Dreaming the Serpent Spear

Présentation de l'éditeur The fourth and final novel in the magnificent saga of Britain’s warrior queen (Boudica – “Bringer of Victory” and the last defender of the Celtic culture) will capture readers’ hearts and minds, as Manda Scott brings the series to a stunning close. It is AD 60 and the flame of rebellion that has been smouldering for 20 years of Roman occupation has flared into a conflagration that will consume the land and all who live in it. There is no going back. Boudica has been flogged and her daughters raped, and her son has burned a Roman watchtower in an act of blatant insurgency. This is the time to act: the Roman governor has marched his legions west to destroy the druidic stronghold of Mona, leaving his capital and a vital seaport hopelessly undefended in the face of twenty-thousand warriors aching for vengeance. But to crush the legions for all time, Boudica must do more than lead her army in the greatest rebellion Britain has ever known. She must find healing for herself, for the land, and for Graine, her 8-year-old daughter, who has taken refuge on Mona. Is revenge worth it under any circumstances, or is the cost more than anyone can bear? Colchester is burning and London is lost without hope. Amidst fire and bloody revolution – a battle that will change the face and spirituality of a nation for centuries to come – Boudica and those around her must find what matters most, now and for ever. From the Trade Paperback edition. Extrait Listen to me. i am luain mac calma, heron-dreamer, Elder of Mona, guardian of those who wait in exile in Hibernia, and protector of the Boudica, who is our hope for the future. You who gather here will inherit that future, whatever it may be. We stand now at a crossroads in our history. Once, we were a proud people; we honoured our heroes for their courage in battle, and our dreamers for the wisdom they brought from the gods. Our tribes were diverse in their customs and histories, we were famed throughout the known world for our work in gold and silver and iron; our horses and hunting hounds are sought from the far northern snows to the heat of Alexandria; our land was so fecund that Julius Caesar believed he had come to a place of the gods when he first sailed across from Gaul with intent to conquer over a hundred years ago. In our diversity was our pride, but we held our gods in common and this was our strength. Each tribe sent the best of its warriors and dreamers annually to train here on the island of Mona, beloved of the gods and all people. This heritage, and the island itself, is at last under threat. It is nearly twenty years since Rome sent her legions to conquer the tribes of the land they call Britannia, to take our gold and silver, our hounds and our horses, to tax our peoples for the right to farm our own soil and to take our youth into slavery. Throughout those two decades, while the eastern part of our land has suffered under occupation, the west has resisted savagely and effectively. The high mountains and the fierce courage of the western tribes have kept safe the land they treasure and, most especially, have protected this gods’ island of Mona. For much of those two decades, I believed that whatever other crimes Rome might commit, Mona and all that it means to us was safe. This is no longer true. The new governor of Britannia, Suetonius Paullinus, is gathering two of his four legions off our coast, tasked first to invade, then to slaughter all those who live within the gods’ domain and to erase for ever the dreaming from the earth. Such is Rome’s fear of what we are and what we may be. Our hope of survival lies now in the woman we know as the Boudica — she who brings victory — in those who care for her and keep her safe, and in the war host that gathers even now in her name. She is Breaca of the Eceni, once Warrior of Mona. Breaca carries within her the strengths and reality of all that we have been. She is a warrior without match and has fough