The Eagle and the Raven (44 page)

“Perhaps. But somewhere there is a truth that will not become a lie tomorrow.”

“I do not wish to discuss it,” Caradoc said harshly. “You are well named, you Druithin. You fight with words and spells, but give me a sword and an enemy I can see.”

“You have both,” Bran reminded him calmly. “And it is impossible to insult a Druid, Caradoc. You have work to do, and so have I. I did not spend twenty years on Mona for nothing. I learned much wisdom and many mysteries but I did not waste my time in the weaving of spells, I have told you that before.”

“Well, what did you do?”

Bran chuckled. “I learned to roll the dice of destiny.”

The Catuvellauni made their way back slowly to the place Eurgain thought of more and more as home. They arrived on a day of intermittent rain squalls and a fresh, blustering wind when the sun flashes in and out like a spark that would not ignite wet wood. Madoc and Jodocus strode to meet them, and Madoc, laughing and roaring, flung his short, mighty arms around each of them in turn. “Rest and peace!” he shouted. “So the mountains let you go, Caradoc! How did you fare? What did you think of our noble cousins? Come and eat!”

The black beard wagged frenetically, the black eyes warmed them, and Caradoc was suddenly glad to call this big fighting man his friend. After the cool, silent danger of the Ordovices he seemed like a torrent of welcome hot water. Llyn disappeared in search of his friends. Eurgain left them immediately to find Annis and the girls, and Caradoc, Cinnamus, and Caelte walked to the Council hut where the fire leaped high and there was a dry place to sit. The smoky, shriveled heads seemed to grin in welcome as they pushed through the doorskins, and the Silurian chiefs ran to greet them. But there was no Fearachar waiting to serve his lord with meat and beer while pouring out a steady stream of woes, real or imagined, and with a sudden pang Caradoc missed him. He crossed his legs and sank to the skins, the fire’s heat warm on his face, and a Silurian slave was there with a platter, boar’s meat, flat bread, apples, and beer. Eurgain returned and his girls ran to be hugged with cries of delight. He held them briefly, astonished that the baby softness had turned in the months he had been absent to lanky bones and the clumsiness of two leggy colts. Eurgain was eleven now and Gladys ten, and as they left him to ply their mother with excited questions he thought how they had grown without him and now were almost unknown to him, two little sword-women that he had fathered in a time he could not remember by a Catuvellaunian girl who had changed, like him, so much as to make her, too, almost unrecognizable. Or is it only I who’ve changed? he wondered dismally. Eurgain settled onto the skins with the girls, Tallia prepared to serve her, and Caradoc’s eyes met hers without expression. He turned to Madoc.

“How did the summer raids go?”

Madoc frowned and his monumental shoulders lifted. “Not well. It is time to change our tactics, Caradoc. The road is patrolled now by soldiers on the watch for us, and every dispatch rider and wain is strongly guarded. We have lost too many men, and the Romans too few. We must strike elsewhere. The spies wait to speak with you. There have been rumors that Plautius is to be recalled to Rome and a new governor appointed, but we do not yet know who it will be. It is too bad. Plautius has been reluctant to push farther than his border across the lowlands and it would have been much easier to mount a campaign away from the mountains.”

Caradoc digested the news, then shook his head. “No, my friend, it would not. Let the Romans lose their heads and try to fight us here. This is country we know, and they do not. The odds would be even. Now we can only wait for the other tribes to make their decisions.” Madoc looked curiously into the thin, gaunt face. The Catuvellaunian chieftain had changed. Well, it was to be expected. No man spent months wandering in the mountains and remained as he was. Madoc was conscious of a fleeting sadness, but he grunted, forthrightly shoving it away. “Patience. Yes, I know. But let them not take too long or the Silures will have to take the battle paths on their own. Where is Bran?”

“He stayed behind to bring the decisions to us in the spring. It will not be long now. And I need the time of quiet left to us to order my scouts.”

“So the time of testing approaches, eh Caradoc? Soon we shall say farewell not only to Plautius but to every cloddish soldier on the island. That reminds me. There is a strange Druid waiting to speak with you.”

“Oh?” Caradoc went on eating.

“He has been here for two months and he says his message is a personal one, not for the Council. He will give it only to you.”

Caradoc sighed. He wanted sleep, his mind needed forgetfulness for a while, but a Druid should not be kept waiting and this one had been waiting for a long time. Perhaps the message was important. “Find him then,” he said. “I will hear his news.”

“Jodocus!” Madoc roared. “Fetch the Druid!”

Caradoc finished his meal and sat still, gazing into the fire, mesmerized by the glowing heart of it. The hut was quiet. Rain rustled in the roof’s thatching and then abruptly ceased. The little girls and Tallia had gone but Eurgain sat on, cup in hand, watching her husband’s face through the steady flames. She knew there was nothing that she could do for him, and that she had lost the power to reach him. Her glance strayed to Cinnamus sitting silently beside his Vida, and her mood lightened. Cinnamus. He too had been changed by his trials in the mountains but he did not carry Caradoc’s load. He was still warm, human. She looked away, shocked at her thoughts. I should go, she told herself. What more can I do? It is too late.

Jodocus swaggered in, followed by a tall, white-swathed figure. The Druid was young, his beard as black as night, his bronze-ringed hair curling below his ears. Jodocus pointed and then sat down and the Druid came and stood before Caradoc who rose, wrenching his mind from the reveries that always waited for him in moments of inaction.

“Greetings, Caradoc ap Cunobelin,” the man said smoothly. “I have waited long to deliver my message, but I was told to seek you and give it to none other, and that I have done. I have news. Will you hear it?” He tucked his hands into the sleeves of his long tunic as Caradoc nodded. “I bring words from your sister.”

Eurgain sprang up and came closer and Caradoc felt himself tense. Gladys! He quickly stilled the whirl of conjecture and excitement that churned within him. She had escaped, she sent vital news of the legions, of course, of course, and he began to tremble as the clean, well-remembered face swam before his mind’s eye. Brown braid hanging over one shoulder, black cloak fastened with pearls, self-sufficient, sea-filled eyes meeting his own. His heart turned over. Gladys! He wanted to shake the Druid in his impatience but did not dare, for the man had closed his eyes and Caradoc knew that the words he would hear had come from Gladys’s own mouth. In a sing-song, phraseless monotone, the Druid began.

“To my dear brother Caradoc, greetings. That you still live is a joy to me, and it is also joy to hear your name whispered with hope among the enslaved tribes who look to the west for deliverance. I, too, am enslaved, but not with chains of iron. Listen to me, my brother, and forgive if you can, remembering that it was I who stayed to face Rome alone, I who fought beside you at the Medway, and I who slew Adminius, traitor and coward.” The listening Catuvellauni sucked in their breath, looking at one another dumbfounded, but they dared not cry out for fear of breaking the Druid’s concentration. Only Caradoc did not move. He stood with heavy stiff limbs like lumps of stone and the Druid went on. “My chains are forged of love and my freedom gone to my beloved. Forgive me, Caradoc. This was the final battle and I have lost it. I have been lonely for too long. You understand. All my life I have prized my freedom and fought for it in pride and with honor, but I can do no more. My sword hangs on my beloved’s wall and I will never take it up again. I am to marry.” Oh do not say it, Eurgain pleaded with the Druid silently. Not now, not here, it will kill him, and Caradoc, his head suddenly exploding in fire, heard the words shouted at him. Plautius! Plautius!

The Druid seemed unaware of the dumb outbursts around him. He went on quietly. “You see why I must beg forgiveness, Caradoc, for my husband is to be Aulus Plautius, a man of honor who offers me his hand. You are his enemy, yet even enemies can command respect, and this man, Caradoc, is worthy of your respect. He is recalled to Rome and I go with him. Do not think hard of me. Sacrifice for me to Camulos, dear brother, for it will be a bitter thing to see the shores of my land for the last time with no member of my kin to bid me go in peace, and I will never cease to mourn for the days of our youth together. May you and your destiny drive the legions into the sea, and may you rule our own Council once more. Greet Eurgain for me. I swear to you that I will do all in my power to lighten the load of the tuaths. Farewell.”

The Druid stopped speaking and opened his eyes. “Here the message ends,” he said. “I am permitted no comment of my own, Lord, but I will say this. She is well, she is happy.”

He stalked out of the hut, leaving a stunned silence. The color had drained from Eurgain’s face and she leaned against the wall, feeling faint. Gladys and a Roman. It was not possible! What is happening to the world? The possibility of a trick flashed through her mind and was instantly dismissed. No Druid would carry a message that was a lie, and Druids had a way of knowing whether the truth was spoken to them. Caradoc stood with lowered head and she could see his hands slowly curl and clench, then all at once he threw back his head and began to shout.

“Slave! Slave and Roman whore! I disown her!” He pulled out his sword, grasped it by hilt and tip, and the blood sprang from his fingers as he tried to smash it in two against the lintel of the door.

“Caradoc, no!” Eurgain screamed, running to him, but he pushed her away roughly and cast the sword at his feet, stamping on it, his eyes wide, and his mouth contorted and flecked with foam.

“The tuath disowns her! The kin disowns her! Henceforth she is Catuvellauni no more, but outcast and slave. Let her be cursed of Camulos! Let her be hunted! Queen of Panic take her mind! Raven of Battle tear her in pieces! May she sleep, eat, walk, and fight in peace no more!”

“No!” Eurgain shouted. “No, no!” But he shouted back. “Her honor-price is forfeit to the people. I, Caradoc, ricon, declare her cast out from the tuath. I forbid her name to be spoken.” He was shuddering all over now, gripped by spasms of madness as he repeated the terrible words of banishment. “Sword-woman no more. Honorable no more. Sister no more. And may this curse follow her into the world to come.” Cinnamus was frozen. Caelte had hidden his face against the wall. Then Caradoc turned and swept out the door, and his going unleashed an excited babble as the Silurian chiefs gathered about Madoc. It had been the right thing to do and they said so loudly and gleefully, while the Catuvellauni present stood horrified under the holding spell. Eurgain was the first to recover and she sped after her husband into the rain.

Caradoc ran. He neither knew nor cared where he was going. He simply fled, his own words echoing in his flaming brain with the thud of his feet. Whore! Whore! Whore! Trees closed about him suddenly but he did not pause. Branches lashed his face, brambles tore at his cloak, but rage and shame drove him on and he could not escape. He opened his hands and it was good to feel the shreds of his reason dissolve into the boiling cauldron of his suffering. He felt as though his head would burst with the bursting of his straining lungs. Roman whore. Faithless slave. He stumbled, flung out his arms, and they closed about a huge oak. He embraced the tree, panting, his eyes closed, his forehead pressed against the wet, woody-smelling bark, and pain like the twisting of a sword tearing at his entrails and head. He sank to the ground and sat with his back against the tree, his arms around himself, rocking to and fro in his extremity while rain pattered gently through the stark branches above him and fell cold on his already soaking breeches and his shoulders. There was no sound but his own ragged breath, the thumping of his own burdened heart, and the confused shouting in his own brain. Whore. He opened his eyes. The clearing was dim, full of a suffused gray light, choked with dead leaves that lay sodden and thick under emaciated dead trees. Dead, dead, everything dead and rotten and old. I, too, am old and dead, all life and laughter gone, all love and honor burned away. Better for me to fall on my sword and let the Romans come. They will find nothing but shadows to haunt their fine new forts, and ghosts to watch them under the forest’s blanket. I did not choose this fate, it was thrust upon me. I am only a man, one man. I have done all that is humanly possible, I can do no more. He felt for his sword but it was not there. Then his attention was caught by a flick or color on the opposite edge of the clearing, like a red leaf settling to the earth, and he stiffened.

A fox padded into sight. It stopped, looked at him enquiringly, then sat, curling its furry russet brush neatly around its tiny feet. It yawned, showing pointed white teeth, and its pink tongue caressed its whiskers, then it fixed him steadily with its black, beaded eyes. He moved a hand but it did not stir. It sat there staring at him. Caradoc felt a peculiar giddiness. He scrambled to his hands and knees, and the fox yawned again. “So you do not fear me,” he whispered. “Why? Do I bear no scent now but the scent of an animal?” The fox blinked, a warm splash of bright fuzzy color, and Caradoc felt the bubble of pain move from his stomach to his chest. The agony of it was unendurable. He gasped and struggled for breath, then it was in his throat and inching into his mouth. Oh let me die, he begged, doubled over, let me die, and then the bubble burst, and tears poured down his face. Bitter tears, scalding and hot, hurting him, and the pain of their flowing was as great as the crumbling of the dam that had held them captive for four long years. He flung himself on the ground and wept with his face buried in his arms, great racking sobs of torment and desolation, and he could not stop. The rain eased, the sun shone out, only to be hidden again, and still he cried. The days of heartbreak and failure, the lonely burdens thrust upon him, the losses and treachery and ceaseless strain all washed away into the soft cradle of the earth.