Legacy: Arthurian Saga (111 page)

"My servant here tells me you have
foretold us victory already?" He laughed, a young man's laugh, full
and ringing. "Then you have indeed brought us today all that we
could desire. Boy!"

Arthur, at the tent door speaking to
Ector, stopped and looked back. The King beckoned. "Here. Stay by
me."

Arthur flashed an enquiring look at
his foster-father, then at me. I nodded. As the boy moved to obey
the King I saw Ector make a sign to Ralf, and the latter moved
quietly with Arthur to the left of the King's litter. Ector hung on
his heel a moment in the tent doorway, but Uther was saying
something to his son, and Arthur was bent to listen. The Count
hitched his cloak over his shoulder, nodded abruptly to me, and
went out. The trumpets sounded again, and then the sunshine and the
shouting were all about us as the King's chair was carried out
towards the waiting troops. I did not follow it down the hillside,
but stayed where I was, on the high ground beside the tent, while
below me on the wide field the armies formed. I saw the King's
chair set down, and the King himself stand to speak to the men.
From this distance I could hear nothing of what was said, but when
he turned and pointed to where I stood high in the sight of the
whole army, I heard the shout of "Merlin!" again, and the cheers.
There was an answering shout from the enemy, a yell of derision and
defiance, and then the clamor of trumpets and the thunder of the
horses drowned everything, and shook the day.

Beside the tower wall stood an ancient
apple tree, its bark now gnarled and thick with lichen like
verdigris, but its boughs heavy with yellow fruit. In front of it
was a tumble of stone with a plinth where perhaps there had once
been an altar or a statue. I stepped up onto this, with my back to
the laden apple tree, and watched the course of the fighting. There
was still no sign of Lot's banner. I beckoned a fellow running past
-- he was a medical orderly on his way to the dressing station
lower down the hill -- and asked him: "Lot of Lothian? Are his
troops not come?"

"There's no sign of them yet, sir. I
don't know why. Maybe they're to be held back as reserves on the
right?"

I glanced where he was pointing. To
the right of the field was the winding glimmer of a stream, flanked
for some fifty paces to either hand by broken and sedgy ground.
Beyond this the field rose through alder and willow and scrubby oak
to thicker woodland. Between the trees the slope was rough and
broken, but not too steep for horses, and the woods could well hide
half an army. I thought I could see the glint of spearheads through
the thick of the trees. Lot, coming from the north-east, would have
had early news of the Saxon advance, and would hardly have come
late for the battle. He must be there, waiting and watching. But
not, I was sure, by order as a reserve placed there by the King.
The dilemma that Cador and I had spoken of might well be resolved
today for Lot: if Uther looked like winning the victory, then Lot
could throw his army in and share the time of triumph and its
aftermath of reward and power; but if Colgrim should bear away the
day, then Lot would have the chance of fixing his interest with the
Saxon conquerors -- in time, moreover, to deny his marriage with
Morgian and take whatever power the new Saxon rule would offer him.
I might well, I thought sourly, be doing the man an injustice, but
my bones told me I was not. I wished there had been time to learn
before the battle what Uther's dispositions had been. If Lot was
anywhere at hand he would not miss this battle, of all battles,
with the chances it held for him. I wondered how soon he would see
me, or hear that I had come. And once he knew, he would have no
doubt at all of the identity of the white-cloaked youth on the
white horse, who fought so close on the King's left
hand.

It was evident that the High King's
presence, even in a litter, had cheered and fortified the British.
Though, borne as he was in his chair, he could not lead the charge,
he was there with the Dragon above him, right in the center of the
field, and, though the press of his followers round him would
hardly let an enemy get within striking distance, the fighting was
fiercest round the Dragon, and from time to time I saw the flutter
of the golden cloak and the flash of the King's own sword. Out on
the right rode the King of Rheged, flanked by Caw and at least
three of his sons. Ector too was on the right, fighting with dogged
ferocity, while Cador on the left showed all the dash and dazzle of
the Celt on his day of luck. Arthur I knew to be endowed by nature
with the qualities of both, but today he would doubtless be more
than content with his position guarding the King's left side. Ralf,
in his turn, held himself back to guard Arthur's. I watched the
chestnut horse swerve and turn and rear, never more than a pace
away from the white stallion's flank.

This way and that the battle went.
Here a banner would go down, swamped apparently under the savage
tide of attack, then somehow there would be a recovery, and the
British would press forward under the swinging axes, and push back
the yelling waves of Saxons. From time to time a solitary horseman
-- a messenger, it could be assumed -- spurred off eastwards across
the boggy land by the stream, and up into the trees. And now it was
certain that Lot's force was there, hidden and waiting in the wood.
And, as surely as if I had read his mind, I knew that he was
waiting there by no orders from the King. Whatever calls for help
those messengers brought to him, he would delay his coming until he
saw how the day went. So, for two fierce hours, lengthening through
midday to three, the British forces fought, deprived of what should
have been their fresh fighting right. The King of Rheged fell
wounded, and was carried back: his forces held their position, but
it could be seen that they were wavering. And still the men of
Lothian held back. Soon, if they did not come in, it might be too
late.

All at once, it seemed that it was.
There was a shout from the center, a shout of anger and despair.
There, in the thick of the press round the King's chair, I saw the
Dragon standard waver, rock violently, then slope to its fall.
Suddenly, for all the distance, it was as if I was there, close by
the King's chair, seeing it all clearly. A body of Saxons, huge
fair giants, some of them red with unfelt wounds, had rushed the
group that surrounded the King, breaking it, it seemed, with sheer
weight and ferocity. Some were cut down, some ' were forced back by
desperate fighting, but two got through. They smashed their way
forward, axes whirling, on the King's left. One axe struck the
shaft of the standard, which splintered, rocked, and began to fall.
The man who had carried it went down with the blood spouting from
his severed wrist, and disappeared under the mashing hoofs. With
scarcely a pause the axe wheeled through its bright arc towards the
King. Uther was on his feet, his sword up to meet the axeman, but
Ralf's sword whirled and bit, and the Saxon fell clear across the
King's chair, his blood gushing out over the golden cloak. The King
was pinned back under the fallen man's weight. The other Saxon
rushed forward yelling. Ralf, cursing, fought to thrust his horse
between the helpless King and the new attacker, but the Saxon,
towering above the British, brushed their weapons aside as a mad
bull brushes the long grass, and charged forward. It seemed nothing
could stop him reaching the King. I saw Arthur drive his horse
forward, just as the rocking standard fell, striking the white
stallion across the chest.

The stallion reared, screaming.
Arthur, holding the horse with his knees, seized the falling
standard, and shouting flung it clear across the King's chair into
a soldier's ready grip, then swung the screaming, striking horse
right into the path of the giant Saxon. The great axe whirled into
its flashing circle, and came down. The stallion swerved and
leaped, and the blow missed, but glancing spent from the boy's
sword, knocked it spinning from his hand. The stallion climbed high
again, striking out with those killing forefeet, and the axeman's
face vanished in a pash of bright blood. The white horse plunged
back to the side of the King's chair and Arthur's hand went down to
his dagger. Then quiet, but clear as a shout, the King called,
"Here!" and flung his own sword, hilt first, into the air. Arthur's
hand shot out and caught it by the hilt. I saw it catch the light.
The white horse reared again. The standard was up, and streaming in
the wind, scarlet on gold. There was a great shout, spreading out
from the center of the field where the white stallion, treading
blood, leaped forward under the Dragon banner. Shouting, the men
surged with him. I saw the standard-bearer hesitate fractionally;
looking back at the King, but the King waved him forward, then lay
back, smiling, in his chair.

And now, too late for whatever
spectacular intervention Lot had intended, the Lothian troops swept
down out of the woodland and swelled the ranks of the attacking
British. But the day was already won. There was no man there on the
field who had not seen what happened. There, white on a white
horse, the King's fighting spirit had leaped, it seemed, out of his
failing body, and run ahead, like the spark on the tip of a
fighting spear, straight to the heart of the Saxon
forces.

Soon, as the Saxons, breaking from
stand to fighting stand, were pressed gradually backwards towards
the marshes that fringed the field, and the British followed them
with steadily growing ferocity and triumph, men started to run in
behind the fighting troops to bring out the hurt and the dying.
Uther's chair, which should have been borne back at the same time,
was forging forward steadily in Arthur's wake. But the main press
of the fighting was no longer round it; that was well forward of
the field where, under the Dragon, everyone could see the white
stallion and the white cloak and the flashing blade of the King's
sword. My post as a visible presence on the hill was no longer
either heeded or necessary. I went down to where the emergency
dressing station had been set up below the fallen tangles of the
apple orchard. Already the tents were filling, and the orderlies
were hard at work. I sent a boy running for my box of instruments
and, taking off my cloak, slung it over the low boughs of an apple
tree to make a shelter from the sun's rays; and as the next
stretcher went by me I called to the bearers to set the wounded man
down in the improvised shade.

One of the bearers was a lean and
graying veteran whom I recognized. He had worked as orderly for me
at Kaerconan. I said: "A moment, Paulus, don't hurry away. There
are plenty to do the carrying; I'd rather have your help
here."

He looked pleased that I had
recognized him. "I thought you might need me, sir. I've got my kit
with me." He knelt on the other side of the unconscious man, and
together we began to slit the leather tunic away where it was torn
open by a bloody gash.

"How is it with the King?" I asked
him.

"Hard to say, sir. I thought he'd
gone, and a lot else gone with him, but he's there now with Gandar,
and sitting peaceful as a babe, and smiling. As well he
might."

"Indeed...That's far enough, I think.
Let me look..." It was an axe wound, and the leather and metal of
the man's tunic had been driven deep into the hacked flesh and
splintered bone. I said: "I doubt if there's much we can do here,
but we'll try. God's on our side today, and he may well be on this
poor fellow's, too. Hold this, will your...As you were saying, well
he might. The luck won't change now."

"Luck, is it? Luck on a white horse,
you might say. A fair treat it was to see that youngster, the way
he pushed through just at the right moment. It needed something
like that, with the King falling back as if he was dead, and the
Dragon going down. We were looking for King Lot then, but no sign
of him. Believe me, sir, another half-minute and we'd have been
going the other way. Battle's like that; it makes you wonder
sometimes, to think what hangs on a few seconds and a bit of luck.
A piece of nice timing like that, and the right person to do it --
that's all it takes, and you've won or lost a kingdom."

We worked for a while in silence then,
quickly, because the man was beginning to stir under my hands, and
I had to finish before he woke to cruel life. When I had done all I
could, and we were bandaging, Paulus said, ruminatively: "Funny
thing."

"What?"

"Remember Kaerconan, sir?"

"Will I ever forget it?"

"Well, that youngster had a look of
him -- Ambrosius, I mean, that was Count of Britain then. White
horse and all, and the Dragon flying over it. Men were saying
so...And the name's the same, sir, isn't it? Emrys? Connection of
yours, perhaps?"

"Perhaps."

"Ah, well," said Paulus, and asked no
more questions. He did not need to say more; I knew already that
rumors must have been flying round the camp from the moment that
Arthur and I had ridden in with the escort. Let them run. Uther had
shown his hand. And between the boy's bravery, and the luck of the
battle and his own misjudgment, Lot would have a hard struggle of
it now to change the King's mind, or to persuade the other nobles
that Uther's son was no fit leader. The man between us woke then
and began to scream, and there was no more time for
talking.

2

By nightfall the field was cleared of
the fallen. The King had withdrawn when it was seen that the tide
of victory was sure, and not to be stemmed by any late action of
the Saxons. The battle over, the main forces of the British fell
back on the township two miles to the north-west, leaving Cador,
with Caw of Strathclyde, to hold the field. Lot had not stayed to
test his position with the other leaders, but had withdrawn into
the town as soon as the fighting was done, and had gone like Ajax
to his quarters, since when no man had seen him. Already stories
were going round about his fury at the King's action in favoring
the strange youth on the battlefield, and his black silence when he
heard that Emrys was bidden with me to the victory feast, where no
doubt he would be further honored. There were rumors, too, about
the reason for the belated entrance into battle of Lot's troops. No
one went so far as to speak of treachery, but it was said openly
that, had he delayed much longer, and had not Arthur performed his
small miracle, Lothian's inaction might have cost Uther the
victory. Men wondered too, aloud, whether Lot would emerge from his
sullen silence to share in the feast which was decreed for the
following night. But I knew that he could not keep away. He dared
not. Though he had said nothing, he must certainly know who
"Ernrys" was, and if he was ever to discredit him and seize the
power he had schemed for, he would have to do it now.