Across the shaggy moorland that lay at the beginning of the gully moved a great horde. The earth was black with them into the distance. Some were walking, some dancing, some riding gaily on unbroken ponies. Among them great wagons moved, decorated with coloured banners and with white skulls set on poles. Above them and behind them black ravens wheeled, hungry for the feasting. Hounds ran here and there, noses to the ground, seeking the prey they had been promised. Women strummed on lyres or blew down bone flutes, children ran in companies waving bright flags and laughing at the holiday.
From place to place chariots raced with gaunt chieftains in them, shepherding the tribes, giving messages and orders. One chieftain from the far west rode on a bull painted green to represent the old god Poseidon, and carrying a trident in his hand. His head-dress was not of bronze but of sea-weed. He tottered helplessly for a while and then fell to the ground among his laughing folk. He was laughing too.
Marcus said, “They do not need soldiers to kill them. They will kill themselves. Look, they are drawing the wagons across the mouth of the gully so that the Romans shall not escape. But before this day is out, they may regret they have shut the gate against themselves.”
But Gerd said sadly, “They outnumber the legions, ten to one. They have only to come forward as they are doing now to smother the men below us.”
And for a moment it seemed that the auxiliaries had thought of that, for their excited chattering had stopped and many of them were looking over their shoulders to see where they could run, if the worst came to the worst.
Then the Celtic battle-horde halted. And from her black wagon in the front rank, Boudicca stood up, her face painted white, her hair flying loose in the wind. And that wind blew her words into the ears of the waiting Romans. “My children,” she called, “this will not take us long, then we can dance and sing at our leisure. Today you face creatures—I will not call them men—who bath in warm water, eat dainty food, sleep on feather beds, and scent themselves with myrrh. Creatures who have a fat old lute-player for their king. Creatures who think so much of their stomachs that they eat the oyster but throw away the pearl that is in the shell.”
Marcus did not hear what else she said, because suddenly he felt so hungry that he almost fell from the oak tree.
Then all at once he knew that she had stopped speaking, and saw that the tribes could wait no longer, but were running forward in a thick mass towards the legions.
Then he heard the hard-voiced decurions below going at their trade. “First rank, cast—kneel. Second rank, cast—kneel. Third rank, cast—kneel. Wait for it. Wait for it. Now, swords out! Forward!”
Everywhere this was being said, and always in the same voice, as though one man had said it all.
And then the rushing Britons were down, men and horses, chariots. Some turned and fled, horses riderless, chariots banging about without drivers, all in confusion.
And through the confused air came the sound of the silver trumpets. The legions standing dead still. The riders coming out on either side from the woods, slashing down at everything moving. Then the trumpets again and the cavalry wheeling and going back under cover as though they were rehearsing manoeuvres on Mars’ Field in Rome.
And now the General once again: “Nicely nipped, my crabs. Oh, nicely nipped. But see if you can get more next time, boys. Just a few hundred more and I’ll be satisfied.”
The Iceni did not seem as though they believed what had happened to them, for they came again almost immediately. And once more the decurions chanted, once more the horse came out. Once more Suetonius spoke down the trumpet, always asking for more, for more. He was like a hungry god.
It was midday now and the sun stood overhead. Gerd said, “Surely they must stop and go away. It must be over.”
But Marcus did not answer. He knew that it would not be over until Suetonius stopped calling down the horn—and that would mean there were no more to kill, that his hunger was satisfied at last.
Then in the middle afternoon, when the flies were swarming in the oak tree, a thing happened that held both armies silent. Down the trampled field towards the legions came a white-haired old chieftain sitting bolt-upright on a dappled pony. His long moustaches reached down to his breast in the Gallic style. The burnished bronze he wore belonged to a past generation. The gold about his neck and wrists glittered for a quarter of a mile. Before him on the red Spanish saddle sat a small boy no older than four, and wearing the same bronze and the same tartan cloak.
Marcus squinted at the man and said, “He is of the royal house of the Catuvellauni, some kinsman of Caratacus. I did not think we had left any of them alive. He must have come from far away, from across the sea, perhaps.”
Behind the dappled pony rode seven youths, on good horses, naked to the waist and shaking lances. All had the same look of the old man in front of them. Only the red bars of paint across their faces and bodies were different.
Gerd looked at them and said, “Woden, Woden! Not one but would be a king in my land. I pray for them.”
Suetonius let them come within a hundred paces before he called to the archers. And then the youths fell one by one. The youngest of them was dragged by his leather thongs almost to spear-thrust of the first ranks of the legions.
But still the old man rode on, never once looking back at the youths. And when he was up to the first stockade of pointing javelins, he cried out in perfect Latin, “Where is the Butcher? Let him come down and face me.”
For an instant, Roman heads turned to see if Suetonius would take the challenge. But no answer came, and then the spearmen began to thrust at the old man. Angrily he slashed out with his long sword and five men went down under him. Then a Balearic slinger stepped forward and taking aim knocked the chieftain off his saddle with the first stone. The spearmen shrugged their shoulders, then pinned him as he tried to rise.
By some strange chance the dappled horse broke free and turned back towards the wagons, with the little boy clinging to its mane unharmed.
Marcus said hoarsely, “They will let him go back. They are not monsters. It is their one salvation, they give honour where it is due.”
Just as he finished, the trumpets screamed again and from either side the whole cavalry came forward, as though they were called on to wipe out a whole contingent.
But when they reached the little boy on the dappled horse they reined in, making a guard of honour through which he must pass. He did not seem to notice them, but rode on, looking towards Boudicca.
Then almost wearily the captain of horse nodded to his squadron and they closed the funnel. They used their swords so reluctantly that it seemed as though they carried lead in their hands, not thin steel.
Afterwards they led the dappled horse back to Suetonius with silent mockery against their General.
Marcus leaned his head against the bough and wept. He was not the only Roman who wept that day.
Then the whole army moved, as though this had been the final signal for the destruction. And as the sun sank, the Britons, penned in by their own wagons, fell in great heaps upon the moorland. Families died together there, the children still playing with their garlands, the women still holding their babies, or with the flute at their lips.
And when dusk began to fall, Gerd said, “I have been sick, Marcus, I could not help it. I feel ill now and must get down this tree.”
He nodded. “I am the same, sister,” he said. “I feel that I shall always be sick now.”
There was no one to hinder them below. The legions were spread far and wide, gathering what they had been promised.