Unruffled, Ambrosius answered levelly, “That Would have left the Wall with nothing but a few guards. The Picts—”

“The Picts came by sea.” Vortigern sagged down onto his couch as though tired of the whole subject, “I said they would

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13

and they did. And I used sea raiders to stop them. It was bargain or deluge, fight one enemy or two. So I bargained. Now … now they say the old man’s no good anymore. Down Vitalinus, up Ambrosius. Well, I told them. I was right. I’ll write my recollections one day and remember every mother’s one of those bastards. I told them: mend a broken sword with sealing wax, don’t be surprised it breaks in half again.”

Vortigern hunched on the edge of his couch, staring into his wine cup, his train of thought lost or not worth continuing. My father cleared his throat.

“Sire, my sons wish to pay their respects.”

The old man’s head came up. He stared blearily at us. “Oh. Of course.”

Flavia led us forward. We saluted jerkily. “Artorius,” Flavia presented me. “We call him Arthur. And baby Caius. He’s our Kay.”

Vortigern gave us a weary smile. “Good lads. You’re a husky one, Arthur. What does your father have planned for you?”

“We hadn’t thought too much of it yet,” Uther said. *‘He fancies military service.”

Vortigern took a drink. “The legions? I think Ambrosius could find a place for the son of Uther Pendragon.”

I became aware of Ambrosius studying me closely. Not for years did I understand that scrutiny. “Perhaps on my own staff,” he ventured.

“Arthur’s a fine rider,” Uther volunteered with audible pride. “Thinks he’d like the alae.”

“The cavalry? Rot!” Vortigern snorted through what began as a belch. “Stay with the legions, boy, that’s where the rank is. Cavalry’s an afterthought. Socially it’s scum, no place for a man of birth. Damn, Uther, that’s OUT problem*. Not a good Briton in the lot. Iberians, Goths, Persians, Thracians, and they all smell like sick camels. Ride half naked, most of them, and a good thing. We couldn’t afford clothes. I wouldn’t send anyone to the cavalry except my first wife. Well then, young Kay, where’s your heart set?”

Unsure, Kay saluted again. Vortigern returned it gravely. “Well?”

Kay writhed. “Go with ‘torius, I guess. Sir.”

Flavia ruffled his darkish brown hair. “Kay’s tutors say he has a fine head for mathematics. That may be a good thing some day as it is.”

“Um.” The emperor seemed to forget us entirely, head droop—

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Firelord

ing, elbows on bony knees. “Ambrosius, remember what I said. Don’t trust the Council.”

Ambrosius exchanged a tolerant look with Uther. “I wouldn’t,

but we need them.*’

“Rot. Force is what you need, a force that moves fast when they’re told. Men loyal to you alone.”

“Sire, with your permission.” Flavia bent her knee slightly to him and shepherded Kay and me to the door.

“Flavia Marcella,” Vortigern called after her. He extended his hand in a fatherly blessing. “For this hospitality, we are in

your debt.”

“The Emperor of Britain graces our house,” mother returned the courtesy. “May he find his chambers adequate.”

Father asked Vortigern, “Will you return to Caerleon tomorrow or rest here?”

Vortigern sighed. “Will it make any difference? Do you know what the late emperor plans to do after tomorrow? I think I will ride west until I hear the sea breaking on some quiet beach with no one around except oysters. Then I’ll sit and watch the sun go down. It always does, you know, and I want something simple to rely on for once in my life. That should keep me busy for years. Good night, Flavia.”

That was my farewell from Vitalinus, Emperor of Britain. To me he seemed a tittle drunk and shabby next to the dignity of my father and the taut manliness of Ambrosius Aurelianus. The next day he went through the ceremony of accession, spoke too long, passed the sword to Ambrosius, shambled away to obscurity, and the world forgot him.

But that night, as I floated closer to the soft edge of sleep, I remembered his words: “Gather a force loyal to you alone. A force able to move fast when and where you need them.”

The war-horses clattered through my dreams, the flute sang softly, Merlin laughed and threw and caught the colored balls, and over the shoulder of his green cloak, I thought I glimpsed the dark Faerie girl.

And my pillow whispered to my ear: “Ave Anorius-, Imperator.” Hail Arthur, King of Britain. Mad as life and as true. The moon rode its arc toward morning and I dreamed no more.

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Even for impatient boys, the years have a way of passing. Ambrosius proved an energetic ruler. He wrangled with the tribes constantly for money, pouring what he squeezed out of them into the army. We lost no more land to the Saxons, but we gained none back.

On Uther’s death, our home went to Kay along with the magistehum of the Dobunni. I had no cause for jealousy, being old enough to understand it by then. Kay was Uther’s lawful son while 1 was begotten in the wrong bed. Beyond that, the Dobunni wanted a Pendragon loyal to them before the emperor, one who would rule from home. They saw very little of me but the hind end of my horse. I was off at the first opportunity with an appointment to Ambrosius’ military staff and a modest patrimony to supplement my positively humble pay as an officer-elect. At my side rode Bedivere, my aide, grown tall and hard as myself. He got his red hair from his mother, who was of the Belgae, and from his father the self-convinced stubbornness and loyalty that marked him all his life. Not that he always agreed with me; more often he didn’t and I’d have to argue. But once Bedivere saw a thing was common sense, he would ride into hell for it. There was one infallible trinity to his world: God, Arthur and Bedivere. My right arm would desert me before he did.

We learned the army. We ate and quartered with the officers out of minimal courtesy, carried dispatches and ran errands. Everyone outranked us, though most of the centurions were only auxiliaries who grudged as little time as possible to their duties before hurrying home. Many of them were incompetent; they mocked my seriousness.

There are two senses you shouldn’t look for in youth: proportion and humor. Bedivere and I raged privately over the laxness of what passed for an army. I grew increasingly vocal, even arrogant, as time passed. When a promotion to centurion came down from Ambrosius himself, even Bedivere noted the swelling under my helmet. It must have been infinitely galling for a veteran tribune or legate to hear a boy in new harness glibly dismiss four hundred years of a fighting force.

“In a word, Centurion—if that is possible—what do you find wrong with the imperial legions?”

“In a word, sir: top-heavy and obsolete.” - A prolonged silence which I later found to be terminal.

“You may go, Pendragon.”

Next day, I was posted to the Second Legion at Caerleon. The imperial staff had decided to blunder along without me.

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A frustrating situation: a centurion without command, still a fetching boy who’d never fought a battle. But 1 had eyes. The day of the legion was past. The forces that threatened Britain would never stand still for pitched battle. They hit our coasts in lightning raids, sailed deep inland in shallow-draft keels, struck: and got away. The legions, even if they could be coaxed from home, were not mobile enough to cope with such tactics.

But gradually, patiently, Ambrosius was remolding our remnant army. A new generation was growing up with little memory of Rome, contemptuous of its now ineffectual name, determined to preserve for themselves what country remained. Men like Geraint of Dyfneint in Cornwall, where his father Caradoc held

some minor sway.

The Dumnonii had little contact with Roman custom. This was evident in Geraint, who could not wear military gear with any consistency. At first sight he looked like a brigand interrupted halfway through the robbery of an officer: sky-blue cloak over a homespun yellow tunic and loose trousers tied at the ankle. To this was added a battered breastplate, cingutum and baldric from which hung a sword longer by a foot than my own.

Geraint’s errand to us was simple and urgent. He was one of Ambrosius’ new breed, given army status to form a squadron of horse from his own tribesmen that might eventually be built into a cohort. The men had their own land to look after, had not been paid and didn’t trust Romans anyway, and couldn’t be kept together at Neth Dun More without silver.

Nonplussed by this sunburst apparition, our legate Trajanus passed Geraint along to a tribune with instructions to find an idle centurion, issue the necessary silver, let them escort this what’s-his-name home and report on training progress. The cavalry-mad Ambrosius might be interested.

“And teach that overdressed barbarian what an officer is supposed to wear and how to salute and speak to a superior, and-—oh, just get him out of here,”

The good tribune consulted his notitia dignitatem for the most expendable officers in camp and issued the orders. We would not even have a complement of men, but Bedivere and 1 were used to being homeless now and rather liked it.

“I’ll pack us up straight after supper,” he said after bringing the colorful Geraint and our orders to my tent,

Geraint placed one foot on a stool, threw back his worn cloak and surveyed us as if he were not sure he would remain in our

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company. I waited for his salute. When it didn’t come, there was nothing for me to do but sit down and look military.

“May I ask your legion rank, Prince?”

Geraint had no tact, but an innocence to charm the harp out of an angel’s hand. “Do you know, they told me and I’ve forgot, sir.” His Cornish drawl turned sir into zor, “I’m half in, half out of the legions, you might say. Don’t like to leave home that much.”