“For the provincial armies would not accept the sale of the empire by the Praetorian Guard. Three powerful provincial governors now sought the throne-
Septimius Severus of Pannonia, Pescennius Niger of Syria, and Clodius Albinus of Britain. Severus was closest to Rome and was proclaimed emperor at the murder of Julianus. This claim was contested by the other two governors, but Severus marched against Niger and defeated him at the Cilician Gates-and when Albinus then stripped Britain of Rome’s legions to march against Severus, Severus met him in Gaul and again was victorious.
“Severus is no weakling, and again the throne of empire is held in the iron grasp of a brilliant and ruthless general. Ten years ago we swept over the Wall of Hadrian in an irresistible wave of flame and steel-overran the South in the absence of Rome’s legions. Then Severus took the empire in hand, the legions returned. Now Hadrian’s Wall has been rebuilt, and again Pict and free Celt are hunted wolves driven back into the Highlands.
“Rome is strong, Wolf of the Heather,” the wizard repeated. “I have seen chiefs and conquerors come and go. Cassivellaunus. Caratacus. Boudicca. Calgacus. Othna Mak Morn. Their bones bleach in forgotten fields. And always the legions return.”
Bran scowled at the ancient priest. “And so?”
“Rome is strong. Just as I have paid a price for long years and secret wisdom-so you must be prepared to pay a price to drive Romes legions from our land;”
“I’ll have no more dealings with sorcery!” Bran growled, following the drift of Gonar’s argument. I’ve made the mistake too often in the past of relying on dark magic to win my battles. I want to be free of its foul taint!”
Gonar kept silent with his thoughts. It had been some three years now since first he had met Bran Mak Morn. At the time Bran, the son of a Wolf clan chief and a descendent of Othna, was consolidating his claim to kingship of the Pictish tribes. Gonar, set in the dying traditions of the Stone Age and cynical of Bran’s rash boasts to drive Rome from Britain, had considered the youth a dangerous hothead who had turned from the old ways of his race, and who ultimately would call down the wrath of Rome with his guerilla raids against the South. Then had taken place an uncanny psychic duel-a combat of ancient will against youthful will-the loser to serve the victor. Gonar had fought for the old ways of savagery and blood-stained altars. Bran had fought for a new age and a return to greatness of the Pictish race. Bran had won. And while Gonar had served Bran faithfully since that duel between two unbending souls, the wizard shrewdly recognized that Bran Mak Morn had been compelled to make use of ancient sorceries and forbidden lore in order to seize victory in his campaign against Rome.
Bran sensed his thoughts. “Don’t sneer at my resolution, old one!” he warned. “I freely admit it was you who warned me against seeking out the Children of the Night to wreak my vengeance on Titus Sulla! I went mad when I watched that taunting governor crucify one of my people as a lesson in Roman justice! In my madness I ignored your warning and sent the Worms of the Earth to burrow beneath the governor’s impregnable fortress-and drag him to me as a gibbering madman whom I slew in pity, not vengeance! By the gods, if I could undo the work of that night!”
He shook himself as if to shake away the taint. After a moment, Bran continued. “But it was your sorcery that then summoned King Kull of Valusia across the gulf of time to lead the Northmen in the ambush of the Roman advance under Marcus Sulius!”
“And do you think you could have won that battle without Kull’s presence?” Gonar argued.
“No,” Bran admitted readily. “No, I could not have. It was Kull who held the Northmen together for that desperate stand that pinned the Romans fast in the jaws of the trap.”
Bran gazed out across the valley where now dawn was spilling light across the heathered slopes. That sun would look upon a new battle today, he mused, and many of those who watched it rise would never see it set.
“No more sorcery!” Bran vowed. “I’ll have done with weapons whose foulness poisons the souls of those who wield them-weapons too foul to use even against Rome!”
“Rome is strong,” Gonar echoed.
“Enough!” Bran’s snarl was like a blow. “The battle today will be Pict against Roman, our steel against their steel-and the victor shall have won his triumph by might and strategy, not through sorcerous interference!
“I will see the Romans driven from our land-and if the price for such a victory is my life, I’ll pay that price gladly! But by the gods, I’ll deal no more in unhallowed sorceries!”
Bran turned and strode back down the slope to rejoin his army-his shoulders straight, resolution driving the shadows from his face. Gonar stood for a moment, stroking his long beard-and in his ancient wisdom thinking of the nightmares that haunted his king.
“Brave words, Wolf of the Heather,” he murmured. “But no man may name the price he must pay for his dream. It was madness to summon forth mat which is beyond your power to put down-and I fear those powers that you would thus repudiate have not released their claim on you.”
3
THE MEN OF THE HEATHER
The rim of the sun made phantom light through the chill blanket of mist. In an hour the mist would melt away, leaving the dewy heather to dry in the distant warmth of the climbing sun. Already the army of Picts was moving across the half-lit moors-a shadowy wave of gnarled and shaggy warriors whose apish bodies barely rose above the mist-buried heather.
Bran’s army numbered well over three thousand-better than half the strength of a legion. Some few were mounted on small shaggy steeds, but the mass of the army was on foot. A line of mounted scouts ranged ahead of the poorly ordered column, while wagons laden with baggage creaked along near the middle. Here and there marched a warrior of taller stature whose savage face showed straight, hawklike features-these were Pictish chieftains whose long bloodlines were free from the ages-ago crossbreeding with the aboriginal race of red-haired giants that had transmuted the Picts into their present ogreish appearance. But such figures were few, and the Pictish army on the march more resembled some Stone Age migration.
Near-naked warriors carried their dwarfish bodies in an ape-like gait. For the most part they were clad in animal skins with some use of coarsely woven cloth. Some wore crude sandals, but many were unshod. No helmets confined their shocks of tangled black hair, nor did they wear body armor.
Cavalry had they none-nor the swift two-man chariots of the Celts of the South. Without stirrups, the chief value of cavalry was mobility-as was the case with chariots, which the Britons used to rush warriors about the field of battle to reinforce key points or retreat from overrun positions. Highland terrain made chariots useless, and it was the infantry who must carry the brunt of battle.
Iron weapons had been introduced into Britain some eight centuries previous, and the Picts were well armed with blades of iron or steel from native forges or bartered from the continent. For weapons many carried heavy bows of black wood and quivers of iron-headed shafts. Most also carried the long-bladed Celtic sword, although many were armed with the shorter stabbing sword of the Roman legionary-loot from past victories. Knives were thrust into crude scabbards at their belts, and nearly all bore a round buckler of stout wood and toughened hide. Elsewhere, a random array of lances, axes and maces were gripped in determined fists.
Looking over his army, Bran smiled in grim pride. They were savages with only a ragtag semblance to the mechanized discipline of the Roman legions-but it was an army on the march, not just a mob of milling barbarians. If history had taught one lesson well, it had proven with gory finality that sheer weight of numbers and brute courage could not defeat the Romans. Disciplined troops must be countered with equal discipline and organized tactics-else certain slaughter under the short swords of the Roman war machine.