Shadow of the King

by Helen Hollick

  “Bedwyr?” she whispered, almost afeared to utter the name aloud. “Bedwyr? Why come you here? And with Ambrosius?” Her gaze flickered to the third man, knew him as an officer, Illtud. Found the same haggard, twisted look about his expression.

  The door was behind them. Was it to open soon, was another man, a man so cherished, so loved, to come banging through at any moment? But it remained shut. No one else entered. And no one spoke or moved.

  The three-year-old girl could sense something was wrong, this quietness was frightening. The three men, standing so still before the door, intimidating. She clutched her doll tighter to her chest, toddled to her mother’s side, slid her pudgy hand between Gwenhwyfar’s cold fingers, snuggled her small body against the comfort of her mother’s leg.

  Gwenhwyfar was not even aware she was there, for her eyes, her mind, was directed upon Bedwyr, upon the sword he was holding in his hand.

  Only one man had the honour of owning such a sword. It was unique, forged, so story told, by the gods and given to the world of mortals by the hand of the Goddess. Arthur’s sword. Still her thoughts were unmoving, frozen, unable to bear to think upon the meaning of all this. Arthur’s sword. Arthur.

  She swallowed, her throat tight, constricted, the scream swelling in her stomach churning higher.

  Her eyes asked the question. Bedwyr’s brief, downward nod answered.

  She put the back of her hand to her mouth, did not notice the pain from her teeth, stuffing that scream away, back down. She shook her head, one slow, unaccepting movement, the one word coming, denying. “No!”

  “You have my deepest sorrow, Madam. This news is not palatable to either of us.” Ambrosius felt awkward, knowing she would not believe him but it was the truth. He had not expected it to be so – indeed had looked forward with anticipation to Arthur’s death. The realities were always different to the thoughts of ambition and imaginings, though. Reality was so final. Held so much pain. You never remembered that in your thoughts and schemes for what might one day be.

  Now the silence had been broken, the men moved, came further inside. Bedwyr crossed the room to pour wine, Illtud going to the inner door, clutching up the little girl as he passed, lifting her with a high swing into his arms. She laughed. She recognised this man, from where or when she did not know, remembered only that he had played with her in the sun, swirling her around and around like her father had used to do before he went away. Recollected, on that same thought, they had gone away together. Happen they were returned together also?

  “Will my Da be home soon?”

  Illtud ruffled her hair, tucked her closer in his arms, made for the inner door that passed into the Hall. “Na, lass. Na, he’ll not be home.”

  What else could he say?

  Closing the door behind him, he took her to find her nurse, to speak quietly to those in the Hall who pressed close to hear with ashen faces and tear-brimmed grief what he had to tell.

  Gwenhwyfar acted with automation, taking the wine flagon from Bedwyr, offering the two remaining men fruit and nuts from the side table. She sat in her chair, her fingers fiddle-fiddling with her pewter tankard. Her eyes gazing at the sword, lying where Bedwyr had placed it, across the bed-furs. On the side where Arthur would have lain.

  They sat a long while in silence. One of the dogs, Blaidd, who had been her eldest son’s favourite hound, came from the warmth of the fire to nuzzle at her with his wet nose. Absently she fondled his silken ears, running her hand over his body. He had pined for the boy a long while after that killing, refusing to eat or settle, until one night when Gwenhwyfar had taken him out with her for a walk beneath the quiet of the stars. They had been up in the north then, where the rivers ran deeper and wider, had sat together, woman and dog, her arms clasped around the roughness of his neck, her head buried against his coat while the dawn rose. And they had come away with their grief laid to rest. But not buried, not forgotten.

  “I would know what happened,” she said, breaking the stretching silence.

  Bedwyr cleared his throat, spoke, telling all as it was, as if giving report. Telling all, knowing she would not want half-truths or delicate covering of the facts.

  When he finished, she asked a question. “And so you know not where this woman – Morgaine – buried him?”

  Bedwyr shook his head. No. “It matters not. He is gone.”

  Silence again. Bedwyr added wood to the fire. Poured more wine for himself. Gwenhwyfar had not tasted hers. Then another question. “It puzzles me. Happen I am tired or confused.” Gwenhwyfar searched Bedwyr’s strained, dark-lined face for a clue to her worry. Found none. Had to ask. “Why did you go direct to Ambrosius? Not come here, to me, at Caer Cadan?”

  Bedwyr hesitated, wiped his trembling hand around the stubble of his mouth and chin, trying to find the courage to answer her. Ambrosius spoke for him. “Bedwyr thought you to be dead. He knew of no one else to take the news to.”

  She thought on this a moment. “Dead?” she enquired, “How so?”

  “I sent a messenger to the Pendragon when you were ill, to inform him we expected you not to recover.” Ambrosius felt the need to justify himself. “You were so very ill. We, none of us, expected you to survive.”

  Again she mulled this answer in her mind. “But you sent again? Informing him of your mistake? And I sent letters to my husband, several, after I recovered.” She added with strained sadness, “Though I received none in return.”

  “Gwenhwyfar, we had none of these. No messenger, no letter, came. We knew nothing. Arthur was,“ Bedwyr looked down at his feet, feeling awkward, stunned, heartstricken with his own grief. His voice choked. “Arthur was desolate.”

  Gwenhwyfar rose, placed her untouched wine on a table, walked across the room, the men apprehensively expecting something, some outburst. Tears, anger? Something other than this stiff, rigid silence.

  Her cloak was draped over a stool, she took it up, walked for the door, clicked her fingers at the two dogs, who rose and padded beside her.

  “I would walk a while,” she said. “Sort my mind.”

  She let herself out into the harsh weather. Neither of the men made attempt to point out it was now raining, or to stop her.

  V

  The unthinkable had happened. The Pendragon was gone, dead, with none to follow him. Ahead stretched a void of uncertainty and anxious fear for Britain.

  Subdued, going about its business cloaked by a mantle of dark grief, Caer Cadan survived through the passing of the night and day, its women keening husbands or sons who would never return. The men, the Artoriani who had remained behind, nursing the loss of comrades, friends and brothers. They were numbed, desolate.

  The wind had dropped, and the rain had ceased, but the sky hung low and petulant over the autumn landscape of the Summer Land. Trees becoming bare, with leaves fluttering from their limp branches to cover dull, browned and faded grass. The winter waters already returning, over all, the cold swirl of grey. More rain was in the sky, threatening with the banks of cloud that rushed from the west, building behind the Tor lunging upward from the Lake, that at this time of year had swelled and spilled over much of the flatness.

  Only the messengers were busy, sent on the fastest horses to all who should know, by Ambrosius. Council was summoned for the next new moon at his own stronghold of Ambrosium. It had to be. Someone must lead, someone must attempt to keep a steady course over the confusion and disquiet. And someone had to put a hand on the rein that kept control over the Saex.

  Ambrosius stood beyond the Hall, looking at, although not seeing, the height of the rampart walls. He had visited Caer Cadan on but a few occasions only. Each time had been impressed – though reluctant to admit it – by the unity of Arthur’s men. Caer Cadan was a thriving community, the heart, the soul the very being of Arthur’s Britain, while he had been King. Yet now, suddenly overnight, it too had died. Ambrosius could feel it, feel the limp emptiness that was the nothingness of a shell, a dying body. A month or two, some day
after the winter solstice, there might well be nothing here save the abandoned buildings of what once had been.

  Gwenhwyfar stood on the ramparts with her back to the Caer, gazing over the solitude of the Summer Land, her husband’s land, hers now. Ambrosius would not take it from her, though he could allow her to keep only that which had belonged to Arthur as personal possession. The Summer Land, Dumnonia. The rest, Britain, was his.

  If he could keep it.

  A step behind, shuffling. He recognised the tap of a crutch, knew his son approached. Did not turn around.

  “She has stood up there since dawn,” Ambrosius observed aloud, pointing with his finger to Gwenhwyfar. “I hear she passed but a few hours within her chamber during the night. I doubt she slept.”

  Cadwy made no answer.

  “How fares the child? Does she understand much of what is happening?”

  Shaking his head, Cadwy acknowledged that Archfedd did not. “A child comprehends little at her age. I doubt she remembers much of her father.” He steadied his own breathing, added, “It is for us, the adults, to come to terms with our disappointments and griefs.”

  His father nodded. Aye, it was so. Suddenly, unexpectedly, he confided; “I know not how I am to contain the Saex. Word will soon spread among them.” He opened his hands, palms uppermost, let them fall to his side. “Bad word always does, like mould in a barrel of poorly stored fruit.”

  Aesc of the Cantii. Vitolinus. Until now, they had argued and fought between themselves; had annoyed each other as much as they had irritated the British. That would change. There was reason to unite now. Now that Arthur was gone.

  Then there was Aelle of the South Saxons and his three sons. Three years they had been settled along the coast near Noviomagus after the first fighting. Three years while they settled themselves firmer. Entrenched with the British while Arthur had been away moving further backward, further into the shadows of the Great Wood.

  There was little that Cadwy could answer, for there was only the truth.

  “The Saex will rise when they hear Arthur is dead. We can but hope they are not as ready as we may fear. It may be a year, happen two, before we need fight them all at once.”

  Astonished, Ambrosius regarded his son through narrowed eyes. “All at once? You think the tribes of the Saex will unite together against us?”

  Sadly, Cadwy shook his head, began to limp away in the direction of the small dwelling-place that was home for himself and Ragnall. “Against Arthur’s British? No father, they would not. Against you? Aye, they will.” He trudged away, glancing once, as he walked, up at the ramparts where his father had been watching, up at Gwenhwyfar, standing bereft, alone. The Saex would unite against Ambrosius. Arthur they would never have beaten, for he had been a warlord, the Pendragon. Ambrosius Aurelianus was of the same family but he was no soldier, no fighter. Never would the honour and respect of the title Pendragon be bestowed on him.

  And that, the Saex knew all too well.

  VI

  Bedwyr’s boots scuffed on the wooden flooring as he ambled along the walkway. He frowned. Gwenhwyfar was alone, staring out into the emptiness of the landscape. He strolled to stand beside her, near enough to be a companion, not so close as to intrude. He folded his arms along the top rail; stood, much as she, gazing out into the world.

  “We will have frosts early this year,” he said amiably.

  “It will be a long winter.”

  He rested his chin on his hands. “I recall the first time I looked across and saw Yns Witrin under snow. A sparkling bright day it was. Great blue-black shadows stretched across the whiteness. Everything shimmered. You could see the shape of the Tor clearer, more bold against the snow.”

  Gwenhwyfar made no answer this time, kept staring, staring out at nothing. He stole a glance at her. Saw a single tear slither, unchecked, down her cheek.

  “The pain,” he said, “never goes. But it does ease.”

  “No,” she said after a while. “It just becomes buried under a mountain of other pains.”

  There was no comfort, no words, that he could offer. He needed them all for himself, although he had grown used to this thing. No, you could never become used to losing someone you loved. Bedwyr had loved Arthur more than he had his own brother. When Cei had died he had mourned, aye, and grieved, but for a while only. The forgetting had come easily there. But it would not be so for Arthur.

  “As a boy, I worshipped Arthur,” he admitted. “He was my god.” He bit his lip. Gods were supposed to be immortal. Gods did not die. His own tears were coming, trickling faster. “At least, though, I have the one comfort.” He turned to her, instinctively opened his arms, “At least I no longer mourn your loss also.” And she went to him, moving swiftly into his embrace, her face going into his shoulder, his hold tight, protective around her.

  They stood together, the guard on patrol altering his routine walk, turning earlier, to step in measured pace back again along the walkway. His own few tears streaking his firm, wind-weathered face.

  Bedwyr held her as if she were a sister, lover, Queen and wife. She meant much to him, for as a boy he had laughed with her and loved her. She had been his first love, the first to stir a lad’s thoughts to the novelty of women. Whether she ever knew it, he was unsure. Probably she suspected, for he had followed her around like a faithful whelp all those months when she had lived with them in Less Britain. He snorted a single note of self-contempt, said to the sky, his chin resting on her head; “I was so jealous when I discovered it was my cousin, Arthur, you loved, not me.”

  She made no answer but her hands, clasped around his strong body, squeezed harder.

  “I was a lad, naive. I had no idea why you and he were always disappearing together. When, much later, I found out, I was so angry with him – but of course it was too late for me by then, you were already his wife.” He moved slightly, held her away from him to see into her eyes. Smiled at her. “Mind, you’d not have had me in his stead. I was only ten and one years at the time!”

  As he hoped, she returned the smile. She put her hand on his heart. “You are a good man, Bedwyr. Happen, had you been older, I might have chosen you.”

  “Really?”

  Her smile widened slightly as she confessed, “There are many who are dear to me, you are among the dearest. But,” she dropped her hand, turned away, “but no one, no one, ever, will fill this cold, empty space left within me.”

  “I do not think,” Bedwyr replied slowly, “anyone would be fool enough to try.”

  Turning her head, she saw Ambrosius striding across the expanse of the parade ground that stretched before the main doors of the Hall, his purple cloak fluttering as he moved, preparing to leave. There was one man who would not grieve for Arthur for long. She ought go down, bid him farewell. Ought to do many things, not stand up here, idling time by.

  She watched Ambrosius mount his horse, move off. He looked up at her, saluted. She ought at least acknowledge him. Did not. Could not.

  From up here she could see the spread of the Caer with its clutter of rectangular dwelling-places, stables, geese, goat, and pigpens. The blacksmith’s place, the tanner and the leatherworker, the small but efficient hospital; the chapel, kennels and the two enormous granary barns. An army settlement which extended beyond the defence walls, down the cobbled lane to the civilian buildings that had sprung up on the level ground below the great height of the stronghold. Down there were two taverns, a bakery, a potter, a jewel-smith, apothecary and a fuller.

  What would happen to them now? Now there was to be no more Artoriani?

  “I suppose they will all follow Ambrosius,” she said with sadness. “There is nothing for them here, now.”

  Bedwyr frowned, uncertain to what she alluded, but did not question her.

  “And I?” she asked, “Where shall I go?”

  Spreading his hands he indicated he was not following her conversation. “Caer Cadan is your home.”

  “No.” She turned to smile at him,
patient, half-indulgent. There was no sparkle in the expression. “No, this was Arthur’s place. There is too much of him here for me to stay.”

  “All the more reason not to go. At Samhain, the night of the spirits, it is to here he will come.”

  She walked a few paces, heading for the stairway. Stopped.

  Said, “He will never come back here. He has no reason to.” She choked on a sobbed breath, gathered her cloak tight between her white fingers. “Do you not see? He searches for me in the other world. He does not know I am not there, that I am here, alive, in this.”

  VII

  Mathild’s plans had materialised with more ease than she could have envisioned. The Goddess of Fortune had most certainly smiled on her. A succession of events had aided her intentions, as if everything were, indeed, meant to be. Wyrd, the Saxons called it. Fate.

  First, as the touch of dawn was tingeing the eastern sky, they had found a small boat, flat-keeled, oared, suited to these wide, shallow and sluggish rivers. They, the Saxons and the British, had marched at an exhausting pace, covering a handspan of miles before full light, only once looking back when the sky behind had reflected the sudden, bright, glow of fire. The farm-steading, poor hovel that it was, had not deserved such a finality of destruction. The group, weary, heart and footsore, although exchanging no word, thought as one. Hoped the family, for all their inhospitality, had got away from the ferocity of the pursuing enemy. Morgaine and her son also. And that she had first succeeded with the safe burying of the body.

  The boat, no doubt, belonged to some similar poor steading, lying hidden by the trees from the river. They did not delay to find out, but took the craft for themselves, Bedwyr insisting on leaving a pouch containing two gold coins, his last minted money, beside the mooring-post. The Saxons thought him moon-mad; for them, stealing craft was as common as a land-man raiding cattle, but they said naught. It was well known the British were a crazed race.