Stonehenge - Bernard Cornwell

Gundur and Vakkal led the charge into Rallin's injured men. Vakkal, swan feathers bright in his hair, hacked with a long-handled axe while Gundur used a heavy spear with sickening efficiency. For a brief while the centre of the field was a tangle of men stabbing and hacking, but Camaban's archers had hurt the enemy grievously and now Ratharryn's picked warriors broke through Rallin's centre. They killed Cathallo's greatest heroes in the stream where Rallin tried to rally them until Vakkal hurled his axe and the heavy blade struck Rallin on the head and the enemy chieftain fell among the willow-herb. Gundur screamed and splashed through the stream to stab his spear down into Rallin's chest, then Camaban was past him, swinging his sword in huge slashes that were as much a danger to his own side as to the enemy. Camaban's wild appearance, his striped face, bone-hung hair and bloody skin, terrified Cathallo's men who stepped back and stepped back again, and then stepped back faster as the fox-tailed warriors attacked in a howling rush.

'Now!' Camaban shouted at the rest of his line. 'Come and kill them! Come and kill them! Their lives are yours!' And the men of Ratharryn, as astonished as the enemy by the success of their line's centre, and seeing that Cathallo's men were fear-racked and retreating, gave a great shout and charged towards the stream. 'Kill them!' Camaban howled. 'Kill them!' His howling rallied his victorious centre, which he led in a wild screaming charge that turned into a pursuit of an enemy which still outnumbered Camaban's forces, but which had been panicked by their chief's death. Ratharryn's men whooped their victory as they cut the fleeing enemy down from behind. Axes and maces crushed skulls, shattered bones, came back bloody. Men killed in a frenzy of released fear, shrieking and stabbing, slashing and battering, and the panic became a rout when Cathallo's skull pole was taken by Vakkal. He hacked blind Morthor down with a sword, seized the pole and smashed the skull with his blade, and the sight of the skull's destruction caused a great wailing in the enemy's disordered ranks. Cathallo's women fled towards the great shrine and the fugitive spearmen followed in panic. It was chaos now, with Camaban's men hunting and herding the fleeing mass. Cathallo was beaten, Cathallo was running and Ratharryn's men were drenching their weapons with slaughter.

Saban alone did not pursue the enemy. Mereth had taken his great axe to the wild killing that soaked the avenue between the sacred stones, but Saban had been watching Derrewyn who had been at her line's western end when Gundur and Vakkal struck Rallin's men, staring appalled as her tribe collapsed. Saban saw two of Cathallo's warriors try and pull her back towards the settlement, but Derrewyn must have known that was where Camaban's army would aim their pursuit and so she ran a few paces west and, when she saw the screaming charge of Cathallo's men cross the stream and converge on the sacred avenue, she headed for the trees that had stood behind Camaban's battle-line. There was nowhere else to hide. Saban thought she must reach the trees safely, but then two of Ratharryn's archers saw her hurrying southwards and loosed their arrows. One of the missiles thumped into Derrewyn's leg, making her stumble, but her two spearmen picked her up and half carried her into the trees as the archers, eager for Camaban's reward of gold, ran after her.

Saban followed the archers into the wood. He could not see Derrewyn or her pursuers, but then he heard a bowstring being released and Derrewyn screaming an insult. Saban twisted towards the noise, plunging through a thicket of hazels into a small clearing where he saw that one of the Cathallo spearmen was lying dead with a black-fledged arrow through his throat. Derrewyn, her face pale and drawn with pain, was sitting against the moss-covered bole of an oak while her last protector faced the two bowmen of Ratharryn. They were grinning, pleased at the ease of their expected victory, but frowned as Saban burst into the clearing. 'We found her,' one of the archers said emphatically.

'You found her,' Saban agreed, 'so the reward is all yours. I don't want it.' He knew neither of the young men, who were scarce more than boys. He smiled at the nearest man, then placed an arrow on his bowstring. 'Do you have a knife?' he asked them.

'A knife?' one of them asked.

'You'll have to cut off the sorceress's head,' Saban explained, drawing back the arrow and aiming its long flint head at the enemy spearman. 'Remember the reward for her death? It is her skull filled with gold, so you must take my brother her head if you want to become wealthy.' He glanced at Derrewyn who was watching him with an expressionless face. 'But do you know how to ward off her dying curse?' Saban asked the two archers.

'Her curse?' the closest man asked in a worried tone.

'She is a sorceress,' Saban said ominously.

'Do you know?' the archer asked.

Saban smiled. 'You kill the curse like this,' he said, then turned fast so that his arrow was pointing at the nearest archer. He loosed it, saw the blood spurt bright in the green shadows, then threw the bow aside as he leaped the body of the dying man to drive the second bowman down into the leaf mould. He hammered the man in the face, grunted as his opponent punched back, then he saw the man's eyes widen in agony and heard the crunch of rib bones as Derrewyn's spearman thrust his bronze blade into the bowman's chest.

Saban stood. His heart was beating fast and sweat was stinging his eyes. 'I thought that I would go through this whole battle without killing anyone.'

The first bowman, who had Saban's arrow through his throat, heaved against the pain and then lay still. 'You didn't want to kill?' Derrewyn asked scornfully. 'Has your Outfolk woman turned you against killing?'

'I have no quarrel with you,' Saban said. 'I have never had a quarrel with you.'

The surviving spearman was holding his bloody spear threateningly, but Derrewyn waved the weapon down. 'He means no harm,' she told her protector. 'Saban blunders through life meaning no harm, but he causes plenty. Go and guard the end of the wood.' She watched the spearman go, beckoned Saban forward, then crooked her wounded leg and hissed with pain. The arrow had gone clean through the muscle of her right thigh and its flint head stood proud at one side and the raven-black feathers of Ratharryn showed on the other. She broke off the feathered end, grimaced, then snapped off the head. There was not much blood, for the flesh had closed about the shaft.

'I can take the rest of the arrow out,' Saban said.

'I can do that for myself,' Derrewyn said. She closed her eyes for a heartbeat and listened to the faint screams that sounded from the north. 'Thank you for killing them,' she said, gesturing at the two dead bowmen. 'Did your brother truly promise a reward for me?'

'For your corpse,' Saban said.

'So now you can become rich by killing me?' she asked with a smile.

Saban returned the smile. 'No,' he said, crouching in front of her. 'I wish none of this had ever happened,' he said. 'I wish everything was as it used to be.'

'Poor Saban,' Derrewyn said. She leaned her head against the tree. 'You should have been chief of Ratharryn, then none of this would ever have happened.'

'If you go south,' Saban said, 'you should be safe.'

'I doubt I will ever be safe,' she said, then began to laugh. 'I should have given Camaban his stones when he asked for them. He came to me last summer, at night, secretly, and begged me for stones.' She grimaced. 'Do you know what he offered me for the stones?'

'Peace?' Saban suggested.

'Peace!' Derrewyn spat the word. 'He offered more than peace, Saban, he offered me himself! He wanted to marry me. He and I, he said, were the two great sorcerers and between us we would rule Ratharryn and Cathallo and make the gods dance like hares in the springtime.'

Saban stared at her, wondering if she spoke the truth, then decided that of course she did. He smiled. 'How my father's sons do love you,' he said.

'You loved me,' Derrewyn said, 'but Lengar raped me and Camaban fears me.'

'I still love you,' Saban blurted out, and he was far more surprised at his words than she was. He blushed, and felt ashamed because of Aurenna, but he also knew he had spoken the truth, a truth he had never really acknowledged in all the years. He stared at her and he did not see the gaunt drawn face of Cathallo's sorceress, but the bright girl whose laughter had once enraptured a whole tribe.

'Poor Saban,' Derrewyn said, then flinched as pain lashed up her leg. 'It should have been you and I, Saban, just you and I. We would have had children, we would have lived and died and nothing would ever have changed. But now?' She shrugged. 'Slaol wins, and his cruelty will be loosed on the world.'

'He is not cruel.'

'We shall see, won't we?' Derrewyn asked, then she opened her cloak to show Saban the three gold lozenges hanging from a leather thong about her neck. She raised one of the small gold pieces to her mouth, bit through its sinew, then held the shining scrap out to Saban. 'Take it,' she said.

He smiled. 'I don't need it.'

'Take it!' she insisted and waited until he obeyed. 'Keep it safe.'

'I should give it back to Sarmennyn,' he said.

'For once,' she said wearily, 'don't be a fool, because in time you will want my help. Do you remember Mai's island?'

He nodded. 'Of course I remember it.'

'We lay beneath a willow tree there,' she said, 'and it has a fork in the trunk just higher than a man can reach. Leave the gold piece in that fork and I shall come to your aid.'

'You will help me?' Saban asked, gently amused, for Ratharryn had won this day and Derrewyn was now nothing but a fugitive.

'You will need my help,' she said, 'and I will give it when you ask. I shall become a ghost now, Saban, and I shall haunt Ratharryn.' She paused. 'I suppose Camaban wants my daughter dead too?'

Saban nodded. 'He does.'

'Poor Merrel,' Derrewyn said. 'Camaban won't find her, but what life can I give her now?' She fell silent and Saban saw that she was crying, though he could not tell whether it was from grief or pain. He went and cradled her head in his arms so that she sobbed on his shoulder. 'I do hate your brothers,' she said after a while, and then she took a deep breath and gently pulled away from him. 'I shall live like an outlaw,' she said, 'and I shall make a temple to Lahanna deep in the forests where Camaban will never find it.' She held her hand out to him. 'Help me up.'

He pulled her to her feet. She moaned as she put her weight on her wounded leg, but she waved away Saban's help then called for her spearman. It seemed she would leave without saying any farewell, but then, abruptly, she turned back and kissed Saban. She said nothing, just kissed him a second time then limped southwards through the trees.

Saban watched until the leaves hid her, then closed his eyes because he feared he would weep.

—«»—«»—«»—

There would be so many tears that day. The avenue of stones was thick with bodies, many with skulls crushed by axes or clubs, and still more with missing heads. But there had been so many heads to take as trophies that, after a while, the bodies were no longer decapitated and some heads had even been discarded by the pursuers. Others of the enemy still lived, though they were horribly wounded. One man, blood dripping from his hair, clung to a stone pillar as Saban trudged past. What songs they would make of this in Ratharryn, Saban thought sourly. Ravens flapped down and dogs came to feast on dead men's flesh. Two small boys who had followed Camaban's men to war were trying to hack a woman's head off. Saban chased them from the corpse, but knew they would find another. The avenue's stones were dripping with gore and he remembered Derrewyn's prophecy that the stones of the new temple at Ratharryn would steam with blood. She was wrong, he told himself, wrong.

The first curls of smoke were writhing from the thatch in the settlement where Camaban's warriors, having fetched what valuables they could from within the huts, were hurling firebrands onto the roofs. While their huts were thus destroyed, the surviving folk of the defeated tribe sought sanctuary in the great shrine. It was there that Saban found Camaban. He was alone on the summit ridge of the huge encircling earthwork where he was systematically kicking the guardian skulls down into the ditch. 'Where have you been?' he demanded.

'Looking for Derrewyn,' Saban said.

'You found her?'

'No,' Saban said.

'She's probably dead,' Camaban said vengefully. 'I pray she is. But I still want to piss on the bitch's corpse.' He kicked a wolf's skull down to the ditch bottom. There was blood on his long hair and on the bones tied to its braids, but it was not his own blood. The bronze sword, which hung from a loop on his belt, was thick with blood. 'I hope Rallin's children have been found by now,' he went on, 'because I want them dead.'

'They're no danger to us,' Saban protested.

'They're Rallin's family and I want them all killed. And Derrewyn's bitch-child with them.' He kicked another skull off the embankment. 'Calls herself a sorceress! Ha! See where her sorcery has left her tribe!' He grinned suddenly. 'I like war.'

'I hate it.'

'That's because you're no good at it, but it isn't difficult. Gundur wanted to retreat because he hadn't thought about the problem, but I knew Rallin would lead with his best men so it was easy enough to lay a trap for them and, to give Gundur his due, he did see how it could work. Gundur fought well. Did you fight well?'

'I killed one man,' Saban said.

'Only one?' Camaban asked, amused. 'I used to be so envious of you when I was a child. You were like Lengar, tall and strong, and I thought you'd be a warrior and I would always be a cripple. But it's the cripple who has conquered Cathallo. Not Lengar, not you, but me!' He laughed, proud of his day's work, then turned to stare at the crowd of Cathallo's people who had gathered about Sannas's old hut. 'Time to frighten them, I think,' Camaban said, and he walked back to the causeway and then into the temple's centre. Less than a dozen of Ratharryn's spearmen had come into the shrine, so Camaban was virtually unguarded, but he showed no fear as he walked to the very centre of the temple, into the space between the twin stone circles that were girdled by the greater ring of boulders, and there he raised his arms to the sky and held them aloft until the frightened crowd had quietened. 'You know me!' he shouted, 'I am Camaban! Camaban the crooked child! Camaban the cripple! Camaban of Ratharryn! And I am now Camaban, chief of Cathallo. Does anyone dispute that?' He stared at the crowd. There were at least two score of men there, most of them still armed, but none of them moved.

'I am more than Camaban,' Camaban shouted, 'for I came here in the night many years ago and I took the soul of Sannas with her last breath! I, Camaban, have Sannas inside me. I am Sannas! I am Sannas!' He screamed this claim, and then, suddenly, began chanting in Sannas's old voice, her exact voice, ancient and dry like old bones, so that if Saban closed his eyes it was as if the old sorceress were still alive. 'I am Sannas come back to earth, come to save you from punishment!' And he began to writhe and dance, to leap and twist, yelping desperately as though the old woman's soul struggled against his own spirit, and the display made terrified children hide their faces in their mothers' clothes. 'I am Sannas!' Camaban screamed. 'And Slaol has conquered me! Slaol has taken me! Slaol has lain between my thighs and I am full with him! But I will fight for you!' He screamed again, and thrashed his head so that his long bloody hair whipped up and down. 'You must obey, you must obey,' he said, still in Sannas's voice.