‘But if they lied about Arthur,’ I said, ‘then why not about Mordred?’
‘Who knows?’ she crossed herself and plucked at my cloak. ‘Come,’ she said abruptly, and led us down the side of the church towards a small wooden hut. Someone was trapped inside the hut for I could hear fists beating on its door that was secured by the knotted loops of a leather leash. ‘You should go to your woman, Derfel,’ Morgan told me as she fumbled at the knot with her one good hand. ‘Dinas and Lavaine rode south to your hall after nightfall. They took spearmen.’
Panic whipped inside me, making me use my spear-point to slash at the leather leash. The moment the binding was cut the door flew open and Nimue leapt out, hands hooked like claws, but then she recognized me and stumbled against my body for support. She spat at Morgan.
‘Go, you fool,’ Morgan snarled at her, ‘and remember it was I who saved you from death today.’
I took Morgan’s two hands, the burned and the good, and put them to my lips. ‘For this night’s deeds, Lady,’ I said, ‘I am in your debt.’
‘Go, you fool,’ she said, ‘and hurry!’ and we ran through the back parts of the shrine, past storehouses and slave huts and granaries, then out through a wicket gate to where the fishermen kept their reed punts. We took two of the small craft and used our long spear-shafts as quant poles, and I remembered that far-off day of Norwenna’s death when Nimue and I had escaped from Ynys Wydryn in just this fashion. Then, as now, we had headed for Ermid’s Hall and then, as now, we had been hunted fugitives in a land overrun by enemies.
Nimue knew little of what had happened to Dumnonia. Lancelot, she said, had come and declared himself King, but of Mordred she could only repeat what Morgan had said, that the King had been killed while hunting. She told us how spearmen had come to the Tor and taken her captive to the shrine where Morgan had imprisoned her. Afterwards, she heard, a mob of Christians had climbed the Tor, slaughtered whoever they found there, pulled down the huts and begun to build a church out of the salvaged timbers.
‘So Morgan did save your life,’ I said.
‘She wants my knowledge,’ Nimue said. ‘How else will they know what to do with the Cauldron? That’s why Dinas and Lavaine have gone to your hall, Derfel. To find Merlin.’ She spat into the mere.
‘It’s as I told you,’ she finished, ‘they’ve unleashed the Cauldron and they don’t know how to control its power. Two Kings have come to Cadarn. Mordred was one and Lancelot was the second. He went there this afternoon and stood upon the stone. And tonight the dead are being taken in marriage.’
‘And you also said,’ I reminded her bitterly, ‘that a sword would be laid at a child’s throat,’ and I thrust my spear down into the shallow mere in my desperate hurry to reach Ermid’s Hall. Where my children lay. Where Ceinwyn lay. And where the Silurian Druids and their spearmen had ridden not three hours before.
Flames lit our homeward path. Not the flames that illuminated Lancelot’s marriage to the dead, but new flames that sprang red and high from Ermid’s Hall. We were halfway across the mere when that fire flared up to shiver its long reflections on the black water.
I was praying to Gofannon, to Lleullaw, to Bel, to Cernunnos, to Taranis, to all the Gods, wherever they were, that just one of them would stoop from the realm of stars and save my family. The flames leapt higher, spewing sparks of burning thatch into the smoke that blew east across poor Dumnonia. We travelled in silence once Nimue had finished her tale. Issa had tears in his eyes. He was worrying about Scarach, the Irish girl he had married, and he was wondering, as I was, what had happened to the spearmen we had left to guard the hall. There had been enough men, surely, to hold up Dinas and Lavaine’s raiders? Yet the flames told another tale and we thrust the spear-shafts down to make the punts go even faster.
We heard the screams as we came closer. There were just six of us spearmen, but I did not hesitate, or try to make a circuitous approach, but simply drove the punts hard into the tree-shadowed creek that lay alongside the hall’s palisade. There, next to Dian’s little coracle that Gwlyddyn, Merlin’s servant, had made for her, we leapt ashore.
Later I put together the tale of that night. Gwilym, the man who commanded the spearmen who had stayed behind while I marched north with Arthur, had seen the distant smoke to the east and surmised there was trouble brewing. He had placed all his men on guard, then debated with Ceinwyn whether they should take to the boats and hide in the marshes that lay beyond the mere. Ceinwyn said no. Malaine, her brother’s Druid, had given Dian a concoction of leaves that had lifted the fever, but the child was still weak, and besides, no one knew what the smoke meant, nor had any messengers come with a warning; so instead Ceinwyn sent two of the spearmen east to find news and then waited behind the wooden palisade.
Nightfall brought no news, but it did bring a measure of relief for few spearmen marched at night and Ceinwyn felt safer than she had in daylight. From inside the palisade they saw the flames across the mere at Ynys Wydryn and wondered what they meant, but no one heard Dinas and Lavaine’s horsemen come into the nearby woods. The horsemen dismounted a long way from the hall, tied their beasts’ reins to trees and then, under the pale, cloud-misted moon, they had crept towards the palisade. It was not till Dinas and Lavaine’s men attacked the gate that Gwilym even realized the hall was under attack. His two scouts had not returned, there were no guards in the woods and the enemy was already within feet of the palisade’s gate when the alarm was first raised. It was not a formidable gate, no more than the height of a man, and the first rank of the enemy rushed it without armour, spears or shields and succeeded in climbing over before Gwilym’s men could assemble. The gate guards fought and killed, but enough of those first attackers survived to lift the bar of the gate and so open it to the charge of Dinas and Lavaine’s heavily armoured spearmen. Ten of those spearmen were Lancelot’s Saxon Guards, while the rest were Belgic warriors sworn to their King’s service.
Gwilym’s men rallied as best they could, and the fiercest fight took place at the hall’s door. It was there that Gwilym himself lay dead with another six of my men. Six more were lying in the courtyard where a storehouse had been set on fire and those were the flames that had lit our path across the lake and which now, as we reached the open gate, showed us the horror inside. The battle was not over. Dinas and Lavaine had planned their treachery well, but their men had failed to get through the hall door and my surviving spearmen were still holding the big building. I could see their shields and spears blocking the door’s arch, and I could see another spear showing from one of the high windows that let the smoke out from the gable end. Two of my huntsmen were in that window, and their arrows were preventing Dinas and Lavaine’s men carrying the fire from the burning store house to the hall thatch. Ceinwyn, Morwenna and Seren were all inside the hall, together with Merlin, Malaine and most of the other women and children who lived inside the compound, but they were surrounded and outnumbered; and the enemy Druids had found Dian.
Dian had been sleeping in one of the huts. She often did, liking to be in the company of her old wet-nurse who was married to my blacksmith, and maybe it was her golden hair that had given her away or maybe, being Dian, she had spat defiance at her captors and told them her father would take his revenge.
And now Lavaine, robed in black and with an empty scabbard hanging at his hip, held my Dian against his body. Her small grubby feet were sticking out from beneath the little white robe she wore and she was struggling as best she could, but Lavaine had his left arm tight about her waist and in his right hand he held a naked sword against her throat.
Issa clutched my arm to stop me charging madly at the line of armoured men who faced the beleaguered hall. There were twenty of them. I could not see Dinas, but he, I suspected, was with the other enemy spearmen at the rear of the hall, where they would be cutting off the escape of all the souls trapped inside.
‘Ceinwyn!’ Lavaine called in his deep voice. ‘Come out! My King wants you!’
&
nbsp; I laid the spear down and drew Hywelbane. Her blade hissed softly on the scabbard’s throat.
‘Come out!’ Lavaine called again.
I touched the strips of pig bone on the sword hilt, then prayed to my Gods that they would make me terrible this night.
‘You want your whelp dead?’ Lavaine called, and Dian screamed as the sword blade tightened on her throat. ‘Your man’s dead!’ Lavaine shouted. ‘He died in Powys with Arthur, and he won’t come to help you.’ He pressed the sword harder and Dian screamed again.
Issa kept his hand on my arm. ‘Not yet, Lord,’ he whispered, ‘not yet.’
The shields parted at the hall door and Ceinwyn stepped out. She was dressed in a dark cloak that was clasped at her throat. ‘Put the child down,’ she told Lavaine calmly.
‘The child will be released when you come to me,’ Lavaine said. ‘My King demands your company.’
‘Your King?’ Ceinwyn asked. ‘What King is that?’ She knew well enough whose men had come here this night, for their shields alone told that tale, but she would make nothing easy for Lavaine.
‘King Lancelot,’ Lavaine said. ‘King of the Belgae and King of Dumnonia.’
Ceinwyn pulled her dark cloak tighter about her shoulders. ‘So what does King Lancelot want of me?’ she asked. Behind her, in the space at the back of the hall and dimly lit by the burning storehouse, I could see more of Lancelot’s spearmen. They had taken the horses from my stables and now they watched the confrontation between Ceinwyn and Lavaine.
‘This night, Lady,’ Lavaine explained, ‘my King has taken a bride.’
Ceinwyn shrugged. ‘Then he does not need me.’
‘The bride, Lady, cannot give my King the privileges that a man demands on his wedding night. You, Lady, are to be his pleasure instead. It is an old debt of honour that you owe him. Besides,’ Lavaine added, ‘you are a widow now. You need another man.’
I tensed, but Issa again gripped my arm. One of the Saxon Guards close to Lavaine was restless and Issa was mutely suggesting we wait until the man relaxed again.
Ceinwyn dropped her head for a few seconds, then looked up again. ‘And if I come with you,’ she said in a bleak voice, ‘you will let my daughter live?’
‘She will live,’ Lavaine promised.
‘And all the others too?’ she asked, gesturing to the hall.
‘Those too,’ said Lavaine.
‘Then release my daughter,’ Ceinwyn demanded.
‘Come here first,’ Lavaine retorted, ‘and bring Merlin with you.’ Dian kicked at him with her bare heels, but he tightened the sword again and she went still. The storehouse roof collapsed, exploding sparks and burning scraps of straw into the night. Some of the flames landed on the hall’s thatch where they flickered feebly. The rainwater in the thatch was protecting the hall for the moment, but soon, I knew, the hall roof must catch the blaze.
I tensed, ready to charge, but then Merlin appeared behind Ceinwyn. His beard, I saw, was bound in plaits again, he carried his great staff and he stood straighter and grimmer than I had seen him stand in years. He placed his right arm about Ceinwyn’s shoulders. ‘Let the child go,’ he ordered. Lavaine shook his head. ‘We made a spell with your beard, old man, and you have no power over us. But tonight we shall have the pleasure of your conversation while our King has the pleasure of the Princess Ceinwyn. Both of you,’ he demanded, ‘come here.’
Merlin lifted the staff and pointed it at Lavaine. ‘At the next full moon,’ he said, ‘you will die beside the sea. You and your brother shall both die and your screams will journey the waves through all time. Let the child go.’
Nimue hissed softly behind me. She had plucked up my spear and lifted the leather patch from her ghastly empty eye-socket.
Lavaine was unmoved by Merlin’s prophecy. ‘At the next full moon,’ he said, ‘we shall boil your beard scraps in bull’s blood and give your soul to the worm of Annwn,’ he spat. ‘Both of you,’ he snapped, ‘come here.’
‘Release my daughter,’ Ceinwyn demanded.
‘When you reach me,’ Lavaine said, ‘she will be freed.’
There was a pause. Ceinwyn and Merlin spoke together softly. Morwenna cried out from inside the hall and Ceinwyn turned and spoke to her daughter, then she took Merlin’s hand and began to walk towards Lavaine. ‘Not like that, Lady,’ Lavaine called to her. ‘My Lord Lancelot demands that you come to him naked. My Lord will have you taken naked through the countryside and naked through the town and naked to his bed. You shamed him, Lady, and this night he will return his shame on you a hundredfold.’
Ceinwyn stopped and glared at him. But Lavaine simply pressed his sword blade against Dian’s throat, the child gasped with the pain, and Ceinwyn instinctively tore at the brooch that clasped her cloak and let the garment drop to reveal a simple white dress.
‘Take the gown off, Lady,’ Lavaine ordered her harshly, ‘take it off, or your daughter dies.’
I charged then. I screamed Bel’s name and I charged like a mad thing. My men came with me, and more men came from the hall when they saw the white stars on our shields and the grey tails on our helms. Nimue charged with us, shrieking and wailing, and I saw the line of enemy spearmen turn with horror on their faces. I ran straight at Lavaine. He saw me, recognized me and froze in terror. He had disguised himself as a Christian priest by hanging a crucifix around his neck. This was no time for men to ride Dumnonia dressed as Druids, but it was time for Lavaine to die and I screamed my God’s name as I charged at him.
Then a Saxon Guard ran in front of me, his bright axe glittering reflected flamelight as he swung its heavy blade at my skull. I parried it with the shield and the force of the blow jarred down my arm. Then I slid Hywelbane forward, twisted her blade in his belly and dragged it free in a rush of spilling Saxon guts. Issa had killed another Saxon and Scarach, his fiery Irish wife, had come from the hall to slash at a wounded Saxon with a boar spear, while Nimue was driving her spear into a man’s belly. I parried another spear blow, put the spearman down with Hywelbane and looked desperately around for Lavaine. I saw him running with Dian in his arms. He was trying to reach his brother behind the hall when a rush of spearmen cut him off and he turned, saw me and fled towards the gate. He held Dian like a shield.
‘I want him alive!’ I roared and plunged towards him through the firelit chaos. Another Saxon came at me roaring the name of his God, and I cut the God’s name out of his throat with a lunge of Hywelbane. Then Issa shouted a warning and I heard the hoofs and saw that the enemy who had been guarding the back of the hall were charging on horseback to their comrades’ rescue. Dinas, who was dressed like his brother in the black robes of a Christian priest, led the charge with a drawn sword. ‘Stop them!’ I shouted. I could hear Dian screaming. The enemy was panicking. They outnumbered us, but the irruption of spearmen from the black night had torn their hearts to ribbons and one-eyed Nimue, shrieking and wild with her bloody spear, must have appeared to them as a ghastly night ghoul come for their souls. They fled in terror. Lavaine waited for his brother close to the burning storehouse and still held his sword at Dian’s throat. Scarach, hissing like Nimue, stalked him with her spear, but she dared not risk my daughter’s life. Others of the enemy scrambled over the palisade, some ran for the gate, some were cut down in the shadows between the huts and some escaped by running alongside the terrified horses that pounded past us into the night.
Dinas rode straight for me. I raised my shield, hefted Hywelbane and shouted a challenge, but at the very last moment he swerved his white-eyed horse aside and hurled the sword at my head. He rode towards his twin brother instead and as he neared Lavaine he leaned down from the saddle and extended his arm. Scarach flung herself out of the path of the charging horse just as Lavaine leapt up into Dinas’s saving embrace. He dropped Dian and I saw her sprawl away from him as I ran after the horse. Lavaine was clinging desperately to his brother who clung just as desperately to the saddle-bar as the horse galloped away. I shouted at them t
o stay and fight, but the twins just galloped into the black trees where the enemy’s other survivors had fled. I cursed their souls. I stood in the gate and called them vermin, cowards, creatures of evil.
‘Derfel?’ Ceinwyn called from behind me. ‘Derfel?’ I abandoned my curses and turned to her. ‘I live,’
I said, ‘I live.’ ‘Oh, Derfel!’ she wailed, and it was then that I saw that Ceinwyn was holding Dian and that Ceinwyn’s white dress was white no longer, but red.
I ran to their side. Dian was cradled tight in her mother’s arms, and I dropped my sword, tore the helmet from my head and fell to my knees beside them. ‘Dian?’ I whispered, ‘my love?’
I saw the soul flicker in her eyes. She saw me — she did see me — and she saw her mother before she died. She looked at us for an instant and then her young soul flew away as soft as a wing in darkness and with as little fuss as a candle flame blown out by a wisp of wind. Her throat had been cut as Lavaine leapt for his brother’s arm, and now her small heart just gave up the struggle. But she did see me first. I know she did. She saw me, then she died, and I put my arms around her and around her mother and I cried like a child.
For my little lovely Dian, I wept.
We had taken four unwounded prisoners. One was a Saxon Guard and three were Belgic spearmen. Merlin questioned them, and when he had finished I hacked all four to pieces. I slaughtered them. I killed in a rage, sobbing as I killed, blind to anything but Hywelbane’s weight and the empty satisfaction of feeling her blade bite into their flesh. One by one, in front of my men, in front of Ceinwyn, in front of Morwenna and Seren, I butchered all four men and when it was done Hywelbane was wet and red from tip to hilt and still I hacked at their lifeless bodies. My arms were soaked in blood, my rage could have filled the whole world and still it would not bring little Dian back. I wanted more men to kill, but the enemy’s wounded had already had their throats cut and so, with no more revenge to take and bloody as I was, I walked to my terrified daughters and held them in my arms. I could not stop crying; nor could they. I held them as though my life depended on theirs, and then I carried them to where Ceinwyn still cradled Dian’s corpse. I gently unfolded Ceinwyn’s arms and placed them about her living children, then I took Dian’s little body and carried it to the burning storehouse. Merlin came with me. He touched his staff on Dian’s forehead, then nodded to me. It was time, he was saying, to let Dian’s soul cross the bridge of swords, but first I kissed her, then I laid her body down and used my knife to cut away a thick strand of her golden hair that I placed carefully in my pouch. That done, I raised her up, kissed her one last time and threw her corpse into the flames. Her hair and her little white dress flared bright.
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