The Dawn Stag: Book Two of the Dalriada Trilogy (80 page)

Around them, the noise was surging, as the Romans drew closer.

‘Our trail has brought us by twisting turns to this place,’ Eremon said. ‘I pray it also takes us from it, riding side by side.’

The king grinned, all the hardness in his face, and the years spent guarding his throne given over to the fierce anger of a young warrior protecting his home. ‘You once boasted that you fought as well as you spoke, prince of Erin. Now, to my great pleasure, I can see if your boast holds true! May Lugh guide your steps, and Manannán your arm!’

Eremon tightened his grip on the king’s wrist before dropping his hand. ‘And may Hawen bless all the days of your life.’

Calgacus held up his sword and saluted Eremon. ‘To Alba! She thanks you for her deliverance.’ Those fierce golden eyes looked deep into Eremon, as they had done so on the first day they met. ‘Go well, my son.’

‘And you.’ Straightening in the saddle, Eremon settled his helmet lower on his brow to shield the sun, turning Dòrn away down the hill. Rori fell into close step on his roan stallion, holding aloft the scarlet and white standard of the Boar of Dalriada.

As they picked their way down the slope between the heaving, screaming ranks of Albans, Eremon tore his gaze away from the steadily encroaching tide of Romans far across the plain to search out his own men, clustered under the White Mare banner in ranks on the flat. He was looking for one man in particular.

I will meet you in the middle
, Conaire had said, his grin lighting up his face. Yet Eremon had been unable to find any words of farewell, because they had always fought side by side.

So long as you leave some Romans for me
, Eremon had managed to croak at last, and then all was as it had always been with them before battle; the banter blotting out the fear.

Despite the keenness of his gaze, Eremon could not see Conaire now because of the rippling banners of the Alban warriors. Yet he knew the time for engagement was near, for around him the songs had settled into one great war chant, surging and ebbing like a storm sea, swords beating on shields in an ever-increasing drumbeat, growing more urgent and primal, until it became part of the pulse of blood through the veins, through the heart.

Alba! Alba! Alba!

Below, the great war machine of the Romans came to a rumbling halt only a league away.

From his horse on a ridge to the north-east, Agricola watched the advance of his men with an impassive face.

‘Savage fools!’ one of his tribunes muttered, as a wave of barbarian charioteers, set free by the blare of a trumpet, flung themselves down the hill-slope to crash on to the plain. ‘We haven’t used chariots like that for centuries! Backward barbarians!’

The chariots had wheeled as one body, careening wildly up and down the bare alley of land between the two armies, horse-tails flying from the tips of the drivers’ spears. Their screams carried clearly to the mounted Roman officers, yet before that aural onslaught Agricola’s auxiliary infantry stood silent and firm, their oval shields interlocked into a formidable wall. At the end of each pass, each chariot whirled and tilted at a crazy angle, one wheel spinning in mid-air.

Someone snorted behind Agricola. ‘Insanity! Bloody insanity!’

‘They will only tire out their horses,’ Agricola remarked.

‘I doubt that anything could tire that one out,’ Lucius commented, pointing at one screeching savage with silver hair flying behind his helmet, his face writhing with blue tattoos. The man was naked but for his bright cloak and a gold torc, and those tattoos curled all over his chest, arms and legs, all the way to his bare feet, braced on the wicker platform.

‘Still, one can’t help but admire such recklessness, however fool-hardy.’

‘My dear Lucius,’ Agricola laughed, ‘admire as you will.’ He leaned back in his saddle. ‘They will still die.’

The rush of wind into Lorn’s open mouth tore his war shout from his throat. His heart was soaring, unfettered, and as the chariot clattered over the stony plain, swaying from side to side, he leaned out towards the Roman lines, steadying himself with the reins.

‘Fear us, red invader!’ he screamed again. ‘Our swords are thirsty for your blood, our arrows for your throats! Fear the sons of Alba! Fear the sons of Arawn and Taranis and Lugh the mighty!’

Though the chariot troop was a screeching onslaught of noise and colour, with the painted wicker, the decorated, flying horses, and the thunder of their iron wheels, Lorn kept them all just beyond javelin range. Yet the Romans made no move to come forward and challenge him, the cowards.

Another turn, and Lorn’s heart delighted as he heard the hundreds of chariots behind following his lead. He slapped the reins across his stallions’ backs, and the beasts stretched out their necks and raced faster. Letting loose another yip of glee, Lorn raised one hand. At the signal a host of small, dark men sprang up from their hiding places at the feet of the charioteers, and their bows curved high, unleashing a rain of death on the Romans.

Those long, foreign shields were raised in sudden, startled defence, and at last Roman curses flew up to join Lorn’s own, as many of the barbs found their mark, and the first of the invaders fell beneath the feet of their fellows.

As the chariots spun once more out of javelin range, Nectan easily kept his feet beside Lorn, his arm a blur as he took arrow to string and released, over and over. Glancing behind, Lorn gazed up at the black hordes of his own countrymen massed on the slopes, cheering him on, cheering for Alba, and at that moment Lorn did not care what would come to him that day. There was only the wind, the thundering wheels and the perfect tension of his muscles as he swayed in his chariot. There was only the noise of the war chant above, lifting him up, making him more than he was.

Alba! Alba! Alba!

It swelled and roared, and bore him up to the rarer air, making of him a god.

Leaning back in his saddle, Rori held his reins in one hand, his fingers clenched around the scrap of blue cloth tied to them, which he’d torn from the hem of Eithne’s dress. If he held it streaming through his fingers and thought of her, then the fear seemed to loosen its stranglehold on his chest, and he could breathe.

Suddenly Eremon glanced back over his shoulder, his prince, whom he had followed over sea and mountain both, and in Eremon’s wide grin Rori forgot even the terror that thundered in his ears.

‘By Hawen, so it begins!’ Eremon called to him. ‘Yet now he comes off the field, I must speak to Lorn. Come!’

He dug his heels into Dòrn’s black flanks, and Rori followed, until they were both charging down the hill-slope side by side. In his other hand Rori gripped the banner of the Boar, and it streamed above his head, the ends snapping and cracking in the wind. These were all he lived for, what he held in his hands: the Boar for his prince; the blue for Eithne. They carried him beyond fear, beyond the dread that clawed at his guts, propelling him towards the cold, silent mass of alien men, who stood waiting on the plain below, watching the whirling chariots with empty eyes.

From the corner of his eye, Conaire saw the Boar banner racing down the slope, and Dòrn bearing Eremon to the left of battle to join his cavalry.

Yet Conaire could then spare no further glance for his brother, for directly in front of him, across the stretch of scored turf and torn-up bushes, the Roman trumpets had called, and the lines of foot soldiers had braced their javelins into attack position. In contrast to the Albans they were silent, their faces impassive at this distance, battle-hardened. It was time.

Conaire raised his sword, gazing around fiercely at the Epidii and Caledonii elite who had formed their battle wedge and were awaiting his order.
His order
, and his only. Alongside the bright surge of blood-lust, pride crested warm in Conaire’s chest. If his son could only see …

He glanced again over the tight ranks of his foot warriors, their shields drawn up into a wall to echo that of the foreigners they faced. Here, now, all the days of training in snow and sleet and wind would carry. Here with his 2,000 – the first to engage –whose job it was to thrust into the Romans as one blade, breaching the solid defences of the infantry pack that awaited them. To each side of the point of the wedge, other men formed protective wings, like the hilt of a sword point.

For a brief moment, Conaire allowed himself to wish for Eremon – not because he was scared, but because they had always fought side by side, since their first battle as boys. When their war shouts echoed together, even the fiercest of fights seemed to grow lighter, and Conaire could easily believe that they were invincible, beloved of the gods. He risked one last glance, yet Eremon had his own job to do, his own troop to lead, and he was already on the move. And though he wasn’t here, he was relying on Conaire as he never had before.

A Roman trumpet screeched, and Conaire’s sword came down, and Roman javelins met flying Alban spears mid-air, with a terrible whine and clash. Then his men were charging forward in formation all around him, screaming for the Mare and the Boar both.

Screaming for their lives.

CHAPTER 72

A
t the thunderous impact of the two armies, Caitlin’s arms tightened around Rhiann’s shoulders. On the sidelines, there was no comfort to be had from speaking, and they found that all they craved was the warmth of touch. Like two frightened cubs, they burrowed into each other, Caitlin standing on a rock behind Rhiann, arms clasped about her; Rhiann holding her hands.

Conaire held the centre, they both knew that. And Rhiann also knew that Eremon led the cavalry, and therefore had not yet joined the battle. Her cold fingers crept up to brace Caitlin’s hands. ‘They have trained for this,
cariad
,’ she whispered. ‘I know Conaire will triumph, I know he will.’

Rhiann could feel Caitlin’s heart thudding against her back, her chest rising and falling swiftly. Yet Caitlin’s reply was cut off by a sudden crackling that came from somewhere in the undergrowth around the hill.

Instantly alert, Caitlin’s arms slackened. ‘Go and see what that is,’ she instructed the two Caledonii warriors, who were standing behind, watching the battle with ill-concealed frustration. As they unsheathed their swords and crept away, Caitlin released Rhiann and unslung her bow from her back.

‘Look!’ Rhiann’s attention had been claimed by a black horse racing beneath a scarlet and white banner. Eremon had finished with Lorn and was crossing the hill again to the other side, behind Conaire’s lines, leaving Lorn and his chariots drawn up out of range to the left.

Yet Caitlin was not following the progress of the black stallion. ‘It is Conaire!’ she suddenly yelped. ‘Look, Rhiann, he has broken the Roman line!’

*

From the hill to the right of battle, Eremon gazed down with tense pride, as the wedge of the Epidii infantry pierced the Roman ranks, like a sharp prow through water. Then the centre block of Roman foot soldiers was disintegrating, confused at this show of discipline from their barbarian enemies, unable to charge the hill because of the wings that spread out neatly behind the wedge, in a bulwark of men.

The seething mass of Calgacus’s warriors on the hillside erupted into frenzied cheering, shaking their spears and swords, only held in check by Calgacus on his chariot, hair and arms and horses a great blaze of gold.

However, there was no time for Eremon to pause and watch, for Conaire would need aid very soon. Below, to the east of the hill, Eremon’s own cavalry troop of 2,000 horsemen waited for him. On the western side of the battle, Lorn’s chariots had cleared javelin range and spun to re-form in lines. As yet, the Roman cavalry had received no order to advance, and all eyes of both sides were on the centre, milling with infantry.

‘Hold your men,’ Eremon muttered as he galloped down the hill to his horsemen, his eyes darting sidewise to the Epidii wedge. ‘Hold them, brother!’

Dòrn came to a halt in a flurry of scattered stones, before Finan’s bay stallion. Behind, Rori reined in under his banner, breathing hard.

Finan turned to Eremon with a grin that split his lined face, his eyes alight with excitement. He broke them, lad, he did it! They cannot advance!’

Struggling within the dense mass of screaming, grunting men, Conaire ducked another javelin and caught it on his shield. As he wrenched it free, a Roman sword stabbed out from the interlocked shields before him, seeking his belly, and he remembered, in a vivid flash, how Eremon’s roll and upthrust once killed a man in this situation.

So Conaire dived, his sword pivoting beneath him, and the Roman went down with a scream, tearing a hole in the shield wall. With a cacophony of screeches the men to each side of Conaire poured into it, slashing away with their longer swords, wrenching the rent wider.

Rolling to his feet, Conaire struggled to beat back the red fog of rage and forced himself to cling to cool wits. He had a responsibility to Eremon, to his men, not to lose himself in the battle lust.

Conaire yelled an order now, urging the men to hold their tight formation, darting back and forth in an attempt to be everywhere in their sight and hearing at once. Through sheer force of will and by his own example, he would not allow any warriors to descend into their own wild abandon, and so splinter the wedge they had carefully constructed.

The Roman lines had struggled to re-form around the breach, and now the Albans were fighting on three sides. Yet no matter how they hurled themselves against the Epidii warriors, the Romans could find no weakness, no way in beneath the tight shields, or between the men fighting side to side with their designated partners.

Instead of a disorganized rabble that could easily be separated and cut down, the Romans faced men fighting much as they did, and as no quarter was given, so none could be won. The fighting became more brutal, as desperation took hold, as men were coaxed out from behind their shields, and swords hacked at ankles and knees and elbows.

‘Hold your line!’ Conaire screamed at his men, swiftly wiping sweat from his sword hand down his tunic. ‘Hold, damn you, or Manannán’s wrath will be upon you!’ He couldn’t see whether he was making any difference, whether the Romans had broken through elsewhere. All he could see was the sun, splintered into a thousand shards of light, and the world of darkness beneath, a world narrowed to screams and grunts and cries, hot blood, and the sweat running down into his eyes.