Clash of Iron

by Angus Watson

  From the shouts outside, the Germans were almost on the camp.

  “The gate is smashed! Run!” someone wailed. She wrenched at the stupid fucking iron loop. The stupid fucking thing didn’t shift.

  The heavy door flap was flung aside and in swung the wanking centurion. He drew his sword, not metaphorically this time.

  “Surely, you’re not going to kill me after all the great times we’ve had together?” she asked.

  “You made me betray my wife and my general.” The centurion advanced, sweaty, white-faced and shaking. He stabbed his shining blade at Chamanca’s bare midriff.

  Chapter 23

  Ragnall strained at his bonds, but it was hopeless. He was trussed to a post in the centre of the German camp by a long rope wound round and round legs, arms and torso, tied behind his back in a knot that he could neither see nor reach.

  At around midday, King Hari came stumbling along the camp’s muddy central track, alone, face bloodied but still smiling. “The battle is lost, Ragnall!” he said cheerily. “Atlas was right and I wish I could start the day again. No matter, I shall return to Germany a wiser man. Sorry to rush off so rudely, but, before I go, I have one more game of chance for you.” He held up a blood-soaked hatchet in each hand. “Which of these would you like to be your agent of dispatch to the Otherworld?”

  “Neither of them?” Ragnall tried.

  “Ha ha ha! Very good. I shall miss your wit!” King Hari began the ancient choosing rhyme that Ragnall knew from childhood: “Eenah Meenha, Minha … Mo!” He looked from hatchet to hatchet with each syllable, finishing on the one in his right hand. “This hatchet then. Your luck holds! I’m right-handed, so less chance of a messy cock-up! Ha!” King Hari took a step forward, then looked over his shoulder. Ragnall followed his gaze, hoping to see Romans charging into the camp. No such luck. There was nobody there.

  “Now, face or gut? Eenah Meenha…” King Hari stopped mid-chant, frozen in place, grin plastered on his bush-bearded face. His fingers opened and the hatchets tumbled to the ground, but otherwise he was motionless, frozen in place as if time had stopped. He fell back and his paralysed bulk whumped on to the earth.

  Ragnall looked about as much as he could, straining on his ropes. The only movement was a few storks flying lazily overhead from the direction of the battle, utterly unperturbed by the scenes of slaughter that they must have just flown over.

  He heard a brief sawing noise. The ropes loosened and fell away.

  He spun to find who’d freed him. It was Flotta the Left.

  “Alive.” She smiled.

  She held out her dagger, hilt first, looked down at King Hari said, “Dead,” then looked back at Ragnall and nodded.

  Ragnall took the dagger. Flotta turned and walked away.

  Ragnall had killed one man before, in the marshes when they’d escaped from Mearhold. It had been dark, he had no idea who he’d killed, and it certainly hadn’t felt like taking someone’s life. It had been more adventure than murder, part of their escape, impressing Lowa …

  It had been easy, though. He’d just drawn the knife across the man’s throat, hard, as Dug had told him to. He looked down at the blade in his hand. It looked sharp.

  King Hari the Fister, called Ariovistus by the Romans, looked up at him. His eyes bulged with pleading. He couldn’t move his mouth, but it was clear he was asking for mercy.

  Ragnall had come to Hari as an unarmed messenger. He had never been a threat. Yet the German king had made him push a girl off a cliff. He’d put him through three horrific games of chance that he was lucky to have survived. Hari had executed helpless, bound and probably innocent captives in front of him. Then, if it wasn’t clear enough what a horrible, horrible man he was, he’d broken off his escape – he’d risked everything – to come and murder Ragnall with a hatchet, while Ragnall was tied to a post. And Flotta had told her to kill him with her “dead” command, so she agreed that the old bastard should die.

  Ragnall smiled. Tears burst out of the German king’s eyes. Ragnall shook his head and raised Flotta’s knife. It was way, way too late for tears.

  Chapter 24

  There, thought, Dug, there was the arch in the white chalk. He’d never seen the waves pound so high against it. How could the arch stand, he wondered? How did the cliffs hold out against the waves’ relentless onslaught? He’d swum in waves like that – not on purpose and he never wanted to do it again – so he knew they weren’t just water, they were aswirl with rocks, wicked-sharp shells and other marine debris. How did the cliffs stand? There, he wasn’t thinking about Lowa any more. He was as tough as the cliffs.

  He thought back to their conversation, winced, shook his head, and picked up his pace.

  Lowa sprinted too fast down the steep slope, misjudged a step and slipped on a smooth flint. Her other foot jarred into a half-dug hole, her ankle cracked and she fell. She tucked her shoulder and rolled head over heels twice, using the second roll to fling herself back on to her feet. Her left foot hit the ground and she collapsed in a bolt of pain. This time she went down with no control, landing hard on her side, rolling until the slope evened out.

  She lay, snorting into the chalky soil, feeling like an idiot, the pain throbbing up her leg so intense that she giggled. Slowly, she clambered on to her good foot and gingerly tested the other one.

  “Ahhh!” she cried, the moment she leant any weight on to it. She looked about. Thankfully nobody had seen her fall over and hurt herself while chasing after a man. It wasn’t a queenly look.

  Fuck the pain, she decided; she’d catch Dug up and he could help her back to his place. It couldn’t be far from here, and she’d be able to say everything she wanted to say while her ankle soaked in a bucket of hot water. Not quite the seduction scene from a bard’s love story, but it would have to do.

  Swearing and yelping, she half hopped, half ran up the slope. She reached the top. There was Dug, approaching the top of the next rise, walking as if Bel had set fire to his arse. She’d never catch him. Fuck dignity, she thought.

  “Dug!” she shouted, into the gale.

  He carried on walking.

  “DUG!” she screamed.

  He paused but didn’t turn. He must have heard her. He’d stopped as if he’d heard her. But then he walked on and disappeared over the ridge.

  She hopped for a couple of paces. She gave up. She’d never catch him. But there was no point, even if she could. Of course he didn’t want to see her. She’d let him fall for her, acted totally as if she’d fallen for him, then shagged a boy two paces away from him, knowing that he’d see.

  She lowered herself on to the grass by the path and sat back with a sigh. Her ankle was pulsing with pain, twice the size of the other one already and blooming angry purple and red. She looked about. Forget the embarrassment, she thought, a helpful passer-by would be very welcome right now.

  Dug was trying and failing to consider what he might have to eat that evening when he heard her shout his name. One day, one day soon, he told himself, he’d be able to stop imagining that he saw and heard her everywhere.

  “Dug!” It was screeched this time. Definitely her. He stopped. Yes, he thought, definitely her, just like it had been all those times when it hadn’t been her. It was a seagull’s cry, no doubt, that his badger’s arse of a brain turned into Lowa running after him and crying out his name. He wasn’t even going to turn round. But he would pause long enough to hear it if she shouted again. Of course, he didn’t hear a thing. Big badgers’ ball-sacks, he was a fool. He walked on.

  Chapter 25

  Chamanca dodged, smashed a knee into the Roman wanker’s balls, and heaved at her wrist chains. The iron loop snapped and she was free. Well, that was lucky timing, she thought. The centurion bent double and Chamanca crowned him with her metal cuffs. He went down, blood streaming. She fell on to her back, swung her feet up and through her wrist chain, then rolled back and over and sank her teeth into the collapsed centurion’s neck. Sweet blood washed down her t
hroat.

  She wanted to drain him, for the joy of it and to kill him, but ever closer shouts and screams meant she had no time for indulgence. She jumped up. Her ankle chain was so short that two-footed leaping was more effective than a shuffling run. She bounced out of the tent, feeling like an idiot. She knew there was a blacksmith’s nearby because she’d heard it. She just had to find it and take a hammer to her chains before any of the rampaging soldiers spotted a woman hopping through the camp like a tasty, disabled rabbit.

  She blinked in the brightness and saw that she was on a road which, judging by the early sun, ran north to south through the camp. Uniform tents, identical to the one that she’d emerged from, lined both sides of it. None of them gave any sign of being a blacksmith.

  She heard running and backed up against a tent, as if that might hide her. Legionaries burst through gaps in the eastern tent line, sprinted across the road and disappeared to the west. If they noticed the escaped captive, they had more pressing things on their minds.

  She toddled along in small steps, looking into each tent. They all contained eight neat little camp beds, legionaries’ travelling gear, and nothing else. No weapons, no chain-smashing anvil and hammer.

  Germanic howls and the clash of iron on iron rang ever closer from the east of the camp. She reached a crossroads, looked to her right and there was a gang of German soldiers, six women and one man, blooded and brandishing weapons. They were wearing even less than she was.

  They came at her.

  “I’m on your side. I’m a Gaul,” she said.

  “We’re not Gauls,” said the foremost, stepping forward and raising a pace-long broadsword. It was one of many sorts of weapon you didn’t want to face when your hands were chained and your movement was restricted to two-footed jumps.

  “Chamanca!” came a shout. It was Carden’s voice.

  “Carden?” shouted Chamanca.

  “You know Carden?” said the swordswoman.

  “No, I just guessed that might be his name.”

  The woman looked confused, but she took a step back.

  Carden and Atlas arrived at a run. Atlas swung Chamanca on to his shoulder without a word and they set off running again.

  “Hello?” said Chamanca.

  “We’ve got to get out of here,” said Carden.

  “But you breached the Roman camp? The Germans are winning the battle?”

  “They’re not. They’re routed on the left and in the centre. We led the right as far as the camp, but right now the Roman reinforcements are swinging round and … never mind. Point is we’ve got to get out of here.” They’d reached the cleared area between the wall and the tents, where the legions would usually keep their horses.

  “No horses,” said Atlas. “Didn’t think there would be.” They ran on, Chamanca bouncing on the big Kushite’s shoulder.

  Chapter 26

  “Who the fuck are you and what the fuck are you doing?” shouted the praetorian, very close to his face.

  “I am the envoy of Julius Caesar. The man I am sitting on is Ariovistus, king of all the Germans, who I have killed.”

  The praetorian leant back, eyed Ragnall beadily and stroked his wide chin, then walked on without a word.

  He waited. The praetorian, he knew, would be one of an advance guard, checking that the camp was safe for Julius Caesar to ride in bravely at the head of the army, officially the first Roman into the German base. Sure enough, the general arrived a short time later, followed by his guard and a crowd of varied tribunes, top centurions and others.

  The praetorian had clearly briefed him, because he walked his horse directly to Ragnall and dismounted. Ragnall stood and Caesar embraced him.

  “Bravest of the British!” cried the general, indicating Ragnall with an outstretched hand, while addressing his retinue. None of them looked like they’d been in a battle, apart from Titus Labienus, who had a bloodied bandage around his neck. “Who now can doubt my envoy’s loyalty? Ragnall the barbarian, taken captive by the Germans, has slain the tyrant King Ariovistus! No longer shall he be called Ragnall the barbarian. Caesar grants him the greatest honour. Hail Ragnall the Roman!”

  “Hail Ragnall the Roman!” They all shouted back. “Hail Ragnall the Roman!”

  Ragnall found himself smiling. So he was a Roman now in name as well as in spirit. It felt right.

  Chapter 27

  Manfrax stood up from from his grim throne, arms open,beaming with what Bruxon suspected to be false hospitality. A new but equally miserable gaggle of naked, injured and chained captives surrounded him. One was leaking blood and pus from a black-crusted eye socket into his own smashed up mouth, another had splinted spikes of bone instead of hands.

  “I’d heard the British were cowards but that must be wrong!” His strange accent made it sound like he was singing. “Here you are, strolling in as if you were visiting your favourite aunty.” Next to the king, the narrow-eyed Queen Reena looked even less friendly than before. Manfrax continued, his smile a little less bright: “Because only very brave men would dare suggest that I’m going to break that blood shake by coming to check up on me. Did you not understand what it meant? That is why you’ve come, isn’t it? To make sure that I’m going to invade and that I’m not going to break my oath?”

  Bruxon opened his mouth to speak, but could think of nothing to say. It could have been the cave that overwhelmed him, so huge and dark that its walls disappeared up into blackness, or the eye-stinging reek of excrement both human and dog, or the vilely abused wretches who girded Manfrax’s throne, or the piercing glare of Queen Reena. Most disconcerting of all was the faux-charming brute himself. Manfrax’s presence – his aura – filled Bruxon with an irrational, paralysing sensation. It was more than fear. The Irish king stirred, deep down in his guts, a strange thrill that wasn’t altogether unpleasant. He told himself that the man was nothing but an Eroo braggart, not worthy even of his contempt. He’d seen his sort at home, men who drank every night until they were brave enough to start a fight. In civilised Dumnonia, these men were shunned, treated as unfortunate idiots by anyone with power or station. On barbarian Eroo they were the leaders and the worst of them all was king. The whole lot of them were peasants, not fit to clean the dogshit out of his horse’s hooves. Yet something about the savage ruler made his heart race and his breath shorten.

  Manfrax smiled at his discomfort. “Or even worse, perhaps, you’ve come to offer help? You know what we do to people in Eroo who offer help when we don’t need it? We do something like this.” Manfrax stood, long flint knife in hand. He grabbed the captive with no hands by the hair at the back of his head. The man didn’t flinch as Manfrax jabbed the tip of his knife into his ear, then he actually smiled as the king pushed the blade slowly into his head.

  Bruxon watched in horror as the man blinked rapidly, then began to spout words in an ugly, guttural language that he didn’t know, then finally, mercifully died. He darted a look at Maggot.

  The druid winked at him, then turned to Manfrax. “We’ve come, you great king of Eroo, you, for nothing of the sort. We are on a journey of leisure. Taking advantage of not having much to do, it being the end of autumn and all our supplies stowed, we have taken a boat across the sea to visit your island purely for the purpose of viewing it. We liked it so much last time that we simply had to come back and see more. Now, would it not have been terribly rude of us, had we been passing and not knocked on your door?”

  Manfrax laughed. Bruxon didn’t know if this was a good sign or not.

  “I do like this one!” shouted the Irish king to his empty hall. It was morning, and the revellers who’d filled the hall last time were off doing whatever they did during the day. The king’s shouts echoed. “Go! Admire the cliff, see the villages nearby, and come back tonight and feast with me!”

  “Thank you, majesty,” Bruxon managed. He turned to go.

  “But while we’re here, and before you have all those other excellent conversationalists to enthral you late into the
night,” said Maggot, “how is your invasion army coming together? When should we expect you?”

  Manfrax’s eyes narrowed. He reddened with anger, then seemed to relax. “To be honest,” he said, “I’m not totally sure.” He sounded reasonable and calm. Reena was looking at him, mouth open, as surprised by the change in character as Bruxon. “It depends on a few factors,” Manfrax continued, “none of which can be predicted with any accuracy. But, rest assured, I’m putting together the sort of army that will provide terrifying bedtime stories for hundreds of generations of children. And it will cross. The soonest? This coming year, late summer. The latest? Two years. It will definitely be on your shores within two years. It’ll be worth the wait. I’ve got a wonderful surprise for you.”

  “You’ll have to let us know a good few moons before you’re coming, so that we can prepare,” said Maggot.

  “That seems reasonable.” Manfrax stroked his chin.

  “What have you done to him?” screeched Reena, standing up.

  “Quiet, you.” Maggot raised a hand at her. She fell back in her chair, mute.

  Manfrax did not seem to notice, and said, “I’ll send you a messenger three moons before we’re coming, and another two moons before, in case the first one doesn’t make it.”

  “Right, thanks. Come on Bruxon.”

  They turned and walked from the cave.

  “What did you…?” Bruxon asked.

  “Me? Nothing,” Maggot stumbled. Bruxon grabbed his arm, and the druid slumped into his grasp. “Now get us out of here.”

  “But if you used magic on him…”