THE SHIELD OF LOCKSLEY

Prologue: (part one) IN THE BEGINNING

Hakon Harroldson

              PROLOGUE

            I

      IN THE BEGINNING

Locksley watched as the first of the flaming arrows streaked across the night sky; they were trailing smoke and hissing in the heavy rain. But flaming nonetheless, he told himself. He pressed up against the thick wall of the palisade, his large eyes franticly searching for a place to hide — any place where this nightmare might dissolve into itself and slip away. He jumped at the sound of an arrow hitting the wall behind him, and ran back across the muddy yard without thinking of where he was going. He slipped, fell, and picked himself back up, ignoring the mud he felt seeping through his clothes. All he knew was that he had to get away. He could see the structured silhouette of the Castle his father had been building on the crest of the hill. Invermere. The flames inside looked like a beacon standing at a distance.

He looked over his shoulder, back at where he’d come from. It’s only a matter of time before the wooden walls become a curtain of flames, he thought, his breath coming in a grunting pant as he coughed through the smoke. He watched in terror as another flight of arrows buried themselves deep inside the thatched roofs of the small huts stacked against the wall — most of the huts recently built and using the inside walls of the palisade. He watched the huts began smouldering. It wouldn’t be long before they burst into flames as well; he knew he’d have to find another place to hide.

He could hear voices crying out in the cold night as panic swept across the fort’s open yard. Soldiers — who just moments before were farmers seeking shelter from the invaders — were now running to the ramparts as arrows laced through the darkness. Old men and women were lumbering about, filling wooden buckets with water in a vain attempt to put out the numerous fires. Shadows leaped and jumped in the growing light of the flames — they were long, graceless caricatures of the men and women tossing water on the flames — and were splashed against the rough timbers of the walls about them. The smoke grew, threatening and thickening, until it was billowing and folding in on itself. Several of the fort’s citizens had already fallen under its deadly spell.

A singular bell was ringing out the alarm as the desperate men and women attacked the flames with their buckets.

The wooden palisade, with its tar-soaked logs, was quick to ignite. The logs used to build it were as thick as a man was wide, and it would take hours before they fell, but fall they would. Men screamed as they burned, and the night air grew heavy with choking smoke hanging about the bailey like a fog — mixing with the sweet stench of burning flesh. Locksley could feel the sting of smoke in his eyes as he made his way up the stairs to the ramparts.

As he reached the ramparts, he could see the silhouette of four huge siege engines inching their way across a now desolate landscape. They were huge monstrosities that seemed to lumber on with the uncertainty of a toddler’s first steps. Standing on his toes, he looked out over the flames licking at the walls, when the battering ram began punching at the weary walls with a determined ferocity.

A thousand thousand sparks and cinders danced inside of each echo of the ram’s pounding resolutions. The hides and timbers covering the battering ram seemed to glisten with the stains of battle under the light of the growing flames. He watched as three full cauldrons of boiling fat were spilled out over the timbered walls. Someone threw a torch down hoping to ignite it. Another cauldron was moved into place, a torch thrown into it as it was tipped. Locksley stood transfixed as the fat streaked like a flaming waterfall down the wooden walls. It touched the pools of fat from the first of the three cauldrons, igniting the muddy ground. The night came alive with the sound of men’s screams, but still, there was the dull continuous echo of the battering ram. The walls shaking as the massive logs groaned.

One…two…three…WHOMP! One…two…three…WHOMP!

Locksley felt a hand on his thin shoulder as Galen dragged him out of the way. Another wave of arrows slivered through the night. The old man pulled him behind the merlon—a wooden structure that was once a large tree, now serving as part of the parapet. Arrows punched the massive logs, sounding like hail on a wooden shield. They made their way back down the set of crude stairs notched into the wall, but not before Locksley saw the Saxon leader, Hakon Harroldson. The man came at the head of what looked to be a small army, the tips of his bronze beard flashing with bits of silver and brass that caught the light of the flames. The Saxons came rushing at the walls with their crude ladders — two, three, four thousand strong — their efforts hampered by the muck and havoc brought on by the rain and steaming cauldrons of liquid fat. Behind them came Lot and his sell-swords numbering at least a thousand; they were mercenaries willing to sell their services to any petty king looking for conquest — as long as they were paid. There was little honour counted among them.

“Are we going to die?” Locksley asked the old man.

“Die? Not if I have anything to say about it,” the old man replied. “Now, shut up so I can think of a way to keep us alive,” he said, dragging the boy across the muddy yard. They made their way to a narrow doorway where Galen picked up the staff he’d left leaning against the wall. He pushed the boy ahead of him as he paused to light a torch.

“How did you know where to find me?” Locksley asked, waiting, watching as the soldiers on the wall prepared to meet the enemy. He could see ladders being pushed back — each one replaced by a second, and then a third — each one smashing up against the wall as the first of the enemy attempted to breech the wall’s heights.

“I was sent to watch over you.”

“By who?” Locksley demanded. “I didn’t see you,” he added softly, his heart racing as he looked at the sturdy door, and then back at the wall.

“See me? Why would you see me? While you were busy looking to hide yourself away, I was busy preparing our way out,” the old man said as he opened the door. Locksley looked inside. It was an open pit of terror from what he could see looking into the darkness. There were steps fashioned into the rock and fading into the depths.

“How did you know I was trying to hide?”

“I didn’t have to see your face to know that you were frightened. I remember my own childhood, and Harroldson’s father,” he said. “Are you ready?”

He pushed the boy into the tunnel.

Galen followed as Locksley stumbled into the dark stairwell. Galen pulled the door closed. He dropped the iron bar into place, knowing it would be almost impossible to open the door without tearing off its iron hinges, which were on the inside as well. The door was also large, and heavy. It would give them more than enough time to reach the end of the tunnel.

“Who was Harroldson’s father?” Locksley asked, his voice sounding muffled in the closeness of the tunnel.

“Who?” Galen asked, turning around and pushing the boy aside, leading the way through the tunnel, the torch held high.

“Harroldson? Who was his father?”
“Oscapar Bluetooth.”

“You knew Bluetooth?”

“I didn’t know him! No. I was a child, much like yourself,” he said, poking the torch into the darkness ahead of them.

Locksley put a hand out and pressed it against the cold wall. Galen, looking over his shoulder, listened to the sounds of the battle fading. The torchlight leaped around them, splaying unearthly shadows against the walls. Galen grabbed Locksley by the collar of the muddy cape he was wearing, pulling the boy through the dark hallway. There were faint screams echoing through the bailey as the curtain wall crumbled, sounding like distant thunder through the confines of the descending stairwell. There was a clash of swords — the honed sounds of pain and fear, with chaos and pandemonium balanced on the keen edge of every scream. As the siege engines hit the walls, he could imagine the first of the invaders cresting the ladders and topping the battlements.

The screams seemed to fade the deeper they went inside. Galen only paused long enough to pick up a new torch, dip it in a bucket of pitch, and then ignite it with the last guttering gasps of the old one. They were moving through a darkened hallway carved into the rocks by an unknown force. The torch smoked thick and heavy, crackling in the silence around them, the flames licking the ceiling whenever Galen paused at a junction where other tunnels met.

The Dragon’s Lair they called it, a long snaking tunnel leading underground, away from the castle. Legends said that dragons burrowed underground and the strange glow along walls was the slime they left behind. Locksley couldn’t help but think how the walls were cold and damp — appearing slick in the reflection of Galen’s torch; the damp floor stinking of withered age. It made him think about the stables, and he found himself swallowing a sob as he thought of the new horse gifted to him by his father. He could only hope it had bolted into the night.

They came to a vaulted room that was ill lit by torches. It was where many of the old and infirm lay. Women and children stared at them with a sense of terror in their eyes — the terror that comes with knowing — because they knew the fate waiting for them if the castle fell. Those few who recognized Locksley as the Prince bowed their heads, while an ancient priest stood in the middle of the floor, intoning the Scriptures of the new White Christ. Locksley half expected to see his mother among the crowd, listening to the priest.

Galen passed through the vaulted chamber without a second thought, only pausing long enough to pull a knotted cord from around his neck and pushing an ancient key into a rusted gate. It gave way with the protest of age. He turned to push the gate shut and lock it, but Locksley put his hand on Galen’s and looked up at the old man with a plea in his eyes. The old man looked down at the boy, his mouth a straight line as he shook his head slowly, turning the key in the lock.

“And what’s to become of us, young Prince?” a child’s voice called out. Locksley looked up at Galen again, looking for an answer he did not have.

Galen hesitated before he unlocked and pushed the gate open once more.

“You’ll be safe here with your God to protect you,” Galen said into the silence, and Locksley wondered if that was true. He knew the price that people paid when it came to battle. Every man, woman, and child, would be put to the sword — the sell-swords would be well paid for their headcount. It was the reason his father refused to hire such men.

“Trust to God you say? Would it were so, Master Galen,” a woman said gently as she stood up, forcing a strained smile. She was holding a child’s hand as she walked toward the gate and looked at the old man. “But you go. You get the young Prince away from here, so that one day he might have his revenge.”

Galen narrowed his gaze and looked at the woman through thick brows.

“Vengeance will be a long time coming,” he said at last. “The boy’s but nine summers past.”

“And in nine more he’ll be a man,” one of the old men called out. “Time moves fast enough when you’re young, and faster still, until you die.”

“You are safe enough here. Lot and his Orkney brood will not find you.”

“Would that it were so, Master Galen,” the woman said with tears in her eyes.

“You must learn to trust in your God.”

“Do you?” she asked. “Have you put your Druid ways behind you?”

“Enough to leave the gate open so you can make your escape if you needs must,” Galen said, turning and walking with the boy in tow. The walls glistened under the light of the torch. There was a dankness in the air that was soon replaced by the smell of the sea.

*

Common soldier and defender of Ivanore Castle

“Where’s my mother?” Locksley asked.

“She’s waiting at the end of the tunnel. She refused to leave without you,” Galen said over his shoulder.

More the fool, she, he thought, holding the torch closer to the wall, looking for the carved notch he knew was there. He was looking at the three tunnels ahead of them, trying to remember which he was supposed to use. He’d studied the maps earlier, when Lot’s army had first appeared and Ambrose had sent out his envoys.

Lot sent each man’s head back in reply.

There’s supposed to be a juncture up ahead.

“And my father? Where’s the king?” Locksley asked.

Galen turned to look at the boy in the light of the torch. His face was blackened with soot from the flames and smoke. There were tracks running down his face where tears had spilled, and the old man wondered if the tracks of his tears were because of the smoke. He wondered how it was possible for an army of five thousand to lay hidden for a week, and where the rest of the army was. Lot was said to have an army three times the size. Their appearance had made it impossible to send for help — every rider had been captured, every bird hunted out of the sky.

A thousand civilians, half of them women and children, against an army of five thousand. Why would I think they might survive? he wondered.

He could have just as easily led them to safety through the tunnels, he knew. But the wounded would only slow them down. The king would not have allowed it. The Prince had to be saved above all else. Was that why he left the gate unlocked?

“He’s to be sent south, with his mother. To my brother’s lands,” Ambrose had told him.

“Where?” Galen asked.

“Inverness.”

Inverness.

It had been years since he’d been to Inverness. Standing on top of a cliff  overlooking the Ness, Inverness was a low, circular mound with a tree-clad rampart around its summit. The wide, surrounding ditch could only be crossed by using the entrance causeway. It had been nothing more than a wattle and daub village with a wooden palisade the last time he’d been there. The last place anyone would look for a Prince, he knew. He had seen a hundred such places in his travels.

He was the last of the Druids to be cast out by the White Christ. He had come to Ivanore Castle ten years gone, but had already lived a lifetime by then. He’d watched the last of the Romans take ship and had become a wanderer, always going north. He begged for food when he couldn't sell his services, but there were always calves to be brought forth, crops to bless, and fortunes to tell. The White Christ had not reached Beyond-the-Wall.

Not yet, he thought.

“Where’s my father?” Locksley asked again.

“Being a King.”

They moved along in silence, the torch sputtering as it began to die. Galen waved it once or twice and paused as he held the torch upside down, letting whatever pitch was left, melt into the flame.

“Why don’t you use your magic?” Locksley asked.

“I don’t need magic to keep a torch alight.”

“You could have used your magic against the Orkneys.”

“That’s not the kind of magic I do.”

“Then what’s the use in it?”

“I’ve asked myself the same question. Now be still. I can see the door.”

He dropped the torch and stepped on it, dousing the flame and plunging the tunnel into a Stygian darkness. They paused, Galen approaching the door and placing a hand on it. He leaned in closer, willing himself to breathe slower. He could sense something was wrong.

You do not need magic for that, either.

He could sense the heat within the door as he pressed his hand against it. His heartbeat slowed along with his breathing. The door was old — Druid old — and he could feel it in his hand as he let himself slip into it, letting himself fall through the cracks. It only took a moment before he could see outside, and then he pulled himself back, falling against the stone wall at the shock of it.

“Can you open it?” Locksley asked.

Galen looked at the boy and nodded slowly.

“Then why don’t you?”

He looked at Locksley closely, wondering how the boy would react once he learned his mother wasn’t waiting for him. He could still picture her lifeless body in his mind’s eye, her naked body violated and crucified to a tree; the dozen guards Ambrose had sent with her, dead as well.

Is that what a life is worth, or is that what the Lothian King thinks of the White Christ?

He tried to smile as he held a hand out.

“Help me up.”

Let me show you what kind of magic I can do, he thought as he reached out for the boy, touching him with his mind and feeling Locksley fall into his thin arms.

He placed his right hand against the door, and pushed, blowing the door off its hinges like a dead leaf in the wind. Bending down, he picked the boy up and carried him from the tunnel.

As he crested the hill, he allowed himself one final look at the fort. More wood than stone, Ivanore fell in on itself and the flames leapt into the night sky. He could hear the din of battle punctuated by blood-curdling screams that told him the business of slaughter was at hand, even as the bell fell silent.

The War of the Twelve Kings had begun.

The Druid wizard, Galen