between his daughters and the emperor. As Calvus read, Prasutagos lis-
tened, his features set in the lines of stubborn determination Boudica
knew so well.
“In Roman law, it is usual for a woman to inherit from her family,
not her husband,” the lawyer said apologetically when the reading was
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done. “A man leaves his wealth to his children. Daughters may inherit
when there are no sons.”
“But—the emperor?” she asked.
Calvus grew a little pink and looked away. “You may be aware that
there are men . . . close to the emperor, who exercise a great deal of
power . . .”
Boudica nodded. Seneca and the other old men who controlled the
boy emperor had been raping Britannia of her wealth these past few
years.
“We think . . . that if Nero is co- heir with your daughters, they
will not dare to challenge the will. It was the only legal way I could
devise . . .” His voice trailed off. He still looked, thought Boudica, as if
he thought she might eat him. She turned to her husband.
“My love, is this indeed what you desire?”
“My desire is to live,” he breathed. “But if I cannot . . . this is my
will. I ask the council to confirm . . . you to rule.”
“Until Rigana is grown and chooses a husband,” added Bituitos.
“The Romans supported Cartimandua because she served them, but
they are not comfortable with ruling queens.”
Prasutagos’s eyes had closed. Brangenos, who for such a tall man had
a remarkable ability to fade into the background when he desired, stood
up. The Roman jumped, having apparently not realized he was there.
“The king has exhausted his strength—he must sleep now.” The
Druid’s frown was a command.
Calvus hastened to gather his things and was escorted out by Cris-
pus. Bituitos followed. But Boudica remained standing. Her defi ant
gaze met the compassion in that of the Druid, who bowed. When he
had gone, she stood gazing down at Prasutagos’s closed features, memo-
rizing the arch of his nose, the line of his brows. There was a little line
between them, as if even in sleep he felt pain. His mustache was entirely
silver now.
Her vision blurred, and she sank to her knees beside the bed, weep-
ing soundlessly. A long time later, it seemed, she felt a touch upon her
hair and jerked upright, trying to dry her eyes.
“Go ahead and cry,” he said. “The gods know I have done so. Do
you think it is easier for me to go than for you to stay?”
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“Yes!” she dashed more tears away. “Was it not worse for you when
your first wife died? And you had only lived with her for a year. You
and I have been bound for nearly half my life, and you are leaving me
alone!”
Prasutagos closed his eyes. Boudica held her breath, appalled at her
own words. They had never talked about the first woman to call him
husband. What madness had made her mention that now?
“When she died . . . I wept because I could not save her,” he whis-
pered at last. “Now . . . because I will not be able to protect you . . .”
Boudica liked to walk down to the horse pen when Brangenos in-
sisted that she leave Prasutagos to get some air. Now it was only here
that she allowed herself the luxury of tears. Bogle and the other dogs
trailed her in uncharacteristic silence as they sensed her mood. The af-
ternoon was fading. The white mare came to the fence, butting at her
shoulder in hopes of a treat, and Boudica put her arms around the strong
neck and buried her face in the mare’s white mane. She did not pray. She
had not been able to pray since she returned from the sacred spring, but
the mare’s solid strength was some comfort.
The Beltane celebrations had been a wake instead of a festival, though
Prasutagos still lived. The chieftains, shocked at the prospect of losing
their king, had been willing enough to agree to all that he asked. Summer
was blessing the land with joyous growth, but with each hour the king’s
strength ebbed as his failing lungs lost their battle to take in air.
With her face pressed against Branwen’s coarse mane, Boudica sensed,
rather than saw the ebbing of the light. Then the mare stamped and
shook her head, and Boudica realized that someone was calling her.
“Mama . . .” Rigana said tightly. “Brangenos says that you should
come.”
A shudder she could not prevent ran through Boudica’s frame, but
when she turned, her eyes were dry. She reached out and took her
daughter’s hand. As they approached the roundhouse she could hear
harp notes, sweet as memory. The Druid’s potions were no longer of
much use, but music seemed to ease the king’s pain. As they passed into
the entryway she stopped, steeling herself against the smell of sickness.
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Rigana joined her sister at the other side of the bed. Bituitos and
Eoc were there, and others. Boudica did not see them. Prasutagos’s face
had grown more gaunt even in the time she had been gone, the fl esh
shrinking upon his bones. Each uneven breath was a struggle. Was he
unconscious, or only so focused on staying alive that he had no attention
left for the outside world? Now the tears that blurred her eyes were from
pity, not her own sorrow.
What Brangenos had said was suddenly real to her. Her husband
could not live. Each hour only prolonged his pain. Was this how Pra-
sutagos had felt when he watched her struggling to give birth to his
child? He labored now to release his spirit, and to her fell the task of
midwifing his soul.
I cannot do it, she thought.
I must . . .
She took a step forward and her husband’s eyes opened. His lips
moved, trying to shape her name.
“Prasutagos . . .” She spoke as he had spoken to her so long ago.
“Prasutagos, I am here . . .” She knelt and took his hands, willing strength
through their linked fingers, and his agony seemed to ease.
His lips moved once more, the words almost without sound. “Watch
over my people, Boudica. Guard my girls . . .”
“Yes, my love,” she answered steadily. “I will.”
With an effort he drew another breath, the body still fi ghting to
live. She leaned forward. Her lips brushed his brow.
“You have done all that you could,” she whispered. “No woman
ever had a better husband. It is finished now, my beloved. Go onward—
go free . . .”
As she sat back his lips curved in their familiar sweet smile. He did
not speak again.
Boudica waited, remembering suddenly how it had been when she
took ship to go to Avalon, how it had seemed as if it were the shore, not
the boat, that was slipping away. A long time later, she became aware
that the labored breathing had ceased. His fi ngers were growing cool
against her own. She released them and gently crossed his hands upon
his breast.
Then she rose to her feet. If others spoke to her, she did not hear
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them. Prasutagos was still. In all the years she had railed against his si-
lences, there had been none like this. Plead as she might, he would not
answer her.
Boudica turned, brushing aside those who tried to stay her. Her
steps led her to the horse pens where the white mare was waiting. What
need had she for saddle or bridle? She leaped to the mare’s back, and in
a moment they were through the open gate and away.
The queen rode the white mare as once she had ridden the red, her
wild hounds baying behind her, and men fled inside their houses where
she passed. “Epona rides . . .” they whispered. “Epona mourns the king.”
But no matter how wildly she galloped, she would never overtake
him now.
T W E N T Y- T W O
L hiannon gripped the rim of the coracle that had brought her from
the larger ship to the shore, and carefully clambered over the side. Sand
crunched beneath her feet. She bent and scooped it up with her hand.
“I bind myself to this earth of Britannia,” she murmured, “to its
soil and stone, stream and spring. To each thing that grows and to all
that walks and flies, to the people of this land I pledge myself, not to
leave it again.”
To her right loomed the gray masses of the holy mount. A few huts
clung to the slopes. Fishing boats were drawn up on the shore, where
crows squabbled with the seagulls for scraps from the last catch they had
brought in.
“Is this Lys Deru?” asked the Irish Druid who had come with her,
looking around him dubiously. His elders, responding to rumors of a
potential influx of refugees from Britannia, had sent him to see for him-
self what was going on.
Lhiannon laughed.
“This is but the bare, stormy face Mona shows to the sea. No doubt
these good folk will give us some food in exchange for a blessing, and
then two days of walking will bring us to the village. But if I have not
lost all my magic, someone may meet us sooner with beasts for us to
ride.”
The prospect did not make the man look much happier, but he
asked no more. Lhiannon sighed. If I have not lost all my magic, she thought,
and if the Druids of Lys Deru are not too distracted by fear of the Romans to hear
my call. The crew that had brought them from Eriu had carried disquiet-
ing rumors of a Roman advance. She had hoped to bring Caillean with
her, but with the situation so unsettled it did not seem wise. The girl
would be safe with the family Lhiannon had paid to keep her until she
sent for her to come.
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It was the dream that had awakened Lhiannon just after Beltane that
concerned her now. She had heard Boudica weeping, and then she had
seen a goddess on horseback who rode wailing across the skies.
The keening of the women cut through the murmur of the crowd.
After three days of public mourning, Boudica no longer really heard
them. Now that Prasutagos’s voice was silent, there was not much that
she cared to hear. When the chieftains began to arrive she spoke to them,
but a moment later could not remember whom she had seen.
The morning after Prasutagos died, the mare, having run herself
out, had brought Boudica home. By then, preparations for the funeral
were well under way. Old women had appeared at the dun to wash and
lay out the body. Men were already digging a burial pit and gathering
wood for the pyre. And by ones and twos and families the Iceni were
coming in.
“Mother—it is time to go . . .” Argantilla’s warm hand closed on
hers.
Blinking, Boudica focused on the scene around her, the somber
faces at odds with the splendor of festival clothing—Temella, Crispus,
Caw as usual at Argantilla’s side. They were all waiting for her to mount
the white mare and lead them to the burial ground. Rigana was already
on her bay horse, face pale from nights spent weeping. Fragmentary
memories told her that it was gentle Argantilla who had held the household
together during these past days. A whisper of reviving maternal instinct
wondered why that should surprise her. Rigana is too much like me . . . she
thought numbly. She is a sword without a sheath.
Obediently she allowed Calgac to give her a leg up and settled her-
self. Branwen, too, was on her best behavior, pacing sedately along the
road as if she could not imagine galloping wildly across the moors.
A stretch of heathland to the north of Dun Garo bore a series of
round barrows raised for ancient kings. Now a new pit lay open beside
them. Her eyes avoided the wood-framed burial chamber where the fl esh
that Prasutagos had left behind rested on sheepskins laid over a bier.
During the days he had lain there his people had come to say good- bye.
They stood now in a great silent mass, waiting.
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There should have been rich grave goods around the body, but
much of what would have been offered had been sold. The wealth of
“the prosperous King Prasutagos” had gone to help his people. But
other items had been added to those she
recognized—small things
whose value was measured by the heart, not by the scales: a piece of
embroidered cloth, a use- smoothed wooden bowl, even a child’s toy
horse. Such treasure could never be taxed by Roman conquerors.
Brangenos stood by the pyre. Beside him, a burning torch was fi xed
in the ground. He had found a clean robe somewhere. Its snowy folds
billowed in the light wind. He was a Druid of many talents, she thought
grimly. Whether you needed music, medicine, or ritual, he was there.
She would have liked to hate him for failing to save the king. But that
would have required her to feel.
She dismounted and took her place with her daughters before the
pyre, where Bituitos and Eoc had kept vigil since their lord was put into
his grave. They had stood at the king’s shoulder since he and they were
boys. Boudica supposed that their loss must bite almost as sharply as her
own. Weeping, they jumped down into the grave-chamber and lifted
their lord so that others could bear him to the pyre.
“This is the body of a man we loved.” The Druid contemplated the
bier. “But Prasutagos is not this flesh. This flesh is earth and the food of
earth, borrowed for a time. Now we must give it back again. From the
waters that are the womb of the Goddess this man came. As blood,
those waters fl owed through his veins. Now the land is fed by the blood
of the king. Through this body passed the breath of life. He has released
it to the wind. Breathing that wind we take in his spirit . . . and let it go
once more. Within this body burned immortal fire. Let that flame now
set him free!”
He pulled the torch from the ground and plunged it into the oil-
soaked logs. Instantly the greedy flames raged upward. Boudica
felt her
daughters’ fingers dig sharply into her arms and only then realized that
she had started toward the pyre. Why do you stop me? she thought resent-
fully. If I burn with him I, too, will be free . . .
Rigana began to sob, and with an instinct that transcended her sor-
row Boudica gathered her into her arms while Argantilla tried to hold
them both. Boudica was suddenly acutely aware of the warmth of their
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flesh against her own. He lives in them . . . so long as I have our children, he
is not completely gone . . . And suddenly that heat melted the ice that had
numbed her spirit and the healing tears flowed from her own eyes as
well.
As the body burned, people were descending into the burial cham-
ber, taking up each item and ceremonially breaking it, the cloth ripped,
the metal snapped in sacrifice, to lie there with the king’s ashes once the
burning was done. Bituitos brought out the gold-hilted sword that had
been hidden when the Roman inspectors came, set the point against a
stone, and leaned on it until the iron blade cracked. Eoc bent the
bronze-covered shield whose whorled boss glittered with red enamel.
The jeweled brilliance blurred through her tears. How could the sun
shine so brightly on such a day? Even the skies should have been weep-
ing to lose this man.
Brangenos took up his harp and began to sing—
“The king who reigns in peace is the shield of his people—
Their praise is his glory, his wealth is their love,
Until his time is done.
The king who wards his people by the gods is welcomed—
He feasts with the blessed, he walks in the light,
Until he shall come again . . .”
Smoke billowed blue in the sunlight, the scent of destruction min-
gling with the pungence of the herbs on the pyre. She would not look,
would not bear witness to the withering of his hands that had touched
her so sweetly, the destruction of his features—whimpering, Boudica
faced the flames, for surely the reality could be no worse than the im-
ages her mind was creating now.
“Fire burn!” cried the Druid. “Wind blow! Flesh consume! Spirit go!”
Her vision was dazzled by the blaze. Fire, said the Druids, released
the spirit, reducing the flesh that had confined it to its component ele-
ments. No wonder the world was rejoicing—Prasutagos was a part of