In the high mead-hall the great fires burned brightly, and the thick spruce-boughs that lined the walls, amber in the light of flames, flung down their heavy scent across the two long tables. At the smaller high table, set above the other two, Gwyndoc sat at Madoc’s left hand, and the cousin Mathwlch at his right. The air was full of song and story and reeked with spilled drink and the smells of roast meats. Along one side of the hall the harpers lounged, stringing their instruments, humming over new airs that had suddenly come to them as the mead-bowl passed, stroking the strings in febrile sweeps, secretly, lest the next man should hear the fresh-minted flourishes.
And Gwyndoc, already in his cups, stole another glance at his new friend, Madoc, over the top of his drinking-horn. There was something about him that reminded Gwyndoc of his uncle, old Cunobelin—except that Madoc wasn’t old, of course! Hardly more than in his early middle-age, as yet. But there was the same set of the long, proud head, the same forked red beard, though the red was perhaps a sort of delicate auburn rather than the old king’s blood-red! But what struck Gwyndoc most of all was Madoc’s sudden way of shaking the two red plaits from his shoulders onto his back when he became heated in argument. That was the old king to the life! Gwyndoc decided that he liked this side of the King of the Ordovices. But there were other things he was not sure about yet; that sudden sly sidelong glance and the smile behind the hand; the rather effeminate interest in clothes and perfumes . . . Gwyndoc was not sure about these things in a warrior—or a comrade. But he let that pass for the moment and drank deep again, finding the spiced heather-honey rich and powerful, too rich and powerful, holding him down in his chair, fettering his tongue, causing the smoke-whirls in the roof to take on strange shapes of bulls and bears and wolves. . . .
Far down at the end of the hall, Ygerne sat with Gylfa, the wife of Madoc, a pale-faced girl of eighteen or so, with two thick strands of red-corn hair that reached, even braided, below her slim waist. Her green eyes and wide wound of a mouth had interested Gwyndoc from the moment he met her. Now he could understand how she had come to kill Mathwlch’s hawk with a bodkin—and even, perhaps, why he hated her. There was something so beautiful and yet so cruel in her—a streak of waywardness, of thoughtlessness, that not even her three children had drilled out of her, either in their coming or their nursing. Gwyndoc looked across the hall at her, but caught his wife’s eye and smiled shamefully and raised his drinking-horn to toast Ygerne. Even from that distance, and through the smoke, he could discern that she was not deceived; and it was almost a relief for Gwyndoc to see the two ladies rise and leave the hall shortly afterwards to go to their own bower. Already he noticed the fixed cat’s smile that Gylfa gave his wife as she stood aside to let the Queen of the Ordovices pass.
And then his attention was taken up once more by Madoc and the mead. And Madoc said, “My two cousins, Mathwlch and Gwyndoc, you are much more than welcome. The time has hung heavy here for a year or two, and we have been kept much at home with the three sons coming so soon, one after another. I have often wished we might have had such visitors as yourselves. These Ordovices are a stupid lot—not like us, who have a more northerly strain in our veins! We know what it is to live and to fight. But their thoughts seldom soar higher than pasture-land or the raising of the corn. . . .”
Gwyndoc let the reference to the corn pass, though he thought at the time that Madoc might have chosen his words more carefully. There were those along the tables to whom the corn-god was perhaps more powerful than Mapon, even, and in any case it was not wise to speak so carelessly where the gods might hear. But he held his peace and said, “Yes, Madoc, no one loves the sword-whistle more than you, every man knows—and that is partly why I am here—I make no excuses for Mathwlch, he would have come without me, as he nearly did.”
Madoc looked at him, smiling, courteous, questioning, his red eyebrows raised.
“I serve Caradoc,” Gwyndoc began. Madoc’s eyes widened. “But surely that is old history,” he said. “Mathwlch has told me all. He has told me that you are here only to wait your time, before returning to the Belgae as their full king. The Badger can’t live for ever, friend! And he has no son. Have courage. I could send a man this night who would bring you back his head and want never a deal more than your kingly thanks at the end of his journey.”
He smiled at Mathwlch, who nodded back with enthusiasm.
“I had hoped,” said Gwyndoc, biting back his first words, “that together the Ordovices and the Belgae might have flung back Rome.”
Now Madoc’s smile was less than ever bearable. “And so they shall, Gwyndoc,” he said. “But with the Otter, not the Badger, to lead them! The old hairy grey one is too gone in the jaws to make the clean kill—the lither water-beast will bite with sharper fangs, surely, Gwyndoc?”
“There is still my oath . . .” Gwyndoc began. But Mathwlch cut him short. “Caradoc has broken his to you. You are absolved of fealty.”
Gwyndoc, heavy with drink, wanted to say so much, but his tongue was now a useless instrument. “I have dreams,” he said. “The Badger still stands in them as the king of beasts. . . .”
The two began to laugh at him, and he felt his hand closing about the haft of his knife and knew then that he must control himself. He knew also that for the moment he could not look to Madoc for support on behalf of Caradoc. He remembered the sunlit days under old Cunobelin’s apple trees, when he and the young Badger, yes, and even Morag and Beddyr, used to play together, and wrestle and sing—aye, and even put their arms round each other in the thoughtless friendship of youth. With the hot fire on his face, and the warm wine in his body, he was overcome by his emotions and could have wept. To save his face, he rose from the board and went back into the stables, pretending that he wished to relieve himself.
Entering the thick air of the hall again, he was conscious that something had changed. The gaily drunken atmosphere had given place to one of tenseness, and the hall was alert with anger. He sat at the board again, when the herald in his wolf-skins rose suddenly and jumped onto the table at the left side of the room, his face red, and turned towards the high board, towards Madoc, almost appealingly.
“Madoc, liege-lord,” he shouted, his voice clear, so that all could hear his words, “am I to tolerate this Scythian bone-chewer any longer? Am I to sit and smile at him while he spits his offal into my face?”
Madoc turned to Gwyndoc. “The Scythian is one of your men?” he said.
But Mathwlch answered. “No, a Roman,” he said, and smiled behind Madoc’s back. Gwyndoc felt the blood rising again in his forehead, and began to speak. “He has taken my oath, Madoc. He is no longer a Roman.” But somehow the words would not come out—or if they did, they could not rise above the herald’s clamour.
“This is a good chance for us to see what manner of men these Romans are,” said Madoc. “Besides, the feast has been a little dull up to now! Usually we have three fights before the day is out and at the least one corpse to burn on the morrow!” Then he raised his voice. “What is your wish, friend?” he called to the herald.
“Let him defend his manners with his sword,” replied the herald, flinging off his wolf-skins and standing for all to see, dressed only in a short kilt and light deer-skin shoes.
Then all at the tables shouted and cheered and called to the Scythian to stand up and show himself. At last, grinning foolishly, and hardly understanding what the noise was about, the short, thick-set legionary stood. His hair hung thick and black down the sides of his face, greasy and unkempt; his heavy arms were tattooed in blues and reds and were naked of any ornaments. His rough linen tunic was now much soiled with mead and meat-fat. And he was so befuddled that he could hardly keep on his feet without the support of his few friends.
As he stood, the hall rocked with laughter. Madoc turned to his cousin. “This will be a poor fight,” he said. “The Roman is badly outclassed. The herald is one of my ablest swordsmen—and that is saying a great deal in a country whose men take more easily to the sword than to any other weapon.”
Then he began to laugh again, for the Scythian, understanding now what was required of him, had reached under the table and dragged out his short ash javelin.
“It looks as though your swordsman may not have the advantage after all,” said Gwyndoc, with spite. But Madoc looked at him smiling. “The herald is a swordsman, and a swordsman is the equal of any man, and assuredly the better of a Roman!” He looked hard at Gwyndoc, as though waiting for him to bridle at the retort, but Gwyndoc had learned now to smile back at Madoc, whatever he felt in his heart.
Then the tables began to shout, “Let them fight, Madoc! Let us see the Roman fight!” And Madoc, smiling like a father at his children, nodded his head and waved the two towards the open space between the tables.
The herald came forward in the silence and saluted the King with his sword, and Madoc bent over his table and kissed him on the cheeks. The Scythian watched this, and grinned, and then stuck the point of his javelin into the earth and danced round it, heavily, like a bear, enjoying the drunken applause of the tribesmen. But all the time Gwyndoc noticed that the man’s eyes were sharp and missed nothing in the room.
Then the two went into the centre of the room, near the great fire, and began their opening passes, trying each other out, watching for weak spots, testing for strong thrusts. And the herald’s long iron sword snaked nearer and nearer the Scythian’s face time after time, as he judged the distance between them, and each time the rough ash spear flicked up, deflected the bright blade by a mere inch at a time—but always deflecting it, never letting it approach nearer than it need for safety. And so the two circled about the fire, and the hall was still. And Madoc turned to Mathwlch and said, “The Roman is not the fool he seemed.” And his cousin answered, “Wait, King. The Roman is drunk, and the herald is sober. We shall see soon who is the fool.” But Gwyndoc said nothing aloud. He was praying silently to the Otter Father on behalf of the Roman, though he did not know whether the Roman’s gods would let his prayers pass unhindered.
Then suddenly there was a low whistle from the tables, and he saw the Scythian stumble on a drinking-cup that lay in the straw. In an instant the Celt was on him, thrusting as viciously as a snake; but the Scythian righted himself and pushed upwards with his javelin, knocking the sword aside. And when he had driven the herald back again, all men saw the damage that the sword had done in that brief interlude. The Scythian’s breast was slashed across, so that his linen tunic parted to show the long shallow wound, and his left arm hung almost useless by his side. But the man was still grinning, in his drunken way, as though he had scarcely felt the thrusts.
Madoc stood up then and shouted out, “Which of you will call this enough?” The herald looked back over his shoulder and shook his head, and as he did so the Scythian stepped a pace forward and thrust out, under the blind sword. The tribesmen groaned and shouted their anger at this act of treachery, and Madoc’s face clouded. “He does not understand your words,” said Gwyndoc hoarsely. “He is a Scythian, he forgets his Gallic when there is fighting to do.”
But Madoc was still staring at the herald, who had tottered back, his left hand clutching his side. And he saw that the Celt was bleeding from the mouth and nose now. “By all the gods,” he muttered, “that was a deathly blow.” Then he raised his voice again, “That is enough, I say. Some of you see to the herald!” But, even as he spoke, the herald regained himself and went forward at the Scythian, who was gasping for breath now from exertion and loss of blood. Then suddenly the Scythian dropped his javelin.
“The herald has him! Down with the Roman!” shouted the tribesmen. And then they saw the Scythian half stoop, so that the sword passed over his head, and with the same movement scoop up a handful of burning wood-embers. And even as the herald poised for the kill, they saw the fiery particles fly up into the swordsman’s face and watched him stagger back, blinded.
“A foul trick! A Roman trick!” the tables screamed, and some men even got to their feet to put an end to the Roman. But before they could have reached him the grim entertainment was over. For the Scythian was still groping, weakly to pick up his spear from the floor when the herald shook his head and cleared his sight for the necessary instant. The long sword swept round, and the Scythian’s head bobbed up from his shoulders and bounced down the table where the two had first sat. Then someone took it by the long greasy hair and pitched it across the hall towards the harpers. An old man caught it and pretended to kiss the still smiling lips.
For a moment the Scythian’s headless body stood, and then sagged limply into the ashes of the fire. The herald watched it fall, turned towards the high table, his face still arrogant, and fell forward into the straw.
Men rushed to raise him, and Madoc stood, his knuckles white on the board, gasping like a man who has fallen into icy water.
When they rolled the man over, his face was set in that last smile, and they saw that the Scythian’s thrust had cut through all his ribs on the left side.
Gwyndoc, watching the King, was torn between contempt and pity as he watched the wild mouthings. Then Madoc’s repeated words became clear to him suddenly, and he only knew pity, a strange tearful pity that almost drove Gwyndoc to run out and kiss the dead man’s face himself. For Gwyndoc knew now what the King must be suffering. “He was the first son of my youth,” Madoc said. “The very spring-time of my blood, to be killed by a blow from a midden-churl!”
When they had moved both of the bodies, and the mead was passing once more along the tables, Madoc turned again to Gwyndoc, his face still white, but his mourn now attempting a smile. “That is your answer,” he said. “I will lose every man of the Ordovices to drag down Rome! Whether you or the Badger lead the Belgae. Tonight it has become my quarrel, too!”
And much later both the King and Mathwlch were carried, sick with mead, from the hall. And Gwyndoc at last levered himself up from the table and staggered to the hide-partitioned bower that had been set aside for him and his wife.
There he found Ygerne still awake, sitting up in the straw bed and waiting for him. And he knew that she was going to ask him about his feelings towards Gylfa. And he knew that he would just laugh and then make love to her, and that in the morning they would both be too sleepy to remember what their quarrel had been about.