Alternate Generals (2 page)

"Young ladies," I returned with a slight bow.

Boudica stood up, draping her cloak about her shoulders. "Come with me, Tribune, and I'll show you one of our temples."

"Very good, Lady." I managed to stand without stumbling. The cool night air, even with its hint of manure, tasted delicious after the close, smoky hall. I expected Boudica to bring me to a building, but no, we walked down into a dell in the side of the embankment. Above us a sentry stood outlined against the star-strewn sky, a glint of gold at his neck.

In the bottom of the dell burned a fire, illuminating a tree so large all I could see of it were a few limbs curving toward the earth and rising again. A semicircle of gold was embedded in one thick limb. Above the fire a small bronze cauldron hung from a tripod, steaming gently. Nearby a spring issued from a rock grotto and rippled away into the darkness.

With one twist of her hands Boudica removed her torc. It must have been almost pure gold to bend so easily. She held it up, so that it shone red-gold in the firelight. Then she threw it into the water. I started forward, appalled and confused in equal measure. But it was gone.

She laughed. "Gold belongs to the gods. They send it to us, we work it into shapes which honor them, and then we give it back."

"Oh." I could hear Catus's voice quizzing me—how many springs and wells contained gold offerings? Where did the gold come from?

"This is the shrine of Andrasta, my patron goddess," Boudica went on. "Victoria in your tongue."

"Minerva," I translated.

"Not necessarily." She pulled what I now saw was a golden sickle from the tree, and from a branch cut a bunch of small white berries. She sprinkled them into the cauldron. "Mistletoe, which grows on the sacred oak. Vervain, henbane with its purple flowers, the early fruit of the elder."

The odor filled my head, flowers and herbs both sweet and bitter.

"And what accounting will you give to Catus?" she asked.

I wondered if she intended to offer me a bribe. "The truth."

"Well then, Tribune Marcus, the truth is that my late husband left his property to your emperor hoping to buy respect. But respect can't be bought."

"Why not? I know freed slaves who've made themselves into successful merchants and become quite respectable."

"Wealth makes one respectable, does it? But our wealth is our freedom. And that's what we would keep." She swept the sickle through the liquid in the cauldron, throwing several drops onto my forearm. My flesh burned. Instinctively I lifted my arm to my lips. The hot liquid scalded my tongue. First a foul taste, and then a honeyed one, swelled into my mouth and nose. Boudica smiled.

The wind whispered in the branches of the tree. The water laughed. The embers of the fire made a rosy glow among the shadows. In the distance men shouted and sang. Boudica was murmuring something in her own tongue, something which tickled the edges of my mind. She unbraided her hair. It flowed thick and golden red down her back.

She, too, was a druid, a priestess, a magician. . . . I felt myself shrinking, smaller and smaller, until I squatted on the grass looking up at her. My long ears twitched. My paws were velvet soft. I was a hare, lolloping about the dell. And she was a gray hound, running after me like a swirl of smoke. I bounded across the grass and she was on me, her teeth closing on my puff of a tail.

I dived into the spring. The chill made me shiver. I was a fish, sleek and cold, looking up through the surface of the water at the distorted shapes of fire and tree. And she was an otter, her smooth body knifing through the water, so that whichever way I darted she was on me.

I launched myself upward, into the air, wings beating, beak open to draw in more breath. Into the tree I flew. The budding leaves brushed my face. And she was a hawk, gliding among the branches with swift, sure strokes, talons striking feathers from my tail.

I fell to the ground a tiny grain of wheat and lay immobile, gazing at the tree, the fire, the water, the sky. She came toward me, a black hen pecking and clawing. She grasped me in her beak. I cracked open, seed and chaff, and scattered into the night. Scattered into the morning, and the golden sun rising in Boudica's blue eyes.

Her cloak billowed into hills, valleys, mountains, groves. Mistletoe sparkled like dewdrops among the branches of mighty oaks. The turf rang to the beat of horses' hooves and then parted, revealing the white chalk beneath, making figures of gods and men which not only lay across the land but which were the land itself.

The brooch on the cloak became an embroidery of wells, streams, and rivers lacing sky to earth, land to sea, a green glass sea swelling and falling to the slow spirals of sun and moon. Roads were golden threads stitching together grove and field, hill and shore, strung with temples like fine beadwork. Hibernia in the far west was sewn to Britannia was sewn to Gaul and on into the east, Galatia, Sarmatia . . . The fine golden embroidery ripped, cut by the iron weapons of Roma, weapons sharp and greedy not for gods but for gold.

Boudica's hands gathered me up. I blinked, returned to my body. She was not sharp and hard as a hen's beak, but warm, soft, moist, a fully-fleshed woman leaning over me, her hair a gleaming curtain around us. My mouth was filled by the taste of honey.

Her draught had addled my wits. It had opened my eyes. It had not sabotaged my capabilities. I'd known only courtesans, and to be made free of a high-born woman, Briton or no, was both intimidating and stimulating. . . . She made free with me, not playing the wanton for my pleasure so much as she expected my pleasure to please her. Which it did, if I do say so myself.

I woke from the dream, from the vision, in Boudica's bed. I was knocking my fists against my forehead, trying to awaken my wits, when the door of the house opened and Boudica entered. Her hair was tidily braided. She wore a simple woven cloak. "Good morning."

"What did you do to me?" I demanded.

"I laid a
geas
upon you. A fate. To know the truth and to speak it."

"I would do that in any event. Truth and honor go hand in hand."

"Do they?" She picked up my tunic from the floor, shook it out, and handed it to me. "Is truth golden? Or is gold truth?"

"Gold is gold." I dressed, glancing warily over my shoulder.

"Then you'd better get on with counting that gold which is yours," she said, and shooed me out the door.

I walked back to the house she'd assigned to me, trying not to catch anyone's eye. If the warriors found out what had happened they'd slay me on the spot. They took insult easily, these men, and what greater insult could I hand them than to make free with one of their women? Even worse, with one of their priestesses? I remembered a straying vestal virgin and her lover buried alive, and shuddered.

Not one warrior paid me any attention at all, even though a couple of Boudica's serving women glanced at me and giggled. I ducked into my house and saw my pack of tablets and pens. That was it. Boudica had sacrificed her honor in order to influence my accounting. But my duty was to make an honest count . . . Wondering if yet again I was somehow playing the fool, I gathered up my supplies and set about my business.

The next five days passed from sunlight to soft rain to night and back again. It seemed as though I'd never before noticed the burgeoning of spring, the waxing of the moon, the intricate patterns of wind, water, and wood.

My men went hunting with Boudica's warriors and acquitted themselves honorably, even as Ebro muttered about undisciplined Iceni hooligans. He drilled my small command every afternoon, to the amusement of Maeve and the younger children. But drill can be learned, while courage cannot; with proper training, I noted, the Iceni would make fine auxiliaries, serving the eagles as well as Ebro and his kind.

One afternoon wagons rolled up the ramp to the gate, bearing treasure from the northwest. Suetonius was campaigning in the northwest, I remembered, and made a note in my margins.

Lovernios worked with me, translating records cut on strips of wood. I had to trust he was giving me a fair accounting, but I didn't catch him out once. They used writing only for the tallying of goods and stock, I learned. When it came to the epics of beasts, gods, and heroes, Lovernios and the bard could recite for hours without faltering.

I finished my task. The night before I left, Boudica took me back to the sylvan temple below the embankment. This was the first time we'd been alone together since I'd waked in her bed. I was both relieved and disappointed to see no fire and no cauldron beside the stream, only a charred circle in the grass. The golden sickle was gone.

But still the branches of the great tree creaked, and water droplets danced above the mossy rocks. Boudica removed a gold torc from her throat and fitted it around mine. "You like gold, don't you? Then try this for size."

The torc was heavy, pulling my collarbones down, elongating my neck. All this time I'd seen her and the warriors wearing such ornaments, and I'd never realized just how uncomfortable they were.

She grasped the knobs at the ends of the coil and pressed them together, choking me. "Gold belongs to the gods. It devotes us to the gods. They can take us at any time. The braided strands are the rope around the throat and the tree limb above. They're the sword which separates head from body. Death takes only a moment, but the next life goes on forever. Do you love me?"

Startled, I opened my mouth to utter some flattery, but my lips and tongue said, "No."

Laughing, she released the torc and teased my short, dark hair. "Good. I wouldn't want you to think our hour together was—personal. I only wanted to taste exotic meat. As you did."

Fair enough, I thought, and was surprised at myself for thinking it. "And this—
geas
?"

"You will know the truth and you will speak it. Whether that will be a blessing or a curse remains to be seen."

I didn't follow her meaning. I twisted the torc from my neck and held it out to her.

"No," she said. "Keep it. As a gift from Andrasta."

Still puzzled, I looked one last time around the dell, and, concealing the torc in my cloak, returned to my tablets and my pens.

The next morning I took my leave of Boudica, Brighid, and Maeve. And of Lovernios, even as I wondered what Suetonius would think of my courtesy. At the eaves of the forest I looked back at Venta Icenorum, at the dark soil of the fields awaiting the plow and the blue arch of sky. So our ancestors must have lived, wild and free, before submitting to the rule of law. . . . I remembered the skulls decorating the gate, and chilled, rode away.

When I made my report to Catus Decianus I thought briefly of minimizing not only the wealth of the Iceni, but their position at the knot of the golden thread of trade. My tongue, however, couldn't shade the truth, let alone utter a lie. I found myself telling him even of Boudica herself, of her strength and beauty and determination to hold the Iceni for her daughter.

His chin went up. His brows rose. "So tell me then, Tribune, how is this barbarian village defended?"

My heart sinking, I told him that, too.

The old man let the scroll roll shut. He shut his eyes and touched his lips with his fingertips. From the atrium came the sounds of voices, footsteps, and furniture sliding across the tile floor.

"Are you in pain?" asked his wife's voice.

"Yes, as always," he replied, looking up. "But mostly I'm tired."

"Why are you writing it down? It was so long ago." She walked to his side and began stroking his shoulders.

"It's my
geas
. I know the truth and I must speak it."

She sighed. "The memories are harsher for you than they are for me."

"You were guiltless. I was not." He captured her hand and held it to his face. It was scented with rosemary, thyme, and coriander, the hot herbs of a hot climate. "What will you do when I've gone to Mars and Mithras? Is there comfort in your secret new god, the crucified one?"

"He reminds me of the gods I knew as a child, who taught that death was not an end."

"As Mithras teaches, too."

They leaned together in companionable silence, as they had for almost forty years now. From the corner of his eye Marcus saw her dangling braid, its red-gold faded to gray. Which was just as well—her hair color no longer drew comment in the streets, although her height always would.

Through the atrium he could see the flat, pale sky. "Thank you, my love," he said, releasing her hand, and spread open the scroll.

The next time I saw Venta Icenorum, it was burning. The damp thatch of the roofs singed slowly, sending billows of gray smoke to mingle with a gray sky. Men lay dead beside their plows in the muddy fields. Birds both black and white wheeled overhead.

A blond warrior was pinned by a javelin to one of the gateposts. Inside the town women screamed and arms clashed. But Catus's legionaries had taken the Iceni by surprise. Why should they suspect an attack by an ally?

I urged my horse toward the Great Hall, Ebro jogging at my knee, sword drawn. But already the sounds of battle were dying. I wondered how many of the bodies we passed were of men I'd lately heard boasting. But perhaps they were the fortunate ones, to go so swiftly to their gods. . . . There were very few bodies, I noted, and wondered whether Catus had been fortunate enough to attack when most of the warriors were out hunting.

I couldn't believe my eyes. Catus himself stood atop a small platform hastily assembled from logs, the standard bearers ranged behind him. Before him Boudica was lashed to an upright pole. Two legionaries crouched nearby, clasping themselves, red-faced. She'd not gone without fighting, then.

Catus signaled. Two centurions stepped forward, ripped Boudica's dress open, and began applying their rods. The slap of leather against her back made my gorge rise. "Catus!"

He ignored me. Obviously he meant not only to bring the Iceni under Roman rule here and now, but to punish Boudica for her presumption. But she was hardly presumptuous in following her own customs. . . . High-pitched screams made me look around.