Pendragon 02 Pendragon Banner (17 page)

Only the wild hills beyond the Roman Wall lay
beyond his
full control or influence. The
rest, even Britannia Secunda,
was, one way or another, his. But the
price to retain it was becoming high. Almost too high.

Gwenhwyfar exhaled a long, weary breath. She
was sick of living in a tent, of moving from place to place, camp to camp. They
still had nowhere to call their own, no safe, peaceful, protected place where
there was no argument or conflict, no need constantly to watch over your
shoulder or fear a moving shadow. Nowhere that did not permeate the threat of
death stalking at your heels. The argument at Lindum had ended all hope of
settling somewhere.

Movement at the entrance flap. Gwenhwyfar’s
head lifted, startled. Arthur stood there, looking tired and careworn, like a
man defeated. Wearing a smile, Gwenhwyfar went to stand a
few paces before him. ‘Llacheu enjoyed his afternoon.
He learnt
much.’

‘
A boy
any man would be proud to call son. You look lovely.’
Gwenhwyfar felt
her cheeks blush. ‘Do you still think so?’

‘Aye.’ He reached forward, brought her to him
but did not kiss her. His fingers played with her hair a moment, then he
said, ‘You know why I cannot go to
Gwynedd.’ She released a slow breath. ‘I know why.’ Arthur released her, swung
away. Leaning against the tent pole he rested his head against his arm. ‘Then
why argue?’ I am aware of your reasons, Arthur, but knowing does not
make "me like them. You keep us with you to
prove a point, to
prove to Ambrosius
that you are not afraid of what he might do.
Well, I am afraid! I fear for my sons and I fear for you. It is almost
as if we are on the run, as though we are
criminals living outside
the law. You pretend otherwise – but is that
not the truth of it? Were you to stay overlong in one place somewhere else
might
have the courage to rise up against
you, go with your uncle. We
move from camp to camp, ride north, south,
east and west
making your presence felt,
reminding the people and your uncle
and
the Church that you are still the Supreme King.’ She
wanted to go to
him, touch him, hold him, but did not. This whole situation was running
over-fast, like a river in winter flood. If the rise of water did not recede
soon, the bank would
burst. ‘I want you as a
husband, as a father, not as a king. I want
you to say damn the lot of
them and ride away from it all. To come back to me and your sons.’

‘
You want too much, Cymraes.’

‘I want you. Is that too much?’ He looked
round at her, eyes pleading. ‘Do not ask me to choose.’
Gwenhwyfar slumped on the bed, her hands falling limp into
her lap. ‘Let us – the children, go. Let us go to
Gwynedd a
while. We have trailed in the wake of the army too long – Amr
knows barely anything except life on the march.
We are sick of
it, Arthur, heart sick of it.’ He fingered a gold buckle
at his waist, intent on tracing the ornate pattern. ‘You once wanted to be
always with me, were
once angry because I forbade
you to ride with me. I was equally
angry because you defied me.’ He
looked up, straight at her. ‘Have things changed so much between us?’
A tear slid down her cheek, splashed unnoticed onto
her
hand. ‘I was young then, Arthur, now I am tired. Tired of this
bickering between you and Ambrosius and the Church.’ Gwenhwyfar shut her eyes
briefly, before saying with a sob, ‘And I am so tired of Winifred’s presence
always behind me.’ Her look, when she turned to him was exhaustion, pleading
for a respite. ‘I will fight Winifred until the
day I draw last
breath. For the sake of my sons.’ She had to shrug. ‘Though
she
fights for the same reason. Her own son
is no doubt as precious
to her.’ Gwenhwyfar ran her hands through her
hair, the soft glow from the single lamp dancing gold among the strands of
copper. ‘I sometimes feel though, Arthur, that it would be best to leave it
all; to go quietly with my three born sons and let Winifred have what she
wants.’ She looked up at him. ‘At least
that
way I need not always have the fear of her son killing mine
some day.’ He
was shaking his head. ‘Na, love. Even were we to give
Winifred my royal torque this very night, she would still see to it
that
Llacheu, any of the boys, were not around to threaten Cerdic’s claim.’ Gwenhwyfar
took a long, slow breath, said, ‘So you keep us
with you for that reason also, to show Winifred what? That you
do
not trust me out of your sight or that we are a loving, happy family?’ She
stood, the movement portraying her defiance. ‘Hardly that, Arthur, are we?’
He took a deep breath, held it for a moment
before exhaling.
Although he returned
her gaze, there was no emotion in his
face, only a blank nothingness,
shielding the feelings of panic
and fear
that were hurtling around his head and hammering
chest. His voice was quite steady when he asked, ‘If I let you go
to
Gwynedd, how long would you stay?’ Gwenhwyfar lifted a shoulder, let it fall.

He smiled, some of the
hurt showing with it. ‘As long as
that?’ He made to
leave. ‘I cannot let you go, Cymraes.’ He ducked through the entrance, was
gone. She could not see his own tears, or read the thoughts. You
may never
come back to me.

Gwenhwyfar leapt to her feet, ran. He was
already walking
away, she followed, pulling
at his tunic, but he did not turn, just
kept on walking. The rain was a
fine drizzle, drenching her under-shift, moulding the thin material to her
body, plastering her hair to head, neck and face. ‘Arthur, please stay with me.
Talk to me.’
Into the rain-swirled darkness
he answered, ‘You want me to
stay, yet
you want to leave me. Make up your mind,
Gwenhwfyar.’
Anger flashed in her eyes, swirling
patterns of tawny goldagainst darkening green. "Tis you who must decide, not I.’ She whirled, re-entered the tent. For a moment she thought he was
going to come after her. As the seconds passed,
realised he was
not.

The boys’ nurse, Enid, lay beside them.
Disturbed by the
flurried movement she
raised her head, expression questioning.
Gwenhwyfar motioned her back to sleep, began stripping off the saturated
clothing, found a dry garment and something to
rub her hair.

The sound of rain pattering on the leather of
the tent was
insistent, irritating, a
relentless beat repeated over and over.
She did not want to leave
Arthur, but she could not stay much
longer
bound within this wretched quarrel for pre-eminence
that he was waging with his uncle. Is this what it
was to be King?
To make camp, break camp. March and march again? If it
was, she had had a bellyful of it.

§ XIX

Arthur did not return immediately to his
tent. He went to the horses, a pretence of checking Cei’s chestnut. The horse
had stumbled earlier in the day, cutting its knee. He peered at the
cut, satisfied to see that the minor wound was
already beginning
to scab over. Further down the line of picketed
horses, Hasta was dozing, one hindleg tipped, head down, ears flopping. He
came alert with a soft whicker as Arthur reached
to make a fuss
of him.

Gwenhwyfar had bred the stallion from her own
mare, had trained him to carry saddle and man, accept a bridle and bit. Arthur,
in turn, had taught him to step over wounded or dead bodies, ignore the smell
and carnage of the battlefield, stand unflinching if his rider were to fall ...
a good war-horse was worth more than any gold or jewels or finery, for a good
warhorse could save your life. Arthur gently pulled the animal’s
ears, stripping the wet hair between his fingers.
You knew
where you were with horses.
There was an old story, one of the
Caesars had made his horse a
Senator because he did not trust or
like the men of his Senate. Arthur patted Hasta’s neck. If
Caligula had to deal with
men like his own Council, then well could he believe such a story! ‘Shall I
make you a Councillor,
my lad? Would that
ease all this disagreement? Could you make
those who owe me, pay their
debts?’
Arthur’s sigh
was bound with regrets and bitterness. He was
in
a web of tangled demands that he could not extricate himself
from. Leave
it all Gwenhwyfar said, go to Gwynedd and let
them
all get on with it! Give up being King, give up what he had
fought for,
believed in, all these years? Is this what it meant to be King? To be
continuously quarrelling, stamping and snarl
ing?
To feel you had not one loyal friend, not one person to trust
implicitly?
His fingers moved to the velvet-soft pinkness of Hasta’s muzzle, the horse’s
breath huffing warm on his cold, wet skin. The animal began to contentedly lick
Arthur’s palm, relishing the slight taste of salt.

He had not expected it to be like this; as a
raw lad when he
aimed for the taking of
Vortigern’s royal torque, he had
exulted only in the dreams of leading a
force of superb drilled
men, of winning
battles and bathing in the light of achieve
ment and glory. It had not
occurred to Arthur that other men
might not
share his vision, might not be content to follow in his
shadow, nodding and smiling agreement at all he
planned to
do. The tedium of reality
seldom sits amicable with the shine of
hopeful, youthful, expectation.

Uthr had tried for the claiming of the same
dreams – had he thought of what, by necessity, came in between the planning and
fighting of battles, the thrill of campaign? Would the great Uthr, had he
become King, have failed as miserably at the everyday routine of Kingship as
his son seemed to be failing?

‘Ah, my father,’ Arthur said with a deep sigh
of regret, ‘you taught me how to fight but gave me no instruction on how to
govern.’ He patted Hasta’s neck, told the horse, ‘Fathers,
tutors, all those who instruct your childhood with a myriad of
information, neglect to give counsel on how to
hold a woman’s
love.’ He turned away. The one thing he needed to know:
how
to keep his Cymraes from leaving him. And
there was no one to
ask, save his
horse. What was he to do? Take himself off into the
hills, and do what?
Become a farmer, a horse breeder? She did not want that either, but he could
not expect her to trail much longer in the wake of the Artoriani on these
endless
rounds of tax collecting and
loyalty gathering. They were all full
to the back teeth with it. There
was so much more he ought to be doing – finding a stronghold of his own,
securing the seacoasts from Saex and Hibernian raiders, watching the latest
movement of Morgause and her weakling husband. Instead he had to ensure and
ensure again, the loyalty of petty lords and
chieftains
to the west and east and south and north of
Ambrosius’s claimed land. Men who gave their pledge of
alliance
to his face and sent their young men to Ambrosius behind his back.

Laying his forehead against Hasta’s neck,
Arthur closed his
eyes. He was tired of it,
tired of this wasting of time when there
was so much of importance to be
done. Happen Gwenhwyfar
was right. Give it
all to Ambrosius, let him deal with the dissidents who refused to send men to
train for the local
militias, let him demand the due payments of cattle
and grain.
Except some of them would
willingly give it. Men of the
Church for instance. That was why the
Artoriani were here,
camped beside the
swollen waters of the Gwy river; because an
abbot refused to pay taxes to the King. Three days they had
been
here, their tents sprawling across the meadows that ran between river and
monastery walls, their camp fires built high, the men deliberately rowdy.

The Pendragon’s envoy
had been refused entry to the
monastery grounds, the
gate remaining firmly shut even to
Arthur’s
personal demands of admittance. Having subsequently
to shout up at high, stone-built walls while
standing in a
swathing curtain of rain
to a defiant abbot had made Arthur
look and feel slightly ridiculous.

But then, this morning,
the second, and as Arthur had
implicitly pointed
out, last, attempt had altered the situation.
The
rain had ceased leaving a blue-washed sky, draped in great
puff clouds
that had trailed languid shadows across a sun-
steaming valley. The abbot had realised that the Pendragon was
not going to go away, realised too, that the King
was not
bluffing, that he thought his
terms to be reasonable enough.
You are built on my land. You pay me, or
I burn down your monastery. The thirty head of red-and-white cattle were to be
delivered on the morrow.