A Year of Ravens: a novel of Boudica's Rebellion

by E. Knight

  And yet they flogged a queen.

  My throat tightened. Breath ceased. No. No. No.

  They were dragging us away from the whipping post. Keena was screaming, and I saw a legionary yanking at her tunic. The cries of the men sounded like beasts gone mad. They no longer cared for anything but the taste of dominance and blood on their tongues. The procurator was gone. My father was gone. We were left to the mercy of vicious soldiers now, who claimed they were free to treat my defense of my mother as an act of war.

  We were vulnerable, all of us. The Iceni. My mother. Women. Nothing but an example to be set.

  I refused to be an example of a woman broken.

  I stood taller.

  I would not be beaten, no matter what they did to me. No pain, no humiliation, nothing could take from me who I was. What I was meant to be. I would survive this if only to exact my revenge.

  “Filth! The lot of you!” I bellowed as their hands pawed at me. “You are not worthy of the air we breathe. And if you don’t leave my family and my people in peace, the gods will strike you down and let me dance upon your graves!”

  Helva’s violent blow slammed against my face, almost felling me to the ground. I tasted more blood upon my tongue. My ears rang as they dragged me away. In the distance, I could hear my mother shrieking and the laughs of the men. Then, just as swiftly, all the sound was dulled as I was tossed beside Keena and Ria upon the storehouse floor. The dust from the ground rose up and into my mouth and nose. I kept my eyes open as they fell on us. Watched Ria crawl away to hide, her whimpers sounding distantly beyond the vicious cheers.

  I kept my gaze steadily on Keena. Locking her in and mouthing for strength as, one by one, they tore at our clothes. Helva wrenched my thighs wide and stole my virtue as another legionary fell upon my sister. I kept my gaze on hers, seeing in the periphery Roman feet. Tight leather lacings. Red blisters, callouses, flesh bulging at their hairy ankles. They walked around us, waiting their turns upon our unwilling bodies. As tears gathered in the corners of my eyes, I gritted my teeth to not make a sound. Keena relented, wailing, her eyes closing tight and tears spilling down her precious cheeks.

  It felt like hours. I was violated by many. But there was only one that I vowed to kill, to slit his throat before the end of my days.

  Helva.

  Helva’s feet were slow moving, as though he wanted to take in everything, to absorb what he saw before he called an end to it. He ordered the men out, leaving us huddled on the ground.

  We would not be executed, then. The torment they’d unleashed on us was enough, and perhaps now, Helva, as centurion, was worried what the backlash would be.

  He offered no apology when he left, only the violent, bloody memories of his presence.

  I was born a fighter.

  From that first moment when my parents left me to the gods and I raised a fist against the injustice of it.

  I trained hard with Duro. I trained harder with Andecarus. And when my mother called for our Iceni people to fight, I did. For vengeance. For our lost honor. For the liberty we wanted for ourselves, I wielded a sword for my people.

  The Romans tried to break me.

  They failed.

  Except in one thing. The day after the Romans left us, when I stood with Mother before our shocked people, Andecarus rushed to offer me assistance. But I turned away. I could not bear to see myself in his eyes now, despoiled. And I knew I could never look at him the same way again. Never look at any man with fondness.

  If there was one thing the Romans had stolen, it was my future with Andecarus. They had stolen my love from me. Turned my heart black and filled it with hatred.

  So I turned away from Andecarus as if he had some part in the shame of what happened.

  That night we gathered in the silent Great Hall, the Romans gone. Their inventory complete. Mother sat stone-faced and rigid. Her wounds from the flogging had been tended, and while a weaker woman might have needed to rest for days, to sleep, to heal, she was already vowing to be out of her bed by morning. Now she sat before her people, her two abused daughters beside her.

  Keena looked so frightened, like she wanted to sink inside herself. I just wanted to protect her before she disappeared completely. Did she not know the depths of the quiet strength that lived inside herself? All the confidence she’d exuded before had been stripped from her. She was a pale, frailer version of herself. The Romans had stolen my love, and they’d stolen my sister’s strength.

  No one spoke to the queen. No one spoke to me. Or to Keena.

  And was their silence because of shame? For when the Romans raped us, they raped our tribe. They tore from us our honor, our dignity. Or at least that was what they’d hoped to do. They sought to make us afraid, but I did not smell fear in this room. The air within the Great Hall was charged, edgy. It trembled with rage.

  No, I realized—there was no shame here. In the face of such tragedy, such atrocity, they were angry. They loved us. They supported us. And so they cared for us.

  When the sun rose, muted by dark storm clouds, Mother stood. She went outside to invoke her goddess in the sacred grove. This time, I did sneak out to watch her. I crept along behind her, hobbling, as my body had hardly healed from the assault. Aches bruised my body in places I’d not known were possible. Mother paused once, listening to the wind, and I suspected she knew it was me behind her. Then she continued on, weaving, barely able to keep her feet. A slow rumbling of thunder shook the earth beneath my feet.

  By the time mother stood at the center of the sacred oaks, a light sprinkle of rain had started. I leaned my hands against a large stone jutting from the ground, pressing as close to her as I dared, ignoring the sting in my cut fingertips. I closed my eyes, tipped my head back, face toward the sky, letting the water from the gods wash away my shame.

  From somewhere, Mother produced a soft white-and-brown hare. It wriggled in her arms, unaware that when she placed it upon the sacrificial mound, it lay in the very same place I had sixteen years before.

  Brandishing her dagger with the bronze hilt, she sliced the hare’s neck and uttered the incantations to Andraste that sounded to me like a lullaby, a mother’s sweet song whispered on the wind and the breast of love.

  “Come here,” she said.

  I startled from my hiding place but obeyed without question. Her eyes radiated a fierce, savage pain, filling with tears as she saw how it hurt me to walk.

  Mother opened her arms and brought me to her, circling me in her warm embrace. We stood like that for some time, and I felt her tears touching the top of my head. I squeezed my eyes closed as I tightened my hold on her and breathed in her familiar scent.

  “I am so sorry,” she said softly, her voice hitching.

  My throat swelled.

  “It’s not your fault, Mother.” What happened to my sister and me . . . it was my fault. I should not have acted so rashly.

  “When a woman’s child is harmed, she always feels blame.” She stroked my hair, kissed my forehead, and then held me at arm’s length. “I love you, child.”

  “I love you, too.” I bit my lip to keep it from trembling, my heart swelling.

  “I can see you take the blame on yourself. Know this: what happened was no fault of your own.”

  “But—” I strangled on the words. If I’d not rushed Helva with a dagger, intent to kill him . . . if I’d not spit in his face . . . kept my mouth shut . . .

  “It wasn’t, child. The Romans . . . they sought to not just take your virtue, but to tear dignity from our tribe. The fault lies entirely with me.” Mother’s lips went thin, agony filling her eyes. “I should have hidden you away. But for all the vileness in them, I did not think the Romans capable of what they did to my daughters. To me, yes. But to you . . .”

  “We would not have remained hidden. We are Iceni. The daughters of a king and queen. We would not cower.”

  Mother dragged in a ragged breath and glanced from me to the h
are upon the mound. The she nodded and straightened.

  “Sorcha, daughter of light, gift from the goddess Andraste. The gods have spoken. They wash away the crime of the Romans, and they bless you.” She dipped her fingers in the warm hare’s blood and swiped them across my forehead, nose, and cheeks while she whispered urgently, “I bless you.”

  The rain caused the blood to drip into my eyes and mouth, but it didn’t bother me. If anything, it lifted me up. I had the blood of the gods running through my veins. The bond I felt with my mother at that moment was stronger than our shared flesh. Light and fire and ice, all of it at once, surged inside me. I stood upon the ground, and yet I soared. I was cleansed of the stains of my violation.

  Mother’s eyes locked on mine, as though she were reading my very soul. “Your people need you now more than ever, Daughter. For we are about to embark on a treacherous journey. We will go to war.”

  I knelt before my mother, before the sacrificial altar inside that circular sacred grove, and I made a pledge. The cold, wet ground seeped into my gown, but it could not cool the fire that had ignited. “However the gods need me, however you command me, let it be so.” Out of this darkness, I would be the light. The lucky charm for the Iceni. The Romans couldn’t strip me of that.

  “You are a daughter of Andraste. A carrier of her message—victory for her people. Victory for the Iceni.”

  “I will fight for my people. I will rip the hearts from the Romans.” From Helva. “I will make them bleed as they have done to us.”

  When spring came and the snows melted and our wounded flesh was healed, I climbed into the war chariot with my mother and sister, no longer a girl but a woman. The chariot was freshly painted red and gold. Gleaming silver and gold chinked from the harnesses of two beautiful, shiny-coated horses. Our faces were painted—Mother’s and Keena’s with blue woad, mine with blood. I wore armor and a helmet forged just for me, a battle raven carved deep into the side. Men lined up behind us in the thousands, woad-painted, hair spiked with lime, weapons dripping from their limbs. They were ready to fight. Ready to show the Romans we would no longer cower to their will. I breathed in the scent of horses, banked campfires, spring sunshine, and another sharper fragrance—that of thirst, of hunger, of need for vengeance.

  I glanced at Keena, pale-faced and quiet. I would protect her. She would come out of this with me. I had to help her find her strength again.

  Mother handed me the reins. “Daughter, you will be our charioteer.”

  I puffed with pride. “Are you certain?”

  Mother nodded, a small smile tugging at her lips. I gripped the leather of the reins, tightening my scarred fingers around them. Feeling the excitement and thrill of what was about to happen. We were going to charge a Roman city—Camulodunum. We were going to sack that Roman city. The first of many. Today I would take the life of a Roman soldier—and I begged the skies to let it be that of Helva.

  When I raised my sword and bellowed a battle cry that carried through the men in our army, I was not just a princess wronged but a warrior born.

  “I am Sorcha, Princess of the Iceni. Daughter of Queen Boudica and King Prasutagus. I am an emissary of Andraste. I am the blessed one. Let victory be ours this day!”

  And then I whipped the horses, and our chariot jolted forward, charged with the energy of thousands of vengeful warriors.

  KEENA

  We’d reached the end of the world.

  The sky had gone dusky with the storm, though it was only midafternoon. Black clouds swirled over our heads, crashing into each other in thundering booms. Rain drizzled over us. My hair was plastered to my chilled face. Fingers numb. I rode Andecarus’ mare, as Sorcha was better trained at driving a cart. We rode to the top of a ridge where it seemed we could see the entirety of the world beyond. There was nowhere else to go. The world dropped off into a deep and wide gorge. The only way around it was to backtrack and try to find another route. I turned the horse—Sorcha was still several paces behind—and I walked the mount back to her.

  As I did, I happened to gaze down the embankment to my left and noticed that the ridge created an overhang. I reined in the mare and dismounted, wondering if perhaps that overhang could be our shelter for the night. Sorcha halted the cart and waited for me to examine the spot. I walked and half slid down the edge to find that the overhang formed the roof of a narrow cave.

  Shelter. Thank the gods.

  I did not hear anything from inside the deep cavern, but still, that did not mean we were alone. Wolves, outlaws, any number of things could have sought shelter there. I glanced back up the crest to where Sorcha and my mother waited. I couldn’t call Sorcha down here. I had to check on my own. Taking a deep, ragged breath, I straightened my spine and tugged Mother’s sword from the scabbard at my hip. Brandishing it inside the darkened space, I waited for attack. Nothing.

  The breath of relief I let out was strong enough to blow the dripping water on my face away.

  “Sorcha,” I raised my voice to be heard over the pounding rain and pointed. “A cave.”

  Sorcha nodded, though I noted the lack of smile at such a good find. She’d grown more resigned over the past few days, and I could feel a subtle shift in both of us. Gone was Sorcha’s burning desire for vengeance, and gone was my burning desire for death. The last year had changed us both dramatically, more than once. Neither of us were the same girls we’d been the morning our mother was flogged, and neither of us were the same from the morning of the final battle.

  Was it possible we might yet meet in the middle? Become of like mind?

  She went to the back of the cart, beckoning me to help. We emptied the stores, putting them into the cave, and then carried Mother, each of us putting one of her arms over our shoulders as we took the precarious trip down the embankment toward the mouth of the hollow.

  We settled mother inside the cave, wrapping her in furs. Then Sorcha went to hide the animals and cart while I gave mother sips of mead.

  Perhaps a half hour later, Sorcha returned, soaked to the bone and shivering. Mother had managed a few sips but was otherwise delirious.

  “I’ll gather wood,” I offered, and Sorcha nodded. I hadn’t expected her to, but she was coming to rely on me. To trust in me and my newfound strength.

  The icy winter rain slowed to a sprinkle and then a mist. I looked for fallen branches beneath brambles and the blanket of leaves I hoped would have kept them dry, and I did find several.

  A loud cawing above me drew my attention, and I straightened from where I’d been yanking a particularly long branch from its perch, hanging halfway off a tree.

  The raven landed on the other end, cocking its head as it stared at me. A sign. Sorcha had once told me of a talk she had with the lone surviving Druid who survived the sack of Mona. He’d talked to her of signs and symbols from the gods. What could this sign mean? Ravens came when death was near. Carrion birds to peck at the flesh of the dead and dying. Was he here for my mother? I clenched my jaw. No. Not yet.

  “Shoo,” I said, waving my hand. “This is my branch.”

  The raven cawed, studying me like he could see inside me. See inside my soul. See my deepest thoughts. My fears. My desires. Did this mean I was about to die and he wanted to pluck out my eyes? No. I wasn’t ready for that. Death could not yet claim me.

  “Go away, Death,” I said, this time with more conviction. “Leave us. No one wants you here. Not even me. Not anymore.”

  And it was true. With a startling clarity, I realized the words I’d spoken were genuine. I didn’t want to die.

  But he didn’t leave me. He flew forward, perching on my shoulder and pecking at my hair. I shrieked, waving him off, and he flew back to the branch to stare into my eyes.

  This raven was not here for my mother. He was here for me.

  If not death, then what?

  He was only a bird, but his eyes seemed familiar to me, as familiar as my own father. Had the raven inherited the sp
irit of my father? Nonsense. And yet the more he gazed on me, the more I felt I knew him.

  “I will live,” I professed to the bird. “I am not beaten.”

  Perhaps my eyes were deceiving me, or maybe it was a trick of the wind ruffling that raven’s feathers, but I swore I saw him nod his agreement. Death was not mine yet. Death would not steal me away. And then he was flying away, up into the graying sky—toward a shaft of light that had broken through the clouds.

  SORCHA

  On top of the rise, the sun had not yet risen. Mother and Keena slept soundly in the cave below while I kept watch on the ridge. In the distance, I could hear the clanging of Roman shields. After all our running and trudging, hiding and scheming—after all my endless worry, my ears forever straining behind us for the sound of pursuit—they had tracked us down. Judging from the clang carried on the wind, they were miles away still, but even though it was not yet dawn, they marched. We had a few hours at most before they’d find us. Because Romans never slept, never stopped to rest their weary, blistered feet. When the Romans wanted something, they harnessed the power of darkness and slogged ahead, forsaking the wants of the body and soul.

  Well, maybe not all the wants of the body. When I closed my eyes, I could still hear Helva’s laughter as he pushed his body away from me. His harsh voice as he goaded his men to mount me in turn. Their distorted Roman feet. I could still see Keena’s eyes staring into mine as we were both taken. Her cries of agony.

  I had thought it was my fault, even when Mother told me it wasn’t. I knew now the blame was not mine. And neither was it my mother’s. Those men were looking for a reason to attack us. They were looking for a reason to slake their violent lust and need for bloodshed. They’d come to our village with intent. I could have been quiet. I could have been still. The outcome might have been the same.

  The sound of Roman swords and Roman feet approaching should have sent me into blind panic. But I sank to my knees, holding still, and the power of Andraste swept around me. She was in the wind. She was in the chill of the earth beneath my fingertips. She was in the light of the fading moon and the graceful stroke of clouds passing over the slowly lightening horizon.