The Medieval Murderers: Hill of Bones

Geraint paused for a moment longer. Perhaps it was the image of the sea on the floor that made him think of waves of people, waves of men, flowing across this land. Men who were of a different race from him. Men such as the ones who had built this villa on the outskirts of the town in the valley and then, in a time before his father’s father, abandoned it and withdrawn like the tide. Or perhaps they had not withdrawn at all but simply died out. Which came to the same thing.

And now there were different waves of men from the east and north, fresh and fierce, Saxon barbarians, threatening this land with fire and slaughter. For years, they had advanced like the incoming tide but now there had come a chance to stem the tide, even to turn it back. The only chance perhaps, but a fair one under their leader, Arthur.

He stood up and gazed across the valley towards the hills to the north-east. One hill stood slightly separate from the others and was distinguished by a flattened top. In the clear light of evening Geraint was able to see that the lines of the hill top looked too straight to be completely natural. There were few trees growing on the lower slopes and none at all on the upper, which meant that any approaching group would be easily seen. It reminded him of the great hill town in the south, near the village that he and Caradoc had come from. The town called Cadwy’s Fort, which Arthur used as his headquarters when he was in the region. The size of Cadwy’s, with its towering grassy flanks and deep defensive ditches surmounted by walls of pale stone, made Geraint think of the work of gods rather than mere men.

The hill opposite where he stood was less imposing than Cadwy’s, but that it was occupied by men was not in doubt, for he now saw a thick column of black smoke rising from a point near the centre of the flattened top. Then other spirals of smoke sprang up, and carried on the breeze there came cries and screams, the scrape of metal on metal, the thud of blows. Geraint had never been in battle, never been close to the scene of battle, but he recognised this for what it was. Had he and Caradoc arrived too late? Was the decisive encounter already taking place?

He felt confused and dizzy and almost sank down on the ground. When he looked again at the flattened hill, its top was placid and the pillars of smoke had vanished. In his ears there rang no sound except birdsong. Geraint was familiar with these moments, which overcame him occasionally. He had told no one of them, except one person.

Geraint blinked and followed his brother downhill towards the town in the valley. It was an open evening on the edge of midsummer. Threads of innocent white smoke wavered from the encampments set around the town of Aquae Sulis. The distance and the fading light made it impossible to judge numbers. You would scarcely know that there was an army camped about the town. You would not know that there was another army on the march in this direction.

Caradoc and Geraint crossed the lower-lying meadows, where the ground was soft underfoot and the breeze rippled through willows and rows of poplars. Geraint said nothing of the battle-scene he had witnessed on the opposite hill top. Either it had happened in the past, in which case there was nothing to be done about it, or – and this was more likely – it was still to come. The question was, would the battle take place in Geraint’s presence? Was he one of the fighters? Was his own voice among the screams and cries he had heard? Or Caradoc’s?

As they drew nearer to the encampments, with Caradoc still in the lead and the dog off to one side on some mission of its own, they could smell distant wood smoke and roasting meat, could hear a whinnying horse. It seemed to Geraint that his brother knew exactly where he was going, he walked with such confidence. Then Caradoc halted. He was standing on the edge of a marshy, reed-fringed stretch of water. They might have been able to wade through it, but beyond the reeds was a faster-flowing current, which caught up all the light remaining in the sky. Geraint realised that this must be the Abona. From their vantage point up in the hills the course of the river down here had been concealed. Now it was going to require a detour before they could reach the encampments or the town.

‘There must be a crossing point further along,’ said Caradoc, gesturing towards the west. ‘There must be a ford.’

How much further along? thought Geraint. He saw the pair of them blundering about in the gathering dark, their nostrils tickled by the smells from the other side of the river and their eyes distracted by the twinkle of fires. He suddenly felt hungry. Caradoc whistled for Cynric and the black shape came crashing through the long grass.

Distracted by the return of the dog, neither brother noticed the small boat sliding noiselessly out of the reeds. When they did, Caradoc dropped the dead rabbit and his hand jumped to his sword hilt. Geraint tensed and Cynric growled. The occupant of the boat had seen them before they were aware of him. He was a lean and wrinkled man – quite old, to Geraint’s eyes – and he was crouching in the centre of the boat, which was about half as broad as it was long. He was pushing himself towards the bank with one hand but there was a paddle resting across his knees.

‘I had my eye on you as you came across the meadows,’ said the boatman.

‘Where is the crossing place?’ said Caradoc.

The boatman did not answer until, with a final flick of his wrist, he caused his craft to crunch softly into the mud and reeds a few feet from where Caradoc and Geraint were standing.

‘Over there, but you will not reach it this side of night,’ he said, jerking his head in the direction of the now vanished sun.

‘We are here to join Arthur’s host,’ said Caradoc.

The boatman cleared his throat and spat into the water. Evidently he was not impressed. ‘Is Arthur here?’ he said.

‘Yes,’ said Caradoc with a confidence that was based more on belief than knowledge.

The boatman cast his eyes up and down the length of the brothers as if assessing their fitness as warriors. Geraint was conscious that he cut a boyish figure but his brother now, Caradoc, he had more bone and sinew on him.

‘You will carry us over,’ said Caradoc.

‘And you will pay what?’

‘We are here to fight our common enemy,’ said Geraint, speaking for the first time. ‘The Saxon horde.’

‘Oh, that enemy,’ said the boatman. He flexed his arms and the oval boat rocked in the water. ‘What are your names?’

‘I am Caradoc and this is my brother, Geraint.’

‘And I am Brennus,’ said the boatman. He had a high-pitched voice, disagreeable. Geraint was reminded of an ungreased axle on a cart. ‘Talking of enemies, mine are the cold in winter and the hunger and thirst all the time. You’ve got something to drink?’

‘The dregs of some water only,’ said Caradoc, ‘warm and stale from being carried all day.’

The boatman laughed, an odd sound like the squeak of some water bird.

‘You must surely be carrying something of value,’ he said. Instinctively, Geraint’s hand tightened on the pouch, which was fixed to his belt across from his sword. Despite the growing gloom, he could have sworn that Brennus the boatman observed this slight gesture.

Caradoc retrieved the coin he’d picked up from the villa floor. He held it towards the boatman.

‘This will more than do,’ he said. ‘It’s a coin from the old days and it is silver. You can have it if you ferry us both across. And the dog.’

‘The dog will swim behind us. You can’t have a dog in a small boat like this on account of the balance,’ said Brennus, stretching out a sinewy arm and waggling his hand to illustrate his point. He gathered a coil of rope from the bottom of the boat. ‘Here. Tie a stick to this and throw it out when we are afloat. The dog will seize hold of the stick.’