t God having given you new life, so now will ye give
your lives to Pentavalon, that tyranny may cease and the Duchy be
cleansed of evil. Who now among ye will draw sword for freedom and
Pentavalon?"

Then sprang the squat man Osric to his feet, with clenched fist
upraised and eyes ablaze 'neath his matted hair.

"That will I!" he cried. "And I! And I! And I!" cried the rest, grim-faced
and eager. "Aye--give us but swords, and one to lead, and we will
follow!"

Quoth Beltane:

"Go you then to Sir Benedict within Bourne and say to all men that
Beltane the Duke hath this night burned down Black Ivo's shameful
gibbet, for a sign that he is come at last and is at work, nor will he
stay until he die, or Pentavalon be free!"

CHAPTER XV

HOW BELTANE HAD WORD WITH PERTOLEPE THE RED, AND HOW THEY LEFT HIM IN
THE FOREST

"Since all men breathing 'neath the sky
Good or evil, soon must die,
Ho! bring me wine, and what care I
For dying!"

It was Giles Brabblecombe singing to himself as he knelt beside a fire
of twigs, and Beltane, opening sleepy eyes, looked round upon a world
all green and gold and dew-bespangled; a fair world and fragrant,
whose balmy air breathed of hidden flowers and blooming thickets,
whence came the joyous carolling of new-waked birds; and beholding all
this and the glory of it, my Beltane must needs praise God he was
alive.

"Hail and good morrow to thee, brother!" cried the bowman, seeing him
astir. "The sun shineth, look you, I sit upon my hams and sing for that
this roasting venison smelleth sweet, while yonder i' the leaves be a
mavis and a merle a-mocking of me, pretty rogues: for each and ever of
which, _Laus Deo, Amen!_"

"Why truly, God hath made a fair world, Giles, a good world to live in,
and to live is to act--yet here have I lain most basely sleeping--"

"Like any paunched friar, brother. But a few days since, I met thee in
the green, a very gentle, dove-like youth that yet became a very lion
of fight and demi-god of battle! Heroes were we all, last night--nay,
very Titans--four 'gainst an army!--whiles now, within this
balmy-breathing morn you shall see Walkyn o' the Bloody Axe with grim
Black Rogerkin, down at the brook yonder, a-sprawl upon their bellies
busily a-tickling trout for breakfast, while I, whose good yew bow
carrieth death in every twang, toasting deer-flesh on a twig, am mocked of
wanton warblers i' the green: and thou, who art an Achilles, a Hect