Page 56 of The Bear's Heart
“But I need to be sure Arthur’s safe.” It came out as a whine, which wasn’t how I’d intended. The fact that I’d killed a man was at the back of my mind, repeating itself incessantly. I tried to ignore it, knowing that if I took notice, it was going to overwhelm me and I would break down. The longer I ignored it, the less real it became. This was not the moment for histrionics.
“Princess Morgawse is right.” Drustans drew himself up, looking older than his years. “You can’t go. I will. You and the Princess must take charge of the wagon, and get the Lady Ummidia and her daughters to safety. I’ll send these two with you.” He indicated his companions. “You should be safe enough now we know where Cadwy’s army is. You can steer clear of it.” He looked for Morgana. “And you can take her–” His voice broke off as he took in for the first time where Morgana was, standing beside his horse, its reins in her hand. But she didn’t know what the stirrup was for and, though tall, was hampered from mounting by her gown.
Drustans was across the clearing in a moment, wrestling her to the ground, sending the horse skittering off toward the trees. A brief tussle ensued, but, strong as she was, she was no match for a fit warrior. He climbed off her and dragged her to her feet, her hair full of bits of dead leaves. “We’d better tie our prisoner up.”
Morgana gave herself a shake, as though to rid herself of the defiling touch of a common warrior, and lifted her chin defiantly. She’d probably forgotten he was a prince himself. Her eyes slid back to me, dark and brooding.
A little shiver ran down my spine.
Morgawse glared at her sister. “And watch her closely. She’s full of tricks.”
A rope was found, and one of Drustans’ two fellows bound Morgana’s hands behind her, none too gently. In the back of the wagon, Albina’s and Cloelia’s relentless sobbing had ceased, although the baby was still wailing in hunger or in need of the Dark Age equivalent of a nappy change.
Drustans, who must have still been sulking with me, hammered his point home. “We have to get these women to safety. And the baby. You and the Princess Morgawse must get them to Caswallan.”
He was going to be as intractable to argue with as Arthur.
An expression of gritty determination on his young face, Drustans looked back at his Saxon prisoner again. “Tie him up, too.”
His two friends found more rope from their saddle horns, and in a trice, the Saxon’s arms were bound behind him. Looking rebellious and angry, he stood between the two young men.
In the wagon, Albina, who’d been watching this, now shoved the baby into Cloelia’s arms. With the agility of a cat, she jumped down to land lightly on her feet in the grass. Her hair was a tangled mess and her dress hung in bloodstained tatters. But she didn’t stop there. She marched up to the Saxon, a big man with a drooping moustache like Theodoric’s and long dirty blond hair. Before any of us could move, her hand shot out and seized a dagger from the nearest warrior’s belt. Without hesitation, she plunged the dagger two handed into the Saxon’s belly, right up to the hilt. He didn’t see it coming, and staggered, mouth open wide in horror, as she twisted it in the wound, blood pouring out over her hands and filthy gown. With his own hands tied behind his back, there was nothing he could have done to defend himself.
The mouths of the two young warriors who’d been standing on either side of him dropped open in shock. Then they reached for Albina.
“That’s for my father,” she spat, twisting the knife again. “And for my mother and my sister.” She batted the reaching hands away with one hand. “I am your executioner.”
The Saxon sank to the ground, taking the dagger with him, his face paper white, blood pumping from the wound so fast it was clear she’d hit an artery.
“Albina!” I exclaimed, coming out of the shock that had frozen me. Fresh in my mind was the feel of my own sword grating against the driver’s ribs, and the pressure I’d had to exert to run him through, and bile rose in my throat once more. But somehow this was worse because this was in cold blood. I was nearly as horrified as the dying Saxon.
Albina gave a wild laugh, and bending over, prised the dagger out of the wound. But before she could stab him again, which definitely looked like what she had in mind, Drustans’ two friends grabbed her by the arms, yanking her back. On the grass at their feet the Saxon warrior writhed. His feet drummed on the ground, and then he lay still. Blood still pulsed from his wound, sluggishly now, with the last beats of his heart.
“Why did you do that?” I asked, but she didn’t answer. Another wild laugh echoed round the clearing, bouncing off the trees.
Turning her head away, Morgawse helped Ummidia to her feet, the older woman cradling her jaw with bloodstained fingers. She’d lost several teeth. Through her broken lips she managed to speak at last. “Don’t blame her.” Her voice cracked with bitterness. “The king allowed his warriors to have their fun with us, in payment for my husband’s supposed embezzlement. I was only raped twice, but the filthy Saxons took a liking to my girls. They kept them all night long.” She spat, blood, spittle and mucous landing accurately on the dead man’s face. “I’d have stabbed him myself if I’d been able. They’re not fit to live.”
Cold fear ran through me. I wasn’t in Kansas anymore. This was a world where the victors took revenge on the women of their enemies, where battles were fought on an almost daily basis, where there was no higher authority to appeal to if things went wrong. All of a sudden, the forest around us bristled with dangers and a million eyes bored into my unprotected back.
Drustans made a decision. “I’m going back now, to tell the army where Cadwy’s men are. We’ve no time to lose.” He looked at his two friends. “You’ll have to take the wagon. Hide the bodies in the bushes, take their weapons, and escort the Queen and the Princess, and our prisoner, with the rest of these women to safety. Remember, not Euddolen’s villa– Caswallan’s, due south of it. No one should find you there. And keep a watch for any stray bands of Cadwy’s men. Though I doubt there’ll be any.”
He bent over the driver’s body and wrenched my sword out. As though it were every day he did so, he wiped it on the man’s clothes, then offered it to me.
I hesitated.
“Take it,” he said gruffly. “You did more than well. But you may have need of it again.”
I reached out and took it, wondering if I’d be brave enough to use it again if we did bump into more danger. On the whole, I’d far rather be cut down by a warrior who mistook me for a man than have that warrior rape me.
“I’m sure you’ll be safe enough,” Drustans went on, with what sounded like false confidence, as he gathered his reins and prepared to remount. His horse spun around in an impatient circle, giving the dismembered head another kick that sent it spinning across the rough grass. “I think Cadwy will have kept all his men for the ambush. But listen out, just in case.” He steadied his horse as he took one last look around, then swung himself up into the saddle. “And for God’s sake, shut that baby and those women up. You don’t want anyone hearing you coming, the way we heardthem.” And with that, he wheeled his horse and galloped away.
We were left alone in a clearing that no longer felt warm and sun-blessed. Blood had stained the grass and soaked into the bare earth in the track. Drustans’ two friends must have felt the same because they didn’t waste any time hanging about or complaining. They shoved Albina and Morgana into the back of the wagon, helped Ummidia into the driver’s seat, and then dragged the bodies into the bushes and kicked dirt over the bloodstains as best they could. As soon as we’d all remounted, we set off along the track through the forest again.
In the wagon, Morgawse fed the baby, who soon fell asleep in her arms, and Cloelia managed to stop sobbing when we’d made her understand the threat of recapture by wandering foederati. While their mother drove, the girls sat in the rear near Morgawse, clutching each other, their faces haggard and red-eyed with crying. Morgana sat upright and hard-faced in one corner, refusing to look at anyone.
I brought my horse up beside the wagon, deliberately shutting what I’d just done out of my mind, and looked down at the sleeping baby. But my thoughts were by no means quiet, as I found myself wishing Cadwy had unleashed some of his bad temper on this child. How easy would life have become if Cadwy had done that job for me. With this battle of Bassas, another in the list that old monk Nennius had compiled, turning out to have been true, I was having a great deal of difficulty in not believing a lot of other elements of the legends. Medraut, and the part he was destined to play, being one of them.
The wagon could only move at about three or four miles an hour, and with over twenty to go, progress was painfully slow. Without the burden of the wagon, we could have been home in a few hours, but this was going to take us all day. I kept an ear out behind us, as I suspected our escort did as well, half expecting that at any moment we’d be overtaken by a host of fleeing men from Cadwy’s army, or the victorious hordes of Arthur. But neither caught us up.
