The Winter King

by Bernard Cornwell

  ‘I know! I know! Caleddin was a Druid, I told you that. An Ordoviciian, too. Dreadful beasts, Ordoviciians. Whatever, cast your mind back to the Black Year and ask yourself how Suetonius knew all he did about our religion. You do know who Suetonius was, I suppose?’

  The question was an insult, for all Britons know and revile the name of Suetonius Paulinus, the Governor appointed by the Emperor Nero and who, in the Black Year that occurred some four hundred years before our time, virtually destroyed our ancient religion. Every Briton grew up with the dread tale of how Suetonius’s two legions had crushed the Druid sanctuary on Ynys Mon. Ynys Mon, like Ynys Trebes, was an island, the greatest sanctuary of our Gods, but the Romans had somehow crossed the straits and put all the Druids, bards and priestesses to the sword. They had cut down the sacred groves and defiled the holy lake so that all we had left was but a shadow of the old religion and our Druids, like Tanaburs and Iorweth, were just faint echoes of an old glory. ‘I know who Suetonius was,’ I told Merlin.

  ‘There was another Suetonius,’ he said with amusement. ‘A Roman writer, and rather a good one. Ban possessed his De Viris Illustribus which is mainly about the lives of the poets. Suetonius was particularly scandalous about Virgil. It’s extraordinary what things poets will take to their beds; mostly each other, of course. It’s a pity that work burned, for I never saw another. Ban’s scroll might well have been the very last copy, and it’s just ashes now. Virgil will be relieved. Whatever, the point is that Suetonius Paulinus wanted to know everything there was to know about our religion before he attacked Ynys Mon. He wanted to make certain we wouldn’t turn him into a toad or a poet, so he found himself a traitor, Caleddin the Druid. And Caleddin dictated everything he knew to a Roman scribe who copied it all down in what looks to be execrable Latin. But execrable or not, it is the only record of our old religion; all its secrets, all its rituals, all its meanings and all its power. And this, child, is it.’ He gestured at the scroll and managed to knock it off the table.

  I retrieved the manuscript from under the shipmaster’s bunk. ‘And I thought,’ I said bitterly, ‘that you were a Christian trying to discover the wingspan of angels.’

  ‘Don’t be perverse, Derfel! Everyone knows the wingspan must vary according to the angel’s height and weight.’ He unwound the scroll again and peered at its contents. ‘I sought this treasure everywhere. Even in Rome! And all the while that silly old fool Ban had it catalogued as the eighteenth volume of Silius Italicus. It proves he never read the whole thing, even though he did claim it was wonderful. Still, I don’t suppose anyone’s read the whole thing. How could they?’ He shuddered.

  ‘No wonder it took you over five years to find it,’ I said, thinking how many people had missed him during that time.

  ‘Nonsense. I only learned of the scroll’s existence a year ago. Before that I was searching for other things: the Horn of Bran Galed, the Knife of Laufrodedd, the Throwboard of Gwend-dolau, the Ring of Eluned. The Treasures of Britain, Derfel…’ He paused, glancing at the sealed chest, then looked back to me. ‘The Treasures are the keys of power, Derfel, but without the secrets in this scroll they’re just so many dead objects.’ There was a rare reverence in his voice, and no wonder, for the Thirteen Treasures were the most mysterious and sacred talismans of Britain. One night in Benoic, when we had been shivering in the dark and listening for Franks among the trees, Galahad had scorned the very existence of the Treasures by doubting whether they could have survived the long years of Roman rule, but Merlin had always insisted that the old Druids, facing defeat, had hidden them so deep that no Roman would ever find them. His life’s work was the collection of the thirteen talismans; his ambition was the final awesome moment when they would be put to use. That use, it seemed, was described in the lost scroll of Caleddin.

  ‘So what does the scroll tell us?’ I asked eagerly.

  ‘How would I know? You won’t give me time to read it. Why don’t you go and be useful? Splice an oar or whatever it is sailors do when they’re not drowning.’ He waited till I had reached the door. ‘Oh, and one other thing,’ he added abstractedly.

  I turned to see he was again gazing at the opening lines of the heavy scroll. ‘Lord?’ I prompted him.

  ‘I just wanted to thank you, Derfel,’ he said carelessly. ‘So, thank you. I always hoped you’d be useful some day.’

  I thought of Ynys Trebes burning and of Ban dead. ‘I failed Arthur,’ I said bitterly.

  ‘Everyone fails Arthur. He expects too much. Now go.’

  I had supposed that Lancelot and his mother Elaine would sail west to Broceliande, there to join the mass of refugees hurled from Ban’s kingdom by the Franks, but instead they sailed north to Britain. To Dumnonia.

  And once in Dumnonia they travelled to Durnovaria, reaching the town a full two days before Merlin, Galahad and I landed, so we were not there to see their entry, though we heard all about it for the town rang with admiring tales of the fugitives.

  Benoic’s royal party had travelled in three fast ships, all of which had been provisioned ahead of Ynys Trebes’s fall and in whose holds were crammed the gold and silver that the Franks had hoped to find in Ban’s palace. By the time Queen Elaine’s party reached Durnovaria the treasure had been hidden away and the fugitives were all on foot, some of them shoeless, all ragged and dusty, their hair tangled and crusted with sea salt, and with blood caked on their clothes and on the battered weapons they clutched in nerveless hands. Elaine, Queen of Benoic, and Lancelot, now King of a Lost Kingdom, limped up the town’s principal street to beg like indigents at Guinevere’s palace. Behind them was a motley mixture of guards, poets and courtiers who, Elaine pitifully exclaimed, were the only survivors of the massacre. ‘If only Arthur had kept his word,’ she wailed to Guinevere, ‘if only he had done just half of all that he promised!’

  ‘Mother! Mother!’ Lancelot clutched her.

  ‘All I want to do is die, my dear,’ Elaine declared, ‘as you so nearly did in the fight.’

  Guinevere, of course, rose splendidly to the occasion. Clothes were fetched, baths filled, food cooked, wine poured, wounds bandaged, stories heard, treasure given and Arthur summoned.

  The stories were wonderful. They were told all over the town and by the time we reached Durnovaria the tales had spread to every corner of Dumnonia and were already flying over the frontiers to be retold in countless British and Irish feasting halls. It was a great tale of heroes; how Lancelot and Bors had held the Merman Gate and how they had carpeted the sands with Frankish dead and glutted the gulls with Frankish offal. The Franks, the tales said, had been shrieking for mercy, fearing that bright Tanlladwyr would flash in Lancelot’s hand again, but then some other defenders, out of Lancelot’s sight, gave way. The enemy was inside the city and if the fight had been grim before, now it became ghastly. Enemy after enemy fell as street after street was defended, yet not all the heroes of antiquity could have stemmed that rush of iron-helmed foes who swarmed from the encircling sea like so many demons released from Manawydan’s nightmares. Back went the outnumbered heroes, leaving the streets choked with enemy dead; still more enemies came and back the heroes went, back to the palace itself where Ban, good King Ban, leaned on his terrace to search the horizon for Arthur’s ships. ‘They will come!’ Ban had insisted, ‘for Arthur has promised.’

  The King, the story said, would not leave the terrace for if Arthur came and he were not there, what would men say? He insisted he would stay to greet Arthur, but first he kissed his wife, embraced his heir, then wished them both fair winds for Britain before turning to gaze for the rescue that never came.

  It was a mighty tale, and next day, when it seemed that no more ships would come from far Armorica, the tale changed subtly. Now it was the men of Dumnonia, the forces led by Culhwch and Derfel, who had allowed the enemy into Ynys Trebes. ‘They fought,’ Lancelot assured Guinevere, ‘but they could not hold.’

  Arthur, who had been campaigning against Cerdic’s Saxons, rode har
d for Durnovaria to welcome his guests. He arrived just hours before our sad party trudged unremarked up the road that ran from the sea past the great grassy ramparts of Mai Dun. One of the guards on the city’s southern gate recognized me and let us in. ‘You’re just in time,’ he said.

  ‘For what?’ I asked.

  ‘Arthur’s here. They’re going to tell the tale of Ynys Trebes.’

  ‘Are they now?’ I glanced across the town towards the palace on its western hill. ‘I’d like to hear that,’ I said, then I led my companions into the town. I hurried towards the crossroads in the centre, curious to inspect the chapel Sansum had built for Mordred, but to my surprise there was neither chapel nor temple on the site, just a waste space where ragweed grew. ‘Nimue,’ I said, amused.

  ‘What?’ Merlin asked me. He was cowled so that no one would recognize him.

  ‘A self-important little man,’ I said, ‘was going to build a church here. Guinevere summoned Nimue to stop him.’

  ‘So Guinevere is not entirely without sense?’ Merlin asked.

  ‘Did I say she was?’

  ‘No, dear Derfel, you did not. Shall we go on?’ We turned up the hill towards the palace. It was evening and the palace slaves were putting torches into beckets about the courtyard where, heedless of the damage they were causing to Guinevere’s roses and water channels, a crowd had gathered to see Lancelot and Arthur. No one recognized us as we came through the gate. Merlin was hooded, while Galahad and I wore the cheek pieces of our wolf-tailed helmets closed across our faces. We squeezed with Culhwch and a dozen other men into the arcade at the very back of the crowd.

  And there, as night fell, we heard the tale of Ynys Trebes’s fall.

  Lancelot, Guinevere, Elaine, Arthur, Bors and Bedwin stood on the eastern side of the courtyard where the pavement was elevated a few feet above the other three sides to make a natural stage; an impression heightened by the bright torches fixed to the wall beneath the terrace that had steps leading down to the courtyard. I looked for Nimue, but could not see her, nor was young Bishop Sansum there. Bishop Bedwin said a prayer and the Christians in the crowd murmured their response, crossed themselves, then settled to listen once again to the awful tale of Ynys Trebes’s fall. Bors told the story. He stood at the head of the steps and he told of Benoic’s fight and the listening crowd gasped as they heard of the horror and cheered when he described some particular passage of Lancelot’s heroism. Once, overcome by emotion, Bors simply gestured at Lancelot who tried to quell the cheers by raising a hand thickly wrapped in bandages and when the gesture failed he shook his head as though the crowd’s praise was simply too great to bear. Elaine, draped in black, wept beside her son. Bors did not dwell on Arthur’s failure to reinforce the doomed garrison, instead he explained that though Lancelot knew Arthur was fighting in Britain, King Ban had clung to his unrealistic hopes. Arthur, wounded all the same, shook his head and seemed close to tears, especially when Bors told the touching tale of King Ban’s farewell to his wife and son. I was close to tears too, not because of the lies I heard, but out of sheer joy at seeing Arthur again. He had not changed. The bony face was still strong and his eyes still full of care.

  Bedwin asked what had happened to the men of Dumnonia and Bors, with apparent reluctance, allowed the tale of our sorry deaths to be drawn from him. The crowd groaned when they learned that it had been us, the men of Dumnonia, who had yielded the city’s wall. Bors raised a gloved hand. ‘They fought well!’ he said, but the crowd was not consoled.

  Merlin seemed to have been ignoring Bors’s nonsense. Instead he had been whispering with a man at the back of the crowd, but now he shuffled forward to touch my elbow. ‘I need a piss, dear boy,’ he said in Father Celwin’s voice. ‘Old man’s bladder. You deal with those fools and I’ll be back soon.’

  ‘Your men fought well!’ Bors shouted to the crowd, ‘and though they were defeated, they died like men!’

  ‘And now, like ghosts, they’re back from the Otherworld,’ I shouted, and I clashed my shield against a pillar, shaking free a small cloud of powdered lime. I stepped into the flamelight of a torch. ‘You lie, Bors!’ I shouted.

  Culhwch stepped up beside me. ‘I say you lie, too,’ he growled.

  ‘And I say it!’ Galahad appeared.

  I drew Hywelbane. The scrape of the steel on the scabbard’s wooden throat made the crowd shrink back to leave a path through the trampled roses that led towards the terrace. The three of us, battle weary, dusty, helmed and armed, walked forward. We walked in step, slowly, and neither Bors nor Lancelot dared speak when they saw the wolf tails hanging from our helmets. I stopped at the garden’s centre and slammed Hywelbane point downwards into a rosebed. ‘My sword says you lie,’ I shouted. ‘Derfel, son of a slave, says that Lancelot ap Ban, King of Benoic, lies!’

  ‘Culhwch ap Galeid says so too!’ Culhwch rammed his battered blade beside mine.

  ‘And Galahad ap Ban, Prince of Benoic, also.’ Galahad added his sword.

  ‘No Franks took our wall,’ I said, removing my helmet so that Lancelot could see my face. ‘No Frank dared climb our wall for there were so many dead at its foot.’

  ‘And I, brother’ – Galahad also removed his helmet – ‘was with our father at the last, not you.’

  ‘And you, Lancelot,’ I cried, ‘had no bandage when you fled Ynys Trebes. What happened? Did a splinter from the ship’s gunwale prick your thumb?’

  There was uproar. Some of Bors’s guards were at the side of the courtyard and they drew their swords and shouted insults, but Cavan and the rest of our men pushed through the open gate with raised spears to threaten massacre. ‘None of you bastards fought at the city,’ Cavan shouted, ‘so fight now!’

  Lanval, commander of Guinevere’s guards, shouted at his archers to line the terrace. Elaine had gone white, Lancelot and Bors were both at her side and both seemed to be trembling. Bishop Bedwin was shouting, but it was Arthur who restored order. He drew Excalibur and clashed it against his shield. Lancelot and Bors had shrunk to the back of the terrace, but Arthur waved them forward, then looked at us three warriors. The crowd went silent and the archers took the arrows off their strings. ‘In battle,’ Arthur said gently, commanding the attention of all the courtyard, ‘things are confused. Men rarely see all that happens in a battle. There is so much noise, so much chaos, so much horror. Our friends from Ynys Trebes’ – and here he laid his sword arm around Lancelot’s shoulders – ’are mistaken, but theirs was an honest mistake. Doubtless some poor confused man told them the tale of your deaths, and they believed it, but now, happily, they stand corrected. But not shamed! There was glory enough in Ynys Trebes for all to share. Am I not right?’

  Arthur had directed the question at Lancelot, but it was Bors who answered. ‘I am wrong,’ he said, ‘and glad to be wrong.’

  ‘I also,’ Lancelot added in a brave, clear voice.

  ‘There!’ Arthur exclaimed and smiled down at the three of us. ‘Now, my friends, pick up your weapons. We will have no enmity here! You are all heroes, all of you!’ He waited, but not one of us moved. The torch flames glanced off our helmets and touched the blades of our planted swords that were a challenge for a fight to establish the truth. Arthur’s smile disappeared as he drew himself to his full height. ‘I am ordering you to pick up your swords,’ he said. ‘This is my house. You, Culhwch, and you, Derfel, are oath-sworn to me. Are you breaking your oaths?’

  ‘I am defending my honour, Lord,’ Culhwch answered.

  ‘Your honour is in my service,’ Arthur snapped, and the steel in his voice was enough to make me shiver. He was a kind man, but it was easy to forget that he had not become a warlord by mere kindness. He spoke so much of peace and reconciliation, but in battle his soul was released from such concerns and gave itself to slaughter. He threatened slaughter now by putting his hand on Excalibur’s hilt. ‘Pick up the swords,’ he ordered us, ‘unless you wish me to pick them up for you.’

  We could not fight our own Lord and
so we obeyed him. Galahad followed our example. The surrender left us feeling sullen and cheated, but Arthur, the moment he had restored amity inside his house, smiled once again. He spread his arms in welcome as he strode down the steps and his joy at seeing us was so obvious that my resentment vanished instantly. He embraced his cousin Culhwch, then hugged me and I felt my Lord’s tears on my cheek. ‘Derfel,’ he said, ‘Derfel Cadarn. Is it really you?’

  ‘None else, Lord.’

  ‘You look older,’ he said with a smile.

  ‘You don’t.’

  He grimaced. ‘I was not in Ynys Trebes. I wish that I had been.’ He turned to Galahad. ‘I’ve heard of your bravery, Lord Prince, and I salute you.’

  ‘But don’t insult me, Lord, by believing my brother,’ Galahad said bitterly.

  ‘No!’ Arthur said. ‘I will not have quarrels. We shall be friends. I insist upon it.’ And he put his arm through mine and led the three of us up the terrace steps where he decreed that we should all embrace with Bors and Lancelot. ‘There is trouble enough,’ he told me quietly when I held back, ‘without this.’

  I stepped forward and spread my arms. Lancelot hesitated, then stepped towards me. His oiled hair smelt of violets. ‘Child,’ he whispered in my ear after kissing my cheek.

  ‘Coward,’ I whispered back, then we drew apart, smiling.

  Bishop Bedwin had tears in his eyes as he hugged me. ‘Dear Derfel!’

  ‘I have even better news for you,’ I told him softly, ‘Merlin is here.’

  ‘Merlin?’ Bedwin stared at me, not daring to believe my news. ‘Merlin is here? Merlin!’ The news spread through the crowd. Merlin was back! Great Merlin had returned. The Christians crossed themselves, but even they recognized the import of the news. Merlin had come to Dumnonia and suddenly the kingdom’s troubles seemed halved.

  ‘So where is he?’ Arthur demanded.

  ‘He went out,’ I said feebly, gesturing at the gate.

  ‘Merlin.’ Arthur shouted. ‘Merlin.’