The Dawn Stag: Book Two of the Dalriada Trilogy (82 page)

Icy fear drenched Rhiann’s pain. ‘No gods demand such blood,’ she gasped out. ‘You are a travesty of the Brotherhood! Your gods will turn their faces from you after death, if you commit such a deed!’

Yet the words fell as droplets of rain on parched earth, and drifted away into dust. For from beneath the wolf-skin, Gelert produced an unsheathed dagger, and started over the ground towards her.

Eremon had only one option: to force away the knowledge that Agricola had held back thousands of men, perhaps as many as 10,000 – doubling his initial forces. To give the Albans false confidence; to make them believe they could win; to draw them here to battle.

To draw me. I did it. It was my decision
.

No! Eremon would not give in to these thoughts yet, not now! He must wheel his flagging men instead, rally those who had frozen in terror, and meet the challenge coming at him head on. He tore the Boar standard from Rori’s numb grasp, and clenching his knees, rose up in his saddle and waved the banner in great, sweeping arcs. ‘To me!’ he cried. ‘The Boar, the Boar!’

His men did not hesitate.

Wheeling their horses on the spot, they screeched their war cries and hefted their blades with as much vigour as when they were fresh. Eremon flung the standard back at Rori, and leaned down to pluck a spear from a dead horse’s belly, before digging his heels into Dòrn. The rest of his horsemen streamed away after him, merging swiftly back into formation as they ate up the ground that separated them from the onrushing Roman reserves.

Behind them, the Roman cavalry who had now been released from Eremon’s onslaught saw their chance. Pouring through the breach that opened between Eremon’s men and Conaire’s infantry, they charged up the slope at the greater mass of Albans who had been holding back under Calgacus.

And finally, answered by a howl that shook the entire hillside, the golden king slashed down his sword and gave the Albans leave to attack, and the whole flank of the hill seemed to slide down on to the plain.

Save them
, Eremon thought desperately, as his horsemen and the Roman reserves crashed into each other like storm-tossed waves.
Save us all
.

Rhiann’s palm grew still around the stone, hidden under a fold of her dress.

Then, as Gelert raised the knife higher, his fingers trembling, she flung scattered dirt at him with one hand and stabbed upwards with the other. The sharp rock caught Gelert in the soft flesh under his arm, and with a screech he dropped the blade and fell onto one knee, teetering off balance.

Ignoring the tearing pain in her belly, Rhiann kicked out with a flailing foot and managed to connect with Gelert’s other shin, sending him tumbling down the slope. He was old, and his leg caught in an arching tree root and twisted. There was a loud snap of bone and a terrible scream.

Blinking the tears and dust from her eyes, Rhiann desperately tried to haul herself up the rock to her feet. Yet the pain felled her with one blow, wrenching open her vitals, and her legs buckled again, her sight laced with stabs of flame. Sobbing, Rhiann began to crawl instead, dragging herself over the stony earth, up the path between the rocks, anywhere, so long as it was away from him. Her legs and hands scrabbled for purchase, her overwhelming fear for the child her only strength.

‘Don’t come now,’ she whispered to it. ‘Stay inside, stay safe and warm, and I will hold you. I will hold you …’

The pain had resolved itself into waves now, each one bearing her up to a bright place of agony that verged on unconsciousness, followed by a trough of darkness that promised another kind of oblivion. And each time, Rhiann fought the urge to let herself go into that shadowed place, to escape from the pain. For if she did let herself sink into it she was lost, and so was her child.

Her daughter
.

From behind came an inhuman moaning, and after a moment of silence a rhythmic scrabble and rasping slide, punctuated by harsh grunts of effort.

Lorn’s chariot had immediately become hemmed about with Roman horsemen, and a cool part of him realized, even as he hacked about him, that a chariot could not stand up to such an attack. One horse was manoeuvrable, where a chariot was not.

With careless grace he danced along the yoke, cut the harnesses with two swipes, and slapped one stallion away from the fighting while he leaped on to the other’s bare back. Behind him, the chariot stumbled and rolled, and was lost among the ranks of trampling hooves. His men began to do the same, and many of the Romans fell as their own horses ran into the careering, tipping chariots.

Then, in the midst of the desperate fighting, Lorn sensed a slackening of the onslaught, and realized that a troop of Roman cavalry had managed to form up on the Alban side of his men and were racing up the slope to barrel into the waiting warriors under Calgacus.

Lorn wondered how these Romans had got past Conaire’s walls, and it was then that he heard the Roman trumpets and the wild cheers of their infantry. Desperate to see, Lorn shouted to his men and wheeled his stallion, fighting his way back up the slope with a thrusting spear, unable to swing his sword bareback without a saddle.

Pressed by the Romans on all sides, Lorn was relieved when he heard the sudden hiss of arrows overhead, and looked up to see Nectan and his archers covering their retreat, calmly despatching all the Romans who surged at their rear. In response to curt commands, the foreign horsemen and foot soldiers immediately gave up, returning their attentions to the Epidii infantry.

Lorn halted his horse before Nectan, clutching at the cut remains of his chariot harness as his reins. ‘A thousand thanks,’ he gasped out, pulling off his crested helmet to wipe sweat from his brow. The sun beat down as the swords had beat on the shields, and Lorn’s dry throat was sticky with thirst.

Nectan did not take his eyes off the Roman lines below as he continued shooting in a measured rhythm, a forest of arrows stuck into the ground at his feet. ‘Look there,’ he said evenly, ‘where the prince took the eastern flank.’

Lorn blinked sweat from his eyes and peered in the direction Nectan indicated. His breath caught. Thousands of new reinforcements had flooded down the rise to the east into Eremon’s ranks. The cavalry originally engaged by Eremon now had a clear opening to plough into the waiting mass of Albans.

Just then, released by the Caledonii king’s great sword, the Albans crashed over the Roman lines, and all order disintegrated before Lorn’s eyes. Conaire’s wedge was immediately lost in a surge of whirling swords, spears and screeches, and all demarcations between the two armies vanished.

Then, as more trumpets blew, the waiting legions at last began their march forward in one deadly wall of men.

‘All the gods above,’ Lorn could only say, his dry throat closing over. ‘There must be above twenty thousand now,’ he croaked. ‘Eremon never knew there would be so many.’

‘There,’ Nectan said, and this time he paused to catch Lorn’s eye, pointing with his chin. Then Lorn saw that the little man was not as unmoved as he’d first thought. His dark eyes glinted with a sorrow that was not masked. ‘The banner of the Boar has gone down.’

*

Another surge, and Rhiann’s whole body was caught in one towering font of agony.

For a moment, it ebbed just enough for her to pull herself over another handspan of earth, her eyes running with sweat and tears. Now there was more fluid soaking the soil between her legs, and from the sharp, copper scent she knew it was blood.

‘I come,’ Gelert’s voice rasped, and now there was no humanity in it. ‘And I take you with me, in fire and blood, and your whelp as well.’

Rhiann tried to shut out the evil words, and instead forced every fibre of strength into her raw fingers and the muscles of her arms, screaming with cramp as she would like to scream if she had the breath. Vaguely, she felt the amber necklace snag on a stone and snap, and heard the clatter of beads rolling away.

And there, in the cold shadow of a great, bulbous rock, Gelert’s hand at last closed over her ankle.

The white face of the Roman foot soldier swam before Eremon’s vision as he ran him down, hacking into the man’s neck.

Dark eyes lifted in terror, a snarl on the bloodied lips, but Eremon didn’t see the broken javelin clasped in the man’s hands. He only felt the lurch in Dòrn’s stride as the stallion’s desperate scream rose above the other cries that swirled in his ears. And then the world tilted, and Eremon’s only thought as his mount fell beneath him was to wrench himself away from the dead weight.

He nearly succeeded.

Jerking up his knee and pushing against Dòrn’s back flung Eremon wide, as the impact with the ground jarred all breath from his body, his sword falling from his grasp, his helmet rolling free. But the dying horse writhed and bucked in agony, and though Eremon clawed desperately in the soft earth to drag himself away, Dòrn gave one last roll and trapped Eremon’s ankle beneath his heaving flank, before collapsing into stillness.

The pain was not great, nothing like the terror that flooded Eremon’s veins as he realized his helplessness. His fingers groped for his sword, lying a handspan away now, as a dark forest of legs trampled the ground all around him. In the chaos of ringing swords and grunts, screams of horses and thud of falling bodies, Eremon could see and hear nothing clearly. He glimpsed a flash of Rori’s hair, and Finan’s grey head, but they were pressed by enemy soldiers, and Eremon’s throat was so dry from the heat and screaming that when he tried to shout to his men nothing came out but a feeble croak.

Then a wild yell suddenly sounded above Eremon, and the sun was darkened by a looming shadow that leaped up onto the stallion’s curved belly, laying about him with a sword that flashed dusty sunlight from its bloody blade. All around the shadow leaped other men, and squinting up at his attacker Eremon scrabbled at his waist for his dagger, tensing to stab at any flesh that presented itself.

Suddenly there was a cleared space around him, as what he now recognized as Alban warriors pushed back the encroaching wall of Romans, guarding him from harm.

‘Away with the knife, man!’ Conaire rasped from above, his voice gravelly with exhaustion. ‘I nearly lost my balls to a boar already!’

Going limp with relief, Eremon sank on to his back once more. ‘My ankle,’ he whispered, all traces of his voice broken.

Conaire’s grin gleamed through the bloody grime on his face, and he sprang lightly to the ground on either side of Eremon’s head. Bending over, he began to push at Dòrn’s slack weight with one arm, while tugging at Eremon’s ankle with the other.

‘And what are you doing all the way over here?’ Eremon muttered. ‘You, of all people, breaking ranks on me?’ His pulse had resumed now, though it was still erratic, and to take the sting from his words he clasped Conaire’s thick arm, wrist to wrist, as his brother released his foot and bent over him upside down.

‘I decided’, Conaire said firmly, ‘that I belonged by your side, Polybius or no.’

Eremon was still holding him, their arms pressed together along their lengths, when there was a great Roman shout, and the Alban line close by suddenly collapsed on top of them, a tide of Romans surging past the fallen Albans. Conaire half turned, but before Eremon could free his hand he felt a sickening thud, which jolted through Conaire’s arm and travelled in an instant of knowing to Eremon’s heart.

Conaire’s eyes widened in surprise, and only then did Eremon see over his brother’s shoulder the maddened face of a Roman soldier, both hands grasped around his short sword, all his weight behind the thrust.

Eremon sensed the tight springs of his brother’s great muscles falling slack as the sword entered his upper back just above the mailshirt. Then Conaire slowly collapsed over to one side, the light in his blue eyes already starting to fade.

Eremon did not feel his own voiceless scream, for all noise and pain and even light was extinguished in the shock, as he desperately grasped the moment and held it still, unwilling for time to continue. He only vaguely noticed Rori and Fergus leap screaming onto the Roman, bearing him down beneath their shields, and the other Albans rally with hoarse yells, desperately forcing the Romans back once more.

Then Eremon’s attention narrowed down to one tiny detail: the blood pooling at the edge of Conaire’s mouth. He rolled Conaire to his back, his shaking fingers pressing his brother’s mouth closed.
If the blood cannot come he can’t leave … can’t leave me
… ‘Don’t,’ Eremon found himself whispering. ‘I won’t allow it.’ He tried to lift Conaire upright, but his weight was too great and Conaire’s head only fell back, his helmet tumbling off to spill golden, bloodied hair over Eremon’s arm.

There was a choking gurgle, then a soft rasp of escaping air, and Conaire’s eyes flickered open, glassy with fear. ‘I can’t … I can’t feel my legs …’

Barely conscious of what he did, Eremon dropped Conaire to the ground and straddled his chest, gripping the neck of his tunic with both hands as he screamed into his face with a torn voice. ‘
No!
I order you to stay here,
I order you
! I won’t allow this.’ Eremon’s shoulders slumped, and in a whispered sob he repeated, ‘I won’t …’

Yet Conaire was already looking beyond Eremon, the racing clouds reflected in the blue veil of his eyes. And the light that was him at last darkened, and there was nothing left then but empty pupils staring up from a bloodied face.

Eremon blinked once and gazed down at the old scar below his eye that Conaire gained in a fight on Erin long ago. The lines of battle hardness seemed to have melted away, leaving only the bewildered, soft face of a boy he had once known.

Without a word, Eremon curled his body around Conaire’s head and waited, calm and eager, for the same killing blow in his own back.

Gelert hauled with surprising strength on Rhiann’s ankle, and though she dug in her broken nails, still he pulled her closer, scraping her belly against the pebbles and gravel beneath. With a choked sob she braced herself for the cold blade, the pain that at least would release the rest of her body. All along her limbs her skin tightened, the muscles quivering as if desperate to be free.