Caradoc of the North Wind - By Allan Frewin Jones Page 0,86

at the trot, there was the risk of him falling and being injured.

As they rode, she puzzled over his cryptic words. Banon had been right to ask the question – who or what had taken hold of her wise, kind, gentle friend? It had come from Blodwedd, she believed, and so she had trusted it – but what if she was wrong? What if something of Ragnar had been put into Rhodri’s mind? What if he was leading them to their doom?

An inner debate occupied her mind as they followed the road.

No. If this was evil, it would make itself clearer, I think. The riddling nature of his words makes it more likely to be something to our benefit – if we have the wit to untangle the message! Oh, why is it always so hard?

Because to strive is part of the purpose.

Perhaps. But to strive and to fail is my fear!

You have not failed so far.

Indeed not? Tell that to the ghosts of Geraint and Griffith ap Rhys and Gavan ap Huw and Linette and Blodwedd …

Have you not learned the lesson yet, you fool?

‘Smoke rises over Pengwern!’ cried Dera. ‘I fear we come too late!’

Branwen had been so wrapped up in her thoughts that she had not realized they were approaching the long hill that rose to the west of the king’s citadel. Here, little more than a month ago, the Gwyn Braw had ridden hard out of the snowy mountains, bearing Meredith and Romney along with them, pursued by Saxon war bands.

She stared into the eastern sky. Dera was right. A veil of smoke hung in the air beyond the crest of the hill.

Branwen slapped the reins, kicking her heels into Terrwyn’s flanks to urge him on. Dera was also riding hard for the hill, Iwan at her side and Banon close behind. Only Aberfa had not joined the wild gallop to the hill – but even she had brought her horse to a brisk trot, riding alongside Rhodri’s horse, one strong hand holding him by the collar so he would not fall.

As they rode up the flank of the hill, Branwen began to hear strange and disturbing sounds faintly from beyond the fast-closing horizon. Dark smoke drifted high, staining the pale clouds.

Branwen was the first to come to the crest of the hill. She rode between thickets of woodland, reining Terrwyn up hard, staring down with horrified eyes into the long valley that lay between them and the king’s citadel.

A dreadful sight met her eyes.

The valley swarmed with Saxons. As thick as bees in a hive, they gathered below her shrinking gaze and her heart withered in her chest to see their numbers.

Even as she reeled in the saddle, the noise of warfare came bursting in her ears, loud and confused and horrible.

Shouts and battle cries filled the air, howls of anger and pain, the neighing and screaming of frightened and dying horses. The jarring scrape of metal on metal, the thud of swords striking shields. The horrible sound of iron slashing and piercing flesh. The hiss of arrows, the thwack of spearheads driving into living bodies.

The army of General Herewulf Ironfist was attacking the citadel from west, north and south, the savage Saxon warriors raging across the open lands in their multitudes. But this was no rabble – the great general had taught them well the art of slaughter. The bulk of the Saxon warriors were divided into blocks of men who moved with the slow weight of mountains, beating the defenders back and back towards the defensive ditch of the citadel. Worse still were the arrowhead wedges of soldiers, hemmed all about with shields, barbed with spears and swords, crashing headlong into the Powys lines, ripping them apart and killing without mercy all who stood in their way. Saxon banners cracked in the air, the white dragon on the red field, pressing forward from all sides as the warriors of Powys were beaten back.

Branwen scanned the hideous battlefield, seeking any sign of Ironfist or of the king of Powys. But the mayhem defeated her eyes – there were too many Saxon banners for her to find the general, and what few red dragons still flew were pressed all about by the enemy.

Rather than have their fortress burned around their ears, the defenders of Pengwern must have chosen to meet their enemy on the field. A more noble option, but surely a doomed one against such numbers? Even as she sat stunned and horrified on