Dreaming the Hound

by Manda Scott

  Then the moment was gone, and the shuddering release of violence and the promise of a clean death was lost, taking with it all hope of victory.

  The procurator stood before Breaca, shaking. He was not a man used to battle and the closeness of his own death terrified him. He wiped both hands up his cheeks, kneading the flesh, and swept a trembling arm across his brow.

  When he had done, and his features had settled, if not the palsy in his limbs, he spoke to her, drawing power from the armed men around him.

  “You did not understand. Now you will do so. Before, you were the emperor’s property. Now, you are his prisoners, taken in the act of assaulting his officers in the province of Britannia. The charge is insurrection and murder for which the penalty is death. When we have searched the steading and have garnered the additional evidence—because there will be some, you did kill Philus—then we will conduct a trial and pass sentence and you will have time, as you die, to reflect that life as the wife of a senator’s third son in Rome might not have been so bad for any of you.”

  CHAPTER 35

  GRAINE WAS GONE TO SAFETY. THAT MUCH WAS GOOD. The other news came in piecemeal, as the evening drew darker and groups of mercenaries came to the procurator to report, or simply showed what they had found. Those ordered to search the steading did so as they had in the days when Valerius led them: violently, destroying anything that might have held a weapon. They found the shields hidden in the roof thatch, which had never been in doubt, and a spear, which had been hidden long ago and forgotten and was rusted beyond any reasonable use.

  The Coritani scout helped those searching outside to find the tracks leading to the great-house and there they discovered the cache of unworked iron, which Breaca had hoped would not happen, but was inevitable. Looking further, they found the tracks leading away from the great-house but did not find any warriors, or children; nor, as dusk began to fall, did they dare send out trackers to look for them.

  Except for Cunomar and Ardacos who were considered dangerous and kept apart, the family of the dead king were imprisoned overnight in his chamber, after the bed had been taken out and burned and the chest that had once held money. A small bronze horse lay in one corner, unwanted and ignored.

  Breaca had never been held captive. The possibility had always been present; before every night-time foray in the west, before every battle, she had schooled herself to imagine imprisonment and what would inevitably follow.

  The reality was infinitely harder than she had imagined; not impossible, but close to it. Her respect for Cygfa and Cunomar, who had survived months in prison in Rome, with death waiting at each turn, rose with every passing heartbeat.

  Lacking a fire, ’Tagos’ chamber was a dark and airless place. Breaca stood leaning against the wall for a while, and then sat on the floor, pulling her knees to her chest so that her feet, outstretched, might not entangle the feet of another, intruding on their privacy. Privacy was important, she discovered, balancing the strength in not being alone.

  She knew without asking where the others were sitting around her. Airmid kept close, so that they could feel each other’s heartbeats; privacy did not matter there. Cygfa was directly opposite, with Gunovar a little to her left, each keeping silent, because that way lay strength; not-talking, they could maintain the illusion of not-fear. Only if they touched, or tried to speak, did it become clear that each of them was shaking, a small, continuous tremor that could not be controlled, but only contained, and experienced, so that by morning, perhaps, it could be damped and not shown to the world.

  It did not help to think of the morning. Breaca pressed her spine hard into the wooden wall and turned her mind away from the future. She thought instead of food and water and the need to urinate and the cold of the wall and the weight of the ancestor-torc around her neck. She regretted not having given it to Dubornos to keep safe for Graine and the future however much the ancestor had railed against it. The procurator would take it now, before or after her death. Melted to gold, it would pay half a century for half a year. Or a century for a quarter-year. Or a single tent party of eight men for—

  “Why would they bother with a trial?” Gunovar asked it, from somewhere nearby in the darkness. Her voice was quite steady.

  Breaca said, “For the records. We are a king’s family. They will want it to be seen to be legal. Small men with small gods rarely do anything that is not accountable. Cygfa, was it like this in Rome?”

  “If you discount the half-month in the hold of a ship spent getting there, and the physicians who insisted on physical examinations afterwards, and the two months of waiting while they tortured Caradoc and Dubornos, yes, it was quite like this. They fed us in Rome, and gave us water. We would have died else.” Cygfa contrived to sound drily amused. “The shaking stops, eventually, after the second month. A body can only hold so much terror before it overflows.”

  There was, it seemed, no harm in talking after all. A fear made open became less. Breaca said, “With luck, we should have joined the grandmothers in Briga’s care long before that.”

  Cygfa snorted mild amusement. “We can hope so. Julius Caesar kept Vercingetorix, war leader of the Gauls, in prison for seven years before he had him slain. I don’t think our procurator has that much patience.”

  “Or this emperor.”

  Gunovar said, “No. Although it would be better if he did not find you are the Boudica. His patience might be greater then, and you—and we—might live longer, and regret it more deeply.”

  There was a short, shocked silence. Breaca said, “Thank you. It might be a good thing to forget. I imagine they will not ask questions, unless they believe we have answers to hide.”

  Gunovar said, “And if they ask, seek death in the manner of their asking. Your body will try to live, but the ways to death will be open if you can embrace them.”

  “We can try.”

  The worst had been named aloud, and they were no worse for it. After that, they spoke of Rome, and Gunovar talked of her time under questioning in the fortress of the IInd legion in the south-west and there was a strange comfort in the memory of pain that is over and the reminder that everything passes in time; it is only that the waiting is tedious.

  Only Airmid did not speak. She sat so close that Breaca could feel the lift and fall of her breathing, which was slower than sleep and faster than death, but only just, and meant that she was dreaming, which was good; any escape from the present was good.

  Cygfa had begun to tell of the procession in Rome, led by Valerius, who had once been Bán, and how the ghosts of his past assailed him and were invisible to the legions, when Airmid breathed in hard and fast and let it out again, harshly.

  “She’s coming.”

  “Who is?”

  “Now. They”re bringing her here. Do you still have your knife?”

  It was the worst of warnings, and the best there could be, sent from deep within the dream, and it gave Breaca time to pull herself clear of the gaping hole that exploded in her chest, to school her features and to lift herself from the floor and appear composed as the sound of booted feet came closer, and the light of a brand lit the doorframe and then the doorway as the door was flung open to reveal hair the colour of ox blood, ragged now with human blood and sweat and tied tight with a cloth that wrapped the small mouth so she could not have screamed to warn her mother.

  Graine was not safe.

  She fell to the floor of Prasutagos’ chamber, twisting to keep her face from the dirt. Her hands were tied behind and her tunic was filthy, with a triangular tear where the serpent-spear brooch had been ripped away.

  “Your daughter died of hunger and grief in the winter.” The procurator stood in the doorway. “You will therefore have no objections if we put this child to the question in the morning, to find the names of her parents and where they are hidden.”

  “This is my daughter.” Breaca was weeping and did not care. What use composure? The torc became tight around her neck, or her throat had swollen with
grief; either was possible and she had not time or strength to find out which. Through a blur of sweat and otherness, she said, “I lied. Clearly my daughter did not die. I can point out those amongst your men who saw us together at the signing of the late king’s will and can attest to it. If you have issue with that, the fault is mine.”

  She knelt and lifted her daughter, light of her soul, to her breast, and pulled the gag from her mouth. Graine pressed her face into the crook of her mother’s neck, sliming her skin with tears and her running nose.

  There, too muffled to be clearly heard, she said, “I’m sorry, it’s my fault. I wanted to come back and prayed to Nemain to find a way but she wouldn’t give it so I prayed to the ancestor-dreamer who holds the serpent-spear and then Dubornos fell asleep and I took his horse and it knew the way home and then I fell off and someone found me and it’s my fault. I’m sorry.”

  “It’s not your fault. It’s not … I love you. It’s my fault. I shouldn’t have sent you away. I’m sorry, so sorry …”

  Breaca spoke Eceni at first, slipping back into the language of the ancestors, which was the only one with the words to hold her grief and not let it destroy them both. She became aware, through blinding tears, that the procurator was still in the doorway, watching.

  He caught her eye and nodded. “A delightful child.” He tilted the light so that it fell on mother and daughter together. “I am sure the senator’s sons would have been glad of her. She has not, I take it, borne a child of her own?”

  “She’s eight years old!”

  “Yes, of course. The prefect, Corvus, said as much in Camulodunum. He cares for her also, it seems. A pity he has been called west to reinforce the governor’s war. And you—” He moved the brand so the light fell on Cygfa. “They tell me the Eceni do not marry, but I do not believe you live chaste. Have you ever borne a child?”

  Cygfa was white, very suddenly. Her knuckles were yellow where she gripped them together. Not understanding, Breaca answered for her, “No, Cygfa has never borne children.”

  She is her father’s daughter, the passion of fire made living, but she has never taken a lover, because to do so would have damaged Dubornos beyond all telling and she cares too much for him to do that.

  “My mother is telling the truth.” Very softly, with a venom born of fear, Cygfa said, “You could, of course, have your physician confirm it.”

  The procurator stared at her. He wet his lips, thoughtfully. “I don’t believe we shall need to. I am happy to take your mother’s word.”

  He closed the door and the world was black again.

  “Cygfa?” Cygfa was weeping, violently, trying to be quiet and failing. Gunovar was closest and held her, while Breaca struggled with the knots that bound Graine’s hands and mouth. “Cygfa? What is it?”

  Gunovar answered for her. “They cannot execute a virgin. It offends their gods and so their laws.”

  “What? What difference does it…? But then, if it’s true, Graine and Cygfa must be …”

  “Must no longer be intact when they come to die. It is not hard for a company of men to ensure that a girl is no longer chaste before she dies. They would do it anyway, only this way they do it with the full consent of the law.” Gunovar’s voice was hollow, shorn of the irony that usually gave it life. The words were poison and she spoke them, because somebody must.

  Cygfa made herself quiet and drew a breath and said, “I’m sorry. It should not matter. It doesn’t matter. In everything else, it is one more thing, of no moment. I will be ready by morning.”

  “Cygfa?” Breaca whispered it, because the understanding was too sudden and too great to give it sound. For ten years, she had believed that Cygfa had taken no lovers out of compassion for Dubornos, when the truth was unthinkable: that Caradoc’s daughter had lived three months as a prisoner in Rome lying nightly awake, making herself ready for a morning that must come.

  It had not come, but the waiting alone had broken her, and the probing examinations of men who had trained to heal, and had been made to maim. You could, of course, have your physician confirm it. As had the physicians of Rome.

  The decision, then, was easy. Once, in a cave, the ancestor-dreamer had made a promise. I promise you nothing. Only that I will be with you, and that if you ask it, I can give you death, which you may crave, or my aid to live, which you may not. It was time to accept that offer, if not for herself, then for others.

  “You will not be ready by morning. There is no need and no point.”

  Breaca stood up. Graine’s knots were undone. The swelling on her left temple where the Boudica’s knife had struck her was the size of a blackbird’s egg and hot to the touch. She was fevered and clung to her mother with small, frantic hands. The patter of her heart beat erratically against Breaca’s chest and she wept herself into incoherence, repeating only the words of earlier, “I’m sorry. I’m sorry. I’m sorry …”

  “Don’t be sorry. It’s good you’re here. I love you. And we are not powerless.” Breaca smoothed the hot, damp hair out of her daughter’s eyes and kissed her eyelids, one at a time. It was dark, and she did not have to school her face, only her voice, that she might seem not to be panicked, or desperate.

  In truth, she was neither of these, only tired and worn thin with grief so that it was hard to reach for the place inside where the ancestor had taken up residence, to ask now for the strength to do what must be done. It had seemed easier when she had considered this before in Camulodunum, in daylight, with men and women and the façades of Rome all around. Then, Graine had stopped her, and Corvus, in friendship, and the ancestor-dreamer had taken no part.

  Breaca slid her fingers up her daughter’s spine, to the crook at the back of her neck where her head was set on, and tried to keep breathing, to seem calm. To the space in her soul where the wind of the gods blew most strongly, she said, I ask your aid, as you wanted me to. And I accept your offer of death.

  She did not think she had spoken aloud, but Airmid took hold of her wrist. “Breaca, you cannot ask that for another. Each of us must make our own peace with the gods if we wish to die.”

  “Even Graine?”

  “Especially Graine. Listen to what the ancestor says.”

  Breaca tried and heard nothing except the clamour of grief and desperation and the nearness of a panic that had never touched her in battle, nor even when Caradoc was lost. She said, “Can’t we—Ah, gods, will they not leave us alone?”

  Outside, guards were running, with lit brands. A voice—Cunomar’s?—was shouting. The door hammered open in a blaze of torch-fire. The procurator stood on the threshold, lit on all sides by flaring torches.

  Peering in, he said, “Still alive? And the child? Good.” He waved in men who came with ropes. “Bind them. Take the child. Quickly.”

  It was only a small room, too crowded, too soon. Three men came for Breaca. She fought them, seeking her own death and Graine’s. The ways to death will be open if you can embrace them. Her forearm crushed a man’s windpipe and she was clawing for living eyes when lightning broke through her skull and exploded into dark and the ground and the wall crashed up against her and the weight that was Graine was gone.

  Unkind hands rolled her onto her belly, tying her wrists, and turned her back. The procurator stood at her shoulder, looking down into her face. “Our Coritani scout has excelled himself. He has a reason to hate you, I believe, and to seek vengeance, which I have promised him. He claims you were once a warrior of some renown?”

  It would be better if he did not find you are the Boudica. One by one the safe barriers of her life were shattered. She spat at the man standing over her.

  The procurator stepped back a pace and so was not marked. He said, “The scout claimed that, left alone, you would kill the child, and perhaps the others. I am relieved that you are less of a warrior than he believed.”

  He stood aside to let out the guards who had tied and gagged the others and held Graine, howling, between them. Pleasantly, he said, “It will be
over soon. Tomorrow. Or perhaps the day after. I have had to send to Camulodunum for the timber with which to raise you. Foolish of me, I should have thought to bring some with me.”

  He stepped back, wiping his fingers on his tunic. The door closed behind him. Breaca lay half conscious in the swimming, incommodious dark, lost to the pain in her head and her ribs and her kidneys, battered over and over by the sound of her daughter screaming her name and the sudden stop as someone held shut her mouth.

  She made no effort to reach the ancestor, or to find a way now to meet death early. Graine was not safe. Nothing else mattered.

  CHAPTER 36

  THE DOOR DID NOT OPEN IN THE MORNING, OR AT MIDDAY, but in the late afternoon.

  Daylight revealed Airmid, Gunovar and Cygfa as they had been through the night; lying tied on the floor, sleepless and bruised and consumed, as Breaca was, by hunger and thirst and the need to urinate without soiling herself, which was trivial and born of pride and would, presumably, cease to consume her at all before the end of the day.

  They supported each other with their eyes and chose not to notice the shaking, which had not stopped.

  They were not fed, but washed and given the chance to use the midden and to drink, because, as the mercenary said, who had made the sign of Nemain, “A body can last longer than you’d ever believe without food, but keep your captives short of water and they’re dead before you know it.”

  He had said it after Breaca had drunk, or she would have refused. He had grinned knowingly, and poured the remaining, precious, contents of his water carrier on his cupped palms and washed his face with it.

  Outside, the reason for the delay was clear. Breaca stood in the open ground in the centre of the steading watching the lower edge of the sun drop towards the horizon, and to her left were dug, but not yet filled, the post holes for half a dozen crosses. I have had to send to Camulodunum for the timber.