Arthur: Book Three of the Pendragon Cycle

  I watched him move off along the deck, thinking, Do I know this man after all? He turned and called, “Not thirsty?” And, never one to turn away a cup, I hurried after him.

  * * *

  The Orcades are a huddle of bare rocks that poke from the northern sea like the heads and shoulders of drowned giants. They are covered with a green crust of earth so that the scrawny sheep have something to eat. It is an unlikely place to find a lord of Lot’s repute. More a hoarding of small settlements than a realm. Yet the lords of Ynysoedd Erch have ever held their own with a fierce and justifiable pride.

  I wondered what our reception would be. Certainly, Lot would welcome an alliance with the south. His position could hardly be comfortable in the best of times—with Picti and Angli between him and the southern lords. But he existed, some said, by trade and friendship with the Angli and Saecsens. Mind, I have never known anyone to make that accusation to Lot’s face.

  As our ship neared Llyscait, where Lot’s stronghold overlooked the deep stone-lined bay, the sun dimmed as it passed behind the clouds. The quick chill off the water made me shiver. But it was not only the cold, I think.

  We were met by a small boat which came out to us from the rock-strewn shingle. The boatmen hailed us and called for news. Some of our ship’s hands obliged them, and then Myrddin bade them take us to Lord Lot.

  This they were happy to do, although it meant that we were made to slither over the side of the ship to drop ingloriously into their boat, whereupon they rowed us to shore. As we bumped to a halt on the shingle, there appeared a welcoming party.

  “Greetings, and God’s blessings be on you, my lords, if you come in peace,” said the foremost among them. His words were gracious, but I saw that those with him wore swords and had long knives tucked into their belts.

  “God be good to you,” replied Myrddin. “Peace is our sole ambition.”

  “Then may it go well with you while you shelter here among us. Will you greet our king?”

  “We would like nothing better. And you can tell Lord Lot that the Duke of Britain has come to hold council with him.”

  Lot’s advisor cocked his head to one side. “Are you the Arthur we hear of?”

  Myrddin shook his head slowly and put out a hand to the young man beside him. “This is Arthur.”

  The man’s expression changed from wary acceptance to astonished disbelief. “You? You are Arthur?”

  “I am,” the Duke answered.

  “We have come a long way, and we are tired,” said Myrddin.

  The advisor turned at once to Myrddin. “I am sorry, Emrys. Forgive me, I—” he began, for he realized at once who our Myrddin must be.

  “It is of no importance. Please, take us to Lot.”

  “At once, Emrys.” The man turned on his heel, and we were escorted from the beach and up a long, snaking passageway cut in the rock to a caer walled in stone and surrounded by gorse. The gate stood open, and we passed through into a small, well-ordered yard.

  Lot stood in the center of the yard, arms crossed on his chest, scowling at three horses standing at halter before him. He turned his head toward us as we entered, and, like his man on the beach, his aspect altered at once—but not entirely for the better.

  Although he threw open his arms and embraced Myrddin, I could not help thinking that his greeting was forced. “Myrddin, you look well. It has been long since we last met. You are welcome here.” Lot smiled, but his smile did not touch his coldly distant eyes.

  “Thank you, lord,” replied Myrddin. “Time has been a boon to you. I see you have prospered.”

  Lot nodded, but did not reply. Instead, he turned abruptly to Arthur. “This can only be Duke Arthur, of whom so much is told.” He extended the same chilly greeting to Arthur, then looked to me.

  “I am Bedwyr,” I told him. “God be good to you, lord.”

  “Ah, Bedwyr ap Bleddyn of Rheged. We have heard of you, too,” Lot said, and barked an awkward laugh. “Do not look surprised. We are not so solitary as it seems. The commerce of these little islands rivals that of Londinium itself, I believe. We hear much, and see more that passes unnoticed elsewhere.”

  “Much indeed,” I said, “if you have heard of me.”

  These formalities observed, Lot turned his attention once more to the horses, explaining, “These animals have been sent me from a trader in Monoth. I can find no fault with them; still I am not liking what I see.” The king appealed to Arthur, saying, “Perhaps you can show me what I am missing.”

  “I will help if I can,” replied Arthur. He approached the horses and walked around them for a moment, pausing to stroke each one and feel its flesh. I studied them, too, for I knew horses well.

  “The two on either side are well enough, if a little light in the hindquarters. They would be swift, but I think they would tire quickly over rough ground. The one in the center, however, is the one you should choose.”

  “Oh? That, to my thinking, is the one least suitable of all.”

  “He is young still,” replied Arthur, “but he will flesh out given time.”

  “See how he stands—as if his legs hurt him,” protested Lot mildly, showing, I thought, a good deal more discernment than he admitted to.

  “It is his shoes,” explained Arthur. “I suspect he was shod just before bringing him here, but the work was hurried and carelessly done.”

  Lot approached the horse, stooped, and lifted a foreleg to examine the hoof. “It is true,” he said, letting the hoof drop. “The shoe is too big and the nails are poorly placed. It is a marvel he can stand at all.”

  “Have him reshod properly and you will see a different animal.”

  “I commend you, Duke Arthur; you know horses,” said Lot, regarding Arthur carefully. “Do you know ships as well?”

  “I know that ships are faster than horses in reaching the far places where the enemy hides. I know that the Angli and Irish must come here in ships, and can be stopped with ships. I know that the shipwrights of Orcady build the finest ships in the Island of the Mighty.” Arthur paused, and then added with a shrug,” Beyond this, I confess that I am ignorant of ships. That is why I have come.”

  Lot appraised Arthur through narrowed eyes, as if to take his measure against the words he had uttered. Satisfied at last, the king held out a hand toward the hall. “Come, Duke Arthur, I think that we must talk.”

  4

  “Not since the Romans have ships been built in Muir Guidan,” said Arthur. “But the shipyards are still there—I have seen them on the Fiorth near Caer Edyn. The fishermen use them for harborage in the winter, and occasionally someone will build a boat there.”

  Lot nodded, deep in thought. “If it is as you say, it could be done.” He was silent a goodly while. “There is good timber nearby?”

  “More than we could ever use were we to build ten thousand ships.”

  “My shipwrights would have to return here in winter to repair my own ships.”

  “I will see to it, and gladly. What do you say?”

  “I say you had better begin finding men to pilot your ships, for Britain will soon have a fleet once more.”

  Beaming, Arthur loosed a wild whoop of pleasure, and Lot’s normally icy demeanor melted under the sun of Arthur’s joy. The king opened his hand toward Myrddin, as if begging the Emrys’ blessing on the pact he and Arthur had just made. Myrddin gave his encouragement by way of clapping Lot on the back and saying, “From the union of two strong lords the defeat of the enemy is enjoined. The Gifting God be praised!”

  Lot then called his stewards to bring us drink and serve the meal, even though the sky was still light outside. For indeed, daylight lingers long in the northern isles—sometimes through the night. At midsummer the sun never truly sets at all!

  We drank and began talking of where and how the ships could be used most effectively, and I noticed Myrddin lay aside his cup, rise, and withdraw from the company. I waited until Myrddin had left the hall and then went out to him.

&n
bsp; I found him standing in the center of the yard, gazing at the vast northern sky. “What is wrong, Myrddin?” I asked as I came to stand beside him.

  He answered, but did not take his eyes from the cloudless, amber sky. “Arthur has his ships—or soon will have, and Lot has been won as an ally. What could be wrong?”

  “You distrust Lot. Why?” It was merely a guess, notched and let fly. But it struck nearer the mark than I knew.

  Myrddin turned his eyes away from searching the heavens and applied the same sharp scrutiny to me. “I do not know Lot. It is hard for me to wholly trust someone I do not know.”

  This I thought a reasonable answer, and true—as far as it went. But I knew Myrddin. There was more to it than that. “He has troubled you in the past,” I said. Another guess.

  “Troubled me?” Myrddin began to walk toward the fortress gate, which still stood open. I fell into step beside him. “No, not that. But he has often confused me. You will have heard it told, I suppose, that few kings supported me for the High Kingship. It is true; only a very few. But Lot was one of them. And him with less reason than any of the others…That perplexed me—as it does to this day.”

  “You suspect treachery?”

  “I suspect…” He stopped as we walked past the gates and down the track toward the sea. Upon reaching the rock shingle he stood gazing out at the dusky sea. The waves lapped at the rocks, and the air smelled of salt and rotting seaweed. We stood together for a long while, and then Myrddin swung his golden gaze to me. “You have a brain in your head,” he told me. “What do you make of Lot? Do you trust him?”

  Now it was my turn to be silent for a spell. Did I trust Lot? What did I make of him? I weighed the scant evidence for and against him in my mind. I tried to be fair.

  “Well?”

  “It seems to me,” I began slowly, “that Lord Lot is unused to having people enjoy his company. He is tolerated perhaps, and obeyed certainly—he is king after all. But he is not loved. Likely he has no friends at all.”

  Myrddin nodded. “Why is this, do you think?”

  Living in Orcady was part of it. Remote, isolated from the rest of the world, cut off by the sea and the barren northern wastes, it was difficult to maintain friendships and alliances with the noble houses of the south. For this reason, and others, the southern lords remained suspicious. Northerners were held in little regard in the south; they were thought to be backward, coarse, and low. Little better than Picts, if not worse.

  From what I had seen of Lot and his men, they were none of these things; they were simply different. Yet, despite their differences, just as civil and refined as any southern lord and his tribe. But living on their barren, sea-surrounded rocks made them severe, in the same way their limited contact with the south made them wary and brusque—always expecting the veiled insult, and finding it, whether intended or not.

  These things I thought, and told to Myrddin. “King Lot has no friends,” I concluded, “because he suspects everyone of trying to do him harm. No, it is not guile at work in him—it is suspicion.”

  “Suspicion, yes. And there is something else: pride.”

  “Suspicion and pride,” I said, “two dogs that lie uneasily together.”

  “Indeed,” said Myrddin, “and neither one to be crossed.”

  At last I thought I had discovered what Myrddin was worrying about. “But that is not why I am uneasy,” he said.

  “No?” Myrddin always does this. Just when you think you have cracked one hard nut, he pulls another from his pocket tougher than the last. “What else then?”

  “In truth, Bedwyr, it has little to do with Lot, and yet everything to do with him.”

  That is something else he does: mutters in obscure riddles. Myrddin dearly loves enigma and paradox.

  “Nothing and everything,” I observed sourly. “We will be here all night.”

  “It is Lot’s father—rather, it is his father’s wife.”

  “Lot’s mother, you mean?”

  “Did I say that? No. I said Lot’s father’s wife. King Loth had two wives. The first was Lot’s mother and she died. Loth’s second wife was a woman named Morgian.”

  “Speak plainly, Myrddin. Who or what is this Morgian to us?” Indeed, in all the time I had known him, I had never heard the name pass his lips. But then, there was much about Myrddin that no one knew.

  Myrddin did not answer. Instead, he asked, “Do you know why men call these islands Ynysoedd Erch—the Islands of Fear?”

  I looked around at the forbidding rocks and the shadowy fortress rising above the sea. The Orcades were a forlorn and lonely place. Certainly, that was reason enough for such a name, and I told him so.

  “No. It is because of her, Morgian, Queen of Air and Darkness.”

  Now, I am a man who does not shrink from much. But I have always found it disturbing to invoke evil, even in jest. So when Myrddin spoke that name, I felt a chill quaver in the air as if rising suddenly from the sea. But it was not sea air that sent the flesh creeping upon my scalp.

  “You know her?”

  “I do—and wish to Heaven that I did not!” The vehemence with which he spoke took me aback. I also heard something in his voice I had never heard before: fear. The Great Emrys was afraid of Morgian—whoever she might be.

  “Myrddin,” I said gently, “what is she to you?”

  His head whipped around and he glared at me. His mouth was a grimace of revulsion, and his eyes were hard, bright points of pain. “She is my death!”

  * * *

  The next days were given to planning how best to commence shipbuilding on the Fiorth. Arthur and Lot were to be seen head to head in Lot’s chambers, or strolling the grounds of the stronghold, lost to the world in their ardent schemes and strategies. While it was clear that Lot and Arthur were becoming fast friends, it was also evident that Myrddin was less and less happy about our stay.

  He made me uneasy. I would see him walking out on the wind-blown hills of the island, or sitting brooding on the rocks overlooking the sea. He rarely spoke in our company; and when he did, it was only to utter a curt reply.

  Arthur appeared not to notice. But I noticed.

  Days passed with little to do. Time weighed heavily on me, and I began to grow impatient to return to Caer Melyn. There, I knew, work aplenty waited for me: there were men to train, horses to break, supplies and provisions to sort, and—not forgetting—irate kings to pacify. No doubt Cai and Pelleas had their hands full while I sat idle.

  More and more, I found myself wishing for something to do. And in the end, I got my wish. Immediately, I regretted it.

  We were given no warning. A ship just appeared at dawn one morning and made for the harbor. This caused a mild stir in Lot’s court and some men went down to meet it on the shingle below the caer. The ship was scarcely anchored when word came back: Irish had landed and were pushing inland to join the Picti.

  Hearing this, I dashed to Lot’s hall where I knew he and Arthur were concluding their business. I entered just behind Lot’s principal advisor, who called out, “Lord Lot, Gwalcmai has returned with dire news: Sea Wolves have put ashore in numbers and are raiding inland. The Picti have welcomed them.”

  “Where is this?” asked Arthur.

  “In Yrewyn Bay.”

  This answer took me aback, for this bay is but a short distance from my home in Rheged. “Have they attacked Caer Tryfan?” I asked, but my question went unheeded.

  “What of Gwalchavad?” asked Lot.

  Just then the door to the hall burst open and a young man hurried in, his bright blue-and-green cloak flying. One glance at his black hair and fierce aspect and I knew him to be Lot’s kinsman. The silver torc at his throat gave me to know that he was nobly born.

  “Gwalcmai!” called Lot. “Where is Gwalchavad?”

  “He has taken the warriors we had with us to follow the Sea Wolves—to keep watch on them. Have no fear…he promised to stay out of sight until we come.”

  The relief in Lot’
s face could only be that of a father for a beloved son. This guess was proven true a moment later when Lot turned and said, “Duke Arthur, I present to you my son Gwalcmai, who has just returned from Mon where we trade.”

  The young man—no more in years than Arthur or myself—inclined his head in greeting. “Duke of Britain,” he said, “long have I desired to meet you—though I never expected to see you here.”

  “I give you good greeting, Prince Gwalcmai. What else can you tell us of this invasion?”

  “The Irish entered Yrewyn Bay and came inland up the river—thirty ships we counted. They seem to be gathering their forces. I think they are waiting for something.”

  “The cran tara has gone out,” said Myrddin, stepping from the shadows of the hearth. “They wait for the other tribes to join them.”

  “Then they will not strike before midsummer. We have time yet,” replied Arthur.

  “Little enough,” I observed. It was less than a month away.

  Arthur turned to the king. “Lord Lot, I will need your ships sooner than expected.”

  “They are yours,” Lot replied. “And my warband with them.”

  “I am yours to command, Duke Arthur,” said Gwalcmai, placing himself under Arthur’s authority. “My ship is ready and waiting in the harbor.”

  “Then we leave at once.”

  * * *

  We had hoped to engage the enemy before they could achieve full strength of numbers. This was not to be. Upon reaching Caer Melyn, Arthur sent messengers to the British kings, summoning their warbands. His own Cymbrogi were ready at once, of course, and Arthur sent them on ahead with Cai, Pelleas, and Meurig, riding overland and taking most of the horses with them. The warbands of the other kings were slow in coming.

  God save them, they were angry with Arthur for making peace with Aelle, Octa, and Colgrim and thought to punish the Duke by withholding aid. Also, they were reluctant to commit warriors to the defense of the north. After all, it is just foul moors and heather bogs—let the Irish and Picti have it. This is what they thought.