The Half-Slave

by Trevor Bloom

  After that, Bauto gave Ascha other messages to carry. Ascha rode as an official Frankish messenger to all the leading towns in Roman Gallia. The letters he carried were mostly routine demands for grain, wine, woollen socks and cloaks for the Frankish army. He delivered them to traders, lawyers and Roman officials. It wasn’t long before he guessed that some if not most of the people he visited were spies in the pay of the Franks. Sometimes they asked him to wait and then he was given a letter to bring back to Bauto.

  As the weeks went by, Ascha began to form opinions on the Romans he met. He took a view on whether they were honest or corrupt, whether they had genuine information to pass on or were inventing news they could exchange for Frankish gold. At first, he found them wary and cautious but as they got to know him, they began to loosen up. He spoke their language and he knew they saw him as different to other barbarians. Sometimes, when he judged it was safe to do so, he asked them questions about their trade. He kept his eyes and ears open, remembered the gossip he picked up about Roman dignitaries, and never forgot to count the Roman troops he passed on the road.

  He told Bauto everything he learned, listing his observations and adding further impressions when he thought them relevant. The Frank listened carefully, his forefinger tapping his lips, taking it in.

  Ascha was pleased. He was making himself useful.

  One afternoon, a tall Antrustion captain with ice-blue eyes, a drooping moustache and his skull shaved close, came to the hut where Ascha slept.

  ‘I am Lothar,’ the Antrustion scowled. ‘And I’ve been ordered by Bauto to teach you to fight. Tiw help us all!’

  Ascha threw himself into war training. He enjoyed the exercise: the long runs each morning, the wrestling and the tugs-of-war. But most of all he loved working with weapons. It was what he had been waiting for all his life. He worked hard to master his new craft: the downward cut from shoulder to chest, the hard stab at the side of the neck, the sharp thrust to head or belly or groin.

  ‘All men flinch from a cut to the face,’ Lothar said. ‘Their face is who they are. Strike through the mouth and the day is yours!’

  Lothar taught him to handle the spear and the seaxe, the long bladed single-edged knife worn by all Germanics. He showed him to throw javelins and lob slingshot, how to wait until the last moment before hurling the angon, the Frankish barbed spear, so it would punch through an enemy’s shield and maim. He learnt to use shields: the small one for fast-footed close work and the big war shield with its heavy iron boss for battle. To parry, feint, lunge and block, using either hand equally. ‘If your right arm is injured you must be able to kill with your left or you are dead,’ Lothar shouted.

  But of all the weapons he worked with, it was the franciska he loved the most. The Frankish tomahawk had a long shaft and a sensuously curved blade – like a woman’s back, Lothar said.

  ‘In the right hands, the franciska is deadly,’ Lothar told him. ‘Look after her as you would your sister and keep her by your side at all times.’

  Ascha took him at his word, and the franciska became his weapon of choice. He practised every day, swinging the blade until it became as much a part of him as his arm. He was not a natural killer, but he was fast and he was agile. With his speed and nimbleness, he found he could overcome opponents bigger and stronger than himself.

  His skill was eventually noticed and the Franks, a heavy-witted people seeing a link between his trade and his dexterity with their national weapon, took to calling him the Carver. Ascha didn’t mind. Better to be known as a Carver than a Half-Slave.

  As weeks turned into months, the Franks saw that Ascha was now under Bauto’s protection and left him alone, while the hostages learnt to accept him as an exile far from home, like themselves. Ascha no longer thought of himself as a Theod but as a hostage in Bauto’s army. The memories of what had happened that day at Samarobriva began to fade

  With a seaxe in his belt and a franciska swinging from his hip, Ascha felt and acted differently. For the first time in his life, he was proud of who he was. He was working for Bauto and he walked with his head held high. If he had doubts about what the Franks wanted in return for arming and training him, he put them to one side.

  ‘Y’know, for a bare-arsed Saxon ditch-dog, you’re not so bad,’ Gundovald the Goth told him one night as they sat around the fire grilling sausages. And with a booming laugh Gundovald slapped him on the back so hard he thought his lungs would burst.

  One day, when Sunno the Frank tripped him as he was re-wheeling a cart, Ascha turned, his blade already drawn. But this time he found he was not alone. Gundovald and the hostages smilingly drew their weapons and watched his back while Ascha and Sunno fought it out.

  The fight was fast and bloody.

  Sunno went down with Ascha’s seaxe wedged between the bones of his forearm and a franciska caressing his throat and was carried off screaming like a girl. Ascha pounded his chest, raised his arms and roared his joy.

  He had become a warrior.

  And he had survived.

  5

  Andecavus, Roman Gaul, five years later

  481 AD

  Just before sun-up and the first pink flush of dawn was colouring the sky. In a drowsy blur Ascha heard birdsong and sensed the stirrings of the early risers. His body still ached from the clash with the Herul and he’d slept badly, his rest broken by the screams and groans of the wounded. He rolled over and opened his eyes. He seemed to be the only one awake, the other hostages still wrapped in their blankets.

  A man was coming towards him, skirting the smoking campfires and stepping over the sleeping men. Roman, he guessed, the wrong side of forty, dressed like a clerk and peering about as if he was looking for someone. The man stopped when he saw Ascha.

  ‘Are you the Saxon?’ the Roman said in thickly-accented Frankish.

  ‘Who wants to know?’ Ascha mumbled drowsily.

  ‘I am Quintilius, secretary to general Bauto and I’m here on royal business,’ the Roman said, wrinkling his nose.

  Ascha pursed his lips. They all stank, of blood and sweat and death. Nobody had washed for days. He pulled himself up on one elbow and rubbed a hand across his chin. ‘I’m the Saxon,’ he said. ‘What do you want?’

  ‘You must come with me.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘Lord Bauto wants to see you.’

  ‘Bauto wants to see me?’ He could hear the surprise in his voice. He had not seen Bauto in years. Was this some kind of joke?

  ‘He has received despatches. They concern you.’

  Ascha gazed at the Roman in amazement.

  Quintilius tightened his mouth with impatience and walked back the way he had come. He stopped a little way off and looked at Ascha expectantly. Ascha sighed and shook his head. He got to his feet, scooped up his cloak, wrapped it around his shoulders and followed.

  Ten days earlier, a war band of sea-raiders led by Eberulf the Herul had landed at the mouth of the Liger. Using an island in the estuary as a base, Eberulf sends his raiders sweeping through Roman Gallia spreading terror and destruction. They sack the towns and villages and fire the fields and leave the province a smoking wasteland. When the Herul reach Andecavus they destroy the city in a storm of fire and slaughter.

  Syragrius, imperial governor of the last Roman enclave in Gallia, has too few troops to defend his dwindling territory and sends riders to appeal to the Franks for help. Bauto calls up the scara, the Frankish army, and leads them with five hundred Antrustions and the royal hostages out of Tornacum, heading south. They reach Lutetia Parisi and take the stone road to the west.

  A week later the Franks reach Andecavus. A pall of greasy smoke covers the town. Bodies litter the streets and the sweet stench of death hangs on the air. The Franks trudge through the smouldering ruins in silence. On the other side of Andecavus they find a detail of grim-faced Roman horse soldiers waiting for them under the trees. Bauto shakes hands with the Roman commander, a young officer with a sharp nose and dark curly hair, and then
the Roman turns his horse and leads them along the river westwards. The Romans have sent scouts fanning out in search of the Herul, and the raiders are not difficult to find. Burdened by laden oxcarts and lines of stumbling captives, their retreat to the river mouth is slow.

  The allies gain on them by the hour.

  The air is heavy and the sky cloudless. The sun glistens on spear points and helmets, pricking eyes and flaming the men’s pale northern skin. A month earlier, Ascha thinks, and this desert of dry earth and burnt stubble would have been a sea of soft-swaying wheat. Now the dust rises up in clouds, stinging their eyes, drying their throats and rubbing their shoulders raw.

  He drops out of the column. Lowering his shield, he lets his pack fall to the ground. He drags off his helmet, touches his brow and winces. The iron rim has chafed, and the skin is sore and weeping. He put his fists against his lower back and with a little gasp arches his spine. He yanks out the stopper from his flask and dribbles some water onto a neck cloth and roughly swabs the dust and muck from his face.

  ‘Shift your arse, Saxon. We haven’t got all day.’ Gundovald’s voice.

  With a sigh, Ascha pulls on his helmet. He picks up the heavy shield and pack, hoists them on his back and runs to join the column.

  Ascha and the hostages trudge over the crest of a low rise. Far off on the plain, at a point where the old Roman road disappears into a clump of scrub pine and oak, a mass of people, carts and animals are slowly grinding toward the coast. He can hear the rumble of wagons and see the shimmer of iron weapons and smell the salt-tang of the sea.

  When the Heruli realize they cannot escape, they turn. Tall men with pale hair and hungry faces. They form a wall of shields and yell defiance.

  Trumpets bray. Captains bellow. Horses thunder by in a cloud of dust. Ascha tightens his grip on his shield. Now they’ve got them.

  The Franks move up. Weapons clank, harness rattles, and there is a steady tramp of feet.

  When they are no more than twenty five paces away, the Franks face the Herul. The shouts and yells fade away. No sound, not a whisper. Ascha fronts his shield and draws his franciska. Stiff with tension he waits with the other hostages. He breathes in and tries to keep calm. This is the hard time, the moment before a battle. His mouth is dry, and he feels the cramp of fear in his guts. He breathes in as deeply as he can and lets it out in a long shuddering rush.

  The horns blow, and the Herul scream their war song. With a shout, the Franks run forward and hurl their angons. Ascha watches, fascinated, as the javelins slowly arc and drop on the Herul. Men fall impaled, and Heruli shields bristle with Frankish lances. Frantically, the Herul hack at the spears, trying to cut themselves free of the encumbering angons.

  The horns blow once more and the Frankish front line moves off. They charge, plunging headlong into a murderous thicket of axes, spears and swords. Leaping onto the angons trailing from the Heruli shields, they uncover the Herul like snails on a thrush’s anvil. Axes sweep and spears lunge. The air is full of men’s cries and the clash of iron.

  After a short and fierce battle, the Heruli shield wall begins to give. Those at the rear turn and flee. A gap opens and the Franks pour through like a winter torrent.

  Eberulf holds out to the last, surrounded by his sons, their shields overlapping, tired blades swinging low.

  The Franks close in like dogs around a boar.

  Ascha hears Bauto shout, ‘Five solidi to whoever brings me Eberulf’s head!’

  Eberulf hears it too. He grins and his axe flashes. An Antrustion goes down and another leaps in to take his place.

  With a wild yell, Ascha rams his shield into a Herul’s face. He hacks with his franciska and sees the man fall away. Another Herul rushes him. Ascha parries and then chops at the man’s leg. He hears a half-choked howl, and the Herul topples back. Ascha swings and feels the crunch of bone as the hatchet bites deep.

  He turns and catches a glimpse of Eberulf fighting for his life but loses him again in a crush of bodies and jabbing spear points. And then suddenly the field clears and Ascha sees the warlord of the Herul, eyes wild, his face and beard flecked with blood.

  ‘How now, you old bastard!’ Ascha screams.

  And the franciska swoops.

  Quintilius walked on without looking to see if Ascha followed. He led Ascha through a jumble of supply wagons, past the cages where the last of the Heruli sat in wretched huddles waiting for the slave buyers, and out beyond the grave pits which stank of death. They came to a small field of sun-bleached grass. Ascha looked about him. Half a dozen double-poled tents for Bauto and his captains, shaded by trees. Outside the biggest tent Ascha saw a tall staff with six black horsetails. Bauto’s standard.

  Antrustions barred the gate to the field. Heavy hard-looking men in dark horsehair crested helmets, carrying long-leafed spears. Ascha tensed, recalling the misery of his first months in Tornacum, but the Antrustions let them pass without a word.

  Bauto was standing outside his tent. He was stripped to the waist. A slave with a thin face and frizzy black hair stood by him holding a bronze ewer. As they drew near, Bauto dipped his head and the slave poured water over the warlord’s head and shoulders. Bauto cupped his hands and washed, using a nubbly finger to clean out his ears and nose and then hawked loudly and spat to one side.

  Ascha was pleased to see him again. Bauto had met his father and knew the world he came from. Ascha looked him over. Bauto hadn’t changed. Middle-aged, but the body was still hard-muscled, skin the colour of old oak, with just a hint of softening around the belly. A scar branched like a deer antler down one arm. Like all high-born Franks, Bauto shaved the back of his head. Only Frankish royalty had the right to wear their hair long.

  Above the trees, the sky was shifting to a dove grey. The hostages would be up and about, preparing for the day. From one of the tents Ascha heard the low gurgle of a woman’s laugh.

  The slave picked up a towel and began to dry Bauto’s back with quick efficient strokes. Quintilius took this as a signal. He stepped forward and put his hand to his chest in a lack-lustre Roman salute.

  ‘I have brought the Saxon, Excellency.’

  Bauto looked up. Quintilius was dismissed with a jerk of Bauto’s jaw, and Ascha felt hard blue eyes fall on him. Bauto looked at him as if seeing him for the first time.

  ‘It’s been a while,’ Bauto growled.

  ‘It has, Lord.’

  ‘You’ve changed, filled out a bit. Put on a bit of muscle. You used to be a gawky wretch. Life as a Frank must suit you.’

  Ascha nodded. ‘Suits me well enough.’

  Bauto rotated his finger in a slow circle above his head. ‘And you wear your hair shaved now, like a good Frank? Not like some top-knotted barbarian, huh?’

  Bauto’s mouth lifted at his own joke. He took the shirt the slave handed to him, dragged it over his head and stuffed it into his breeches. He buckled on a heavy war belt and then sat down and pulled on his boots.

  ‘And these days you bear arms,’ he said, ‘like an honest freeman?’

  Ascha bent his head. ‘I do, Lord.’

  Bauto grinned. ‘And if Eberulf were alive he’d say you know how to use ‘em, eh?’

  Ascha gave him a wide grin. ‘I think he would.’

  Bauto waved the slave away. ‘Na, you fought well, lad. Earned your gold…’

  ‘Thank you, Lord.’

  ‘…for a Saxon half-slave, you sure know how to fight. Put us freeborn folk to shame.’

  Ascha stiffened. He felt his cheeks flame but held his silence.

  Bauto watched him and then slowly dipped his head.

  ‘Yes, you’ve come a long way, boy,’ Bauto said. He leaned to one side and spat again into the dust. ‘Come so far that maybe you’ve forgotten your mother was a slave, huh?’

  Ascha held his eyes. ‘I’ve not forgotten.’ How could he ever forget? It lived with him each and every day. No matter what he did, he would never be good enough. He would always be the half-slave, never the equa
l of a free man.

  ‘Did you know that a German called Hwadaker is now emperor of Rome?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘When barbarians become emperors, slaves become warriors, women rule and pigs fly. That’s when the world turns upside down. Ain’t that right?’

  ‘If that’s how you see it,’ Ascha said sourly.

  ‘Oh, I do, boy. I do.’

  Bauto scratched his chin and seemed satisfied with whatever point he was trying to make. He picked up a message tablet from a brass table and tapped it against his palm.

  ‘I’ve just received despatches from Tornacum,’ he said. ‘Childeric is dead and his son, Clovis, is now Overlord.’

  Ascha’s jaw dropped. ‘He can’t be,’ he said. ‘He’s no older than I am.’

  Bauto gave him a sly glance. ‘That’s thrown you hasn’t it? Well, he is and he’s sent for you, wants you to ride to Tornacum. What do you think of that?’

  Ascha was stunned. He stared at Bauto. ‘Why does he want to see me?’

  Bauto opened the pouch on his belt. He took out a bone pick and began to scrape the line of black from his nails. ‘You really don’t know?’

  ‘How would I know?’

  ‘You wouldn’t be lying to me now, would you?’ Bauto said, tapping the pick against his teeth.

  ‘I’ve never lied to you.’

  Bauto gave him a thin smile and put the pick back in his pouch.

  ‘Maybe he wants to thank you for saving his life when that fool of a brother of yours would have dashed his brains out. How do I know what he wants? All I know is that you have to be in Tornacum before the week is out.’

  Bauto held out the message tablet, and Ascha took it.

  ‘Take my report of the fight with the Herul to Clovis. If he asks, tell him it was a glorious victory over the enemies of Frankland.’

  Ascha hadn’t expected this. He had no idea why Clovis wanted to see him and nor did he care. He’d not seen the Frank in five years. Where was Clovis when he needed him? Overlord or no, Clovis could go hang.