by Mary Lide
He pushed back his coif so that there should be no mistaking who he was, but I knew him long before, his face a mask of hate.
“Peace,” I said, “I come in peace. Let my brother and me go freely into Cambray; you are sworn to be my father’s man, and as warden of the marcher lands he orders you. It is your oath to help, not to hinder, us.”
I thought he would choke with venom at those words. “By Christ,” he roared when he had speech, “the whore of Cambray returned, who took my son’s life, who planned his death. Come down, mistress, and I’ll give you peace. You and your paramour will scream for it before I’m done. And so your brother, a traitor sworn, who even his father would not help. And so that misshapen imp, your devil’s twin.”
A second and a third time I cried, “Odo of Walran, keep to your bond. If not to Cambray, then let us cross the border freely, without let.”
Then he did give a bellow of rage and shouted to his men to ride after me and take me alive. “I knew,” he howled, “that you were in league with those Celtic scum, scavengers of the earth, carrion. Go where you will, we follow you. The border does not protect you, nor them, this time.”
His men gave a cry, as huntsmen do when they sight their prey. “Ho, Olwen of Cambray,” they mocked. “Wait there for us, little one. Fall in our arms, we beg.” And other such things too obscene to mention here. They began to gallop toward me, Lord Odo in the lead, fanning out to hem me round. For a second I watched them, terrorized, until the gray horse, scenting battle, began to sidestep and prance, throwing its head from side to side. In panic I spread my hands apart as far as I could, jerked them down with a violent twist so that the knots parted as they were meant and the reins slid free, although my hands were still shackled to them. I twined my fingers once more into the mane, and kicked with my heels. “Run,” I shouted, “now run.”
Taliesin’s horse, which had never felt the touch of spur or whip or needed them, half reared, to toss such impudence from its back, laid its head low, flattened its ears, began to move. Back it went, the way we had come, snaking in and out of rocks, taking bushes at a stride, pounding out the heather beneath its flailing hooves so that clods shot behind us in showers of mud. Almost jerked out of place by that first lunge, I flopped in the saddle like a rag doll. But it could not toss me off, too well tied on for that. So, bearing me, a nothing, on its back, it ran free.
That horse knew every inch of the moors, and so did I. When I had recovered breath enough to haul myself upright, a cut streaming blood where its head had knocked mine, my eyes so water-filled I could not see, lips dry, heart pounding in my ears, I leaned forward over its neck as Taliesin used to and spoke to it; I gathered up the reins, which were bound to my wrists in such fashion that, although I could not stop or hold the horse in any way, I could still guide. Back and forth it swerved, almost prancingly, sometimes doubling around to pass through the Walran line, plunging through with a sweep of hooves and teeth that caused many riders to go down. Soon those Norman knights were jostling each other, fumbling for foothold at the gaps, running foul. Bunched together or spread out, they could not hope to catch us, nor could they control their mounts. Some fell at rocks; some stumbled at the ditches hidden by the gorse roots; some tried to jump the bushes; their horses were too heavy for jumping. At every pass they lost a man, their numbers openly diminishing. An unhorsed knight is useless, too; back he had to limp on foot. But Odo of Walran was a good horseman himself. He saw his men running wild; he called the remainder to heel. “A gold piece,” he told them, frothing with rage, “a sackful of my treasury, for the man who catches her, alive or dead. Death for him who lets her escape.”
Now danger ran close and hot. Those still left hefted their spears to hurl and unplucked their bows. They had no breath to gloat but came on more cautiously. The Lord of Walran leveled his lance, threw up his shield with the wolf’s head. He spurred his own destrier forward so that it, too, advanced, fighting mad. Once more I leaned in the saddle, breath gone, vision gone, my voice hoarse, hands and legs wrenched apart, jarred by every raking stride. Now would the last ride of all be run. “Come, my lord,” I whispered through cracked and bleeding lips, for a beast can be as noble as a man, “come, my lord, show your speed.”
I felt his muscles tense, his hooves spread; the heather ripped and fell apart. Back toward the pass we came, across the open moors. And following as fast as they could, the remainder of the Walran force persisted in their pursuit. Some threw their shields and helmets aside to reduce the weight; some even let their sword belts fall to give more speed; so ride huntsmen when they have their quarry within their grasp, so flees the terrified prey. Except suddenly terror was gone. Never in my life shall I ride like that again. Strength flowed from that horse to me; I was a god of air myself, and he had wings. The open moor flowed past as if it were unrolled on either side, and before us the hill fort waited patiently.
Down the track our enemy came, not twenty men left now, perhaps not ten. And of those some were unarmed, some willfully riding to win the gold that had been offered them, some almost forgetting that I was also an enemy with friends of my own. Along the track, then, beneath the fort, toward the ruined tower at its western end; the border almost reached, one by one those Norman knights pushed ahead for place, those a length behind whipping their horses along furiously. Down from the fort, cutting down from the high path that Taliesin had used those years ago, the three Welsh horsemen plunged, in front and behind, to catch the Normans as they rode.
At the ruined tower I swept past, not on the track but across the moor with its deadly scatter of stones and rocks. Taliesin had not fallen here, neither should I. But the Normans could not make the turn. Trying to wrench their horses to a stop, trying to force them around, a maneuver impossible, they spilled and tumbled; so much for Norman skill. A broken back, crushed ribs, and Celts at hand to finish them. “Sa, sa, sa,” beat the Celts upon their shields. “Sa, sa, sa,” they sang. Rising in the stirrups as one man they hurled their spears, brought their shield rims down hard, hacked with their swords, hewing a path of their own. No Norman afterward left horsed, they say, the moor littered with dead or broken men, except Odo of Walran and his body-squire, both trapped against the ruined tower.
They say, too, that Taliesin reined up, his hair blown golden until it looked like summer grass, his eyes like the distant sea. “Yield,” he cried, “you and your man. Safe conduct promise me and mine; safe conduct I give you.”
But, they say, that Norman lord, maddened beyond hearing or thinking sense, wild with fury as his own son had been, cried, “I fight on,” although his horse was foundered and he had but one frightened boy to back him.
And they say, too, those who relish this tale, that Taliesin replied gravely, like a graybeard in council, “I give you life. Would you have given that much?” And when Odo did not reply, “Then fight. But since your horse goes lame, fight like a Celt, on foot with knives.”
And they tell how Taliesin threw his sword aside, and his armor and his shield with the Walran crest, which he had taken and used—the last time he ever did such a thing, for pride and arrogance, and for something else, youth’s exuberance perhaps—and leapt off his horse. He sprang on foot over the heather clumps, lithe with youthful grace, and in his hand he held that knife of mine which was neither knife nor sword. “Here I am, Odo of Walran,” he shouted. “You swore to take me, I think. Now try.”
Odo of Walran, seeing the advantage that impetuosity had afforded, gave a laugh of derision and scorn. A fool, he must have thought, a simpleton, a barbarian untutored in knightly ways. Ignoring the challenge that the prince had made, he spurred his horse into a charge, flailing down with his sword for one last lunge. And they say Taliesin never moved, his feet planted on his own ground, bowstring taut, but determined not to give way.
When the horse and horseman were upon him, the horse laboring mightily, its rider bent over to run him through, he hurled himself against its lame side, rolling away from the churni
ng hooves but dragging hold of the reins and stirrup irons. The sword edge hewed through his leather coat, but that was the last thrust Odo made. Man and beast went crashing to the ground, the rider caught beneath.
They say that Taliesin was the first to rise, one hand held to his ribs where the sword had ripped, the other still clasping that little knife with its sharp blade and its handle worn right through to gold. They say he cried to Odo, who lay half stunned, “Catch,” and had his men throw a second knife so that it slid along the grass within Walran’s grasp. They say that that Norman lord heaved and pried with both hands, trying to lug his massive weight upon its feet. But there was no one to help him, and his own horse had him pinned, its neck snapped.
And they say, too, that the prince watched him strain for a while, neither moving toward nor away, not even seeming to notice that his own wound was bleeding heavily. And when the struggle was done, and Odo was spent with fear, he walked up to him, almost strolled. Odo’s head rolled back; he tried to twist himself around—so looks a hare caught in a net. But Taliesin made no move to harm him, merely beckoned to the squire. A young boy he was, fresh from home, and this his first taste of war. “Here, lad,” Taliesin is supposed to have said, his breath coming in gasps, “bear your master home. As he has other sons, bid him cherish them. I never sought to kill the oldest one. And as I have a father whose life has been destroyed by hate, bid your master not let hate destroy him. Life I grant. Let him savor it.”
They say he called to his men to lead up a horse, and never taking his gaze, dark and thoughtful, from Walran’s face, grown gray itself, all blood drained from it, he heaved himself into the saddle, motioned to his men to ride on. They wheeled as one, rode up the cliff path toward the fort. And when they had quite gone and he was sure it was no trick, they say the little squire came timidly out from the wall where he had crept, dismounted on that scuffed and bloodstained track, and stood gazing around him in complete amaze. So long he looked after those three horsemen that he almost forgot to help his lord. But they say Odo of Walran as silently allowed himself to be helped, and when at last he was freed and could speak, as Taliesin and his men had long since gone, he went back to Walran in silence, too.
That is what they say, all those who remember the crossing of the pass and the encounter there. I never saw what happened, nor did the Lady Olwen, waiting for news herself, hidden in the foxes’ lair. She and Hue stayed there until the prince returned. The wait was not as long as they feared; first they heard the sound of horses trotting over the grass, and then, in the distance, that Celtic whistle. Out she darted, a strange-looking boy with her hair cropped short and her dirty boy’s clothes, and ran toward them bare-footed, since my boots did not fit. When she came to them, she looked at each carefully, and each in turn nodded at her as if to say, “It is done.” Only the prince added slowly as if his voice came from far off, “Now we can go home.”
Well, they got him off his horse before he fell; they tied him up, a deep and raking wound but not one to hinder him. They mounted again, two by two for the last time, the lady behind him to steady him, the single man who could have carried me riding as guard. And since Henry’s men still encircled Cambray, too many in number for the Celts to break through, too few to watch the castle and pursue, the five fugitives had no alternative but to cross the border and continue on.
And what of me, where was I? Who knows where the wind blows or where wild birds fly. We ranged the open moor, the horse and I, all through that long and vicious day, as fleet as cloud shadows that sweep down from the hills and ripple past. But there was no cloud as shield that day; the sun beat down without restraint. Thirst bothered me at first, but afterward even thirst was gone. Bound to that saddle, hands still tied to the reins, fingers latched about the mane like thorns, I remember thinking, we shall ride like this until I die and he can find some way to rub me off, or until he dies, and I with him, no way to untie myself, no way for anyone to approach us, not even when he tires of galloping. When once he halted by a moorland stream, ice-cold it trickled beneath the fern, I could almost taste its peaty water on my tongue, but never a way for me to drink. We splashed through boggy patches, where gnats rise in swarms, and strayed among the meadow-sweet and parsley flowers, brushing heavy and dew-laden about my knees, no way to reach and pull at them. Toward nightfall, I know, we came up onto the highest part of the Cambray hills, where stands an old circle of stones, leaning together like ancient men discussing the state of the world. Once, long, long ago, a prophecy was made there to the Lady Ann. Grief was in it, and joy, and hope, that perhaps one day the rift between the two races, Norman and Celt, might be bridged. I turned my head stiffly and watched those stones as we sped by, until they sank over the crest of the hill. Fickle are those Celtic gods, promising fair, showing foul, never gift without due sacrifice. And we journeyed on.
But you see I live to tell this tale. The gods had not yet had their will of me. The second, third day, what matter, dark and light as one, the night bringing relief from heat, the day swelling those leather thongs to eat into the tender flesh, so that I knew in part what torture Hue had known, I felt the horse start, flick up its head, catching me anew where I dropped upon its neck. It laid back its ears, listening. I thought I heard, far away, across the hill, mindless as a fluting bird, that Celtic whistling.
Perhaps I heard it, perhaps I dreamed, perhaps so dreamed the horse. It moved into its flowing gallop once again, heading away from the coast, inland, across the border, straight to where its master rode. And so it is that I, Urien the Bard, the horse master, tell the end of this tale. We were caught easily, the horse happy to have its real rider returned. The Celts untied me, carried me in a litter slung between their two mounts. Surely the Lady Olwen was at wit’s end at first, three sick men, each trying to cheer the other on. Christ who reigns in Heaven, never was such a pitiful group, as we wound our way north to Afron. And in truth only the survivors of the princely guard, their duty almost done, began to speak, freely allowing themselves to talk of family and friends, each day another tale of new delight and gossip to encourage us, such memories of green fields, vast stands of oak and birch, such horses, sheep, and womenkind, until even their prince threw up his arms in protest, as if to say, “Is that truly as it was when I left?”
“But look you, masters,” one said in his shy and gentle way, his cunningly entwined Celtic thought lacing his cunning Celtic words, “on my travels I have seen Englishmen who speak and talk and think like French, and Frenchmen, born and reared, whose greatest wealth lies in England. Back and forth that channel sea those lords bate, like hounds, as if water were a hunting field; how can you know or love any land since you are pulled between the two, since you own properties in both? Afron men live and die in Afron, or should; that is where our roots are.” A truth in that, for sure, and so it was, I think, for their prince. And when I heard those Welshmen sing, as now they did, epitaphs for their fallen companions, denied a fitting burial, their song were marvels of intricacy to praise and honor dead friends.
We did not hurry; no need for haste. We had food in plenty, the weather continued fair, and although we avoided any place of note where the prince might be recognized, there was no enemy left to harry us. Nor did haste best suit our needs; how many weeks now upon the road, what matter if a few more passed? And it may be that in my lady’s mind there was more than one reason for loitering, not least, the knowledge that at our journey’s end there was yet the Lord of Afron to be faced.
The high pasture air gave Lord Hue new heart. He still was slow of speech but could feed and dress himself, and, praise God, could ride, taking turn and turn about. To see him astride a horse, you would not think he had ever lacked the skill, his hair grown long to cover his scar, his training in horsemanship so ingrained as to give him back his old fire. And in good time he learned to draw and wield a sword as well as any mounted lord, giving him the nickname of “Hue Crook Thumbs,” which title he did not scorn. I learned to walk myself, my bon
es so wrenched apart, my joints so racked with fever fits, I half believed I would end more twisted than nature meant.
And what of the prince and his lady love? Taliesin, too, would bear a scar all his life; an inch closer in, so much for pride! But his wound did not hinder him or hamper him in his loves. Wherever he and the lady went, sensuality seemed to flow from them; they seemed to move as if still joined. He could not keep his hands from her nor she from him, so that when he lifted her on his horse—for he let no one touch her but himself—his hands felt beneath her short boy’s tunic; and when he helped her off, she slid down his full body’s length; and when he mounted behind, he kept his hand low on her waist to pull her down upon himself; and when he rode, by turns, in front, she pressed her breasts against his back and breathed softly in his hair, crisped long around his ears. And nightly, or in noon heat, when they moved aside and we heard him cover her, the in-caught breath, the sob of lust, was as natural as any sound in those wide hills. I accepted it, God’s gift to them. So may it be to all mankind.
We came to Afron’s castle at dusk. I think the prince had planned to make his entrance without all the ceremony of midday, or perhaps he merely wished to round off his journey in fitting wise, the day’s work done, the restful night ahead. Or perhaps I imagine this, and he merely lingered for a few more hours among those clover fields he had described. The scent of them, the sound of bees humming all day long, was enough to drug any man out of mind. I lay in the clover myself, upon my back, and held the gray horse to graze, while its master was pleasure-bent. It was hobbled tightly, to be sure, but it snuffled, as if to show it bore no ill will; nor I to it, although I will confess I never asked to ride it again, nor any horse, if there were some other means. Yet that day I lay between its great forefeet as nonchalant as if it had been a hound.