Bear was startled into passivity. He was winded, too, and shocked by the water’s cold sting. It was an instant only. Ectorius watched in approval as he twisted out from under and sprang to his feet. His sword had never left his hand. “Saxon?” he demanded in his turn. “Dane? How dare you, you savage? I am prince of Cerniw, and my father was the son of the Dragon of the South, as good a Briton as ever lived!”
The blade flashed. The dark-haired lad staggered up out of the water and jumped back, but only far enough to draw his own weapon.
Ectorius leaned forward in his saddle. This stranger bore a sword such as the old Roman had never seen, and he wielded it well. Too well for his protégé? Ectorius tensed. If the boy fell, all was lost…
Then, suddenly, the very air changed. The flaring rage between Bear and his opponent seemed to fall out of it like scales. Bear had been schooled in the rules of combat, and apparently so had his opponent, although God alone knew where. Engagement with a worthy foe must be fair. Soldiers on the battlefield could hack at one another like butchers, but this boy had offered himself one-on-one. Bear found his balance, waited till the other was firm on his feet too, and made his move.
Blade hit blade, and sparks flew.
Ectorius watched the fight progress. Bear was putting into practice all he had been taught, and keeping his head, too, which could not always be counted on. The other, after his initial burst of rage, had settled into a combat stance that was almost cool, and heaven only knew where he had got that astounding sword. Bear was actually smiling—had breath and poise to ask, between parries, “Well, what are you, moorland warrior? A long-legged Pict?”
“Pict?” the other demanded, accurately mimicking Bear’s outraged echo ofSaxon.“I am Lance, son of King Ban of Vindolanda…” He paused, long enough to spring up the stream bank, obliging Bear to move after him, fighting uphill. “As good a Roman as ever drew breath.”
“Oh? I am Roman, too, by upbringing.”
The boy called Lance seemed to consider this, although he didn’t ease the ferocity of his attack. “In that case we probably have no fight.”
“Probably not,” Bear admitted. He was getting the worst of it. Childishly he added, “But you started it!”, and lunged in with an uncontrolled thrust whose force Lance effortlessly caught and turned against him, dumping him backover into the water once more.
The splash was considerable. Gaius roared with laughter. Lance put up his sword at once and waded in, one hand extended to help.
And Cerniw’s heir lost his temper. He scrambled to his feet, evading the other boy’s grasp. His hair swung round his face like a wet lion’s mane, and he seemed from somewhere to gain a foot in height. “Peasant!” he snarled. “You have no idea who I am! How dare you block my way, here or anywhere in this land?”
Ectorius frowned in an effort to keep his face straight. It felt like only yesterday he had watched the child being chased by its nurse around his courtyard for a change of undergarments, but he held his tongue: like the fighting, within certain bounds he must let the budding regality have sway. Lance only looked disgusted. What a change came over that handsome face, when his smile was replaced by disdain! He turned his back and began to walk away.
A mistake. In this state of mind, Bear would not be ignored. And he was a good boy, Pendragon’s heir, but he had the hot blood of both his parents—the warrior king, and the bride he had stolen, starting a war in the process, and she just as much of a spitting wildcat as her new lord could handle—running through his veins. He could only take so much, Ectorius knew, for all the lessons in courteous defeat he had tried so patiently to learn. He might have been gracious, had Gaius not laughed. Instead, he grabbed Lance by the shoulder, spun him round and knocked him down with a flying punch.
Ectorius jumped off his horse. “Arthur!” he barked. “Stop that at once. How dare you treat a brave warrior so shabbily?” He strode across the stream. A time would soon come when he would not be able to clout his ward over the head to restore his manners, but until then, Ectorius retained full parental privilege. Bear took the blow without flinching, as he had been taught, his eyes wide and fearless on his guardian’s.
Then Ectorius glanced down. The lad lay motionless and pale on the turf. His eyes were closed. “By Our Lady, Art. What have you done?”
Arthur’s mouth fell open. His face suffused with shame and horror. “He was defending his father’s land, as you would have done yours,” Ectorius said sternly. “And he has not the benefit of all your training, you spoiled child.”
Arthur tore out of his grip. He crouched down beside Lance. He shook him, then collected himself and began to search for the injury. It didn’t take long: tenderly he raised his head, reached beneath it and sat back with bloodstained fingers. “He fell onto a rock. I have killed him. Oh, Father Ector—the shame to me, that I should have served a noble enemy thus!”
Once more Ectorius repressed a smile. Round and rough-tongued enough in his daily speech, the boy did tend to poetry when he was upset. Somehow it sat well on him. Taking pity, Ectorius knelt down stiffly on the turf himself. He felt for Lance’s pulse beneath his jaw. “Well,” he said. “Perhaps we need not bury himjustyet. Don’t sit there gawping, child! Fetch me some water from the stream.”
Chapter Six
Lance sat up gasping at the splash of ice-cold water into his face. He stared at the old man, then at the elder of his two companions, who was standing with his hands on his hips, clearly amused by this small drama. Then his attention was caught by his opponent, disarmed now and kneeling a few feet away, eyes fixed on the turf.
“What’s wrong with you?” Lance asked mildly, dabbing at his split lip. “I’m all right.”
Arthur jerked his head up. “Oh! Thanks be to Tamara, goddess of Cerniw’s river,” he said fervently. Then, when the old man cleared his throat: “To Iesus and his blessed mother, I mean. I ask your forgiveness, Lance of Vindolanda.”
“Granted,” Lance said unsteadily. “Forgive my calling you a pig. I thought you were...” The elder knight had hoisted him effortlessly to his feet and was dusting him down: embarrassed, Lance stepped away and tugged his clothes straight for himself. He tried to remember what hehadbeen thinking, while he ran down from the top of the ridge. Very little. His mind seemed to have been caught in one long dream, from the time of the hunt in the snow until this very moment. What had woken him? He frowned at the sight of the bright-haired boy still kneeling on the grass. “I thought you were invaders. Where did you say you came from?”
“Cerniw—as far southwest as you can go without riding into the sea. Farmland, tin mines, not much else, but… it is very big, at least, the land I will inherit. Isn’t it, Father Ector?”
“At present,” Ectorius responded with feigned gravity. “Whether it stays that way will be up to you.” He shook his head. “At the moment we seem set on tackling our enemies one by one. And you, young man—does all this territory belong to your father?”
Heat touched Lance’s face. He’d made a large claim, hadn’t he, when he’d declared he was King Ban’s son? “No, sir,” he said honestly. He pointed to the patch of grey stone in the distance that marked Vindolanda. “Just that settlement there.”
“Valuable to us, nonetheless. We’ve travelled a long way, and don’t want to risk the moors at night. Will your father make us welcome?”
Lance hesitated. The cobwebs of the dream were still all about him. There had been a running hare, some paintings on the inside of a cave, a strange old woman. She had told him things—some marvellous, some almost impossible to bear. “My father is gone,” he said at last. He looked toward the village. “Iwill make you welcome.”
“May heaven reward your hospitality,” Ector formally replied. “I must introduce myself. I am Ectorius, of Londinium and the Forest Wild. That tall, ill-favoured gentleman there is my son, Gaius, and the scapegrace child still rightly on his knees at your feet is Artorius. Arthur, in his own rude Kernowek tongue.”
