PROLOGUE

The village is still considered remote. Even now, two thousand years after its creation, you would still have to be lost to find it. But for those who do stray from the beaten path and literally stumble onto the crossroads that marks the centre of this tiny dwelling, there is little that might convince them of any peculiarities. A traditional, well-stocked corner shop holds no surprises, nor the orange bricked public house standing opposite. The usual host of amenities and vendors are on offer here for your convenience, much the same as all other villages in the centre of England, the one difference being that after leaving the populated roads of this hamlet, and reappearing on the anonymous face of the country lanes, the average traveler will have no clue as to where they have been. Because it doesn’t exist.

61 AD

She woke with the morning sun. An ethereal mist rolled over the fields like ghosts of the fallen, drifting away to a final resting place. Was she traveling with them? She should be. Traveling with her mother and her sister. She wanted to be with them now. The fight was over. For better or for worse, the fight was over. Her eyes adjusted to the bright light of dawn, focusing on movement amongst the long shadows that dragged themselves across the landscape. Bodies lay strewn across the green carpet of pasture, javelins jutting awkwardly from them like vicious splinters. Some had been torn asunder by the ravages of battle, faces still forged by the grimace of war. Of determination. Of desperation. The gods had been with them. Her mother had told her that. Where were those gods now? Where were they?
Her senses began to return like a dream unfolding. The smell of wet grass and burnt wood filtered through her nostrils. And death. The smell of death was everywhere. She managed to pull herself up from the dirt onto the remains of a broken chariot. Only now the scale of defeat truly showed itself. The number of fallen seemed to reach hundreds and then thousands, and then tens of thousands as her crystal eyes tried to absorb the magnitude of such carnage. The bodies lay like a morbid carpet stretching as far as the eye could see in every direction. A few walking wounded were searching amongst the bodies for survivors or for any belongings that might be worthy of salvage but they stumbled around in a daze without coordination or conviction. Was this death? Had she gone to a dark place for her sins? She tried to decipher what it was that the Gods were telling her. Why had they bought her back to this ravaged land? Why was she not in  paradise with her family?
Her family.
Her eyes fell to the ground and there was her own face. Pale and peaceful. Her fiery hair ignited by the early morning sun, dirt smeared across ghostly cheeks. She sucked back a sob then threw a hand across her open mouth as she realized that the face she stared into was that of her sister. And beside her, the war torn frame of her beautiful mother. She fell to her knees and cried for some time not realizing that all around her, a crowd was gathering.
‘Aoife.’
She froze upon hearing her name. It was as if she hadn’t heard it spoken for centuries. Like it belonged to someone else. Looking up from where a pool of tears had stained her mothers cloak with their salty wetness, she peered through bleary eyes at the collection of faces that surrounded her. They could see her? Were they all dead too?
‘It’s a miracle.’ someone whispered. ‘The Gods have given us light.’
A hand reached out to touch her but she instinctively backed away. What did these people want? Aoife wiped her bloodshot eyes with the back of her hand and looked more closely to the crowd. There were maybe a dozen figures, but she didn’t recognize any of them. She was sure from their dress that they weren’t Romans. They weren’t the enemy.
A man in long dark robes stepped forward, his skin was bright white, his eyes pink like a rat. Black hair fell over his face and down to his broad shoulders. Aoife was startled by his appearance but his voice when he spoke was calming.
‘We were sure you were dead my dear. So sure.’
‘But I am dead.’ she said. ‘I have to be.’
The pale man smiled. ‘No Aoife, I can see that you are very much alive.’ He held out his hand and reluctantly, she took it.

Aoife’s torn and stained silk dress did nothing to ward off the early morning chill so some of the survivors had bought her animal pelts from fallen soldiers along with water and fresh meat from a recent hunt. She sat in the warm wind of the fading fire and ate and drank and cried some more before the pale man returned to talk to her once again.
‘How do you feel?’ he asked.
‘Like I should be dead. Like I should be with my family.’
‘I understand. This must be very hard to accept for someone of so few years but…’
Aoife interrupted. Her face was red an swollen with grief and her words spat out like sparks from a fire. ‘With all due respect, sir, I’m not entirely sure you do understand. We were all supposed to die. Now we face a lifetime of slavery at the hands of our enemy. That isn’t life. That isn’t what it is to be alive. It’s worse than death.’
There was anger filling her brow and she got up and stumbled back toward where her mother lay, stepping over the bodies of her brethren as she went, each lifeless face she encountered stoking the fire of her frustration.
‘You see!’ she yelled behind her at the pale man, ‘These are the lucky ones. They died free men, they died fighting for what they believed was right! We will only die like animals!’
She finally reached the body of her mother and reached inside her cloak for the small clay bottle she had known would be there. She removed the stopper in anger and the musty smell of hemlock filled her nostrils. Aoife took one last look at her mother’s face, and then her sister’s. ‘I’ll be with you soon.’ she whispered and bought the poison to her lips.

‘No.’ The pale man’s robe’s rippled in the wind, his hair blown back revealing the sharp features of his face. He spoke the word softly but it carried such weight that Aoife hesitated for just a second. She briefly wondered how he’d managed to cover so much ground so quickly before realizing that the pale man was floating. He was flying. Aoife blinked. Then a white hand slapped her face harshly, knocking the hemlock to the floor where it emptied out onto the battle field. Aiofe put her hand to her cheek and took it away to reveal a streak of crimson where the pale man’s long fingernails had drawn blood. She thought she might cry. But the tears wouldn’t come and her fear gave way to rage. Her teeth clenched, her jaw tightened. She had stood by her mother’s side. Watched mighty cities razed to the ground by her mother’s hand. She had seen the blood burn in her mother’s veins, and that same blood, now streaked across her face, also burned in Aoife. She ran at the pale man, screaming like an animal but her flailing fists never connected with his body. Instead, she found herself turned around and quickly soaring into the sky. Unable to move in his vice like hands she watched the ground fall away and soon, she was breathless amongst the clouds. He turned her to face him and spoke through clenched teeth.
‘You are not a slave, Aoife. And you never will be, that much is clear. The Romans left. They left you for dead and took those they wanted for slaves. The rest of us, those people down there, we are outcasts. We are unwanted because we look different or behave strangely. But we are still your people. You have a responsibility to lead us, a responsibility that extends far beyond your own personal grief or your own selfish acts.’
Aoife struggled against his grip but he didn’t budge. She couldn’t escape. ‘I don’t have to do anything. I don’t owe you a thing. Nothing.’
His eyes seemed to burn red in their sockets. ‘Your mother taught us to fight for our freedom. When she died she didn’t fail us. Not all of us. We are free you see. We are those chosen few who won the war. But we need you to lead us.’
Aoife remembered her mother’s war cry. The shrill scream of raw, murderous hate that filled Roman hearts with terror, those unable to accept women as leaders were equally unable to accept them as warriors. Trained fearsome men would tremble with wide eyes before she ran them through with animal aggression.
She did have a responsibility. Whether she liked it or not.
Aoife’s voice softened as she realized the weight of her duty. It was her penance for surviving where others had fallen. ‘I’m just a child.’ she pleaded. ‘How can I be the leader of men?’
The pale man’s face smiled back at her. ‘You stand at the edge of your childhood, waiting to fall into the vacuous horrors of adulthood. Now is your time to fall, Aoife. Now is the time.’
And with that, he let go.
Aoife grabbed his open hand and held on to keep her from falling. ‘No,’ she wailed, ‘I want to live. I want to try to help you, please don’t let me fall. I need to do it for my mother, for her memory. Please. I need to do it for the people.’
She was losing her grip, desperately clinging to his fingers. The pale man leaned down to look her in the eye, and he said with a smile. ‘No Aoife, you are wrong.You need to do it for yourself.’
She fell away from his face, tumbling through the clouds to see the earth rushing up to meet her.

Aoife awoke with the morning sun. As she grew more aware of her surroundings she realized she was back in the field, still surrounded by the dead. She got to her feet and looked down to find the bodies of her mother and sister beneath her once again. She put her hand to her cheek but no cut could be found. She’d been given a second chance. Perhaps the Gods hadn’t forsaken her after all. A line of determination drew itself across her face as once again she reached down to her mothers body. This time, instead of reaching for the poison, she removed the dark red cloak her mother had worn in war and pulled it around her own shoulders. Stroking aside a shock of red hair illuminated by the dawn she unfastened her mother’s ornate gold necklace and fastened it round her own neck, pulling back her curled auburn locks before allowing them to rest full and bright against her shoulders. Finally, with both hands, she heaved the battlesword free of the earth where it jutted. It had been her father’s and then her mother’s. Now it was hers. She filled the cloak with her slight frame as best she could and bellowed with as much authority as she could muster, ‘Listen!’
Those who were aimlessly wandering amongst the dead stopped and looked up in surprise. Surprise gave way to excitement and then delight. They also felt that they had been given another chance. A miraculous chance that could only come from the Gods. There was hope once more. And she saw it shining in every eye.
‘This place is ours. Our brothers and sisters may be dead but they are still our people and this area where they have fallen will forever remain ours. Will forever remain theirs. They did not die in vain. They died to secure our freedom and in this place, we will be free. You may feel unwanted. You may feel as if you have been outcast by the Roman army, not even fit for slavery. Well let there be no doubt in your minds that there is a place for you. And you did fight for your freedom. And you did win. This place will bring salvation to all those who are outcast by the invaders. It will be a peaceful place where we can live together without fear of persecution. And there will be no more fighting. We have won the fight. Now we will build our village and to be certain of our future, we will make that village disappear from enemy eyes.’
There were shouts of excitement and enthusiasm. The people now had a purpose. It was all they could have hoped for.
That night the crowd gathered around Aoife in the warmth of the firelight and decisions were made to start piling up the dead while a wooden wall was built around the perimeter of the grave. And while these discussions were carried out and roles were administered to those fit enough to work, Aiofe noticed a pale man who was receiving treatment for a stab wound to his shoulder. She dismissed herself and went over for a closer look. His white skin and pink eyes were familiar to her, black hair falling across his face.
‘I’m Aoife.’ she offered, unsure of what to say next.
‘I know you are, my dear,’ he replied in equally familiar warm tones. ‘I am Aisilon.’
‘Have we met before?’ she asked.
‘Perhaps,’ he said with a smile. ‘Perhaps in another life.’