Jack Whyte - The Saxon Shore

"So you had no fears of that?"

I smiled, shaking my head. "None, but now the matter is academic. We are both here, and now four of us know."

"What of the boy, Arthur?" Donuil asked. "When will we go for him?"

"As soon as possible. Within the month, if all goes well. It will take several weeks to see Ambrose welcomed and settled into place in Camulod, and then we can leave for your home." I paused, struck by a sudden thought, and looked to Ambrose. "Forgive me, Brother, I am assuming you can stay?"

He smiled. "I'm here, am I not? I can stay, at least for a time. Bear in mind, though, I had no idea of what you wanted in summoning me. Donuil's instructions were none too enlightening on that, and now I know why. He had no more knowledge of what you really wanted than had I." His voice faded and his eyes drifted towards the fire, so that when next he spoke, his tone was pensive. "I had expected to remain in Camulod for some time, but I had no expectation of hearing the kind of things you have told us tonight. So many layers within layers of responsibility and duty. I knew none of that, and I did not expect to find filial obligations surrounding me so densely. It makes me feel some guilt towards Vortigern."

"How so?"

"I'm his Captain," he answered, as though I should not have to ask. "He relies on me. Relies on me to help him govern his domains, and to expand them."

In the pause that followed, I decided not to ask of these plans for expansion, knowing that there would be a more fitting time. Ambrose, however, was already launched and spoke what was in his mind.

"Vortigern is ambitious, Caius, but not for himself alone. He is a fine, good man and a strong warrior with a formidable mind. And in a way, his motivation is the same as our grandfather's was. For years he has had to face the question, asked by all who meet him, of what he will do when the Danes he has brought in ask for more land and he has none to give them. Now he is taking steps to solve that problem before it arises."

"What kind of steps?" I was incapable of not asking.

"Expansionist steps; acquisitive steps; territorial steps. Vortigern is extending his boundaries."

"Unchallenged?"

He smiled at me. "Who is to challenge him? His people, thanks to Hengist's Northmen, are the only folk in all the northeast who have not been decimated by the invaders from north beyond the Wall and east beyond the seas. The lands are virtually uninhabited. All Vortigern has to do is hold them. The surviving people welcome him, with his Danish Northmen, as a rescuer."

"I see." I had no reason to doubt him. "And when will you return to him?"

He sucked air audibly through his front teeth. "I spoke of a year's absence. I'll go back then, but it might only be for a brief visit, to let him know what I am doing. I have no foolish thought that I am irreplaceable." He smiled. "Vortigern lacks neither champions nor captains, but he has earned of me at least my loyalty and a final, formal leave-taking." He paused, looking me in the eye. "What are you thinking, Brother? That's a pensive, angry-looking frown."

I shook my head, erasing my thoughtful scowl and returning his smile. "I don't really know, but I'm certainly not angry. I'm surprised, I suppose, that you should have made such a momentous decision so quickly, before even arriving in Camulod." My smile widened to a grin. "You may not like it there."

"Oh, I shall like it. Since you began to talk tonight, I have come to realize that it's my home, even though I've never been there. Too many echoes of recognition sounded in my breast while you were speaking, although how I could recognize things totally unknown to me is beyond me. I'm a soldier, not a mystic. It seemed to me, for all of that, listening and hearing much of your tale for the first time—and all of it in sequence for the first time—that this Camulod, founded and governed since its founding by my own immediate ancestors, my father and his father, must have some ties to offer that, having found, I should be loath to lose." I nodded, and he continued. "So, it seems to me there will be work for me, and I am born to do it. You, on the other hand, have other duties. This child in Hibernia, for one."

"Eire," grunted Donuil.

"Eire, pardon me. He is my cousin, and yours, too, and he is Donuil's nephew, as well as titular heir to the Queen of Cornwall and grandson to the High King of Donuil's Scots. That says nothing of the additional truth that he is the son of the Pendragon kings, and great-grandson to Publius Varrus and Luceiia Britannicus of Camulod. A formidable lineage."

"I felt the same when I first saw him," I said.

"It is the simple truth. So!" He clapped his hands and stood up. "Tomorrow morning we ride into Camulod and I will finally meet my great-aunt Luceiia and the Colonists who know my antecedents better than I do. A few weeks, you say, to put me in place, providing that I do not prove to be a square peg in a round hole or vice versa, and then you and Donuil can leave for Eire and the boy. Donuil, will you return?"

The question took me by surprise but not Donuil.

"To Camulod?" He yawned and stretched his huge frame. "Aye, can you doubt it? I hardly dare go home, since I am ruined. I've grown used to bathing frequently, and even to horses, and I've learned your heathen tongue and ways. I would be lost in Eire now." His big head swung towards me. "But before we sleep, Caius Britannicus, I have some other questions about the boy. May I ask them?"

"Ask away."

"Did I hear you properly? Connor has no idea the child is his nephew?"

"None. To consider that, he would have had to accept the death of your sister Ygraine. He had plainly decided not to countenance the possibility of that, so I decided to say nothing of the child's parentage, other than that I was his guardian but not his father."

"He accepted that?"

"What else could he do? He had seen with his own eyes that I was prepared to die to save the child."

"Does anyone else besides your aunt know who the child is?"

"No. I saw no point in drawing attention to the child, other than as a guarantor that I would return, bringing you. You yourself told me long ago that not all your brothers and uncles are as mild as Connor. Why place the child needlessly in danger as a potential threat to any of their plans at some future date?"

"Aye. What about Uther's people? Will you tell them?"

"No, not yet." I responded more slowly, thinking about that for the first time. "And probably for the same reason. I have Uther's ring, his signet, in my keeping for the boy. It will serve to announce his right, when the time comes, but before that time it could place him in needless danger."

"Of what, and from whom?"

"Of death, my friend, just as it might in Eire; assassination by any ambitious malcontent who might construe the child's existence as a threat to his own schemes."

Donuil squirted a stream of saliva between his teeth and into the fire with great deliberation, then wiped his lower lip with the back of his hand. "Good. I'm glad to hear you think that way. I think you're absolutely right. It's not necessary for the child to carry such a load before he needs to; he's already orphaned, and that's burden enough for any mite his age."

Ambrose had been gazing at his drawn dagger, testing its edge with his thumb. "Orphaned, perhaps, Donuil, but he is well uncled and cousined." He looked at me and smiled. "Well connected."

Donuil grunted and laughed as he stood up. "Aye, and well protected. A good night to both of you. I'm for sleep."

VII

"If Vortigren could see this, he would die of envy." Ambrose was gazing in awe at the spectacle laid out below us, where we stood on the hillside road to Camulod's main gates, looking down on the great drilling ground that stretched out below them.