My brother sat motionless for a moment, staring at me with his old hot stare. Then he dismounted hurriedly, ran a few steps towards me; stopped; walked on slowly.
“It is impossible,” he said, his face growing red. “You…you are dead.”
“Truly, I am not.” I replied.
“Gwalchmai?” he asked. “Gwalchmai?”
“You know him?” demanded Cei in astonishment. Agravain did not even look round.
“I had not thought to see you so soon,” I said. “I am very glad.”
He smiled hesitantly, then beamed, caught my shoulders, looked at me, and crushed me in a hug. “Gwalchmai! By the sun and the wind, I thought that you were dead, three years dead! Och, God, God, it is good to see you!”
I returned the embrace wholeheartedly, laughing, and it seemed that finally all the dark years of our childhood were blotted out for me. We had both endured too many things to feel anything but gladness on meeting one another again.
“What is happening?” asked Cei, in complete confusion. “Why are you jabbering in Irish?”
“Cei!” shouted Agravain, releasing me and whirling about to his comrades. “This is my brother, Gwalchmai, the one who died—the one I thought had died! I swear the oath of my people, I do not know how, but this is he.”
The warriors reacted by staring in astonishment, except for Cei, who gave me a look of first embarrassment, then apology. But the farmers around me drew away a little, and the monks stared with increased suspicion.
“So he is the famous Agravain ap Lot,” said Sion, looking at my brother—the only one in the crowd who was.
“Is he famous?” I asked, remembering my old worries for Agravain’s case as a hostage. Clearly, they had been wasted. “Och well, it might have been expected.” Agravain grinned at that.
“Where have you been when you were considered dead, that you heard nothing of your brother’s fame?” asked Bedwyr quietly. I looked up, met his eyes, and felt respect for him.
“I have been to a distant place,” I said. “And through strange things, too many to tell quickly.”
“Indeed,” said Bedwyr, not questioning at all, and shook himself.
“These are strange matters enough,” said another of the warriors. “Come, let’s finish our business here and go to Camlann. Arthur and the rest will be there soon, and there’s nothing to eat there but pork rinds and cabbage.”
Most of the foraging party set about loading the monks’ goods into the already loaded carts, and, at my insistence taking down the amount and kind of the farmers’ goods. Agravain and I stood looking at each other and trying to decide how to begin. Then the carts rolled out into the yard, and Sion, who had been harnessing his mare, reluctantly jumped from the seat. “You will see that my horse is well treated?” he asked me.
I nodded, then, realizing that it was intended that he should continue to Camlann on foot and that I might not see him again, I caught his hand. “And I will remember you, Sion ap Rhys, if the thought of that gives you pleasure. If I do not see you at Camlann, remember that. And if ever you need any help, and I can give it, my sword is yours.”
“I thank you,” he replied, quietly. “And…may God grant you favor with the emperor.”
“And may you walk in Light.” I climbed into his cart and took the reins. “I will drive this one,” I told Agravain. He nodded, and I shook the reins. The little mare started off, trotting down the hill towards the causeway. Those warriors who had taken the other carts followed, and Agravain rode his horse beside me. We left Ynys Witrin and turned east for the main road and Camlann.
“Why don’t you let the farmers drive their own carts?” I asked Agravain.
“They would go too slowly, and when they arrived in Camlann, drive the prices up by their bargaining. As it is we can have the standard price ready for them when they reach the gate, and send them off at once. You seemed friendly with that man; where did you meet him?”
“On the road, yesterday.”
Agravain checked his horse. “Yesterday? What did he do for you, that you let him take liberties?”
“He gave me a ride in his cart, and paid for my night’s stay at Ynys Witrin. I had nothing to pay with.”
Agravain scowled. “And for that you take his hand? You should merely have repaid him double, and not demeaned yourself. Why in God’s name had you nothing to pay with?”
“In God’s name,” I said. “Have you become a Christian, Agravain?”
“God forbid!” he said, grinning, then frowned again. “You should not let commoners become so familiar. They are always wanting favors, then.”
I sighed. “Sion is a good man. I was lucky to have met him.”
Agravain’s frown deepened, but he shrugged. “Well, you can choose your own friends.”
“I think he is capable of that,” said a quiet voice on the other side. Bedwyr drew his horse in besides us. “Come. We must hurry. I do not want Arthur to have to wait for his victory feast at Camlann.”
Agravain spurred his horse and I urged Sion’s mare obediently, though she did not like the brisk trot with the heavy cart. We fell silent again, and Cei came up and rode beside Bedwyr, giving me interested looks.
“You destroyed Cerdic’s raiding party, then?” I asked, finally thinking of something to say. “That is good, but surprising. I would have thought his parties move too quickly for even the Pendragon to reach them before they returned to Sorviodunum.”
“It was more chance than foresight,” said Bedwyr. “We were returning from fighting the East Saxons when we heard news of this raiding party from Sorviodunum, and we caught them only just in time.”
“That was a thing Cerdic hadn’t planned for,” said Cei with satisfaction. “They say that that sorcerer of his, Aldwulf Flamddwyn, has been telling him where Arthur is. But even Aldwulf cannot predict where Arthur will be.”
“Nor can we,” said Agravain. “Even when we are with him. He is a great king, Gwalchmai. It shames me that ever Father fought him. We should have made alliance with him, and not with those Northern cattle.”
“Now, that is true,” said Cei, “and it would have saved you time, as well.”
“But your brother must believe this, too, Agravain,” Bedwyr added, “Otherwise he would not be seeking to serve Arthur.”
Agravain frowned again. “What were you expecting to do, Gwalchmai? Arthur takes only warriors and a few doctors with the warband. You could stay in Camlann, I suppose, if you are not planning to go home.”
“I cannot go back to the islands,” I said. “But you, Agravain, how is it that you are fighting alongside Arthur’s own warband? And gaining fame in it, as well? I have not heard any news of you, not since you were taken hostage.”
“Och, that,” said Agravain. “That came of itself. The High King was kind to me, after Father and our kinsmen had gone; and I had some admiration for him already, because of his skill at war, though I hated him for an enemy.”
“But he let you fight beside his men?”
“Not at once.” Agravain suddenly grinned at Cei. “This hard-handed lout of a Dumnonian decided to give me the sharp edge of his tongue, and that is a sharp edge indeed. I understood little enough of it at the time, for my British was still not good, but I understood enough. And so one day, when he and the Family, returned from a raid, were at Camlann, and he began to say, ‘The only worse men than the Saxons are the Irish,’ I up and hit him. So he hit back, and we were at it like hammer and anvil. Only, as you see, he is bigger than I, and got the better of me.”
“Only you would not stop fighting for all that,” Cei put in. “Gloria Deo! I was certain I was fighting with a madman.”
“And when he knocked me down for the fifth time, and I tried to get up again, and had to hold on to a table to do it, he said, ‘You mad Irishman, don’t you know enough to stop fighting when you are beaten?’ and I said, ‘I do not; and I wish my father had not either.’ And he said, ‘You’re a wild barbarian, but by God, you’ve heart enough. I take back my words,’ and helped me up. And when the High King next wanted him to lead a raid, Cei said, ‘Let me take Agravain, then. It is the only way to keep him out of trouble.’”
“Not,” added Bedwyr, “that Cei wanted to keep out of trouble. On the contrary, there is nothing he likes better, and he was the more pleased that he had a friend to make it with him.”
“So I have fought for the High King,” Agravain concluded. “And it is well and good. Father has sent messages, from time to time, saying that he is pleased to hear that I fight well. But what of yourself, Gwalchmai? For three years I have heard nothing of you, not from the islands, nor from Britain nor from anywhere else. Where have you been?”
I looked away, unsure. I owed it to my brother to tell him the truth, but what he would do with that truth I could not guess. Probably, refuse to believe it. Still, I would tell him. But how could I speak of Morgawse before Bedwyr and Cei? Agravain would have to believe what I said of her—he knew her just well enough for that—but it was not for the ears of others.
“Perhaps you should begin at the beginning,” suggested Agravain when the silence became awkward.
“There is time enough for you to tell the tale,” Bedwyr added, “It is miles yet to Camlann.”
I studied Bedwyr. Here, I realized, was another man who served the Light, but one completely different from Sion. He had seen at the first that I had had dealings with the Otherworld, too, and his eyes were still doubtful. Now Cei too was giving me a peculiar look. Only Agravain noticed nothing.
“Agravain,” I said, “I can tell you. But not now.”
“By the sun and the wind!” exclaimed Agravain, using his old oath, which touched me hard with memories, “You have just returned from the dead, as far as I know, and you wish me to wait patiently and make light conversation?”
“That might be best,” I said. “It is a family matter.”
“I have another family now,” replied Agravain, waving his hand towards the warriors around him. “And what concerns me concerns them.”
“If you wish to join us,” Bedwyr commented, “you will have to tell us as well. There is no vengeance taken for past blood feuds or such once a man has joined the Family.”
“Gwalchmai join the Family?” asked Agravain. “That is as unlikely as his engaging in a blood feud. He is not a skilled warrior.”
Bedwyr looked thoughtful. “Perhaps.”
“I am not,” I said. “I hope to serve the Pendragon in some other way.”
“Arthur does not take many men with us,” said Cei, “but he might make an exception, if you can ride well.”
“He was the best rider in the islands,” said Agravain. “He can join us in some fashion, then, if not as a warrior?”
“That is up to our lord Arthur,” Bedwyr said.
“But if you wish to, we have a right to know what you have done,” Cei told me. “Shortly after Agravain joined us, he had a message from the Ynysoedd Erch saying that his brother had ridden off a cliff, and he went into mourning for weeks. Anything that affects him thus is my concern too. So, tell us now.”
I looked from him to Bedwyr to Agravain, then shrugged. “As you wish. But it is a strange story, and I do not know whether you will believe me. And there are things Agravain and I can understand that you may not. I am not a skilled fighter, to be involved in duels and blood feuds, but this is a matter of Darkness…”
The doubt in Bedwyr’s eyes flamed in suspicion. Agravain gave a start, like a frightened horse shying. “Then it does have something to do with Mother,” he whispered.
“It does,” I agreed. “Would you prefer that I wait, brother?”
He began to nod, stopped again. “I had heard that you went riding at night, on Samhain. By the cliffs. It was a mad thing to do, but like you, and I had heard also that…” he trailed off, and I saw that he too was familiar with my old reputation for sorcery. Cei and Bedwyr glanced at each other, the same thought in their minds.
Then Cei snorted. “Your mother, the famous witch, and an old pagan festival, and this is a reason for disappearing? I do not believe in such things. I did not think you believed either, Agravain.”
“I don’t,” said Agravain. But he did not look at Cei. He believed, well enough. It was impossible to know Morgawse and not believe in her power.
“Shall I go on?” I asked.
“Yes,” said Agravain. “Cei and Bedwyr are also my brothers now; they have the right to hear.”
Well, if that was how it was to be, I would tell the tale to the three of them. But I didn’t want to. It would be painful enough to tell to kinsmen, let alone strangers. “Agravain,” I said, “what did you hear of my death?”
“Only what I said, that you went riding at night on Samhain, and your horse was found by the cliff next day, riderless. No one could expect you to turn up two and a half years later, eighteen miles from Camlann, dressed like a servant and picking fights with Cei—couldn’t you have chosen someone else? He’s the best foot fighter in the Family.”
Cei grinned and nodded his agreement with this.
“And you have grown! It has been so long since I saw you—you are seventeen now, and the last time was what—more than three years ago. Come, explain how it happened.”
I drove the cart in silence for a while, trying to decide where to begin, and praying that my brother would accept the story. “You recall a certain summer, years ago, when I first began learning Latin?” I asked finally.
He thought back. “Yes. A wise thing to do; they speak a deal of it here, and I still cannot understand a word of it.”
“That is where it began. We had a quarrel over my learning such a thing, and you called me a bastard and said that I was trying to learn sorcery.”
Agravain looked surprised. “I did? I don’t remember that.”
“I suppose you wouldn’t. It didn’t mean much to you. But I was foolish, and it meant a deal to me. I determined to truly learn sorcery.” I lifted my eyes from the road and met Agravain’s hot stare. “And I am certain that you did hear of those matters.”
He shifted uneasily, flushing, and looked away from me. He nodded. I looked back at the road.
“So I went to our mother, and she taught me many things, all terrible.”
Agravain’s hands had tightened on the reins, and now his horse snorted, trying to stop and shying at the unsteady jerk. He quickly relaxed his grip and edged the horse back to the cart.
“She is very powerful, Agravain,” I said urgently. “She is much stronger, probably, than any other on earth, so much that she is scarcely human now. At first she hated her father, and her half-brother Arthur, and then all Britain, and I think now she hates all the universe, and wishes to drown the world in Darkness.”
Agravain’s horse started again, laying its ears back, catching fear from its rider. Bedwyr dropped behind the cart, then drove his horse up beside Agravain’s, to steady it. Agravain closed his eyes for a moment, his face strained and white. “No,” he whispered. “She can’t truly want that.”
“She does,” I said, wanting to reach out to him, but not quite daring. “You know her. Think.”
He turned his face away, shoulders shaking a little. For a long time we rode in silence, the hooves of the horses clattering on the causeway, the cart jolting in the sunlight. The marsh reeds shook in the wind. Cei was puzzled, Bedwyr withdrawn.
After a long time, shortly before we reached the main road, Agravain’s hands slowly relaxed and he nodded. “It is true,” he said, in a choked tone. “I would rather not think of her, Gwalchmai. But it is true. By the sun, why?”
I shook my head. He expected no answer.
“Go on,” said Agravain, after another stretch of silence, when we had turned south on the main road. I noted that he controlled himself better. Three years before he would either have started a quarrel with me or driven his horse ahead at its fastest gallop.
“I said that our mother hated Arthur. She has cursed him many times, but her magic does not seem to work on him. Two and a half years ago, on Samhain, she wanted to try some other spell to kill him.”
“God,” said Agravain in a strangled tone. “What affair is it of hers? What harm has he done her?”
“She hates him. You know that. And I think every black sorcerer in the West is seeking of the death of Arthur. Aldwulf Fflamddwyn certainly is.”
“What?—och, I know she hates the High King. But can she…?”
“I do not think she can,” I said.
He stared at me earnestly for a moment, wanting reassurance, then nodded, relaxing. “Laus Deo, as they say here in Britain. But, by the sun, she should be destroyed. Someone should kill her; though she is my own mother, still I say that she should die.”
“Perhaps she should,” I replied. “But who could kill her? She wanted me, and Medraut, to be there that night…”
“I had heard that Medraut…but I was sure that was false. No one was altogether certain that Medraut was…and it is unlike him.”
“It is true, though,” I said. “Though I did not know it till that night.” Again I thought of Medraut with pain. She must have devoured him by now, sucking out all his innocence and love for life, replacing it with hatred and bitterness and more ambition. And there was nothing I could do.
Agravain looked at me miserably. He had been trying for years, I think, to forget Morgawse, as he had tried for years to ignore her. But he accepted this now.
“Do you remember Connall?” I asked. “The Dalraid, the one in our father’s warband?”
“Of course. A brave man, and loyal, and a good fighter, as I well know from campaigning with him in Britain. The first time I ever went whoring he took me back in Din Eidyn.”
“Morgawse was going to kill him,” I said. “And, Agravain, I could not endure it. Not him and Medraut also. I killed him quickly and fled, and she tried to kill me.”
He looked sick. “This is madness. Why can’t people fight with swords, simply, instead…”
“People never fight simply with swords,” Bedwyr broke in. “Even you and Cei do not do that.”
Agravain paused, blinking at Bedwyr. “What does that mean?”
“No one takes up the sword without a reason. Even love of battle is a kind of reason. In the end, the reasons are never simple, and they are as important as the sword itself.”
“Philosophy,” said Cei. “You read too much of it, Bedwyr.”
“The reasons remain important,” said Bedwyr imperturb-ably. “Go on, Gwalchmai.”
“Our mother set a curse on me, and I fled from it, without thinking where I was going, until I came to Llyn Gwalch—that is the place on the cliff where I spent so much time, when we were children, Agravain—and let the horse go. The demon couldn’t follow me there. I don’t know why, except that I once believed in the place, and the Light…” I stopped. How could I tell Agravain about that? He could not possibly understand. I did not understand it myself.
“Our mother could not kill the Pendragon,” I began, “because Arthur fights against the Darkness, with the force that is also against the Darkness. When I was trapped there, I called on that force, because I was very wearied with the Darkness and hated it. And an ancestor of ours, who serves the Light, sent aid.”
“An ancestor?” asked Agravain in confusion. “This becomes more difficult as you go on. What ancestor?”
“Lugh of the Long Hand.”
He shook his head again. I saw that I was beginning to lose him. “I do not know what to think of this, Gwalchmai. If anyone else came to me with a story like this, I would laugh at him. But you…”
“I think that you must believe him,” Bedwyr interrupted softly. “I do not know that I have ever seen a man so deeply touched by the Otherworld.”
Agravain glared at his friend. “There is nothing wrong with my brother. True, he is a poor warrior, but that gives you no right to insult him.”
“I am not insulting him.” Bedwyr seemed mildly amused. “And I think he can look after his own honor. Gwalchmai, go on.”
“Lugh sent a boat from Tir Tairngaire, at the urging of the Light…”
“What is this ‘Light’ you keep talking about?” asked Agravain irritably. “The sun?”
“I think I understand,” Bedwyr said slowly. “In a sense, the sun. As the sun is a type of Light, since all other lights are ultimately derived from it, by reflection or by dependence with the rest of the world, so the Light which your brother speaks of is the source of good and of illumination, and other goods are known only in it. Yes, Cei, I did read it in a book of philosophy. But am I right?”
“I…I think so,” I said, astonished. “Yes, if I understand you. I do not know any philosophy. I know only that the Light sent a boat, and I embarked, and it took me to the Islands of the Blessed.”
“Oh God!” said Cei, at last releasing his growing anger. “How many have made that claim? And how many have been to those islands? None, because those islands do not exist outside the songs of poets! Agravain, you are my brother, but this brother of yours is another matter. He has been spinning gossamer from clouds of lies this whole while, and you’ve been taking it for true yarn. But I can’t. When you have had enough, I will be riding up ahead.”
“He is not lying, Cei,” said Bedwyr.
But Cei only gave me a look of disgust. “No, indeed. He is merely giving a poetic form to the concepts of philosophers, and discoursing upon the summum bonum or whatever you call it. This is a fine enough tale for Breton mystics and philosophers, Bedwyr, but I am a Dumnonian and a Roman, and I want no more of this.” He spurred his horse to a gallop and left us, reining in beside some other warrior.
“Go on,” said Agravain. “I will listen.”
But he was beginning to agree with Cei. “I am not lying,” I said.
“I do not say that you would, deliberately,” said Agravain, apparently deciding to be very honest. “But after what had passed, you could easily have had some kind of dream.”
“I thought it was a dream, when I woke up and found myself in Britain,” I said. “But I still had this.” I touched Caledvwlch’s hilt.
Agravain looked at it, his brows knitting. “A sword. I noticed it earlier. It looked to be worth a good amount. You think it was given to you in the Land of Promise?”
“It was, by Lugh, from the Light. When I woke up southeast of here, returning from Tir Tairngaire, I knew that I had not been dreaming or gone mad, because it lay beside me. Its name is Caledvwlch.”
Agravain glared at it. He was becoming angry now, and I dreaded the results of his anger. “A sword. A fine sword, as far as I can tell. Let me see the rest of it.”
I drew Caledvwlch. His eyebrows went up and he whistled. “Och, fine indeed; I should like such a sword. But it is not supernatural.”
Bedwyr stared at the bright steel for a moment, then looked away. He apparently did see something supernatural in it.
I considered making the fire burn in the blade, to show Agravain the power as well, but decided not to. It was too violent and obvious; an abuse of the power. Besides, I had no desire to be thought a witch, and I did not know the warriors. So, “Lugh gave it to me,” I reiterated.
Agravain snorted. He was rejecting the story now. Perhaps he could simply not accept it of me, of Gwalchmai, his weak, ineffectual little brother. “Go on,” he said, however. “You woke up with the sword, east of here, after spending—how long?—in the Isles of the Blessed.”
“It was nearly three years. It seemed only a day. But time was strange there. I woke in the hills in the borderland between the kingdom of Dumnonia and the land Cerdic claims, and when I was walking west I walked directly into a Saxon raiding party on its way back to Sorviodunum.”
Agravain calmed at this; this he could believe. “Couldn’t you tell a Saxon from a Roman?” he asked.
“I did not know where I was. For all I knew, I might be going to Constantinople, though I thought it unlikely. So I told them that I was a thrall, and my master had died in a blood feud, and they brought me back to Sorviodunum and sold me to Cerdic.”
“Why should he buy you? Did he suspect that you were a king’s son?”
“I don’t think so. Aldwulf of Bernicia told him to, and Aldwulf, like Bedwyr, or Sion, or most people these days, was not sure I was quite human when first he saw me.”
“That is ridiculous,” said Agravain. “Why should they think that? You did not, did you, Bedwyr?”
“Your brother is right,” said Bedwyr. “I think you underestimate him.”
“I know him better than you,” snapped Agravain. “Go on.”
“Aldwulf wanted to kill Arthur, as I said, and thought that if he killed me and used the sword, he could manage it, by sorcery. But he had conjured up a horse of the Sidhe for Cerdic, to prove his power in sorcery, a horse which could outrun and outstay any horse on earth. Cerdic was trying to break it, but could not. I could—you must remember that I was good with horses, though this one was different—and I did, and I rode it out of Sorviodunum as fast as possible.”
“Then where is it now?”
“I let him go. He was of the Sidhe; I had no right to keep him. That was the day before yesterday; and yesterday I met with that farmer you disliked and came to Ynys Witrin, where you came this morning.”
“A fine story,” said Agravain scornfully. “Very fine, indeed. But you forgot a few details, Gwalchmai. What about the hill-fort full of armed Saxons? But doubtless you slew them by the scores as you rode off on the king’s horse.”
“They did try to stop me, they just weren’t quick enough—no, I am not claiming any skill at arms. We both know better. But the Saxons were afraid. They did not think that I was human, and I had the sword.”
“Your sword! Why should they fear that?”
“It…I imagine it can be frightening.”
“Gwalchmai,” said Agravain, his voice level and controlled, but plainly very angry, “Cerdic’s warriors are not children to run away from a reputed magic sword. And what of the king, and Aldwulf of Bernicia? You say that Fflamddwyn is a sorcerer, and so his name and fame are in all Britain; couldn’t he have ruined that famous sword for you?”
“I do not think his power is that great,” I said, “I do not think anything could quench Caledvwlch, except its bearer. If I turned against the Light, since it is by Light that the sword burns…whatever. Aldwulf was unconscious when I left. I’d cut his face open with Caledvwlch.”
Agravain reined in his horse to a complete halt. “And how many Saxons did you kill leaving the camp?” he asked quietly.
I stopped the cart. Sion’s mare halted gladly, her sides heaving. “Three.” I knew what was coming now. “Agravain, I am not trying to claim that…”
“You have said enough,” Agravain went on firmly. The entire foraging band was halting now, and the warriors were turning their horses back or driving their carts forward to see what was happening. “The first part of your story I believe, the second is a dream or some confusion honestly and easily made, but this…this can be nothing other than an outright lie. You, striking down a Saxon king, and killing three of Cerdic’s warriors single-handed? You can’t even throw a spear straight.”
“Agravain, I said it was not from skill but…”
“Was it by magic, then? You said you’d rejected that, and rightly so.”
“No, it was not, but…”
“Then your tale is a tissue of lies,” Agravain proclaimed fiercely. “Nonsense you made up to give yourself some honor which you are afraid to win honestly in battle. You are hopeless as a warrior.”
“I've never said otherwise.”
“And I will show you how hopeless.” My brother ruthlessly thrust aside my attempts to fend off what was coming. “Get out of that cart and I will teach you not to lie…”
“I will lend you my horse,” Bedwyr said to me, quite suddenly, “and my spear and shield as well, so that you can fight as a warrior should.”
There was an instant of startled silence. “Thank you,” I said at last, slowly. “But I fear I will disgrace your weapons.”
“Perhaps,” said Bedwyr, “and perhaps not.”
“I wager he will,” said Cei cheerfully. “I stake a gold armlet that Agravain downs him. You are right, Agravain, to do this; no one could believe that tale but a Breton.”
“I would accept your stake,” said Bedwyr, “only I do not share your taste for jewelry. I have my reasons for believing the tale, Cei.”
Agravain scowled. He had wanted to fight me in the way he was best accustomed to, with his fists. But he decided that this would do. “Very well. Hurry. We must reach Camlann before too long.”
I climbed down from the cart, tying the reins to the corner post, and Bedwyr dismounted. He gave me his spear and shield, tying a rag around the point of the spear and telling me to use the butt end, then gave me the reins of his horse, which was a long-boned dappled Gaulish war-steed. I thanked him, feeling resigned to my inevitable defeat. It would be only another fall, I told myself. It could not hurt me.
I mounted Bedwyr’s horse and rode it in a tight circle, seeing how it responded and trying to get an idea of its temper. It was a good horse, though of course nothing like Ceincaled.
We moved off the road to the cleared land about it. Now that we had left the marshes behind, the road wound through steep hills, covered with plowed land and pasture. The pastureland by the roadside was soft, so a fall would not be very painful. The warriors of the band formed a circle, not really understanding what was happening, but interested. No one accepted Cei’s wager.
Agravain rode to the far side of the circle, levelled the blunt end of his spear, and nodded briskly. “I won’t hurt you,” he warned me, “But you must learn.”
I nodded, sighed, and raised my shield. He would be cheerful again once he had downed me, and it was a small enough price to pay for that. Still, I wished that he would believe me. It hurt a little that he could so quickly call me a liar.
Agravain urged his horse to a trot, angling his spear and following the line of the circle. I followed his example, trying to remember what I had struggled to learn in the Boys’ House. My brother saw I was ready and swung his horse towards me, touching it to a canter.
Suddenly, everything narrowed, and time itself seemed to slow as I touched Bedwyr’s horse to a gallop and rode to meet him. My heart soared, and I swung my spear out of line. Agravain saw it, smiled, confidently came in. The world narrowed further to his spear tip and right shoulder, and around these points all was blurred. He was almost upon me; I swerved my horse just half a step, caught his spear on the edge of my shield, sending it glancing off, dropped my own spear into line, and thrust it against his shoulder, braced for the impact.
Time resumed its normal flow, and Agravain fell from his horse, his eyes wide with surprise, as I reined in and turned my animal quickly, dropping my spear to threaten him.
He lay still for a moment, then rose, slowly, rubbing his shoulder and scowling in bewilderment. I came to myself and stared, first at him, then over at his horse, which was now nibbling the thick grass. I could not understand what had happened.
“We will try again,” said Agravain loudly. “Now.”
“It was an accident,” I said. “I could not do it again. I know that you’re the better warrior of us, Agravain.” Of course he was; it was his world.
“We’ll do it again, damn you!” shouted Agravain. He went over to his horse, remounted it, jerked savagely at the bit, and rode over to the opposite side of the circle.
“Cei,” said one of the warriors. “Is the wager still on?”
“If you want,” said Cei.
“Fair enough; I’ve armlets too.”
Agravain lowered his spear, and began trotting about the circle again. I did the same, waiting for him when he turned his horse nearly backward and came up with a swerving course. This time I reined suddenly as we approached, bringing Bedwyr’s horse rearing to a stop. Again everything contracted about us, and I felt even more clearly the wild lightness in my mind. Agravain was almost beside me, and his spear, aimed at my left thigh, was close. I beat it out of line with my shield, turning my horse and allowing his weight to join mine behind the spear as I thrust at Agravain’s side. Again, he fell; again his horse ran on, this time into the circle of warriors where it was caught.
Agravain rose to his feet. He was no longer scowling, but staring in total bewilderment, like a man who has seen the sun rising in the west. The madness was still on me, and I did not wish to speak, so I sat silent and unmoving, spear ready, and waited.
Agravain went and got his horse, remounted, levelled his spear. I rode to the opposite end of the circle and nodded.
He came at me immediately this time, at a full gallop. I hurled my spear, blunt end first, as he came, and rode on drawing Caledvwlch.
The spear hit his throat and glanced off, though he would surely have a bruise to show for it; had I thrown it tip first he would be dead. He almost fell as it hit him, but recovered in time, keeping his spear straight. His thrust as we drew even would have struck me through the ribs to the right of my shield, had it touched me—but I hacked at the shaft with Caledvwlch, and it snapped. Time froze, and I lifted the sword before Agravain’s horse could complete another step. The light was burning in the blade, and I was filled with a strength which seemed hardly to be my own. The world looked as though it had been etched on bright steel. I let all the force fall into my arm as I struck Agravain with the flat of the sword blade. He fell into the grass, his horse plunging slowly past me. He rolled over and lay still. There was a massive silence.
My head cleared a little and I sheathed the sword. Still Agravain lay motionless. The rest of the madness departed from me, and I dismounted hastily. “Agravain?” He did not move. I ran over to him. By the Light, how hard had I hit him? “Agravain?”
He shook his head groggily, then climbed to his knees, holding his arm where I had struck it. He stared at me. His face was white, beaded with sweat. He climbed slowly to his feet, still staring.
“Dear God,” he said, very slowly, each word falling into the ring of silence that was the watchers. “What have you become?”
“I said that you underestimated your brother.” Bedwyr walked forward, still calm and unshaken. “I think that you will find a place with Arthur, Gwalchmai ap Lot.”
“But the sword!” said Cei. “Didn’t you see the sword? It was burning. He…”
“The sword?” asked another, “Didn’t you see his eyes?”
Light! I thought desperately. Now they do believe that I am a witch.
“He has beaten Agravain of Orcade in fair combat, do any of you question that?” asked Bedwyr sharply.
“I question it,” said Cei immediately. “That was not fair combat. No ordinary mortal being could have…”
“It was a fair fight,” said Agravain. The warriors at once stopped glaring at me and stared at him instead. “It was a very fair fight, and long overdue. Gwalchmai is no witch, I swear the oath of my people to that. If any of you thinks otherwise, I am willing to fight again today. My brother is a warrior. God! By the sun, I have never fought anyone as good!”
“It was an accident…” I began, still bewildered.
“It was not. You are better than I, and we both know that now.”
“One fall might have been an accident,” Bedwyr stated. “Three times constitutes proof. You are very good, Gwalchmai. Perhaps better than I.”
“That is absurd. You are the finest horseman in the Family,” objected Cei.
Bedwyr only smiled.
Cei shook his head violently. “Nothing of this makes sense. Swords cannot burn like firebrands. His story is impossible; but if it is true, where does that leave us? He is a sorcerer…”
“I said, nothing more about that!” Agravain snapped. “Whatever he was in the past, my brother is a warrior now.”
“How can I be?” I broke in. “I never could fight. You know that, Agravain. You must remember how I was in the Boys’ House, how I could not throw a spear straight…” Agravain rubbed his throat where my spear had caught it, but I plunged on. “Everyone knew that I was no warrior. Father was disappointed in me, I was disappointed in myself, so much that I was willing to give myself up to the Darkness from sheer anger and the pain of failing. How can I be a warrior?”
“You say that you laid open Aldwulf’s face with that?” Agravain began to point at Caledvwlch with the arm I had struck, then winced and clasped it again.
“I…yes, but…”
“And you killed three Saxons when you escaped from Din Sarum?”
“Yes, but Agravain…”
“There you are, then.” He turned to the others. “He has ruined Fflamddwyn’s good looks for him and fought against our enemies. Can you question that he is fighting for us?”
“We have only his account to rely on for that tale,” objected Cei.
“Do you accuse my brother of lying?” asked Agravain, trying to reach for his sword and wincing again.
Cei stopped, staring at my brother. Then he sighed and shrugged. He plainly thought that I was lying somehow, but he would not fight his friend for it. “I accuse no one,” he said. “But I will tell Arthur of this.”
Bedwyr nodded. “And I will tell Arthur that I believe Gwalchmai.” The two looked at each other for another moment, and then Bedwyr smiled gently. “You merely do not wish to lose that armlet, Cei.”
Cei looked confused for a moment, then remembered his wager. He grinned shakily, pulled the armlet off, and tossed it to the man who had won it. That man sat his horse looking at it uncertainly, then put it on. Cei clasped Bedwyr’s hand, remounted, and turned his horse back to the road. Slowly the others followed, and Bedwyr took his horse and shield from me and went after them.
“Agravain…” I began again.
“Gwalchmai.” He rubbed his arm, winced again. “By the sun, I have a bruise here. Bedwyr has forgotten his spear; where is it?”
I picked it up. The rest of the foraging band had started off down the road at a walk; Sion’s mare was cropping the grass by the roadside. Agravain caught his horse, gathered the reins up, awkwardly one-armed. Just about to mount, he stopped, looked at me again, and caught my arm.
“Gwalchmai, I am sorry,” he said.
“I am the one who is sorry. Truly, I did not mean to hit you so hard!”
“I don’t mean for this.” He had slipped back into Irish from the British of the warband. “Though I am sorry, and should be, that I cried liar on you. But all your life I have been calling you names to provoke you to fighting, and beating you to make myself feel better; and I have pretended to help you with the arts of war while I ruined you for them, pretending, even to myself, that it was generous of me and for your own good—do not say anything. I know that it is true. I began to realize it after I was a hostage here, when I was no longer the first-born and leader in everything, and when I saw that it was hopeless to fight and still wished to. And when they told me that you were dead, and all Britain said, ‘There is one witch the less,’ then I did understand, and wished myself dead as well. I remembered how you looked at me once after a fight, and I knew it was the part of a dog and a devil from Yffern to so humiliate a brother, and I had done it, and gone hunting afterwards. Listen, perhaps there is no repayment for it, but I am sorry.”
I clasped his shoulders. “My heart, I have said that I was a fool then, and took things over-much to heart. If I had been able to laugh at you…and it is past now. Forget it.”
He embraced me. I felt his chest shake, realized that he was weeping, realized that I was as well. “From this time on, Gwalchmai,” he muttered, “it will be different.” He released me, looking at me earnestly. “I will boast of you before I boast of myself. From now on there will be only victories.”
I could say nothing, and he said again, “Only victories, Gwalchmai. Forget all that I ever said about your skill as a warrior. You will be a great warrior, a man they make songs about.” He looked up the road then, and added, “They are slowing the pace for us, but we will still be left behind. Come, help me on to this horse. My arm is still numb.”
When the cart was jolting and swaying down the road again, Sion’s little mare trotting briskly to catch the others, Agravain fell behind. I understood very well why. He wished to be alone with his thoughts, as I did with mine, and, after such words as had just passed, we would have nothing to say to each other for a time.
I did not know what to think or to feel. I had beaten Agravain; Agravain had repented to me for the past. I had beaten Agravain, he said that I would be a great warrior. There had been a time when that was the focus of my dreams, but I had abandoned those dreams for the Darkness, and I had never thought to see them placed within my grasp. And I wanted to turn the cart about and ride away from Camlann as fast as the horse could gallop.
I looked at the worn leather of the reins, dark with the polish of use, and at my hands curled around the leather. I had sworn those hands to the service of the Light. What had Bedwyr said about the Light? Something about all other lights or goods being known only in it. And I had already come to see that the Light could do whatever he wanted, even among the Saxons. Surely he did not need my aid, and did not need to have given me Caledvwlch, or to have sent me to Britain. Agravain had asked me why, when I spoke of Morgawse, and I knew that he meant not only “Why does she hate?” but, “Why must she be there to hate?” And I could not see why. If the Light could protect Arthur against her strongest spells, and could save me from her, he could certainly rid the Earth of Darkness. He did not need me or anyone to run about Britain and make war. I saw with a sense of shock that I did not like the thought of war, and I saw that I believed that it was wrong to kill. I had never heard of any such idea in my life, and yet, I thought again of those three Saxons and thought that there surely should have been some other way. And if it were sometimes right to kill, as I would have killed Aldwulf, or, in a different way, as I had killed Connall—when was it right? And how could anyone be always right? The Light of its—his—own nature must be always right, if what Bedwyr had said was true, and I believed that it was. But the world of men is mixed, good and evil together, and there was no simple and clear struggle, no one decision like the one I had made at Dun Fionn.
Yet men make choices, and must make choices. I had chosen Light at Dun Fionn. Medraut had chosen Darkness. Violently, I wished that I could have stopped him, and I remembered him standing in Morgawse’s room, looking at her in adoration. If I had dragged him from the room after me? But he had been calling me “Traitor,” the shout had echoed behind me. If I saw him again, and spoke to him, could he still change his mind? Surely, the Darkness could not completely enchain his will—and then I thought that I and the Light could not either. But who would choose Darkness, if they understood what they were choosing, understood the hunger and fear, the hatred that consumes happiness, the loss? And yet sometimes it seemed plain that we could not help but serve Darkness. And if I fought for Arthur, I would have to make choices, and it was evident that in the nature of the world I would sometimes choose wrongly. I did not want to fight in the complex world of men. It was easier to fight in the Otherworld.
I stared up at the hills before us, and found Bedwyr looking back down the road. Our eyes met for a moment; he reined in his horse and fell back till he was level with the cart again.
“Your thoughts seem heavy ones, Gwalchmai ap Lot,” he told me.
“They are heavy, lord,” I replied. “Agravain says that I may be a great warrior now, and you have said as much also. And I am a hair’s breadth from turning about and returning to the Orcades, a piece of foolishness such as I have never heard of.”
Bedwyr’s eyes glinted slightly. “And why is that?”
“You serve the Light, I think,” I said. “Is it right to kill men and to make wars?”
“Ach!” He stared at me. “I do not know.”
“But you are a warrior, and when I spoke of the Light you understood it better than I did myself.”
“I doubt that. I merely know the language of philosophy, and so could describe it better. You have touched on something, Gwalchmai ap Lot, which I have often questioned. I could only say what I know myself, from what I myself have experienced.”
“Then tell me that, if there is time. I am sick with thinking of it.”
“I think I understand that.” Bedwyr’s eyes glinted again with the suppressed amusement. It was very strange, I thought fleetingly, that I could speak to him so easily, and that he had so quickly taken my part against Cei. Perhaps it was that we served the same lord that created this understanding.
With his shield-arm, the one with the missing hand, he brushed his hair back from his face. “Very well,” he began. “As Cei has mentioned several times already, I am a Breton, and my father has estates in the southeast—no, that is not to say I have a noble clan; in most of Less Britain, clans are less important than ownership of land and civic status. My father is a curialis—that is a title. Officially his rank is clarus, but he calls himself clarissimus, because he likes the sound of it.” Again came the glint of amusement. “We are near the border of Less Britain, and while I was young, not a summer went by without the Franks, or the Saxons, or the Swabians or Goths or Huns breaking into our fields and driving off our cattle, and demanding gold for the municipality. So I learned to fight early, as men also do here in Britain. I also learned to read, but I considered this of less importance. In Less Britain, as in parts of southern Gaul, the old municipal schools are still run for the children of the nobility, and I went there and was taught the elements of rhetoric from the grammaticus there; and very tedious it was. We had a textbook, though, one among the class of twelve, and it was written by a Marius Victorinus, who was a philosopher. When he wished to give an example of an exhortation, he exhorted to philosophy; of discussion, a debate about the summum bonum—that is, what is most excellent in human life. He thought it was philosophy. I thought he was a fool, for the Franks cared nothing for philosophy, and I enjoyed killing the Franks. Mind, I enjoyed it, not tolerated it, but took pleasure in showing off my skill. When I was seventeen, I enrolled some peasants from my father’s estate, and took them off, with one or two other youths from the area, to fight for the Comes Armoricae—the king of Less Britain, you would say. After a few years, the Frankish king died, and the new king was busy with the Goths, and the wars seemed over for a time. Then I heard that our king’s younger son, Bran, had made alliance with Arthur of Britain, and planned an expedition. I had never been to Britain, and had killed no Franks or Saxons for nearly a year, so I took my followers and went with Bran.
“You know of that campaign, I think, and how Arthur, won the purple, so there is no need for me tell you of it. But for myself, I was wounded in the battle by the Seafern.” Bedwyr held up his shield-arm again. “The blow was not bad in itself, but the wound took the rot, and I, who was not afraid of the Saxons, was afraid of the doctors, and did not go to them until I was sick and had to be carried. They took the hand off, but I was in a high fever from the rot, and I thought that I would die. I lay there in the monastery where they had brought us, and now I had time to wonder about how many men I had placed in this position, and the thought did not please me as it had before. All my renown was useless to me now. And I kept remembering the exhortation to philosophy from that textbook, and thinking that glory was not, after all, the summum bonum.
“For three days I lay between death and life. On the third, Taliesin, the chief bard of Arthur, came to the monastery—I still do not know why. When he walked past the rows of the wounded, it looked to me as though a star burned on his forehead, and I thought that I was dead. So I called out to him that I was not yet prepared.
“He stopped and came over and knelt beside me. ‘For something you are prepared, Bedwyr ap Brendan,’ he said, ‘But not for death.’ Then he turned to the doctors and said that he thought the fever would break soon. ‘So you regret your life,’ he said turning back to me—I had never seen him before, and still I thought him the angel of death. ‘With all my heart.’ I replied. ‘You live now,’ he told me, ‘and will for many years yet. But remember your regret when you recover, and, I warn you, things will turn out otherwise than you expect. Have faith, and do not wonder at what happens.’ With that he left, and the doctors put me in a heated room with many blankets, so that the fever broke, and I began to recover.”
“Who is this Taliesin?” I asked. “His last words to you were the same as Lugh’s to me.”
He gave me a dark, serious look. “Indeed? I do not know where Taliesin comes from or who his parents were. No one does. He is a great poet, and a healer besides. There are other stories about him, some very strange, but nothing is known for certain. I know that he is not evil, and his words then were true. I recovered from my fever, but I remembered what I had felt then, when I had thought that I would die. I asked the monks who cared for the sick if they had that textbook by the philosopher Victorinus, but they had never heard of him. They had only a few books, and those gospels. So I read one of the gospels, that of Matthew, and I came to the place where the Christ was betrayed, and led off to execution; and one of his followers drew a sword to defend him, and our lord said, ‘Put your sword in its place: for those that take the sword will perish with the sword.’ Then I decided that it was wrong to kill and to make wars, and I resolved to return to Less Britain as soon as I was well enough to travel, and there enter a monastery, and contemplate the Good. I anticipated that my father would be angry, but I would not have yielded for all that. So, you see, I know what it is that troubles you.”
“Why did you change your mind again?”
He smiled, a quick but very warm smile, “I met Arthur. I had seen him before, but never spoken with him. He came to the monastery to visit the wounded. I was sitting in the garden: it was summer, and evening, and I was trying to read. He came up to me, calling me by name, and asked me of my wound; then asked when I would rejoin King Bran. I told him that I did not plan to continue to live as a warrior, but to enter a monastery, and he said that Bran thought highly of me, and that he did not understand.
“I explained my reasons, and, surprisingly, he did understand. He had even heard of Victorinus—he had read of him in a book by one Aurelius Augustinus. ‘But I do not agree with your Victorinus on the highest good,’ he told me. ‘Do you think that it is glory, then?’ I asked. ‘Indeed not,’ he replied, ‘But Augustinus says evil is not a substance, but an absence, being nothing more than the denial of good. And this my own heart teaches me as well, for I can see from it that evil begins in weakness, cowardice, and stupidity, and proceeds to hatred and desolation, while good is active. So it seems to me that the highest good cannot be a thing that sits like a picture on the wall, waiting to be admired, but must be active and substantial.’ And I: ‘Victorinus says that the Good, that is, the Light, subsists in all things, for if it did not, nothing would exist. But because men do not consider it, and act blindly, they create evil.’ And he: ‘If they do nothing but sit and consider, they are bound to create evil, for they cannot create good.’ ‘But they might find it and know it,’ said I. And he stood and paced about the garden, then asked me, ‘Is justice good? It is active. Are order, peace, harmony good? Is love?—Augustinus says that love is a property of men but not of God, but I think that, if this were so, we would be superior to God, which is unthinkable; for I am certain that these things are good, love most of all.’ And I: ‘The Church says that God, that is, the Good, loved and acted once, in Christ.’ And he: ‘I say he did then and does now, in us. Tell me, is it good that the Saxons take away the land, the cattle of their neighbors, and that men and women, and children, too, are left to starve? Is it good that only a handful of nobles in Britain can read, and few of them have books? Is it good that men are reduced thus to the level of beasts, thinking of nothing but food and slaughter?’ ‘Why do you ask?’ I said, ‘There are evils, but they have come about because Rome has fallen and the Empire has gone from the West. What can we do but ourselves abstain from evil in such times?’ ‘We can restore the Empire,’ he said, and stopped pacing, standing with the moonlight in his hair—for by then the moon had risen over the abbey wall.
“‘Before God, I will preserve civilization in this land or die defending it, because I love the Good. And I think that to fight thus is the highest good for men, and not philosophy.What would your Victorinus say to that?’ ‘Victorinus had no emperor like you to Follow,’ I said, ‘or he would have spoken differently.’ And I knelt to him, and told him, ‘I have only one hand to fight for you, but, in God’s name, take me into your service, and all I can do, I will.’ He looked at me in surprise for a moment, for he had not realized how much his words had stirred me; then he took my hand and swore the oath a liege-lord swears to his follower. And I have fought for him ever since, and will do so all my life, God willing: for I now believe that to act with a desire for good, even if we may act wrongly, is better than not to act at all. But whether in the end we are justified in the eyes of God, I cannot say.”
I was silent for a long time. “That is hardly comforting,” I said at last.
“Life is not comfortable,” he replied. “Nonetheless, I think there is more joy in struggling for the Light than in retreat.”
“But the difference between us and the Saxons is not so great,” I objected. “They are men too, and much like us. And I know that you are a Roman, but still, I cannot see why the Empire has anything to do with the Light. No British king had some miserable slave tortured to death to see whether his master threw stones at a royal statue, or had three thousand people massacred at a theater because they had rioted, as did Theodosius, the High King of Rome. My mother told me of this, but still, it is true, isn’t it? And I never heard of any king in Britain or in Erin having hundreds of innocent noblemen put to death, solely because their names began with “Theod,” as Valentinianus did because of an oracle he had received, though he missed Theodosius. Moreover, the Romans took Britain by force of arms, just as the Saxons are attempting to do now, and no doubt the people here then liked the Romans as little as we now like the Saxons—why are you smiling?”
“Because you can speak Latin and read and are probably a Christian, and still, if you do not object to my saying so, you are a barbarian. I mean no insult. It is true, the Empire caused much evil and misery. But no British lordling ever created as much of good and beauty, ever gave to the world so much knowledge, art, and splendor as did the Romans. And no British king ever founded hospitals, or endowed monasteries to care for the sick, the poor, and the orphaned; or again, relieved his domains when there was famine and restored them after fire or war, which the Christian emperors did. The Empire is worth fighting to preserve. That I could never question.”
“Very well, I am a barbarian,” I said, beginning to laugh. “You southern British—excuse me, Bretons—always say as much about the Irish. I still do not see that your Empire has much to do with the Light; but, from what you have said, I think the Empire Arthur desires would. And I have been given a sword, which, if it is a weapon of Light, is also a weapon of war. I do not fear perishing by it if I take it up, and if your Christ threatened nothing more than that, I would have no hesitations. Only…by the Light, it is too sudden. I never expected…I never thought that I could become a warrior, and would have to make such a choice.”
“Perhaps when you meet the Emperor Arthur it will become clear. Look, there is Camlann. We are almost home.”
Camlann is ancient, older than the kingdom of Britain, in fact. It stood empty and decaying while the Romans ruled, but after Londinium fell to the Saxons, Ambrosius Aurelianus had it resettled. Arthur had it refortified with the great walls, which, when we rode up that day, were only half-finished. As we approached, Agravain drove up his horse to ride beside me again; and Cei fell back, watching me as though he expected me to grow wings and fly off rather than enter the fortress. So I came to Camlann, driving a heavy-laden cart pulled by a spent mare, flanked by three warriors who viewed me in vastly different lights, fastening my hopes on a High King who was absent.
The gates had been thrown open for us before we reached them, and we drove up the steep hill, the warriors calling greetings to the guards and shouting that they had a victory. The High King was expected back, with the rest of the warband, at any moment, and Bedwyr wanted the supplies from Ynys Witrin to be unloaded before the Pendragon returned.
“I do not wish my lord to have to trouble himself with inventories, nor to wait for his victory feast,” he told one of the servants.
“Of course,” said the man, eyeing the carts with some eagerness—I gathered they had been short of supplies in Camlann. “Did you bring mead from Ynys Witrin?”
“Seeing that the monks make the best mead in Dumnonia,” Cei replied, “we were hardly likely to miss it.”
“Good. We’ve only that ale we saved from last winter, and I had no wish to give that to the Emperor after a victory.”
The carts and horses were brought to a stable, and I cared for Sion’s mare and gave her some grain. I was finishing with her when Bedwyr entered, followed by Cei and Agravain. “The Emperor is almost here,” he told me, “if you wish to come down to the gates.”
The Family was still riding up when I went to the gates to see them. It was a long column, coming from the North, mounted men, some driving cattle; one or two wagons, spare horses on lead reins. They covered the road into the distance, glittering with weapons in the afternoon sun. At the front a rider carried the standard, a deeper glint of gold at that distance, and behind him came a man on a white horse. Arthur.
I thought of all that had happened to me up to that moment, of my mother and my father both, of Agravain, of Lugh, of the Saxons. The physical struggle and the spiritual struggle: they met here. My throat constricted and I stood, my eyes, like the eyes of all around me, fixed on the man who rode behind the standard.
The vanguard of the warband broke off from the slower-moving group which drove the cattle. Horses’ manes and tails and men’s cloaks streamed in the wind of their motion, and, through the dirt of hard riding, the sun glittered off weapons and mail and jewelry. The Pendragon wore the purple, gold-embroidered cloak of the Roman High Kings over his coat of mail. He rode well, and held his tall spear as though he knew how to use it. As he passed the gates, the inhabitants of the fortress shouted a welcome with one voice, and they shouted, “Arthur!”
The king laughed and reined in the horse, and his followers pressed around him, catching his hands in greeting. I remained standing on the half-finished wall, staring at him and wondering that so much doubt and deep thought could come to nothing in so brief and transient a moment. I knew that somehow I had already made my choice, perhaps made it when I fled from Dun Fionn. Somehow I had known all along that I would become a warrior, and fight for Arthur.