“If I had the least ideawhat you were talking about…” Cai didn’t mind too much.The sun waswarm, the mossy slope beneath him comfortable.He took a deepdraught from the flask she offered him, and made a face.“GoodChrist, woman.What was that?”
“Just something to sustainyou for a while.You’ll need it.Yes, it was good of you, and I amgrateful.So I will give you one last prophecy.”
Cai chuckled.“I swear—if you tell methe Vikings are coming…”
“Ah.Did you see it foryourself, boy?Are you getting that kind of power, as your lifeebbs?It does happen sometimes, with people of your—”
“Danan, I was joking.Pleasetell me you aretoo.”
“Forget Vikings, then, andhear me about just one.Turn back, Caius of Fara.Get on your horseand ride home before something much worse than your own littlesorrows comes to pass.”
“One Viking?”Cai jumped tohis feet.His blood heated and coursed in his veins.He rememberedfighting up through fever clouds while he was ill, fighting Fen’sgrip with a bestial strength that seemed to return to him now.“Which one?Tell me!”
“The one whose loss you’vegrieved over.”Danan took his hand.The shimmering cobwebs ofrestored youth had blown away from her.She was ancient again, andher eyes held sorrow enough for both of them.“You don’t need tomourn him anymore.He’s come home.”
All the way back to Fara, Cai waslooking out to sea.Time after time he rode his snortingmount—Swift, he named her halfway home, to bring down the rightkind of spirit on her—up the side of a dune, reined her in andscanned the blazing waters.It was too bright for him to see.AViking fleet of any size could have been concealed in the light, inthe troughs between the dancing waves.An hour passed and thenanother, Cai leaning low over Swift’s neck, scarcely aware of theground she covered or the thunder of her hooves.The jolting hurthim, but his pain had become a bright, cold fire, a kind ofunearthly singing.
The light had changed.The tracksnaked inland here.Cai halted Swift on the brow of a hill.Scentsof gorse rose up at him in clouds, all the sweeter for a touch offrost that morning.Now he could look out as far as the horizon,out to Addy’s island and beyond.He could see every detail, down tothe rainbow beaks of the fat little short-winged birds sittingplacidly on their rocks.Black-and-white ducks plied their serenecourse along the shoreline, and a vast sea eagle—Addy’s, perhaps,relieved of its fishing duties—sailed in wide circles overhead.AChristian monk was not supposed to take counsel from bird omens,but Cai would swear to it that no harm could come by water today.The North Sea was peaceful, not a ship in sight…
But an army bearing down on him byland.
Cai reined Swift in at the start ofher downhill plunge and sat motionless.What poison had Dananslipped him, to bring on a vision like this?He wiped his eyes, butthere they still were—a moving cloud of men and horses, chariotsand mounted soldiers, crossing the coastal plain that stretchedfrom Berewic in the north to Fara.
But Fara was not their target.Now Caicould see brightly coloured tunics, metal helmets, manes of long,thick hair.Vikings, dozens upon dozens of them, their shipsexchanged for war carts, their motives transformed.Cai had heardfor years of places further north than Berewic still, up in thewilds of Scotia, where the pirates came to raid and never left,settled and began new conquests from the land.No, not Fara thistime—Fara had nothing.The coast had been scavenged, its bonespicked clean, and this army was turning inland—for the Saxon farmsand villages, for the strongholds of chieftains like Broccus.Not araid.An invasion.
And a force was riding out to meetthem.Cai froze, his hands clamping tight on the reins.Was helooking through veils of time to a battle played out here fivehundred years before?Not since then had a Roman standard beenraised in defence of the north coast.With dreamlike slowness, Cairecognised the ancient sign his father had treasured up in the barnalong with his chariots—a time-blackened eagle, the letters SPQRworn away almost to nothing beneath it.The Senate and the Peopleof Rome, about as far away from home as they could get… The leadchariot was Broc’s.From somewhere amongst the hills and scatteredvillages, the forts and the elderly warlords who ruled them, Cai’sfather had raised an army.
Cai broke into laughter, startling alark from the gorse.The old man had threatened to, hadn’t he?Caihad taken it as an empty boast, part of his dream of a noble past.Broc had underestimated him, and he’d returned the favour, years ofmutual disdain piling up between them.
His laughter died.Yes, Broc had donemore than gather a dozen or so of his hoary friends and theircarts.He was leading at least fifty men over the plain from thefoothills, and at a cracking pace.They looked good.Cai would havebacked them against anything short of the enemy they were facing.They were outnumbered—by how many, Cai couldn’t tell from thisdistance.Maybe not many.Not enough at any rate for Broc to seesense and back off.The fight would take place—farmers and cowherdsagainst Vikings.
Cai couldn’t let it.All he’d learnedfrom clash after clash with the wolves from the sea was that hecouldn’t win, and nor could any landsman.Broc could fight them toa standstill as Cai himself had done, spill out the best blood ofthe ancient forts to do it, and the next tide would bring inanother pack.
He was closer to Fara than he hadthought.He must have ridden for miles under the influence ofDanan’s potion.The effects were draining from him now, but onemore hard gallop would do it.
He didn’t stop to consider just whatit would do until he was back on the mud flats again.Swift wasslackening her pace, the magic of her name wearing off, foam risingon her neck and flanks.That was no good, no use to Cai, and hesignalled frantically to Gareth, who had appeared on the track atthe sound of his approach.
“Is Fen here?”Cai yelled,as soon as Swift carried him into earshot.“Did he comeback?”
“Caius, where did you go?We’vebeen searching for you all day.There’s a horde ofvikingrhorsemen on theirway down from the north, and—”
“Yes, I know.Did Fen cometo warn you about them?”
Gareth’s gaze clouded in something Caifought not to see as pity.“No.No sign of him.”
“Well, look out for him.The other mare Broc gave us—is she in the paddock?”
“Yes, I think so.But—”
“Gareth.Fetch me thehorse.”
Cai slithered off Swift’s back andstood with his hands propped on his knees.By the time Gareth camerunning down from the paddock, he had caught his breath.“Thanks,”he said, grinning, reaching out to grab the fresh beast’s halter.“Help me get the bridle off this one and onto…” He was runningshort of inspiration, but Broc’s other gift still had a long greenstrand hanging from her startled mouth.“Onto Clover.”
“Clover?All right.Butwhy, Caius?They’re plough horses, not… What are you going todo?”
“I’m not sure.But if it goeswrong, and you see thevikingrtroops making for this place, you take yourbrethren and leave.”
“Can’t we give them a fightfor it?”
