Uther

Uther listened and was grateful, although he knew that nothing in Garreth's words spoke of Ygraine's welfare. The fate of the child's mother would mean less than nothing to Gulrhys Lot compared to the reality of having a son of his own. If there were the slightest question of choice, of the life and health of one over the other, Ygraine would die as soon as the question was defined. The birth of a daughter, on the other hand, would be unimportant to Lot, but it would remove both mother and child from danger.

Listening to the Whistler's words, Uther dismissed his anger and became convinced that he had been worrying needlessly and prematurely, for the hard-headed truths Garreth was uttering were exactly the kind of sensible, pragmatic direction and opinion he had come to expect from this extraordinary man. Garreth Whistler had now been Champion to three Pendragon Kings, having transferred his allegiance naturally and easily to King Uric upon the death of Ullic Pendragon, and Uther had been greatly pleased, when he himself had become King on his own father's death, that Garreth Whistler had agreed to serve as his Champion, in turn.

Uther was still thinking about the Whistler, smiling in appreciation of a loyal friend, as he lay down on his cot that night, and he slept better than he had in a long time.

Three days after that conversation, a letter arrived that changed everything, brought into camp at dusk by a messenger who carried Uther's own ring, the one he had left with the Queen, on a leather thong about his neck. The fellow carried Ygraine's letter securely bound at the small of his back, five large pages of fine papyrus covered in a strong but concise and clearly legible hand and folded lengthwise into a soft, narrow leather pouch.

Much news, little time to tell it. This must be completed and gone within the hour, a fleeting chance gained when least expected. I am speaking it aloud to Joseph, my priest and confessor, who has arrived at the perfect time to write this for me.

Your son is born and he is beautiful, the image of his father, save that he has shining, wondrous eyes of yellow gold, the like of which I have never seen. He came to us three weeks ago at the second hour of morning, and I have named him Arthur, since you were not here to advise me of any other name. He is glorious to behold, perfect in every detail.

May God defend us, for should this letter be found and read by unfriendly eyes, then we are dead, my babe and I. The man bringing it to you has been known to me all my life. He is Erse, his name is Calum, and he is one of my brother Connor's most trusted men, sent to me in secret, disguised as a mercenary, in order to find out if I am well. Connor wants to take me out of Cornwall, home to my father's Hall in Eire. Calum will return to my home when he leaves you, bearing the tale of my misery, although he knows naught of me and you, or of our son, and soon Connor will come to take me home.

In the meantime, I have my son. The Monster has not seen him and does not even know he lives, even after three long weeks of happiness for me. I am surrounded again by my own people, and have been so for several months, for which I thank God daily, and we have managed to achieve a miracle despite the presence of the Monster's creatures crowding around my doors. One of my serving women, Clara, had her child the night before I had mine, and we were able to conceal my birthing the following night. It was sudden and relatively silent, and the concealment was unplanned at first, until we found that no one outside my chambers had even been aware of the event. Now Clara suckles my child, although I do, too, when I can be unobserved. Another of my women has sewn me a girdle containing a pillow large enough to make me look as though my babe is still to come, and so we have been able to pretend that nothing has yet occurred. I know not how long we will be able to keep up the deceit, but as long as we can, we will.

Here are some tidings that should be of note to you: there is a heavy concentration of Saxon forces gathered in the coastal region to the east, just beyond the borders of Cornwall. The Monster's glowering minions have deemed this to be a serious threat and he has sent an army to confront the Saxon interlopers and drive them back where they came from. Need I tell you he did not go himself? The army, ten thousand strong and under the command of a new-found mercenary champion, a sullen, dark-faced lout called Nabur, left weeks ago, just prior to your arrival. No word of how they are prospering has come back to us.

And yet more tidings, far more doleful. You may already know that Lot has seized Tir Gwyn and declared Herliss and Lagan traitors, condemned to be killed on sight. That has been so for several months now. The latest infamy, however, is difficult to imagine, let alone to describe and set down in words. It appears that some of Lot's creatures managed to infiltrate Herliss's following and discovered where he was encamped. Lagan was away when they made their attack, but they captured Herliss, and Lagan's wife and son, Lydda and Cardoc. Herliss they killed immediately, bringing back his head to Lot in a cask of salt water, but they brought the woman and her son alive, in chains, to face Lot's mercy.

By our dear Christus, I can barely speak of this, but if ever proof were needed that my benighted spouse is insane and needs to be killed, it is contained in what I must describe next. Lot gave the woman Lydda over to his soldiers for their pleasure, and they used her until they eventually killed her. I know that in itself, although monstrous, is not unheard of, but what followed is. He made the boy, who was eleven years old, watch the atrocities that were being heaped upon his mother, telling him constantly as he watched that his father, Lagan, was to blame for what was happening. The poor boy was beside himself until his reason left him and he apparently fell silent, never to speak again. Then, when Lydda was dead, Lot had her feet cut off and sent them back, along with the child's hands, severed from his body after his murder, to where Herliss and his people had been camping when they were captured. This was a reminder, he sent word to Lagan, of the penalties for disloyalty to a friend.

I have no knowledge of Lagan's reaction, and I have no wish to think about it, but the man must he demented with grief.

And finally: at this time, Lot is hiding in the north, in his northernmost stronghold, which is an ancient place with no name other than "the Shelter." It is on the coast, some twelve leagues north of the island fortress at Rosnant, where there they are adding to the fortifications and building barracks, although there is not yet sufficient comfort in the place for Lot's taste. He will stay in the Shelter, it seems, until word reaches him of success in the southeast against the Saxons. I have also heard a rumour, but not a solid one, that he has gone there to await the arrival of a new fleet of Erse galleys, nothing to do with me or mine. If that rumour is true, then he might well be waiting for a fleet of galleys belonging to our ancient enemies who call themselves the Sons of Condran. If he is as terrified of my brother Connor as I think he is, it would make a kind of twisted sense for him to seek alliance with the Sons of Condran, and they would be perfect for each other.

I think you may have a chance to deal with Lot once and for all if you can take him while he is walled up in the Shelter. They think of it as a coastal fort, but it is not quite on the seacoast. My understanding is that it stands on a headland overlooking the sea, but the cliffs are of soft stone and subject to crumbling and collapse, and so the walls of the fort itself are set back some distance from the lip of the cliffs. I have been told, however, that you might be able to surround it completely and take it. You yourself will be the best judge of that when you see the place.

Those are all my tidings and my inky-fingered scribe has shown great patience with my stumbling and my changes. He assures me, however, that by the time he has recopied my words, you will see no sign of where the changes have occurred.

I have but one thing more to say to you, and it is this. We have never spoken of love, we two, and if truth be known, I have never really known what love is. Now, however, looking at our son, I know the feeling that threatens to consume me is love, and it is strangely like the feelings that have boiled here in my breast since last I saw your face. I know that when I gaze into your eyes again and see you hold our son in your strong arms, I will know love at last and forever. Farewell, and come to me safely. We will be moving soon to another of Lot's strongholds, since we have already been here for too long, and I will find a way of sending word to you when that occurs, so that you will be able to come and find us.

Farewell, and think of me sometimes.

Think of me sometimes. Uther smiled briefly upon reading that the first time. But then, slightly overwhelmed by the profusion of information in the letter, he left his quarters, saddled his horse and rode away to where he could be alone and free of interruptions. And there, on the bank of a fast-flowing stream, he sat down on a moss- covered tree stump and read Ygraine's words again several times aloud, allowing himself to be buffeted by the conflicting emotions they stirred up in him.

Among the first of these were pride and a sense of incredulous wonder. He had a son. That single piece of knowledge affected him more deeply than anything else he could remember. A son, Arthur Pendragon. He liked the name, sufficiently akin to his own to ring well in his ears when he spoke it aloud, as he did repeatedly. Arthur Pendragon. Uther Pendragon; Arthur Pendragon. And not merely a son, but an extraordinary one, beautiful and the image of his father, but with shining golden eyes the like of which his mother had never seen. He had heard of such eyes, however, among his own ancestry. Caius Britannicus, brother to his Grandmother Luceiia, had had such eyes—eagle's eyes, his grandmother had called them. And now they had resurfaced in his own son, the eyes of a golden eagle.

He sat silent for a long time after that, the letter loosely gripped in the hand that hung by his side as he sat gazing into nothingness, trying to imagine the boy and how he would grow up. But then other thoughts intruded and stole the warm glow from his eyes. Lagan Longhead had had a son, too, and had doted upon the boy. And now the lad was dead, his severed hands sent to Lagan, along with his mother's feet, in token of Lot's displeasure. Displeasure! Uther's stomach soured at the thought of what his friend must have endured on seeing those remains, and he had little difficulty in agreeing with Ygraine that Lagan must be well-nigh demented with grief and rage. But then the significance of Ygraine's news of Lot's present whereabouts came to him, and he sprang to his feet, determination swelling in his chest like a hard knot. He would find this Shelter and burn it about Lot's ears, and then he would send the whoreson's singed head to Lagan.

His mind resolved, and feeling more positive than at any time since entering Cornwall weeks earlier, he turned his attention to a new strategy, and as soon as he had regained his camp, Uther summoned his field commanders to discuss their imminent foray into the north to contain Lot in the bolt-hole called the Shelter.

Despite his wish to avoid prolonged sieges, Uther had nonetheless discussed the possibility of mounting a direct strike against a fortified position with his field commanders several times in the recent past, on the clearly defined understanding that they might be fortunate enough to gain absolute knowledge of Lot's whereabouts and be able to pin him in one place, unable to flee. That last point was arguable in this instance for a number of reasons, including their utter lack of knowledge about the place called the Shelter, and Uther's senior commanders did not hesitate to raise their objections. The report on which Uther was basing his proposed plan to march northward against Lot was no more trustworthy, they suggested, than an earlier report that had come to them about an army of Erse warriors called Galloglas that was supposed to land on the northwestern coast of Cornwall some time within the following few days. If that report was in any way true, they pointed out, then Uther might well be leading his army into needless danger, and a costly battle against a nameless enemy would do them little good when their true quarry was Gulrhys Lot himself.

Uther did not accept that. The enemy army described as Galloglas in that report, which had come from a nameless sympathizer, must, he believed, be the same Erse fleet mentioned in his report —- the fleet that Lot had marched north to await. Based on that belief, he argued that the newcomers would sail directly to where Lot awaited them in the fort known as the Shelter.

Some of his most senior commanders, including Mucins Quinto, the military surgeon attached to the contingent from Camulod, remained unconvinced that Uther's information was incontrovertibly valid, despite Uther's fiery convictions, and their skepticism was aggravated by his stubborn refusal to identify his informant, aware as always of the need to protect Ygraine. Quinto's objections were based upon the risk of useless slaughter. Slaughter was part and parcel of warfare, Quinto knew, but needless slaughter was anathema to him. The march Uther was proposing to undertake was foolhardy under the circumstances, an unacceptable risk under any conditions and one that directly flouted Uther's own rules governing the selection of military objectives and the responsible disposition of troops.

Agreeing with Quinto, Popilius Cirro went so far as to call Uther's suggestion outrageously impulsive; it had to be considered unjustifiable, until and unless they could obtain more concrete information from at least one additional source about the supposed threat posed by the Saxon army reported to be massed on Lot's eastern borders. They had no proof that army was even there, Popilius maintained, and even less proof that Lot's main army had been dispatched to deal with them. That lack of certainty, entailing the very real possibility of a threat from their rear on a northward march, allied with this other unconfirmed report of an advancing army of Ersemen from the north, cried out to be resolved and settled before any major decisions could be made concerning troop movements and objectives.

Uther listened to all of them and then vetoed their disapproval, claiming that the existence of the written report he had received was proof enough. He even read the pertinent section of his letter aloud in an attempt to demonstrate his good faith, but his continuing refusal to put a name to his informant worked against the credibility of his information.

In the end, of course, Uther's will as King prevailed, but a degree of uncertainty over the outcome of his projected thrust remained, because none of his people had ever seen the fort Ygraine had described, and so they could not know how accessible the seacoast was from the fort's walls, or how wide the outer space around the fort, between the walls and the clifftop, might be. That information was vital, and Uther himself swore he wanted no part of attacking the position if Lot could simply escape by sea, leaving his mercenaries to defend his back. There was nothing they could really do to resolve that impasse, however, since they would not be able to answer the questions until they approached the place and saw it for themselves.

Once the decision to go there was made, however, Popilius and the rest of his commanders accepted his wishes, and the remainder of their planning fell quickly into place, although he reminded all of them, as always, about the standard observation and proviso governing all such planning. Uther had been taught by all his mentors and instructors that no battle plan, irrespective of how well or how painstakingly it might have been prepared, had ever been known to survive intact after the first real clash with the enemy. That was an accepted axiom of all warfare: to be effective and successful, a battle plan—and a commander's mind—must allow for an enormous amount of flexibility.

Uther and his commanders spent three days working on their strategy, and on the fourth day they set out for the northwest coast. They encountered no more opposition than they had in the previous month, so they made excellent time, and the miles fell away at their backs. Late in the afternoon of their fourth day's march, their forward scouts sent back word that they had reached the coast and were now within sight of the Shelter.

Uther called a halt and established camp immediately. Many of his troops, he knew, would spend a sleepless night, as he would, anticipating the next day's battle, and all of them would be up and ready to advance before dawn's hues first began to tinge the night sky.

All the sleepless nights, however, were wasted. As soon as Uther came within sight of the stronghold called the Shelter and stopped to take a long, evaluating look at it, he knew that their journey had been but one more frustrating element in a campaign already filled to overflowing with disappointment and inaction. The thought had barely had the time to form in his mind, however, before Garreth Whistler and Huw Strongarm rode up to put the lie to it. They, too, had seen the hopelessness of the situation, but they had seen beyond it, too, and sensed an advantage to be gained while they were there in force.

The fort, a typical concentric ditch-and-dyke construction, had been built on a headland, as his information had indicated, and its walls were safely withdrawn from the edges of the cliffs of crumbling, friable rock, leaving a clear area surrounding the perimeter that could conceivably accommodate an encircling force. Only an idiot would have tried to put such a force there, however, for what Uther's information had lacked was detail: the headland itself rose steeply towards the sea, then ended in an abrupt, unscalable cliff, and the fortification that had been established there over hundreds of years had been adapted admirably by its builders to the steeply sloping terrain. Many of the surfaces within the ramparts had been raked so they were level, and the walls at the front of the fort, facing the mainland, were more than twice as high as those at the rear. Those walls showed Uther immediately that the place would not be taken by direct assault; no besieging force could scale those enormous front slopes. Nor could any sustained attack be mounted against the lesser walls at the back, for in order to reach the rear of the fortification, any attacker would first have to circle the walls, using the narrow strip of land between walls and clifftop as their only pathway. There was not a patch of cover anywhere. While the attackers would have to fight every pace of the way against the steep slope, the defenders on the ramparts high above them would be standing on artificially levelled ground. The entire area around the walls was a killing ground.

"Not what we thought, eh?" This was Huw Strongarm. Garreth Whistler said nothing at all, merely watching Uther with tightly pursed lips. "Still, it could be worse, from our point of view."

"Could it?" Uther asked. "How?"

Huw allowed his surprise to show fleetingly and then ploughed onward. "Well, Lot's in there, and he's stuck there as long as we stay."

"We have no way of knowing he's in there, Huw."

"Yes we have. He's there, I've just been told."

"By whom, and why have I not been told?"

Huw shrugged and dipped his head. "Because the word came to me through one of my own men no more than moments ago, and I'm telling you now. One of our scout patrols picked up two local farmers early this morning. They are no supporters of their King, and they didn't need much persuasion to tell everything they know about this place. They saw Lot's arrival here eight days ago, and he hasn't been seen since. So we have him, safely cooped up in there. There's no way out that I can see."

"You can't see the back view of the cliff, Huw. They could have flights of stairs leading all the way down to the beach there, for all we know. Lot could have left by sea days ago."

"Aye, he could have. It's possible, I'll grant you that. But I'll wager he didn't, and if he stayed, then he'll stay there now until we say he can leave. There was a way out at the back, for some of my fellows have been there, seen it and closed it off. You set me in charge of all the scouts, remember, and that means that all our scouts are now Pendragon. First thing I set them to do once they got here was to explore the seaward side of things. There's a way down to the sea from the back, certainly, but it's not man-made. There's a few flights of steps, but they're primitive, and the rest is as nature made it—steep and narrow and dangerous. About two-thirds of the way down from the top there's a chasm, as though the entire cliff fell sideways at some time. My fellows couldn't see the bottom of it, said it's just like a hole clear down through the earth. Anyway, the gap's about ten paces wide at its narrowest point, and crossed by a bridge. Or it was. My fellows chopped the bridge down."

"They chopped it down . . . Are you telling me it was unguarded?"

Huw grinned and shot a glance at Garreth Whistler. "Oh no, it was guarded. There's a guard tower above it and another below it, but they were built to guard against an attack coming up the path from the sea, and the people in them were not expecting Pendragon bowmen. No one was expecting our scouts and no one saw them arrive. They crept around the base of the cliffs under cover of night and then scaled them on either side of the path just after dawn. Then they flanked the guard towers and picked off all ten of the guards before the fools even knew they were under attack. After that, they chopped down the bridge. So no one will be leaving by that back route unless they sprout wings and fly across the chasm. And there will be no re-supply from the sea using that route, either."

By the time Huw had finished, Uther was shaking his head in admiration. But then Garreth Whistler spoke up. "Huw's people could be very important to us were we to leave them on the cliffs, Uther."

"How so?"

"Well, they're safe there from attack from above. No one can see them down there from the walls, let alone reach them. But then again they have the advantage of height and distance when the fleet that Lot's waiting for arrives—if it arrives. Lot's people in the fort up there will have no way of letting the newcomers know they're in danger. The fleet will sail in close, expecting to land safely at the base of the cliff, and my bowmen will use the same trick they used at home against the invasion fleet: fire arrows soaked in pitch. In the meantime, you can deploy your army right across the base of the headland there, and Lot's all trussed up like a fowl for roasting. Can't leave, can't escape."

"But then we'll be involved in a siege, and one we can't win. We have neither the time nor the resources."

"We don't need them. If Lot's Erse fleet comes when it's supposed to, we'll savage it and send it limping home. That'll be a victory, and we'll rub his nose in it, since he'll have to watch and do nothing. Then, with his fleet gone, we can hold him here by leaving a small force to keep him locked up while the rest of our army marches south again."

Uther sighed and then looked about him at the way his army spread across the landscape and at the way the old fortification on the headland reared above them. From where he sat, on a hill facing the rising headland, he could barely see the sea at all. The headland rearing up directly in front of him cut off most of the view, and he was left with no more than two small stretches of flat-horizoned seascape, one on either side of the promontory. Finally he nodded.

"Very well, we'll try it, but for no more than three days. I have no wish to sit around here growing old, waiting for a fleet that might not even be a reality. Make your dispositions then and convene a meeting of all officers in the command tent this afternoon an hour before dinner."

When the others had gone, Uther looked to where Nemo and a squad of Dragons were erecting the huge tent and estimated that it would be no less than half an hour before he could hope to move in and remove some of his heavy armour. Resigned, he swung his horse around and kicked it forward to where the individual units of his army were being dismissed by their commanders and were starting to lay out their encampment. He knew it would do no harm at all to spend the time he had riding among his troopers, letting them see his face and hear his voice as they sweated to lay out their barracks lines in a way that would not draw the wrath of their decurions. And while he was bantering with some of his own men from Tir Manha, a messenger came looking for him to tell him that there was a stranger bearing tidings and asking for him by name. Uther excused himself and made his way back with the messenger.

He recognized the newcomer immediately as one of Ygraine's servants. The man had been among her retinue at Herliss's Crag Fort.

Now, however, he looked very different. While he had once appeared sleek and well-fed and unctuous, he now seemed haggard and frightened, his clothes torn and road-worn and his face and hands blackened with dirt. Uther's face closed into a thunderous frown and remained that way until the fellow, whose name was Finn, had assured him that the Queen was safe and that his own appearance was due only to his difficulties in remaining hidden from the mercenaries who thronged the roads everywhere to the south. Mollified upon hearing that, Uther called for ale and led the man into his tent, which was just now fully prepared, and sat him down by a newly lit brazier that soon began to throw out a comforting heat.

The Queen was well. Finn reported somewhat breathlessly after he had drunk deeply from the flagon of ale that had been brought for him, and so was her child, but they had recently been moved into a stronghold less than twenty miles south of where the two men now sat—much closer to Uther and his rescuing army than Ygraine could ever have hoped for. Knowing that Uther would be a mere day or two away from her. Ygraine had decided to send word to him immediately to come and get her and the child. She had been waiting for her confessor, Joseph, to return from a journey so that he could write a letter for her, but events had moved too quickly. Finn had been sent out early with added urgency when she received unexpected word from one of her informants that Lot's main army in the southwest, having failed to bring the Saxons there to battle, had turned around and was now marching back into Cambria, where it was to be reinforced and strengthened before joining with Lot's remaining forces to exterminate the Camulodians. It was now known, Ygraine had been told, that Uther's army numbered no more than two thousand in all, and the army in the southwest, prior to being reinforced, already outnumbered them by three to one.

Three undisciplined mercenaries were no match for one mounted Camulodian trooper, the Queen knew, and were even less daunting when matched against a Pendragon longbow, but she had wanted Uther to know immediately of the threat at his back. Word had been sent north by sea to Lot, she said, advising him of the change in plans and the return of his army, and Ygraine had no idea what Lot's reaction might be. She did not, however, believe that it would bode any good for Uther, and she wanted him to take nothing for granted.

The Lady Ygraine would be waiting for King Uther as soon as he could come to her, Finn concluded, and she was surrounded by a tight core of loyal followers, including her own bodyguard. The fort in which she was now held was a minor one, well removed from the normal paths of armies and battle, and it had little more than a skeleton garrison, since its present purpose was only to provide a quiet place for the Queen to bear her child, and no one expected any trouble. Her own bodyguard shared garrison duties there and was more than capable of overcoming the others and capturing the place. They would do so as soon as Uther sent her word that he was coming. In the meantime, he said, the lady was in no danger, but she was impatient for him meet her son.

Uther listened to all Finn had to say, nodding from time to time as one point or another registered in his mind, and he soon found himself wishing that he had not been persuaded to besiege the Shelter. Lot's southern army might or might not be approaching him from the rear, but he had time to deal with that, should the problem materialize. What concerned him most now was his own impatience to see his living son.

He instructed Finn to return to the Queen and tell her that he would be coming for her within the week, but before he had even dismissed the man, he was interrupted by the arrival of yet another messenger, this one a Griffyd runner sent by the seaman, Aelle of Carmarthen, whose galley now lay along the coast less than a league south of Lot's present haven. Aelle, sailing northward and hugging the coastline two days earlier, had seen an entire fleet of Erse galleys unloading an army less than ten leagues—between thirty and forty Roman miles—to the north of Uther's current position. The discovery had been unplanned and unlooked for, and Aelle had been fortunate in being concealed from the seaward side by the land against his back. He had turned back southward as soon as he could safely do so, and knowing that Uther's force was headed north and west, he had begun dropping messengers ashore, a league apart from each other, to find and warn the King.

That information took the wind out of Uther's sails. He had guessed wrongly in interpreting the information brought to him earlier, and now he had one army sweeping towards him from the north and another possibly marching towards him from the south. Forcing himself to remain stone-faced and betray none of his thoughts, he thanked the Griffyd clansman and sent him to the commissariat to find food and drink. Then he thanked Finn and dismissed him, too, bidding him return to Ygraine immediately and instruct her to be ready to leave within three days, half the time he had originally named.

As soon as he was alone again, Uther sat down and reviewed his options, and no matter which way he assessed them, they all boiled down to flight: a withdrawal to ground of his own choosing, there to await an attack. He stood up then and went to call for one of his guards, but before he could send the man to look for Popilius Cirro, he found himself listening to a rapidly growing commotion. Curious, he brushed by the guard and stepped outside to where he could hear muffled shouts and sec people straining on tiptoes, trying to see out towards the sea. He noticed one of Huw Strongarm's bowmen running away from the scene, passing close by him, and reached out to grasp the man's arm. The fellow tried to wrench his sleeve free, then stopped as he recognized the King.

"What's happening?" Uther asked.

"A fleet, lord. There's a fleet out there. Hundreds of galleys."

"Have you seen them?"

"Aye, with these." The man pointed at his own eyes.

"Where are you going, then, in such a rush?"

"To tell the Chief."

Uther knew he meant Huw Strongarm. "Good. Find him quickly and send him to me directly. Tell him I'll be here in the command tent. Now hurry. And if you see the Whistler, send him to me, too." He spun back to the guard, who had been standing listening. "Go and find Popilius Cirro for me quick as you can. Tell him I need him now'' He turned then and went back into his tent, fighting the urge to run and gaze out to sea, counting the enemy ships like any of his rank and file. In the shadowed coolness of his tent Uther forced himself to think, refusing to say to himself that this could not be happening, not all at once, mere moments apart on the same day. An army in the south, an army in the north, landed from a fleet, and now a fleet off the coast. He could not remain here, that was clear. Even his men on the cliffs with their fire arrows were now at risk, because the Galloglas army coming from the north had been less than forty miles distant two days earlier and might now be just over the brow of the closest hill to the north. If they arrived before the Pendragon bowmen could be withdrawn from their cliff perches, then the bowmen would be lost, cut off and slaughtered or starved out. They had to be recalled immediately, and even that was going to take a deal of time to achieve, since the isolated bowmen would have to be contacted one by one.

Garreth Whistler arrived quickly, followed moments later by Popilius Cirro, then by Mucius Quinto and Huw Strongarm. A hurried conference generated a quick consensus, and no single person there thought to say a word about forewarnings or their earlier misgivings. The orders were for the army to retreat immediately in good order, and the senior commanders were dispersed to their various tasks.

Uther sent a runner to find Nemo, and when the trooper appeared in answer to the summons, removing her heavy helmet as she entered the tent, Uther waved her to a chair and handed her a large cup of honeyed mead. He had never done the like before, and Nemo accepted it wordlessly, watching closely as Uther sat down across from her on the other side of the brazier, where he lifted his cup in a salute and sipped a mouthful, preparing to say something but evidently not quite ready to speak.

Nemo waited in silence, as always.

Finally Uther smiled. "Do they still call you Hard-Nose?"

Nemo nodded.

"That's because they respect you. You know that, don't you?" Another nod. "Aye . . . and they all think of you as a man. That, my friend, is an astounding achievement. They all think you're a man. Nemo. And yet Nemo means No One. No Name. No Man. That's ironic, is it not? No Man. It's who you have become, and yet it's who you have always been . . . I know who you really are, because you and I have been friends that long. But I never did know your true name."

She frowned, bringing her brows together into a solid bar of black. "Jonet."

"What?"

"Jonet. My real name . . . Jonet. My mother was Naomi. I took her name when I ran away . . . when I met you. Then you called me Nemo. It was close, and I liked it."

"Jonet is your real name? I didn't know that. I prefer Nemo."

"Me too."

"Then Nemo you will remain forever, and Nemo only. I have a task for you. Nemo, a very difficult and dangerous task for one person acting alone. I would never consider asking it of anyone else. Will you undertake it?"

"Aye."

Uther stared at her. "That simply? You don't even know what it is."

Nemo merely blinked, her face unreadable. "I'll do it. What is it?"

"I need you to find a man and bring him to me. His name is Lagan."

"The Longhead."

"Ah, that's right, you know him from before, don't you? Yes, Lagan Longhead. Now, the difficulty lies in that I don't know where he is. He might even be dead."

"If he's alive, I'll find him. Why is it dangerous?"

Uther shrugged. "For several reasons. First, you'll be alone, and the countryside is swarming with Lot's mercenaries."

It was Nemo's turn to shrug massive shoulders, genuinely unimpressed.

Uther continued. "Another reason is that he might be mad, and therefore unpredictable. Have you heard about what happened to his wife and son?" Nemo shook her head and Uther outlined the story briefly. When he had finished. Nemo nodded, indicating that she understood.

"When do you want me to go, and what do you want me to tell him when I find him?"

Uther made a huffing noise through his nostrils and emptied his cup in a single gulp. "I want you to go as soon as you're ready, and when you find him, bring him back here to me. Tell him the Queen is safe, and that she and I need his counsel. Can you remember those exact words?"

"The Queen is safe and you and she need his counsel. I can remember that."

"You'll need these," Uther said, reaching into his scrip and pulling out two small items. "They are the tokens I arranged to use with Lagan. This one, the coloured pebble, is his own. It will prove to him that you come from me. The other, the wax seal marked with a cross, was to be my token to his father, Herliss, and to him. Keep them close and guard them well and never part with both of them at the same time. Always keep one of them in your possession. They are your guarantee of safe conduct through Lagan's army, wherever it might be."

Nemo closed her hand around the tokens and nodded. "Good. I'll go now." She stood up and gulped down the mead, then tucked the two small items securely beneath her tunic. Uther sat watching her.

"Tell me your message again. Nemo."

"The Queen is safe and you and she need his counsel."

Uther nodded, his face grave. "I won't try to offer you a reward for this, but when Lot is dead and we are safe back in Cambria, you can tell me what you want and you'll have it, if it lies within my power to grant it."

"I want to live in Camulod with you and the Dragons."

Uther was surprised and touched by the simplicity with which she said the words, so close to the dearest wish of his own heart. But he could not find it in him to tell her bluntly that he would never live in Camulod again. He knew, and she did, too, were she to think about it, that his life lay now in Cambria, among his own people as their King. He had sworn an oath to that effect. And so he said nothing of that, but grinned with pleasure at her request.

"Well, my old friend, none of us can know what will happen tomorrow, but if fortune smiles on us and all goes well down here in this wild land, we might all be able to fulfill our dreams. Now, we'll be leaving here today as quickly as we can arrange ourselves and make away without appearing to run off. Our line of march will be directly southward to Herliss's fort at Tir Gwyn. You've been there. When you find Lagan, you can intercept us anywhere along that route, or at Tir Gwyn itself if it takes that long. May all the gods of Cambria go with you, Nemo, and may we see each other again soon. Farewell."

He held out his hand and Nemo grasped it in friendship and loyalty, probably for the first time ever, then sniffed and turned her face away, vainly trying to conceal the tears that stood in her eyes. Uther drew himself upright and Nemo nodded, her eyes downcast now, and then turned and strode off, jamming her helmet onto her head. As she went out, another decurion passed her on the way in and saluted Uther.

"Your pardon, lord, but we have to strike your tent again. Have you finished in here?"

Uther looked around him with a sigh. Apart from sitting in a chair by the brazier and pouring two cups of mead from the flask, he had not touched a thing since the tent was erected hours earlier.

"Aye," he murmured. "Bring in your men. I'm done here."

Less than two hours later, two hours of intense, concentrated labour by everyone concerned in the preparations, Uther's army had reformed itself and turned backward to face south, the way it had come. A full screen of scouts already rode fanned out ahead of it as it advanced, and another, similar force would deploy behind it as it marched. Uther had called for volunteers for the rearguard, a hazardous post should the northern Ersemen be as close as he suspected they might be, and command of that contingent had gone to a young officer called Marcus Bassus, a gifted junior commander from Camulod who took great pride in being the fourth generation of his family to serve in the forces of the Colony.