He grinned, relaxing suddenly. “No fear of that. Come along, then. There’s a couple of rooms still habitable, and we’ll find you a bed.”

*   *   *

I was given Camlach’s room. It was draughty, and full of dust, and Cadal refused to let me use the bedding until it had lain in front of a roaring fire for a full hour. Dinias had no servant, except one slut of a girl who looked after him apparently in return for the privilege of sharing his bed. Cadal set her to carrying fuel and heating water while he took a message to the nunnery for my mother, and then went to the tavern for wine and provisions.

We ate before the fire, with Cadal serving us. We talked late, but here it is sufficient to record that I told Dinias my story—or such parts of it as he would understand. There might have been some personal satisfaction in telling him the facts of my parentage, but until I was sure of him, and the countryside was known to be clear of Vortigern’s men, I thought it better to say nothing. So I told him merely how I had gone to Brittany, and that I had become Ambrosius’ man. Dinias had heard enough already of my ‘prophecy’ in the cavern at King’s Fort to believe implicitly in Ambrosius’ coming victory, so our talk ended with his promise to ride westwards in the morning with the news, and summon what support he could for Ambrosius from the fringes of Wales. He would, I knew, have been afraid in any case to do other than keep that promise; whatever the soldiers had said about the occasion there in King’s Fort, it was enough to strike my simple cousin Dinias with the most profound awe of my powers. But even without that, I knew I could trust him in this. We talked till almost dawn, then I gave him money and said good night.

(He was gone before I woke next morning. He kept his word, and joined Ambrosius later, at York, with a few hundred men. He was honourably received, and acquitted himself well, but soon afterwards, in some minor engagement, received wounds of which he later died.)

Cadal shut the door behind him. “At least there’s a good lock and a stout bar.”

“Are you afraid of Dinias?” I asked.

“I’m afraid of everybody in this cursed town. I’ll not be happy till we’re quit of it and back with Ambrosius.”

“I doubt if you need worry now. Vortigern’s men have gone. You heard what Dinias said.”

“Aye, and I heard what you said, too.” He had stooped to pick up the blankets from beside the fire, and paused with his arms full of bedding, looking at me. “What did you mean, you’re getting your own place here ready? You’re never thinking of setting up house here?”

“Not a house, no.”