It seemed he had read my thought… "Nay, Glyndour." he said suddenly, "I know not where she might be. She did not deem it any concern of mine, it seems—though I am quite sure"—here his voice was dry and cool—"that the lady has arranged matters to her advantage."
"And the boy?" I asked after a moment.
He was not quick enough this time in his control, and his mouth twisted before he could help it.
"I do not know that either… But one thing I will tell you: It is possible—possible only, Glyndour—that the boy is whose your leader thinks him."
I saw in his face, heard in his voice, what this admission had cost him to make—insofar as it was admission. So, Gwenwynbar has not dealt in honesty with you either, Rheged… And that Owein should say even so much as that was by way of repayment to Arthur, a return on the debt of freedom that lay now between them. Yet not paid in full for all that…
"He is gone then?"
I answered Arthur's question but looked at Gweniver as I did so.
"Aye, gone; Betwyr and Tari are following as escort until he clears the system."
I flung myself into a chair and shaded my eyes with my hand. Not for worlds would I have let them know how I was feeling about this: I had such a presentiment of oncoming disaster as made me queasy as a pregnant woman or a seer in the throes of trance. And not that alone to make me loath-sick: For several appalling hours I had been off-planet in one of the escort craft that had been dispatched to see Owein beyond the gravity well of Gwynedd; other ships would be accompanying his craft on from there.
It was the first time I had been truly in space; though we barely ventured past atmosphere and clouds had hidden the lands beneath, still the sky above was black and thick with stars, thicker than I had ever seen, even on all those cold winter nights of wandering. It was a short first trip, and the crew of the little craft obviously well versed in its handling; even so, I had been seized by panic as never before. To fight Edeyrn, and the gallain forces he had brought to face us, we would be travelling through space a good deal farther than this; would we be up to it, and still able to fight when we came to our journey's end? Travelling to Tara would mean flight through hyperspace, and that was a chilling prospect, not only to Taliesin the space faintheart but perhaps to many of the others as well.
"Well, you know, Talyn," said Gweniver kindly when I broached the subject later, "we have been training for just such an invasion for some years now. Aye, even in hyperspace! It is not so fearful a place as you would make it to be; many of us Companions have sailed it—you remember even Tryffin went in secret to Kernow when we were preparing the ship attack down Glora, and I can tell you that he did not sail there straight! You will do as well, I promise. Or ask Merlynn for a rann if you do not."
I looked keenly at her as we spoke: Since the events at Cadarachta Gweniver and I had had little time together; she was usually occupied with one task or another concerning the imminent invasion, and when not—I sighed, and across the table she caught it and half-frowned.
I was not alone in thinking that the various dramas and disasters that had been our lot since Cadarachta might have served to bring Arthur and Gweniver, our proclaimed rulers that would be, closer together and more in harmony with one another and with their future task. It had so far proved not so: Arthur, when he was not occupied with the preparations for war, thought chiefly of Uthyr, and often, I knew, of Malgan. While Gweniver—It had been more or less an open secret that Gweniver and Keils Rathen, Uthyr's chief warlord, had long been lovers; though over the course of the past two years they had seemed to drift into a kind of closeness that was less a romance than a long loving squabble, now in these frantic weeks they had grown close again. To the point that messengers sent to find one or the other, late at night, at Arthur's bidding or mine or Ygrawn's or Morgan's, would look first in the other's bed for the one being sought.
This was held to be no ill thing, mind; Ygrawn for one made plain her tolerance of the situation, treating Keils as kin and friend, not simply as a queen might treat a loyal and trusted advisor, and Uthyr too was known to approve. But none of that altered necessity: When the time at last came for it, Gweniver and Arthur would wed as they had pledged to do, and Keils would then be required to choose—to end the involvement, or to accept what place he must, as far-charach, though this was not usual where royal marriages were concerned, or lennaun, or any of the several other lawful titles and ranks that Keltic law and custom supply in their wisdom for partners-of-love. It might be that when that time came, he would not be able to accept such arrangement; and how that would affect Keils's loyalties, to Arthur and Gweniver both, how that would work upon him personally, none but he, and maybe Gweniver and Arthur, could say…
It was about that time, in the last weeks before our sailing, that we had our first brush with Edeyrn's hired forces, the gallain mercenaries that had until now been but reported of. And the way of it was this…
In the course of our preparing for departure—making ready our forces, learning to command our captured ship-fleets, securing Gwynedd against possible attack or counter-rising in our absence—we had not been looking to encounter out-world enemies. So when a scout sloop came limping in at Caer Dathyl's port, with a tale to tell of surprise attack just beyond the orbit of Arianwen, Gwynedd's one small moon, we were inclined to dismiss it as a last stand made by desperate Ravens, a forlorn-hope maneuver ventured upon out of ignorance or suicidal vengement.
"Not so," said Keils, who with Tarian had received first report of the incident. "They were Fomori, Artos, and some of them were flying Keltic ships."
Those who sat round the council table—the usual suspects, plus one or two additions such as Tryffin and a new Companion, Tanwen of Dyonas, who had come into Gweniver's service at Coldgates—sat up at that, as if a spear had flung them sharply forward. Only Arthur still lounged in his chair, sitting on the end of his spine as he did when he wished to think; at his feet Cabal bristled briefly and subsided with a grumble.
"Artos?"
He stirred, but did not respond at once to Gweniver's query, touched as it was with impatience.
"It is a test, surely," said Kei with conviction. "The Marbh-draoi seeks to try us before we come to Tara; and, as Owein Rheged did say, does not wish to spend his own forces to do so."
"Truly," said Arthur, coming to life at last. "And it is in my mind that Owein did indeed faithfully deliver our message as he was charged to do,—else Edeyrn would not be sending these little jabs to vex us."
"Well," said Gweniver, by now vexed herself, "what shall you do about it?"
Arthur grinned at her. "Oh, not overmuch."
His 'not overmuch' proved to be a wave of lightning raids out from Gwynedd in all directions, which netted us, to our great surprise, rather more of the mercenary ships than we had been looking to find.
"Well, you know, Talyn," said Arthur after it was done, "when you see one mouse in the grain-store there are at least twenty more you do not see… Any road, it was good practice, for as yet we do not have so much experience in space fights as I should like for us to have. And also we have learned much from the gallain ships we have taken in the raids."
"Though not so much, I think, from the prisoners." This last was a sore point: Most of Arthur's closest advisors, seeing that the amassing of gallain captives, as well as that of traitor Kelts, was about to begin on a large scale, had almost as one recommended a course of mercilessness. Some of us were surprised at the apparent bloodthirstiness; but, they argued, we were about to embark on a campaign the scale of which was unprecedented in all Keltic history. Why cumber ourselves with hostage traitors who could most like not be claimed, or waste precious resources and troop-strength in Warding outfrenne prisoners?
Arthur heard my disapproval and flushed slightly, his own position was somewhere in between, and he knew I was one of those who held with mercy. Oh, not for any tenderheart motives or even mere disinclination to kill—gods know, I have enough of that in my time
, both with my own hands and commanding the hands of others to be set to it—but rather from a deep feeling that it was always best to err on the side of mercy. Well, so long as it did not cost us the fight in the end, why not? But we had been down this road before, Arthur and I…
"You know how I feel about that, Talyn," he said quietly. "And have I not ordered camps to be maintained while we are gone? Not here on the planet, true, it would not be safe; but on that Dyvetian moon we took last month. The prisoners will be well kept there, and Dyved was easily retaken, never overinfested with Edeyrn's vermin to begin with. Besides, our own hostages may be more kindly treated do we so."
"Aye, aye, I know." I waved a hand to dismiss his argument; for of course he was right. "So, then. We have Gwynedd, and Dyved, and Powys is about to fall to us. Grehan is on point of winning back Erinna,—though Aluinn Douglas has had a harder fight for Caledon, and we must strengthen his arm as soon as we can. But what for us, braud?"
For the first time, I think, since Cadarachta, Arthur gave me his full, unforced smile, that marvellous warm bright blaze across his face.
"For us? Tara for us; royal Tamhair herself."
This, then, was it; it had begun, that to which all this rest, all the torments and anguished efforts of twice a hundred years, had been but prelude and overture. If I had thought we were strung to a pitch beyond mortal bearing before now, I soon saw how very wrong I could be, as every last atom of every last soul of us was bent to the service of one thing only: the readiness to sail, and battle-readiness when we came to our sailing's end.
I saw not so much of Arthur in these last days; as Rex Bellorum he was everywhere, there for everyone whether he will or nil, and if he ever tired of it he never let it show where folk could see. Only to us his close Companions—to Ygrawn, to Merlynn, to Tarian and Betwyr and Daronwy, to Morgan and me—did he allow himself to be less than perfect, paying us the very great compliment of being witness to his vulnerability. And we repaid him as we could and as he needed, by undemanding and unquestioning love and loyalty and also by demanding and questioning and even the odd hump or two where merited… Only to Uthyr, of all those Arthur held dearest, did he strictly dissemble, and that out of love also for Arthur would sooner have been dead in a ditch than trouble the wounded King with doubts or uncertainties. Not that he spoke only cheerful lies to his uncle—lasathair—he could just as cheerfully recount tales of woe, but only to make some greater point, never to burden the King with any greater trouble than he had already to bear.
For Merlynn had Seen and spoken truth: Uthyr's wound had not healed up, the great wound in his thigh; and though he had grown but little weaker he had grown no better, and he was in continual pain. He bore it well, most gallantly and tranquilly,—sometimes as I looked at him with druid-sight I saw a silver light about him, not the laeth-fraoch, the hero-light, but the true coron-solais, the soul-veil that clothes our bodies as the aurora does veil the poles, and silver is the color of faith.
But Uthyr too would come with us to Tara, on that he had been as iron,—and Ygrawn was as one with him in that. Only Marguessan, of all the royal family, was to remain on Gwynedd; and that chiefly because shortly before Lughnasa she was lighter of a son. It was the first royal baby of the new generation—well, the first one we were certain about, in any case; the verdict was not yet come in on Malgan—and the folk were wild with joy.
"She has named him Mordryth," said Morgan, coming to me straight from her first visit to her sister and new nephew. She pitched her cloak onto our bed and stretched out on top of it, snugging the fur up around her face as if for comfort.
"A likely name," I said, trying to be helpful.
She snorted. "And you, a bard, to say so! They are putting it about that it is a name of tradition in Irian's family; but even her husband cannot smooth over its history all so featly."
"Nay, well, perhaps not." I lay down beside her and stared UP at the ceiling. Mordryth. The name of a remarkable trimmer of old, a gray eminence in the royal family several hundred years ago; one who wielded a king's own powers, though he was never crowned… I shifted beside Morgan; this might be one of the last times for many days to come that we have a proper bedchamber with a proper bed to lie in; once we came to Tara it would be camp-couches and clochans, if we were lucky perhaps a commandeered castle now and again—great shame to waste such luxury just now…
But her mind was not running on romance… "Talyn," she said suddenly, turning and rising on one elbow to look down into my face, "when we come to Tara, there is a thing must be done without which all the battles my brother may win shall be won in vain. It is not a thing one person may rightly ask of another—"
I kissed my fingertips and brushed them gently over her lips. "Then do not ask, for the answer is 'aye, and aye again.' What did you think I should say? Who shall come with us? Where do we go?"
She laughed and lay down again beside me. "I think we shall not lack for company! Only let us wait on that until we are there,—for the moment, I'd not waste this time on talk, nor yet this bed on sleeping—it will be Fian bedding again for us soon enough now!"
To look back on that morning at Caer Dathyl, when we left the castle in the care of our friend and Companion Ferdia mac Kenver and the planet in the guardianship of my sister Tegau Goldbreast; and, still more than a little dumbstruck with the sheer tremendousness of the thing, took to the skies above Gwynedd where Arthur's ship Carnwen waited for us, to lead the sail against Tara… Even now, near a century later, tears still sting my eyes at the beauty and the terror and the joy of it.
We had boarded, and settled ourselves, and seen first of all that Uthyr the King was disposed as comfortably and securely as might be, and Ygrawn with him—she had given me a foster-mother's blessing, and Uthyr an uncle's, when time came to leave—and now we had all gone to our assigned posts, for the hour was surely at hand.
From my place behind Arthur, standing on the bridge of this ship he had chosen as his own and renamed Carnwen—'White Hilt,' though in the bardic usage its meaning was more on the order of 'Sacred Claw,' as that of a beast holy to the Goddess or the God—I peered out a viewport and down at the planet below.
That was a sight beyond all brave sights imagined: the planet glowing like a shield of silver; and above it, wherever I looked, like deadly diamonds ships stood out against the stars. I had never seen Gwynedd from such a perspective: It did not look at all like the schoolroom globes on which Arthur and I had learned geography, as lads in Daars. There were all those clouds, for one thing, slashes and tatters obscuring the lands that lay beneath.
Then suddenly the tatters swirled and parted—some weather-magic, perhaps, wrought by Merlynn or some other to give what would be for many of us a last clear glimpse of home—and I saw the whole west coast of the main continent, from Caerllyon in the south, past drowned Gwaelod (and here the sea was green, not deep blue, over the sunken land), to the ice-plains north even of Coldgates. That land held my heart, and I was leaving.
I felt a hand placed on my shoulder, and I did not need to turn to know who it was had placed it there. It was Arthur's land too, broken Daars lay there below, tucked away in the hill-folds, though from this height it could not be discerned. Yet it is there… I looked up then, but he was staring straight ahead, out at the stars, across the unimagined distances that no longer barred our path. We were out of the cage: For the first time in two hundred years, Kelts who wore no yoke of Edeyrn's making were about to pass between Keltic worlds. For the first time since Athyn's day, war would come to Tara.
So I looked where Arthur looked, and knew that as it was there with us on Carnwen, so it was with all our Companions on all the ships behind us. Not a one of them but had eyes on that powdered brilliance, straining to distinguish the one speck in thousands around whose brightness turned Tara.
And then I looked at Arthur again. He was smiling faintly, his whole face alight with it, as if he knew some great secret and would not share it just yet with any other. He loo
ked very young, and very happy, as bright and deadly as Llacharn. As I looked, even then he raised his hand to his right shoulder and let it fall again, almost casually, to his side.
Ymlaen," he said softly, which in the Kymric tongue signifies, 'Onward!'. And the ship leaped beneath us into space.
* * *
* * *
Chapter Six
FROM GWYNEDD TO THE THRONEWORLD system of Tara is an eight-hour sail at speed through hyperspace; eight hours, that is, in normal times, which gods knew these times were nothing near. Without question there was fighting to come before ever we reached there, and a greater fight to come after; but first we must cross the great gulf that lay between, and with but a few exceptions amongst the Fianna, and latterly us Companions, we had never made such a crossing before.
Hyperspace—ard-na-speire, as we call it in the Gaeloch, the overheaven—is a terrifying place, and I did not shame to let anyone see just how fearful I myself did find it. And not that alone, but it made me physically, shamefully, ill: I, who had sailed single-handedly tiny curraghs over the wildest, widest waters on Gwynedd without a single queasy pang, spent the better part of this historic voyage in the confines of the privy, heaving up my guts.
But for all my shame and discomfort, I found this overheaven lovely past longings: stars like netted gems, with a blackness that seemed softly alive between the knotted light strands, a faint bluesilver glow over all that seemed to have its source everywhere and nowhere. Even for one who prides himself on ollaveship, it was a hard place to catch in words.
Words, however well-crafted, were not my chiefest task just now: There was too much else to do of greater import and urgency—preparing and organizing and exhorting and heartening, for Arthur fully expected to emerge at journey's end into the heart of a pitched battle.
"It stands to reason they will be waiting for us," said Tarian. "Edeyrn knows from Arthur's vaunting screed that we are coming sometime, and by now he knows from Owein that we are coming soon. Therefore he will have deployed his gallain fleet across the mouth of our most likely exits from hyperspace, in hopes of stopping us before ever we come to Tara."
The Oak above the Kings Page 6