by Mary Stewart
The first I knew of our coming to shore was being roused, still heavy with that exhausted sleep, by voices talking over me.
"Well, all right, if you believe him, but do you really think even a bastard prince would be abroad in those clothes? Everything soaking, not even a gilt clasp to his belt, and look at his sandals. I grant you it's a good cloak, but it's torn. More likely the first story was true, and he's a slave running away with his master's things."
It was, of course, Hanno's voice, and he was talking in Breton. Luckily I had my back to them, curled up in the welter of blankets. It was easy to pretend to be asleep. I lay still, and tried to keep my breathing even.
"No, it's the bastard all right; I've seen him in the town. I'd have known him sooner if we'd been able to show a light." The deeper voice was Marric's. "In any case it would hardly matter who he was; slave or royal bastard, he's been privy to a lot in that palace that Ambrosius will want to listen to. And he's a bright lad; oh, yes, he's what he says he is. You don't learn those cool ways and that kind of talking in the kitchens."
"Well, but..." The change in Hanno's voice made my skin shift on my bones. I kept very still.
"Well but what?"
The Weasel dropped his voice still further. "Maybe if we made him talk to us first...I mean, look at it this way. All that stuff he told us, hearing what King Camlach meant to do and all that...If we'd got that information for ourselves and got away to report it, there'd be a fat purse for us, wouldn't there?"
Marric grunted. "And then when he gets ashore and tells someone where he comes from? Ambrosius would hear. He hears everything."
"Are you trying to be simple?" The question was waspish.
It was all I could do to keep still. There was a space between my shoulder-blades where the skin tightened cold over the flesh as if it already felt the knife.
"Oh, I'm not as simple as that. I get you. But I don't see that it —"
"Nobody in Maridunum knows where he went." Hanno's whisper was hurried and eager. "As for the men who saw him come on board, they'll think we've taken him off with us now. In fact, that's what we'll do, take him with us now, and there are plenty of places between here and the town..." I heard him swallow. "I told you before we put out, it's senseless to have spent the money on his passage —"
"If we were going to get rid of him," said Marric bluntly, "we'd have done better not to have paid his passage at all. Have a bit of sense, we'll get the money back now in any case, and maybe a good bit over."
"How do you make that out?"
"Well, if the boy has got information, Ambrosius'll pay the passage, you can be sure of that. Then if it turns out he is the bastard — and I'm certain he is — there might be extra in it for us. Kings' sons — or grandsons — come in useful, as who should know better than Ambrosius?"
"Ambrosius must know the boy's useless as a hostage." Hanno sounded sullen.
"Who's to tell? And if he's no use either way to Ambrosius, then we keep the boy and sell him and split the proceeds. So leave it be, I tell you. Alive, he might be worth something; dead, he's worth nothing at all, and we might find ourselves out of pocket over his passage."
I felt Hanno's toe prodding me, not gently. "Doesn't look worth much either way at the moment. Ever know anyone so sick? He must have a stomach like a girl. Do you even suppose he can walk?"
"We can find out," said Marric, and shook me. "Here, boy, get up." I groaned, rolled over slowly, and showed them what I hoped was a wretchedly pale face.
"What is it? Are we there?" I asked it in Welsh.
"Yes, we're there. Come on now, get to your feet, we're going ashore."
I groaned again, more dismally than before, and clutched my belly. "Oh, God, no, leave me alone."
"A bucket of sea water," suggested Hanno.
Marric straightened. "There's hardly time." He spoke in Breton again. "He looks as if we'd have to carry him. No, we'll have to leave him; we've got to get straight to the Count. It's the night of the meeting, remember? He'll already know the ship's docked, and he'll be expecting to see us before he has to leave. We'd better get the report straight to him, or there'll be trouble. We'll leave the boy here for the time being. We can lock him up and tell the watch to keep an eye on him. We can be back well before midnight."
"You can, you mean," said Hanno sourly. "I've got something that won't wait."
"Ambrosius won't wait, either, so if you want the money for that, you'd better come. They've half finished unloading already. Who's on watch?"
Hanno said something, but the creak of the heavy door as they pulled it shut behind them, and then the thudding of the bars dropping into their sockets drowned the reply. I heard the wedges go in, then lost the sound of their voices and footsteps in the noises of the off-loading operation that was shaking the ship — the creak of winches, the shouts of men above me and a few yards away on shore, the hiss and squeak of running hawsers, and the thud of loads being lifted and swung overside on to the wharf. I threw the blankets off and sat up. With the ceasing of the dreadful motion of the ship I felt steady again — even well, with a sort of light and purged emptiness that gave me a strange feeling of well-being, a floating, slightly unreal sensation, like the power one has in dreams. I knelt up on the bedding and looked about me. They had lanterns on the wharf to work by, and light from these fell through the small square port-hole. It showed me the wide-mouthed jar, still in place, and a new hunk of barley bread. I unstoppered the jar and tasted the water cautiously. It was musty, tasting of the rag, but good enough, and it cleared the metallic sickness from my mouth. The bread was iron-hard, but I soused it in water until I could break off a piece to chew. Then I got up, and levered myself up to look out of the port-hole.
To do this I had to reach for the sill and pull myself up by my hands, finding a hold for my toes on one of the struts that lined the bulkhead. I had guessed by the shape of my prison that the hold was in the bows, and I now saw that this was correct. The ship lay alongside a stone-built wharf where a couple of lanterns hung on posts, and by their light some twenty men — soldiers — were working to bring the bales and loaded crates off the ship. To the back of the wharf was a row of solid-looking buildings, presumably for storage, but tonight it looked as if the merchandise were bound elsewhere. Carts waited beyond the lamp posts, the hitched mules patient. The men with the carts were in uniform, and armed, and there was an officer superintending the unloading.
The ship was moored close to the wharf amidships, where the gang-plank was. Her forward hawser ran from the rail above my head to the wharf, and this had allowed the bow to swing out from land, so that between me and the shore lay about fifteen feet of water. There were no lights at this end of the ship; the rope ran down into a comfortable pool of darkness, and beyond that was the deeper darkness of the buildings. But I would have to wait, I decided, till the unloading was finished, and the carts — and presumably the soldiers with them — moved off. There would be time later to escape, with only the watch on board, and perhaps even the lanterns gone from the wharf.
For of course I must escape. If I stayed where I was, my only hope of safety lay in Marric's goodwill, and this in its turn depended on the outcome of his interview with Ambrosius. And if for some reason Marric could not come back, and Hanno came instead...
Besides, I was hungry. The water and the hideous snack of soaked bread had set the juices churning in a ferociously empty belly, and the prospect of waiting two or three hours before anyone came back for me was intolerable, even without the fear of what that return might bring. And even if the best should happen, and Ambrosius send for me, I could not be too sure of my fate at his hands once he had all the information I could give him. Despite the bluff which had saved my life from the spies, this information was scanty enough, and Hanno had been right in guessing — and Ambrosius would know it — that I was useless as a hostage. My semi-royal status might impress Marric and Hanno, but neither being grandson to Vortigern's ally, nor nephew to Vortime
r's, would be much of a recommendation to Ambrosius' kindness. It looked as if, royal or not, my lot would with luck be slavery, and without it, an unsung death.
And this I had no intention of waiting for. Not while the port-hole stood open, and the hawser ran, sagging only slightly, from just above me to the bollard on the wharf. The two spies, I supposed, were so little accustomed to dealing with prisoners of my size that they had not even given a thought to the port-hole. No man, not even the weaselly Hanno, could have attempted escape that way, but a slim boy could. Even if they had thought of it, they knew I could not swim, and they had not reckoned with the rope. But, eyeing it carefully as I hung there in the port-hole, I thought I could manage it. If the rats could go along it — I could see one now, a huge fat fellow, sleek with scraps, creeping down towards the shore — then so could I. But I would have to wait. Meanwhile, it was cold, and I was naked. I dropped lightly back into the hold, and turned to hunt for my clothes.
The light from the shore was dim but sufficient. It showed me the small cage of my prison with the blankets tumbled on the pile of old sacks that had been my bed; a warped and splitting sea-chest against a bulkhead; a pile of rusty chain too heavy for me to shift; the water jar, and in the far corner — "far" meaning two paces away — the vile bucket still half-full of vomit. It showed me nothing else. It may have been a kindly impulse which had made Marric strip me of my sodden clothes, but either he had forgotten to return them, or they had been kept back to prevent me from doing this very thing.
Five seconds showed me that the chest contained nothing but some writing tablets, a bronze cup, and some leather sandal-thongs. At least, I thought, letting the lid down gently on this unpromising collection, they had left me my sandals. Not that I wasn't used to going barefoot, but not in winter, not on the roads...For, naked or not, I had still to escape. Marric's very precautions made me more than ever anxious to get away.
What I would do, where I would go, I had no idea, but the god had sent me safely out of Camlach's hands and across the Narrow Sea, and I trusted my fate. As far as I had a plan I intended to get near enough to Ambrosius to judge what kind of man this was, then, if I thought there was patronage there, or even only mercy, I could approach him and offer him my story and my services. It never entered my head that there might be anything absurd about asking a prince to employ a twelve-year-old. I suppose that to this extent at least, I was royal. Failing Ambrosius' service, I believe I had some hazy idea of making my way to the village north of Kerrec where Moravik came from, and asking for her people.
The sacks I had been lying on were oldish, and beginning to rot. It was easy enough to tear one of them open at the seams for my head and arms to go through. It made a dreadful garment, but it covered me after a fashion. I ripped a second one, and pulled that over my head as well, for warmth. A third would be too bulky. I fingered the blankets longingly, but they were good ones, too thick to tear, and would have been impossibly hampering on my climb out of the ship. Reluctantly, I let them lie. A couple of the leather thongs, knotted together, made a girdle. I stuffed the remaining lump of barley bread into the front of my sack, swilled my face, hands, and hair with the rest of the water, then went again to the port-hole and pulled myself up to look out.
While I was dressing I heard shouts and the tramp of feet, as if the men had been formed up ready to march. I now saw that this had indeed happened. Men and carts were moving off. The last of the carts, heavily loaded, was just creaking away past the buildings with the whip cracking over the straining mules. With them went the tramp of marching feet. I wondered what the cargo was; hardly grain at that time of year; more likely, I thought, metal or ore, to be unloaded by troops and sent to the town under guard. The sounds receded. I looked carefully round. The lanterns still hung from the posts, but as far as I could see the wharf was deserted. It was time to go, before the watch decided to come forward to check on the prisoner.
For an active boy, it was easy. I was soon sitting astride the sill of the port-hole, with my body outside and my legs gripping the bulkhead while I reached up for the rope. There was a bad moment when I found I could not reach it, and would have to stand, holding myself somehow against the hull of the ship, above the black depths between ship and wharf where the oily water lapped and sucked, rustling its drifts of refuse against the dripping walls. But I managed it, clawing up the ship's side as if I had been another of the shoregoing rats, till at last I could stretch upright and grasp the hawser. This was taut and dry, and went down at a gentle angle towards the bollard on the wharf. I gripped it with both hands, twisted to face outwards, then swung my legs free of the ship and up over the rope.
I had meant to let myself down gently, hand over hand, to land in the shadows, but what I hadn't reckoned on, being no seaman, was the waterborne lightness of a small ship. Even my slender weight, as I hitched myself down the rope, made her curtsy, sharply and disconcertingly, and then, tilting, swing her bow suddenly in towards the wharf. The hawser sagged, slackened, drooped under my weight as the strain was loosed, then went down into a loop. Where I swung, clinging like a monkey, it suddenly hung vertical. My feet lost their grip and slid away from me; my hands could not hold my weight. I went down the ship's side on that hawser like a bead on a string.
If the ship had swung more slowly I would have been crushed as she ground against the wharf-side, or drowned as I reached the bottom of the loop, but she went like a horse shying. As she jarred the edge of the wharf I was just above it, and the jerk loosened what was left of my grip and flung me clear. I missed the bollard by inches, and landed sprawling on the frost-hard ground in the shadow of a wall.
2
There was no time to wonder whether I was hurt. I could hear the slap of bare feet on the deck above me as the watch raced along to see what had happened. I bunched, rolled, and was on my feet and running before his bobbing lantern reached the side. I heard him shout something, but I had already dodged round the corner of the buildings, and was sure he had not seen me. Even if he had, I thought I was safe enough. He would check my prison first, and even then I doubted if he would dare leave the ship. I leaned for a moment or two against the wall, hugging the rope burns on my hands, and trying to adjust my eyes to the night.
Since I had come from near-darkness in my prison, this took no more than a few seconds, and I looked quickly about me to get my bearings.
The shed that hid me was the end one of the row, and behind it — on the side away from the wharf — was the road, a straight ribbon of gravel, making for a cluster of lights some distance away. This no doubt was the town. Nearer, just where the road was swallowed by darkness, was a dim and shifting gleam, which must be the tail light of the last wagon. Nothing else moved.
It was a fairly safe guess that any wagons so guarded were bound for Ambrosius' headquarters. I had no idea whether I could get to him, or even into any town or village, but all I wanted at this stage was to find something to eat, and somewhere warm where I could hide and eat it, and wait for daylight. Once I got my bearings, no doubt the god would lead me still.
He would also have to feed me. I had originally meant to sell one of my brooches for food, but now, I thought, as I jogged in the wake of the wagons, I would have to steal something. At the very worst, I still had a hunk of barley bread. Then somewhere to hide until daylight...If Ambrosius was at "a meeting," as Marric had said, it would be worse than useless to go to his headquarters and ask to see him now. Whatever my sense of my own importance, it did not stretch to privileged treatment by Ambrosius' soldiers if I turned up dressed like this in his absence. Come daylight, we should see.
It was cold. My breath puffed, grey on the black and icy air. There was no moon, but the stars were out like wolves' eyes, glaring. Frost glittered on the stones of the road, and rang under the hoofs and wheels ahead of me. Mercifully there was no wind, and my blood warmed with running, but I dared not catch up with the convoy, which went slowly, so that from time to time I had to check and hang b
ack, while the freezing air bit through the ragged sacks and I flailed my arms against my body for warmth.
Fortunately there was plenty of cover; bushes, sometimes in crouching clusters, sometimes singly, hunched as they had frozen in the path of the prevailing wind, still reaching after it with stiff fingers. Among them great stones stood, rearing sharp against the stars. I took the first of these for a huge milestone, but then saw others, in ranks, thrusting from the turf like storm-blasted avenues of trees. Or like colonnades where gods walked — but not gods that I knew. The starlight struck the face of the stone where I had paused to wait, and something caught my eye, a shape rudely carved in the granite, and etched by the cold light like lampblack. An axe, two-headed. The standing stones stretched away from me into darkness like a march of giants. A dry thistle, broken down to the stalk, stabbed my bare leg. As I turned away I glanced at the axe again. It had vanished.
I ran back to the road, clamping my teeth against the shivering. It was the cold, of course, that made me shiver; what else? The wagons had drawn ahead again, and I ran after, keeping to the turf at the road's edge, though this in fact seemed as hard as the gravel. The frost broke and squeaked under my sandals. Behind me the silent army of stones marched dwindling into the dark, and before me now were the lights of a town and the warmth of its houses reaching out to meet me. I think it was the first time that I, Merlin, had run towards light and company, run from solitude as if it were a ring of wolves' eyes driving one nearer the fire.
It was a walled town. I should have guessed it, so near the sea. There was a high earthwork and above that a palisade, and the ditch outside the earthwork was wide and white with ice. They had smashed the ice at intervals, so that it would not bear; I could see the black stars and the crisscross map of cracks just skinning over with grey glass as the new ice formed. There was a wooden bridge across to the gate, and here the wagons halted, while the officer rode forward to speak to the guards, and the men stood like rocks while the mules stamped and blew and jingled their harness, eager for the warmth of the stable.
