The pain in my hand was cruel, the worst of all; I heard rather than felt the small bones grind where their ends were broken. I felt myself lurching as I got to my knees, and dared not try to stand upright so near the cliff’s edge. Below me a master wave struck, thundered, fountained up into the greying light, then fell back to crash into the next rising wave. The cliff trembled. A sea-bird, the first of the day, sailed overhead, crying.

I crawled away from the edge and then stood up.

Brithael was lying near the postern gate, on his belly, as if he had been trying to crawl there. Behind him on the turf was a wake of blood, glossy on the grass like the track of a snail. He was dead. That last desperate stroke had caught the big vein in the groin, and the life had pumped out of him as he tried to crawl for help. Some of the blood that soaked me must be his.

I went on my knees beside him and made sure. Then I rolled him over and over till the slope took him, and he went after his sword into the sea. The blood would have to take care of itself. It was raining again, and with luck the blood would be gone before anyone saw it.

The postern gate stood open still. I reached it somehow and stood, supporting myself with a shoulder against the jamb. There was blood in my eyes, too. I wiped it away with a wet sleeve.

Ralf had gone. The porter also. The torch had burnt low in its socket and the smoky light showed the lodge and stairway empty. The castle was quiet. At the top of the stairway the door stood partly open, and I saw light there and heard voices. Quiet voices, urgent but unalarmed. Uther’s party must still be in control; there had been no alarm given.

I shivered in the dawn chill. Somewhere, unheeded, the cloak had dropped from my arm. I didn’t trouble to look for it. I let go of the gate and tried standing upright without support. I could do it. I started to make my way down the path towards the bay.

CHAPTER TEN

CHAPTER TEN