"My lord:" he began apologetically, but Duncan had already stepped forward, seizing his hand to steady him. Gilan heard Halt's introduction.
"Ranger Gilan, my lord, attached to Meric Fief. With messages from Celtica."
Suddenly, the King was galvanized with interest. "Celtica?" he repeated, studying Gilan more closely. "What's happening there?"
The other Council members had moved from the sand map to group around Gilan. Baron Arald spoke: "Gilan was carrying your messages to King Swyddned, my lord," he said. "Invoking our mutual defense treaty and requesting that Swyddned send troops to join us-"
"They won't be coming," Gilan interrupted. He realized he had to tell the King his news before he collapsed from exhaustion. "Morgarath has them bottled up on the southwest peninsula."
There was a stunned silence in the Council tent. Finally, it was Gilan's father who broke it. "Morgarath?" he said, incredulously. "How? How could he get any sort of army into Celtica?"
Gilan shook his head, suppressing a huge need to yawn. "They sent small numbers down the cliffs, until they had enough troops to catch the Celts by surprise. As you know, Swyddned keeps only a small standing army:"
Baron Arald nodded, anger showing on his face. "I warned Swyddned, my lord," he put in. "But those damned Celts have always been more interested in digging than protecting their own land."
Duncan made a small, pacifying gesture with one hand. "No time now for recriminations, Arald," he said softly. "What's done is done, I'm afraid."
"I should imagine Morgarath has been watching them for years, waiting for their greed to overcome their good sense," Baron Tyler said bitterly. The other men nodded quietly. Morgarath's ability to maintain a network of spies was all too well known to them.
"So Celtica has been defeated by Morgarath? Is this what you're telling us?" Duncan asked. This time, as Gilan shook his head, there were relieved glances around the tent.
"The Celts are holding out in the southwest, my lord. They're not defeated yet. But the strange business of it all is that Wargal raiding parties have been carrying off the Celt miners."
"What?" This time it was Crowley who interrupted. "What earthly use has Morgarath for miners?"
Gilan shrugged in reply. "I've no idea, sir," he told his chief. "But I thought I'd better get here with the news of it as soon as possible."
"You saw this happening, then, Gilan?" Halt asked, frowning darkly as he puzzled over what the young Ranger had just told them.
"Not exactly," Gilan admitted. "We saw the empty mining towns and the deserted border posts. We were heading deeper into Celtica when we met a young girl who told us about the raids."
"A young girl?" the King said. "A Celt?"
"No, my lord. She was Araluen. A lady's maid whose mistress was visiting Swyddned's court. Unfortunately, they ran into a Wargal war party. Evanlyn was the only one to escape."
"Evanlyn?" Duncan said, his voice the merest whisper. The others turned to him as he spoke and were startled. The King's face had turned a chalky white and his eyes were wide with horror.
"That was her name, my lord," said Gilan, puzzled by the King's reaction. But Duncan wasn't listening. He had turned away and moved blindly to a canvas chair set by his small reading table. He dropped into the chair, his head sunk in his hands. The members of his War Council moved toward him, alarmed at his reaction.
"My lord," said Sir David of Caraway. "What is it?"
Duncan slowly raised his eyes to meet the Battlemaster's.
"Evanlyn:" he said, his voice breaking with emotion. "Evanlyn was my daughter's maid."
23
T HERE WAS NO TIME TO PUT THE PLAN INTO ACTION THAT night-dawn was less than an hour away. At one stage, Will had suggested that Horace and Evanlyn should leave him behind to burn the bridge, while they rode to take the news to Araluen. But Horace had refused.
"If we go now, we won't know if you've succeeded or not, so what do we tell the King? There might be a bridge or there might not be?" he said, in another example of the solid common sense that had become part of his thinking. "And besides, destroying a bridge this size might be a little more than you can manage alone-even a famous Ranger like yourself."
He smiled as he said the last words, to let Will know he meant no insult. Will conceded the point. Secretly, he was glad they would be with him. He shared Horace's doubt that he might not be able to handle the task alone.
They slept fitfully until dawn, finally woken by the sounds of shouting and whips as the Wargals drove the miners back to their task of finishing the bridge. Throughout the day, they watched with alarm as the completed footway crept closer and closer to the side of the ravine where they lay hidden. With a sinking feeling, Will realized that the estimate given them by the dying miner was not to be relied upon. Perhaps the extra numbers of slaves were the reason, but it was obvious that the bridge would be all but completed by the end of the following day.
"We'll have to do it tonight."
He breathed the words in Evanlyn's ear. The two of them lay prone on the rocks, overlooking the building site. Horace was a few meters away, dozing quietly in the cold morning sun. The girl shifted her position so that her mouth was closer to his ear and whispered back.
"I've been thinking, how will we get this fire started? There's barely enough wood around here for a decent campfire."
The same question had been taxing Will's brain throughout the night. Then the answer had come to him. He smiled quietly as he watched a group of Celt miners hammering pine boards onto the bridge framework to form the roadway.
"There's plenty of good firewood here," he replied. "If you know where to look for it."
Evanlyn glanced at him, puzzled, then followed the line of his gaze. The frown on her forehead disappeared and she smiled slowly.
As dusk fell, the Wargals herded their weary, starving slaves back from the bridge and into the tunnel. Will noticed that by the end of the afternoon, the work of enlarging the tunnel seemed to have been completed. They waited an hour longer, until full darkness. During that time, there had been no sign of any activity from the tunnel. Now that they knew to look for it, they could see the loom of the firelight from the valley at the other end of the tunnel, reflecting on the low, scudding clouds.
"I hope it doesn't rain," said Horace suddenly. "That'd ruin our idea all right."
Will stopped in his tracks and looked up at him quickly. That unpleasant thought hadn't occurred to him. "It isn't going to rain," he said firmly, and hoped he was right. He continued on then, leading Tug gently to the unfinished end of the bridge. The little horse stopped there, ears pricked and nostrils twitching to the scents of the night air.
"Alert," said Will softly to the horse, the command word that told him to give warning if he sensed approaching danger. Tug tossed his head once, signifying that he understood. Then Will led the way across the uncompleted section of the bridge, stepping lightly as he crossed the narrow beams above the dizzying drop. Horace and Evanlyn followed, more carefully, with Horace heaving a sigh of relief when they reached the point where the planking began. He noted that compared to the previous night, there was much shorter distance to traverse before reaching the completed section. He realized that Will was right. Another day would see the bridge finished and ready for use.
Will unslung his bow and quiver and laid them on the planking. Then he drew his saxe knife from its scabbard and, dropping to his knees, began to pry up one of the nearest planks from the bridge walkway. The wood was soft pine, roughly sawn, and perfect firewood. Horace drew his dagger and began prying up the planks in the next row. As they loosened them, Evanlyn moved them to one side, stacking them in a pile. When she had six planks, each over a meter long, she gathered them up and ran lightly to the far side of the bridge, stacking them on the far bank of the Fissure, close to where the massive, tarred cables were fastened to wooden pylons. By the time she returned, Will and Horace were well on the way to removing another six. These she took to the other cable. Will had explained his plan to them earlier in the day. To make sure there was no remaining structure on the far side, they would need to burn through both cables and pylons at that end, letting the bridge fall into the depths of the Fissure. The Wargals might be able to span the Fissure with a small, temporary rope affair, but nothing substantial enough to permit large numbers of troops to cross in a short time.