by Simon Lister
Arthur sent a scouting party of five, led by Mar’h, into the forests. They were told not to make any contact with the enemy but to return with the earliest possible warning if the Adren were following the band’s tracks and making their way to the cove. Arthur thought the risk of entrusting the scouting party to Mar’h worthwhile. It would bring his mind back on the present and the task at hand, nonetheless he sent Morveren with him to keep an eye on him. He told Morveren that Mar’h had let the deaths of Tomas and Elowen, and those of the women in the hut, get to him and that she should stay close and watch him. He also told her to keep the events of the hut to herself. Morveren had accepted this, the pain of losing her friends had affected her too. She could understand how Mar’h must be feeling and she assumed that Arthur must be thinking about the others’ morale in wanting to keep the nightmare scenes from the hut just between the three of them.
The scouting party slipped over the lip of the headland and disappeared into the darkness of the forest, retracing the route taken by the rearguard. The rest settled back down to wait for either the seas to calm or the forest to erupt in an Adren attack.
The clouds above them began to break and patches of the bright winter stars could be briefly seen before being snatched away again by the scudding clouds. The snow had stopped but the wind still swirled and buffeted the bay, forcing the serried waves onwards in their endless assault on the beach. The constant tumult of the sea and the rolling and grinding of stones as the waves broke upon them filled the cove with a ceaseless roar, which lulled the tired warriors. Heads nodded and eyes closed in the cold, damp air and Arthur went from group to group to keep them awake and watching the forest.
Elwyn brought the longboats in one by one and with Cael’s help, marshalled the horses into them. These boats were designed to carry not only the Belgae villagers but also their stores and stock so each boat had partitioned stalls in which to tether various animals. The horses were unused to this and it took several men to lead each horse up the ramp and into a stall. It was a lengthy process but eventually all the horses and what stores they still had were loaded and the longboats once again rode at anchor, their bows pointing to the narrows that led to the open water.
Elwyn then went round all of Cei’s warriors that had remained with Arthur and told them which boats they were to make for. He told the Wessex warriors to follow the lead of the Anglians in their boat and to do exactly as they were told if they wanted to make it out of the cove and across the seas. No one resented the instructions, they were well aware that once in the boats their fate was in Anglian hands.
Next he went to the Uathach band and told them which of the boats they were to take. As they no longer had their horses the stalls on their boat were empty and Elwyn had stored some supplies there for the crossing.
Finally he brought the empty sledges up to where the wounded were. They could be carried to the boats on the makeshift stretchers when the time came. Having done what he could, Elwyn too settled down to wait either for the Adren or for the wind to change. He did not think the wind would change any time soon so he strung his longbow and counted out what arrows he had remaining. He did not have that many and certainly not enough. He sat down with the longbow over his legs, and with his back to the headland he watched the heaving seas and waited.
He did not have long to wait. Within the hour Morveren came sprinting out of the trees and leapt down to the sand dunes below the rim of the headland. Arthur was by her side in seconds.
‘Adren?’
‘Yes,’ she panted in reply.
‘Coming this way? To the cove?’
‘Yes.’ Her face was running with sweat.
‘How many?’
‘All of them.’
‘All of them?’
Morveren shrugged between deep breaths, ‘The forest is alive with them.’
Arthur started to yell out orders and groups raced across the stony beach, flinging themselves into the surging water and making for the longboats. Mar’h and the other scouts ran from the trees and took up their positions with the defenders.
‘How much time do we have?’
Morveren looked at Arthur shaking her head, ‘Not enough.’
Chapter Eleven
The cove was a good place for concealment but a bad place to have to defend. Arthur knew this but there had been no alternatives, concealment had been their best gamble. It had not paid off.
Elwyn and the other Anglians raced for the boats, flinging themselves headlong into the waves that still pounded the beach. Arthur had considered putting bowmen on the boats to give them cover as they retreated but having stood on the decks, as the boats rode at anchor, he realised they were pitching too violently for any kind of accurate aim.
Instead, those of his war band not already making for the boats formed into two arced ranks on the stony beach forming a slightly askew crescent. He put those that could swim in the first rank with their longbows ready and the remaining arrows held by those behind them who had their shields raised. They waited one last time, all eyes scanning along the headland above them waiting for the Adren ranks to come swarming over the rim and down the sand dunes.
Elwyn and his men were working desperately to bring the longboats close enough to the shore for the rest of the warriors to board. Ruraidh and the Uathach plunged headlong into the sea and struck out for their boat. Gwyna, unable to swim because of her injured shoulder, stood by the wounded who were laid out on the sledges at the edge of the beach behind the two ranks of Arthur’s warriors. As the waves raced up the beach the sledges lifted momentarily in the surf, half turned and then grounded again. The spent waves eddied around the legs of the waiting ranks and dragged at their feet as it tried to suck them back into the next crashing wave.
Arthur cast a look back over his shoulder to see how close the boats were. They were not close enough yet. He yelled to Ceinwen and Gwyna to float the sledges out as soon as they could. Then the Adren came.
They stopped on the rim above the dunes, at first just a few then more and more joined them until the whole of the headland was crowded with the black figures. From one end of the half circle to the other they looked down on the two ranks of Arthur’s war band.
Arthur yelled to the line before him to wait for the charge. He did not want to precipitate the attack, every second the Adren hesitated, the closer the longboats got to the shallows.
A dark cloud of arrows flew from the Adren ranks but they were firing into a strong wind and their bows were far less powerful than the longbows used by Arthur’s warriors and they fell short, skittering across the wet stones.
Then with a roar that echoed over the wind and waves the Adren charged down the slope. In front of Arthur the first rank let their arrows fly, then reached over their shoulder for the next arrow to be slapped into their hand by the person behind them. The bowmen could loose an arrow every few seconds this way. It would take the Adren at least forty seconds to cover the two hundred yards over the dunes and sand. Even at two hundred yards the warriors’ aim was deadly and the force of their arrows sent those they hit flying backwards. The arrows tore through the packed Adren ranks and over a hundred and fifty fell as they covered the distance to the shoreline but the charge did not falter and others took the place of those that fell.
When the massed ranks of the charging Adren were only ten paces away Arthur roared for the first rank to fall back. Arthur’s line closed in front of them with their swords drawn and their shields raised to meet the raging force of the Adren. The shield wall swayed backwards as the Adren crashed into it but it held intact and the furious hacking battle started.
Those that had been in the first rank now waded desperately towards the nearing longboats, the waves breaking over their heads and surging on to crash around the raging battle in the shallows. The surf foamed red with blood as Arthur’s shield wall was slowly driven into deeper water.
Arthur stood at the centre of the arced wall with Mar’h to his right and Balor to his l
eft. The Adren were forced upon them by the pressure of those behind trying to reach the hated raiders. As planned, the shield wall slowly gave ground. Arthur and those around him were waist deep in the water now and already the two ends of the curved line had reached a depth where they abandoned the fight and thrashed towards the longboats. In this way the length of the shield wall that the Adren could attack gradually diminished but the fighting grew fiercer as it became more focussed on the centre.
Still shoulder to shoulder and allowing no gaps for the Adren to force their way through, they continued to give ground. Arthur was savagely hacking down the Adren before him, while Balor’s axe pummelled downwards to his left and on his right Mar’h’s sword jabbed in repeated thrusts over his shield at the faces of the enemy that were pressed towards him.
Still the two ends of the shield wall peeled away as warriors flung aside their shields and floundered to the boats that were almost upon them. The sea was up to Arthur’s chest now and the waves lifted friend and foe alike as they swept their way onto the beach. The fight had become desperate and the Adren flung themselves at the nine warriors still around Arthur.
Coiled ropes flew from the nearest longboat and slapped into the water behind the last of the shield wall. Arthur roared the last order and the remnants of the shield wall broke apart as they flung their shields at their attackers and grasped for the ropes in the water behind them. Fending off the hacking Adren swords they wrapped the rope around their arms. Those on the longboat hauled with all their strength and the last of the shield wall surged raggedly backwards as they were pulled out of their depth and beyond the Adren still attacking them. Not all of them made it. Four of those last nine died, hacked down or lost to the sea.
Arthur was hauled up the side of the longboat still tightly gripping his sword. He spilled onto the deck and knelt on all fours, coughing up seawater. Mar’h and Balor were hoisted up over the side and flopped next to Arthur, Mar’h spluttering and gasping, Balor lying still and unmoving. Blood seeped from a head wound where his hardened leather cap had been split.
Arthur climbed to his feet, exhausted from the fighting in the water. He shook Mar’h back to a sense of his surroundings, ‘Mar’h! See to Balor, he’s hurt,’ he shouted hoarsely to him.
Mar’h crawled across to the inert Balor and Arthur looked around the boat, trying to keep his feet as it pitched violently. The boat was being driven back towards the shore and to the Adren who lined the beach firing arrows out over the shallows, enraged that they had been cheated of killing the hated raiders.
Arthur searched the dark bay for the other boats. One was nearing the entrance to the cove, probably Ruraidh’s as they were first off. The other two were gradually making headway after Ruraidh’s longboat. In his own boat the Anglians at the front were pulling on the oars with all their strength but they were too few and their efforts only served to keep the boat pointing bow-first to the waves.
Elwyn was yelling orders from the stern where he stood on a raised platform manning the rudder. Arthur understood what he wanted even though his words were stolen by the wind. He gathered those around him and they began feeding the oars out into the boiling sea. Following the rhythm of the Anglians in front, they began to haul on the oars. Inch by inch then foot by foot they stopped the drift back to the shoreline. Saewulf, who was near the bows, began a chant and the Anglians roared it out to the strokes of the oars as they put their backs against the sea.
Arthur’s men were too exhausted to join in. They shut their eyes and hauled on the long oars in time to the chanting. Their boat began to nose its way forward towards the mouth of the cove where Ruraidh’s boat fought to make its way out. Arthur tried to look forward as the boat shuddered violently against the oncoming waves. The open sea looked no nearer but he could only see two boats ahead of them now, bows pointing to the narrower gap that led out of the cove. Either one boat had made it out or it had gone under, turned by a wave then capsized by those that followed greedily after.
Arthur’s men, already exhausted by the battle, were tiring rapidly. Elwyn could see that they were not going to make it. He lashed the rudder in place and raced down the wooden planking to where Morveren and Mar’h were pulling on an oar. He jumped down beside them and turned his head away as a wave crashed against the side of the boat and cascaded over them.
‘You know how to steer this boat?’ he yelled at Morveren.
She nodded violently back, her long dark hair plastered across her face and neck. She had grown up by the sea in the far West of Wessex and had been sailing boats since childhood.
Elwyn flung his arm back towards the lashed tiller, ‘Keep her pointed dead centre of the opening!’ he yelled as Morveren worked her way past him. She ran lightly back down the boat, seemingly oblivious to the jarring assault of the waves. Seeing that Mar’h could not grip the oar with his left hand, Elwyn quickly lashed it to the oar and turned to yell at those around him, ‘Row! Row or die!’
He joined Mar’h at the oar and together they swung it back into the water in time with those in front.
They rowed with arms and backs that burnt with the effort. They rowed with gulping desperate breaths that were not enough to feed their strained, exhausted muscles. They rowed blindly with faces screwed up in pain, crashing into those behind them when a deeper trough robbed their oars of any purchase in the water. They rowed beyond their limits, when their strength was gone and only their will remained. They made the entrance to the cove only for the concertinaed waves to hold them trapped in a boiling fury of white water. Elwyn screamed for one last effort for it was now or be turned and smashed against the cliffs that guarded the entrance. Somehow the Anglians manning the oars in the bows found the reserves to increase their strokes and the ragged band behind them doggedly followed the pace, knowing that another few seconds were all they could give.
It was enough. The longboat pulled through and away from the entrance. Arthur’s men collapsed over their oars, fighting for breath while the Anglians sprang to the masthead to unfurl and set the storm sail. It rippled then cracked open and the boat surged to one side. Elwyn took the rudder from Morveren and the longboat leapt forward, diagonally cutting into the waves and rolling wildly from side to side.
Arthur’s men were dead to the world and beyond caring whether the storm took them or not. For a long while they existed only in their own individual worlds of pain and exhaustion. Mar’h struggled to untie the rope that lashed his arm to the oar then gave up and drew his knife to cut himself free. He half crouched, half crawled his way back along the boat that tilted to first one side then the other as the heavy rollers of the sea first lifted the longboat then dropped it like a toy. Mar’h’s stomach lurched up and down with every rise and fall as the boat fought up to the crest of each wave and then hurriedly slid down into its trough only to start the whole sickening process over again.
Finally he reached Balor who was still unconscious. He dragged him across to the side and propped him up then gingerly removed his split leather cap. The seawater that continually crashed over the sides had doused away the blood and washed the wound clean. It did not look too deep but Mar’h guessed that Balor would be at best badly concussed. He called across to one of the Anglians nearby and together they carried him to the comparative shelter of one of the stalls.
These longboats had no quarters below decks. They were not designed for anything more than a crossing of a few days and then not over winter seas. The warriors who only a short while ago were burning with exhaustion now huddled wherever they thought there might be shelter. The Anglians knew better, there was no shelter on a longboat in open seas and they busied themselves with the running of the boat. They all froze in the unrelenting and biting wind. The gale whipped the water from the tops of waves and the air was drenched with spray that continually soaked them, and their clothing gradually stiffened with ice despite their attempts to keep moving.
They saw no sign of the other boats, even if one or more had been near, t
he rolling dark hills of water and the winter night would have kept them from sight. Each boat took its own course, tacking widely across the dark, storm-driven seas. Elwyn was hoping to make it to a sheltered bay used by the Anglians and knew the other boats would be making for the same bay. Everyone on the boat had made the journey across the Western Seas on more than one occasion but that was on the ships from the Haven. They were far bigger than the longboats of the Anglians, three-masted and with quarters below decks.
They all recalled the tales of how one Imbolc the ships never returned to Middangeard. It had happened many generations ago and thousands had been lost. No one had survived to tell whether they were lost in a storm on the journey out or back, or whether they had landed on some strange unknown shore and met their fate there. Many tales were told of the lost crossing and many took enjoyment from listening to them but none wanted to be a part of any such tale.
Each spring when the sun rose once more over the Western Seas, the lookouts on the towers in the Haven watched the oceans for the sails of the homecoming ships and each year they celebrated both the homecoming and the Wakening of the Sun. Except for the year when they never came home when the tales tell of whole villages standing empty and fields going fallow. All through that summer they had kept watchers on the towers but the seas remained empty and as autumn approached they chose a new king and prayed to their gods for the thousands of the lost crossing.
The warriors on the longboat did not want to share that fate but could do nothing other than wait and keep out of the way of the Anglians as they went about the task of getting them home. Throughout the journey the wind howled against them as if seeking to drive them back to the Adren armies and the Shadow Lands. Elwyn worked the boat in long tacks, fighting against the wind while each turn took them a little closer to home. They covered six times the distance that the migrating birds took in autumn to get from coast to coast.
