Legacy: Arthurian Saga (135 page)

"Now, which way do you plan to go
tomorrow?"

"I thought, by the west road through
Deva and Bremet. I have a call to make at Vindolanda."

His finger followed the route
northward till it reached Bremetennacum (which is commonly spoken
of now as Bremet), and paused. "Will you do something for
me?"

"Willingly."

"Go by the east. It's not so much
farther, and the road is better for most of the way. Here, see? If
you turn off at Bremet, you'll take this road through the mountain
gap." His finger traced it out: east from Bremetennacum, up the old
road following the Tribuit River, then over the pass and down
through Olicana into the Vale of York. There Dere Street runs, a
good, fast highway still, up through Corstopitum and the Wall and
thence still north, right into Manau Guotodin, where lies Lot's
capital of Dunpeldyr.

"You'll have to retrace your steps for
Vindolanda," said Arthur, "but not far. You'll lose nothing in
time, I believe. It's the road through the Pennine Gap that I want
you to take. I've never been that way myself. I've had reports that
it's quite feasible -- you should have no difficulty, just the two
of you -- but it's too broken in places for a troop of cavalry. I
shall be sending parties up to repair it. I shall have to fortify
it, too...you agree? With parts of the eastern seaboard so open to
the enemy, if they should get a grip on the easterly plains this
will be their way into our British heartland in the west. There are
two forts there already; I am told they could be made good. I want
you to look at them for me. Don't take time over it; I can get
detailed reports from the surveyors; but if you can go that way, I
would like to have your thoughts about it."

"You shall have them."

As he straightened from the map, a
cock crowed outside somewhere. The courtyard was grey. He said
quietly: "For the other matter we spoke of, I am in your hands. God
knows I should be thankful to be so." He smiled. "Now we had better
get to our beds. You have a journey to face, and I another day of
pleasure. I envy you! Good night, and God go with you."

8

Next day, furnished with food for two
days' journey, and three good mules from one of the baggage trains,
Ulfin and I set off on the journey northward.

I had made journeys before in
circumstances as dangerous as this, when to be recognized would be
to court disaster, or even death. I had, perforce, become adept at
disguise; this had given rise to yet another legend about "the
enchanter," that he could vanish at will into thin air to escape
his enemies. I had certainly perfected the art of melting into a
landscape: what I did in fact was assume the tools of some trade,
and then frequent places where no one would expect a prince to be.
Men's eyes are focused on what, not who, a traveler is, who goes
labeled with his skill. I had traveled as a singer when I needed
access to a prince's court as well as a humble tavern, but more
often I went as a traveling physician or eyedoctor. This was the
guise I liked best. It allowed me to practice my skill where it was
most needed, among the poor, and it gave me access to any kind of
house except the noblest.

This was the disguise I chose now. I
took my small harp, but only for my private use: I dared not risk
my skill as a singer earning me a summons to Lot's court. So the
harp, muffled and wrapped into anonymity, hung on the
baggage-mule's shabby saddle, while my boxes of unguents and roll
of implements were carried plain to be seen.

The first part of our way I knew well,
but after we reached Bremetennacum, and turned toward the Pennine
Gap, the country was unfamiliar.

The Gap is formed by the valleys of
three great rivers. Two of these, the Wharfe and the Isara, spring
from the limestone on the Pennine tops and flow, meandering,
eastward. The other, an important stream with countless smaller
tributaries, lapses toward the west. It is called the Tribuit. Once
through the Gap and into the valley of the Tribuit, an enemy's way
would be clear to the west coast, and the last embattled corners of
Britain.

Arthur had spoken of two forts lying
within the Gap itself. I had gathered from seemingly idle questions
put to local men in the tavern at Bremetennacum that in times past
there had been a third fort guarding the western mouth of the pass,
where the Tribuit Valley widens out toward the lowlands and the
coast. It had been built by the Romans as a temporary marching
camp, so much of the turf and timber structure would have decayed
and vanished, but it occurred to me that the road serving it would
stand a survey, and, if it were still in reasonable condition,
could provide a quick corner-cut for cavalry coming down from
Rheged to defend the Gap.

From Rheged to Olicana, and York. The
road Morgause must have taken to meet with Lot.

That settled it. I would take the same
road, the road of my dream at Nodens' shrine. If the dream had been
a true one -- and I had no doubt of it -- there were things I
wished to learn.

We left the main road just beyond
Bremetennacum, and headed up the Tribuit valley on the gravel of a
neglected Roman road. A day's ride brought us to the marching
camp.

As I had suspected, little was left of
it but the banks and ditches, and some rotting timber where the
gateways had once stood. But like all such camps it was cleverly
placed, on a flank of moorland that looked in every direction over
clear country. The hillside had a tributary stream at foot, and to
the west the river flowed through flatlands toward the sea. Placed
as the camp was, so far west, we might hope that it would not be
needed for defense; but as a staging-camp for cavalry, or as a
temporary base for a swift foray through the Gap, it was
ideal.

I had been unable to find anyone who
knew its name. When I wrote my report to Arthur that night, I
called it merely "Tribuit."

Next day we struck out across country
toward the first of the forts of which Arthur had spoken. This lay
in the arm of a marshy stream, near the beginning of the pass. The
stream spread out beside it into a lake, from which the place took
its name. Though ruinous, it could, I judged, be speedily brought
into repair. There was abundant timber in the valley, and plenty of
stone and deep moorland turf available.

We reached it toward late afternoon,
and, the air being balmy and dry, and the fortress walls promising
sufficient shelter, we made camp there. Next morning we began the
climb across the ridge toward Olicana.

Well before midday we had climbed
clear of the forest and onto heathland. It was a fine day, with
mist drawing back from the sparkling sedges, and the song of water
bubbling from every crevice in the rock, where the rills tumbled
down to fill the young river. Rippling, too, with sound was the
morning sky, where curlews slanted down on ringing streams of song
toward their nests in the grass. We saw a she-wolf, heavy with
milk, slink across the road ahead, with a hare in her mouth. She
gave us a brief, indifferent glance, then slipped into the shelter
of the mist.

It was a wild way, a Wolf Road such as
the Old Ones love. I kept my eye on the rocks that crowned the
screes, but saw no sign that I could recognize of their remote and
comfortless eyries. I had no doubt, though, that we were watched
every step of the way. No doubt, either, that news had gone north
on the winds that Merlin the enchanter was on the road, and
secretly. It did not trouble me. It is not possible to keep secrets
from the Old Ones; they know all that comes or goes in forest and
hill. They and I had come to an understanding long since, and
Arthur had their trust.

We halted on the summit of the moor. I
looked around me. The mist had lifted now, dispersing under the
steadily strengthening sun. All around us stretched the moor,
broken with grey rock and bracken, with, in the distance, the
still-misty heights of fell and mountain. To the left of the road
the ground fell away into the wide Isara valley, where water
glinted among crowding trees.

It could not have looked more unlike
the rain-dimmed vision of Nodens' shrine, but there was the
milestone with its legend, Olicana; and there, to the left, the
track plunging steeply down toward the valley trees. Among them,
only just visible through the leafage, showed the walls of a
considerable house.

Ulfin, ranging his mule alongside
mine, was pointing.

"If only we had known, we might have
found better lodging there."

I said slowly: "I doubt it. I think we
were better under the sky."

He shot me a curious glance. "I
thought you had never been this way, sir: Do you know the
place?"

"Shall we say that I know of it? And
would like to know more. Next time we pass a village, or if we see
a shepherd on the hill, find out who owns that villa, will
you?"

He threw me another look, but said no
more, and we rode on.

Olicana, the second of Arthur's two
forts, lay only ten miles or so to the east. To my surprise the
road, heading steeply downward, then crossing a considerable
stretch of boggy moorland, was in first-class condition. Ditches
and embankments alike looked to have been recently repaired. There
was a good timber bridge across the Isara itself, and the ford of
the next tributary was cleared and paved. We made good speed in
consequence, and came in the early evening into settled country. At
Olicana there is a sizable township. We found lodgings in a tavern
that stood near the fortress walls, to serve the men of the
garrison.

From what I had seen of the road, and
the orderly appointments of the town's streets and square, it came
as no surprise that the walls of the fortress itself were in the
same good order. Gates and bridges were sound and stout, and the
ironwork looked fire-new. By carefully idle questions, and by
listening to the talk in the tavern at supper-time, I was able to
gather that a skeleton garrison had been placed here in Uther's
time, to watch the road into the Gap and to keep an eye on the
signal towers to the east. It had been an emergency measure, taken
hastily during the worst years of the Saxon Terror, but the same
men were still here, despairing of recall, bored to distraction,
but kept to a tingling pitch of efficiency by a garrison commander
who deserved something better (one gathered) than this dismal
outpost of inaction.

The simplest way to gather the
information I needed was to make myself known to this officer, who
could then see that my report was sent straight back to the King.
Accordingly, leaving Ulfin in the tavern, I presented myself at the
guardroom with the pass Arthur had supplied.

From the speed with which I was passed
through, and the lack of surprise at my shabby appearance, and
refusal even to state my name or my business to anyone but the
commander himself, it could be judged that messengers were frequent
here. Secret messengers, at that. If this really was a forgotten
outpost (and admittedly not I nor the King's advisers had known of
it) then the only messengers who would come and go so assiduously
were spies. I began to look forward all the more to meeting the
commander.

I was searched before being taken in,
which was only to be expected. Then a couple of the guards escorted
me through the fort to the headquarters building. I looked about
me. The place was well lighted, and as far as I could see, roads,
courtyards, wells, exercise ground, workshops, barracks were in
mint repair. We passed carpenters' shops, harness-makers, smithies.
From the padlocks on the granary doors, I deduced that the barns
were fully stocked. The place was not large but was still, I
reckoned, undermanned. There could be accommodation for Arthur's
cavalry almost before the force could be formed.

My pass was taken through, then I was
shown into the commander's room, and the guards withdrew, with a
neatness that told its own story. This was where the spies came;
and usually, I supposed, as late as this.

The commander received me standing, a
tribute not to me but to the King's seal. The first thing that
struck me was his youth. He could not have been more than
twenty-two. The second thing was that he was tired. Lines of strain
were scored into his face: his youth, the solitary post up here, in
charge of a bored and hardbitten contingent of men; the constant
watchfulness as the tides of invasion flowed and ebbed along the
eastern coasts; all this, winter and summer, without help and
without backing. It seemed true that after Uther had sent him here
four years ago -- four years -- he had forgotten all about
him.

"You have news for me?" The flat tone
disguised no eagerness; that had long since been dissipated by
frustration.

"I can give you what news there is
when my main business is done. I have been sent, rather, to get
information from you, if you will be good enough to supply it. I
have a report to send to the High King. I would be glad if a
messenger could take it to him as soon as it is
completed."

"That can be arranged. Now? A man can
be ready within the half hour."

"No. It's not so urgent. If we might
talk first, please?"

He sat down, motioning me to a chair.
For the first time a spark of interest showed. "Do you mean that
the report concerns Olicana? Am I to know why?"