Doward, in the end, was not a battle but a mere skirmish. The skirmish changed the world for Ilsa, one last time.
They reached the forest around the double peaks of Doward six days after setting out from Calleva, for a company that large could not move fast. Ambrosius was content with the speed, for the reports coming back from his scouts and spies said Vortigern was still tucked tight in the hillfort.
Some said he was afraid to emerge, because Merlin had sent the fear of gods and fate upon him.
Merlin had been one of the scouts Ambrosius dispatched from Clausentum as soon as the ship ground against the wharf stones. He had been captured by Vortigern’s own scouts and taken to confront the High King.
There, he had confronted Vortigern alone. He foretold the fall of Vortigern’s kingdom and Vortigern himself.
Not knowing he had the son of his enemy in his hands, Vortigern ejected from his keep the wizard who spoke such black prophecies. Merlin had waited upon the road for Ambrosius to find him and report in.
Vortigern, cowed by Merlin’s prophecies, remained in Doward, the greatest fort in the southern lands. Ambrosius did not seem bothered by Doward’s reputation, though.
Ilsa rode with the women’s cohort in the center of the company. They were placed just behind the commanders and senior officers, including Arawn, who kept Ambrosius company at the front of the line. Maela’s cohort consisted of twenty-five women skilled with horses and with an aptitude with blades. The women came from all corners of Mabon’s kingdom. They were base-born, poor, the wives of rich traders. Even Maela’s royal companions were a part of the group, for Maela had selected her women with this military function in mind.
Twenty-five women fell far short of a traditional Roman cohort, although Maela refused to call her group a band or unit or any other name which would diminish their role. “We are a military group. Cohort will do,” Maela explained to Ilsa. “Perhaps we will one day fill the ranks enough to meet the Roman definition.”
It did not seem to bother Maela that she rode to war against her father. One night around the campfire, Maela told Ilsa and her women the full story of Vivian and Lynette and Cadfael. She explained how Vortigern’s deal with the Saxons had caused Cadfael to shift his allegiance to Ambrosius…and Maela, too.
Maela also told them the story of Boudicca, the queen of the Iceni, who had led her people in war against the invading Romans. Ilsa had heard the story before, as a tale told at night, before sleeping. She had not realized it was true, or that many of Boudicca’s descendants could be traced among the Celts and Britons alive today.
Ilsa would have liked to have related the tale to Arawn, to measure his reaction to the idea that British women had fought in wars long before Maela thought of it, only Arawn stayed with the officers surrounding Ambrosius.
She regretted that her insistence upon riding to war had put this distance between them. She wanted more of the night they had spent in Calleva. Arawn had never been that way before, not even after the child had been lost.
Only, if they were to fulfill their purpose here and support Ambrosius, then it was better that Arawn pretend she was not among the queen’s cohort. Ilsa could concentrate on learning the drills Maela could only describe while they were traveling.
At night, Maela would draw lines in the earth at her feet to expand upon her daylight descriptions and the patterns came together in Ilsa’s mind. The power of the flank units was their speed and maneuverability, made even greater because the women’s lighter weight upon the stallions allowed the horses to move faster and with great flexibility.
The stallions were all war horses, trained from infancy to fight for their riders. They used hooves and teeth and their weight to kick and bite and knock the enemy off his feet. Once a man was down, they could quickly trample him to death. Even a kick from the stallion’s hind legs could maim a soldier so he would not get up again. A kick to the head could kill him. The horses had been trained to aim for the head.
Mercury was trained for war, too. He would work for her as faithfully as any of the stallions Maela’s women rode.
Mostly, it was a matter of clinging to the horse and coordinating his efforts with the others, although Ilsa would also be able to use her bow to pick off any enemy fighters who were farther away and trying to outflank Ambrosius’ men.
At night, while Maela spun her stories, the women worked on leather jerkins, stitching small metal plates to them. The jerkins were long, worn down to the knee, and split front and back, so when they were astride their horses, the sides protected their legs.
When they fitted Ilsa with the jerkin they had made for her, Ilsa felt the weight of it like a shadow in her mind. This was real. She would soon be a warrior, fighting a battle where, curse or not, she might die.
Sleep did not come easy that night. More than once, she resisted the need to find Arawn among the sleeping men and talk to him.
The next day, they filed into the Doward valley, with its sharp sides of rock face and narrow crevasse floor.
“A fine place for an ambush if ever there was one,” Cadfael observed in a voice which carried back to the women, for the air was still and hot as if it was the middle of summer, not autumn.
“The scouts have cleared out anyone lingering in the valley,” Ambrosius replied. “There is only us.”
As if his words were a signal, the valley in front of the head of the column erupted with men screaming for blood. They fell upon the company with their swords and knives raised, their eyes filled with mad fury.
More burst from the low scrubby trees to either side of the company. The ambush was real.
For a moment, Ilsa froze—not with fear but with disbelief. It didn’t seem possible that the battle had been joined now. Here.
The blood-curdling cries of the men running at them with their blades lifted was real enough, though. Isla fumbled for her bow and reached back for an arrow, her fingers uncooperative.
Then Maela grunted and leaned forward in her saddle, one hand holding herself up, her blonde hair shining in the sunlight. An arrow pierced her shoulder, the black feathers jutting from between the metal plates of her jerkin.
Ilsa’s fear evaporated. Cold calmness descended. She grabbed Maela’s reins and tucked them beneath her knee, fitting an arrow and tracked the closest enemy, a man with an ax, who leapt into the air to bring the ax down upon a head—it didn’t matter which head.
Ilsa fired with deliberation, putting all her strength into the shot. The arrow pierced the warrior’s neck, above his armor. He dropped instantly to the ground, not even taking the three or four steps a deer usually did.
She glanced up and down the line. The entire valley was a writhing mass of fighting bodies, squashed into the ravine together.
One of the other women—Jascilla, Ilsa thought—gave a harsh cry of her own. She threw herself out of the saddle, her leather clad body flying through the air, her knife held out. She landed against the chest of a warrior, who grunted and staggered back, his big hands flailing as he tried to get a grip upon her and toss her away. Jascilla clung with her knees, raised her knife and buried it deep in the man’s neck, then tore the knife sideways.
Bright red blood spouted. The man went down, Jascilla on top of him.
Behind him, another warrior came running, his eyes blood shot, his teeth black, his fury driving him.
“Kaila!” Ilsa cried. She jumped onto her saddle cloth and balanced there. She met Kaila’s eyes and pointed at the racing warrior. “Together!”
Kaila jumped onto her saddle as Ilsa was and nodded.
“Now!”
Together, they threw themselves at the warrior, a side each. The man toppled backward, screaming his frustration.
As soon as Ilsa could get her knees under her, she yanked her knife from her belt and jammed it into his throat, then yanked sideways, just as Jascilla had.
The gurgling, bubbling sound the man made didn’t touch her. She scrambled out of the way of the blood gushing from his neck. So did Kaila.
Running footsteps warned Ilsa. She spun, her knife out, to meet the next attack.
It was Arawn, his sword bloody, his face grimy. He came to skidding halt, his eyes widening as they moved from Ilsa to Vortigern’s man behind her, who had finally grown still.
“I heard you scream…” Arawn said, his voice almost bodiless.
“I screamed?” Ilsa said.
“You did,” Kaila said, grinning. She wiped her brow with her wrist, her hand dripping blood which wasn’t hers. “Makes a man’s balls shrivel just to hear it,” she added.
“There’s more of the enemy, yet,” Ilsa said, hefting her knife.
Arawn came closer. “The fighting is over. It was just a few dozen, designed to slow us down so word can get back to Vortigern.” He dropped his sword and pulled her into his arms and held her.
He trembled.
Ilsa stayed still, her heart thudding, even though her body was tense, ready to leap to fight another enemy.
Arawn took her face in his hands and held it so he could meet her eyes. His gaze moved over her face. “I love you,” he said, his voice low and hoarse. “I don’t give a damn who hears it. I don’t give a damn about curses or breaking them, or even this great purpose of ours. I only know I love you and that nothing else matters but you.”
Ilsa clutched at him, her heart stopping. “Truly?” she whispered, the need to fight draining from her limbs, to be replaced by something warmer and more languorous. “You love me? But…the curse…”
He shook his head and kissed her, as an answer.
Ilsa wrapped her arms around his neck, letting him hold her, taking in the pure pleasure of being in his arms.
“Are you so besotted with the woman you can’t even keep your hand off her in the middle of a battle, Arawn?” came the enquiry.
Arawn loosened his grip on her and looked around. Uther stood nearby, cleaning his sword on some rag he must have torn from an enemy cloak. He looked relaxed and calm. He was assessing the bodies lying behind them, his gaze taking in Kaila with her bloody knife and Ilsa’s blade, lying forgotten on the ground at her feet.
“Yes, I am that damned besotted, Uther,” Arawn said. “One day, I hope the gods strike you with this madness, so you may know what it is like.”
“Never!” Uther said and turned away. “We have a siege to attend, if you can spare your attention for a few more hours!” he called over his shoulder.
MANY YEARS LATER, ILSA heard the songs and the stories told about Doward and marveled at the embellishments the poets had added to the truth.
The facts were simple enough. Vortigern sent his waylaying party, knowing they would be slaughtered by the far greater host coming through the valley. It gave him time to withdraw into the keep and shut the fort as tight as a drum.
Ambrosius, who wanted to spare his men and resources to face the Saxons, sent a negotiator to Vortigern. Ambrosius offered him safe passage to a harbor of his choice and a boat to the continent, if he surrendered and laid open the gates of the fort.
The negotiator stumbled back to Ambrosius two hours later, his hands cut off and hanging in a bloody, dripping pouch at his belt. He lived long enough to gasp his message. “It was the queen’s doing!”
Ambrosius grew cold and hard with anger and ordered his army to surround the entire hill and not let anyone through the line. Ilsa sat on her horse beside Arawn. Maela, bandaged and her arm in a sling, was beside Mabon. The queen’s cohort was scattered throughout the circling line, as much a part of the army as any man there.
Arrows wrapped in oil-soaked cloth were distributed to all the archers. Ilsa took one of the arrows, her heart hardening. Arawn said nothing as she nocked the arrow then lowered the point for the boy to hold the torch against it.
She raised it up again, the tip burning hard, and waited for the order.
“Fire!” Ambrosius shouted, giving the order himself.
Ilsa let the arrow loose and watched it trail heat and fire, high into the air where a thousand more flaming arrows joined it, then plummeted down upon Doward.
Arawn picked up her hand and kissed it. He held it while they watched the fortress burn.
Thousands of people surrounded the fortress and not a single person moved or looked away, as the sun set red over the valley and the fortress burned to the ground.
The stories were true about that.