Wulf the Eternal Warrior

The band of Alemanni traveled from Germania from first light, twelve men of hardened aspect traveling on foot towards the west. The king of the tribe, Wulf, reasoned that a small band would have better prospects of reaching the far off Roman settlement of Londinium, slipping in and out surreptitiously, than would a force of hundreds.

The length of Belgica in Germania must be traversed; luckily the tribes of Vandals, Goths, and his own Alemanni were in a state of uneasy alliance at present, primarily because of their mutual hatred of the Romans.

The smoke from cook fires drifted up ahead through the trees, and Wulf signaled to his doeskin clad men to drift with him to the right, into the forest. No sense chancing trouble if they could manage to just slip by the village. The men moved in a jagged line, as noiselessly as a pride of panthers. The soft leather beneath their feet made not a sound against the undergrowth of the great black forest, as they wended their way amongst the giant trunks of the endless forest of Germania like wraiths.

That night, the band camped in the woods, with not a fire to warm them, and squatting on their haunches effortlessly they munched on dried meat. Two men were designated to keep watch for the first part of the night, two more at the next part. None spoke, and all was well, with only the hooting of an owl and the movement of wildlife in the woods.

Next morning, the Alemanni were all up before dawn, and once again traveled silently on their errand. Two days travel later, they had arrived at the seashore separating them from Brittania. Anchored just off shore was a fishing boat, of ample size to carry his men!

Leaving his men hidden, the king approached the boat. “Ho, sir!” called Wulf, as he neared the captain of the vessel. The barbarian was wrapped in a bearskin against the late evening chill, and held up his hands to show he was not threatening the man. “I wish to hire passage to Brittania,” he said in a soft, low voice.

“To what purpose?” queried the captain, resting his hands against his ample paunch, and turning quickly in surprise. For indeed, the barbarian had appeared noiselessly out of the woods, and appeared threatening indeed with his wide shoulders and supple frame.

“I wish to trade with the Romans…,” began Wulf, in a barbarously accented Latin, but the captain cut him off.

“You are no trader!” he said, backing away and drawing his sword, which was a small blade, studded with gems. “You are a barbarian!” His Latin was perfect.

“I am,” Wulf said equably, not taking offense. I am Wulf of the Alemanni, and I will give you gold to take us across the waters; aye, and then to bring us back!” He reached into his girdle and produced a handful of small gold coins. “One half now, one half on our return.”

The captain, whose name was Lucius, was a native Briton that had got fat under the Romans, and “gone Roman” as they said. His small eyes glittered with greed as he looked on the coins, and he sheathed his small weapon.

“Welcome aboard,” he said, thinking that this man would never return from his journey, whatever that was- Germanic barbarians were not welcomed among the Romans! But, gold was gold, and he was not a fighter like this man obviously was.

However, he looked displeased as Wulf gestured with his hand, and from the woods emerged eleven strong fighting men, all with large swords on their belts. But, looking up at the sky and asking a blessing from his adopted god Jupiter, he beckoned them onto his boat.

An impossibly large wall stood before the Alemanni! This was the wall of Londinium, put up by the Romans to secure their colony in Brittania- a sheer expanse of rocks set up to protect the settlement from the local Britons, chief among them the Iceni, whom they had recently conquered. The Iceni were a wild tribe of tattooed, blue-dyed barbarians, with flaming red hair and blue eyes, and they still raided the Romans every chance they got.

“You men will stay here, outside these walls.” said Wulf, including them all in the gaze of his intense gray eyes. “I will pass as a Briton; as long as I don’t speak inside- and my tawny hair will help me in my disguise- the rest of you are too fair!” he stated, noting that the majority of his men had yellow hair. All except for you, Crispus, who will pose as my “master” inside the walls!”

Crispus, who had been freed by Wulf after his Roman army had been conquered with the help of the gods, smiled widely. His curling black hair, and Roman accented Latin would serve them well here!

Later that afternoon, Crispus entered the gates of Londinium, speaking commandingly to the guards in his upper level Roman accent. Wulf walked behind him, stooping to appear smaller, with his cloak drawn over his head. He carried a bag, presumably for his master, and leaned heavily on a staff of wood.

The two walked the brick streets, with Wulf thinking only of someday seeing this huge pile of civilization in flames and ruins. Crispus probably felt as if he was home again, but a home he had been glad to escape from to the pristine wilderness of Germania, where he was a free man! All Romans were slaves to their corrupt state; he had not known it until he had seen how the “barbarians” lived.

Stopping in a tavern, Crispus ordered wine, and raised eyebrows when he also ordered a tankard of ale for his servant! He engaged another Roman, a prosperous looking tradesman, in conversation, and once more his excellent Latin came in handy. He found the whereabouts of the arms and weaponry storage of the city, which was also the temple and storehouse of the god Mars. It had been converted from the Celtic Druid temple that stood there under the Iceni.

“But, that place is shunned after dark!” warned the Roman merchant. It is guarded well, so they say, and not just by soldiers.” He shuddered, and fingered the medal of Sol on a chain about his fat neck.

In the dark, Wulf and Crispus approached a huge, ancient temple of rough hewn rocks. Not the perfectly fitted stone of Roman buildings, this was far older, of Druidic construction. A new statue of the Roman god of war, Mars had been placed high up on the building, with a helmet of gleaming bronze, but who knew what had originally adorned that spot?

Wulf, having been raised among the hills and mountains of the Alemanni, planned to climb the walls, and slip in through an upper window. No Roman could have climbed those rough walls, but they were child’s play to the barbarian. Crispus waited outside, and watched the large barbarian climb straight up the sheer wall, and disappear into the small cleft in the rock high above.

Inside, Wulf looked down onto a huge storeroom and temple, a large altar with a ceremonial flame burning redly in the center, with ancient shields and weapons decorating the walls. Priests in Roman togas walked about, some with weapons, and others performing arcane religious ceremonies. Tentatively climbing down in a shadowy corner of the hall, he eventually lurked behind a hanging towards the back.

He was helped in that all of the priests were looking intently at a ceremony taking place upon the altar. A young child of perhaps 5 or 6 years lay there, and that child was beyond saving, having been sacrificed recently by these same priests. They appeared to be divining the future by examining the exposed organs…

Wulf spat in disgust. HIS people were supposed to be the inferior- the barbarians! But never would they harm a child, even of an enemy; and these religious priests of civilization were happy to use the innocents of their own children thus to their own advantage. He swore to Woden to light these halls in flames one day!

Walking as softly as he did in the forest, he moved like a shadow, looking for the doors to the treasury and the armory, which he heard were all together in a great room. It was sure to be locked, but he would find a way…

“What- who are you?” came a voice in perfect Latin. A shaven headed priest stood before him, holding a flaming taper and some sort of scepter or rod. He was obviously someone of authority, and he did not appear in the least bit frightened. “How did you gain entrance to the temple of Mars, unbeliever?”

With a rasp of metal, Wulf drew his sword, and moved rapidly towards the priest. I climbed the wall- call out once, and I drench these walls with your blood!” he grated. “I want access to the storeroom!”

A smile crossed the priest’s thin face, and it was untroubled with fear. “No man could climb those walls, and so I know you for a liar,” he said silkily. “Follow me, barbarian. This is a temple of truth, and liars will only meet their doom here.”

Walking down a long hall, the barbarian, his eyes slits of burning intensity, candle light gleaming on his naked sword, followed the white robed priest. The priest produced a large ring of keys, and taking one, he opened a large stone door, swinging it wide. Inside was a huge room, with stacks of swords and shields, bows and other armaments, all in heaps and piles. Enough to equip ten armies, or twenty! And, beyond them, chests of gold and silver, open and overflowing.

Wulf went to enter, and something warned him- the priest pulled a hidden lever- Wulf leaped forwards, into the room.

A spiked grate, with spear points on the bottom, crashed across the doorway, and smashed into the stone floor- another step and he would have been skewered and crushed like a worm! He turned vengefully on the priest, who had just pulled a long cord next to the doorway, and he heard a commotion heading towards them. And here he was, trapped in the storeroom as in a jail, with the grate locking him in!

“Here come my soldiers, barbarian, to slay you at their leisure. How come you here; you are no Iceni, with blue-dyed skin and tattoos. I see you as one of the Germanium barbarians, although what you do here is beyond me- no matter, you will tell me all as we slowly sacrifice you to Mars, and divine the auguries of the gods from the inside out…,” and he laughed mirthlessly.

And the sound of armed men arriving were definitely coming, as metal rasped and clanged, and the sound of many feet came pounding down the corridor. Wulf prepared to sell his life dearly- as soon as the grate was raised, he planned to rush the soldiers through the opened door, bringing the fight to them- it was not in his nature to fight defensively!

But, through the grate, Wulf saw not the Roman legions he had expected, and that the priest had obviously signaled with his pulling of the long cord by the door…

“What??” cried the priest, drawing a small poniard from his girdle.

Down the hall came a tall woman with flaming red hair, bright blue eyes, and blue dyed skin to match! She was armored, and carrying a long straight sword, and behind her came a score of blue dyed, tattooed Iceni tribesmen, all brandishing arms, and spattered with Roman blood.

She paused at the door, fixing the priest in her blazing eyes.

“Open this grate, false priest of the Romish gods!” she said. “Or die now, I care not which! I have slain your dog-soldiers, and would gladly add you to the list.”

The Roman priest of Mars, shaking with unslaked vengeance against all things barbarian this night, reluctantly pulled his hidden lever yet again, and the grate slowly rose. Grabbing the priest roughly, and holding her sword to his throat, the warrior woman slowly walked through the door in lockstep with him, and then, once safely through, threw him to the ground with great force and beckoned to her men behind her.

She saw Wulf, with sword raised. “And who is this?” she queried, in total perplexity. Romans she had expected to find in plenty, a northland barbarian, here, in Britannia? It made no sense.

“I am Wulf, a barbarian king of the Alemanni. I see you are a Briton, of the Iceni tribe, and a barbarian like me,” he said, pointing to the blue figures tattooed upon her skin. “I am here only to bring death to Romans!”

The fierce woman smiled, an expression that was obviously very foreign to her. It made her almost beautiful. She was nearly as tall as Wulf, and where his swept back hair was tawny and roughly shoulder length, hers flowed about her shoulders in a tangle of shining scarlet, and intricate tattoos covered her sinewy limbs. Blood clotted on her sword, and there was a circlet of gold confining her scarlet tresses, with no other ornament.

“I am Boudica,” she stated, “Warrior Queen of the Iceni!”

“I am here for arms and treasure for my people, the Alemanni, to continue the fight against the Roman dogs!” said Wulf. Reaching down to where the Roman priest cowered on the floor, he yanked him up effortlessly. “And this cur will help me to get it!”

“Then we are of like mind,” said the warrior queen. “Shall we have an alliance, for now- us against the Roman swine?” With a nod from Wulf, it was done.

“Priest- is this all of your riches, in this storeroom? Or is there richer booty hidden away?” He put the point of his sword to the Romish priest’s throat, and raised his eyebrows questioningly.

“No, no, my lord- there is more, much more… follow me!” And he moved forward, leading the way past the overflowing chests of gold and silver coins, to a passage that to the back of the cavern.

As the barbarian king Wulf, the Iceni queen Boudica and her men followed, they entered into a passage that led subtly downwards. Strangely, a dank wind blew outward from the descending path, which made no sense.

But, after a bit, they came to a large bronze statue of the god Mars, the Roman god of war, in full armor. He gleamed in the dim moonlight shining through the slim windows cut in the stone, his stone sword upraised, his bronze helm lowered. About his feet were stacked offerings- bars of gold and silver, and jewels of bright ruby and green emeralds, some fashioned into crowns and bracelets- left here as offerings for the favor of him, the god.

Queen Boudica dropped to her knees, and began to gather the valuables together, ordering her men to do so as well! She spread her cloak, and put the gleaming amulets and gems into it, and her manservants did so as well. They gathered glowing armfuls of precious rainbow lights and sparkling treasure, as Wulf and the priest stood looking on. Wulf was wary- this was going too easily!

Sensing sudden movement, the barbarian drew his sword- the bronze statue of the god had moved!

The Roman priest they had ushered into the chamber was grinning, and holding a curious amulet hanging from a long chain about his neck aloft- it shone with a bright radiance, that he shone towards the bronze statue of Mars, which glowed in return, brightly.

Mars the god drew his sword, and struck downwards at Wulf!

Parrying, Wulf backed away, eyes wide. A bronze statue, a representation of a god- attacking? He knew gods, his own Woden and even the Roman god Jupiter he had met, but this was not the real god- this was a statue, a mere representation of a god that he was sure existed, but not here. This was a priestly enchantment; an animation of metal through sorcery.

The Iceni warriors and their queen also drew their swords, and drew back warily as the statue advanced. It struck, and one of the Iceni dropped- cut through the vitals, streaming blood. Boudica also struck back at the statue, and the corridor rang with the strident “clang” of metal on metal- the metallic creature was unscathed, and came out lashing his sword yet again, this time at Wulf!

Again, the Allemani parried, returning the thrust- but aside from the clang of his blade hitting the unyielding metal, there was nothing. The bronze statue actually smiled, his face of metal curled upwards into a travesty of actual human emotion- and then it stabbed venomously at Wulf, who slipped out of the way at the last moment, leaving the blade to go into the heart of another Iceni warrior behind him.

The priest was behind the living statue of the bronze god now, and the golden Mars warrior was in full-fledged, invincible action. Slashing, stabbing- attacking the Iceni and Wulf, there was no way to attack the priest, or even to defend themselves- the statue was metal, impervious to wounds, and absolutely brimming with vitality. Boudica, spinning as she parried the blows, and Wulf, trying to wear down the statue with hard blows given relentlessly, were having no effect.

Two more of the Iceni tribesmen were down, their blood flowing across the floor, when Wulf, in desperation, was planning to throw himself directly across the path of the statue god, and reach the priest behind him with his sword! It would mean his end, but perhaps he could kill the priest before the bronze god could end his life; it was a desperate gamble, but all he could think of…