‘I am queen,’ she had told him when she appeared at morning orders the first time. ‘These are my warriors, so I must lead them.’
Sabinus had gulped nervously, for the skirt of the queen’s tunic showed most of her legs and he was not accustomed to seeing an equestrian lady display herself in this way, let alone such an attractive one. However, the army was the army and things ought to be done properly. ‘The numerus is under the care of your husband.’ He swallowed again, for like everyone else he knew that the marriage between Ferox and Claudia was scarcely orthodox. ‘That is Flavius Ferox. It is not the Roman custom to let ladies serve as soldiers.’
Claudia gave him a look of the sort Ferox had always felt she reserved for him alone, mingling disappointment with weary contempt at the stubborn idiocy of a small boy. Having already had this conversation with her, and realised that she was absolutely determined and quite possibly right, he let it play out.
‘I am queen, and we are Brigantes.’
‘You are Roman, my lady,’ Sabinus said, surprising Ferox by his determination. ‘This is not proper.’ Then he made a huge mistake as his lips curled into a smile. ‘I admire your bravery, but war is grim work and best left to men.’
Enica nodded thoughtfully as if seeing the wisdom, prompting Sabinus to smile, but before he could say another word she started to turn. Her hand gripped the sica, which slid from the scabbard in one fluid motion and flicked up, the curved edge stopping a whisker short of the centurion’s throat. It was all so sudden, but then Dionysius jumped back in surprise and a guard was shouting, hefting his pilum to use as a spear.
Ferox waved at the man to stand fast. ‘You will discover that the queen has considerable skill at arms,’ he said gently. Sabinus was gulping again and again, eyes wide, still struggling to believe what was happening. ‘And the Brigantes will fight all the better – if the time comes – for the queen’s presence. But,’ Ferox raised his voice. ‘This is a principia of the army, and more than that the principia where I command and not some tavern suited for brawls. You will sheath your sword, your highness, and do it now.’
Enica glanced at him, then did as she was told. Then she gave Sabinus a flirtatious smile that was pure Claudia, leaving the centurion even more confused than before.
Ferox stood up behind his desk. ‘I command here. If anyone draws a weapon here again, they will be in chains before the day is out. Is that understood?’ He saw that his wife was fighting the urge to make a lewd joke – or at least a statement easy to interpret more than one way – and was pleased that she controlled it. This was not the time.
‘You command and I will lead my people to serve you,’ she said.
‘Good enough,’ he replied. ‘Have it added to today’s orders that the queen is to command the Brigantes, second only to me, and that she is to be treated by all with the respect due to a centurion and an eques.’
So from then on the queen attended morning orders, and did the rounds with Ferox and the others, openly supervising the training of the Brigantes and riding out once or twice with patrols, when she added silk Parthian trousers to her attire. As the days passed the officers all became used to it, not least because she was attractive and charming and very positive when she gave orders. The contingent of Brigantes she had brought to the fort came equipped with a vexillum standard, the blue flag painted with what most Romans must have assumed was the figure of Victory. To the tribesmen the woman was Brigantia, the goddess of their people, who lived on earth in the women of the royal line. Ferox had not been surprised to see that the painted figure had red hair and a short tunic. Some of the legionaries and auxiliaries had scoffed when they saw it installed in the aedes, the shrine for the standards in the principia. This was almost empty for a fort this size, for none of the men at the fort had brought a signa, and otherwise there were just two other vexilla, one for I Minervia and one for cohors I Hispanorum veterana.
The Brigantes showed no surprise as their queen took charge of them.
‘She’s the queen,’ Vindex explained to Sabinus. ‘And they don’t hate her like they do Ferox.’
The rest of the garrison displayed shock, amusement, and then surprisingly swiftly became used to the sight of a woman wearing armour and giving orders. That was the charm again, and helped because this was a fort full of men largely deprived of the sight, let alone the company of women, so that such a pretty one was a treat. Ferox quickly noticed that there were always more men around than usual whenever they were carrying out an inspection and began to climb one of the towers. Even when he tried to vary the route, there they were, off-duty soldiers and sentries arriving early or lingering late for this shift, talking among themselves or apparently busy, but ready to cluster as close to the bottom of each ladder as they dared when it came time for the queen to climb.
‘I wish you would wear a cloak, at the very least,’ he whispered to her as she followed him up onto the top platform at the porta decumana at the back of the fort.
Claudia Enica’s expression was one of supreme innocence. ‘Some of the men have no breeches under their tunics.’
‘It’s not the same,’ he hissed, as Sabinus appeared through the open trap door, his face somewhat red.
After that Ferox made sure that she went first up any ladder in front of him and came down last. There would still be plenty of interested bystanders, but at least he spared his senior staff both embarrassment and enjoyment. Vindex was not impressed whenever he joined the party.
‘Jealous, eh?’ he leered. ‘Or just desperate?’
Ferox ignored him, for in truth the repeated views up his wife’s tunic as she climbed were reminders of his failure as a husband and his surging desire. Having her here, but still unreachable, was a lot harder to bear than when she had been so far away, especially when he tried and failed to stop himself from staring up at her wondrous rear and the little pants she favoured. She knew it too, and Ferox was sure that she was deliberately stopping part way up and even wriggling more than necessary each time she got onto a platform. Yet still he slept alone, in one of the smallest rooms in the praetorium.
Sulpicia Lepidina was sympathetic, at least to a point. ‘Claudia will come around. Be patient and play her games. It is all your fault in the first place for losing her. Sometimes you are too much the barbarian, aren’t you?’ Her face had a wistful look, and he wondered whether she was thinking back to their own affair. ‘I would like you both to be happy,’ she said. ‘And while I wonder about Claudia’s talk of magic and fate, I do suspect that you are meant for each other, while also guessing that it will be the rockiest of roads.’
Although she had been disappointed when the letter arrived from Cerialis telling her to stay at Piroboridava for the moment, Sulpicia Lepidina had got on with things as she always did, running the household since Claudia had little interest in such matters when there were warriors to supervise. Remarkably, she took over without making Philo resent the new, far tighter oversight. The praetorium bustled, and often echoed to the cries of the children. Ferox remembered reading that Cicero felt his new villa had gained a soul when a library was created, but nothing made a place a home faster than children. It was all so comfortable that he wondered whether he was ready for a quiet life, even a dull life, if only Claudia would take him back. Then he would remember where they were, and think of Dacians swarming over the ramparts of the fort. They were ruthless in war and could be cruel to captives. He had heard too many stories of what the local women had done to captured Romans in past wars to doubt that there was a lot of truth in them, and the allies in any Dacian army could be even less predictable. If his fears were right then that meant captivity or death for everyone here, perhaps with many cruelties along the way and such thoughts chilled him to the very bone.
On the morning when all was ready to test the monâkon, it was easier to live with such fears. The day was glorious, with the sky an almost unbroken field of pale blue and hardly a breath of wind. Almost the entire fort was watching, with th
e ramparts lined wherever there was a decent view of the canabae and bridge beyond. On top of the right-hand tower of the porta praetoria was a place reserved for the ladies and the children, the latter especially eager when told that this mighty machine flung vast rocks to smash all in its path. To Ferox’s relief, Claudia Enica was as elegant and proper in her attire as Sulpicia Lepidina, both adding broad-brimmed felt hats to guard against the sun. They still attracted plenty of sidelong glances, as did their maids, both of whom were pretty. A man would struggle to peek up a long dress when they climbed or through the gaps in the planking, but Ferox knew that plenty would still try.
The mood of celebration was helped because this was genuinely a festival day for the Brigantes, and later several cows were to be sacrificed and form the basis for a feast.
‘Is it safe, do you think?’ Vindex said with great suspicion.
‘Bet it doesn’t work,’ Sabinus told Dionysius.
‘I reckon it’ll either tear itself apart or work so well that it knocks the bridge down,’ the auxiliary centurion replied.
‘No, it’ll hit the tavern,’ Vindex suggested. ‘Accidents always happen to the most important things.’
Ferox had thought the same thoughts, which was one reason why he had ensured that the ladies and the children would watch from this tower, rather than the left one which was closer to the catapult. They should all be well out of reach of any unexpected event up here. He walked over to the rear of the tower. Below him, Naso stood with a cornicen.
‘Signal that we are ready,’ he shouted.
‘Sir!’ Naso replied and a moment later the trumpeter sounded a deep note on his curved cornu.
Ephippus waved, but was still making final adjustments. Ferox stayed at the rear of the tower, for he felt that luck was more likely to be with them if he did not watch the first shot land. Apart from that, only from here could he see the machine properly. Two men loaded the stone into the sling which had already been cranked down. Ephippus was confident that the engine would be capable of hurling something twice the weight, but had agreed that a cautious approach was best. The men stepped back, the engineer checked that all were safely away from the frame and then took the cord ready to pull. Ferox wondered which gods the Greek prayed to as he hesitated, and then yanked it free, releasing the arm. Even at this distance Ferox flinched at the force as the arm sprang forward, banging into the padded upright with more noise than he had expected, and at its tip the sling whipped over the top and released the stone. The whole frame shook with the action, and he knew that it was at a pretty low tension.
‘Bugger me, it works.’ That was Vindex, but anything else was lost in a great gasp from the crowd that turned into a cheer. He pushed his way back to the front. There was a faint puff of dust where the stone had landed and broken apart. It was still well short of the bridge by a good hundred paces, but about the longest range for any of their other engines.
The second shot bounced thirty paces nearer, the stone cracking into two big pieces, one of which kept going straight. They were using soft limestone for the trials. Partly that was to avoid smashing the bridge or – if it went wild, a building – and partly because Ephippus had suggested that the fall of each missile would be that much more obvious and easier to measure afterwards. The third was closer still, the thump as it was loosed the loudest by far. After that Ephippus began to adjust the tension on the main washers, lobbing the missile higher if slower. Within a few shots, a stone splashed into the river beside the bridge.
‘Tell him if he breaks it, then he’ll have to pay for it,’ Sabinus said cheerfully.
‘Riders!’ Vindex interrupted, pointing to the south, where three horsemen were coming up the track.
Claudia Enica pulled the brim of her hat down as she stared for a long moment. ‘They’re mine. We must warn them.’
‘I am sure they will work out the danger for themselves, dear lady,’ Sabinus suggested.
‘Depends how daft they are,’ Vindex muttered.
Claudia turned to Ferox. ‘Either send someone to ride out and warn them or I will do it.’
He glanced down, taking in her long dress.
‘I can ride in this,’ she said, and he hoped there was more amusement than anger in her eyes, ‘or take it off.’
Ferox went to the rear of the tower and shouted down to Naso. Before the cornu sounded there was another dull thump. He heard the murmur of the crowd, softer now than at the start, but still excited and then it turned into shouting.
‘Oh bugger,’ Vindex said. By the time Ferox could see there was a plume of dust beyond the bridge and the three horses were bolting in all directions. Two of the riders stayed on, while the third was down and not moving.
‘I hope that is not Bran,’ Claudia Enica said quietly.
‘Bran?’ Ferox had almost forgotten the boy he had not seen for six years, and struggled to accept that the lad – a man now presumably – was over there.
Claudia nodded.
‘Oh shit,’ Vindex muttered.
XVI
The valley to the north west of Piroboridava
One day after the Kalends of May
‘IT REALLY IS good to see you,’ Ferox said and meant it.
‘Oh yes,’ Vindex added, but he was not looking at Bran. He winked at Bran’s companion, who continued to ignore him.
‘I took an oath,’ Bran said.
‘Yes, and I am all the more glad that you gave it,’ Ferox told him.
The five of them were riding a hundred paces ahead of the main force with the line of outriders ahead of them. At the moment the woods were more than half a mile away, and otherwise the ground too open to hide many enemies. Soon, they would have to be far more careful. They were higher up the valley, some twelve miles from the fort, looking for the missing half of a patrol. The remainder had split away to follow a different path as they returned to Piroboridava and ought to have met up when they were almost home. There had been no sign of them, and still they had not returned, so Ferox had decided to go and look. Sabinus had argued, saying that they ought to wait or send someone else, but Ferox used his rank to make it an order. Apart from anything else, he was hoping for a little time to speak to the new arrivals when the grip of the army did not hold them all so tight. Bran and the other warrior were from a world beyond Rome.
Bran must be about sixteen by now, and it was an effort to see in the confident young warrior much trace of the boy they had captured on that desolate beach almost six years ago. He had grown, not so much in size or breadth, for he was still small even by the standards of the Selgovae. His tribe were not large people, but they were slim and much stronger than they looked in both spirit and strength. The Selgovae thought highly of themselves and did not bother to hide it, and he saw some of that in the boy, but far more, for his assurance was as much the mark of knowing his own skill. Bran moved like a cat, always careful, always balanced, his eyes steady and unblinking. If the lad drew the gladius on his belt then Ferox had no doubt that it would move as an extension of his hand, every cut and thrust fluid and practised. That was the training he had received in the last few years, taught by the Mother, that head of the strange cult living on one of the smallest islands far to the north west of Britannia. She taught a select few, boys and young women from the tribes, who passed her tests and survived the hardships of getting there and winning her respect, showing them how to use sword, spear or whatever came to hand as a weapon.
‘The Mother is pleased with my brother,’ Enica said, giving Bran a smile. Interrupting her education as a good little Roman, her parents had sent her to the island to become a warrior. ‘As she is of my sister.’ Bran had come with a woman a few years older than him, a Hibernian whose family had all been slaughtered in a power struggle within her tribe so that she had no home left to her. She had raven black hair, today coiled under a bronze helmet, and a beguiling, pale face utterly misleading in its softness. Her name was Minura and she did not say much, or at least had not done so far
in Ferox’s hearing. There was a hardness in her eyes and the hint of great sorrow.
Vindex gave the woman another encouraging smile. ‘Aye, bound to be proud of you both.’
‘So am I,’ Enica continued, for once not indulging the scout. Minura and Bran both touched their chests, where Ferox knew the members of the cult had a tiny scar given by a blade. Enica had the same mark between her breasts and a moment later she pressed her fingers against the mail rings above it.
‘We have travelled and we have fought,’ she added, and it sounded like a quote, but Ferox did not recognise it so wondered whether it was from a song of the Brigantes or verses special to the Mother and her children. So far the queen had said little about their activities in the last few months. He suspected that it was all part of her scheme to secure the rule of her tribe once and for all. As things were, there was little point in prying, for they had little time alone and then she was not forthcoming in any way. He hoped that the knowledge was not dangerous, or that if it was she would tell him in time. That it involved death he did not doubt. The Mother taught remarkable skill at arms, but her children did not kill during their time with her and some never managed to do that well. A mere glance at Bran and Minura revealed to eyes willing to see that they had already walked that path. There was simply an extra edge to their bearing.
The man with them, whose horse had bucked when the missile struck nearby had fallen, was not helped by having his hands tied. Landing badly, his neck had snapped and he had been dead before anyone reached him. Neither Bran nor Minura would say much about him, apart from the obvious fact that he was their prisoner, and that they were bringing him here as instructed.
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