CHAPTER 6
Annwn - Fall 60 AD
Boudicca awoke to the delicious scent of ripening apples, meadowsweet and heather
filling her nose. She could hear the playful chirping song of small birds as
they flittered around her, and the soft burbling of a nearby creek. Her eyes
fluttered open to gaze at the blue summer sky above her. It was such a beautiful
day. Without hesitation she luxuriously stretched, feeling the feather soft
grass caress her whole and unbroken skin.
Unbroken skin! No wounds, no pain, no weakness of body. Fear shot through Boudicca.
She had died and her children were alone. She shot up to her feet, looking at
the beauty around her. The rolling hills covered in heather and bracken. The
mountains rising steep above the hills, cloaked in thick forests. The grassy
fields cut by shallow creeks and blooming with a multitude of flowers in more
shades than a rainbow. It was a place of peace and comfort. A place to be explored
and savored. But Boudicca was unable to appreciate it for the despair in her
soul. She was in the Summerlands.
Confusion quickly dawned in her, as she realized there were no others here with
her. If this was the Summerlands where were the others? She had seen souls scooped
up by Arawn. She had heard their voices when they spoke across the veil. She
could not be alone if this was the Otherworld. She had visited Annwn before
as part of her training. It looked like the Summerlands. It felt like the Summerlands.
But it couldn't be the Summerlands. If it wasn't the Otherworld where was she?
She felt the presence behind her before she turned, knowing that her answer
had arrived. There towering over her, standing straight and proud, more beautiful
than words, stood Andraste, radiating danger and feline menacing capability.
The goddess was clad in shimmering gold and blinding white, tall bronze spear
in hand, with long snow-white hair flowing loose in the breeze away from her
ageless chiseled features. It could be no other. The powerful magnificence that
was Andraste took Boudicca's breath away.
Queen to queen, priestess to deity, Boudicca offered her a respectful bow and
a priestess's reverence. The need to question rose to Boudicca's lips. The need
to know where she was, and if she was dead bubbled up within her. Only through
a great strength of will did Boudicca repress the words that threatened to erupt
in an unending stream. She would wait for Andraste's pleasure. She would wait
for the goddess to speak first.
A slight smile graced Andraste's face as she felt the battle within Boudicca,
feeling the force of will her self-control cost her. Andraste let the silence
stretch between them. She generously gave Boudicca time to come to terms with
her own confusion, before addressing her.
"No Boudicca you are not dead," Andraste's voice whispered breeze
soft. "Nor is this the Summerlands, though it lays within the borders of
Annwn. Though I know you deciphered that already.
"This is the place of healing. The land where the hounds of Arawn run and
play between their hunts. The land where the riders of the Wild Hunt take their
ease. This is the place for those who undergo the ugly brutality by choice,
for the good of the land and life. For they must have beauty and peace to balance
themselves, least they become corrupted by what they must do. You will need
this balance for what I must show you and what you must do."
Boudicca merely nodded, knowing that if she questioned at this point the questions
would burst free from her in a never-ending flood.
"First you must know what had occurred while you battled the Romans in
your kingdom."
Without warning, pictures flashed through her mind and experiences filled her
senses. She was there, watching, a part of, the nightmarish attack of the Romans
on Ynys Mona. She saw-heard her father's fetch as he shouted curses down on
the invading army. She saw-heard the Roman leader rally his men, as he drove
them against their own good sense to attack the sacred isle. She felt the thick
darkness around her, as it supported and hid the Druids, enveloping, retreating.
She saw the hungry flames that leapt from pyres, bathing all in crimson light,
revealing the horrifying sight of half-armed Celtae warriors as they threw themselves
against the Roman shield wall.
She became the warriors, filled with righteous fury at the invaders, blood thrumming
through their veins as they charged the enemy. She joined them as they hacked
and destroyed all the enemy they could reach. She was filled with the painful
knowledge that they were spilling the blood of war on the isle. But knew there
was no other way. She felt their exuberance when a strike fell true on the enemy.
She felt their acceptance of death, the knowledge that they were outnumbered.
She felt the blood spray their bodies, both the enemies and their own. She felt
the screaming fire that filled them as they were wounded and maimed, fighting
on despite the pain, despite the knowledge that they were losing. She felt their
dying agony as they fell beneath the Roman forces.
She became the Druids, concentrating with all their might to draw forth the
power of the land to battle the Romans. She felt the power almost within their
grasp before Roman cavalry cut them down from behind. The Druids were unarmed,
unseeing of the world around them, caught in the strength of their joined casting.
They fell one by one, brief flashes of light pulled from the spell. A small
abyss of darkness formed as each one died, leaving the others to try and catch
and hold the wavering power. Power that fluttered and slid from their grasp
as each life ended. She felt the void left with each Druids fall. She felt the
wealth of knowledge of the past and the future extinguished as each spirit slipped
free of its mortal body.
She became the trees of the sacred grove, falling beneath the Roman axe. She
heard the screams of the trees and felt the death throws of the ancient ones
whose very lives where tied to the woods, their homes. She felt the power of
a foreign deity rising from the Roman leader, a deity that ruthlessly used him
as a stepping-stone into the land. A corrupt power, who reveled in destruction
and desecration, who drove men to wars of annihilation. A power that elevated
the masculine and degraded the feminine, caring nothing for balance. A power
that sought to bring all within its fold. That sought to drive all other powers
and beliefs from the lands its minions invaded. A power that sought to exterminate
all that stood in its way. She felt the touch of the foreign power reach out
towards her with laughing mockery and tainted grasp, seeking to pull her into
its own folds.
The vision vanished as quickly as it had begun. Boudicca was left screaming
and writhing on the ground at the goddess' feet, overwhelmed by pain of soul,
mind and body. The isle had fallen to the barbarians. The sacred fastness of
the groves had fallen to their axes. The barbarians sought the very fall of
the gods and goddesses themselves. Her mind burned with the horrible knowledge.
Her body cringed from the touch of the foreign god's power, so repellant to
her and all she knew. It took a while for Boudicca to regain control of her
body. She rose slowly and painfully to her feet despite the shudders that still
racked her limbs.
"What must I do?" Boudicca gasped. She gazed up into Andraste's eyes,
revealing her fury and her willingness to die to prevent the fall of her land
to this foreign god and his people.
"You will gather the clans. You will create a Clannada," the goddess
purred. "You will march forth and take all that the Roman have to fight
for so that they will loose heart and return to their homeland across the sea.
You will drive them forth from their homes as our people have been driven forth.
You will destroy their families, their homes, and their cities. You will show
no mercy. No Roman should be spared. You will take the battle to them. But you
will not follow their lead. Take their supplies, destroy what you cannot carry,
tear down their temples and their government houses. Battle the army only if
they stand in your way but pursue them not if they flee. For the cornered dog
fights fiercest.
"For this first assault even the ancient tribes have agreed to assist you.
You will not be alone in this war against the invaders. I will walk with you
in this war. Together we will defeat the Romans."
A vision formed in Boudicca's head, softer and gentler than before, a dream
instead of an experience. She saw Camulodunum reduced to smoldering ruins of
blackened timbers and ash. She saw her forces, thousands strong, riding away
in triumph, toward their next target.
As the vision faded Boudicca felt the pain flow back into her body. The white-hot
fire of the lash marks. The throbbing pain of her fingertips, where she had
ripped off most of her nails on the door of the healer's house. The dry swollen
scrapping of her irreparably damaged throat. She found herself laying face down
on a pallet near the fire, once more in her physical body.
Her moans of pain brought the healer women to her side. Faces blurred by the
weakness and torturous agony that wracked Boudicca's body. Not knowing and not
caring of who she gave the orders to, she demanded that the chieftains and messengers
still in the town be brought to her immediately. She resolutely refused to drink
the sleeping pain potion they tried to press on her. She gasped out that she
would drink it when everything had been set in motion. Boudicca told them that
there was no time to lose, for already Ynys Mona had fallen and the Druids slain.
The women pulled back from her, knowing she could see beyond the veil. They
ceased their futile ministrations and rushed away to do her bidding.
In short order the proper men and women had been gathered. They crowded the
small hut, leaning close to hear her weak, barely heard, words. Still unable
to make out features Boudicca gave her orders blindly, knowing that they would
be able to sort out who should do each duty.
She ordered bands of men sent south to aid the Trinivantes in completing their
current battles to free their enslaved comrades. She ordered runners sent to
all the clans, not in the Roman's sway, to call them together here to Venta
Icenorum with all haste. The messages were sent both in the name of the Queen
of the Iceni and in the name of the Lady of the Land. She ordered all the forges
in the Iceni lands to be fired up and as many weapons as possible be made. She
ordered horses to be rounded up and chariots to be put into good working order.
She ordered carts gathered to be repaired as the chariots, for they would leave
no one behind to face the retribution of the treacherous Roman forces. She ordered
food supplies gathered and inventoried for the march.
She told them they were going to war.