The Brothers of Gwynedd (23 page)

  "No matter," said Llewelyn, "we shall need no reinforcements. We are enough to deal."

  He spoke also, as we walked back together in the night, of David, though not naming him.

  "He is shamefully misled," he said. "Surely I have been traduced to him, and he thinks I grudge him advancement. Owen will have gone to him with some lying version of what was said between us, wanting to make use of him. Faith," he said ruefully, "I made the arrows for him to shoot, for indeed I did roughly refuse what was asked, how can I deny it? Yet that was not the way. I would most gladly use the boy, to the full of his powers, when the time offers, and trust him with much. But not that way!"

  "When he comes to himself," I said, "he will know and understand it."

  "There is a battle between us and that day," said Llewelyn grimly, "and I must and will win it, whoever goes down. Yet I pray God David may come out of it whole. I wonder did Owen go also to Rhodri? Though Rhodri is a blab-mouth, and would have let out the secret, besides being no great help in a fight. Maybe he thought it better to leave him out of the reckoning."

  "Or it may be," I said, "that Rhodri refused him."

  "Then all would have been out, for he would have betrayed Owen to me as surely as he would betray me to Owen were the matter opposite. Rhodri, given a choice, will keep clear of trouble. Doubtless he would like a larger portion, but not at that risk."

  "Did you ever think," I asked him as we went in, "that it would come to this?"

  "I waited," said Llewelyn, "for God to dispose. And He has disposed. And God forgive me if I boast myself before victory, and bear me witness I will not vaunt myself after it."

  Then he went in and slept. At dawn there was a brief council with his captains, and after it we moved south by Glaslyn water, round the roots of the great mountains, for in that valley no long-sighted look-out could find us, and over the uplands our movements and our few colours might have been visible over miles, even with our steel blackened. Where we left the river and turned west, a third messenger met us, and confirmed that the armies of the two brothers were moving up the easy coastal plain of Arfon, towards the border pass of Bwlch Derwin, where once Trahaearn ap Caradoc defeated Griffith ap Cynan at the battle of Bron yr Erw, and drove him back into Ireland for refuge, before he fought his way home into Gwynedd to avenge the shame by overcoming and killing Trahaearn. But that was long ago, soon after the Normans came. Much was changed at their hands, but the rocks and passes of Eryri were not changed, and by that same road Owen must come.

  "By this," said Llewelyn, "unless Owen is a bigger fool than I think him, they should know that we are in arms and on our way to meet them."

  "They do know," said the man, "but not by which way we come, or how close we are. No question, they'll accept battle wherever we happen to run our foreheads against theirs. And they are in good conceit of themselves, and sure of their fortune."

  Said Llewelyn, but in a manner almost devout: "So am I." And indeed all that day he moved and disposed as one bearing consciously, in pride and humility, the burden of his own future, which was the future of Wales.

  We who were mounted made a stay near the old place of the Romans by Glany-Morfa, to let the foot soldiers overtake us and get an hour of rest. Then we went on towards the great thrusting head of Craig-y-Garn, towering above Dolbenmaen. Here we had the lower, rolling hills of Lleyn on our left hand, and on our right, beyond this sheer crag, the higher peaks and lofty moors stretching away for miles towards the north, bare rock above, heather and bracken and peat-moss below. Here the mountains are not so high as round Snowdon itself, yet high and bare and bleak enough, and in the uplands between the peaks the black marshes fester, and the dark-brown peat-holes reflect the sun from within their circling reeds like longlashed eyes, the colour of my lord's. The strong, steel-bright bones of his face always called to my mind the rocks of Snowdon, and his eyes those silent lakes between.

  Our road avoided the lower ground here, and kept upon the shoulder of the mountain, circling Craig-y-Garn, and crossing brook after brook that came tumbling down from the ridge on our right hand. Thus we climbed towards the watershed, and into the scrub woods that grow in the sheltered places of the pass of Bryn Derwin. And there we took our stand, with our forward look-outs keeping watch down towards Arfon, and the body of our host drawn back in two small cavalry bands flanking the woods, and arrayed where they had the advantage of the slope on either side the way, and passable ground for their advance. The lancers were drawn up in the pass, where it was somewhat sheltered on either hand by low trees and bushes. And the archers climbed in four small groups among the rocks, two to the left, two to the right, and on either side one group higher than the other. There was broken cover there to hide them, and dun as we were, lacking the show of banners and armour, we melted well into that landscape, without even motion to make us visible at any distance.

  That was the first time that I had ever worn mail corselet or sword in earnest, though I had some years since taken to exercising at play with Ifor ap Heilyn, who was the best swordsman about the llys at Carnarvon, and he thought fairly well of me for one coming late to the game, and a clerk into the bargain. I was well-grown and strong and had at least a quick and accurate eye, if not the true dexterity of wrist to match it. Nor was I afraid, though I do not know why. Neither in play against my betters, who could bruise if they wished, nor now in the pass of Bryn Derwin was I afraid, but for a corner of my mind that dreaded, against my conviction of blessing, for the issue, and for Llewelyn.

  He kept me at his side, with the knights on the right flank, and I was glad. For where he was, was where I willed to be, for good or ill. Nor did he ever send me away from him at any trial or danger, for he read my mind plainly, and held me so in his grace that I might have what most I wanted.

  We waited until past noon, before the fore-runners sent back the signal that Owen's army was in sight below the pass. We had not taken the extreme forward position possible to us, commanding the entire downward slope against them. And I think that Llewelyn had avoided this error, and sacrificed its advantages, to prevent their seeing us too soon, assessing the odds too cautiously, and abandoning, with some plausible pretext, the offered combat. For though he had not provoked nor sought this trial, now with all his heart he desired it, and intended it to come to an issue this day, and not to continue hanging over him for more long years, before he was set free to pursue his purpose and his fate.

  Then we saw them rise out of the trough beyond, in the gentle bowl of the enclosing hills, first their plumed heads, for they were prouder and more Norman than we, and had exulted in the array of their knighthood, though neither of them was then knight. The long frontal line rose slowly out of the ground, marching in close order, the horsemen first, with that dancing gait horses have on a gradual climb, first their bowing, maned heads coming into view, then the rippling shoulders, and the horsemen sitting erect and swaying to the movement. I have heard music like this motion. And behind the riders we saw the bright heads of the lances splinter in the sunlight, and the faint golden dust like a gilded mist hanging about the foot soldiers.

  They saw us, and knew us, across some extended bow-shot of rock, gravel and turf. The long line checked and hung still, staring. Not in surprise, for we might well have cropped up at any point of this onward journey, though perhaps they had not looked to meet us so soon. They stared like hawks fixing before the stoop, measuring mass and distance. And even I saw that they were more in numbers than we, perhaps by thirty to forty men.

  Thus these two armies stood confronting each other in the sunlit afternoon, motionless and at gaze, just out of reach one of the other. And Llewelyn said, ranging the line of horsemen ahead for the figures best known to him: "I will not draw on my brothers without due challenge given. Hold your shots, archers, but cover me close." And he rode forward some twenty paces before his front rank, and sitting his horse there alone, shouted before him in a great voice:

  "You are looking for me, Llewelyn ap Griffith? Who comes here in arms against me, and for what purpose? Peace or war? Speak now, or strike now!"

  I saw the light flicker of movement in the still ranks ahead, and cried out a warning he did not need, for he had as good a judgment of the range of the short bow as any man in North Wales. The men of the north were by nature lancers and throwers of the javelin, and our archery as yet felt more at home with the short bow than with the great long-bows the southern men used, drawn to the ear. This arrow loosed at my lord fell a dozen paces short, and struck humming in the turf. He never gave a glance at it, but he laughed, and cried powerfully towards his brother and elder, there in the centre of the foremost rank fronting him:

  "I accept your answer, Owen! Come on, then! I am waiting for you!"

  He wheeled his horse, turning his back fully on them, and as he moved back to us and to his chosen place, so did they move forward, breaking into the fast and fierce rush the Welsh always used, even against horsemen and fully-armed knights, trusting in agility and speed to strike a first damaging blow, and if forced to draw off in flight, able by reason of their lightness to outdistance pursuit, and find time even to harry it, seizing every chance to turn again and do more devastation. Llewelyn well knew they were hot on his heels, but he had time to order all before they struck, opening his ranks at the impact to take in such as penetrated, and make sure they never drew off again, and signalling the alert to his archers, in cover up the slopes on either side.

  Our lancers formed close, butts braced into the ground, the first rank kneeling, the second standing. Owen's horse-men, too ill-disciplined to temper their speed to the footmen's pace—though some clung to their stirrups and were carried with them—struck that wall of lances, and did no more than make its centre shake for a moment. Then the rushing spearmen struck after them, and foot by foot our centre gave slowly back to draw the whole mêlée inward, and it became a hand-to-hand struggle there, edging always a little back towards the east.

  We with the two small companies of horsemen remained drawn aside on either hand, a little up the sloping ground, and the rush of the attack was so wild and single that it crashed full into the centre between us like a hammer-blow, leaving us stranded on the flanks. Above us the archers shot a first volley, and a second, into the mass, wounding several horses, and churning the whole into a threshing confusion. Then Llewelyn gave the sign, and we charged down from either side into the shouting, bellowing tangle of horses and men, crushing it between our two matched thrusts.

  The battle at Bryn Derwin lasted but one hour in all, from the first clash to the breaking and flight of the remainder of Owen's army. As for me, all I saw of it after the first attack was a turmoil of hand-to-hand fighting, almost too close for damage, where I was flung hither and thither by the swaying of the battle, and glimpsed now one enemy fronting me, now another, without, I think, doing harm to any beyond a scratch or two. But I kept close at Llewelyn's quarter, covering his flank as best I might. I know he singled out Owen's plumed helmet as he led our downhill charge, and drove straight at it. His lance struck his brother's raised shield full, almost sweeping Owen out of his saddle, if the shaft had not shivered and left him still force enough to regain his seat. Then they had swords out at each other, but Owen's horse, slashed by a chance blow, and shrieking, reared and wheeled, plunging away from the fight. And other riders came between, loyal to their prince, to fend us off.

  This mêlée was brief. The foot soldiers knew defeat first, and drew off as they could, and scattered. Then a few of the horsemen also fled, some were already unhorsed and wounded, some yielded. Only a handful, at the very moment of our downhill charge, had wheeled to meet the attack on the other flank, driving vehemently up the slope to clash with Goronwy's detachment. And these continued fighting tooth and nail when all else was over, even when they knew their fellows had broken and run, and there was nothing to be gained.

  So intent was I on this tight whirlpool of motion on the slope opposite that I never saw the moment when Owen Goch was pulled from his horse, half-dazed, and pinned down in the turf under the weight of three or four of our spearmen. Two more led aside and quieted the maddened, trembling horse. But we watched the small, obstinate battle on the hillside, reduced now to two enemy horsemen, of whom one was gradually hedged off from his fellow and surrounded. The other spurred his beast obdurately higher up the slope, clear of immediate reach, and instead of attempting flight, whirled again to drive at us who moved below him. He circled and wove as he came, whirling his sword about him on all sides to fend off attack. Young and tall he was, and slender, but steely, and he drove his horse with hand and spur and knee straight at Llewelyn. And his visor was raised, and I saw that it was David.

  His face I could see from eyebrows to mouth, brow and jaw being cased by his helmet. So I saw the smear of blood along one cheek, and the gleam of sweat outlining his bright, lean bones, and the black of his lashes like a soiled frame for two eyes so fixed and pale in their blueness that they looked tranced or mad. Straight at Llewelyn he drove, and leaned in the saddle, and swung a round, mangling stroke at him with his sword.