Boudicca, p.5
Boudicca, page 5
“You may have sport with them, but do not kill them.”
“No!” I screamed, and staggered to my feet to lunge after my girls.
Decianus caught my braid as I tried to rush past him and jerked me off my feet.
“You see what happens when you aren’t polite?”
From the ground I looked up at him and pleaded. “Please! Do as you will with me, but they are children. They are no threat to you.”
“Ah, but they will grow up, and because you insist on arming your women, they will become my enemies. Think of this as a lesson in propriety. I am actually doing them a favor. Perhaps, when they are adults, this will teach them not to bear arms against their betters.”
“Mama!” Ceri sobbed.
“Help us!” Enfys screamed.
Rage filled me to overflowing. I surged to my feet again. Shrieking the Iceni war cry, I ran directly at Decianus. I bared my teeth to use them as weapons and made my hands claws as I went for his eyes. The procurator staggered back. Off balance, he fell against the soldiers who were struggling to contain the two hysterical girls.
For an instant I thought Ceri and Enfys might escape—might dart between the wall of soldiers and shields and flee into the misty, concealing forest. But the men only laughed, made the mocking sounds of clucking hens at the girls as they closed their wall of shields. Ceri and Enfys ran in the other direction. Again, the wall closed and the soldiers taunted. Hand in hand, the sisters raced from the column and ran into the only building on the field, the hut in which straw targets and wooden practice swords were stored. They closed the door. My heart ached with the futility of it. The hut was no barricade against the lust of Rome. Still laughing and clucking like hens, soldiers broke down the door and entered the hut.
As my children’s screams lifted to the boughs of the great, watching oak, Decianus backhanded me before he wrapped my long, thick braid around his hand and dragged me to the center post.
“Tie her!”
The waiting soldiers did as he commanded, binding my hands above my head so tightly that my face pressed into the thick wooden post.
“Stop your men!” I pleaded with the tax collector as I hung from the post. “I will not arm my daughters. If you release them unharmed I give you my oath as queen that they will never take arms against you!”
Decianus took his pugio from a sheath strapped to his side and approached the post. With ironic gentleness, he lifted my thick braid and brushed it aside so that it no longer covered my back. Then the procurator leaned into me so that his hot, foul breath brushed my cheek. His body pressed against me and I could feel his erection, hard and insistent. “But what good is the oath of a queen who is so weak she cannot even protect her children?” A cold blade touched the patch of skin that was visible at the base of my neck. “Your daughters must learn what happens when women are not ready to serve their men.”
With a swift stroke that left a line of warm blood dewing my skin, Decianus cut through the back of my tunic. He pulled and ripped the garment until I was naked from the waist up. Then he went to his horse and unwrapped a long, braided whip from his saddle. It ended in several strips of leather that were knotted. Decianus shook it out and cracked it over his head as he approached me again.
“And now, your lesson begins, Iceni queen. But let it not be said that I am without mercy. All you need do to stop your flogging is cry out and ask me to do so, and I will know you have learned your place. I shall put away my whip then.”
I said nothing as he marched away. I could not think past the screams of my daughters. I had no time to prepare. The first lash struck like a hot knife fileting my skin. I opened my mouth to scream, but the whip snaked out immediately again. My gasp of pain cut off my scream as it struck my back, leaving a hot ribbon of agony. The pain was so all-encompassing that it took my breath, my voice—it felt as if it took my soul. I had no control over my body; it jerked spasmodically with each blow. My bound hands grasped the wooden stake. My fingernails broke and bled as I clawed the post, but I did not cry out. I could not cry out. I had no breath. It had fled and taken my words. Decianus struck again—and again I could not scream, could not gasp, could not cry out. Instead I struggled to hold to consciousness as my sight tunneled and blood washed down my back with every lash.
The only sounds in the field were the murmur of soldiers, my daughters’ fading screams, and the crack of the whip.
“Cry out, woman! Beg me to stop!” Decianus commanded.
My cheek pressed against the wooden post. I did not close my eyes but stared up into the mighty oak before me and said nothing.
“I said, cry out!” Decianus’s voice was shrill. Nero’s tax collector struck me over and over until blood ran down my hips and thighs and calves to pool around my feet.
And still I did not cry out. Instead I continued to stare into the tree. The watching soldiers had gone silent. My beloved daughters had stopped screaming. The day held its breath.
My mind became very clear. Gone were dizziness, confusion, anger, and fear. I realized that Andraste had known I would not choose to remain in Annwn while my people were attacked. The goddess had also known that her Victory, though not a queen who had led Iceni warriors into battle, would not bow to the will of Rome. With that icy clarity that often preludes the end of life, I understood that I had come to the real choice the goddess had foreseen and asked me to make. Die or survive. I could feel the seductive allure of death as surely as I felt the white-hot lash of the coward who flogged me.
A raven lit on a bough of the oak. Its gaze caught mine. I stared into its dark depths. I could easily remain silent. I could already feel Arbred, the mortal world, slipping away. The pull of Annwn was great. Prasutagus was there. My mother was there. So, so many beloved Iceni elders were there. My daughters quite probably were there. If I just let go, my spirit would follow my loved ones. Andraste had given me this choice; she said she would welcome me to her Summerlands. This day I could feast with those most dear to me—free of pain and of the oppressive fist of Rome.
But with every lash a new raven landed in the oak. Each great black bird stared at me in silence until one raven opened its obsidian beak and I heard the goddess’s voice inside my mind. Look around you, Victory.
My vision, like my mind, was preternaturally sharp. I turned my head to gaze around the training field and the path my children and I had so recently been forced to walk. The bodies of the elders of Tribe Iceni were strewn everywhere. Ancient limbs had been severed. Skulls had been broken. Bellies that had carried children who now had children of their own had been opened, spilling entrails across the hard-packed ground.
If I chose death, what would the Iceni do? In a span of a few short months they would have lost their chief, their queen, their royal family, and their elders.
My gaze returned to the tree. The raven’s dark eye caught mine again. If you choose death, the Iceni will be no more. They will be absorbed by other tribes who will bow to Rome. With the extinction of Tribe Iceni, so too will life as you know it end—and Rome will go unpunished for its crimes.
With those words—Rome will go unpunished for its crimes—anger began to build within me. With each stoke of the whip, that anger grew into a rage that burned away the lethargy that had begun to lull me into death.
“Submit to me!” Decianus shrieked, and the whip snaked against my blood-slick back again as yet another raven landed to perch in the great oak and bear witness to the flogging of a goddess-anointed queen.
The memory of Andraste’s promise filled my mind. If you heed my words and let today fuel your anger instead of your demise, a great blue tide of vengeance will sweep across your world and you will ride its crest, leading the charge.
Vengeance.
It was then that I spoke. My voice filled the field with such authority that the leaves on the oak trembled and the ravens croaked eerily.
“Stop!”
“Ah! Good!” Decianus’s words released in bursts as he gulped air and tried to catch his breath. “Good! You are strong. I acknowledge that.” His panting voice drew closer to me as he continued. “Your strength makes it more gratifying that you finally learned the lesson I came to teach you. You see, Queen Boudicca, I knew Prasutagus was dead. I came for you—not him. To teach you a lesson, which it seems you may finally have learned.” He halted beside me. From the edge of my vision I could see that sweat dripped like tears from his fat, florid face. “One last thing.” Nero’s tax collector wrapped his thick fingers around my delicate golden torque and ripped it from my neck. With a self-satisfied smile he hefted it, testing its weight, before he slid it around his meaty bicep and pinched it closed. “There, lesson over.” Still smiling, he used his pugio to cut the ropes that trapped my wrists over my head.
My legs would not hold me. I dropped to the ground, which was wet with my blood. My head lolled uncontrollably and as I fought off the graying of my vision, Andraste’s voice lifted from my memory once again. Do not forget that I will be beside you every moment . . . I will hear your voice, my Victory—to that I pledge my oath.
Righteous indignation filled me. It cleared my vision and sent a wave of strength through my battered body. I gripped the post and stood. My chin lifted and I looked down to meet the diminutive tax collector’s hot gaze. Then my rage spilled from me. I spoke with the fury and force of a tribal carnyx, the war horn that struck fear into the heart of anyone who stood against Iceni warriors.
“Catus Decianus, procurator of the emperor Nero, I curse you and every man here. For taking my mother’s life and violating my daughters, you will know the fire of Brigantia. For what you have done to the Iceni, you will know the vengeance of Andraste.”
Decianus’s self-satisfied smile faltered. His sweaty face blanched the color of a dead fish’s belly. “Shut up, woman!” His voice was a shrill obscenity—and utterly impotent compared to the power of my curse.
I was not a defeated queen. I was the instrument of a warrior goddess who blazed with the fierceness of a mother calling down vengeance on the abusers of her children. As I finished the curse, my voice echoed throughout the silent field.
“Your homes will burn. Your women will burn. Your children will burn. You will all—every one of you—suffer more than my daughters and my tribe. You will cry out for mercy and you will be shown none, because, Caius Decianus, through my blood and with my goddess-blessed breath, I have cursed you unto death!”
As I pronounced the last two words of the curse, unto death, every raven took wing from the oak and circled so low over me that Decianus cringed away from them, before they flew into the fog and disappeared.
“I said shut up!” The procurator struck me across the face, knocking me onto the ground.
Through vision blurred by sweat and blood, I watched him turn his back to me and walk hastily to his horse. He gestured wildly at the gaping soldiers.
“Well, what are you waiting for? Move out! We have more of these Brittani to attend to, and this rabble has cost us far too much time. Thankfully, I need not return to this pathetic village until after harvest to collect that which is owed us.” But the soldiers around him were staring at my torn body and made no move to obey his command. Decianus picked up the bloody whip and cracked it over his head, drawing every man’s attention to him. “Shall I inform Paulinus his soldiers disobeyed my order? I said we return now! I need a bath and a drink.”
Silent and subdued, the Romans withdrew. The men who emerged from the hut were laughing. As they observed the somber expressions on the faces of their comrades, they, too, went silent, so that, soundlessly, the Roman centuria disappeared into the fen like wraiths returning to their graves.
Chapter VI
The rage that roiled within me was second only to my need to get to my daughters. I tried to stand. My legs would not hold me. “Enfys! Ceri! Girls!” I called, but the hut remained as silent as the rest of Tasceni. Fear began to replace my rage as I crawled toward the little structure. My back was on fire. My mouth was so dry I couldn’t swallow, but I did not stop. I did not think. I gripped the ground with my hands, digging my broken fingernails into the hard-packed dirt, and dragged myself to the soundless hut.
When I reached it I only paused long enough to put my arms through the ragged sleeves of my tunic, which I rearranged so that from the front, at least, my girls, should they be alive—Oh, Andraste, please let them be alive—would not easily realize the extent of my wounds. I gritted my teeth against the pain and drew several deep breaths. Using the side of the hut, I pulled myself up so that I stood on unsteady legs. I drew another deep breath and then pushed open the rickety door.
My children were naked. Curled together, they lay still and silent in each other’s arms. When my shadow darkened the doorway, Enfys looked up. Her eyes, green as my own, were open and glassy with shock. Enfys’s scream echoed off the interwoven branches that made up the curved walls of the hut. Ceri whimpered and held tighter to her sister, but she did not open her eyes.
“Enfys! Ceri! Oh, my little loves! It is me—your mama!” I staggered to my two girls and dropped to my knees beside them.
“Mama!” Enfys cried my name. “M-mama! Th-they hurt us! They h-hurt us over and over!” Through teeth that chattered, words and sobs flowed from my eldest daughter, thick as the dark blood that coated her thighs.
“I know, sweet girl,” I said soothingly as I brushed back Enfys’s sweat-matted hair. “I am here now. All will be well.” I scooted closer so that I could stroke Ceri’s bruised cheek. “Little dove, can you open your eyes for Mama?”
Ceri only whimpered and trembled as if in the grip of a terrible fever.
I wanted to curl myself around them, hold them close, and will their pain away, and for a moment I was paralyzed with grief. No! I do not have the luxury of grief. Not now. Not yet. They need me.
My gaze searched the hut until I found the wooden trough that captured rainwater. The water was kept fresh for Iceni warriors after they practiced their skills. I made my body stand and staggered to the trough to lift the ladle. I drank quickly, greedily, several ladles full and felt stronger and less dizzy. I filled the ladle yet again and returned to my girls. I helped Enfys drink and then went back to the trough for another ladle full of water.
“Ceri, let me help you drink.”
The little girl whimpered again and did not open her eyes, but I was able to hold the ladle to her lips so that she choked down some water.
“Mama, we tried to fight them. I promise we did!” Enfys cried softly as she spoke.
“Shh, shh, sweet girl. Of course you did. You were so brave. Both of you are so brave.”
“B-but we could not stop them!” Enfys said between sobs as soundless tears leaked from Ceri’s closed eyes and washed down her cheeks.
Then I did put my arms around them. I held them close and stroked their damp hair gently. “Listen to me. Both of you did the bravest, most courageous thing you could ever do—you survived.”
Another shadow fell across the doorway. Enfys shrieked again. I ignored the agony in my back, grabbed a wooden practice sword from those piled in the hut, and whirled to face the intruder.
“Och, goddess! What have they done?”
I did not recognize Briallen until she spoke. The warrior’s face was purple and black. One eye was completely swollen shut and pink-tinged tears leaked down her dirty cheek. The woad-colored short tunic worn by all of the queen’s guard was tattered ribbons. Briallen’s blood had soaked what was left of it, changing the blue to the purple of her bruises. Like the two children, her legs were painted crimson down to her ankles.
“Girls, little loves, it is only Briallen!” I moved to help the warrior get water, but Enfys clutched my tunic and would not loose me. “Drink.” I gestured at the trough. “Then sit here, beside me.”
Briallen took the ladle from me, went to the trough, and drank deeply. Then she returned to the three of us.
“Sit. Rest.”
Briallen shook her head and grimaced at the pain the motion caused. “My queen, we cannot rest here. We must get the girls to the lodge so that their wounds and yours can be cleaned and packed.”
“But you’re wounded, too! You’re bleeding everywhere. You cannot—”
“I can because I must! We both will because we must.” Briallen cut off my words. She went to her knees beside me and beseeched, “Forgive me for speaking so to you, my queen.” Then Briallen lowered her voice and added, “How badly wounded are you? I cannot tell through the blood that covers your back.”
“I do not know.”
“Can you walk?”
I met my warrior’s gaze. “I can because I must.”
Briallen nodded quickly. “Aye, my queen.” Her one-eyed gaze flicked to the children. “I can carry Enfys if you can carry Ceri.”
I nodded. “It will be so.” Then I spoke softly as I gently pried my eldest daughter’s hands from my torn tunic. “Enfys, Briallen is going to carry you and I shall carry Ceri. We must return to the lodge, where we can care for your wounds. Do you understand?”
Enfys’s eyes were glazed with shock, but she nodded and allowed the warrior to lift her. Then I turned to my youngest daughter, little Ceri. The child was curled on her side, knees to her chest, eyes tightly closed as she shivered violently.
Rage roiled within me again and I used it to fuel the fire that kept me moving. I drew a deep breath and caressed Ceri’s sweaty hair. “Little dove, I am going to carry you home.” Eyes still tightly closed, Ceri said nothing but allowed me to lift her into my arms.
I stood still for a moment until the world stopped rolling and pitching around me while I cradled Ceri’s body against my chest, as I had when she’d been a sweet infant—and was shocked by how light and boneless she felt.
Side by side, the only Iceni warrior left alive in Tasceni and I carried the girls to the lodge. The trek was like moving through a waking nightmare. Bodies of men and women I had known for fifteen years littered the path. I paused at the first of them and pressed Ceri’s face against my shoulder as I bent beside Heulyn, a mother of ten and grandmother of six, revered as an expert baker. I touched her face gently to see if there was any sign of life in the old woman. Heulyn was gone.
