The Back of Our Heads by Stephen Barr (my reading book .txt) đź“•
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- Author: Stephen Barr
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"That has nothing to do with it."
"My friend's father, who lives near the river, always eats the fat of the game they kill, and he is fat. So you see!"
"That has nothing to do with it," she said, and went into the cave.
The young man walked up and down angrily. "Why does she talk that way? Is she one of our sisters? I don't remember her."
"No," said the other. "She was with the people we fought with three seasons ago. She is my new mate and she is very good at magic, only I advise you not to pay any attention to what she says."
The other picked up the scraping-stone she had left and looked at it with grudging envy. "The very tall man who killed the aurochs by himself has a son," he said, "and the son is short."
The other shrugged. "Don't pay any attention to her."
The woman came out again and looked at the sky, then went to the fire and stirred the pot with a stick. "I wish you would try to get the young animals," she said. "You always bring home the biggest ones and they are hard to chew unless I cook the meat all day."
"My father said that if you wish to be brave, powerful and swift, you must eat only the animals that are brave, powerful and swift," said the young man obstinately.
"Didn't he eat roots, too?"
"Yes."
"Well, then."
The young man threw the scraping-stone hard against the side of the cave opening and split it in two. "Roots are not animals!"
The young woman picked up the pieces and said, "I think I can make a small scraper out of the big piece and a throwing tip out of the little one, but this is a foolish way to get little stones. There are more little ones than big ones."
"Show him your bent stick with the animal sinew," said her mate. "She has a way of throwing very small spears with a bent stick," he said to his brother. He had a dim feeling that there should be peace between the other two, since they were near his cave, but he was scarcely aware of the feeling.
The young woman looked pleased and went into the cave and brought back a stick of springy wood with a thong attached to one end, and a few dried reeds.
"See," she said, and took a dried reed which had a small sharp stone stuck in the end of it. Then she bent the stick and strung the sinew from end to end. The younger man had his first view of a bow and arrow. "This was the way my mother showed me to throw little spears."
She fitted the arrow into the bow and, pulling it back, shot it at a pine tree on the other side of the fire. The bowstring twanged and the arrow wobbled, having no fletching, but it stuck into the tree trunk. The young man jumped back in alarm and blinked his eyes. Then he went to the tree and pulled at the arrow. It came loose, leaving the tip stuck in the bark.
"What good is it?" he said derisively, to conceal his astonishment. "It is a child's plaything!" He tried to pry out the arrowhead with his thumb, and broke his nail.
"If any child of mine played with this," said the young woman, "I should beat him." She put a larger arrow into the bow—one that had a heavier tip—and shot it into the same tree. Owing to its superior balance, this arrow did not wobble; it swished through the air and sank its tip deep into the soft wood.
"You have no child," said her mate, "so how can you beat it?"
The young woman said nothing, but she looked angry.
"My other women have children," he went on tauntingly. "They laugh at you."
"You have no child younger than ten seasons!" she said, and stamped her foot. "That is why I have no child! You are an old man!"
He started toward her with a look of furious intention. He had no spear in his hand, but he held a club with flint splinters stuck in the heavy head. She ran back to the cave mouth and put another arrow in her bow and aimed it at him. They both stood silently staring at one another. Then he threw down his club and turned away.
"Peace," he said.
"Peace," she replied, and dropped her bow. She went to the pot over the fire and sniffed it, poking at the meat with a sharp stick. "The food is ready," she said. "Will you take the pot off the fire? You have braver hands than I."
Q. How are we to find out anything about them, when you are so slow?
A. What are we supposed to find out?
Q. That is what you are supposed to find out.
A. I am to find out what I am to find out? You sound like them—like men.
Q. Like Man?
A. No, men. The women aren't quite the same. That's why I always choose to be one, but I wish you would send somebody else—another part of our Organism. I'm tired.
Q. Absurd. Besides, you are the best; you cannot be tired.
A. The best! How am I the best? You do nothing but criticize. You send me because I understand the intentions—the leanings—of live things. You say I understand understanding. I suppose that makes me some kind of epistemologist: the father confessor of the inscrutable.
Q. Wouldn't it be mother confessor?
A. Not with them; they don't like women to be priests. They can be holy, but they don't like women to tell them what to do. It's called nagging. They get especially angry if the woman is right.
Q. Hmm. Now you say that we criticize you. You surely are not going to claim to be above criticism here, are you?
A. Oh, no. I'm beneath it.
Q. Then why do you resent it?
A. Because it doesn't apply. If a mother is not a fool, she will correct her child, but she won't blame it. You can't go looking for good and evil motives in everything that happens. Does a stone have a motive when it falls to the ground?
Q. If this is the way you always talked, I'm not surprised you angered them.
A. I am sorry.
Q. You turn everything around that's said to you.
A. I will try not to. It's like the bishop—he complained about the same thing, and I was only trying to—
Q. What bishop?
A. I forgot his name. He was the thin one; he was much cleverer than the others. He gave me an impossible choice, so I chose to make another start.
Q. You mean you got yourself burned again?
A. Yes! They did it to all their best people. Both sides did. I would have looked a precious fool if I'd backed down.
Q. Can't you bear to admit you are wrong?
A. But I wasn't wrong. Anyway, they'd have made me out in the wrong either way.
Q. Did they only burn the women, when they thought the women were wrong?
A. No, of course not. And it was usually when they suspected the women were right. Then there were the women who were thought to be possessed by what they thought were evil spirits.
Q. They didn't suspect they were right, surely?
A. No, but they were afraid they might be. They were very unsure of themselves and their beliefs. That's when they burned people.
Q. It sounds very wasteful. They must be very careless of their possessions.
A. No, not in the least. I'll explain—
Q. I wish you wouldn't.
A. There, you see? They were just like you—they kept asking me questions and getting more and more enraged when I answered them. So, to shut me up, they tied me to a stake.
Q. You are too interested in your own reactions to things. Tell us about something more constructive—about what you found in other guises. I understand you led an insurrection?
A. If you call throwing an armed robber out of your house an insurrection. The trouble was that on that occasion a lot of my friends thought I was right. That's called conspiracy....
The captain led a small group of foot-soldiers into the village at what, to the Romans, was the Twelfth Hour, which is sunset. The soldiers had light armor and carried only the small shields—not the enormous testudines—but they had been warned to keep their eyes open as the British were tricky, even treacherous. The captain greatly disliked to take such raw troops so far north, where the treaties were uncertain and the Pax Romana was held lightly, if at all. An ancestor of his, also a captain, had been killed near here in one of Hadrian's marches, and no one was quite sure what had happened.
The earth wall that Hadrian's men subsequently built across the British island was intended to keep out the more unruly natives of the North, and later the emperor Severus built another one of stone, but it was by now in a state of disrepair and only a few of the guard towers were manned. Even the Great North Road made an attenuated and unreliable line of supply, and the captain could expect neither reinforcements nor food from the camps further south, like Eboracum or Lancastrium.
Live off the land, he was told, and that meant quartering his troops—a risky thing because it separated them—or sending foraging parties to the surly farmers for "contributions." Since he was here to collect back-taxes, the inhabitants would not take kindly to feeding the collectors.
The village had a stockade of undressed logs and wide gates at either end. These were surmounted by arched wooden structures that were supposed to serve as watch-towers, but beyond spears and knives for hunting and the necessary farming implements, the villagers were not allowed to carry weapons of any kind. The stockade was not big enough to enclose all the houses, and the majority of these were on the outside and huddled against the walls.
The small body of Roman troops—barely a manipulus—were not surprised to notice that all the windows and booths had been shuttered, and in the exact center of the village, the local chieftain and heads of families were gathered in a respectful and anxious group. It annoyed the captain that it was impossible to make an unexpected arrival anywhere in Britain; news traveled faster than Roman foot-soldiers.
"Hail Caesar!" said the captain, putting his arm up, the palm of his hand facing forward.
"Hail Caesar!" said the villagers.
"We come for the taxes which were not paid last year."
The villagers shook their heads and made regretful sounds.
"Nor the year before, nor the year before that. Which is your headman? I shall require food for my men at once—they are tired after a day's march."
A gray-bearded, very tall man stood forward. "The food will be ready at once, noble decemvir, and I hope you will honor me with your presence for dinner."
"Thank you very much," said the captain, "but I prefer to stay with my men until I see them taken care of. And I am not a decemvir. My rank is captain—Caesar's captain."
The bearded man bowed and said, "Then, after the arrangements have been made, Captain, will you not take a cup of wine?"
"Don't press him, Grandfather," a voice said from above them, and, looking up, the captain saw a girl's face at a second-story window. She had very dark skin, red hair and blue eyes. "If he's been walking all day, I expect he wants to go to bed early. You'll only keep him up all night talking about boar hunts."
"Silence!" the headman shouted. "Get back, girl! You insult our ... our guest!"
"No, let her stay," the captain said with an amused smile. "Better still, have her come down. I think I shall accept your offer about the wine later."
In the evening, the captain came to the headman's house with his two lieutenants as guard. They were received with deference and given wolf-hides to sit on. The wine was brought by the granddaughter and served in horn cups.
"What is your name, young lady?" asked the captain politely. "This is excellent wine, by the way."
"Thank you, Captain," she said. "We have had a cask taken to your men. I made it myself, three years ago. My name is Boadicea."
"Boadicea?" said the captain in astonishment.
"No, no, Captain!" the headman said hurriedly. "She's joking—her name is Flavia; the other is the name she takes for herself. I apologize for her."
"It is not a joke," she said. "Boadicea is my heroine and I have taken her name. I don't like the name Flavia—it's Roman. Do I look like a Roman to you, Captain?"
"You look very beautiful," the captain said, laughing, "and there is no need for apology. I admire Boadicea myself; she very
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