It was a strange-looking sail, which belonged to none of the ships he could recognise. Nor was it one of the rough-rigged craft used by the local fishermen. This was a foreign-looking rig, with a square, red-brown sail. And as it came clear to the sight there moved behind it another. And another.

And now the ships themselves were visible, riding long and low in the water. No device on the sails; no banners at the mast; but along the thwarts rows of painted circles glinting in the shifting sunbeams. Shields.

Unmistakable, even to him who had never seen a Saxon longboat before. And where certainly no Saxon longboat had any right to be. Then suddenly, as he watched, the ships – there were five of them – turned as one, the way a flight of birds turns at some unheard and invisible signal, to make for the shore and the narrow harbourage of the bay a bare mile to the north of where he stood. Even then the watcher paused, in the very act of turning to run with the news. It was just possible that the ships, so far west of the Saxon Shore, that strip of territory granted to the Saxons long ago, and now the home of a federacy of Saxon kingdoms, it was just possible that the little fleet had been driven off course, and was seeking shelter here for repairs and fresh water. But there had been no storm recently, and – he could see details now as the ships drew nearer – the vessels showed no sign of damage, and there as witness were those shields and the thicket of spears above them. So, five Saxon longships, fully armed?

He turned and ran.

The young man’s name was Baudouin, and he was brother to March, King of Cornwall. The king had left Cornwall some three weeks previously, to seek a conference with one of the petty kings of Dyfed, and during his absence the care of the kingdom had fallen on the younger man. Though the king had, of course, gone royally attended, he had not taken with him the main body of his fighting men, so when Baudouin rode out, as he did almost daily to check the kingdom’s boundaries and visit the guard towers, he rode with an armed escort.

They were with him now. They had dismounted beyond a rocky bluff, out of the sea-wind, to rest the horses and share out the barley-cakes and thin ration wine. They were some fifteen miles from home.

Within minutes of the alarm the troop was mounted, and riding hard for the steep coomb that led down into a sheltered bay which the local fishermen used for harbour.

“How many?” It was the officer riding at Baudouin’s side. His name was Howel.

“Hard to say. Five ships, but I don’t know how many men one of their warships will take. Say forty to a ship, fifty, perhaps more?”