It sounded like the plan of a madman the first time Pinnosa presented it to us, after we gathered to hear the reports from all the returning patrols. But at length, we were forced to agree there was no other way; our priority was for the refugees to reach the safety of Trever’s walls before the city shut its gates for good and hunkered down for the long siege. There was no alternative — all the roads south led through Trever, and the refugees were already too exhausted by the long march from Coln to try to wander across the hills and forests to reach any other safe haven — the next nearest city, Mettis, was yet another week’s march away.
The only way to get to Trever was to somehow break through the Saxon warband, on the last, narrow stretch of the old highway.
“Should we not try to negotiate the passage with Odowakr?” I asked. “He doesn’t seem like the sort who would bring harm to unarmed civilians.”
“Hostages,” Pinnosa replied. “We can’t risk him getting his hands on the noblemen of Coln. Many of us have friends and family in Trever. Lord knows what having us captured and threatened would do to the city’s morale.”
“It would be better for them to die as warriors, than to let themselves be paraded like cattle before the walls of Trever,” Hildrik said grimly.
“A pagan sentiment, but in this case, I can’t help but agree,” said Pinnosa.
Many Romans perish before they get to the other side of this gauntlet, though not, as Hildrik would have preferred, as warriors. Dozens of bodies lie strewn all over the road; most trampled underneath the feet of their comrades or the hooves of the oxen and horses in the panicked tumult, others slain by a stray Saxon spear or sword. One overturned wagon tumbles into the ravine, pulling the dray horses with it. Another cracks an axle and flips over, crushing all within. But despite these tragedies, the losses seem lighter than we feared, and soon all that stands between Pinnosa’s men and the safety of Trever’s walls is just another mile of a winding, empty Roman highway.
Finally, the Saxons return; fewer in number and bloodied, but no less eager for it. Furious at having been tricked into a fruitless pursuit, they emerge onto the road just in time to see the rear of the refugee column soon disappear beyond the bend. The civilians present an easier target than Hildrik’s warriors, and an opportunity for revenge and plunder. Even Odowakr realises he can no longer hold his men back. He shouts an order, and his entire horde launches, belatedly, into a chase.
Above, the forest rustles with movement. It’s the Franks, racing after the refugees and the Saxons, desperate to also make it to the city in time. The slope coming down to the river is too steep for ponies; it’s unsafe even for the warriors running on foot, and I imagine not all of them will make it to the shore in one piece.
Only Haesta and his mercenaries remain where they are. I order the Iutes to halt on the edge of the forest. The Haestingas form a line, separating us from the rest of the pursuit.
“What’s he waiting for?” asks Audulf.
“He doesn’t care about the wealas,” I say. “It’s us he wants.”
“Then let’s give them what they want,” says Ursula, drawing a lance. There’s a strange look in her eyes, one that I’ve never noticed before: one of bloody resolve. Witnessing Odilia’s death transformed her in an instant. No — it wasn’t just that. I look around my men; how had I not seen it earlier? The battle at Tolbiac changed them from Iute sailors and farmers into true warriors. Before Tolbiac, they may have been ready to fight — now, they are ready to die.
“We only want to get to the other side,” I remind them. “Don’t get tied down in a needless brawl. There’s safety at the end of that road. Warm food. Warm bed.”
Ursula stares down the lance shaft with a steely gaze. It’s a look of someone who no longer cares for such trivialities as warm food and bed. She wants to kill someone, and she’s just chosen her target. I follow her gaze — she’s looking straight at Haesta. I put a hand on her shoulder.
“He’s not worth it,” I tell her, and nod at the dead girl on the pony’s back behind her. “Odilia needs a proper burial.”
“She’ll get one,” Ursula replies. “I’ll make certain of it.”
We form a narrow wedge — the rock rubble and the flotsam left after the refugees only allow five horses abreast — and launch into a trot. Haesta grins in a mocking smile. His men holster their lances and draw small, round bucklers and swords instead. I can tell they’re not taking us seriously; head-on, in the open field, my small band of farmers-turned-warriors stands little chance against a trained squadron of war-horse-mounted cavalry. My only hope is for most of us to press on through and do enough damage for Haesta to break off his pursuit. As I spur to charge, a thought flashes in my mind: if Haesta wants only me, maybe I can occupy his attention long enough for the others to reach safety — even if it means my own death…
Two white shapes blur past me with a thundering noise. Two riders on Thuringian war horses, one to each side of me, storm towards Haesta’s men, out of nowhere… Hildrik raises his sword high and strikes at the nearest of the mercenaries. The blade slices through the shield as if it was made of cheese and shatters the enemy’s arm. Basina shoots, point-blank, at another of the Haestingas, and then whirls the bow and whacks him in the face. Within seconds, Hildrik and Basina carve a two-man gap in Haesta’s line. I swerve into that gap.
“Single file!” I shout to my men. “Quickly!”
I glance behind. Seawine and Audulf ride close behind me and are the first to clear the gap. Two more Iutes follow, but then the gap closes, just before Ursula; Odilia’s body is weighing her down, and she’s too slow to make it.
I turn around. I yell at Audulf and the others to keep going, but they ignore me and ride with me back into the mercenary line. I shout a challenge to Haesta. Some of his men turn their attention to me. The line breaks, now facing the ponies from two sides. An arrow whistles past my ear and hits one of Haesta’s men on the shoulder — Basina and Hildrik, too, are turning back again.
I charge at Haesta. Our swords clash; he strikes with such force it almost throws the weapon from my hand. With a great cry of rage, Ursula throws her lance at his side. He swerves to avoid it. The horse rears under him and whinnies in annoyance. Ursula uses the opportunity to sneak past the horse’s hooves to the other side.
“Get her out of here!” I cry, and this time, the men heed my order. Those who broke through surround Ursula’s pony with theirs, and gallop away in this tight formation. Five more Iutes remain on the other side. But now Hildrik and Basina join us. On the narrow road, the Haestingas can’t make use of his numbers, and for a moment, our strengths are equal. I strike at him again, and again we exchange blows to no effect, but as we do so, two more Iutes ride through the gaps. Hildrik grabs his enemy’s lance. The mercenary lets go of the weapon and pulls away, leaving enough of a gap for another of my men to pass.
Haesta’s sword finds an opening through my blocks and cuts me across the shoulder. One of the remaining Iutes — Oxa, I remember his name, a keen tavern brawler in life before Gaul — leaps on Haesta’s horse and grapples him to the ground. In the chaos, the last two Iutes sneak past. I lean to help Oxa up, but I’m too late — Haesta draws a knife and stabs him in the stomach.
Basina tugs me on the shoulder. “Come now! Or it’ll all be for naught!”
Two mercenaries close in on me from both sides, lances lowered to strike. I sheathe the sword, turn around and start off towards the city. With each beat of the pony’s hooves, the wound on my shoulder spurts blood and pain.
It’s not over yet.
A long, tightly packed column of men, wagons, oxen and horses, crowds the Trever Bridge from the western gatehouse to the eastern wall, stretching the crossing’s capacity to the limit. At the western end of the bridge, on our side of the river, a small troop of soldiers in crimson cloaks — I can’t tell whether they’re Pinnosa’s surviving equites, or a sallying squadron of Trever’s own garrison — holds its own against a great horde of Sax
ons, pushing at them from the south. Their struggle is valiant, but desperate. As we race down the Coln highway, Odowakr’s warband, some half a mile ahead of us, reaches the bridge from the north, squeezing the Roman soldiers in a pincer — and cutting off our retreat.
Just then, with a shrieking war cry, Hildrik’s Frankish warriors finally descend from the wooded hills, and join the battle from the west. A chaotic brawl erupts, in which the Saxons, the Franks and the Romans fight each other over access to the bridge gate.
“The Romans don’t know we’re here to help them!” I shout to Hildrik. “Pull your men back!”
“The walhas will be slaughtered! And what about your own men?”
He points to the end of the bridge, just beyond the gate. My heart rises, then sinks, at the sight. Somehow, a small handful of my Iutes have made it past the Saxons, past the Romans — and past the gate. I spot Ursula among them. But the remainder is trapped in the same muddled fight on the shore as everyone else, struggling to push through.
As the last of Coln’s refugees reach the safety of the eastern gate, trumpets sound a desperate alarm from the wall towers. At this signal, the Roman soldiers begin to make a disorderly retreat. Some of the Saxons and Franks mix with them in the confusion, but nobody seems to be paying attention to them. As soon as the last of the Romans clears the western gate, the great door begins to shut — but it’s too late. The Saxons pour onto the bridge, overrun the defenders and climb up the towers, to take control of the gatehouse.
The trumpets sound again — a different signal this time; the Roman soldiers halt at the edge of the last span of the bridge and turn back again. There’s a change in the way they stand against the Saxon horde; they appear slumped, dejected, as if accepting some inevitable disaster — but determined not to let the enemy move even a step closer to the city.
I spot a troop of guards run out of the gatehouse, armed with axes. They do not rush to aid their comrades — I can’t tell what they’re doing at first, but then I spot it: they hack through the thick ropes tied to the bridge’s weakened wooden span. As the ropes snap one by one, slowly, almost imperceptibly, the entire span begins to heave and buckle — with the remaining refugees, the Roman soldiers and the Saxons attacking them still on top of it.
“It will never hold. Now you have to pull them back,” I tell Hildrik. “Get them away from that bridge.”
He notices it too, now, and blows retreat on his horn. The Franks begin to draw away from the Saxon rear and fight their way towards us; I call on my Iutes — what’s left of them — to do the same. Odowakr and his men pay no attention to us — their only concern now is to break through the Roman line. If they can reach the eastern gate, they will end the siege before it even begins. In the rush of the battle, they fail to notice the creaking of the ropes and of the wood underneath their feet.
With a great heave and a crackle, the weak wooden supports bend, then yield to the weight of the fighting crowd and snap. The entire span folds in on itself and crumbles into the river with a deafening splash, taking both the Saxons and the brave Roman defenders with it into the rolling depths of Mosella underneath, leaving only the ends of the ropes dangling in the spray.
For a few brief moments, everything is silent, as both the city folk and the barbarian horde are too stunned to react to what just happened. As the dust and mist settles down, I hear Odowakr’s voice, calling for his surviving warriors to rally around him at the bridge’s western, remaining, end.
“We should leave,” I say to Hildrik, “before the Saxons notice we’re the only ones left to fight.”
He nods. “We will hide in the woods,” he says, “until I figure out what to do next. With me, men!” he cries and blows a rallying call on the horn. “Gather your strength one last time — pull back, back into those cursed dark hills!”
PART 3: TREVER
CHAPTER XIII
THE LAY OF WIRTUS
I hold my breath as the bee lands on my hand. I watch it turn in place, stroll across my knuckles, ponder its predicament for a bit, then fly away to join its sisters on a nearby briar bush.
An overturned, cracked beehive is still home to the swarm, though judging by its state no beekeeper has taken care of it in months, or of any of the several other beehives scattered around the cherry orchard. The trees are heaving with rose-blushed fruit, too small and sour for men to eat yet, but good enough for the great flock of starlings, whose incessant noise conceals our approach. The farm, its white-washed buildings gleaming through the trees, is not in ruin, merely abandoned by the owners when news of the coming barbarian army first reached Trever.
Though the cherries themselves are yet unripe, there’s a chance the farm’s storehouse might still contain some of last year’s preserved fruit, or better yet — wine. The buildings appear untouched by Odowakr’s foragers. It’s a small miracle that we found this place, far off from any road, up on a south-facing hilltop. Whoever built this farm here preferred solitude.
There are only eight of my Iutes left now. Every night, I remember the names of the fallen, and light a scrap of tallow candle in their memory. Gille and Haeth, slain at Tolbiac. Oxa, the wrestler. Odilia, the eager young tracker, whose death shook me the most, and whom I mourned the deepest. But those unfortunate deaths happened early on in our adventure. The rest of us grew both in experience and a number of scars over time. We are all battle-hardened now, grim and resolute to see this war to its end, whatever it may be. We’ve built a small shrine in their memory — a simple circle of river-smoothed boulders on a glade overlooked by three mast-like beeches, which my Iutes renamed Wodan, Donar and Frige. And though I do not share the faith of my companions, raising the memorial helped us all to ease the pain of loss and focus our efforts on the task at hand.
Four dead and three missing — Ursula and Audulf managed to reach Trever before the disaster at the bridge, and I hope another of my riders, Nodhbert, is with them. I have not heard from any of them since; I can only hope the people of Trever took good care of them. Ursula, at least, with her good Latin and her Christian upbringing, should have little trouble finding herself something to do in the besieged city. Pinnosa would vouch for her and Audulf — but I have no way of knowing if the Dux survived the battle at the bridge. In the chaos of the fighting, unable to tell them apart from the crimson-clad soldiers of Trever, I lost sight of the Comes and his men.
I miss my friends. I am now all alone: the only one left out of the four who set sail on Aegidius’s liburna. The city gates are closed shut now, not letting anyone in or out, even if I did manage to get past Odowakr’s blockade — and across the river, now that the bridge is gone. The morning after the battle on the bridge, the siege started in earnest, with every road and path within the blockade’s perimeter, no matter how small, patrolled by Saxon guards.
I gave myself a couple of weeks to make the final decision. If nothing changes, I will take the surviving Iutes and we’ll try to make our way back to Britannia — even if it means abandoning Ursula and Audulf. Nine pony riders can’t possibly do any meaningful damage to Odowakr’s forces. Staying here will be a waste of effort and, ultimately, lives.
Even for the journey back, we need supplies, and so for the past few days, I’ve been sending the Iutes out on careful hunting and foraging missions all over the cliffs overlooking Mosella’s steep valley. The cherry farm might provide us with plenty of sustenance.
There’s just one problem — we’re not the first ones here.
“Are you sure they’re not Saxons?” I ask Seawine, who led the patrol that discovered the orchard.
“The Saxons wouldn’t skulk around like that,” he replies. “I could barely see them; they pop in and out of the huts like rabbits out of hutches.”
“How many have you seen?”
“Two or three. Can’t be sure. They all wear the same drab cloaks.”
I draw the sword but tell the others to keep theirs sheathed. I order the men to spread out around the orchard’s border and s
tart moving towards the centre.
“We want them alive,” I whisper. “They might be from Trever.”
We reach the farmhouse without seeing anyone. The single window is boarded shut, and the door is closed. I gesture at my warriors to surround the house from all sides, then approach the door.
“You’re surrounded,” I say in Saxon, then repeat the same in the Vulgar tongue. “Come out unarmed!”
A response is a Latin slur I’m not familiar with, which tells me, at least, that Seawine was right — these are not Saxon deserters or lost Franks. I sheathe the sword and hold up just the shield instead. I kick the door in. A short, heavy iron dart, fletched with goose feathers, flies out and bounces off the shield feebly: I’ve never seen this kind of weapon before, but I recognise it from descriptions as a plumbata, the lead-loaded missile of the Roman Legions; I barge inside, followed by Seawine and a couple of Iutes. We overpower the three men inside with little effort. They’re too weak to resist us — one is injured, the other two appear just famished. The red spots on their fingers and faces, which I take for blood at first, tell me there’s little chance of us finding any of the farm’s stores intact.
Their cloaks are not drab — just turned inside out. Underneath the brown leather lining, I spot bright crimson. I look closer and recognise one of the men.
“You’re from Coln,” I say. “Pinnosa’s soldiers.”
“What’s it to you?” the man replies. He stirs in Seawine’s grasp. I nod for the Iute to release him.
“We are Iutes,” I reply, pointing to my warriors. “We fought together at Tolbiac.”
He looks me over, then the rest of the Iutes, with a glimmer of recognition, but remains untrusting. “I thought the Franks had all left,” he says.
The messenger from Meroweg’s court arrived two days after the battle at the bridge. By some accident of fortune, we managed to intercept him, bumbling along the Coln road on a tired horse, before he was discovered by Odowakr’s patrols. The moment he told us what he’d been sent with, we regretted our fortune. The news was unwelcome, but not surprising — Hildrik had been expecting a message like that ever since we departed from Coln.
The Blood of the Iutes: The Song of Octa Book 1 (The Song of Britain 4) Page 23
