The White Mare: The Dalraida Trilogy, Book One

by Jules Watson

  Eremon leaped for the advantage, his blood instantly alight. With Lorn, he’d had no time for tactics, and as Conaire pointed out, must match fire with fire. Though Drust was no equal opponent, Eremon still wanted a quick, decisive victory, which showed off his own skills, and left no room for foolish errors.

  So with Drust still off balance, he began to rain sword blows down on his shield so fast and so hard that the Caledonii prince had no chance to get his sword up again. With every ringing blow, Eremon advanced, relentlessly, and Drust had no option but to retreat, closer to the edge of the hide.

  Eremon had practised blows such as these with Conaire. The awesome strength in his brother’s arm called forth an answering strength in his own, but it was the rhythm that was key. His whole torso twisted in a steady beat that gave both speed and power to his arm. His sword was a blur as it glanced off Drust’s shield, again and again, one blow flowing into another so swiftly that Drust could find no faltering gap to exploit.

  It was never going to be an even contest. Eremon deliberately drove Drust backwards towards one of the stakes that held the hide, and between one breath and the next Drust was forced to dodge the stake, and in so doing stumbled off the hide, skidding on the wet grass.

  The crowd broke into cheering, but it was tinged with disappointment, for it had been too easy.

  ‘I win then,’ Eremon panted, his sword-tip pointing at Drust’s chest.

  ‘Wait!’ the Caledonii prince hissed, his eyes burning. ‘You cannot shame my father here, before these men. You have it wrong: I can explain it to him.’

  Eremon hesitated, but glancing up, he saw the darkness in the King’s face, and his heart twisted within him. ‘You have until the end of the games.’

  The prince slowly backed away, and without looking at his father, disappeared into the crowd.

  Rhiann understood that Eremon gave Drust that time out of respect for Calgacus. And yet she felt uneasy about the wisdom of letting the prince return to the dun alone. Since no one would miss her, she decided to follow him herself, slipping away as Conaire brought Eremon water and Caitlin a cloth to wipe the sweat from his face.

  But just as Rhiann approached the dun, a large party of mounted warriors forced their way past. And that was when she felt it: a dark shimmering in the air, and a pressure, like a storm growing.

  Her stomach turned, and she peered around. Hordes of people were streaming in and out of the gate, many now cursing as the warriors’ horses neighed and shied. On the far side of the crowd, she glimpsed a black-haired man dismounting, and the pale sheen of white bear-fur over his thick shoulders. But then the shifting mass of people swallowed him up, and Rhiann was nudged along inside the gate.

  After pulling free of the press of bodies, she hurried to Drust’s workshed. He was not there. She waited until the steward that looked after the King’s Hall returned from the storehouses, and asked if Drust had returned. He had not. When she insisted, he took her to Drust’s empty bedplace. She then searched the stables and other worksheds, but could find no trace of him.

  Cursing, she raced back down to the field, seeking for Eremon.

  Drust had vanished.

  After dusk that day, as Eremon delivered his unwelcome news to Calgacus, he wished that the King had the time to grieve in peace. But all the tribal leaders had now arrived, and the welcome feast must go ahead.

  Calgacus and Eremon were alone in the King’s meeting room, a screened alcove off the second floor gallery. The King sat heavily in his carved chair, the straight line of his shoulders for once broken.

  ‘He went straight from the dueling ground to the port,’ Eremon said. ‘He must have planned it moons ago, secreting clothes and jewels with someone in the village, who organized a boat to stand by. He must have done it in preparation for such a day.’

  Calgacus shook his head, still stunned.

  ‘I am sorry, my lord,’ Eremon added, for the third time. ‘I challenged him to force his hand, to give him the opportunity to tell you himself. It may have redeemed him.’

  ‘If he had not run, then I may have doubted your information, prince. But – gods!’ Calgacus struck the arm of the chair. ‘He confirms his guilt with his own actions. My son … a Roman traitor!’

  Eremon’s heart ached, but he kept his silence.

  After a long while, Calgacus sighed. ‘He was always the first down the pier when the Roman traders came in. The first to sport the latest jewellery, or cup, or bowl …’ He gazed around the room in despair, for among the woven wall hangings and bronze of spear and shield there gleamed the red glaze of Roman pots on claw-foot tables; the glitter of glass goblets and silver wine jugs. ‘He was always asking leave to travel south, to learn the stone carving. I should have seen it myself !’

  ‘A man should not have to doubt his own son,’ Eremon said quietly.

  Calgacus sat up straighter, and got slowly to his feet. ‘Son?’ His eyes were bleak. ‘I have no son. I will never speak of him again, and we will tell no one of what happened here today.’

  As they reached the woven screen, Calgacus put a hand on Eremon’s shoulder. ‘Though it grieves me sorely, and though I hated he who brought me this news, if only for a moment, you did the right thing. If my real son had even a grain of your honour in his soul, prince, then this would never have happened.’

  The words ‘my real son’ echoed in Eremon’s mind. He looked up into the King’s eyes. ‘It is not a role I was happy to play.’

  ‘Nevertheless, if he had been here longer, he may have had useful information to impart. As it stands, perhaps his Roman reception will be colder than he hoped, for what can he say? That we meet in council, that is all. If this causes Agricola to fear, it is well. One day he will find the truth on the ends of our swords.’

  This halted Eremon. ‘Am I to understand that you will speak in favour of an alliance tomorrow, then?’

  Calgacus gave a grim smile. ‘I have placated my nobles enough. The betrayal of my son is a sign that I must rid Alba of the Roman poison. I will overrule my chieftains, and take my chances with their mistrust. Yet I fear it will not be long before our friend Agricola makes his move, anyway, and we are proven right.’

  Chapter 64

  The feast that night in the hall was subdued. The Caledonii did not know about their prince’s flight yet, but they always took their mood from that of their shining King, and this night he was sunken and silent, and shining no longer.

  Rhiann stayed close by Eremon’s side. They spoke little, sad as they were for Calgacus, but she was comforted by Eremon’s leg pressing against hers on the benches, as they shared meat from the same platter, and mead from the same cup, and jested with Conaire and Caitlin. Whenever Eremon leaned in close, she caught the musk scent of him, and for the first time, she found that comforting, too.

  Although it had been traumatic for the King, Rhiann was relieved at the turn of events. Drust’s betrayal had severed any last feeling she had for him, and for all of them, it was better that he was discovered now, before he could pass on sensitive information to the Romans.

  She sighed and scanned the faces around her, lit by the hearth-fire, banked high against the clear cold of the night. Men murmured to each other behind their cups, their eyes darting one to the other, sharp as ravens, firelight glinting on heavy rings. How could Calgacus be assured of allegiance from any of these men? The Romans had been a trading force to the south for generations. People in Alba were used to gaining from them, rather than fighting them. How in Thisworld would Eremon convince the kings to join?

  And that was when she froze, for among the faces flushed with drink and heat, swathed in smoke, a dark pair of eyes was fixed on her. They glittered, and yet somehow sucked the light around them into twin voids of blackness.

  The eyes belonged to a broad man with a coarse black beard and tangled mane of hair. His heavy, slack cheeks were ruddy, as if wind-scoured, and his swooping nose was thick-veined from ale.

  Among the restless throng of
people, he alone was still.

  Again, as at the gate, she felt the storm pressure beating on her spirit-eye, and for a moment, caught by those eyes, something tugged at her memory. Eremon sensed the tensing of her thigh, her shallow breath, and laid his hand over hers. ‘You’ve gone pale, lady. What ails you?’

  Rhiann ducked her head. ‘Don’t look right now, Eremon, but there is a man over there, with black hair and eyes, watching me. Do you know who he is?’

  Eremon gazed idly around the room, and then back to her. ‘Calgacus pointed him out to me. It is Maelchon, King of the Orcades islands.’

  Maelchon. Rhiann mouthed the name, but could not place it.

  ‘You are very beautiful,’ Eremon murmured, ‘but I’ll be damned if I’ll let some king stare at you like that, no matter how powerful.’ He slipped his arm around her waist, returning the man’s bold look, and Rhiann found herself sinking into his side, so close she felt his heart beat against her arm. And the pressure on her faded a little.

  It was only when Eremon said, ‘He’s leaving,’ that she dared to look over again. And when she did, she caught the back of Maelchon’s black head moving through the crowd, and behind him, a slight, hunched girl with brown hair who shot a glance at Rhiann of equal intensity, before following the King.

  ‘Why are they doing that?’ Eremon asked.

  ‘I don’t know,’ Rhiann replied. But she felt the darkness in the room drain away.

  At the sinking of the moon, when all that lay above were the cold pinpricks of stars, Maelchon prowled. A wind-storm had blown up during the feast, and now, as he paced high on the palisade, it clawed at his bear cloak, whipping his tangled hair before his eyes.

  In his own home, such restlessness, such denial, could be quickly assuaged. But here, there were no maids under his control, to take at his will.

  Seeing the Epidii queen tonight had shocked him; it was wholly unexpected. Yet the sudden shock made the fire that had only smouldered in him for three years burst into searing flame; a flame that sucked the breath from his lungs.

  Her hair was just the same, but the new maturity in her bones, the shadowed eyes, the hint of woman breast under her dress, only made her more maddening, more alluring than her girl-self had been.

  And seeing that Erin cub pawing her, his head close to that hair … it made the meat stick in Maelchon’s throat, and his hands tremble, itching to close themselves around the prince’s neck, to wrench the life away, to wipe that scornful smile from his perfect face.

  And the girl had been given to him.

  The hair had been taunting him throughout the feast, for as she dipped her head it flowed in a drape of copper and gold over her shoulders, catching the light … bringing back every bitter moment. He had seen that same sheen in the sun, against the heather of the Sacred Isle. Yet the memory of that time was inflamed by more than her beauty; far more.

  A marriage with you is out of the question, the foster-father had said. The Epidii have high hopes for a foreign alliance.

  But the man’s piercing eyes, the shared glances with wife and nobles in the great hall on the island, had belied his words.

  You are nothing, their eyes said. A petty king from a poor land; coarse and ill-gotten. You are beneath us. You are nothing.

  Far from the sentries, as the wind tore at the trees below, Maelchon gripped the palisade and a moan escaped his throat, forced past rigid muscles by the rage that roared within.

  The arrow flew wide, missing the trunk and driving deep into the mud beneath the oaks, yet Eremon let fly another and another, wrenching the barbs from the quiver across his back so swiftly that he was soon out of breath.

  When the quiver was empty, he stood, panting, and realized that he had a hunt through the undergrowth ahead of him, and really, it hadn’t made him feel much better.

  ‘I’m glad my wife can aim properly, at least.’

  Eremon turned to find Conaire leaning against a nearby birch tree, his thick arms folded.

  ‘It has been some years since I took up a bow, brother.’ Eremon waved it ruefully. ‘Yet I needed to shoot at something, and could not find you to go hunting with.’

  With so many men to fit into Calgacus’s hall, only the kings themselves had been invited to the first council. The kings, and Eremon.

  ‘That bad, was it?’ Conaire picked up a discarded arrow and wended his way through the bushes, handing it to Eremon.

  ‘That bad. Only the new Taexali king – a young buck with hot blood – Calgacus, and myself support an alliance. The others refuse, even after we set out our case; even after I was told that the Damnonii villages, including Kelan’s on the coast, were pillaged by Agricola after our raid.’ Again, Eremon swallowed down the anger and pain that accompanied that particular piece of information, for after the Roman attack on Crìanan, he had been too lost in darkness over Rhiann to remember to check how the Damnonii fared. Well, now he knew, and he cursed himself for it. ‘And there was more, brother, and still they do not see!’ He struck the tree trunk with his palm.

  Conaire was rooting around under a tangle of hawthorns for more arrows. ‘More?’

  ‘The Romans are fast building a new line of forts across the land between Forth and Tay: Venicones lands. Apparently, the Venicones have surrendered, just like the Votadini.’

  Conaire straightened, an arrow in his hand, his tilted mouth now grim. ‘And what do the kings say to that?’

  ‘That the Venicones are no more than traitors, which is why Agricola has established a border there – but so long as we are less inviting, he won’t come further.’

  ‘Ah.’

  Eremon spied an arrow sticking out of the deep loam beneath another tree, and wrenched it free. ‘It’s not a border, it’s a frontier, can’t they see that? It’s not to keep us out, it’s a place of strength from which to launch an attack!’

  ‘What was the reaction, then?’

  ‘Well, let me see if I remember one king correctly.’ Eremon folded his arms, the mud-flecked arrow sticking out from his clenched fist. ‘“This is our land, not yours, prince, and we do things our way. Our mountains keep us safe, and I’m not spending my men’s lives protecting someone else’s rich, fat lowlands!” He glanced at Calgacus as he said that – I’m surprised the King didn’t call for his sword right then and there!’ Eremon threw the arrow down with the bow. ‘And what galls me, brother, is that all the while we sit here and bicker, Agricola is out there, somewhere. He’s waiting for the signal from his emperor to move north, and he will get it. Soon, he will get it!’

  On a rolling, windblown ridge above the Earn plain, Agricola sat his horse and watched the oxen hauling the last load of timber from the river below. On his right flank, atop a rise of cropped turf and heather, his latest watchtower was taking shape. The ditch and rampart were in place, and the timber breastwork complete. His soldiers now only needed to finish the tower itself, with its lookout platform and beacon.

  Against the purple heath, the granite scree and clouded sky, it did seem vulnerable, but Agricola had not listened to the officers who said he must retreat south into safer lands. If the legions left now, the tribes would think them cowed and weak, and would be encouraged to exploit that weakness.

  In any case, the attack by the Erin prince on his western fort only succeeded because it was half-built, and the men unprepared. And as for the other fort, well. He snorted. Carelessness had done the barbarians’ work for them. The gate showed no signs of having been forced, it was open – open – with one watchman dead of an arrow wound. How that had happened, Agricola could not guess. He did not know if this was also the work of the Erin prince, but his heart suspected it.

  He sighed in exasperation. One thing he must not do, was attribute every setback to Eremon of Erin. That would only signal the start of a dangerous obsession. Samana was already a shade too interested in the happenings among the Epidii, which was natural, he supposed, after she had been so thwarted. But he had a nation to subdue, not one man.
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br />   There was a scrabbling behind him, and one of the Venicones cattle-lords – he hesitated to call them chieftains – topped the rise on a stocky hill pony. ‘My lord.’ The man was breathless, although it was the pony who had done the walking, not the man.

  ‘What is it?’

  ‘They have done well to keep it secret, but we have had word that the other tribal kings are meeting at the Dun of the Waves.’ The man pushed his chest out, so that it was nearly level with his paunch.

  Agricola’s horse flicked its tail and stamped. ‘I know.’

  The warrior’s mouth dropped open. ‘How – how did you know?’

  Agricola glanced at him derisively. ‘Did you think you are our only allies in the north? I have other informants.’

  ‘Are you going to attack?’ The cattle-lord sounded eager to get his hands on those rich Caledonii lands.

  ‘No. My informant also tells me that this dun is very well guarded, and that this king, Calgacus, will have notice of our fleet entering his waters long before we are close enough to strike his dun. We would find an ambush waiting.’

  The warrior fell silent, and Agricola pursed his lips. These people were tiresome, and the sooner they were under the Roman yoke, the better. They had no idea how to conquer a land. Launch a village raid, perhaps, or steal a few cattle – but never take over a whole territory, from sea to sea. When that territory was split by snow-scoured mountains and impenetrable bogs, its coast slashed by sea-loch after sea-loch, one could not embark on some blind, grappling assault.

  Like the barbarians’ fidchell game, the plan must be put in place tiny piece by tiny piece. Every move had to be considered carefully, and weighed up for consequences. When the emperor Titus released the army units he had recalled, Agricola would have twenty thousand pieces to command, to move across this mountain-checked board. And then he would make no mistakes.