Bernard Cornwell - Excalibur

We heard the shield clash on the hill. It was a dull grinding sound, like thunder from under the earth, and it was the sound of hundreds of shields and spears striking as two great armies smashed head to head. The men of Gwent were stopped, held by the weight of the Saxons who heaved against them, and I knew men were dying down there. They were being speared, being chopped by axes, being trampled underfoot. Men were spitting and snarling over their shield rims, and the press of men would be so great that a sword could hardly be lifted in the crush.

Then Sagramor’s warriors struck from the northern flank. The Numidian had plainly hoped to outflank Aelle, but the Saxon king had seen the danger and sent some of his reserve troops to form a line that took Sagramor’s charge on their shields and spears. Again the splintering crash of shield striking shield sounded, and then, to us who had the eagle’s view, the battle became strangely still. Two throngs of men were locked together, and those in the rear were shoving the ones in front and the ones in front were struggling to loosen their spears and thrust them forward again, and all the while Cerdic’s men were hurrying along the Fosse Way beneath us. Once those men reached the battle they would easily outflank Sagramor. They could wrap around his flank and take his shield wall in the rear, and that was why Arthur had kept us on the hill.

Cerdic must have guessed we were still there. He could see nothing from the valley, for our men were hidden behind Mynydd Baddon’s low ramparts, but I saw him gallop his horse to a group of men and point them up the slope. It was time, I reckoned, for us to go, and I looked at Cuneglas. He looked at me at the same time and offered me a smile. ‘The Gods be with you, Derfel.’

‘And you, Lord King.’ I touched his offered hand, then pressed my palm against my coat of mail to feel the reassuring lump of Ceinwyn’s brooch beneath.

Cuneglas stepped onto the rampart and turned to face us. ‘I’m not a man for speeches,’ he shouted,

‘but there are Saxons down there, and you’re reckoned the best killers of Saxons in Britain. So come and prove it! And remember! Once you reach the valley keep the shield wall tight! Keep it tight! Now, come!’

We cheered as we spilled over the hill’s rim. Cerdic’s men, those who had been sent to investigate the summit, checked, then retreated as more and more of our spearmen appeared above them. We went down that hill five hundred strong, and we went fast, angling westwards to strike against the leading troops of Cerdic’s reinforcements.

The ground was tussocky, steep and rough. We did not go down in any order, but raced each other to reach the bottom, and there, after running through the field of trampled wheat and clambering through two hedges that were tangling with thorns, we formed our wall. I took the left side of the line, Cuneglas the right, and once we were properly formed and our shields were touching, I shouted at my men to go forward. A Saxon shield wall was forming in the field in front of us as men hurried from the road to oppose us. I looked to my right as we advanced and saw what a huge gap there was between us and Sagramor’s men, a gap so big I could not even see his banner. I hated the thought of that gap, hated to think what horror could pour through it and so come behind us, but Arthur had been adamant. Do not hesitate, he said, do not wait for Sagramor to reach you, but just attack. It must have been Arthur, I thought, who had persuaded the Christians of Gwent to attack without pause. He was trying to panic the Saxons by denying them time, and now it was our turn to go fast into battle. The Saxon wall was makeshift and small, maybe two hundred of Cerdic’s men who had not expected to fight here, but who had thought to add their weight to Aelle’s rearmost ranks. They were also nervous. We were just as nervous, but this was no time to let fear abrade valour. We had to do what Tewdric’s men had done, we had to charge without stopping to take the enemy off balance, and so I roared a war shout and quickened my pace. I had drawn Hywelbane and was holding her by the upper blade in my left hand, letting the shield hang on its loops from my forearm. My heavy spear was in my right hand. The enemy shuffled together, shield against shield, spears levelled, and some-where from my left a great war-dog was released to run at us. I heard the beast howl, then the madness of battle let me forget everything except the bearded faces in front of me.

A terrible hate wells up in battle, a hatred that comes from the dark soul to fill a man with fierce and bloody anger. Enjoyment, too. I knew that Saxon shield wall would break. I knew it long before I attacked it. The wall was too thin, had been too hurried in the making, and was too nervous, and so I broke out of our front rank and shouted my hate as I ran at the enerm. At that moment all I wanted to do was kill. No, I wanted more, I wanted the bards to sing of Derfel Cadarn at Mynydd Baddon. I wanted men to look at me and say, there is the warrior who broke the wall at Mynydd Baddon, I wanted the power that comes from reputation. A dozen men in Britain had that power; Arthur, Sagramor, Culhwch were among them, and it was a power that superseded all other except for kingship. Ours was a world where swords gave rank, and to shirk the sword was to lose honour, and so I ran ahead, madness filling my soul and exultation giving me a terrible power as I picked my victims. They were two young men, both smaller than me, both nervous, both with skimpy beards, and both were shrinking away even before I hit them. They saw a British warlord in splendour, and I saw two dead Saxons. My spear took one in the throat. I abandoned the spear as an axe chopped into my shield, but I had seen it coming and warded off the blow, then I rammed the shield against the second man and thrust my shoulder into the shield’s belly as I snatched Hywelbane with my right hand. I chopped her down and saw a splinter fly from a Saxon spear shaft, then felt my men pouring in behind me. I whirled Hywelbane over my head, chopped her down again, screamed again, swung her to the side, and suddenly in front of me there was nothing but open grass, buttercups, the road and the river meadows beyond. I was through the wall, and I was screaming my victory. I turned, rammed Hywelbane into the small of a man’s back, twisted her free, saw the blood spill offher tip, and suddenly there were no more enemies. The Saxon wall had vanished, or rather it had been turned into dead and dying meat that bled onto the grass. I remember raising shield and spear towards the sun and howling a cry of thanks to Mithras.

‘Shield wall!’ I heard Issa bellow the order as I celebrated. I stooped to retrieve my spear, then twisted to see more Saxons hurrying from the east.

‘Shield wall!’ I echoed Issa’s shout. Cuneglas was making his own wall, facing west to guard us from Aelle’s rearward men, while I was making our line face towards the east from where Cerdic’s men were coming. My men screamed and jeered. They had turned a shield wall into offal and now they wanted more. Behind me, in the space between Cuneglas’s men and my own, a few wounded Saxons still lived, but three of my men were making short work of them. They cut their throats, for this was no time to take prisoners. Guinevere, I saw, was helping them.

‘Lord, Lord!’ That was Eachern shouting from the right-hand end of our short wall, and I looked to see him pointing at a mass of Saxons who were hurrying through the gap between us and the river. That gap was wide, but the Saxons were not threatening us, but rather hurrying to support Aelle.

‘Let them be!’ I shouted. I was more worried by the Saxons in front of us, for they had checked to form in ranks. They had seen what we had just done and would not let us do it to them and so they packed themselves four or five ranks deep, then cheered as one of their wizards came prancing out to curse us. He was one of the mad wizards, for his face twitched uncontrollably as he spat filth at us. The Saxons prized such men, thinking they had the ear of the Gods, and their Gods must have blanched as they heard this man curse.