Hollow Hills (16 page)

These line the fields of Less Britain, rank on rank, like old grey warriors waiting, or armies of the dead.

They have stood there, men say, since time began. No one knows why, or how they came there. But I had long known that they were raised, not by giants or gods or even enchanters, but by human engineers whose skill lives on only in song. These skills I learned, when as a boy I lived in Brittany, and men called it magic. For all I know they may be right. One thing is certain, though men's hands lifted the stones, and are long since dust under their roots, the gods they served still walk there. When I have gone between the stones at night, I have felt eyes on my back.

But now the sun was up, gilding the granite surfaces, and throwing the shadows of the stones slanting blue across the frost. The wharf-side was already busy; carts stood ready for loading, and men and boys ran about the business of tying up and unloading the ship. We were the only passengers, but no one cast more than a glance at the travellers in their decent, sober clothes; the musician with the harp in his baggage and his wife and baby beside him, with his servant in attendance. Ralf had lifted the baby from Branwen's arms, and supported her as she trod gingerly down the gangplank. She was silent and pale, and leaned heavily on him. I saw, as he bent over her, how — suddenly, it seemed — he had grown from boy to man. He would be turned sixteen now, and though Branwen was perhaps a year older than he, Ralf might well be taken for her husband, rather than I. He looked brisk and bright, sleek as a springtime cockerel in his neat new clothes. He was the only one of our party, I thought sourly, feeling the wharf tilt and sway under me as if it had still been the heaving deck, who had weathered the passage well.

The escort he had arranged was waiting for us. Not the escort of troops which King Hoel had wanted to provide, but simply a mule litter for Branwen and the child, with a muleteer and one other man, who had brought horses for Ralf and myself. This man came forward now to greet me. From his bearing I judged him to be an officer, but he was not in uniform, and there was nothing to show that the escort came from the King. Nor apparently had the officer been told anything about us, beyond the fact that we were to be led into town and housed there until the King should send for us.

He greeted me civilly, but without the courtesies of rank. "You are welcome, sir. The King sends his greetings, and I am here to escort you into town. I trust you had a good voyage?"

"They tell me so," I said, "but neither I nor the lady are inclined to believe them."

He grinned. "I thought she looked a little green. I know how she feels. I'm not a great one for the sea, myself. And you, sir? Can you ride as far as the town? It's little more than a mile."

"I can try," I said. We exchanged courtesies while Ralf helped Branwen into the litter and drew the curtains against the morning chill. As she settled herself into the warmth the baby woke and began to cry.

He had very good lungs, had Arthur. I suppose I must have winced. I saw a gleam of amusement in the officer's face, and said dryly:

"Are you married?"

"Yes, indeed."

"I used to think sometimes what I might be missing. Now I begin to know."

He laughed at that. "One can always escape. It's the best reason I know for being a soldier. Will you mount, sir?"

He and I rode side by side on the way into the town. Kerrec was a sizeable settlement, half civil, half military, walled and moated, clustered round a central hill where the King's stronghold lay. Near the ramp which led up to the castle gate was the house where my father had lived during his years of exile, while he and King Budec assembled and trained the army which had invaded Britain to claim it back for him, her rightful King.

And now, perhaps, her next and greater King was here at my side, still yelling lustily, muffled in a litter, and being carried over the wooden bridge that spanned the moat, and in through the gate of the town.

My companion was silent beside me. Behind us the others rode at ease; they chatted among themselves, the sound of their voices and the sharp clop of the horses' hoofs on the cobbles and the jingling of bits sounding loud in the still and misty daybreak. The town was just waking. Cocks crowed from yards and middens; here and there doors were opened and women, shawled against the cold, could be seen moving with pails or armfuls of kindling to start the day's work.

I was glad of my companion's silence as I looked about me. Even in the five years since I had left it the place seemed to have changed completely. I suppose one cannot pull a standing army out of a town where it has been built and trained for years, and not leave an echoing shell. The army, indeed, had been mainly quartered outside the walls, and the camps had long since been dismantled and gone back to grassland. But in the town, though King Budec's own troops remained, the orderly bustle and the air of purpose and expectancy which had characterized the place in my father's time had gone. In the street of the engineers, where I had served my apprenticeship with Tremorinus, there were a few workshops open and already clanging in the early dawn, but the air of high purpose had gone with the crowd and the clamour, and something almost like desolation had taken its place. I was glad that the way to our lodging did not pass my father's house.

We were lodged with a decent couple, who made us welcome; Branwen and the baby were carried straight off to some women's fastness, while I was shown to a good room where a fire blazed and breakfast was spread waiting beside it. A servant carried the baggage in, and would have stayed to wait on me, but Ralf dismissed him and served the meal himself. I bade him eat with me, and he did so, cheerful and brisk as if the last week or so had been spent holidaying, and when we had done asked if I wanted to go out to explore the town. I gave him leave, but said that I would stay within doors. I am a strong man, and do not readily tire, but it takes more than a mile on dry land and a good breakfast to dispel the grinding sickness and exhaustion of a winter voyage. So I bade Ralf merely see to it that Branwen and the child were comfortable, and, after he had gone, composed myself to rest and wait for the King's summons.

It came at lamplighting, and Ralf with it, wide-eyed, with a robe over his arm of soft combed wool dyed a rich dark blue, with a border worked in gold and silver thread.

"The King sent this for you. Will you wear it?"

"Certainly. It would be an insult to do anything else."

"But it's a prince's robe. People will wonder who you are."

"Not a prince's, no. A singer's robe of honour. This is a civilized country, Ralf, like my own. It's not only princes and soldiers who are held in high esteem. When will King Hoel receive me?"

"In an hour's time, he says. He will receive you alone, before you sing in the hall. What are you laughing at?"

"King Hoel being cunning from necessity. There's only one catch about going as a singer to Hoel's court; he happens to be tone deaf. But even a tone deaf king will receive a travelling singer, to get his news. So he receives me alone. Then if the barons in his hall want to hear me, he doesn't have to sit through it."

"He sent that harp along, though." Ralf nodded to the instrument which stood shrouded near the lamp.

"He sent it, yes, but it was never his; it's my own." He looked at me in surprise. I had spoken more curtly than I had meant to. All day the silent harp had stood there, untouched, but speaking to me of memories, of most, indeed, that I had ever had of happiness. As a boy here in Kerrec, in my father's house, I had played it almost nightly. I added: "It was one I used here, years ago. Hoel's father must have kept it for me. I don't suppose it's been touched since I last played it. I'd better try it before I go. Uncover it, will you?"

A scratch at the door then heralded a slave with a ewer of steaming water. While I washed, and combed my hair, then let the slave help me into the sumptuous blue robe, Ralf uncovered the harp and set it ready.

It was bigger than the one I had brought with me. That was a knee harp, easy to transport; this was a standing harp, with a greater range and a tone which would reach the corners of a King's hall. I tuned it carefully, then ran my fingers over the strings.

To remember love after long sleep; to turn again to poetry after a year in the market place, or to youth after resignation to drowsy and stiffening age; to remember what once you thought life could hold, after telling over with muddied and calculating fingers what it has offered; this is music, made after long silence.

The soul flexes its wings, and, clumsy as any fledgling, tries the air again. I felt my way, groping back through the chords, for the passion that slept there in the harp, exploring, testing as a man tests in the dark ground which once he knew in daylight. Whispers, small jags of sound, bunches of notes dragged sharply. The wires thrilled, catching the firelight, and the long running chords lapsed into the song.

There was a hunter at the moon's dark

Who sought to lay a net of gold in the marshes.

A net of gold, a net heavy as gold.

And the tide came in and drowned the net,

Held it invisible, deep, and the hunter waited,

Crouching by the water in the moon's dark.

They came, the birds fighting the dark,

Hundred on hundred, a king's army.

They landed on the water, a fleet of ships,

Of king's ships, proud with silver, silver masted,

Swift ships, fierce in battle,

Crowding the water in the moon's dark.

The net was heavy beneath them, hidden,

waiting to catch them.

But he lay still, the young hunter, with idle hands.

Hunter, draw in your net. Your children

will eat tonight,

And your wife will praise you, the cunning hunter.

He drew in his net, the young hunter,

drew it tight and fast.

It was heavy, and he drew it to shore, among the reeds.

It was heavy as gold, but nothing was there but water.

There was nothing in it but water, heavy as gold,

And one grey feather,

From the wing of a wild goose.

They had gone, the ships, the armies,

into the moon's dark.

And the hunter's children were hungry,

and his wife lamented.

But he slept dreaming, holding the wild goose feather.

King Hoel was a big, thick-bodied man in his middle thirties. During the time I had spent in Kerrec —

from my twelfth to my seventeenth year — I had seen very little of him. He had been a lusty and dedicated fighting man, while I was only a youth, and busy with my studies in hospital and workshop. But later he had fought with my father's troops in Greater Britain, and there we had come to know and to like one another. He was a man of big appetites and, as such men often are, good natured and tending to laziness. Since I had last seen him he had put on flesh, and his face had the flush of good living, but I had no doubt he would be as stalwart as ever in the field.

I started by speaking of his father King Budec and the changes that had come, and we talked for a while of past times.

"Ah, yes, those were good years." He stared, chin on fist, into the fire. He had received me in his private chamber, and after we had been served with wine, had dismissed the servants. His two deer-hounds lay stretched on the skins at his feet, dreaming still of the chase they had had that day. His hunting spears, freshly cleaned, stood against the wall behind his chair, their blades catching the firelight. The King stretched his massive shoulders, and spoke wistfully. "I wonder, when will such years come again?"

"You are talking of the fighting years?"

"I am talking of Ambrosius' years, Merlin."

"They will come again, with your help now." He looked puzzled, then startled, and uneasy. I had spoken prosaically enough, but he had caught the implications. Like Uther, he was a man who liked everything normal, open and ordinary. "You mean the child? The bastard? After all we've heard about it, he'll be the one to succeed Uther?"

"Yes. I promise you."

He fidgeted with his cup, and his eyes slid away from mine. "Ah, yes. Well, we shall keep him safely. But tell me, why the secrecy? I had a letter from Uther asking me openly enough to care for the boy. Ralf couldn't tell me much more than was in the letters he brought. I'll help, of course, every way I can, but I don't want a quarrel with Uther. His letter to me made it pretty clear that this boy's only his heir in default of a better claim."

"That's true. Don't be afraid, I don't want a quarrel, either, between you and Uther. One doesn't throw a precious morsel down between two fighting-dogs and expect it to survive. Until there is a boy with what Uther calls a better claim, he's as anxious as I am to keep this one safe. He knows what I'm doing, up to a point."

"Ah." He cocked an eye at me, intrigued. I had been right about him. He might be well disposed towards Britain, but he was not above doing a quietly back-handed turn to Britain's King. "Up to what point?"

"The time when the baby is weaned, and grown enough to need men's company and to be taught men's arts. Four years, perhaps, or less. After that I shall take him back from you, and he must go home to Britain. If Uther asks where he is, he will have to be told, but until he does — well, there's no need to seek him out, is there? Myself, I doubt if Uther will question you at all. I think he would forget this child if he could. In any case, if there is blame, it is mine. He put the boy in my charge, to rear as I thought fit."

"But will it be safe to take him back? If Uther's sending him here now because of enemies at home, are you sure it will be better then?"

"It's a risk that will have to be taken. I want to be near the child as he grows. It should be in Britain, and therefore it must be in secret. There are bad times coming, Hoel, for us all. I cannot yet see what will happen, beyond these facts; that this boy — this bastard if you like — will have enemies, even more than Uther has. You call him bastard; so will other men with ambition. His secret enemies will be more deadly even than the Saxons. So he must be hidden until the time comes for him to take the crown, and then he must take it with no cast of doubt, and be raised King in the sight of all Britain."