For the first time since he had seen her, his face relaxed and the hard expression evaporated, did she see tears in his eyes now? His fingers caressed hers. “I want to believe you but my head is in a thousand broken pieces. I don’t know what to think anymore.”
“Are you still thinking of killing me?” She asked her face suddenly neutral.
“I didn’t want to kill you Brenna, I never did,” he paused, “that’s a lie,” he said, “of course I did but you know what I mean? What would you have thought if things had been the other way around?” He asked.
She pulled his hand towards her mouth and kissed his fingers. “I would have run into the camp swinging my blade if things had been reversed. If it had been me behind the tree with the head of my brother on a spike and I had heard you say what I had said, I would have killed you first without hesitation.”
“So you see my problem?” He asked.
“Well you haven’t killed me, yet” she paused, “and that’s a good thing isn’t it? You could always decide to chop me into little pieces later.” She tried to smile.
“Don’t make light of this Brenna.” He warned her.
“I’m sorry.” She said. “Where are your quarters? You must be tired if you have been awake all night.”
He looked over to the direction of his barracks. “I wasn’t awake all night, I had some sleep. I couldn’t sleep now anyway, it’s the last thing on my mind.”
“We could just rest together then, I need a hot bath. You don’t know how much I’ve craved a proper hot bath instead of a cold stream or small amounts of hot water to wash in from bowls.” She smiled and for the first time he returned it.
“We can get a bath but not together.” He said. She looked hurt.
“I’ll settle for that, for now.” She replied.
Dumnoc didn’t have to work too hard to find his next target but he did have to wait for things to settle down after his first attack. The Romans surprisingly had not sought retribution but rumours were rife about what had happened to the occupants of the villa and Vertuna’s family. All that remained of the building and compound was a burned out husk, within days an auxiliary cohort was sent to demolish it entirely. Perhaps the governor was attempting to keep the matter quiet and had decided that discretion was better than seeking revenge.
Three weeks after the abduction of Vertuna, his wife and children, Dumnoc had begun travelling further south to find another site that would be suitable for attack. The spring days were already getting warmer as he rode past the track to a farm where another villa stood. There were slaves, Britons working in the fields but they didn’t raise their heads as he went by. He was aware of the freedmen watching over them, staring at him but he didn’t catch their gaze as he didn’t want to attract attention.
The building lay in a long sweeping valley where the crops would have shelter from the wind and the householder, one Vanutius Friscus, was said to enjoy working his slaves hard. A local settlement of five roundhouses had been destroyed because they just happened to be on the land that Friscus had chosen to take as his own. Because the Britons had objected, they were driven away, homeless. Friscus didn’t have any children but lived with his wife, a skinny beady eyed woman with a large nose and bigger ambitions for her husband to rise up the social ladder.
When Dumnoc was free of the watching eyes, he looked again at the long straight path lined with thin trees leading to the villa. It was larger than his previous target but the layout was virtually the same. He glanced back towards the men and women working in the fields and saw one of the freedmen lash out at a young man with a whip.
“You dumb bastard.” He heard the overseer shout, hitting the young man across the face. “Don’t you know anything about crops?” He raised the whip again as his victim cowered. “If you put them in the ground like that, we’ll have nothing to see for all our hard work, or is that what you intend?”
“Please sir,” An older man begged approaching the freedman, “my son has not worked in the fields before, he knows nothing of this.” He opened his hands to the ground.
“Get back to your own line,” the guard shouted, “or you’ll get this across your face as well.” He raised the whip again and the father backed away. He looked over at Dumnoc now stationary, he had stopped his horse to watch the incident.
“Be on your way, this doesn’t concern you.” He shouted. Dumnoc smiled briefly and bowed his head, his eyes cold and nodded. He saw the guard was a thickset rotund man with a long dirty looking grey beard. His brown tunic was drenched with sweat and he had a deep scar running down through his right eyebrow and onto his cheek. Five other freedmen stopped what they were doing, their attention caught by the shouting. He clicked at his horse nudging it gently with his thighs and turned moving away. He heard more shouting behind him as he carried on along the track.
“How wrong you are.” He said to himself smiling. “How wrong you are.”
Later that night, he watched the villa from the side of the valley now in total darkness. He had made sure that the rest of his people were hidden away over the brow of the rise. Because of the last attack, he had decided to bring fewer warriors this time as he didn’t want to risk falling upon a Roman patrol with what would have been a suspicious number of riders. Even then to avoid suspicion, they had slipped away from their settlements after dark and only in two’s and three’s. He had watched the compound from the same position for the last two nights to make sure of their routine. He didn’t want to be caught out knowing that it would mean death for him and his warriors. He was surprised that no guards patrolled the grounds or walls, which he found strange considering the attack further north only a few weeks before. After waiting for a considerable time after the last light was extinguished, he got up and went to where the others waited.
As he led his small war band down the slope of the hill, he waved an arm to Drustan who split off with his seven raiders so they could approach the villa from the other side. As he didn’t have the luxury of a lot of people this time, he had decided not to have any archers covering the building. He stopped at the end of the long straight track leading to the large wooden gates and paused to listen and watch in the gloom. There was no movement or discernible noise except for those associated with the night. He walked forward again, his boots crunching on the gravel surface. He moved off to the left and went along the grass at the side.
The walled villa was painted a similar colour to all the others he had seen and stood out against the dark night as they got closer. He turned every now and again to make sure his people were close behind, they were. Getting to the wall, they fanned out along its length then he heard a horse whinny from inside the stable and then a bang. It sounded as if the horse had kicked the door of its stable. He put a finger to his mouth warning the others to be quiet and waited for it to settle down again. Maybe the horse had heard or sensed them moving along the wall. When it was quiet he nodded to the man nearest him, then turned his back to the wall and crouched interlocking his fingers, Drustan stepped up and was pushed upwards onto the top of the wall. He heard a soft padding sound as he landed on the other side. Again he waited in case anyone had been disturbed inside.
After a short time he saw Drustan through the gap in the two gates as he struggled to lift the securing bar. It made a slight grating sound as he lifted it clear from its brackets and the gates opened. He led his warriors inside. His people spread out, covering the doors and windows where Friscus and his wife slept. They were in a room next to the freedmen, so they were close by in case of an emergency, but it wouldn’t help them this night. Because he had fewer numbers he had decided previously not to cover the doors where the Britons quarters were, assuming they wouldn’t cause them problems.