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small, thin glow to remain. It seemed a long time, however - long enough for me to begin harbouring the
suspicion that I had indeed lost both Gereint and Bors, and was now completely alone. Once this
suspicion hardened into certainty, I decided to try to get up and move in the direction of the light.
Searching around me for a sturdy branch to use for a staff, I put my hand to a crooked tree limb; it was
old and the rotten bark came off in my hand, but the wood was strong enough to support me, and so I
used it to pull myself up onto my feet once more. My injured leg still throbbed with the slightest
movement, but I clenched my teeth, steadied myself, and started off.
I found I could hobble only a few paces before the pain grew too great to bear and I must stop and rest.
Then, after a few moments' respite, I staggered on. I saw that I was following the trail which the black
beast had forced as it crashed through the wood. This made my passage somewhat less difficult, for I
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was able to steady myself against the fallen trees and broken branches.
Thus, by halts and starts, I proceeded along the narrow path. Despite the cold, I was soon sweating
once more with the pain and exertion, my breath hanging in phantom clouds around my head. I listened
all the while, alert to any sound in the forest. I strained to hear Gereint returning at any moment, or Bors.
Or the black beast.
But no. I was alone. Again fear boiled up, but I swallowed it down and moved on, berating my
companions for running off, as I supposed, after the horses. How I had come by this notion, I cannot say.
Consumed by my own troubles, I had not spared a single kindly thought for them. Indeed, they could
have been lying wounded or dead in the wood nearby and I would not have been any the wiser.
'Blessed Jesu, forgive a foolish man,' I sighed aloud, and then breathed a silent prayer for the safety of
my friends. These thoughts and prayers occupied me as I staggered my slow way along the trail towards
the faint moon-shimmer of radiance.
At long last, the trail turned slightly and I came to a huge bramble thicket - an infernally dense tangle of
spiked vines and thorny branches. Had it been a rampart of stone, it could not have been more
formidable. Yet the monstrous creature appeared to have crashed into this wall and, in its blind rage,
driven a ragged gap into the close-grown tangles. Although I could not discern the source, the light
seemed to be coming from somewhere beyond the hedge wall.
I leaned on my crooked staff, gazing at the thicket. The throb in my leg had become a steady pulse of
pain, and my side felt as if live coals were smouldering under the skin. I was shivering with cold and pain,
and sweating at the same time. I closed my eyes and leaned harder on my staff. 'Jesu, nave mercy,' I
groaned. 'I am hurt and I am alone, and I am lost if you do not help me now.'
I was still trying to marshal my waning strength to attempt the hedge when I heard quick, rustling
footsteps behind me. My first thought was that the monster had returned. This fear swiftly vanished at the
sound of my name.
'Gwalchavad!'
'Here!' I called. 'Here I am!' I turned to stare back down the narrow path that had led me to this place.
A moment later, I saw Gereint loping towards me, his face gleaming ghostly in the pale light. He carried a
sword - mine, it was - and wore an expression of mingled relief and wonder.
'Lord Gwalchavad, you are alive,' he said as he joined me. Out of breath, he stuck the sword in the
ground, and bent over with his hands on his knees. 'I feared you were - ' He paused, gulping air, then
said, 'I feared I had lost you, but then I saw the light and followed it.'
Observing my leg, he asked, 'Is it bad?'
'I can endure it,' I replied. 'What of Bors? Have you seen him?'
'Not since the attack,' he answered.
'God help him,' I replied; then leaving Bors' welfare in the Good Lord's hands, I turned once more to the
thicket. 'The light drew me here, too. It seems to be coming from the other side of this hedge wall.' [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]

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