The crystal cave - Mary Stewart [130]
"Will they come after you?"
"I doubt it."
But as we kicked the beasts to a gallop between ridge and river a horseman loomed, and our horses swerved and shied.
Cadal's beast jumped forward under the spur. Iron rasped. A voice, vaguely familiar, said clearly: "Put up. Friend."
The horses stamped and blew. I saw Cadal's hand on the other's rein. He sat quietly.
"Whose friend?"
"Ambrosius'."
I said: "Wait, Cadal, it's the greybeard. Your name sir? And your business with me?"
He cleared his throat harshly. "Gorlois is my name, of Cornwall."
I saw Cadal's movement of surprise, and heard the bits jingle. He still had hold of the other's rein, and the drawn dagger gleamed. The old warrior sat unmoving. There was no sound of following hoofs.
I said slowly: "Then, sir, I should rather ask you what your business is with Vortigern?"
"The same as yours, Merlin Ambrosius." I saw his teeth gleam in his beard. "I came north to see for myself, and to send word back to him. The West has waited long enough, and the time will be ripe, come spring. But you came early. I could have saved myself the pains, it seems."
"You came alone?"
He gave a short, hard laugh, like a dog barking. "To Vortigern? Hardly. My men will follow. But I had to catch you. I want news." Then, harshly: "God's grief, man, do you doubt me? I came alone to you."
"No, sir. Let him go, Cadal. My lord, if you want to talk to me, you'll have to do it on the move. We should go, and quickly."
"Willingly." We set the horses in motion. As they struck into a gallop I said over my shoulder: "You guessed when you saw the brooch?"
"Before that. You have a look of him, Merlin Ambrosius." I heard him laugh again, deep in his throat. "And by God, there are times when you have a look of your devil-sire as well! Steady now, we're nearly at the ford. It'll be deep. They say wizards can't cross water?"
I laughed. "I'm always sick at sea, but I can manage this." The horses plunged across the ford unhindered, and took the next slope at a gallop. Then we were on the paved road, plain to see in the flying starlight, which leads straight across the high ground to the south.
We rode all night, with no pursuit. Three days later, in the early morning, Ambrosius came to land.
BOOK IV -- THE RED DRAGON
1
The way the chronicles tell it, you would think it took Ambrosius two months to get himself crowned King and pacify Britain. In fact, it took more than two years.
The first part was quick enough. It was not for nothing that he had spent all those years in Less Britain, he and Uther, developing an expert striking force the like of which had not been seen in any part of Europe since the disbanding nearly a hundred years ago of the force commanded by the Count of the Saxon Shore. Ambrosius had, in fact, modelled his own army on the force of the Saxon Shore, a marvellously mobile fighting instrument which could live off the country and do everything at twice the speed of the normal force. Caesar-speed, they still called it when I was young.
He landed at Totnes in Devon, with a fair wind and a quiet sea, and he had hardly set up the Red Dragon when the whole West rose for him. He was King of Cornwall and Devon before he even left the shore, and everywhere, as he moved northwards, the chiefs and kings crowded to swell his army. Eldol of Gloucester, a ferocious old man who had fought with Constantine against Vortigern, with Vortigern against Hengist, with Vortimer against both, and would fight anywhere for the sheer hell of it, met him at Glastonbury and swore faith. With him came a host of lesser leaders, not least his own brother Eldad, a bishop whose devout Christianity made the pagan wolves look like lambs by comparison, and set me wondering where he spent the dark nights of the winter solstice. But he was powerful; I had heard my mother speak of him with reverence; and once he had declared for Ambrosius, all Christian Britain came with him, urgent to drive back the pagan hordes moving steadily inland from their landing-places in the south and east. Last came Gorlois