Have her disarmed and brought to my tent this evening.”
“I am not armed, and I look forward to seeing you as a peer in the evening. We will discuss terms. I have a plan that will surely…” She tailed off because Caesar had turned his horse from her and begun to talk to Labienus. Ragnall saw knuckles whiten on the hand holding her aurochs’ reins. She was angrier about the general snubbing her than the death of her entire retinue.
“Keep the praetorians here to hold the road,” Caesar continued to Labienus. “I’ll send up a cohort of the Tenth as well to cover the country around. No Roman is to go any further north than this point. Any Germans who attempts to come south of it will be killed.”
Labienus nodded agreement, but glanced at Felix, tightening his cheeks and pursing his lips as if he’d put something unpleasant in his mouth. Ragnall wondered what was going on.
Chapter 9
L ittle Dug lay on Lowa’s lap, wrapped in cotton and wool, breathing softly and staring into her eyes. He was a pretty little thing – thank Kornonos, since she’d seen some grotesque babies in her time – and she definitely felt some affection for him. But love? No. Why should she? Shitting, crying and sleeping, his sole activities thus far, were not endearing. Everyone said that being a mother would change the way she thought about everything forever, but she hadn’t expected it to and it hadn’t. She had a child and that was that. She liked him, but if he was taken away right then and she never saw him again? She’d live. She’d lost people before.
Perhaps other mothers saw more of their babies, and that’s why they fell for them. Lowa had hardly seen Dug since his birth because she spent most daylight moments and many of the nights training her army. She was in charge of the cavalry, Mal looked after the scorpion crews, Atlas was head of the infantry and Chamanca commanded the heavy and light chariots, but with those latter two in Gaul and Lowa as overarching chief, she spent as much time with the other sections as her own.
It was hard work. They were slowly learning new methods, and gradually mastering new weapons and equipment, but so many had been killed in the battle with the Eroo and their Fassites that their real problem was numbers. The coming Roman army was likely to be a good deal larger than hers, not to mention vastly more experienced, with years more training and, apparently, supported by a legion of unspecified but powerful demons.
As well as preparing to defend against an invincible foe, she had to continue to manage resources to avoid the famine that might have followed the Spring Tide – and might still – and she had to ensure her army and its ancillary support was fed, sheltered, fuelled, stopped from running wild, that its shit was taken away, outbreaks of disease contained, squabbles stifled before they could escalate … She’d put people in charge of all these tasks, but found herself having to intervene again and again. With a few exceptions, her commanders simply did not give nearly as much of a fuck about getting everything right as she did.
The only thing that she’d done since she’d been queen that could be considered selfish was learning to swim. Escaping from Zadar years before, she’d almost been caught because she couldn’t swim. She never wanted to be in that situation again, so on a succession of calm evenings she rode south to the sea alone, waded into the frigid water and worked out how to float and paddle about. She hadn’t expected it to be difficult – as she’d told herself all those years ago, many children could swim and children were idiots – and it hadn’t been.
With running a conglomeration of tribes and invasion preparation taking up every heartbeat of her time, she reckoned Danu might forgive her if she didn’t go all weak in the limbs and gushy about her son.
People told her, all the time, that the boy looked exactly like his father, Dug. Yes, maybe
“I am not armed, and I look forward to seeing you as a peer in the evening. We will discuss terms. I have a plan that will surely…” She tailed off because Caesar had turned his horse from her and begun to talk to Labienus. Ragnall saw knuckles whiten on the hand holding her aurochs’ reins. She was angrier about the general snubbing her than the death of her entire retinue.
“Keep the praetorians here to hold the road,” Caesar continued to Labienus. “I’ll send up a cohort of the Tenth as well to cover the country around. No Roman is to go any further north than this point. Any Germans who attempts to come south of it will be killed.”
Labienus nodded agreement, but glanced at Felix, tightening his cheeks and pursing his lips as if he’d put something unpleasant in his mouth. Ragnall wondered what was going on.
Chapter 9
L ittle Dug lay on Lowa’s lap, wrapped in cotton and wool, breathing softly and staring into her eyes. He was a pretty little thing – thank Kornonos, since she’d seen some grotesque babies in her time – and she definitely felt some affection for him. But love? No. Why should she? Shitting, crying and sleeping, his sole activities thus far, were not endearing. Everyone said that being a mother would change the way she thought about everything forever, but she hadn’t expected it to and it hadn’t. She had a child and that was that. She liked him, but if he was taken away right then and she never saw him again? She’d live. She’d lost people before.
Perhaps other mothers saw more of their babies, and that’s why they fell for them. Lowa had hardly seen Dug since his birth because she spent most daylight moments and many of the nights training her army. She was in charge of the cavalry, Mal looked after the scorpion crews, Atlas was head of the infantry and Chamanca commanded the heavy and light chariots, but with those latter two in Gaul and Lowa as overarching chief, she spent as much time with the other sections as her own.
It was hard work. They were slowly learning new methods, and gradually mastering new weapons and equipment, but so many had been killed in the battle with the Eroo and their Fassites that their real problem was numbers. The coming Roman army was likely to be a good deal larger than hers, not to mention vastly more experienced, with years more training and, apparently, supported by a legion of unspecified but powerful demons.
As well as preparing to defend against an invincible foe, she had to continue to manage resources to avoid the famine that might have followed the Spring Tide – and might still – and she had to ensure her army and its ancillary support was fed, sheltered, fuelled, stopped from running wild, that its shit was taken away, outbreaks of disease contained, squabbles stifled before they could escalate … She’d put people in charge of all these tasks, but found herself having to intervene again and again. With a few exceptions, her commanders simply did not give nearly as much of a fuck about getting everything right as she did.
The only thing that she’d done since she’d been queen that could be considered selfish was learning to swim. Escaping from Zadar years before, she’d almost been caught because she couldn’t swim. She never wanted to be in that situation again, so on a succession of calm evenings she rode south to the sea alone, waded into the frigid water and worked out how to float and paddle about. She hadn’t expected it to be difficult – as she’d told herself all those years ago, many children could swim and children were idiots – and it hadn’t been.
With running a conglomeration of tribes and invasion preparation taking up every heartbeat of her time, she reckoned Danu might forgive her if she didn’t go all weak in the limbs and gushy about her son.
People told her, all the time, that the boy looked exactly like his father, Dug. Yes, maybe
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