Dumnocoveros moved into the vision. Stepping forwards, he threw his cloak over the man's back, covering him. It lay there insubstantial as a wisp of mist.
'No, Boudica,' he said softly. 'Not this one. Not yet. Save him for the gods.'
Although the queen made no sign of having heard, she put out her hand to grip the warrior's arm.
'Wait, Ecenomolios,' she said. 'Not Homullus. Him we keep.'
Ecenomolios growled out a curse but straightened and slipped the knife back into his belt. He pulled the Roman upright and, with a shove of his knee, sent him sprawling at the feet of the nearest warrior.
'Take the bastard away, Corux,' he said. 'But be careful where you put your hands. He's shat himself.'
The warrior and those around him laughed; Dumnocoveros, too. Homullus was hustled off, moaning, and another man in a soldier's tunic and breastplate was dragged towards the pit.
The Druid had seen enough. He gathered his spirit back into himself and willed the vision to fade.
After the shambles of the dun. the farmyard seemed unreal, the grass too green and the smells of dung and wood-smoke too bland. He was still propped against the door of the barn, with Solla's thin face staring into his own. He doubted that more than half a dozen heartbeats had passed since he had pushed her away.
'Father?' she said.
Dumnocoveros took a deep breath and let it out slowly. He felt drained, his body an empty husk.
'Fetch your husband,' he said.
She ran towards the house, awkward as a colt, her skirts flying about her bare brown legs, while Dumnocoveros went back into the barn for his staff and satchel.
They came back together. The farmer – he had been out at a lambing until late the previous night and Dumnocoveros did not know his name – looked worried.
'You wanted me, lord?' he said, knuckling his brow. Beside him Solla stood silent.
Dumnocoveros closed his eyes momentarily, fighting off the last vestiges of dizziness. 'You have a war-spear hidden somewhere? A shield, perhaps?'
'Aye.' The man grinned. 'There's a chance I might find both these things, if I looked hard enough in the right places.'
'Good.' Dumnocoveros did not smile. 'Then look.'
The grin faded. 'Father?'
'The Wolves on the dun are dead. The tribe is rising.'
Both stared at him open-mouthed, although neither asked him how he knew. Dumnocoveros would have been surprised if they had: you did not question a Druid. Without another word, the man turned and ran towards the house.
Dumnocoveros was already shouldering his pack.
'You'll eat before you go, Father?' The girl's face was grave. 'A bannock and some fresh milk?'
Dumnocoveros shook his head; after the vision even bannocks and milk would have choked him. 'No,' he said. 'My thanks for the hospitality of your house.'
'The house was honoured,' She smiled. 'And the thanks are mine.'
She was still watching when he looked back at the turn in the track, slim as a birch tree, her belly showing no sign yet of the Wolf-child that his herbs would take away when the moon began to wane. He raised his hand in a final blessing, then turned his face towards Coriodurum.
Long before he reached it he could feel the anger all around him, in the air and in the ground, so strong that his head was thick with it and the hairs rose stiff against his neck. The gates were guarded, but at the sight of his Druid's cloak the guards reversed their spears. Dumnocoveros walked past them in silence.
The dun reeked of blood. The men and women he met were dyed with it, necks and arms and faces. They stared but kept a respectful distance, knuckling their brows as he went by.
The pit of his vision lay just within the entrance to the royal compound. It had been filled with dung, and the ground round about was trampled flat and stippled with red pools. Around the empty dais and along the front wall of the palace itself were the heads. Some of them the crows had already found, and the eye-sockets were empty.
As he approached the palace door the warrior who had dragged Homullus through the crowd came out to meet him. His arms and hands, too, were stained with blood, and now he carried a sword.
'You're welcome, Father.' The man raised fist to forehead. 'Enter, please.'
Dumnocoveros nodded. 'Thank you. Join us, Ecenomolios.'
The warrior looked startled, but he said nothing. Where his fist had rested, under the fringe of his back-pulled hair, was a fresh smear of red.
Boudica was sitting alone by the unlit hearth. She had changed her torn dress for one of flame-red wool. Her eyes, too, burned.
'You come too late for the feast, Father,' she said.
'So I see.' Dumnocoveros smiled and took the chair opposite hers. 'Your guests seem to be giving a feast of their own outside.'
Ecenomolios, standing behind him, chuckled. 'Aye,' he said. 'They're generous in their deaths, if nothing else. But then they can afford to be. It costs them nothing.'
'You have the leader safe? The little man with the soiled tunic?'
He caught the sound of Ecenomolios's indrawn breath. Even Boudica stirred on her chair.
'We have,' she said.
'Good. He'll be needed.'
'Use him as and when you will.' Boudica turned to the servant behind her chair. 'Tammonios. Some food and wine for the holy one.'
The man nodded and left.
'You're in pain, Daughter,' Dumnocoveros said; not a question but a statement. His physician's eye had noticed the stiffness in the movement and the tensing of the muscles around her mouth before she spoke.
'It's nothing of importance.' The queen's head went up.
'To be flogged is not nothing, Boudica. Either for the body or the soul. And you will need to be strong in both. You will let me see what the Wolves did to you, both you and your daughters.'
Boudica shrugged. 'It's not important,' she said again. 'The Wolves have already taken the sting away. As for Segoriga and Belisamovala I doubt if even a Druid's salves can heal a broken maidenhead.'
Dumnocoveros stared at her. 'They were raped?'
'You didn't know?' Boudica's mouth twisted. 'So, then, a Druid's knowledge has its limits. Aye, they were raped. What else would you expect of savages like the Romans?'
'Those responsible died slowly.' Ecenomolios's hand stroked the blade of his sword. 'Very slowly. And no longer as men.'
'So.' Dumnocoveros nodded. 'Good. That is good. I'll see the girls none the less. There are certain potions that will make them forget.'
'No!' The queen's eyes blazed. 'There will be no forgetting! My daughters took their own revenge, as was their right. You will not deprive them of that memory with potions.'
'Very well.' Dumnocoveros put it aside. 'As you please. What now?'
'First we clear the Romans from our borders.' Ecenomolios had sat himself in the chair to the queen's right. His sword was still loose in his hand, and he laid it across his knees. 'After that, we count our friends. The Corieltauvi will join us, and the Trinovantes. The tribes of the west and north are already with us, or will be when they smell forts burning. We drive the Wolves back to Gaul where they belong. And if they will not go then we kill them where they stand.'
Boudica laid a hand on his arm.
'No, Ecenomolios,' she said. 'Those who flog women and rape children have given up the right to be treated as warriors. The Romans are vermin, and we will treat them as such. We kill them all, wherever and whoever they are; whether they run or not.' She turned to Dumnocoveros. 'You agree, Father?'
Dumnocoveros closed his eyes. Foreknowledge was a terrible thing, but gods were gods. They looked after their own concerns, and mortals could not interfere.
'Aye,' he said. 'I agree.'
'That is good.' Ecenomolios smiled, and his fingers caressed the blade of the sword. 'So, then. We kill.'
26.
Albilla swallowed down her nervousness. She had never been inside a native shop before: like all wealthy Colonists she bought her presents from
the stores on Cloak and Praetorian Streets, where the shopkeepers were citizens and spoke good Latin. Beyond the south gate was foreign territory, strange as another world. If her mother had known she intended to look here for Marcus's birthday present she would have been furious.
Albilla didn't care. If the present had been for anyone else the Colony shops would have done. But not for Marcus. And he had been here himself, the day he had met Senovara.
She tied Phoenix's rein to the hitching post and went inside.
The room with its wooden counter looked reassuringly normal. Apart from the shopkeeper it was empty.
'You're Eisu?' she said. The man was staring at her, but she had expected that. ‘I'm sorry. I've no Celtic. Can you speak Latin?'
'Aye, Lady. A little.'
'I'm looking for a present,' she said. 'A birthday present. For a man. A ring, perhaps.'
Eisu bent down and brought a soft leather bag from under the counter. The contents scattered across the wooden surface and he gathered them together in a pile.
'Rings I have, Lady. See.' They were silver, chased with the same swirling patterns as she had seen on Ursina's brooch. 'You like?'
'They're beautiful.' Albilla sorted through them, holding each one up to the light to see the design. Finally she picked one out. It was heavier than the rest, a twisting knot with a leaping horse carved into the bezel. 'How much is this one, please?'
Eisu smiled. 'The sir is a horseman?'
'Yes.'
'Then wait. Perhaps I have something better.' He disappeared through the curtained doorway behind the counter, then came back holding a small round disc. 'Here.'
Albilla took the thing from him. It was a gold coin, the size of her thumbnail. On the uppermost face was a stylised running horse made up of a few simple curves, so real it seemed to leap from the metal. As soon as she saw it she knew that it was perfect.
'Cuno.' Eisu pointed to the lettering beside the horse. 'Is king before Romans.'
'Cunobelinus,' Albilla said. 'Yes, I know.'
'And look here.' He took the coin from her and turned it over. 'Camu. Camulodunum. Is make on dun.'
'But the letters are Roman. Roman letters, British horse. Both together.'
‘Ah. Yes.’ Eisu nodded. ‘Cunobelinus likes Romans so makes coin half-half.' He held up his hands, the fingers interleaved and overlapping like the pattern on the rings. 'Half is Roman, half is British, both together in one. You understand?'
'Yes, I understand.' Albilla laughed. 'It's perfect.'
'You want?'
'Oh, yes. Very much.'
'It's beautiful, Albilla.' Ursina held the coin up to the light. 'Very unusual. Yes, Marcus will like that. Are you giving him it as it is, or having it made into something?'
'I hadn't decided.' Albilla was glad Ursina liked the coin. Her own mother, she knew, would hate it: it was too crude, too un-Roman. And, as Ursina said, too unusual: Bellicia gave presents that looked like presents, bought from proper shops. 'I thought about a ring, but that would spoil it somehow.'
'You could have it put on a chain, perhaps. Like an amulet.' Ursina turned to Aper. 'Titus, what do you think?' She paused. 'Titus!'
'Mmm?' Aper had been staring into the flames of the brazier that, even now spring had come, he insisted on having in the villa's living-room. 'I'm sorry, Bear-cub. What were you saying?'
'Albilla was wondering whether to have Marcus's coin made into an amulet or a ring.'
'Ah.'
'Titus, dear, you're hopeless.' Ursina passed the coin back. 'There's plenty of time to decide, of course, Albilla. Even though his birthday is in six days you'd want to give it to him yourself, and he won't be back until the autumn.'
'That long?' Albilla knew the question was stupid before she asked it, but the words had spoken themselves.
'He can't leave his command, lass,' Aper said gently. 'Especially now the Foxes have been ordered west. And even if the campaign's a quick one the new territories will have to be garrisoned. If you wanted a soldier then you've got him.'
'Titus!' Ursina snapped.
'Aye. Aye, I know, Bear-Cub.' Aper massaged the socket of his missing eye. 'I'm sorry. Albilla, my apologies, I'm not fit company for anyone this afternoon. A touch of the bone-ache.'
'Ask Trinnus to rub you with goose-grease,' Ursina said.
'Mothers forfend! That beggar has hands like roof tiles!'
'Have you heard from Marcus at all?' Albilla asked, as casually as she could manage. The question had been her main reason for coming all the way out to the villa, but she had felt too embarrassed to ask it.
'No.' Aper shook his head. 'Not since Braniacum. But that's no great wonder. He'll still be on his way to Deva, and when he gets there he'll have better things to do than write letters he can't send back. When we've news we'll tell you, don't you worry.' He held out his hand. 'Meanwhile let's see this coin of yours.'
Albilla gave it to him. 'The shopkeeper said it was struck on the dun,' she said.
'Aye.' Aper turned the gold piece in his hand. 'There was a mint there twenty years back, before we came. Governor Plautius called the money in and had it melted down for bullion. There won't be many of these around now, you can be sure.'
'Eisu said it was special. I liked the horse.'
Aper chuckled. 'He's a character, isn't he? Or maybe I should say "she". I've seen her before, cut in the chalk hills between Verulamium and Calleva.' He passed the coin back. 'Very nice. Very nice indeed. Incidentally, speaking of mares I hear you've fostered out that new one of yours with Brocomaglos's daughter.'
'Senovara? That's right. Our groom Catti said Lacta needed the exercise, and I still can't ride properly with this arm.' Albilla laughed. 'Mind you, I can't ride properly at the best of times. Lacta's better where she is until Marcus gets back.'
'You made a fine choice, certainly. That one'll take care of her like she was a visiting princess.'
'She said she'd teach me to ride.'
'Did she, though?' Aper blinked. 'Then you're honoured, lass. And lucky.'
'If she doesn't break her neck for her,' Ursina said.
When Albilla had gone, Aper went through to his study, closed the door and lay down on the couch to think.
The scraps of news and rumour he had picked up on his visit to town that morning had been worrying. The gods alone knew what was really happening at Coriodurum, but if Montanus had been right about Homullus then it could be nothing good, and now Paullinus had withdrawn so many of the policing garrisons even the Colony was beginning to feel the effects. People with native servants complained of skimped work and surly behaviour. At the baths Firmus, the man in charge of the Temple workforce, had complained of a spate of accidents: carts whose axles broke from overloading, cement lost to water damage, barrels of nails dropped into the river by stevedores unloading the barges. When Aper had suggested that the 'accidents' had been nothing of the kind, Firmus had laughed.
'These beggars don't have the imagination for that sort of thing, Titus,' he had said. 'Take my word for it, there's nothing more sinister involved than clumsiness and sheer bloody lack of brains.'
Aper frowned, remembering the total absence of concern in the man's voice. And Firmus could have been speaking for almost every Roman in the Colony.
Mothers! he thought. Am I the only sane one left?
He got up and crossed to the bookshelf where his translation of Xenophon’s treatise on horsemanship sat in almost-isolation. Taking it from its battered leather case, he opened it at random and settled himself back down on the couch to read. As always, the old Greek's assurance of his own infallibility calmed him. By the third page he was feeling more in command of himself. Carefully –the roll was beginning to split in places now with age and use – he wound the book back onto its spindle and replaced it in its tube.
Perhaps it was already too late, but the attempt had to be made. He would go to Brocomaglos.
Aper had never known the dun so deserted, or so silent, or so full of inv
isible eyes. The fields, normally busy at this time of year with last-minute ploughing and sowing, were empty, and the doors of the huts he passed, despite the mild spring weather, were closed. Once a stone flew past his head. He turned. The road behind him was bare, but his eye caught a flicker of movement beside one of the hurdles as if someone had ducked out of sight.
He rode on, his spine prickling.
As he passed through the compound gate Durnos, Brocomaglos's dog, leapt at him the full length of his chain and stood barking; not a warning bark, but a furious, frustrated yapping that continued as Aper dismounted and tethered his horse to the rail.
Brocomaglos's door, too, was shut. Aper walked up to it and knocked. Then, when there was no answer, he beat on it with his fists.
Finally, it opened. He stepped back.
Brocomaglos stood foursquare in the doorway, his hair unbraided and his face hard as stone.
'Aye?' he growled.
Aper pushed past him, shouldering the heavier man aside.
'We talk,' he said.
He had half-expected the room beyond to reflect the chief's appearance but it was neat and clean as always. There was no sign of Matugena or the girls.
'The Commander is wasting his time.' Brocomaglos had followed him inside. 'There is no need for talk.'
Deliberately, Aper sat down on one of the chairs by the hearth. 'There's every need,’ he said ‘Otherwise our swords may do the talking for us.'
'And would that be a bad thing?' Brocomaglos had remained standing.
Aper noticed that the man's huge right hand was slowly clenching and unclenching, as if the fingers were stiff with lack of use.
'Mothers!' he snapped. 'Are you fool enough now to ask me that?'
Brocomaglos flushed and turned away. 'Aye, I know,' he said. 'But sometimes there is no other choice.'
'There is always a choice!'
'Aye, for the wolf, perhaps. We've had this conversation before.'
'Have you had it, too, with Matugena and Senovara and young Ahteha? What did they say?' Brocomaglos did not answer. Aper took a deep breath. 'Brocomaglos, I am begging you for the good of all of us, your folk and mine, to help me keep the peace.
The Horse Coin Page 17