Red Queen, White Queen Page 8

  A party of young men danced down the main street, wine-flasks clutched in their hands, their heads crowned with garlands of ivy. As they went, they chanted a curious song, their hoarse voices rising and falling on three notes, monotonously.

  ‘Wife needs man,

  Man needs wine;

  Wife feeds man,

  Man feeds swine;

  Swine feeds wife,

  Man feeds grave;

  Graves take bones,

  Bairns gain grief !’

  As the young men reached the Roman party they formed a ring and danced round them, laughing derisively at the strangers.

  But Aba Garim put on such a fearful expression that they soon fell away and staggered on down the street, looking for an easier prey to intimidate.

  Gemellus said, ‘Your people are a strange folk, Duatha. It is almost impossible to understand their ways.’

  The Celt replied, ‘They are children, brother, nothing more. A child is cruel and kind by turns; he is unpredictable when it comes to matters of the heart. And we are the same, compared with you Romans, we are children. It is your duty to help us, not blame us.’

  Yet he spoke those words in such a tone of voice, and with such an expression of humility, that Gemellus had the strong suspicion that the Celt was mocking him.

  The party moved on towards the horse corral, separately, and keeping clear of any of the many groups of men who gathered here and there, laughing and singing and talking with wild gestures.

  Gemellus had never been in a British town before on a festival day, and the confusion bewildered him. Dogs, hens, swine, jostled among the many folk, horsemen reared their mounts high above the heads of the pedestrians, trying to frighten them into clearing a passage through the crowded thoroughfare; from every house with a bunch of leaves above its door came the sound of drunken merriment.

  Smoke rose from the pavement, where a band of tribesmen roasted a red hunk of meat to break their fast after a hard day of drinking and bargaining; a girl sold rolls of coloured woollen cloth, sitting cross-legged on the ground next to a blind man who collected offerings in a wooden bowl. A young boy balanced on his hands and rolled a ball on his feet, while his companion, an old woman in a filthy shawl, held out her wizened hands for coins. On an improvised trestle-table in the middle of the street, three fat men, their faces blackened with soot, and wearing women’s clothes, performed deeds of strength, bending iron bars, breaking stout oak boughs, allowing any man in the assembled crowd to put ropes about their necks and try to strangle them….

  In such chaos, mere musicians, players on pipe and drum, stood, little chance of gaining a hearing. Such wanderers smiled grimly and, putting up their instruments, entered the nearest tavern to drink their cares away.

  Then at last the Roman party broke clear of the multitude and came out into an open place, overshadowed by a house with a high gabled roof. They looked for the corral of oaken staves and chestnut hurdles, set about with red flags, and soon found them.

  But among all the men and the many horses, there was no sign of the one they came to find.

  For an instant or two, Gemellus feared that the guide had sent them down into an ambush, but Duatha touched him on the arm and said, ‘Look, the man riding in now. That must be Drammoch!’

  The newcomer rode a shaggy Celtic pony, which was so short in the leg that the horseman’s feet almost brushed the rough ground as he went. Before him trotted a dozen sheep, long-fleeced and panting in the warmth of the summer evening. A thin dog ran from side to side, behind them, driving them on, sometimes misjudging his distance from the pony’s hooves and being kicked. Then his yelps mingled with the snuffling of the horse and the panic-stricken crying of the sheep.

  Aba Garim shrugged his thin shoulders in disgust, implying that in his country men took greater care of their four-footed creatures.

  But Dagda said, ‘There is rich pasture in this land, Arab. Our sheep can afford to run off a pound or two of fat before they reach the market. But from what I have heard, the sheep in your land are mere bags of bones, and the grass is harsh and thick with desert salt. So do not scorn that which is far superior to anything you know’

  Aba Garim, who had but recently killed a man, smiled back as gently as a little child and touched his forehead with the back of his brown hand, as a sign of homage. Then he grinned mockingly and made a very rude noise.

  Duatha said, ‘Yes, that is the king we come to meet. Let us wait till we see how the land lies, then approach him discreetly. Only the two of us will go to him, or he may not welcome us. Celts do not like to be met by too many strangers at once—they feel at a disadvantage, and it is a bad thing, Celt or not, to put any man who might help you, at a disadvantage!’

  A rough-looking youth ran forward and held the King’s horse, while another beat the frightened sheep onward to a pen where a crowd of men waited for them.

  King Drammoch swung his heavy leg from the sheepskin saddle and stood on the dusty ground. He was over six feet in height and had a chest like an ale cask. The Roman party saw the white hair with the red streak, the tartan of gold and blue, the bracelet of jet set with bluestones. But they saw something else, which their black-haired guide had not told them of—a red face, as wickedly cruel as that of any hawk or hunting fox, and light blue eyes which seemed to miss nothing, to approve of nothing, to offer nothing….

  Duatha whispered, ‘I hope that the Prefect at Glevum was soundly advised when he chose this man to help us on our way. To me he has the true look of the Catuvellauni—men of ambition, all of them, with ice in their veins instead of blood.’

  But Gemellus had noted the shapeless felt hat that the King wore, with its greasy band of sweat above the flopping brim; he had observed the patched and shiny leather of his breeches, gone at the knee, and tied roughly about his lower leg with knotted thongs of hide; and though the man’s hands were laden with thick gold rings, the knuckles were gnarled, cracked and filthy and the nails bitten down almost to the quick.

  He heard this King’s voice,, when the groom was too slow in rubbing down the pony. It was a rough voice, more used to cursing than to blessing. It was the voice of a stablehand, not a nobleman.

  In disappointment, he said, ‘But, friend, this is not what I think of as a king! Among my people a king is a man of wealth and elegance, one to be respected not despised.’

  Duatha said with a quick smile, ‘One of those rings on Drammoch’s finger would buy the whole rich armour of a Roman lord. And do not be deceived by the poorness of that dress—Drammoch would be an idiot to come to market dressed in his best. Either he would be waylaid by some foot-pad, or would be seen by a Roman spy and reported to the tax-gatherer. Your great Emperor Nero is not famous for his leniency to our kings, or our queens, for that matter.’

  King Drammoch was now standing, legs wide apart, surveying the corrals, as though he too had come into the town to buy, like any other dealer.

  Duatha nudged Gemellus, and the two went forward towards the man. When they reached him they stood silent beside him, as was the custom when dealing with kings, though they did not make any sign of obeisance, for they were absolved from such subservience, being servants of Rome herself.

  It was long before King Drammoch seemed to notice their existence, and when he did, he stared them up and down as though they had come to rob him.

  ‘And who are you, by Belatucader?’ he said gruffly, towering above them and glaring.

  Duatha said quietly, ‘We come from Glevum with a present for a great lady.’

  The King looked away from them, towards a party of dancers which stretched hand in hand across the street.

  At last he said, ‘You must be impostors, or rogues. I know no one in that stinking nest of vipers.’

  He turned then and strode towards a tavern, at the window of which a man leaned out, beckoning him merrily.

  Yet, as the men stood, bewildered, he half-turned and said, ‘The only job I can give you two is to take my pony back to
my farm tonight. I shall not be able to ride the thing when I have been two hours in that place. Make for the hill of the three stones, and if you try to ride that beast, I will have you flogged to death. That is a king’s mount; do not forget it, you swine! ‘

  Then he was gone. And the men turned to see the groom watching them strangely.

  ‘I don’t like the looks of you two, either,’ he said. ‘You are not from hereabouts, are you?’

  Duatha spoke. ‘We are as good Britons as you are, dog. We are not slaves who hold horses in markets on feast days, neither!’

  The man laughed, showing his broken teeth, ‘That’s a good one, friend!’ he said. ‘No, you don’t hold horses in markets, you hold them all the way home for men too drunk to sit on them!’

  Duatha forced himself to smile. ‘Here, fellow,’ he said. ‘Here are five denarii, for no doubt the King will forget to pay you when he falls out of that door later. Now give me the bridle of that pony and we will start back with him.’

  The man took the money churlishly, but when Duatha mentioned the horse, his eyes narrowed.

  ‘I still don’t like the looks of you,’ he said.

  Then suddenly his attitude changed.

  ‘But why should I try to protect the property of Drammoch!’ he said. ‘He is a swine and a miser. He never pays his debts. Here, take the beast, and I hope you’ll run him lame before you get him home!’

  Gemellus gave the man such a look that he turned away and occupied himself tying up his leg-thongs.

  When they had walked a little way from the place, Duatha said, ‘That groom was probably another spy. That was why the king spoke as he did, no doubt. Well, there is no more we can do, but take this creature to its master’s farm. What will happen there, Mithras only can tell.’

  12: Drammoch’s Steading

  Towards nightfall the four men reached Drammoch’s steading. It stood on a gently sloping hill, beyond which towered a great tumulus, on the summit of which a great trilithon was etched gaunt against the evening sky, as though the stones, a tribute to the old gods, watched over the farmstead, protecting it or threatening it. Gemellus, who had been taught to follow Mithras, with his clean, clear precepts of tolerance and straight thinking, sensed something foreboding, even vicious, in the religion of the British Celts. The three stones on the purple hill above the farm symbolised for the Roman the dreadful and superstitious power of the Celtic gods; thirsty for blood and roaring for anguish. Dark gods for a dark-souled people, he thought, as he looked up towards the place to which they must go.

  The steading itself was a prosperous-looking place, for Britain, though it had none of the white dignity which even a moderately successful farmer’s dwelling in Italy would have had. At the foot of the hill, and circling the whole place, ran a dry-stone wall, as high as a man, the one gate of which was formed by a thick hurdle of woven chestnut boughs. Up beyond this was a tussocky meadow, cut across here and there by ditches, as though this field might be used for defensive action in the event of a siege of any sort.

  And higher up the hill another wall straggled its way round the slope. A wooden stile gave access through this wall to the upper levels of the steading.

  The farmstead itself was a strange confusion of buildings, some of rough-hewn stone, some of wood. A native beehive hut of wattle and thatch stood cheek by jowl with an attempt to simulate a more classical type of building. Blue woodsmoke rose from the chimney holes and circled round the habitation, before being swept by the night breeze into the banked trees of the oak grove which surrounded the settlement.

  Dagda said smiling, ‘I am pleased to see that this king has planted oak-trees about his house. As one who was trained to become a priest of the oak groves, it gives me pleasure to see a man of authority holding to the ancient customs. All the same, I hope that he will give us Roman food this night. I am afraid that my tastes have been diverted by my service with the Legion. I can no longer stomach half-cooked mutton and black bread!’

  They led the pony to the hurdle gate and were about to open it when a man came running down the outer meadow, leaping the ditches and calling.

  ‘Away with you, wanderers! The black bull’s loose in the paddock! You may not enter!’

  Duatha called back to the man, using his own dialect.

  ‘Is this the hospitality of the Catuvellauni? Is this the treatment your folk offer to strangers in their country?’

  The man halted, sensing the authority of Duatha’s tone.

  ‘Who are you, master?’ he shouted, haltingly, through the growing twilight.

  The Celt answered sternly, ‘We are men of some importance to your master. Open the gate so that we may bring in the horse of King Drammoch. Hurry, man, we are not used to being kept waiting.’

  The creature shuffled down to the hurdle gate and began to tug at it breathlessly. He was a shock-headed fellow, dressed in rags, and stinking of barn and byre. When the Roman party had passed through, into the meadow, the man stayed only long enough to salute them and beg them to forgive his rough words; then he ran off into the dusk, and shortly they heard the sound of blows and the furious bellowing of a bull, from behind the thickets.

  They passed up the hill, zig-zagging between the ditches, until they came to the stile. There they tethered the restive pony as they climbed over into the upper paddock.

  Two men were standing over a pig, tall men who wore nothing but loose breeches, the upper parts of their body bare and tattooed with blue spirals. Their light hair wafted across their faces as they stood up to gaze at the approaching party. Gemellus saw that the pig’s fore and hind hooves were bound and that the taller of the two men held a curved knife in his right hand. There was a small wooden tub to catch the blood.

  The pig squealed with fear, scenting death, and turned its small dark eyes on the men who had just arrived, almost as though he hoped for a reprieve.

  Gemellus shuddered at the sight. It seemed that this island was soaked in blood.

  The man with the knife said brusquely, ‘Greetings, strangers. Go to the hall and wait there for me. If you have weapons, leave them beside the door, for none may enter armed in the house of King Drammoch.’

  Then he bent over the pig. As the Roman party walked on through the dusk, they heard the creature’s screams rise, and then fall away to a sobbing, gurgling plea for relief.

  The man with the knife caught them up. His broad chest was wet with red and he was laughing. He wiped his arms on a woollen cloak which he afterwards flung over his bare shoulders.

  ‘You are expected here,’ he said. ‘My father told me that you would be coming tonight. He said that you were to be treated with respect if you behaved, but killed if you acted as the Romans often act in the villages. You are in a king’s house now, gentlemen.’

  He flung open the heavy door and the men entered a long low room, at the far end of which two horses pawed the ground and four cows munched stolidly away, swishing their tails, their heads tethered to iron hooks in the wall. The air of the place was sweet with the smell of cows and of the peat-smoke which rose from the central hearth-fire.

  Gemellus noted that the low walls were hung with cloth,’ coloured with vegetable dyes, in red and green and yellow. The floor itself was thick with clean straw. A wooden bench and table stood beside the fire. This was a warm, clean room, the room of a king.

  A slightly-built red-haired girl sat on the stone beside the hearth-fire, mixing barley-flour to make pancakes. Once she rose and went to one of the cows. When she came back, the barley-flour was moist with the warm milk she had drawn from the udder. Duatha smiled to see the expression on the face of Gemellus.

  Then the tall man with the blood-spattered chest said, ‘I am Bran, son of Drammoch. This is my sister, Eithne. She is eighteen and unmarried. She is a virgin. Either I or my father would crucify any man who touched her. She will marry a king of the tribes one day. Till then she will not know a man.’

  Gemellus looked at the man, Bran, in some annoyance th
at it should be thought necessary to warn guests in such away. But Bran grinned back, showing his white teeth and said, ‘I mention this because while my father is away, I am the lord of this house, and I like all who, enter to know my wishes. Moreover, I see that you have a dark-faced man with you, and it is to him that I speak mainly, for the men of the east who ride with the Romans do not always understand our customs. Seat yourselves and drink your fill of what we have.’

  But the tribesmen were not to be scared away by such a warning. Lurching drunkenly, they rushed into the room. The Roman party went down, overwhelmed by numbers. Duatha stood longer than the others, punching and kicking as they came in at him like hounds. Then King Drammoch himself struck him in the nape of the neck with his clenched fist. They flung him down and stood on his wrists and ankles, clustering about him like slavering hounds.

  But before they were thrown, bound hand and foot, into the dark beehive hut that lay beyond the king’s hall, Duatha snarled at Drammoch, ‘If I live, Drammoch of the dung heap, I will have your filthy head for this.’

  And Drammoch patted him gently on the shoulder as he answered, ‘But you will not live, Roman carrion! That is the point!’

  13: Before Dawn

  As he lay in the darkness, Gemellus’ mind turned again and again to the lecture which he and the other young Decurions of the Imperial Guard had received before they were posted to the Provinces.

  Their lecturer was a young Staff Officer, with a fresh childish face and a lisp. Prancing about on the dais he had said, ‘You are the envoys of a great Power, you men. The greatest Power the world has ever known. You will go out among the barbarians and they will respect you, they will recognise you as being the representatives of Rome, the Great Mother of the world. They will look on you as elder brothers, who will praise them, or rebuke them, according to their deserts. Make no mistake, men, you are the holders of a great position among the men of the barbarian world. See that you do nothing to disgrace Mother Rome. Very well, stand! Dismiss—and see that you remember what I have said.’