by Angus Watson
What he did go on and on about–and on and on–was Rome. He was frustrated that they weren’t heading directly for the capital because Caesar had a local rebellion to crush, but he more than made up for it by constantly telling Spring every little thing about the city.
His only topic of conversation other than Rome and its inhabitants was Caesar, whom he idolised, just as he’d idolised Drustan when they’d first met, and then Lowa. Ragnall, she thought, needed someone to follow. Dug had once told her why people were addicted to things like alcohol and mushrooms. Their addiction, he said, was a comfortable place that removed them from the troublesome real world of decision-making, guilt and so on. That was why Ragnall always had to follow someone, she reckoned. He’d never had to make a decision in his life and had become addicted to being told what to do. Nothing had ever been his fault. It might be, she mused, why he never talked about himself and his successes. Just as he thought his failures were other people’s failures, he probably never counted his successes as his own.
Eventually, over a moon or so in Gaul, she found herself coming to like him, a little. He was a traitor who’d joined the enemy. He was blind to the faults of those he idolised and followed them unquestioningly–something that Spring would never, never do–but he was not a bad man and there was a certain strength to him. She was his prisoner. He could have neglected her or beaten her or worse, but he didn’t. Instead he spent most waking hours with her, explaining how Roman structures worked and how they all culminated in this wondrous city where they were going to spend the winter. Ultimately, his incessant enthusiasm was effective. By the time they headed for Rome, Spring was quite looking forward to seeing it.
Chapter 12
With the ship and crew that Caesar had provided, Felix crossed back to Gaul. The journey was achingly slow because the captain and slave rowers refused to believe that he could make things go very badly wrong for them if they didn’t speed up, yet he found his legion stunningly unchanged. Felix’s keen mind needed constant occupation, yet his creations could sit and stare unthinkingly into space and simply wait for him to return. He was fairly sure that some of them hadn’t moved at all since he’d left. That irritated him on one level because he thought it proved that they were seriously unintelligent, but on another, more niggling level he knew that he’d never achieve the peace of mind needed to simply sit, yet these brutes could do it with ease. So, in one way, their minds were superior to his.
Since the crew of slave rowers had been surly on his way back and the captain disrespectful, Felix enjoyed his first order to the Celermen and Maximen: to kill half of the slaves to fuel the Maximen’s row back, and to break the legs of the rest so that they might not cause any trouble until their deaths on arrival in Britain. Unfortunately they needed the captain, so he’d have to stay alive for a while, but Felix expected he’d be a good deal more deferential on the return journey.
After a faster but still annoyingly slow load using two tenders, they set off back to Britain with the Maximen rowing at an astonishing pace. As the boat surged through the swell, Felix kept a lookout for British druids in boats and ship-holing behemoths, but the sea was blissfully clear. He called over Bistan the Celerman and told him he was the legion’s new centurion. Bistan took the news of Kelter’s death matter-of-factly. Although they came from the same Sicilian village, the men were very different–Bistan was smaller, pale-skinned between his pustules, light-haired and openly friendly, while Kelter had been dark and cruel-faced. Bistan was cruel in character, of course–all of Felix’s creations were–but he didn’t look it or act it when he wasn’t actually hurting someone, which made him more pleasant to talk to than Kelter.
Felix told Bistan his plan for the landing, instructed him to continue the watch and settled back to bask in the wonderful music created by the screams and moans of the broken-legged Gaulish slaves, piled in the boat’s bow, now tied up after a couple had managed to scrabble over the side to drown. The sounds reminded him of childhood voyages with his slave merchant father and he soon floated into peaceful slumber.
Bistan shook him awake and said with a cheery smile that there was a fleet of ships to the north and a fire to the north-east.
It was the Roman fleet–the entire Roman fleet–heading back to Gaul with lanterns at bow and stern twinkling prettily above the black sea, away from the burning Roman camp.
“Neptune’s knob end!” he said. For a fleeting moment he thought about carrying on to Britain and taking the island himself–surely he could conquer the oafs with his legion alone?–but then he remembered that Caesar had Spring. And, actually, he needed the general’s legions. His troops were powerful, but they were few, and they were mortal.
“Turn the boat around,” he said, clenching his fists so hard that they shook.
“Sure, boss!” said Bistan, like a carefree junior baker asked to put a couple more loaves in the oven.
The following day, his legion safely concealed in a new and unlucky woodland village, Felix went to see Caesar. After a little asking around he rode along a road busy with empty ox-carts trundling inland and plank-laden carts bumping in the other direction to the coast, and found the general in the middle of what had once been forest but was now stumps, detritus and industry. Some slaves stripped leaves, twigs, branches and bark. Some tended great fires. Others carried logs to carpenters for the more skilled job of sawing planks. Swivel-eyed overseers armed with whips strode about with bored-looking legionary escorts. The air was thick with woodsmoke, sawdust, the bellows of oxen, the shouts of workers and the screamed pleadings of a few slackers that the overseers were whipping to the bone. Caesar stood as a serene hub in the Underworld-like whirl, peaceful as if he were watching a parade of vestal virgins on a cool afternoon.
“Ah, Felix,” he said, “walk with me.” He headed off, picking his way over broken branches and circumnavigating hut-sized piles of burning foliage and twigs.
When they were out of everyone’s earshot, Felix said: “What happened? Why—”
“The army returned because part of the plan failed. The part of the plan that failed was yours.”
“But I was on my way. I saw you and you agreed—”
“Had you landed as we’d arranged on your first attempt, then this conversation would not be taking place. However, you will not be punished.”
Not be punished! The man was amazing. The plan was that he’d wait until Felix returned to Britain. It was Caesar’s plan and he’d even supplied the ship. Something must have happened or he must have found out something new. Whatever it was, Caesar had returned earlier than planned, forgotten what had actually happened and decided that it was all Felix’s fault. This was why he was so dangerous. A man might be executed for failure in any army. In this army you could be executed for landing the wrong role in Caesar’s fantasies.
“Caesar will launch an invasion next year,” the general continued, “for a full campaign. His reconnaissance has confirmed what he thought. The Britons are a tougher nut to crack than the Gauls, so he will require a larger nutcracker. Six legions, more cavalry, more slingers and archers, your legion and more. Out of sight of Rome, the entire war machine might be fully tested in the obliteration of the British.”
“I see. Where will we winter?”
“Caesar’s wintering is unclear–there is rebellion in Illyricum that he will have to stamp on–but you will winter with your legion in the marshes of Belgium. There is insurgency fomenting in those swamps which may hamper next year’s invasion of Britain. You and your troops will end it. Travel quietly and swiftly from village to village and teach them the folly of resistance.”
“Execute some as an example?”
“Execute them all as a solution.”
Felix sighed. Another ball-achingly cold winter away from Rome did not appeal, but at least he’d have some fun.
“Certainly, Caesar,” he said.
“Good, then farewell, Caesar shall see you in the spring.”
“Right. Ah. The
re’s one other thing. Do you still have that British girl you captured?”
Caesar looked into his eyes unblinkingly for so long that Felix felt sweat prickle under the skin on his brow. “You seem unnaturally interested in this girl,” he said eventually. “You were desperate to have her on the beach in Britain. Why do you want her?”
“I knew her in Britain.”
“You did not know her well. Unless you were pretending not to recognise her at first.”
“She has changed from a girl to a woman, she looks completely different.”
“Answer the question now and truthfully. Why do you want her?”
“You know that my sacrifices are more effective if I know the victim. I have known this girl since she was born, so—”
“No. It is more than that. Caesar can see your desperation. Perhaps she is the great British magician of whom you spoke, whose powers will enable Caesar to conquer the world? Perhaps you mean to take these powers for yourself?”
“No, Caesar, no, you have it wrong. The magician, like all those who can use magic, is a man of reasonably advanced age, not a girl. It is possibly the man who commanded whales to hole my ship. Women do not have the capacity for magic.”
Caesar looked him in the eye for far too long again. Felix felt a treacherous bead of sweat leak from his bald skull and trickle down behind his ear.
“No matter,” the general said eventually, “because you will not be going anywhere near the girl and you will make no attempt to see her.”
“If that is what Caesar wishes, I will strive to—”
Caesar turned and walked away at speed. It seemed that their audience was over, so Felix set off back to his legion. Shortly afterwards he came across a large grass snake writhing on the open road, a female by her size, presumably injured by the woodcutters. He stamped on her head. It gave him a little boost and he felt a great deal better. He’d bide his time and he would have that girl.
Part Three
Britain, Rome and Gaul
55/54 BC
Chapter 1
“Bah bah bah!” shouted Dug “Aye… bah!” He pointed his forefinger to the sky behind her with his eyes so wide that there might have been a dragon coming in to land, and screamed even more loudly than he’d been able to last time Lowa had seen him.
She looked up. Nothing there. Who knew what the little oddball’s developing mind was seeing? Maybe there was a dragon that adults couldn’t see? Elann Nancarrow’s cats were forever staring freakily at terrifying invisible beings. Maybe when people aged they lost the ability to see into other worlds? It was possible, she supposed. Lowa dragged herself back from ridiculous musing. She’d been on her horse all night and her mind was bouncing around like a storm-tossed sailing dinghy.
Keelin put Dug down on the rug, on all fours. The day was cold but sunny, and the baby was bundled into an outfit made of fox fur which made him look like a fat bear cub. He spotted his wooden dog on the far side of the rug, screamed with joy and crawled towards it wobblingly.
“See?” said Keelin. “Crawling.”
“I see,” said Lowa, as Dug’s arms splayed and he face-planted into the rug. But he pushed himself up, looked at his mother, scream-shouted happily and carried on.
“He’ll get better. He’s later crawling than most, but I’m sure that’s because of his whacking great head weighing him down. He’s still the cheeriest baby I’ve ever seen. Even when he’s crying you can see the smile in his eyes. He’s the smartest as well. He knows things, that one. He certainly should be clever, with a head that size. His dad had a big head, didn’t he?”
Lowa nodded and smiled. It was good to see new life, particularly because she knew what was coming next. She’d arrived back at Maidun that morning from another recruitment trawl. This time she’d been to the treacherous bastards in Dumnonia. She was that desperate. It had been depressing, whole villages populated by the elderly and children after so many of fighting age had perished under the Spring Tide. Thank Danu that most of them blamed their dead king Bruxon for leading the whole army to their deaths against Maidun, rather than blaming the queen of Maidun for drowning them. She’d still received the odd angry shout and thrown egg, though. She’d very nearly killed the first man who’d thrown an egg, but Mal had calmed her down and charmed the egg thrower so much that he had become her chief recruitment agent, mustering half a thousand on his own. So forgiveness did work sometimes, she guessed, although that half-thousand were pretty much all fourteen-year-olds who’d been deemed too young for the army the year before.
When she’d reached Maidun, Mal had run up to say that the merchants and fishers all reported that the Romans were preparing a much larger invasion fleet, to be ready early the coming summer. Then Chamanca had approached, wrapped in a woollen shawl, looking as if she hadn’t slept for a year.
“Welcome home,” the Iberian had said. “Atlas is still alive, the stubborn bugger. Maggot says anyone else would have died a moon ago. He will die tomorrow or possibly the next day.”
“I will see my son, then I’ll come straight to Atlas.”
“Thank you. He’d like to see you. He is in his hut.”
Lowa left Keelin feeding cow’s milk and honey to Dug from a cored bull’s horn fitted with a leather teat. The boy, guzzling happily, didn’t seem to notice Lowa leaving.
The door to Atlas’ hut was open. Lowa could smell death from twenty paces away. She knocked on the doorframe and Chamanca answered from the darkness. The stench inside was so strong that for a heartbeat she couldn’t see. When her eyes had adjusted, she saw Chamanca sitting on a stool. She looked up at Lowa but didn’t greet her or stand.
Atlas was on the bed, lying on his side, a thin woollen blanket over his shrunken bulk.
“Lowa, welcome,” he said, his voice deep as a god’s. “Chamanca, please will you offer our guest a drink.”
“Don’t worry, I just… drank.” Lowa didn’t want to breath in.
Atlas sniffed a weak laugh. “Don’t be awkward, please. Death is merely a stage of the journey. Not an enjoyable one, I grant you, but there is no need to be miserable. Have you seen people grow old? It is not pleasant. I have no desire to age and weaken. I look forward to seeing what comes next. Now, take a seat. Chamanca, fetch Lowa a mug of beer, please. And have one yourself.”
Sitting down on the stool next to Chamanca’s, Lowa could see Atlas more clearly. His frail smile was twisted by the scar that she’d given him with a deer bone, when they’d killed her women and tried to kill her. Sometimes that evening seemed as if it were centuries ago and sometimes as if it had happened only moments before. This was one of those latter times. She felt a flash of anger that he’d killed Aithne, then reminded herself that he’d been under Felix’s spell and he’d done his best to make up for it since, plus it was hard to hate someone so obviously near death. His injured shoulder was grossly swollen. A black, sewn-up wound ran across it, with a tube–a cow’s vein, Lowa guessed–running from the wound into a wooden bucket by the bedside. It was hard to be precise, but it seemed that most of the stench was emanating from the grim bucket.
“I never thought I’d be Rome’s first victim in Britain,” said Atlas.
“The Taloon man and the Haxmite who killed him were the first victims of Rome’s invasion,” said Chamanca, sitting down with two mugs of beer and handing one to Lowa. “So stop trying to blow your own trumpet.”
“Quite right, quite right,” said Atlas. “I’ll leave that to Carden. Where is Carden? He was just here.”
Chamanca clamped a hand to her face, stood and walked swiftly from the hut.
“Tetchy, that one,” said Atlas, “now, tell me, where is Carden? Off with his brother Weylin somewhere?”
“That’s one way of putting it,” said Lowa.
She sat and talked to him until he went to sleep. When she left he was snoring quietly and unevenly.
Chamanca was waiting outside, alongside Maggot and Walfdan. Lowa nodded a greeting and opened her mouth to
ask if there was anything the druids could do for Atlas, but closed it again. They would already have done everything.
Chamanca went back into the hut and Lowa asked Maggot and Walfdan to return to the eyrie with her to discuss deployment of the new recruits, training schedules and other things such as who would replace Atlas as the infantry commander.
They set off slowly, since Walfdan was not well and could not go any faster, and Lowa sent three onlookers to fetch Mal, Adler and the blacksmith Elann Nancarrow. One of the many things she hated about being queen, possibly the thing that she’d hated most initially, was that there were always slack-jawed dimwits who thought it was perfectly acceptable to stand and gawp at her as she went about her day. However, since she’d realised that she could use them as a permanent fleet of errand people and a source for food and water, she’d despised them less.
Chapter 2
“You said it was impressive.” Spring wrinkled her nose.
“You aren’t impressed?” Ragnall raised his arms at the wonderful architecture and stunning carvings towering all around them. There was nothing like this in Britain, nothing close to it. It must have looked like a god’s palace to Spring. She was impressed, she was just being annoying. “It kicks the arse off Maidun’s wooden arena.”
“That’s got seats all the way round.”
Ragnall sighed. They were in Pompey’s theatre complex. Several years before, Drustan had given his life to transport Ragnall there to save him from being buried alive by Felix. Back then it had been a building site. Now it was a freshly painted, palatial amazement. He and Spring were standing in the middle of the main theatre, on an expansive marble-floored stage surrounded by a towering semi-circular tier of seating and a three-storey, balconied, marble-columned backdrop.