Sword of Neamha

by Stephen England

  And something else. With a cry, I sprang from the back of my horse, into the sea of struggling men, into the melee. A face, something familiar. A man rose up to my left and I clubbed him down with the war hammer. Aneirin’s voice sounded behind me, a cry of warning, but I was heedless of it.

  It was him, it had to be. Older now, of a surety, but the same. Another instant and we were face-to-face in the heaving mass of men. His mouth opened in recognition and he raised his spear to block me, but I smashed it down, splintering the wood with a single blow of my hammer, forcing him back against the trunk of the great tree.

  I was looking full into the face of one of the mercenaries that had fought with Cavarillos that dark night, that had escaped at his side.

  “Where is Cavarillos?” I screamed, my weapon lost in the confusion, my hands around his throat as I pinned him to the bark of the tree. “Where is he?”

  I felt a blade pass through my garments from one of the other botroas and he spat in my face. I squeezed harder, watching as his eyes bulged from their sockets. “Tell me!”

  “He is with the Casse. In—” A spear came flying through the air, piercing through his side. Blood poured over my garments as he slumped against me, the life draining from his body. I looked up into the eyes of Tancogeistla as he looked down from his horse. brihetin were all around us, running down the rest of the fleeing Casse.

  “Why?” I cried, gazing at the general with ill-disguised fury in my eyes. “Why?”

  He looked surprised. “I feared for your life, my son. You seemed to have gone mad.”

  I didn’t answer, rather looked down at the lifeless body of my last link to Cavarillos. Maybe I had. If so, so had the rest of the world. Gone mad…

  Chapter XX: Return to Ictis

  We stripped the dead of their weapons and provisions and then moved quickly south, continuing toward Ictis on roads that were considerably the worse for the heavy rains we had received.

  And with each mile traveled, I found my sleep to be more troubled. I had not dreamed of Inyae in years, but with the reappearance of the botroas I found myself thinking more of the old days. Cavarillos. I was surprised to find how much hatred still lurked inside my spirit for my old friend, for the friendship he had betrayed.

  I hungered for a meeting with him.

  Arriving at Ictis, we quickly encamped around the oppida, cutting it off from all outside aid. Years of war with the Casse had taken their toll upon the standing forces of the Dumnones, and according to the intelligence of Galligos moc Nammeios, they could muster less than four hundred warriors in all of Ictis.

  I prayed he was right.

  We besieged Ictis for a year and a half, hoping to starve the defenders into submission. Tancogeistla looked worse with each passing day, old wounds taking their toll upon his aged body. Motios, the druid, did his best to attend to his master, but there were things even beyond his power.

  And Tancogeistla would not rest. Ictis was his obsession, and each day he rode out before the palisade to taunt the defenders with their impotence, to taunt those who had humiliated him so many years before. He had returned…

  And then, one day early in the month of Equos, a rider came pounding into the camp from the north, bearing word for Tancogeistla. Though his message was for the general only, we could see by the way he carried himself, the urgency of his steps, that the news he carried was anything but good.

  An hour later, I was summoned to Tancogeistla’s tent. A council of war had been called.

  The general looked haggard, old even beyond his years. Aneirin moc Cunobelin stood at his side, surrounded by several of the highest-ranking nobles of the Aedui. I had a sense that all of them were waiting.

  “My trusted friends,” Tancogeistla began, coughing violently. He covered his mouth with his hand and when it came away, I saw that it was flecked with blood. He cleared his throat and started again. “This will be brief. I have just received word from Yns-Mon.”

  A murmur ran through the nobles.

  “The garrison there has betrayed us. Three weeks ago, an emissary from the Casse approached, conferring with Captain Piso. And for a price, Piso agreed to turn over the oppida to our enemies.”

  “What he had so nobly defended from Casse swords, he turned over readily enough for a sum of Casse gold,” Tancogeistla hissed, his lip curling upward in a sneer of disgust.

  “The town and surrounding countryside belong to our enemies. Apparently most of the garrison went along with Piso’s betrayal. Those that did not were slain.”

  I saw the shock in Aneirin’s eyes. He had spent long hours with Piso, talking with the sub-chieftain about the defense of the oppida, the heroic battle fought there. Clearly he struggled to credit the news.

  “Do we march north, then?” One of the nobles asked, laying a hand upon his sword’s hilt.

  “No!” Tancogeistla cried furiously, slamming his fist into the wood of the rude wooden table in front of him. “We will carry our revenge to the Dumnones first. Then we deal with the traitors. Drustan and his warbands think themselves proud that they humbled an Aeduan army seventeen years ago. They must be taught a lesson. They must die.”

  He looked across the table into my eyes, his fierce, charismatic gaze seeming to hold me in its spell. “We will prepare for an assault. Cadwalador, you will ride with my son.”

  “Yes, my lord.”

  Months earlier, two mighty battering rams had been prepared, and now men formed around them, preparing to push them against the kran of the Dumnones.

  According to the plan Tancogeistla had outlined during the council of war, he was to lead the assault, at the head of over fifty brihetin, the flower of the Aeduan nobility. Following him through the gate would be the ordmalica of Lugort, and the eiras, the nobles of Emain-Macha. The rest of the army would follow.

  Aneirin seemed nervous as we mounted for the battle, and I noticed his gaze constantly flickered to the other contingent of brihetin, his father’s bodyguard.

  “What is wrong?” I asked him.

  He shook his head. “My father—he has…” his voice drifted off as though he hesitated to continue.

  “He has been coughing up blood?” I asked.

  He glanced over at me sharply. “How did you know?”

  “I have seen it. How long?”

  “Weeks. Ictis possesses him, consumes his body and spirit. He is not fit to lead this assault.”

  I shook my head. “He will lead the assault. He can do no other. And we must succeed. I was with your father the last time we came before these walls. And we were defeated. He will not survive another defeat here.”

  And so we rode slowly forward, approaching the kran and the starving men who stood behind it, ready to defend their homes to the death. And scenes from the past came flashing back through my mind.

  Cavarillos and I standing side by side, waiting for the Dumnone army to crash down upon us. The frenzied melee that followed, the men I had killed. Cavarillos had saved my life that day. If it had not been for him, I would never have lived to see another sunrise. Yet, for the friendship we knew, Ictis was the beginning of the end. An end that had been as violent and bloody as battle itself. Only it wasn’t over yet.

  The rams moved forward, and in the distance we could hear their steady, rhythmic pounding, battering at the palisade surrounding Ictis. A death knell.

  Lugort’s men smashed open the gate and we could see Tancogeistla’s brihetin pouring through the breach to fall upon the levies on the other side.

  I could see Aneirin was restless. But our time was not yet come.

  The eiras moved forward, through the breach on the right side of the gate, following upon the Dumnones from the flank. They began to pull back from the gate and I nodded to Aneirin. It was time to move.

  As one our horsemen moved forward, in column, a signal for the rest of the army to follow.

  We reached the gate and poured through it. The lugoae of the Dumnones had pulled back a short distance and were now p
utting up a stiff fight. But Tancogeistla was nowhere to be seen.

  Of a sudden, Aneirin cried out and clutched at my arm, pointing. I glanced up at the hill in the center of Ictis, and I could dimly descry the brihetin of Tancogeistla on the crest of the hill, engaged in vicious melee with Drustan’s chariots. I knew what had happened. In his lust for revenge, Tancogeistla had singled out the enemy chieftain, intent on killing him with his own hand.

  Our column swung forward, moving up the hill at a gallop. The fight on the rise continued, chieftain against chieftain, bodyguard against bodyguard. And silhouetted against the sky I could see the form of Tancogeistla, his blood-wet sword brandished high toward the heavens.

  But his companions were dying, one by one, crushed ‘neath the chariots of Drustan. The fate of Malac, come once again.

  Kuroas. Champion. Neamha. Berserker. Tancogeistla was all these things, and never more so than on this bright day, slashing furiously at the enemies which surrounded him, slaying Dumnone charioteers by the dozen. None of his bodyguards could equal him, and they died because of it, killed by better warriors than themselves.

  Then he was alone, yet the enemy chieftain dared not to close with his sword-arm. Instead, Drustan pulled back to the center of the town, where nigh a hundred warriors waited, the reserve of the Dumnone warbands.

  And Tancogeistla followed, riding into their midst, scattering them left and right. Cernunnos reincarnate. It was as though he had a death wish. Perhaps he did.

  Saddened by the perfidy of Piso and the garrison of Yns-Mon, obsessed with the killing of his old adversary, Drustan, he rode direct into the midst of the mob, his armor washed in the blood of his enemies, his sword dripping red. Calling out taunts at the cowardice of the Dumnone chieftain, he struck down his enemies like a man possessed.

  Our horses blown from the gallop up the hill, we could do nothing. We were too far away. The eiras surged up the knoll behind us, driving enemy lugoae before them like cattle. Yet it was all too late. Far too late.

  The lone horseman emerged from the ranks of the Dumnones, cutting a path with his sword, then the mob swallowed him up again. A fierce cry rang out across the hill, over the sound of battle. And then he disappeared, overcome.

  I could scarcely believe my own eyes, a lump rising in my throat that threatened to choke me. I heard the sound of sobbing from someplace beside me, and turned to find tears running down the cheeks of Aneirin moc Cunobelin. Tears of grief—and rage. Word of Tancogeistla’s death spread through the army like a fire and as one man we surged forward, up the hill, heedless of danger. Avengers.

  Horsemen fell around Aneirin and me as we galloped forward, challenging the last chariots of Drustan. Two of them fell beneath the ferocity of our charge. Then we were face to face with Drustan. The screams of dying men surrounded us as the eiras and ordmalica charged onto the square, slamming into the warbands of the Dumnones, but it was all distant, far-off. All that mattered was Drustan. I rode beside his chariot, careful to avoid the wheels, my eyes focused on his face.

  My first javelin missed the chieftain, lancing into the shoulder of his bodyguard. The wounded man let out a cry, toppling from the chariot. A moment later, the wheels rolled over him, breaking his bones with a sickening crunch.

  Aneirin’s form materialized out of the whirling melee, his mount’s coat flecked with blood. “Leave him to me, Cadwalador!” he screamed, his voice full of rage as he rode straight at the Dumnone chieftain, intent only on taking his revenge.

  I saw a smile cross Drustan’s face as he saw the inexperienced heir ride to the side of his chariot, a sword in his hand.

  Aneirin was going to die. I could see that from the moment their swords crossed. His rage was not commensurate with his skill, and he would die because of it.

  I stabbed my second javelin into the flank of one of Drustan’s horses, causing him to rear and paw at the air with his hooves, straining at the harness. The charioteer glanced at me and I saw the fear in his eyes as he struggled to restrain the horses. Fear replaced a moment later by the agony of death as the javelin pierced his throat.

  Freed of restraint, the horses bounded forward, the sudden uncontrolled motion catching Drustan off balance.

  With a scream, he fell backward, off the chariot, his body disappearing beneath the heaving mass of horses and men. To his death.

  Our men let out a frenzied cheer at the sight of his death, hacking into the enemy warband of botroas with renewed fury. Within the hour, every last Dumnone warrior lay dead. Ictis was ours. But at what cost…

  We found Tancogeistla after pulling several enemy corpses away from his body. His flesh was scored with countless wounds, his long white hair stained crimson, his armor and garments soaked in blood. Yet the breath was still in him.

  At the sound of Aneirin’s voice, his eyes flickered open for a brief moment. “Aneirin, my son,” he whispered, his voice a fragile shell of the eloquence we had so long known of him.

  I glanced over at Aneirin, motioning him to come to the side of Tancogeistla. The young heir came and knelt down at his adoptive father’s side. “My father,” he gasped out, the tears flowing freely as he removed his battle-scarred helmet. “I—”

  Tancogeistla lifted one feeble hand to stay his words, before it collapsed weakly to his side. “Tell me, my son. How goes the day?”

  “Victory belongs to us, father. Ictis is in our hands.”

  “And Drustan?” the dying Vergobret asked, a strange fire flickering in his eyes.

  “He is dead, my father. As all those who lift sword against thee.”

  “It is enough,” Tancogeistla breathed slowly, those charismatic eyes closing for the last time. “It is enough…”

  I turned away to hide my own tears, unable to comprehend my emotions. Tancogeistla was dead. The strange, crafty old general whose banner I had followed for all of my adult life. The man I had defended with my life and yet stood against at Attuaca.

  I can write no fitting eulogy for his death. I am a man of the forge and the spear, not the pen. I know not how to take the sum of his life. Therefore, these are the words of Motios, the old druid. His lamentation over Tancogeistla.

  Tell it not in Caern-Brigantae, whisper it not in the streets of Camulosadae, lest the daughters of our enemies triumph, lest they take joy in our sorrow. For the pride of the Aedui wast slain in the high places, the mighty are fallen in battle. Valiant was he in his youth, and in his age, bravery did not depart from him. Neamha was his name and as his name, so were his deeds. From the blood of the slain, from the fat of the mighty, his sword returned not empty to its scabbard. Yea, even the sword of Tancogeistla.

  He scattered his enemies with his voice and they fled, as the sheep in the highlands. They came against him in a host, and he laughed. Three score of the enemy were as nothing unto him. They came and he slew them, leaving their bodies in the field.

  Cursed be thou, Ictis, and the people thereof. For on thy oppida was he slain, on thy heights was his life taken. The sword of the mighty is vilely cast away, it lieth in the dust of the streets, as though it ran not red in the blood of his enemies.

  Dieth Tancogeistla as a brave man dieth? Nay, not as a brave man, but as a kuroas falleth, so fellest he. Weep, ye daughters of the Aedui, yea, weep ye for the mighty art fallen…

  Thus endeth the reign of Tancogeistla…

  Chapter XXI: Succession

  It was a victory. Oh, yes, Ictis was a victory, but it felt hollow, as empty as the defeat we had experienced on these same plains seventeen years earlier. And now, as then, the situation was grave.

  As we stood there around the body, Lugort came up to us, his clothes torn and clotted with blood. Only a few of his ordmalica had survived the assault on the square. “My lord,” he began humbly, addressing our new Vergobret. “What is to be done with the population of Ictis?”

  I almost thought Aneirin hadn’t heard him. He kept gazing at the body of his adoptive father for a long moment. Then he slowly turned, glancin
g first at Lugort and then down the hill where the women and innocents of Ictis were being gathered at spear-point. “Kill them,” he ordered, his face like a flint. “Kill them all.”

  Old soldier that he was, Lugort turned to obey, his expression showing no disquiet at the job he had just been tasked with.

  Aneirin turned away toward the chieftain’s palace, and I followed behind him. “Is this necessary, my lord?” I asked quietly.

  He turned, anger in his eyes. “They killed my father, Cadwalador. A lesson needs to be taught here. It is what oi Neamha would have wished.”

  That I could not argue with. And indeed, I felt his anger surging through my own body. Yet I shuddered at the screams I heard floating up from the foot of the hill. The screams of women and children. Women like Diedre and Inyae. Children like Faran. There was no difference. We were all one.

  “Come inside with me, Cadwalador. There are things which we need to discuss.”

  I turned, catching the eye of several nobles who stood behind us. Aneirin sensed my hesitation and spoke sharply to them. “Give us a few moments.”

  They obeyed grudgingly, and we went into the palace grounds. Aneirin’s sword was still unsheathed in his hand, my javelins at my side. We knew not where enemies might still lurk.

  “Much blood will be shed before I can take the throne Tancogeistla bequeathed to me, Cadwalador. You know that full well as I. And I need your advice.”

  I hesitated, unsure what to say. “My lord,” I began slowly. “You ask for something I cannot give. There are many men in the Aeduan state far more experienced than I, men who would—”

  “Betray me at the turning of the wind,” Aneirin interrupted angrily, his eyes flashing. “You saved my life, Cadwalador. There in the battle.”

  “My lord, I—”