There was nothing that could be done now to help Gwyndoc. To expose their position, and that of their armed men, would be to invite an attack from the victory-crazed Romans.
Madoc turned and gave the order to move back down the hill, out of sight. He looked at the tribesman with whom he had the wager. “The Badger outlasted the first charge,” he said grimly. “My friend, I owe you a sword. Come for it this evening!”
As he led the troop away, he cursed himself for not watching Gwyndoc more closely. He should have seen that the man was going berserk. It was his duty to notice things like that, after all.
But it was doubtful whether he would have seen the madness coming on; it came so quickly. Gwyndoc didn’t even feel it coming himself.
All he knew was that suddenly he had noticed Morag standing above all men, the arrows whistling round him, his arms thrown up, his head back—and screaming. Gwyndoc couldn’t hear what he was saying, or singing, but somehow he knew as by instinct that Morag was offering himself as the sacrifice that should turn away the wrath of Rome. And he suddenly felt envious of the blind man.
Then Gwyndoc saw the sun come out from behind a cloud, immediately behind Morag, framing the wild, black figure with its brilliance. And then a lark rose suddenly, almost from under the feet of the legion, and rose, rose, rose, above the little stone fort at the summit of the hill. And its song mingled with Morag’s long howling. Then it seemed that the battle stopped for an instant, and everything was still. Even the Romans stood, listening to this strange wild man whose voice shared the summer air with a lark’s limpid song. Then the attackers rolled forward again, and, as Gwyndoc watched, the sun behind Morag seemed to grow and grow, and come closer and closer, faster and faster, roaring like a waterfall, until it seemed to enter his own head, to explode with great heat and an intolerable light. . . .
Then at last he was conscious of his horse’s galloping movement. He heard someone—was it Madoc?—shouting behind him; but now that was unimportant. He felt the horse’s flanks heaving beneath him, and found that he had made the detour round to the other side of the hill. Up and down the rocky slope, he saw the Belgae, in small knots and groups, the battle for the wall forgotten now. Some were kneeling, some setting their swords among the rocks and falling upon them, some grovelling while their comrades performed the last service of hacking their heads from their shoulders. The women and children were sitting or lying about, their hands over their eyes, wailing, or imploring the gods to give back the victory.
As Gwyndoc rode, he saw before him, almost half a mile away, Caradoc, followed by two horsemen, galloping eastwards, towards the thick forests. So the Badger was safe at least. Then, as he passed along the base of the hill, Gwyndoc saw the wall on his side break, and the wagons topple over it, rolling down and down as splintered wrecks. And then a great torrent of men surged down, weeping, shrieking, tumbling, striking at each other, mad with fury and despair. And Gwyndoc suddenly found himself in the centre of this torrent, heads swirling round him like angry waves, mouths cursing him for a traitor, hands striking up at him or trying to drag him from his horse. And Gwyndoc drew his sword, and struck about him, at last clearing some sort of path round his horse’s head. He began to move away once more, but a great hand reached up and took his bridle-rein firmly, pulling his horse round. And Gwyndoc, terrified, struck with his sword, and heard a man scream. Then he galloped on, and suddenly saw that a red hand was still clutching his rein. He bent and unclenched the stiff fingers and the hand fell, and he rode on.
So he came clear, and the forest lay before him. And, bent low over their horses, he saw Caradoc and the two cousins riding beneath the hanging boughs. Then Gwyndoc rose in his stirrups and shouted and blew his war-horn until his chest almost burst. But they did not look round, and he sank back into his rocking saddle, exhausted and afraid.
After that a heavy cloud descended and filled Gwyndoc’s head and he rode through a howling nightmare of darkness for day after day, it seemed; a darkness that made his heart stumble and blinded his eyes, letting him see clearly only in occasional flashes.
And in one of these patches of clarity he thought he saw a fire blazing in a glade and seemed to gallop through it, scattering men to right and left. He saw the terror in the whites of their eyes and lashed at them as he passed. . . . At another time cloaked men seemed to leap out at him from the shadows of trees, and he heard himself singing and laughing as he thrust them back with his boar-spear. . . . And again, he seemed to be lying cold and shivering on a narrow rocky ledge, high above a wide plain, watching a broad river marching below through the misty dawn. . . .
But always through these nightmares echoed the names of Caradoc, Morag and Beddyr. Always they seemed to be just a few yards before him. Yet whenever he reached the place where they were they had gone again. . . .
And so it was that at last he saw before him the walls and rooftops of Evrauc, Cartismandua’s capital; the great town of Brigantia. His head cleared for a while and he knew that he had ridden from one side of Britain to the other. He looked down to pat his horse and to praise him for coming so far, for galloping so gallantly. But he did not recognise his own charger or the harness. This was another horse. A roan, and not the black he had started out on. It was not his own embossed saddle, either. This was a dirty sheepskin, lashed to the horse’s back with a rough hide thong. And the reins in his hands were rope. . . .
Then he saw his own clothes. They were soiled and torn almost past recognition. His cloak and helmet were gone. His hands and arms were scarred and caked with black, dried blood. The sword, dangling at his side, was hacked and notched and bent—a useless thing.
And so he passed through the stockade of Cartismandua’s capital. The two guards laughing at the gate stepped back to let him enter. Then he heard the gates shut behind him and the laughter rise; and he rode on, only half-aware of the curious, mocking eyes that stared out at him, from all the doors and windows, right across the beaten earth parade-ground before the old queen’s hall, and into the royal house itself. . . .
Then he stopped, and someone lifted him from the saddle and took his wrist and held it. And the hall was full of the sounds of armour and laughter. He looked round, through a haze, and saw that rank upon rank of Romans lined the walls, their dark eyes hostile from under their burnished helmets. He turned but they were behind him too, close and smiling harshly. He heard a sharp order, and the javelins came up on guard, all pointing towards the centre of the long room.
And at the end of the room, on a dais, seeming taller than all of them, despite her shrunken old body, stood Cartismandua, the Queen of the Brigantes, her arms above her head as though she was prophesying, her pale eyes turned up towards the roof. And at her feet Caradoc, the Badger of the Belgae, was kneeling humbly, supplicating, his eyes turned up to her merciless face.
Gwyndoc remembered the far distant wedding-feast and suddenly heard himself shouting, “Badger! Badger!” But Caradoc did not turn. Then Gwyndoc felt a spearbutt jar against his ribs, and he was silent again.
Then there was an order that Gwyndoc could not understand, and six soldiers detached themselves from the ranks and marched up the hall in perfect step. They stopped at the dais and dragged the Badger to his feet, holding him roughly.
Then Gwyndoc heard Cartismandua begin to laugh, and he tried to shake off the hands that held him, to go to the Badger. But his sword had gone, and when he tried to make the war-shout, hands came over his mouth, hard fists punched into his face and neck. . . . Gwyndoc fell, and saw only trampling feet. Then he was up again. Caradoc had reached the door and was going out, the soldiers hemming him about. He looked fine still, head and shoulders above his captors. Then Gwyndoc shook his head to brush off the hands about his face, and bit into hard fingers and yelled, “Morag! Beddyr! They are taking away the King! Save him, they are taking the Badger away!”
But there was only laughter and cruelty. “Badger! Badger! My Badger!” he screamed, but Caradoc never turned his head.
Then Gwyndoc heard Cartismandua’s laugh again, and saw that she was going out with them too. He cried out with all his strength, “You barren bitch! The carrion of the air shall have you, Cartismandua!” But she smiled in his direction, and a Roman kneed him hard in the belly and he fell again.
Then he felt that they were dragging him along passages, through low doors, and could smell that they were approaching the kitchens. “Where are they taking the King?” he gasped. A hard-faced Roman laughed and said, “To Rome, my friend! Where else? But you are going to Jagoth, the slave-master. He will look after you!” Then they flung him through a doorway, and he saw the women among the fires and boiling-pots stop their work to turn and look at him. And he saw a big black-haired man come forward swiftly towards him, his bearded face smiling cruelly. And behind him he heard the Roman say, “Here he is, Jagoth! Treat him well, he looks like one of your kings!”
Then Jagoth punched him hard in the mouth a number of times while some men in horse-hides held him upright. And they stripped him of his clothes and ornaments and struck him on the body with spits until he fell to the filthy floor from pain and exhaustion, bleeding and groaning.
And after that they kicked him, some lightly, some brutally, but some with cunning and skill. Then they left him.
And Gwyndoc lay alone by the dying fire for many hours, half-delirious, bleeding from the mouth and ears. And he thought he was leading the chariots of the Cantii down the slope once more, against the glittering shield-wall. Once when he was half-conscious, he heard himself screaming, “Bobyn will save Britain! Put your money on Bobyn, my friends!”
A long time afterwards a kitchen slave crept in by the grey dawn light to clear the dead ashes from the fireplace. He found the cold shuddering body and shrank back from the blood that choked Gwyndoc’s nose and ears and mouth. Then he went away and told some scullions what he had seen, and two of them came and dragged the body into the other kitchen where the fires were burning. There he was left for the rest of the day, naked and shivering, even though they had thrown him so close to the great furnace that one of his legs was burned from hip to ankle.
At eventime one of the slave-women forced a cup of greasy broth into his mouth and covered him with an old hide. He slept deeply that night. And on the following day, when his hearing began to come back to him and he could see a little, they showed him how to cut a hole in the hide and put his head through it, wearing the skin like a tunic, gathered in about the waist with a length of rope.