Roman harbour.
Lludd’s foreign sojourn was finally
coming to an end this cold night and he exited the fortress early with the
slaves, tramping out of the rear gate with a long line of these exhausted
people, heading gratefully home to their hovels. Limping along and keeping his
head bowed and enveloped by the deep hood of his cloak, Lludd leaned heavily on
the tall crook and made his way around the ditches and down toward the
ramshackle part of the town, adjacent to the frozen marsh reserved for these
downtrodden slaves. The mushy brown track trampled into the snow and which
snaked between the rows of low, smoking and turf-roofed hovels at either side,
was stark against the snow-white fringes in the moonlight. The ground was as
hard as rock beneath his booted feet, causing him to wonder how these wretched
and subjugated people could possibly survive in these conditions and in those
meagre dwellings he passed by in silence.
He exited the slave quarter with
relief and even in the low light of dusk, he picked up the tail as soon as he
entered the town via the slave gate. He’d known he was being followed almost
immediately but gave no outward sign of this, shuffling onwards and bent at the
waist he clutched the tall shepherd’s crook with its ram’s-horn handle by the
hazel shaft. Glancing back at the man as he entered the town and heading slowly
downhill toward the harbourside, Lludd saw that he was a nondescript,
middle-aged man with a bald head, around which was draped a grey fringe
attached to an untidy beard. A big beer-belly stretched the laces of his
leather jerkin and strained the loose knitting of the woollen pullover under it,
showing a filthy woollen undershirt through ragged rents of broken stitching. This
man with a slightly exaggerated air of nonchalance was dressed shabbily like an
unemployed local in worn chequered bracs and work-worn, much-repaired leather
shoes. Had Lludd not known this man was dogging his footsteps, he wouldn’t have
given him a second glance and so he was ideal for the job. He was good at his
job too Lludd conceded, not just looking the part, as he came down the street
behind him casually as if he were browsing the stalls but looking as though he
belonged. However good his acting skills were, he couldn’t fool a Brythonic
Dewin and Lludd noted him well, as he negotiated his way through the teeming
merchant’s stalls of this main street behind him. The man made a show of
looking at the displayed beaver pelts on a fur-trapper’s table but waved the
pushy vendor away when he approached, distracted for a moment but long enough
for Lludd to get a good measure of him.
He was clearly a Roman spy-catcher
and this town was crawling with them, as was every other across Gallia but
Lludd wondered what had alerted this man to him. Perhaps they followed all new
arrivals here, but it was a huge town and so that was improbable, raising the
spectre of treachery. It was far more likely that his ‘priestly’ clothing had
singled him out on reflection and coming from the fortress where the secret council was on-going would have
also thrown suspicion on him, as the Druids of Gallia were still the leaders of
any demonstration or insurrection against their Roman rulers. With rumours of
the war-council rife among the locals, it shouldn’t have come as a surprise.
Regardless of the reason, the baleful glare of Rome itself was now directed at
him and Lludd knew if he was caught, it would go badly for him. He had seen
Roman crucifixion up close for himself and he didn’t plan on leaving this world
in that particularly ungodly manner.
People were lighting the rows of tall
torches which lined the streets of this huge port town now, and their
flickering flames lit-up the wares which were still on sale and would be until
the streets became deserted. This last hour, the slack period before darkness
descended on Anfers proper was often quite busy, and the street sellers would
squeeze every last second of trade out of each day if there were still people
abroad. Lludd smirked, as he watched the portly man following him step into a
big ice-crusted cow-pat in the street and curse, before crossing over to Lludd’s
side to wipe his foot on a rock. He looked up then and their eyes met in the
flickering gloom. The man froze when he realised his mark was staring at him
from the shadows of the deep black hood but to his credit, he just boldly
returned the stare and stood his ground, waiting for Lludd to make the next
move. This self-confidence told Lludd what he needed to know in an instant;
that this was no covert surveillance but may be an attempted arrest. His blue
eyes narrowed in the shadow of the hood and Lludd turned on his heel.
Still in character he shuffled down
the side street toward the docks, leaning on his tall crooked staff and
remaining concealed in the black folds of the long, hooded cloak. Limping
slowly down onto the main drover’s road which cut through the top half of this
great harbour town, he turned right, with the long hazel staff in his left hand
flying out in front of him with each two steps, and that was when he spotted
the four soldiers.
A pair of Roman legionaries was
stationed at the head of each side-road to his left and although they slouched
against the plastered wall of their respective corner houses, it was clear they
were there for a reason and the routes back into town were obviously now closed
to him. This confirmed his suspicions and Lludd calmly considered his situation
and his slowly narrowing options as he checked the western skies. Judging it
was mere minutes until Bel vanished and the night proper crushed the preceding and now fading dusk into denser, less
penetrable darkness, Lludd pressed on with a thoughtful expression in the
shadows of the hood. Taking an oblique angle to his right away from the soldiers,
he crossed the dung splattered and pot-holed main road, limping his way over to
the head of a lane further east. Another
surreptitious glance over his shoulder told him everything, as when his pursuer
came down onto the main road behind him, he looked across and nodded to both
pairs of soldiers and they too began to follow. It was at that precise moment
Lludd sprang into action.
Had he bothered to look back, Lludd
was sure to have seen shock register on the faces of those Romans, as the
ancient and crippled priest suddenly burst into a sprint any deer hunter would
have been envious of, as in the blink of an eye Lludd Llaw Ereint had vanished
around the corner and bolted down the back alley like a Greek athlete.
This uneven, hazard-strewn and pot-holed
lane wound downhill to the docks and the stench from its industry was almost
overpowering. This was where the long line of painfully thin and freezing
slaves carried the big heavy pots of human waste, down to the tanner’s yard at
the bottom of the lane and it made an abysmal spectacle. There was a vast
clay-lined pit at the head of this lane, where all the night-soil and daily
effluent produced in this locale was brought and dumped. It was where the slaves’
part-processed the crusted filth, before ladling it into big clay pots and
carrying it down to the only factory in the neighbourhood which could compete
with the foul stench of its suppliers.
The entrance to this communal
slurry-pit was off to his right as Lludd tore down this lane, his black cloak
billowing out behind him and he had to watch his flying footsteps carefully, as
there was ice and human excrement everywhere. The muck was all over the
pathways and the hedgerows and it was splashed up the mean walls and thatching
of the industrial buildings lined on the left, and the air was thick with the
choking miasma. It was no surprise the Romans had neglected to guard the head
of this lane as it was given a wide berth by everyone, apart from the dozens of
slaves shuffling up and down it with their heavy and malodorous burdens.
It was immediately clear that the
chase was on, as a shout went up behind him from the soldiers when he shot
around the corner and he could hear their hob-nailed sandals, crunching loudly
on the gravel of the main road behind him. Lludd slipped in the icy filth but
only skidded a little way, gaining his feet quickly out of sheer will power
alone, as he was definitely not going to fall flat into that stuff he was paddling in. He had to leap athletically over a
bale of straw to dodge a pot-slave, who was bent over at the waist and heading
downhill with his burden, which slopped its disgusting contents to the
snow-lined street before him with each laboured step. Lludd shot past him like
a black wraith from the Underworld and this struggling individual didn’t even
look up. The filthy slaves coming back uphill with their empty pots looked
agape, as a one-armed and elderly priest in a long black cloak ran past them
like a teenage bull-runner, dodging and weaving like a coursed hare, as he
careered wildly downhill in the half-frozen grime. Lludd could hear the chaos
behind him as the Romans charged downhill after him and from the sounds, they
were not quite as agile as he was. He was actually smiling at the thought of
the jostling going on behind him, and his hunters being covered in the stuff
this lane was famous for.
Slowing down a little, Lludd reached
out across his body with the long shepherd’s crook and unhooked the coil of
rope around the two abutted posts, then he tugged the gate with the hooked
handle and it came open handily as he shot past the butcher’s yard, his
abbreviated pink arm flailing for balance. The high-pitched squealing of the
escaping piglets into the street behind him made him smile even more, as he
finally cleared the escalating chaos of the revolting lane. Jinking swiftly to
his left and away from the Tannery, he entered the dockyards at precisely the
moment, when the last bloody light of day was extinguished in the western
heavens and the docks were suddenly plunged into darkness.
From the concealment of a stack of
plump grain sacks, Lludd watched his enemies enter the dark and frozen dockyard
and a meddlesome moon cleared a cloud at that instant, washing the whole
harbour with its cold impersonal glow. The freezing timbers glistened under
this wintry light, as if the wharf had been scattered with a million diamond
fragments and the breath of the Romans in the search party, billowed before
them in white clouds. The bald and overweight spy-catcher had been joined by an
Optio in full glimmering armour and their four soldiers fanned out in search of
the surprisingly fleet-footed priest, who turned out to be about half the age
he purported to be. Lludd grinned wickedly from the shadows of his hood and his
blue eyes blazed from its depths, as he saw the bald man and the four soldiers
approaching were covered in shit and looked none too happy about it.
Moving stealthily among the shadows,
Lludd pushed further into this open sided thatched warehouse which was packed
with produce awaiting loading or collection. Pyramids of barrels were stacked
in rows, full of oil or tar and before them were laid the rows of amphorae
racks reserved for the nobles. Low, curving timber racking supported the mid-sized
oil and wine amphorae, with their tall and graceful necks and nicely shaped
handles. Behind these stood the soldier-like row of huge clay pots, with their
wide necks and robust handles and these leviathans were filled with precious
grain, each stoppered with a round timber bung and secured with a square of
waxed double-linen, tied-down over the neck by the corners with lengths of
twine. Down the centre of this long rectangular open warehouse stood the bales
of thatch-straw, hay and cut flax, forming a huge grassy wall in the centre and
he used it for cover as he sneaked toward the rear. Lludd moved between more
stacks of tar in big barrels, stepping around great coils of new hemp rope as
thick as his wrist and he could hear many rats scurrying about in the dark,
running between these mountains of stores. They could be seen boldly running
about everywhere on the snowy lanes and among the mean thatched buildings which
serviced this long and normally busy harbour, but instinctually they kept well
clear of him and he ignored them.
As he left the cover of the great
warehouse at its rear, Lludd drifted toward the great bastion of the eastern
sea-wall which the Romans had built. It thrust rudely out into the bay from a
rocky beak and it protected the harbour and these docks. It also served as an
excellent weather-break and the great stone wall terminated at a round watch
tower, whose foundations were constantly washed by the cold waters of the great
northern channel. Unseen from here, there was an identical stone wall reaching
out from the western perimeter of this harbour and together, they framed and
protected the flanks of the whole bay, with high stone walling and a pair of
tall watchtowers. This massive bastion which reared up into the night above
him, was the terminal of the eastern wharf and moored close to its cold
stonework and sheltering deep in its projected shadows was the first trading
ship in the row, tied up to the posts on this dock. This little twin-masted
trader was familiar to him and by the movement on deck, it was preparing for
its logged sailing west with Roman
cargo. The Roman manifest held by the harbourmaster would have the Aulerci
harbour in Celtica listed as its delivery point but Lludd knew its true
destination and he had to be on it,
as it was his only transport home. If for some reason he missed it, he would be
on the run for another week or more like these scurrying rats, until his next
berth could be secured. He’d only been on the run for around ten minutes and
already he was in trouble. So, all his ferocious will-power will be bent this
night to that one crucial imperative. The Captain and the crew of the waiting
vessel were trusted allies to a man and they had become adroit at the dangerous
business of ferrying people secretly across the channel to Prydein and back,
but they were bound by a Roman schedule and Roman laws.
Lludd crouched in the shadows and
dragged his eyes from the little trader, which by the activity on deck was
making final preparations before departure and he controlled his escalating emotions
and breathing. Just turning his head, he watched this enemy search-party tread
carefully on the icy boards toward him and under the supervision of this new Optio,
they were performing their duties well, covering the exits and positioning
themselves so that they could cover each other effectively. The loose ‘lozenge’
formation they formed made it difficult for them to get picked-off one by one
in any sudden attack and their experience was obvious, as was the leadership of
their Optio.
Behind Lludd and back from the quay,
yet still in the wall’s huge angular shadow were huddled a few small groups of
homeless people, and they were gathered around three sputtering braziers in the
stunning cold. He headed for these people in the dense shadow of the great wall
and the ground underfoot was treacherous, as it was freezing hard again, and
icicles hung from everything. Long spears of ice were festooned from the spars
and rigging of the ice-dusted and sparkling ships to his left, making them look
ghostly but he veered away from them and the harbour, heading for the monstrous
blockwork of the Roman wall.
These forlorn and homeless people had
constructed a wind-break of sorts, out of timber flotsam fished out of the
freezing water of the harbour and it had been lashed together with an eclectic
assortment of leather strips and rope. Clambering around the leaning and
dishevelled structure, he ducked down and turned to watch his pursuers once
more from its cover. The Romans were still around eighty reeds away but were
inexorable in their slow march down the length of this icy timber wharf toward
him, checking every nook and cranny for their elusive and deceptive fugitive.
He didn’t have long, as the tide was almost at its peak and he had to cross the
dockyard and get to the quay unobserved before he could approach the ship. If
he tried to cross now he would be spotted in an instant, as even in the stygian
shadow of the great wall behind him, the human eye is superb at spotting quick movement
and as they were all facing this way, he didn’t stand a chance.
It wasn’t immediately apparent how he
was going to pass the broad and slippery looking quay unobserved and there was
no way he could endanger the ship and her crew, as reckless escape alone was
not enough. There was a garrison of soldiers within easy reach of these docks
and there were several Biremes moored at the western ‘military’ part of the
harbour, even a magnificent Trireme. Just one of those human-powered and swift
galleons could catch and overhaul that little trader in no time at all. It was
imperative that he sneak aboard without any kind of alarm, as he knew the ship
wouldn’t even clear the harbour unless it got the all-clear from the
watchtower. In his long black hooded cloak, Lludd was just another shadow among
the many and carefully, infinitely slowly he moved away from the wind-break.
Approaching the first group of people
huddled on the frozen ground around the brazier, he crouched near them and saw
they were completely wrapped up in mantles and blankets. They looked like
little conical mounds of immobile, ice-dusted wool to Lludd and he bowed his
head to them, suppressing a grin. They were passing between them clay pots of
some obnoxious smelling liquor and it was clear they were inebriated against
this biting cold. Only their eyes moved within the crack left open in the
windings for sight, above the wet one allowed for the spirit and they surveyed
him with fear, as much as they did the approaching soldiers.
In their own dialect, Lludd calmed
them and informed them quietly that the Romans were looking for workers, for
some clandestine loading operation in the next dockyard. For an hour’s labour
and no questions asked, they were offering a silver coin to each man and Lludd
shrugged down at them, revealing the pink stump of his right forearm with a
grimace before moving on like a disconsolate black ghost.
Behind him, the cones of wool looked
at each other for a brief moment, before they rose as-one and sprouted legs
beneath them. On these unsteady and rather skinny supports, they assembled and
began to shuffle toward the Roman search-party. Lludd ghosted onwards to the
next group and the next, imparting the same well-received information, before
moving tight to the wall and vanishing into impenetrable blackness, from where
he calmly observed the results of his quick actions.
More woollen cones sprouted reedy
legs and over twenty drunken and homeless hopefuls shambled from the shadows in
three groups and approached the soldiers to offer their services. As the three
unsteady groups coalesced into one jostling, woolly herd of faceless cones and
met the approaching Romans on the frozen Elm planking, chaos ensued amid much
drunken shouting, gesticulating and pointing. It looked absolutely comical to
Lludd, making him grin again in the dark. He took his opportunity then and
moved along the wall in a crouch, grateful for the knee-high scrub which gave
him an added measure of cover.
As he crouched at the first, in the
expanse of dark and glistening timber planking stretched out ahead of him, he
tensed for the dash across the very end of this frozen quay and his ship home,
which alarmingly was about to leave! It took momentous will power to exercise
the patience needed at that pivotal moment, as his timing and footwork would
have to be perfect. Looking back, he saw that the drunken cones of wool had
moved landward of the Romans, to seek the dubious shelter of the great open
warehouse no-doubt and the Romans had turned to face them, berating them and
even drawing their swords to make them go away. Their backs were turned, and it
was the very moment Lludd had waited for and he went for it, sprinting across
the icy timbers in a crouch, every ounce of concentration focused on his
footing. With barely a skid, he reached the quay wall and slid over the edge,
dropping gratefully to the railed timber walkway for foot passengers below,
which he knew ran the whole length of this dock.
Only his head could be seen above the
quay wall now but if he ducked, he could move to the ship unobserved and he
turned to do just that when he froze in position, holding his breath. His blue
eyes growing huge they just swivelled to his right, as the unmistakeable sound
of approaching iron-shod footsteps crunching on ice-crusted timbers came to his
ears, like a shrill alarm on the cold night air. To his annoyance, one of the
dock guards came sauntering around the corner and his grin faded. The Roman
appeared from behind the stern of the ship he was about to clamber aboard and
although he was armed with a long javelin, he was also clearly bored to death
and almost frozen to the same degree.
This distracted soldier was making
his ponderous and absent way back along the length of this walkway along the
dockyard wall, again. The all-too familiar details of his immediate
surroundings had clearly vanished long ago from sight at the repetitive
monotony, to be replaced by the day-dream which obviously sustained him in the
dark and final, freezing hours of his duty shift. Whatever this soldier was
seeing in his mind, be it tavern, brothel or home in front of a fire, he wasn’t
with his autonomous body in this frigid and coldly commercial dockyard in Duru
Anfers and he wasn’t really seeing the walkway he was patrolling. Lludd’s heart
beat rose a little at the sight of the Roman soldier coming at him and he took
a couple of deep breaths to calm himself, his eyes narrowing as he prepared to
draw steel. As the soldier approached he noticed the man’s dreamy expression
and he released his grip on the dagger, as Lludd had other powers to call on,
over and above those of clinical and silent assassination.
The way this causeway had been built,
the soldier on his normal tour of this dock would have to pass him by, and so
closely they would almost touch, so there was no place to hide. He was
concealed for the moment by a big vertical timber post attached to the dock
wall the breadth of a tree and which supported this walkway but in moments, the
soldier would be alongside him. Lludd continued his deep breathing calmly in
the shadow of this tree trunk, as the sound of iron studs on cold timber
approached. His face slackened a little then, as the Warrior-King retreated
into the shadows of the hood and the Prime-Dewin took its place, like an
ancient warrior-priest emerging cold-eyed and terrible, into the crystalline
stillness of this starlit night.
The preoccupied soldier stepped
around the post and came to a sudden standstill his eyes flying open, as an
invisible man had appeared before him in an instant. His disbelieving eyes were
locked in that same instant to the mesmerising blue crystal beacons of Lludd
Llaw Ereint, Brif-Dewin of Prydein and the man couldn’t cry out, as he couldn’t
move a muscle. A vacant expression relaxed the man’s tanned face then and his
jaw fell open to reveal rotten stumps, as Lludd’s shocking power poured in
through his eyes and stunned him. The Roman was a good deal shorter than Lludd
and the only thing that could be seen of him above the dock wall, was the point
of his javelin. Lludd smiled down at him now in that enigmatic, unnerving way
of his and the man’s eyes became glassy.
“You are alright soldier, everything
is just fine!” Lludd told him in perfect Latin and in an easy, friendly tone
but one of Patrician authority, giving him a smile and a friendly pat on the
shoulder but the man didn’t even blink, as his eyes were huge and swimming.
Lludd took his arm and turned him, so that he was mere inches from the frozen
timber and facing the dock wall. “You can just wait here in the warm sunshine
my friend.” Lludd whispered in his ear, his arm thrown around his shoulders in
friendship. “Just look at that glorious view!” He demanded, his eyes still
blazing their unnatural power as he relieved him of his spear and leant it
against the big post. This entranced soldier just gaped and nodded at the
scarred and battered wall in front of him, drooling now from his hanging mouth.
“Stay here and enjoy the view my old friend and you will be relieved soon
enough with some hot posca!” Lludd
added, giving him another pat on the back before squeezing past him and
hurrying to the awaiting ship, which was already unfurling its sails.
A grinning crewman at the square
stern caught his eye and they nodded to each other, being old friends. Lludd
slipped the big hoop of hemp rope over the top of the bollard and freed the
stout stern line from the quay, throwing the heavy rope up to his combrogi
Maelgwyn ap Gorwyn, the son of an Essyllyr Captain who had served under him.
Gŵyr Gorwyn’s capable son was
reported to be a fine sailor and had needed employment, so Lludd had secured
his position on this trader for him. The boy had proved himself many times with
his calm, unflappable character and had repeatedly justified his reference.
Lludd had known him since birth and young Maelgwyn had sailed with his son
Afalach many times, surprising him with his intuitive sailing skills and the
intimate relationship he had with the whimsical Gods of wind and sea. The boy
was no-less than family now and Lludd knew he could rely on his level-headed
pragmatism in any pinch.
Looking around at the dock and the
commotion by the warehouse from his elevated viewpoint, Maelgwyn nodded the
all-clear down to him with a wide grin on his round young face. With a huge
leap, Lludd vaulted up and grabbed the gunwale, pulling himself up and over it
with one hand, before vanishing without a sound into the bilges. The young
crewman didn’t even blink and carried-on coiling up the rope, continuing to
watch the commotion on the dock and he laughed, as the guard stood like a
statue on the walkway below. The Roman guard drooled in vacant inactivity with
his spellbound face planted firmly to the dock wall, still gripped by the
unique power of Lludd Llaw Ereint. As
the ship under him slid away from its berth in virtual silence, Maelgwyn spat
into the widening gap of black swirling water at the stern, before turning to
his duties still grinning like a fool.
The Optio on the dock watched the
ship depart with shrewd eyes as the soldiers cleared the rabble around him, as
it was possible their fugitive was on it, but he wasn’t prepared to have it
hauled over as it was clearly transporting Roman goods. After-all it was only
an old priest these men had been chasing and if he did signal the watchtower
now to set in motion the boarding and the search of the trader, the
harbourmaster would need to be summoned, as would a Centurion from the garrison
with a search party and if the priest was not aboard, his career in this army
would be all-but over, if not his life. With a pragmatic spit to the frozen
planking, the Optio turned back to the drunken mob of woollen-clad local idiots
and drew his sword.
The little twin-master sailed toward the harbour mouth with
just the foresail up and a Roman looking pennant flying from the masthead. A
soldier in the top room of the watchtower checked his waxed tablet, before
making the signal out of the window with his burning torch. The men on the
barge across the mouth of the harbour to the west, got up from their wicker
chairs at this signal and manned the great capstan, facing their own stations.
Their overseer remained in his chair aboard this large barge, as the coiled
whip in his hand was threat enough and so the two big muscular slaves, bent to
the task. With their enormous fur-clad backs turned to the direction they
wanted to go, they took up the strain at either side of the huge drum, and the
enormous muscles in their bare arms bulged as they thrust against the handles
protruding from the big timber spokes, forcing the big drum to turn.
Inexorably, inertia was conquered by their bulging muscles and it began to
revolve, causing a huge wet iron chain to emerge dripping from the water behind
them, its weight alone taking its toll on the barge men, but they kept up the
pressure against the handles on the drum and slowly, the barge moved away from
their station. As they continued to turn the great drum in the centre of their
vessel, the wet chain was wound about it between them and they were drawn
backwards across the harbour entrance on their barge, clearing the mouth for
the ship to sail through with no alarm.
To reseal the entrance of the bay, they would row the barge back across,
paying out the chain behind them and a land-mounted capstan was used to tighten
the great chain once more.
They were already half-way back and rowing furiously, with
the drum rotating and the huge iron links splashing back into the cold black
sea, when the pretty little trader sailed passed them at a jaunty angle and
with both sails up.
The trader turned south-west down the channel, heeling with
this favourable wind and it was lifted by the lively swell, as were its crew
and its invisible, resting passenger. They would be passing Southern Prydein
soon and if they strayed a little too near to its coast in this unpredictable
wind, they may well be forced to seek sanctuary in Porth Rutupia, before being
able to continue their journey to Celtica further west for their Roman patrons.
If they were forced by the capricious nature of the weather in these parts, to
actually make land at Caint in Prydein they would no-doubt lose their
clandestine stow-away, but gain so much more in the longer term.
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