The Prince and the Pilgrim (2 page)

“They will be dead when they get ashore,” said Baudouin calmly, and proceeded to give his orders.

So it was that the Saxons, rowing their armed fleet into the quiet-seeming bay, found themselves suddenly in the grip of a fierce current that threatened to sweep them straight out to sea again. The strength of the current took them by surprise, driving their ships off course and turning them sideways to the shore. As the rowers, bending to their oars, fought to bring the craft back again, and force them nearer inshore, a shout came from the Saxon lookout.

Out from the south side of the bay, where the rough jetty had hidden them from view, appeared a small flotilla of boats. They seemed to be unmanned. They bobbed away from the jetty, spun for a few moments aimlessly in the waves, then, as the outgoing current took them, they gathered speed and headed, as directly as if aimed, for the Saxon longships.

As they bore down on the vessels still helplessly
wallowing
in the tide-race, it could be seen that smoke was rising from the little boats, smoke which burst, suddenly and vividly, into flame. Then the Cornish boats, well ablaze, were in among the longships, driven against them and held there by the current, while the Saxons, abandoning their rowing, fought to fend them off with oars which flamed and charred and spat fire into their own ships. Three of the Saxon ships, tangled with the fireships into a blazing mass, caught fire and burned. Some of the men managed to scramble aboard the other vessels, one of which capsized. One longship only escaped the fire. Bravely, the men aboard her tried to hold her clear of the blazing wreckage, and pick up the struggling swimmers, but the heavy load and the driving current were too much for them, and at length the surviving ship, overloaded as she was, managed to fight her way back to seaward, and, leaving the smoking wreckage and the despairing cries for help in her wake, vanished once more beyond the point.

The Cornishmen, thigh-deep in the water, waited for the rest. Barely thirty of them reached the shore, struggling to land only to meet the swords of the troopers. Of the survivors, the first three, by Baudouin’s orders, were dragged alive from the water and bound, to be taken back for questioning. The rest were killed as they reached the shallows, and their bodies thrown back into the sea for the current to take. But first they were robbed of what valuables they carried, and this, too, at Baudouin’s bidding. “For,” said he, “we still have to face our real battle, with the fishermen
whose
boats I have just destroyed. So take what weapons there are, but set the rest of the takings aside – yes, here beside me. I shall see that none of you is the loser by this day’s work, but the villagers must get their due. Believe me, the loss of their catch, for as long as it will take them to build new boats, will soon seem far more dreadful to them than the chance of a Saxon raid!”

“Chance! It was real enough!” said one man, pulling a broadsword from its scabbard. “Look at this! These notches! Every one a death, I’ve no doubt!” He handled the sword lovingly, but threw it, with its belt and gilded buckle, down on the pile.

“A thing is only real once it has happened,” said Baudouin. He looked around him at the troopers who, some of them with outspoken regrets, but all cheerfully, were following suit. “And thanks to your speed and readiness, this did not.” He laughed. “But let us hope that the villagers saw enough of that chance to make them spare their boats to us! See yonder. They’re coming now.”

A small crowd of villagers was heading down the coomb. Some of the men carried weapons, hastily snatched up, but word must have gone round that the fighting was done, for the women were with them, and even some children, skirmishing and crying out shrilly on the outskirts of the crowd.

They came to a halt a few yards away, and after some muttering and shuffling one man, presumably the headman of the village, was pushed forward towards the prince.

He cleared his throat, but before he could speak
Baudouin
said quickly: “Rhu, isn’t it? Well, Rhu, the danger is past, and I – the king and I – have to thank you for giving us the fire and the tinder.” His teeth showed in a brief grin of satisfaction. “As you see, it sufficed. There were five Saxon longships, fully armed, and God knows what they had planned to do, had they once landed, but you may be sure that by this, not even your children would have been left alive.”

There were murmurs at that, and it could be seen that some of the women gathered their children closer to their skirts, while eyes went to the sea’s edge, where a couple of bodies bobbed and wallowed in the shallows. A woman called out suddenly, shrill with anger. Two small boys, excited and curious for a closer view of the corpses, had crept from the back of the crowd and started down the shingle. They were caught and dragged back, to smacks and scolding from their mothers, and looks of amused indulgence from the men. In the brief flurry of action, the tension slackened, and Baudouin, seizing the moment, laughed and said, easily: “I’m sorry about your boats, but this should help you build new and better ones, and keep you and your families meantime.”

At this there was a growl of approval from the villagers, and at a word from Rhu two of the men started to gather up the spoils. “To share fairly, later, for everyone,” said Rhu gruffly, and Baudouin nodded.

“And no doubt the tides will bring you more. There’s wreckage coming ashore already. The king makes no claim on it. It’s yours.”

This, too, brought approval and even some rough words of gratitude. Wood was scarce enough in that rocky and windswept land, and the Saxon ships had been well built. There would be rich pickings along this shore for some tides to come.

A trooper brought Baudouin’s horse, and, rein in hand, the prince paused to exchange a final word with the headman. But some of the villagers still crowded close, and among the crowd there were ugly looks directed at the prisoners, and harsh mutterings. “What about those? To let them live? When they would have murdered us all, and burned our houses and taken our women, aye, and killed and eaten our little ones! Everyone knows what these Saxon wolves are like! Give them to us, Prince!” And a couple of the women, armed with what looked like skinning-knives, took it up in a shrill shouting. “Give them to us! Give them to us!”

“Keep back!” said Baudouin sharply, as the troopers closed round the prisoners. “If you know what might have come to you, then we’ll hear no more from you! For you, this is the end of it! The rest is for the king. As for these three men, for all we know there may be other threats coming to this land of ours, and King March must know of them. So we keep these men alive to tell him what he needs to know. They are not your meat, my friends; they are the king’s!”

“Then pity help them,” said someone, almost inaudibly, adding, to be heard: “The king your brother should reward you nobly for what you have done this day, Prince!”

Baudouin, riding homewards, found himself wondering, almost with apprehension, what his brother would in fact say to him. There would certainly be no noble reward. March was a good enough ruler for this wild and remote kingdom; he was harsh, as were his people and their ways, but he was also subtle, and enjoyed plotting and guile, and the besting of other men by secret means. Not for nothing was he known to his peers as King Fox. But cruelty and cunning are not traits that make a man beloved of his people, and the Cornish people had no love for their king. Baudouin, the young man of action, who understood their ways and spoke to high and low alike, he had their love.

And King March saw, and burned, and said nothing.

The king came home three days later, and before he was well within the courtyard of his stronghold he heard about the attempted Saxon landing and his brother’s success in repulsing it. From the captain of the troop that Baudouin had led, to the groom who took March’s bridle and the servant who drew off his boots, all were eager to tell the king what had happened, and to praise the prince’s resourcefulness.

“So where is my brother now?” asked March.

“I saw him come in barely an hour before you, sir,” said the servant. “He went to his own chambers. The little boy was ailing earlier this week, and your brother’s lady wife was anxious.”

“Hm.” The king betrayed no anxiety about his brother’s child. This was a boy just over two years old, and so far the only child of Baudouin and his young wife Anna. A lively, and normally a sturdy child, he served as another spur to the elder brother’s jealousy: March had no son, and though he was attentive – some said too attentive – to his Irish queen, she bore him no children, and he was too jealous of her youth and beauty to put her aside. The thought that his brother’s son Alexander seemed likely to be the sole heir to the
kingdom
only served to add to the bitterness that thinned his blood and put rancour in all his days.

As was customary on the king’s return after an absence from court, March held a council that evening. It was an informal affair, merely a meeting of the Cornish nobles and officers held before supper in the great hall. The queen was not present. Baudouin sat, as usual, on the king’s right, and Drustan, his nephew and the king’s, on March’s left. While the men were still waiting for the king to enter the hall and open the proceedings, Drustan leaned across the empty chair to speak with Baudouin.

“A word with you, cousin.” The two men were much of an age, so that between them the title of ‘uncle’ would have come absurdly. Drustan was a big man, brown-haired and fresh-skinned, with the look of a fighter. Which, indeed, he was. He was the son of King March’s sister by the lord of Benoic, and had the open nature and gallant bearing learned at the court of that splendid ruler. Of him, too, March was jealous, and in fact had good reason for being so; but suspicion was not evidence, and of that there was none. So Drustan was still, perforce, made welcome at the Cornish court.

He had been with King March on his Welsh journey, so was eager, now, to hear Baudouin’s account of the adventure with the Saxon ships. He, too, had heard the rumours of a Saxon attempt to make landfall in the remoter parts of the west, and praised the other man’s action. “As,” he added with a grin, “you won’t hear yourself overmuch commended by our gracious lord. But never
mind
that. Less said the better till we see how the wind blows. So … They tell me that young Alexander was ailing while we were abroad? I trust he’s better now?”

Baudouin, thanking him, assured him that all was well in the nursery, and then the king came into the hall, and took his place.

“Ha, brother.” It was the first time March had seen Baudouin since his return. The greeting was loud, for all to hear, and hearty enough, if brief. “They tell me that you have been busy defending our shores. It was well done, and we thank you. Later, after we have examined the prisoners, and know perhaps a little more about the purpose of this raid, we will talk again. But for the present our business must concern what was said and agreed between myself and the Welsh king – and then, by the gods, to supper! Our lodging in Dyfed was well enough, but we fared thinly on the road home!” He gave his great laugh, and clapped Baudouin on the shoulder, but he was looking the other way, at Drustan, and there was no mirth in the pale eyes. “And there are other things a man is hungry for, after so many days and nights away!”

At that council, no more was said to Baudouin, and once supper was over the king did not stay to speak with anyone, going straight to the queen’s rooms, but next afternoon a servant sought Baudouin to tell him that his brother would see him privately that evening, for supper.

When he told Anna, his wife, she said nothing, watching with careful calm as her maids drew fresh clothes for him from the cedar chests and laid them ready on the bed. Only after the girls
had
gone, their soft steps dying away down the stone stair of the tower where Baudouin’s family was housed, did she turn swiftly, her eyes anxious.

“Take care. You will take care?”

He did not need to ask what she meant. “Oh, I will. But what can you fear for me? From all accounts his councils went well, and he was in a good enough temper at supper last night. Indeed, he spoke well of my fight down by the bay.”

“What else could he do?” The anxiety in her voice robbed it of sharpness. “He knows, who better, what the people think of you. But you and I know –”

“Anna!” He said it warningly, though they were alone in the tower room, and the walls were thick; but most people at March’s court were used to caution, and who more so than the king’s heirs?

“I’m sorry, love. No more. But take care.” She said it softly this time, then put a hand up to caress his cheek, and smiled. “The barber, my dear, before you go to this royal supper, and look, I finished the shirt while you were out on your adventures. Do you like it?”

He fingered the fine embroidery that she was holding, then pulled her to him and kissed her. “It’s beautiful. Like you, my love. Am I allowed to wear it, or is it to be laid away with herbs and cedar-wood for Alexander to inherit?”

She nestled closer, and her lips sought the hollow of his throat. “It is for you, every stitch of it, as well you know. But tonight? You would wear it tonight? Why trouble yourself just for – I mean, just for an ordinary talk and a supper?” Then,
suddenly
fierce, as if in spite of herself: “And doesn’t he hate you enough already, with everyone in the place dinning into his ears what a great fighter you are, and how the men love you and follow you, and now you want to go to him looking like a prince of the High Kingdom – as fine and as handsome as King Arthur himself?”

He laid a gentle hand to her lips. “Hush now, let that be enough. These things don’t need words. And we had best hurry. So, my love, help me put on my best for my brother the king. Yes, this beautiful shirt; why not? My thanks. And the collar of citrines. And now the dagger for my meat … No, nothing more. Can I go armed to sup with my brother?” He kissed her again. “Now, enough of your fretting, Anna. Get the boy to bed, and I’ll see you soon enough. I doubt if I’ll be late – you can be sure I won’t stay any longer than I have to!”