Camulod Chronicles Book 8 - Clothar the Frank

by Whyte, Jack

  I nodded, smiling. "An impressive estimate, my friend, for one whose responsibilities have no connection with such things."

  "Aye, right." He inclined his head, acknowledging my praise. "But where does that leave us?"

  I glanced at Ursus. "It leaves us with a bridge down that ought to be up. Let's change that, for a start."

  Clodio began shouting orders to the men he had ordered down from the battlements above, and while he was instructing them, Ursus turned to me, nodding towards the bridge. "That is excellent," he said, "and all very well. Raise the bridge and keep the wicked ones out. Excellent precaution. But it has flaws. What about Beddoc?"

  "What about him?"

  "He'll be here soon, probably within the hour." He saw from my expression that I had no notion of what he was suggesting, and so he continued. "You want to keep him outside the gates and away from Gunthar? That's understandable, except that Gunthar is out there as well, on the far side of the bridge."

  I stared at him, hearing his words and understanding what he was saying, but completely incapable of responding. He spoke on, ignoring my open-mouthed silence. "So, will you keep Beddoc outside the gates to wait for Gunthar's arrival, or let him inside, knowing that he is Gunthar's man and therefore your enemy?"

  "And knowing, too, that once he is inside we have no one here to withstand him or to influence his behaviour," I added, finally finding my voice.

  "Exactly." Ursus looked at me, one eyebrow raised, and almost, but not quite smiling. "You catch up quickly, no matter how far you lag behind at the outset. I think you've grasped the gist of the problem."

  I nodded, slowly. "Aye, but not the solution."

  "There may not be one." He turned around in a wide arc, gazing at the layout of the castle's defenses. "Certes, if you raise the bridge no one comes in, but we shut out our friends as well as our enemies. We'll hold Gunthar and his ambitions at bay, safe outside the walls, but Queen Vivienne will be out there with him, as will your two other brothers and the men who ride with them. And then will come the arrival of Samson and Chulderic. An entire carnival, with good and evil ranged on opposing sides, and all on the lands outside your gates. Do you enjoy the thought of that?"

  "No, Ursus, I do not—most particularly since these are not my gates. They are the Queen's gates, now, for she is Ban's legal regent until Samson can assume the kingship."

  "Think not on that, lad. As long as you control the bridge the gates are yours. All we can do is hope to have the time and opportunity to open them to the Queen and her men."

  "Aye, but there are too many unknown factors here and I do not enjoy having that responsibility, Ursus."

  "No more do I, but there must be an answer for us somewhere, even though I cannot see it yet . . . Was your uncle Ban a drinking man?"

  "What do you mean?"

  "Did he drink beer, or wine? Would he keep any of such things available for his use?"

  "Aye," I concurred, remembering. "He always had beer to hand."

  "Good, then let's raise this whoreson bridge and find some of his beer. In the drinking of fine beer, many weighty problems are easily solved and frequently come to naught."

  Half an hour later, secure behind a raised drawbridge, Ursus and I sat with Clodio, holding foaming tankards and discussing our situation. Clodio said nothing, content to leave, at least outwardly, the thinking to Ursus and myself.

  For my part, I disliked the taste of the beer but I was willing to think, to make the effort of thinking. Unfortunately, I lacked both the capacity and the experience to be aware of what I should be thinking about at such a time, and so I, too, said nothing.

  Ursus sat silently and sipped his beer with grave deliberation, gazing with tranquil, uncreased brow into the middle distance.

  "So," I asked him when I could bear his apparent equanimity no longer, "what think you, Ursus?"

  He turned to gaze at me and raised his upper lip to bare his teeth, not in a snarl but in the approximation of a smile. "About where we sit?" he asked. "What would you like to know first?"

  "Anything," was my immediate response. "Anything you care to share."

  It turned out to be the correct answer, for he began speaking immediately and I listened to him closely, finding no need, and no desire, to interrupt the flow of his thoughts.

  "We're on a pronged twig, over a fire," he began, "skewered two ways and secured among the flames. We'll be thoroughly cooked, at best. At worst, the skewer we're hoisted on will burn right through and drop us into the fire's heart." He looked at me, one eyebrow cocked, and grinned ruefully. "If we let Beddoc and his crew come inside when they arrive, we might as well surrender to Gunthar right away, no matter what he does or what he might be guilty of, because we have no forces, nothing, no strength with which to withstand Beddoc's strength, and no means of denying him anything he wishes—including access to the drawbridge controls.

  "So. What can we do? Nothing, is the correct answer to that question, because there are other things happening out there beyond these walls, on the far side of that bridge, that are beyond our control, although their outcome is crucial to us and to our well- being. The Lady Vivienne is out there, at the mercy of whatever might develop from all this, and as well as Samson you have three cousins—brothers—out there, too, Gunthar, Theuderic and Brach." Ursus was unaware that Clodio knew who I really was, and so he kept on talking through his momentary slip, hoping that Clodio might not have noticed it. Clodio, for his part, gave no sign of having heard anything amiss as Ursus continued.

  "Among them, they have some two hundred men, but the problems we are facing here all stem from the basic fact that we don't know what's happening among the three of them. They might, for all our fretting, have all joined forces and be on their way back here in perfect amity. We simply have no way of knowing. But if that's so, why are they not already here? It's but five miles, you said, from Ingomer's castle to here." He turned to look directly at me, his narrowed eyes leaving me in no doubt that I was being called upon for a contribution to this discussion, and perhaps for a solution or a decision. "So, Lord Clothar, what are we to do?"

  "Get out of here." The words came unbidden to my tongue and were out before I knew I would say them.

  Ursus raised his eyebrows high, wrinkling his brows. "Now that is an answer I had not expected. Abandon the castle, you mean?"

  "Yes, and no. At this very moment I am not sure what I mean, not exactly. I know it's illogical, but that feels like the right thing to do, here inside me." I tapped my breast.

  "You propose to leave the fortress to the enemy?"

  "What enemy, Ursus? We don't know yet if there is an enemy . . . Isn't that what you have just been saying? We are yet talking about family matters, and to this point no demonstrable treachery has been offered or committed, and no one has been harmed."

  "As far as we know."

  "Yes, that's the right of it: as far as we know. But there's too much we don't know. You said it yourself, we'll serve no useful purpose penned up in here with no supporting strength while all the other people with a part to play in this are free to move about outside." I glanced again at Clodio, who sat watching and listening, as mute as an old stag. "Clodio, you have not said a word since we came in here. What think you of all this?"

  He made a wry face. "Not my place to think about it, is it? I'm only an old soldier."

  "Oh, no, don't hand me that 'old soldier' claptrap, my friend. I won't wear it because it never has fitted. You're one of Ban of Benwick's lifelong friends. And besides, if you're qualified to be left in trust of the entire fortress, you're qualified to express an opinion. So speak up and spit out whatever might be in your craw."

  He stared at me for several moments, nibbling on the inside of his lip, then nodded his head. "Right. Here's what I think. Ban has four sons: Gunthar, and Samson, Theuderic and Brach. Gunthar is poisonous—a demon in human form. All his brothers know it and fear him for it, because they know there's nothing he would not do on his own be
half.

  "That fear is why Theuderic reacted as he did when he heard the word of Ban's being wounded and Gunthar's riding off to find their mother. His first fear was that Gunthar might seize power and might even seize the Queen, his own mother, to make sure that none of his brothers would dare to challenge him. Theuderic's a clever young man and I have a gold piece under the leg of my bed that say's he's right in this."

  "But why would Gunthar think to usurp power? He is the King's named heir." I knew that was no longer true, but I wanted to see Clodio's reaction to hearing me say it.

  "Aye, that's true, but it's the common word around here that the Queen has no trust or faith in him. She fears his nature. There are some who would even tell you she has been coaxing at the King for years to change his decree and give the name of king to Samson, his second-born."

  I was staring hard at Clodio as all this came out, knowing exactly whence he had gained his insight and wondering admiringly at the extent and depth of his evident friendship for and intimacy with the King, and probably with the Queen, too. I was sure that such talk could not be common knowledge, as he claimed. Had it been so, Gunthar would have learned of it long since and, being Gunthar, would have taken steps to guard against it. Or would he? I found myself hesitating there, acknowledging that there was but one man for whom Gunthar had always shown genuine respect and fear. King Ban, his father, had always overawed Gunthar, and now that I thought of it, it seemed inconceivable to me that Gunthar would make any move to fulfill his own ambitions while there was any chance that Ban yet lived and might come home to knock him down and put him firmly in his place. But yesterday the word had come that Ban was gravely injured. How grave the wound might be could be something that was open to interpretation, depending upon the sympathies and loyalties of the reporting messenger.

  If that was so, and if the messenger were friend to Gunthar, or if he had an eye to his own enrichment, then the tidings rendered might well have tempted Gunthar to trust his fortunes to the gods of chance.

  "The messenger, Clodio, the one who came yesterday from Chulderic. Who was he?"

  "His name is Grimwald. Why. is it important?"

  "It might be. Is he a friend to Gunthar?"

  "No one is a friend to Gunthar. But Grimwald would like to be one of his cronies, there's little doubt of that. He sidles after Gunthar like a lovesick pup after a bitch in heat, sniffing at the great man's arse and falling over his own feet."

  I knew then that what I had been supposing was right: the messenger had made his choice and weighted his message, and Gunthar had seen his opportunity to seize the power he lusted to possess.

  "Hmm. Tell me, is the old postern gate still in use?"

  "What, you mean the old gate in the back wall by the lakeside, above the rocks at the high-water mark? Nah, it's been sealed up these five years now, ever since a boatload of Alamanni almost succeeded in using it to steal into the castle. Ban ordered the door torn out and then he filled the entranceway with mortared stones. No one will ever enter or leave that way again. Why do you ask about that? You look as though you've bitten into something with a nasty taste."

  "I have, old friend. What I was thinking was that if we left here now, today, Ursus and I, and some division of the enemy—and I mean Gunthar's forces—were later to take over control of the castle and deny entry to our friends, you might be able to open up the postern gate during the night and let us back in under cover of darkness. But that's not going to be possible, so mayhap we have to stay here, useless as we are in such a case." I looked at Ursus, who sat watching me with pursed lips, his arms folded tightly across his chest.

  "He's dead, isn't he? Ban's dead. That's why you're here."

  I turned back to Clodio. "Aye, Clodio, he is. It grieves me to have to be the one to tell you of it, but he died two days ago." I described the seriousness of the wound. "Even Sakander the surgeon could do nothing for him."

  I told him, then, how Beddoc's men had slipped away in the night to bring the tidings to Gunthar, and how Ursus and I had taken off after them, passing them and leaving them behind by nightfall.

  As I spoke, Clodio's eyes did not waver from mine. "But the most important thing in all of this is not known yet," I continued, speaking to him directly and quietly. "Not to anyone here, at least. You were right in what you said about the Queen and how she had been working on King Ban. Before he died, the King assembled all his men and decreed in their presence that he was disinheriting Gunthar and naming Samson to rule in his place. Knowing that, there can be no doubting that Beddoc was on his way to warn Gunthar. Beddoc's people will yet be several hours behind us, but we've already been here for more than an hour, so they can't be that far away. That's why it was so important for me to arrange to use the postern door." I swung back to Ursus. "We have to decide . . . I have to decide, I know. We can't simply continue to sit here doing nothing."

  "You could come through the caverns." Clodio's voice was so quiet that I barely heard it, and the meaning of his words took some time to penetrate my consciousness, so deeply was I concentrating on what I must do next. I sat up straighter, suddenly alert.

  "What did you say?" I asked.

  "I said you could come in through the caverns." His voice was still barely audible.

  "What caverns?"

  'The King's Caverns, below us, in the rock."

  I leaned closer to him, watching the tiny half smile on his face blossom into a wide grin as he decided that he had done the right thing in telling me of this.

  "Which king's caverns, Clodio? King Ban's?"

  "Aye." He was grinning hugely now. "But King Ban the Bald, the old man, your grandfather. And he told his son, our King Ban, that he had been shown the caverns by his father, who had learned of them from his, and so on, back until the days before the fortress was built."

  "Wait!" I held up my hand. "I don't understand this. Why have I never heard of this before? I grew up here, and never once in all my boyhood did I hear a whisper about any caverns."

  "I know you didn't, nor did anyone else, because no one knows they're there. Only myself and the King ever knew of it, and I only found out by accident. And then Ban swore me to secrecy. You never heard mention of it because you were never meant to, along with everyone else. It's the biggest and best-kept secret in all of Benwick."

  "But there must be an entrance somewhere . . ." I was thinking furiously. "If they're right under our feet, as you say, then there must be an entrance nearby, somewhere along the beach, above the high-water mark. But if that's so, then why has it not been found by others, long before now?"

  "Because it isn't there." There was no trace of a smile on Clodio's face now. "It's nowhere near the lakeside. There is only one entrance, and it's far from here, inland."

  When he told us where it was, I remembered the place, recalling that I once had known it very well indeed, having spent a fair-sized period of my boyhood playing there. But I had covered every bit of space in the caves that were there—I would never have called them caverns—and had found no hidden entrances or exits. One small tunnel I remembered, leading from one chamber to another, but that was all. I said as much to Clodio and he agreed with me. He, too, had played there as a boy, he told me, and had never seen anything unusual. But then one day he had seen the old King and his son emerge from the caves without ever having gone in. He had been playing there all day with half a score of friends and none of them had seen any sign of either the King or his son in all the time they had been there, until both of them had come out.

  Everyone had thought it was magic, and they had hidden lest the old King see them and decide they had been spying on his sorcery, but as soon as the two Bans were gone, everyone had descended in a rush upon the caves, searching them from top to bottom in a hunt for some indication of whence the old King and his son had sprung.

  A few years later, sheltering from a sudden summer storm with his friend Ban in the same place, Clodio had recalled the event and mentioned to Ban what they had s
een that day. No one had ever been able to make more sense of what had occurred that afternoon, he said, and the incident had gradually been forgotten. Now he mentioned it only as a curious memory. Ban showed no reaction. A short time later, however, Ban vanished completely after uttering an unearthly, terrified howl that echoed eerily through the emptiness of the caves.

  Clodio scoured the caves and found no trace of his friend, the King's son, and so, badly shaken, he made his way back as fast as he could to the castle, intending to summon help. And there he found Ban, sitting placidly against the wall waiting for him.

  For months after that he wondered what had happened, for, of course, Ban offered no explanation. He merely smiled mysteriously, and thereafter he would appear and disappear from time to time, simply to keep the mystery alive. It was not until another three years had passed that Ban had shown Clodio the secret doorway set into a blank rock wall at the back of the cave. By that time, however, they were fully grown and fast friends, having already saved each other's lives in battle, and their trust in each other was absolute. And Clodio had kept the secret until now.