The Hollow Hills - Mary Stewart [161]
My post as a visible presence on the hill was no longer either heeded or necessary. I went down to where the emergency dressing station had been set up below the fallen tangles of the apple orchard. Already the tents were filling, and the orderlies were hard at work. I sent a boy running for my box of instruments and, taking off my cloak, slung it over the low boughs of an apple tree to make a shelter from the sun's rays; and as the next stretcher went by me I called to the bearers to set the wounded man down in the improvised shade.
One of the bearers was a lean and greying veteran whom I recognized. He had worked as orderly for me at Kaerconan. I said: "A moment, Paulus, don't hurry away. There are plenty to do the carrying; I'd rather have your help here."
He looked pleased that I had recognized him. "I thought you might need me, sir. I've got my kit with me." He knelt on the other side of the unconscious man, and together we began to slit the leather tunic away where it was torn open by a bloody gash.
"How is it with the King?" I asked him.
"Hard to say, sir. I thought he'd gone, and a lot else gone with him, but he's there now with Gandar, and sitting peaceful as a babe, and smiling. As well he might."
"Indeed...That's far enough, I think. Let me look..." It was an axe wound, and the leather and metal of the man's tunic had been driven deep into the hacked flesh and splintered bone. I said: "I doubt if there's much we can do here, but we'll try. God's on our side today, and he may well be on this poor fellow's, too. Hold this, will your...As you were saying, well he might. The luck won't change now."
"Luck, is it? Luck on a white horse, you might say. A fair treat it was to see that youngster, the way he pushed through just at the right moment. It needed something like that, with the King falling back as if he was dead, and the Dragon going down. We were looking for King Lot then, but no sign of him. Believe me, sir, another half-minute and we'd have been going the other way. Battle's like that; it makes you wonder sometimes, to think what hangs on a few seconds and a bit of luck. A piece of nice timing like that, and the right person to do it -- that's all it takes, and you've won or lost a kingdom."
We worked for a while in silence then, quickly, because the man was beginning to stir under my hands, and I had to finish before he woke to cruel life. When I had done all I could, and we were bandaging, Paulus said, ruminatively: "Funny thing."
"What?"
"Remember Kaerconan, sir?"
"Will I ever forget it?"
"Well, that youngster had a look of him -- Ambrosius, I mean, that was Count of Britain then. White horse and all, and the Dragon flying over it. Men were saying so...And the name's the same, sir, isn't it? Emrys? Connection of yours, perhaps?"
"Perhaps."
"Ah, well," said Paulus, and asked no more questions. He did not need to say more; I knew already that rumours must have been flying round the camp from the moment that Arthur and I had ridden in with the escort. Let them run. Uther had shown his hand. And between the boy's bravery, and the luck of the battle and his own misjudgment, Lot would have a hard struggle of it now to change the King's mind, or to persuade the other nobles that Uther's son was no fit leader.
The man between us woke then and began to scream, and there was no more time for talking.
2
By nightfall the field was cleared of the fallen. The King had withdrawn when it was seen that the tide of victory was sure,