Page 4 of Ensnaring the Dove

This shouldn’t have been his fate—to run with outlaws instead of ruling his people. Yet here he was, crouching in the undergrowth, unable to walk tall with his head high in his own lands.

Gut clenching, Aedan shifted his attention to the row of covered carts rumbling through the valley. A harsh smile tilted his lips then. The second of his companions, Sego, was also right. Judging by the heavy escort, this supply convoy was likely to be a rich one.

It was headed to the Wall: the vast stone fortification that now stretched from one coast to the other.

Just another symbol of Roman vanity, several forts studded the Wall—and this convoy could be going to any of them.

Those heavy carts would be laden with weapons, food, and coin. The Britons throughout this territory would welcome the supplies. Brigantia was vast; it stretched down from the Wall to the great boundary river of Afon Merswy far to the south. Of course, many of their people wouldn’t personally benefit from this haul—but a few would.

“We’d better alert the others,” Aedan said then, speaking for the first time since he’d joined Lucon and Sego on the edge of this valley. “The attack needs to be here … once they reach the end of the vale, they’ll be harder to corner. The trees will provide cover for our bowmen.”

Sego grunted in agreement, even if his dark-blue gaze was cool when it settled on Aedan. “Come on then.”

The three warriors, clad in leather and wool, slithered backward on their bellies and crept through the press of alders to the rest of their band.

The others were waiting for them, their faces tense, their gazes sharp with anticipation.

Their leader, Maccus, stepped forward, large hands clenching at his sides. The outlaw was heavily tattooed and lanky, with a thick brown mustache and long hair tied back at the nape of his neck. “Well?”

Aedan nodded to him. “The convoy is passing through the valley now.”

“It’s bigger than we thought,” Lucon added, his gravelly voice catching with excitement.

Maccus’s hazel eyes glinted. “How many supply carts.”

“Over a dozen,” Aedan replied without hesitation.

“And soldiers?”

“A full century.”

Maccus nodded, although he frowned. A century was eighty men, a band of legionaries led by a centurion. It was nearly double their number.

“Those whoresons are definitely carrying riches with them,” Sego muttered. “They wouldn’t have such a heavy escort otherwise.”

Maccus’s gaze narrowed further, an expression that emphasized his hawkish features. “Aye, but we have the element of surprise.” His attention then snapped back to Aedan. “Anything else I should know?”

Aedan shook his head. There was a challenge in Maccus’s voice—as there always was when he addressed Aedan. The outlaws’ attitude to him had been ambivalent from the very beginning.

After leaving his brother, and walking away from his old life forever, Aedan had been rudderless, lost. For a few days, he’d wandered without purpose, brooding over the fate the Gods had dealt him, and cursing the Caesars for ever setting foot in Britannia.

When he’d set Aedan free, Justinian Aquila had offered him a position in his household, as a paid servant rather than a slave—but he wouldn’t return to Vindolanda and take him up on it.

Aedan was too embittered for that. Too proud.

Nor would he live in any of the townships outside the forts on the Wall. To do so would be like pouring salt on the wound.

Instead, he wanted to leave his old life behind, to strike out afresh. He needed a purpose. And he thought he’d found it when he encountered Maccus and his warriors.

But a year on, he was as restless and resentful as ever. He didn’t belong to these people either. They appreciated his knowledge of the Caesars and their ways, and had used it to their advantage many times, but they saw him as tainted. It didn’t matter that Aedan hadn’t lived amongst the Romans willingly. The other warriors viewed him as if he were a half-breed. A man who didn’t belong in either world.

Satisfied that Aedan wasn’t holding anything back—and he wasn’t—Maccus whirled on his heel. He then gave a high, piercing whistle, causing the rumble of conversation farther back to die. “We move,” he barked, his gaze sweeping their faces. “Leave no Roman alive.”

The carpentum bounced high before crashing down upon its axles. The traveling cart’s wooden sides shuddered and gave an ominous creak.

Wincing, Colombia shifted from her seat and moved close to the small window. Peering out, she spied tall grass framed by a press of trees: the sides of a long valley that seemed to stretch on for eternity. The journey up from Londinium had been a long and tiring one so far, yet today’s road felt as if it were paved with boulders.

Outside the large, covered wooden cart, the light had developed a golden hue. The day was waning; the convoy would halt soon.