Reign of Iron (27 page)

Spring turned away. She did not want to see the next bit.

“By Jupiter!” said Ragnall.

“Well, fuck me backwards with a wooden spoon,” said Ferrandus.

Spring opened one eye.

The fat merchant was still standing, staring at the elephant. The elephant was two paces away, calmly swinging his nose. Spring knew he was male because a penis the same length as his nose had been unleashed from underneath and he was pissing prodigiously. Sitting on his great neck, stroking his head, was the first African who’d disembarked, the one with the silly helmet.

“What happened?” she asked.

“Bronze helmet man happened,” said Ragnall. “Now there’s a fellow who knows his elephants and by Bel can he leap!”

“I knew they were kind animals really.”

The sound of shouting reached them from the beach. The merchant was waving his hands and hurling abuse at the elephanteer. The African leant forward, lifted an ear flap and said something to his mount. The elephant raised its tusks then cracked one down on the head of the merchant, who fell. Helmet man said something else. The elephant reared up on his hind legs as it had done on the ramp, stamped on the merchant, then bounced on his front legs again and again, pulverising the man into a bloody mess on the sand. When there was nothing solid left to mash, the rider jumped off, issued another order and, with a great trumpeting, the elephant attacked the half-built boat with his tusks, feet and nose, smashing it to bits.

“You certainly know your animals, Spring,” said Ragnall. “I’m not sure if I’ve ever seen a kinder beast.”

“M
y go now,” said Adler.

“Thank Danu for that!” Mal had thought he’d have to give up rowing ages back. He’d kept going and somehow found new strength but that new strength had now become very stale indeed. The little boat wobbled precariously as he stood stiffly and swapped seats with the captain of the Two Hundred, but he was too exhausted to worry about falling out.

He slumped gratefully on the back bench, reached under it for the water skin and drank one big swig. That was all he allowed himself, in case they were blown or carried by tides out into open sea. Chances of that were slim, since the shore of Britain was closer than Gaul’s now, and there was a constant south-westerly pushing them along – a south-westerly that could bring the massive invasion fleet across in half a morning.

Spying on the Romans, as Atlas had assured him, was much easier than you would have imagined, unless you stood out like a blackbird at a seagulls’ party like Atlas did. That was why Mal and Adler had gone across, rather than Atlas or Chamanca. By vaguely pretending they were merchants – Mal slung a sack containing the water skin and a couple of woollen capes over his shoulder and that was it – they’d been able to walk all along the beach, right by all the Roman ships. They’d counted nearly six hundred transports, so Makka knew how many Romans were going to flood across the Channel, but it was the elephants that had really freaked him out. After they’d watched the second one ashore kill a man and destroy a merchant’s boat at the command of its rider, they’d seen a further thirty-eight disembark. As they walked back, trying to work out how many soldiers would fit into all those boats, Adler said, “Screw it, let’s just ask someone.” So they approached a Gaulish loader and did.

“Six legions!” he’d replied. “So nearly thirty thousand men, plus a whole load of cavalry and slingers. The Britons are in for a treat, I tell you.”

Lowa’s army was about half that size. Mal couldn’t see how they had a hope, and that was without considering Felix’s dark legion. He’d only heard about that second hand, but if Atlas reckoned it was unbeatable, that was good enough for Mal. Or bad enough. Whichever way, they were in trouble.

“What are we going to do?” he asked Adler when they’d refloated their rowing dinghy and were a good distance from shore.

“I don’t know.”

“Flee?”

“No,” she said.

“Well, at least we’re in the same boat,” he said, then gestured at the boat they were sitting in and chuckled. Adler raised one of her handsome eyebrows but remained stony-faced.

When Adler shook him awake they were across. She’d taken at least a double shift rowing while he’d slept.

“Thanks,” he said.

“I didn’t want to hear your ‘in the same boat’ joke again.”

She hauled the boat up the shingle by its mooring rope while he pushed, red-faced.

They travelled inland to Lowa’s new headquarters at Big Bugger Hill. Mal had found the place and organised its rebuilding. He was very proud of it.

It was the only hillfort in south-east Britain, but a year before it had been little more than a low hill, fallen into disrepair over centuries. It had only one ditch, following the contours of a sixty-pace-high mound and enclosing an area about a third the size of Maidun Castle – around the same expanse as Maidun’s eyrie. There had been no palisade on the wall, and the ditch surrounding the wall was half collapsed, overrun with scrubby bushes and trees.

Mal had renovated and rebuilt the fort in, he had to admit to himself, a pretty ingenious way. Everyone else had been sceptical, but Lowa had understood and agreed, so his plans had been realised. By the time it was finished, all the doubters were convinced that it was the best thing that could have been done.

In every other hillfort you had your ditch outermost then a bank or wall of earth and rock inside that, with a palisade on top of the wall. In multi-walled places like Maidun Castle, from the outside it was ditch, wall, ditch, wall, ditch, wall, but Big Bugger Hill was smaller, with only a single ditch and wall. To make the most of the space inside, and make the single wall as strong as possible, what Mal had done – or, more to the point, what he’d had the now fifteen-thousand-strong Maidun infantry do – was to build an awesomely strong, six-pace-high palisade not on top of the earth wall as was the norm but
around
the wall, growing up from the bottom of the ditch, using the ditch as a deep foundation. He’d shored up the wall and filled in the gap between it and his palisade, so that all around the perimeter of the hillfort was a walkway twenty paces wide. Defenders could move rapidly around the unprecedentedly wide wall top and as many ranks of archers and slingers as you’d ever need could shoot down at the foe. To make the wall even higher and safer from rams and ladders, Mal had dug a new ditch all the way around, filled with the traditional spiked timbers, as well as some newer ideas like concealed ankle-trapping holes and three-pronged iron caltrops hidden under soft soil at the ditch’s base.

Lowa’s addition had been a high, sturdy wooden command tower from which you could see all the land around, and she’d also greatly improved the road running inland from Big Bugger Hill. Ostensibly that meant that the fort could be supplied and garrisoned with great rapidity, but the real reason for the road, known only to Mal and a few others, was so that they’d be able to flee effectively.

The one thing that hadn’t changed about Big Bugger Hill was its name. It was a shit name, everyone agreed, especially for a hill that wasn’t big. Mal had heard about seven different stories from locals about how it had got its name, a couple of which were truly disgusting. One thing everybody did agree on was that it was unlucky to change a name, so they were stuck with it. They’d have enough to deal with without luck being against them.

As they approached, the wall towered higher. Mal thought it looked almost as formidable as Maidun Castle. “You would not want to attack this,” he said.

“No,” said Adler. “Not unless you had thirty thousand highly trained, fiercely disciplined soldiers, more siege equipment that you could shake a spear at, a squad of gigantic animals, one of which can reduce a ship to kindling in a few heartbeats and a mysterious force of monsters.”

They found Lowa in the camp’s small central clearing, at the highest point of the hill. They’d sent a shout to announce their approach, so the usual leadership team of Atlas, Chamanca and Maggot was waiting for them, too, along with Lowa’s child and his nanny. When she saw them coming, Lowa nodded to Keelin and she led Dug away by the hand. The little boy toddled off next to his nanny, free hand waving, chattering nonsense. He was a lovely little boy, thought Mal. Mal and Nita had never been blessed with children. Having a little wobbler like Dug of his own was another reason for him to make his intentions known to Taddy Ducktender. Or to test the water at least.

“Did you see Spring?” Lowa asked without preamble.

“We did,” said Adler.

“We did?” This was news to Mal.

“She was on the low cliff above the beach, when we were watching the elephant rip the ship apart.”

“They have an elephant?” asked Chamanca.

“Elephants. Forty of them. I’ve only heard about them before but I’m sure that’s what they were, but I didn’t know they were so big, powerful or well-trained. One of them fell from the gangplank and flew into a frenzy, but the rider leapt on it and—”

Lowa held up a palm “Tell me about Spring first.”

“She seemed fine from what I could see at that distance. I’m—”

“How far were you?”

“Two hundred paces. I didn’t get Mal’s opinion because he was preoccupied watching the elephant and I was certain it was her, plus she was with three guards so I didn’t want them spotting our interest.”

“What type of guards?”

“Two black-clad legionaries and a man in a toga.”

“Can you describe the man?”

“Early twenties, good-looking, quite fat. I was sure it was Ragnall initially, but on the return journey I questioned myself. I didn’t know him well when he was here, and if it was him then he has been eating with gusto.”

“All right, thank you. Back to the elephants.”

Mal and Adler told them everything they’d discovered. Afterwards they stood in silence, Lowa with her lips pursed and fists clenched. Chamanca paced and Atlas shook his head. Maggot wore a relaxed smile, his jewellery jangling softly as he turned his whole frame to watch birds flit by.

“We have three options,” said Atlas eventually. “We send a delegation now offering allegiance to the Romans and your rule as client queen.” He turned the iron arrowhead hanging from a leather thong around his neck as he spoke. It was from the arrow that had nearly killed him. If a man wearing that sort of lucky charm is suggesting surrender, thought Mal, then our position is far from strong.

“No,” said Lowa. “We won’t be doing that.”

“Option two is flight. With our army we could conquer Eroo without a fight and then, because the Romans will follow us there to prevent us returning, we build a fleet and cross the great sea to—”

“No.”

“We cannot hope to win against such a force. With just the legionaries – men with training and experience that ours never could match – they will outnumber us. The warships will prevent us from hampering their landing, which they will undoubtedly fuck up less having learnt from last time, they are not idiots, and now we hear they have elephants. More than all of that, they have Felix’s Ironmen and Leathermen. If we take option three, to stand and fight, we are condemning our men and women to death.”

“If we don’t, we are condemning them to dishonour,” said Chamanca.

“Dishonour or death?” said Maggot brightly. “I’d prefer dishonour, but perhaps that’s just me. Tell you what, though. Lowa and I have a plan to slow them up a bit.”

Lowa nodded. “And we have several more schemes in place to send them back to Gaul which, gods willing, will save many of our lives and all of our honour. The one involving the Aurochs tribe needs to be modified. Atlas, have you encountered war elephants?”

“Are you asking me because I’m African?”

“Yes.”

“Well, it so happens I have encountered war elephants.”

“Good. Elann will be here tomorrow. You’ll talk to her and…”

Queen Lowa spent a long time outlining her plans, making sure that her generals understood them, then sent them off to do their duties.

“T
he ships have oars, so why can Caesar’s legions not row to Britain?” Caesar smiled thinly.

Ten days after Caesar had ordered the fleet to sail, it was still beached on Gaul’s shore. Given the circumstances, Felix would have beaten the chief boat builder’s face into a pulp with a ship’s mallet then shat into the bubbling hole where his mouth used to be, but Caesar seemed calm. He wasn’t, though. Felix could see a vein throbbing at his temple. The shipwright had no idea that he was a hair’s breadth from crucifixion. Felix stifled a smile.

“No ships can make way against wind and tide like this, with or without oars.” Apiapandus the chief boat builder was a former merchant from a land to the north of Germany who’d settled in Ostia, Rome’s port. He was considered to be the best, so Caesar had commissioned him to build the fleet. With his cap of blond hair, lapine face and a voice like a seal’s, he didn’t look like the best.

“Caesar asked you to build boats that can be rowed.”

“The ships can be rowed, but they will not make way against a strong wind and a contrary current. Last year, before the commission, I wrote detailed descriptions of the ships’ capabilities and limitations. I gave you these descriptions and you told me to build your boats. They are ships and they can do what ships can do. They are not magic carpets.”

Caesar drew his sword. The magic carpet comment, Felix guessed, had signed the man’s death warrant.

Apiapandus’ eyes bulged preternaturally wide. “No! You cannot! Nobody could have predicted this freak current. I built what you asked! I—”

Caesar stabbed him in the stomach, pumped his arm to slice across and withdrew. Apiapandus grabbed the wound with both hands. A glossy pocket of gut peeked between his fingers of his left hand. Felix licked his lips. He did enjoy watching a man trying to hold his innards inside a slit stomach. Apiapandus, mouth silently opening and closing, staggered backwards and slumped into a canvas chair. Caesar followed him and raised his sword again. Felix thought for one horrible moment that he was about to deliver a mercy blow, but the general wiped his sword on the man’s shoulder, returned it to its scabbard and turned, leaving Apiapandus sitting there blinking, holding his guts and dripping blood on the non-magic Mesopotamian carpet.