Jack Whyte - The Saxon Shore

Once the initial storm of greetings had passed and I had ascertained that they had been in no other danger since Shelagh's departure, I turned to Shelagh herself. In deference to the children's presence, she had closed her cloak modestly, holding it tight around her, its edges twisted in one hand.

"Your clothes," I said. "Where are they?"

She tossed her head, indicating the slope behind us. "Up there somewhere."

"Find them, and dress. I'm going to see to Julia."

As soon as I said his mother's name, young Bedwyr's face crumpled and he began to weep, moaning deep in his throat, and Ludmilla swept him into her arms, comforting him and making crooning sounds of grief and sympathy. Arthur stiffened, his shoulders hunched, then raised his hand to the huge lump on his forehead, covering it with his palm, and turned away from all of us.

"Arthur." He turned towards me. "Where are your horses?"

The boy swallowed hard, visibly fighting to keep from breaking into tears as had his friend. He shook his head. "I don't know, Merlyn. We tethered them where we always do, at the top of the meadow, but I don't know if they're still there. I didn't see them after the men came. They might have stolen them." His lip trembled.

"No," I said. "I doubt that. They're probably where you left them. Come back with me. You can collect them while I do what I have to do."

His crumpled features straightened when his body did and he stepped towards me, his hand falling away from the swelling on his brow now that he had something to do, but before he reached my side he stopped and turned back towards the others. "Bedwyr," he called, his voice firm now. "I'm going to get the horses, do you want to come?"

Bedwyr, who had been weeping inconsolably on Ludmilla's breast, raised his tear-streaked face and turned around but made no attempt to move away from his source of comfort.

"We're going to need some help," Arthur continued. "They may be scattered."

Gwin had not moved since I had spoken first to Arthur. Now he turned his head towards Bedwyr, saying nothing. Bedwyr looked from Arthur to him, wiping his runny nose on his sleeve, then knuckled his eyes and looked back at Arthur.

"You want me to?" he asked.

Arthur smiled, and I realised that I was watching him with awe, seeing an eight-year-old boy behaving like a seasoned commander. "Are you coming?" was all he said.

Bedwyr nodded and snuffled again, blinking his eyes clear of the last tears, then stepped away from Ludmilla and began to make his way up to where we waited. Arthur glanced at Gwin. "Good," he said. "Let's go."

As we re-entered the meadow, I took care to turn left and uphill, leading the boys up to the spot where they had tethered the horses and away from where the body of Bedwyr's mother floated in the sluggish stream. I spotted a flash of whiteness back among the trees and Arthur saw it, too, as soon as I did.

"There's one of them," he said, and I heard relief in his young voice.

"Aye, and the others will be close by," I answered. "Go you now and collect them, but be cautious. They were cut loose, perhaps injured, and may still be panicky. Take your time. I'll join you in a little while."

I sat and watched them until the woods swallowed them, then turned my horse around and went down to the river.

Julia was already cold with death, and with the chill of the water. I dragged her body gently to the bank and laid her on her back, concealing the huge wound that had killed her and the bloodied evidence of her violation. She bore no visible signs of violence in front, save for a split lower lip and single large bruise high up on her face. Any other evidence had been washed away by the river. I found her clothing scattered nearby and covered her decently, fighting the urge to scream aloud in rage and grief as I closed the glazed, empty eyes that once had been so warm and lively, full of love and life and joy. Lucanus, I knew, would be as griefstricken as her husband Hector. Kneeling beside her, I bowed my head in a prayer, then stooped to kiss her cheek, after which I covered her face and made my way up to collect the boys, who had found all the horses.

Moments later, we were on our way back to Camulod, riding in silence, for the most part, since there was little merit in discussing what had happened at that time. The attackers had been strangers. The younger children were too young to know what had occurred, and the older boys, I believed, too fragile to listen to a discussion of death and rapine that had taken one of their mothers. Shelagh and Ludmilla had their own thoughts to occupy them and I, God knew, had mine.

Two hours had passed since our return to the fortress and I had done everything I could think to do. The frantic activity stirred up by our arrival and the news we carried had finally died down, to be replaced by a strained atmosphere of expectation as we waited for the first reports to begin corning in. The children, all six of them, were under the care of Lucanus and Ludmilla, safe in the Infirmary and confined to bed for observation, as Luke termed their quarantine. In fact, they were being isolated for their own protection from the rumours and speculation, now being embroidered upon and argued over by everyone who still remained in Camulod.

The garrison was out already, scouring the countryside for strangers, only a holding force remaining in the fortress. Ambrose had taken overall command of that operation, coordinating the search from the Praesidium. Dedalus, Quintus, Benedict and Rufio had each been assigned a quadrant of our lands to search, radiating outward from the fort, and their cavalry was supported by eight infantry contingents, two under the nominal command of each of these four but controlled by their own officers. Fast riders had also been dispatched to each of our perimeter outposts to spread the word to seal our borders, permitting no one to exit from our lands. If there were interlopers still alive in Camulod, they would be found.

Hector, the one most intimately injured by this day's events, had ridden out with Dedalus to the scene of the attack, to bring his wife's remains home, under guard. No one had been able to dissuade him from going. Dedalus, on the same sweep, would also seek the man whom I had wounded in the groin and if the wretch was still alive he, too, would be sent to Camulod for questioning.

Now there remained only the matter of Shelagh's account of the day's events. Two separate matters had vied within my mind for attention throughout all that I had done that afternoon, and I had kept them in check successfully only by a single-minded effort of sheer will. The first of these, by far the more pernicious, was that I might even now be passing on my sickness to my friends; the other was occasioned by the fact that there had been four, perhaps five slain men there in the glade by the river, and no explanation of their deaths.

I drew a deep breath before knocking on the door to the quarters occupied by Donuil and Shelagh, and moments later it swung open and Donuil stood looking at me, his face unreadable. He had taken Shelagh away shortly after the chaos of our arrival began to die down, both of them white-faced and badly shaken by the narrowness of her escape from death. Now there was silence in the room behind him.

"How is she, Donuil?"

He shrugged and stepped aside to allow me to enter. Behind him, his wife sprawled in a stuffed armchair, her legs spread and her head tilted back, eyes closed. There was colour in her cheeks now, nevertheless, and in one hand she held a cup containing what I had no doubt was her own fiery, homemade mead. Her belt of knives lay on a nearby table, dropped in a careless heap. I glanced at Donuil, who merely shook his head, then I moved closer to her.

"Shelagh?"

She opened her eyes and looked up at me, heaving a great, deep sigh before straightening up, blinking her eyes as though to clear them of sleep.