‘No, kill a man?’
Kai shrugged. ‘We have no choice. That’s our life now. Besides, these are wicked men. Bucellari are mercenaries without honour. You heard the farmer in Urien’s hall. These men have killed women and children and razed farms to the ground. They deserve to die.’
Arthur nodded and followed his friend back to their mounts. Fear curdled his belly and Arthur did not share the meal of oatcakes and ale. All the men in Ector’s war band were hard men, killers and professional warriors. Ector himself was the champion of Rheged. Many said he was the greatest warrior in all of Britain. Ector never lost, not even on the practice ground. Kai had come close the last winter, almost landing a strike with a wooden sword, but Ector had recovered and thundered a fist into Kai’s belly to win the bout. It was time to become a man, and Arthur hoped he was brave enough. Kai could do it. He was fearless and a fine warrior with every weapon. He beat Arthur in most practice bouts, and Arthur himself was skilled with sword and spear. In his heart, Arthur was not a violent man. He liked to listen to the bards and their stories, to dream of heroes and legends and of the Rome-folk and their mighty empire. He enjoyed weapons, especially the sword, and the physicality of the practice yard. Every lesson Ector and Huell had taught told Arthur that to kill was his purpose in life, he would be a warrior and protect Rheged from her enemies. But to rip a man’s life away, to pierce his flesh with cold iron and send him screaming to the afterlife, that was different to hitting Kai with a wooden sword or a spear.
The war band reached the villa as the sun set behind them, washing the land with a dim light the colour of gold. Their spears cast long shadows like the claws of a monster upon lush green grass as twenty-three warriors crouched behind a gorse thicket. They peered at the ruins of a sprawling villa, its white stone walls crumbled, and red tiles which once covered its sloping roof littered the ground. The villa was another remnant of the mighty Romans who had ruled Britain for hundreds of years and then left in the time of Ector’s great-grandsire to leave the land littered with memories of their greatness and riven with violent anarchy without law or legion.
‘How many?’ asked Ector. He crouched with his sword drawn. Its steel edge gleamed, and its blade caught the twilight to reveal the strange smoke in its metal. It was a magnificent weapon, given to Ector by Uther Pendragon for his services in the Great War against Vortigern and the marauding Saxons. Arthur could not take his eyes off the sword. He hoped to own such a weapon one day, the weapon of a champion. Arthur carried a spear and a long knife, and he would continue to do so until he killed a man and gained better weapons, or his lord rewarded him with them.
‘Thirty men,’ Huell said, his flint-hard eyes squinting at the men lolling in the villa’s courtyard. They had made a fire from rotting roof beams and lolled about it, laughing and drinking ale from clay jugs. They were rough men, bushy bearded, with dark eyes and darker laughs. Three women mewed and wept as the bucellari mercenaries passed them around the fire. The women, stripped naked, had terror-stricken faces drawn long by fear and suffering. A nest of spears and shields were neatly piled in a corner, while six tied horses stood beside the rubble of a fallen-down barn. The bucellari wore wool tunics and dark cloaks, a handful wore leather breastplates, and none wore the heavy chain-mail coats which separated the lords of war from the rest of the warrior caste. Ector and Huell each wore a heavy mail coat, made from tiny, interlocked rings of iron which protected them from neck to groin.
‘We’ll do them now whilst they’re drunk,’ said Ector, and Huell grinned wolfishly.
‘A rider!’ hissed a spearman. Arthur turned; spear lowered. He licked at dry lips, thoughts flashing through his head. What if it was enemy riders? Perhaps the enemy had surrounded them?
A figure approached from the treeline beyond a wild meadow, the same direction from which Arthur and the war band had marched moments earlier.
‘Bloody fool, girl,’ Ector cursed, but Arthur smiled because the figure was not the enemy.
It was Lunete, Kai’s younger sister. She came with a bow slung over her shoulder and a quiver of arrows at her belt. Her dark hair fell about her slim shoulders, and she raised her chin in defiance as Ector and Huell waved frantically at her to duck down before the bucellari mercenaries saw her.
‘I warned you, girl,’ Ector said through gritted teeth as Lunete crouched between Arthur and Kai. ‘I’ll marry you off the moment we get home. You’re going to get yourself killed!’
‘I can’t let you two have all the fun whilst I spin yarn and listen to the wives talk of weaving and babies,’ said Lunete. She ignored her father, blue eyes prideful and her raven-black hair shining. Lunete unslung her bow and tested the string, and Arthur laughed at her brave impudence. She was Ector’s favourite, the apple of his eye, and he doted on her wild savagery. Lunete’s upbringing should have focused on spinning yarn, weaving clothes and tapestries and becoming a good wife. But she was wilder than either Kai or Arthur, and Ector indulged her, training her to fight with bow and spear and allowing her to ride and live with his men.
‘Don’t get in the way, pig-nose,’ Kai whispered, and Lunete punched him on the arm. She hated that name, earned because of her snub nose, and Arthur laughed again at the fond rivalry between brother and sister. It masked his fear momentarily, but Huell readied the men and the gnawing heat in Arthur’s belly returned.
‘Strike fast, don’t hesitate,’ Lunete whispered, fixing him with her bright eyes. He nodded and swallowed the lump in his throat.
Ector stood and raised his sword to the heavens. ‘For God, and Rheged!’ he roared, and strode from the gorse like the champion he was. Orange light from the enemy’s fire caught the links of his mail and the patterns of his sword blade, and the enemy leapt from the fallen masonry. Men dashed for spears and shields and Ector broke into a charge, flanked by Huell and his twenty loyal spearmen. Each warrior in Ector’s war band was oathsworn to fight and die for him, and he led from the centre, brave and unflinching. The warriors charged like a flock of birds, Ector at the tip of the wedge, every man howling his war cry. Kai ran with them, spear lowered, his boyish face twisted in anger. All Ector’s men carried spears in their fists and long knives at their belts. Some were lucky enough to carry shields, but only Ector and Huell had swords.
‘Go, Arthur,’ Lunete shouted, kicking Arthur in the leg. Fear rooted him to the spot like a tree, unable to move or breathe. ‘You can do it. Go!’
Arthur clenched his teeth and gripped the smooth ash of his spear. He surged to his feet, held his breath, and ran. His heart thundered in his chest like a war drum as he followed ten paces behind Ector, spear lowered, the sound of men shouting and horses whickering churning in his ears. The enemy panicked, desperately readying weapons to fight off the men who came screaming from the fields like demons. Ector killed the first man with a sweep of his sword, and blood flew bright in the fading light as death came for the brigands who had raided King Urien’s lands.
An arrow whipped past Arthur’s head and slammed into a bucellari warrior’s chest, and Arthur glanced over his shoulder to where Lunete nocked another arrow to her bowstring. He turned back, and his spear shifted off balance. The butt caught his trailing leg and Arthur sprawled on the grass. He cursed and scrambled to his feet, but a short man with a furious face swung an axe at Arthur’s head and he thought he must die, but an arrow struck the enemy in the thigh, and he sank to the earth in pain. Arthur twisted around the fallen man and kept on running. The fight raged around him, and Huell drove his spear into a big man’s throat and twisted the blade with a mighty roar. A bucellari disembowelled a Rheged man with a long knife. Arthur knew him and gasped at the terrible wound. The iron stink of blood, and the stench of shit as dying men voided their bowels, filled the air and Arthur ran. He reached the villa’s crumbling walls and realised he was running to nowhere, caught up by fear and closeness to death.
Huell dragged his spear free of a dying man and roared his war-fury as he threw the spear to take another enemy in the chest. Huell spat and dragged his sword free of its fleece-lined scabbard. He parried an enemy spear and slashed open that man’s throat with a vicious backswing. Hot blood spattered Arthur’s face as he ran past Huell, and he gasped at the feel of another man’s lifeblood upon his skin.
This is what you were trained to do, so do it. Fight! Arthur tried to convince himself, but his feet would not move, as though fixed to the earth by a druid’s spell. Kai drove his spear into the belly of a young warrior, yanked the point free, and stabbed again to make his first kill. Arthur’s mouth was dry, his tongue like old leather. He could feel eyes upon him, judging him, could imagine Huell’s cruel rebukes if he failed to strike a blow in the fight. I should have killed the axeman. Lunete had saved his life, and all Arthur had to do was kill the wounded man and the deed would be done. He would be a warrior. But he had just run away like a dog without sense or courage.
A huge enemy with a thick black beard and wild curly hair burst from the ruins, holding a war axe in one hand and a shield in the other. He barged Huell out of the way with his shield, roared in defiance, and cracked the edge of his axe into a Rheged warrior’s skull with a sickening crack. The bearded enemy yanked the axe free in a wash of dark blood and grey slime and grinned as his eyes rested on Arthur. He came at Arthur, his maw full of stubby brown teeth and his beard a mess of tangled hair, lice and filth. He swung his axe and bellowed with hate, and Arthur ducked beneath the wild swing. The shield came about and crashed into Arthur’s shoulder, driving him backwards. Arthur stumbled under the impact and the axe came around in a blur. He raised his spear just in time to parry the blow. The big man kicked Arthur savagely in the groin and, as he doubled over, a knee thundered into his face. Arthur fell to the ground and scrambled over the dew-soaked grass. He was winded, gasping for air, and had dropped his spear. Panic flooded his senses as he tried to drag his knife free of the sheath at his belt. He closed his eyes tightly, expecting the axe to fall and chop into his skull, neck or back.
‘Fight me, dog,’ barked a familiar voice. Arthur sucked in a chest full of air and rolled onto his back. Ector had come, and the big bucellari left Arthur to face King Urien’s champion. The two men circled each other, like great wolves eying the other’s size and battle scars. Arthur scrambled to his knees and then stood, bracing himself against the rough edge of a broken-down wall. He found his spear in the grass, and humiliation washed over him. To drop a weapon in battle was shameful and Arthur looked around, hoping that nobody had seen him fall before the enemy warrior, and found Huell’s cruel eyes boring into him, a smirk playing at the corners of his hard mouth.
The battle was over, and six enemy warriors knelt in submission. Only the bearded man remained. More writhed on the blood-soaked ground in miserable pain, whilst others lay dead amongst the ruins. Ector’s war band gathered about to watch their leader fight the fiercest of the enemy and the big man spat at them, shaking his axe and daring Ector to come and die. Ector dropped his shield and drew his long knife in his left hand, his sword blade soaked with dead men’s blood and held firm in his right. Arthur stared at Ector, wondering how he could be so brave and so fearsome. The war band stared at Ector like he was a hero of old, one of the giants who had lived in Britain before the Rome-folk came. Their eyes blazed with pride. Ector’s hard, flat face was implacable as he advanced on the huge bucellari mercenary.
The fire crackled and spat, and its light danced on the planes of Ector’s face. He came forward, sword held in an aggressive stance and his knife held low. The sword lashed out, snake fast, and the enemy warrior darted away from its bite and swung his axe at Ector’s midriff, but the knife blocked the strike with a great clang of iron as the two weapons came together. Ector stepped in and head-butted the enemy warrior savagely in the nose, and then again. He sliced his sword along the bigger man’s shield arm, and the bushy-bearded enemy dropped his shield and staggered backwards. His face was a mask of blood around his ruined nose and Ector stepped back and drove the point of his sword into the bucellari’s chest. The enemy tottered, staring down with horror at the blade in his chest and Ector dropped his knife, gripped the sword hilt with two hands and ripped the blade downwards so that it tore the enemy open like a hunted deer, disembowelling him with fearsome strength. The big man fell to his knees and the blue-red horror of his insides slopped out, steaming, onto the grass.
The war band cheered, and Ector cleaned his blade on the dead man’s filthy cloak.
‘Kill the rest of them, all but one, and mount their heads on the ends of their spears as a warning to any other raiders who come this way,’ Ector ordered, and Huell saw it was done. All the bucellari died, save one sullen warrior whom Huell tied to a post to wait for Ector’s questioning. ‘Arthur, are you hurt?’ Ector came close and draped a heavy arm about Arthur’s shoulders. He could not meet his foster father’s eyes and stared instead at the ground.
‘No, spear-father,’ he said, using the name he had used for Ector since he was a small boy. It was not right to call the man his father, for he was not, and spear-father had always seemed more appropriate.
‘You must learn to be more ruthless, my boy. Kai made his first kill, congratulate him.’ Ector placed a thick finger beneath Arthur’s chin and raised his head so he could peer into Arthur’s eyes. ‘Your time will come, lad. There is a warrior inside of you. I can see it. Believe in yourself and master your fear.’
‘But I was afraid, I…’
‘A man can’t be brave if he isn’t afraid. What is bravery but the overcoming of fear? I was afraid today, and so was every man here.’
‘You were afraid?’
‘Of course. All men fear death. You must accept it, lad. Pretending to be brave and acting in the face of danger is still bravery.’ Ector smiled and clapped Arthur heavily on the shoulder and then left to join his men.
Arthur sighed. The warriors gathered about Kai, and Arthur’s friend and foster brother basked in their acclaim. He recreated his spear thrust, and the warriors cheered him. Huell grabbed Kai’s forearm in the warrior’s grip, and Arthur thought that was the thing he wanted most in the world, to be respected by Huell, to be offered the warrior’s grip from so great a warrior. Ector went to his son and raised his arm in triumph. He stripped the weapons from the man Kai had killed and handed them to his son, along with a conical helmet the dead man wore. Finally, Ector placed his hand on the dead man’s wound, stood, and wiped the blood down Kai’s face. The men of the war band bowed their heads and then roared their acclaim for the newly blooded member of their brotherhood of warriors.
‘I killed two men today,’ said Lunete. Her lithe limbs bounded over rubble, and she stood beside Arthur, watching Kai’s glorious moment. ‘Nobody bloods my face.’
‘Your father is angry with you,’ said Arthur. ‘You shouldn’t have come.’
‘If I hadn’t, you’d be dead.’ She crossed her arms and raised her eyebrow. Lunete had none of her father’s harsh features and all of her mother’s beauty, or so the women of Ector’s hall said. Her mother had died when Lunete was a girl, and so she had grown up amongst the warriors.
‘I would have killed that axeman if you hadn’t hit him with your arrow.’
‘No, you wouldn’t.’ She stood, teary-eyed with her lip quivering. ‘A thank you would be nice. You are a horrible boy, Arthur.’ She stormed off. Arthur wanted to go after her, to thank her for saving his life, but he just slumped against the ruined villa and pondered his failings.
2
