Hawk of May Read Online Free PDF Page B

face in her neck, saying her name in a hoarse whisper. I saw her face over his shoulder, the still, cold disgust in her eyes mixed with a strange pride in her power.
    â€œWelcome home, my lord,” she murmured, disengaging herself. “We are glad to see you home unharmed.”
    Lot nodded, muttered, and looked towards the Hall and his chambers there.
    â€œAnd where is Agravain, my son?” she asked, softly.
    Lot recollected himself, took one arm from about her and turned to the warband, which was now pouring through the gate, talking and laughing with the gladness of coming home. “Agravain!” he shouted.
    A blond head jerked up, and Agravain rode across to Lot. He was a little older, a little taller, much dirtier, and looked more like Lot, but I recognized at once that he was not much changed. He slid off his horse, smiling widely, delighted to be back.
    â€œGreetings, Mother,” he said.
    â€œA thousand welcomes,” said Morgawse. “There is a feast tonight for the both of you…but you will want to rest now.To sleep, my lord.” She smiled at Lot.
    My father grinned, took her arm and hurried off.
    Agravain watched them go, then turned to Medraut and me. “Well,” he said, then grinned hugely. “By the sun and the wind, it’s good to see you again!” and he hugged both of us hard. “What a summer!”
    â€œI canget you some ale if you want to come into the Hall and talk,” I suggested, glad—in spite of everything, very glad—to have him home.
    â€œA marvellous idea!” said Agravain. “Especially the ale.” He looked at Medraut, rumpled his hair. “Gwalchmai, I swear our brother’s grown inches since last I saw him. Even you’ve grown.”
    â€œYou too.”
    â€œHave I?” he asked delightedly. “That’s wonderful! When I’m tall enough Father will give me a mail-coat. He promised.”
    We walked over to the feast Hall, where I got him some ale and asked him about the war. He was near to bursting from eagerness to tell someone and told us for an hour and a half.
    He had not, it seemed, actually fought as a warrior, but he had ridden in the middle of the warband, and in the great battle had thrown spears at the enemy.
    â€œI think one of them may have hit someone,” he said hopefully. “But, of course, we couldn’t go back to see whether it had. We barely escaped alive at all!”
    His manner was a little different from what it had been when he left. His energy, always overflowing, had found a channel. He enjoyed being a warrior. He had copied the speech and mannerisms of the older warriors so as to fit into their society. But underneath it I could tell he was exactly the same.
    He was overjoyed to be back. The last months of the war had been especially unpleasant. A major blood feud had almost begun between two of Lot’s under-kings, and at one point there had been a threat of war with Gododdin as the warbands tried to ease their tension by sneering at foreigners. The peace and familiarity of home seemed, after this, marvelously attractive.
    After talking himself out, Agravain yawned and decided to go to sleep. He stayed in the Hall to rest since he was officially a warrior, and I didn’t see him till late the next day.
    Lot, after settling himself and the warband back into Dun Fionn, began to work towards the next season’s war. It would plainly be a war lasting several years, and such enterprises are costly. The plunder taken that summer would not pay for even the fighting that had acquired it, let alone buy new weapons, and the harvest had been a bad one. My father increased the amount of tribute he demanded from his subject kings by as much as he dared; the subject kings raised the taxes on their people; and the people grumbled. There had not been a war on this scale for nineteen years, and no one was used to it.
    For a little while Agravain tried to help our