by Simon Lister
Balor returned first. He had found the first of the brands two hundred yards to their left. Arthur sent them to meet up with Ceinwen and the others. He would wait for Mar’h to return from the other direction. Once they had left, he rested his forehead against the tree trunk he was sheltering behind. The bark was frozen and thinly covered with ice. It felt like it was burning through the numbed skin on his face but he welcomed it. He was reliving the last moments in the Adren camp, the fate of Caja and the other two women from the villages. He slid his forehead from side to side against the iced bark. Tomas and Elowen dead. Perhaps Ethain had been wise to go with Cei but what were the chances their fate would be any different? He wondered if Gwyna had made it to the forest alive and found he didn’t much care one way or the other.
He thought of Caja dancing barefoot in her simple white dress with a circlet of daisies in her hair. He thought of her mother, Ceinwen, and decided never to tell her that Caja had survived Branque. He didn’t think that either Mar’h or Morveren had recognised Caja but all the same he would tell them not to reveal what they had seen in that hut. An image of Fin Seren, her smiling face turned to the rain, came unbidden to his mind and he wondered if he could stop the Cithol sharing the fate of those who had fallen this side of the Causeway. The Downs and valleys of Wessex, would the Adren swarm over them too? Merdynn, Cei, his sister, all gone into the Shadow Lands of the East on a doomed venture.
He reined in his growing desperation and forced himself to stand straight. Not all was lost. If Cei could cut their lifeblood, if the war bands could hold out against the Adren for just long enough. Then perhaps. He remembered Merdynn saying many years ago that hope can be found at the most unlikely times and in the darkest places. For as long as there was a will to make something happen, then there was hope it might be so and hope only needed a seed. A seed that does not need light and does not need water. Just a will to make it happen.
He scanned the darkness of the plain once more and thought he saw shadowy movement. At the same moment Mar’h appeared among the trees to his right. Arthur called out softly to him and Mar’h joined him.
‘Balor’s found the markers,’ Arthur said.
‘Let’s go then, I keep seeing shadows in the darkness,’ Mar’h replied.
‘Did you take the poison barrel out of the Adren camp?’ Arthur asked.
‘Yes. I buried it under the snow out on the plain,’
‘Good. They’ll think we were just raiding their stores. And Mar’h, not a word to anyone about what we saw in that hut.’
‘Did one of them know you?’
‘She mistook me for someone else.’
Mar’h nodded absently, he was wondering if the raid had been worth the price of losing Tomas and Elowen. He put the thought to one side and followed Arthur as they began to make their way back to the camp, constantly looking towards the plain where the snow flew at them from out of the darkness. As they came across the brands that led them to the camp, Arthur upended and extinguished them in the snow.
Morgund and the rearguard were waiting for them. Ceinwen had already led the others off into the forest and towards the cove.
‘Have you put the brands out?’ Arthur called out but before Morgund could answer a cry went up from those around him. An Adren band had stumbled across them. The rearguard only had time to loose off one round of arrows before the Adren were among them.
The roars of the Adren mingled with the sound of weapons being drawn and a vicious, chaotic struggle ensued in the darkness between the trees. Grunts and oaths rang out with the frantic clattering of steel as the rearguard and the Adren scrambled alike in the deep snow, spears smacking into shields and swords flaying at the enemy.
Arthur and Mar’h rushed to join the brutal battle and their sudden onslaught from the Adren flank turned the skirmish in the war band’s favour. But they had lost two more warriors in as many minutes.
Automatically they retreated back into the forest, leaving their dead behind and following the obvious tracks left by those that Ceinwen had led. They retreated in two groups. One would hold a line, longbows drawn and searching the forest while the other retreated a hundred yards. In such a way they leapfrogged each other as they covered the distance to the coast.
The Adren had either misgauged the raiders’ numbers or were too hastily organised, for their hunting packs were too small to overwhelm the rearguard and the only ones that had found the camp were now lying dead around it. Other packs were searching other areas of the forest edge but none had yet picked up their trail and the rearguard made the cove without further attacks.
Things were not as Arthur had expected. The horses were still corralled to one side, under a jutting bluff that offered some shelter from the blizzard that still howled around them. He had expected the difficult process of boarding them onto the boats to have been completed by now. In fact, he had expected the longboats to be only awaiting the rearguard’s arrival. He immediately sent Morgund with his bowmen back to the top of the headland that crouched around the cove in a semi-circle and then looked for Mar’h to find out what the delay was.
He was surprised to find it was Ceinwen who was trying to hasten things along. She was arguing with the adamant Elwyn who had taken on the leadership of the Anglians that had remained with Arthur after Cei’s departure. Elwyn was not a great deal taller than Ceinwen but his thickset, powerful figure matched his attitude. It was not easy to make him give ground in either a fight or an argument. Arthur strode across the pebbled beach.
‘Why aren’t the horses loaded on?’ he shouted to them over the noise of the crashing surf. Ceinwen threw her arms up in exasperation and gestured to Elwyn.
‘We can’t board the boats in these seas! It’s too wild and we’d never get the horses aboard!’ Elwyn shouted back. He shrugged as if to say it was out of his hands and there was nothing to be done.
‘You said you could sail the boats in winter seas!’ Arthur yelled back.
‘Yes, but not in a storm like this! Not yet!’
Arthur looked to the boats, anchored side by side beyond the shallows a hundred yards out and their bows rose in unison as a wave pummelled into them, sending gulleys of foam down the narrow spaces between their sides.
‘We have to wait out the storm?’
Elwyn nodded and Arthur cursed then turned to Ceinwen, ‘Get the wounded up into the sand dunes below the cliff face, do what you can.’
Ceinwen looked up at him, afraid he was going to add something but he only jabbed his thumb towards the place he meant. Ceinwen gathered her supplies and the injured and, with Cael and Morveren’s help, led them up to the shelter of the sand dunes.
A fierce wave stumbled then collapsed onto the beach, spilling its turbulent burden to race up over the tightly packed pebbles that were worn veterans of countless such storms. It engulfed Arthur up to the waist as it surged up the sharp slope and then dragged at his heavy cloak as the sea sucked it back once more. Arthur struggled to keep his footing then waded on towards Ruraidh and the Uathach who were gathered on the far side of the beach.
‘A boat, Arthur! You gave your oath we would have a boat!’ Ruraidh said.
‘Take a boat but I would wait if I were you. The Anglians say it’s folly to launch in this,’ he replied.
‘And wait for the Adren?’
Arthur shrugged his disinterest in their choice. He pointed to Gwyna and another of their clan who were huddled to one side, both wounded.
‘Ceinwen can help your wounded. She’s up in the sand dunes with ours. If you don’t sail now then we could use you on the left up there to guard against an attack.’ Arthur left them without waiting for a reply and went to organise his warriors in a defensive ring around the bay. Ruraidh watched him disappear into the darkness then signalled his warriors to help their wounded up to where Ceinwen was. He reluctantly led the others up to the headland where Arthur had pointed; Elwyn was right, they could not launch in this weather and they would not get away at all if the Adren
caught them here unprepared. Gwyna would have refused Ceinwen’s help too but she was only half-conscious and wracked by enough pain to quell her pride.
Arthur set his warriors below the rim of the headland just before the sloping sand dunes that led down to the stone beach. Even here the snow was two-feet deep and it formed a slight overhang on the edge. Arthur’s warriors huddled behind this overhang, clearing away spaces from which to watch the dark forest that encroached to within yards of the drop down to the cove.
Arthur checked on Ceinwen and the wounded. She answered his questions nervously, in constant fear that he would make a judgement on who would and who would not survive. To her relief he left to join Mar’h who was halfway down the snow-covered dunes and sitting alone with his head bowed.
‘What’s wrong?’ he asked.
‘Back there, in the camp, that hut...’ Mar’h said, then brought both hands up to rub his face.
Arthur nodded but remained silent, staring out over the beach.
‘Those poor women. I’ve seen rape before but…’
‘What warrior hasn’t?’ Arthur replied.
‘I know the Uathach take child-bearing women and use them for breeding but at least that shows some kind of respect for life, no matter how twisted it is. But those women back there, they were kept for sport, as, no more than supplies.’ Mar’h stopped. The thought was too horrific to put into words. He realised he was shaking. Seeing Llud die, then Tamsyn weeping over Talan, both were terrible as were the deaths of Tomas and Elowen during the raid on the camp and he found it hard to accept he would never see any of them again, not this side of death, but at least there was some understandable explanation and reason for their deaths. They had died in battle. They were part of the Wessex war band and they had died in battle either against the Uathach or against the Adren. Such was their fate. But those women? How could their fate lead them to such an end?
He could not stop the shaking. The initial shock had passed during the flight from the Belgae villages but now the true horror was creeping in and he was not at all sure he could face it. Suddenly he turned to one side and vomited. He was sick until there was nothing left to vomit and still he retched, trying to purge the sickening revulsion from deep inside himself. But the horror ran deep. He wiped his mouth with the back of his hand and scooped up a handful of fresh snow to spread over his face.
Arthur watched Mar’h’s shaking hand and stared at his face as his lips worked wordlessly.
Finally Mar’h said, ‘You did recognise her, didn’t you? The screaming one?’
Arthur sighed, ‘Yes. Caja from Branque. Ceinwen was her mother – or at least she had raised her,’ Arthur replied not looking at Mar’h.
‘She called you ‘Breward’?’
‘Her lover from the village I presume, or at least a boy she loved. Maybe just a boy who loved her. She was only seventeen. She was dancing in their hall when the Adren swarmed in.’
‘Seventeen?’ Mar’h asked, his voice shaking again, ‘Oh gods.’ He clasped his arms around his raised knees and bent his head. His lean frame was shivering as he rocked slightly back and forth.
Arthur stared ahead. Even in the darkness he could make out the rolling white horses on the crests of the waves as they advanced in confused ranks and hammered down in a churning, violent assault upon the steep beach. He realised the wind was now blowing into his face and wondered if he had lost his bearings or if the wind had shifted. He saw Elwyn yelling at Lissa and Aylydd and then all three wading the distance to the boats. Aylydd disappeared under the chaos of white raging water as two waves collided against each other, then she was back up and once more fighting to reach the boats.
Arthur turned to Mar’h and quietly asked, ‘Who was she, Mar’h?’
Mar’h looked at Arthur and there was fear in his dark brown eyes.
‘Who?’ he replied, watching Arthur carefully.
Arthur’s face was expressionless as he continued looking into Mar’h’s eyes.
‘When did it happen?’ Arthur asked quietly.
Mar’h’s head sunk back to his chest and his eyes closed. ‘It happened years ago. A lifetime ago. I wasn’t much more than a child. Nor was she.’
Arthur could barely hear him. Finally Mar’h raised his head but his eyes were unseeing, looking instead into the darkness of the past.
‘Oh gods, the fear in her eyes.’ His eyes filled with tears and, as his gaze shifted from one barrelling wave to another, they spilt down his face unchecked. Arthur remained silent, watching the guilt and anguish of the past persecute the man next to him, waiting for him to continue.
‘It was in an Uathach village. We’d just raided them. Breagan, one of Saltran’s men, led the raid. I’d only just joined the war band and I’d just killed my first man. You and some of the others were on another raid somewhere to the North of Mercia. It was back when Saltran was still the Warlord. Oh gods, why did I do it?’ Mar’h’s voice broke and he gripped his knees tightly. ‘Why did I do it?’ he repeated, slowly shaking his head in disbelief and denial.
‘Why did you do it?’ Arthur asked.
Mar’h turned to him suddenly as if accused and condemned. Arthur did not recognise the face before him, a face contorted with despair.
‘Breagan said he had a reward for me. Led me to one of the buildings. She was in there. Cowering in a corner, crying in fear. He held her down and told me to take her, and, I did. Gods help me, I did.’
Mar’h’s shoulders heaved as slow, heavy sobs wracked his chest. He covered his eyes with both hands but could not block out the image of her face as she had cried and pleaded with him. The joy of killing and battle had been upon him and he had looked upon her as his just reward. In quiet moments, over the many years that had passed since, he had kept coming face to face with her.
Arthur remembered Breagan. He had been one of Saltran’s men when Arthur took command of the war band. He was the same kind of warrior too, the kind that had been more of a threat to the villagers than a protector of them. Some of Saltran’s men stayed when Arthur became warlord and Breagan was one of them. They were weeded out one by one as Arthur gradually changed the nature of the war band and he remembered executing Breagan for raping one of the Branque women. He looked at Mar’h and regretted not killing Breagan sooner.
‘I’m no different from those bastards back there,’ Mar’h said bitterly.
‘You think they’d have been haunted by the things they’ve done?’ Arthur asked.
‘Gods, if I could only go back, put it right, take it back, not do it.’
‘You can’t undo what you have done.’
‘What can I do if I can’t undo it?’
‘What you have been doing ever since. Atone.’
Arthur got to his feet and left Mar’h to wander alone in the dark cave behind his glazed eyes, searching his soul and coming once again face to face with the screaming Uathach girl.
Ceinwen looked up as Arthur knelt beside her.
‘They’ll mend, mostly,’ she answered the unasked question.
Arthur looked around for Gwyna but could not see her.
‘Gwyna?’ he asked.
‘She’s a tough bitch. I took the arrow head out, cleaned and bandaged her shoulder and then, when she had finished cursing me, she was off without another word to join Ruraidh and the others.’
Arthur nodded and left her to her work. He climbed the slope up to Morgund.
‘How long are we going to wait here?’ Morgund asked. He was shivering in the cold and steam curled in wisps from his exposed shaven head.
‘Where’s your cloak?’ Arthur asked.
‘Lost it in that skirmish in the forest.’
‘They can’t get the boats out of the cove safely in this storm.’
‘It’s lessening, and the wind’s veered round too. It’s not as if we’re exactly safe here,’ Morgund pointed out.
‘As long as they don’t find our tracks we should be safe. They have no reason to think we would head fo
r the coast, remember they think they destroyed the only boats,’ Arthur said.
‘Just as well,’ Balor said from nearby, ‘We’d be trapped like rats if they found us here.’
Morgund nodded his agreement, his teeth clenched to stop them from chattering. Arthur unhooked his heavy sheepskin cloak and handed it across to Morgund.
‘I’ll see if there’s another on the sledges. You’re no good to us frozen,’ Arthur said and got up to go but Morgund stopped him,
‘Tomas and Elowen?’ he asked.
‘Both dead. Elowen jumped back down to help him but he was already beyond help.’
Morgund nodded as he wrapped the cloak about his broad shoulders, thinking of the time he disturbed them in his roughly built shelter and Tomas’ smile of apology at Elowen’s rebuke. He tried to remember how long ago that was but couldn’t quite place it. A lifetime ago for the both of them he thought and returned to watching the forest edge where he expected the shadows of the Adren to launch an attack before long.
Arthur had gone to talk once more with Elwyn who was back on the beach with both Lissa and Aylydd. Elwyn was adamant that the chances of getting the longboats out of the cove safely were only half-and-half. The blizzard had ceased but the wind still drove the stacked waves fiercely into the cove.
‘Can’t we row them out of the cove to open water?’ Arthur asked.
‘Perhaps, with experienced seafarers. How many of your warriors have handled boats like these before?’ Elwyn asked.
‘Not many,’ Arthur conceded, ‘but if the Adren catch us here in numbers then we’ll die in this cove. I’m sending a scouting party into the forest to give us some warning. If the Adren approach here we’ll row out, whether it’s safe or not. Have the boats ready and have the horses ready too.’ Arthur left them looking at each other.
‘If it comes to it, we’ll captain a boat each and spread our lot among the boats. At least then we’ll have some on each boat who know what they’re doing - because the Wessex lot don’t,’ Elwyn said and the three of them waded out once more to the longboats to finalise their preparations.
