There were stones in plenty to pile over him for a barrow, and we cut sods with our daggers to turf it over. By the end of summer the bracken and foxgloves and young grasses would have grown right over and shrouded him. So we left him.

As we went downhill again past the cave I thought of the last time I had gone this way. I had been weeping then, I remembered, for Cerdic’s death, for my mother’s loss and Galapas, for who knew what foreknowledge of the future? You will see me again, he had said, I promise you that. Well, I had seen him. And some day, no doubt, his other promise would come true in its own fashion.

I shivered, caught Cadal’s quick look, and spoke curtly. “I hope you had the sense to bring a flask with you. I need a drink.”

CHAPTER FOUR

CHAPTER FOUR

CADAL had brought more than a flask with him, he had brought food—salt mutton and bread, and last season’s olives in a bottle with their own oil. We sat in the lee of the wood and ate, while the cob grazed near us, and below in the distance the placid curves of the river glimmered through the April green of the fields and the young wooded hills. The mist had cleared, and it was a beautiful day.

“Well,” said Cadal at length, “what’s to do?”

“We go to see my mother. If she’s still there, of course.” Then, with a savagery that broke through me so suddenly that I had hardly known it was there: “By Mithras, I’d give a lot to know who did that up yonder!”

“Why, who could it be except Vortigern?”

“Vortimer, Pascentius, anyone. When a man’s wise and gentle and good,” I added bitterly, “it seems to me that any man’s, every man’s hand is against him. Galapas could have been murdered by an outlaw for food, or a herdsman for shelter, or a passing soldier for a drink of water.”

“That was no murder.”

“What, then?”

“I meant, that was done by more than one. Men in a pack are worse than lone ones. At a guess, it was Vortigern’s men, on their way up from the town.”

“You’re probably right. I shall find out.”

“You think you’ll get to see your mother?”

“I can try.”

“Did he—have you any messages for her?” It was, I suppose, the measure of my relationship with Cadal that he dared to ask the question.