Attila’s fury erupted, and he raised his sword and brought it down. The holy man died where he stood, unflinching, slumping almost gently to the ground before Attila’s horse. A moment later, arrows slammed into the eight knights, killing some and mortally wounding the others. Even then, not one of them reached to draw his weapon and fight, as if the example of their bishop had been his last word to them. Attila himself loomed over them and finished them with thrusts of his sword.
His men gathered round him, but crying, ‘Leave me be!’ he drove his heels into his horse’s flanks and surged forward, up the steps, over the bodies of the slain and in through the great west doors of the cathedral. The moment he had passed through, they slammed shut.
His men waited, perturbed. Orestes had visions of Attila’s horse leaving bloody hoofprints all down the white marble paving of the aisle.
He appeared a short while later, still mounted, dragging the doors open again awkwardly from the saddle. He stared up at the sky. ‘Strange,’ he muttered.
Orestes said, ‘My lord?’
He still gazed upwards, as if searching heaven. ‘That there should be thunder out of so clear a sky.’
His men exchanged anxious glances.
‘Great Tanjou,’ said Chanat, ‘we heard no thunder.’
Attila’s reaction was shocking. He rounded on the venerable old warrior and gripped him about the throat with his mighty left hand. With his right he held his swordpoint to his throat. Chanat’s horse whinnied and backed away, but Attila held on with a vicelike grip, his own horse moving in tandem.
‘You lie!’ he cried, and the stately buildings around the square echoed back, lie, lie, lie. ‘You heard thunder! You lie, to make me think I am hearing phantoms, that I am haunted by the Christian god there in his charnel-house church! You would have me think myself mad, ride out into the wilderness, fall on my sword, that you may plant the first of your own seed on the throne of the Huns!’
But Chanat was no man to be bullied, even with a swordpoint at his throat. ‘No, my lord,’ he said quietly. ‘The first of my seed, the Lord Aladar, died serving you under the walls of Constantinople. And we do not lie. We heard no thunder.’
Attila’s eyes bulged, his mouth worked. Then he released Chanat, and sank back in his saddle. There was a long silence. In a nearby street, the cold wind slammed a wooden shutter back and forth in a desolate rhythm. Finally he pulled his horse around, his expression once more blank and hollow, tossed his sword away to clatter on the worn cobblestones, and rode back out of the square.
Geukchu glanced enquiringly at the old warrior, almost with sympathy.
‘I still endure,’ growled the old warrior. And he said it as if he were under a curse.
They rode after Attila, only Orestes dropping down from his horse – clutching his side still bandaged and sore from the stab-wound – to retrieve the sword. For was it not the sword of Savash?
The northern battle group under the command of Geukchu had swept through the valleys of the Mosa and the Scaldis, destroying the cities of Tornacum and Cameracum along with many others, and then descended on the city of Lutetia, on the island in the River Sequana in the country of the Parisii. Attila’s horde was approaching likewise from the east.
Here again, history has already become legend; and yet it is an established fact that the Huns did not, after all, ever capture or destroy Lutetia, but passed it by and rode on south. Some say that the men of the city were preparing to flee, horrified by the sight of not one but two approaching dust-clouds: on both northern and eastern horizon. But the women of the city, made of sterner stuff, insisted that a holy maid called Genevieve had promised them the city would never fall to Attila.
‘A holy maid!’ scoffed the men. What did holy maids know of war and warriors?
The women said she was praying to God even now, quite calm and resolute, in the circular Baptistery of St Jean-le-Rond. Some of the men went to look, peeking in on her, and saw that it was as the women said.
Across the river, the Hun horsemen were already massing. The modest walls of the city and the narrow stretch of river seemed little protection. Even less did the prayers of an unworldly young girl called Genevieve. But a large group of the women took refuge in the Baptistery with her, singing hymns and psalms, and then men joined them, crowding around outside. The spring air resounded with many voices lifted in praise of the Lord God of Hosts, the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. And when they looked again, they saw that the Hun horsemen had miraculously disappeared.
It is impossible to distinguish the truth from the legend of St Genevieve. But, for whatever reason, the Huns never laid a violent hand upon Lutetia. Maybe it was entirely pragmatic of Attila to wish to push on south as rapidly as possible. He wanted to destroy another enemy, before that enemy could join up with the Roman Army. He wanted to make it to Tolosa.
5
Aetius’ legions marched the six hundred miles from Aquileia to Gallia Narbonensis in twenty-six days, each legionary carrying his full forty- or fifty-pound pack on his back. It rained much of the way, and snowed heavily at times. Reviewing their achievement, Aetius felt they had performed satisfactorily.
As they neared Tolosa, he ordered his men to stand down while he and his commanders rode on in alone. It would not do for a force of twenty-five thousand to appear suddenly below the walls of the city unannounced. The irascible King Theodoric might get the wrong idea.
It seemed only moments after they had announced themselves at the East Gate, that there came a frenetic clattering of horses’ hooves down the steep cobbled street within, and there were the princes Theodoric and Torismond on their white chargers, faces shining.
‘You have come to destroy Attila at last!’ they cried.
‘I must speak to your father first,’ said Aetius gravely.
Old Theodoric received him in a small chamber heated by a burning brazier, and wearing a great white fur cloak across his back. He grasped Aetius’ hand in his bearlike paw and squeezed it tight, smiling beneath his beard.
‘By God you gave my boys a good time of it, so you did, out there in the East. My eldest damn near lost his arm, and if he had I’d have come after yours! But he’s well now: young flesh and bone knit well. Sit. Drink. You, boy, bring us wine – well-cooked.’
Cooked wine? In the name of Light…
There was no time for small talk. ‘So,’ said the old King, ‘you will face Attila on Gaulish soil.’
‘It seems so.’
‘You know his numbers?’
‘A hundred thousand.’
Theodoric shook his great shaggy white head. ‘More. I think two hundred thousand. They are ill-provisioned, and far from home, living only on what they can loot. Can you calculate how much fodder two hundred thousand horses travelling in winter need?’
‘A lot – more than the Huns have prepared for. The country will be stripped bare.’
‘You could just leave them to starve. The asses. Your own lines of supply are well ordered, I presume?’
‘Of course. Are we not Romans?’
Theodoric guffawed. ‘So you are. Well-organised as always, I’ll stake my beard on it.’
‘And our numbers: twenty-five thousand. They are the finest: well trained, fighting-fit, and full of confidence. But they are only twenty-five thousand.’
Theodoric shook his head again, his eyes gleaming in the light of the brazier. ‘It is not enough.’
‘If the wolf-lords of the Visigothic nation rode with us-’
‘ No! ’ Theodoric roared. ‘Do not ask us. This is not our war. We are not Attila’s enemies. He comes for revenge against Rome.’
The cooked wine arrived. Aetius tasted it. It was heated, spiced, honeyed, and quite revolting. He drank it down manfully.