The Winter Prince (The Lion Hunters:01)(13)

“No one spoke of evil,” I said lightly. “Only of mystery, and darkness.”

“Like the mines,” Lleu said slowly, understanding. “This is real, but it doesn’t threaten you. You don’t have to come here. Father holds back the real evil—the pirates and invaders from the sea, the painted people from the north—treats with them and keeps them at ease.”

“It’s no easy thing to treat with the Sea Wolves,” I said.

Goewin added thoughtfully, “You have to—you have to be able to imagine what they are thinking. It’s not like feeding hounds and having them be loyal to you. Hounds don’t plan; they don’t think.”

“But the Saxons think wrong,” Lleu said.

“Only according to you!” Goewin laughed. “The raiders from the w mis from arships may be evil, but not all Saxons are evil, certainly not those who have settled here in peace. You can’t just dismiss them all. And not all your own folk are good, either. What will you do if a treaty is broken? What will you do if you find treachery within?”

Lleu laughed also. “When I find treachery within I’ll call on you, suspicious one. I can continue Father’s defense.”

“But it isn’t just a matter of defense!” Goewin pressed. “You have to be able to change, to know whether to attack or to organize new treaties yourself, even if you’re not sure they’ll work—you have to stand your ground but be fair to your enemy at the same time. That’s what Father really does. You have to learn to take risks.”

In fierce rapture, I watched their faces as the twins worked their way through the last argument. “Have you thought long on the government of a kingdom, Goewin?” I asked. Oh, she of all of us has always and only been the true child of the high king: Artos the Dragon and Artos the Bear, forbidding and forgiving, who holds a few tottering and assaulted peoples together as a single, peaceful kingdom.





We turned back. We broke into sunlight again, and began the journey home across that broad, bright country.





IV


The Bright One




IN THE MIDST OF that mild summer Lleu learned to use a sword. Bedwyr, whom Artos calls most trusted of advisers and best of friends, took over Lleu’s training in swordsmanship even before I had taken the splints from Lleu’s arm. Bedwyr had lost his left hand in one of the high king’s early battles, but despite this remained the most accomplished swordsman I had ever known. When Lleu’s broken arm kept him from his usual swordplay Bedwyr suddenly noticed him, and appointed himself Lleu’s tutor. At first he and Lleu did not practice with weapons; to watch them you would think that Lleu was learning some kind of tight, dangerous dance. The two of them spent their afternoons dodging and circling each other. When Lleu’s arm was sound enough to bear some occasional battering, Bedwyr bound it to Lleu’s side to keep it steady and they began using wooden swords.

Lleu’s fledgling talent was so startling that at first they did not dare to speak of it. Bedwyr, whose blunt and heavy countenance rarely breaks out of its frown, is not one to be lavish with praise; but I heard him once growl at Artos, “I don’t know what made you think Caius can teach your son to use a sword. Lleu can’t hack things down by sheer force, he’s too light. But you watch. He’s a rare one. In a year he’ll be able to disarm you.” In time Lleu’s arm was whole again; together he and Bedwyr made it almost as strong and capable as the right, until Lleu could manage a sword with either hand. He improved rapidly as a young deer might grow, and he began to develop a skill that we could all see was nearly as deadly as his master’s. Lleu danced. He was too quick to catch, and too agile to hold. I do not think it was more to him then than a dance, a game; the swords he used were only of wood, or dull. But his excitement in the swordplay kindled to precision, speed, a sapling strength in his arms and back. I had thought him the slight one, the fragile one: his skill was frightening.

I thought I was content. At long last I could hunt again; I had not brought down anything larger than a rabbit in over a year, and now we hunted wolf, deer, and boar for their hides and the winter’s meat. The cordhallenge and chase were exhilarating. Parties of us spent days at a time on foot with spears in the vast forest south of Camlan, and then we would bring back four or five large kills at once. But best I liked to ride out alone, or in small parties of two and three, and to hunt with the bow.

The harvest was not bountiful, but sufficient. That in itself was reason to celebrate, and we set beacons flaming across the land in thanksgiving. There were bonfires on the Edge over Elder Field to the west and on Shining Ridge to the east, and we danced between these at Camlan, the heart of all the lights. Lleu had been absorbed for weeks with a group of traveling jugglers and tumblers who had assisted in the reaping and storing of grain. He had never forgotten the few somersaults and handsprings taught him as a child; he was now graceful and supple as he had been then, but stronger. The performers were enamored of him, and on the harvest night they masked him in copper and amber as his namesake, Lleu Llaw Gyffes, the Lord of the Sun. They made him tumble as they had taught him, tossed him and caught him, and called him “prince of acrobats” and “prince of dancers.”