by Jack Whyte
My second memory is of the exhibition of horsemanship and weapons skills that took place in the afternoon. Then, for the first time, I witnessed what a body of mounted men—our new Scouts—could do with the new, light spears. Group after group swept forward, covered from head to foot in toughened leather armour, galloping at full speed and leaning far out from their saddles, braced only by reins and stirrups, to pluck brightly beribboned coloured targets from the ground on the points of their spears. Later, others advanced in lines at the full charge against a row of propped up shields, to pull their horses up into rearing turns, moving as one, while the riders braced themselves and threw their spears above the edges of the shields to where they would have skewered the men who held them. As they rode away from the "encounter," swerving easily between the riders now approaching in the following lines, each rider held a new spear, drawn from its carrying place behind his saddle. I knew, watching these manoeuvres, that I was witnessing a new form of tactical warfare.
Dedalus had been standing beside me throughout all this, as had Rufio, and now, as the last of the demonstration teams rode off the field to enormous applause, Rufio spoke up. "See what our fellows have learned while we've been gone? Makes you feel inadequate, doesn't it?'
Ded glanced sideways at him, smiling. "Rufe, if you hadn't met that demon cursed bear, we could have given them a display of swordsmanship, with our game of two stick, that would have made them all feel sick. "
As Rufio nodded and spat disconsolately, Ded turned back to me. "The boys still could, you know. Not two stick, they don't have the skill for that, but they're good enough with one oak staff each to raise these people's eyebrows. What think you, Cay?'
The thought had already occurred to me, but I had dismissed the notion. "No, Ded, I don't think that would be a good idea. In the first place, it might not look right—might give the impression we're feeling as inadequate as we are, and trying to compensate by showing off. And in the second place, I don't think it would be good for the boys to be singled out like that. Let's not do anything to call unnecessary attention to Arthur. "
Ded shrugged and nodded. "You're the Commander, so be it. " He raised his head and sniffed. "God, that meat smells good. I'm starved. Let's go see if they're ready to start serving. "
We strolled together towards the cooking area, and that, as it happens, constitutes my last distinct memory of that day. I know that Tress had a wonderful time, for I recall her flushed and laughing, bright eyed and slightly out of breath from dancing with one of the young men; and I know that the food was varied and excellent, for I remember Marco being carried shoulder high by a boisterous crew of troopers and cooks; and I know I met many more new faces throughout the day—but I remember none of that in detail, nor do I remember going to bed that night.
The day that followed was dedicated to cleaning up, and once again the troopers overran the great campus. By the end of the day, in the brief spring twilight, there was no sign that the tent town had ever been there; even the blackened rings of fire scorched earth had been raked over with harrows, their depressions filled and the ashes buried or scattered.
By the time the sun rose the morning after that, the enormous campus was transformed yet again, its entire surface covered by precisely aligned formations of motionless men: the rearmost half was made up of squadrons of heavy cavalry, the flanking troops were composed of smaller bodies of the Scouting Force, and the front central ranks and files were composed entirely of foot soldiers. Riding through the front gates, on my way down with Ambrose to inspect them, I pulled my horse to a stop. Ambrose reined in, too, looking at me.
"What?"
"Brown," I replied. "They're all brown."
He turned away for a moment, looking down on the army assembled below us, trying to decipher my meaning, and then he looked back at me. "The armour, you mean?"
"Yes. Seeing them all together like that, as an entity, it suddenly struck me. There's not much metal."
"No, we don't have much metal, not enough to armour thousands. But we don't really need metal armour. The Romans conquered the world in leather armour, didn't you know that?" He grinned. "Triple layers of toughened oxhide with metal studs will turn most weapons. Besides, our weapons are all iron, and they are the best in Britain, made in our own smithies. And if you look closely, you'll see that our officers are all armoured in metal. They're the ones who need it most, since they're the ones who stand most exposed to the enemy. Shall we go on?"
"In a moment, wait!" He had begun to urge his horse forward, but now he stopped again. "Where are we obtaining our iron nowadays?"
"Where we always have—anywhere we can find it Carol has contacts scouring the countryside all the time. The ore beds are mostly in south Cambria to the north of Glevum, and along the southeast shore. But few people are mining them now and, of course, the south-eastern shores are Saxon occupied. So most of our raw iron still comes from Pendragon country... " He fell silent thinking, then sniffed. "Publius Varrus said in his writings that iron would one day have more worth than gold. I wish he had been wrong. "
"He seldom was, in matters of metal. And that reminds me, I have something for you, in my quarters. It's not a gift, since it's as much yours as mine, but it will please you. As soon as we are finished down below, if you'll ride back with me, I'll give it to you. In the meantime, our troops look magnificent, as they ought to... Let's ride on down. We have kept them waiting long enough. "
We made our way down onto the plain, and as we approached the dense mass of our army, coming close enough finally to be able to discern the unsmiling, individual features beneath the rows and rows of identical war helmets, it struck me forcibly that I would be seeing very few soft, feminine faces in the days and months that stretched ahead.
It took more than two hours to inspect our troopers, but it was a pleasant and rewarding task in the warm springtime sunlight. Our men were ready, primed for war, and there was a sense of bubbling anticipation among them, though they stood silent and arrow straight as we walked among them, peering critically at their weapons and armour, their animals and saddlery.
The veterans of Lot's War, years earlier, stood out unmistakably among the assembly, distinguished by the decorations they had won in the conflict. They alone had the right to wear a stiff, whitish crest of boar bristle on their parade helmets in commemoration of the fact that they had fought and defeated Gulrhys Lot, whose emblem had been the Boar of Cornwall. All other Camulodian troopers wore crests made of brown horsehair.
In addition to the crests, many of our veterans also wore combat rings, directly adapted by my grandfather Caius from the ritualized reward system employed by the Romans, where meritorious service in varying degrees won individual soldiers, the right to carry rings of differing sizes and metals—gold, silver, bronze and iron—mounted on their cuirasses. Some of these rings were ornate, others were plain, and each of them had its own significance.. The largest, the size of a man's palm, symbolized the crowns that could be won by heroic soldiers in ancient times for outstanding deeds of valour, such as capturing an enemy stronghold.
Tertius Lucca, our primus pilus, wore three rows of three such rings on his breastplate, covering his whole chest. Two woe of plain gold, indicating instances of unparalleled personal valour and achievement, while two more were of silver carved to look like rope, announcing to the world his leadership of victorious companies in two distinct campaigns; two more were plain silver, and the three on the bottom row were bronze, each denoting a companion's life saved single handedly in battle. He wore shoulder flashes, too, of polished iron, covering the seams of his front and rear armour, and these were crusted thick with twelve smaller honour rings, welded atop each other in layers. Atop his helmet, which was equipped with full face flaps that protected everything except his gleaming eyes, he wore a huge, spectacular crest of stiffened white horsehair, sweeping from shoulder to shoulder in the centurion's manner.
Tertius Lucca, in the prime of his manhood, made an impr
essive sight in his parade armour, and at the conclusion of our formal inspection of his troops we thanked him ceremonially and returned the control of the assembly into his hands after our final salute to the podium, where the massed standards of our formations were ranked together. As we rode away then, the two Commanders side by side, followed by our corps of staff officers, we heard Lucca's voice, as loud as Stentor's, marshalling the throngs one last time, bidding them prepare to be dismissed in good order.
Back at the fort, I thanked the other officers and dismissed diem, before leading Ambrose into the room in my quarters into which I had piled all the crates and cases I had not yet unpacked. I quickly identified the one I sought and prised the lid off it to reveal Excalibur's case, carefully packed in wood shavings, and the two replicas made from the last of the skystone metal. I hoisted one out and tossed it to Ambrose. He caught it by the sheathed blade and held it up to the light, staring at it.
"I thought of this the other night, when you reminded me about making ourselves identical that day in Saxon country. Remember how you worried because our bows were different, as if the people we attacked could notice such a thing from a hundred paces distant?" He smiled and brought the hilt closer to his eyes. "Well, our swords will be identical from now on, at least. " I held out the other of the pair, so that he could see that they woe, in every respect, identical from pommel to sheath tip.
"Who made the scabbards?"
I held mine out and withdrew the blade. "Joseph made them, using the same techniques Uncle Varrus used. They're sheepskin, as you can see, folded and sewn, with the fleece inside and shaved away to a mere nap that polishes and cleans the blade each time you draw it out or slip it in. The upper part is reinforced with a metal sleeve, to keep it stiff and snug around the top of the blade, and to support that long, straight hook on the back of the scabbard. We needed something to enable us to carry these things, and this hook is what Joseph came up with.
'The blade's too long to permit a straight arm draw, either over your shoulder or from your side, and it's far too long even to let you walk, if you are carrying the sword hanging by your side. The only alternative you have is to carry the thing in your hand all the time, and that is obviously ridiculous. So, the long tongued hook on the back of the sheath slips into the harness ring between your shoulders, and the sheathed blade hangs down your back, the hilt above your shoulder. Nothing new there. The new part comes when you need the sword. See?" I had been demonstrating as I spoke. "You take hold of the hilt, reach behind you with your free hand, low, push the scabbard up until the hook clears the ring at your back, then flip the blade forward, over your shoulder, to where you can catch it again in your free hand. Draw the sword, like that, and slip the sheath hook into your belt, so you don't lose it. The sheath dangles, flexible and harmless, and you have a naked, dangerous weapon in your hand. You approve?"
"Hmm, I do. Very ingenious. Joseph came up with this?" Ambrose was fumbling behind him, attempting to insert the long, straight hook of the scabbard into the ring at his back where his long bladed cavalry spatha normally hung, its blade through the ring.
"He did. You'll grow used to that manoeuvre. I had difficulty with it myself, for the first few days, but it's usage, like anything else—balance and feel. I slip the hook in there nowadays without even thinking about it, and I can have the sword drawn and bare in my hand before a man can count to three. "
He slid the scabbard into place eventually and then went through the motions of drawing the weapon, his movements slow and clumsy. I repeated them, my own movements smooth and liquid, bouncing the sheathed blade against my right shoulder for impetus, then twisting my wrist inward on the down pull, bringing the blade across my chest to where my left hand could grasp the scabbard just below the hilt; a straight pull in opposite directions with either hand, and I had my bared sword ready to strike. The scabbard flopped empty in my left hand as I slipped the retaining hook into my belt.
"As I said, you'll soon capture the trick of it, and the marvellous thing is that it works even better on horseback than it does on foot. "
Ambrose was examining the blade of his sword, holding it close to his face and angling it so that the light reflected along the length of it. "Aye, " he said, absently. "I'm sure it does. You know, this thing even looks better— I mean up close like this, close to the eye—than any other sword I've ever seen. It has a wavy pattern in the iron, much more than in any other sword. I know it's from the way the smiths fold and twist the metal bars that make up the blade, when they heat them and then hammer them flat, but it looks different, somehow. "
'It is different. The metal's different. It's skystone metal, not mere iron. "
He glanced at me and straightened his shoulders before sliding the blade of his new sword carefully back into its leather sheath. "Where is Excalibur now?"
I nodded towards the open crate. "In there. "
"May I look at it?'
I retrieved the polished wooden case from the packing crate, blowing away a few tiny curls of wood shavings that clung to its gloss, and then I opened it and produced Excalibur, grasping it through the silken cloth that covered the blade and offering it hilt first to my brother. Ambrose gazed at it in silent wonder, making no move to reach for it, and then he quickly stripped the scabbard again from the sword he held, dropping the empty sheath on a table top and transferring the sword hilt to his left hand before reaching for Excalibur with his right. He stood with both arms stretched ahead of him, comparing the two swords side by side.
"It's so much more... elaborate, " he whispered.
"Aye, it is. It's as much for display as for use—a king's weapon. The other, by comparison, is a working sword, a fighting man's weapon. "
He jerked his head to look at me, his mouth quirking into a half grin. "May not a king, then, be a fighting man?"
"You know better than that, Brother. But many's the fine fighting man could never be a king. "
"No, nor would want to be. " He had turned back to his comparison. "See how shiny the blade is! There has never been anything like it. "
"No, you are wrong, Ambrose. There are two others like it, and you are holding one of them in your other hand. Their blades seem duller, that is all, but that is simply because Excalibur is burnished. They are exact replicas, merely plain and unadorned, while their companion piece is gaudier."
"Gaudier... that's an ugly word, Cay. It smacks of falseness. This is Excalibur! There's nothing false about it. Has Arthur seen it yet?"
"No, not yet. He's still too young to take it. Soon, now, it will be his, but I will have to be convinced that he is old enough to understand why I have kept it from him until then."
Ambrose looked at me from beneath a raised eyebrow, then smiled sardonically, changing his grip on Excalibur to grasp it by the cross guard and extending the hilt to me. "Now, that," he drawled, "was a convoluted statement, but I think I understood it."
"Excellent. Let's hear you repeat it, then."
"The boy's too young and won't be old enough to know until he's old enough to know that he's too young. Is that not what you said?"
I laughed and closed the lid on the polished case, returning the glorious sword to its storage space. "Exactly, Brother! That is precisely what I said."
PART TWO
Cambria
SEVEN
"Bedwyr, Merlyn. "
Donuil's words brought me back from my thoughts and I turned my head to look where he was pointing. I saw young Bedwyr immediately as he brought his horse at full gallop down the smoothly sloping hillside across from where we sat, guiding it easily between the rock outcrops that littered the short grassed ground, picking the shortest, easiest route to the knoll from which we watched his progress.
"He rides like a centaur, doesn't he?"
"Aye, he does, " I answered. "But what we need are warriors who can fly like eagles. "
I twisted around in my saddle to look behind me, down to where my forces were spread out for more than
a mile along the broad belt of land by the water's edge. Beyond them, the late morning sunlight reflected dazzlingly from the waves that still churned the surface of the sea, restive, despite the now cloudless skies, from the fury of the violent summer storm that had swept over this area the previous night. The coastal plain was wide here, along the westernmost edge of south Cambria, and I had no fears of being entrapped, despite the apparent unpreparedness of
my army, spread out as it was, its soldiers sprawling at leisure on the ground. Now I heard Rufio's rough voice, growling in response to my comment.
"I doubt that, Merlyn. We're in Cambria, remember? Even a soaring eagle can be felled up here by a well flighted Pendragon arrow."
Smiling, I turned to face him. Beside him, standing with one hand on the neck of Rufio's horse, his friend Huw Strongarm, the leader of our Pendragon contingent, stood looking at me and shaking his head tolerantly at Rufe's bluntness. His great longbow was slung over his shoulder and the flights of a full quiver of arrows rose behind his head. I winked at him and answered Rufio's remark.
'True, Rufe, but all the Pendragon longbows are with us, so your point is weakened."
"Hmm'phmm!" The sound was loaded with disgust. "."Most of them are, Commander, most of them. But there are too many turncoat whoresons out there with Ironhair for my taste."
He was referring, I knew, to Owain of the Caves. I nodded, then spoke to Benedict, whose mount was so close to me on my left side that my knee touched his. "Well, we'll know now what Philip has found inland. Judging by the speed young Bedwyr's making, it must be significant."