Daughters of Fire (68 page)

Carta sighed. ‘I see. It is all arranged.’

‘As it must be.’ Mairghread poured a goblet of wine and gave it to her.

‘Does Gruoch know where my baby has gone?’

Mairghread shook her head. ‘I heard her beg Artgenos to tell her. He had the child taken away in the night the same day she was born.’

‘Do you think he had her killed?’ Carta’s eyes filled with tears.

Mairghread shook her head. ‘He would never have done that, lady. Never. He is a good man as well as a great priest and Druid.’

Carta gave a wry smile. ‘So. My supporters dwindle by the day. Where is Vellocatus?’

‘He went hunting, lady. Remember?’ She did not remind her that Vellocatus’s disappointment at finding Carta had not borne him a son had been so acute he had drunk himself unconscious and stayed drunk for a week. After that he had ridden over the dales and into the forest with four companions. Two months had passed and he had not returned.

‘Is there news from Môn?’ Carta looked up at Mairghread as she tended the fire.

Mairghread shook her head.

‘I will consult the goddess,’ Carta said at last, uneasily. ‘We should support the Druids. We could send warriors secretly. The Romans need not find out.’

Mairghread nodded. ‘That would please your people.’

‘And Vellocatus.’

‘And Vellocatus.’ Mairghread smiled sadly.

It was too late. As soon as the winter snows melted and the ground began to dry out, the Romans moved. Gruoch walked into Carta’s private chamber and dismissed the queen’s companions. ‘The news over the last few days has been bad. Last night I looked into the waters of the sacred pool and they ran red with blood. I ordered my best young seer to sleep the sleep of true dreams and he has told me what is happening.’ Her face was white.

Carta stood up and went to the side table. She poured mead from the jug there and pressed the goblet into Gruoch’s hands. ‘Tell me.’ Her mouth was dry and with shaking hands she poured mead for herself as well.

‘The Romans advanced into the land of the Deceangli. They made a base at Deva and another at Segontium so they could attack Môn by land and sea! They lined upon the shores of Afon Menai in formation and waited there, afraid to cross the strait.’ She bit her lip. ‘Our people were waiting on the far side of the water. They invoked the gods. They called out to the spirits of the sea and sky. The Romans were afraid. So very afraid. They would have fled but their leaders forced them on. And -’ She paused, tears streaming down her face. ‘They landed on the blessed island and put the community to the sword. Every one. Men, women and children. No one was spared. They have even burned the sacred groves - those ancient, blessed oaks!’ She collapsed into a heap on the floor, weeping.

Carta swallowed. She felt a sheen of ice close over her body. ‘Is there no one - nothing - left?’

‘Nothing.’ Gruoch shook her head. ‘We could have helped them. We have known for months - years - what they intended.’

Slowly, Carta began to pace the floor. She entwined her fingers together in anguish. ‘Artgenos?’ She turned back to Gruoch in sudden horror. ‘Was he in the vision?’

‘He died fighting.’ Gruoch stared up at her blindly. ‘An old man in his eighties and he died fighting.’

There was a long silence. There were tears pouring down Viv’s face.

‘And the brooch?’ Peggy whispered. ‘Where is the brooch?’ She spoke through clenched teeth.

Viv pushed her away, shaking her head. ‘There is no one left to
attend to the dead.’ Her voice rang out across the darkening hillside, the voice of the goddess. ‘Ravens. Kites. Wolves out of the forests. The gods are shamed. Look. The Romans are washing the blood of the Druids off their swords and their hands in our sacred pools. The creatures are weeping. The birds are crying. Their beaks are dripping with blood and gore. Sacrilege. Shame. Shame on you, Cartimandua. You could have stopped this happening.

‘But that’s not true!’ Her voice changed. Her whole demeanour. She was Cartimandua again. ‘They would have killed us, too. Our Druids would have died as well. Gruoch would have been slaughtered. As it is, she lives. She has recruited more men and women to the college and the mistletoe flourishes under her care. The Romans did not succeed. They left us alone. They went back south.’ She frowned. ‘News came, you know. Only days later. Of the rebellion of the Iceni. After Prasutagus died the Romans dishonoured their agreement. They violated his daughters. They whipped his queen and Boudica turned on them. She burned Camulodunum and Londinium and Verulamium. The whole of the south-east rose up in bloody revolt.’

Pat had risen unsteadily to her feet. Now she squatted down again. She put her hand on Viv’s arm. ‘So, why didn’t you support her, Cartimandua?’ Medb was back, now the drug was wearing off a little and her voice was heavy with sarcasm. ‘You had it in your power to alter the whole course of history! If you had gone to her aid with your men, if you had allied with Venutios, you could have driven the Romans out of Britannia forever. You could have helped her win!’ She laughed. The sound was harsh and cruel. Medb’s laugh. ‘But you didn’t. Even then, you didn’t. You couldn’t bring yourself to fight the Romans, could you! You stayed at home with your lover!’

Vellocatus had come home. He rallied the men and sent them back to the training grounds and he came back to Carta’s bed.

He drew her to him and kissed her forehead gently. ‘I’ve been neglecting my wife. It is time we put that right.’

Nestling against him, she relaxed into his arms. ‘I’ve missed you.’

He smiled, lifting her chin to kiss her mouth. ‘I thought you no longer loved me.’

‘How could you think that?’ Indignantly she kissed him again.
‘You are my life! My love! My world!’ She wound her arms around his neck. ‘And you will be the father of my sons.’

He smiled. ‘We will have seven sons, my darling, and then seven more.’ Sweeping her off her feet, he carried her to the bed and laid her gently on it. If she gave an anguished thought for her little lost daughter, she gave no sign.

They made love all night and rose only when a shaft of sunlight made its way through a chink in the roof thatch and strayed across her face. They didn’t call the servants. He watched her dress, his eyes on her body, noting every movement, every languid shadow on breast and belly. She had changed since she had borne the child. She was more statuesque, her flesh richer, her hair thicker. She was if anything more desirable than ever.

Ready at last, she turned to him. ‘Now I shall be your dresser. See, you may ask the Queen to comb your hair and your moustaches.’ She picked up the carved comb from her table. ‘And I shall help you on with your mantle and pin your cloak.’

She tipped the contents of her jewel casket onto the sheet and rummaged amongst her bangles and brooches.

‘This one.’ He bent and selected a pin from the tangle. ‘I remember Venutios wearing this bird.’ He smiled grimly. ‘He swaggered with it on his cloak. It will give me great pleasure to sport it on mine.’

She paled as he held out the gold enamelled brooch on his palm. ‘Not that one, Vellocatus. Any one but that.’

‘Why not? A crane to bring me luck in battle.’ He smiled and pulled her onto his knees. ‘Venutios’s luck changed when he ceased to wear it, remember? And surely, you would deny me nothing, sweetheart? You are not saving it to give to him again?’

She shook her head. ‘I feared it was cursed. I’ve never worn it. Don’t touch it. Please. It is through that brooch that Medb controlled Venutios.’

He threw back his head and laughed. ‘What nonsense! It is beautiful. I shall wear it forever!’

He stifled her protests with a kiss and she was too besotted to argue further.

Within days he had left her side to hunt once more in the forests of the north. The moon waxed to the full and she knew she had not conceived.

In her dreams, she heard Medb’s laughter echoing across the fells.

There was a long silence. Viv pushed her hair out of her eyes. They were still fixed on the distance.

‘The Romans sent me reminders that I was their friend. That they had honoured our agreements. That they had saved me when I was in danger. That our Druids would not be harmed if I kept Brigantia out of the rebellion. Our people would not be put to the sword. Always I thought of our people. They were the children I never had. All that was left to me when my only baby was taken from me. I was their queen. The Romans never harmed them as long as I was there to stop them. Instead they sent me gold. They sent me Gaius.’ She gave a low moan of unhappiness. ‘They sent me Gaius, when all I wanted was Vellocatus.’

Suetonius Paulinus set off for the south from Anglesey the same day he heard of the outbreak of revolt of the Iceni. He sailed at once back to Deva and then rode south. One of his priorities was to send for Gaius Flavius Cerialis. He was to perform a secret and special, nay vital, mission. He was to ride north, at once, to the Queen of the Brigantes.

‘Sir?’ Gaius ground his teeth with frustration. ‘You need me to fight the rebels.’

‘I need you to ensure the Brigantians stay out of it.’ The governor was curt. The table before him was littered with letters and plans. There was a line of officers waiting outside his tent for urgent meetings with him. He leaned forward and gazed hard into Gaius’s face. ‘This hell cat, Boudica, was the wife of a client king. She is a friend or a relative of Cartimandua - bound to be. I do not want Cartimandua unsettled. We cannot afford another rising on the northern front. It would be the end of us. Almost single-handed Cartimandua has kept her tribesmen out of our hair, even against Venutios. Ido not intend to let her slip out of our clutches for the sake of a bit of diplomacy. And,’ for a moment the governor’s face slipped into something which could have been a leer, ‘my informants tell me you are very good at diplomacy with the barbarian queen.’

Gaius felt his cheeks redden violently. ‘I hoped for useful pillow talk, sir.’

‘You do not have to explain, officer. I am assured of your loyalty.’ Paulinus stood up. ‘Take a small detachment of men and call at the treasury. Small rich gifts this time. Nothing that can’t be taken in a
saddlebag. Be careful; the roads are infested with British rebels. Do not get caught. Stay up north with her as long as you need to keep her occupied. Once we have defeated Boudica and sent her to her gods we can deal in whatever way is appropriate with Cartimandua.’

Gaius managed to school his features until he was out of the governor’s sight. Then he let out a string of violent expletives. He wanted to fight. He did not want to go and crawl to that woman with her lustful thighs and her scornful eyes. He would have to grovel, ingratiate himself, win her over yet again and to hold her attention for as long as it took - attention which up until now had barely granted him one night in her bed before she had grown bored with him. On top of all that she was, so the report the governor had handed him recounted with much disgust, remarried to a young slave, her husband’s shield bearer. A man she could not keep her hands off, she was so besotted with him.

He swore again.

But at the same time he was intrigued. There should be no competition, surely. He, battle-hardened, handsome - he tightened his jaw a fraction, aware of his own modest self-mockery - and charming, versus a barbarian peasant. No contest.

He took a hand-picked party of men, eight of them, on fast, well-trained horses. They travelled with the minimum of supplies and equipment, each man with a saddlebag of jewellery, gold coin and - Gaius’s idea this - small packages of silk and brocade, ivory hair combs and rich face creams, that last the idea of his new wife, Augusta, a lady less than pleased at his assignment, as much as he had told her of it, but luckily preoccupied with their small new son.

The roads were swarming with British. They scattered at the sight of the Roman broadswords, but behind their backs there were jeers, thrown stones and vicious looks. These people had been violently and thoroughly disarmed by their conquerors and as long as they were scattered and without a leader they were no danger, but now they were all heading towards Camulodunum and they had found a leader. Boudica.

Gaius cursed yet again. He wanted to be there to fight the bastards face to face and beat them into submission. Pillow politics was not his idea of service. It would make him a laughing stock. No one ever won a commendation by bedding the enemy.

*

Cartimandua was now in Elmet. She had already received a series of messengers from Boudica - the first carrying pleas for aid against the governor’s unjust treatment of a queen and a widow, in deliberate contradiction of her husband’s will and his agreement with Rome, the second a shocked and angry account of what had happened to her and her daughters at the hands of Rome’s hand-picked men and now a third demanding Cartimandua’s support. Other messengers had ridden further north to Venutios. Boudica demanded that they make up their differences in order to help her defeat the enemy. The whole of Britain was about to rise. If they did not support her they would be the only two rulers who would not be a part of the insurrection.

It took four days for Gaius and his men to reach Brigantia, lightly laden as they were. They had to take frequent detours, to avoid the angry bands of Britons roaming the lands of the Trinovantes and the Iceni, and further north they faced disaffected men and women from the Catuvellauni and the Corieltauvi.

Gaius’s party spent one brief night with the men of the IX legion, as they in their turn prepared to ride south to protect Camulodu-num, then they rode on at dawn.

‘I bring gifts yet again, great queen.’ Gaius managed a gallant smile as he was ushered into her presence. He sensed hostility all around him in the township and it dawned on him for the first time that the Brigantians were well aware of what had happened on Môn and now in the south. If he had thought to reach her first and convince her before any word of what had happened to the Druids or to Boudica had reached her, he had been deluding himself. He decided on disarming honesty.

‘I came to check you were all right. You’ve heard about the rebellions, of course?’

She was if anything more beautiful. Older, of course, as he was, and with the lines on her face now which came with experience of life, but still alluring, still powerful. Still undeniably attractive.

She raised an eyebrow at his comment. ‘I have heard. The Queen of the Iceni is full of rage, quite rightly after the way she has been treated, and her people with her.’

‘As you say, her rage is justifiable. The men who perpetrated this outrage have been punished.’

He had no idea what had happened to them. If they had been punished for anything, no doubt it would have been for stirring up such a cauldron of fury in an already unstable situation.

‘The Governor sent me to speak to you. He is very grateful for your continuing support.’

She pursed her lips. The man must be a fool and take her for one as well. But she would play his game for now. ‘How grateful?’

He met her eyes uncomfortably. ‘I have brought gifts,’ he said slowly.

‘The same kind of gifts as before?’ She looked straight at him. She was playing with him. He could see the intelligence in the woman’s eyes and the cynicism - had that been there before? - as well as weary amusement.

‘I have been told that you have a new husband, lady,’ he said softly. ‘I would not care to trespass on another man’s territory.’

She smiled even more broadly. ‘Not what I had heard about the Romans. Or about you, if I remember last time you came. I was married then, too.’ She had seen in the scrying bowl Vellocatus and his men encamped by cold far-away northern lakes; they had killed bear and beaver and even in the chase he wore the golden crane. ‘And you,’ she narrowed her eyes, ‘you have a new wife I’m told.’

He felt himself grow tense. How did she know that? ‘I have indeed.’

‘Your first wife died?’ she went on.

‘She did.’

He held her gaze boldly, almost daring her to ask about Portia who had died in childbirth. But she merely nodded imperceptibly and he realised that of course she knew. This woman was a Druid - he made the sign of protection secretly. They knew everything. Except how to save themselves from annihilation by the Roman army. The thought of the reports of what had happened on Môn comforted him. Her next words did not.

‘I have read the omens. The seas around the lands of the Iceni run red with Roman blood. Boudica will not need my help.’ Then, as though realising that that statement would release him from his charge of convincing her to stay out of the battle, she smiled again. ‘You are lucky, Roman, that my new husband is away. He is hunting bear in the far mountains and will not return for another moon at least.’ She put her head on one side coquettishly. ‘His absence has made me lonely, I confess. We will talk this evening. I will
order a feast for you and your men and you will tell me about your life in Camulodunum and about the new temple to Claudius they have built there.’

In his anxiety to distract her from the subject of the Roman action on Môn and what was happening in the south, news about which he suspected she probably actually knew more than he did, by one means or another, he told her far more than he intended. About the farm he had been given out on the coast on the edge of the marsh and the villa he was building there. About the Trinovantian slaves, the men who had owned the land and served their own royal prince before it had been confiscated and given to him and who now farmed it for him as slaves, about his wife and his new son, about working for Paulinus. About the temple of Claudius and the grandeur of the new great city which was the capital of the whole province of Britannia, with its council chamber and huge theatre, its circus, its houses and market place. He realised he had drunk too much wine and he saw the frown on the faces of one or two of his men, but he was telling her nothing secret. Nothing indiscreet. Nothing she didn’t know already.

Obediently he followed her to her chamber later. She had new attendants, he noticed. Young. Pretty. Giggly. They peered at him nervously as they readied her for bed and trimmed the lamps and then they disappeared. It was a change after the sour-faced woman who used to look after her. As he fell naked into her bed he wondered briefly what had happened to her.

When Gaius slept at last, Carta had risen from her bed with a shiver. What she had done had been this time without enthusiasm. It was a betrayal of Vellocatus and their love, a sacrifice of her body for her people. With a sigh she wandered to the doorway. Mairghread was waiting in the darkness, wrapped in a black cloak. Seizing Carta’s arm she dragged the queen down the passage between the two great round houses into the shadows, away from the leaping firelight.

‘I have a knife. I will kill him. You go to the main feasting hall and listen to the bards. You cannot be blamed if you are not there when it happens.’

‘No.’ Carta pulled her own mantle closer. A thick white mist was drifting up from the stream threading its way between the houses.
She could hear the snort and stamp of the Roman horses from the stables at the edge of the camp. They were restless. Gaius’s men were asleep by now in one of the guest lodges, discreetly watched and no doubt at least one of them discreetly watching. ‘I forbid you to touch him.’

Mairghread stared at her. ‘This man is a Roman soldier. For the Lady’s sake, after what these people did on Ynys Môn you would protect him? Can you forget so soon what happened to Artgenos and the others?’

‘Gaius was not on Môn’.

‘That makes no difference. You can’t - you cannot allow him to live!’ Mairghread was hissing the words, spitting with fury.

‘No. I forbid you, or anyone, to lay a hand on him or his men.’

‘Then you betray everything that is sacred!’ Mairghread whispered angrily. ‘How can you? I can smell him on you! Have you no pride?’

‘I have pride.’ Carta was furious. ‘Don’t dare to question my actions. And don’t dare to disobey me!’ She stepped forward swiftly and wrenched the knife out of Mairghread’s hand. ‘If you touch him you will die.’

There was a moment’s silence. ‘Will Vellocatus be so tolerant when he hears what you have done?’ Mairghread sneered suddenly. She was rubbing her wrist.

‘You will tell him nothing.’

‘I won’t have to. The entire township knows you cannot keep your hands off this man. You seal your own destiny with this lust. If you need a man so desperately, take a warrior. Take a man of whom we can be proud.’ Turning on her heel, she disappeared into the darkness.

Carta frowned. Mairghread was becoming a danger and a liability. Walking back into her chamber, she stood looking down at the drunken man sprawled across her bed and then at the knife in her hand. Why not? What had he done for her, save cause her confusion; make her hated within her own family, her own tribe, the whole of Brigantia. It was not as though she loved him. He had attracted her; he amused her and yes, in a way she lusted for his body, though not in the way she lusted after Vellocatus, her lover and her husband. No, it was that he was, in a real sense, her friend. Was it for that friendship she had betrayed her own people? Or was he an excuse? She sighed, unable to understand either herself
or her emotions. For a long moment she hesitated, looking down at him, then with a shiver of disgust at her own weakness, she turned away.

Through half-closed eyes he had seen the flash of the blade. He had seen her throw the knife down.

He also saw the look of disgust.

When it was clear she was not coming back he rose and dressed. Peering out of the entrance he saw there were no guards posted. Stupid woman. Straightening his shoulders he walked out of the house and strode towards the guest lodge. With his own man on guard, wide awake and standing to attention he exchanged a cheery, lewd greeting and a thumbs upsign. Then he went and threw himself down on one of the mattresses against the wall.