As their coracle bobbed up and down towards the rocky shore, the two men turned their heads, staring back over the dawn-lit waves, to where the great rollers of the Channel marked the open sea. Beddyr could just make out a faint grey shape, low in the water; he could not distinguish the colour of the hide sail or see the oars beating against the head current. Morag, humped close behind him in the flimsy shell, could see his own hands on the wicker-rail and the water lapping almost up to his fingertips, but little more; the rest was a blurred shadow, through which broke the sudden cold gull-cries and the sound of the sea.
Then they felt the rough sand beneath their craft, and Beddyr jumped out into the white foam and dragged the coracle onto the beach. Putting his arm round his shoulders, he helped his half-blind brother out, and then, bending, pushed the frail coracle out once more among the waves. For a time, as the bitter morning wind tore down the sand and the chill water still broke over his soft-hide shoes, he watched the little boat caught on the ebb, bouncing up and down, until it was far out to sea again. Then the brothers began their climb over the rough boulders and up towards the cliff face that towered above them.
They were lucky to find what had once been a watercourse, and holding on to whatever tuft or stunted branch they could find they made their way up it slowly and without speaking. When they were perhaps half-way up the cliff-side Beddyr stopped and looked back over the leaden waters, shading his eyes, and at last pointing. “I can just see her,” he said. “She is heading south with the wind in her red sail now. If you could see, brother, you would weep to watch them go—the pick of the tribe. All that are left now. The Belgae!”
Morag snuffled, pulling his ragged cloak about him in the icy wind. “I would not weep for any but the Badger,” he said. “They have their freedom and their eyes. They will sell their swords to Egypt or Greece. They will have gold again to wear on their throats and silks for their backs. They have life before them. We have only a dream of a king who has gone from us. We have only a long wait in the dark before death comes on us, too.”
Beddyr turned back and looked at the tears on his brother’s cheeks. The wild gulls wheeled round them as they stood a moment longer in the cleft. “Have courage, Morag,” he said. “We are in Gaul now. The gods will take us to Rome one way or another, and then we shall see whether it is their wish that Caradoc should be freed from his enemies. That is our duty now, to Badger and the gods.”
Morag did not speak at this, but slowly pulled off his last arm-ring, a pretty piece of chased silver, set with sea-pearls, and twisted into the shape of a water-snake. He held it close to his eyes for an instant, then he whirled it out into the grey air, and Beddyr watched it as it swung for a moment in the strong breeze and then fell, without making a ripple, into the oncoming waves.
And they both remembered their mother fastening the thing on the young boy’s arm, once when he had come back successful from a hunting-trip, bringing her the skin of a red deer for a new bed-robe. Beddyr recalled that he had brought her an otter’s pelt at the same time, but that had only earned him a smile and a kiss. Now the silver bracelet had gone back into the sea, and it didn’t seem to matter any longer whether one had a gift or a smile, whether one brought a red deer’s skin or an otter’s pelt. Nothing seemed to matter much any more, only finding the King, wherever they had taken him. Just finding him. Beddyr dared not think any further than that.
“I hope the sea-god will like your gift,” he said.
Morag smiled grimly. “He has pearls enough,” he said. “But it is all I have to give now.”
Then Beddyr took him by the hand, and together they struggled on towards the coarse grass that jutted out above them and marked the summit of the cliff.
At the top they stood for a while, getting back their breath and turning their faces towards the sea once more. When they turned again, a man was standing twenty yards from them, half-hidden by a gorse-bush, his arrow drawn to the head and trained on Beddyr’s heart.
Beddyr looked at him helplessly, noting the Roman helmet and the heavy iron-plated leather jerkin. He glanced at Morag, who had not seen anything but seemed uneasy, sniffing the air like a dog.
Beddyr held up his hand, showing that he carried no weapon. “Hold!” he called in as quiet a voice as the wind would let him use. “We come as friends. We are wanderers without a lord. We mean no harm to Gaul.”
The man in the Roman helmet smiled, sneering. “My orders are to shoot anyone who lands along this stretch, friend or no!” he said. “Gaul has no friends now. It has only Rome to care for it!”
Something in the man’s voice made Beddyr say, “You speak better Gallic than most Romans, friend.”
The watcher bridled. “I am no Roman,” he said. “I am a professional soldier now.”
Beddyr said, “Your voice reminds me of Catuval’s. Catuval was my cousin—but he is dead. I am Beddyr, and this is Morag, my brother.”
The man in the Roman helmet slowly let fall his bow and slackened the string. “If you are liars,” he said, “I will blind you with gorse-spikes.”
Morag laughed bitterly. “You will need to blind only one of us,” he said. “Gwyndoc has saved you half your trouble.”
Then the man came towards them, amazement marking his face. “Now I know you speak the truth,” he said. “We know of Morag the blind here, and of the vow he made to revenge himself on Gwyndoc. A wanderer told us of it round the fire one night, a bard.”
Beddyr said, “Was it Roddhu?” And the other nodded. Then he said, “I was Catuval’s bowman. I rode in his chariot. I was at Camulodunum with the Cantii on the day that Rome broke the Belgae.”
Then he smiled. “If you had worn your tartans,” he said, “I should not have threatened you.”
And Morag said, “We wear the tartans of the birds and beasts now—only hide and feather! The last shred of tartan blows in a thorn-tree on a hill above Viroconium, and soon the crows will carry it away to line their nests.”
The watcher said, “Are the Belgae broken at last, then?” And the brothers nodded their heads. “Where is Gwyndoc?” he went on. “Is he dead too?”
Morag said, “He followed us from the battlefield. He was at the bitch’s hall when they took Caradoc. Perhaps he is dead now. We do not know.”
And the watcher said, “Why are you not dead, then?”
Beddyr bit his lips and then said, “The Badger made us stay outside the stockade when he rode in to meet Cartismandua. He told us to wait for Gwyndoc and stop him. But we did not see him. He entered at the second gate.”
The other looked at him steadily. “How did you get here?” he said. Beddyr nodded back towards the sea. “We took a long-boat, with the rest of the Belgae who came across to Evrauc, and sailed down to Gaul. They went on to the middle sea, they said. They set us off in a coracle and we let the tide bring us inshore.”
The watcher said, “Where is the coracle?”
Morag answered, “It has gone back to the sea-god. We turned it back into the waves.”
The watcher said, “That was a foolish thing to do. A coracle is worth something. Now if it gets washed ashore again someone may be suspicious. They will think someone has landed, you see. And no doubt your coracle was a coast-wise one from Brigantia. They make very singular boats. You can tell them a mile away. It is the way the wickerwork is framed before the hide is stretched over it. A Roman would know that without a doubt. They are sharp ones, these Romans. I give them credit for that. They wouldn’t have got as far as they have if they hadn’t had their heads screwed on the right way!”
Beddyr frowned at him. “It is done now. We cannot undo it. But perhaps by the time the coracle is washed ashore we shall be on our way to Rome.”
The man in the Roman helmet said, “That’s where they have taken him—Caradoc. He came past here four days ago, heavily guarded, in a wagon.”
Morag turned his nose towards him, “Was he chained?” he asked.
“Yes,” answered the watcher. “They had chained him heavily, and there were twelve picked soldiers in the wagon with him. He will not escape now. That is the end of him. Claudius will treat him as Julius did that other one.”
Then he smiled, and Beddyr seeing that smile shuddered. “What is your name, friend?” he asked.
The soldier shrugged. “It does not matter now,” he said. “I have stopped using my Belgic name. I am called Gracchus now on the army lists. But a name is only useful to me on pay-days—and they come seldom enough on this part of the coast. All the best jobs are in the south or in your country now. That’s where I would be if I were ten years younger. But I can’t stand the damp now.”
Morag had not been listening, and he said, “How did the folk hereabouts treat the Badger when he came through? Were they good to him?”
The soldier laughed. “What have they to be kind about? They owe the Badger nothing. He killed many of their sons and husbands who had been taken over to Britain as auxiliaries. No, they didn’t strew flowers before him. Most of them either threw dung at him or spat at him, if they were near enough! That’s how it was! That’s how it is with every hero once they have been dragged down.”
As he spoke the thin note of a trumpet sounded through the morning. He stopped. “You will have to take cover,” he said. “There is a detachment of legionaries camped half a mile from here. They do a morning patrol along here. It would be bad for me if they found you here.”
Beddyr said, “Can you hide us? We do not know where we are.” For a moment the other surveyed him from top to toe, noting his rope belt and his toes showing through the ends of his shoes. “You have nothing to pay, Beddyr,” he said. “It would be more profitable for me to hand you over. They would at least give me a copper or two blood-money. You are princes, after all!”
Beddyr did not move to strike him, as the man had expected, but just shook his head from side to side. “You will not get blood-money,” he said. “Blood-money is only paid for live prisoners. Morag and I will fling ourselves from this cliff if you make any sound to signal our whereabouts. Either that or you will have to kill us for attacking you!”
Then Gracchus came forward and put his hand on Beddyr’s shoulder. “You are a broken man, but still one of the Belgae. I am a Roman kept-man, but I still remember Catuval.”
For a moment they smiled into each other’s eyes. Then Gracchus said, “Quick! I can hear them forming up. Follow me to the village!” He set off without looking behind him, and the brothers followed. When they had traversed the heath, they looked down on a small cluster of huts built round a central farm. Their guide stopped and indicated a deep bed of bracken. “Lie in there until I return,” he said. Then he ran on down towards the farm.
As they lay in the fern Morag whispered, “When he returns I will hold his arms to his side. Then do you take his knife and slit his throat.” Beddyr punched him in the side. “Do not be a fool,” he said. “He is our only friend.”
Morag muttered, “He laughed when he said that they spat on Caradoc. I do not trust him!”
Beddyr said, “He has an honest face. He was Catuval’s bowman.”
But Morag answered, “I cannot see his face. I only know his smell and what his voice says behind the words he uses. Besides, Catuval is dead long since, and with these cattle loyalty dies when the master is not there to enforce it.”
Beddyr punched him again, but harder now. “We will not kill him, yet,” he said. “We must wait till we have rested and know the way we shall take towards Rome. That is good sense, brother. Yours is madness.”
Morag was still grumbling inarticulately when Gracchus returned and told them to follow him again.
“I have arranged for you to lie up in the farm,” he said. “I know the old woman who runs it. Her husband fell out of a tree last year and died straightway. I look after her and her young daughter now, when I can; see that soldiers don’t get billeted on them, and such like. They repay me as well as they can. They always accept my friends as their own.”
In the village the three moved under the walls of the huts, not daring to risk the open spaces. But no one was stirring at that time, except the Roman party, whose feet could be heard now from the road above the village as they marched towards the cliff.
The farm house was solidly built, some rooms of stone, others of wood; very different from the farmhouses in Britain. The windows were shuttered and the doors stout and well-bolted. Beddyr noticed these things as he was led into the low hall. It was a place where a man could feel fairly safe for a time at least.
In the hall, seated by the fire, the old lady was waiting for them; she did not rise when they entered, but touched her forehead with the back of her hand, in respect, for Gracchus had told her she was to entertain princes of the Belgic blood. Her daughter, a girl of sixteen or so, knelt beside the fire, stirring the broth-pot. Her black hair was heavily braided and her hands were fine, but her face wore the sullen look due to a heaviness of jaw that so often characterised the Parisii. Beddyr had seen it among the Brigantes, and now it looked familiar, as if they were back in Evrauc again. But then the girl looked up and smiled, and Beddyr saw that she was a friendly thing who perhaps needed someone to talk to. It was a lonely spot for a girl of quality, he thought. And the old lady looked the domineering type.
Morag had strayed into the room and was sniffing. “I smell broth,” he said. “Bring me a bowl of broth, you lady, whoever you are.”
Gracchus turned and went to the door. “You will be safe here,” he said, “and when the coast is clear—perhaps tomorrow—I will set you on your way again. Rest here till I come.” Then he went out, and Beddyr noticed that the girl followed him with her eyes as though she loved him.
After they had eaten they were taken out into one of the barns, where they lay among the straw through most of the day, on the off-chance that a squad of legionaries might decide to call at the farm. But when darkness came the old lady came into the barn and told them politely that they might come back into the house and rest the night there.
In the flickering light of the fires they lay down on pallets of hay, draped over with old robes and the skins of deer. After a while a woman in a nearby hut began to moan, in sleep or childbirth, they did not know which. A man’s rough voice swore at her, telling her to be still, and so she was silent until the pains or the nightmare came back. Morag could not sleep but lay listening to her, his dull eyes wide open in the firelight. Then from the other side came the distant howling of a wolf. Morag saw his brother’s dark body rise, and he knew that Beddyr was sitting upon his pallet listening, too.
After a while Beddyr became aware that the girl, at the other side of the room, was watching him, her eyes shining brightly as the last flames caught them. In a far corner the old woman lay huddled fast asleep and snoring from time to time. Morag saw his brother dimly stretch out his hand and beckon towards her, and, shading his eyes, he looked through the gloom and saw a quick movement from the other side of the hut. Then he lay back in his bed and pulled the coverings over him, biting his wrists as he lay in the darkness.
Beddyr watched the girl come towards him and saw that she had thrown off her shift. She stood still for a moment by the side of his bed, rising above him, her shadow thrown past him and onto the wall. Then she moved in beside him, gently, almost apologetically, a peasant beside a lord.
For the space that a man would need to count fifty he lay still, his heart racing with the unfamiliarity of a warm body beside him; it seemed that he had been a warrior so long, so long accustomed to the harsh embrace of an iron breastplate and the chafing of a shield-strap that his senses had unlearned their sensitivity to touch. Then her hands moved over his shoulders and down his arms, across his breast and down his stomach; stroking, feeling the hard muscles tightening and then relaxing, knowing the harsh wolfish power that lay in them, waiting for the last touch to set it free. And when that touch came, suddenly and almost wickedly, Beddyr swung towards her and clutched her so fiercely that she would have screamed but for the old woman snoring in the corner.
Then at last they fell away from each other and for a space lay still. When they were aware once more of other things outside themselves, they heard the woman moaning and the wolf’s cry coming from the spinney just outside the farm stockade. The girl shuddered and reached out her arm again towards Beddyr as though for comfort. And so again his body possessed her, brutal, as though, warrior-like, he would destroy her.
And at last the girl bit her lips until the blood ran slowly down her chin, and she wondered that a man could so approach a god and yet walk on the simple soil of Gaul! And in the end, when the night began to seem a long tunnel through which a haycart tried to pass, but so overladen that many men had to push it from behind and the bales scraped so strongly against the walls that the stones began to fall and the tunnel to crumble in, then Beddyr pushed her away roughly and said, “Go to my brother. He is weeping and needs comfort.” And when she listened she heard Morag’s sobs and then knew that Beddyr was sleeping again, his head flung back, his arms dangling at the sides of the pallet.
And she lay beside Morag, trying to be still, trying to let the rest of the night pass quietly by. Then Morag turned to her and put his arms about her and rubbed his rough face against her breasts. And she waited; but there was nothing. Only his low voice seeming to call for a mother and the hairy face nuzzling her breast. And at last he was still and the crying stopped and she crept quietly from his bed and went back across the room.
But even while she was putting on her shift again, feet sounded on the earthen pathway to the house. She sat up in alarm, for she knew the sound of Roman marching-boots, and she could hear that these men were armed as javelin clanked against shield-boss in the dark. So she rose quickly and ran across to Beddyr, shaking him and whispering that he was to be silent. He sat up, puzzled, then he heard the feet and shook Morag into life again. The girl pointed to a wall-hanging and told them to go through and hide in the straw. Then, as she was shaking the old woman, they heard the spear-butts hammering on the door and they lifted the hangings as she had said.
Behind the rough matting they found a stout door, which opened easily. They shut it quietly behind them and found that they were once more in the barn they now knew so well. Morag went to his old place and covered himself completely. Beddyr saw that his brother was hidden, then he squeezed himself behind a wagon into a heap of sacking and lay still. From the other room they heard the women’s voices, as though suddenly wakened from sleep, querulously arguing, demanding to know why good citizens of Rome should be treated in this fashion. And they heard the reply of the centurion in charge, and they knew that this was a man who would not be balked by so much as an inch. For a while the argument went on, and Beddyr remembered enough Roman to know that they were all discussing the two pallets by the fire that they had so recently left. The girl was saying that they had been made up to accommodate a cousin and his wife who were supposed to be visiting them from the Ardennes. The centurion asked where they were, and the girl answered that they had not arrived. Perhaps their horse had gone lame. A soldier answered that it could not be as lame as her story, for the bedding was still warm!
Beddyr felt the hackles rising on his neck as the man said these words. But then he heard the girl laugh and say that she had had the coverings on her own bed, since it was a chilly night, until she had heard their knock, then, thinking it was the cousin and his wife, and not wishing to appear inhospitable, she had flung them back onto the other beds as she went to open the door.
The centurion laughed at this, but Beddyr shivered at the laugh, for it was that of a man who knew the truth in his heart but could not prove it for the moment.
Then he heard the house door bang again and feet marching round the side of the barn to the door that led onto the stackyard. Then he felt a cold blast of air and could see the light of torches flickering on the beams above his head. For a time no one spoke, then he heard the voice of Gracchus. “They must be here. This is where they hid through the day. I know that. I looked in through the window and saw them before the sun went down, both of them, the blind one and the big one.”
From outside the centurion said, “Your story had better be a truthful one, Gracchus, I don’t like bringing men out at this time of night on a fool’s errand. Prod the straw, my lads, and see if this dog is lying! No, start from one end and work to the other. That’s it!”
Beddyr heard the men grunting with effort as they moved slowly down the barn, and he waited trembling for Morag’s scream. But nothing seemed to happen. And still the feet moved down the barn. Then the centurion said, “It looks as though you will know the Roman lashes before breakfast, my friend. Three hundred should give you an appetite, eh?” And he heard Gracchus say, “You Roman bastard, do you think I would lie about this? They killed my lord, Catuval. They put him into their battle-line and let him die! But for them he would have been living now. He would be my chief still—not a snivelling Italian like you, who can neither read nor write, nor even hold a sword correctly!”
Beddyr heard the centurion roar, and then the prodding into the straw seemed to stop and there was some scuffling. “Hold him!” cried a sudden voice. “He’s armed!” Then there was a scream, and the centurion said, “Cut him down; the man’s mad! Here, let me get to him. Stand back, I have my sword! I’ll show him whether I can hold it correctly—and we can let the reading and writing wait!” There was nervous laughter, and the voice of Gracchus starting to cry Catuval’s battle-charm. Then his voice went very low and he began to gurgle in his throat. For a moment no one spoke in the barn. And at last the centurion said breathlessly, “Roll him over there. Yes, take his helmet and arms; they will come in. We can leave the women to dispose of the body. Less expense for Rome!” There was laughter, and the centurion said in a softer voice, “Well, Gracchus, can I hold a sword, think you?” But this time no one laughed.
And Beddyr sat stark, listening to the silence swirling through the low place, beating in waves on his eardrums till it sounded like the throbbing of his own heart or the sea.
Then he heard the centurion say, “All right, lads. There’s nobody here. Gather the others from the house and make your way back to camp. There will be no roll-call for you in the morning.”
Beddyr heard the sound of marching footsteps outside, and then there was silence in the room beyond the wooden wall. He sat still, on and on, waiting, for he sensed that there was still someone in the barn. At last he could bear it no longer and slowly moved his head so that he could look below the wagon. The centurion was still standing over the body of Gracchus, muttering now. “You bloody fool! Now I shall have to make out a report—and you were right, I can’t read or write! I could have stood the bit about the sword if you had not said that! Oh, you Celts, will you never learn when to keep your stupid mouths shut!”
There was something in the man’s tone that appealed to Beddyr. This centurion was a warrior of his own sort, he thought. Then the man seemed to look up suddenly, straight into his eyes, and Beddyr sank back into the shadow again.
Then the centurion said, “That was a rat, if I ever heard one,” and the man’s feet shuffled through the straw towards him. Beddyr sat, turned to stone, like a rabbit as the stoat closes in on him. He saw a long spear-point stab beneath the wagon, a foot to his right side, and heard the Roman curse.
Then a pink mist seemed to come over his eyes and a strange smell came into his nostrils and ran down the back of his throat. And he felt his teeth meeting through the sacking and his nails breaking against the wooden floor. And the white-hot point slid easily into his groin and through the lower part of his stomach. But he had fainted away before he could scream through the thick fabric that filled his mouth.
Then the soldier went through the door with his torch and the cold air swept through the barn again. And Morag crept slowly from his hiding-place and groped his way to where his brother lay and felt for him across the floor in the darkness, calling his name again and again, reproaching him for lying still, telling him that the Romans had gone. That they were safe now.