to plan. I was to work my way along the road to a position a little south of the others, there to lie in wait for the supply train. I was to keep out of sight and be ready with my bow if anything went amiss.
Just before he sent us to our places, Bran said, “Let no one think we do this for ourselves alone. We do it for Elfael and its long-suffering folk, and may God have mercy on our souls. Amen.”
CHAPTER 10
Amen!” We pledged our lives with our king’s, and then stood for a moment, listening to the hush of a woodland subdued beneath the falling snow. And there was that much to goad a fella to reflection. Some or all of us might be dead before the day’s journey had run, and there’s a thought to make a man think twice.
“You heard him, lads. Be about your work,” said Iwan, and we all scattered into the forest.
I moved a few dozen paces along the roadside and found a place behind the rotting bole of a fallen pine. It lay atop the slight rise of a bank overlooking the road below with a clear view ahead to the place where our rude welcome would commence. Trying not to disturb the snow too much, I cleared me a place and heaped up some dry leaves and pine branches, and lay my bowstave lengthwise along the underside of the pine trunk, where it would be somewhat protected from the snow and ready to hand. Then I hunkered down amongst the boughs and bracken. I need not have worried about leaving too many telltale signs, for the snow kept falling, gradually becoming heavier as the morning wore on. By midday the tracks we’d made had been filled in, removing any traces of disturbance. All the world lay beneath a clean, unbroken breast of glimmering white.
I sat and watched the flakes spin down, snow on snow, and still it fell. The day passed in silence, and aside from a few birds and squirrels, I saw no movement anywhere near the road. All remained so quiet I began to think that the soldiers guarding the supply train had thought better of continuing their journey and decided to lay up somewhere until the snow stopped and travel became easier. Maybe little Gwion Bach had it wrong and the wagons were not coming at all.
The daylight, never bright, began to falter as the snow fell thicker and faster. Warm as a cock in a dovecot under my cloak, I dozed a little the way a hunter will, alert though his eyes are closed, and passed the time in my half-sheltered nook . . .
. . . and awakened to the smell of smoke.
I looked around. Nothing had changed. The road was still empty. There was no sign of anyone passing or having passed; the snow was still falling in soft, clumping flakes. The light was dimmer now, the winter day fading quickly into an early gloom.
And then I heard it: the light jingle of a horse’s tack.
I fished a dry string from my pouch and was rigging the bow before the sound came again. I shook the snow off from the bag of arrows and opened it. Bless me, there were nine black arrows inside—black from crow feather to iron tip. I placed four of them upright along the trunk of the tree in front of me, and blew gently on my hands to steady and warm them.
Oh, a fella can get a bit cramped waiting in the snow. I tried to loosen my stiff limbs a little without making too much commotion.
The sound came again and, again, the faint whiff of smoke. I had no time to wonder at this, for at that same instant two riders appeared. The snow softened all sound but the jingle of the tack as they rode, and the hooves of their horses breaking a path in the snow. Big men—knights—they loomed larger still in their padded leather jerkins and long winter cloaks which covered their mail shirts. Helmeted and gauntleted, their shields were on their backs and their lances were tucked into the saddle carriers; their swords were sheathed.
They passed quietly up the road and out of sight. I counted slow beats until those following them should arrive. But none came after.
I waited.
After a time, the first two returned, hastening back the way they had come. When they reached a place just below my overlook, one of the