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Thunder Sandwich #23 |
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Carole Lanham |
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One Through the mist he caught a glimpse of the sword as it came on; its hilt a white branch of polished bone, topped with a sphere of metal that flowed like molten skin into the hand that gripped it. But for a twist of the neck, it would have sheared off Fortune's head. Instead, the blow from fist and handle knocked him off his ride. Before he had chance to damn his luck, he was on his back and lost in a stampede of hooves. Fortune's unit had been crossing an open field when their Centurion took a flaming arrow in the heart. By the time the man hit the ground, curses were cursed and bridals were snapped. Swords rang free from bronze scabbards in one great shivering chorus - Ching! In the surrounding woods a single scream swelled from a hundred lungs. Celtic warriors poured through the fog and the battle was begun. Thanks to the hit, Fortune's helmet dug into his face and he hurried to throw it off. The ground was a series of hoof print pools bridged by arms or parts of heads or the occasional pile of steaming innards, one of which he'd landed on and wore across his shins. He was scrambling to find a sword when he noticed that the field was quiet as a cracked bell. The war had run off without him. Rain plinked in puddles and a tree limb gave a stoic creak, but there were no sounds of blades being crossed. Or men grunting as they fell. The fog cinched around him like a blindfold, leaving his ears to do all the work. He used them like he used his blade; with tremendous impatience, and at first he heard nothing but rain and creaky branches. Then, he heard something. A horse. Turning. Galloping. Running. The ground beneath him began to quake. A black horse bounded from the fog and reared in a splatter of mud. Fortune found himself staring up at the under-side of its hooves. His disappointment was immense. To be run down by a horse carried no dignity at all. The 'Fool's Death' his brothers had called it. Old Man Fen had died the Fool's Death when he drank too much restina and decided to take a nap in the middle of the road. Folks had little sympathy for a man trampled dead without a sword in his hand. Fortunately for Fortune, the black horse just grinned at him, then dropped on all fours to allow a rider to leap off its back. Relieved that hooves would not be the thing to send him to his grave; Fortune was just about to pray a prayer of gratitude when he recognized the sword the Iceni pressed to his throat. The point urged him to his feet and began to back him up. With each new step, the mud fought to take his sandals and he had to curl his toes and hold on tight or see them sucked clean off his feet. The sword forced him over body after body, turning fallen soldiers into slick stepping stones that crunched or moaned, depending on where one placed a foot and the over-all deadness of the man. When at last Fortune butted up against a tree, mud ringed his calves and he was short one fine Aspallugan sandal. They were in the forest now. The Haunted Forest of Madravale. Like everyone in Britannia, Fortune had heard tell of the ghosts that swept from the woods after battles to gobble up the dead. He was not a man given to superstition, yet his toes burned as if invisible phantoms had already begun to nibble on his flesh. The sharp tip of the Iceni's blade reminded him of realer things. It traveled down the length of his breast plate to score it like a slab of mutton. BAM! Pricks of light winked around the inside of his brain. He was on the ground again and this time his nose felt as though it had been re-routed to his throat. Using one hand, the Iceni rolled him on his stomach and began to loosen his armor. The flat side of the Celt blade slammed against the back of his neck, making him breathe mud. The steel was hot and wet and seemed as heavy as the sky. Mud and blood bubbled around his nostrils as he listened to the clattering wing-flaps of a metal bird in flight. Once his brain quit sparking though, the metal bird turned out to be pieces of his armor being flung into the forest. With a grunt, the Iceni stripped Fortune naked, then turned him over and mounted him as if he were a woman. Fortune swung his fists, not about to let himself be raped by this big oaf. But when the big oaf drove his big oaf-sword into the ground next to Fortune's ear, surely the ghosts all licked their lips. Sweating now, he contemplated making a grab for the weapon. To do so would slice his hands to ruin but, with any luck, he might just find the strength to pull the blade free and use it against his attacker. He had done something similar in the Virmose Bog when a pirate had been fool enough to embed a shiny new spatha in the wall above his shoulder. That sword, however, had been far lighter and Fortune's hands were useless for weeks after. Even so, he looked at the twisty scar that cut its way across both palms and thought, I can do this. The Iceni growled and tossed off his helmet, sending it flying through the air. A streaming banner of red-gold hair snapped in the wind. The Iceni was a woman. She took no visible satisfaction in noting Fortune's surprise, and moved no more gently now that she was a woman. Rather, she reached between his legs and groped. "Ow!" Fortune hissed. Her hair hung in her face like an animal and her thighs were clamped so tightly around him that his feet turned prickly, then numb. Fortune had known some wild creatures in his time but this woman seemed more like a man than most men he knew. As if to reinforce this thought, she boxed his head against the sword so that it cut into his ear. By now, Fortune was seeing red and struck back with frenzied punches that handily annihilated the air around her face. The Iceni dodged his every swing and, with a fed-up snort, hit him across the jaw for his trouble. Not until she pushed up her tunic and fell on him, did she at last feel like a woman. Woman or no, Fortune bucked in outrage. He could think of no greater insult than being treated like a female at the mercy of a soldier. If he could turn the tables then, by Jupiter, he would be more than glad to have her, but not like this. When the Iceni barred her teeth and growled, Fortune growled back. I've suffered worse than this, he was quick to remind himself. Gaspar made him put his fingers in scalding water once, and he had survived the dungeons of Valletta. Fortune knew how to use his mind to deflect from the frailties of the flesh and this skill had saved his hide on many an occasion. Then again, there were worse things than physical torture. Gaspar liked to say that a man could steal your sword and your money and even your life, but, come what may you should never let anyone rob you of your pride. A man's pride, Gaspar said, was everything. It was pride, strong as stone that Fortune clung to now. 'Find a place inside yourself where something pleasant lives.' This was Gaspar's favorite lesson and the hell-hound in him had taken satisfaction in teaching it to Fortune time and time again. The battle for Vectis, or the siege on Jerusalem, or the contest at Cesarea . . . These were all good choices if one wished to slip away for awhile. They made Fortune's pulse surge with pride and both he and Gaspar had relied on these trusty memories to get them through many a bad jam. This particular situation, however, called for something different. Nothing pleasant, surely. The very opposite, in fact. In an effort to combat what the Iceni was doing to him, Fortune raised his chin in defiance and thought himself back to a miserable place, a place that reviled his very soul. When it came to revolting and/or unendurable torture, there were any number of memories to pick from, but only one was worse than all of the others. The dunes at Al um Ca. Fortune never went back there. Not for any reason, yet he went there now. And for that, he wanted to kill the Iceni witch. Once he allowed his mind to swing in that direction, the dunes gulped him down like quick sand. He was back - running on that dusty, worn-to-bone horse, running for his life with an arrow in his shoulder and dozens more singing past his ears. It was hard to distinguish the pain in his shoulder from the various agonies afflicting the rest of his body; hunger, weakness, whips across the back. He felt all of it again, and more. The desert. The heat. The creaky ribs of that ancient horse giving way against the insides of his legs. Finally, for the first time, he liked this memory. 'Come on, Gaspar,' he called out over his shoulder. 'We're losing them!' Then he looked back to see a spear strike Gaspar in the chest and, quick as that, his brother fell. With a crack of the Iceni's palm, the hot blue dome of the desert sky pitched wildly out of focus. Try as he might, he could only see the mist now. And the knee that rammed against his teeth. For Gaspar's sake, Fortune tried not to feel her, but the Iceni rocked in a way that jarred every bone in his spine cock-eyed. Al um Ca fell away and he could not catch it again no matter how hard he tried. It was sand through his fingers, and then it was gone. His back popped. Her hair was in his mouth. The brooch on her chest dug into his skin, printing its image on him like a scar. When the Iceni threw her head back and howled, a dark thrill seized him through and through. To be sure, she did not move in a way intended to please herself. Or him. It was a punishment. An act of humiliation, and he knew that if he took any pleasure in it at all, she would defeat him in a way far worse than death. He heard her teeth gnashing under that fiery hair, felt her working away at him on some primal level he had never scratched at before. Pushing him. Pounding him. Until he lost all control. His body was still shuddering when she lifted her head and shook back her hair. Victory shone in her eyes; victory cold as a metal blade. "I remember your face," she whispered in the language of the emperor. Fortune looked a little harder, but he did not recognize the woman. "What is your name?" she asked him. "Fortune," he said. "Fortune of Rome." She nodded and raised up on her knees. "You are a bad lay, Fortune of Rome." Fortune being Fortune, he slammed his fist forward and knocked the woman out. Who is this crazy savage? he wondered, shoving her off his lap. Whoever she was, she was his prisoner now. For shackles, he hacked off a hunk of her hair, twisted it and used it like rope to tie her hands behind her back. Fortune had been raised on swords but the Iceni blade felt heavy as the sun, and just as hard to handle. One slip and it would relieve a man of all ten toes, and maybe his ankles too. He was giving it a good once over, when the woman opened her eyes and hurled a mouthful of spit at his feet. The spit was followed by a slew of awe-inspiring curses, the gist of which amounted to this: "I am going to kill you, Fortune of Rome." Fortune practiced swinging his new sword. "How do you know me?" he asked, smiling at the way his fingers took to the grip. "You do not remember my face?" she snorted as she climbed to her feet. "Refresh my memory." Whoosh. Whoosh. The sword was a very fine weapon, in deed. "I am the wife of the Briton king, Prasutagus." she told him and, even as she spoke, the sword became too heavy to hold, nearly pulling free of his fingers. "Boudica is my name." Boudica. Queen of the Iceni. Her attack made sense to him at last. Fortune decided that, despite everything, this must be his lucky day. "I will be rewarded when I bring you to Nero," he bragged. "I would put on my clothes first, were I you," the queen of the Iceni said. Then she took back her sword. He would never know how she got free. Magic perhaps, for one minute the sword was in his hand, the next she was preparing to cut his throat with it. "Do you remember what your men did to my daughters, Fortune?" Remember? No doubt the girls had been raped when Decianus ordered her village sacked a few weeks before, but how was a man to remember all the gory particulars? Did she really think herself so special? "Do you have a family, Fortune?" Now that Gaspar was gone, Fortune had only Rome. "The Iceni do not take prisoners," she told him. "Still, it seems a pity you will not live to see what I am about to do to your precious Rome." Fortune might have laughed at this had he not been standing naked with a sword to his throat. Instead he wondered why he hadn't killed the barbarian queen while he had the chance. "You should have," she said. "Oh the lives you might have saved!" Fortune snickered at such talk. Who would dare to take on Rome? "Do you what my name means in my native tongue, Fortune?" Fortune did not. "Victory," she said and he felt the blade begin to saw his skin. He ignored the pain and clenched his teeth and gritted out a smile. "Do you what my name means in Latin, Queen?" By the look of her, she did not. "Lucky," Fortune told her. "Hm," Boudica said. "In deed you are, dear Fortune. You are number one." |