The Eagles Have Flown

by Henry Treece

  The Bear scratched the side of his nose, as he did when growing angry, the boys had observed. ‘Ambrosius has already appointed me dux bellorum, sir,’ he said. ‘You would ride to Magiovinium only to find disappointment.’

  Medrodus shrugged his shoulders and his fine armour made a musical tinkling sound with the movement.

  ‘Then,’ he said, ‘Ambrosius will be missing an opportunity.’ He turned in the saddle as though to give a command. It seemed that the meeting was ended and that the two forces were to pass each other on the road, there and then. But suddenly Artos the Bear urged his stallion a pace towards the other and held out his right hand to him.

  ‘Can we not ride together, as friends? ‘ he said, and as he held out that massive mutilated hand, those of his followers who were familiar with his ways began to grin and nudge each other, and some even to loose the swords in their scabbards.

  Medrodus sensed that the other was testing him. He saw too that the hand of Artos lacked two fingers and such a hand must lack strength. With a gay smile he took it in his own firm grasp, having first removed the rings from his fingers and handed them to a grey-haired warrior who sat behind him.

  Only those who stood near at hand were aware of the silent struggle that went on in those moments, for it seemed merely that two horsemen were bidding each other a fond but prolonged farewell. The boys, however, saw the momentary look of surprise in the dark eyes of Medrodus as he felt the other’s grasp tighten; they sensed the man’s chagrin that his adversary should possess the greater strength even though wounded in the hand. At length, with the sweat-beads rolling from beneath his golden helmet and into his beard, Medrodus whispered, ‘Have done. You are a strong man. Your father must have been a smith, or your mother the daughter of a ploughman!’

  This was said in an even, controlled voice, although all could see that Medrodus must have been suffering agonies. He was a brave man; but his final words had touched Artos on the raw, for indeed, in the north, one of his nicknames had been ‘The Ploughman.’ By now many more soldiers had gathered round to watch this silent conflict between their leaders. Even the bowmen in the shadow of the woods had lowered their weapons and stood staring through the moonlight. As Medrodus finished his taunts, all men saw him wince and almost cry out with pain, for the Bear had suddenly increased the pressure of his grasp until the other’s bones had nearly cracked.

  Now they drew apart and all men felt for their swords. Medrodus smiled a little ruefully as he shook his hand, then, putting on his rings again, he said in an unconcerned voice, but one which nevertheless carried in it a sly and silky menace, ‘Well done, Bear, for only Artos could have such a grip; but a soldier uses a sword, does he not?’

  Artos swung his hip round so that the great sword lay under his left hand, Medrodus saw the movement and shook his head,

  I did not mean that,’ he said, gently, ‘though if you insisted I would not disappoint you. No, there must surely be another way that will neither disappoint our followers nor our own honour.’

  ‘Light torches,’ shouted Artos, swinging about in the saddle. Then, bending low he whispered to one of the baggage-men who had joined the throng about the leaders, a smith by trade, who went running back to the wagons and returned shortly, carrying a heavy log of wood, an oak bole, on which he hammered out dents in armour. This he set down in the middle of the road, where all could see it, with the ring of torches set about it.

  Medrodus stared as Artos the Bear swung himself from the saddle. Then all men saw that Artos had drawn his great sword, Caliburn. They watched him swing up the weapon in his left hand, and then saw the broad blade cleave down in the torchlight, to bury itself a hand’s depth in the knotted wood.

  Gasps rose on all sides, for no man among that army could have done half as much, with such a heavy weapon, and into such tough wood. But that was not the end of the affair. Artos nodded to the waiting smith who now tottered forward with a leathern bucket full of water, which he poured over the wooden anvil to swell it. When this was done, Artos turned and said to the dark-faced Medrodus, ‘There is a test worthy of a man. Withdraw the sword, sir, and I promise you, I will kneel in the road under my feet and swear myself to serve you while life beats in my body.’

  Medrodus looked sourly down at the other, but as Artos finished speaking, there rose such a great shout from all men who loved a contest of strength, that he was compelled to dismount with as good a grace as possible and stand beside Artos.

  ‘You drive a hard bargain, Bear,’ he said. But the other only stared into his face, without a smile. Then all men pressed forward as Medrodus set his hand upon the great bronze hilt. They heard him grunt as he tensed his muscles to drag iron from wood. They saw him fall back at last, glowering, and rubbing his arm muscles as though he had strained them in pulling.

  Then Artos the Bear moved before the great sword and took it in his unwounded left hand. At first a look of annoyance came over his face, then he set his foot against the tree-bole and seemed to bunch the great muscles of his shoulder above the blade. Those closest to him saw the sweat fall from his forehead in the torchlight. And then he was standing back from the log, holding the sword high for everyone to see.

  A great cry went up then from all sides, ‘Artos the Bear! We will follow Artos the Bear!’

  Festus found himself yelling too, like all the rest. But Wulf was grim-faced and silent.

  ‘The Bear may one day come to regret that he made the black one look like a woman,’ he said.

  Festus looked at the two leaders as they embraced in the light of the flares. It seemed that Medrodus had forgotten the slight to his strength. They held each other by the shoulders and were both laughing now.

  ‘You are mistaken, Wulf,’ he said. ‘Look, Medrodus is a great one, like Artos, too.’

  Wulf only smiled a little and said, ‘We shall see, Festus. But one day you will say that I do not judge a man lightly.’

  Then, as the fires sprang up all along that stretch of road, and the tents were set up here and there, the two forces began to eat together and to drink, and even to sing wildly, as though they felt themselves the equal of any foe in the world, now that their two great leaders had come together.

  PART TWO

  1. The Village of Death

  So the summer rose to its height and at last declined. The two forces now mingled, and at least on the surface their leaders acted like old friends. They moved up and down along the great road, foraging where they could to feed the combined forces, and sometimes having to compel lonely fortresses to surrender what provisions they held. This had its good side, however, for after they had taken the stores from such places, their garrison usually chose to ally itself with them, and all who could provide themselves with horses were accepted into the army.

  Although this great band rode, nominally, under the joint leadership of the two men, in their hearts, most of the cavalrymen felt that, since their great trial of strength, Artos was the leader in reality. Even the grey-haired man, Bedwyr, who had held the rings of Medrodus, now rode beside Artos, and once showed his loyalty by hauling their leader back when he stumbled into a deep salt marsh by night. Medrodus had hung back, smiling, and, after it was all over had said that he was not at all afraid for the Bear’s safety, and that a man who could pull the great sword from an oak tree could quite easily pull himself out of a muddy puddle! So it passed off without any hard feeling on the part of Artos, though from that time forward the boys noticed that the Bear kept a watchful eye on his dark companion.

  Towards the autumn, when it seemed that the eastern road was clear of Saxon raiders, since none had been encountered, it was decided in council that the army should work to the west, skirting the thickest of the forest-land and trying to gain the old Fosseway.

  It was about this time that the leaders became blood-brothers. They stood up amidst their assembled forces and each made a slit in his wrist with a sharp hunting-knife. Then Bedwyr bound their wrists together with a broad thong,
so that the blood mingled. This ritual was not greeted with much belief by most of the hardened soldiers who observed it. One said in the hearing of Festus and Wulf, ‘That is supposed to make them brothers, but to my way of thinking they are more like father and son, with Artos as the father.’

  Indeed, it soon became a common belief through Britain as time went on that Medrodus was truly a relative of Artos, some men saying that they were father and son, some that they were uncle and nephew. But that was not the most strange belief, for in the years to come, when the exact details of the contest had been forgotten, ignorant folk told their children that Artos the Bear had become a king by pulling a sword out of an anvil, while others said that it had been a stone. Such legends naturally accrue to the great; yet no one in his own day looked on Artos as a king, least of all Festus and Wulf, who saw him every day, and who saw him rather as a hard and ruthless soldier, albeit a just one, when occasion allowed him to be just. Though he was never gentle; such an emotion would have been out of place in those times and might have brought about his death quicker than most things. If a guard slept at his post, he was shot through with arrows next morning; if a soldier risked his life for the good of others and not merely for himself, he was relieved of guard duty for a week and allowed a double ration at all meals. That was all; either death or a double ration, and be it said in favour of most of the troop that while they did not flinch from death when it came towards them, they seldom claimed the double rations to which they were entitled, though they made great show of gratitude when Artos awarded this prize.

  All the same, they had joined the Bear to fight, and though on every side the air shimmered with the whispering of hidden enemies, it was seldom that the Saxon or the Bacaudae were seen. This was doubly disturbing now that the force was passing through what was largely forest country where every thickleaved oak was a shelter for bowmen, every undergrowth a place of death. Moreover, the heavy mounted cavalry often had to dismount because of dangerous overhanging boughs, and a cavalryman on foot is worse than no man at all. Coupled with which, as summer wore on into autumn, supplies became scarce and the men and horses alike had to go on half-rations, which did not help the temper of anyone. So half of the troop openly demanded that they should take the big road again and fight in the south, while the other half begged that Artos let them go forward at their fastest to see what the west held for them. Although at this stage mutiny was unthinkable with such a well-ordered force, there is no knowing what might have happened but for a strange incident which pulled the army together, though at a dreadful cost.

  They had passed through the thickest of the woodland and hoped soon to strike the Fosseway, when below them in a valley, they sighted a village, a shambling primitive affair, but at least a village. There had lately been a spell of hot weather, as though summer might be beginning all over again, and now the men were tormented by thirst as well as by hunger. Medrodus, who was first to sight the place, sent a scouting-party forward and when they had returned some time later and had given him their report, he had ridden over to Artos and had offered his troop first entry into the place, as befitted the senior leader of the force. Nor would he forgo the privilege of riding in later, he said, although the Bear insisted on share and share alike. So it was that those who held closest to Artos rode down to the village while Medrodus and his smaller force stood on the hillside, watching and supposedly waiting their turn.

  Festus and Wulf were puzzled by this sudden generosity on the part of Medrodus, but they rode with their fellows, unquestioning.

  Outside the dry stone walls of the village a few children and dogs rolled together, shouting and barking, among the midden-heaps and ashes of old burnt-out fires. Smoke hung thickly in the air and the atmosphere was heavy with the stench of rotting garbage and decayed bracken. Along the crumbling wall hung many skins of otter and wolf, and here and there, even, of bear, the big brown creature that still ambled about the densest woodland, in summer contenting himself with the spoils of bees’ nests, in winter becoming bolder and carrying away tethered calves and goats, and even straying children. These skins gave off a rank odour. Festus, noticing the scraps of flesh that still adhered to their undersides and seeing the hungry flies swarming over the pelts, pinched his nostrils together and made a grimace of distaste.

  ‘Phew!’ he said, ‘We of the south have learned other ways. But these inland folk live like savages still. Four hundred years of Rome, and it has made no difference whatever.’

  But Wulf, riding stiffly in at the gate, the flies now thick about his own head, merely smiled patiently and made no reply. No doubt Festus would have said the same about his own village among the Cantwara.

  The screaming children had fallen silent when they had observed the approach of the horsemen. Now, pointing and murmuring among themselves, they ran before the intruders in an anxious group. Artos called out to them, as gently as he could make his voice, but his accent was strange to them. His blood might be theirs, but his words were not those which they heard about the hut fires, and so they were afraid.

  The straw and wattle huts were set in a rough circle about a hard-trodden central clearing, in the middle of which still burned a communal fire. Here Artos halted and held up his hand for the following troop to remain still.

  ‘Eyes will be watching us,’ he said. ‘We must wait until we are sure that we shall be welcome.’

  A sword-scarred man who rode behind him said tiredly, ‘Your Roman sword should be authority enough, Bear.’

  Artos answered him with a grim smile. ‘If I drew my sword not one of us would be alive inside a minute. A flight of arrows from the darkness of the huts is a more potent debater than three feet of sharp steel that cannot see its enemy.’

  But the man who rode near Artos was bitter now. ‘You were not always so discreet, Bear. I cannot imagine that you were so cautious when old Ambrosius created you Leader of the Armies.’

  Still Artos kept his temper. ‘Had we all learned caution and discretion a little earlier, Rome might still be standing firm against the world, and we would not be here, begging our bread from barbarians now.’

  As he spoke a horn howled out from the far end of the village and then the silence broke. Chattering heads appeared in the dark door-holes of the huts and even the mangy dogs seemed to take courage and to raise their voices again.

  Festus said, ‘A man is coming towards us. I think it is their headman.’

  Wulf replied drily, ‘He carries the right weapon for that calling.’

  From the shadows of the furthest and most ambitiously built hovel, a long stable-like dwelling, a squat, broad-shouldered man limped in their direction, his head held forward suspiciously, a long-hafted axe held ready in his hands.

  Artos called back in a whisper, ‘Let no man draw sword or put bow to string. I will go to meet him.’

  And for the space of many minutes the leader bent down from the great black stallion, talking earnestly and evenly with the headman, who at first waved his axe about vehemently, to stress his refusal, it seemed, then at last, running his eye along the length of the company, relented, turning away from them and shrugging his shoulders as though it was all one to him.

  Artos gave the signal for the troop to advance, and said to those near enough to hear him, ‘The old man is a fool, I think. He said at first that there was no food, and then he said that the gods were angry with the village and that we must go away if we would escape the curse. I told him that we were all Christians, or as near as made no matter, and at that he gave in.’ So they led on towards the long building, which was little more than a long thatched roof set on rough tree-trunks, a board running down its centre and its floor covered with rotting straw.

  As they entered, tethering their horses outside, Wulf said in a whisper, ‘I do not like this, Festus. I could not catch what the old man said, but I heard something in the tone of his voice which turns my stomach away from any food he will bring for us.’

  Festus said, ‘I am so hun
gry that I could lie down now and eat husks with the swine. I shall go in.’

  Wulf suddenly took him by the hand. ‘My friend,’ he said, ‘I beg you, trust my nose. I am nearer the state of savagery than you, perhaps, and I know that a word is often a liar. It is the tone beneath it that tells the message, the true message.’ Festus gazed at the Jutish boy, and there was such a grave concern in his eyes that Festus gave in. ‘I think you are a fool, Wulf,’ he said. ‘And I am perhaps a bigger fool for listening to you. But I will obey you and not go in, at least not for the moment. Yet I warn you, if my hunger comes on again, I shall break away from you, even if you clutch me by the throat, and take my turn with the others.’

  By this time the troop were inside the long hut and seated roughly about the board. From time to time ragged villagers slouched in and out, carrying wooden platters and mead-jugs, and it seemed that the company of Artos was drinking with relish, from the songs that began to float about the hanging rafters.

  Festus said, ‘Wulf, this is madness. I could eat the leather of my belt. Let us go in.’

  But suddenly the Jute turned and pointed back towards the hillside. ‘Look.’ he said, ‘Medrodus is leading his force away. Would he do that, think you, if he was anxious to come down for his dinner?’

  Festus followed the other’s pointing finger. A long dark trail of horsemen was winding away back over the hill, and the sharp eyes of Festus saw that now there floated a great blue banner before them, bearing a sign which he had not seen before, the Christian cross in black. ‘That is the banner of Medrodus,’ he said. ‘I have heard of it, yet he never unfurled it while he rode with us.’

  ‘Medrodus is confident that he will ride alone from now on,’ said Wulf. ‘He no longer fears the Bear.’

  As he spoke these words, Festus broke away from him and ran into the hut.

  ‘Artos,’ he shouted, ‘Medrodus has deserted us!’