when the battle lines were drawn. Where once rushes had grown, the bodies of many dead men now lay. The Otadini singers were already composing songs of this vicious battle, where neither side had been prepared to cede victory to the other.

As Gawayne reported to his king, both sides had fought to a weary standstill, for their armies were almost evenly matched. Both sides were desperate, and both were fighting for survival, so the conflict was a dour, bitter affair.

‘Eventually, the Jutes withdrew and granted us the field,’ Gawayne told Artor grimly. ‘They’ve retreated back inside their borders and won’t be able to advance again for several years. Their losses were particularly heavy, for you know these huge, hairy barbarians hate to surrender.’

‘I’d be careful what you say about Jutes within Odin’s hearing,’ Artor warned with a wide grin. His temper had frayed easily at the beginning of the campaign but although his eyes were hollow with weariness, his smile now came easily and his mood seemed lighter and more optimistic, for all that he preached disaster to the twins.

Perhaps he’s just happy to be away from the court, Gawayne thought, and no one can blame him for that!

‘The Jutes brought me bars of red gold in carts drawn by milk-white oxen to purchase the bodies of their dead. They were noble adversaries, so I accepted their payment, just as we’ve done in the past. I’ve travelled with their gold for many miles to pay it to your steward. I’ve also taken a one-tenth share for the kin of our dead, which has been sent back to my father and the Otadini tribe. I trust this arrangement is acceptable to you?’

‘Aye, Gawayne. You act with commendable common sense and dispatch in matters of warfare.’

Gawayne grinned and accepted a mug of ale from Odin.

Artor no longer saw Gawayne often, for his nephew had avoided Cadbury for years, having discovered, to his cost, that the queen was a ruthless hunter and he was easy prey. He was never able to resist her charms, even as she aged, and his answer to this weakness was to hide from the seductive siren call of his paramour.

‘We’ll let the Saxons retreat in good order and without undue harassment,’ Artor ordered. ‘Meanwhile, all the tribes must contribute to the fund needed to refurbish our defensive positions, except for the Otadini, as Gawayne has brought the Jute tribute with him. This instruction is especially binding on the Brigante tribe and they lie under threat of being cast out of the Union of Kings if they refuse to comply.’