BERNARD CORNWELL
Enemy of God
The Warlord Chronicles: II
A NOVEL OF ARTHUR
PENGUIN BOOKS
Contents
PART ONE
PART TWO
PART THREE
PART FOUR
PENGUIN BOOKS
ENEMY OF GOD
Before becoming a full-time writer Bernard Cornwell worked as a television producer in London and Belfast. He now lives in Massachusetts with his American wife. He is the author of the hugely successful Sharpe series of historical novels.
Penguin publish his bestselling contemporary thrillers Sea Lord, Wildtrack, Crackdown, StormChild and Scoundrel, and the historical novel Redcoat. Penguin also publish his mythimbued Arthurian romance, The Warlord Chronicles, which consists of The Winter King, Enemy of God and Excalibur.
For more information about Bernard Cornwell’s books, please visit his official website: www.bernardcornwell.net.
Enemy of God is for Susan Watt, its onlie begetter
Foreword
Enemy of God is the second novel of the Warlord series, and immediately follows the events described in The Winter King. In that book the King of Dumnonia and High King of Britain, Uther, dies and is succeeded by his lamed baby grandson, Mordred. Arthur, a bastard son of Uther’s, is appointed one of Mordred’s guardians and in time becomes the most important of those guardians. Arthur is determined to fulfil the oath he swore to Uther that Mordred, when he comes of age, will occupy Dumnonia’s throne.
Arthur is also determined to bring peace to the warring British kingdoms. The major conflict is between Dumnonia and Powys, but when Arthur is invited to marry Ceinwyn, a Princess of Powys, it seems that war can be avoided. Instead Arthur elopes with the penniless Princess Guinevere and that insult to Ceinwyn brings on years of war that are ended only when Arthur defeats King Gorfyddyd of Powys at the Battle of Lugg Vale. Powys’s throne then passes to Cuneglas, Ceinwyn’s brother, who, like Arthur, wants peace between the Britons so that they can concentrate their spears against the common enemy, the Saxons (the Sais).
The Winter King, like the present book, was narrated by Derfel (pronounced Dervel), a Saxon slave boy who grew up in Merlin’s household and became one of Arthur’s warriors. Arthur sent Derfel to Armorica (today’s Brittany) where he fought in the doomed campaign to preserve the British kingdom of Benoic against Frankish invaders. Among Benoic’s refugees who return to Britain is Lancelot, King of Benoic, whom Arthur now wants to marry to Ceinwyn and place on the throne of Siluria. Derfel has fallen in love with Ceinwyn.
Derfel’s other love is Nimue, his childhood friend who has become Merlin’s helpmate and lover. Merlin is a Druid and the leader of the faction in Britain that wants to restore the island to its old Gods, to which end he is pursuing a Cauldron, one of the Thirteen Treasures of Britain, a quest which for Merlin and Nimue far outranks any battle against other kingdoms or invaders. Opposing Merlin are the Christians of Britain, one of whose leaders is Bishop Sansum who lost much of his power when he defied Guinevere. Sansum is now in disgrace and serving as Abbot of the Monastery of the Holy Thorn at Ynys Wydryn (Glastonbury).
The Winter King ended with Arthur winning the great battle at Lugg Vale. Mordred’s throne is safe, the southern British kingdoms are allied and Arthur, though not a king himself, is their undisputed leader.
Characters
ADE
Mistress to Lancelot
AELLE
A Saxon king
AGRICOLA
Warlord of Gwent, who serves King Tewdric
AILLEANN
Once Arthur’s mistress, mother of his twin sons Amhar and Loholt
AMHAR
Bastard son of Arthur and Ailleann
ARTHUR
Warlord of Dumnonia, guardian of Mordred
BALIN
One of Arthur’s warriors
BAN
Once King of Benoic (a kingdom in Brittany), father of Lancelot
BEDWIN
Bishop in Dumnonia and chief councillor
BORS
Lancelot’s cousin, his champion
BROCHVAEL
King of Powys after Arthur’s time
BYRTHIG
Edling (Crown Prince) of Gwynedd, later King
CADOC
A Christian bishop, reputed saint, a recluse
CADWALLON
King of Gwynedd
CADWY
Rebellious prince in Isca
CALLYN
Champion of Kernow
CAVAN
Derfel’s second-in-command
CEI
Arthur’s childhood companion, now one of his warriors
CEINWYN
Princess of Powys, sister of Cuneglas
CERDIC
A Saxon king
CULHWCH
Arthur’s cousin, one of his warriors
CUNEGLAS
King of Powys, son of Gorfyddyd
CYTHRYN
Dumnonian magistrate, a councillor
DERFEL CADARN
The narrator, born a Saxon, one of Arthur’s warriors, later a monk
DIAN
Derfel’s youngest daughter
DINAS
A Silurian Druid, twin to Lavaine
DIWRNACH
Irish King of Lleyn, a country formerly called Henis Wyren
EACHERN
One of Derfel’s spearmen
ELAINE
Lancelot’s mother, widowed wife of Ban
EMRYS
Bishop in Dumnonia, succeeds Bedwin
ERCE
Derfel’s mother, also called Enna
GALAHAD
Lancelot’s half-brother, a Prince of (lost) Benoic
GORFYDDYD
King of Powys killed at Lugg Vale, father to Cuneglas and Ceinwyn
GUINEVERE
Arthur’s wife
GUNDLEUS
Once King of Siluria, killed after Lugg Vale
GWENHWYVACH
Guinevere’s sister, a Princess of (lost) Henis Wyren
GWLYDDYN
Servant to Merlin
GWYDRE
Son of Arthur and Guinevere
HELLEDD
Cuneglas’s wife, Queen of Powys
HYGWYDD
Arthur’s servant
IGRAINE
Queen of Powys after Arthur’s time, married to Brochvael
IORWETH
Druid of Powys
ISEULT
Queen of Kernow, married to Mark
ISSA
One of Derfel’s spearmen, later his second-in-command
LANCELOT
Exiled King of Benoic
LANVAL
One of Arthur’s warriors
LAVAINE
A Silurian Druid, twin to Dinas
LEODEGAN
Exiled King of Henis Wyren, father to Guinevere and Gwenhwyvach
LIGESSAC
Traitor in exile
LOHOLT
Arthur’s bastard son, twin to Amhar
LUNETE
Once Derfel’s lover, now an attendant to Guinevere
MAELGWYN
Monk at Dinnewrac
MALAINE
Druid in Powys
MALLA
Sagramor’s Saxon wife
MARK
King of Kernow, father of Tristan
MELWAS
Exiled King of the Belgae
MERLIN
The chief Druid of Dumnonia
MEURIG
Edling (Crown Prince) of Gwent, later King
MORDRED
King of Dumnonia, son of Norwenna
MORFANS
‘The Ugly’, one of Arthur’s warriors
MORGAN
Arthur’s elder sister, once Merlin’s chief priestess
MORWENNA
Derfel’s eldest daughter
NABUR
Christian magistrate in Durnovaria
NIMUE
Merlin’s lover and chief priestess
NORWENNA
Mordred’s mother, killed by Gundleus
OENGUS MAC AIREM
Irish King of Demetia, a land once called Dyfed
PEREDUR
Son to Lancelot and Ade
PYRLIG
Derfel’s bard
RALLA
Merlin’s servant, married to Gwlyddyn
SAGRAMOR
Arthur’s Numidian commander, Lord of the Stones
SANSUM
Bishop in Dumnonia, later Derfel’s superior at Dinnewrac
SCARACH
Issa’s wife
SEREN
Derfel’s second daughter
TANABURS
A Silurian Druid, killed by Derfel after Lugg Vale
TEWDRIC
King of Gwent, father of Meurig, later a Christian recluse
TRISTAN
Edling (Crown Prince) of Kernow, son of Mark
TUDWAL
Novice monk at Dinnewrac
UTHER
The dead High King of Dumnonia, Mordred’s grandfather
Places
Names marked * are fictional
ABONA
Avonmouth, Avon
AQUAE SULIS
Bath, Avon
BENOIC
A kingdom, lost to the Franks, in Brittany (Armorica)
BODUAN
Garn Boduan, Gwynedd
BROCELIANDE
The surviving British kingdom in Armorica
BURRIUM
Gwent’s capital. Usk, Gwent
CAER AMBRA*
Amesbury, Wiltshire
CAER CADARN*
South Cadbury, Somerset
CAER GEI*
Gwynedd’s capital. North Wales
CAER SWS
Powys’s capital. Caersws, Powys
CALLEVA
Silchester, Hampshire
CORINIUM
Cirencester, Gloucestershire
CWM ISAF
DINNEWRAC*
A monastery in Powys
DOLFORWYN
Near Newtown, Powys
DUN CEINACH*
Haresfield Beacon, near Gloucester
DUNUM
Hod Hill, Dorset
DURNOVARIA
Dorchester, Dorset
ERMID’S HALL*
Near Street, Somerset
GLEVUM
Gloucester
HALCWM*
Salcombe, Devon
ISCA Dumnonia
Exeter, Devon
ISCA Siluria
Caerleon, Gwent
LINDINIS
Ilchester, Somerset
LLOEGYR
That part of Britian occupied by the Saxons, literally ‘the lost lands’. In modern Welsh Lloegr means England
LLYN CERRIG BACH
The Lake of Little Stones, now Valley Airfield, Anglesey
LUGG VALE*
Mortimer’s Cross, Hereford & Worcester
MAGNIS
Kenchester, Hereford & Worcester
NIDUM
Neath, Glamorgan
PONTES
Staines, Surrey
RATAE
Leicester
THE STONES
Stonehenge
THE TOR
Glastonbury Tor, Somerset
VENTA
Winchester, Hampshire
VINDOCLADIA
Roman Fort near Wimborne Minster, Dorset
YNYS MON
Anglesey
YNYS TREBES*
The lost capital of Benoic, Mont Saint-Michel, Brittany
YNYS WIT
Isle of Wight
YNYS WYDRYN
Glastonbury, Somerset
PART ONE
The Dark Road
TODAY I HAVE BEEN thinking about the dead.
This is the last day of the old year. The bracken on the hill has turned brown, the elms at the valley’s end have lost their leaves and the winter slaughter of our cattle has begun. Tonight is Samain Eve.
Tonight the curtain that separates the dead from the living will quiver, fray, and finally vanish. Tonight the dead will cross the bridge of swords. Tonight the dead will come from the Otherworld to this world, but we shall not see them. They will be shadows in darkness, mere whispers of wind in a windless night, but they will be here.
Bishop Sansum, the saint who rules our small community of monks, scoffs at this belief. The dead, he says, do not have shadowbodies, nor can they cross the sword bridge, but instead they lie in their cold graves and wait for the final coming of our Lord Jesus Christ. It is proper, he says, for us to remember the dead and to pray for their immortal souls, but their bodies are gone. They are corrupt. Their eyes have melted to leave dark holes in their skulls, worms liquefy their bellies, and mould furs their bones. The saint insists that the dead do not trouble the living on Samain Eve, yet even he will take care to leave a loaf of bread beside the monastery hearth this night. He will pretend it is carelessness, but all the same there will be a loaf of bread and a pitcher of water beside the kitchen ashes tonight.
I shall leave more. A cup of mead and a piece of salmon. They are small gifts, but all I can afford, and tonight I shall place them in the shadows by the hearth then go to my monk’s cell and welcome the dead who will come to this cold house on its bare hill.
I shall name the dead. Ceinwyn, Guinevere, Nimue, Merlin, Lancelot, Galahad, Dian, Sagramor; the list could fill two parchments. So many dead. Their footsteps will not stir a rush on the floor nor frighten the mice that live in the monastery’s thatched roof, but even Bishop Sansum knows that our cats will arch their backs and hiss from the kitchen corners as the shadows that are not shadows come to our hearth to find the gifts that deter them from working mischief.
So today I have been thinking about the dead.
I am old now, maybe as old as Merlin was, though not nearly so wise. I think that Bishop Sansum and I are the only men living from the great days and I alone remember them fondly. Maybe some others still live. In Ireland, perhaps, or in the wastes north of Lothian, but I do not know of them, though this much I do know: that if any others do live, then they, like me, cower from the encroaching darkness like cats shrinking from this night’s shadows. All that we loved is broken, all that we made is pulled down and all that we sowed is reaped by the Saxons. We British cling to the high western lands and talk of revenge, but there is no sword that will fight a great darkness. There are times, too frequent now, when all I want is to be with the dead. Bishop Sansum applauds that wish and tells me it is only right that I should yearn to be in heaven at God’s right hand, but I do not think I shall reach the saints’ heaven. I have sinned too much and thus fear hell, but still hope, against my faith, that I will pass to the Otherworld instead. For there, under the apple trees of four-towered Annwn, waits a table heaped with food and crowded with the shadowbodies of all my old friends. Merlin will be cajoling, lecturing, grumbling and mocking. Galahad will be bursting to interrupt and Culhwch, bored with so much talk, will steal a larger portion of beef and think no one notices. And Ceinwyn will be there, dear lovely Ceinwyn, bringing peace to the turmoil roused by Nimue.
But I am still cursed by breath. I live while my friends feast, and as long as I live I shall write this tale of Arthur. I write at the behest of Queen Igraine, the young wife of King Brochvael of Powys who is the protector of our small monastery. Igraine wanted to know all I can remember of Arthur and so I began to write these tales down, but Bishop Sansum disapproves of the task. He says Arthur was the Enemy of God, a spawn of the devil, and so I am writing the tales in my native Saxon tongue that the saint does not speak. Igraine and I have told the saint that I am writing
the gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ in the enemy’s language and maybe he believes us, or maybe he is biding his time until he can prove our falsehood and then punish me.
I write each day. Igraine comes frequently to the monastery to pray that God will grant her womb the blessing of a child, and when her prayers are done she takes the finished skins away and has them translated into British by the clerk of Brochvael’s justice. I think she changes the story then, making it match the Arthur she wants rather than the Arthur who was, but perhaps that does not matter for who will ever read this tale? I am like a man building a wall of mud and wattle to resist an imminent flood. The darkness comes when no man will read. There will just be Saxons.
So I write about the dead and the writing passes the time until I can join them; the time when Brother Derfel, a humble monk of Dinnewrac, will again be Lord Derfel Cadarn, Derfel the Mighty, Champion of Dumnonia and beloved friend of Arthur. But now I am just a cold old monk scribbling memories with my one remaining hand. And tonight is Samain Eve and tomorrow is a new year. The winter is coming. The dead leaves lie in shining drifts against the hedgerows, there are redwings in the stubble, gulls have flown inland from the sea and woodcock gather under the full moon. It is a good season, Igraine tells me, to write of old things and so she has brought me a fresh pile of skins, a flask of newly mixed ink and a sheaf of quills. Tell me of Arthur, she says, of golden Arthur, our last and best hope, our king who never was a king, the Enemy of God and the scourge of Saxons. Tell me of Arthur.