The Lance Thrower cc-8

by Jack Whyte

  It took us nearly two weeks to travel from Camulod to Verulamium. That was several days longer than it ought to have taken us, yet the journey across the belly of Britain was largely uneventful, and in fact highly enjoyable once we had reached the truly uninhabited uplands, and when we finally reached Verulamium we found Bishop Enos in residence.

  Verulamium was a shell of a place that could barely lay title to the name of town any longer, and the bishop’s residence was a plain, unimpressive building, long and low and purely functional, with no single element of beauty to distinguish it. But it was built of stone and it boasted a solid and enduring roof made of tiles imported many years earlier from Gaul. The town had once been a thriving regional center, and the evidence of that was plain to be seen everywhere and most particularly in the surviving public buildings of the old administrative center, many of which were imposing and spacious. With the departure of the legions, however, and the subsequent eruption of anarchy over the ensuing decade when people lost all fear of being punished for anything they chose to do, Verulamium became, like most of the other towns in Britain, too dangerous a place in which to live, because it attracted plunderers and looters the way a carcass attracts flies. And so most of it had been abandoned, left to the mercy of the elements.

  One thing had saved the place from being completely abandoned to neglect and decay, however, and that single thing was the reason for the continuing presence of Bishop Enos and the long line of bishops who had lived and worshiped there before his time. Verulamium had been the home of Britain’s first Christian martyr, a saint called Alban. Alban had been executed by the Roman authorities two hundred years earlier, in the third century of the new, Christian calendar, for saving the life of a proscribed Christian priest during one of the periodic persecutions of the sect in the days before the Emperor Constantine had emancipated them and their religion by taking up the Cross himself. When arrested and challenged for his so-called crime—providing aid and sustenance to an enemy of the state—Alban had steadfastly refused to recant his newfound belief in’the one true God and had been decapitated for his faith.

  After that, the town had quickly become widely revered as the home of the blessed Saint Alban, and a shrine had been erected there in his honor, in response to the occurrence of several miraculous and unexplainable wonders. Even to the present time, according to Bishop Enos, miracles continued to occur as the result of the saint’s blessed presence, and the shrine continued to attract more and more visitors with every year that passed. The town of Verulamium might be as dead as its Roman past, Enos remarked to me, but Saint Alban’s shrine would never know oblivion, and in recent years people had stopped talking of the town as Verulamium, referring to it nowadays simply as Saint Alban’s Shrine.

  There was a gathering of some kind going on when we arrived there, and the unexpected appearance of a large band of disciplined horsemen caused no small amount of consternation among the participants. Bishop Enos himself, who was a much older man than I had expected him to be, was the first to recognize the armor and trappings of our Camulodian troopers and he quickly brought his flock to order, explaining to them who we were and promising that no one had any reason to be afraid of us.

  Listening to the bishop as he called for the attention of the panic-stricken assembly, and carefully observing the unfolding activities in the meadow outside the town walls where the gathering was being conducted, I was impressed to see—and there was no possibility of it being other than it appeared—that the mere mention of the name of Camulod had an immediate calming effect on the crowd. As soon as they heard Bishop Enos mention the name, people began repeating it and they turned to stare inquisitively at the mounted representatives of the distant colony where, rumor had it, the rule of law was still in force and men and women could live in freedom from threat and fear.

  Sitting as I was, however, slightly apart from the main body of the troopers, I saw something else. There was one small band of men among the crowd whose behavior was greatly different from that of the people surrounding them. When we first swept into sight of the gathering, the assembly had scattered in panic, reassembling only very slowly after they had seen for themselves that we were not poised to murder them. But one band of men had refused to scatter and had indeed closed in upon themselves, grouping tightly around one man and what appeared to be his family: a woman and two children. The man at the center of this group stood taller than all the others, dominating all of them by at least half a head, and he was carefully coiffed, his hair and beard meticulously trimmed. His eyes were moving even as I noted him, cataloguing our contingent of troopers and flitting from Cyrus to his decurions and finally to me and my small group. I heard Perceval’s voice.

  “The tall fellow over there, Clothar, surrounded by the bodyguard. He looks like a chief of some kind—a leader, certainly, whatever rank these people give their headmen. Wonder who he is.”

  “I noticed him, too. He could be a king, judging from his bearing, but he might just as easily be some kind of champion or chieftain, as you say. We will find out about him later, from Bishop Enos. Cyrus, put your men at ease and take me to meet the bishop, if you will.”

  Enos, however, was not to be idly diverted from his responsibilities. Our arrival had interrupted a prayer gathering in celebration of the anniversary of the martyrdom of Saint Alban, and the bishop invited us to step down and join with him and his congregation in the final prayers of the ceremony. Only when it was over and he had blessed the participants and sent them on their way did he approach me and acknowledge that he had heard me say earlier that I had messages and missives for him from Germanus. He was most hospitable, graciously accepting the leather pouch of writings that I had for him and betraying not the slightest indication that he might be impatient to sit down somewhere and start reading them. Instead, he went out of his way to arrange accommodations for all of us, quartering the troopers in the central hall of the town’s basilica, the administrative hub of the former Roman military government. Germanus, he told us, had cleaned out this and many similar large rooms years earlier, setting his followers to sweeping away the detritus of decades of neglect and turning the refurbished premises over for use by the hundreds of pilgrims who had flocked to Verulamium to attend the great debate he staged here between the orthodox adherents of the Church in Rome and the misguided bishops of Britain who had chosen to follow the teachings of the apostate Pelagius.

  Bishop Enos, aware of the ongoing needs of the legions of pilgrims who visited the shrine of Saint Alban each year, and anticipating that the steady increase in their numbers might lead to the town’s having need again of spacious accommodations in the future, had seen the wisdom of maintaining the public rooms in good condition for use as dormitories. The main hall was perfect for our uses, featuring two great stone fireplaces, one at each end of the long room. Wooden cots were already in place at one end, strung with rope netting, and an ample supply of straw-filled palliasses set up on end on some of them, to allow the air to circulate between them and keep them dry, while at the other end of the hall someone had arranged rows of tables and benches. A large courtyard at the rear of the building, paved with cobbles and covered with straw, was easily capable of accommodating all our horses, and the yard itself lay but a few moments’ walk from the grazing meadows beyond the town walls.

  Only when he was absolutely satisfied that our needs had all been attended to did the bishop leave us to our own devices while he retired to read the material that I had brought with me from Gaul.

  I rose early the following morning, well before dawn, knowing that Enos would be sending for me sooner rather than later, and I had already completed my morning toilet and broken my fast by the time his summons arrived. I followed my guide to the dayroom from which the elderly bishop conducted his episcopal affairs, and Enos came to meet me and make me welcome immediately, ushering me to a comfortably padded armchair and asking me if I would join him in breaking his fast.

  I assured him that I
had already eaten, but then I had to insist that he eat his own meal, for he immediately signaled to a hovering priest to take the untouched food away. Eventually, however, accepting my protests, he acceded to my wishes and waved the priest away, then began to eat sparingly from a bowl of chopped nuts and fruit which he augmented with small pieces of bread ripped from a crusty, fresh-looking loaf. I talked to him as he ate, telling him about our journey and our adventures along the road, and he soon pushed away his bowl, cleaned his mouth with a draught of plain water, and began the main part of our meeting by asking me how much I knew concerning the information I had brought to him.

  His question was more direct than I had expected and I sat blinking at him for several moments before I could collect my thoughts. “I know much of what is involved, sir,” I said eventually. “Bishop Germanus discussed the matter with me at some length.”

  The old bishop nodded, then held up his hand, forestalling me. “Forgive me, Master Clothar, but to which matter do you refer?”

  “The matter of the Riothamus coronation,” I replied, hearing the surprise in my own voice. What other matter was there? But the bishop was already nodding, plainly satisfied with my answer.

  “I see,” he said. “Go on, if you please. What did my brother Germanus hope to achieve in this matter?”

  I was becoming confused, beginning to wonder whether or not Enos had actually read the missives I had brought him, but I decided to say nothing and simply to answer the question as posed.

  “He is hoping that you will lend him your unqualified support and substitute your presence and your dignitas for his in presiding over the crowning of Merlyn’s ward, Arthur Pendragon, as the new High King of Britain.”

  “Riothamus …” He paused, as though savoring the sound of the title before continuing. “There has never been a Riothamus within living memory, you know. At least, not a real one. Vortigern laid claim to the title, some years ago—did you hear tell of Vortigern, in Gaul? I know Germanus met him here in Britain on several occasions, but I have no knowledge of the regard, if any, he formed for him. Are you aware of who he was?”

  “Vortigern? No, sir.” I shook my head in a negative and Enos nodded, unsurprised.

  “He was a king, in Northumbria, far to the northeast, close by the great wall the Romans built to keep invaders out hundreds of years ago. And by many reports he was a good king, concerned above all with the welfare of his people—there are not many kings, anywhere, of whom that can be said, as I am sure you are aware. Anyway, it was Vortigern who found and resurrected the name Riothamus, for it had not existed, nor had the rank been spoken of, since the Romans came to Britain. Vortigern recalled the name somehow and, as I said, laid claim to it. High King of all Britain. It sounds very grand, does it not? No one knows who the last one was.” The old man laughed, a gentle cackle that surprised me greatly. “No one knows who any of them were, for that matter. The High Kings, all of them nameless, all of them forgotten beyond recall, their very existence open to doubt and question … . And yet there must have been at least one such, or else the name and its ranking would not exist.”

  He stopped, plainly waiting for me to respond, and I nodded wordlessly, hoping to convey an impression of gravity and deep thought that would belie my utter ignorance of what he was talking about, but the bishop was already speaking again.

  “So Vortigern claimed the title, and I have heard from several of my brethren that he might have made a noble Riothamus, had he but lived. But then again, I know others who say he was too close to the Pelagians and thus would have stood condemned by the Church. You know who the Pelagians are, I presume?”

  “No, sir, I do not. Forgive my ignorance.”

  He waved my comment away. “No need for forgiveness, Master Clothar. They were heretics, condemned and banned.”

  “You say Vortigern did not live, sir … .”

  “No, he didn’t. The Danes killed him, and only recently. He brought about his own undoing, I fear, when first he invited the Danes to live within his bourne.”

  “He invited them into his domain and then they killed him?”

  “Aye, they did, but not immediately and the tale is much more complex than can be easily explained. But Vortigern sowed the seeds of his own overthrow when he invited the Danes into his domain. He had befriended Hengist, a Danish warrior and leader, when they were both young, and when Vortigern came to rule in Northumbria, still young and hale, he found his kingdom sore beset by raiders who attacked from all directions, both by land and sea. And so he invited his friend Hengist to come and live in Britain, in his kingdom of Northumbria, where Vortigern would give grants of land to Hengist’s followers in return for their services in withstanding threats from outsiders of all kinds.”

  Enos shrugged his shoulders, pursing his lips as though to indicate that he would make no judgments. “It worked,” he continued. “It worked for many years and everyone appeared to be well pleased, until the Danes began inviting relatives and family to come and restore their ranks, which had been badly eroded after years of warfare. All at once, it appeared, there was no longer a sufficiency of land, and rivalries began to emerge among neighbors who had been friends for years, but were now reduced to being Danes and Northumbrians—Oudanders and natives, competing for what land there was. And then Hengist died and his son Horsa came into power, and Horsa was a very different creature from his father. He still is, and grows worse every passing day. He led a rebellion to overthrow Vortigern several months ago, and word has recently arrived that Vortigern was killed in the fighting and that his kingdom is now completely in the power of Hengist’s Danes.” He paused again, then smiled at me.

  “Of course, there is no reason for you to know or understand any of this at all. I merely speak of it because I have an ill sensation somewhere at the back of my mind that tells me we here in the south of Britain will have to reckon with Horsa the Dane, one of these days. I have no solid reason for suspecting so, but the feeling, a premonition if you will, refuses to quit my mind. Anyway, where were we?”

  “We were speaking of Bishop Germanus’s hopes for the coronation of the Riothamus, sir.”

  “Ah, yes, of course we were, and then I digressed, as usual. Forgive me. Now, please-tell me again, what were Germanus’s wishes on this matter?”

  I cleared my throat, then spoke out boldly. “Well, sir, he hopes, as I have said, that you will agree to stand in his place at the crowning, thereby lending your authority—the Church’s authority—to the naming of the Riothamus. But lord Germanus also voiced the hope that, in addition, you would use your episcopal authority and your powers of persuasion to convince your fellow bishops throughout Britain to unite with you in supporting Merlyn’s initiative, since the Church itself stands to benefit directly and substantially from having the backing and support of the military strength of Camulod as Defenders of the Faith and of the Faithful in Britain.”

  Enos sat silent while I said all this, nodding his head only occasionally as I approached the end of what I had to say, and when I was finished he sat frowning into the distance for a spell before nodding his head once more, this time emphatically, and rising to his feet.

  “Good,” he said, almost to himself. “Excellent. So be it.” He looked directly at me then, and dipped his head in a determined nod again, his lips compressed into a thin line. “I agree,” he said. “I will do everything my brother Germanus asks of me. The bishops of Britain will stand united behind the young man from Camulod. We will crown him King and name him Riothamus. But it will be the responsibility of Merlyn, and young Pendragon himself, to ensure that he becomes High King in more than name alone. I doubt, however, that that will be much of a concern. I have counted Merlyn Britannicus among my friends for many years now and I have met Arthur Pendragon on several occasions throughout that time. He is a very fine young man—a boy, really—grave when gravity is called for, and naturally and spontaneously pious without being sanctimonious. I found him to be abstemious, which surprised me i
n one so young, and self-restrained, and yet I know that among his friends he is fun-loving and normal in every normal, boyish way. His friends think highly of him, and he appears to have many friends, perhaps more than one might normally expect.” He hesitated for a moment, his brows furrowing briefly, then went on. “On the matter of the young man’s military prowess, mind you, I am not qualified to judge, but I stand completely prepared to be guided by Merlyn’s expertise in that area.”

  He smiled at me at that point, apparently quite confident that I would agree with him, and again I said nothing, merely nodding my head.

  “On the matter of finding Merlyn, I foresee no difficulty other than the passing of time. We have none of that to waste. Merlyn must be told about all of this immediately. I will send out priests in search of him within the next few days. They will carry the word to the West, into Cambria and Cornwall and wherever Merlyn is, he will be quickly found. What will you do, now that you have delivered your messages to me?”

  “I shall return to Camulod, as quickly as I may, to await Arthur Pendragon’s return from his sweep of the north. I have not yet met him.”

  “Aye, I can see why you would be anxious to do that,” he acknowledged. “But would you consider instead remaining here in Verulamium?”

  I gaped at him, astonished that he would even ask such a thing, but he was in no way put out by my obvious reluctance, for he kept right on speaking as though I had told him that I would be happy to remain close to Saint Alban’s Shrine forever. “I have the feeling that as time goes by and the arrangements for the coronation progress, it will be a benefit to everyone to have you right here at hand.”