Bran Mak Morn: The Last King Page 6

  �ood! Lead on, wizard.� But now Bran took charge. He had recovered himself and was at ease. Whether he thought, like Cormac, that this was all a gigantic hoax arranged by Gonar, he showed no sign.

  �ing Kull, see you those men yonder who lean on their long-shafted axes as they gaze upon you?� �he tall men with the golden hair and beards?� �ye �our success in the coming battle hinges on them. They swear to go over to the enemy if we give them not a king to lead them �their own having been slain. Will you lead them to battle?� Kull� eyes glowed with appreciation. �hey are men such as my own Red Slayers, my picked regiment. I will lead them.� �ome then.� The small group made their way down the slope, through throngs of warriors who pushed forward eagerly to get a better view of the stranger, then pressed back as he approached. An undercurrent of tense whispering ran through the horde.

  The Northmen stood apart in a compact group. Their cold eyes took in Kull and he gave back their stares, taking in every detail of their appearance.

  �ulfhere,�said Bran, �e have brought you a king. I hold you to your oath.� �et him speak to us,�said the viking harshly.

  �e can not speak your tongue,�answered Bran, knowing that the Northmen knew nothing of the legends of his race. �e is a great king of the South � � �e comes out of the past,�broke in the wizard calmly. �e was the greatest of all kings, long ago.� � dead man!�The vikings moved uneasily and the rest of the horde pressed forward, drinking in every word. But Wulfhere scowled: �hall a ghost lead living men? You bring us a man you say is dead. We will not follow a corpse.� �ulfhere,�said Bran in still passion, �ou are a liar and a traitor. You set us this task, thinking it impossible. You yearn to fight under the Eagles of Rome. We have brought you a king neither Pict, Gael nor Briton and you deny your vow!� �et him fight me, then!�howled Wulfhere in uncontrollable wrath, swinging his ax about his head in a glittering arc. �f your dead man overcomes me �then my people will follow you. If I overcome him, you shall let us depart in peace to the camp of the legions!� �ood!�said the wizard. �o you agree, wolves of the North?� A fierce yell and a brandishing of swords was the answer. Bran turned to Kull, who had stood silent, understanding nothing of what was said. But the Atlantean� eyes gleamed. Cormac felt that those cold eyes had looked on too many such scenes not to understand something of what had passed.

  �his warrior says you must fight him for the leadership,�said Bran, and Kull, eyes glittering with growing battle-joy, nodded: � guessed as much. Give us space.� � shield and a helmet!�shouted Bran, but Kull shook his head.

  � need none,�he growled. �ack and give us room to swing our steel!� Men pressed back on each side, forming a solid ring about the two men, who now approached each other warily. Kull had drawn his sword and the great blade shimmered like a live thing in his hand. Wulfhere, scarred by a hundred savage fights, flung aside his wolfskin mantle and came in cautiously, fierce eyes peering over the top of his out-thrust shield, ax half lifted in his right hand.

  Suddenly when the warriors were still many feet apart Kull sprang. His attack brought a gasp from men used to deeds of prowess; for like a leaping tiger he shot through the air and his sword crashed on the quickly lifted shield. Sparks flew and Wulfhere� ax hacked in, but Kull was under its sweep and as it swished viciously above his head he thrust upward and sprang out again, cat-like. His motions had been too quick for the eye to follow. The upper edge of Wulfhere� shield showed a deep cut, and there was a long rent in his mail shirt where Kull� sword had barely missed the flesh beneath.

  Cormac, trembling with the terrible thrill of the fight, wondered at this sword that could thus slice through scale-mail. And the blow that gashed the shield should have shattered the blade. Yet not a notch showed in the Valusian steel! Surely this blade was forged by another people in another age!

  Now the two giants leaped again to the attack and like double strokes of lightning their weapons crashed. Wulfhere� shield fell from his arm in two pieces as the Atlantean� sword sheared clear through it, and Kull staggered as the Northman� ax, driven with all the force of his great body, descended on the golden circlet about his head. That blow should have sheared through the gold like butter to split the skull beneath, but the ax rebounded, showing a great notch in the edge. The next instant the Northman was overwhelmed by a whirlwind of steel �a storm of strokes delivered with such swiftness and power that he was borne back as on the crest of a wave, unable to launch an attack of his own. With all his tried skill he sought to parry the singing steel with his ax. But he could only avert his doom for a few seconds; could only for an instant turn the whistling blade that hewed off bits of his mail, so close fell the blows. One of the horns flew from his helmet; then the ax-head itself fell away, and the same blow that severed the handle, bit through the viking� helmet into the scalp beneath. Wulfhere was dashed to his knees, a trickle of blood starting down his face.

  Kull checked his second stroke, and tossing his sword to Cormac, faced the dazed Northman weaponless. The Atlantean� eyes were blazing with ferocious joy and he roared something in a strange tongue. Wulfhere gathered his legs under him and bounded up, snarling like a wolf, a dagger flashing into his hand. The watching horde gave tongue in a yell that ripped the skies as the two bodies clashed. Kull� clutching hand missed the Northman� wrist but the desperately lunging dagger snapped on the Atlantean� mail, and dropping the useless hilt, Wulfhere locked his arms about his foe in a bear-like grip that would have crushed the ribs of a lesser man. Kull grinned tigerishly and returned the grapple, and for a moment the two swayed on their feet. Slowly the black-haired warrior bent his foe backward until it seemed his spine would snap. With a howl that had nothing of the human in it, Wulfhere clawed frantically at Kull� face, trying to tear out his eyes, then turned his head and snapped his fang-like teeth into the Atlantean� arm. A yell went up as a trickle of blood started: �e bleeds! He bleeds! He is no ghost, after all, but a mortal man!� Angered, Kull shifted his grip, shoving the frothing Wulfhere away from him, and smote him terrifically under the ear with his right hand. The viking landed on his back a dozen feet away. Then, howling like a wild man, he leaped up with a stone in his hand and flung it. Only Kull� incredible quickness saved his face; as it was, the rough edge of the missile tore his cheek and inflamed him to madness. With a lion-like roar he bounded upon his foe, enveloped him in an irresistible blast of sheer fury, whirled him high above his head as if he were a child and cast him a dozen feet away. Wulfhere pitched on his head and lay still �broken and dead.

  Dazed silence reigned for an instant; then from the Gaels went up a thundering roar, and the Britons and Picts took it up, howling like wolves, until the echoes of the shouts and the clangor of sword on shield reached the ears of the marching legionaries, miles to the south.

  �en of the gray North,�shouted Bran, �ill you hold by your oath now?� The fierce souls of the Northmen were in their eyes as their spokesman answered. Primitive, superstitious, steeped in tribal lore of fighting gods and mythical heroes, they did not doubt that the black-haired fighting man was some supernatural being sent by the fierce gods of battle.

  �ye! Such a man as this we have never seen! Dead man, ghost or devil, we will follow him, whether the trail lead to Rome or Valhalla!� Kull understood the meaning, if not the words. Taking his sword from Cormac with a word of thanks, he turned to the waiting Northmen and silently held the blade toward them high above his head, in both hands, before he returned it to its scabbard. Without understanding, they appreciated the action. Blood-stained and disheveled, he was an impressive picture of stately, magnificent barbarism.

  �ome,�said Bran, touching the Atlantean� arm; � host is marching on us and we have much to do. There is scant time to arrange our forces before they will be upon us. Come to the top of yonder slope.� There the Pict pointed. They were looking down into a valley which ran north and south, widening from a narrow gorge in the
north until it debouched upon a plain to the south. The whole valley was less than a mile in length.

  �p this valley will our foes come,�said the Pict, �ecause they have wagons loaded with supplies and on all sides of this vale the ground is too rough for such travel. Here we plan an ambush.� � would have thought you would have had your men lying in wait long before now,�said Kull. �hat of the scouts the enemy is sure to send out?� �he savages I lead would never have waited in ambush so long,�said Bran with a touch of bitterness. � could not post them until I was sure of the Northmen. Even so I had not dared to post them ere now �even yet they may take panic from the drifting of a cloud or the blowing of a leaf, and scatter like birds before a cold wind. King Kull �the fate of the Pictish nation is at stake. I am called king of the Picts, but my rule as yet is but a hollow mockery. The hills are full of wild clans who refuse to fight for me. Of the thousand bowmen now at my command, more than half are of my own clan.

  �ome eighteen hundred Romans are marching against us. It is not a real invasion, but much hinges upon it. It is the beginning of an attempt to extend their boundaries. They plan to build a fortress a day� march to the north of this valley. If they do, they will build other forts, drawing bands of steel about the heart of the free people. If I win this battle and wipe out this army, I will win a double victory. Then the tribes will flock to me and the next invasion will meet a solid wall of resistance. If I lose, the clans will scatter, fleeing into the north until they can no longer flee, fighting as separate clans rather than as one strong nation.

  � have a thousand archers, five hundred horsemen, fifty chariots with their drivers and swordsmen �one hundred fifty men in all �and, thanks to you, three hundred heavily armed Northern pirates. How would you arrange your battle lines?� �ell,�said Kull, � would have barricaded the north end of the valley �no! That would suggest a trap. But I would block it with a band of desperate men, like those you have given me to lead. Three hundred could hold the gorge for a time against any number. Then, when the enemy was engaged with these men to the narrow part of the valley, I would have my archers shoot down into them until their ranks are broken, from both sides of the vale. Then, having my horsemen concealed behind one ridge and my chariots behind the other, I would charge with both simultaneously and sweep the foe into a red ruin.� Bran� eyes glowed. �xactly, king of Valusia. Such was my exact plan � � �ut what of the scouts?� �y warriors are like panthers; they hide under the noses of the Romans. Those who ride into the valley will see only what we wish them to see. Those who ride over the ridge will not come back to report. An arrow is swift and silent.

  �ou see that the pivot of the whole thing depends on the men that hold the gorge. They must be men who can fight on foot and resist the charges of the heavy legionaries long enough for the trap to close. Outside these Northmen I had no such force of men. My naked warriors with their short swords could never stand such a charge for an instant. Nor is the armor of the Celts made for such work; moreover, they are not foot-fighters, and I need them elsewhere.

  �o you see why I had such desperate need of the Northmen. Now will you stand in the gorge with them and hold back the Romans until I can spring the trap? Remember, most of you will die.� Kull smiled. � have taken chances all my life, though Tu, chief councillor, would say my life belongs to Valusia and I have no right to so risk it � �His voice trailed off and a strange look flitted across his face. �y Valka,�said he, laughing uncertainly, �ometimes I forget this is a dream! All seems so real. But it is �of course it is! Well, then, if I die I will but awaken as I have done in times past. Lead on, king of Caledon!� Cormac, going to his warriors, wondered. Surely it was all a hoax; yet �he heard the arguments of the warriors all about him as they armed themselves and prepared to take their posts. The black-haired king was Neid himself, the Celtic war-god; he was an antediluvian king brought out of the past by Gonar; he was a mythical fighting man out of Valhalla. He was no man at all but a ghost! No, he was mortal, for he had bled. But the gods themselves bled, though they did not die. So the controversies raged. At least, thought Cormac, if it was all a hoax to inspire the warriors with the feeling of supernatural aid, it had succeeded. The belief that Kull was more than a mortal man had fired Celt, Pict and viking alike into a sort of inspired madness. And Cormac asked himself �what did he himself believe? This man was surely one from some far land �yet in his every look and action there was a vague hint of a greater difference than mere distance of space �a hint of alien Time, of misty abysses and gigantic gulfs of eons lying between the black-haired stranger and the men with whom he walked and talked. Clouds of bewilderment mazed Cormac� brain and he laughed in whimsical self-mockery.

  III

  �nd the two wild peoples of the north

  Stood fronting in the gloam,

  And heard and knew each in his mind

  A third great sound upon the wind,

  The living walls that hedge mankind,

  The walking walls of Rome.� Chesterton

  The sun slanted westward. Silence lay like an invisible mist over the valley. Cormac gathered the reins in his hand and glanced up at the ridges on both sides. The waving heather which grew rank on those steep slopes gave no evidence of the hundreds of savage warriors who lurked there. Here in the narrow gorge which widened gradually southward was the only sign of life. Between the steep walls three hundred Northmen were massed solidly in their wedge-shaped shield-wall, blocking the pass. At the tip, like the point of a spear, stood the man who called himself Kull, king of Valusia. He wore no helmet, only the great, strangely worked head-band of hard gold, but he bore on his left arm the great shield borne by the dead Rognar; and in his right hand he held the heavy iron mace wielded by the sea-king. The vikings eyed him in wonder and savage admiration. They could not understand his language, or he theirs. But no further orders were necessary. At Bran� directions they had bunched themselves in the gorge, and their only order was �hold the pass!

  Bran Mak Morn stood just in front of Kull. So they faced each other, he whose kingdom was yet unborn, and he whose kingdom had been lost in the mists of Time for unguessed ages. Kings of darkness, thought Cormac, nameless kings of the night, whose realms are gulfs and shadows.

  The hand of the Pictish king went out. �ing Kull, you are more than king �you are a man. Both of us may fall within the next hour �but if we both live, ask what you will of me.� Kull smiled, returning the firm grip. �ou too are a man after my own heart, king of the shadows. Surely you are more than a figment of my sleeping imagination. Mayhap we will meet in waking life some day.� Bran shook his head in puzzlement, swung into the saddle and rode away, climbing the eastern slope and vanishing over the ridge. Cormac hesitated: �trange man, are you in truth of flesh and blood, or are you a ghost?� �hen we dream, we are all flesh and blood �so long as we are dreaming,�Kull answered. �his is the strangest nightmare I have ever known �but you, who will soon fade into sheer nothingness as I awaken, seem as real to me now, as Brule, or Kananu, or Tu, or Kelkor.� Cormac shook his head as Bran had done, and with a last salute, which Kull returned with barbaric stateliness, he turned and trotted away. At the top of the western ridge he paused. Away to the south a light cloud of dust rose and the head of the marching column was in sight. Already he believed he could feel the earth vibrate slightly to the measured tread of a thousand mailed feet beating in perfect unison. He dismounted, and one of his chieftains, Domnail, took his steed and led it down the slope away from the valley, where trees grew thickly. Only an occasional vague movement among them gave evidence of the five hundred men who stood there, each at his horse� head with a ready hand to check a chance nicker.

  Oh, thought Cormac, the gods themselves made this valley for Bran� ambush! The floor of the valley was treeless and the inner slopes were bare save for the waist-high heather. But at the foot of each ridge on the side facing away from the vale, where the soil long washed from t
he rocky slopes had accumulated, there grew enough trees to hide five hundred horsemen or fifty chariots.

  At the northern end of the valley stood Kull and his three hundred vikings, in open view, flanked on each side by fifty Pictish bowmen. Hidden on the western side of the western ridge were the Gaels. Along the top of the slopes, concealed in the tall heather, lay a hundred Picts with their shafts on string. The rest of the Picts were hidden on the eastern slopes beyond which lay the Britons with their chariots in full readiness. Neither they nor the Gaels to the west could see what went on in the vale, but signals had been arranged.

  Now the long column was entering the wide mouth of the valley and their scouts, light-armed men on swift horses, were spreading out between the slopes. They galloped almost within bowshot of the silent host that blocked the pass, then halted. Some whirled and raced back to the main force, while the others deployed and cantered up the slopes, seeking to see what lay beyond. This was the crucial moment. If they got any hint of the ambush, all was lost. Cormac, shrinking down into the heather, marveled at the ability of the Picts to efface themselves from view so completely. He saw a horseman pass within three feet of where he knew a bowman lay, yet the Roman saw nothing.

  The scouts topped the ridges, gazed about; then most of them turned and trotted back down the slopes. Cormac wondered at their desultory manner of scouting. He had never fought Romans before, knew nothing of their arrogant self-confidence, of their incredible shrewdness in some ways, their incredible stupidity in others. These men were over-confident; a feeling radiating from their officers. It had been years since a force of Caledonians had stood before the legions. And most of these men were but newly come to Britain; part of a legion which had been quartered in Egypt. They despised their foes and suspected nothing.