Reign of Iron (11 page)

Initially he’d found the Celermen better company. You could have a conversation with a Celerman. But now he preferred the Maximen. Felix had never much enjoyed conversation and the big ones were easier to control.

He looked across the river. So, Chamanca and Atlas were still around. It was a shame his troops hadn’t caught them. Caesar would have rewarded him well for killing them after all the trouble they’d caused. By the skill it would have taken to shoot three Celermen, the archer surely had to be Lowa. That was interesting. He’d assumed that Chamanca and Atlas were working as mercenaries with the Gauls and the Germans, but if Lowa was with them it seemed like they were indeed a British effort to hamper the Roman advance. Lowa would have been a good kill, too … No matter, he thought, all three would be dead soon enough.

“Pondering your successes?”

Felix span round. It was Kelter, chief Celerman.

“Hello, boss,” he said, his accent thick Sicilian. “What’s next?” He’d stripped to the waist and removed his hood. Kelter had been a beautiful man once, with prime skin, high cheekbones, thick, dark hair and a lean, muscled body. Unfortunately, the magic that gave the Celermen speed also caused their hair to wither and fall out, and blazing red pustules constantly surfaced all over their heads, each blooming, yellowing and erupting in a few hours. The pus-spouting spots were why Felix made them wear hoods. From the neck down, they were hairless but unblemished, their torsos and limbs not far from perfect in the druid’s eyes.

“Next,” said Felix, letting his eyes stray over Kelter’s pectoral and abdominal muscles then pretending that he’d looked down because he’d seen something interesting on the ground, “we rebuild the bridge, cross it and kill everything we find: man, woman, child, dog, cat, bird – everything. The Germans will learn that Gaul is Roman territory. They will never cross the Rhenus again. When we’ve killed all we can find, we cross back and destroy our bridge.”

“There are many injured Germans in the camp,” smiled Kelter. “We can use their energy to build this bridge.”

“Good, yes. Have the Maximen gather building materials from the smashed camp – large stones, long planks of wood, rope and pottery – and bring them here.”

“Pottery?”

“To be ground and mixed with limestone for cement that will set underwater. I’ll have engineers deliver the limestone and requisite tools and show you how to make it. Have the other Celermen corral the German survivors, and appoint three in rotation to guard them from the Maximen. Keep four hundred Germans alive to power the bridge building. The rest you can kill. Got it?”

“I have it.”

“Set it in motion then, quickly.”

R
agnall walked through the thriving industry of an itinerant Roman army making camp, glad that he was spared the donkey work of digging ditches and pitching tents every night. The centurions and legionaries did all that. Ragnall was officially a legate now, one of Caesar’s inner circle, upgraded from clerk. Nobody had told him what his new role was, but it seemed that he was expected to follow the army, hang around the other legates, keep quiet and simply be a British king in waiting. So he spent his waking hours marvelling at Roman efficiency and watching the scenery change as they marched across the land. It was enough to keep him busy.

Now he’d been summoned to Caesar’s tent, however, and was worried that he might be called upon to do something dangerous like going on another envoy mission. Surely Caesar wasn’t going to send him to Britain? Carden and Atlas had seen him acting as Roman envoy to King Ariovistus. If he went back to Maidun, who knew what they’d do to him?

As usual, Caesar was dictating his diary when Ragnall arrived: “So Caesar pursued the treacherous Germans to the Rhenus where he found that the bulk of their army had escaped by boat. His advisers suggested that he and his army cross in the same manner. However, travelling by boat is beneath Caesar’s dignity, so he ordered that a bridge be built. In ten days, Roman engineers and legionaries built a strong bridge across the Rhenus, forty feet wide and fifteen hundred feet long. Caesar crossed and spent eighteen days ravaging the land to discourage further German incursion…”

Caesar continued. Ragnall only half listened, but his ears pricked up when Caesar began describing some of the creatures that they’d found on the other side of the Rhenus. The men, he said, had reported seeing unicorns, and elk with no knees that ran along straight-legged and rested by leaning on trees. These latter creatures, the general said, his men had captured by half sawing through trees so that they broke when the elk leant on them.

These made-up tales of bizarre creatures perplexed Ragnall for a while, then he realised what the general was doing. If the rumour of a monstrous legion was the only tall story that the chattering citizens of Rome heard then they might give it some credence. If the tale of monsters was just one more unbelievable story in the fountain of nonsense spouting from fantasist legionaries in Gaul, nobody would believe it for a moment.

When he’d finished making up animals and creating the most Rome-palatable tale of the Usipetes’ and Tencteri’s destruction, Caesar sent his scribes away and turned to Ragnall.

“Stay for wine, king of the Britons. Tell Caesar more about your land.”

The slaves poured two goblets and Caesar shooed them away, ordering them to leave the amphora. Ragnall and the general sat in collapsible chairs facing each other across a small table, in front of the screens painted with pictures of the battle of Aquae Sextiae, in which Caesar’s uncle Marius had killed a hundred thousand barbarians – far fewer than Caesar’s own campaign had killed over the previous two years.

Ragnall told him about the Island of Angels, Drustan, his adventures on the floating island, his love affair with Lowa, the death of Zadar and more. All the while Caesar kept refilling Ragnall’s goblet, but never his own. Ragnall, excited to be alone with the great leader and to be telling his own story, drank heartily.

Halfway through the fifth or possibly the sixth goblet, Ragnall found himself saying: “So these rumours about Felix’s dark legion … they’re true, right? They attacked the Germans?”

Caesar regarded the younger man without blinking. His dark, sparkling eyes seemed to look through Ragnall’s and into his mind and the young man shifted uncomfortably, even half drunk as he was. Finally the general said:

“Felix does command something like a legion, and, yes, it did rout the Usipete and Tencteri forces. Caesar has judged that its existence should be kept a secret from Rome, and, as far as possible, the rest of the army. So you will tell nobody about it, and discuss it with nobody, even if you think that they also know about it.”

“Right,” said Ragnall, thinking that was that, and reckoning it unwise to probe further, but Caesar continued.

“The legion has only two companies, each smaller than a century but larger than a contubernium. One is made of large, powerful men whom we call the Maximen. The other is comprised of men who are blessed with the speed of Mercury – the Celermen. With their combined talents, despite their meagre number, they could defeat any army on earth – including any Roman one.”

“Where are they from?”

Caesar sat back, stretched out his legs, made a pyramid of his fingers and looked down his bony nose as if deciding whether to say more. Torchlight glinted in the remainder of the general’s silver hair and shone off his freshly shaven shins. Finally, he leant forward. “The short answer, Ragnall, is that Caesar does not know. Neither does Felix understand the mechanisms that have created his little army. The longer answer is that when Crassus defeated Spartacus, he gave Felix a multitude of captured rebel slaves. Most of these, six thousand men, Felix had Crassus crucify in a line that stretched shore to shore across Italy. Felix used the
energy
– for want of a better word – released by the death of these men to bring about a metamorphosis in some of the remaining captives. Almost all of them died in the process, but a few became larger and stronger. A few more became quicker. Now, they both still feed from death. Killing gives them their power.”

“How…?”

“Only the gods know.”

“And you have no worries about—”

“Of course there must be concern about their utilisation. It is done sparingly, only to save Roman life.”

“And when they can operate secretly, out of sight of anyone who might get word of them back to Rome?”

Caesar breathed in sharply through his nose and Ragnall thought he had gone too far, but the general said: “Caesar has sent them into battle three times. Once to obliterate Ariovistus’ cavalry when it threatened to starve his army. Once to clear the Nervee ambush from the forest. And once. Before Caesar leads the legions to Britain, he needs to neutralise the German threat to his Gaulish territories. Caesar could use his legions to achieve this, but it would take a year, perhaps two, and he needs to be in Britain this year. After today’s battle with the Usipetes and Tencteri, and the harrying of the Germans which Felix’s legion will now carry out, Caesar need fear no interference from the east.”

“What did Felix’s legion do? What will they do?”

“Do not trouble with the means, only the outcome. Now, return to your tent and sleep. Tomorrow the army will head west, towards your throne.”

Ragnall felt a rush of excitement – he was going to be a king! He nodded, stood, and thanked the general for the wine. He left the headquarters and walked away between the rows of tents, step jaunty and arms swinging. He looked about, assessing his new allies – his new tribesmen.

A British army camp would have been full of men and woman drinking, shouting stories at each other, dancing and otherwise preparing for the long day ahead in the most idiotic way possible. The Roman camp, in anticipation of the morrow’s march, was silent, other than for the odd whinnies from horses and snorts from snorers.

The Roman way was
so much
better and Britain would benefit from it to an immeasurable degree. And if Caesar used Felix’s dark magic troops to conquer Britain? If this unstoppable host was unleashed against Lowa and her army…? Well, that was all the better. Fewer Romans would be killed, as Caesar had pointed out, and surely Britain would capitulate and surrender the moment they saw what the dark legion could do, so fewer Britons would be killed as well?

L
owa rode back over the rise and there was Maidun Castle, shining like a white beacon fire from a sea of mud. They’d managed to keep grass from growing on the walls while she was away, which was a good sign. Hopefully everything else would be in similarly good order.

Riding next to her was Mal Fletcher, then came the Two Hundred followed by three thousand men and women, mostly on foot. After two moons travelling around Britain, Lowa had hoped for at least twice the amount of infantry recruits. She now had around ten thousand foot soldiers in total. According to Atlas and the others’ previous reconnaissance, the Romans could send double that, possibly more. She had a much smaller number of chariots and cavalry as well as the infantry, but the Romans would have cavalry, too, and in a full-force, pitched battle on open ground – the kind the Romans would strive to make her fight and she might not be able to avoid – infantry numbers would be the most important factor. Unless Felix’s dark legion slaughtered all the Britons before they so much as clashed swords with a legionary, that was, as it had done to the Nervee in the woods. She wished she had more information. Knowing next to nothing, as she did, she couldn’t plan counter-measures, other than encouraging and bullying her soldiers until they became tough and skilled enough to fight anything. That, and hope that reports of the demons were exaggerated.

Monsters aside, Rome’s legions were professional soldiers, rigorously trained for years, with several seasons of battle experience. A great deal of Lowa’s force were pressed farmers, craftsmen and layabouts, many of whom were more likely to trip over and spear themselves to death than kill an enemy. Still, they had to try.

She left Mal and others to billet the new recruits – there were plenty of spare tents after the previous year’s battle at Frogshold – and headed up to the castle, the eyrie and little Dug. She hadn’t expected to miss her son while she was on the road, and she’d been right; she hadn’t much. When she’d left, he’d been screaming, snotty and shit-smelling and she’d been glad to hand him over to Keelin. On the road she had sometimes found herself picturing his small face smiling or sleeping, or imagining his tiny fingers encircling one of her own, but most of the time she’d been too exhausted by the time she went to bed for such imaginative frivolities, and too busy during the day to consider anything but immediate business.

The Haxmites had been the most obstructive, but, by Bel, what a bunch of whingers the rulers of the British tribes had proven to be. You’d have thought the threat of a conquering horde coming to kill or enslave them all was reason enough to give as many people as possible for her army, but, no, she’d heard tales of how palisades needed rebuilding, religious rituals needed to be observed, ponds needed draining – countless excuses not to send every single adult south and learn the skills they’d need to fight the invaders. It had taken her every ounce of patience and persuasion to garner even the meagre, inadequate number that she had.

Keelin was waiting inside the main gate, baby on one arm. The child saw his mother, stuck his whole fist in his mouth and ducked his head into Keelin’s capacious chest.

“Hello, Keelin, hello, Dug,” said Lowa, wondering if babies were meant to be able to fit their fists in their mouths.

Dug waggled a saliva-dripping hand at her, said, “Ba! Ba! Ba!” and smiled. The change since she’d last seen him was startling. He was enormous. His comically round head was nearly as large as Keelin’s. He’d been more or less bald and eyebrow-free when she left, but now a thick fuzz of blond-brown hair had overrun his scalp and pale arcs heralded the growth of eyebrows. He raised one of these proto-brows at her quizzically, just as his father had done. Six moons old. He didn’t look like a baby any more, he looked like a little boy – a big-eyed, clear-skinned little Dug. Lowa felt her breath catch and tears press.