The King's Peace (39 page)

Urdo had thought to bury Galba with the other dead. There were too many of them to burn.

Fifty-two of ours we might have managed, at some cost to the forest, but not six thousand Jarnsmen. So they were given to the earth in the new way, and great mounds were built below the hill at Foreth where they lie still in honor, their weapons beneath their feet. Galba alone of those who fell on the field was carried home and given back to fire and air in the old Tanagan way.

It was Emlin who changed the High King's mind, coming to us almost as soon as we were back down Foreth Hill and before we had dismounted. Ohtar had decided to walk back down. Urdo had just sent Ulf off and had pushed back his hair and drawn breath to say
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something to me as Emlin came up. Emlin looked nervous but resolute, and his hair was shorn so short that from above I could almost see his neck.

"My lord," he said, to Urdo, and added "Praefecto," to me, perfunctorily but politely, establishing this as a formal and not a friendly conversation. "My lord, they said they are going to bury the Captain, I mean my praefecto Galba ap Galba. I have put a guard around his body or they would have taken him already."

Urdo swung down to the ground and summoned the groom with a twitch of his head.

He did not look as if he wanted formality. "Glyn's people were only following my orders,"

he said, as ap Caw led the red horse away, "to have everything ready for sunset. What is the matter?"

"My lord, he was heir to his father's land, and three of his grandfathers shared his name and lie on that land, and he loved it so. The old Duke would want him to come home, all those he led know he would have wanted it." I looked around. There were indeed more than a few of Galba's people hanging around watching us anxiously. They had all cut their hair short. I realized as I saw this that they had done this not for close friends or fallen kindred but for Galba, their captain. They had served under him since Caer Lind, but all the same this was something I had never seen. The Vincan troops had done this for their great emperors, for Adren and Aulius and much loved Drusan. Cornelien records that the legions on the northern borders refused orders to cut their hair at the death of Tovran, saying that grief began in the heart and could not be commanded. The order had been withdrawn. I have always thought this sensible, though Cornelien saw it as a dire precedent. All this passed through my mind as I looked from Galba's armigers back to

Emlin. He had been to Urdo's strategy feasts, he must know all this as well as I did. He would not have given an order. All the same someone must have suggested it. Few of these armigers would keep Vincan ways at home.

"It is close enough half a month's ride to Magor, without risk to the horses," Urdo said.

"And it is summer." There was a bank of low clouds far off to the west behind the hill, presage of the rain that was coming, but as he spoke it was a very hot afternoon. "It would be better to take the ashes to his family."

"Ten days, from here," I said. As I spoke I felt my voice shake, and dismounted to steady myself. The loyalty of the ala had moved me. As I reached the ground I went on, "I think Emlin is right that it is what his father and the land would want. We could make a casket." Emlin looked at me gratefully.

Urdo turned his head sideways and seemed to be listening for a moment. I wondered if he heard messages on the wind from distant Magor. I looked to the southwest and saw only the river and the forest.

Urdo sighed. "I could not do this for all the fallen. But none other here is a king, or a land's heir.

Will you take his body home with his ala then, Sulien?" I turned to him.

"If you can spare me, I could," I said, "It is my family duty if not my desire. It will be very hard to give this news to my sister and his young sons."

"The news will be there before you, the red-cloaks are riding already, news of the Peace and those who died to make it will be all over the kingdom as fast as swift horses can carry it. But if you will take Galba's body home you can perhaps give a little comfort.

Also—Emlin, do you feel ready to command the ala?"

Emlin shook his head. "No, my lord."

"That is as I also thought," Urdo said, and smiled, "Leading an ala takes different skills from being a tribuno, and you are a very good tribuno." He turned back to me. "Sulien, do you want to live down at Derwen and Magor near your family for a while?" Before I even got my mouth completely open, Urdo put his hand on my arm. "That was a question, not an order."

"No," I said. A great deal of relief seemed to have crept into my voice from somewhere, but my emotions felt out of reach as if they were happening somewhere else and I was hearing reports of them sent by unreliable scouts. I tried hard to speak evenly.

"I will take my brother Galba's body home and then come back. To Caer Tanaga?" I asked.

"To Caer Tanaga, yes, to the feast of Peace when the harvest is in. I will take your ala down with me, and Gwair's ala, too." He frowned a little as he mentioned Gwair Aderyn.

"I shall miss Gwair. He was the steadiest prae-fecto I had, and the first to take up my cause.

When I was a boy at Thansethan there were very few things I remembered about the time before I came there. It is all a jumble of pictures in my mind. I remember the silks my mother would wear, and how she always smelled so beautiful. I remember running out in the mud and getting filthy and my nurse scolding me, with mud dripping between my fingers. I remember a bee caught against a window somewhere, buzzing and buzzing to get out, to escape, and yet that may have been at Thansethan for they have beehives there and make good honey. I remember riding in front of someone on the saddle of a pony, I remember how the pony's ears looked quite clearly, but I do not know whose horse it was. I remember seeing a goat, too—that was when I first came to

Thansethan, the goat's barred yellow eye. Children take notice of animals, I suppose. I remember when I first came there I did not know how to play with other children, and they all knew each other, having been born there or come there very young. That was strange, and lonely. And I remember coming there, riding through the night sitting on the front of Gwair's saddle with my lady mother riding beside us. He used to come and see me once a year as I grew up, to take back news that I was well I suppose. I always looked forward to his visits. He used to bring gifts. I fancied that he must be my father. I do not remember my father at all." He sighed, staring into nothing. Emlin and I looked at one another, wondering if we should stop him, but not quite daring. "Gwair was a good man.

He was of no great birth nor was he very skilled in the new ways of fighting, yet nobody ever scorned to serve under him."

"I never knew him well. Did he have children?" I asked, as gently as I could.

Urdo blinked a little and looked at me, his eyes back on the present. "Yes, he has two daughters, one of them is a decurio in Angas's ala and the other is married in Segantia and has half-grown children of her own. Well. Neither will inherit his ala. When you come back I will put ap Erbin in charge of them and send them on to Caer Segant. We can discuss then who you want as your new second."

"Masarn," I said, without hesitation. "He's the right sort of steady."

"We will discuss it next month when you come back to Caer Tanaga," Urdo said.

Appointing a tribuno would usually be a praefecto's responsibility. With my ala it was different, as we worked so closely with Urdo I had long since agreed that he would have a say concerning appointments. "You are in charge of Galba's ala while you are there. Then Emlin, you can take care of them for a little. When you come back to Caer Tanaga, Sulien, bring your brother Morien with you. Galba's trained him, and he's been leading a pennon.

Let me have a look at him and see if he's up to command. He's the obvious person, if he can cope with it. Do the troops like him, Emlin?"

"He's very quiet," Emlin said, clearly choosing his words carefully, not looking at me. I wondered what he meant.

Urdo looked at him sharply, but just then Raul came up, and close behind him Alfwin, who had a stunned look about him. "You can leave in the morning," Urdo said. "Marchel's ala will be going back to Caer Glo-ran; you can travel together that far." Emlin went off to tell the news to the other armigers.

Urdo took two long breaths. "Greetings, Alfwin Cellasson, King of Tevin!" he said.

"Have you heard that Peace is made?" Alfwin looked as if he had taken a step off the edge of a cliff and found firm but invisible ground beneath him.

"I missed the battle," he said. "We have been hurrying since we got the message from the daughter of Thurrig, and we came too late."

"You have fought for me and beside me these seven years," Urdo said, "And we all know that those on two feet move more slowly than those on four. I am not giving you Tevin wrapped like a bride gift—Sweyn is dead, and I have his older nephew, but the younger one, the heir, is missing, and there may still be some resistance. Still, that is your problem, you are the king here now, rightfully, in your father's place."

"It is not quite that simple, among Jarnsmen," said Alfwin, and his face unfolded from its stiffness, and he grinned. "Yet, I will be king by the time we meet next, I have little doubt."

"If you wish it, if you wish to be received into the church as your wife has, I could crown you here today in the name of the White God," Raul murmured. I could hardly believe his audacity, even if someone had managed to convert Alfwin's wife. That must have taken some doing considering that she had been in Bereich all the time. Ohtar's fierce opposition to the White God was well-known. I wondered for a moment if Alfwin would accept. I knew, as Raul did, that he had spent time with Marchel, who could be very persuasive. Yet even if he had wanted to it would be hardly possible without consulting the land gods of Tevin.

Urdo's face went very blank as if he was deliberately keeping all expression away. I thought of the stone on the hilltop. Alfwin looked more stunned than ever.

"This is not the condition on which you give me the land?" he asked Urdo.

"No indeed," Urdo said. "Nor have I made such a condition even to those who have been fighting against us." Urdo looked impassive, but Raul was frowning.

"A great chance is being let slip away," he said.

"We will speak of this later," said Urdo, and his tone was final. "Any choice you make is your own entirely, Alfwin."

"Indeed," said Raul, "I was only asking if it was what you wanted."

Alfwin laughed, with some anger clear behind the laughter. "I am not afraid to face the ordeal, monk," he said. "Lord Tew who gave us this land will not find me wanting." He turned to me then. "Ap Gwien, of your kindness, is my brother's daughter well?"

"She is well, and what's more she did well, very well, in the battle," I said, pleased to have something positive and helpful to say that changed the subject. "I am proud to have Haraldsdottar in my command, she is daring and valiant and skilled, indeed she led back troops today and probably saved my life, and the life of the High King."

Alfwin did not seem to be getting used to surprises. His pale skin flushed red, and he swallowed.

I was tired and had quite forgotten that he would be embarrassed to hear a woman of his family praised for skill at fighting.

"The Cellingas have served me well, even in your absence," Urdo said. He was smiling now, but he still looked a little remote.

"Good," murmured Alfwin. "It is not our way, but it is the way of this land, and we are here now." Alfwin was never a fool. He took a long breath, and spoke more firmly. "Good.

I am glad we had our part in this victory, even if I came too late. But I will need her for the next few days, with your permission, of course?"

"Of course," I said. "She can come back to the ala when you come down to Caer Tanaga for the Peace feast."

"Ohtar Bearsson will be here soon," Urdo said, before Alfwin replied. "It would be good if you talk to him today. Also we're going to have to arrange quite quickly what we're going to do to help Ayl with the defense of Aylsfa this winter. Aylsfa is not near as strong as it was this
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morning."

"I thought Luth and his ala would be a good choice," put in Raul.

"Yes, that would work," said Urdo. He looked terribly tired, suddenly. I wondered if we had missed four nights' sleep or only one. "We will have a full council in the morning, with the allied kings. Organize it please, Raul. And we must speak." Raul scratched a note in the wax pad he wore at his waist. It was full of notes already. I left them to it.

I washed, and slept a little, before the sun came near the horizon and it was time for the ceremony. I do not think Urdo can have had time for either. He was moving stiffly and seeing him I thought I could imagine how he would be when he was old.

All those who were neither wounded nor exhausted had been working part of the day on raising the mounds. Glyn, Ayl, and Raul had organized Jarnsmen and arrmgers working together, and now the mounds made a line along the length of the hill. The mounds would rise higher yet and grow with grass, and the battlefield would become a quiet resting place. For now the dead had been laid within them by their friends and were covered by earth. I did not see them before they were covered. It was the only thing to do in the circumstances, and of course it is the usual thing now. Thirty years ago when I

lit the fire for Veniva it was a matter for muttering, and now if my great-nephew heeds my wishes and burns me when my time comes, it will be a great scandal.

One fire had been laid in front of the mounds, a single pyre, too small to burn even one of the dead. We gathered there before sunset, drawn up by ranks, each ala together. None of the Jarnsmen were there, not even Alfwin and his men—they had had their own ceremonies—but every living armiger who had been at the battle was there on the field.