Jack Whyte - Uther

It was a long, miserable journey to Tir Manha, and he would never forget the aching relief he felt on arriving to discover that his mother had recovered from her sickness. His shame, however, did not abate. On the contrary, many weeks later, when he discovered the whole truth of what had happened in Camulod after he left, it grew enormously, for he knew beyond dispute that had he, in his rage, not driven the terrified girl out into the night, she would never have met the man, or men, who had savaged her, leaving her for dead, battered and bleeding, ravished and sodomized, so that she survived only by some miracle. So great was his self-loathing then that he was incapable of defending himself in the face of Merlyn's suspicions that he had been responsible. In Uther's own mind, he had been responsible for the girl's flight. But it pained him and saddened him more than he would have thought possible that Merlyn could suspect him of such foul baseness as had been perpetrated under the cover of darkness upon the poor little waif. That pain would remain with him for the rest of his life, and because of it, he would never have imposed himself knowingly upon another member of Cassandra's family. Whatever lusts he had, however intense, he would direct them elsewhere.

Ygraine, on the other hand, had no such scruples. But neither had she any sexual appetites—or so she believed. She would have ridiculed the notion that she might ever indulge in sexual pleasure with anyone, let alone her Cambrian captor. Ygraine of Cornwall had known no man in almost three years and believed that she had purged herself forever of the need to know another. Her few physical encounters with her own husband had been terrifying and depraved, and they had appalled and disgusted her, frightening her and scarring her deeply. She had come to believe, deep within her being, that no man could possibly be attracted to her after the defilements her husband had heaped upon her, and at the same lime she had convinced herself that all men were as he was, and that no man would ever again have occasion or opportunity to defile her as he had.

The two of them were destined to rut, nevertheless, and months later they would agree that the die was cast for both of them at some point on that first afternoon when they had admitted Herliss to their newly hatched plan to save his life. The huddled, conspiratorial intimacy brought them close enough to each other mentally and physically to ignite their awareness of each other, and it was like the explosive combustion that engulfs and consumes a moth that has fluttered too close to a candle flame—a completely unexpected turn of events that took both of them unawares and swept them irresistibly up and out of themselves as it hurled them into each other's arms with the inevitability of death.

Uther was vibrant with excitement over their plan, and at one point he reached out spontaneously and squeezed her forearm, easing the pressure of his grip almost immediately but making no attempt to remove his hand as he spoke earnestly to her, gazing directly into her eyes. That was when she first felt the awareness— the lusty thing, as she thought of it afterwards—stirring in her belly.

"This is going to work. Herliss has agreed to take part. Now we have to plan, all of us . . . and carefully. The worst thing that could happen here is for anyone but we three to find out what's afoot."

Ygraine sat staring at him as he went on to outline their next moves, but she barely absorbed half of what he said, for she had been thunderstruck, instantly dizzied, her whole being plunged into turmoil by the sudden, physical awareness of his hand upon her arm. All the reactions that she would have thought of as normal had been instantly routed by the incredible, undreamed-of sensations that the touch of his hand, even through the fabric of her sleeve, sent rushing and flushing through her entire body. Her skin rose up in tingling gooseflesh, her nipples hardened, her throat constricted, threatening her ability to breathe, and her head filled up with a roaring, rushing sound that made her feel nauseated.

She was appalled by her own body's tumultuous reactions, and she was excruciatingly aware of the hot flush that had suffused her face and neck. Had they seen? Was it possible they had not noticed? But Uther and Herliss were intent on their discussions, and as time passed, her pulse rate slowed down, her breathing gradually settled to an approximation of normal, and she felt the hectic colour subside slowly from her face and neck until she eventually reached the stage at which she knew they might look at her and see nothing beyond the normal.

Inside herself, however, Ygraine felt far from normal. Never before in her life had she been so unexpectedly overcome with lust, and the experience had shaken her, rattling her confidence and making her doubt her own perceptions. Since her escape to Herliss's White Fort, Ygraine had been celibate. But now she was convinced by the furious tide of sensations that had assailed her that she had but little true knowledge of her own body and its dictates. She heaved a deep breath, lighting to keep it silent, and then, struggling to appear natural and casual, she allowed herself to look again at her two companions.

They were deeply involved in the logistics of the escape, attempting to reconcile their needs and requirements with the realities facing them. They had to arrange the disappearance, silent and unnoticed, of approximately fifty people, almost all of whom would be afoot. Only Herliss, the Queen and Dyllis would ride horses in their flight. The others, mainly Ygraine's bodyguard, would march out as they always did. Ironically, however, all the normal difficulties of escape would be reversed in this instance. None of the obvious problems of organizing a large-scale breakout would cause the slightest difficulty here, since this was an engineered escape. The real difficulty, verging upon an impossibility, lay in the need to keep its true nature secret from the very people who would be escaping.

"We can't afford to overlook Popilius Cirro in all of this," Uther was saying to Herliss when Ygraine began to listen again.

"Who? You mean the fellow who came in this morning with your army?"

"Aye. Popilius is a good man—none better—but he's not really one of mine, and he is of the old ways, the old Roman ways."

"What do you mean?"

"Popilius is the senior soldier of Camulod, the highest-ranking soldier—as opposed to a trained staff officer—in all their army. In the Roman legions he would have been called the primus pilus, the First Spear, and to tell the truth, that's what they call him in Camulod to this day. I le actually served in the legions as a boy, in Asia Minor with my uncle Picus Britannicus, when Picus was senior cavalry legate to Stilicho—" He broke off, seeing the expression on Herliss's face. "You've heard of Stilicho, haven't you?"

"Aye, I think so, a long time ago. Wasn't he the Emperor'.'"

"Almost. He was imperial regent for the Emperor Honorius."

"Blabbety-blah-blah . . . what does that mean?"

"Imperial regent? It means a temporary ruler, governing in the name of an emperor too young to govern by or for himself. Stilicho did that after the death of Theodosius while the old man's son, Honorius, was still a little boy. Much good it did him, though. As soon as Honorius was old enough to stand on his own, he wiped out all his former friends and supporters—had Stilicho murdered with the rest of them. He would have killed Uncle Picus, too, as part of the same sweep, but Picus managed to escape and made his way back here to Britain. Merlyn and I were seven years old when he got back. He brought a small group of friends with him, and Popilius Cirro was the youngest of them, hardly more than a boy. But boy or not, he had saved Picus's life and stood by him throughout their flight, and so Picus trained him personally after that once he himself had taken over as Commander in Chief of Camulod. Now Popilius is answerable only to the Legate Commander of Camulod. And Popilius is so trustworthy that it makes him a danger to us . . ."