"Well, then, since you are legally a boy and not yet a warrior with a warrior's responsibilities and duties, why should you feel shame over not having identified my origins? Even had you been curious about me, your curiosity would have gone unsatisfied. Forgive my mentioning it, but you are yet too young to participate in men's affairs."
"But not too young to ask questions. Not being a warrior is no excuse for being unready, Lord Balin. Had I been unready a few days ago, your wife might not be here now."
Balin inclined his head in acknowledgment of that truth. "But why would you even think to ask where I was from? You make it sound highly important that you should know such a thing."
Uther stood up and placed his cup carefully on a small table near his chair. "It is, sir, when the answer to the question is Cornwall. Now I must leave you. Thank you for the wine."
"Great Dagda!" Balin subsided into a chair as quickly as Uther had sprung to his feet, but he was smiling in disbelief. "You intend to leave me, just like that, for being from Cornwall? Are we then mortal enemies, and have you found yourself in here with me by misadventure? Do you fear, then—tell me quickly— for your life?"
Uther felt a flush steal over his face. "Well . . . no."
"Aha! Then sit, if it please you, and finish your wine, and while you are doing so, inform me, if you will, why it should surprise you so unpleasantly to discover where I make my home. Have you enemies in Cornwall?"
"Yes, I have. A mortal enemy." Uther sat down again, but made no move to pick up the wine cup.
Balin, whose question had been facetious, now sat staring blankly at him for a space of moments before he spoke again. When he did, the entire tone of his voice was different, cautious and faintly speculative.
"Your father made no mention of this."
"My father knows nothing about it."
"But how can that be? You have a mortal enemy, but unknown to your father? Not that I doubt you, of course, but it seems . . . strange. You have never visited Cornwall, have you? So whence comes this enmity? Is it recent"
"No, it began three years ago."
"Three years ago? Then you were but a boy indeed, a child! What happened, and with whom were you at odds?"
"Do you know Duke Emrys?"
"Of course I know Duke Emrys. He is my lord."
"And his son, Gulrhys Lot?"
"Lot? Great gods! Were you the one, then, the boy who attacked Lot in Camulod and almost killed him?"
Uther shrugged. "I suppose I was. But he attacked me, too . . . Look, see where he chopped me." He extended his right leg and pulled up the hem of his tunic to expose a long, deep scar on the outside of his thigh, a hand's breadth above the knee.
"Indeed! That is a man's wound, a battle wound. But you were mere children, boys."
"No, Lord Balin, I was twelve years old, and Gulrhys Lot was as old as I am now, and he insulted my mother beyond credence or bearing. Had my uncle, Picus Britannicus, not stopped us, Gulrhys Lot would not be alive today. I would have killed him."
Balin sat silent for a spell digesting that, then nodded, his face blank. "I see this struck far deeper and was of greater moment than I was given to believe. You say Lot insulted your mother . . . sufficiently to provoke you to the point of killing? I find it hard to believe that Duke Emrys would have permitted such gross behaviour from his son."
Uther merely blinked, his own face betraying nothing of his thoughts. "Duke Emrys was not there at the time. There were but the three of us—Lot, my cousin Cay and me. The Duke knew nothing of what happened until it was all over. And Uncle Picus found us only by accident. He was passing by and heard the sound of our swords."
"May I ask what you were doing in Camulod? I have never been there, and I am curious about the place. Some of the tales I hear of it seem too wondrous to be true. This uncle of yours is an important man there, is he not?"
Uther hesitated, then picked up his wine again and sipped at it. It was clear that the anger he had expected to inspire with his revelation about Gulrhys Lot would not be forthcoming. Either this Balin was indeed a more skilful diplomat than he betrayed, or he was genuinely uncaring of what might have befallen his lord's son. Uther rolled the delicious wine around on his tongue and then look a larger gulp, filling his mouth and holding the beverage captive, feeling the tiny prickles of the sparkling bubbles. Then finally he swallowed, conscious that his father would be displeased to see him drinking unwatered wine of any kind and would be even less pleased by the overt pleasure he was showing in the drinking of it. He replaced the cup carefully on the small table, then smiled at Balin, who sat watching him.
"My uncle, Picus Britannicus, is Legate and Supreme Commander of the Forces of Camulod."
"A very grand title."
Uther nodded soberly. "Aye, sir, and a powerful one. He assumed command from my grandfather, Gaius Publius Varrus, who had inherited the title from his friend and brother by marriage, Caius Cornelius Britannicus, who was Uncle Picus's father. Great-uncle Caius and Grandfather Varrus were the founders of Camulod, which was originally a collection of large and prosperous farms."
Balin sat blinking, fingering his beard abstractedly and frowning slightly in perplexity. "Farms? Explain that, please. I don't quite understand. Camulod is a fortress, from what I have heard. No one has ever spoken of the place in terms of farms or farming."
Uther fought to keep his face expressionless, because he was surprised and fascinated by how much he was learning here. Before his discovery of Balin's Cornish identity, he had assumed that this man, as an honoured guest of his father and an ambassador from some distant king or chief, would know everything there was to know about Camulod, Pendragon's closest and strongest ally. It now appeared, however, that the man knew almost nothing, and that made it instantly obvious to the boy that his father had been unresponsive to the questions Balin must have asked him.
Uther's mind was churning, his thoughts chaotic. Why should his father have been so secretive? It must have stemmed from distrust, he decided—if not of Balin himself, then certainly of his master, the Cornish Duke Emrys. Although he had often been glad in the past that he was not expected or permitted to sit in on the frequent and all too often tedious gatherings of his father's Council, Uther now found himself wishing heartily that he knew more about these things. Then, remembering Garreth Whistler's warning that it was most often better to say little and listen closely, he shook his head and smiled, allowing himself to look slightly perplexed.
"Have you never been in that part of the world at all. Lord Balin, the lands around Aquae Sulis to the east of here?"
"Yes, I have, but not for many years, and I never gained any great knowledge of the region. I understand that Camulod itself is not far from there, a matter of a few days' ride . . ." Balin paused for a long time, evidently musing on other things, before continuing. "It is a strange thing, because I have travelled widely over the years in my role as adviser to Chief Emrys, long before he took upon himself the Roman title of dux, or Duke. I began as his factotum, to use the Roman word for it, standing in his place to assist and mediate in his early trading ventures, and my responsibilities in the service of the Duke have gradually increased as time has passed. In each of my several capacities I have seen the entire length of this island—along the coastlines of both Britain and Caledonia, on both sides, east and west—on several occasions, and I have even crossed the western sea to Eire three times.
"Before the Romans left, in the first great exodus when Stilicho recalled the British legions, I wandered over the entire country, looking after the commercial interests of my master—" He broke off suddenly, and his face lit up in a smile. "Strange, is it not, how all things change, even our ways of thinking of ourselves? You are too young now to see the truth of that, but some day you will. I spoke about myself and Emrys. Now he is Duke Emrys, and I refer to him as my lord. Formerly, however, he was Chief Emrys, and before that merely Emrys, an able and gifted trader and a formidable fighter." Balin paused again, staring into his cup, and then resumed, still gazing pensively into his wine.