The Endless Knot by Stephen Lawhead Page A

smoke; his eyes and teeth showed white, like chips of moonstone. Sweat poured off him, washing pale rivulets through the grime.
    â€œTegid thought you might need help,” I explained. “How is it here?”
    â€œWe are trying to keep the fire from spreading further eastward. Fortunately, the wind is with us,” he said, then added, “but Cynan and Cynfarch will have the worst of it.”
    â€œThen I will go to them,” I told him and hurried away again. I rounded a turn and crossed a bridge, meeting three women, each carrying two or three babes and shepherding a bedraggled flock of young children, all of them frightened and wailing. One of the women stumbled in her haste and trod on a child; she fell to her knees, almost dropping the infants she clutched so tightly. The child sprawled headlong onto the bridge timbers and lay screaming.
    I scooped up the child—so quickly that the youngster stopped yowling, fright swallowed by surprise. Goewyn appeared beside me in an instant, bending to raise the woman to her feet and shouldering an infant all in one swift motion. “I will see them safe!” she called to me, already leading them away. “You go ahead.”
    I raced on. Cynfarch stood as if in the midst of a riot, commanding the effort. I ran to him, shedding my cloak. “I am here, Cynfarch,” I said. “What is to be done?”
    â€œWe will not save these houses, but—” He broke off to shout orders to a group of men pulling at burning thatch with wooden rakes and long iron hooks. A portion of the roof collapsed inward with a shower of sparks, and the men scurried to the next hut. “These houses are ruined,” he continued, “but if the wind holds steady, we may keep it from spreading.”
    â€œWhere is Cynan?”
    â€œHe was there.” The king glanced over his shoulder. “I do not see him now.”
    I ran to the place Cynfarch indicated, passing between burning buildings into a valley of fire. Flames leapt all around me. The heat gushed and blasted on the breeze. Everything—the houses to the right and left, the wall ahead, the black sky above—shimmered in the heat flash.
    I heard a horse’s wild scream, and directly in front of me a man burst through the bank of smoke, holding tight to the reins of a rearing horse. The man had thrown his cloak over the terrified animal’s head and was leading it away from the fire. Immediately behind him came four more men with bucking, neighing, panicky horses, each with its head bound in the men’s cloaks. Only a few horses and kine were kept on the crannog; all the rest ranged the meadow below the ridge-wall. But those we stabled in Dinas Dwr we could least afford to lose.
    I helped the men lead the horses through the narrow, fire-shattered path between the burning wrecks of houses and sheds. Once on the wider path, I retraced my steps and hurried on. Smoke billowed all around, obscuring sight. Covering my nose and mouth with the lower part of my siarc, I plunged ahead and came all at once into a clear place swarming with people. Fire danced in a hazy shimmer about me. I felt as if I had been thrust into an oven.
    Cynan, with a score of warriors and men with axes, chopped furiously at the timber wall. They were trying to cut away a section as a firebreak to keep the flames from destroying the entire palisade. Threescore men with sopping cloaks beat at the wooden surfaces and the ground, keeping the surrounding flames at bay, while more men with buckets doused the smoldering embers of the ruins they had reclaimed. Black curls of soot and gray flakes of ash fell from the sky like filthy snow.
    â€œCynan!” I called, running to him.
    At the sound of my voice he turned, though the ax completed its stroke. “Llew! A fine wedding night for you,” he said, shaking his head as he chopped again.
    I scanned the ragged, fire-ravaged wall. “Will your firebreak