Адриан Голдсуорти - Brigantia

Ferox obeyed, lifting the body and walking over to the brink of the chasm. He let the man fall, saw him vanish into the foam, and part of him half expected the woman to step up behind and push him over as well. When he turned he saw that she was already on her way back to the camp. As soon as Vindex returned with their mounts, they set out, riding north for an hour before they made a cold camp. They left the Ordovices to lie and hoped no others would appear seeking revenge. Before dawn they woke and set out once more.

Enica dressed like a Parthian and rode like one as well, her grey seeming to respond to her merest thought without need for any gesture. At times she did not even hold the reins, merely looping them round one of the pommels on her saddle. Before she swathed herself in a hooded cloak the next morning, Ferox saw that her trousers were russet, her tunics a pale blue, and all of them from silk.

‘Any fool can be uncomfortable,’ Enica told him, noticing his surprise. ‘Lice don’t seem to like it, which means it’s also the best way to keep free of them.’ Ferox wondered whether that was true. Vermin were simply a fact of life. You could cull them now and again, smoke them out if you did not mind your clothes reeking of charcoal for a month, but only really be free of them if you lived close to a good bath-house, used it often, and changed every day. Otherwise, lice were like the weather, sometimes a torment but usually bearable.

‘It makes you conspicuous,’ he said. He guessed that with the silks, the princely grey horses, the young woman was probably wandering around with the equivalent of a hundred years’ pay for a legionary.

She gestured with her hand, splaying the fingers like a fan as she passed by her face. ‘I am conspicuous.’

‘That you are, lady,’ Vindex said admiringly.

She smiled at him. ‘The Carvetii are a courteous folk. Sadly, the Silures mistake silence for wit.’

The tracks to the north were hard to find, and they got lost more than once or came to a dead end beyond which the horses could not pass. At first they said little, although Vindex sang softly for much of the way. He did not have a pleasant voice, but he sang stories of the old days, of the proud kings and magical queens of the Brigantes, of feasts and rivalries, contests and battles. Enica smiled at him often. Now and again she caught Ferox’s eye and then she would screw her face up in a scowl, mocking him.

Twice Ferox saw a warrior up on the peaks above them, squatting beside a boulder, watching as they passed. He was not sure, but thought that it was the same man each time, and a nimble man on foot could easily have kept pace along the heights, given how slow and winding were the paths they took. At noon they reached a bridge, much like the other one, save that it had been deliberately broken. There were tracks of around thirty or forty horses; the mud was too churned up to be more precise. The horses were heavily laden and all much the same size, and the prints left by the men who had dismounted showed hobnailed caligae . Cavalry had come here, crossed over and then ripped up the planks, piling them neatly on the far bank.

‘I’m guessing you are not with them,’ Ferox said.

‘I am with you, centurion, hadn’t you noticed?’

Ferox ignored Vindex’s chuckle. ‘Then who are they? They cannot have been far behind you all this time.’

‘Is it my fault if men follow me?’ The voice was pure Claudia, in spite of the Parthian rig and swords at her belt. She sighed. ‘You can be rather dull, do you know that? I had always understood the Silures could look at tracks and tell you what colour eyes the wife of the rider’s cousin has. No? Pity.

‘They are Brigantes, since your art fails you so lamentably. Men from the royal ala, and led by my brother.’

‘And what does he want?’ An arched eyebrow prompted him to add, ‘My lady.’

‘At last, a tiny piece of courtesy. Maybe there is hope for you after all, Flavius Ferox. My brother does not want what I want. He never really has, since the days when I followed him around and his pride took daily insults because his little sister was better than him at everything.’

‘Apart perhaps from modesty?’

‘That is merely a fancy way of telling lies. Why should I deny the truth? I thought that at least was something Silures understood?’

‘You need to tell me what is going on, my lady.’

‘Do I?’ She gave him a coy look. ‘Do I really? Perhaps later.’

‘I could make you,’ he said, growing tired.

‘You could try.’ She walked her horse away from the river. ‘Had not we better move on? As we climb nearer the source of the stream there is bound to be a spot narrow enough to cross. Come along.’

‘I am not your whisperer, lady.’

‘Indeed not, Achilles can be amusing. He is also one of the finest bookkeepers in all the lands. Vindex?’

‘Yes, lady.’

‘If this fellow insults me again, will you be kind enough to kill him?’

The scout gave a broad grin. ‘Happily, lady.’

‘If he is a only little rude, just chop something off.’

‘Happy to oblige.’ He rode after Claudia Enica. Ferox stayed where he was, and after a moment Vindex turned back and leered. ‘You don’t have to come.’

Soon they were leading the animals more often than riding. Claudia Enica kept pace and showed no sign of being more tired than either of the men. They kept climbing and eventually reached a wide plateau. The stream was smaller there, chuckling along at the bottom of a gully. After a search they found a spot where it was only a few yards across, and the banks looked firm on either side. Vindex insisted on going first, and whispered in his horse’s ears before he put her at the jump. The mare sailed over, landing well. Before Ferox could offer to help, Enica took both her greys over at the same time, riding one and leading the other on a long rein. They were superb animals, smaller than Frost and Snow, a pair of matched greys given to Ferox by King Tincommius, but alike in many ways. He wished he had either of those mounts with him now, but one was lost and the other still recovering from a wound.

Ferox came last, and his gelding was not keen at all. Twice it refused, and he had to slap it hard on the rump several times. First it bucked, then it shot forward and bounded over the gap so suddenly that he almost lost his seat. The others watched with amusement.

The afternoon wore on as they began to follow the stream and go down to where they could hope to find a better path. As the sun started to set, Vindex cantered ahead to look for somewhere to camp for the night.

‘I suppose you expect to share my food,’ Enica said as she watched him vanish into a dell.

‘We have some.’ In truth they had little left, for most of the provisions were on the pack animals with the main party – or scattered in the chasm and down the flowing stream in the case of the lost pony. ‘And are used to going without. I am sure you are too. The Mother teaches hard lessons to her sons and daughters.’

‘She does.’

‘When I met Claudia Enica in Londinium I would never have imagined you now, or fighting with those warriors. She – well, you – seemed so…’ He sought for the right word, sensing that all the time she was testing him and that so far he had not done well.

‘Soft,’ she said. ‘Weak and silly.’

‘No.’ In truth that was just what he had thought. ‘But precious, like a glass vase. Beautiful and perfect, and so fragile that it must ever be wrapped in silk and kept safe.’ He felt he was getting it right. ‘I fought alongside the sons and daughters not long ago. The sons were not far into their training. The daughters were good, although not as good as you. You reminded me of the Mother.’