The Kingmaking

by Helen Hollick

  Arthur rolled the parchment. “Which someone?”

  Cei grinned. “Someone else I believe you would be interested in meeting.”

  “A day for surprises, eh?” Arthur grinned back. “Well, where is he?”

  “I am here!”

  Arthur spun round at the voice, saw a man vaguely familiar, a few years his senior.

  “You are?”

  The man laughed, good natured, held his hand out in greeting. “I am named for your grandfather, Ambrosius Aurelianus. My brother – your father – and my friends call me by my British given name.”

  Arthur started forward, delighted, to embrace the man, his uncle. “Emrys! I ought to have known you. What brings you here?” They clapped each other on the shoulder. “Are you not needed to defend your own coastland?”

  A shadow crept across Emrys’s face. “There is nothing left to defend. We were raided, some months past. My wife and daughter are dead. An all too familiar story.”

  “Sea wolves?”

  “Saex pirates, aye. They came, took what they could carry, slaughtered what they could not. They left me for dead. With God’s protection they missed my son, hidden by the quick thought of a slave.”

  “You came alone to fight with Vortimer, then?”

  “Your cousin, Geraint, is here also. He has two sons born, did you know?”

  Arthur was guiding his uncle from the tent, talking animatedly. A soldier’s arm plucked at his tunic as he passed.

  “Glewlwyd! What? Wounded?” Arthur hunkered down, concerned, beside one of the bravest of his turmae.

  “Nothing serious, my Lord – a sword slash, “twill heal.” The man nodded a respectful greeting at Cei and the other man he did not know, said to Arthur, “We did well – could have done much better had we been used right.”

  Arthur patted his shoulder affably. “And we shall be used right the next time we fight, I promise you. I have finished with simpering in the shade alongside those who have not the stamina to stand in the full sun.”

  Beaming, Glewlwyd attempted to rise from his bed. Arthur playfully pushed him back. “Take your time to heal sound first, man. You are no use to me in pieces!”

  With his two companions Arthur left the hospital, the idea planted so long ago in his mind ripe at last, ready for the harvesting.

  As they walked, Emrys talked of everyday things; poor crop yields, raiders, his family. His young son.

  Arthur, not listening, suddenly stopped him. “Vortimer has not the ability to lead us and I will not follow a blind man into darkness. I am going to make the break. Now. I intend to gather men to me, fetch up those horses Gwynedd has ready and gather more from my restored lands to the west. But I need the backing of prominent men. Are you with me, Emrys?”

  A man hailed him, coming up behind saying, “After this day’s bungling I am, Pendragon, for certain.”

  Arthur spun to greet Geraint, son to one of Uthr’s sisters, with warmth and pleasure. They had met on occasion as boys, had liked each other’s company. Geraint greeted Cei, but acknowledged Emrys, Arthur noted with interest, with distinct reservation.

  The four men strolled to Arthur’s tent in search of food and wine as Arthur outlined his ideas. He could barely contain himself at the knowledge that at last his ambition was becoming some solid thing, hovering just beyond his grasp. The years of waiting were almost over.

  But where to start that first push to send the stone rolling downhill? It needed one stone only to gather speed, taking up rocks and boulders, shrubs and trees as it went. Rolling faster and faster, becoming an unstoppable landslide. One stone.

  While they were eating, huddled around the dim glow of a single brazier, the conversation turned for a while to lighter topics.

  Geraint, mentioning his infant twin sons went on to say, “My wife had a liking to show them off to her family; we were visiting there when we heard of the Londinium massacre. We were on the road home when Vortimer made his call to arms. I had not the time to escort them safe home, so have left them with the Holy Sisters of the Virgin at Yns Witrin.”

  Arthur started in surprise, fingers hurriedly feeling for a rolled parchment tucked in his belt. “Twice today have I heard of these Sisters!”

  He slapped a meat-greased hand on his thigh. “That settles one nagging thought, then! We ride to Dumnonia to persuade Vortigern’s placed governor that he is now to swear allegiance to the Dragon, and on the way we call at Yns Witrin to see your lads, Geraint,” he raised his goblet in salute, “and Osmail’s widow.”

  Things were looking hopeful. Happen Branwen knew something about Gwenhwyfar. He could still not bring himself to accept she was dead, for if that were so, nothing in his life made sense anymore.

  Geraint yodelled his delight. Cei handed round more meat. Emrys, embarrassed, cleared his throat.

  “I will not be with you.”

  Silence.

  Arthur laughed. “You do not have to ride if you have no wish for the exercise, Uncle! Go gather your son and meet us at our rallying place in Gwynedd.”

  Emrys twiddled a chicken bone between his fingers. “I meant I will not back you in this fight for a royal torque, Arthur.” He looked at his nephew with no trace of embarrassment. “For the same reason that I would not back your father. I do not hold with kings. We are of Rome, we have an Emperor. We are a province of Rome and should look to her for guidance and protection.”

  For a moment Arthur sat silent, astounded. Was the man serious? When Emrys said nothing more, Arthur realised he was.

  “Rome cannot help us. We have been abandoned to our own fate,” he said.

  “I disagree. We are temporarily left to our own devices, but Rome will recover from her trials, you will see. Some few seasons from now the Emperor will gather his armies and come to our aid. He will not be pleased to see another claiming his title.” Emrys placed the bone to burn on the brazier, got to his feet. “For all that, I wish you well, Arthur.”

  With narrowed eyes, Arthur observed, “Yet you fought this day under a king.”

  “As, should your bid be successful, I may one day fight under you. I recognise the need for a leader, a man to command while Rome sorts her troubles, though I would wish that leader had not reverted to an abandoned tribal title, but that’s as may be. Through temporary need I must recognise a king, whoever he is, but I will not become involved in civil fighting over who is to be that king. Again, I wish you well.” He was gone, stepping from the tent into the wet night.

  Geraint and Arthur looked at each other incredulously. Geraint shrugged, poured himself more wine. “Living in the past, that one,” he said.

  Arthur laughed, tore with relish into his meat, reached also for the wine. “I remember Uthr saying his brother Emrys had an odd way of thinking. They never saw eye to eye on anything. I always put it down to the years between them, but happen it is more than that. Fool of a man! Rome will not be back. Eh, Cei? You are quiet this night. What say you?”

  Cei stretched, tossed his sucked bone into the flames, finished his wine and stood. “I say it is time I checked the men and horses.” He walked from the tent, saying over his shoulder as he left, “But you ought know, for the most part, I agree with Emrys.”

  XXXIV

  Gwenhwyfar knew something was to happen. Not precisely when, but soon, very soon. It was an odd feeling this, something inside niggling like an image vaguely remembered after a waking dream. For the past week she had climbed the Tor each morning, settled herself close by the largest standing stone on the summit and watched. For what, she did not know, just watched.

  It was not a Christian place, this Tor, the Holy Sisters did not like her walking here. Yns Witrin it was called, the Glass Isle. Even in the driest of summers there was always water spread around the foot of this conical hill – sodden places, marsh oozing underfoot, pitted with deeper bog that could trap and drown the unwary. Come winter, or after weeks of rain such as this year had brought, the low flat levels became a plain of dotted lakes and ru
nning channels. The brooding height of the Tor reflected in those vast, mirroring waters. An imaged island as delicately translucent and brittle as glass.

  Shrouded in morning mist and with its ancient miz-maze path winding back and forth in ritual pattern up the steep slopes, the Tor squatted over a cluster of little hills, like a matriarch presiding over her mixed brood sheltering within the fall of her shadow.

  It might not be Christian, but it was a revered and mystical place. A sanctum of the Old Ways, of the Mother Goddess and Avallach, God of the Underworld. She danced on the buttercup-spotted or frost-rimed grass. He slept beneath, in his domain of Avalon within the darkness of the hollow hill, waiting for the souls of the dead to find their way by night down the passages into the Other World.

  Once, there had been many who served the Goddess; now the young women went to the Christian Mother. Daughters learnt the litany of the Holy Church, not the ancient learning of a Goddess who was sliding into obscurity. Only three priestesses were left down there at the base of the Tor, their poor dwelling houses built along the shore of the water.

  Theirs was an ancient, once elite, clan. ‘The Ladies’, they were called: women of the Goddess. With the passing of the three, the Goddess would be gone from the Tor. Forgotten.

  Drawn to this richly spiritual place, Christian people had settled their community among the cluster of hills set on the flat of the Summer Land. They had built their little chapel and crude dwellings; set up their market place and expanded as each year more came. The chapel became a church, the dwelling houses merging together into cloistered orders where men and women could live and work alongside God and Christ. Traders arrived. Farmers brought their produce and cattle to the market and prospered; a tavern flourished to provide bed and food for weary travellers who came to worship at the wondrous-built church, or seek healing or learning from the holy men and woman. Under the Christ God the Glass Isle thrived.

  It may have been very pagan, this Tor that hovered above the mist of a damp spring or autumn morning, or floated on a flood plain of glistening, sky-bright water, but Yns Witrin possessed a pull of awe and inspiration. A place where it was easy to listen to the voice of your God. Within the spirit of the Tor, you could see through the shaded windows of your own soul.

  And the Tor was a place of the Mother. Whether she were the old Goddess or the Virgin Mother of Christ, she was still the Mother. Gwenhwyfar had been safe here under her protective wing, was calmed and becoming healed of fear and the disgrace of an unwanted and uninvited invasion of her body. Rape carried a powerful backlash of wretchedness.

  To her, this quiet hill was a patient, contented place away from the dark, crowding shadows of horror. A place for the female. A sanctuary where time drifted with the moon cycle and where the earth beneath your feet understood the pain of labour and the joy of birth.

  Have other women stood here, where I stand on this wind-teased summit, she wondered. Watching as I watch, waiting as I wait, for a child to be born or the menfolk to come back from war?

  Probably. The Tor was a guardian shield for women. It was said children were conceived or borne with ease and safety up here. Women’s natural troubles were healed. The Tor, a buffer against the harsh reality of life out there in the bad lands.

  It seemed so long ago, so far away, that rain-drenched night in Londinium. Yet it haunted her, clinging like stale perfume. Sickly and repulsive.

  She had a vague recollection of how she came to be here. She remembered the shouting and a clash of weapons; fearful desperate faces. Pounding hooves, sobbing breath – her own? Frightened horses bolting. Her arms clinging exhausted to a bay horse, muscles locked, unable to let go until he shuddered, eventually, to a halt.

  Gwenhwyfar had no idea how far that wild flight had taken her or to where she was taken. Knew only that her body ached and head throbbed. She was unaware of the jagged slash across her forehead, barely recalled the swinging hilt of a sword on a rocking boat that had caused it. The scab had long since peeled itching away, the scar beneath fading white against darker skin.

  The Holy Sisters said she had ranted delirious in fever for several days.

  Had an inner sense guided her to them? Or had it been the wandering bay horse with a rider slumped across his withers who had trotted to other horses, eager for company? Whatever, the six women making their way to join the Sisters of Yns Witrin had taken her into their wagon, tended and cared for her. Unsure who she was or where she had come from, and unwilling to delay their journey, they had decided to carry her with them.

  In her dazed state, Gwenhwyfar had raised no objection.

  The gentle Sisters fluttered round her, enfolding her in the safe seclusion of their nest, clucking and cooing, thanking the wisdom of the Virgin for guiding a daughter to safety. Gwenhwyfar let their attentions wash like healing balm over her muddled mind, having no energy or inclination to contradict them, relieved and thankful that the Goddess – under whatever guise – had brought her here, once strength and sense began to return, to idle among these gentle women of peace.

  Once, she had visited the Ladies, going across the spread of the lake to their huddle of meagre dwellings at the base of the Tor. The two she had met had welcomed her, were as kind as the Sisters, but – and this surprised Gwenhwyfar – could offer her no more comfort than the Christian community. Strange, it was the quiet, simple lives of the Holy Sisters that provided the inner peace she craved.

  The Ladies were brash and gaudy – their bangles jangling at their wrists, the vivid-bright tunics, the startling blue tattooed in writhing swirls on face and arms. Inside the squat building they took her to, a heavy, mind-numbing aroma muddled her mind even more and left her disorientated and distant. They were kind, concerned and eager to help, but Gwenhwyfar sat with them tense and stiff, like a doll carved of wood.

  And something else she realised, as she punted the little boat back across the lake: they seemed to be living a pretence. A theatre play. Women dressed up as the Goddess’s Ladies, raising their hands to the sky and calling with shrieks and cries for the Mother to hear and help. Not that it had been like that; there had been no wailing or moaning, but the intoned prayer had jarred with a stilted rhythm, which had grated and pierced the ears instead of relaxing and pacifying the spirit as did the chanting of the Sisters.

  Gwenhwyfar would walk on the Tor, but she never went back to the Ladies at the Lake.

  The Sisters led a life of rigid routine revolving around daily chores and prayer. Their speech was quiet but not without laughter; indeed, they laughed often, sharing the many pleasures of their God’s created world of happiness and beauty. In the Sisters’ chapel or about their duties, they would often sing, chanting their praising rhythms to the glory of God. A comforting sound.

  One other reason kept Gwenhwyfar away from the Ladies: Morgause was one of them. She was the third Lady.

  After leaving the Ladies on that one visit, Gwenhwyfar had walked down the sloping path, through the clusters of alder and willow and had met with her, coming up from the lakeside.

  They had not exchanged words, merely stood, the one eyeing the other, stone-faced, critical. Morgause was dressed as a Lady of the Goddess, her golden hair loose with the blue-painted patterns tattooed on her cheeks, forehead and bare arms. In comparison, Gwenhwyfar, with cloak clutched tight to her breast, was pale, frightened and tired.

  This was the Lady they talked of then, down in the market place and in the tavern; the women with clacking disapproval, the men with shared winks and nudging elbows. She had wondered, Gwenhwyfar, meeting with the two Ladies, what there was in them for the men to be so excited over. They were old, shrivel-skinned, claw-fingered women with creased, toothless smiles.

  Her Holy Sisters were virtuous, pledged to serve God, not a man’s lusting. The Ladies welcomed the pleasure a man could give. Though what pleasures could be shared with those two crones Gwenhwyfar could not imagine. Not until she stood before Morgause. As young and perfectly beautiful as ever.
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  She had dipped her head and stood aside to allow Gwenhwyfar to pass, honour-bound to a guest of the Goddess. Gwenhwyfar had murmured her thanks and hurried by, barely noticing the child, darker-skinned but with the same golden hair, tucked behind Morgause’s flame-coloured skirts.

  The wind lifted Gwenhwyfar’s loose hair; she liked letting it flow unbound up here on the Tor, it added a sense of abandoned freedom. She would have liked to cast aside her clothing too, run naked over the short, springy turf. But that would shock the dear Sisters too much, and besides she did not have the courage to prance about in the open birthclad.

  Overhead, a screech of swifts darted, swooping and diving, their calls shrill but wildly exciting. She watched them pass, clapped her hands at their breathtaking aerobatics. As quickly as they had appeared, they were gone, skimming down the side of the Tor and away.

  Gwenhwyfar closed her eyes and breathed in deep, holding the heady scent of morning-damp air, releasing it slowly. Thank God today the rain had ceased. Gwenhwyfar smiled, felt the babe within her kick at her belly.

  That was one thing she was grateful for. One solid thing that had given her strength to defeat the evil sense of dirt that Melwas’s stench had left on her. Even had she not known otherwise, the child she carried was too large, too well formed, to have been put there by him. She placed her hand on the bulge, felt another hefty kick. “Ah, babe, you are anxious to see your Da? Soon will I send for him and he will come for us; soon.”

  “Talking to yourself? They oft-times say it is a madness sign.” Gwenhwyfar swivelled, startled. Morgause leant against another of the standing stones, her arms folded, expression mocking. The child was with her again, a pretty girl for all the grubbiness of skin, hair and dress – and the startling sign of fear that surged, naked, in her wide, dark eyes.

  Gwenhwyfar had seen similar eyes somewhere before. Where?

  “Happen it is best to talk with yourself if you know the answers make sense.” Gwenhwyfar spoke to the woman pleasantly; the Tor did not lend itself to bad moods and sour answers. “Aside,” she said with a smile, “I talk to my child.”