Caradoc of the North Wind - By Allan Frewin Jones Page 0,88

swarm up the hillside towards them. An arrow sang, skidding past Iwan’s shoulder.

‘Form a circle!’ Branwen howled, her eyes filled with the fearsome sight of the onrushing Saxon warriors. ‘Back to back! Let them see how the Gwyn Braw meet their end!’

‘And let us take as many of them as we can to the halls of Annwn!’ shouted Dera, her sword ringing as she drew it.

They pulled their horses back from the brow of the hill, gathering together in a gap between two clusters of trees. Branwen stroked Fain’s feathers.

‘Fly to the trees, my brave one,’ she murmured to him. ‘You cannot aid me here – you are too badly hurt.’

The falcon cawed once and then sprang from her shoulder, flying clumsily over their heads. Twice more he cried, as though wishing them well – or wishing them farewell – then he sped to the trees and Branwen lost sight of him in among the bare branches.

She looked for the last time into the faces of her companions. Iwan, smiling a little, as though ready to laugh in death’s face. Dera, grim and dark, her eyes burning. Banon, testing her bow-string with her thumb, her red hair blowing about her cheeks. Aberfa with her great limbs and her brow like a boulder, hefting a spear in her hand and watching for the first target to come within range.

And Rhodri, at her side now as they formed a defensive circle with their horses’ heads facing outwards. At her side, as he had always been since that first day of mist in the mountains when Rhiannon’s goraig-goblins had led her to him and she had knocked him off a cliff edge with a tree branch.

‘You were a fool ever to ride with me, Rhodri,’ she called to him – not for the first time. ‘And now your folly reaps its reward.’

‘Perhaps so,’ he replied. ‘But something within me says you are not destined to die here.’

‘Is that so?’ She could almost have smiled. ‘I’m glad to hear it. Although if you knew the doom that Ragnar has planned for me, you might think death less of a burden.’

He frowned, then a look of alarm came into his face, as though he had somehow understood what she meant. ‘No,’ he said. ‘The Shining Ones would never let that happen to you. Ragnar will not take you. Have no fear of that.’

‘The Shining Ones?’ said Branwen. ‘They cannot save us, Rhodri. I know what they said to Blodwedd – they have no power here. Rhiannon said it herself … they are bound to the land and can do nothing to alter the course of the battle that is to come. She was speaking of this battle, Rhodri.’

‘They are upon us!’ hissed Aberfa. ‘Farewell, friends, we will meet again in Annwn!’

Branwen turned her face outwards, bringing her shield rim up to her eyes, tightening her fist around her sword hilt, gripping hard with her knees around Terrwyn’s sturdy body.

They were coming.

Like swarming rats the Saxons flooded in from every direction. They pressed forward, their shields locked together in an onrushing wall, arrows and spears flying as they shouted their dreadful battle cries.

A spear ran quivering through the air. Branwen lifted her shield, angling it so that the spear was deflected. She rocked in the saddle from the impact, her arm tingling. She heard Aberfa roaring.

‘Gwyn Braw! Gwyn Braw!’

More arrows hissed. Dera’s horse fell screaming. Rhodri’s sword arm rose and fell, rose and fell as the Saxons pressed in around him.

But then they were upon her, and she had no more time for fear or grief or guilt as she slashed at the yelling Saxons and lost herself in the red fog of battle madness.

CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX

‘You fool! You fool, Warrior Child! Did you not heed the Lady Rhiannon’s words? Did you not listen?’

The voice came sharp as needles in Branwen’s mind through the boil of her blood and the din of battle. Blodwedd’s voice? Geraint’s? Linette’s? It was impossible to tell as she twisted and swung in the saddle, angling her shield to fend off spear and sword, striking down on her attackers with her bloodied blade, kicking at the Saxons to drive them back while Terrwyn reared and struck out with his hooves, cracking skulls and snapping limbs.

I did listen! I did!

‘Remember these words! We three are bound to the land and cannot be called upon to hold back the army that is coming! Tell her exactly these words, Messenger of Govannon – and hope