Page 3 of Boudicca

“Ha! You granddaughters would be lost without their precious Nain,” cackled Dafina.

“Hush, you! Our queen is an excellent mother!”

“Never said she wasn’t...,” Dafina mumbled as she continued brushing her mistress’s hair.

“My granddaughters are a great joy to me—as are the Iceni.” Arianell’s expression changed. She stared into the fire and spoke slowly, as if weighing each word carefully. “I did not believe I would find such joy and purpose after your father’s death, but I have had a second life here with the Iceni. I want you to know that, my daughter, my queen. I have been more than content these many years.”

The hearthfire seemed to stop radiating heat, and I shivered. “You are the beloved matriarch of the Iceni. How many Iceni babes have you helped to bring into the world?”

Still staring into the fire, Arianell said, “Many, with the aid of my patron goddess, Brigantia.”

“Yes,” I said firmly. “And with the goddess’s aid you will bring many more Iceni into the world.”

“Indeed,” Arianell said softly. “Should it be the goddess’s will.”

“Should it be the goddess’s will,” Dafina echoed eerily.

I shivered again. “Mother, you have not told me why you woke so early.”

“I was compelled awake by Brigantia. The goddess whispered that I must give counsel to Victory.”

The breath rushed from me in a gasp. Father had often told the story about how he had known the moment he’d looked into his firstborn and only child’s eyes that he must name me after the ancient wordbuaidh, which meant “victory.” My voice broke as I asked, “A-and what counsel would you give me, Mother?”

“I have already given it you in the form of a precious offering, but in addition I simply remind you of something you already know. Listen to the forest.”

“Yes, Mother. I will remember.”

Arianell’s smile lit the shadowy room as she turned her gaze from the fire to look fully at me. “You should be on your way. It isnever wise to keep destiny waiting.” Arianell turned and spoke over her shoulder. “Dafina, make ready a measure of the bannock cake and some of that excellent cheese the queen likes so much.” Dafina quickly wrapped a generous portion of the still-warm wheat, barley, oat, and hazelnut cake, along with a hunk of goat cheese, in a skin and gave it to me with a fond smile and another bow.

Arianell stood. Though she was not as stiff and hobbling as her servant, I noted that Mother was slowing. She straightened with a grimace and rubbed her left hip. Arianell was not petite, but I stood more than a head taller. The wise woman I loved so well reached up and cupped my cheek gently with her hand.

“It has been difficult for you these months since Prasutagus’s death.”

“It was too sudden. Too soon.” My shoulders sagged with sadness. His last day rushed back to me as it had over and over. I watched my virile husband, seemingly so strong—almost godlike in my eyes—stand abruptly from his place of honor at the Imbolc feast just three months before. His ruddy face abruptly drained of color. He clutched his left arm, spoke my name, and, with an expression of wide-eyed surprise, the chief of the Iceni fell and did not rise again.

Arianell patted my cheek gently. “Time eases grief. And, remember, none of us are ever truly gone. We are all connected, and will be eternally.” She kissed me softly—first on my forehead, then each cheek, and finally my lips. “May the joy of the day be with you, my precious daughter, my precious queen.”

My response was automatic. “And may the blessings of the earth be on you, beloved Mother.”

“Now go! You are like a colt who needs to run.”

With a sigh of relief I rushed from the lodge and stepped out into a world turned gray.

Chapter II

The Druids called it the breath of the dragon. When fog rolled in with the dawn, thick and swirling with a life of its own, it made the mundane seem mysterious and the extraordinary seem mundane. That morning it blanketed the village.

The two Queen’s Guards snapped to attention when I joined them on the wide, raised wooden entrance to my roundhouse lodge. They were part of the twelve elite warriors, men and women of the Iceni, whose honor it was to protect their queen.

“Be at ease, Bryn and Briallen.” As my warriors relaxed I studied the thick fog that swirled throughout the village. “It is late in the year for the dragon’s breath, isn’t it?”

“Aye, it’s a strange one this morn,” said Bryn. He gestured with his long spear out at the fog.

Briallen, a tall, slender woman who was Bryn’s twin sister, teasingly used the blunt end of her spear to tap my shoulder. “Worried that it be Stoorworm coming to get you, my queen?”

I acted instantly, brushing aside the spear with one hand and stepping inside the reach of Briallen’s weapon. I pulled her short sword free of the scabbard at her waist and pressed the blade of it against the warrior’s throat.

Like all Iceni women, I have been trained in close combat as well as with the blade and spear and bow. Ironically, it was Briallen who had drilled me over and over again so that I was strong, confident, and accurate with all three.