Writer Obscura

TAGS: Present Tense, Celtic Britain, Druids, Sexual Violence, Serial Fiction, Re-Post

VI – The Retreat

The first raindrops hurt—a warning.

His wooden owl mask sits on the rock, as lifeless as his father, and all that remains of his warpaint is a blue cloud in the brook. Clean of the fight, he sits upon the pebbled rivulet and gives himself a tug so the current flushes his foreskin.

The white horse with a dark sliver-moon patch on her forehead approaches for a drink, and after taking her fill, she retreats to the trees. He rises from the stream and picks away stones embedded in his buttocks. He reaches under the nervous mare’s barrel and unbuckles the saddle.

“You are no longer a Roman citizen.” Aedan pats her coup. “You will go about naked as Epona intended.”

The mare lifts her muzzle and lets out a snort.

“My father raised horses.” He wraps his spindly arms around her neck and touches his forehead to her withers. “You’ll like our pastures. Plenty of studs and just enough clover that you won’t get patchy.”

The mare brings her head about, nudging his back and pulling him closer.

Aedan returns to the water and steps into his britches. He ties the waist rope tight before collecting his mask and hugging it to his chest.

“I miss my father,” he says to her, then grins. “He sounded like a God when his cock spat.”

The mare whinnies.

“Oy, my mum took care of him like that,” he clarifies. “The darkest place in Annwn’s bowels is reserved for any father that uses his child like that.”

Aedan climbs the jagged riverbank and moves toward the trees. Hearing no hoofs follow, he turns to find the mare lying beside the saddle.

“Did he mean that much to you?” he calls.

The mare’s skinny legs kick as she flips.

“Was he beautiful, your master?” he asks as she nuzzles one of the saddle’s four-prong grips. “Is he that fierce fucker that came out of the reeds?”

She playfully groans and rolls again.

“I couldn’t see his face behind that metal mask. I couldn’t even see his eyes, the slits were too small.” Aedan folds his arms. “I like men whose eyes grow dangerous when they see me.”

Suddenly, the mare stands and emits a squeal.

From the trees comes a diverse collection of brawny warriors, their painted bulges streaked with blood that streaks in the rain.

“Druid,” says the largest, his breasts flopping with each step. “You knew we’d fail. What say you now?”

“I’m not arch here.” Aedan searches each face until he finds the man he knows. “Speak to Taran. This is his story, not mine.”

Kelr filters out as if chosen and points his head at the sack near the saddle.

“We lost some good boys getting those drawings,”

Aedan collects the saddle from the grass.

“Boys get lost on the battlefield,” he says, draping it over the mare.

Without another word, he retrieves the sack of maps and papers, and the mare follows close behind him, cutting a path through the gathered warriors.

Kelr strips off his blood-stained britches and stomps into the water. Others join him, whispering when Aedan sits upon the highest rock to watch them through the downpour. The sullen druid wants one of them; only Kelr knows it’s him.

Clean enough to reveal his freckled arms, the boyish Kelr with the muscular chest bids the men goodnight. His bright yet tired eyes find him while leaving the riverbank, yet he guards his interest from the others.

Aedan departs after him, he has no reason to hide his desires.

Most of the freshly washed gang trail after Aedan on the rainy trek back to the fort. Inside the compound, they move people from his path and then oust an older warrior from his covered stable when Aedan lingers long, debating where to leave the mare.

He leads them to the largest roundhouse, where the druid Taran holds court with his mother and the clutch of sycophants that never joined the attack.

Aedan’s newfound gang of toughs crowds the space until there’s no room for the ass-kissers to sit. He dumps the sack’s contents onto Taran’s new sandbox, and his mother is the first to unravel a scroll.

“This is the Tamesas,” she says of a well-drawn map.

“There’s more.” Aedan unrolls another and shoves it at Taran. “This lists every man’s name, rank, camp duties, and pay.”

“What fuck does that give us?” asks Ciniod.

Aedan ignores her as Taran examines it.

“What time they eat, where they eat, how they eat,” says Taran, who thrusts a scroll in her face. “This is a camp layout drawn for the non-fighters among them.”

Ciniod wonders, “How did you know where these would be?”

“Someone drew the Greek word for administrator on the side of a wagon,” Aedan reveals. “No doubt one of the Treberoi.”

Ciniod rolls her eyes. “I guess your father teaching you that gibberish finally serves a purpose,”

“The Greek language binds us to the continent,” Taran scolds.

“Of course, dear,” she soothes.

“That being said,” Taran confronts Aedan with a gentle tone. “We lost eight young ones taking that cart, not to mention risking yourself.”

Aedan says nothing—painted to fight, and that’s what he did.

“You will fight no more,” Taran asserts. “I’ve lost Fintan, I won’t lose you.”

“You’re going to need me,” he says. “The wolves will come before morning,”

“You’ll need us all if that’s true,” the largest of the gang speaks, the hair above his lip braided and his chin clean-shaven. “I doubt nothing The Owl King says since everything he says comes to pass.”

“The Owl King?” Ciniod scoffs.

Taran sighs, “Logical determination is not divination,”

“I have no idea what you just said,” the man retorts.

His words matter little, thinks Aedan. He’ll be dead by morning.

“The reality stands in waterlogged soil.” Taran presents a paternal smile. “The wolves won’t find our tracks in this rain.”

Aedan gathers the scrolls, but Taran grabs one, tearing it. Two warriors stand before Aedan. Another shoves the scrolls back into the sack. Rain taps the roof as every man with a sword watches the other.

“What’s this division now?” Ciniod declares. “The wolves want us all.”

Aedan retreats with his hands up.

Let them keep the scrolls, he thinks, the Romans will need them.

Outside, hard rain washes away furious tears. He enters another roundhouse where his meager quarters await. He pulls his father’s owl mask from his waistband and hangs it on a perch meant for a real owl.

On his wool-covered hay sleeps Kelr, his muscular back exposed and a tartan blanket clinging to his hip. He watches the slumbering man briefly before bringing his foot down hard on a shoulder.

Kelr jumps to his feet, howling.

Aedan falls to his knees, eager for that first fist.

“Damn, you!” Kelr cradles his shoulder. “I’m in no mood for this,”

“Your mood remains black,” he admonishes. “You knew we would fail.”

“You said that, yes,” Kelr grimaces. “But seeing you fight so hard, we all thought your prophecy might change,”

“Prophecy?” Aedan cranes his neck. “I’m no seer.”

“You knew we would fail,” Kelr cries.

“Anyone with a knack for strategy knows Taran has none.” He unties his britches and pulls out his cock. “If you’re angry at the loss, take it out on me.”

Kelr grabs him by the neck and uses his other hand to catch Aedan’s wrists, pinning him to the floor.

Despite the pleasurable fingers digging into his throat, Aedan cannot resist kicking out with a limber leg and catching Kelr’s jaw with his foot.

“Ow!” The man-child retreats. “I can’t do this.”

Aedan’s cock grows soft before pressing a foot to Kelr’s shapely chest.

“You say you want me,” he taunts. “Force me,”

Kelr grits his teeth before throwing himself onto Aedan again, and for a pleasurable moment, their wrestling fills Aedan’s flesh with blood—at least until the young man traps his arms and legs, and he cannot strike.

Aedan twists like an eel until Kelr gets him onto his belly and forces his legs apart with determined knees. He bucks his ass and eagerly anticipates the pain of a dry stab—sadly, a gob of spit and a thumb arrive instead.

After several seconds of Kelr’s gentle hand kneading his buttock, Aedan thrashes like a fish out of water.

“Oy,” Kelr cautions. “Let me admire your back end for a bit,”

Aedan fights free and confronts Kelr’s crotch.

“Why is it not up?”

“It’s not up because,” Kelr growls through his teeth. “Nothing about this brings me pleasure,”

Aedan pulls back his knees and exposes his hole. “Not even this?”

Kelr stares in a trance. “Where’s your hairs?”

“I scrape them away with a blade,” Aedan says.

“You run a blade over your balls?” asks Kelr, staring.

“Keeps it all clean,” he says, then flashes his tongue. “Taste it.”

Kelr crawls to him, his cock bouncing to life.

Without warning, Aedan drives his foot heel into Kelr’s nose. The young man cries out, and Aedan rolls from his position, laughing with fists ready.

Kelr turns from him, holding his bloodied nose.

“Why can’t you rut like a normal man?”

Kelr’s nasally sobs kill the mood.

Aedan snatches his pants up and exits without a word.

Outside, the rain provides a pleasant sting, but Kelr’s insult ring over and over, angering him. He loves things, more things than anyone can know—but he loves himself most, so it’s down to him if he wants anything done; he’ll finish himself on a wall.

It won’t be his first time pleasuring a tree, and the fort’s planks are just headless trees without roots. That truth returns him to the time he yanked off on the face of an old man that lost his forearms or hands to rot. Most pitied the bastard, but not Aedan, and for this, the man died grateful when his time came.

At the south wall, he takes himself out, but before his cock touches the rough bark, the earth beneath his feet falls away. He steps away in time, watching a hole grow under the gate’s hem.

It widens as the downpour melts the mud.

It’s big enough for one man—but soon more. No archer will protect these walls, not when Romans crawl beneath them. Another sinkhole emerges on the walk back, and near it is a clear bootprint.

Aedan sprints to Taran’s roundhouse and enters to find his mother consoling her brother with her tits.

“We need to flee,” he warns, panting.

Ciniod closes her robe. “What are you talking about?”

“Does this boy never sleep?” Taran sighs.

“They’ll slaughter everyone,” he says, frantic.

Taran grouses. “This day’s been bitter enough,”

“Mother,” he grabs her arm. “Heed me, please.”

Ciniod wipes a wet curl from his forehead.

“Let’s go, boy,” she whispers, taking his hand. “Sleep is what you need.”

Outside the roundhouse, however, she confronts him.

“What do you know, boy?”

“They’re here,” he whispers. “We must go,”

Ciniod walks him to where his warrior followers gather—men whose names she suddenly knows, and orders them to prepare for their departure. He stares at her with suspicion until she breaks.

“What? You thought they rallied behind you?” she says. “Cassibelanus left them for me, and now it’s time we take them home.”

Aedan sprints toward his battle prize.

“Where are you off to?” she yells through the rain.

“My horse,” he shouts back.

“You don’t have a horse,” comes her cry.

The white mare waits where he left her, sheltered under a covered stable and still donning that four-pronged Roman saddle.

“Come on, girl,” he soothes her restlessness by stroking her nose. “We’ll not die here,”

The regal mare snorts.

“Nothing will hurt you if I’m around, Looir.” He kisses her moon-shaped patch and then slaps at a saddle prong. “I might have to hurt myself on one of these later.”

He leads her out and spots more eroded mud under a portion of the fence.

---

Across the field through the rain, their caravan moves into the wood, five on horseback, six on cart. One of the men on the cart is Taran, bound and gagged because Ciniod refuses to leave him.

Aedan casts a judgmental eye until his mother explains that she’s not the sort to be alone in this life or the next.

Kelr’s glare finds her soon after, and she asks if he wishes her dead. He complains of their cowardly retreat and leaving innocents to die. She takes it in stride, telling him to hate her all he likes; at least he’ll live enough to keep doing it.

Looir gives a nervous whinny before Aedan hears the first scream. He tugs her reigns, and she slows to let the others pass. Gusty wind divides the rain, bringing shrieking horses, muted shouts, and clanging metal.

Hours from where they started, a burning hilltop glows on the horizon.