Chapter 8
Chapter Eight
Sorcha led the refugees to the Durotriges hillfort of Dun Cam late the next afternoon. Its workers were still tending their crops in the fields beneath the towering ramparts. The fort was one of the largest in the Durotriges’s kingdom. Even so, its earth walls had been raised recently.
Sorcha, accompanied by Alina, who leant heavily on Garamaros’s arm as they climbed the entrance trackway, led the Mai Dun group through the entrance passage into the hillfort.
The refugees assembled in the spacious meeting place before the chieftain’s roundhouse.
Word had already spread of their arrival, and a crowd gathered around them.
Bledyos, the Dun Cam chieftain and newly elected king of the Durotriges, strode from his roundhouse and cast his gaze over the assembled arrivals.
He was a middle-aged man with blond hair and a flowing moustache streaked with grey.
His face, hard and impassive, revealed neither welcome nor hostility.
Sorcha looked to her mother in deference, as she held the highest rank in their group.
Alina had straightened into her usual regal pose after their tiring journey.
Now she stepped forward to speak on the group’s behalf.
“Noble Bledyos, greetings from my son Caileanos, chieftain of the Mai Dun Durotriges. I am Alina, widow of King Arthmael. We bring news of the Roman invaders, who even now are readying to lay siege to Mai Dun.”
A ripple of alarm flowed around the assembled crowd.
Bledyos raised his hand for quiet. “Go on, Alina, my esteemed sister-in-law.”
“Caileanos ordered these women and children from Mai Dun to save them from the siege and possible slavery, and he begs that you receive them into your settlement until the outcome of the forthcoming combat is known, and if Caileanos and his warriors be defeated, offer them a permanent home here.”
Bledyos looked over the group again. His gaze ran past their prisoner and returned to him before moving on. The chieftain dipped his chin in agreement. “As you request it, Alina, and we are kin.”
The tension in Sorcha’s body eased.
“Your people will be safe here. Do you also seek sanctuary for your family?” Bledyos asked.
“We seek only a few nights’ shelter. We accompany my daughter, Sorcha, to her betrothed at Dun Creg, on the Dumnone frontier.”
Bledyos dipped his chin. “You are welcome. Set up a camp for the women and children beyond the existing roundhouses.” He gestured to the north.
“We thank you,” Alina responded with a bow of her head.
Sorcha turned to leave. At least her uncle had granted the refugees protection.
“Alina, will you and your family join me for a meal at sunset?” Bledyos asked.
And now he was fulfilling his familial duty by inviting them to dine with him.
“Of course. We are grateful for your welcome. And my sister, your wife, she is well?” Alina answered.
“She is. As you will see this evening.” Bledyos dipped his chin and returned to his roundhouse.
The crowd had already begun to disperse.
The Mai Dun refugees looked to Alina for direction. She gestured for Garamaros to lead the wagons, past the jumble of wattle and daub roundhouses with their vegetable gardens and livestock enclosures, to the open northern expanse of the hillfort,
Garamaros, who had travelled widely within the Durotriges lands and had visited this settlement many times, took command.
Once again, he ordered the wagons into a circle and set up cooking fires in the center.
He tied their prisoner to a stake driven deeply into the soil and manacled his ankles so he couldn’t run.
Tomorrow they would start building temporary roundhouses for those who would remain. Once that task was well under way, Sorcha and her family would depart for Dun Creg, their future home. And her future husband.
Sorcha tried to remember the details of Oglach’s face, but could not. Was he as attractive as she had first thought? A prickle of unease invaded her stomach.
She chastised herself for her foolishness. She was marrying a chieftain—a strong warrior and a future leader of the Durotriges. It shouldn’t matter to her whether he was also handsome.
She glanced over at Lucius where he labored with Garamaros to set up camp.
Even covered in grime, his sculptured good looks were impossible to ignore.
According to her disloyal memory, he was far handsomer than her betrothed.
“Curse it,” she muttered and strode to the wagon that carried her belongings.
Later, Sorcha and her mother, both wearing fresh dresses, led the way into the king’s roundhouse, followed by her six younger brothers.
Garamaros refused to accompany Alina when she suggested it.
Sorcha was glad. He was not part of Arthmael’s family and had no right to join them in Bledyos’s hospitality.
They took their place on low benches ranged opposite Bledyos’s numerous family members.
Bledyos sat on an ornate chair that raised him above everyone else.
Several druids sat on one side of him. An empty chair stood on the other side with half a dozen youths and girls beyond it, who were introduced as Sorcha’s cousins.
Soon, a woman dressed in finery that could only be bought from traders from the continent, joined them. Her bearing was haughty, her face proud and full of disdain. His wife?
Alina smiled at the woman. “Sister, I am glad to see you again and in good health.”
“And I you, Alina. It has been many years and births since we last met.”
“Indeed, Rigana, I have eleven sons as well as my daughter.” Alina indicated Sorcha beside her.
The woman’s gaze ran over Sorcha’s brothers and stopped at her. “I heard that your first baby was a girl. Everyone at Dun Limen was disappointed, but it is as well for the Durotriges that you had a daughter first.”
What did she mean?
“All my children, female and male, were welcomed by Arthmael,” her mother replied in a level and confident voice. “I gave Arthmael many fine sons and Caileanos is a worthy successor to his father.”
“I am glad that was the case,” Rigana replied. The upward lift of one side of her aunt’s mouth implied a deeper meaning behind the monotone of her bland words.
“I wish to know more of the Roman campaign,” her husband interrupted, his voice brusque.
Rigana silently took her place between her husband and her children.
While they ate, Sorcha and Alina told Bledyos all they knew of the capture of Dun Limen and that Roman soldiers were already in the vicinity of Mai Dun.
The meal finished, and the dishes were removed by servants. With a dismissive wave from Bledyos, the musician who had strummed a harp while they ate set aside his instrument. Taking this as a signal for them to depart, Alina and Sorcha arranged their shawls over their heads in preparation.
“I noticed that you have a Roman prisoner,” Bledyos said. “What has he told you of their plans?”
Sorcha stilled. “Nothing as yet,” she answered.
“Then perhaps we should persuade him to tell us more?” Bledyos proposed.
“We want no harm to come to the prisoner. We will ransom him when the time is right,” Sorcha said.
“Ah. He’s important, is he?”
“To us he is. Besides, he does not speak our language, nor we his. Are you or your wise men fluent in the Roman tongue?” Sorcha indicated the druids.
They shook their heads. “Alas, no,” Bledyos said.
“Then you must leave him with us.”
Bledyos smiled with his mouth, but his eyes remained hard as he nodded in a benign way. “Aye, we must.”
The conversation turned to their planned journey to the west.
Soon afterwards, Alina rose from her seat and said “We must bid you goodnight.” Sorcha and her brothers followed her.
Alina walked almost the whole distance back to the campsite before she whispered to Sorcha, “Mount a special guard on our prisoner while we are here, Sorcha. I do not trust Bledyos not to seize him. How I wish Garamaros had been with us to see and hear all our host revealed.”
“Mother, you have too much confidence in Garamaros.”
“I do not.”
Her mother was ridiculously gullible when it came to Garamaros’s opinion. “What do you really know of him, an itinerant craftsman?”
Her mother turned and levelled a direct look at Sorcha. “I know everything I need to know about him to trust him totally, and I urge you to do the same.” Alina raised her hand to gently squeeze Sorcha’s shoulder. “Mind you increase the guard, Sorcha, or shall I ask Garamaros to do so?”
“I will take the first watch myself, and my brothers will follow me.”
“I shall send Garamaros to you. You will need him also.” Alina walked towards the covered wagon in which she had slept in for the last two nights.
Sorcha and Garamaros took the first watch.
They sat opposite each other in the darkness beyond the fire, leaning against the wheels of the circled wagons, alert for any approach to the slumbering Roman lying beside the built-up fire.
Each was armed with a bow and arrows, should anyone make any move to attack or free the prisoner.
Maonos and Drustan, the elder of her brothers travelling with them, took over the watch later.
Nothing happened the first night, the second, the third, the fourth or the fifth.
During the day, the Mai Dun women and children erected roundhouses for themselves. The Roman and Garamaros performed the heaviest work, while the women and children wove the wattle walls. Day by day, the Roman grew scruffier, his face covered in stubble, his tunic ragged and dirty.
Every evening, Sorcha and her family joined Bledyos in his roundhouse. On their last night, just as Sorcha was about to leave the camp with her brothers and Alina to dine there, Garamaros called her back.
“I’ve been talking with Lucius,” he said.
“Has he revealed anything that would help Caileanos and the men of Mai Dun?”
“From what he has told me, I fear it is too late to pass it to those at Mai Dun.”
“What do you mean?” she demanded.