Warriors of Camlann by N. M. Browne Page A

also her battle readiness.
    There was a murmuring from the assembled men, a wave of challenge: let her fight.
    Ursula glanced around quickly at the assembled men and spoke to them directly. She was afraid now, Dan knew it, but she was ready to do some damage. He prayed silently that there would be a way out. Ursula was good, but without magic, she could be beaten. Ursula herself brought his earnest prayer to an unexpected halt. ‘Come on then! Try me!’ she shouted in the commonest Combrogi tongue, accompanying the challenge with a white-toothed smile that had much in common with Braveheart’s warning teeth-baring. She dropped into a fighting stance. She turned off hergrimace of a smile – her face became sullen and expressionless, as it always did when she was under threat. Her blankness was strangely intimidating.
    The assembled men ceased their muttering as Larcius rose to his feet, somewhat awkwardly due to his wound. ‘For those of you who do not know me, I am Ambrosius Larcius, son of Ambrosius Aurelianus, High King of Britannia, and grandson of Ambrosius Aurelius who wore the purple.’
    There was a sharp intake of breath from the assembled men and Dan finally grasped the reason for the underlying tension in the air. Ursula was only part of it. If this Larcius was the son of the High King was he not the new High King? Did he now outrank Arturus?
    Larcius waited until silence was restored. ‘I am here now, alive before you, due to the courage and strength of this young woman. She has proved herself to me and I stand as witness to her many stalwart qualities.’
    There was silence, then someone from the back shouted, ‘You fight her then!’
    Dan sensed Ursula’s shock; her mixed pleasure and annoyance at Larcius’s somewhat patronising accolade. She did not want to fight him. Dan knew that.
    â€˜He is injured!’ Ursula objected, angrily.
    â€˜And you are a woman,’ Arturus said softly. ‘Give him a sword!’
    Someone took Larcius’s cloak and gave him a sword,not a gladius but a longer Roman spatha. Ursula looked at it in distaste. She spat on her hands and wiped them on her grimy tunic. Dan was worried. If this handsome Larcius were a prince he would have had the best available tuition in the arts of war. Ursula had learned with a hard taskmaster, Hane, himself Roman trained, but even so. Maybe Dan could help her as she had once helped him. Maybe he could enter her mind.
    â€˜Ursula?’
    He knew she’d heard him, felt the connection between them, the marrying of minds. It had happened before, in Macsen’s world, this strange intimacy at once shocking and familiar. Her answer came back firm and uncompromising, and shocking in its crystal clarity.
    â€˜Get the hell out of my head, Dan. Can’t you see I’m busy?’
    Larcius circled her with a professional eye. Ursula contrived to look bored. He made a move and Ursula turned his blade away nonchalantly. Her extra height and reach and her longer sword gave her an advantage that Dan had, in his panic, failed to acknowledge.
    She parried several more of Larcius’s more probing attacks. He was a confident swordsman but Ursula came from the hacking and thrusting school of survival; she looked unimpressed. Dan watched her with growing respect. She was not as quick as Dan himself, but she was always where she should be. She moved without particular grace but with great economy and she wasstrong. She turned aside Larcius’s blade again and again. The crowd was silent now, watching. If any of the assembled men were true Combrogi they would be betting on the outcome even as Ursula fought. Dan began to get the feeling that Ursula was spinning this out, trying to make Larcius look better than he was. He saw several opportunities she didn’t take, and he knew she’d seen them too.
    â€˜Ursula, get on with it. Finish it!’
    She did not answer him but thrust forward suddenly