Jack Whyte - Uther

Despite his haste and the many problems that swarmed in his mind, Uther was yet surprised to notice how small she was and to realize that he had been completely unaware of that in all the time he had known her. In his mind she had always seemed taller and more buxom than she looked now, despite the fact that her breasts were now swollen with milk and her waist was still thickened from her pregnancy.

No thought of secrecy or circumspection in her mind now, Ygraine came directly to him and handed him his son, her face wreathed in a smile of welcome, and as he took the child from her and held it up to where he could see it plainly, all awareness of pain, loss and battle-weariness faded immediately from his mind.

The boy was beautiful, even Uther could see that, despite his total ignorance of babies. He had thick, dark hair shot with streaks of pale brown, and enormous, shining eyes of a strange golden colour the like of which Uther had never seen. A great lump formed in his throat, closing off his breath, and for several moments he thought he might weep with the beauty of what was stirring in his breast. He was vaguely aware that everyone in the gateway and the courtyard beyond was looking at him, watching to see what he would do or say, but he had eyes only for the child, his son, Arthur, and he could feel Ygraine's wide eyes fixed on his face, gauging his reactions to what he was seeing.

He swallowed, hard, and drew a deep, shaking breath, holding it until he was sure he could speak without his voice trembling, and then he hefted the child gently as though measuring his weight. "Arthur, you said, that is his name? Arthur? There's little of the Cambrian in him." He saw her stiffen as though in shock and smiled at her, continuing to speak. "This one is Roman more than Cambrian, but British Roman. You made my son well, lady, complete with eagle's eyes.

"My grandmother has often told me of her brother, Caius Britannicus, who founded Camulod. He had eyes like this one here, bright, golden, eagle eyes. A soldier's eyes. A leader's eyes. A King's eyes, in truth. This one will be a King like none before him." He finally looked at Ygraine, smiling broadly and shifting the child into the crook of his right arm as he reached for her with his left, seeing the tears trembling in her eyes. "Now will you kiss me in front of all the world and be my wife and mother to my son for everyone to see and know?"

She swallowed a sob and moved quickly into the crook of his arm, lifting her face to him and kissing him deeply, and as they stood locked in their embrace, the child between them on one side, someone began to cheer, and the sound spread quickly, bringing him back quickly to awareness of where they were and what remained to be done.

"I can hardly wait until tonight," he said into her ear, hugging her close with the arm that encircled her and hoisting the child in his other arm. "We soon must make another one of these." He squeezed her even more tightly against him, already looking over her head and starting to take note of things beyond the gates in the interior of the stronghold. "But before then we have much to do. Is Lagan here?"

Ygraine shook her head and moved away from him, reaching for the child, and as he handed over his son she said, "No. I have no idea where he is, but they say he is tearing the land apart looking for Lot, with an army at his back, made up of clansmen from all over Cornwall. No one knows where he is, but the stories say he is everywhere. Where are your men?"

"Coming. At my back. We had some trouble with Germanic mercenaries. A strong force, far superior to Lot's usual filth. But things were well in hand when I left them, and my men should be close behind me. Are you ready to leave?"

"Aye, we are."

"How many people have you?"

"Fifty of my own guard under my cousin, Alasdair Mac Iain, another thirty of Herliss's clansmen and twelve of my women, with some other servants and attendants."

"Twelve women? Gods, Ygraine, we are at war! What am I to do with twelve women? I can barely look after my own men."

"What would you, Uther? I cannot simply leave them to Lot's mercy; he would kill them all. We have three wagons, each with a team of four horses. We will not hamper you."

"You could not hamper me, my love, not with my son in your arms . . . but twelve women . . . Well, we can but make the best of it. How quickly can you be prepared to leave?"

"We are ready now, and have been since last night. The fighting was all finished here by sunset. But we have just received word, a half hour before you came, that Lot is on his way here from the coast, a mere four leagues away."

"Damnation!" The news hit Uther hard. "That's no more than ten, twelve miles. How many are with him?"

"We don't know. The man who brought the news had not seen them, but he said he had been told it was an army . . . hundreds of men."

"Landed from the galleys that we saw earlier. Damn his foul, craven soul."

Ygraine was squinting up at him. "How did he escape you in the north?"

"He did not have to escape. There was nothing I could do to capture him. We had enemies approaching from all sides. We could not stay and wait for him to come to us and we could not attack him. I'll tell you all about it later. For now, we must be on our way, and quickly, and the only way open to us is to the south. Have you heard any more of this southern army?"

Ygraine shook her head. "No, only that they are on their way, moving north and living off the land, which means that they cannot be moving too quickly. But whether they are in the east or the west I know not. and I have no idea how close they are. I do know that my brother, Connor, is coming to find me, but he will land more than seven leagues to the southwest of here at the mouth of the river they call the Camel. That is close to where I was, but Connor does not know that I have been moved. Calum, the man I sent to you with my last letter, arranged for us—me and my guards, I mean—to meet him there. We know where it is, but it is a long way from where we are now. Connor will be there within the week, if our timing is right."

"Good, then we will head for the river mouth there, striking directly southwest, and hope we don't meet Lot's main army before we reach your meeting point." He began leading her towards the gates as he spoke, one arm about her shoulders. "I'll leave you there with sufficient men to keep you safe until your brother comes, and then I'll go and do what I have to do. We took severe punishment from the people we met yesterday. I didn't know Lot had units of that quality, and I hope he has no more of them. They savaged us, ripped us to pieces, and the fault was mine. I underestimated my enemy. Now. when we come face to face with Lot, I will be poorer by several hundred good men, and he already had us outnumbered by at least three to one. I only wish I could find Lagan and his army. There's no time to spare. So let's get your women loaded into those wagons and be on our way."

Chapter THIRTY-SEVEN

The addition of Ygraine's eighty men more than doubled the size of Uther's party, but they made good progress and intercepted the main Camulodian force without incident in less than two hours. That, however, was the last of Uther's designs that went as planned.

As soon as the two groups had reunited and even before the arrangements had been made to fit the extra wagons into the baggage-and-supply train, a messenger came from Popilius Cirro to summon Uther into a council of war. He went immediately, knowing that Cirro must have strong and convincing reasons for such a peremptory summons, but he was dismayed when the trooper sent to find him led him back towards the hospital wagons, where he discovered that Popilius had been twice wounded in the fighting earlier that day. The first injury, an arrow through the fleshy part of his upper arm, had knocked the veteran commander off his feet, and while he had lain on the ground, vainly trying to dislodge the barbed arrowhead from his flesh with his uninjured hand, he had been slashed in the left thigh by a running mercenary, who had himself been struck dead before he could raise his sword a second time.