Jack Whyte - The Skystone

"How? What's his plan?"

He grunted, wrestling the thigh bone of a large fowl from its joint. It came free with a voluptuous ripping sound that started my own saliva flowing. He slapped it onto a wooden platter and picked up half a loaf of bread, wiping his greasy fingers on it before taking a bite and speaking through a full mouth.

"Bagaudae. He ever talk to you about them?"

I laughed and looked across at Caius, who was standing alone, pouring himself some mead. "Yes. frequently. Caius admires them. He thinks their way of life is a good one. "

"Hmmph, " Plautus mumbled, swallowing the food in his mouth.

"Good? He makes them sound like they own the universe. "

"You think he plans to set up a Bagaudae community here?"

"Sounds like it. Sounds like it might work, too, until some son of a whore decides to come along and upset the whole cart. That's the only drawback I can see, but it's a big one. I wonder if he's thought about that?

About the impossibility of defending the place?"

I smiled at him. "Plautus, if he hasn't thought about it, it will be the first time I have ever known him to miss anything important. Caius is a meticulous animal when it comes to details. "

He quaffed half a cup of wine and ripped off a mouthful of succulent cold fowl, speaking around his mouthful again. "Well, we'll see. It's the first thing I'm going to ask him about. Right now. " The others were all moving back to their seats by the fire and I loaded a platter hastily, ripping off the other thigh of the fowl that had looked so good and sprinkling it liberally with salt. By the time I had poured a flagon of ale and turned back, they were into the discussion again, and Plautus was talking to Caius.

"Don't misunderstand me, " he was saying as I sat down. "I think your concept is a good one. I like the idea of everyone pulling his weight and contributing. No parasites. That's good. But — and I think this is a big but — where will you find the right people to make it work? And how would you define your priorities in setting up this community?" Surprised at the unusual fluency shown by the normally taciturn Plautus, I glanced around the faces of the group and saw that they were all endorsing his questions.

"All right, Caius, " I thought, "I've been wondering about that, too. " Caius was smiling. "Valid questions, Plautus, and I'll try to answer them as clearly as I can. " He looked around the group again. "But let's be clear in our understanding of the context, all of us. Bear in mind that we are doing more than merely talking about survival here. We are now planning for it! This is real. We are talking about the end of the world we know. We believe, each of us, that, like it or not, that end is going to come, and when it does happen, when the Empire falls, nothing that we know today will ever be the same again. Nothing! The legions will be gone — gone completely. That means there will be no law. Think of that! The law will be gone! That means no judicial system backed by the force of arms or government. No civic law, because the towns and cities will have no garrisons and no system of enforcement. On the bright side, there will be no taxes to pay, and no bureaucrats to demand them.

"No more roads will be built, and those that exist now will fall quickly into disrepair. There will be no troops in the forts of the Saxon Shore to defend against seaborne raiders. " He paused again and looked at every man. "And there will be no food available to those who do not grow their own. Think about that one fact alone, my friends. No food, unless you grow your own! The cities are going to starve. You heard Terra and Firma. It is happening already. "

His next words fell on us with the force of hammer blows, bludgeoning our disbelief.

"The entire world is going to go down into chaos when Rome falls, and the biggest danger facing anyone today is the temptation to believe that it cannot, or that it will not happen. Believe me, my friends, the only people who will survive that fall will be those people who have prepared for it by preparing themselves. By preparing their own defences. By preparing their own food supplies. By planning for their own continued, structured existence in advance of the time of chaos. "

He took a coin from a pocket in his robe and flipped it into the air, catching it as it fell. "You may think I am being over-dramatic, but here's another thought. " He held up the coin. "There will be no more of this made. No more. Even today, it is next to useless. The price of gold has risen beyond belief! So, what will we do without money? Those who have it will hoard it, but with no new supply, the hoarders will soon face the day when it has lost all value, for men will have stopped using it. They will have gone back to the barter system. Among ourselves, in our community, we have to stop using it immediately. " His pause held us as much as his words and his automatic assumption that we were going to go along with his suggestions. "I say 'immediately' because I want you to be aware that we, the people gathered here, with all our families, our friends, our servants and our neighbours, are going to survive. All of us. We have the will, the intellect, the necessary skills, the ability, the tenacity and the advantage of foreknowledge. We will survive. And we will prosper. And we will preserve an island of real Roman virtues, Roman values, Roman worth and Roman standards of freedom and dignity here in this island of Britain. "

It was a stirring piece of rhetoric. When he had finished, he sat there looking from one to the other of us, and nobody moved or spoke. The silence stretched and grew, and eventually he started speaking again, taking up where he had stopped.

"Of course, as you have heard Tonius say, the end is not going to come tomorrow or the day after. But you have also heard Terra and Firma, and you know they are correct. It may take ten years, it may take twenty, or even more, but it is going to come, my friends. "

Another silence, then Gaius Gallus asked, "So, when do we start organizing this community you speak of? And how? You still haven't answered Plautus's questions. "

Caius pursed his lips. "I will now, and yours, too. We have started. It has begun, tonight. You asked about priorities, Plautus. Well, let's start with defences. Tonius? Am I wrong to place this aspect first?" Plautus and Tonius both smiled, Plautus looking at me, and Tonius said, "No, Caius. I would doubt your sanity if you placed it anywhere else."

"Well, then. How do you see our case?"

Tonius, now in the role of Legate Cicero, General of the armies, shrugged. "I have no idea. How big a territory do you want to hold?"

"This valley. "

"All of it?" There was surprise in his voice.

"Why not? It is a Roman enclave. "

"But it must be twelve miles square, Caius!"

"Fourteen long by about eleven wide, I estimate. "

"That is a lot of land to defend. "

"Nowhere near as big as the Empire, Tonius. The entire plain is four times that large. Eventually, I hope to coverall of it. "

"That's all very well, Caius. " This was Plautus again. He seemed to have completely forgotten his awe of officers. "But where will you find the men?"

"We will find them, Plautus, have no fear of that. Given the time, we'll breed them! Grow them ourselves!" This brought a welcome gust of laughter. "In the meantime, every able-bodied citizen of the new Colony will bear arms, as our ancestors did in the beginning.

Soldiering will be a part of farming. It will be a feature of our community life. As our numbers grow, our armed strength will grow. Tonius, where would you base our forces, when we have enough?" There was a pause as Cicero mulled this over. "Up on the hills. There are some old Celtic forts on the high hills of this region, without getting into the mountains. I would refurbish them. They are well placed. "