The Singing Sword cc-2

by Jack Whyte

  He shrugged, his face breaking into a smile. "Publius, we are friends. There is nothing else in the world that I would have hesitated to ask you for. But I know how you treasure her, and I knew that everything would be in the asking, so I approached your wife, instead. And I was right, was I not? So was she."

  I picked up a piece of bread and tore off a pinch of it, kneading it between my thumb and forefinger, seeing my daughter's lovely, smiling, innocent face in my mind. "So," I said, "tell me about this son of yours, whom you would have as husband to my Veronica."

  "You met him when you visited me the time before last, two years ago. He was the age then that Veronica is now."

  "So that makes him, what? Fifteen?"

  "Almost. He has not quite filled his fifteenth year."

  "So, when would you want them to be wed?"

  "On his eighteenth birthday." This was better. Veronica would be a woman by then. Fifteen, almost sixteen.

  "And why Veronica?"

  "Why Veronica? Are you serious?" His smile was broad and easy now. "She is her mother's daughter! And yours, of course, although that's a misfortune she has learned to live with. I know my son could do no better."

  "But she's a Roman."

  His grin was all teeth and crinkled eyes. "Not so. She's a Briton, Publius. Don't you remember? The Britons were reborn at Stonehenge the night we met."

  "So, you believe a Celtic-Briton match would be a good one, do you?"

  His smile vanished instantly, to be replaced with an expression that contained no levity.

  "Aye, my friend, I do. It would be good for the young ones and good for us. We are both kings, Publius, each in his own way, for you are Britannicus's heir, his spiritual heir if you like, in spite of Picus's return and in spite of your Roman fears of kingship. For I swear I never saw two more kingly men than you and he."

  "You flatter me, Ullic." I was pleased. "I would not have expected that from you."

  "I flatter no man, friend. It is the truth. No more than that."

  We spoke no more for some time, each of us absorbed in his own thoughts. It was Luceiia who broke the silence, placing her hand gently over mine as she asked me, "My love, are we agreed? You seem to be in favour of the match, but you have not yet said so."

  I looked from one to the other of them. "Is there any more wine?"

  "Plenty."

  "Then pour us all a draught to seal our bargain, woman. If we are to mix our blood with Celts, we might as well get drunk."

  Ullic threw back his head and laughed a great laugh of relief and pleasure, and then he jumped to his feet and embraced each of us, and we drank a toast to our children and to their children whose own children would join our two peoples long after we were gone.

  XIX

  We were fortunate enough to be able to see Picus often during the two years of Stilicho's campaign in Britain, in spite of the fact that the fighting was intense and hectic all during that time. It was he who told us that the major problem facing Stilicho's forces was one of deployment, since the enemy they were fighting was seaborne and undisciplined and there was no master plan behind the Saxon incursions. Picus insisted that it was inaccurate to speak of invasion for that single reason: lacking a master plan, or even a recognizable leader, these attacks, significant and consistent though they were, nevertheless consisted simply of massive numbers of Saxons, Hibernian Scots, Caledonian Picts, and Franks from south Gaul striking without warning wherever they made landfall, so that Stilicho's armies were constantly reacting instead of initiating. This was a new form of war; there was never any question of military confrontation, of meeting and defeating a static enemy in a fixed battle.

  In the course of those two years, Stilicho's greatest weapon, his supreme advantage, was his new heavy cavalry. It became clear very early in the campaign that the speed and manoeuvrability they possessed demanded augmentation and encouragement, and Stilicho was a brilliant commander who believed in making the most of every advantage at his disposal. Within months, boatloads of prime horseflesh began arriving regularly at the Saxon Shore forts along the south coast — the very finest horses the Empire could provide.

  Young Quintus Flavius, one of Picus's close friends, was promoted to general and given the responsibility for overseeing the breeding farms of the armies of Britain. It was far from coincidental that every time one of these two visited the Colony, he came mounted on a fine stallion, and our own stock improved with every foaling.

  Late in the autumn of 398, Picus arrived one night accompanied only by a small, armed escort. He saw to the quartering of his horses and his men and then he drew his father and me aside into Caius's study. We could tell that something important was in the wind, but we had no idea what it was, or how it might affect us. Picus let us know the answer to those questions just as soon as Gallo had brought us wine and honeyed wheat-cakes and had built up the fire in the great brazier so that it was now a roaring blaze. As the door closed behind the old man, Picus opened his pouch and produced a rolled parchment, which he handed to his father. The imperial seal that held it closed was dazzling in its import.

  "Read it aloud, Father."

  Caius broke the seal and scanned the parchment quickly, then cleared his throat and began to read aloud:

  " 'Caius Britannicus, Proconsul of Rome, from Flavius Stilicho, Commander-in-Chief, Imperial Armies.

  " 'In the name of His Imperial Majesty, Honorius, Emperor of all Rome, the time has come for me to remind you of the terms of the commission issued to you by my hand in the year of my arrival in Britain.

  " 'Now, in the second year of our campaigning, it appears that our armies have turned the tide of invasion and re-established the supremacy of Roman arms in this province. I am commanded by His Imperial Highness to withdraw my legions to the marshalling of his affairs elsewhere in the Empire; departure will be immediate upon conclusion of military arrangements in Britain to my satisfaction.

  " 'The Legate Picus Britannicus will remain in Britain with his cavalry, as my deputy, until such time as the Empire shall have need of him elsewhere or until he has established a cavalry command to his own standards within Britain and can feel confident in delegating his own authority to a subordinate, freeing himself in conscience to return to my command.

  " 'With this letter, to be delivered to you by the Legate Britannicus, I am enclosing a plenary warrant of authorization confirming you in the rank of Legatus Emeritus of the Irregular Armies of South-west Britain, in the name of Honorius, Emperor of the West. In this capacity, you will use all the powers at your command to defend the territories delineated on the accompanying chart signed by my hand and sealed with the seal of Honorius.

  " 'Stilicho, Commander-in-Chief. Pro persona: Honorius, Imperator.'"

  When he had stopped reading, we both stood staring at Picus.

  "So," said Caius, "what does this really mean? Apart from the obvious. Stilicho is leaving and you are to remain, for the time being. How long will you remain in Britain?"

  Picus shrugged, smiling. "Who knows, Father? He may send for me next month, although I doubt it. My guess is that I am here for a long time. Stilicho has three commanders of cavalry here in Britain with him now, not counting Flavius. I am senior of the three. He has chosen to leave me behind to organize Britain. It could be a big undertaking."

  "Could be?" Caius's tone was sharp. "Could be? Are you unsure?"

  Picus shook his head, chastened. "No. Let me rephrase that without false modesty. It is a major responsibility. Stilicho does me great honour."

  "That's better."

  I caught Picus's eye, feeling the half-smile on my face at hearing the meticulous father critical, although only mildly so, of the favoured son. Picus, however, was unaware of me. His expression was thoughtful, and he stared intently into the fire of the brazier for a long time before he spoke again.

  "It's not going to be an easy matter to build a permanent cavalry garrison here, or to staff it with a self-sufficient command that I can leave
behind. There is too much entrenched resentment among the regular army command."

  "How so?" The look on Cay's face was measuring, his eyes intent on his son as the young man laid out before us the problems facing him.

  "They're jealous, I suppose," Picus muttered, finally. This was accompanied by another shrug of his shoulders. "After four hundred years of Roman occupation in Britain, their authority, as they see it, is being usurped by an upstart body of elitist troops under the command of a chain of staff officers most of whom are not yet twenty-five years old."

  "Damn it," I said, "that's the way it has always been. All the brilliant soldiers of history have been babes in arms!"

  He glanced in my direction, noticing me, I felt, as one would notice a passing wasp. "Aye, but most of them fought on foot, Varrus."

  Caius interrupted. "Invalid, my son. After that same four hundred years of occupation, Roman military intelligence has finally come up with a new way to re-establish Roman supremacy. Surely the army commanders can see that?"

  Picus half twisted his head, an incomplete gesture suggesting that his father's suggestion was an unconvincing one. "Perhaps they can, Father, but that doesn't mean they have to like it."

  "True, absolutely not. But Stilicho's imperial authority means they have to accept it."

  "No argument." Picus held up his helmet and brushed at its crest with the sleeve of his tunic, preening the stiff, scarlet-dyed horsehair. "But any acceptance, Father, can be qualified by willingness. Resistance to change is an intrinsic human failing. I remember, as a boy, hearing you say time and again that true change, lasting change, comes very slowly. The military command in Britain has had radical change thrust down its throat in the space of two years. My cavalry has no tradition. It has no history, and you, of all people, Father, know what tradition and history mean to the officer corps of the Roman army."

  He held out his helmet to his father at arm's length. A full face-mask of heavy metal hung from the brow of it, peaked in a crease so that the sides of the mask swept in to the cheekbones and then flared out. It was obvious that its prime purpose was to deflect missiles.

  "Take this, for example. I have insisted that all of my men have face-masks like this one fitted to their helmets." Cay took the proffered helmet and examined it closely, raising and lowering the face-guard on its intricately hinged flaps as his son continued. "Our speed brings us too quickly within bowshot of our enemies, and our faces are unprotected. It is a new circumstance, but I have lost too many men to this kind of injury. Now my men's faces are protected, but their pride is taking a battering from the jeers of the old infantry sweats and their officers, who have never had a need for face-masks."

  Britannicus chewed on that for a full minute before answering. "You know, my son," he finally said, "you have just made a point that I have to acknowledge and emphasize. One of the advantages of growing old is the growth of the astonishing ability to accept that one can be, and frequently has been, wrong in one's deepest beliefs. I have been wrong in many things in my lifetime, but the paradox has been that much of the time, at the time, I was correct." He paused and looked down at the imperial letter he was still holding. "We are living in a time of changes — changes that would have been inconceivable fifty or a hundred years ago when the world was still set in its ways. Nowadays we have to accept and accommodate the need for such changes — sudden, radical changes, wholesale adaptations to new and abrupt circumstances. And when I say 'we' I mean we colonists in this tiny corner of the Empire. The rest of the Empire cannot, will not adapt to such changes. That is why the Empire's days are numbered. That is why we are here. Your cavalry corps is an adaptation to changing circumstances. If the inertia of the military chain of command, the hidebound military intellect, will not accept the need for it, that is tragic."

  I had been pouring wine and sampling the honeyed wheat-cakes while this last exchange was going on, and now I spoke through a mouthful of food. "Tragic it may be, but it's not unusual." I handed each of them a cup of wine. Caius sipped at his before answering me.

  "No, Varrus, it's not unusual. We are unusual. We are determined to adapt, and so we shall survive. Your daughter's wedding next spring to young Uric Pendragon will mark an official bonding of two peoples. The fruit of that bond will mark a new beginning in the history of this island of Britain. Your grandchildren, Publius, my great-nephews and great-nieces, will be set apart by their blood."

  I demurred. "I don't often argue with you, Cay, but this time I think you're exaggerating a little. Romans have been marrying the women of Britain for as long as there have been Romans in Britain."

  He shook his head, dismissing the validity of my comment while apparently agreeing with what I said.

  "Of course they have, my friend. We all know that. But it has never happened at this level before. This is a monumental step, don't you see that?"

  "No, Caius," I said. "I don't. What 'level' are you talking about?"

  "The highest level."

  "What's so different about it, in God's name? They're just two young people who are being wed by their parents. They're no different from any of the other young people who have done the same thing, gone the same way."

  "Publius Varrus!" He shook his head impatiently, a frown of annoyance on his face. "Have you no sense at all of the order of things? There is no Celtic blood in my family that I am aware of, nor is there any in yours. Is there?"

  I shook my head, twisting my lips into a grimace of unconcern to show it was matter of complete indifference to me. "No, not as far as I know, although I haven't made an issue of investigating it."

  He pounced on that. "There you are, then! We have been bred in Britain, it is true, but our blood is pure Roman. Unsullied Roman blood, Publius. Republican blood. And it is a matter of great pride in our friend Ullic that his own blood is, as he would put it, untainted by Roman impurities. His race is regal, Varrus. He is pure Celt. His people have ruled this part of the world for centuries, long before the Caesars came to power. And you say you can't see what this means?

  "When your daughter weds Ullic's son, it will be the start of a new bloodline — the same thing that excites Victorex in his breeding of horses. And breeding is what we are talking about here, let us not lose sight of that. We are causing the creation of a new breed of man by mingling Veronica's pure Roman blood with Uric's pure Celtic blood. Forget the others that have gone before. That was miscegenation. Roman legionaries have not been pure Roman for hundreds of years. They are a mongrel creation of the Empire, romanized, perhaps, but never Roman."

  He swung on his son, whose face was as blank as mine. "Picus, don't tell me that you had failed to mark the significance of this match?"

  Picus shook his head slightly in bewilderment. "No, Father. I hadn't thought much about it at all, and certainly not from that perspective."

  "Then think about it now! And think about it from this time on. Your cousins by this union will be the progenitors of a noble house of unique qualification."

  Picus's lip quirked upwards. "Yes, I suppose they will, when you put it like that."

  "No suppositions! They will be!" Caius looked from Picus to me and then raised his cup. "Now! Join me in a toast to the unborn. To the sons of Veronica and Uric, the future rulers of this Colony and this whole land, for we will raise them to a legacy of strength and freedom that has not been seen by men for centuries. To our heirs!"

  It was a fine toast and a stirring thought, and we drank to it gladly, although I had to resist shaking my head in wonder at my own lack of perception. There were times when Caius Britannicus could make me feel like an absolute bumpkin.

  "Why are we all still standing like idlers on a street corner?" Caius finally asked. "Let's sit and enjoy the fire. There is a nip in the air tonight that reminds me of my multiplying years." He sat by the fireplace and we joined him, pulling our chairs closer to the flames as he spoke again to Picus.

  "So, let's talk of strategy. Is the invasion turned?"

 
Picus nodded. "Yes. We believe so. The indications are all there. Reported raids have decreased greatly in the last few months."

  "How significant is that?" I asked him.

  "Highly significant. No raids at all in the last two weeks. Prior to that, only three in three weeks. In the three months before that only twelve, and six of those occurred in the first month of the three."

  "That is still a lot of raids," said his father. "You really feel justified in claiming that to be a significant decrease?"

  Picus leaned forward and toasted his palms in front of the glowing coals for a few moments before answering. Finally he said, "Yes, Father, I do. Very definitely. In the same period last year, there were more than forty raids. In any man's language that has to be a significant difference."

  "Yes, I suppose it is." There was silence for a time and then Britannicus went on. "Your technique, here in Britain — how has it developed?"

  "I'm not sure of your meaning, Father. From what viewpoint?"

  "How has it improved over the past two years? What have you learned? What have you done? What have you initiated?"

  Picus smiled. "Much. A great deal on all three points, Father. I think perhaps the first thing we learned is that, laced with an enemy whose strikes are unforeseeable, the last thing one can hope to do is operate under the normal conditions of warfare. No, let me rephrase that." His speech slowed perceptibly as he enunciated his thoughts with much greater precision. "The last thing one can hope to do is operate as though the accepted traditional ways and methods have any application. They do not." He paused and drank deeply before going on.