by Hume, M. K.
‘And then you’ll go?’ he asked in a doubtful voice.
‘You have my word on it as a prince of the Britons,’ Arthur replied. ‘Are you a Saxon? A Jute? A Briton? I only ask so I can speak to you in your own language.’
The headman looked puzzled.
‘We have lived in this village for time past counting, my lord. The Saxons and Angles leave us be, as long as we pay the thane’s tribute in coin or kind. Our people were here when the legions first came, so we know one master is much the same as any other. None of them worry us as long as we accede to their demands.’
Arthur promptly switched to the Celtic language and the surprised villagers stirred with a sound like rustling leaves.
‘Where are we, master? What is the nearest large town, and where does it lie?’
The headman launched into a rapid explanation in Celt, while further lowering his spear. He drew a rough sketch of the surrounding area in a soft patch of earth to indicate the relative positions of various landmarks. Meanwhile, the other villagers sighed with relief when Germanus and Gareth straightened up from the fighter’s crouch that they had unconsciously adopted when the fishermen had drawn their weapons.
‘The nearest town to us was called Vinovia for many years. It is two days’ march away on one of the northern rivers. Our thane rules from the old Roman town of Cataractonium. Do you know these towns, master?’
Arthur grinned happily.
‘I travelled through Vinovia years ago to reach the lands ruled by my uncle. The Otadini tribe used to rule the broad acres that lie on the other side of the Wall, as I’m sure you’d know.’
The headman looked grave and shuffled his feet.
‘What happened to the Otadini tribe and the kin of King Gawayne of blessed memory?’ Gareth asked bluntly. He was certain from the demeanour of these peasant fishermen that their tidings would be sorrowful.
‘Most of them are dead, my lord. Llyr Marini Gul, who is the son of the Celtic king, Meirchion Gul of Rheged, came out of his fastnesses in old Verterae with a horde of warriors and killed every Otadini tribesman they could find. They killed and tortured their victims until they could find no further enemies to destroy. They hated Lord Gawayne, although he was long dead, because he fought alongside the great Artor, who had been an avowed enemy of the Brigante. Gul’s warriors waited until the Otadini were isolated from their allies, and then crushed the last of Gawayne’s line. I hear tell they even dug up his bones so they could be scattered to the winds. The Gul clan is allied to one of the kings of Powys, a man called Ector, so I suppose there were old wrongs to be settled in the slaughter that took place.’
The headman laughed drily.
‘But the descendants of Gawayne are hard to kill and some of them still prey on the Angles. These warriors are outlaws all, or so I hear tell. At any road, the son of Meirchion Gul set up a fiefdom in Bremenium after they had smashed the Celtic palaces and churches into so much kindling. They are now in control of the southern lands abutting the Wall. Even our own thane treads carefully around this kinglet who likes to call himself the Dragon Slayer, because he’s plain crazy.’
Arthur had lowered his head to concentrate on what he was hearing, so the villagers watched him narrowly, in case he should blame them for any unpalatable information. When he raised his head again, his eyes had paled with anger.
‘So old wrongs and unseemly ambitions continue to colour my family’s name. Bran and Ector! I’d not have thought them guilty of such shame.’
The headman and the other villagers, puzzled, feared they could become the objects of his wrath.
Eventually, the headman screwed up his courage and reached out a tentative hand towards the tall warrior. ‘What is your name, lord?’ he asked shyly. ‘We have no reason to speak to our thane about your visit, even if he chose to speak with us – which he would never do! I would like to know what nobles have come to our village.’
‘I am called Arthur! I am known as the Last Dragon, and I have travelled from the lands of ice and snow so that I could return to my homeland once again,’ he answered ambiguously. Then, with a slight smile, he bowed to the fisherfolk and left the circle of light. Night had fallen during the discussion, so Gareth and Germanus followed Arthur into the darkness, while praying that they wouldn’t fall among the dunes and injure themselves.
‘Who was he? He told us he was the Last Dragon, whatever that means,’ the old man mused. ‘I thought he said his name was Arthur, and he came to us from the Land of Ice. Perhaps it was a dream? I’ve seen no sign of boats being beached nearby, so the gods might have sent them to us as an omen of things yet to come.’
The villagers agreed that the Last Dragon was a man to watch out for because he was courteous and well behaved. But the headman still thought that his new friends were obviously warriors, who could have killed them all.
The three were forced to paddle hard and fast to reach Sea Wife, which had lagged behind the rest of the fleet in anticipation of their arrival.
The canoe reached the longboat just after midnight and Arthur dragged himself up onto the deck before offering his hand to Germanus to manoeuvre the exhausted Frank over the side of Sea Wife, where he proceeded to curse in several languages about incipient old age.
Finally Gareth pulled himself over the side to fall in a crumpled heap on the boards. He was forced to endure some good-natured joking from the crew as they sat at their rowing benches, for they were ready to resume rowing as soon as Arthur issued his orders.
Gareth cheerfully acknowledged his own weariness, while mentally praising the crew for their tact in not making jokes about Germanus’s exhaustion, thus allowing the elderly warrior to retain his dignity.
‘We’ll sail into the north, Snorri. The next deep river flowing towards the coast marks the end of the Wall and we’ll find excellent landing places there that will meet all our requirements, just as the Romans did. Once there, we will assess the terrain, construct a beachhead and then select a defensive perimeter that can be held with the forces at our disposal. Is that understood, Snorri?’
Arthur waited as the helmsman and the nearest banks of rowers chewed over his instructions.
The helmsman nodded. It was part of his duties to disseminate information and relay Arthur’s orders to the rest of the fleet, which he did as Sea Wife sailed close to any of the other vessels. Arthur sometimes dwelled on the inadequacies of this archaic system, but something always seemed to prevent him from developing a better solution.
Given the slight onshore breeze, Sea Wife had been forced to tack to keep her sail filled. Arthur expected the wind to drop even further, so the rowers would be forced to labour throughout the night if the fleet was to continue its journey up the coast. Perhaps it would be better to down oars, lower the great sail and then wait until dawn; he had no idea what shoals and reefs existed in these waters and was fully aware that his good fortune might not continue if they pressed on in the darkness.
Deciding, he issued an order to the flotilla that the fleet should stop and maintain their positions overnight, so the longboats slowed and eventually came to a halt. Since the sea was too deep to drop anchors, sea anchors were allowed to trail out into the dark waters.
Meanwhile, the spirits of those aboard the longboats were high because their long and dangerous journey was over and the Last Dragon had done what he promised. A new land stretched out before them, a world of soft skies, gulls and, from what they had experienced so far, peace. No ships came to intercept them; no warning pyres lit the skies with messages of alarm exchanged between shore-based defenders, and the waters fairly teemed with fish. To the warriors under his command, everything Arthur touched turned to gold.
In the morning, after eating mouldy flat cakes, dried apples and strips of raw fish covered with a piquant sauce that Ingrid seemed to have conjured out of thin air, Arthur ordered the fleet t
o continue cautiously towards the shoreline. He soon realised that the fleet had drifted closer to it than he would have expected and his calculations convinced him that their passage along the coast had been affected by totally unexpected tidal currents during the night. The shoreline seemed innocuous and relatively harmless, so he ordered Snorri to steer closer and then sail parallel to the shore. He wanted to remain as close as he dared during this reconnaissance, so he was depending on Lars to carry out depth measurements every ten minutes or so. Another crew member was perched perilously at the top of the mast as lookout. From this position, the changing colours of the waters would warn him of shallows, while flocks of seagulls hovering and diving indicated the presence of reefs where the birds were feeding on surface fish. This lookout was also searching for rocky outcrops along the beaches that might be hiding otherwise safe areas where the fleet could make a landfall.
An hour passed, then two. Finally, the sailor aloft sighted a large, sheltered cove protected by two rocky headlands. Arthur quickly recognised that it could be an almost perfect landing place; the beach in this cove was creamy-white with mixed shingle and sand that would give the crews every assistance to drive the prows of their vessels above the high-water mark.
But first, Arthur ordered Snorri to carry out a brief reconnaissance to check the security of the cove and determine whether there were obstructions below the surface. The cove and headland were on the far side of a large river mouth that would be suitable for the shallow-drafted boats to enter once the security of the locality was established, but Arthur knew they would have to winter in these sheltered waters. With this in mind, he insisted on checking thoroughly before committing his flotilla to a landing.
Under oars and with Snorri at the helm, Sea Wife drove its bows towards the white sand while the other vessels held back and awaited Arthur’s orders. The longboat cut through the grey waters like a dolphin until, on a prearranged signal, the rowers raised their oars.
Cruel, ship-tearing rocks slid past Sea Wife on the port side where a headland reached out into the waters, and Arthur reflected on the possibility of building a fortress here in future. But then the rocky outcrop disappeared behind them to be replaced by a regular sandy bottom. If sets of stone walls were erected, defenders could control the entire cove and hence the fertile lands beyond.
Arthur was the first man to leap over the bows as Sea Wife’s keel drove effortlessly into the sand and shingle. Her practised crew used brute strength to haul the superb vessel into the softer sand where the jealous sea would be unable to steal her.
After a quick reconnaissance by speedy scouts, Arthur was advised that there was no sign of human habitation in the immediate area. Then, and only then, Snorri drew out a long, red-dyed pennon and attached it to the mast where it unfurled like a tongue of fire. The signal had been passed to the fleet to make their own landings.
The sturdy trading vessels made their way to the shore, their broader draft making their landfall less graceful than the beaching of Sea Wife. Meanwhile, the other longships guarded the entry to the cove. As Arthur watched his flotilla finally land, he experienced a sense of accomplishment that his will had prevailed. He had brought his people to a new and wonderful world.
Now for the establishment of a beachhead. Having sent out a number of scouts to further explore the immediate vicinity, Arthur issued instructions for a horseshoe faced defensive perimeter to be set up some four hundred yards inland. A location such as this fertile strip begged for human habitation, and one of his scouts returned quickly to report the presence of an abandoned village on the banks of a broad river flowing past the headlands, no more than a mile from their landing point. The scout also told Arthur of a small stream that fed into the river, which meant his forces would have a plentiful supply of clean fresh drinking water.
As the other scouts returned from their forays they reported that the terrain in their district seemed rich and fertile from silt laid down by the flooding river. Rough paths ran from along the banks of the river, bisecting other paths that seemed to be heading west towards the hinterland behind the village. One scout had seen evidence of dressed stonework near the river, but the village had clearly been abandoned for some time.
We’ll carry out a more detailed survey of our surroundings once we set up a base camp beyond the dunes, Arthur thought. There were none of the usual fishing boats and coracles he would have expected from a village by the mouth of a major river. The only signs of life were the footprints of a few mangy dogs that could be seen from a distance as they were slinking among the stone buildings.
From where he stood at the top of the highest dune, Arthur’s gaze followed the path of a straight road that led into the west. Perhaps there was an abandoned Roman settlement further inland; if so, such a settlement would be an ideal base for the winter.
‘This is a perfect spot for us to make our landfall, Snorri,’ Arthur said happily. ‘We can establish a secure compound here where our people can spend the winter, and we can prepare the lands surrounding our encampment for farming by our settlers. By the time that spring comes, we’ll be ready for the arrival of our women and children.’
Snorri had followed Arthur like a faithful hound, eager to investigate this new country where he was preparing to transplant his family; he longed to spirit his wife and young sons away from the Dene lands now that Justinian’s Disease was ravaging his people.
‘Master?’ he asked. ‘Will we be able to return to The Holding before winter sets in?’ Snorri could smell snow on the wind.
‘No, Snorri. These parts of Britain can occasionally be as cold as Jutland, but winter finishes far earlier here than in the northern climes. When the last of the winter snows have thawed and the northern ice has begun to melt, we’ll be able to bring our women, children and chattels to Britain. By then, we’ll be well and truly dug into the landscape, and we’ll know if we’re likely to suffer any attack. I’d not have innocents arrive during a war.’
The winter months would be long and lonely but, at the very least, Snorri could savour the knowledge that his labours would benefit his family.
‘That will be a good day for us, Master Arthur.’
‘Aye, Snorri! It will indeed.’
The perimeter was established on the landward side of the dunes where the grass was sweet and deep. Enough supplies for several days were unloaded, while guards and wandering scouts were tasked to patrol the lands within the perimeter and maintain a watch over the tents in the newly prepared encampment. Unlike many of his companions, Arthur found tent-living pleasant for it reminded him of long summers in Arden where he had received his first lessons in woodcraft, trapping and fishing.
Then he had believed that his life’s path was set in stone: to protect Bedwyr, his mother and his siblings and to provide guidance and protection to the people of Arden Forest until his eventual death. So simple a dream now seemed unimaginably narrow.
The land around the base camp showed evidence of abandoned agriculture. A stand of fruit trees crowned one low hill and unpicked apples were scattered on the ground. In the same patch of ground, stalks of grain raised heavy heads ripe for harvesting, and wild herbs and vegetables had been left to seed and regrow for several seasons. Some of the provident Dene warriors were already hard at work harvesting the bounty.
‘Volunteers,’ Arthur barked at his crew. ‘I need ten men to investigate a village on the river, about a mile distant. You can actually see it if you climb to the highest point of the dunes. I won’t feel comfortable until we know its importance.’
Snorri was the first to leap to his feet, and Arthur chose nine men at random to carry out the patrol under the helmsman’s command. Meanwhile, he gave Germanus and Lars the task of arranging a series of fire pits. Germanus was also instructed to allot permanent positions along the defensive line for the crews from the various vessels. With an order of battle firmly fixed in their min
ds, Arthur’s warriors would always know who was on their left and who was on their right, essential knowledge if a pitched battle should test them, especially at night.
Lars proved his worth during the hours that followed. Recently promoted to the post of longboat commander, the young man had asked Arthur for permission to join the Briton’s crew during the voyage from the Dene lands, when Arthur had taught him long-distance navigation, a skill that he had learned from his expert mentor, Stormbringer. Using the fixed stars in the heavens as reference points was invaluable when the Dene ships were far from land.
Now Lars could be used to communicate Arthur’s orders to the large number of northerners in the fleet.
Arthur and his group set out over the dew-wet grass at sunrise the next morning on what seemed to be a beautiful day.
The journey was uneventful, and the column found the remains of a village community that had once thrived from the bounty of the river, the sea and the commerce that had come with traders who sailed inland to the Saxon and Angle settlements, as the old Roman docks along the river banks demonstrated. The river had narrowed a little over the years, and the waters had deserted the docks, leaving rich land for agriculture and vegetable patches now full of weeds.
Now, Arthur and his companions drew their swords and searched cottage after cottage as they made their way into the village. Each home was deserted, and had been picked clean of furniture, stoves and food. Even the rats had left, having devoured everything that was edible. Arthur found a small carved wooden fish that had been chewed on the tail by baby teeth, its surface smoothed by the fingers of many small children over many generations.
On a whim, Arthur slipped the toy inside his tunic, where it could lie against his heart.
‘Master! There’s something odd over here that you must see,’ Snorri called from the edge of a small stream about fifty feet away. The streamlet had cut its way through soft deposits of silt from an underground spring that was trickling from the earth. Rain, thaws and flood had eroded a trench into the upper bank of this streamlet. But some enterprising soul had filled in the ugly scar on the landscape, allowing the water to run free. Arthur felt a stab of irritation.