The Story of Gawain and Ragnell Read Free

taken the hill-fort in the first place? It was an impressive site, high and wide, with a series of ditches and ramparts on the steep slopes that would make it fairly easy to defend. On the other hand, the size of the flat hilltop would require a large warband to fight off attack — perhaps Ragnell's father had not had enough men at his disposal? One of the things they would have to do before reinforcements arrived would be to try and count the fighting men in Bertilak's service. If they could come up with a good estimate, they would have a better idea of how many men would be necessary to retake Caer Camulodon.
    If only there were a way to speak with Ragnell in private; perhaps she remembered something of how the battle had progressed and how the attackers had won.
    "Brother Gaw."
    Gawain turned, wondering if she had some of the same magic as Yseult — it was as if his thoughts had acted as a message to her and brought her to him.
    He bowed his head as he imagined a priest would. "Lady Ragnell. How is it that none of Bertilak's men are following you now?"
    She threw back her veils and laughed, a bright, pleasant sound, surprising given her recent trials. "They think me in the kitchens, where I belong. But I slipped out. I wanted to speak with you."
    "And I with you, Lady."
    She gave him a smile, an odd-looking expression in the middle of her ruined face, and it struck him that her mouth was unharmed, the lips full and red. The destruction of her beauty passed from her right jawbone diagonally across her features, puckering and discoloring the skin from cheek to forehead, but leaving her lips untouched. Even her left profile showed traces of ravished skin, but her lips had somehow escaped the results of the accident.
    "What would the great Lord Gawain want with such a one as me?" she murmured, yanking him out of the contemplation of the landscape of her face.
    He attempted another obeisance appropriate for a monk. "I was hoping you would be able to tell me something of the battle so that I might understand how Bertilak was able to take this place," he whispered.
    "Would you care to accompany me back to the kitchens, Brother Gaw?" she said, her voice at a natural volume.
    "Certainly, Lady Ragnell," Gawain said.
    As they ambled towards the kitchen buildings, Ragnell indicated a dip in the defensive earthworks that Gawain had not yet noticed. "The main attack was from the south. They must have scouted the hill-fort thoroughly before they attacked, and most likely they knew that my brothers were both ill."
    "How many men did your father have?"
    "Just after harvest and before snow?" she asked in return. "Well under a hundred. War is not normally conducted in winter — there is too little plunder on the road and too great a chance one's own troops will not survive the adventure."
    "That may be precisely what Bertilak was counting on," Gawain murmured. "A hill-fort in its peaceful winter sleep."
    Ragnell shrugged. "I think he also must have known about the puking sickness that was plaguing us and the surrounding villages, and he decided to take advantage of our weakness. The sickness was not life-threatening, except for the very old and the very young, but it put a swath of warriors besides my brothers in their beds rather than on the ramparts."
    He wanted to take her hand, give her whatever comfort he could. He imagined that many of those puking warriors, up to and including her brothers, had died in their beds or not far away.
    "I'm sorry about your losses," Gawain said.
    "Thank you." She rubbed her good eye briefly and continued. "The green warrior has help of some powerful magic somehow, I am sure of it. But it is not here; he is calling on it from elsewhere."
    It appeared she did have some of the powers of the Old Race — unless she was one of those who could recognize magic without being able to cast it herself. "You cannot identify who is wielding the magic?"
    She shook her head.
    "Have Bertilak's men at least treated you