Dreaming the Hound (51 page)

The boy became a smudge of green and brown among the heather and then less than that. A short, sweating wait later, a small stone, less than might have been dislodged by a settling crow, cracked onto the rocks above Valerius’ head to show he was in place and had, if nothing else, remembered the first of his orders.

Nydd held the standard. To him, Valerius said, ‘Keep beside me, ride where I ride. If we are attacked, I will defend you. If the war hound falls, we have no way to signal to Huw and he will die. If he dies, Braint dies to the inquisitors at the fortress. Do you understand?’

Nydd was older than Huw, and had fought more battles. He did not flush. ‘I have killed enough Roman standard-bearers. I know what happens when they fall.’

‘Good. Let’s go.’

Valerius led his column out from the rock cover and felt the watching eyes more keenly than before. There was satisfaction in their touch, tinged with disappointment that he should repeat old manoeuvres; Longinus expected better of him than that.

They climbed steeply north along a goat track too narrow for any sane rider. At a certain point, where the bracken ceased to unfurl, they dismounted and led the horses over rock that even the goats chose not to attempt. Two of the older Silures had lived in these mountains as children; their memories of youthful dares were the foundation of Valerius’ plan. His relief in finding their memories sound lasted him most of the climb up the mountain.

They reached the top, where the two ridges met at the valley’s point, and, for the first time, looked down into the open plain spread out below. The path down was as unappealing as the one up and the drops on either side were terrifying in their steepness.

When all thirty warriors had joined him and remounted Valerius said, ‘Nydd, let the standard fall to the east and then bring it up again. Make it look as if it has slipped and you have caught it.’

The standard-bearer did as he was bid, neatly. For the space of ten breaths, there was peace. The horses shifted a little under their riders, finding safer footing. A crow circled and landed on a stunted, wind-blown oak. Valerius’ war hound whined and snuffed the air. Then a horse screamed, not one of Mona’s, and out of the peace came, briefly, chaos, and then pandemonium.

At the far southern end of the pass, nearly six hundred warriors rode line abreast into the mouth of the valley. Because Longinus had, indeed, remembered the strategy of the past, a full wing of five hundred Thracian cavalry were waiting for them. The clash as the two came together carried across the straits to Mona.

On the high mountain, above the carnage but not beyond the noise, Valerius raised his hand. He waited a moment, offering prayers to both of the gods who held his heart, and swung it down.

‘Let’s go.’

Above everything else, the warriors of Mona knew how to ride. Their horses were as sure-footed as any in the world and they lived for war. If need demanded, they could gallop down a mountain and not break a leg. Valerius’ bay cavalry mare was branded from Iberia, and she was as good. He set her to the steep slope down and, for a while, there was nothing to be done but lose himself in the vertiginous incline of the path and the need for speed and the improbability of reaching the valley’s floor alive. The closer they came to the foot of the mountain, the fewer stones blocked their path and the faster they were able to go until all thirty were riding line abreast along the valley’s floor, far behind the lines of battle, and the horses were racing for the joy of it.

Valerius pushed his mare until her mane flagged back in his face and his eyes streamed with the wild wind of their running. His heart matched the rhythm of the gallop, wild with elation, and he shouted encouragement, reminding the mare of the greatness of her forebears and of the foals she would one day carry. Once, as a child, he had dreamed of this, or something close, and the exultation filled him each time. However jaded, however drunk, however careworn or weighed with responsibility, for the duration of each battle’s ride Valerius of the Eceni was free and the world was at war without him.

The tents of the cavalry were ahead, five lines with the officers’ tents closest to the mouth of the valley. The scouts believed that Braint was held in one of them, but none had seen which.

Valerius had dismounted before his mare had stopped running. His blade was already naked in his hand.

Warriors ran to join him, ready to kill the guards. There were none; Longinus rarely squandered the lives of his men. Valerius

used his belt-knife to cut the side of the largest of the officers’ tents, slicing up and across so that a triangle of white fell inwards and he could step through. The inside was not lit; he stepped out of daylight into gloom. There were no guards here, either, which surprised him.

A figure lay prone against the far side, chained at wrist and ankle with the loops fixed to an oak log too heavy for two men to lift. ‘Braint?’

Valerius ran to her, and knelt. She turned her head, stiffly. They had not beaten her as he had been beaten, but she had fought them and someone had used the flat edge of his blade on her face; the angry cut sliced up and across and would scar her for life, if she lived long enough for it to heal that far. Afterwards, they had knocked her unconscious at least once. An angry bruise grew from the side of her temple, and closed her left eye.

Unthinking, Valerius reached out to touch it. She jerked back out of his reach. Her open eye raked him, full of scorn. ‘You! I thought Tethis might come. I’m glad she has more sense. It’s a trap, do you not know that?’

Valerius nodded cheerfully. Here, in the heart of action, he was free and could carry the sting of her hate. ‘Of course. I would be disappointed if it weren’t. Longinus was always the best mind in the cavalry.’

He looked up. A smith of the Cornovii had followed him in, bearing a hammer and forged chisel with the point hardened in charcoal fires. To him, Valerius said, ‘Cut the staple at the log. The manacles will take too long.’

Any time was too long and waiting was torture. The sound of the hammer chimed over the more distant turmoil resounding from the mouth of the valley - and then changed, suddenly. The smith grunted satisfaction.

‘Gone.’

He was a big man. He lifted Braint as if she were a child. Her chains clattered around her, still tying her wrists and ankles. She twisted her head to look back.

‘Valerius, you can’t—’ Never in the history of Mona had the Warrior been carried alive from the field of battle. Better to die than be so dishonoured.

Valerius said, ‘There’s no time to cut you free. You can go out across the horse. Nydd will take you to safety. If you have to go to

Mona like this, at least you’re still alive.’

Nydd was outside, holding the reins of the bay cavalry mare alongside his own grey. These two were the best horses on Mona; solid and fast and able to take care of a rider. Without ceremony, the smith slung Braint across the bay’s saddle.

Valerius said, ‘Hold the girth strap if you have to. It’ll be a fast ride out.’

Braint spat at him. ‘If I die like this, unable to fight, I’ll wait for you for all time in the lands of the dead.’

‘You won’t be alone.’

Valerius lifted his hand to slap the bay mare’s rump - and stopped, as a flash of sun on armour caught his eye.

He turned. South, the valley was a mass of several hundred cavalry riders who had suddenly found themselves alone on a battlefield that had once been thick with warriors. As fast as they had come, the warriors of Mona who had charged the valley’s mouth had melted back into the mist and the heather and the scrubby oak thickets. Fearful of ambush, the cavalry had not ridden out, but had turned back, to close for a second time the trap they thought secure. These were men who knew how to make a line and hold it, without being ordered. They rode slowly and steadily towards their own tents, a solid bank of horseflesh and metal.

‘They’re coming.’ Nydd said it quietly. His gaze flicked back and forth. ‘They’re blocking the valley all the way across.’

‘I know. But they think you’re going to try to break through the line and go south and you’re not. Ride north and don’t look back. Your horse can make it back up that hill; most of theirs can’t. And whatever you do, don’t drop the standard. We need to know when you’re safe.’

Valerius slapped both horses and felt them start away from him, like the first strides in a race. On either side, two dozen warriors hesitated, watching the incoming cavalry; they were not used to being told to flee in the face of the enemy.

Valerius swung his arm forward as he had done so often, leading a cavalry charge. ‘Go! All of you. To the north and to Mona. Go!’

The two dozen warriors kicked their mounts from a standstill to a gallop. Circling Nydd, Braint and the smith, they raced north, to freedom, using their bodies as living shields. Their horses were not

racing for honour and victory now, but for their lives, flat to the ground, as fast as blood and straining flesh could take them. They knew the route, having ridden it in; each warrior had marked a clear path out and was committed to ride it or die.

Two died, caught by thrown spears. Valerius heard them fall and chose to believe that neither was Nydd or Braint; he had no time to look. He was left with six warriors and they faced the advancing wall of Thracian cavalrymen.

Valerius watched them come, counting the heartbeats. Twenty for Nydd and Braint to reach the foothills of the mountain. A dozen more for the blood-red banner of the war hound to be high enough that Huw might see it and use his sling to signal once again. Less than that for the auxiliary to reach him. Braint was no longer their first concern. They were watching Valerius. He was unmounted, an easy target.

‘Here. Valerius. Get up.’

He had asked for a loose horse to be caught without expecting it to happen. Nevertheless, someone passed him the reins of a roan gelding that had run from the carnage at the valley’s mouth. It was black with sweat and bleeding from a shallow wound to its chest, but still willing.

With his eyes on the oncoming riders, Valerius whistled to make it run and the six warriors who followed him and the hundreds of auxiliaries he had once commanded watched him make the cavalry mount from the ground onto a running horse and were reminded that here was something exceptional.

Then, doubting their senses, the horsemen of the Ala Prima Thracum saw their former commander swing his arm high and bring it down and heard the war cry of Mona howl from his throat as he led his handful of warriors directly towards them.

We will be the distraction that allows Braint to escape. If we make the arrow of Mona and ride hard, we may break through their line, but I make no promises. Those who remain with me are least likely of all to survive.

So Valerius had said before they left Mona and, against all expectation, four women and two men had offered to remain with him while Braint was taken to safety. They followed him now, as tightly disciplined as any Roman-trained cavalry, and he led them towards the only weak spot in the enemy line, a gap of less than a horse’s width between the standard-bearer and the armourer, whom he recognized of old: the man had never yet ridden sober into combat.

This one man’s inattention let them through. Horseflesh cannoned on horseflesh as the broad edge of Valerius’ living wedge met the line of the enemy. Blades struck blades and iron sang and sparks crested high above and two men died and neither a warrior of Mona. They burst into open ground and Valerius swung his arm and they moved into line abreast and raced south, for their lives, and the open mouth of the valley.

Which was no longer open, and perhaps had never been. Long before they reached it, Longinus was there, with the other half of his troop, closing the trap on the trap on the trap. A string of cavalry was lined up across the valley. They were more than a hundred with less than a spear’s length between them and each man was stone cold sober; not one of these was about to let him through.

‘Halt!’ Forgetting himself, Valerius flung up his arm. Responding to a cavalry command they had seen but never learned, six warriors pulled their sweating, blowing horses to a halt.

‘Valerius! Their officer is riding your horse!’

It was Madb who spoke, a wild Hibernian woman with slate grey hair and the bright eyes of a jackdaw who fought for Mona because she chose to, not because her land was under threat. The spare horse had come from her, and the protection now at Valerius’ back. He had never fought at her side before and regretted it.

Valerius held his new mount steady and looked where her blade pointed. He had seen it already, had known it, possibly, for months, but it did no harm to look as if the news were fresh and welcome.

The other five warriors held their horses steady to watch. They were outnumbered hundreds to one and there was nowhere to go and, in any case, the notoriety of the pied horse that had been Valerius’ mount had reached far beyond the ranks of the cavalry. Its anger and ferocity in combat were legend, vented as much against its rider as against the enemy, except at the peak of battle when horse and rider fought as one. It emerged from the mass of the oncoming cavalry, running hard towards Valerius. Madb’s indrawn breath was only the closest, not the loudest or the most heartfelt.

What could be said of the Crow-horse but that it was perfection on four legs? Splashed white on black, it was as if the gods had poured liquid snow onto the blanket of the night and both were perfect in their purity. Cleaned now for battle, it ran for Longinus with the same bloody-minded dedication as it had for Valerius, and for the first time the man who had thought himself its only master

saw how it must have looked to others, and was left silent and unwatchful in the heart of the enemy, disabled by the pain of its loss.

Aloud, he said, ‘I have your mother. She is on Mona, in foal one last time to a sire who might be the match of yours. She would be proud of you.’

‘Move!’

Madb pushed him, and so saved his life. The spear that had been aimed for his throat clattered spent on the ground and skidded into a tent.