Axl noted all this with a sense of admiration for the soldier’s strategic skill, as well as dismay at its implications. There had been a time when Axl, too, had once nudged his horse forward, in another small but subtly vital manoeuvre, bringing himself in line with a fellow rider. What had he been doing that day? The two of them, he and the other rider, had been waiting on horseback, staring out across a vast grey moor. Until that moment his companion’s horse had been in front, for Axl remembered its tail flicking and swaying before him, and wondering how much of this action was due to the animal’s reflexes, and how much to the fierce wind sweeping across the empty land.
Axl pushed these puzzling thoughts away as he struggled to his feet, then helped up his wife. Sir Gawain remained seated, apparently stuck to the foot of the oak, glowering at the newcomer. Then he said quietly to Axclass="underline" “Sir, help me rise.”
It took both Axl and Beatrice, one on each arm, to bring the old knight to his feet, but when finally he straightened to his full height in his armour and pulled back his shoulders, he was an impressive sight. But Sir Gawain seemed content to stare moodily at the soldier, and eventually it was Axl who spoke.
“Why do you come upon us like this, sir, and we but simple wayfarers? Do you not remember how you quizzed us not an hour before by the waterfall?”
“I recall you well, uncle,” the grey-haired soldier said. “Though when we last met a strange spell had fallen on us guarding the bridge that we forgot our very purpose being there. Only now, my post relieved and riding to our camp, it all suddenly returns to me. Then I thought of you, uncle, and your party slipping past, and turned my horse to hurry after you. Boy! Don’t wander, I say! Remain beside your idiot brother!”
Edwin sulkily returned to Wistan’s side and looked enquiringly at the warrior. The latter was still giggling quietly, a line of saliva spilling from one corner of his mouth. His eyes were roaming wildly, but Axl guessed the warrior was in fact taking careful measure of the distance to his own horse, and the proximity of his opponent, and in all probability coming to the same conclusions as Axl’s.
“Sir Gawain,” Axl whispered. “If there’s to be trouble now, I beg you assist me to defend my good wife here.”
“I’ll do so on my honour, sir. Rest assured of it.”
Axl nodded gratefully, but now the grey-haired soldier was dismounting. Again Axl found himself admiring the skilful way he did this, so that when finally he stood to face Wistan and the boy, he was once more at exactly the correct distance and angle to them; his sword, moreover, was carried so as not to exhaust his arm, while his horse shielded him from any unexpected assault from the rear.
“I’ll tell you what slipped our mind when we last met, uncle. We’d just received word of a Saxon warrior left a nearby village bringing with him a wounded lad.” The soldier nodded at Edwin. “A lad the age of that one there. Now, uncle, I don’t know what you and the good woman here are to this matter. I seek only this Saxon and his lad. Speak frankly and no harm will visit you.”
“There’s no warrior here, sir. And we’ve no quarrel with you, nor with Lord Brennus who I suppose to be your master.”
“Do you know what you speak of, uncle? Lend a mask to our enemies and you’ll answer to us, whatever your years. Who are these you travel with, this mute and this lad?”
“As I said before, sir, they’re given to us by debtors, in place of corn and tin. They’ll work a year to pay their family’s debt.”
“Sure you’re not mistaken, uncle?”
“I know not whom you seek, sir, but it wouldn’t be these poor Saxons. And while you spend your time with us, your enemies move freely elsewhere.”
The soldier gave this consideration — Axl’s voice had carried unexpected authority — uncertainty entering his manner. “Sir Gawain,” he asked. “What do you know of these people?”
“They chanced on us as Horace and I rested here. I believe them to be simple creatures.”
The soldier once more scrutinised Wistan’s features. “A mute fool, is it?” He took two steps forward and raised the sword so the point was aimed at Wistan’s throat. “But he surely fears death like the rest of us.”
Axl saw that for the first time the soldier had made an error. He had come too close to his opponent, and although it would be a hideous risk, it was now conceivable for Wistan to move very suddenly and seize the arm holding the sword before it could strike. Wistan, however, went on giggling, then smiled foolishly at Edwin beside him. This latest action, however, seemed to arouse Sir Gawain’s anger.
“They may be strangers to me only an hour ago, sir,” he boomed. “But I’ll not see them treated with rudeness.”
“This doesn’t concern you, Sir Gawain. I would ask you to remain silent.”
“Do you dare speak to a knight of Arthur that way, sir?”
“Can it be possible,” the soldier said, completely ignoring Sir Gawain, “this idiot here is a warrior disguised? With no weapon about him, it makes little difference. Mine’s a blade sharp enough whichever he may be.”
“How dare he!” Sir Gawain muttered to himself.
The grey-haired soldier, perhaps suddenly realising his error, took two paces back till he was exactly where he had been before, and lowered the sword to waist height. “Boy,” he said. “Step forward to me.”
“He speaks only the Saxon tongue, sir, and a shy boy too,” Axl said.
“He needn’t speak, uncle. Only raise his shirt and we’ll know if he’s the one left the village with the warrior. Boy, a step closer to me.”
As Edwin came nearer the soldier reached out with his free hand. A tussle ensued as Edwin tried to fight him off, but the shirt was soon dragged up the boy’s torso, and Axl saw, a little way below the ribs, a swollen patch of skin encircled by tiny dots of dried blood. On either side of him, Beatrice and Gawain were now leaning forward to see better, but the soldier himself, reluctant to take his gaze off Wistan, did not glance at the wound for some time. When finally he did so, he was obliged to make a swift turn of his head, and at that very moment, Edwin produced a piercing, high-pitched noise — not a scream exactly, but something that reminded Axl of a forlorn fox. The soldier was for an instant distracted by it, and Edwin seized the chance to break from his grasp. Only then did Axl realise the noise was coming not from the boy, but from Wistan; and that in response, the warrior’s mare, until then languidly munching the ground, had suddenly turned and was charging straight for them.
The soldier’s own horse had made a panicked motion behind him, causing him further confusion, and by the time he had recovered, Wistan had gone clear of the sword’s reach. The mare kept coming at daunting speed, and Wistan, feinting one way, then moving the other, produced another shrill call. The mare slowed to a canter, bringing herself between Wistan and his opponent, enabling the warrior, in an almost leisurely manner, to take up a position several strides from the oak. The mare turned again, moving smartly in pursuit of her master. Axl supposed Wistan’s intention was to mount the animal as she came past, for the warrior was now waiting, both arms poised in the air. Axl even saw him reach towards the saddle just before the mare momentarily obscured him from view. But then the horse cantered on riderless towards the spot where so recently she had been enjoying the grass. Wistan had remained standing quite still, but now with a sword in his hand.