“O Behl,” the druid murmured, “I am your servant. Lord of Sun and Oak, accept poor thanks and promise of restoration. That I should be the one who sees the castle of my father’s father’s fathers half a million times removed!”
The trio at Quester’s prow fell silent.
Samaire, herself no mewling girl nor yet a small souled person, but a woman of will and determination even among the free women of Eirrin, looked from one of those men to the other. Gaels both, dark of hair and pale of eye. The weapon-man and the druid; the eternal twain: warrior and priest. Samaire could not help but feel that she stood in the presence of giants, and of the eerie. These were men sure who stood above other men, whose lines ran back into the mists of time out of mind, and were likely to continue into the far mistier future, even as far.
These two had been here again and again, and would tread this earth again and again still.
And she knew too, with an absolute though never explicable certitude, that she had known at least one of them before.
She was a princess born, and had been wed as a King’s daughter must be, to a prince now dead in his youth. But their relationship had been a tiny and tenuous thing in the immensity of time, even in the limited sweep of this lifetime. He could not have been the man Cormac mac Art was, that prince of Osraige whose loveless wife she had been; nay, not even in his dreams.
And now she was certain too that there was no way she and Cormac could have failed to meet-again-or could part, not ever. She had known him before this life, she now realized, and she would know him again, and again in the unwoven tapestry of the sprawling time-to-come.
Then she looked out before their gliding ship, and what she saw interrupted her reverie and drove it from her mind.
“Cormac-land! Islands!”
And he looked, and gave the orders to swing Quester sharply to starboard, and hold that westward course until they dared turn south again, safely around the Ire of Manannan and the Wind Among the Isles.
Chapter Three:
Death-tide
The man had been roped to the great rounded spire of sea-rooted rock for hours.
From the sea that tall chunk of granite rose, at the very edge of a rocky isle, before which it stood like a sentinel: With the sun shining down, men had walked to it from shore in no more than a foot of water. At high tide, only its upper two feet were visible.
The monument of water-smoothed white stone rose twice the height of a man.
The man bound to it was tall, taller than tall. Nevertheless, both he and those who had bound him here knew that he was not tall enough. The salt sea was coming for him. The water had lapped about his ankles when his captors had left him, well tied. Now it quivered just below his nipples, and crept ever upward. High tide was but a little over an hour away. Sooner than that, he knew, was death.
First there would be the desperate tipping back of his bearded head, the desperate straining to remain above the salt water that lapped at his lips… into his mouth… until it at last rose to his moustache… and above his nostrils. And then he would see the one-eyed All-father, Odin… if the Valkyries could find him, at the time of tide’s ebb.
Behind the mighty rock and the giant with the fiery beard bound to it, another man sat. Well back up the beach was he, with a goatskin bag to hand. It gurgled with the thin, sour wine of Briton grapes. He had situated himself so that he could see the rockbound man, to whom from time to time he called taunting words.
The seated sentry’s shield lay beside him, upturned, and at his other hand was his spear. Between his outstretched legs, though he expected no trouble, lay his ax, a thin broad blade with a hook at its top edge. Down his back fell a thick straw-coloured braid from just behind his right ear; the left braid lay on his shoulder. Both were wound about with two plaited strips of leather, brown and red and tightly bound.
“I’m having another fine sip of wine, now, son of a Danish dog and a piggish slut; can ye hear its gurgle as it goes down to quench my thirst? Or… can ye hear only the gurgle of… water?” He laughed. “Well, drunken dog of Dane-mark, it’s soon your own thirst will be quenched… with salt water!”
Chuckling, the man drank.
Awaiting death, the Dane made no answer. He was a big man, and many heads had fallen to his ax, and making answer to such a one as his Briton ghoul-guard was beneath him. He’d plead with Odin and Thor, Woden and Thunor, until the end of time itself, to be allowed to come back and meet this taunting midden rat as men should meet, and to end his days… slowly.
“Ahhhhhhh,” the man from Britain sighed, with much exaggeration. First licking his lips, he wiped them with the back of his hand and set the goatskin bag aside.
“Tide,” he called out, “come! Bledyn of Gwent grows weary of watching this ugly Danish body swallowed by the sea!”
“Then rise, Bledyn, pig of Gwent, and let me aid you in the shortening of your vigil.”
For a moment Bledyn froze at that cold voice that came from behind, where no man should be. Then he hurled himself to roll sidewise, snatching at both spear and buckler even as, backing like a crab, he drove himself to his feet by main will.
Brooding dark and menacing before him, a tall man stood, lean and chainmailed. Deepset eyes were only just visible in a scarred, grim face set like death itself. Though this challenger was helmeted, Bledyn saw that he was dark of hair. On his left arm the man wore a small buckler, a targe, with a ferocious boar emblazoned on its face. The shield was seemingly negligently held, nor did the man from the night have a spear. He held a goodly sword whose double-edged blade was nigh straight, and slimmer than Bledyn’s own glaive.
“Who… be you?” Bledyn demanded, speaking with care to keep the quiver from out his voice. “Kull of Atlantis. You Britons profane my castle and raise a stench therein, by your piggish presence.” The accent was none Bledyn knew, and thus was
barbarous. And… Atlantis?
“What… do you want here of me, outlander?”
“It’s yourself’s the outlander, man; ye be not now on your own piteous isle, which you first gave to the Romans and now suffer to be taken by all who come from oversea with a few spears! As to what I want… the man on yon rock. It’s a better man than you he is, and I like not your taunting of him. He dies not this night.”
Bledyn’s fingers tightened sweatily about his spear. From out the haunted dark of this unknown bit of rocky land came this strange dark man, calling himself by no name known to Bledyn of Gwent, and calling that fantastic inland keep his. Holding lips and teeth tight, the Briton spoke.
“Be ye man or shade, the Dane dies. So be the decision of us all, and so be the decree of Bedwyr son of Ingcel, and so it’s to be. Begone, man of night, an ye value your hide.”
“I do not.”
That flat stark statement sent Bledyn’s short hairs astriving against the pressure of his helm. Best to move swiftly and end this menace, this insanity, ere the other made the first move. Spear against sword, the Briton of Gwent was sure, were no contest-particularly when he struck first.
Bledyn of Gwent drove his spear with its long leafshaped blade at the man’s belly. At the last moment he twitched it upward, to skewer the face of this “Kull of Atlantis” whilst he strove to protect his vitals.
The other man’s shield was a blur. There was a clang accompanied by Bledyn’s grunt as his spearpoint struck that small buckler which, twisted slightly in a hand both expert and signally swift, sent his weapon aside. Then in another blurring motion that was silvery in the moonlight, the stranger’s sword swept. Again Bledyn grunted; the blow of the blade not only sheared away two feet of his spear, but slammed its haft into his side with its terrible force.
Rather than follow up the advantage that so shocked his opponent, the stranger was still, staring, hardly so much as crouched in combative stance.
“Quarterstaff against sword be no good match, Bledyn of Gwent. Best pick up that ax, or yield your self. Yield and live.”
Still feeling as
though he were a wanderer in some weird dream, Bledyn stared at his decapitated spear a few seconds more. Then he dropped it even as he bent and snatched up his good ax all in one swift motion. Nor had it ended; in a continuation of the same movement, he lunged. The ax-head rushed straight upward. One step backward the dark man took, and then with a frightful clang ax rang off the very boss of the stranger’s shield. It was sped so swiftly aside that Bledyn thought his arm would come off.
“The same tactic twice? Pitiful, Bledyn. Best ye yield, man; I kill only when I must, and there are few enough Britons on the ridge of the world to face off the invaders of your land.”
Bledyn yielded not. Grim, back-prickling fear lent strength to his body and skill to his attack. His great swinging slice was aimed at the other man’s sword-arm.
Somehow that seemingly magic shield was there again, the stranger turning partway aside-and then completely around, to crash his buckler against Bledyn’s with such force that he groaned and felt his shield-arm strike his mouth with a splitting of lip. Desperately he tried to chop. Upward whipping shield-edge struck his arm, his fingers flew open, and his ax went sailing.
At the same time the other man used his sword against the Briton for the first time. He drove it with jolting power into Bledyn’s belly, through leathern jerkin and blue-dyed tunic. A strong arm gave the imbedded blade a half-twist before whipping it free.
The tall slender man stepped back while the Briton, in his eyes a startled look, stretched his length on the sand.
“Ye were warned, Briton,” the man from the night said with a sigh. He half-bent to thrust his sword into the sand. “Unfortunately, killing is usually necessary, though one does try…”
With care, he returned his sand-cleaned blade to the sheath he had slung across his back. Bledyn made no reply, nor did he see aught, for all that his eyes were wide. His feet kicked the sand in spastic jerks.
First looking all about, straining his eyes against the moon-shot dark,. Bledyn’s slayer nodded; the Gwentish Briton had been alone. The tall man walked down the strand to water’s edge, behind the rock to which was bound the red-bearded captive. There he left his targe, and waded out through the tidewaters.
Coming around the huge rock rising up from the sea, he looked into the face of the outsized man bound there. The latter’s eyes widened.
“Cormac! Thunor singe my beard-it’s CORMAC!”
Cormac shook his head. “For shame, Wulfhere, leading total strangers to our island. Ah, Samaire’ll not be liking this, after it was you your self named this isle for her! And man, man, the vanity in ye… bathing your ugly self at this hour!”
Wulfhere Hausakliufr’s fiery beard twitched as the giant’s mouth writhed. He was able to curb hot rejoinder: “It’s shame upon me on both counts in truth, Wolf. But meseems to’ve got entangled… might ye be prevailed upon to lend a poor shame-filled son of Woden a sharp blade?”
Cormac showed his old comrade his dagger, a Saxon’s sax-knife the length of his forearm. “Why o’course, old friend. Where would he like it best: across the throat, or the belly, or straight into the heart?”
After a moment, Wulfhere made reply, “The heart were best; I’d prefer death to come all at once.”
“Aye.”
Unsmiling, Cormac, put up his left hand to the Dane’s massive chest, which even in naught but sodden tunic looked as if he wore one of those moulded cuirasses that gleamed on the high officers of the Romans.
“And whiles I be finding the exact spot-so as to be sure to miss it first time, old friend-suppose ye occupy your gross self with the telling me of how it is ye came here in company with Britons. When I last saw ye it was crew ye were going in quest of-and naturally methought they’d be Danes, sith ye could not afford the best-Eirrin’s sons. But… Britons! And to our island!”
“Cormac!” Hurt broidered Wulfhere’s tone.
Cormac lifted his brows. “This grows more difficult. Your nipples are already under water.” He glanced about, then up at the moon. “Well, ye probably have time for the telling of your tale, ere the tide silences ye.”
“Cormac! Ye… ye demand explanation of ME, battle brother?”
“Humour me.”
“Use your reason, man! Those Britons tethered me here to die as the tide came in. Now no great brain be needed to know we are not allies, they and I! Nor to know that the man ye’ve just come through had an ax, which is my weapon. Now if it’s Britonish blood ye’d be seeing and our booty ye’d prevent their taking, it’s much worse ye could do than to have with you a man in search of the same goal-vengeance sped!”
“A good argument,” Cormac said in the same flat, emotionless tone that was all Wulfhere had heard this night. “And unsullied by statements of old friendship and the like. But Wulfhere… how came ye here in their company?”
Wulfhere sighed. When Cormac the Wolf had a point to make or to hear, he was tenacious as the jaws of his namesake. Nevertheless, Wulfhere tried still again. “How know ye I did?”
“This water grows chill, Wulfhere. Saw you a ship of Eirrin a day or two agone, and it ringed about by Picts?”
“Aye-was you, then!”
“We were too far to recognize, but I know now who was the big fellow standing so close against the mast of the ship I saw.”
“Then ye know I was their prisoner,” Wulfhere said in his chesty rumbling voice, “and roped to that mast. That, Cormac who sore injures me with his doubts, is how I came here ‘in their company.’”
Cormac nodded. He said nothing.
Wulfhere waited, hopefully. Still the Gael spoke not, and the Dane realized that Cormac, too, was waiting. At last the huge man heaved a sigh and gave it up. Looking straight ahead into the darkness so as not to meet the other’s eyes, he told his tale in a swift-running string of words that were quietly spoken indeed.
“I left ye, with Ceann and Samaire, on Eirrin’s shore, nor will I ask aught of what befell ye after. As for me, Odin smiled. I had crew before I reached Dane-mark. Next we found an easy, ah, prey, and soon we were as happy as men can be, with a good ship and no wounds and the wherewithal to buy the best ale. That we did-unwisely, though, for one of my company told me this townlet of Britain, at the Demetian point, was open and there we’d be welcome. Too, he spake of a fine inn, and a great thirst was upon us. There we put in, and went to the ratty inn of that mud-heim, and whilst I wet my throat I let it be known I was alook for more seamen. None came forward, though there were friendly spirits there-”
“Meaning you bought the ale.”
“-and, to my eternal shame, a tavern-wench, an exotic Romish looking girl with shield-broad hips-and may she be accursed with lice, piles, and phlegmy throat all her days! I… she…”
“Ye got drunk with her and your lip flapped like a loose sail in the wind.”
The massive chest rose and fell in another great dolorous sigh that rippled the waters. “Aye, old comrade. When I awoke, my men were gone and I was captive. The wench had two brothers and she brought them fast enow, once I was asleep.”
“Blood of the gods,” Cormac said, his wondering tone not all feigned. “You, drunk unto sleep! Why ye must’ve drunk the land dry as far inland as Powys and Gwent!”
“The place was… well stocked,” Wulfhere admitted. “Naturally it was only denials I made, despite some small pain… I be missing a fingernail now. But these fellows had a ship, and plenty there were about who sought any sort of hope other than being pushed into the sea by the Saxons-ye know how goes it with the Britonish.”
“Ye denied what ye drunkenly blabbed to the wench, but they elected to come and look for themselves.”
“Ah, that brain-how I’ve missed ye and your wise counsel, Cormac!”
Cormac said nothing. Wulfhere, waiting, realized then that so was his fellow-pirate of old. He went on, dully.
“Aye, they decided to sail down here anyhow. With me bound to the mast, stiff and baking by day and shivering by night.”
Such things Wulfhe
re Skull-splitter was not wont to admit, Cormac knew; how anxious the giant was becoming, with the water approaching his collarbones!
“Were there no such isle they said, or no such castle upon it, they avowed it was back they’d take me, and mayhap even aid me in seeking out my crew and the ship they stole from me. An it were here, I’d die though, for having lied that it wasn’t. They, claim to set great store by the truth, these lying Britons!”
“It’s considerable regard for it I’ve always been having myself,” Cormac said musingly.
He ruminated. He believed most of the woeful story, and decided to press no further into the matter of a few points he believed not, and some few details he was sure had been left unmentioned. He knew Wulfhere. He understood.
Cormac was sure that the Dane’s shame was unfeigned. Mayhap he had foolishly made alliance with the wrong men, who’d turned on him when he spoke too much of their destination and what it held-though he’d split many skulls indeed, Wulfhere might too have been surnamed “the Impetuous.” Or mayhap he had indeed fallen deep into his cups and blabbed to some Roman-descended Briton temptress who knew how to love a man and bring his secrets from out him-particularly when they were bragging matters. And mayhap there was another explanation altogether.
It did not matter. Cormac knew he’d been told the greater part of the truth, and that assured him Wulfhere remained the same, and his friend. The Dane had ever been too much given to the moment’s call and too little to thinking a bit. It was a fortunate good pairing they’d made, after they’d met in that foul prison years ago; the Dane had always bent ear to his Gaelic comrade’s counsel, and nearly always abided by it.
With a few swift movements of his knife, Cormac cut Wulfhere loose. He waded back onto the beach while the giant stood flexing his great arms and sucking up vasty breaths.
Following, Wulfhere picked up the Briton ax. He hefted it, plucked up the buckler, with its large protruding boss-which Bledyn had failed to use as he should have done. Wulfhere rushed the ax through the air, swung the shield in a blow that would have sent a foeman flying.
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