Age of Iron

by Angus Watson

“Right. What are you going to do for the rest of the day?”

  She slung the quiver across her back. “Goodbye.”

  “Wait.”

  “What?”

  “I’ll help.”

  Lowa looked at him for a long moment then said, “No.” She turned again to go.

  “What’s your plan?”

  She didn’t reply. She was at the top of the bank now.

  “You won’t get anywhere, running at him with murder on your mind.”

  Lowa disappeared over the bank. Dug raised his voice.

  “You’ll be killed and Zadar will live happily ever after. You would have been killed yesterday if I hadn’t been there!” No reply. He shouted, “And we’d both be dead if a little girl hadn’t rescued us!”

  All was quiet. She’d gone.

  Ah well, thought Dug. Probably for the best. He looked for things to tidy around the camp, but it looked like Spring had done it all.

  “OK. I’ll admit that you may have been some help yesterday.” Lowa was standing at the top of the bank, hand on hip. Dug smiled. The sun shone whitely in her hair. “But we would have escaped without the girl. We freed ourselves from those ropes.”

  “Aye, but we were well guarded. Without Spring it would have been near impossible.”

  “Maybe…”

  “Let’s face it. You’re not much use on your own.”

  Lowa smothered a smile. “So what do you suggest?”

  Dug shrugged. “That we make a plan.”

  “Why ‘we’? Why do you want to help me?”

  “I don’t know why I want to help you. I just might as well. I had planned to join Zadar’s army, but I’ve shat all over that path so now I haven’t got much else to do.”

  “And I need you because…?”

  “I’ve been a busy mercenary nearly twenty years and a Warrior for over fifteen.”

  “So?”

  “I’m still alive.”

  “That is a point.” Lowa nodded.

  Chapter 23

  Weylin sat on the embankment, watching Zadar’s court. The evening was lovely, but Weylin wasn’t. His head was wound in an off-white woollen bandage and his arm was in a sling. His temples were tight with knots of pain. He felt sick. His wrist was pumping waves of hurt up his arm from where the oaf had whacked it with his hammer. Lowa Flynn had killed his wife earlier that day, badly hurt his brother and a good friend the night before and, worst of all, humiliated him. A wave of hatred almost made him vomit. Why do bad things always happen to me? he thought.

  To cheer himself up he’d got pissed, obviously, then come to watch Zadar’s court. The Maidun force that had crushed Boddingham and Barton was camped for the night in a broad, lush valley halfway between Barton and Maidun, by a bridge over the River Otterhold in the territory of the bee-worshipping Honey tribe. In common with most tribes, the Honey’s gods normally dispensed justice through the druids. So, until recently, druids had been judge, jury and sometimes executioner. However, Zadar favoured a version of the Roman system, which separated law and magic, putting justice in the hands of magistrates. In Zadar’s version, Zadar replaced the magistrates.

  On that summer’s evening Zadar was holding Honey assizes. Above him a few scraps of white cloud were drifting slowly across the blue sky. He was sitting on a throne – actually the village’s biggest chair – in a fenced pasture. On benches either side of him were the usual crowd – Felix the druid, Chamanca and Tadman, the king’s young mistress Keelin Orton, and others favoured by Zadar, including Savage Banba, a Warrior who Weylin had his eye on. Now that he was free of Deidre, there’d be more chance to do something about that.

  His injured brother Carden and Carden’s friend Atlas were absent, no doubt convalescing somewhere. Keelin was another who bore the scars of Lowa’s escape. Her chin was swollen with purple-black bruising, and she had an expression like a hunting dog who’d swallowed one of the Honey tribe’s bees. Weylin still would have given all the tin in Dumnonia for ten minutes alone with her. He looked away. It wasn’t good to be caught staring at Zadar’s mistress. So instead he looked at his king.

  Zadar was wearing a close-fitting iron helmet, undecorated apart from a central iron crest the thickness of a finger. Lank blond hair spilled out along the rim, hanging down in front of his shoulders to the top of his plate iron breastplate, which was unadorned but for a necklace of boar’s tusks. His fleshy lips were set in their usual thoughtful, piscine pout above a cleft chin coloured by days-old stubble. His large, hawkish nose seemed to be constantly sniffing out others’ weaknesses.

  The Honey tribe were gathered at the far end of the corral, surrounded by Maidun troops who were as much guards as spectators. As Weylin settled himself on the bank, two women peeled from the Honey tribe’s ranks, approached Zadar and stood in full glare of his gaze. A man with an unkempt beard in a black peasant’s smock and round yellow woollen hat – a local druid, Weylin reckoned, in a shit attempt at a bee-themed outfit – shuffled forward and placed a baby’s basket on the turf.

  “King Zadar!” cried the man. Everyone quietened. “Both these women claim this baby.”

  “What?” said Felix, face crumpling in disbelief. “How could that happen? Which one of you pushed it out?”

  Chuckles pulsed from the Maidun troops. Both women started to talk at the same time.

  “He’s mine!”

  “You bitch, I can’t believe you were my friend!”

  “You were never my friend, clearly! How could you claim him? He doesn’t have your big ugly nose for a start, and another thing—”

  “Quiet!” shouted Felix.

  “Can anyone other than these women explain the situation?” Zadar asked. He sounded bored, but, even bored, his voice was like an iron sword drawn across a granite quern stone. Weylin shuddered despite the couple of skinfuls of medicinal mead that he’d knocked back.

  “They came down the river in a skiff,” said the yellow-hatted druid. “We never seem ‘em before. They had a baby with ’em. She said it was ’ers.” He pointed at one of the women, then the other. “And so did she.”

  “Hers died. This one’s mine!” The women began accusing one another again.

  “Silence!” shouted Felix again. Zadar leaned forward, chin in hand, and studied them. The crowd waited.

  “The women will share the child,” he said. “Tadman.” The big bodyguard nodded. “Cut the baby in half.”

  Tadman strode forward, hefting his short-handled iron blade.

  “Noooo!” screamed the shorter and older of the two women, dashing at Tadman. He met her with a backhanded slap. She fell. The other woman stood, arms folded, a small smile pulling up one corner of her mouth. The baby wailed.

  “The one who attacked Tadman is the mother,” said Zadar, wearily raising his voice above the baby’s crying. “The smug one is the liar.”

  The rightful mother fell to her knees, moaning thanks. The other woman’s smile dissolved. The Honey murmured approval of Zadar’s wisdom. Tadman turned to walk back to his post.

  “Tadman. You haven’t finished.” The German stopped. The crowd hushed. The baby’s crying was the only sound. Zadar continued: “I told you to cut a baby in half. Why can I still hear a whole baby?”

  The crowd gasped. The baby’s mother collapsed. Weylin smiled. Tadman returned to the wicker basket and picked the squalling child up by its feet. He slid the blade between its legs. There was silence all around the field. Tadman looked at Zadar. Zadar nodded.

  When it was done, Zadar said, “Give the rightful mother a piglet. She will learn to look after her young and I will see that piglet alive and happy on my next visit.”

  He turned to look at the false mother. A rare, barely noticeable smile crept onto his face.

  “You, druid,” The Honey’s druid stared at him. “Fetch liars’-tongue scissors, a fire dog and a pot of cooking oil. You and you – ” Zadar pointed at two of the Honey tribe “ – help him. Someone else lay a fire.” The woman made to bolt, but
Chamanca was on her like an eagle on a crow. She tripped her, leaped on her back, gathered and gripped her arms, leaned forward and sank her teeth into her neck.

  “Calm, Chamanca!” said Felix. “We don’t want to hurt her yet.”

  Weylin smiled. This was what he’d come to see. Nothing like other people’s troubles to make you forget your own.

  Judging over, the Maidun troops dispersed, those of the Honey tribe still capable of walking carried those who couldn’t away, and it was Weylin’s turn to see Zadar.

  He stood in the pasture in front of his king, bandaged head throbbing. The summer evening sky had turned the tenderest blue, melding to orange at the western horizon. Delicate insects floated up from the grass. Bees buzzed. Weylin could feel Felix’s gaze worming through his mind.

  “You let Lowa Flynn escape,” said Zadar. It wasn’t a question.

  It wasn’t my fault! But Weylin knew better than to disagree. “Yes,” he managed.

  “Her flight was aided?”

  “By a band of men. Ten of them. Their leader said his name was Dug.”

  “He introduced himself?”

  “Yes. No. That’s what his men called him. Tough buggers they were. Northern. Murkan, I think. They killed everybody else before we knew we were being attacked. Only my reflexes saved me. I managed to do for four of them before they knocked me out.” He pointed at his injured head.

  Felix leaned over to Zadar and spoke quietly in his ear.

  “You were outwitted by a child. A girl,” said Zadar.

  How could he know?

  “There was a girl.” Weylin felt himself reddening under the amused stares of Zadar’s entourage. “But that was luck, and it was mostly this northerner—”

  “‘This northerner’. Single. Not a group?”

  Weylin looked into Zadar’s emotionless eyes. They looked like the eyes of a fish that had lain too long on the fishmonger’s slab. He glanced at Felix. Felix smiled back, terrifyingly, then whispered something else to Zadar. He knows what happened. The idea that Felix had been somehow watching him made Weylin’s bowels churn. What else did he know? It was time to tell the truth.

  “There was one northerner. He bested us through trickery, with the child’s help. They escaped on horseback.”

  “How old was the child?” Zadar asked.

  Weylin’s eyes darted to Felix. “Eight?”

  Savage Banba barked a laugh. Tadman snorted. Even Keelin’s bruised mouth pulled into a pained smile.

  “Tell me everything you can remember about both of these rescuers. Leave nothing out.”

  Weylin told them all that came to mind. Zadar probed further.

  “So. Lowa has escaped you twice,” Zadar said finally.

  That was totally unfair. It wasn’t his fault that the troops he took to Bladonfort had been so useless. And when Lowa had escaped from Barton, he and Dionysia had been two of many pursuers. Carden and Atlas were more to blame. They’d had her in their clutches and let her go.

  “I am aware that others are to blame as well as you. I’m going to give you another chance, Weylin.”

  It was better than he’d hoped for. Felix looked disappointed.

  “Pick twenty good Warriors and horses. Travel light and fast. I shall send shouts to all the tribes. They’ll give you supplies and information. If they refuse, take what you need. Go back to Bladonfort and find their trail. Bring Lowa Flynn to me alive, uninjured. Bring me the child, unharmed. Torture the man Dug in front of every tribe you pass on your return. Make them watch. Explain that this is the penalty for defying me. I’d prefer him alive, but don’t hold back. If he dies – ” Zadar shrugged “ – so be it. But make sure many people see him suffer. A lot. That will be all.”

  Weylin walked away through the warm, calm night into the camp. The shout went up behind him and echoed along the valley and over the hills: “To all! Capture Lowa Flynn and companions! Help Weylin Nancarrow!” The call would be relayed between the farms, hamlets and villages under Zadar’s influence. By the end of the night there would be a network of people stretching a hundred miles in every direction ready to help him.

  The shout’s echoes died away as he walked through a camp that smelled of woodsmoke and horses. Zadar’s rule that everyone must shit and piss well downstream of wherever they camped had caused much initial bitching, but nobody objected now that the camps didn’t smell of a thousand people’s crap. Plus it was brilliant riding through villages further down the river the following day and seeing their mills, dykes and fishing nets caked in turd.

  Chapter 24

  “So. What happened with Zadar?”

  Lowa narrowed her eyes at Dug. What were his motives? Why had he risked his life for her and why did he want to help her now?

  She abhorred vanity, but the most likely explanation was that he wanted to shag her. No, more than that – that he’d actually fallen for her. Not long ago a drunken Aithne had told Lowa that she wasn’t overly attractive in any normal way, but she was the type that some men would always become besotted with. What Aithne had actually said was, “Not everyone gets you. Most guys would do you if they were drunk and you made it easy, but they’d just as happily shag me. However, there’s something about you that some guys see and really go for, so there’ll always be a number of men who’d be grateful to crawl two miles over jagged flint to sniff the cock of the last man who fucked you.”

  Aithne was right, perhaps not literally, but men did seem to fall heavily for her every now and then. It was a shame she never felt the same way. Usually she pitied her suitors, and pity was about as big a turn-on as incontinence.

  Maybe Dug was different. He was old, but he was good-looking, and beneath a slightly bumbling exterior he was competent and relatively bright. And modest – she liked that. Even more, she liked that he hadn’t tried to jump on her the night before. She couldn’t see herself falling for him, but he was right, she could do with some help from him and the weird little girl. Even if it was just guarding her while she slept or being decoys while she escaped.

  And if he did try it on … well, that would depend on what sort of mood she was in when he made his move and whether she’d been drinking.

  “OK,” she said. “I’ll tell you.”

  Dug wobbled his bottom on the log like a duck settling down on a clutch of eggs, making himself several degrees less attractive. Spring, back from washing the breakfast gear in the river, sat next to him and looked at her expectantly. Well, Lowa thought, we’ve got hours before it’ll be safe to get back on the road, so I might as well begin at the beginning.

  “My first memory is when our village was sacked and I saw my mother, father, two older brothers and a younger sister killed, along with uncles, aunts, cousins, my friends, their families. All apart from me and my older sister Aithne. We’d been gathering berries near the village…”

  It took Lowa a long time to tell her story, accompanied by the chirruping chatter of wrens and tits hopping about the encircling foliage. She’d never done this before – she rarely talked about herself – but she was surprised how easy and enjoyable it was to tell everything to these strangers. She wanted to get it out. She found herself impatient to carry on when Dug spent too long off in the woods on his mid-morning dump.

  The rest of the time he listened attentively, asking questions every now and then. Spring whittled sticks. At one point she left with her sling, came back with a moorhen and cooked up a stew for lunch.

  Lowa told them about her childhood of running and fighting, how her band of archers had come together by accident, how she’d come to work for Zadar, and how her band had risen to the pinnacle of Zadar’s favour before he killed all those she loved and tried to kill her. She found herself telling Dug that the attack on Barton had been her idea. Zadar had intended to march straight past. Barton was a good fiefdom that paid its taxes on time. She’d persuaded him that they needed a strong northern base and that the slave price for the battle’s survivors would cover a good few years of tax r
eceipt. So it was her fault all those people at Barton had died, although, in her defence, she’d suggested blocking the bridge and capturing everyone, not slaughtering them.

  Then, for no reason she could fathom, Zadar had had her women killed and tried to murder her too. So now she wanted revenge on Zadar. She didn’t, she said, need or deserve any help.

  Spring nodded. “We shouldn’t help her, Dug. She’s not a good person and she wouldn’t help you.” The girl had an intense look that naggingly reminded Lowa of somebody, but she couldn’t think who. She kept almost getting it, but then the image dissolved like the tantalising memories of a dream.

  “You’re right. And I haven’t asked for your help. But the people Zadar killed – my sister, the other four – were good people, and they deserve to be avenged, but … yes, there is no reason you should help me. This is my battle and I—”

  “Shhhh!” Spring held a finger to her lips. She cocked her head. “Dogs. Over there. Coming nearer.” She pointed in the direction they’d come from the night before.

  Dug began to say something, but Lowa held up her hand for silence. Lowa had never met anyone with better hearing than herself, but it was a good thirty heartbeats before she could make out the barking of dogs. She looked at Spring. The girl smiled and nodded like a mother encouraging a toddler who’s completed a simple puzzle.

  Thirty more heartbeats, and Lowa was certain the dogs were coming in their direction. Shit. She’d thought she was clean away, but Zadar wasn’t going to give up that easily. What had she done?

  “Pack up. Quickly,” she said.

  Lowa gathered her bow and the meagre kit that Spring had pilfered from the forester, then helped Spring load the horses while Dug pulled on his mail shirt and helmet.

  “Right,” said Dug in his strange northern accent, already heading up one of the low banks. “We’ll lead the horses up through the woods. There’s a stream—”

  “No,” interrupted Lowa.

  “No?”

  “No. They’re after me and they’ll have my scent. You two take the horses and ride at speed along the river valley. You’ll be faster in the open. I’ll draw them up into the woods. When you hit the Bladonfort road, head west, away from Bladonfort. I’ll meet you on the road.”