61 A.D.

14

Lannosea was sitting in her chair tying her long hair back with a leather thong when Heanua stormed in, still angry with her mother for sending her to fetch her sister like some house servant. Lannosea started when she saw her, nearly falling out of her chair. Her expression was a mixture of fear and guilt. She doesn’t even have her armor on, Heanua noted. Lannosea wore nothing more than her shift, as though she had no intention of coming along for the battle. Had her sister turned into a coward?

“What are you doing?” Heanua asked. “Why aren’t you ready? Mother is waiting for us at the head of the army.”

“Tell her I will be there shortly,” Lannosea replied, and turned her attention back to her hair, twisting it into a tight bun before securing it with the thin leather strap.

“I’ll do no such thing. I’m not your servant.” Lannie had always been a bit spoiled. The result of her stunning beauty and her station as an Iceni princess. In the past, she had gotten her way with a subtle flash of her ice blue eyes and a well timed shift of her hair. Heanua, whose brown hair and gray eyes rarely attracted notice, had been forced to play second to her younger sister for most of her life. While Heanua was also an Iceni princess, it was widely believed that Lannosea would someday marry a more powerful husband, and thus assume the queenship of the Iceni people.

Yet here she was, languishing all but naked in a cushioned chair on perhaps the most important day in the history of their people.

“Lannie, you need to get ready. Now. Or I will drag you to Mother as you are.”

“You wouldn’t dare.”

“You know I would.” Heanua crossed her arms over her chest. “Today is important. Today we strike back at Nero.”

“As we did at Camulodunum?” Lannosea asked, her voice soft, muffled. “Do you remember the sound of thousands of people dying, Heanua? Their screams as they pleaded for mercy? Did it please you?”

“Of course,” Heanua said. “The dogs of Rome deserved nothing less.”

Lannosea turned her face away, but not before Heanua caught sight of the tears building in her eyes. “We are far from Rome, sister. The people of Camulodunum, like the people of Londinium, have done nothing to us.”

“Do you remember the sound of your own screams?” Heanua shot back. “I was there, as well, remember? Your cries for mercy went ignored, as I recall. How can you sit in your chair and pretend the Romans deserve compassion?”

Lannosea didn’t answer, but Heanua heard the sound of her breath as it hitched in her throat. Was she crying? Today, of all days? By the gods, what was wrong with her?

“That’s enough, Lannie,” Heanua said. She strode across the room and grabbed her sister’s wrist, yanking her to her feet. Lannosea yelped at the sudden jerk, but recovered enough to pull her arm back from her sister’s grasp.

“Don’t touch me, Heannie!” she screeched, her face streaked with tears. “Don’t touch me again or by the gods I’ll-”

Heanua slapped her sister across the face. “I don’t know what is wrong with you, Lannie. But you are coming with me if I have to drag you all the way to Londinium. Now I suggest you grab your armor and get moving before I-”

Heanua stopped short, her breath caught in her throat. Lannosea’s clothing had shifted when she got to her feet, and now Heanua saw what she’d missed before. When Lannie had been sitting in her chair, the bulge at her middle had been hidden by her clothes. But now that she was on her feet it was easy to tell.

“No,” Heanua whispered. “No, it can’t be. Lannosea…”

Her sister’s expression crumbled, and she slumped back into her chair and dropped her face to her hands. Her shoulders bobbed up and down as she sobbed into her fingers, the severe bun in her hair coming loose and sending stray locks of hair spilling down around her shoulders. “One of the Romans…” she said.

Heanua understood. The rapes. One of those Roman bastards had created what would be another Roman bastard. And her sister, an Iceni princess, would be forced to live with the shame of it. No wonder she hadn’t been acting normal. Even after the Iceni and Trinovante reclaimed Britannia from Nero, Lannosea would never rule. Indeed, the likelihood of her ever finding a husband at all was slim. No one would want her now. Not after word spread that she’d given birth to a bastard child of a Roman legionary. It wouldn’t matter that the child was born of rape. Few men, certainly no man of any standing, would want to touch her.

“You can’t keep this child,” Heanua said softly.

“I don’t want it,” Lannosea said. “The devil take it, I never wanted it. I tried to kill it, early on, but the potion failed. Now I don’t know what to do. I still have five more months before delivery, and I’m only going to get bigger. I’ve sent away all my servants so no one would know, but that won’t last much longer. Soon I will be stuck in this tent, or worse, hiding somewhere like a criminal.”

“How are you going to hide this from mother?” Heanua asked. “She’s waiting for us to lead the attack on Londinium.”

“I don’t know,” Lannosea replied. “I tried to strap on my leathers, but they don’t fit anymore.” At this, Lannosea fell into another round of sobbing. Heanua looked at her shoes, a small twinge of remorse worming its way into her breast. She should have known better. Her sister wasn’t a coward. She had never been afraid to fight. But she was afraid of what the Queen would say.

“Stay here,” Heanua said. “And stay hidden. I have to get back to the front line. We’ll figure out what to do about this when I return.”

“What about mother?”

“I’ll handle mother. You just make sure no one sees you like this. Dress in something loose and flowing, and don’t leave this tent.”

“People will think I’m a coward.”

“People will think what mother tells them to think.”

“And what will that be?”

“I don’t know yet,” Heanua said, turning to leave. “But I hope I can think of something by the time I reach her.”

Ramah returned from hunting. Over his shoulder he carried the body of an elk, recently killed and waiting to be cleaned. His talk with his mother hadn’t gone as well as he had hoped.

“She’s bewitched you,” she had said when he told her of his plans to marry her. “The filthy Chalika has cast her spell on you.”

Ramah had struck her then. His own mother. His hand sent her to the floor. If he lived a thousand years, he would never forget the shocked look on her face. He’d left her sitting on the floor, rubbing her face with her hand, to go hunting. He’d needed something to calm his nerves.

How could he strike her? His mother!

He would apologize when he saw her next. But he would not relent. He would marry Neeya with or without his mother’s permission.

I’m sorry, mother, he thought, but you can’t make this decision for me. I won’t let you.

The village was quiet. Much too quiet. And empty. No children played in the streets. No men stood and talked of the day, and no women walked through the camp carrying sticks or water or blankets. As far as he could tell, he was the only one in the village. Ramah stood at the entrance to his mother’s hut and listened.

Voices came to him, quiet and distant. They seemed to come from the eastern edge of the village, where the fertile lands gave way to the Living Sands.

“No,” Ramah said. He dropped the elk and ran. There was only one reason the entire village would gather at the edge of the Living Sands. They meant to banish someone to the Wastes.

And he had a pretty good idea who.

“Mother!” he shouted as he ran. “Don’t do this!”

But as he neared the edge of his village, he saw his people gathered in a group. Several men spotted him and came out to meet him. He tried to shout a greeting, but they grabbed him by his arms and dragged him forward. As the crowd parted in front of them, he saw his mother standing on the edge of the Living Sands. The red mark of his hand was still plainly visible on her cheek.

Neeya was nowhere to be seen.

“Mother, what have you done?” he asked when he reached her. In response, she spat at his feet and slapped his face.

Ramah woke with a start, bolting upright on his makeshift bed of dried straw. The small bundle of cloth he’d used as a pillow was wet with blood. He picked it up and wiped away the tiny red trails from his cheeks. It had become a ritual of late. Every evening he woke with blood leaking from his eyes.

The dream. Every day this week it had come to him. Why? It was bad enough when he only dreamed once a month, but every damned day? What was the reason? He took the cloth away from his face, surprised to note the tremors that rocked his normally steady hands. Maybe he should see Lannis, after all.

He rose from the bed, shaking the memory from his head. The Living Sands had burned, like walking on coals…

No!

He had things to do tonight. Theron and Taras waited. He would have liked to kill them the night before, but by the time the Lost One finished with the Roman, the weakling had lost consciousness. Ramah needed to ask him a few questions before he allowed the bastard to die, and the sun was almost up, so he’d left him there, hanging from the chains in the wall.

But not tonight.

Ramah stood, shaking the last wisps of the dream from his mind as he set himself to the task at hand. Tonight Taras and Theron would both die, and he could return to the Halls of the Bachiyr and pay Lannis a visit. She might be able to cure him of the dreams, but she would want something in return.

Lannis always did.