Gwenhwyfar_ The White Spirit - Mercedes Lackey [162]
Arthur looked gray, as if the ground had been cut out from under him. So Medraut’s treachery cut him deeper than her defection? Well, so be it. That was just one more indication of how little he had thought of her and what she truly was, how little he had valued it. But he had his wits about him enough to see that she was right. “Do as Gwenhwyfar commands,” he told the boy, and he turned to Kai. “Muster out the men. Send messengers. Gwalchmai, how many are there?”
“Same as last time.” The old man—when had Gwalchmai gotten old?—clutched his shoulder as Kai pushed past him. “It’s the full Saxon army, the one that retreated when we confronted them. That encounter was just a feint to test us and get our numbers. Medraut was planning this all along, planning to get you separated from the rest of your force. We’re outnumbered, Arthur. Badly.”
Arthur grimaced and grew paler. But he straightened, and Gwen saw that, like her, though doom fell upon them, he would fight to the last.
“Maybe not as badly as you think.” Gwen’s mind was racing. “Let me go to Yniswitrin. I’ll see if I can call Gwyn ap Nudd out. You likely won’t get fighters out of him, but he might make a passage for yours to come quickly. There’s more than one tale of mortal armies passing through Annwn at need, and he is one of your Companions and an ally King.” Right now . . . she wished profoundly she could be the one to lead those armies here. But the King of Annwn would be the only one who could.
“I’ll go with you,” the Lady said quickly, before Arthur could say yea or nay. “With two of us, he is less likely to refuse.”
Arthur looked for a moment as if he were going to refuse anyway, but then he shrugged. “Whatever can be done, we must do,” he said, his face a mask of resignation.
Gwen didn’t wait for him to change his mind. She strode out of the tent with the Lady sailing behind her.
There were several horses tethered beside Arthur’s tent, and to her intense relief, one of them was her Pryderi, who tossed his head, whickered, and picked up his ears when he scented her. Whoever had appropriated him—well, too bad, he was going to have to find himself another mount. She ran to the picket line, pulled his reins loose, and hauled herself up into his saddle. The stirrups were set too long; she ignored them for now. The day she couldn’t sit a horse for a straight run without stirrups would be a sad one indeed. As Aeronwen stood in the path, she rode up next to the Lady, and offered her hand. Aeronwen weighed next to nothing—did the Ladies never eat?—and Gwen was able to pull her up behind with just a little grunt of effort.
As ever, Pryderi responded as if he could read her mind; he danced a little and then leaped into a full gallop, answering her touch on the reins to arrow toward the distant isle, which rose above its perpetual mist as if it truly didn’t belong in this world. Behind her, Gwen heard the camp coming to life, shouted orders and the frantic clashing of men getting armored and armed. In her ear, she heard the Lady softly chanting. What she chanted—well, Gwen didn’t recognize it at all; it was older than any words she knew. But she felt it, felt the Power in those words, and felt that Power being drawn from somewhere ahead of them. Pryderi’s ears swiveled, then pointed ahead again. He had never been disturbed by anything; she had schooled him to that.
They neared the mist, and the mist swelled and billowed out to meet them in a solid wall of white. Pryderi plunged into it without hesitation.
“Slow him,” the Lady said in her ear, but she was already reining Pryderi in, lest he make a misstep, go tumbling, and kill them all. He tossed his head with rebellion, for he loved to run, but dropped immediately to a walk. The mist closed around them so thick that it was even hard to see the ground right under Pryderi. It clung to them, chill, damp, carrying with it a scent of water and green things.
Pryderi’s hoofbeats sounded muffled, as if he walked on thick