WARNING: This chapter may contain strong bloody violence, scenes of prolonged tension and some flashing images. No animals were harmed in the making of this fiction…
3. The ruin of the proud usurper, Tyrannus Vortigern
Uther fell heavily to his knees behind the relative protection of an upturned cart as he fought desperately to catch his breath. His face was streaked with grime and he could feel rivulets of sweat working their way down his back beneath his chain mail. To his left crouched his brother, his piercing eyes staring intently at the thick stone wall before him as he calculated his next move.
Their march to Albion had been a festive affair at first, each village so relieved to see their return that they had run cheering into the streets, the women waving scraps of cloth and the children laughing and chasing after them as they continued their journey toward the city. They had seen a great many signs of Vortigern's tyrannical and oppressive rule as they made their way closer to their target, the villages showing increasing signs of damage, many reduced to nothing more than burnt out shells which Vortigern's Saxon cronies had attacked again and again.
It had taken them three tiring months to reach the actual Pendragon citadel that Vortigern had naturally made his stronghold, pushed back time and again by pockets of Saxons and noblemen, loyal to the pretender king, who had engaged in combat with them along the way. But now here they were, their numbers having swelled to such proportions that they could now completely surround the castle walls, pinning the usurper, his poisonous wife and all his followers inside. Now they were at the crux of their campaign and everything was at stake.
Behind Uther, Balinor made his way into a clearing. He was flanked on all sides by four soldiers, forming an impregnable ring around him to shield him from attack and the onslaught of arrows that were raining down from the walls. Balinor himself seemed unfazed by the activity around him; his face was calm and serene as he gazed intently up at the great hulking creature beside him. Kilgharrah, the Great Dragon loomed out of the shadows, his thick hide easily deflecting the razor sharp arrow heads fired at him.
As the Dragon moved into position, guided and directed by Balinor; Aurelius raised his arm to signal his men to stand ready. An eerie hush fell over the men as they all watched their king in anticipation of the attack, leaving just the sound of the arrows as they snickered through the air and the distant cry of commands being shouted from the far walls of the castle. Uther slowly placed his helmet on his head, gripping his sword experimentally in his hand as he readied himself for battle.
Leaving his right arm raised above his head, Aurelius now lifted his left and motioned to Balinor to come forward. In one fluid motion, beast and man as one, Balinor and Kilgharrah rushed forward toward the castle walls, the four guards desperately moving to protect their charge. With a fearsome cry, Kilgharrah reared up onto his hindquarters, drawing his head back and discharging an almighty stream of fire at the giant metal-studded wooden doors of the castle. Balinor raised both hands in an upward gesture and Kilgharrah needed no further instruction; with one graceful leap his wings spread wide and he banked swiftly up into the air, spiralling once over the heads of the terrified soldiers that lined the walls, before dropping a new torrent of flames on their heads.
Aurelius and his men knelt ready in the dirt, their veins thrumming with adrenalin, waiting for the Dragon to do his work. With a wrenching groan the old door began to buckle under the intensity of the flames that licked greedily at its wooden timbers, the framework starting to fall away from the surrounding stone. With another nod of his head, Aurelius signalled two groups of his men to approach the door; one group carrying a heavy battering ram, the other group supporting a large triangular shield held over their heads to protect them all from falling missiles.
With the sentries atop the wall so heavily under attack from the Dragon there was little hindrance to the work of the men and with an almighty heave the battering ram thudded heavily into the blazing wood. The ram had been soaked in water beforehand to stop it too from being engulfed in fire and now the wood smoked angrily as it sank repeatedly into the flames. With one last charge the men surged toward the weakening wood and the doors buckled with a sickening crack, finally collapsing and exposing a gaping hole in the defences of the castle.
A hearty battle cry ripped from Aurelius' throat as he brought his right arm down to signal the attack. The cry was echoed in unison by his men, Knights and common-men alike, bodies streaming from the darkness and running full pelt toward the opening in the gates.
Hoards of men swarmed into the confined space of the castle's courtyard, clashing fiercely with the opposition. Uther leaped over the burning remains of the doorway to join the fray and met immediately with the full swing of an enemy sword, ducking nimbly to the side and countering the attack blow for blow. All around him came the screeching sound of metal on metal, the crunch of a mace breaking through bone, the clean slice of a sword cutting through soft tissue and the gurgling cries of fallen men.
Rising up behind this gory carnage was the steep slope of the main castle fortress. High up on its battlements stood Vortigern, his cold eyes staring in anger out of his pinched face. On his right stood his beautiful and cunning wife Rowena and on his left stood a man bedecked in the regalia of a priest of the old religion. His cloak was a deep purple and his long greying beard whipped out behind him in the wind.
Alwyn strode quickly to the centre of the courtyard, a gap in the bloodbath appearing inexplicably around him. He cast his eyes upward, using his hand as a visor to help him peer through the gloom at his quarry.
"Mabon!" he shouted, his voice booming and echoing around the walls of the courtyard, "Are you nothing but a delicate vase that must be kept out of harms way on your pedestal? You are a trembling daisy indeed to cower so fearfully on your battlements!"
"You harness the force of the Great Dragon and it is I who is the coward?" spat the sorcerer in reply, "You will not taunt me into leaving my King unprotected."
"He is nothing but a servant!" Roared Aurelius, bringing his sword arm crashing down on his hapless opponent, severing his head from his shoulders in one slick movement, "And I will rip the crown from your lifeless body this very night Vortigern, do you hear me?"
Vortigern made no reply, his paling skin speaking volumes as he and his wife stepped further from the edge of the battlements and out of Aurelius's eye line.
Kilgharrah made another sweep of the castle walls, swathing them in further streams of fire before rising swiftly into the air out of reach of the arrows and spears hurled in his direction. The light of a protective force field shone momentarily around the three figures on the battlements and it became clear how Mabon's powers were protecting his Sovereign, as the Dragon's flames rolled harmlessly off them.
"You think I cannot reach you up there, maggot?" taunted Alwyn, commanding a bolt of brilliant white energy and crackle through the air, striking at Mabon and his protective shield with great force. High on the wall above, Mabon staggered slightly under the intensity of the blow, before regaining his foothold and shooting a bolt of energy of his own back at Alwyn, his face grimacing at the effort.
As the two sorcerers continued to battle one another, Aurelius's men fought on valiantly, tirelessly battling the seemingly never ending stream of enemy guards pouring from the castle to defend their king.
As the commander Prince tore his way through the opposition, he saw suddenly that the men protecting Balinor were being especially targeted, each one being picked off one by one until the Dragonlord was now almost defenceless, his own face blissfully ignorant of this fact as he gazed intently at his Dragon charge.
"Balinor!" he cried urgently, his panicked voice causing nothing but the smallest of flickers of recognition to pass across Balinor's serious face. Leaping from the top of a lower rampart, Aurelius ran to protect the Dragonlord, shouting at his men within reach to do the same. Hefting his sword through the air he bought its well honed blade down on the exposed back of an enemy soldier, knocking him sideways onto his knees but not before the mace the soldier had been swinging found its target and sunk its teeth into the flesh of Balinor's upper thigh.
Giving a startled cry at the pain shooting through his leg, Balinor stared at the blood seeping profusely from the wound in confusion, as if it did not belong to him at all. The Dragon, distressed by the sudden break in their mental link, faltered in his attack, circling aimlessly around in the night sky.
Mabon took this momentary cease fire from Kilgharrah as his queue to usher the Usurper King and his Saxon bride back inside the relative protection of the main castle building, away from the full force of the flames – and began his attack on Alwyn in earnest. The latter courageously dug his heels into the dirt, meeting the intensified attack in equal measure.
Aurelius swiftly tied a length of rope around Balinor's leg, inserted a short piece of splintered wood into the loop and twisted it to form a makeshift tourniquet, stemming the flow of blood from the mace wound. "Can you continue?" he asked beseechingly, his fingers gripping Balinor's shoulders intently.
"I can sire," Balinor replied, grimly hoisting himself into an upright position and closing his eyes in concentration to rejoin his mind to Kilgharrah's.
On the battle raged and Uther could no longer feel his fingers, so numb they had become from the constant action of his sword locking teeth with his opponent's. He sidestepped yet another jarring blow, jumping quickly back as the blade swiped forward across the plackart of his armour. His feet were quick but not quite quick enough as the hilt of his challenger's sword swung back and caught him a glancing blow to the head, causing the visor to his helmet to snap back - another sudden blow all it took to knock his helmet clear from his head. Blinking away the stars that burst across his vision, Uther was able to block the next strike, twisting sideways and thrusting his own sword in between the crease of his attackers armour, sinking the blade into his heart from beneath the armpit and out again in one clean movement.
As he reached to retrieve his lost helmet, another soldier raced forward to replace his fallen comrade and it was all Uther could do to raise his sword, before the curved blade of an axe crashed into his skull. He felt the cool blade slice into his skin, burning a deep diagonal trail from the hairline of his right temple all the way down to his eyebrow. Pushing up against the shaft of the axe with all his might, Uther desperately parried the attack from his new opponent, blinded as he was by the river of blood running into his right eye from his head wound. The light weight of his sword gave him the tactical advantage compared to the cumbersome weight of the axe wielded by the other man and soon he too had joined his fallen companion in the dirt. Pausing only to scrape the blood quickly from his eye, Uther turned and plunged once more into the skirmish, ramming his helmet onto his head as he went.
Bodies littered every square foot of the courtyard, some dead, some injured; neither side showing any sign of conceding defeat. Alwyn shuddered under the attack of another blast of lightening from Mabon, his eyes following the path of the Dragon intently as he circled the battlements above. He could sense his own powers beginning to fail and knew that Aurelius would have no chance at victory if Mabon and his protective shield were allowed to continue. His old, tired eyes took in the carnage of the battlefield around him, resting finally on Aurelius himself. If there was to be peace and prosperity in Albion once more there was but one thing he could do.
Summoning up every last vestige of strength, Alwyn struck out at Mabon with renewed vigour, before stepping imperceptibly backwards from his original position, drawing Mabon slowly forward to the edge of the battlements as he did so.
Laughing, Mabon too increased the intensity of his attack, not realising his position was being so greatly compromised, "Concede old man! Your strength will soon be fully spent!"
"Then we shall go together rat!" cried Alwyn, suddenly redirecting the force of his charge, aiming instead at the foundation of the battlements, causing the masonry to crumble and Mabon to teeter precariously on the edge of the castle wall. This momentary surprise caused the proud sorcerer to lose his grip on his protective shield for an instant. Alwyn had depended upon this fact and timed this very moment perfectly, for no sooner had the shield dissipated than Kilgharrah made another pass of the battlements and bathed Mabon in a molten bath of liquid fire and brimstone. His skin blistered and popped and his wretched cries sang out into the cold night air as his writhing body plummeted down from his vantage point, hitting the ground with a sickening thump, the fat on his bones feeding the flames hungrily.
Both Aurelius and Uther heard the cry and witnessed the end of Mabon the dark sorcerer, their eyes dropping in unison to the prone form of Alwyn lying unmoving on the ground. In redirecting his charge to target the battlements, he had knowingly exposed himself to the full force of Mabon's attack… the effects of which had stilled his heart inside his chest.
There was no time, however, to mourn the loss of Alwyn as the news spread that the entrance ways into the castle were no longer stopped up by Mabon. The cry of revenge for years of torment and oppression bubbled over in the hearts of the common people and they surged one and all into the castle, brandishing their makeshift weapons and blazing torches.
"Stop you fools!" shouted Aurelius, desperately trying to prevent the mob from passing through the doorway and completely destroying his Father's castle in their thirst for Vortigern's blood. His words were lost amongst the din of the crowd and he, Uther and his depleted guard were thrust easily to one side.
Staggering back toward the courtyard, Aurelius was forced to watch as one by one the windows of the ancient Keep took on a haunting orange glow as the flames took hold and swept throughout the building.
Satisfied with their work, the people now fled the castle, pouring in streams down the steps, some carrying souvenirs and items stolen hurriedly from the royal chambers. The old gatehouse and the outer walls of the Keep were hastily barricaded and the muffled cries of those locked inside crept plaintively to their ears.
There was a wild look of fury in the eyes of Aurelius Ambrosius, second son of Constantine II and rightful heir to the throne, as he watched his beloved castle eaten up in flames. Vortigern and Rowena would meet their fiery end and the kingship would be his… but the sweet taste of justice and redemption was marred by this incomprehensible loss, even as the smoke billowed out as a deadly sign that Vortigern's reign was at an end.