it took a lot of effort on my part to make him one. Not like poor old Vortigern, who had run out of money, as usual, and had started to welsh out on his obligations. You will remember Vortigern marrying Hengest’s daughter, the indescribably beautiful Rowena?’
‘I do,’ Jamie agreed, as a huge wave of booing and jeering wafted across from the battlefield.
‘And how the wedding party afterwards got a bit out of hand and somehow the Wealas guests, except the new bridegroom of course, ended up dead?’
‘I remember.’
Grimm nodded in a satisfied manner as he drew the picture back into his mind. ‘These things happen, don’t they, especially when I’m around.’ He gave a chuckle that converted into a coughing session. When he had steadied he continued. ‘After that Arthur went back to his teenage amusements. Unfortunately for him, Euric the Goth caught him and his boys during one of their escapades in the west of Gaul, for which I must take some blame.’
‘You surprise me.’
‘Do I, dear Leofwine? I am so pleased,’ said Grimm, the irony in the youth’s voice going completely unnoticed. ‘Euric, of course, was another one of my descendants and I happened to be visiting him at his new kingdom in Western Gaul. I was advising him to sell off the local population to the Moors across the Middle Sea. He was keen on keeping them in order that they could work the land and he could sit on his increasingly fatter backside and do nothing. I tried to explain to him that either they would interbreed with his folk until they, as my folk, no longer existed, or they would throw my folk over at the first opportunity, but he wouldn’t listen. So I dropped word to young Cerdic the Artful, suggesting that he might do the catching and exporting of the local Western Gauls instead.’ The old man gave a regretful sigh and looked at the battered grass at the edge of the groundsheet. ‘If only I had stayed around to make sure all went to plan rather than taking time off to wind up another of my descendants, Clovis the Frank, who operated to Euric’s north. You see, I had thought that it might be entertaining to set him upon the Gauls in Amorcica. Euric made no move against the locals – just stayed put with his thegns and gesith armed for an action they never did take, and as a result they were on hand to catch poor artful Cerdic and his crews. Still, Euric shewed some common sense for once and, rather than kill Art and his crews, he bound them with an oath and then gave them gainful employment keeping his enemies off guard. He based them at Vannes, and to this day there is an island named for Cerdic in the bay there. It wasn’t all work of course and every summer Art and his lads, plus any of Euric’s tribe who needed a break, went for some R & R in Spain. Their favourite resorts were two fly-ridden places called Benidorm and Ibiza. They wouldn’t have been such grotty places to stay at if the boys had managed to get out of the habit of trashing the houses each time they arrived. Still, I suppose the holidays were cheap seeing as they financed themselves by selling the locals off to the Moors at the Gibraltar flea market.’
‘Nothing changes,’ Jamie informed him. ‘Even today it’s cheap Spanish holidays for the English youth, all full of violence, drunkenness and destruction.’
‘Is that so? Oh well, let the good times roll. Back to Arthur: he got so settled at Vannes that he sent back to Britain and arranged himself a marriage with a flighty girl called Gugnir. Her mother was of my folk but her father was Cornish, so say no more. Art had spent time with them as a boy whilst recovering from his fever. I advised him not to marry her, but he wouldn’t listen. I suppose she was pretty in a way, with long wavy yellow hair and big flashing blue-grey eyes. The trouble was her eyes tended to flash at other men as well as at Art, as he later found out!’
‘Was she Guinevere?’
‘A later French invention, nothing like the very real Gugnir, except in her liking for beds that belonged to men other than her husband.’
Boos, jeers and catcalls from the battlefield seemed to indicate that the victorious Normans were parading off the field, having won the scripted battle.
Grimm did not seem to notice that Jamie’s attention was wandering. ‘Well,’ he rambled on, ‘eventually old Euric died and Clovis persuaded the old man’s son, Alarac, to move on and take his Goths with him. Alarac was a sentimental young fool, and crossed over the mountains and headed for where he had always been happy: that’s right – Benidorm and Ibiza! There is no accounting for some people’s taste, is there.’
‘Hmm?’ Jamie pulled Grimm’s last half-heard words back into his mind. ‘Benidorm and Ibiza? No, bad taste is universal and found throughout all time.’
‘You are becoming wise, young man; wise!’ Grimm drained the last of the beer from his leather jack. ‘So, Art’s oath died with Euric and, after coming to an arrangement with Clovis for a long-term lease on Vannes in exchange for a discount on shipping prices, he went back home to the South Hampton, taking his young son Cynric with him, leaving Gugnir behind for the time being. The problem was Art’s dad had died, and the local Wealas chief, Natanleod, had made a successful hostile takeover of the whole operation, including the land the Gewise folk had owned for generations. Natanleod claimed that it was sacred land, a treasure of the original people of the land, and that he had a treaty that said that on these grounds he retained the rights forever to all land, rivers and seabed.’
‘Not a nice thing to do; however it is becoming popular again in these post-colonial times with those who claim to be the native people.’
‘Yes, well: Art was not amused. He asked me what to do; how should he negotiate? Should he ask for a commission to be set up to look into the claims? I told him the only way to negotiate was at the point of a spear. So Art, his son Cynric and their three shiploads of hard men took the South Hampton and the business back into their possession and then some. I can’t remember where Natanleod’s head ended up, but I do remember spending a rather pleasant afternoon watching my ravens strip it of flesh whilst I quaffed an ale or two.’
Loud cheering told Jamie that the English and their Danish allies were leaving the field, so he got up to watch them enter camp and to be ready to help the sweat soaked members of Regia Anglorum’s Fyrd disarm. ‘An ale or two? You have had more than that from us today, Grimm.’ There was no reply, so the youth turned and looked back into the geteld only to see it empty of all but scattered gear and covered-over beer supplies. ‘Grimm?’ Jamie went out and stood in the pathway between getelds and other period-accurate tents, casting his eyes around. There, flying about the heads of a group of camp followers making their way towards the trudging and weary warriors, were two starlings. Jamie smiled, knowing that Grimm had gone and he would have to wait to hear the rest of the tale of awfully artful Arthur.