A King's Comrade Part 41

"Shall you take part if there is any?"

"Why, of course," said I, laughing; "it is for you."

She looked at me, and I know that for a moment she had a mind to beg me not to fight; but that she could not do, and so she only smiled a wan smile and bade me have a care. So I bent and kissed her hand, and she went back into the hut. Sighard was calling to her to come and tell him what all the turmoil was.

Then I hurried to where Jefan stood on the works by the gate, whence one could see all over the camp, and half round the hillside as well. Not a shred of mist was left, and it was as glorious a morning as one could see; only it was hotter than the wont of a Maytime morning, and over the southward hung a heavy, white-topped cloud bank, with a promise of thunder in its pile. Not that I noted it now, but I had done so. From the ramparts there was more than enough to keep my eyes on the hillside.

Up the steep came three bodies of men, to right and left, where the hill was sharpest, and straight for the gate, where there was a long, even slope ending in a platform, as it were, before it.

Gymbert himself headed this company on foot, and men whose names the princes seemed to scorn altogether led the others. Altogether there were not less than a hundred and fifty men; but as they drew nearer I saw that they were not at all the sort of force with which I should hope to take so strongly stockaded a place as this.

Outlaws, runaway thralls, and such-like masterless men they were, ill armed and unkempt and noisy. Their only strength was in their numbers, so far as I could see.

As for ourselves, the gate was the weakest place, by reason of there being no ditch before it, and that the ground was level, or nearly so, for twenty paces outside. I did not think it in the least likely that our men could not hold off the two side attacks; for the stockade was well placed and high, and the ditch sheer-sided and deep. Take it all round, it was hard to see how Gymbert expected to take the place, or why he would try it at all.

"Quendritha is driving him," said Kynan, laughing, when I said as much. "If that woman bids a man do a thing, he has to do it, or woe betide him. But it will be a fight, for a time."

Now Gymbert halted his men beyond bow shot, and called to Jefan once more to give us up; and so finding no answer beyond a laugh from the men who were watching him from the rampart, drew his sword and bade his men fall on.

They broke into a run for a dozen paces, and then some half of either company halted, and while the rest went forward, those who stood began to try to clear the way with arrow flights, shooting over their heads so that the shafts might drop within the stockading. And at the same time our men began to shoot, somewhat too soon; for the Welsh bow will not carry so far as the English, though the arrows are more deadly, being heavier.

Seeing that, Jefan bade his men hold their hands until he gave the word; on which Gymbert called to his men, and they came the faster.

The arrows met them then at short range, and in a deadly hail, and they faltered. Many fell under them, yet they still came on; and now the men who had been shooting found that the Welsh were too well sheltered under the stockade timbering for much harm to be done them, and they ran and joined their comrades at some call from their leaders. Then without stay the whole three companies threw themselves with a great shout against the defences, leaping into the ditch on either side, and surging up against the gate itself.

In a breathing s.p.a.ce our Welsh were ready with the long spears, and as one by one the heads of those who climbed gate or stockade showed themselves, hoisted up by their comrades, or climbing in some way or other, back they were sent with a flash of the terrible weapon, falling on those below them. And now and again the Welsh spears darted through the s.p.a.ces between the timbers of the stockade at some man who came close to them and was spied, or at those who tried to help their comrades to climb. The whole place was full of yells and shouting.

But it was harder work at the gate, for there the foemen were more densely packed before us, and they seemed to climb in an unending stream. More than one fell inside the gate, and there lay still; but none had won his way to the ground alive, nor had we yet lost a man. The loss was all on the side of the attack.

Then at last the men at the gate drew back for a time; but from the side attacks came a new danger. With spear b.u.t.t and seax they were trying to undermine the stockade, and one could hear the creaking of the stout timbers as they tried to tear them down. It would have gone hardly with us had there been but a few more men, or if these had brought pick and spade with them.

As it was, that attempt did not last long. Into the crowd of men who worked the heavy javelins fell, and through the timbering the reddened spears went and came, driving at last the foe to safer distance. And so the first attack ended, and for all that Gymbert from the gate tried to urge them on, his men stood sullenly in the deep ditch and under the gate, where we could not well reach them, save by casting javelins and darts high into the air, that they might pitch among them; but there were few throwing weapons to spare.

"He would have done better to attack at one point only," said Jefan, sitting down on the rampart above the gate. "He might have overwhelmed us so, for he has men enough."

His brother laughed.

"There is a difference between us in this way," he said, "and it is a great one: there is little fight in his men, and we must needs fight our best. Listen! they are pa.s.sing some word round."

So it was, for there fell a silence on the humming men below us, and we could hear muttered words from one to another. Then the attack came again from the same three places, but I thought it was not pushed home as at first. Nor did it last so long. In a few minutes men began to get out of the ditch and away down the hillside while the Welsh were too busy to shoot at them. There they scattered, and stood and watched. And then the attack on the gate ceased, and back the foe went.

"After them, and scourge them home to their mistress," shouted Kynan, leaping down to the gateway, where his men did but wait some word which should tell them to throw it open for a sally.

I looked for Jefan; but he was across the camp, seeing hastily to the weakened places in the stockade.

"Kynan," I cried, "have a care! This is what they want you to do!

Wait!"

For I could see that in the open Gymbert had the advantage of numbers, and I suspected that he was trying to draw the fiery Welsh from their works. There was surely some reason for this half-hearted attack on the stockade that had been already proved too strong.

He did not hear me. It is in my mind that I may have called to him in the Frankish tongue of my last warfare. That is likely enough, for with the clash of arms again I know I had been thinking in the familiar tongue once more. I do not know, but again I called him, and he seemed not to hear. The gate flew open, and with a wild yell of victory out went the Welshmen, with the prince at their head.

Jefan heard and turned back, and called to him to stay; but he also was too late. He had but a dozen men with him, while from the opposite side of the camp those who had driven off their foes had joined those who poured out with Kynan. One or two of Jefan's men shouted, and went with them, unheeding the call of their leader to stay.

Then in a moment I knew what the word which had been pa.s.sed meant.

The Mercians who had drawn off from the side attacks closed up and charged down on the scattered Welsh, on whose pursuit Gymbert and his men turned. We could do naught but stand and watch, helpless, for we dared not leave the gate, which we could not close against the retreat which must come.

Round Kynan and his men Gymbert's force swarmed, and the din of wild battle rang as the ancient foes, Welsh and Mercian, met on the level turf. I saw Kynan's red sword rise above the turmoil, and heard his voice rallying his men to him; and then he had them together in a close body, outnumbered indeed by two to one, but better fighters and better trained than the mob against them. And then they began to cut their way back to the gate.

We stood there across it, waiting, and then it was our turn. Of a sudden out of the ditch on either hand leaped men who had waited there unnoticed for this moment, and they fell on us. We were eight, and but four of us could stand in the gateway at a time.

Jefan and I and Erling and a tall Welshman were the first, and before us were some dozen Mercians, and more to come as they could find room on the narrow causeway.

Now it was a question whether we might hold the gate till Kynan won back to it, or whether when he did come he should find it held against him; and for one terrible moment I had a fear that men would be coming over the stockade in the rear upon us. And I could not look round, for I had all my time taken up in keeping my own life from the attack in front.

I think it was about that time that Kynan began to sing some wonderful old Welsh war song, which rang above the clash of weapons and the cries of those who fought. It took hold of me, and I seemed to smite in time to its swinging cadence. Yet he came back very slowly.

Jefan went down first. Into the ditch he rolled, with his grip on the throat of a Mercian; for his sword snapped, and he flew at the man. One from behind us took his place with a yell of rage, and he went too far, and was gone also, speared at once. Then another, and another to my left; for the tall Briton was down, and still Erling and I were not hurt. I would that Kynan would get back more quickly. He was coming, but the press before us was thick.

So we fought, and I fell to thinking what a wondrous sword this was which Carl the Great had given me. It sh.o.r.e the spear shafts, and the bra.s.s-studded shields seemed to split before it touched them, and the tough leather jerkins of the forest men could not hold its edge back. The wild song of Kynan never ceased, and he seemed to sing of it. He was getting nearer, but the Mercians thronged between his men and us.

Now there seemed to be a grim joy in the faces of the men before me, and the Briton at my right fell. There was none left to take his place, and there were but three of us in the gate.

"Kynan! Kynan!" I cried, for in a moment he would find his retreat barred. I do not know whether any voice came from me, but I seemed to call him.

Then Erling and I were alone in the gateway, and the snarling Mercians leaped at us. The last Welshman had fallen, hurling his broken sword at a man who smote at me, and so staying the blow.

"A good fight for a man's last, master," said Erling to me through his teeth, standing steadily as a rock with his hacked shield linked in mine, and his notched sword swinging untiringly to the grim old viking war shout "Ahoy!" as it fell.

Kynan was twenty yards from us, and now I saw Gymbert among those whom he was steadily driving back.

A shadow swept over me, and it grew darker. I saw all the land below me lying in brightest sunlight, and then the great swift cloud shadow fled across it, though round us there was not a breath of wind. I think the men before us two shrank back a little at that moment, so that I had time to note all that went on, as a man will at such a time, and yet without taking his eyes from the foe before him.

That was but a breathing s.p.a.ce. With a fresh yell the Mercians fell on us again, and I had three of them on me; and my hands were full, though they hampered one another. The old Wess.e.x war cry which I had not heard for so long came back to me, and I shouted "Out!

out!" and met them. There needed but a little time and Kynan would be on the causeway. His song rang close to us.

Erling reeled and steadied himself against me, and the Mercians howled. His war shout rang once, and then he fell across my feet, face downward, and I stood over him in a white rage, and set my teeth and smote. It came to me that there were more men on the causeway now, but that they would not near me. I was fending spearheads from me, and I forgot Kynan.

Then of a sudden those who were on me seemed to know that his song was in their very ears, and they looked round. His men were on the narrow gate path, and they were between them and me; and with that they yelled and fled into the ditch on either side the causeway, and I was aware that for a long minute I had kept the gate alone.

But I did not think of that. Out of the way of heedless, tramping feet of those who came back into safety I must get my fallen comrade, and I threw my sword within the gate and stooped and dragged him after it, setting him on one side, on the steep rampart bank, out of the way. He smiled and tried to speak, but could not; and even so much cheered me, for I had thought him dead.

Some one came swiftly and touched me as I bent over him, and I saw the old priest.

"Leave him to me," he said. "See to Kynan now; there may be work yet for the lady's sake."

Even as I rose at his word, loath to leave my comrade, but knowing that I must, and while I still had my face from the gate, there came a blinding flash of lightning from the ragged black edge of the cloud overhead, and with it one short, awesome crash of thunder. The storm which had crept up behind us had broken on the hilltop.

After that crash came a dead silence, and then were yells of terror such as the fight had had no power to raise from men on either side. And among them one voice cried shrill that this was the work of Ethelbert, the slain king.

Then as the foe fled back the gates swung to, and I heard the bars clatter into their sockets, and Kynan came to me.