Jack Whyte - The Eagles' Brood

During this summation my father had been nodding in grim-faced agreement. When Uther finally spoke, there was a tone of unwilling admiration in his words.

"That whoreson! What a devious, treacherous, unprincipled—"

"Aye, all of those and more, Uther," I said, interrupting him, "But include brilliant, and painstaking. If he were on our side, he'd be one of our master strategists. The flaw in his planning has been accidental. We turned the tables on his allies and arranged the truce we did, and we came out of it with more information from a first-hand source than Lot could possibly have anticipated."

"So be it, Caius," said my father. "You may have entered the mind of our antagonist far better than either Uther or I could have done. I for one can find no fault in your logic, or your deductions. But I confess your reference to buying time still leaves me grasping for meaning. Why should he need time? For what? What can we expect next?"

"He may have bought it already...I'm guessing now." They nodded, their eyes intent, and I took a few extra seconds to prepare my next thoughts. "I think Lot is here, close by us now. I think he'll attack us soon with everything he has, as soon as he can, before we are ready for anything. Uther, did you receive any indication at all of the strength he had concealed within his walls?"

A brief headshake. "Absolutely none. It could have been empty, or he could have had men piled in there, row on row, like logs. I have no idea."

"That's what I thought. Very well, visualize this, and bear in mind the type of man we have to deal with here.

Uther might have come home to face one of three situations: The first, and most desirable from Lot's point of view, would be that we had been completely beaten by the Scots invaders, and Uther would thus be riding into a deathtrap. The second would be that we had come home victorious, to whatever extent we might have been able to salvage a victory—I honestly do not believe Lot could have imagined such a complete victory as we have won, since God was clearly on our side and fighting with us, and Lot has little to do with any God. In this event, Uther would return to find us licking our wounds and recuperating from our exertions. The third possibility is that we might still be engaged in campaigning against the invaders, so Uther would find only a holding garrison in Camulod.

"Any one of these three possibilities would work to Lot's advantage. Remember, his spies ride with you, Uther, and you are supposedly convinced of Lot's blamelessness, despite any personal hatred you might have for him. Are you both with me thus far?" They nodded, still listening intently.

"Now, if I were as devious as Lot, I would attribute-to us sufficient malice to keep these two men waiting to deliver their messages. A day, at least, two days or three if my luck was working for me. If the Scots have been victorious, then Lot has no problems. If we have won, then we need time to lick our wounds and regroup, and we should be relieved to get Uther's reassurance—in spite of any personal misgivings—that the trouble in the south-west was without substance." I was confident in my logic, but its conclusions were startling, even to me. I took a deep breath before delivering my next statement.

"Father, Uther, I am prepared to wager that Lot followed hard on Uther's heels, and is now less than two days' march from here, in full force, waiting for his two spies to come back. If they do not arrive within two days, he will know that we were not defeated in the north. If we hear his envoys and send them back immediately, tomorrow, then he'll know within three days and still be closer to us than we would suspect. On the other hand, if we keep them waiting for two days, three days, he will have all the time he needs to deploy his armies and hit us from every direction, when we least expect it. He'll either use the departure of his spies as the signal for attack, or he'll move against us while they are still here."

"Would he sacrifice his friends that callously?" My father was still thinking of Lot in terms of normal human decency.

"The man has no friends, Father. He wouldn't think twice about it. I believe Lot of Cornwall intends to initiate all-out war against us, no less than three days from today, and no more than five. So let's say four days, but be prepared for three. And he'll be right here at our gates."

The silence that followed this assertion seemed to last forever. It was my father, clutching at straws, who broke it. "Cay, I'm not disputing your logic, but there's one flaw in it. Our own people are out there, throughout our lands. If Lot's army were to attempt to approach us, no matter how carefully, we would have word of it."

Even as he was speaking, I shook my head, denying him that avenue, which I had already considered. "Would we, Father? Don't forget his two hundred bowmen with their arrows that can kill with a scratch. Those people could move in a circle around us on a mile-wide front and kill every living soul. Especially if they did it in stealth. We haven't got that many people out there, and those who do live on the farms tend to congregate, after working all day. There would be no survivors to escape with warnings. The same applies to our sentries and outposts. Poisoned arrows! All it takes is a scratch. Uther, how long does it take a man to die?"

"All of the men I lost were dead within half an hour. Less than half that time for most of them." He was looking at my father, who listened, pale-faced.

"Father," I said, my voice as gentle as I could make it, "we have to assume that the people in and around Camulod itself, the people we can hear and see, are the only people left alive in the entire countryside who are not our enemies."

"That is monstrous!"

"Monstrous and evil. But it is typical of Lot of Cornwall, who is an evil monster."

He was convinced. "So be it! What do you suggest we do?" He was himself again. I changed my tone.

"We move. Immediately. Uther, not much rest for you tonight, Cousin. We'd better get Titus and Flavius in here, Father. We're going to need them."

He struck the small gong on his table and instructed the soldier who came at its summons.

Uther sighed and stretched himself. "What have you got in mind, Cay?"

"Your envoys. I don't want them to suspect that we are mobilizing. They must know nothing. The only thing I want them to think is that we are as stupid and unsuspecting as they assume us to be. Fortunately, if my suspicions are right, they'll take our treatment of them at face value. I want an unobtrusive guard placed over them, but I want them to know it's there. Keep them away from any place or any person that might make them suspicious of what we are doing. In the meantime, I've already sent word to the stewards of our breeding farms to assemble all our animals for a census. We made those arrangements by sheer chance, before we knew anything of this, but it means our horses will all be gathered right where we need them.

"Lot already knows that Uther had his four hundred horsemen with him, so he'll be expecting to find them here. That's good. They'll be here, but what I'm thinking of is that difference you mentioned, Father, of over six hundred horses. We know we're stronger than anyone else suspects. I'll be surprised if we have less than seven thousand souls living in the Colony, scattered throughout our camps and farms?" It was a question, but neither of them reacted.

"Do you agree? About seven thousand, counting women and children?"

My father nodded. "Aye, that many at least. Our numbers have been growing steadily for years. We have more than two thousand here in Camulod itself, within and around the walls. We've always concentrated on our strength—our ability to defend ourselves—but in the past few years, what with one thing and another, we seem to have lost sight of numbers."