61 A.D. b-2

by David McAfee

  The moment the word Bachiyr left her lips, the creature turned toward her, snarling like a rabid dog. It strained against its bonds, grunting with the effort. Her men jumped back a step at the sudden movement, their swords pointed toward the cage, but the ropes held strong, thank the gods. After a tense moment, the Bachiyr relaxed, apparently realizing it was stuck.

  But for how long? Boudica doubted they would be able to detain the creature indefinitely. By the look on the Bachiyr’s face, it was thinking along the same lines. Its eyes sizzled with anger, sending a chill up the queen’s spine despite the heat of the nearby fires. She had never seen a true Bachiyr before, but she had heard all the legends, some more ludicrous than others. They were said to drink human blood. Some said they melted into the shadows, or they were the shadows, or they controlled the moon, or even that they could kill you from halfway across the world with nothing more than a malicious thought. All ridiculous, of course.

  Or were they?

  “A Bachiyr?” Heanua asked, eyeing the prisoner with a mixture of awe and fear. “Are you sure, Mother?”

  Boudica nodded, unable to find her voice. She had grown up hearing the stories of the Bachiyr from her father and nurse, but she always considered them to be just that; stories. Fireside tales told to children to entertain or frighten them, but nothing more. How could they be real? But as she stared at the thing in her midst, she felt the creature’s hate roll over her body like steam. The Bachiyr were not legends, after all. They were real, and they were dangerous. And now her men had captured one.

  What to do?

  We should kill it, she thought. Kill it before it escapes and kills us.

  Heanua seemed to have her own ideas. She pulled her mount close and leaned over her saddle. “We can use him,” she whispered.

  “What do you mean?” Boudica asked.

  “Drop him behind the walls of the city,” Heanua said. “Let the Romans deal with him.”

  Boudica shook her head. “I think not. That thing is far too dangerous, daughter.”

  “But think how much havoc he would wreak on the defenders of the city,” Heanua persisted. “He could do more damage in one hour than the ballistae will do all night. Just having him inside the walls will send most of the soldiers running.”

  “And then what?” Boudica replied. “Once the Bachiyr is free of the city it will kill us, as well. The Bachiyr care only for blood, they do not concern themselves with whether that blood is Roman, Iceni, or otherwise.”

  “We could make a deal with him. If he gave us his word-”

  “It would be worthless.” Boudica looked at her daughter’s eager expression. The bloodlust filled her face, making her look almost evil in the shifting firelight. She would risk anything for her revenge. While Boudica could sympathize, she was not foolish enough to allow one of the Bachiyr to go free. The thing would most certainly return to kill its attackers, and she had no desire to give it free vent to do so. “The Bachiyr have no souls,” she explained. “It would honor its word in much the same way as Nero. It would turn on us at its first opportunity.”

  “But-”

  “The matter is not subject to debate, ” the queen said. “The Bachiyr is a demon, not a weapon, and I will not set it free so it can kill us and ravage the Iceni countryside. That is my final word on it.”

  Heanua lowered her head, but Boudica noted the defiant expression on her daughter’s face. Soon, she thought. I will have to deal with her soon. But first I must deal with the Bachiyr.

  She turned toward the creature, half expecting it to have broken loose during her exchange with Heanua. Thankfully the ropes still held, and the threat the creature posed was nullified. For the moment. She couldn’t help feeling like she was staring at a caged wolf. Were it not for the bonds, the thing would probably be pacing back and forth across the cage and growling. She shivered at the idea of letting it go free. Not even to avenge my husband, she thought.

  But how to kill it? She dared not send anyone into the cage to lop off its head. Fire was rumored to work, but what if it didn’t? What if she set the cage aflame and all she accomplished was that the creature broke free once the wood burned away. She would be in just as much trouble as if she followed Heanua’s misguided suggestion.

  She knew of only one way to be certain. There was one way to kill a Bachiyr that was the same in all the legends, but it would require an open roof on the cage. She checked the structure. It was sturdy, iron and oak. The roof was a patchwork of bars and beams, and would do little to stop a rain shower, let alone sunlight. It would do.

  “The Bachiyr will remain in its cage until the sunrise,” she proclaimed. “Tomorrow morning the sun will take care of it for us. Until then I want forty archers with arrows trained on the cage at all times. If the creature moves, shoot it.”

  Heanua started to protest, but Boudica silenced her with a raised hand. “Those are my orders. See that they are followed, daughter.”

  “Yes, my Queen,” Heanua mumbled. Her words were echoed, albeit with a great deal more enthusiasm, by the men around her as they went to find forty archers.

  Once the men had assembled on two sides of the cage, Boudica turned her attention back to the siege of Londinium. Damn it all that a wretched Bachiyr should come into their camp now. The forty archers she had stationed around his cage would be sorely missed once the ballistae finished their onslaught. Still, the outcome of the battle would be the same. Londinium could not stand against the combined might of the Iceni and the Trinovante, archers or no.

  She sat in her saddle and directed the attack, a sullen and silent Heanua at her side. Down the line of cavalry, Lannosea had ridden through the troops and assumed command of the charge. General Ogden didn’t look pleased, but there was little enough he could say. Lannie’s appointment to the cavalry carried the weight of the Queen’s command.

  She felt eyes on her back and risked a glance over her shoulder at the captured Bachiyr. The creature stared at her from its cage, its angry eyes glowing like cinders from the shadows of its face. Even from forty yards distant the thing’s malevolence filled her with dread. The sooner the sun rose in the morning, the better.

  ***

  Theron watched as the queen sat on her horse and directed the troops. Soon enough, she would have to leave her position and engage the enemy herself. Her pride and the respect of her troops would demand it. With luck, it would create an opportunity for him. If so, he would have to be ready to take advantage of it.

  The archers crowded each other on two sides of his cage. Boudica had instructed them to place two rows of ten men on the south and east sides to prevent any chance of her soldiers being injured in a crossfire should the need arise to shoot. Theron could have told her to save her breath. He would not give the archers any reason to shoot him. His escape would come from within. From the queen’s own blood.

  He had heard the girl’s request to release him into the city. After the queen’s rebuttal, the anger rolled off her daughter’s shoulders in waves so thick and hard Theron could almost see them. Every few minutes, she would look back at the cage with a mixture of longing and anger. It would only be a matter of time before she tried to set him loose on the city despite the queen’s command. Her thirst for revenge had blinded her to the dangers around her, and that would be her undoing. It would also be his freedom. If he had time, he meant to kill the queen on his way out of the camp.

  His only concern was the fact that somewhere out beyond the camp, Ramah would be looking for him. If the Blood Letter found out the Iceni had taken his prize from under him, he would storm the camp and cut a swath of bodies to reach Theron’s cage. Weak and tied to the post as he was, Theron would be unable to defend himself from the elder Bachiyr, and Ramah would gut him in less time than it would take a mortal man to blink.

  He only hoped Heanua would come to his cage first.

  ***

  Baella dragged the unconscious Ramah back through the thicket of trees, listening to the chatter of the en
camped army to ensure they had not been seen. Satisfied, she deposited his prone form in a small clearing twenty or thirty paces from the edge of the trees. It wasn’t large, but it was well hidden. It would do for now.

  She would have to figure out a way to smuggle him back into the city before he awoke. It wouldn’t be easy with the whole place under attack, but her portal lay inside the city. She had built it in a tunnel beneath the streets and hidden the entrance. It should still be standing after the attack, but the sun would rise before the Iceni siege would end, and she needed to be away from the city by then. Otherwise it wouldn’t matter. She would have preferred to catch up to him inside the walls, but he was more powerful than she’d anticipated. He caught up to them too soon.

  Nothing to do for it but improvise. The Psalm she’d used on him should leave him unconscious for several hours. It was a simple enough trick, her energy simply shut down the nerves in his body. She’d learned it, and many other things, in her four thousand years, including many tricks the Council of Thirteen would pay dearly to know.

  To the abyss with the Council of Thirteen, she thought. The Father’s lapdogs. Licking his boots for scraps from his table. Not her. She had no use for The Father or his laws. That’s why they hated her so much. The Council of Thirteen would have every Bachiyr believe that they needed the structure and protection of the Council to survive, but she was living proof that they did not. The only thing holding Bachiyr society to the Council was a thin strand of bluffs and outright lies. The Father could take them all to his realm for all she cared.

  All but one.

  She glanced at Ramah, running her finger gently up the curve of his jaw. So handsome. So dark. So beautiful…and so wasted in service to the Council. She knew his history, he was the product of a love gone wrong. The Father had tricked him into servitude by using his broken heart against him. But she would set him free, and together they would spread fear through all of Bachiyr society. It might take time for him to come around to her point of view, but she was up to the task. She certainly had time to spare. Her face split into a grin as she reflected on the last four thousand years. What were a few centuries weighed against eternity?

  First, though, she had to get him back to her home, and that meant getting into Londinium under full siege. And for that, she did not have centuries. She had only a few hours. She sat her back against a tree and watched the Iceni lay waste to the city’s walls, waiting for an opportunity to present itself. Sooner or later the Iceni would cease the long range attack and send in the cavalry. That would be her chance to enter the city.

  She just had to wait.

  Thankfully, she didn’t have to wait long

  27

  Taras stood in the doorway of a crumbling baker’s shop, watching as people ran screaming by. Many of them sported flames on their arms, legs, and heads. The charred, smoking remains of the less fortunate could be seen littering the street. Most of the city’s people had left before the attack, but enough remained behind that the smell of their burning flesh hung in the air, mixing with the smoke of fires too numerous to count. Speckled among the bodies was the rubble of the city. Buildings, wagons, and merchant stands littered the street with smoking debris, many reduced to piles of charred wooden boards, their splintery points aimed in every direction.

  The store where Taras took his refuge had been all but demolished by a rock the size of a fruit cart, and flour, burst eggs, and a myriad of other ingredients covered the wreckage. Here and there, broken pieces of the baker’s trade littered the street outside the entrance. Mixing pots, spoons, jars of honey and sugar, all lay cracked and broken amidst the rubble. But the doorway stood, and it made as good a place as any for Taras to rest and evaluate his situation. It wasn’t good.

  He could not leave the city through the western gate. He would have to find another way. Fortunately, there was another way. A small tunnel used by smugglers to bring questionable goods into the city. Taras had found it one night while trailing a robber who’d stolen an elderly man’s coin purse. Before the man died, he told Taras everything he wanted to know. The entrance was hidden beneath the floor of a tavern on the northern side of the city and the tunnel led to a small copse of trees about a hundred paces from the north wall. The smugglers had chosen that location because the trees hid their comings and goings from the city guard. It would accommodate him, as long as he could reach it before the incoming soldiers.

  The area around him was thick with crazed people running and shouting, trying to escape. But they had no place to go, and so they simply ran up one street and down the other until fire or weapon claimed them. Here and there, officers called to their men, directing them to the walls to try and hold off the invading forces. No one was tending to the wounded or dead, and the fires were left to rage on. Defense of the city took first priority. But even from Taras’s vantage point, huddled under a doorframe, he could see it would be no good. Tonight Londinium would fall.

  The smell of blood was everywhere. It drove into his brain like a hot metal spike. Gods, he needed to feed, but there wasn’t time to track down a suitable victim amidst the chaos. There were plenty of people nearby, but they were mostly soldiers, women and children. He couldn’t bring himself to kill them. Even after thirty years, Jesus’ words still haunted him. He could kill innocent people, or he could die a slow death.

  There is always a choice. It is not always a good choice.

  Killing innocents was no choice at all, and even though the city burned with flames taller than buildings, Taras could not bring himself to sacrifice his life to them. He clenched his jaw and strode out into the street. He would simply have to wait to feed. It wouldn’t be the first time.

  But unless he found blood soon, it could well be the last.

  ***

  Lannosea sat atop her mount and ran her sleeve across her forehead, wiping away the beads of sweat and leaving a smudge of soot as she examined the city walls. This close, the heat and smoke were almost more than she could bear. Her horse, a huge black mare known more for her strength than her disposition, shied away from the wall, wary of the flames that consumed it. The ballistae and catapults had certainly done their job, reducing huge sections of the outer wall to smoldering rubble. She and her fellow riders should have little trouble storming the city.

  A long, low horn blast sounded behind her. She knew what that meant. The ballistae crews had nearly exhausted their ammunition, which meant it was time for the cavalry to get ready. She held her sword straight up in the air and shouted “Hail Iceni!” Every mounted soldier up and down the line returned the salute, raising their own swords in the air and shouting her words back to her. When the next horn blast came from the ballistae crews, indicating that the long range ammunition was gone, Lannosea lowered her sword and pointed it at the city.

  As one, the line of mounted men rode forward, with Lannosea at its head. The creak of their saddles and the pounding of their horses’ hooves were soon drowned out by the noise from within the city. The screams of the injured and the dying overpowered the shouted orders from the town’s remaining defenders, and few of the soldiers on the wall looked like they knew what to do. Most of them stared at the approaching horsemen with a look of fear or resignation. By the look in their eyes, each of them knew they would not live to see the sunrise.

  Lannosea could relate. The Iceni cavalry boasted over four thousand battle hardened warriors, each of them bearing multiple scars from one campaign or another. She doubted the Romans had that many legionaries in the entire city. Taking Londinium would be easy.

  But she did not intend to come back.

  Her mother knew. Lannosea saw it on the Queen’s face when she requested to lead the cavalry charge, and she’d given her consent. Had the queen known? Probably. The queen knew everything. Of course, Lannosea’s death would mean Heanua would one day be queen of the Iceni, but that would probably be for the best. Despite what her mother and suitors said, Lannosea had never really wanted to be queen. Too much resp
onsibility. Her desires were far more mundane. A good husband and a quiet life filled with the laughter of children were more to her taste, but even that could not be now.

  A flutter in her belly reminded her why she was doing this. The Roman bastard growing in her womb had ruined everything. Nero’s men had taken her maidenhood as well as her honor, and now they would get her life, as well. It didn’t seem fair, but she would not dishonor her entire family by birthing the bastard child of a Roman legionary. Her shame was hers alone, and she would wipe it away tonight by dying with honor. She could do that much, she knew.

  “The Iceni do not fear death,” she whispered under her breath, reciting the mantra her father had taught her as a child. “Death comes for all.”

  Fifty yards from the wall, her troops were hit by Londinium’s archers. Scores of arrows sailed through the night at the advancing Iceni, many of them carried small balls of flaming tar on their tips. Several dozen of her men and a score of horses went down under the deadly rain, but dozens more came forward to fill the gaps.

  “The Iceni do not fear death. Death comes for all.” Even unborn Roman bastards.

  She ordered a full charge and kicked her horse into a gallop. At full speed, the archers on the walls would have time for only one more barrage before Lannosea and her men crossed into the city. One would not be enough to kill her remaining soldiers, not even close. After that it would be over. The cavalry would soften up the remaining defenders, and then the infantry would march in and take care of the rest. The citizens, if any were left alive, might put up a fight, but they would not be able to stop the march of the Iceni. Soon they and their city would be ashes.