***
Everything was going smoothly indoors, so I went to check round outside. The stables had been mucked out, and the post-horses and mules groomed; the cow and goats had been milked and moved to a fresh field. Looking down to the little river, I could see three of the maids doing the laundry in the big shallow pool, and the bushes near the bank were draped with newly washed tunics and towels. Taurus was whistling as he mended a gate, and Hippon was in the training paddock, with Titch and the other horse-boys and some little native ponies they were breaking to harness. I stopped to watch our newest lad; his movements were lithe and quick, and he managed the ponies and their harness easily.
I strolled to the orchard next to the large paddock, taking it all in. The apple trees were full of fruit and would crop well this year; even the new pear tree, which was much more temperamental, was promising a good harvest, and we’d already started on the plums. The bees were busy everywhere, making the air calm with their steady buzzing. We should have a good honey harvest as well.
It was all so orderly and peaceful. I relaxed as I stood looking across the narrow valley, breathing in the good air, and thinking how much I loved our small piece of this raw new province. Yet was the appearance of orderly peace deceptive?
Travellers attacked? Headless bodies? Young lads playing warriors? And somebody called the Shadow of Death telling us to get out or die? What was going on?
I didn’t know, but I had no doubt of my reaction. Nobody is going to tell
me
to get out! Nobody is going to make
me
leave this place, my home, which I love and work for and want to spend my life in. They can threaten all they like, but I’m staying here where I belong. And if they want a fight, by Mars I’ll give them one!
I heard a familiar scuffling noise close by in the trees, and my favourite hound came romping up—Lucky, the black one with the tattered left ear, who’s always full of himself. He stood in front of me whining and wagging his tail, then he walked a little way downhill, looked over his shoulder, whined and came back to stand by me again. I knew that signal, he had something he wanted to show me. He and his mate had probably killed a young deer. They were quite good at this, but then needed human help to get the trophies home.
“What is it, Lucky?” I patted his jet-black coat. “Something in the woods here?”
His tail wagged harder.
“I should be getting back inside, you know. But it’s such a beautiful morning….Oh all right, why not? Come on then, show me.”
He barked joyfully, and ran ahead of me down through the orchard, almost to the little river, and turned right, in among the huge old oak trees that had been here since time began. This was one of my favourite walks, along a path that wound its way more or less parallel with the river, and I strolled along happily, revelling in the quiet shade.
The dog led me perhaps a couple of hundred paces, till we came round a bend and out into a small clearing, where sunshine flooded in to light up the grass. I stopped dead, horrified. There on the ground was another body.
A big chestnut horse lay on its side, legs stretched out, throat cut. Flies buzzed and crawled all over its head, and a knife stuck out of its neck. I remember I noticed it looked a good knife, with some jet inlay in its smooth wooden handle.
It had been a fine horse, glossy-coated and well cared for. It had two white socks, and a white star; it was a first-class riding-horse, but there was no sign of saddle-bags or bridle. The grass and plants all around its body were trampled and there was dried blood everywhere. I got the smell of the blood in my nostrils, and it was all I could do not to be sick.
This must be Quintus Antonius’ horse right enough. He’d been attacked here, and the attackers had killed the horse, perhaps to quieten it, and thought they’d killed the man. No, that wasn’t right; they hadn’t used their knife on Quintus Antonius. They had hurt him badly and could have killed him, even cut off his head, but they hadn’t. Which meant they must have been interrupted in their gruesome work before they could finish him.
I set off further along the path, more slowly now, looking carefully. I saw trampled grass here too, snagged twigs, several footprints in the bare patches, and once a definite bloodstain, hard to spot among the brownish remains of last year’s leaves. The path ahead curved away from the river, slightly uphill for a few paces, and would come out on the main road. From there it was only a short distance back down the road to our turning, and the paved track that led to our parking area. Was that the way Quintus Antonius had crawled last night?
I stopped walking as the questions chased through my mind. Who had attacked him? Did they realise they hadn’t killed him, and if so, would they come back? I knew there’d be more to learn if only I had someone who could read the tracks and signs on the ground. It was time to send for Hawk.
Hawk is a native hunter, and he reads tracks the way the rest of us read books. His sharp black eyes miss nothing. He can look at a few scuff marks in the dust, or some bent blades of grass, and tell you who’s been passing by, which direction they were heading, and what they had for breakfast. And probably whether they enjoyed it.
Hence his nickname: everyone calls him Hawk, either in British or Latin. He understands both, but will only speak his own language. Not that he’s anti-Roman exactly, but he’s his own man, with his own way of doing things. He sees himself as equal to anyone, Roman citizen or not.
He lives with two wives and a brood of children in a round house in the woods, about a quarter mile from us. The red-haired boy I’d seen talking to Titch was one of his sons, so I sent him home with a message, and Hawk appeared in the middle of the afternoon, just when the flow of customers was slowing down.
He is a slight, dark man, with long hair and a neat black beard, and he moves as silently and lithely as a cat. Today he was wearing hunting clothes, tunic and breeches made of tough homespun and dyed greenish to give him camouflage in the woods, and he had his bow with him, and his big hunting-hound Bran trotting along at his side. He didn’t enter the bar-room, but sent his son in to fetch me out to the stable yard.
“I hear you’ve had an unexpected guest,” he said after we’d exchanged greetings. “Quite a mystery, it seems. My son’s full of it.”
“Yes, unexpected, uninvited, and decidedly odd.” I told him how I’d found the wounded man, and about Lucky leading me to the horse. As usual he spoke in British, and I replied in Latin. It must have sounded strange, but it suited us.
“I want you to try and find out what happened to him, Hawk. He’s had such a bang on the head he can’t remember anything clearly. But there’s quite a lot of disturbance around the horse’s body. I’d appreciate any help you can give me to piece the story together.”
“All right. Let’s take a look.” We walked down through the orchard and along the path towards where the horse lay. I was amused to notice my hound Lucky walking behind us at a respectful distance, while Hawk’s dog trotted beside his master. Lucky, like all the local dogs, knew a pack leader when he saw one.
“If dogs had kingdoms,” I remarked, “your Bran would be King of Brigantia.”
“He would.” Hawk smiled, and gently stroked the dog’s head. “But it takes more than brute strength to be a good king. I don’t think dogs have learned that yet.”
“Plenty of men haven’t learned it either. Look at the way the tribal chiefs used to fight among themselves in the old days here. It was always the strongest who won, whether they were good chiefs or bad.”
“Whereas Romans, of course, never fight each other, but just sit round a table debating who’s the best ruler, and then appoint him, and all the rest of the candidates acknowledge him with gracious smiles.”
I laughed. “With the Senate and People of Rome, it’s a case of ‘do as we say, not do as we do.’ We’re allowed to tear our Empire apart in civil wars, but woe betide anybody else who tries to do the same.”
“You’re unusual for a Roman, Aurelia. You don’t think that everything Roman is perfect.”
“Hardly! They say love’s blind, but patriotism doesn’t have to be.”
The banter stopped abruptly when we reached the clearing and he saw the horse’s body. He gave a sort of moan, and went to stand at its head with his hand outstretched, palm down, and chanted a brief prayer to Epona, the horse goddess. Then he turned to me, and his black eyes were blazing.
“Evil men did this. It’s cruel and it’s wasteful.” His voice was low and angry.
“But I think the attackers were interrupted,” I said. “One of them left his knife behind.”
“Knife? Where?”
“There, in the…” I broke off, staring, because there was no knife. Yet there had been one. I knew there had.
“It was in the horse’s neck. A long, narrow blade, and a wooden handle with a jet inlay.” I felt shaken as I considered the implications. “Someone’s been back to fetch it since I was here before. Jupiter! They might still be around now.”
“Not now.” He looked down at his wolflike hound. “Bran will tell us if he hears anyone. Won’t you, boy? On guard now, while I look round.”
Both dogs lay down, and I stood watching, fascinated, as Hawk searched the ground, carefully and thoroughly, like a man looking for a gold piece in a hayfield. Occasionally he bent low to examine the trampled grass, the broken twigs, and the bloodstains. Sometimes he gazed at what looked to me like perfectly ordinary clumps of weed, or patches of earth with vague lines in them. He walked along the path beyond the clearing quite a way. He must have got to the road, but I lost sight of him, and the dogs and I stayed put. Then he came back almost to where we waited, and branched off the track, down the slope a few paces towards the little river. As he did so, his dog stood up and gave a low growl, and from behind us Lucky rumbled an echo.
“What’s up?” I asked.
He looked at his dog. “Who is it, Bran?” Bran gave another soft growl in his throat, and twitched his big pointed ears. Man and dog stood still, listening. I listened too, but all I could hear was the faint breeze rustling the leaves, and a murmuring of the shallow river water.
Then Hawk shrugged. “It’s all right. Only one of the woodcutters.” He turned and walked back towards me. “Well, this was a wild goose chase, I’m afraid. I can’t tell you much.”
I was surprised, and disappointed. “Aren’t the tracks clear?”
He shook his head. “This ground looks as if an army’s marched all over it. The tracks are all mixed up. There was more than one man, and they had a fight of some sort, and the horse was killed. That’s about it.” He sounded irritated, as if it was my fault his usual powers weren’t working.
“No, really? I’d worked that out for myself!” I was about to say, but then my brain started, belatedly, to function. The dogs had growled, there were strangers about, and Hawk was being cautious in case of eavesdroppers. Which meant he probably
had
found something.
“Oh well, if you can’t, you can’t.” I tried to inject the right note of resigned annoyance into my voice as we began to walk back towards the house, the dogs prowling behind, still uneasy. If we were being spied on, I must somehow invite Hawk into the mansio where we could be private, without arousing anyone’s suspicions. I racked my brains for a convincing reason.
As we reached the stable yard, inspiration struck me. “By the way, do you need some more cough syrup for your little boy? Albia said he was wheezing like a hedgehog when she saw him yesterday.”
“Yes, thanks,” he said, “I will take a bottle. It eased his chest before. I’ll bring you a nice fresh hare tomorrow in exchange.”
“It’s a deal. You may as well take the stuff now. It’ll help the poor kid sleep.”
“All right. I mustn’t be long though.”
Soon we were sitting comfortably in my study, he with a mug of beer, and me with some wine.
“Did I guess right?” I asked. “You wanted to talk, but there was someone listening?”
He nodded and sipped his beer. “The trees have ears. There was somebody there that my dog didn’t know.”
“So you found something worth telling me?”
He put down his mug. “Oh yes, I can tell you more or less what happened, as well as anyone can who wasn’t there to see. That horse has been dead since last night, throat cut with a knife as you said. From the tracks I could see five attackers on foot, and there was someone else there too, a lookout of some sort I’d say, keeping well back from the path—small footprints, maybe a woman or a boy. I don’t know who any of the attackers were, but they all had on Roman boots, with the uppers nailed and stitched onto the soles. They make quite different prints from native boots. They must have been bought in somewhere like Derventio or Eburacum, because our local cobbler in Oak Bridges makes boots in the traditional way, you know, each one just a single piece of leather. I’ve not seen any of those tracks before, but I’ll know them again.”
“How?” I asked, pouring him a refill.
“Boots with stitching or nails are all different from one another if you know what to watch out for. For instance, one of the attackers had very worn heels, and part of the stitching missing on his left sole. That sort of thing. The other two, the riders, had army type riding-boots, fairly new.”
“
Two
riders? We’ve only found one.”
“Two horses came down off the road, at a walk, both being ridden, with the attackers walking. Both men got off the horses, or were dragged off, in the clearing there, and the one horse was killed. There was a fight, and they both put up quite a struggle, but they hadn’t much chance against five. Luckily for them both, something interrupted the attackers. I don’t know what, maybe some odd noise scared them. One rider managed to mount up and gallop off towards the road, and the other was left here, bleeding. Quite a lot of blood, all in one place, so probably he was unconscious and they thought he was dead. Anyway the attackers ran away down towards the river. Eventually the wounded man crawled back along the track, up onto the road, and found his way to your forecourt. He was lucky they didn’t come back for him later.”
“That’s brilliant, Hawk! Thank you.” I truly was impressed, and relieved that my faith in him had been justified.
“Tell me one thing.” He fixed me with his piercing gaze. “The man you found, was he carrying any kind of message?”
I handed him the bone disc with its grim threat, and he didn’t seem surprised, but nodded and stared awhile in thoughtful silence.
“What does it mean, Hawk? You know something about this?”
He put the disc on the table. “Just a few rumours. Have you heard of the Shadow-men?”
“Shadow-men? No. Some sort of religious group?”
“Not exactly, though the Druids encourage them. A war-band, but a secret one. The main thing about them is that they’re Britons of the old sort, who want to put the calendar back to before you Romans came. They’re mostly young and headstrong, just boys, but there are some older ones involved as well, training them to kill. Not like their ancestors killed, riding chariots into battle. The Shadow-men kill by stealth, at night. Their members are supposed to keep themselves secret, but some of the younger ones are easy to spot. They can’t resist showing off in their war gear.”
“I’ve seen them.” I described the group of native warriors in the bar.
Hawk’s eyes glinted. “Vitalis leads them, but young Segovax is the better fighter. They’ve been riding around for a few days now, just daring someone to give them any trouble.”
“Yes, that was the feeling I got. They had a kind of tension, like a taut bowstring. But they’re only fooling about, surely?”
“Not fooling, though they’re not dangerous on their own. But there are some more experienced men leading them, and
they
’re
keeping themselves carefully hidden. This Shadow of Death, for instance.” He glanced down at the bone disc. “He’s their leader, but who he actually is, nobody knows.”
“So this threat, ‘Get out or die’…they really want to drive us out?”
“Yes.”
“They seriously think they can?”
“Yes.”
“But that’s absurd!”
“Is it?” He looked at me soberly.
“It’s laughable, Hawk! We’ve got three legions stationed in Britannia, not to mention all the auxiliaries, and the navy. And then there are thousands of Roman civilians settled, helping to make something of the province. The Britons couldn’t defeat us fifty years back when old Emperor Claudius invaded, or in Nero’s time when Queen Boudicca rebelled. That was thirty years ago, and we’re even more firmly established these days. They must see they’ll never do it now.”
He rubbed his chin thoughtfully. “They’re trying different tactics. Think about it. Your army’s unbeatable in battle, yes, but can it fight secret enemies in the dark? Can it protect all you civilians from small groups who murder at night and melt away in the morning?”
“
All
the civilians? Surely we’re just talking about a local band of rebels?”
“Maybe so, at this stage,” he agreed. “But their plan is to succeed in Brigantia, and then encourage other tribes to rise up against you. I pick up rumours, you know, just as you must do here, only my sources of rumour are different. What’s happened here today is meant to be just a beginning, and the situation for Romans will get worse before it gets better.
If
it gets better.”
We were interrupted by a tap at the door, and Albia looked in. She smiled when she saw Hawk.
“Relia, Councillor Silvanius is here, and he says you’re expecting him.”
“Gods, I forgot he was coming. Is it about his wine order?”
“He didn’t say. He seems a bit agitated. I’ve put him in the garden with some wine and cakes. Felix is with him.”
“That’s a relief. Silvanius can be a shade pompous, but Felix always brings him back to the real world. I’ll be with them in just a little while.”
“And Albia,” Hawk added, “best not to say you saw me here. Our esteemed Chief Councillor doesn’t approve of me.”
“Don’t worry. I told His Pomposity that Aurelia was in a meeting with the oil wholesaler. Just sneak out through our private door, he’ll be none the wiser.”
“I suppose you and Silvanius are like chalk and cheese.” I smiled as I tried to picture Hawk wearing a toga.
“You could say that! It’s not a personal thing, we hardly know each other. But I’m a Briton, and I’m proud of it. I don’t even
want
to be a Roman.”
I sipped some wine. “Whereas Councillor Publius Silvanius Clarus is determined to be more Roman than the Romans.”
Hawk snorted contemptuously. “He makes himself ridiculous! That vast new villa, and his Greek major-domo, and his Italian chef, and wanting Oak Bridges to be a proper Roman town, and building his very own temple. Yet underneath it all he’s no more a Roman than I am.”
“Well, he’s a citizen, and so was his father. I suppose that does make him more Roman than you are. And if he wants a Roman life, I’m hardly going to criticise him for that, am I? Live and let live, surely?”