We were eighty-four men and Mordred brought over a hundred to attack us, but when they saw our shield wall formed and ready, they stopped. Some of Mordred’s horsemen spurred into the shallows of the sea-lake, hoping to ride about our flank, but the water deepened swiftly where the channel ran close beside the southern shore and they found they could not ride around us; so they slid out of their saddles and carried their shields and spears to join Mordred’s long wall. I looked up to see that the sun was at last sliding down towards the high western hills. Prydwen was almost afloat, though men were still busy in her rigging. It would not be long, I thought, before Caddwg came, but already there were more enemy spearmen straggling down the western road. Mordred’s forces grew stronger, and we could only grow weaker.

Fergal, his beard woven with fox fur and hung with small bones, came to the sand in front of our shield wall and there he hopped on one leg, held one hand in the air and kept one eye closed. He cursed our souls, promising them to the fire-worm of Crom Dubh and to the wolfpack that hunts Eryri’s Pass of Arrows. Our women would be given as playthings to the demons of Annwn and our children would be nailed to the oaks of Arddu. He cursed our spears and our swords, and threw an enchantment to shatter our shields and turn our bowels to water. He screamed his spells, promising that for food in the Otherworld we would have to scavenge the droppings of the hounds of Arawn and that for water we would lick the bile of Cefydd’s serpents. ‘Your eyes will be blood,’ he crooned, ‘your bellies shall be filled with worms, and your tongues will turn black! You will watch the rape of your women and the murder of your children!’ He called some of us by name, threatening torments unimaginable, and to counter his spells we sang the War Song of Beli Mawr.

From that day to this I have not heard that song sung again by warriors, and never did I hear it better sung than on that sea-wrapped stretch of sun-warmed sand. We were few, but we were the best warriors Arthur ever commanded. There were only one or two young men in that shield wall; the rest of us were seasoned, hardened men who had been through battle and smelt the slaughter and knew how to kill. We were the lords of war. There was not a weak man there, not a single man who could not be trusted to protect his neighbour, and not a man whose courage would break, and how we sang that day! We drowned Fergal’s curses, and the strong sound of our voices must have carried across the water to where our women waited on Prydwen. We sang to Beli Mawr who had harnessed the wind to his chariot, whose spear shaft was a tree and whose sword slaughtered the enemy like a reaping hook cutting thistles. We sang of his victims scattered dead in the wheatfields and rejoiced for the widows made by his anger. We sang that his boots were like millstones, his shield an iron cliff and his helmet’s plume tall enough to scrape the stars. We sang tears into our eyes and fear into our enemy’s hearts.