Frontier Wolf

by Rosemary Sutcliff

  The harper tried to laugh again. ‘Nay now, you should never believe aught that my kind is telling you. We are overused to the weaving of stories. And I – I have plied my craft in Erin before now.’ But the laughter had not enough breath to it, and his hands were shaking as he stowed his harp back in its bag. Then, scrambling to his feet he was gone, lurching away into the dark.

  Alexios shot a quick glance at Connla; but with head tipped back and a frown of deep concentration, the Chieftain’s brother was shaking the very last drops from the wine jar down his throat. Clearly he had seen nothing. If indeed there had been anything to see.

  But in his heart, Alexios knew that he had not been imagining things. And for the second time, the memory that he brought away most vividly from the Chieftain’s Rath was of the brilliant eyes of Morvidd the Priest in the black shadow of his hood.

  A small memory, but a chill one.

  8 Thunder Brewing

  AS SOON AS he got back to Castellum next morning, Alexios let it be unofficially known that he would be glad to have a word with a certain harper who had been at the Chief-making feast, but would probably have gone his way by now. Then he sent for Druim of the Arcani and asked him if his men had heard anything of envoys from Hibernia coming to the High King of the Caledoni under the Green Branch; or of a gathering in the North to discuss plans for a marriage between the two peoples.

  ‘Why should my men know of a thing so far beyond our hunting runs?’ Druim asked.

  ‘I have heard it said that not a leaf falls from the tree for three days’ march beyond the Old Wall, that the eyes-and-ears of the Frontier do not hear it,’ Alexios said.

  The other shook his head. ‘If a leaf had fallen from a Green Branch, and my men had heard it, assuredly the Commander would have been informed.’

  But there was something in his spy-master’s open blue gaze that Alexios did not completely trust.

  And next day three men who had been part of his escort at the Chief-making, reported finding the harper over towards the Long Moss.

  ‘Face down in a soft patch, very dead,’ said one of them speaking for the rest. ‘We left him where he was, in case anyone came to see how he died, and missed him.’

  ‘You think – he didn’t just lose his way?’ Alexios said, feeling sick. ‘He was probably drunk.’

  ‘It was meant to look like that. But there was a little mark on his neck – if you knew where to look.’

  ‘And you are sure it was the same man?’

  ‘We all saw him at the feast, Sir. And his harp was still in its bag between his shoulders; and this – in the folds of his waist-cloth.’ The man set down a gold half-solidus with a little click on the office table.

  Alexios talked the thing over with Lucius and Hilarion, put the Frontier Wolves on double alert, and gave Druim orders to send some of his men up beyond the Old Wall. He was still not sure about trusting the Arcani, remembering with uneasy clearness Julius Gavros’s opinion that they rode too much alone and listened to too many strange stories and dreamed dreams that could be dangerous. But he did not see that there was anything much he could do but assume that they were loyal. If they were, they might still pick up something. If they were not, and there was something brewing in the North, they would be off to join it when the time came, anyway.

  Then he made out a detailed report and sent it to Bremenium, though he very much doubted if it would serve any useful purpose, with Praepositus Calventius, the old Commander of the Numerus, a sick man, only holding on long after he should have been relieved, for his successor to take over.

  ‘Why in the name of Ahriman the Black One couldn’t they have promoted Gavros Praepositus and found somebody else for Habitancum?’ Alexios demanded of his Senior Centenarius that evening as they stood together on the southern rampart, looking out over the thatched roofs of the town to the crop-lands beyond. ‘If there is going to be trouble we could do with an old Frontier Wolf at Headquarters, and not a sick one, nor some new man who knows nothing of the Frontier and nothing of us.’

  ‘Spoken like a true Frontier Wolf yourself,’ said Hilarion beside him, his tone glinting with laughter, ‘and you not yet a year with the Family.’

  Alexios grinned, ‘Not so far short, though. It was none so long past harvest when I came – and look at the crop-lands now.’

  Leaning elbows side by side, they looked. In another three days it would be time to start cutting on the southern slopes. Alexios watched the barley whiten under a long warm sigh of wind from the south. Well, it promised to be a good harvest this year, anyway. That lightened his anxiety a little. Six years’ service on the Frontiers had taught him that it was generally after a lean harvest that troubles came.

  But Hilarion had begun sniffing the warm wind like a hound.

  ‘Smelling Picts?’ said Alexios. ‘Or is it the tanning sheds?’

  ‘Wrong direction for Picts. No, I was thinking it’s turning a bit thundery.’

  The thunder came in the night, with wind and hissing rain; and by next day’s spent and sodden dawn, the croplands that had been sleek with promise in the evening light were rough and staring like the coat of a sick hound, pock-marked with threadbare patches where the ripe barley had been beaten flat to the earth.

  In the days that followed, between the returning storms, garrison and tribesmen laboured side by side to get in what could be saved of the harvest. But much of the grain blackened before it dried enough to be cut and carried, and in the end the granaries made a poor showing that year as they had done the year before.

  And the shadow of another lean harvest had had no time to lift before the government tax-gatherers were at Traprain Law, their underlings scattering through the Frontier raths and villages according to the yearly custom. For a while the Frontier Wolves were kept busy acting as escorts for the tax officials, a job which they did not relish. But it was over at last, and the Commander of Castellum heaved a sigh of relief. ‘Well at least nobody seems to have been knifed.’

  ‘I am thinking some of those pot-bellied officials must have come fairly near to it,’ Lucius said, picking an early-fallen birch leaf out of his pony’s mane. They were riding back from exercise in the time of long shadows. ‘The government might have chosen a better time for this new tax on broken horses.’

  ‘Do you think that’s all it is?’ Alexios asked after a moment.

  ‘All what is?’

  ‘I don’t know. A feeling like thunder brewing in the back of my neck.’

  ‘The Votadini are resentful, of course,’ Lucius said slowly. ‘Wouldn’t you be, if breeding and breaking horses was your way of life? But if there’s trouble brewing – real trouble –’

  ‘It’s more likely to come down from the North or across from the West,’ Alexios said.

  The Junior Centenarius cocked an eye at him. ‘Still brooding on that harper’s story?’

  ‘Not really, no. The Arcani report nothing out of the ordinary stirring beyond the Wall. Only . . .’

  ‘Only?’

  ‘Only I’ve got a feeling like thunder brewing in the back of my neck.’

  ‘And that’s not the kind of thing you can put in an official report,’ Lucius said soberly; and then, turning the thing into a jest since there was not much else that you could do with it, ‘Heart up, Sir, it’s probably the weather.’

  And laughing, they struck their heels into their ponies’ flanks and took the last stretch back to the Sinister gate at full gallop.

  The weeks passed, with still no sign of anything amiss beyond the Frontier; and life seemed to settle into its usual pattern again, as the dust sank behind the tax-gatherer’s heels. After the storms that had wrecked the harvest, the autumn came in soft and gently; an open autumn of soft blustery winds and rain, and long spells of quiet gleaming days stretching far on into the time when they should have given place to winter. The swallows lingered about the eaves of Castellum as though unwilling to fly south, and long after they were at last gone, the honeysuckle was still i
n flower in the small walled wilderness behind the officers’ quarters that had once been a garden; and the pessimists and weather-wise wagged their heads and talked about Paying for it Later.

  Anyway it was getting late now for any kind of trouble from overseas – unless, said a small chill whisper somewhere deep within Alexios, the long mild autumn was to give anyone ideas for a gambler’s surprise attack at the last possible moment when the garrison were already off-guard . . . Alexios kept the long summertime patrols going weeks after the short two- or three-day patrols of winter would normally have come in, and there was a good deal of grumbling at Castellum in consequence. Even his two centenarii looked at him, Lucius with slightly puzzled surprise, Hilarion with amusement. But they had not seen the face of Nuada the Weaver of Tales when he saw Morvidd standing beside him.

  The thing could still come.

  What actually did come, a short while before midwinter, was word from the new Praepositus who had at last taken over command at Bremenium.

  The message arrived late in the evening, brought by a weary galloper. And when he had opened the cloth packet and broken the sealed thread that held the tablets together and read what was scratched in careful clerk-hand on the wax within, Alexios broke the news to his officers gathered with him in the smoky Mess room. ‘We have all that we need to make us happy! Our new Commander is coming on a three-day visit of inspection!’

  Everybody stopped whatever they were doing.

  ‘When?’ said Centenarius Lucius, looking up from Virgil on bee-keeping.

  ‘He doesn’t say. He’s for Traprain Law first; I suppose it depends on how long the King keeps him there.’

  ‘But at this time of year!’ said the Quartermaster, with disgust.

  ‘It’s an open season, roads still quite passable,’ Lucius pointed out reasonably. ‘And I’m thinking he’d have to dip his dragon to the Lord of the Votadini as soon as possible.’

  Hilarion leaned wearily back against the wall. ‘That will mean he’s the keen type. All the virtues; not to be put off by the chance of a little wind and rain. That kind’s always the worst.’

  ‘Take heart,’ Alexios told him, ‘the weather is bound to break soon. He may founder on the way up here.’

  ‘He’ll want fresh meat, they always want fresh meat,’ said the Quartermaster fretfully.

  ‘We’ll send out a hunting party, Kaeso dear.’

  ‘What are we going to do with him for three days?’ Lucius asked with slightly worried interest.

  ‘He’s coming to inspect us,’ Alexios said, closing the pair of tablets and dropping them on the table. ‘And inspect us he shall, Typhon included – and the fort, even to the old owl’s nest in the armoury. Pray the heating in the bath-house works better than it usually does. And I suppose we’ll have to put on some sort of manoeuvres or a display of weapon-dancing. You’d better get the optios busy on that.’

  It all sounded fairly pointless, and the troops would hate it, but it was the kind of thing one had to do on such occasions. He picked up the tablets again, and began thoughtfully to turn them over and over between his hands. ‘And it might be none so bad a thing to invite Cunorix and a few of his household warriors to come over here.’

  ‘What precisely for?’ Hilarion asked.

  ‘I don’t know, yet – eat – grumble about the new horse tax – make contact, anyway.’

  Hilarion wagged his head gently, without troubling to lift it from the wall. ‘How did the Empire manage before it had you, Sir?’

  Five days later Praepositus Glaucus Montanus arrived, clattering in through the Praetorian gate on a magnificent golden bay stallion, with his escort behind him.

  And from that moment, the trouble started. The Praepositus did not understand the Tribes and clearly did not want to; and therefore, though they were his command, he did not understand the Frontier Wolves either. In his company, Alexios realized how much he himself had had to learn in the first year. But at least he had been willing to learn; Praepositus Montanus was not. He was an embittered man who had hoped for better things of the army than a command of Frontier Scouts at the back end of the Empire; but since that was what he had got, he would make them over into something more like troops he knew or break his neck and theirs in the attempt. An hour in his company was enough to tell Alexios that much.

  And the Frontier Wolves would not take kindly to being made over.

  When, on the very first evening, after watching the ponies taken down for watering, Montanus gave orders that the heathen custom of touching the black stone beside the ford was to cease, they were outraged and insulted. Also, they were afraid. The Lady would be angry, and there would be trouble for the horses, and for the men who rode them. But chiefly they were outraged that a cherished custom of the Ordo should be spat on. They showed nothing, but Alexios, who was well-tuned to his men by now, felt their mood and longed for the three days to be over.

  On the morning of the first day, Praepositus Montanus inspected the fort and the Third Ordo, Frontier Scouts. He said little, but his rather full dark eyes touched on all things, especially Typhon perched on the junior trumpeter’s shoulder, with a marked lack of enthusiasm.

  And soon after the light noon meal had been eaten, Cunorix arrived, with Connla and a handful of his household warriors. Cunorix riding one of his best horses, and clad in all the splendour of a Celtic Chieftain from the huge brooch of enamelled bronze that held his cloak of red and saffron plaid at the shoulder, to the tip of the magnificent inlaid spearhead, which he carried reversed, according to the ancient custom, to show that he came in peace. His warriors behind him almost as fiery-fine as himself.

  ‘I’m dazzled!’ Alexios said, when the courtesy-greetings were over and the Guest Cup passed round; and he got a moment’s chance of a word alone with his friend as they headed for the practice ground to watch the display of roughriding which the Ordo had made ready for the Praepositus’s entertainment. ‘Surely we have mistaken the time of year, and the sun stands at midsummer!’

  Cunorix’s big mouth curled suddenly almost from ear to ear. ‘Wolf Commander, are we not here to help you do honour in all ways to your Commander?’ But his gaze followed where Glaucus Montanus rode just ahead, holding his golden bay on a short rein to make him prance and fidget. ‘Oh you beautiful!’ he said very softly in the vernacular, ‘Oh you begetter of fine and fiery sons!’

  ‘Horse or rider?’ Alexios asked, equally softly, and there was a spirit of laughter from Connla beside him, while Cunorix murmured something about the rider which Praepositus Glaucus Montanus would not have cared to hear.

  Alexios touched his heel to Phoenix’s flank, and pushed forward to his Commander’s side as they came out from the narrows of the half blocked up Sinister gate and saw the Ordo ready mounted and waiting for them in the open space beyond. All round the edge of the practice ground were the people of the town who had crowded up to watch the show, with the sellers of honey-cake and cheap wine busy among them as though it were a fair.

  And the show was certainly worth the watching, Alexios thought, when he and his guests had taken up their position, and to the shining notes of the hunting-horn, the troops came flying by, skeining out like wild geese after the standard-bearer. He saw Typhon clinging to the shoulder of the junior trumpeter, his ears laid back and his bushy tail streaming out behind him as though in echo of the green silk tail of the Ordo dragon as it whipped out on the wind of their going. Certainly, he judged, the men were enjoying themselves, once the heart lifted in them and the thing warmed up. No one could do the crazy things that they were doing with such swing and dash unless they were also delighting in what they did; riding backwards, exchanging horses at full gallop, flinging off every trick of the rough-rider; while the ponies, linked to their riders by an inner communication, delighted also, you could see it in the way they tossed up their heads as they wheeled and turned to the signalling yelp of the hunting-horns, and the hand and heel of the men on their backs. And under all the seeming lig
htness of heart and almost-foolery, Alexios sensed the concentration that must not be allowed to waver for an instant.

  A pony streaked towards him, the rider half-out of the saddle, clinging tensely along the flank of his mount; then as they swept past, he gathered himself and swung down under the creature’s belly among the flying hooves, and up again on the far side, and as he swung back into the saddle, Alexios saw that it was Bericus the Emperor’s hard bargain. The crowd roared its approval, headed by a wild high hunting yell from Connla.

  But as time wore by the Commander of Castellum became more and more aware that neither of his chief guests was giving their full attention to the riders who swept and swirled in front of them. The Praepositus because he did not consider such a backwoods display worthy of his full attention, and Cunorix because, though he was taking care not to show it to the world, he had seen the Praepositus’s bay stallion with the eye of love, and also with the eye of a horse-breeder.

  And the first of these things annoyed the Commander of Number Three Ordo for his men’s sake, but the second touched him with a light chill finger, foreboding trouble ahead.

  That evening they gathered for supper at a table set up in the cross-hall of the Principia, since there was not space for so many in the ordinary Mess room of the officers’ quarters. Four braziers, burning wild cherry logs above the charcoal, gave off a fragrant smoke that hung among the rafters overhead where the light from the lamps on the table could scarcely reach.

  The cookhouse orderlies had bestirred themselves to produce such a meal as Alexios never remembered to have eaten in Castellum before; and he exchanged glances of congratulation with the little round red Quartermaster, as they ate their way from hard-boiled duck-eggs through deermeat baked with moorland herbs to little crisp honey-cakes and the last of the dried figs.