Адриан Голдсуорти - The Encircling Sea

‘Apologies, centurion, but it seemed necessary.’

The door did not burn, and once the Novantae realised this they began to leave. Ten loped off towards the boats. The rest waited for a short while and rode off towards the ford. Two rode double, supporting wounded comrades, and two more had captive women slung across the necks of their horses, and Ferox felt flat as he saw them because he knew that for the moment there was nothing he could do. They must have come from the farm or another settlement. With their other trophies, the heads, the horses, and weapons including Crispinus’ fine sword, there might be enough marks of victory for the leader to claim that their losses were worth it.

Ferox watched them as they went down the slope, saw them wading into the ford, but then the rain came, heavier than before, and the cloud was so low that he could not see them anymore. The scent of salt was even stronger, and the circling gulls were joined by carrion birds.

The patrol from Luguvallium arrived half an hour later. There were just fifteen of them, and Ferox wondered what fool had sent so few. Crispinus insisted on taking the horse from one of the troopers and leading the rest in pursuit, berating the decurion in charge who insisted that he had been sent to reconnoitre and not to chase barbarians. The appearance of Cerialis left the man overwhelmed with forceful senior officers, and he gave in. Ferox doubted that they would catch up, and hoped that the two officers would have the sense not to fight unless the Novantae were careless and vulnerable.

‘What about us?’ Vindex asked him. He had calmed down once the enemy left, and was surprised not to be going with the cavalry.

‘I’m going back to the boats.’ Ferox did not explain, and the scout may have sensed that he did not really know why he wanted to go.

It was getting dark by the time they had walked to the beach. On the way, they found the headless corpse of the cavalryman sent out from the tower. The dead man looked very pale in his nakedness. There were slashes across his thighs, arms, and chest, as well as the deep wound to the stomach that had brought him down. That was the way of the Novantae, the injuries meant to weaken the man so that he would not become a danger to his killers in the Otherworld.

They cut off a couple of branches from a tree, sharpened the ends and drove one into the ground on either side of the dead man so that it would be easier for the burial party to find him.

When they got to the beach the fires had long since died down, and the carcases of the three boats looked black in the fading light. The good boat had gone, but on the beach lay the two corpses, and the little boy sitting beside the old man. He was staring out to sea, clutching the dead man’s cold hand. The older lad, the one the centurion had knocked out, was nowhere to be seen.

‘Why did you not go with them?’ Ferox asked.

‘They did not want me,’ the lad said in a flat tone. He squeezed the corpse’s hand even more tightly. ‘My uncle was the last who cared. The others are gone.’

‘How old are you, boy?’

‘They say I have nine summers or maybe ten.’ He was small for his age, but up close Ferox thought that to be about right.

Ferox sat down on the sand beside him. ‘If you wish, we will set you on your way, give you food, and you may walk home.’

The boy said nothing, still gazing out to sea.

‘Or, if you give me your word, I will take you into my service for seven years. Then you may go wherever you will.’

‘I hear the Romans take boys as if they were women.’

‘Some fools do,’ Ferox said, ‘but I do not. No one will do that with you.’

‘Good,’ the boy said. ‘When I am a few years older I want a wife with pale skin and long black hair that she can wrap around me to tie us together for all time.’

Ferox wondered whether the child was even older, and thought again how the words of poets settled in the mind even of the young. ‘It will be up to you to find her.’

‘I will do it.’ At last the boy turned to face him. ‘What will you want as service? I can fight if you give me a sword.’

‘In time,’ Ferox said, managing not to smile. ‘For the moment you will look after the horses. Do you know much about horses?’

‘Not as much as I know about boats.’ It was a boast, but Ferox sensed real knowledge behind it. He ignored Vindex’s muttered ‘Well, can you use a shovel?’

Ferox stood up. ‘Will you swear to serve me for seven years, swear by the gods your tribe swears by and by moon and stars and the cold wind?’ He thought that was the way the Novantae took an oath.

The boy got up. ‘I swear.’

‘Good. Then what is your name, child of the sea?’

‘Some call me Bran.’

It did not sound like any name he had heard, but if the boy wanted to hide his real name then that was up to him. ‘Then come with us, Bran, unless you have more to do for your uncle.’

‘It is done. The sea and the birds will take him and the others.’ The boy’s eyes were glassy, but he did not break down.

‘Come, Bran.’ Ferox held out his hand and the boy took it. They walked off the beach. Vindex waited for a moment, and kissed his wheel of Taranis before he followed, wondering about the future.

NERATIUS MARCELLUS, legatus augusti pro praetore of the province of Britannia, sat on a folding chair on the raised platform and waited for the blaring trumpets to cease. There were a dozen cornicines on either side of the dais, eight from each of the three legions represented at this parade, and as they repeated the rising scale the blare was enormous, drowning the warbling sound of the high Hibernian horns, shaped liked the letter S. One of the chieftains covered his ears.

The last hanging note of the fanfare ceased, and there was silence, apart from the gentle rippling of flags and cloaks in the breeze. Three officers stood behind the legate, and next to them was the aquilifer of II Augusta, holding aloft the precious standard of the legion, the gilded bird with wings upraised and clutching a thunderbolt in its claws. The eagle did not normally leave a legion’s base unless most of the unit took the field, but the legate had wanted one of Rome’s eagles to witness the scene, so had given specific orders. To guard it II Augusta had sent their first cohort, twice the size of the other nine cohorts in the legion, and drawn from the biggest and most experienced soldiers, who stood in eight ranks behind the podium. The other two legions stationed in Britannia had each sent two cohorts, with VIIII Hispana parading on the right of the legate and XX Valeria Victrix on the left. Altogether there were almost two and a half thousand legionaries, and over three thousand auxiliaries, a third of them cavalrymen, standing at an angle to the legionaries to form three sides of a square. The standards of all the units, more than seventy of them, were divided into two parties formed beside the trumpeters. This was the field force that the legate had assembled for the summer’s manoeuvres, but it was also a grand show of strength for receiving the Hibernian rulers.

Ferox stood in front of the platform to act as interpreter. It took a while for the ringing in his ears to stop after the fanfares. The chieftain who had covered his ears shook his head a few times after the noise stopped. Otherwise, neither the kings nor their nobles and escorting warriors showed any reaction at all. They would see an army parading, shields uncovered to show their elaborate insignia, metal of armour, weapons, and fittings polished to a high sheen, leather brushed and wooden shafts oiled. Ferox would make sure that in the days to come the visitors were told that this was but a fraction of the army of the province, and that Britannia’s garrison was an even smaller part of the mighty army of the emperor. It was possible that they would believe him.