The Wald

by Born, Jason

  First it was the seaman closest to the prow. “Bottom,” he called. Then another and another, all shouting, “My oar is striking bottom.”

  The ship skidded to a halt. All around him, Septimus saw that the fleet was becoming beached. The centurion scanned the dark sea and saw that the tide was ebbing – rapidly. The more experienced Frisians had seen it first. Septimus wondered why Cornelius the augur hadn’t warned his commander, but ignored the thought as he moved to save what he could.

  Twenty of the Frisians slammed their shoulders or hands into the hull of Septimus’ warship as it teetered on its keel. One of them wedged a thick log to help it hold. “Well, don’t stand around watching!” shouted Septimus. “Help them.”

  Septimus, too, jumped in and ran to another nearby ship to steady it. He had some of the stunned oarsmen onboard send over ten of their pine blades to act as chocks to keep the craft upright. Then Septimus ran on, slogging through the soaked sand.

  He ran past three of the pig ships since they were flatter bottomed and would be less apt to tip over. But he was too late in helping one of the warships. The water had raced away from its position on a sand bank and so the ship fell to its side, cracking the hull and allowing what seawater was left to rush in.

  It all happened as rapidly as a battlefield encounter or as rapidly as a young man finishes himself during his first time with a woman. The Frisians had fanned themselves out and saved countless ships. The other crews had been inspired by that of Septimus and had joined in. All but five ships were saved. Thankfully, thought Septimus, the general’s flagship was among those rescued. It took fifty men on a side to lean their backs against it until enough wooden supports could be brought to hold her steady.

  When all was supported or held in place, the fleet waited in the icy winds. There was nothing more to do than wait for the flow tide and hope a great storm didn’t blow in to swamp their armada while it was helpless. Some of his men spread their arms wide as they spoke to Neptune, seeking his favor.

  Septimus was ashamed of what happened, especially since it occurred in front of the eyes of the Frisians. They proved able and willing to help, but this was not a story that should be passed to their families around the hearth all winter. Worse yet, it was not a story that should find its way to the other tribes – the Sugambrians, the Cheruscans, et cetera. It was just the type of story that could embolden them. The wild tribes might believe the legions were fallible. They may believe they had hope. And if they believed they had hope, then they would fight all the harder, all the longer. Septimus was certain of a Roman victory because no one could stand against the legions. He also preferred that battles be fought and won rather than having an enemy simply capitulate at once. But if the tribes believed in an independent future, they could still slaughter many legionaries.

  Septimus sat shivering wet aboard his ship thinking these thoughts as the waters lifted it out of the muck. Perhaps, he wondered, the Pillars of Hercules hadn’t been such a wondrous sign after all. He resolved to find the augur, Cornelius, sometime as they wintered in Oppidum Ubiorum and see if his mind had changed about the meaning of the red and white columns.

  CHAPTER 4

  11 B.C.

  Berengar fidgeted while he sat at the end of a bench several spaces removed from his father. It was the same type of bench they used for sitting in his family’s longhouse, but he had been resting for so long during these negotiations that one of his feet, which stuck out from his stick legs like paddles, had fallen asleep. Adalbern said nothing about his wiggling, though it shook the entire length of the bench, since he was concentrating on talking with the impressive man across from him who sat in the center of an identical bench. Gundahar, whose hairy arms brushed against the boy’s, prodded Berengar’s ribs with a finger as rigid as one of the posts that held up the roof of a longhouse.

  The Sugambrian delegation had travelled to the Cheruscans in order to bring them into league against the Romans. Adalbern decided that the legions’ foray in the Mare Germanicum, which all of the tribes chattered about, may have made the mighty clans of Cheruscans more malleable to his argument. Heretofore, they could rest assured that they were safe in their beautiful valleys surrounding the Visurgis River, with the other tribes serving them as a buffer. No longer, hoped Adalbern. The Roman general they called Drusus had proven that he meant to plunge to the very heart of Germania.

  “They already freely control the west side of the Rhenus. The fleet of watercraft they’ve built depleted an entire forest – a place where I used to sometimes hunt with my grandfather when I was a child. The alliances they’ve made with the Batavians and the Frisians have given them the mouth of the Amisia River. The little Chaucians of the western Visurgis River have capitulated. If the curs take both sides of the Visurgis, they’ll descend on us like a bull does a heifer in heat. All of us will be plowed then,” pleaded Adalbern.

  His counterpart smiled at the picture the big man just painted in his mind. Segimer, a powerful Cheruscan chief with red hair knotted at the side of his head, calmly sipped from a crude mug of ale to which his wife had added spices before she left the men to their business. “Times are moving too fast,” the man said at last. Segimer scratched at the back of his head and pulled out a tiny nit between his two fingers, inspecting the would-be louse before flicking it into the central hearth. “As a boy, I remember when the Suebians came rushing through our lands, fleeing from someone they called Julius the Caesar. Nothing came from that. The Suebians live to our south and east now and have become good neighbors, almost a part of us. Years passed. Then I hear there is a new Caesar they call Augustus. Years passed. Now this Augustus means to conquer what he calls Germania. It seems he means to Romanize us. Now every spring brings this Drusus to you, the fringe tribes, like the rains. Times are too fast.”

  “Aye. That’s the case. I’m told that Drusus fled the cold north to go to Rome for the winter. But he doesn’t nap. That man’s ambitious. He left to discuss invasion plans with his Caesar for the coming time of war when the weather breaks. And you talk of the Suebians. We travel to them once we leave you. They will join us, I know. They’ve seen what the legions can do.” Adalbern downed the last of his third mug of ale as he finished speaking. His eyes glanced down a time or two to the empty cup.

  “Thusnelda!” snapped a man sitting next to Segimer. “Fill the cup of our guest. Thusnelda, where are you?”

  “Coming father,” chirped a bright sounding girl aged five summers. She had a mess of red hair with large, round eyes set in a face smudged with whatever she had been playing with outside. The men watched the little girl skip her bare feet to the table to retrieve the pitcher of warm ale. She slowed her steps and walked with purpose as she carried the heavy pot to the giant bear of a man who seemed to like his ale. When the cup was full, she looked expectantly to her father for more instruction.

  “Go on,” said the man with a wave of his hand. Her spritely demeanor returned, and she trotted away after returning the pitcher to its place.

  “That’s quite a girl you’ve got yourself there, Kolman. She’ll be a rare beauty someday. Make a man happy and sad all at once like a good woman should. Make you many grandchildren,” said Adalbern as he raised his mug to thank his hosts.

  “Thank you,” said Kolman with a thin smile. He sat to Segimer’s right. By his clothing and grooming it was apparent he was wealthy enough to even be able to give his appearance consideration.

  “By the way,” began Adalbern in between swigs from his mug. “What kind of name is Kolman? I’ve never heard anything like it before.”

  “It’s a name my father gave me. He had done some trading with, well with outsiders, and he liked the name so he changed it a little and gave it to me. It means dove.”

  “That’s fancy,” answered Adalbern. “Don’t tell me these outsiders were Romans.”

  “Yes. They spoke Latin and it’s a Latin name originally.”

  Adalbern threw up his hands, spilling ale onto himself an
d the hard-packed earthen floor. He ignored the liquid that now bled into his wool jerkin, which was dyed blue from woad leaves. “That’s exactly what I’m talking about, Segimer. Here you lie in the center of the tribes, far away from the southern bastards, and you are already being Romanized. One of your very own chieftains carries one of their heathen names. By Teiwaz!” Most of the Cheruscans gasped at his shouting of the war god’s name.

  Segimer held up his hands to compose everyone. “Men, let’s calm ourselves. Earlier, Adalbern mentioned that the Suebians will be called into an alliance against Rome. I believe the opposite of what our Sugambrian friend thinks. Their past experience with the legions is more likely to send them away from such a fight rather than into the fire. People say they lost eighty thousand of their number in those days.” Everyone around the room knew the number of the Suebians who had been killed by Julius, but each time it was uttered men breathed in astonishment.

  “And so where does that leave us?” asked a frustrated Adalbern. “Are we to be left fighting short-handed? Have I always been correct that it’s family, village, clan and no other that I can trust? Or, do you expect me to hand over the rule of my clan and village and tribe to the Romans in exchange for a handful of those coins they like so much?”

  “No, it means none of those things.” Segimer studied his visitors until his gaze at last rested on Berengar. “Adalbern, there is a large boar in the forest near here that I have tried to put over my fire for at least three seasons. Bring your boy, and I’ll bring mine. We can talk about this business later. Perhaps the gods in the glens will give us the wisdom we seek to make such a judgment as war or peace as we stalk the beast.” Adalbern began nodding his approval.

  “But . . .” began Kolman, but was cut off by Segimer.

  “We’ll host a feast in your honor tonight, Sugambrians. Our priestess will divine answers and speak them to us so that we may understand. You’ll then have your reply. And in the mean time it will be a positive omen for your cause should you be able to bring in that boar today.” He gave Adalbern a wink. “Ermin, let’s hunt.”

  A slight boy with delicate features came from the recesses of the longhouse where he must have sat quietly, simply observing, for none, not even the wandering eyes of Berengar, had noticed him. His hair, like his complexion, was fair, but he carried a long-healed, darkened scar on his left cheek. Berengar recognized the scar immediately because he had put it there some years earlier when the two boys had met at a gathering of the tribes. This boy, who Berengar now knew was Ermin, son of Segimer, had stolen a loaf of highly prized soft wheat bread on which Berengar himself had his eye. In the end, Berengar hit the boy and had the loaf half eaten before the loaf’s owner discovered him and whipped him with a branch torn from a nearby tree.

  “Let’s hunt, father,” answered Ermin giving Berengar a confident glance that showed neither fear nor contempt, only confident recognition.

  . . .

  The great boar hung from a spit that ran from its ass through its mouth, the red-hot coals of a fire sat heaped beneath it pouring heat into the surrounding night air. The tips of its ears had blackened early on and some men had stolen them for gnawing. The animal’s coarse hair had been boiled off earlier with bubbling water so that all that was left was its brown and black blotted skin, the fat of which was starting to gurgle and hiss.

  The successful hunt had been pleasing to the men and their sons. Segimer and Adalbern each carried bows cut from the wood of the yew. Both men had slung over his shoulder a quiver filled with a dozen iron-tipped arrows, while the boys lugged spears when they left in search of prey. The older pair chatted idly about days spent in the wald as youths, wistfully hoping for more time in their current roles as chieftains to spend on leisure activities. The younger pair, plodding in silence, followed some steps behind their fathers. They stared at the ground on the path in front of them, hoping to avoid any conversation. After a time, Segimer signaled that it would best serve their purpose to fall quiet and the group’s pace slowed as they all were more careful in placing their footfalls. But despite the deliberate, measured tempo, Ermin fell behind. This fact suited Berengar just fine. He could now hold his head up high as he scanned for a glimpse of the great boar for which they hunted without fear that his eyes might meet those of the frail-looking Ermin. Eventually, Berengar was happy to forget that Ermin was even there.

  The breeze brought rutting sounds echoing up from a ravine that fell into the earth just ahead of them. Flapping grunts of a boar followed. The fathers nodded to one another, hoping that this was the boar. Berengar gripped the spear tightly as he walked dutifully behind his father. He secretly hoped that he would be able to drive the spear into the beast and therefore receive a bit of hunting glory, but knew that his father would expect him to place the weapon in his huge hand when he shot it back to the boy.

  Segimer silently moved left toward the cusp of the ravine, Adalbern moved right so that the animal sounds came from directly between them down the slope. The Cheruscan noble quickly encountered a mass of tangled vines that had caused several young trees to bend their branches to the earth. Segimer navigated further left around them while Adalbern, with Berengar in tow, slid right around a knotted old maple. Both chieftains had already nocked arrows in place as they carried their bows.

  The great bear of a man froze in some soggy red and brown leaves and waved Berengar to a halt. The boy was frustrated because he could not see their quarry, but he knew it was a full grown adult boar from the way its deep grunts of joy bounced off the hills. Berengar prepared his legs to follow after his father should the need arise.

  The krek krek call of a male landrail came from the snarled forest near Segimer. The boar jumped with a start. The beast spun its head with ears erect so that it faced the direction of the bird’s sound. Its breathing sped and deepened as it sensed the woods had become a danger to him.

  All at once the beast sprang forward down the winding ravine, ignoring the half-eaten deer carcass it had come across. Blood dripped from the boar’s red-smeared snout as it ducked under a tree that had fallen across the ravine. Segimer’s arrow cracked into that tree and the Cheruscan called out, “Adalbern, he’s out of my range. Take him!”

  The boar was passing just below the Sugambrian as he drew his bow to its full weight, then released. His arrow drove the iron head into the animal’s right hind quarter, spinning the crying beast to the ground. But in just a moment the boar was back to its feet pounding its way over the slippery, smooth rocks that littered the floor of the ravine. It sped away down the crevice while Adalbern angled for a second shot at the disappearing hulk.

  He did not have one, but released anyway, hoping for a lucky break. The second arrow skipped over the back of the animal and tore a gash that would do more to anger it than kill the wild hog.

  Segimer, who was running up behind, shouted. “We’ll have to track him all night. Even so, the creature is so strong he may heal his way around your arrow.”

  Each man grumbled about a night in the soggy woods. It wasn’t nearly as exhilarating as it was when they were young men bent on making a name for themselves. They simultaneously turned to their sons, “Come, boy.”

  Neither boy was to be seen. A crash caused both warlords to look up just in time to catch the sight of Berengar as he dropped over the lip of the gully which had curved back to the right. Adalbern’s face lit up as he thought of his aggressive boy on the hunt.

  “If he’s fortunate enough to catch it, you know the boar will likely kill your son,” said Segimer while both men were in pursuit.

  “Perhaps,” was all that Adalbern had to say.

  The squeal of the hog and the cry of the boy said that the two had, in fact, met. The fathers slapped arrows home while they jumped over the same edge as Berengar.

  Below them, they saw Berengar with his back pressed against a vast rock. The feral hog was crazed as it attempted to tear at the boy’s chest with his bloody tusks. Berengar had driven the spear in
the beast’s side and its long handle flailed wildly into the air and then back onto the ground.

  Segimer already had his bow drawn to his cheek, but just as he loosed the missile, Adalbern struck his back arm, sending the projectile flying off harmlessly into the wood. “What are you doing?” the Cheruscan yelled. But in the next moment he saw the answer for himself.

  Ermin was jumping off the top of the rock behind the quickly fading Berengar. The spear which his father had entrusted to him was gripped so tightly his knuckles showed white. With all the weight the insubstantial boy could muster, he drove that long narrow spear tip into the back of the raving beast. It fell on its side and pinned Ermin’s leg underneath its massive weight.

  Segimer had his knife drawn and took a long stride to save the boys, but again Adalbern reached out. This time he gripped the smaller man on the shoulder with his great paw. “Let them be.”

  “I’ll not have my fragile son killed when I can stop it,” shouted an angry Segimer.

  “They’ve got the beast. Let them finish it. That way, live or die, your boy will no longer be considered fragile by any man.”

  The Cheruscan sloughed the giant hand from his shoulder and turned to save the boys. He halted in his steps, understanding the wisdom of Adalbern’s words when he saw what happened next. The youths worked together. Would it be a sign of what was to come with their peoples?