Caledonia

by William Kelso

  Emogene had lain on her straw bed in her father's house on top of the hill. Her father was the clan druid and as usual on Samhain had brewed a potion which the villagers said caused one to forget everything. When her father had not been looking Emogene had stolen a couple of mouthfuls of the bitter liquid. That night her sleep had been disturbed and she had tossed and turned. The spirits that could show the future and the past had come to her. They had taken her to the other world, the world that existed beyond the material and there, for a brief moment, they had drawn back the veils that hid the future. She had been terrified by what she had witnessed. She had seen burning houses, men butchered and enslaved, women raped, children abandoned and dying of hunger and disease. They had been her people. She had cried out in her sleep, tormented by the vision. Something terrible was going to happen to her village and her people.

  A great loss you shall suffer. But if you Emogene, remain true to your people, then hope shall return and a new love will find you.

  She had woken covered in sweat and screaming. The intensity of the dream was like nothing she had ever experienced before. What had it meant? Her father had sat watching her with his wise pale blue eyes but he had said nothing as she had fled from his house in embarrassment.

  Emogene glanced across the hill towards where Calgacus stood surrounded by his closest clansmen and the tribal chieftains. He was a tall, powerfully built man and looked like a leader of men should she thought. For a moment she tried to hate him. His summons had put the promise of her happy life in danger. But she could not feel any anger. Her father trusted Calgacus and supported him and so would she. Calgacus had achieved a miracle when he had united the tribes for the first time since anyone could remember. But would it be enough? Would her brave countrymen be able to defeat these Roman demons? The stories she had heard about the power of the Romans had unsettled her. None could defeat them it was said. Nor could any magic stop their relentless march north. They had the support of powerful gods, the strength of bulls and the cunning of the fox.

  Amongst the prominent warriors that surrounded Calgacus, she suddenly caught sight of Baldurix and her heart sank. He seemed to be looking straight at her. She gasped. How could Calgacus tolerate that man in his retinue? It was Baldurix after all, a leading clan leader of the Decantea who had been Calgacus's main rival for the position of war leader. With the support of the druids and her father the matter had been decided in Calgacus's favour. It had been no surprise that her father had supported Calgacus. Ever since she could remember there had been a clan blood feud between Baldurix's Decantae and her father's clan, the Vacomagi. Her father had told her that the feud had started with the murder of a young Vacomagi druid. It had happened before she was born but still today men risked their lives by entering the territory of their blood enemy. Only Calgacus's authority as supreme war leader and the Roman invasion had allowed the two clans to gather without blood being spilt.

  A Carnyx bellowed its defiance. Others further down the hill joined in when suddenly she saw the Roman missiles hurtling into the Caledonian ranks. She felt Bones tense under her grip. He was a war dog and wanted to join his master.

  "No Bones, stay," she whispered.

  He looked up at her with that inquiring look of his.

  "When we are victorious you may go to him," she replied avoiding his stare.

  Calgacus was pointing at the flanks of the Caledonian army and conferring with his chiefs. What was his plan? Did he have one? Then she heard a great thundering of hooves. The Roman horsemen on the flanks were charging and turning to face them were the Caledonian charioteers. Emogene stared as the two forces smashed headlong into each other. In a fraction of a second it became impossible to tell friend from foe. Her husband would be down there in his chariot fighting with his closest kinsmen. Then she caught sight of the black pennant flying from his chariot. The world seemed to slow. She opened her mouth to scream but no sound came out. The Romans riders spear had knocked him clean over the side of his chariot. No man could survive such a blow. Her body felt numb, stunned by the suddenness of it all. Her husband had told her he would be alright. Now he was gone. She stared down the hill unable to look away. Then as a tear trickled down her cheek she felt a terrible resolve take hold. No, she thought savagely, she would not mourn for her husband, she would not cry. He was not dead. She refused to accept that he was dead. She would see him again.

  Chapter Four - Gods let this battle finish soon

  The Caledonians were starting to outflank the auxiliaries. Groups of warriors were coming down the slopes of the hill and looping round to attack the Romans in the rear. What the fuck was Agricola doing? Couldn't he see what was happening Marcus thought. The flank of the Roman line had splintered into small groups of men, some fighting back to back as they desperately tried to fend off the Caledonian attacks that were coming in from all sides. Marcus raced towards a small tight group of dismounted horsemen who were trying to hold back the growing Caledonian tide. The horsemen were nearly surrounded by a furious enemy. The Caledonians had started to sense victory and it seemed to give them extra strength and courage.

  A bearded warrior came at Marcus wielding a huge axe. The weapon slid of Marcus's parrying sword and sliced into his horses neck. Blood welled up from the wound in a great gushing fountain and the beast crashed sideways to the ground. Marcus was thrown clear and landed painfully. The wind was knocked out of him and for a moment he was disorientated. Then a terrible roar brought him back to reality. The bearded warrior was coming at him once more, swinging his axe. Marcus rose to his feet just in time as the axe slashed past his face. Then in a single movement he punched his sword into his attackers face and heard the crunch of metal on bone as it cut straight into the man's head. There was no time to watch the Celt die. Wildly he scrabbled on the ground groping for a discarded infantry shield. Then he was among friends. The small group of dismounted cavalrymen had formed a protective circle. A Caledonian, naked from the waist up, his torso covered in tattoos flung himself too carelessly at his enemy and the auxiliary beside Marcus smashed his shield boss into the man's face before stabbing him.

  "Nice of you to join us," a voice beside Marcus hissed.

  It was Bestia. The Decurion managed a crooked half smile. The officer was nearly twice as old as Marcus but he was still one of the fittest and most dangerous fighters in the troop. The rumour at camp had been that during the Batavian rebellion, Bestia had tortured Roman Legionary prisoners by cutting of their balls and making them eat them.

  "If that fuck Agricola leaves us here to die I am personally going to ram my cock up his Patrician arse!" Bestia screamed. No one answered him. Marcus felt a heavy blow land on his shield and the force of the attack travelled up his arm. Blindly he stabbed with his sword. Someone cried out in a foreign language. Then something hit his helmet. He cried out in pain and felt blood trickling down his ear. A Caledonian raised his arm to fling a spear but collapsed with a spear protruding from his back as another desperate auxiliary came staggering towards the small group. Marcus raised his sword hand and tried to wipe the blood from his eye. As he did so one of the auxiliaries in the group collapsed.

  "Agricola, you fucking prick," Bestia hissed blocking a slashing sword with his shield.

  Suddenly a trumpet blast echoed off the hills. It was followed moments later by a second answering blast. Then the ground began to shake. Marcus had no time to see what was happening. The thunder of hooves was coming closer. Then a man screamed.

  "Atticus is coming, Atticus...!"

  The Caledonians had heard the sound too but they had no time to react. Within moments the small band of auxiliaries and the Caledonians who swarmed around them were engulfed. A long wave of horsemen swept through them and crashed head long into the rear of the Caledonian line. Then another wave followed and then a third. Marcus screamed in savage delight. Atticus had arrived just in time. The main Roman cavalry force must have skirted around the edge of the battle and had fallen on the enemies rear. T
he battle was as good as won.

  "Kill the fuckers, kill them!" Bestia roared. They all felt it. The violent release of so much pent up terror. It was time to finish the enemy. The Caledonians knew it too for suddenly their line began to waver. Attacked from the front and now the rear was too much for any man. It only took a second but then the rout spread like wild fire. The Caledonians turned and began fleeing back up the hill in great numbers. Marcus felt the brutal bloodlust. All around him Atticus's cavalry were cutting through the fleeing enemy, mowing them down like corn during harvest. This was the time when most men would die. This was the moment when the battle became a massacre. The slopes of the hill were becoming littered with bodies.

  "Kill them, kill them all...!"

  Up the slope he caught sight of Bestia's blood stained face. The Decurion was laughing as he finished off the enemy wounded. Marcus wanted to laugh too but in that instant something caught his attention. A short distance away a Roman cavalryman had fallen from his horse and lay pinned beneath the dead beast. The man was screaming something in Latin and with a shock Marcus realised that the man was calling out his name. It was Pig face. He stumbled towards the dead horse and knelt down beside his friend. Pig face was still yelling his name. His legs were trapped under the dead horse.

  "Shut up," Marcus shouted.

  He got his hands under his friend's armpits and heaved.

  "Marcus, watch out!" Pig face yelled.

  A Caledonian with wild terrified eyes came running towards him with a raised sword. Then the man tripped and stumbled. Marcus sprung forward but as he did so the Caledonian dropped his weapon and fell to his knees, raising his hands. He was weeping. In one hand the man held up a sprig of Mistletoe.

  "No more, no more, a truce, I beg you," he cried in his Celtic language. Marcus stared wildly at the Caledonian warrior and the sprig of mistletoe. He knew the meaning. His mother had taught him that in Celtic society, no warrior may fight on in the presence of Mistletoe. The plant was sacred. It was also a desperate act. A dishonourable act. Celtic warriors fought to the death. The truce would last for a whole day. He kicked the man in the head. The blood lust was fading.

  "Stay where you are. If you move the truce is broken!" he shouted in his mother's language.

  He retreated to where Pig face lay trapped. His friends shouts had turned to deep groans and gasps of agony. Behind him the Caledonian with the mistletoe had risen to his feet. The man was about to say something when a spear embedded itself in his back and a goblet of blood shot from his mouth. A Roman rider charged past as the Caledonian fell to the ground. Marcus crouched beside Pig face. His friend was crying now. After the third attempt he managed to drag Pig face free. The young riders legs had been crushed. He would never walk again. Pig face's head lolled from side to side. Then he slipped into unconsciousness. Marcus pulled him into his lap, leaned back against the dead horse and cradled him in his arms. The sight of his wounded friend had a sobering effect. Suddenly he felt very tired. The bloodlust had gone and his hands began to tremble as he suddenly realised what he had just witnessed. Gods let this battle finish soon he thought.

  Chapter Five - Vellocatus

  Vellocatus picked his way carefully across the corpse strewn battlefield. The hill was littered with the debris of war as far as the eye could see. The cries of the wounded and the dying could still be heard. Vellocatus's nose twitched as he caught the scent of thousands of dead men. Neither the smell nor the corpses bothered him. He was used to seeing the dead and the dying. He paused to look up at the sky. It was growing dark. It would be too dark soon to continue. He would have to hurry. He was a tall man of thirty two and was wearing an expensive coat made from pure white bear skin. With an expert eye he took in every detail of the battlefield. To the Romans and the Caledonians who had just fought in this great battle, this nameless hill was a place of death, of shame and of glory but to Vellocatus the place was nothing more than a gigantic goldmine. Once he'd overheard a slave comparing him to a Vulture. He'd had the slave buried alive. No one had tried to compare him with anything after that, not even those who pretended to be his friends. But the slave had been right he thought. His profession made him act like a Vulture.

  The dead and dying lay in great heaps and scattered amongst them were discarded shields, bloodied swords and spears, helmets, dead horses and over turned chariots. The story of that day's battle could clearly be seen in where the dead lay. Vellocatus ignored the dead. They were of no use to him. There was a hungry, excited look on his face. The gods knew how long he had waited for this day. They knew how hard he had worked to be here. How much money he had poured into this venture. And now after all that effort, the time had finally come for him to harvest his investment.

  "Water..." a wounded Caledonian cried out nearby. Vellocatus glanced across at the warrior. The man lay on the ground clutching his stomach. His fingers were stained black with blood and dirt.

  "No good," the slave who was following him with a stylus and a wooden writing tablet, muttered.

  Vellocatus stared at the wounded man. The slave was right. The man would be dead by nightfall. There was no use in dragging him back to the slave pen. There were healthier prisoners still out there whom he could take as slaves. Again he glanced up at the sky. If only the light would hold a little longer. Ignoring the dying Celt he started up the hill. Oh what a day it had been. That morning as soon as the outcome of the battle had been decided he and the mercenaries he'd hired had clustered around Governor Agricola waiting tensely and anxiously for his permission to storm onto the battlefield and start collecting the enemy prisoners. He had bagged sixty nine slaves so far. All of them had been dragged from the battlefield or found hiding in trees. He had clasped them all in neck irons. By nightfall he was hoping to make it eighty. Tomorrow he would have another look but from experience he knew that the best slaves would all have been snapped up by then or managed to flee.

  Eighty new slaves was his target. The price he could fetch for each one would vary of course, depending on the state of the particular slave, but he had already calculated that with eighty slaves, sold at a fair price, he would be able to repay the debts he owed to the Jewish moneylenders and still have enough money left over to build himself that villa which he had always dreamed of owning. His new found wealth would finally allow him to marry Clodia, the young Patrician lady on whom he had set his sights. Lady Clodia was the sister of Governor Agricola's wife. It was only by his incessant lobbying of her that he had finally managed to get Agricola's permission to take the slaves. With such a marriage, he Vellocatus would be propelled into the elite circles of Roman society in Britannia. He smiled at the prospect. Oh yes, the battle that had just been fought was going to change his life alright. Legally the slaves taken on the battlefield all belonged to Agricola and the army but Agricola had already agreed to sell them to him for a pittance of what he Vellocatus would get when he sold them in the great markets of Londinium and Eburacum. Life was good. He was going to be a rich man. The last time that a slaver had been able to make such a fortune had been twenty three years ago, well before his time, when Governor Paulinus had destroyed the Druids on Mona Insulis and routed that bitch Boudica.

  Vellocatus strode on up the blood soaked hill. Here and there he came across a Roman soldier robbing the dead. The soldiers however would drift away as he and his men approached.

  "Fucking slaver," a voice cried out suddenly from close by.

  Vellocatus stopped in his tracks and turned to look at the badly wounded Roman auxiliary who lay half covered under a heap of corpses. The soldier was staring up at Vellocatus with dull, listless eyes.

  "We do all the fighting," the soldier muttered, "and you take all the rewards. I curse you, may you rot forever in the belly of the gods of the underworld!"

  Vellocatus didn't hesitate. He took two steps towards the wounded man, bent down and with a quick movement cut the Romans throat. Then he stood up and without looking back started on up the hill.

 
"Master," the slave carrying the stylus and the writing tablet said touching his arm, "Over there beside the dead horse. He looks unhurt."

  Vellocatus stared in the direction in which his slave was pointing. The Caledonian lay beside the dead beast. He was young, little more than a boy with dark curly hair. He seemed to have witnessed the killing of the Roman soldier for the boys eyes widened in alarm as Vellocatus approached. The slaver kicked the boy in the thigh.

  "How old are you?" Vellocatus asked speaking in his native Celtic language.

  "Fourteen," the boy replied with a trembling lip. He looked up in terror at the slaver and his men as they crowded around him. "Don't kill me," he pleaded.

  "Show me your teeth?" Vellocatus demanded.

  The boy did as he was asked. Vellocatus grunted in approval.

  "Bestia, we will take this one," he cried over his shoulder in Latin. From the gathering gloom the Decurion appeared. His face was still splattered with blood and in his hand he clutched several Torcs and finger rings which he had robbed from the dead. He grinned as he saw the latest prisoner to be turned into a slave. Whether it was the killing he had just witnessed or Bestia's blood splattered face, the boy suddenly turned pale with terror.

  "Please, I don't want to die," he cried out. "Spare me, let me go free and I will tell you about a secret. I will tell you what I know."

  Vellocatus was already moving on when he stopped in mid stride. Slowly he turned round to look at the boy.

  "Wait," he raised his hand. He stared at the boy cowering on the ground. "What secret do you know that could possibly interest me?"

  There was a sudden movement beside the boy. A Caledonian warrior with a deep gash along his side stirred and opened his eyes. The man tried to lift his head but he lacked the strength.