When the Eagle Hunts

Sheathing his bloody sword, Cato fell to his knees beside Macro's still form.

'Sir!' Cato grabbed Macro's shoulder and pulled the centurion onto his back, wincing at the savage wound to the side of his head. The Druid's sword had cut through to the bone, shearing off a large flap of scalp. Blood covered Macro's lifeless face. Cato thrust his hand inside his tunic. The centurion's heart was still beating. Prasutagus was kneeling beside him, shaking his head in pity.

'Come on! Take his feet. Get him to the wagon.'

They were struggling back with the limp centurion when Boudica emerged from the trees, leading the children by either hand. She stopped as she saw Macro's body. Beside her the young girl flinched at the sight.

'Oh no…'

'He's alive,' grunted Cato.

They laid Macro gently in the back of the wagon while Boudica retrieved a waterskin from under the driver's bench. She blanched at her first clear look at the centurion's wound and then removed the stopper from the skin and poured water over the bloody mangle of skin and hair.

'Give me your neck cloth,' she ordered Cato, and he quickly untied it and handed her the length of material. Grimacing, Boudica eased the strip of scalp back into place over Macro's skull and tied the neck cloth firmly round the wound. Then she removed Macro's neck cloth, already stained with his blood, and tied that on as well. The centurion did not regain consciousness, and Cato heard him breathing in shallow gasps.

'He's going to die.'

'No!' Boudica said fiercely. 'No. Your hear me? We have to get him out of here.'

Cato turned to Lady Pomponia. 'We can't leave. Not without you and your children.'

'Optio,' Lady Pomponia said gently, 'take your centurion, and my children, and go now. Before the Druids come back.'

'No.' Cato shook his head. 'We all go.'

She raised her chained foot. 'I can't. But you must get my children away. I beg you. There's nothing you can do for me. Save them.'

Cato forced himself to look into her face and saw the desperate pleading in her eyes.

'We have to go, Cato,' Boudica muttered at his side. 'We must go. The Druid that got away will fetch the others. There's no time. We have to go.'

Cato's heart sank into a pit of black despair. Boudica was right. Short of hacking off Lady Pomponia's foot, there was no way she could be released before the Druids returned in strength.

'You could make it easier for me,' said Lady Pomponia, with a cautious nod in the direction of her children. 'But get them away from here first.'

Cato's blood chilled in his veins. 'You're not serious?'

'Of course I am. It's that or be burned alive.'

'No… I can't do it.'

'Please,' she whispered. 'I beg you. For pity's sake.'

'We go!' Prasutagus interrupted loudly. 'They come! Quick, quick!'

Instinctively Cato drew his sword, and lowered the tip towards Lady Pomponia's chest. She clenched her eyes.

Boudica knocked the blade down. 'Not in front of the children! Let me get them mounted first.'

But it was too late. The boy had grasped what was going on, and his eyes widened in horror. Before Boudica or Cato could react, he had scrambled into the back of the wagon and threw his arms tightly round his mother. Boudica grabbed the arm of Pomponia's daughter before she could follow her brother.

'Leave her alone!' he screamed, tears coursing down his dirty cheeks. 'Don't touch her! I won't let you hurt my mummy!'

Cato lowered his sword, muttering, 'I can't do this.'

'You have to,' Lady Pomponia hissed over the head of her son. 'Take him, now!'

'No!' the boy screamed, and he locked his hands tightly about her arm. 'I won't leave you, Mummy! Please, Mummy, please don't make me go!'

Above the boy's crying, Cato heard another sound: faint shouts from the direction of the hill fort. The Druid who had escaped the ambush must have reached his comrades. There was very little time.

'I won't do it,' Cato said firmly. 'I promise I will find another way'

'What other way?' Lady Pomponia wailed, finally losing her patrician self-control. 'They're going to burn me alive!'

'No they're not. I swear it. On my life. I will set you free. I swear it.'

Lady Pomponia shook her head hopelessly.

'Now, hand me your son.'

'No!' the boy screamed, squirming away from Cato.

'The Druids come!' Prasutagus shouted, and all of them could hear the distant drumming of hooves.

'Take the girl and go!' Cato ordered Boudica.

'Go where?'

Cato thought quickly, mentally reconstructing the lie of the land from his memory of the day's travel.

'That wood we passed four, maybe five miles back. Head there. Now!'

Boudica nodded, grasped the arm of the girl and headed into the trees where she untied their horses. Cato called Prasutagus over and indicated Macro's still form.

'You take him. Follow Boudica.'

The Iceni warrior nodded, and lifted Macro easily into his arms.

'Gently!'

'Trust me, Roman.' Prasutagus looked once at Cato, then turned and headed towards the horses with his burden, leaving Cato standing alone at the back of the wagon.

Lady Pomponia grasped her son by the wrists. 'Aelius, you must go now. Be a good boy. Do what I say. I'll be all right. But you must go.'

'I shan't,' sobbed the little boy. 'I won't leave you, Mummy!'

'You have to.' She forced his wrists away from her and towards Cato. Aelius struggled frantically to break her grip. Cato took hold of his middle and pulled him gently out of the wagon. His mother watched with tears in her eyes, knowing she would never see her small son again. Aelius wailed and writhed in Cato's grip. A little way off, hooves pounded on wood as the Druids reached the trestle bridge. Boudica and Prasutagus were waiting, mounted, by the edge of the trees. The girl sat mute and silent in front of Boudica. Prasutagus, with one hand firmly holding the centurion's body, held out the reins of the last horse and Cato thrust the boy up on its back before he swung into the saddle, himself.

'Go!' he ordered the others, and they set off along the track away from the hill fort. Cato took one last look at the wagon, consumed with guilt and despair, and then dug his heels in.

As the horse jolted into a trot, Aelius wriggled free and slipped from Cato's grasp. He rolled away from the horse, stood up and ran back to the wagon as fast as his little legs could carry him.

'Mummy!'

'Aelius! No! Go back! For pity's sake!'

'Aelius!' Cato shouted. 'Come here!'

But it was no use. The boy reached the wagon, scrambled up and hurled himself into the arms of his sobbing mother. For an instant Cato turned his horse towards the wagon, but he could see movement down the track beyond it.

He cursed, then jerked the reins and galloped his horse after Boudica and Prasutagus.