by Jack Whyte
"At least a month. Why, what's wrong?"
Uther's face had darkened, his anger, always sudden, ignited by this unexpected complication.
"Everything. Everything's wrong, damnation! Can we send after him, bring him back?"
"Not easily. We don't know with certainty what route he'll follow. He is on his way to Verulamium for a debate with a party of two hundred . . . more of an ambassadorial journey than anything else, really. His mission is to demonstrate Camulod's strength to whoever might turn up for this debate among the bishops."
"What debate? And what in the name of all the gods at once is Merlyn doing among bishops?"
"I'll tell you in a moment, but first tell me what's going on and why you're here. I understood you had no plans to leave Tir Manha this year. What changed your mind?"
Uther moved around behind the table, punching one hand into the open palm of the other. "Gulrhys Lot, what else? Nemo had barely left with my last dispatches for Merlyn when I received word that Cornwall is seething with armed men again. Where is Nemo, by the way? Is she still here in Camulod?"
Titus shrugged. "I have no idea, but I doubt it. She delivered the dispatches a week ago."
"Word came in to Tir Manha that Lot might be making a nuisance of himself again, that Cornwall is an armed camp. My first reaction was to ignore it. It didn't seem to me that Lot could have raised another army in so short a time after the thrashing we gave him less than a year ago. But then I remembered the nature of the beast, and so I sent out scouts. Didn't waste any time. I sent them on the run, the same day the report came in, with orders to examine anything unusual that they could find down there and then bring the information back to me as quickly as they could. I sent two scouting expeditions, one by sea and the other overland. The overland group was a squad of my own Dragons, some of my very best.
"The seagoing party, two galleys, came back first, within a week. They had barely crossed the river estuary before they saw action, and they didn't even begin to approach the open sea. They were fortunate to escape capture as it was. According to the two captains, the entire northern coast of the peninsula down there is alive with shipping, so it's a safe wager the south coast will be, too. They told me there are vessels arriving from every direction every day, filling up every little bay along the shoreline and unloading men, then setting off again, presumably to transport more.
"That was all I needed to hear. I know Lot inherited his father's love of assembling mercenaries from beyond the seas, so I decided to ride over here myself and get our joint preparations underway without any waste of time. But even before we could leave to come here, the other scouting party came back, too . . . or what was left of it. They had set out to ride directly southwest into Cornwall, travelling cautiously and hoping to attract no unwelcome attention, holding to the west of Isca where the land is bleak and barren. But they were less than sixty miles into Lot's territories when they were found and challenged and forced to turn back. By that time, fortunately, they had seen all they needed to see, but they had to fight every mile of the way home, and they lost more than half their number.
"Lot has a large army gathering down there, Titus, and there's only one way for him to bring it out, as you and I both know. I don't think we have any time at all to waste sitting around talking. But I haven't even mentioned the most important information we uncovered with our overland expedition. The army my people found down there—the southern army, I've been calling it—is only half the story. According to the prisoners taken and questioned by my men, the call has gone out for an enormous assembly of men, all under Lot's banner, to take place to the northeast of here close by Aquae Sulis. When they are all together, they will start a systematic devastation of the towns in this region, beginning with Aquae itself and Glevum."
"What? But that's insane! There's nothing left in Aquae Sulis to plunder, nor in Glevum. Twenty years ago, even ten years ago, there might have been some point to that, but the towns are empty shells nowadays. Lot must know that."
Uther nodded, his face expressionless. "He probably does, but it won't make any difference to him. He is selling the idea of plunder for the taking. The picture of fat towns waiting to be sacked and looted is what he's using to raise his army, and you can be sure the rabble he's attracting have no idea his promises are empty. When they find out the truth, they'll be murderous, but Lot will be back in Cornwall by then, and we'll be the ones left to deal with it, on top of everything else."
"Hmm." Titus's face was still, his eyes narrowed. "What do your people tell you about Lot's preparations? Are they far advanced? And are any of his forces trained?"
"If any of them are, they'll be units who have fought together before now, on the continent, for the Romans, and they'll be in a minority. The vast majority of his people, as always, will be savages. Fearsome enough in hand-to-hand fighting, but totally lacking in any kind of co-ordinated skills. As for how close they are to being ready to move, your guess would be as good as mine. But simple prudence would dictate that we take no chances and incur no risks by being complacent."
Titus nodded. "Look, we can't rely on catching up with Merlyn and bringing him back here. He has been gone too long. My people would not even know where to begin searching for him. We know that he headed east originally, by way of Sorviodunum and Venta, but that is really all we know. He intended to improvise from then on, depending upon what he discovered along the way, and there is no certainty that he would even stay on the main roads if he encountered trouble at any point. So you and I had best decide on a campaign of our own, lacking his involvement."
Uther grimaced. "So be it. I don't like it but there seems to be no other choice. Tell me about this gathering in Verulamium . . . what did you call it, a debate?"
"Aye, that's what it is . . ." Titus launched into a brief description of the issues at stake among the Christian community in Britain, reminding him of the visiting monastic priests who a few years earlier had threatened all the people of Camulod with excommunication and damnation if they did not immediately renounce all their former beliefs and do as they were bidden for the salvation of their souls. Merlyn's father, Picus Britannicus, had refused to be bullied or browbeaten by the zealots and had expelled them from the Colony, declaring publicly in Council that he would make no decisions regarding the safety and welfare of his people's immortal souls until he had heard the reasoning underlying such sweeping changes clearly defined by a source possessing more authority and dignitas than a herd of unwashed, intolerant, wandering priests.
A debate to address this question was to take place within the following month in the great Roman theatre of Verulamium, and Merlyn had decided to attend the gathering, as his father would have, in order to keep track of what was happening within the Church's teachings and equally to ensure that the bishops making these decisions should be aware that there was a strong Christian centre of influence in Camulod, far to the southwest.
Uther himself had never been more than nominally Christian, seeing no more appeal in the Christian god than he found in any of the other, older gods of Cambria and Britain, or even Rome. He had been baptized a Christian years earlier, but that had been to please his grandmother. It had nothing to do with any feeling of personal conviction. Now he looked at Titus, his arms crossed tightly over his chest, frustration stamped on his features.
"You believe this journey of his—this expedition all the way into foreign, hostile territory—is worthwhile, even though it calls him away when he is needed here by his own people? This is not merely grandiose nonsense?"
Titus shrugged. "What should I know of such things? Is it not enough that Merlyn thinks so?"
For a few moments, Uther looked as though he would answer that with an angry negative, but then he sighed and accepted the inevitable.
"Yes, well, I suppose we will leave him to get on with it, then, for lack of any real alternative, and we will make our own plans for how we defend ourselves during his absence." Uther dragged a hand wearily d
own his face, closing his eyes as though to banish his frustration and focus his thoughts, "We should be combining our forces, Camulod and Pendragon Cambria, more than we have ever done before, melding bowmen and infantry in an army group consisting of two or possibly three compact, sell sufficient armies, just as Picus Britannicus described to us a thousand times. Each army will be self- reliant and will have set battle tactics, but all three will function as a solid legion whenever the need arises. And surrounding and protecting them, heavy cavalry strike formations, mobile and hard-hitting, radiating in all directions, but always launching from the central hub formed by the army. What think you?"
Titus smiled. "I think Picus Britannicus taught you well. And you know I would never disagree with a style of warfare I was taught to fight in boyhood. Fortunately, we have already begun training more of our people to fight together, combining their different skills, after last year's events. I see no great difficulty facing us there, other than the obvious lack of time to prepare. Let me send for Flavius. I have the feeling we're going to need his input right from the outset."
Uther remained in Camulod for three days on that occasion and slept on each of the three nights in the home of his grandmother. From Luceiia, during one long evening's talk, he learned the story of Deirdre's pregnancy and Merlyn's marriage, and if he felt any pain over his evident exclusion from his cousin's nuptials, he said nothing of it, remembering the suspicions Merlyn had harboured over the night Deirdre, who at that time had still been called Cassandra, had been attacked and brutally raped. He also heard from his grandmother the strange story of how Deirdre's real name was discovered when she was reunited with her brother Donuil after years of separation.
The remainder of Uther's time in Camulod was spent in conference with the interim Joint Commanders Titus and Flavius and the senior staff officers of the armies and garrison of Camulod, drawing up plans to deal with the invasion they all believed would come from Cornwall and trying to cover as many contingencies as they could envision. By the time he left to return to Tir Manha on the fourth morning after his arrival, it had been decided that Uther would command an entire brigade of heavy cavalry, one thousand strong, during the coming campaign. In the meantime, he must return to Cambria and raise as many Pendragon bowmen as he could within the month, bringing them back to Camulod to train with the infantry for as long as circumstances would permit.
Before Uther had even departed from the fortress, the hard-core training of both infantry and cavalry had begun, and the great plain at the base of the hill of Camulod was once more obscured by clouds of dust from dawn until dusk each day.
As soon as he returned to Tir Manha, Uther rode out again, this time to raise warriors from the westernmost territories of the Griffyd clans, where another young Chief called Dergyll ap Griffyd, who was not much older than Huw Strongarm, had succeeded Cativelaunus of Carmarthen. The old man had fallen into an icy mountain stream swollen with melting snow at the end of the previous winter and died. Uther and Dergyll had known each other very briefly during one boyhood summer long before and had formed a mutual liking and admiration at that time, so it was easy for them to get along with each other again after a gap of many years. The expedition was a great success, and Uther returned to Tir Manha accompanied by Dergyll himself and a large company of several hundred warriors.
He arrived, however, to discover that fresh word had come from Camulod and that his mother, Veronica, wished to speak with him immediately. Intrigued, he went directly to his mother's house, and she told him about how Merlyn's young wife Deirdre and the babe she had been carrying had been murdered. A courier had arrived from Camulod three days before, bearing a letter from Luceiia Britannicus in which she described the little that she knew about what had happened. She had known where Deirdre was, and in fact had planned the expedition with the girl, who had been pining for the solitude she had loved while living in her secluded valley for months, and so a week and more had passed without Luceiia being unduly worried. But when the younger woman had failed to return as promised during the second week, Luceiia had grown concerned and asked Daffyd, Merlyn's Druid friend, to visit the young woman and make sure that she was well.
Daffyd found a scene of carnage: Merlyn's young wife slaughtered, her unborn babe destroyed with her, her decomposing body floating in the lake, bloated and ravaged beyond recognition. By Daffyd's initial estimate, later confirmed by other findings, Deirdre had been dead for at least a week, perhaps longer, by the time he found her, and the cause of her death had been a brutal battering, administered by someone of great strength. Daffyd discounted a sexually motivated attack from the moment of his first objective assessment of the crime, judging by the fact that the corpse was still fully clothed, even to her loincloth and other undergarments. And yet robbery could not have been the reason, either, as nothing had been taken from the wagon.
Daffyd judged then that it would be best for everyone—he was thinking most particularly of Luceiia's sensibilities—if he were simply to bury the sad remains of both mother and unborn child as close as possible to where he had found them and to recommend them to the gods as creatures worthy of respect and kindness. Having laid them to rest beside the lake beneath the sacred trees— all trees were sacred in the eyes of Druids—he then searched the entire locality thoroughly and painstakingly, looking for signs or traces of the unknown assailant. He found nothing, however, apart from an area of scuffed and trampled earth that might have been torn up by the hooves of an attacker's horse or, equally likely, by Deirdre's own cart horse, which lay close by, dead in its harness.
He stood vigil by the young woman's grave that night, praying over her, and then, convinced that there was nothing further to be learned at the scene, he returned to Camulod bearing his tragic news.
Luceiia withdrew to her rooms, where she remained in mourning for two days, greatly distressed by the knowledge that word could not reach Merlyn in Verulamium in time to bring him home ahead of his scheduled return. By the time the messengers crossed the entire country to reach him, if they survived the journey at all, it would already be nigh on the time for him to set out for home on his return journey.
Uther sat listening in silence as his mother told him the story and read to him from his grandmother's letter. When she had finished, he rose to his feet and stood over her for a while, gripping her shoulder tightly with one hand, incapable of speech. Then he turned away and walked from the room.
Concerned by the look of him as he walked away, Veronica rose quickly and followed him, watching as he left the house and made his way directly to the cluster of long buildings that had been erected several years before as stables for his cavalry mounts. The sullen trooper Veronica disliked, the woman-man called Nemo, had been standing outside the house, waiting for him to come out, but he waved her off impatiently, and she instantly fell back and walked away, plainly knowing her superior well enough to gauge his mood and know she was not welcome for the present.
Veronica stayed back and waited and watched until her son emerged again from the stables a short time later, riding his huge chestnut gelding, and as he disappeared towards the main gates of Tir Manha, looking neither to right nor left, she turned and signalled to a passing trooper, bidding him find Garreth Whistler and bring him to her house immediately.
"Are you ever going to speak again?"
Uther turned his head very slowly and threw Garreth Whistler a long, considering look, then turned back and kicked his horse forward, down the sloping bank to where the narrow river bustled through its gorge.
Garreth dipped his head in a private gesture that said. Well, I tried, and followed horse and rider down the steep incline. He had caught up to Uther easily, within five miles of Tir Manha, because Uther had been making no attempt to move quickly, but he had made no effort thereafter to impose himself upon the King, content simply to ride along half a length behind him and wait to be noticed. Uther, however, had paid him no attention, apart from a swift glance to determine who it was tha
t had followed him, and more than an hour had elapsed since then. Garreth could tell, however, that Uther was not displeased by his presence.
They had been sitting side by side for almost half of the past half hour, simply gazing down at the torrent in the gully below, and now Uther was approaching the edge of the fast-flowing stream and rising in his stirrups prior to dismounting. Garreth waited until he had dismounted completely and moved to sit on the trunk of a fallen tree by the riverside, and then he swung down from his horse, too, and dug into one of his saddlebags. From it he withdrew a cloth containing a cold fowl, a loaf of bread and a small, stoppered horn filled with salt, all provided by Uther's mother. He carried the bundle lo where Uther sat on the tree trunk and perched beside him, placing the cloth between them and untying its knot.
"Here, eat. Your mother told me what happened. She also told me you must be starved."
Uther glanced down at the food and shook his head, still apparently not ready to speak.
Garreth shrugged and ripped a leg off the bird, then sprinkled it profligately with salt and bit off a succulent mouthful. He chewed with relish for a while, then stuffed the meat into one cheek and spoke around it. "You're acting as though this was personal to you . . . as though you had known the woman herself . . . What was her name? Deirdre?"
Finally, Uther spoke. "Deirdre, yes, but she was Cassandra before that. You never knew about the fight we had, Merlyn and I, the night Cassandra was attacked, did you?"
"No, not really. All I know is that after a lifetime of seldom being more than an arm's length apart, you two spent nigh on a year without seeing each other."
Uther shook his head and heaved a great sigh. "Do you know, Garreth, that to this day I regret that night. But even at the height of it, while Merlyn and I were almost at each other's throats, I had no notion of how great the rift would grow to be between us . . ."
Garreth's voice, when next he spoke, was pitched low. "The two of you were at each other's throats?"