Emperor

XV

Somehow Nectovelin had dragged Cunedda out of the thick of the fighting. He brought him to the cover of a scrap of wood, on a patch of high ground unoccupied by the Romans.

Nectovelin, his own face a mask of blood, loomed over him. 'I don't want to hear a word about how you have been dishonoured by not being allowed to die. You're smart enough to know that there's no honour in a pointless death. And it would have been pointless, wouldn't it?'

Cunedda struggled to sit up. They were in the shade of the trees, in cool green. His head banged with pain; Nectovelin said a warrior on his own side had managed to clatter him with a club. He was drenched with blood, but little of it was his own.

The roaring of the battle continued, and the air stank of shit and death. He scrambled to the edge of the copse and peered out.

From this bit of high ground he could see the disposition of the Roman army. The Roman units were still hard, compact blocks, red and black and silver. There were ten of them, with four in a front row engaged with the British and two rows of three waiting in reserve behind. Further away was another set of ten cohorts with a similar deployment. Away from the stolid blocks of the legionary cohorts were smaller units, on foot or horseback. They were auxiliaries, he knew, cavalry or specialists such as archers and slingers. They held their positions, not needed yet.

By comparison the shapeless British mob looked like a tide that had swept forward. And wherever British wave crashed against sturdy Roman block there was a bright froth of blood.

Nectovelin, beside him, pointed. 'Look over there.'

Marching from the west, Cunedda made out more compact Roman units, tramping steadily towards the fray.

'I've been counting the cohorts,' Nectovelin said grimly. 'I reckon we face three Roman legions today. Ten cohorts each, see? We've already broken ourselves on two of them. And now here comes the third, to mop us up.'

'How long was I out?'

Nectovelin shrugged. 'Heartbeats. Not long.'

Cunedda glanced up and saw that the sun hadn't moved perceptibly from where it had been when the charge had begun. 'And yet the battle is already lost.'

'Oh, there's plenty of killing to be done. But, yes. In fact we lost it the moment we charged. Look.' He pointed to the rear of the British lines, where the non-combatants, the wives and children and traders, were hastily packing up and fleeing. 'The Roman cavalry will come after them, but the women and children ought to get away. Agrippina has a chance.' He laughed darkly. 'Never did think much of Roman cavalry.'

'What of the princes?'

'Who can say?'

'Nectovelin, in the thick of the fighting-the way the Romans killed-it was relentless.'

'This is the way civilised men kill,' Nectovelin said. 'It is an industry. They kill as they make pots. To leave a man to fight again is, to them'-he waved a hand-'a waste of effort.'

'Why did you pull me out of there?'

'Because, by Coventina's baggy quim, though the day is lost, Cunedda, the war is long. We'll find Agrippina, and we'll think again.'

They turned from the grinding battle and slipped away.