by Manda Scott
Maroc signalled behind him. Two of the apprentice singers dragged forward a hide-covered vessel and set it on a slate on the dreamers’ side of the fire pit. In its presence, the quality of the silence changed. Breaca felt the tension around her rise to battle pitch. None of the others had hand-scars that warned of battle, but each of them had been proved best in the testing grounds of the tribes and none had come to Mona without sufficient experience of war to sense the changes in the air. They held themselves ready, like dogs straining against a leash, and each felt it as the last moments of battle before the spears are thrown, when life is sweetest and Briga fills the air with death. Breaca swallowed on nothing and reached for Hail, who was not there.
“Warriors of Mona.” Talla’s voice was thin as a hollow reed. In the air above the warriors, it gathered strength, and echoed from the back walls. “Warriors of Mona, you know by now that Venutios, who has been your Warrior, the greatest of his generation, has been recalled by his people. He goes in honour and with the blessing of the elders. He has served for twelve years beyond the ten of his training and his honour guard served with him. All are free now to return to their tribes, but we would ask one last service of them.”
Talla gestured to her right. Venutios stood in the shadows and none of them had seen him. He had changed from the formal dress of the welcome party, replacing it with a short hunting tunic the colour of dried bracken. Newly hung round his neck, was a leaping salmon carved in blue stone, and a bull’s horn hung from a thong at his side. This last, above all else, was the symbol of the Warrior, the badge that set one above the rest. It was hard to imagine it borne by anyone else.
Talla acknowledged him with a nod and went on. “As with the Elder, Mona can never be without her Warrior. Before Venutios leaves, one must be chosen from amongst the two thousand of the school to take his place. The laws of the choosing come from the ancestors; they are clear and precise. You need not know them, save as they affect you directly. Maroc will guide you through the first steps.”
The Elder stood less straight than she had done. Maroc took her place at the edge of the fire pit. The logs burned red at his feet and cast his shadow upwards, giving him height. His voice was deeply resonant and reached them all without effort.
“Warriors of Mona. Of the two thousand, thirty will be chosen to take the tests. Of those thirty, one will be Warrior. The first part is in the hands of the gods alone. The tests that come after are yours for you to prove yourselves before the gods. They last a night and a day and will be harder than any you have encountered. There is danger. At each time of the Warrior choosing, some have died. You are not bound to take part in the first selection, but if, having taken part, you are among the thirty, you are bound to continue. Those who wish to leave may do so now.”
He looked out into silence. Two thousand warriors looked back. Nobody moved.
“Good.” He reached down and stripped the hide from the vessel at his feet. The skull of a bull shone white in the firelight. Between its horns sat a wide copper vessel the mouth of which was sealed with a black horse-skin, bound drum-tight across the top. At Maroc’s signal, Venutios stepped forward and stabbed his knife in the centre to make a single incision, five fingers wide. The blade flashed once as he lifted it clear. Breaca flinched and felt the ripple of it pass on and multiply, two thousand times.
Maroc said, “The cauldron holds a pebble for every member of the warriors’ school. All are white but thirty, which are black. Venutios will call the names in rank order. When you hear your own, you will step up to the mark, reach across the fire pit and take a stone from the vessel. If your stone is black, you are one of the thirty and must remain here. If it is white, you are free to go.”
The preparations took moments. The bull’s skull was moved to the very edge of the fire pit. A long, narrow slate already gave a mark on the warriors’ side of the fire. On the dreamers’ side, Maroc stood to one side of the vessel, Venutios to the other. The Warrior spoke the first name gently, as if they two were alone, sharing news across a campfire.
“Ardacos of the Caledonii.”
A small, wiry man with the dark colouring and high cheekbones of the ancestors stepped up to the fire. Ardacos had been on Mona a decade, longest of all those in the school. He would return to his people at the spring equinox unless he had reason to stay. Without question, he was unmatched by his peers for skill with the spear in battle or in the hunt. In the moments before the gathering, when rumours had flown fast as larks and the betting faster, over half of those present had bet that he would take Venutios’s place as Warrior. Breaca had not been one of them but Ardacos would have been her second choice. She had no doubt that the gods would want him to take part in their tests.
Ardacos stood at the slate and leaned over the fire. The flames washed red along his arm. He touched one finger to his forehead in homage to Briga and slid his other hand through the slit in the hide. When he opened his palm the pebble that lay on it was black. Two thousand sighed, less one.
Maroc’s voice echoed over their heads. “Ardacos of the Caledonii is first of the thirty.”
Venutios was already speaking the second name.
They passed through forty stones, the remainder of those warriors who had entered the school in the same year as Ardacos. Two of his comrades joined him, a man and a woman, both of northern tribes, although none as far north as the Caledonii. Breaca, watching with the clarity of Mona, saw in those who drew white a diffidence, or an absence of confidence, that betrayed each in the moment of reaching across the fire. By the time Venutios called the next name, she could tell before a hand was opened what colour stone would lie on the palm.
“Gwyddhien of the Silures.”
Black. It would be black. Breaca would have known it this time simply from the name. There were only two amongst the school who were in genuine contention to be Warrior and Gwyddhien was, in Breaca’s opinion, the better of the two. She had bet as much with Airmid, staking a silver brooch with coral inlay on the outcome. The only surprise was that Airmid had accepted.
A tall woman with blue-black hair and eyes that spoke to the soul stepped back from the fire pit and opened her hand. The stone on her palm was black.
“Gwyddhien of the Silures is fourth of the thirty.”
That half of the warriors who had not bet on Ardacos let out a collective breath. Across the fire, in the front rank of dreamers, Breaca saw Airmid’s sudden smile and returned it. Airmid may not have bet on Gwyddhien to win the tests, but she had badly wanted her to be part of the thirty.
The night took on its own rhythm. Venutios spoke through the nine-year warriors to the eight to the seven and on. The names ran through hundreds to thousands. On Mona, where the dreamers learned songs and laws that could take days in the telling, two thousand names remembered in order was no great feat, but the man was neither a dreamer nor a singer and if he had put effort into learning the names of each year’s new intake as they arrived at the school, Breaca had seen no sign of it. The list came now from a knowing that went beyond rote learning and was part of what made him Warrior: the care for those whose lives he might one day hold in his hand. It was what set him apart from the others, what, for Breaca, set Gwyddhien apart from Ardacos. The latter excelled as a lone hunter or single warrior—if one had need of a man to set an ambush, or to steal from the enemy, Ardacos was that man—but it was Gwyddhien who could lead two thousand into war and wield them as a single force. It was not hard to imagine her, ten years from now, speaking two thousand names as if each were a valued friend, and meaning it.
“Cumal of the Cornovii is twenty-second of the thirty.”
Cumal was of the fourth year, the only one of his intake to have drawn a black pebble and deservedly so; he had a fine eye for a spear throw and was best of all the island with a slingshot. Breaca had fought at his side in practise battles and had found him sharp-witted and dependable; a good choice for the thirty.
The next name was an uninspiring warrior of the
Dumnonii, the first of those who had been on Mona three years. Surprisingly, he picked a black pebble as did the woman who came after him, so that in the space of a dozen breaths, there were six left black in a vessel of nearly six hundred white where before there had been nine.
A soundless sigh passed through the thinning ranks of those remaining. Somewhere, a voice calculated the new odds out loud. Breaca had no need to listen. She could feel the shape and size of the black stones in her core, as if each one nested in a long bone, cushioned on marrow and laced through with her blood. They sang to her in high voices, like curlews, and she had no way to answer in kind. She prayed to Briga and watched the changing textures in the air above the fire until her mind ached.
Venutios named the warriors of the third year and the pebbles came out in their dozens, each one white as an eye. The first of the second year’s intake reached through the horse-skin and when he, too, brought his hand out with white on the palm, six black pebbles remained amongst three hundred and eighty-seven white. Breaca was last of the second year. The summer of Amminios’s attack had been long and full of caring for the wounded and she and Airmid had set out late in the autumn, reaching Mona long after the equinox on a ferry that had been launched from its winter dock to carry them across. One month longer and Breaca would have been considered the first of the next year’s intake.
Another new hand reached into the horse-skin and her mind said to her, “Black.”
“Cerin of the Votadini is twenty-fifth of the thirty.”
Five black pebbles lay among two hundred and fifty-four white. Three warriors of the second year remained to take the call.
Two.
The whine in her ears grew louder and reached a higher pitch. The pulse rushed in her head, lifting her clear of the ground. The tension could be tasted, metallic on the tongue. Her heart slowed, and each beat crashed against the cage of her ribs. Venutios’s mouth made a shape and the name floated towards her, slow as a leaf on a pond. She stepped forward to meet it.
“Breaca of the Eceni.”
There was warmth in his voice and a recognition of the battles she had fought, the one against Amminios that had changed her life and those others, smaller, staged as tests in the school. In the silence after was a smile and a reminder of a sword fight, one on one, when she had broken Venutios’s blade on her own.
Three steps to the fireside and three more to the slate. The elder grandmother waited on one side, as real as the heat. Eburovic was less real, less solid, but she remembered the smell of him, fresh from the forge. Both of these were a part of her; on Mona, she could find them with ease. She set both feet on the slate and gazed across the fire pit and her heart cried out for the one she had never seen, for the one she sought in the quiet of every night and had not yet found. In the last moments before stretching across the fire, she could have prayed to Briga to give her a black stone and did not; she prayed for Bán.
Who was not there.
Airmid was there, surprisingly close, and one other, not clearly seen, and then her arm was bathed in melting heat and her hand was slipping through a drum-tight hide and if the vessel held dozens on dozens of stones she did not feel them, just the one that came to her hand as if made for it. She closed her fingers and drew out her arm and her mind said to her, “Black.”
“Breaca of the Eceni is twenty-sixth of the thirty.”
She turned left and walked to the waiting group. Twenty-five pairs of eyes watched her, weighing her worth and her chances of success. The stone burned like red iron in her hand. Her soul wept.
A warrior of the Cornovii joined her shortly afterwards and there were three stones left. Those still to choose had been on Mona a year or less. In a while, all that remained were the dozen who had come across in a single group at the equinox. They clustered together like sheep, raw from the crossing and the change in life that was Mona. In their own tribes, they had been the best of their age, possibly the best in living memory. Now each was simply one amongst many, all equally good, all still unproven.
“Braint of the Brigantes is twenty-eighth of the thirty.” A lean, black-haired girl took her place on Breaca’s left, her face stiffly white. She was one of the northern Brigantes, distant kin to Venutios, and her name was that of the goddess in the far northern tongue of her people. Breaca knew nothing else of her history or skills. In a moment, the girl’s cousin joined her, a broad-shouldered boy with red hair and fair skin: twenty-ninth.
Those left dispersed, one by one, white after white until only one warrior remained. He was the youngest and the newest to Mona and he approached the fire with the smile of one who sees his destiny clear before him. Breaca watched him stretch across the fire and knew herself split. The part of her that reasoned said that if there had been two thousand pebbles and only one was left, then that one must be black. The other part, which saw the greater pattern of things, said, quite clearly, “White”—and was correct.
The boy stared at his palm in horror. There was no doubting the colour. He had drawn white and must leave. Close to weeping, he stepped back from the fire and began the long walk round to the dreamers’ side and the way out.
Numbly, Breaca watched him go. She had no foreknowledge of the testing but her life’s experience had taught her that if the gods required thirty warriors to set out together, they should be given exactly that. She saw Maroc share a look with Talla, who nodded. A pile of white pebbles lay at Maroc’s feet where the departing warriors had placed them. Bending, he scooped them up and counted them in handfuls through the cut in the hide so they landed, ringing, against the copper floor of the vessel. As the last few fell to silence, Venutios raised his head and said, “Caradoc of the Ordovices.”
He was not there. He could not be there. Breaca had seen his face and felt his presence when she had picked her own stone and had known him a ghost of her past, not her present. When the movement began far back in the still ranks of the dreamers, she was certain it was someone else coming forward to explain to Venutios his mistake. It was well known that Caradoc had spent the autumn in the land of the Ordovices; he could not be in the great-house.
She had forgotten that Venutios was Warrior, and did not make mistakes. The front row of dreamers split and swayed and when it came together Caradoc stood on the dreamers’ side of the fire pit, his face calm, his hair dulled to straw by the torchlight and his eyes bright as ice. She felt his presence as a mule kick to the chest.
She was not alone. Surprise hissed through the ranks of dreamers. Far back, a woman said, “He is not of the warriors’ school. He cannot take part in the choosing.”
“That is not so.” Talla’s voice cut through the rest. “The laws are clear on this. Those who train with the Warrior are of the school for that day if for no other. Venutios.” She turned, raising an arm. “Have you trained today with Caradoc of the Ordovices?”
“I have. He came to me this morning and we practised with sword and spear before the work of the school began.” Venutios was Warrior. None doubted his word.
“Then it is so.” Talla turned back. “Caradoc of the Ordovices—had all thirty been chosen, your name would not have been called. As it is, there remains one black pebble between the bull’s horns. Sufficient white have been added to make one hundred in all. Your test will be no less great than the others’. You may approach the slate.”
He had a long way to walk round the edge of the fire pit. Breaca watched him, feeling sick with a dread that had nothing to do with the choosing of pebbles. She did not doubt that he would pick the black stone; the gods had spoken merely by his presence and they would want him of all people among the thirty taking the tests. The sickness came rather from his presence as it had done each of the few times they had met since the death of her father and the theft of Bán’s body.
Caradoc had not come to see her in the long summer months immediately after Amminios’s attack as Breaca had thought he might. She had spent the time helping Airmid with the wounded or working out in the field
s, trying to plant and weed and gather the same harvest as they might have done before losing so many people in the battle. The work left her exhausted and irritable and she would have made poor company, but the thought of him gave colour to days that might otherwise have passed in shades of grey and she was grateful for it.
In the space of his absence, the elder council of the Eceni had met, absolving him of blood-guilt, together with his father and Togodubnos. Maroc had crossed the country from Mona to attend, to ensure that this was so. The dreamer’s word had not swung the council—no-one with sense wished to declare war on the Trinovantes—but his presence had spoken strongly for the need to maintain an amicable peace. Cunobelin had sent blood-gifts of untold worth and had declared in public, before a gathering of elders, that his middle son was no longer welcome in his presence and that the lands and ports south of the sea-river which had formerly been granted to Amminios were to be given instead to Cunomar, son of Togodubnos, to be held by the latter until the child came of age. Togodubnos himself had ridden up alone to offer his own heartfelt regrets and to restate his wish for continued friendship with the Eceni. Caradoc alone had neither visited nor sent word.
