GUNHILD TOOK HIM back through the forest to the place beyond where the Swan Maidens’ boat was moored amid the reeds.
‘This is where we part ways,’ Gunhild said. ‘You must go to the battlefield. I will join the other women.’
‘I have so many questions,’ Hagan said.
He felt an overwhelming urge to wrap his arms around her, pull her close to him and press his lips to hers. He was going to war. Perhaps to his death. Perhaps this was the last time he would ever see her.
As if anticipating his action, Gunhild stepped back.
‘There’s no time now,’ she said. ‘And it’s a very long story. When the battle is over and we have time some night beside the fire I will explain everything. But right now you need to go.’
Hagan nodded. She was right. For all he knew the Romans were already advancing.
Then their eyes met. Hagan felt like he was frozen, locked in by her gaze.
‘You look like an angel,’ he said. ‘With the feathers and robe, I mean.’
‘Good luck,’ she said. ‘Make us all proud of you today. I know you will.’
She turned and hurried off through the trees.
Hagan stood for a few more moments, watching her go, then turned and ran as fast as he could back to the battlefield.
To his relief the fight had not yet started. The Burgundars still waited in their lines while across the meadow, perhaps three hundred paces away, the Romans maintained their own line.
Hagan picked up his spear and shield where he had left them and shoved his way back into the sweating, tight-packed press of men who waited for the fight.
‘I thought you’d run away and left us,’ one of the other lads said.
‘Of course not,’ Hagan said. ‘My father asked me to do something.’
As if overhearing his words – which was impossible given the distance from the third to the front rank, the noise and the chatter – Hagan’s father looked around. When he saw Hagan had returned he shot a questioning look in his direction.
Hagan nodded in a response he hoped gave reassurance to his father that the king was on his way.
‘It must be starting soon,’ one of the older warriors said. ‘Here come the priests.’
A procession of holy men, clad in long robes woven with golden thread, one carrying a censer filled with holy incense, another carrying a huge, bejewelled cross began to walk along the front of the Burgundar army. The priests were chanting and moving their hands, pronouncing blessings on the warriors preparing for battle. As they reached them the warriors of each section knelt and bowed their heads to receive the consecrations.
Each man crossed themselves but Hagan noticed many of the older men around him also made the two-fingered gesture of the old gods of the people. Childeric was one of them.
‘Aren’t you afraid of sending your soul to Hell by doing that?’ Hagan said. ‘You could die today!’
‘All our souls are going to Hell, lad,’ the older man said. ‘Hel is the name of the Queen who rules the world of the slain in the faith of our folk. The Christians just stole her name. Tiwass has always been our God, lad. Ever since the world was young. This Jesus God is just a fashion. Like the clothes we sometimes wear made in a certain style. Or the way we cut our hair. We did not follow him before and in years to come we may not follow him any more. Tiwass will always be there, however.’
Hagan glared around, fearful someone might overhear.
‘But the king says we must worship Jesus now,’ he said.
‘The king may not always be the king,’ Childeric said in a low voice, looking around him. ‘But a god will always be a god. Tiwass was the god of your father. And mine. And my father lived a long and prosperous life. And if I survive to the age he did then it’ll be a long time before I worry where my soul ends up.’
‘The priests say Tiwass was just the Devil in disguise,’ Hagan said.
‘This is your first battle, isn’t it, boy?’ Childeric said.
Hagan nodded.
‘Well, you will find that you might need to act like the Devil himself before the day is over. If you don’t you won’t see the sunset. On the other hand if old Tiwass can help with that then I’m all for him.’
Another similar procession of holy men was making its way along the front ranks of the Romans. When both arrived about the centre of their lines, the Roman holy men turned towards the Burgundar and began shouting and gesturing towards them in a manner that was far from friendly.
‘What are they shouting about?’ Hagan said.
‘They are calling us heretics, lad,’ Childeric, the older warrior who stood nearby said. ‘They are calling down Jehovah’s curses on us and damning us all to Hell.’
‘That doesn’t sound very…’ Hagan rummaged his mind for the right word. ‘Christian of them. Don’t they know we worship the same God?’
‘The same God, yes,’ Childeric said. ‘But they have different beliefs about the Logos, his son. It’s hard to explain. Our priests say that it is they, the Romans with their Trinity, who are the real heretics.’
Hagan frowned. Nothing the older warrior said made sense to him. It unnerved him. If no one knew who the real god was, how could they be sure what happened when death came? And death was here. He hovered in the woods, waiting to start his dreadful harvest. His expression made this clear to Childeric.
‘Suffice to say, lad,’ Childeric said, ‘when the dead from today’s battle meet in the afterlife, all ours will be with Jesus in his Heaven. Their lot will be somewhere a lot hotter and a damn sight more uncomfortable.’
The other warriors around him laughed.
Then the king arrived at last. Gundahar came galloping onto the battlefield mounted on a magnificent white horse. He rode along the Burgundar battle lines, one arm aloft, his mighty sword waving in the air. On his other shoulder was his shield, painted with the eagle of the Nibelungs, the king’s clan. All his warriors cheered.
‘There he is at last,’ Childeric said. His chest swelled and his back straightened. ‘I knew he’d come. And he’s brought the young lion with him too!’
Behind the king rode a young man around the same age as Hagan. The resemblance ended there. He was tall and slender and his mail coat shimmered like the king’s. His helmet was polished and bore the wings of a raven, one nailed to each side. A long, golden-hilted sword was strapped under his left arm. His shield too bore the emblem of an eagle.
Hagan knew him well: he was Gunderic, the son of the king. As with Gunhild and Brynhild, Hagan had grown up together with Gunderic, running around the Royal Household. They were friends, though in the constant state of rivalry that often passes for friendship of young men of their age.
Hagan made a face. Part of him was pleased to see his friend, but another part of him felt jealous of the magnificent war gear he wore. Hagan knew he could never compete with the king’s son in wealth, influence or good looks, but still he could not help himself trying.
‘He looks good in all that armour,’ one of the other lads nearby said. ‘But can he fight?’
‘We’ll see soon enough,’ Childeric said with a sniff.
‘Will we?’ the lad said. ‘When the fighting starts Gunderic won’t be anywhere near the likes of us.’
The king and his son stopped in the middle of the line, near to where Hagan stood. Gundahar made his horse rear so that it thrashed its forelegs in the air and his men all cheered once more.
‘By God, you all look fearsome today,’ the king shouted. ‘I don’t know about the Romans but you terrify me!’
The Burgundars let out a storm of war cries.
‘Today, men, we fight Rome,’ the king said when the noise died down. ‘Once that might have struck fear into the hearts of us all. But no more. We beat them before. There is nothing to be scared of from these pathetic soldiers and their womanly dragon banners. They’re standing there shivering in the cold, wishing they were in the bathhouse or the theatre. They have no stomach for battle and campaign. They will run for home as soon as we charge. We’ve seen it before. Many of you fought with me at Noviomagus and Argantoratum. Did we not even have our own tame Emperor for a few years?’
The Burgundar warriors laughed.
‘Yes, but Aetius defeated us,’ Childeric said from the corner of his mouth. ‘And that’s the same general over there today, if I’m not mistaken.’
‘What does he mean about the Emperor?’ Hagan said. The other young men around him looked equally mystified.
‘More than twenty-five winters ago – before any of you lot were even a notion in your fathers’ loins,’ Childeric said, ‘our folk first crossed the mighty Rhine and moved south into the Empire.’
The young fighters around him all groaned. They had heard about the great move south so many times from the older folk.
‘Back then, Rome was at war with itself,’ the old warrior continued. Hagan’s ears pricked up. This was new to him. ‘Of course, if she hadn’t been, the Great Old Whore would never have let us get halfway across the river. Gundahar there – along with the king of the Alans – supported a Roman called Jovinus in his claim to be Emperor. They forced him to allow us to set up home here within the Empire. They made him do all sorts of things, most of them humiliating. He was their lapdog and we were half his army. Jovinus only managed to hang on to the Purple for a couple of years. Then he lost his head. We stayed here, however. Did your father never tell you how we came to live in Vorbetomagus?’
Hagan frowned. He knew the Burgundars came originally from somewhere far to the north but he had never heard of this Emperor Jovinus. Perhaps he had heard the story before but he could not remember. When it came to lore, Hagan preferred the tales of the ancient heroes, with their dragons and old gods, to what happened a few winters past.
It seemed strange not to think of Vorbetomagus as the Burgundars’ home. He had grown up here. The city, these forests and the mighty Rhine had surrounded him since he was born. They were his earliest memories. Yet men like his father and Childeric had spent their childhood somewhere else. Home was a different place for them. It was hard to imagine.
Gundahar went on.
‘Now Rome is back. She pokes her big nose towards the Rhine where she has been humbled so many times before, right back to the days when Arminius slaughtered the legions in the forests. Today, we will make that Roman nose bleed again. This is a war they have provoked. We did not want to fight, but now we have to, we will and by the Lord God we will win! We will conquer this proud Roman Aetius and send him and his pathetic army back to Ravenna where they belong. Are you with me?’
The warriors erupted in a torrent of screamed war cries, chants and cheers. Despite what he had witnessed earlier, Hagan felt a surge of pride. The thought came to him again: with such a great man as Gundahar to lead them, how could they lose this fight?
The king kicked his heels against his horse’s flanks. He moved on down the ranks to deliver his inspiration to the next section of the army. To the surprise of Hagan and those around him, Gunderic did not follow his father. Instead he swung himself out of the saddle and onto the ground. Then he slapped the horse’s rear, sending it galloping on without him.
Gunderic strutted to the shield wall, the front line where the champions and heroes of the tribe stood. He grinned, acknowledging their good wishes and the pats on the shoulder and back they gave him.
‘Let me through, men,’ Gunderic said. ‘I must take my place with the others my age.’
The men of the front rank cheered their prince. They parted shields and he shoved his way back through the ranks, looking left and right until he spotted Hagan.
‘He’s definitely his father’s son,’ Childeric said. ‘He knows what it takes to get men to follow him.’
Hagan felt a rush of pride that made him grin like an idiot. All the fear and tension that had built up within him fell away.
‘You have come to stand with us?’ he said, hardly able to believe it.
‘Of course I have,’ Gunderic said as he pushed himself into position beside Hagan. ‘If there is a battle I can’t have my old friend Hagan taking all the glory, can I?’
He winked.
‘Let’s not get too cocky,’ Childeric said. ‘General Aetius will not be a pushover. That’s still the Roman Army over there.’
‘Shut your mouth, old man,’ one of the young warriors said. The presence of the king’s son had given him courage to speak his mind. ‘I’m sick of listening to you. If you don’t want to fight then go home and die in your bed like the coward you are.’
‘I am no coward, boy,’ Childeric said, turning to glare at him. ‘I killed my first man long before your mother and father ever lay down together to make you, you snivelling brat. And I’ll kill more today. I’ll die if I have to. It doesn’t mean I don’t have the right to say what I think. Burgundars are free people. We can say whatever is in our hearts. Don’t mistake experience for fear.’
He tossed his long hair as the young man looked down, rubbing the shorn stubble on the back of his head.
‘How do you know so much about the Roman Army anyway?’ Hagan said.
‘I spent ten years in it, boy,’ Childeric said. Hagan noticed he braced his shoulders and straightened his back again as he spoke. ‘The Romans call us barbarians but they need us to do their fighting for them. That’s why I don’t fear them. But we should respect them.’
Several of the young warriors gasped. Hagan felt confusion, knowing now that one of the enemy – albeit a former one – stood beside him. But was he really the enemy? He knew Burgundar warriors joined the Roman Army at times when it was not engaged in fighting them, but it was seldom spoken about. He had thought it was something everyone knew happened but never discussed.
‘Grow up, lads,’ another of the older warriors said, noting the looks on their faces. ‘Most of us have spent some time in the Roman Army. It’s a great way to see the world. And the training in warcraft is second to none.’
‘And that,’ Childeric said with a wink, ‘is also how we know how to beat them.’
A Roman on horseback was riding along the front of their ranks like the king had done with the Burgundars. He was straight-backed and wore a metal cuirass that was moulded to the form of a muscled torso. Under it he wore a white linen tunic and breeches. On his head was a brass helmet that gleamed like gold and had a tall white horsehair crest that ran front to back across the crown. Behind him flowed a red cloak.
‘There he is,’ Childeric said. ‘That’s General Aetius. He’s a Roman through and through. He’s very dangerous. If we could kill him I’d say the rest of that Roman army will turn tail and run away.’
There was movement in the front ranks and Hagan saw his father walking out in front of the others. He strode forward holding his spear and shield up above his head.
‘It looks like your father is going to try to do just that, Hagan,’ Childeric said.