“You’ll wake everyone.”
“I don’t care. I’ll cry.” This was a very real threat.
“Please, Branwen. Give me a kiss.”
“No!”
He hugged her. She hit him. Then, before she could wake anyone, he pushed the coracle into the water and stepped inside it. Moments later he was paddling swiftly out of sight, down the stream into the darkness.
He had done it. Ever since the news of the invasion had come, just before the druid had offered the shield to the river, he had secretly planned this expedition. Day after day he had practised with his spear until he achieved an accuracy that few adults could equal. And now his chance had come at last. He was going to fight beside his father. He can’t very well send me away if I suddenly arrive just as battle is beginning, he thought.
The night was long. With the current flowing behind him, and with the little paddle to help, he was able to slip down the river at two or three times the speed the boats had made coming up. In the darkness the banks seemed to race by.
But he was only nine. After an hour his arms felt tired; after two they were aching. He pressed on, though. Two hours later, in the deepest night, he began to long for sleep. He had never been up so late. Once or twice his head fell forward and he came awake again with a start.
Perhaps, he told himself, if I was just to lie down for a little while, but an instinct also warned him: do that and you will sleep until midmorning. He found that if he kept the vision of his father before him, it gave him strength. In this way, resting his arms now and then, and thinking always, hour after long hour, of his father waiting for him upon the battlefield, he was given the power to press on. They would fight together, side by side. Perhaps they would die together. It seemed to him that this was all in the world he desired.
As the dawn began to lighten the sky, he entered the start of the river’s tidal flow. Luckily, it was on the ebb, and so it carried him swiftly down, towards Londinos and the sea.
By the time the sun was up, the river was getting much wider. An hour later and he was approaching a familiar bend. Even his lack of sleep was forgotten in the excitement as he began to turn it and came in sight of the druid’s island, less than a mile ahead. Then he gasped in amazement.
In front of him, the Romans were crossing the river.
The force that Caesar had assembled for the conquest of Britain was formidable indeed. Five disciplined legions – some twenty-five thousand men, with two thousand cavalry. He had lost only a few men in the south-eastern peninsula of Kent.
The alliance of British chiefs was already beginning to crumble. Caesar’s intelligence was excellent. He knew that if he could break Cassivelaunus now, a number of important chiefs would probably start to come over to him.
But this river crossing was a serious matter. The day before a captured Celt had told them about the stakes in the riverbed. The palisade opposite was stout. The Romans had one great advantage, however.
“The trouble with the Celts,” Caesar had remarked to one of his staff, “is that their strategy doesn’t match their tactics.” So long as the Celts harried his line with their chariots in a game of hit and run, it was almost impossible for the Romans to defeat them. Given time, they could wear him down. Their strategy, therefore, should have been to play a waiting game. “But the fools want a pitched battle,” he observed. And here the Romans would usually win.
It was a simple question of discipline and armaments. When the Roman legions locked their shields together in a great square, or, in a smaller detachment, locked their shields over their heads to form the ancient equivalent of a tank, they were quite impregnable to the Celtic infantry, and even the wheeling chariots found it very hard to break them. Looking across the river, therefore, to where the Celtic horde was drawn up on open ground, Caesar knew that his only serious obstacle was the river. Without more ado, therefore, he gave the order: “Advance.”
There is only one place to ford the River and even that is difficult.
So Caesar wrote in his history. There was, of course, nothing intrinsically difficult about the ford, but Caesar, as a good politician and general, was not likely to admit that.
I at once ordered the cavalry to advance and the legions to follow. Only their heads were above water, but they pushed on with such speed and vigour that infantry and cavalry were able to make the assault together.
It was hardly surprising that neither Julius Caesar nor anyone else noticed a little coracle, several hundred yards upstream, beaching on the river’s muddy northern bank.
By the time he found himself on solid turf, Segovax was a small brown figure caked in mud. He did not care. He had made it.
The Celtic line was less than a mile away. How splendid it looked. He scanned the thousands of figures for a sight of his father, but could not see him. Dragging his spear and making a squelching sound as he walked, he slowly advanced. The river was full of Romans now. The first formations were grouping on the northern bank. Huge concerted shouts arose from the massed Celtic forces. From the Romans, silence. Still the boy moved on.
And then it began.
Segovax had never seen a battle before. He had no conception, therefore, of the incredible confusion. Suddenly everywhere men were running, whilst chariots wheeled about at such speed that it seemed as though in a matter of seconds they might bear down across the meadows upon him. The Romans’ armour seemed to glint and flash like some terrible, fiery creature. The noise, even from where he stood, was tremendous. Amidst the din, he heard men, grown men, screaming with cries of agony dreadful to hear.
Above all, he had had no idea how big everyone would seem. When a Roman cavalryman suddenly appeared and cantered across the meadow a hundred yards from him, he was like a giant. The boy, clutching his spear, felt completely puny.
He stopped. The battle, now half a mile away, was edging towards him. Three chariots rushed out, straight at him, then careered away. He had not the faintest idea where, in this terrifying mêlée, his father might be. He found that he was trembling.
Now half a dozen horsemen, all together, were chasing a Celtic chariot that was wheeling about only two hundred yards away.
A galloping cavalry charge is a fearsome thing to behold. Even trained infantry, formed in squares, usually shiver. An unruly crowd, faced with charging horsemen, will always flee. Small wonder, then, that the boy, suddenly aware that an entire army was moving towards him, should have found himself so frightened that he could not go on. He started to back away. Then he fled.
For weeks he had prepared. All night he had paddled downriver to be with his father. And now here he was, only hundreds of yards away from him, unable to run to his side.
He stood, shaking, by the riverbank for another two hours. Below him, beached on the mud flat, was the little coracle into which, if the battle came closer, he was ready to jump. White with fear, he felt terribly cold. The day seemed to echo like a nightmare. As he gazed at the huge battle going on across the meadows, he realized with horror: I must be a coward.
“If only,” he prayed to the gods, “my father does not see me, a coward, now.”
But there was no danger of that. Upon the Romans’ third rush his father had fallen, sword in hand, as the gods had revealed that he would.
Segovax remained there all day. By mid-afternoon the battle was over. The Celts, brutally broken, had fled northwards, pursued some distance by Roman cavalry, who mercilessly hacked down all they could. By early evening, the victors had set up camp just to the east, near the twin hillocks of Londinos. The battlefield – a huge area strewn with broken chariots, abandoned weapons and bodies – was empty and eerily quiet. It was upon this desolate field that, at last, Segovax ventured forth.
Only once or twice before had he seen human death. He was not prepared, therefore, for the strange greyness, and stiffening heaviness of the corpses. Some were horribly mutilated; many had missing limbs. The smell of death was beginning to permeate the place. The bodies were everywh
ere: in the meadow, around the stakes and palisades: in the water around the druid’s island. How should he find his father amongst all these, if he was there? Could it be he would not recognize him?
The sun was already reddening when he came upon him near the water. He saw him at once, because he was lying on his back, his sweet, thin face gazing up at the sky, his mouth, wide open, giving him a vacant, pathetic air. His flesh was blue-grey. A short, broad Roman sword had opened a frightful gash in his side.
The boy knelt beside him. A red heat seemed to rise in his throat, choking him and filling his eyes with hot tears. He put his hands out and touched his father’s beard.
And was so racked with sobs that he was not aware he was no longer alone.
It was just a small party of Roman soldiers, accompanied by a centurion. They had come to search for any fallen Roman weapons. Seeing the lone figure, they walked towards him.
“A scavenger,” one of the legionaries remarked in disgust. They were only twenty feet away when the boy, hearing the clinking of their armour, turned and looked at them with terror.
Roman soldiers. The evening sun was glowing on their breastplates. They were going to kill him. Or at least take him prisoner. He glanced round frantically. There was nowhere to run to. He had only the river behind him. Should he make a dash for that? Try to swim away? They would catch him before he could get into the current. Segovax glanced down. His father’s sword was lying beside him where he had fallen. He stooped, picked it up, and faced the approaching centurion.
If he’s going to kill me, he decided, I may as well fight.
The sword was heavy, but he held it firmly, his young face set. The centurion, frowning slightly as he continued to advance, indicated that he should put the weapon down. Segovax shook his head. The centurion was very close now. Calmly he drew his own short sword. Segovax’s eyes grew large. He prepared to fight, hardly knowing what to do. And then the centurion struck.
It was so fast, the boy hardly saw it. There was a metallic bang, and to his astonishment his father’s sword had gone from his hand and was already lying on the ground again, while his wrist and hand felt as if they had been wrenched apart. The face of the centurion was calm. He took another step forward.
He’s going to kill me, the boy thought. I’m going to die by my father after all. Though now, seeing the grey corpse beside him, there no longer seemed anything attractive in such a death. Anyway, he thought, I’ll die fighting. And once more he scrambled to grab the sword.
To his horror, he could hardly lift it. His wrist hurt so much that he needed both hands. Swinging the sword wildly, he was vaguely aware of the centurion’s calm face watching him. He swung again, hitting nothing. And then he heard a laugh.
He had been so intent on the centurion that he had not noticed the approach of the riders. There were half a dozen of them, and they were now staring down at the little scene curiously. In the middle of them was a tall figure with a bald head and a hard, intelligent face. It was he who had laughed. He said something to the centurion, and everyone laughed with him.
Segovax went red. The man had spoken in Latin, so he had no idea what he had said. Some cruel joke perhaps. No doubt, he supposed, they proposed to watch him die. With a huge effort he swung his father’s sword again.
But to his surprise, the centurion had sheathed his own sword. The Romans were moving away. They were leaving him alone, with his father’s body.
Segovax would have been surprised indeed if he had known the words that Julius Caesar had just spoken.
“Here’s a brave young Celt. He still won’t give up. Better leave him alone, centurion, or he might kill us all!”
On his father’s tunic, Segovax saw, was pinned the brooch that Cassivelaunus had given him. Reverently he took it, with the sword, and started to leave, pausing only once, for a last look at his father’s face.
In the months that followed the engagement at the river, Caesar did not take over the island of Britain. Whether he intended to occupy it there and then has never been clear, and he was far too wily to make it plain in his own account.
The British chieftains had to supply extensive tributes and hostages. Caesar claimed a triumphant success. By autumn, however, he and his legions had returned to Gaul, where trouble was brewing. In all likelihood, realizing that his conquests had run too far, too fast, Caesar had decided to consolidate his rule in Gaul before taking over the island at a later date. Meanwhile, life on the island returned, for the time being at least, to something like its normal state.
The next spring, though it was half expected, neither Caesar nor any Romans came. Nor in the summer.
Except once. For on a summer’s day that year, the inhabitants of the hamlet looked out early one morning to see a strange sight. A ship was advancing up the river on the incoming tide, and it was unlike any they had ever seen.
It was, in truth, not very large, although to the people of the hamlet it seemed so. It was a squat sailing vessel, about eighty feet long, with a high stern, a low bow, and a mast amidships that carried a big, square sail made of canvas sewn with rings through which the brails for gathering the sails were neatly passed. A smaller mast, sloping over the bow, carried a little triangular sail for extra power. Its sides were smooth, made of planks fastened to the ribs with iron nails. It was steered not with one but two rudders, placed on each side of the stern.
It was, in short, a typical merchant vessel of the classical world. Its swarthy sailors, and the rich Roman who owned it, had ventured into the river out of curiosity.
They rowed ashore to the hamlet and approached the villagers politely. They made it clear that they were anxious to see the place where the battle had been fought, if it was thereabouts. After some hesitation, two of the men agreed to show them the ford and the druid’s island, which they inspected. Then, finding nothing else at Londinos to interest them, they left on the ebb tide, having paid the people of the hamlet for their trouble with a silver coin.
It was a visit of no historical significance whatever. A fleeting visit from a ship riding on a tide of much greater history, making a detour to an almost nonexistent place to satisfy a rich man’s curiosity.
But for young Segovax, it meant everything. With fascination he studied the outlandish boat moored so tantalizingly in the stream before him. Avidly he inspected the silver coin, gazed at the god’s head upon it, understanding that its purpose was more than ornamental, though he could not exactly guess its use and value. Above all, as he watched the ship depart downstream again, he remembered that precious day when he had seen the open sea with his father.
“That’s where the ship is going,” he murmured aloud. “Out on that sea. One day, maybe it’ll come here again.” And secretly he dreamed of going on it, Roman though it was, whatever its destination might be.
Strangely, it seemed that it was Segovax, more than the rest of his family, who suffered. It had come as a great surprise to the boy when, after three months of uncontrollable grief, Cartimandua had suddenly taken up with another man. The man was from another hamlet, and was kind to the children. But still his own grief would not depart. Who knew how long it might have persisted had it not been brought to a close at the end of autumn by a small event?
There was, in the Celtic world, a great feast that took place at the start of winter. This was Samhain, a time when the spirits were active upon the earth, arising from graves, visiting the living, reminding men that the community of the dead who kept the ancient habitations demanded recognition from later trespassers too. It was an exciting but rather frightening time, at which feasts were prepared and important oaths made.
A few days after Samhain, on a mellow, misty afternoon, the boy and his sister had decided to play at the end of the gravel spit by the hamlet. Now, however, having tired of their games, Branwen had gone away, and the boy, feeling suddenly melancholy, was sitting on a stone, gazing across the river at the hills of Londinos opposite.
He had taken to sitting like t
his recently, especially since the visit of the strange ship. He found comfort watching the river’s slow, tidal breathing. Here, at dawn, he could watch the golden light of the rising sun strike the little eastern hill, and at sunset watch the reddening glow of its departure upon its western counterpart. Here, it seemed to him, the rhythm of life and death made a perpetual and satisfying echo. He had been there some time when he heard a footfall and saw, approaching him, the old druid from his island.
The old man had been looking frail of late. The battle of the previous year had been, some said, a great shock to him. Yet still, in the year since Caesar’s departure, he made his quiet, unannounced rounds of the hamlets. Now, recognizing the boy sitting sadly alone, he paused.
Segovax was surprised that the druid should wish to speak to him. He rose politely, but the old man waved him to sit down again, and then, to the boy’s still greater astonishment, calmly sat down beside him.
But if Segovax had supposed that the presence of the druid might be a little frightening, he was surprised once more, and very pleasantly. Far from being alarming, there was an inner calm about him that was comforting. They talked for a long time, the priest gently questioning, Segovax replying with greater confidence, until, at last, and with a strange sense of relief, the boy told him all about the terrible day of the battle, and what he had seen, and even of his cowardice.
“But battles are not for children.” The druid smiled gently. “I do not think you are a coward, Segovax.” He paused. “You think you let your father down? That you failed him?”
The boy nodded.
“But he did not expect to see you there,” the old man reminded him. “Didn’t he tell you to look after your mother and sister?”
“Yes.” And then, despite himself, and thinking of the new man his mother had taken, he burst out tearfully, “But I’ve lost him. I’ve lost my father. He’ll never come back to me again.”
The old man gazed across the river, and for a time said nothing. Although he knew the boy’s grief was as useless as it was understandable, Segovax’s sense of loss touched him in ways the boy could not have dreamed of. Indeed, it reminded him only too well of anxieties and mysteries that had troubled him for a long time now.
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