by M. K. Hume
‘In the end, it was far easier to pay the bastards off,’ Fiachna continued in a muffled voice. ‘We ceded them a small payment in coin for every trading party that passed through the forest. It was expensive, because they continued to attack the travellers anyway.’
‘Is there no honour among thieves?’ Caradoc asked blandly.
‘And you?’ Maximus demanded, turning his chair to face Bleise.
‘I can see no reason to answer to a Roman,’ Bleise blustered, but the squeak in his voice betrayed his feeble attempt at belligerence for what it was, the last gamble of a guilty man.
‘I’d warn you that Maximus is a senior officer in the Roman occupation of your lands, and a man who never accepts insults with equanimity. Maximus and I were attacked by your outlaws. We were forced to do battle with villains who believed they were protected and untouchable. The Roman and I have both lost men. We demand an explanation for ourselves and for everyone in this room.’
Caradoc’s bluntness wrung an unwilling grunt of agreement from Sorcha, who was inclined to distrust anyone who rode with a Roman. The other kings looked down at their hands and left Bleise to fidget and tremble, while his rheumy eyes began to fill with self-pitying tears.
‘I never knew the name of the ruffian, but pilgrims who came to visit the Giant’s Carol were robbed, tortured and murdered by the outlaw band. Eventually, the town’s prominent citizens insisted that I do something. They even provided most of the coin that was paid on a yearly basis. That was the price of doing business!’
‘Why didn’t you unite with Fiachna to defeat them? The outlaw band couldn’t have resisted the combined forces of two kings.’
‘I didn’t know that Fiachna was also paying them,’ Bleise complained. ‘Our Durotriges friend spends most of his time complaining that he has no gold to spare, despite the fertility of his lands.’
‘I don’t have a steady stream of pilgrims that come to see the Giant’s Dance, do I?’ Fiachna countered, his face mottled with anger.
‘Gentlemen! Gentlemen! Remember your stations, my friends! This is perfect proof that communication between the kings is vital if any of you hope to survive the travails that will begin to confront us in the years to come,’ Caradoc urged.
Then Maximus called Lorn forward. He had been standing with Trefor in the shadows at the back of the room, and now he moved forward with a small bag in his hands.
Maximus took the bag with a flourish, drawing out a small bar of gold impressed with the stamp of the legion and a Roman numeral.
‘And which of you gentlemen gave legion gold to common outlaws, eh?’ Maximus’s voice was hard. As he waited, the apprehension in the room was palpable, broken only when Maximus slammed the gold bar down onto the tabletop with a loud thud. The tableware shook from the force of the blow.
Fiachna’s eyes were round with shock, but his greed overcame him. He reached out with a dirty finger to touch the bar, but instantly withdrew his hand when Maximus’s eating knife was suddenly buried in the tabletop beside the ingot. Caradoc immediately acquitted Fiachna of any guilt. This man would never, ever, part with gold.
Likewise, Bleise looked thoroughly puzzled. ‘I don’t understand!’ He read the embossed Roman numerals upside down and his mouth formed a little moue of surprise.
‘Eburacum . . . the legion from Eburacum,’ he muttered. ‘How did that ingot get here?’
‘Precisely!’ the tribune snapped. ‘More to the point, I have to ask how this bar, and another two hundred and nineteen similar bars, could find their way into the cache of a common criminal near the town of Vindo Cladia.’ Maximus focused on the other three tribal chieftains.
‘Two hunded and nineteen bars of gold?’ Gwaun bleated.
‘Two hundred and twenty,’ Caradoc corrected him gently.
‘Don’t look at me! If I had two hundred and twenty bars of gold, I wouldn’t be trying to convince my neighbours to form an alliance that would protect my lands,’ Sorcha said grimly, his eyes threatening trouble to whoever had been holding out on him.
All eyes settled on the toga-clad Adwen ap Rhys of the Dobunni tribe. His natural good looks were spoiled by a tendency to store fat around his thickening belly that was quivering with nervousness as he breathed under the hard scrutiny of his peers.
Caradoc watched the play of emotions on Adwen’s broad and increasingly florid face as his silence dragged on. To speak? Or to keep silent?
Finally, Caradoc watched as the Dobunni king flinched, and then closed his eyes. Adwen had arrived at a decision.
He’s going to confess, the Dumnonii king thought triumphantly. He aimed a quick glance at Maximus who winked back at him.
Adwen stared at his entwined fingers. ‘My family held this gold legally for over half a century after a payment from Emperor Constantine to my grandfather’s father. The empire was in turmoil at the time. Emperor Constantius had perished at Eburacum and his son ruled for a brief year before chaos tore the whole fabric of the empire to bloody shreds. Then, the great Constantine took the throne. I don’t know the half of the deal made with the emperor’s men in those bygone years, but my ancestor was asked to shore up the south of Britannia against a slew of aspiring claimants who rose up like poisonous mushrooms to grasp at the crown. My grandfather claimed that other tribal kings had also been paid to provide services to the empire because these rulers were sympathetic to Constantine’s strong right arm. As far as I know, the whole agreement was made through proxies, but my family fulfilled our part of the agreement.’
The other kings at the table sat gape-mouthed at Adwen’s confession because, in their ignorance, they had no understanding of the storms that raged within the seats of power in Rome, and further afield in the vast empire. Of those present, only Maximus could truly understand Constantine’s odd bargain with a group of influential kings. For their part, the Dobunni had kept trade with the empire hale and strong, so their support had been worth the two hundred and twenty ingots of gold offered some sixty years earlier. As it turned out, Constantine had ruled for many years and had stabilised the world that Maximus knew.
Adwen took heart from the understanding he could see in the tribune’s eyes, so he drew a deep breath and carried on with his tale.
‘I knew of the Eburacum gold, of course, for I had been charged by my father to keep it safe from harm. Before he died, my father told me where it was hidden, but he cautioned me against using the treasure because it would be a potent weapon if kept intact. To be truthful, I never felt an inclination to look at it. Unfortunately, I have never discovered how other men came to know of it. Perhaps my father told a bed-partner or his general might have told another man when he was in his cups. But persistent gossip about a treasure trove of Roman gold, held in Dobunni hands, was rife among our neighbours. I lied to my first wife when she confronted me with this rumour, for women are notoriously quick to boast and talk. I will probably never know how treason nearly separated my head from my body, but it almost did.’
His audience was rapt. As Adwen gained in confidence his gestures grew more expansive and his language became more colourful.
‘My eldest son by my first wife had no desire to wait for me to die a natural death. I won’t speak his name, because I still feel pain when I think of him. I married young, so he was twenty-five when he started along the path to treason and patricide, after convincing himself that I’d treated his mother poorly and had brought about her death. My beautiful son fell very far and very fast.’ Adwen sighed with regret.
‘In truth, my first wife loved wine more than the children she bore, so she eventually set herself afire during one of her drunken moments, along with a large section of my hall. My son blamed me for the accident. He hated my second wife and her children, because he was resentful of the affection I felt for them. At any rate, he fomented rebellion within the tribe by making promises to distribute
the Roman gold held by the family.’
‘I knew you had executed your son, but I never heard the details,’ Sorcha observed. His dark brows were furrowed with resentment, although Caradoc had no idea why the Regni king should feel this way. Adwen’s personal tragedy had won Caradoc’s sympathy. ‘That was near to five years ago, but I still can’t see how the gold became part of an outlaw hoard.’
‘The Dobunni tribe was at war with itself for five years. At first, my son played on the ambitions of the younger warriors in the tribe. I was forced to flee from my own hall as I tried to save my wife and children. Yes, you must know that I lost all but one boy, Llew, who is now my heir. My hatred for my eldest son was hot and ugly, and didn’t abate until I drove him into the forest and killed him. But you can’t kill his kind of betrayal. It still lies in my heart like a heavy stone weight.
‘When I finally took back my hall in Corinium, I was surprised to find that the Roman gold had been removed from the place where it had been hidden. No one knew anything of the theft, so what could I do? The entire cache had been taken! Until you told me of its continued existence, I’d heard nothing of it for five years.’
Adwen tried manfully to pull himself together, for his tears had begun to fall as he came to the end of this tragic story of loss and betrayal.
‘You may think of me as a fool, if it serves your purposes. I probably am, but that cursed gold has cost me my family and has given me too much pain. I will refuse to make any claim on it, for all that I remain committed to our part in the old bargain. In all truth, I’d prefer that it was returned to the emperor’s war chests in Eburacum so that it can be used in the interests of all of Britannia’s people.’
Adwen gave Maximus a brief smile. ‘The gold should be owned by Rome. You may return it, if you so wish. It’s no odds to me.’
He asked one final question. ‘Incidentally, did you gain any information regarding the source of the gold? The hoard has followed a strange path, so I am curious about the identity of the man who led your band of outlaws.’
Caradoc gathered his scrambled wits. He had never expected to feel any sympathy for Adwen, a man he had always considered something of a fool. Like all the southern kings, he had heard of the internal troubles that killed so many of his neighbours, but Adwen had asked for nothing from the Dumnonii. Caradoc had minded his own business, seeing tribal civil wars as a means of maintaining the status quo in southern Britannia. Besides, the Dobunni had always been too rich and too strong for his liking.
He decided to tell Adwen and the kings what he knew of the outlaw band. If Maximus didn’t like his description, then Maximus would have to put up with it.
‘The outlaw chieftain told us his name was Elphin, but we never heard his father’s name or his tribe. He was clever and frightened of nothing, for all that he was a scabrous, foul-mouthed savage. One thing I can swear to is that Elphin was a genuine leader. His band had been successful for a very long time and he died without any appeals for clemency. I wouldn’t be surprised to discover that he’d once been a warrior of sorts.’
‘That’s strange,’ Gwaun remarked.
‘How so?’ Maximus demanded.
‘That name! The name means white in the Latin language. But in our tongue it refers to someone who has been so unfortunate as to have had his birthright unfairly stolen from him. His life history would have been enlightening.’
‘We’ll never know who he was, except that he was an excellent thief and a superior rogue, one who had a huge cache of Roman gold in his possession. I’m tired of old ghosts, so I’d be happy to let the dead bury the dead,’ Adwen said, suddenly looking like a cadaverous old man. The king who had seemed barely middle-aged earlier in the conversation had been replaced by a grandfather who was as dried up as winter grasses, blown out of the earth by freezing winds.
According to Gwaun, who rarely let an opportunity for carousing pass him by, it was time for the feasting to commence.
A hunt gave no one very much pleasure, except for the peasants who were paid a measure of the meat that was slaughtered under the guise of amusement. None of the kings mentioned the Roman gold or Adwen’s personal tragedies, but Caradoc maintained a close watch on the Dobunni king when the man’s strength returned and he began to immerse himself in a vain pursuit of superficial pleasures.
In the long evenings, Maximus proved his power to charm his peers by siding with Sorcha. Without any hesitation, he leaped at the opportunity to champion an argument in favour of an alliance between the six kings that would be formed to oppose the Saxon raiders.
‘What will happen if Sorcha should lose a coastal port to the Saxons?’ the Roman demanded of Fiachna. ‘I know you insist that his problems have nothing to do with you, but what will inevitably follow such an inroad into the Regni lands?’
‘They’ll spread out! That’s what will happen! As sure as night follows day, the Saxons will be threatening me if Sorcha allows them to get a toehold,’ Gwaun complained. Strangely, the Atrebates king could see the emergency with the same clarity as Sorcha, but it was only when Maximus drew a graphic description of the consequences on the tabletop with a piece of charcoal that Fiachna and Bleise began to understand the dangerous situation they were in.
‘This platter is your land, Gwaun, and this, Fiachna, is yours.’ Maximus deftly moved a number of table implements to approximate the tribal boundaries. ‘Now! If you imagine that the Regni platter has been taken over by the Saxons, where would the surviving Regni refugees go? Would they all flock to Gwaun’s lands?’
‘Not if they’re sensible,’ Caradoc said. He was entering the conversation as an interested party and, much as he hated to consider the possibility, Maximus was explaining the probable future of the British tribes with far more expertise than Caradoc could ever have mustered. Suddenly, the miles between Tintagel and Venta Belgarum were not as vast as he had previously believed.
‘The refugees will take to their heels and head as far as possible from any likely threat to themselves or their families. They’ll head towards the Durotriges tribe, the Dobunni or the Belgae,’ Adwen decided. His narrowed eyes were alive with the intelligence he had just gleaned. ‘They will head away from the coast, for the Saxons will be attacking from that direction.’
‘I won’t be feeding any refugees,’ Fiachna snapped.
‘Don’t be an idiot, Fiachna! If the Saxons really attacked, you wouldn’t have much choice in what would happen, so stop your whining,’ Sorcha put in. He had little sympathy for the grimy Durotriges king.
Maximus drew black arrows on the tabletop . . . towards Portus Adurni, along the coast towards Durnovaria and then inland towards Sorviodunum.
‘Consider the Roman roads,’ Maximus said. ‘The cleverest of the Saxon thanes won’t bother with Venta Belgarum because it will be too heavily defended. It would be far easier to inveigle their way into your most powerful city by stealth – in fact, it will come through trade. This Saxon triumph won’t happen in a month, or a year, or even a decade. These disasters will occur in your grandchildren’s time or even later, but whenever you repel the Saxons, you are setting back the terrible times that will come. Meanwhile, it’s better for the Saxons that they attack weaker sites around the prized cities, places that are only lightly guarded because their rulers believe no sensible Saxon would bother with them. Places like Calleva Atrebatum, Durnovaria, Clausentum or Sorviodunum are real prizes. A network would be built, piece by piece, that will lead inexorably to their capture. Your lands, gentlemen, will be taken from your heirs before the enemy steals Venta Belgarum. I would plan to defeat Gwaun in just this fashion, if I were a Saxon.’
Fiachna and Bleise stared at the platters and the charcoal marks on the tabletop. Both men were beginning to understand that, ultimately, an attack on one tribe would be a threat to all.
‘In the north, the Picts harry the Otadini and the people who inha
bit the borders,’ Caradoc continued. ‘At the same time, Hibernians attack the Brigante, the Ordovice and the Deceangli, while the Saxons pose a constant threat to the whole eastern coast and the lands of the south. What if our tribune and his friends were recalled to the continent, taking with them the manpower, equipment and fighting skills of the legions? Could we survive?’
During the time that Maximus had been speaking, the Dumnonii king had accepted the fragile nature of Britannia’s peace and how swiftly it could be swept away. He felt like a man who had awakened from a beautiful dream to discover that reality was cruel and dangerous.
‘You’ll be sitting pretty whatever happens,’ Fiachna sniped. ‘Who’d want your windswept coasts?’
‘Time alone will tell,’ Caradoc retorted. ‘So! It’s time to announce our intentions. Who is in favour of a united opposition to the threat posed by the Saxons? Or, for that matter, any attack by outsiders?’
Hands rose, slowly but firmly, because the tribal kings were finally aware that they must fight the coming battles as one single entity. Predictably, Fiachna was the last ruler to capitulate.
The first tentative alliance in Britannia had been formed. All that remained were discussions on the minutiae that would be needed to give full effect to their treaty. Then, only time would decide if the loose confederation of tribes would have any lasting value.
Two days later, a small troop of Roman cavalry arrived at Venta Belgarum and craved the attention of Magnus Maximus. Within hours, Maximus had left with a wagon piled high with several heavy boxes of treasure that represented Caradoc’s share of the outlaw hoard.
‘I’ve been recalled to Segontium because my master, Theodosius, is about to be appointed to the post of Magister Equitum for pacifying Britannia. The scroll he sent to me explains that we are bound for Gaul and service with our master, Gratian.’
Although neither Maximus nor Caradoc was truly comfortable with the other on matters of politics, they trusted each other as men in a strange companionship that Caradoc would miss. He said as much to Maximus and prepared to complete the formalities by thanking King Gwaun for his hospitality and making good his departure.