Heidhin, who had led in readying the boar, stood nearest the fire, apart from the others. He drew his knife, lifted blade to lips, sheathed it again. "Welcome, lady of ours," he greeted. "Behold, they are come as you bade, they who speak for the folk, that through you the gods may speak to them. If you will, say forth."
Edh lowered her hands. While not loud, her voice struck to its mark past the noises of the night. More than Heidhin's, it kept an outland tone, a rise and fall like surf beating on some far shore. Maybe from this came a little of the awesomeness that forever enwrapped her.
"Hear me, sons of Brucht, for great are my tidings. The sword is aloft, the wolves and ravens eat well, the witches of Nerha fly free. Hail to the heroes!
"Let me first give you the older truth. When I called you hither, my wish was only to hearten you. The time has been long, homes guest hunger, and still the foe has stood fast. Many among you begin to wonder why we are allied with our kin beyond the river. We have shames to avenge but no yoke to cast off. We have a kingdom to build together with them but cannot if they fail.
"Yes, tribes among the Gauls have risen too, but they are a flighty lot. Yes, Burhmund has ravaged among the Ubii, those dogs of Rome, but the Romans have wasted the country of our friends the Gugernes. Yes, we have laid Moguntiacum and Castra Vetera under siege, but from the first we had to withdraw and the second has held out month after month. Yes, we have had our victories on the field, but we have had our defeats too, and always our losses were heavy. Therefore would I renew my promise to you, that Rome shall fall, the bones of the legions lie strewn and the red cock crow on every Roman roof—the vengeance of Nerha. We have but to fight on.
"Then, only today, surely by the will of the goddess, a rider reached me from Burhmund himself. Castra Vetera, the Old Camp of the enemy, has yielded. Vocula the legate, victor of Moguntiacum, is dead, and Novesium, where he died, has likewise surrendered. Colonia Agrippinensis, proud city among the Ubii, asks for terms.
"Nerha keeps faith, sons of Brucht. This is the beginning of the pledge she will wholly redeem. Rome shall fall!"
Their yells tore at the sky.
She harangued them longer, though not much longer, and ended quietly: "When at last your warriors come home, Nerha will bless their loins and they will father men to bestride the world. Now feast before her, and tomorrow bring hope to your women." She lifted a hand. Once more they lowered their spears. She took a brand from the fire to light her way and departed into the darkness.
Heidhin led them as they pulled the offering off the grill, carved it, and devoured the smellsome flesh. However, he said little while they talked into each other's mouths of the wonder told them. Often such a silent spell came upon him. Folk had grown used to it. Enough that he was Wael-Edh's trusty man and, in his own right, a shrewd, swift leader. He was lean, with narrow features, white streaks in the blackness of hair and close-trimmed beard.
When the bones were cast aside onto the midden and the fire was guttering low, on behalf of everyone he bade the gods good night. Men sought the lodge nearby, where they would rest before starting back in the morning. Heidhin went a different way. His torch helped him along a dim trail until he came out from under the trees to a broad clearing, where he dropped it to die. Here the moon ran above western woodland, amidst the wind and the witchy clouds.
Before him hunched a house. Frost glistened on thatch. Within it, he knew, kine slept along one wall, folk along the other, mingled with their stores and tools, as they might anywhere else; but these served Wael-Edh. Her tower hulked beyond, heavy-timbered, iron-bound, raised for her to dwell in alone with her dreams. Heidhin walked onward.
A man stepped into his path, slanted spear, and cried, "Halt!"—then, peering through the moonlight: "Oh, you, my lord. Do you want a doss?"
"No," Heidhin said. "Dawn's nigh, and I've a horse at the lodge to bear me home. First I would call on the lady."
The guard stood unsure. "You'd not wake her, would you?"
"I do not think she has slept," Heidhin said. Helpless, the man let him go by.
He knocked on the door of the tower. A thrall girl woke and drew the bolt. Seeing him, she held a pine splinter to her clay lamp and used it to light a second, which he took. He climbed the ladder to the loft-room.
As he awaited—they had known one another so long—Edh sat on her high stool, staring into the shadows cast by her own lamp. They wavered big and ill-formed among the beams, the chests, the pelts and hides, the things of witchcraft and the things brought along from her wanderings. In the chill she kept her cloak wrapped around her, the hood up; when she looked his way he saw her face nighted. "Hail," she said low. A wraith out of her lips glimmered in the dull light.
Heidhin sat down on the floor, leaning back against the panel of the shut-bed. "You should rest," he said.
"You knew I could not, this soon."
He nodded. "Nevertheless, you should. You grind yourself thin."
He thought he glimpsed a half smile. "I have been doing that for many years, and am still above ground."
Heidhin shrugged. "Well, then, sleep when you can." It would be fitfully. "What have you been thinking of?"
"Everything, of course," she said wearily. "What these victories mean. What we should do next."
He sighed. "I thought so. But why? It is clear."
The hood crinkled and uncrinkled, shadowful, as she took her head. "It is not. I understand you, Heidhin. A Roman host has fallen into our hands, and you believe we should do what warriors of old did, give everything to the gods. Cut throats, break weapons, smash wagons, cast all into a bog, that Tiw be slaked."
"A mighty offering. It would quicken the blood in our men."
"And enrage the Romans."
Heidhin grinned. "I know the Romans better than you, my Edh." Did she wince? He hastened on: "I mean, I have dealt with them and theirs, I, a war chieftain. The goddess says little to you about such everyday things, does she? I say the Romans are not like our kind. They are coldly forethoughtful—"
"Therefore you understand them well."
"Men do call me cunning," he said, unabashed. "Then let us make use of my wits. I tell you a slaughter will rouse the tribes and bring new warriors to us, more than it will set the foe on vengeance." He donned gravity. "Also, the gods themselves will be glad. They will remember."
"I have thought on this," she told him. "The word from Burhmund is that he means to spare their men—"
Heidhin stiffened. "Ha," he said. "Thus. He, half Roman."
"Only in knowing them still better than you. He deems a butchery unwise. It could well enrage them into bringing their full strength against us, whatever that costs them elsewhere in their realm." Edh raised a palm. "But wait. He also knows what the gods may want—what we here at home may think the gods want. He is sending a headman of theirs to me."
Heidhin sat straight. "Well, that's something!"
"Burhmund's word is that we may kill the man in the halidom if we must, but his rede is that we stay our hands. A hostage, to swap for something worth more—" She was still for a bit. "I have spent this while mutely calling on Niaerdh. Does she want yon blood or no? She has given me no sign. I believe that means no."
"The Anses—"
Seated above him, Edh said with sudden stiffness: "Let Woen and the rest grumble at Niaerdh, Nerha, if they like. I serve her. The captive shall live."
He scowled at the floor and gnawed his lip.
"You know I am foe to Rome, and why," she went on. "But this talk of bringing it down in wreck—more and more, as the war wears on, I come to see that as mere rant. It is not truly what the goddess bade me say, it is what I have told myself she wants me to say. I must needs utter it again tonight, or the gathering would have been bewildered and shaken. Yet can we really win anything but Roman withdrawal from these lands?"