Bernard Cornwell - Stonehenge

'I want the same,' Rallin answered, glancing at Merrel who lay in the slave's arms, 'but there cannot be peace so long as Camaban has Sannas's spirit.'

'Our ancestors are unhappy,' Morthor explained. 'They want Sannas to join them. Send us Camaban, Saban, and we shall give you stones.'

'Or tell Camaban to make war on us,' Derrewyn sneered. 'You think he is a warrior? Let him come to our spears! And tell him, Saban, that when he comes we shall tear the flesh from his bones piece by piece and we shall make him scream for three days and three nights and at their end I will take his soul and the soul of Sannas.' She spat into the fire, then plucked the cloak from the ground to cover her nakedness. 'I thank you for Lengar's head,' she said coldly, 'but have nothing to give you in return.' She took her daughter back, then stalked to her hut and ducked inside.

Saban looked at Rallin. 'Do women make the law here?'

'Lahanna does,' Rallin said curtly. He stood, and pulled Morthor to his feet. 'You should leave now,' he told Saban.

'There will be war if I leave.'

'There will be war whether you leave or stay,' Rallin said. 'We have known nothing but war with Ratharryn since your father died. Do you think we can so quickly make peace?' Rallin shook his head. 'Go,' he said, 'just

go.'

So Saban went.

And the war would go on.

—«»—«»—«»—

Camaban did not seem surprised or disappointed that Saban's mission had failed. 'They want war,' he said. Camaban was at the Sky Temple where Saban found him brooding over the twin rings of Sarmennyn's stones. 'Cathallo thinks that with Lengar dead we shall be easy prey to their spears,' Camaban went on. 'They think I cannot lead men into battle.'

'They said as much,' Saban confessed.

'Good!' Camaban said happily. 'I like an enemy who underestimates me, it makes his humiliation so much easier.' He raised his voice so that Gundur and Vakkal, the war leaders of Ratharryn who were among his entourage, could hear him. 'Men think war is the application of force, but it isn't. War is the application of thought. Cleverness. And I think we should march tomorrow, straight across the marshes, over the hills and into Cathallo.'

Gundur half smiled. 'We have tried that before,' he said softly, 'and failed.'

'You've tried everything and failed,' Camaban retorted.

'And we hear Cathallo is filled with spearmen,' Vakkal put in. 'They expected to meet our forces and the men of Drewenna and so they gathered their allies.'

'But they will know Drewenna has deserted us,' Camaban said, 'and will hardly believe we dare to attack them. What better time to do so?'

'They're probably planning to attack us,' Gundur said gloomily.

'You always think of difficulties!' Camaban shouted at them, astonishing both men. 'How can you win a war if all you do is worry about losing one? Are you women?' He limped towards the warriors. 'We shall leave tomorrow morning, we shall attack in the next dawn and we shall win. Slaol has promised it. Understand? Slaol has promised it!'

Gundur bowed his head, though he was plainly unhappy with Camaban's decision. 'We shall march tomorrow,' he reluctantly agreed, then plucked Vakkal's elbow and walked back to the settlement to warn his spearmen.

Camaban watched the two warriors walk away, then laughed. 'We'd better win now or those two will want my head.'

'It will be hard to win,' Saban said carefully, 'for Cathallo seems to know everything we do. They must have spies here and they will know you're coming.'

'What choice do I have?' Camaban demanded. 'I have to fight now, and not just to take the stones, either, or to persuade Gundur and Vakkal not to hack me down like a dog. If I am to be chief here then I must show myself a greater leader than Lengar. It's easier to be cleverer than Lengar, but men don't admire cleverness. They admire power. So by defeating Cathallo I achieve something Lengar never did. The problem, of course, is what to do with all these spearmen once we've won peace. Warriors do not like peace.'

'You think you will have peace?' Saban asked.

'I think, brother, that Slaol will give us victory,' Camaban said, 'and I think you will build me a temple and that your first job will be to pull out these stones.' He gestured at the pillars that had been brought across the sea to be sunk in Ratharryn's turf. 'They looked so splendid in Sarmennyn,' Camaban went on, frowning. 'Do you remember? And you could feel the presence of Slaol. Brooding. Always there! Trapped in stone. Not here, though. Dead, that's what they are here, dead!' He pushed at a stone, trying to topple it, but it was too well sunk in the ground. 'They'll all have to come out, all of them! How many men will you need to haul out the stones?'

'Thirty?' Saban guessed. 'Forty?'

'You'll need more than that,' Camaban said confidently. 'And you're going to need men and oxen to drag the new stones from Cathallo.' He fell silent, staring at the unfinished circles of stone. 'I wish I did not have to fight,' he finally said, then turned to his brother. 'Have you ever seen a battle between whole tribes?'

'No.'

'You should. Before it begins every man is a hero, but as soon as the arrows begin to fly half of them find they've got sprained ankles or upset bellies.' He smiled. 'I think you will prove a hero, Saban.'

'I thought I was to be a builder?'

'A warrior first, a builder after,' Camaban said. 'I would not go to battle without you, brother.'

It had been a long time since Saban saw warriors ready themselves for battle, but next dawn he watched as men stripped themselves naked and daubed their bodies with a paste made from water and woad, then dipped their spear blades and arrow-heads in a viscous mix of faeces and herb-juice. When the sun was at its height the spearmen danced about Mai and Arryn's temple and a captive from Cathallo, who had been kept under guard ever since the last skirmish between the tribes, was dragged to the temple and slaughtered. Camaban was curious about that rite which Gundur told him had begun with Cathallo killing their captives before battle and so Lengar had ordered it done at Ratharryn as revenge. Haragg protested at the killing, but Gundur assured him it was no sacrifice and so the high priest held the skull pole as Gundur, naked and smeared blue, and with his hair blowing wild, took a bronze knife and slowly slit the man from crotch to breastbone. Ratharryn's spearmen then dipped their right hands in the blood of the victim whose long dying scream had been a message to the gods that the tribe was going to battle.

Saban did not dip his hand, nor did he dance about the temple poles as the drummers beat out a quick rhythm on their goatskin hoops. Instead he squatted beside Aurenna who had watched the captive's death unmoved. 'You will win the battle,' she said. 'I saw the victory in a dream.'

'You have a lot of dreams these days,' he said sourly.

'Because I am here,' Aurenna said, 'where Slaol wants me to be.'

'I wish we were going home with Lewydd,' Saban said. He had helped Lewydd drag the burned and shrunken bodies of Kereval and his men from the ashes of the hall. The corpses were to be buried high on the grassy slope above Slaol's old temple and Lewydd would then take the gold back to Sarmennyn.

'This is now my home,' Aurenna said. She watched the warriors crouch one by one over the eviscerated corpse. 'All this was meant to be,' she said happily. 'We did not know what Slaol intended when we came from Sarmennyn. We thought we were just bringing stones! But instead he wants us here to make his glory.'

'So the last years were all wasted?' Saban asked bitterly. He had given the best years of his life to moving the stones from Sarmennyn, only to have them rejected as soon as the task was done.

Aurenna shook her head. 'The years were not wasted,' she said calmly. 'They were given to Slaol, as proof that we could do great things for him, but now we must do more. Scathel's temple was a place for killing, a temple like the Sea Temple, and our new shrine must be a temple of life.'

Saban shuddered. 'Derrewyn once prophesied that our temple would steam with blood. She said the sun bride would die there. She said you would die there.'

Aurenna laughed softly. 'Saban! Saban! Derrewyn is an enemy. She would hardly speak well of what we do. And there will be no blood. Haragg hates sacrifice! He detests it!' She touched his arm. 'Trust us,' she urged him. 'Slaol is inside us! I can feel him like a child in my belly.'

Haragg was to accompany the war band. It was expected of the high priest, though Saban was surprised Haragg was so enthusiastic. 'I have never liked killing,' the dour high priest confessed, 'but war is different. If you had not offered them peace, Saban, I would be unhappy, but they have been given their chance and refused it, so now we must do Slaol's duty.' Haragg was carrying the tribe's skull pole that he took to Arryn and Mai's temple where the warriors assembled. Camaban had donned one of Lengar's old tunics with bronze strips sewn to its breast and at his side hung Lengar's bronze sword. He had dipped his hand in the corpse's blood, then smeared the blood on his tattooed face so that, with his black hair loose, he looked like a thing from a nightmare. He gestured for Haragg to lower the skull, then placed his bloody hand on the yellowed dome and shouted, 'I swear on our ancestors' souls that we shall destroy Cathallo!'

Over two hundred warriors watched that solemn oath. Most were veterans of Lengar's wars, a few were youngsters who had passed their ordeals but had not been tattooed as men for they had not yet killed in battle, while the wildest spearmen were the outlaws who had come from the forests with Camaban. 'We march now and we shall reach Cathallo in tomorrow's dawn,' Camaban cried, 'and that is when we shall attack. And Slaol has spoken with me. He has always spoken with me. Even when I was a child he came to me, but now he speaks more clearly and he tells me we shall win a great victory! We shall conquer Cathallo! We shall kill many spearmen and take many prisoners. We shall end, for all time, the threat of Cathallo and your children will grow in a land at peace!'

They cheered him and the tribe's women added their shouts of approval, then the drummers beat on their skins and the war band followed Camaban north into the woods. They walked all afternoon and it was almost dark by the time they reached the marshes about Maden, but their path across the wet land was lit by a white high moon that glossed the streams and shone on the ghostly white skulls that Cathallo had planted at the edge of the wooded hills to deter Ratharryn's spearmen. Camaban plucked a skull from its pole and threw it to the ground, then the rest of the war band followed him into the forest. Camaban's outlaws, who were at home among the dark trees, went ahead as scouts, but found no enemy.

It was slow going in the woods for the leaves obscured Lahanna's light and the spearmen travelled cautiously. They stopped when they reached the highest ground and there waited through the chill night. Gundur and Vakkal were nervous, for Cathallo had never before allowed Ratharryn's warriors to cross the marshes unchallenged: they were now deep in the enemy's territory and they feared an ambush, but no arrows or spears came from the dark. In the past, Gundur said, Cathallo had forced Ratharryn's warriors to fight their way into these hills where they were constantly ambushed by archers, but now the woods were empty, tempting every warrior to believe that Cathallo was ignorant of their coming. As dawn approached a mist sifted through the trees. Fox cubs scattered across a clearing as the advance resumed, and men took the presence of the cubs as a good omen for the beasts would surely never have left their dens if Cathallo's warriors were lurking among the trees, but then, just as spirits were rising in hopes of an easy victory, a terrible roar made the men crouch and even Camaban's striped face showed sudden fear. There was a trampling in the bushes, not quick like a deer's movement, nor deliberate like a man's, but something huge and ponderous that sounded out of the mist to make the whole war band shudder.