Brigantia

XXX

‘TODAY FOR VENGEANCE, tomorrow for mourning,’ Vindex said firmly, and drew his sword. His spear was buried in the royal guard and the shaft had broken when he tried to pull it free. The scout smiled. ‘As long as you think this is a good idea!’

Sepenestus had killed the other two, and his arrows came out much more easily. He wiped the heads on the hem of his tunic and put the arrows back in his bag.

‘There are nine left and the prisoner,’ Ferox said. ‘You’ve already done enough and don’t have to come.’

The archer sniffed at that and patted his sword, an army-pattern spatha. Gannascus nodded approvingly. ‘We cannot wait for more of them to arrive, so it will just have to be unfair,’ the big man rumbled, saying almost as much as he had done in the three days of pursuit.

As Enica had shouted out, the battle had been won, and a lot of the credit went to her. Cerialis had taken the old fort after a bitter struggle. The stocky little Vardulli were saying that they had rescued the Batavians and the big men from the Rhineland were denying that they needed any help. Both prefects had been wounded, but managed to stay on their feet until it was done. On the left Brocchus and the cavalry had fought a long, whirling fight, charging, driving the enemy back, before being chased in turn. Numbers were with the Brigantes, and they were on the higher ground, so that they did not break easily. Gradually, the auxiliaries made headway, until their main lines were on top of the hill. Next to them the royal cohort had met the Gauls, who had fought for a long time before weight of numbers drove them back. Somehow, Neratius Marcellus had got an order to the reserve cohort of Legio XX and the Victrix had plugged the hole in the line. Beyond the rampart, men had fought and died where they stood, and it was only Ferox and the men around him who had begun forcing that vast crowd of enemies back. Soon, someone’s will would have broken. It only took a few to turn and run and others would follow. It might have been the Romans, especially at the rampart, for there it was hard for the Britons to give way with so many men pressing behind them.

Then the horns sounded. Enica brought no more than five hundred warriors to the fight. Quite a few were Carvetii, led by Vindex’s half-brother, who was on his way to seek vengeance even before the high queen sent out her call. A lot of men were sympathetic or simply hated her brother for what he had done, but some were afraid, and there was simply not time to gather the rest. Enica needed men with horses, and gratefully took the chariot and team from a chieftain too old to walk, let alone fight. She also wanted horns or trumpets, and took any she could find. Vindex had told her the story of when they had caught Rufus and the others, and she had liked the idea. Nearly seventy of her riders carried something to blow, so that when she reached the battlefield, horses foamy with sweat and too weary to do more than trot, it had sounded like a vast host ready to fight.

The deception worked. The Brigantes were fighting hard, but had not yet won and were growing tired. When a host of their kin appeared behind them, lining the crest of the next row of hills, they doubted. When Enica rode among them, calling out for all of her people to follow her and she would ensure they were free to go, all but a few grasped at the chance of life. Arviragus escaped. None of his people would hinder him, and probably some of Enica’s men felt the same, not wanting royal blood on their hands. No more than twenty or so men went with him. Many of the guards fought until Enica implored them to lay down their arms if they wished to carry them in her service. Here and there across the field little groups fought to the last, but the result was no longer in doubt.

Philo was delighted when Ferox told him about the ploy. The young slave was almost as delighted, and a good deal more scared, when his master told him that he would have his freedom as soon as the documents could be prepared. There had not been time in the two hours Ferox was given to get ready for the pursuit. To his surprise, Enica did not want to come.

‘A sister should not shed a brother’s blood, even after he has tried to kill me. It is better this way.’ She stood tall and proud, every inch a queen, and he found it hard to believe that they had any future. Still, perhaps the gods still meant him to pay for her life with his own, and it was with that gloomy thought he rode off, taking the others with him as well as five Carvetii scouts.

Arviragus headed north, and as they followed Ferox began to recognise more and more of the country. He wondered whether the prince hoped to reach the tribes beyond the province, trusting them to give him shelter. Gannascus was dismissive when he suggested this.

‘Tincommius will not want to provoke the Romans.’

The fugitives did their best to confuse the pursuit they must have known was following, and snow might have saved them, but the brooding skies gave only drizzle hour after hour, so that their horses left prints that were easy for Ferox to track. Most of the men rode cavalry mounts, but there were several ponies and two very big horses, one of which surely carried the prince.

Late on the second day the trail split, eight men heading west into the high hills. Two of them rode the big horses.

‘I can’t see anything,’ Vindex said after he had stared at the prints for a long while.

‘Different rider,’ Ferox insisted with more confidence than he felt. There was something odd about the prints he had found in a long patch of mud. Only a few from one of the big horses were good enough to see apart from the muddle of all the rest. He wondered whether he really saw something or just sensed that this was a ploy because it was the sort of thing he would do if he was trying to escape. It could be a bluff, although he doubted Arviragus had the subtlety to think that way.

In the end he compromised, sending the Carvetii after the smaller trail, and taking the others after the main party. They had only gone a mile or so after the decoys, so not much time was lost. During the next day, Ferox knew that they were gaining, and close to dusk they caught up with them. Thirteen horses were in the pens around five round houses, crammed in with the livestock spared the winter slaughter. It was a farmstead like any other, although not yet quite close enough to his region for him to know the people who lived there.

Three of the royal troopers acted as sentries, and Sepenestus shot two while Vindex stalked and killed the third. They were tired, not keeping a good watch, and Ferox could only hope the same exhausted despair had fallen over the rest of the party.

‘You know the prince?’ Ferox asked the bowman.

Sepenestus nodded.

‘You must not kill him.’ Just as Enica must not be a part of her brother’s death, so the prince, even though he was a rebel, must have the chance of an honourable death, toe to toe with his pursuers. Perhaps then the rifts torn among the Brigantes would heal more quickly. Ferox was not sure, but his wife and the legate might be right and those were his orders. The bowman went to their left, hanging back a little as the other three strode towards the farm. Vindex had one of the horns they had used in the battle and managed a rasping blast.

‘Come out, lord prince!’ Ferox yelled as loud as he could. ‘Come out and face us!’ Vindex stood on his left, and the towering German on his right. ‘You must kill us if you ever wish to leave this place.’

There was silence, so Ferox nodded and the scout blew the ox horn trumpet again and he repeated the challenge. ‘This is Ferox,’ he added. ‘The noble Neratius Marcellus and your sister have sent me to find you.’

Arviragus wore the torc and the helmet and armour of Venutius, even though he must now know that the last two were not genuine. He bent down to come through the door and then stood.

‘Just four of you,’ he said, his voice as weary as it was disappointed. ‘It would be you, wouldn’t it, Ferox – leading the wolves on my trail.’ He drew his sword. ‘I will not go back.’

‘I know, lord prince. But if you are to go on, you must face us first.’

Arviragus smiled and seemed to grow taller as if some of his spirit returned. He walked towards them as his men appeared. Four troopers of the royal guard came from another house and stood on his right. Another, along with Brigantus, a chieftain and another warrior joined him on the left. The warrior was naked in spite of the cold, his body a whirling network of blue woad, and Ferox remembered this man in his black chariot. He dragged Crispinus by a chain, and the tribune crawled like a dog. The warrior kicked him, until he lay down next to the wall of a pen, moaning.

There was no ditch around the farm, or even a wall or fence, and the courtyard between the pens and houses simply opened up into the meadow where the three men stood.

Gannascus gave a deep-throated chuckle.

‘Oh well,’ Vindex muttered, and they started to walk forward as the Brigantes came for them.

Sepenestus loosed an arrow. The trooper on the far right raised his oval shield to block it, but did not realise the appalling power of the archer’s bow at this range. The arrowhead was slim and pointed, similar to the head of a pilum, and it drove straight through the shieldboard and into the man’s eye. A second arrow was in the air, and the next trooper held his shield up firmer and further from his body, so that when the head came through it did not reach him. He shook from the impact.

Ferox had borrowed a cavalryman’s oval shield from a Batavian trooper, and it was much lighter than a scutum. There was a notch on the blade of his gladius, courtesy of the man with the torc, and he had not had time to work on it. The memory the battle had faded, as it always did, and there was little left of the wild joy he had felt when he had brandished the aquila as a club. His own helmet had been trampled and bent, so he had also borrowed a fur-topped one from the same soldier.

Another arrow banged against the trooper’s shield, making him stagger again. Then the next went under the rim and struck just above the knee. That was wonderful shooting in the gloom, and the man gasped, dropping his shield and spear to clutch at his leg. He was hit again, hard in the chest, and fell.

Arviragus yelled and ran at Ferox, the others taking up his cry. One of the troopers threw a spear at Vindex, who deflected it with his shield. The other cavalryman had a sword and the scout parried the blow with his own blade. Gannascus bounded forward, lunged with his own spear to spit the chieftain, who fell, gasping for breath. The German barged Brigantus out of the way with his shield as he reached for his sword. The bodyguard was showing none of the speed he had been famed for in his days as a gladiator.

The naked man was on Ferox’s right, the prince on his left, and both watched him. He feinted at the warrior, who stepped back and then slashed at him as he tried to turn and attack the prince. Their swords met, throwing off sparks in the darkness, and the prince cut faster than he expected, giving him a glancing blow on the helmet. Ferox’s head rang.

Each of them faced two men as Sepenestus watched for a clear shot. Vindex managed to give one of the troopers a cut on the chin, but before he could regain his balance, the other one slid his blade past his shield and punctured his mail shirt. Gannascus was forcing his two opponents back, moving with a speed truly uncanny in so big a man. His shield was scarred by their blows, but he kept coming, pounding them with it.

‘Never trust that bitch!’ Arviragus spat the words at Ferox. ‘She’d kill any man without a thought.’

Ferox did not reply. He had realised that the warrior was faster than the prince, so now he loosened his grip on his shield, wanting to use the prince’s taunts.

‘Don’t trust Crispinus either. He’s done more than you know. Hanged a girl at Vindolanda. Humped her first, though. Only a slave, but still… Bet he’s rutted with my sister as well!’

Ferox bellowed, trying to sound enraged, and, letting go, he hurled the shield at the prince, something only a madman would do. Arviragus flung up his own shield to block it and went back. As he did so Ferox dived and rolled, swordpoint under the warrior’s guard as he pushed it deep into his groin. The shriek was piercing, and he yanked at his sword, taking a moment to tear it free.

Gannascus killed the trooper as the man was distracted by the scream of agony. One of the men facing Vindex tried to work around him and took an arrow in the back. The scout hooked his shield around the edge of the other man, ripped it away and rammed his sword into the man’s chest, snapping the scales of his armour.

Ferox was pushing himself up, and then was beaten face down onto the ground by a sword slamming against him. He rolled away, but felt a bitter stab of pain as the point went into his side.

‘Poisoning bastard!’ Ferox had never heard Vindex so full of rage. ‘That was my father.’

‘I did not do it,’ Arviragus maintained, but his voice trembled.

Vindex came at him, arm whirling as he slashed down again and again. The prince took the blows on his shield, which started to split as the relentless scout came after him. Ferox pushed himself up. Gannascus had beheaded Brigantus, but stayed back, understanding that this was something Vindex had to do on his own.

‘It was him!’ Arviragus gasped. ‘Not me!’ He sounded like a child caught stealing apples. His shield collapsed into fragments. He lunged desperately, and Vindex was so wild that he had left a gap and the sword broke mail rings and came back red. Arviragus smiled, and then the scout stabbed him through the mouth. Vindex held the corpse upright for what seemed like a long time. Then he spat in his face and let him fall.

Ferox was sitting up, his back and side burning with pain. Vindex sat beside him, hand clamped to his side, which was clearly the nastier of the two wounds he had taken. A pale face peered out at them from one of the huts.

‘Trouble?’ Ferox asked.

‘They may help. Unless they are bound by oaths to the prince. Then they probably won’t be so friendly.’

Gannascus went over to the corpse of the prince and prised off the torc.

‘My king sent me for this,’ he said.

‘Take it.’ Ferox said. He had always suspected Tincommius wanted more than to simply help his Roman allies. He did not care. ‘Tell him to keep it.’

‘We go now.’

‘I’m not going to stop you!’

‘No, you won’t, but some Romans might try, so we will not give them the chance.’ Gannascus came over to stare down at them. ‘You will live,’ he announced. ‘Probably.’ He gave them a big grin. ‘I hope we will not be enemies one day.’

‘I’ll try to send you the girl,’ Ferox said.

‘Keep her. I don’t think she would like the north very much. And she’s fond of that boy of yours.’

‘Philo?’ Ferox had not had the slightest idea, and it felt odd that the massive German had realised what he had not seen.

‘Farewell. You are my friends always.’ The grin was back. ‘Unless the king says otherwise. Farewell.’ He and the archer strode off, going back to the horses

Ferox and Vindex sat in silence side by side. The scout began cutting up his cloak to bandage their wounds. There were faces in the doorways, and hopefully soon the people would come and help them. He doubted that they owed any particular loyalty to the prince, and the Brigantes were hospitable folk as a rule. Crispinus still crouched by the pen, muttering to himself, and he wondered what they had done to him and whether his wits would ever return. The prince’s words were in his head, but he did not have the energy to think about them.

‘Still think this was a good idea?’ Vindex said.

Ferox laughed, and his side hurt, which only made him laugh the more.