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Chapter Fourteen: Cuffs and Creeping

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Banna rode into the darkness, revelling in the bite of the wind on her face and the cold air searing her lungs. The rest of her body was warm, however, and not only due to the thick, comfortable covering of the warm skins and pelts that she wore. They were getting closer to Murchadh and the other traitors. They were getting closer to Cathalan. As she scanned the trees around her for any signs of danger, Banna smiled faintly as she imagined Fearghus' face when the two friends were finally reunited.

If Cathalan is still alive. Her smile faded away as quickly as it had come.

She squinted as the trees ahead tossed in the wind, sending a volley of small leaves and grit straight into her face. Gods, she wished this gale would die down. Her night vision was quite good, but it was damnably hard to notice any suspicious movements when everything around her was moving. She slowed Peigi to a walk as they approached a stretch of particularly thickly-clustered trees. The shadows here were deeper. Quietly, Banna slid the axe from the makeshift sheath on her back, and held it lightly in her right hand. Listening carefully, she urged Peigi forward. The little mare, to her credit, made no sound as they ventured into the menacing shade.

Dead pine needles coated the ground beneath their feet, and a resinous scent filled the air. The wind barely penetrated the trees here; the leaves and needles of the strong-limbed evergreens clinging stoically to their posts through the long winters, and creating strange glades where the light was ever dim and mossy. Pale lichens furred branches and fallen logs, and if she listened carefully, Banna could hear the sound of a faraway stream murmuring to itself. Dismounting, she led Peigi through a thick patch of ferns, dried brown and scratchy from the winter. Without the constant hissing of wind-thrashed bushes to cover her passage, the tracker winced at the horribly conspicuous crackling and crunching of the ferns as she and Peigi brushed through. The grey mare tossed her head nervously, lifting her hooves high as Banna led her through the treacherous stretch of dead bushes, watching carefully for rabbit holes. Or worse. A sheltered woodland glade such as this made a good refuge for any number of creatures, humans included. Taking a deep breath, Banna tried to relax as she let her eyes wander over her surroundings.

Crunch.

Both she and Peigi froze at the unexpected sound. Banna dropped to a fighting crouch, mentally cursing herself for bringing her grey mare this far into the glade. In the surrounding dark, Peigi's snowy-pale coat seemed to glow faintly, making her an easy target.

Crunch.

The sound came from up ahead this time, closer than it had been before. Biting her lip, Banna gripped the axe tightly and shuffled forward, still in a crouching position. She needed to get Peigi away. Taking another deep breath, Banna reached up and slapped the mare hard on the rump, wincing at the loud whap of contact. But it did the trick – Peigi, already nervous and highly-strung, was off like an arrow into the darkness with a squeal of fright. Hopefully, she'd find her way back to Grainne and the others. But that's unlikely, and you know it, thought Banna, as she shuffled forward a little more, her heart thudding wildly. The unfamiliar sturdy weight of the axe in her hand did nothing whatsoever to reassure her.

Crunch. Crunch.

Gods be good, what is making that noise? Banna thought, the hairs rising all along her arms and a frisson of panic stirring in her gut. It sounded like thick branches snapping, or bones cracking…

Crunch.

Closer now. Banna adjusted her grip on the axe carefully, wrapping her fingers around the smooth wooden haft. She needed to get back to the others, warn them not to come this way. But it was too late to get away, now. Whatever it was that was stalking forward was too close, so close that she thought she could hear it breathing. She listened hard, her eyes desperately trying to pick out any discerning clues in the darkness. Nothing.

Then, into the ominous silence, someone laughed nastily.

A shudder of horror crawled slowly over Banna's skin, the fact that she could neither see nor precisely locate the source of the laugh only intensifying her fear. The chuckle had been deep, undoubtedly that of a man, and darkly amused. Banna had hunted in the night many times, and had felt fear before dangerous prey, like the madly-charging wild boar, or a lurking pack of wolves. But this… this was different. Something – no, someone – was out there in the darkness, stalking her like an animal. Laughing. An almost primal terror began to bloom through Banna, like a drop of dye spreading in a pool of still water.

Crunch.

Banna's breath came quick and quiet, her heart thudding so hard she could feel it in her throat. Help me, she wanted to whisper, but she would not allow herself to make a sound. Help me.

The chuckle came again, a note of madness to it that rooted Banna to the spot.

Crunch.

The glade was dark, and the branches blocked out the wind, the moon, the world.

Help me. Banna pressed herself to the ground and waited, ready to spring up and swing out with the axe. The ferns crackled as someone brushed through them, coming ever closer, closer…

Crunch.

Banna held her breath, and prayed.

Oh gods, please, somebody help me.

But the glade was dark, and quiet, and she knew that she was horribly alone.

Well, almost.

Crunch.

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Mordred bit into the dreadfully stale, water-dipped bannock with a grimace of distaste. At least it's food, he reminded himself wearily as he sat alone on the damp grass, wondering when Banna would be back. She had been gone for a very long time, and he was beginning to worry. For goodness' sake, he thought sternly, I shouldn't be worrying about a Woad. But he was. And his worry was worrying him. Two worries he really did not need at this point in time, but there it was. The darkness had fallen quickly, and Banna was out there alone. And the bread in his mouth was horribly stale. Arthur was probably worried about them. Oh, gods above, Mordred groaned internally. Can I ever follow a logical thought pattern?

"She's been gone too long," said Tristran unexpectedly, sitting down beside him and peering into the distance, eyebrows drawn tightly together. Mordred jumped guiltily at the sound of the scout's voice, heat flooding his cheeks.

"Banna?" he said, swallowing, glancing at Tristran.

Tristran rolled his eyes. "No, your mother," he replied sarcastically. "Of course I'm talking about the tracker, you fool. I'd better go after her."

Mordred shook his head immediately. "No, you can't," he said without thinking, rubbing a hand over his wind-burnt face. Tristran raised an eyebrow eloquently, and their earlier conversation came flooding back. I want to keep you all safe; I want us to return to Sarmatia together. Mordred swallowed guiltily. "Listen, Tristran, about before…"

Tristran sighed under his breath. "Drop it," he said, in his usual brusque manner. "With the way you've been carrying on all afternoon, I wish I hadn't said anything."

"I was an idiot, Tristran," continued Mordred, forcing himself to look the scout in the eye unflinchingly. He deserves that much, in the very least. "And I'm sorry. I've treated you badly over all the years we've known each other, and while I don't expect you to forgive me, I…"

Tristran leaned over and cuffed him on the side of the head. Hard.

"Argh!" exclaimed Mordred in surprise, lurching sideways. He scowled accusingly at Tristran, who gave him a bland, mildly amused look before biting into a lump of…something.

"You're an idiot, Mordred," he said through his mouthful, wiping his beard. "Don't see why I didn't think to hit you earlier. Would have saved me all those hours filled with your anguished sighs." He glanced over at the second-in-command, a flicker of amusement crossing his serious face.

"Tristran, take this seriously," implored Mordred, straightening up and leaning forward. "You can't just dismiss something like…"

"I can, and I will," said Tristran firmly, taking another bite of his unidentifiable food. "I'm not dismissing it, though. You're an idiot, but you're my brother." He shrugged at Mordred's puzzled look. "Brothers forgive, eh? But never talk about Arthur like that again, understood?"

Mordred nodded, ignoring the lack of respect in Tristran's tone. It didn't matter anymore. "Yes," he replied quietly.

Tristran grunted, stretching out his legs. "Better find her, then," he said, cocking his head from one side to the other and cracking his neck. Mordred stood up quickly, checking that all his weapons were present and accounted for.

"We'll all come," he announced. "If there's any danger, at least you'll have us there to back you up."

Tristran shrugged. "Suppose so. Let's get going then, eh?" He clapped Mordred on the shoulder as he stood up, holding his lump of food in the other hand. The clap on the shoulder sent a flood of relief through Mordred, the firm companionship in it communicating a forgiveness that words could not express. It was not total forgiveness, but it was a start.

Mordred felt a surge of affection for the grumpy scout. "Tristran, I…"

"Shut up," said Tristran succinctly. "I'm trying to eat."

Mordred stifled a grin, and strode off to tell Grainne and Fearghus to get ready. As he made his way over to the two Picts, however, his worries about Banna came creeping back in once more. Things might be improving between him and Tristran, and that was a great comfort – but Banna was out there in the darkened forest. And she had been gone for far too long. As he saddled his horse beside Fearghus, the lad's face worried and pale, Mordred couldn't help but imagine all sorts of dreadful scenarios in which Banna had been hurt, or captured, or had lost her way…

Stop. Worrying.

He pursed his lips firmly in pain as he clambered up into the saddle. His side was still troubling him, and he kept forgetting to ask Tristran to fix the bindings. Not that there was time for that sort of thing, anyway. Still, the faint stain of blood seeping through his tunic was a little concerning. As they rode off once more into the darkness, sore and on the brink of exhaustion, Mordred sighed.

Well, at least Arthur and the others are safe back at the Wall, he thought, privately thanking whatever deity gave his Commander that famously sensible – if slightly idealistic – brain. I can count on him not to do anything foolhardy, such as taking off after us across Caledonia.

He grinned at the very thought. Ludicrous. Right now, they're probably sitting at the tavern drinking ale, bored out of their minds.

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"This is bloody ludicrous! We should be at the tavern right now, drinking ale!" exclaimed Lancelot, throwing his hands up in frustration.

"We'd be bored out of our minds," muttered Dagonet. "This is a much nobler use of our time."

"I don't give a fu…"

"Language, Bors," sighed Arthur.

They'd lost the trail. Again.

"Damn Tristran and his scouting skills!" exploded Gawain, picking up a pine cone and throwing it violently into the trees. "I cannot believe we've lost them yet again. Just when we think we're about to catch up with them, Curly there decides that we're following the wrong trail."

"It was too narrow, it didn't look like…"

"Go home! The tavern wenches are the only ones who even vaguely appreciate your existence, you pathetic…"

"Gawain, you're being a bit harsh," cut in Galahad bravely. Gawain swung around to snap at him, but Arthur stepped in just in time.

"Men!" he growled warningly, his patience reaching breaking point. "We continue north-west, as that seems to be the direction in which Mordred and Tristran have been travelling. With luck, we'll run into them – if we keep up the pace. Get back on your horses, and let's continue." The men grumbled and muttered to themselves as they trudged back to their horses wearily, mounting up gingerly and, in Bors' case, loudly. I'm getting too old for this, thought Arthur to himself, trying to find a position in which his rear end didn't feel as though it was about to be chafed right back to the bone.

They continued into the darkness, a silent column weaving its way through the tree-crowded forest. The sky above them slowly filled with stars, glittering brightly in the sudden absence of cloud and mist. Arthur watched their surroundings as carefully as possible, but after so many hours of riding, even he was close to exhaustion. The only positive thing he could find about the thick blanket of fatigue that had settled over him and his Knights was that it seemed to have stopped the bickering. For now. The trees soon became more densely packed together, and the Sarmatians and their Commander were constantly whipped and snapped by small twigs and branches. Their horses made their way forward uncertainly, tossing their heads and snorting at the small unexpected sounds of the night forest. Arthur too was listening carefully, but after spending his entire life in the glens and woods that covered the island of Britannia, he was used to the noises made by passing animals, and the lonely creaking of the trees in the wind.

Up ahead, Galahad pointed out a small stream from which they could draw some drinking water. As the Knights dismounted, pulling out their flasks and water-skins, Arthur walked off to inspect the trees ahead. A thick belt of them lay before him, densely packed with ferns and other small bushes. Undoing the laces of his bracae, Arthur gazed vacantly into the wall of foliage as he relieved himself, listening indifferently to the rustlings of some small animal making its way through the ferns. He could barely see the stars above him, now, so thick was the canopy above. As he did his laces up once more, he imagined lying on the top of the trees, watching the endless sheet of stars above his head as he drifted off to sleep peacefully, the wind soft across his body. With a fond smile, he remembered Pelagius' lessons about the stars, their names and meanings, their hidden secrets…

Arthur froze. The sound that had just issued from the trees was made by no animal.

No animal that he knew of chuckled like a man.

Dropping to a defensive crouch, he edged his way through the long grass to the source of the noise. Making as little rustling as possible, he pushed aside the dry, crackled fronds of dead fern and springy bracken as he peered into the intimidating dark of a small glade, ringed on all sides by thick trunks of evergreens. Little moonlight was admitted into the clearing, but it was enough for the Commander to see. Not five spans ahead of him, partially shielded by the long shadow of a towering pine, stood a tall man holding a longspear.

Pict.

Arthur drew in a long, deep breath as he watched the man stalk forward, chuckling coldly all the while. He was hunting something; that at least was evident. But what? Surely an animal would have tried to make its escape by now, but perhaps it was paralysed – either by fear, or by a fatal wound. Arthur edged further forward, sliding his sword infinitesimally slowly from its sheath. The slightest scrape of metal on metal could betray him. The man wore a shaggy, dark fur slung across his upper torso, belted at the waist; and dark trousers with boots laced up to his knee. The longspear he held in his hand was a common weapon among the Picts, but even without it, the man was clearly one of them. A shaft of moonlight illuminated his long, tangled hair; limed white and ghostly-looking. The Pict appeared to have reached what he was hunting, for now he was circling around it closely, muttering under his breath. Whatever it was that he had trapped, it was quite big. Arthur finally crawled right through the encumbering ferns and bracken, and emerged on the other side of the clearing, just as the man feinted forward at his unseen prey. The creature let out a small cry, startling Arthur, and leapt up in a flurry of movement, swinging an axe at the… the… Wait… an axe?

Oh, God! thought Arthur, leaping to his feet in horror and dashing forward to help. He's been hunting a woman!

At Arthur's aggressive shout, the man swung around in surprise, the axe missing him by the width of a fingernail. The woman growled wildly, the momentum of the swing throwing her off balance and sending her staggering into the ferns once more. Arthur took advantage of the man's momentary confusion to barrel forward and tackle him to the ground, throwing his entire body weight into the leap and pinning the Pict to the pine needle-strewn ground. The man struggled wildly, shouting for all he was worth.

"You…mongrel…" hissed Arthur, as he tried to slice his sword at the man's throat, "How dare…you…"

They tussled wildly on the ground, joined suddenly by the weight of another body. The woman had thrown herself into the fray with another crazed shout, pinning one of the Pict's arms to the ground as Arthur grabbed the other. Together, they flipped him over, twisting his arms up behind his back. The woman grabbed the Pict's head and slammed it into the ground with a brutal violence that shocked Arthur, despite the satisfying crunch the man's nose made as its bones shattered. Arthur continued to hold the man to the ground as she leaned forward and spat on the side of the Pict's face, snarling something threatening in… oh.

She was also a Pict.

The woman drew back, and then slammed her elbow into the man's temple viciously, knocking him unconscious. Arthur stared at her in horror, scrambling back and drawing his sword. What kind of animal was this woman?

"Artorius! Rus!" yelled Bors, crashing into the clearing with a fierce war cry. He stopped short as he beheld the sight before him, and was almost bowled over by the force of Gawain tumbling into him at full pelt from behind.

"Arthur… what?" gasped the long-haired Knight, as Galahad appeared at his side, bow at the ready. At the sight of the woman kneeling on the ground beside Arthur, he bared his teeth and nocked an arrow to the bowstring, aiming it at her throat.

"Arthur!" exclaimed Dagonet, as he and Lancelot burst into the clearing, respective weapons drawn.

As everyone stood staring at everyone else, frozen in indecision, a crashing came from the other side of the clearing. Hoofbeats were approaching quickly, but before Arthur could do anything, a man barrelled into the clearing partially mounted, brandishing a sword threateningly as he hung precariously onto his horse's mane. He leapt from the saddle and stumbled slightly as he lurched forward, calling out something in Pictish.

"Mordred?" yelled Arthur incredulously, recognising the stumbling man instantly. Mordred stopped short, his mouth dropping open.

"Arthur?" he gasped, fumbling as he almost dropped his sword. "What are you… who is… what?" Behind him, three more figures appeared from the semi-darkness, weapons held at the ready.

"Tristran?" Arthur called, squinting in an effort to see. The scout strode forward, his fluid gait identifying him immediately.

"Arthur!" Tristran said, his voice low and angry. "What are you doing here?"

"And please tell me they're with you," added Mordred, pointing to a spot behind Arthur, an odd look on his face.

"Of course they are! Can't you see? It's Bors, Lancelot, Gawain…"

"Noo…" said Mordred slowly, still pointing. "I meant those men with the arrows pointed at all of us."

Arthur whirled around in shock, only to be met with the sight of at least fifteen Picts standing behind his Knights, longbows trained on each person in the clearing.

"Oh, buggeration," brayed Bors loudly, dropping his weapons and holding his hands in the air as the armed Picts strode forward.

Arthur couldn't have said it better himself.

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A/N: Sorry about the long wait for this, everyone! Hope you enjoyed, and that you're not too confused or anything :) Do leave some feedback and tell me what you thought of this chapter – the big, joyous reunion… or not. Thankyou again to the wonderful people who review, your feedback is very encouraging :)