Chapter Five.
It’s Monday morning and the entire hill is awash with human bodies. The Romans have arrived and formed a wall of steel with their shields. The Queen gives the signal and the Celts move out from the forest; another signal and the Picts step out from their cover. The Romans realize they’re surrounded and outgunned. Queen Boudica rides on a white stallion from one end of the army line to the other and then back to the centre and shouts, "Adami, Quartari Legarri.”
To the left of the hill are the priests and priestesses congregated in a semicircle, and they take up the chanting. It begins softly and then rises to a crescendo, calling down fire and brimstone upon the Romans. The ground begins to quake, and it seems all hell is about to be unleashed.
Queen Boudica raises her sword. The army lines open up to reveal ten-foot-wide boulders that start careering down the hill. This is followed by showers of flamed arrows from the archers. It seems armageddon has arrived. Queen Boudica raises her sword and the whole Druid army begins to move. It starts as a march, then becomes a trot and then a full all-out stampede with the Celts and Picts joining to meet them. Up goes the clarion call, “Death to the oppressors.”
It seems as if all the ancestral chieftains had risen from the dead to join in the fray.
What seems an impenetrable wall of steel starts to crumble. What starts as a walk in the park turns into a race into hell for the Romans, as they start running for their ships. The Picts' hatred for the Romans is without equal, and they follow them into the sea to get their hands on them. Even the ships are no protection for the Romans. The Druid archers start firing a wall of flame-infested arrows into the ships. The ocean becomes a sea of red blood as the cries of Roman annihilation permeate the air. The Romans who don’t make it onto the ships are slaughtered.
Here is a story the Druids would pass down for centuries to their children; poets would write verse; songsters, songs of heroism. This day would go down in ignominy for the Romans.
When not a Roman stands aloof in the water, Queen Boudica raises her sword and the bugles of retreat sound. A cry goes up that must have been heard in heaven. “We’ve beat the buggers.”
