Full Circle
by Diz
Maximus Decimus Meridius was lost and for the life of him couldn’t work out why.
The rain had begun as a soft drizzle after he’d been riding for a couple of hours. As time passed it became heavier until it obscured the way in front of him. Muttering soft curses he dismounted and led Mithras, his battle trained stallion, under an oak tree to gain the protection of the thickly leaved branches. The big horse stood quietly waiting for his rider to decide when they would move on. The General smiled and clapped a hand to the big horse’s arched neck, “you’ll be fine here. I’m just going to check how long this weather is likely to hold,” he explained conversationally. Mithras snorted as if in reply and the Roman chuckled lightly as he moved away.
There was a slope rising away on the right and he climbed it to try and ascertain how quickly the rain was moving.
It was only when he reached the top that he saw the cave and for a second or two glimpsed the dancing light of a flame. It looked to him like a campfire and so he moved towards it his feet treading softly his hands tracing the shape of the rock wall ahead of him. The breeze that had been at his back seemed to have moved round and now caressed his face bringing the scent of wet vegetation and wood smoke. He felt his ankle snag on something and pulled it clear only to hear a muted jangling sound that made him smile. Whoever was at the campfire they were clever enough to set up warning trip wires? He moved forward towards the warm glow of the fire that warmed the darkness.
His first sight of what lay beyond the campfire made him catch his breath.
A young man, he estimated must only be in his late teens, stood and stared at him. His long dark hair was braided at the sides and forehead to lie back from his face and hang past his shoulders, the right side braid was decorated with 4 crow feathers each with their quills dyed red.
He wore a leather sleeveless tunic belted over a blue homespun shirt and trews that matched the shirt. From the knees down the trews were held close to his calves by crossing strips of leather until they reached his ankles. His feet were covered with soft hide boots. In one hand he held a short sword in a grip that showed he knew well how to use it and in the other a bone handled knife with a wicked looking blade.
He was shorter than Maxim by an inch or two and his body, broad shouldered and slim, looked to have the lean wiry strength you would expect of a warrior at the height of his youthful power. However it was his face that had made Maximus’ eyes widen with shock.
The firelight danced along the firm line of a chin inclined to stubbornness, his mouth was generous and seemed even now on the brink of a smile, a strong nose showed the bump of an old break. His cheekbones were high and gave his face a chiselled handsome look that would only become more so with maturity. All of these features could be found in the northern Celts that Maximus had cause to know well but it was the boy’s eyes that caused the stir in the Roman’s heart. Sea green intelligent they were the exact match of his own.
“So she was right,” the younger man said in a language that the older man hadn’t heard in years. “You have come.” The matter of fact tone surprised Maximus as much as the way the lad sheathed his sword and replaced his knife in its holder.
“Who was right?” he asked feeling the words of his mother’s language strange but familiar on his tongue, “no one knew I was coming. I did not know I was coming,” he added ruefully glancing back over his shoulder at the mouth of the cave.
“My mother,” the boy replied, “she said that if I was in need and she was no longer here, that I was to come here, light a fire and you would come.”
“Your mother?” Maxim’s mind was reeling.
“Daimhin,” the lad said with a sad smile. “I am Daithi. If you are Maximus, then I am your son.”
“My son,” Maxim repeated and a bitter sweet smile lifted his lips. “Your mother knew me better than I knew myself it seems.”
“Yes, she had that skill with me to,” Daithi said and Maximus was further shaken by his smile because it was every bit his Mother’s. “Will you join my fire Roman?” the younger man asked.
“I will,” Maxim said formally and matched the way Daithi sat.
Once he was sure his guest was settled Daithi lifted a skin flask, unstoppered it and poured out a little as an offering to the earth before handing it to the broad man beside him.
Maximus took the flask and drank a healthy draft. Years of carousing as a young man and later with officers and wealthy senators came to his rescue as the harsh liquor in the flask burned his throat and threatened to make him cough. He swallowed hard and sucked in a breath, “it’s been a long time since I drank such as that,” he said in a voice that was only slightly rougher than before.
Daithi smiled his disconcerting smile again and took the returned flask. Lifting his lips he drank with the ease of a man well used to the taste. Maxim’s mouth quirked, this son he’d only just met was a man grown, who had killed in battle, and grown used to alcohol, he may even have a wife and child. Suddenly the idea of being a grandparent rose to taunt him making him smile. His smile became a grin as he realised that, even if there was child from his child it would not be a Roman, it would be a Celt, a Barbarian. He thought of Daimhin and what she might say to him, the great Roman General, about it all.
“Will you tell me what you remember of her?” the young warrior asked.
Maximus nodded and began to speak.
“It was the day of my mother’s funeral when I first met her. She cared for me and I returned to my Father’s side.” his voice was low and soft as he felt the tingle of memory and her cool fingers that tracked the line of his scar.
“You met again?” Daithi asked with an edge to his tone, even now the Celt wanted the truth of his parentage to be a fiction made up by seers and storytellers
Maximus smiled, “indeed yes. For the next two years we met sometimes by chance, sometimes by design. She was already a woman in the eyes of her people, my Mother’s people, your people,” he added. “She never missed a chance to remind me that I was still a child, but I grew taller and stronger in that time and soon she had to admit that I could match her skills,” his mouth quirked as he remembered the day and her grudging admission. “Many of the things she taught me served me well as I moved up the ranks,” His face clouded and he stared into the empty fireplace.
“What happened?” Daithi’s soft question pulled him back from the memory.
Maximus
turned to look at him and said,”we did not part well. I had gone to meet her
at the place we had first met, near the wall but far enough away from the
fort. The day I matched her skills we had become lovers and at first it was
as always between us, all the urgent desperate passion of youth, but
then…afterwards I told her my news. My father Titus was returning to
“I take it she did not take the news well,” the young man said.
“Indeed,” again a rueful smile. “She became angry. She said that I would become a killer for the Empire and that one day we would be on opposing sides. She glared at me and said that should that day come she would kill me for the oppressor I would have become.”
“Has that day come?” Daithi was afraid to ask but afraid not to.
“No. I am here alone. To gather information, we’re not sure the North is worth the manpower any more,” Maximus said and began to chuckle.
“Why do you laugh…Father,” the word came haltingly as if the lad had never used it.
“I am happy…son,” Maxim said finding the same oddness on his tongue at the word he had never used, “but now we must talk you and I as men. What is this need you have that your Mother cannot help you with?”
Daithi took another drink, one the older man recognised as bolstering his courage, before he handed the flask back and said, ”they want me to lead the war band. To take over where …” his voice cracked as he remembered the geis laid on speaking the name of the dead,”the previous leader left off. She was a fierce warrior, and a strong leader and I don’t know that I am worthy of the place,” the young Celt admitted. “So I came here, to try and divine what I should do.
Maxim listened and heard all that he didn’t say. For all his adulthood the boy missed his mother’s guidance and now he was being asked to take her place, to become a leader amongst his people. The leader of the war band was, in any clan, seen as second in power to the clan chief.
He took a second, more tentative sip of the liquor and said, ”you obviously have the skills in that are needed,” he indicated the crow feathers with their red dyed quills indicating kills in battle, “and I’m sure that your …previous leader taught you her tricks and skills well.”
“Yes she did,” Daithi said with pride ringing in the words.
“Then surely it would honour her to become what she trained you to be,” Maximus said.
“If I am able yes, but if I fail then the dishonour would be all the greater. I would be the pretender to her name, the noisy child with the mouth that promises much but who achieves little,” the lad said.
“That is what your head tells you and I hear others words in it,” Maximus noted. “What does your heart and your gut tell you?” he asked.
Daithi frowned.
“Close your eyes, quiet your thoughts and listen to the sound of your heart and the feeling in your gut,” Maxim’s voice was low and encouraging and the other man did as he was bid.
For long moments there was no sound but the crackling of the fire and the soft breeze through the branches of the trees that covered them. The Roman studied this young man who was his son and felt the deep stirring of pride in what he saw. It was then that Daithi opened his eyes and met the matching gaze of his Father.
“I am as ready as I will ever be,” he said, “how can I not take up the armband? I was made for this, born of great warriors.” He rose to his feet nimbly, proving the truth of his name, and held out his arm to the seated man.
Maximus clasped the strong arm and rose to stand with Daithi looking into his green eyes now at peace and steady with purpose.
“The warrior who birthed you will be proud, as I am. You are a credit to her and I am glad to have seen you at least once,” he said offering his right arm for the warrior’s clasp of respect.
Daithi took the clasp encircling Maxim’s forearm and saying,”she told me of you, that you were man of principle, a man of honour and that I should be proud.”
“I never knew for certain, I heard of you and of her but I always thought that she had found marriage and that any child of hers…” his voice trailed off realising how little he knew of his son’s life.
“She did, but there were no other children,” Daithi shrugged. “I will have many children,” he vowed and Maxim smiled hearing the voice of the only child that he knew well being one himself.
“Have you a woman in mind for the task?” he asked, and was surprised when the self possessed man in front of him disappeared to be replaced with a blushing boy.
“Aye I have,” Daithi said.
“Tell me of her?” Maxim asked and the pair sat again.
Dawn was breaking when Maxim took his leave of his son, the pair having talked and learned of each others lives seizing the chance they both felt they would never have again.
As the first rays of the sun pierced the canopy of the trees the two men exchanged tokens.
Daithi cut a length of his braid and gave it to Maxim with one his ‘kill‘feathers so that his father might always remember that his son was a skilled warrior.
Maxim gave his son a small carving strung on a piece of leather that he had carried ever since Daimhin had given it to him. It was a Celtic deer and was the animal the boy’s mother had been named for.
They hugged fiercely and Maxim moved away back through the darkness of the cave to emerge back into the rain and grey daylight of a landscape he recognised
The rain eased and he rode home thinking of Daimhin the fierce warrior girl who had first taken care of, then trained, and then loved the boy and young man he had once been. He marvelled at her determination and courage in bringing up her child…his son.
He closed his eyes seeking her face and finding it came easily because now he had the newer memory of Daithi and it was only then that tears came, tears for the death of his first love and for the child he had never known until he was already a man and now not knowing if he would ever see him again.
The End.