The Eagle and the Raven

by Pauline Gedge

  Venutius’s hand still traced out the battle paths. “The Twentieth is alert and waiting for us. That cannot be avoided. But if we slip past it to the Ninth, unexpected, we can take Nasica by surprise.”

  “Not if we tarry in Brigantia.” Emrys’s foot came out and gently scuffed the map away. “Do not do it, Arviragus. It will not work.”

  “It will. I will make it work. Aricia will die, and then everything will work.”

  “Nothing we can do will save Sine and Manaw, Venutius.”

  They fought silently, eye to eye, the big-shouldered, flame-headed chieftain and a lean, stubborn Emrys. Then Venutius snapped, “Look you, Ordovician. We have the horses, we have the manpower and the tactical advantage. We also have the will, and we have had the time to grow strong again, and cunning. It does not matter whether we cut the Twentieth to pieces first or the Ninth. We will win. The governor is an old, bad-tempered man with a grudge against everyone. Young Nero sits in Rome, pondering the complete withdrawal of all troops from Albion on the governor’s advice, and the legionaries know it. The fight is going out of them. Why die now, they say, when in a few months these shores may be abandoned for good. I say to you that no matter whether we march east or south and east, we will have the victory. “

  “In that case we will have plenty of time to deal with Brigantia when the Romans have gone.”

  “No.” Venutius’s mouth grimaced in hate, or passion. “I want her dead now.”

  “You have no right to intrude private vengeance, Arviragus.”

  Venutius stabbed him with his fierce gaze. “Private, Emrys? Do you not want her dead as well?”

  Emrys continued to look at him steadily, but he was nearing the end of his control. “Not at the expense of a sea of unnecessary bloodshed.” Venutius spun on his heel and went away.

  Emrys did not attend the Council. He took his cloak and a blanket and walked into the forest until the sounds of the thousands who gathered to hear Venutius’s words were far behind, and still he paced, his thoughts succeeding one another as silently and regularly as his soft footfalls. I could kill him, but what good would that do? The Silures, the Demetae, and the remnants of the Deceangli would not follow me, and the Ordovices cannot march alone. We have all become too dependent on each other for that. I could speak against him in Council, but then the host would become divided, and precious time would be lost while we quarreled. This time your visions played you false master, my strange-eyed cousin. The Druithin have made a mistake at last, and what a mistake! Why this mistake, cousin, why have your dreams failed you now? Is it an omen for the future? Is your power waning at the end? Venutius is no Caradoc.

  He is flawed, like a rock with a seam of sand running through it.

  Emrys found a tiny waterfall, splashing through green ferns down a tumbled rock face that was hidden in treetops, and he cupped a hand and drank. He sat beside the tinkling, ice-cold curtain and drew his cloak about him, folding his hands beneath it and staring into the forest. Sine, my Sine. I cannot remember a time when I was without you, and now time stretches ahead of me, an infinity of meaningless, dead days, carrying me from nowhere into nothing, and fate laughs at your pathetic, pitiful ending. You and I together. You and I apart. Forever. And the last chance at freedom is going also, lost because of a woman, one cheap, dishonored woman. I sacrifice you, I lay down your life—for what? For the chance of a chance. Die well, beloved, as you have lived. Sine… Pain crushed him at last to the earth. He put his face in his hands and wept.

  He stayed alone in the forest that night, and when he returned to the camp in the early morning he found the tents being struck and the chiefs readying themselves to move. He sought out Madoc, who greeted him tersely, his black beard bristling and his wrinkle-set eyes bright with annoyance.

  “I am getting too old for this constant running,” he complained. “I should fall on my sword and let my son champion the Silures. Would that I had died under Caradoc’s command!” He grumbled a little more, quietly, then Emrys asked, “Is his mind set on this foolish thing?”

  “It is. We march immediately. Yet it need not be so foolish, Emrys. There will be more ground to cover, of course, and less room for mistakes, but we have a good chance of success.”

  Mistakes. A good chance. Emrys suddenly laughed. “Caradoc warned us that we should never attempt pitched battle, and we did not listen. That is, not until we were scattered and he was a prisoner. Then we were wise, Madoc, oh how wise! We smashed the Twentieth by making good plans, even as we should be doing now, instead of crossing Albion in full view of everyone and then standing against a legion that will be ranked and waiting. All our victories since the Twentieth have been because we finally learned sense. Now we are about to repeat every mistake we ever made, and we will be defeated, and you and I will die still crawling about in our own mountains.”

  Madoc looked at him critically, noting the marks of a night of grief on the fine, thin face. “I am sorry about Sine,” he offered gruffly. “Yet, Emrys, she will live again.”

  Emrys’s eyes seemed to gather all the hurt on his face into them selves. “I know,” he whispered. “But not with me, Madoc.”

  In two weeks the west had emptied. Venutius led his forces south and east, cutting deep through Cornovii country and then swinging north along the Coritani border. Long before the dry summer paths would have led them to Lindum they veered again, flowing quietly just under the eaves of the great forest that straggled the edge of Brigantia’s moors. No one saw them pass. The Cornovii peasants were busy in their fields, for the harvest time was approaching, and the legionaries, at Gallus’s command, spent their time patrolling the foot of the mountains and did not know that the mountains were no longer their enemy. The weather was hot, the wind stilled. Autumn waited patiently for the sun to tire, and the rebels waited also, riding enervated and sweating under the thin, stuffy shade of the trees. The night they made their last camp before moving out under Brigantia’s revealing sky, Venutius called Madoc and Emrys to him.

  “I will take the Brigantian war band and march alone to the town,” he said. “Two thousand warriors will surely be able to defeat my wife’s forces. You are to stay here under cover of the forest. I will send word when it is safe to march against the Ninth. This way no Roman need know that our host is gathered together here and that I have not come out of the west on a private matter.”

  It was a good compromise, a sensible precaution, and Emrys’s spine loosened in relief. With the main force held back, perhaps they might still take the fort at Lindum by surprise. Venutius and his chiefs slipped away that night, riding hard, muffled in dark cloaks, and Emrys and Madoc settled themselves to wait. Idleness hung heavy on Emrys. He had nothing to do but pace the forest, back and forth, and think of Sine. Had she come this way, on her journey to death? He watched the last full moon of summer shimmer like a silver globe in the soft night sky, but its plump beauty could not stir him. His heart was cold.

  Venutius and his men traveled by night and lay in the folds of the hills by day, but they did not go unnoticed. A young sheepherder, wandering after his flock in the late evening, saw the last of the chiefs and their horses disappear into a thick clump of willows by the stream where the sheep liked to drink. His clear eyes had picked out the flicker of setting sunlight on helms and swords and, his heart in his mouth, he left his beasts and ran to his father’s farmstead, and well before dawn a message was speeding to Aricia. At noon the next day she heard it, sitting before the Council hall with Andocretus and her other chiefs, and she got to her feet, astounded.

  “A rebel force here? In Brigantia? Impossible! They must be messengers. Venutius is sending me another dreary mouthful of misery.”

  The chief shook his head. “My son saw horses and weapons. He said that there were many men concealed in the trees—he could hear their voices.”

  She looked past him for a moment to the peaceful sky, the smoke towers rising tall and gray from the fires of her town, and that other fear rose up t
o choke her. The men of the west creeping toward her, their eyes alight with grim anticipation, and she herself rooted to the earth, unable to run. She pursed dry lips. Venutius was coming, but was he coming with only a few of his bodyguard, as a token of dignity, or was he coming to fight? Had the eyes and ears of the shepherd boy deceived him out of fear? “My thanks,” she said to the shabby, bronzed man before her. “Eat and drink before you return to your farm. My bard will give you payment later for your news.” He bowed and walked past her into the hall and she moved slowly down through the town until she reached the earthwall.

  “Andocretus, have the gates closed and a guard set,” she ordered, then she climbed the wall and stood high above her world. Her eyes strained in each direction, but the horizon flowed on, uninterrupted by movement of horse and rider, and blurred into haze where the land met the forests striding out of the west. Most of my armed chiefs are with the Roman patrols, on the Deceangli border, she thought. I cannot recall them, it is too far away. She was unable to plan. Her mind felt helpless, muddled. What shall I do? He is one day away, and Nasica is two. He will come first. I have many chiefs gathered here, waiting for his surrender, but not enough to do more than hold the town for a little while. A wind blew from the ocean where she was standing on the rim of her wall, and it brought to her the salt scents of Gladys and the merry tumult of old Camulodunon, but she knew, as the memories wafted in her nostrils, that her town was not Camulodunon and she was no Caradoc, though it was not Rome but a small war band that marched against her. She was afraid.

  Before another hour passed she had sent a rider to Lindum. “Tell the legate that a small rebel force is coming this way,” she said. “I must have help. If he does not send me soldiers he may find my town in flames.” She did not wait for an acknowledgment. She almost ran into her house, standing before Brigantia with clenching hands and a beating heart. But she had no offering and no prayers. She had forgotten them all.

  Nasica listened to the chief’s message with a mounting exasperation, and when the man had gone he sat back in his chair with an exclamation of ire. “Oh damn the stupid woman! Why can’t she handle her internal affairs properly? She should have left well enough alone when her first attempt to get Venutius failed, but no, she had to go on probing around in his wound until he lost his temper. If I had my way he could hang her from the nearest tree. How am I supposed to do my job efficiently when every time she has nothing to do she stirs up trouble with her husband?”

  His secretary listened, smiling. “Sir, we may yet capture the arviragus or, better still, kill him in battle,” he said, and Nasica waved impatiently.

  “I know, I know. I must send her a few men, there’s no way around it, because if I don’t and she loses this scrap we will have a much larger problem on our hands. I am only angry at her ineptitude. Her usefulness to Rome is rapidly coming to an end and I intend to tell the governor so.” He rocked back on his chair and flung an arm over it, raising his ruthless pocked face to his aide. “Have two auxiliary infantry units called out right away. No, make that two cohorts. Put the primipilus in charge. Send him to me first. I am going to have something to say to Cartimandua when this is over. Stupid…” He turned back to his desk, muttering, and the secretary saluted and left the office.

  The auxiliaries marched out of Lindum that afternoon, but they were only halfway to Aricia’s town when Venutius drew rein and pointed. “There it is. We will not pause to talk with her. Straight on, surround the town!” He surged forward, his men strung out behind him, and on the wall Andocretus gave a cry and slithered down to where the lower circles were packed with armed chiefs. Aricia ran to meet him.

  “They are coming!”

  “How many?”

  “It is hard to tell. Perhaps a thousand, helmed and weaponed. They do not come to talk, Lady.”

  She put her fingers to cold lips, trying to think, trying to decide what to do. Her messenger had still not returned from Lindum and she supposed that he intended to ride back with the soldiers. Without Domnall to advise her, a Roman centurion to do her thinking for her, she was confused. Finally she dropped her hands, looking around her to the massed, jostling chiefs. “Open the gate!” she called. “Meet them out in the field!”

  “Lady!” Andocretus shrieked. “No! Order them to the walls with slings! If you do not they will be slaughtered!”

  “Why? They are Roman-trained, they will hold together, and Venutius will not be able to so much as touch the gate.”

  “But Lady…”

  “Be silent, Andocretus!” The tall gates were already inching open and her men were flooding the meadow beyond, shouting and screaming, and the massed roar of an answering host came faintly. “I send forth at least twice their number. Are you afraid? Come up onto the wall and watch.”

  Yes, I am afraid, he thought, but so are you, Lady. Your lips are white. He followed her obediently up, while behind them the gates thudded shut once more and the streets lay empty under a blue and white patchworked sky. Her bodyguard straggled behind them, and they squatted beside her where she sat, far out of the reach of stones or spears. Venutius, lifting his eyes above the running, screaming mob of his erstwhile kinsmen who had come spewing out of the gate, saw her there. She looked high and small, her black hair floating around her on the wind, red cloak billowing out, her face a tiny white spot. The surge of love and hate that began in his belly did not have time to burst into his chest. Her henchmen were upon him.

  All that morning the little battle raged fiercely. Contrary to Andocretus’s gloomy expectations, Aricia’s warriors were not cut to pieces within the first hour. They were no longer the naive, hot blooded tribesmen who would rush howling into a fray and expect their first charge to win the day. They had rubbed shoulders with Roman discipline for too many years, and some of the caution and coolness of the legionaries had been communicated to them. They stood in loose ranks, fighting shoulder to shoulder and back to back, and Venutius’s men were forced to abandon their horses and do battle on foot. But gradually the long-learned fluid ability of the rebels to change tactics, an instinct born in them under Caradoc’s relentless hammering and Venutius’s own foresight, began to tell. Aricia, still sitting with her stolid bodyguard atop the wall, saw her army gradually lose its cohesive mass and become ragged splinters of men surrounded by an increasing number of dun tunics, and suddenly she realized that the drab tunics were increasing, not because more rebels had come but because her own force was rapidly diminishing.

  “Where are the soldiers?” Andocretus said anxiously. “If they do not come soon we are finished.”

  “It does not matter,” she replied, her voice quavering, though she tried to keep the fear out of it. “Even if Venutius is victorious he will not be able to breach the gates before our help does arrive.”

  “Lady, my brothers are down there!” one of her chiefs reproached her angrily, and the others began to murmur.

  She kept her gaze on the plain below her, the tumult of battle pounding against her like ocean waves, and watched and listened to the destruction of her war band. She felt nothing, nothing, as though she sat on the highest mountain in the whole of the world and the wind blew right through her and moaned in her empty cavities, and out of that nothingness came a last terrible idea, a sacrifice to herself, an obeisance to degradation. She turned to Andocretus.

  “Bring me a carnyx,” she said slowly, “and have the two prisoners brought up here.” He saw the hungry yellow tongues of power flaming behind her eyes, and he rose without a word and scrambled to the first circle. She turned back to the carnage below her, but now her fingers moved in the folds of her cloak, pleating and clutching, and her mouth worked soundlessly.

  The burning noon sun stood overhead and then began to roll west, and just as Venutius paused a moment to lean on his sword and wipe the sweat from his eyes, the high, haunting note of a carnyx tingled in the air around him. He glanced upward, startled, conscious as he did so that the pace of battle was slowing to a halt.
One by one the combatants fell apart to stare around them, seeking the source of that wild melody, and then the sword fell from Venutius’s hand. Aricia had risen. She stood above the wall, the carnyx in her outflung hand, and beside her swayed the two tattered figures, their ankles and wrists chained. Behind them the cloaked chieftains of Aricia’s bodyguard were bunched, their swords drawn and glinting in the early afternoon brilliance. Venutius sensed Domnall racing to him and staggering to a halt, but he had eyes only for the hunched, scarecrow pathos of Sine and his young kinsman, and Aricia’s gloating, wide-stretched arms. She tossed the carnyx over the wall and shouted, her rich voice carrying easily over the corpse-littered field.

  “Venutius! Do you see what I have up here? Come forward!”

  A breathless quiet had fallen over the whole arena of battle. All eyes were turned to the sun-limned figures on the wall. Domnall gasped Venutius’s arm convulsively. “Lord, do not stir! She cannot see you yet. She…” But Venutius was already threading his way over the blood-soaked grass like a sleepwalker, his movements sluggish, his frozen face upturned. Domnall walked with him. She saw him coming and gave a cry of triumph like a hawk’s hunting croak, harsh and full of anticipation, then she lowered her arms and bent forward. He came to a halt at the foot of the wall, and at last his eyes left her and found the others. Sine looked down at him calmly, her head somehow small and foreign without her wolf-mask. Manaw stood with a stillness on him that was not the apathy of despair but an acceptance of his fate. “My wife, Arviragus?” he called down, and then Venutius shook off the webs of past memories and present horror and squared his shoulders, nailing down with ruthless purpose the fact that the mad woman leering at him was his wife, and placing on the coffin every cruelty he had suffered at her hands. Emrys had been right. She was not even worth killing, and he had sacrificed two people in order to prove it to himself. He answered his kinsman in a level voice. “She is safe, Manaw.” He turned toward Sine. “Lady, I am sorry. I can say nothing more.”