Gavin Smith - The Age of Scorpio

‘Because their god is watching us,’ Fachtna growled.

‘And wants you to know that the poison we coat our blades with is made from his blood. Our spears will pierce armour and flesh and rupture bowels. You will smell the filth of your own death.’ It was the same warrior who had spoken before.

‘Enough!’ Teardrop cried. His stance relaxed but his staff stayed at the ready. The warriors shifted slightly, keeping their spears levelled at them. ‘Either fight or take me to your god,’ Teardrop demanded. Fachtna looked less than pleased.

The village was a series of roundhouses not too dissimilar to those of Britha’s own people, although smaller. They were set on a number of low islands of hard-packed dirt that rose out of the surrounding marsh. They called themselves the Pobl Neidr, the People of the Snake, and were part of the much larger Catuvellauni, whose name meant Leaders of Battle. They had burned their own village, taken what supplies they could and fled into the marshes before Bress’s raiders. They had tried to fight them using cunning and their greater knowledge of the land, or so Tangwen, the warrior who had been doing all the talking, told them. Tangwen was a woman but apparently found it useful to impersonate a man in order to get other warriors to take her seriously. This didn’t make any sense at all to Britha, who also found it odd that they showed no reaction to Teardrop’s swollen and deformed head

Fachtna was clearly not happy. He treated the snake-masked warriors with contempt and was obviously itching for a fight despite near-constant warnings from Teardrop. Leaving the village, they were taken deep into the marshes by hidden trails and sunken causeways. The People of the Snake moved with an easy grace through the marsh, but more than once Fachtna, Britha or Teardrop missed their footing and ended up soaked or covered in mud.

‘We are going to find this thing and kill it, root out the centre of the corruption, yes?’ Fachtna demanded.

‘We are going to see what it is. Things are not as they should be here.’

Beyond realising that the Naga were a hated enemy of Fachtna, Britha could not make out what was happening.

She did not realise that there was a large island in the marsh until she stepped from a sunken causeway and onto it. It just blended with the rest of the marsh. There, staying low beneath the height of the rushes, she saw the rest of the People of the Snake. They did not have the fearsome countenance of the mud-covered, painted and masked warriors. They were landsfolk, or more likely fisherfolk and those who hunted birds, judging by the wooden frames with hanging fish and fowl. They regarded the newcomers with apprehension and would not look directly at their own warriors. This Britha understood: the warriors had taken on aspects of the serpents that they looked like. Dangerous spirits would possess them when they wore the snake masks. They were no longer kin to these folks but fearsome animalistic warriors.

In the centre of the island was what initially looked to Britha like a stone-lined well, but as she got closer she realised that it was a series of wooden steps lodged between the rocks of a dry-stone shaft going down into the island itself. Fachtna was shaking his head.

‘What are you frightened of?’ Britha asked, goading him.

‘I am to keep Teardrop safe. Go down there yourself if you want.’

‘You are safe if you do not wish ill on us and our father,’ Tangwen said. She nodded to some of the folk nearby. They shrank from the serpent visage of her mask, and just for a moment Britha caught the look of discomfort on the other woman’s face through the mud. They were brought food, a stew made from fish and fowl in bread trenchers, and wooden mugs of something ale-like. As a child offered Fachtna his food, he slapped it out of her hands. The little girl looked shocked and then very angry.

‘I’ll not accept hospitality from the likes of you,’ Fachtna told Tangwen. Teardrop look pained. Britha watched Tangwen’s expression darken and saw the look of anger on the other warriors’ faces.

The blow landed so solidly because Fachtna had not been expecting Britha to hit him. His nose flattened itself against his face and squirted blood down over his mouth and bearded chin.

‘What was that for?’ the genuinely aggrieved Fachtna demanded.

‘I don’t care who these people are to you,’ Britha told him, using her left-handed voice, the sinister tone, the one designed to frighten and curse. ‘If you don’t want their hospitality, then refuse it. If you want to fight, then challenge them. What you do not do is behave with the manners of a diseased dog in my presence, because what you do affects Teardrop and myself as well. They do not fear our swords or spears so you should not fear their food and drink! Do you understand me, boy!’

Fachtna looked furious. Britha was sure that he would at least strike her, perhaps even draw his sword. She was prepared to use the spear. The warriors of the People of the Snake and the folk under their protection watched. Chagrin replaced anger on Fachtna’s face. Whatever he might have been, he did know how to behave with respect, and he knew that he was in the wrong, much to Britha’s relief.

Fachtna knelt by the little girl.

‘I am sorry,’ he told her in her own language. Like all other languages he could speak it, and like all others Britha found herself able to understand it. Fachtna picked the bread from the ground, found bits of meat, barley and vegetables and put them back into the trencher. Then he ate it all. He handed the girl the wooden cup. ‘If you would be prepared to get me another drink, I would drink it and with thanks. I would understand if you did not.’ The little girl stared at him fiercely. He met her look, but she fetched him another drink. Fachtna thanked her and then stood up.

‘I apologise. Please do not judge my companions on my behaviour. I will meet you over meat or metal as you prefer,’ he said to Tangwen, who nodded her acceptance. Finally he turned to Teardrop and Britha. ‘I apologise to you both.’

Teardrop shook his head, looking bemused. Britha nodded, accepting the apology though still angry. It was clear to her that the Naga, whoever they were, had done Fachtna a great wrong in the past. She had gratefully accepted her trencher and cup. It was good to taste normal food again, not the strange stuff they had given her on the Will of Dagon , which had done terrible things to her bowels.

‘We are safe now,’ she said as they accepted the protection of the law of hospitality by sharing food and drink with the People of the Snake. Perhaps Fachtna was right: perhaps these people were the lowest of the low, oath-breakers who would break the law of hospitality, but she knew that for her part she would not reject it.

Britha now understood why Fachtna had wanted to fight. This was neither natural nor right. She too felt the urge to drive her spear through the abomination of their hosts’ living god.

Her people respected the serpent. It was a powerful animal. They invoked it on stone, in paint and in their woad tattoos. It was the symbol of the ban draoi , the female symbol of power, which was why it was tattooed across her back. What she saw before her, however, was nothing more than a mockery of the serpent she respected.

The chamber was large and lined with stone. They had entered from the shaft through a crawl space following a shallow stream. There was a dirt mound in the centre. The shallow stream surrounded the mound. Some kind of silver-coloured crystals covered the dry-stone walls. They crystals had formed in similar patterns to that made by wax as it melts down the side of a candle.

Set back further in the chamber, in the shadows thrown by the free-standing bronze braziers that lit the room, was the entrance to another chamber. Through the darkness Britha could make out the second, much smaller chamber. It was also lined with the crystal. There was a strange-looking sleeping pallet on the floor of the room. Something about it made Britha think of a nest. The air was thick with the smell that she had always associated with animals. As ban draoi she shared in the meat and milk provided by the livestock kept by the rest of the tribe. Her roundhouse had to be kept as a ritual space, however, and as such she had never had to share it with cows, sheep, goats or chickens.