“Is it over at the walls, then?” she asked.
“Naught but the dead,” Bran told her. “It would have been Pictish dead, had you not come when you did.”
“I raised those who would heed my call,” Liuba shrugged. “And returned as swiftly as I might.”
“What clans are they?” Bran asked. “My men had little luck in rallying the countryside about Baal-dor.”
“Perhaps my arguments were more compelling,” Liuba smiled. “I raised such warriors as were known to me.”
Bran studied the corpse-strewn field. “You must have taken few casualties.”
“Very few,” Liuba agreed. “These vermin had no heart to stand and fight.”
“And Claudius Nero?”
“Fled,” Liuba advised him. “Hell be halfway to the Wall by dawn.”
“I’ll overtake him before then,” Bran vowed. “Can you show me where he fled?”
Liuba sheathed her blade. “My horse is tethered just beyond.” She gestured toward the heath beyond, where the vengeful Picts hunted down the last fugitives. “I’ve no further interest in watching this tedious butchery. You and I have done what we came to do here.”
26
CIRCLES
Claudius Nero fled southward, driving his mount at a killing pace. Panic claimed the proud heart of the legate, for he had seen his greatest victory crumble into black defeat, and the invincible might of his legion was a hollow and shattered thing below the haunted walls of Baal-dor.
The caverns of the People of the Dark were no shelter for him. Such of his former masters as had escaped the massacre would take certain vengeance upon him if he returned alone.
And well Nero knew that Bran Mak Morn would not rest until he had run the legate to earth for his own vengeance. Nowhere in the Highlands of Caledon could Claudius Nero hide from the wrath of the king of Pictdom.
Thus Claudius Nero fled southward to the Wall beneath the grey skies. In the madness of his flight, Nero remembered that he was a Roman. In the South he would find a welcome among others of his blood.
A germ of a plan took root. There was much Claudius Nero might tell Rome of Bran Mak Morn-of his sundered fortress, of his tattered army. In his mind’s eye, Claudius Nero saw himself leading the legions of Rome into the Highlands of Caledon, saw Pictdom smashed beneath his new legions, saw Rome turn out its multitudes to hail the mysterious conqueror who had come from the shadows…
At dawn his horse fell dead beneath him.
Nero picked himself up unsteadily, wondering how much farther to the Wall. The sky was ablaze with the approaching sun. Nero knew he would have to seek cover somewhere. He had acclimated himself to withstand the light of dawn, dreaming of the day when he might walk the earth of his sacred forebears. But until he fully accustomed himself to daylight, he must find shelter, or the full rays of the sun would peel away his skin in cracked and blistered strips.
The sun was rising, but Nero decided he should put some distance between himself and his dead mount. Moving through the shadows of the trees, he trudged perhaps a mile before the horsemen came out from the woods along the trail.
They were Goths, yellow-haired wolves attached to their newly landed legion as mounted auxiliaries. Their Latin was as unintelligible to Nero as his was to them, but they made it plain that he was advised to come with them.
It was a small marching camp, and Nero guessed it held no more than one century and a like number of mounted auxiliaries. Its centurion had spent some twenty years on the Danube and cared little for the caprice of fortune that had sent him to this fog-ridden isle.
“We found him slinking around beneath the trees,” one of the Goths explained.
The centurion grunted, studying Nero intently.
“I am Quintus Claudius Nero, a citizen of Rome,” the legate announced. “I have information regarding Bran Mak Morn that your superior officers will be interested to learn.”
“Is that so?” wondered the centurion. “And what did you say your rank and outfit was?”
“That is something else that will interest your superiors, Nero temporized.
The centurion stared at him impassively. He had been in Britain only about a month, but he had heard a great many tales of the Picts and of their cunning king. The massacre he had just returned from verifying convinced him the tales of Pictish deviltry had been understated.
“Your Latin is worse than these flax-heads,” he grunted, noting the man’s peculiar features, the dark hair, the strangely stunted physique. Twenty years on the Danube had taught him certain lessons in dealing with barbarians.
“And you chose the wrong old soldier to try to pull something on, Quintus Claudius Pictus.”
He stabbed a calloused finger at the legate’s red cloak. “Marcus Sertorius Facilis was the best officer I ever served under,” he growled. “I didn’t like what I found left of him and his command, and I don’t like finding a Pictish spy wearing the cloak and gold pin Sertorius had when we shipped over!”
The centurion ignored Nero’s futile protests. “Crucify him,” he ordered. “I wouldn’t be surprised if this is Bran Mak Morn himself.”
They set up a cross and left him hanging there as a warning to the other Picts. The day was dawning when they drove in the nails, and it is said that a snake cannot die before sundown.
***
“Are you certain Nero rode this way?” Bran Mak Morn questioned. “I see no evidence of horse or rider.”
“Soon you’ll see,” Liuba promised, riding beside him.
Bran scowled impatiently. The stars were dimming, and he feared his enemy would escape into some burrow with the coming of dawn. So intent was the Pict over overtaking Claudius Nero, that already his victory seemed a distant memory. Bran studied the broken rocks of the streambed they followed, as if his vision could pierce the predawn darkness as keenly as did Liuba’s.
“Let’s cross over here,” Bran suggested. “He might have forded the stream, doubled back.”
“I’d rather not cross the stream,” Liuba complained. “I’m certain we follow the right path.”
Bran frowned at the faint greyness in the east. “We’re not riding south. I though you said Nero would try to seek asylum south of the Wall?”
“Who can say what sanctuary Claudius Nero will find,” Liuba shrugged.
Bran swore in exasperation. The woman had a maddening way of evading anything that resembled a straight answer.
“That’s Kestrel Scaur over there,” he said suddenly. “Thunder of all the gods! Nero’s played us for a fine pair of fools! We’ve ridden half the night, and all he’s done was decoy us south, then double back to the Door beneath Kestrel Scaur. If we’d only guessed his ploy, we could have ridden straight across the heather and waited for him here instead of following alongside this stream bed you’ve been so shy about crossing. Come, on, we’ll ride straight for the barrow.”
Liuba said nothing as they rounded Kestrel Scaur and gazed down at the silent barrow below them. The dying light of the stars played upon the spectral mists that eddied past the broken circle of rowans. Bran mused that it looked like the loneliest place on earth-a forgotten tomb with its guardian circle of rowans. From this height the swaying ring of white blossoms in the swirling mist seemed too regular for nature’s work. If the rowans reseeded themselves from dropped fruit, these trees-or their distant ancestors-might have been planted here when the barrow was raised.
“Look!” Bran pointed. “Yesterday we rolled the stone back across the barrow tunnel. It’s still in place. Either Nero has another den close by, or we’ve beaten him here by minutes.”