The rain hadn’t stopped for three days. It came in thin veils that clung to the heather and the men’s cloaks. whispering through the birch like ghosts that had never left the Chase.
Taranis knelt by the dying fire, sharpening the edge of his blade with slow, deliberate strokes. Each scrape of the stone was a prayer, though no priest would have known the words.
“Water’s risin’, lord,” said Caedric, glancing toward the ford. “River’s near burstin’. We’ll not cross ‘fore dark.”
Taranis looked up, eyes catching the faint shimmer of dawn through the fog. “Then we hold. The storm waits for no man, but we’ll not feed it needlessly.”
A murmur ran through the men tired, hungry, but loyal. They’d followed him from the salt marshes to the high woods, and not one had broken yet.
Byrin crouched beside him, rubbing at the scar along his jaw. “Word from the south. Roman riders out o’ Pennocrucium. A full cohort, maybe more. Marchin’ for the hill road.”
Taranis’ mouth twitched at the name Pennocrucium,. The Roman word for Penkridge, though no Stormborne had spoken it without spitting since the fort was raised.
“Let ‘em come,” he said quietly. “They’ll find nowt but mud, ghosts, and trees that whisper their names to the wind.”
Caedric chuckled darkly. “Aye, an’ if the trees don’t get ‘em, we will.”
They waited through the day as the rain thickened. Ravens wheeled low over the clearing, black against the iron sky.
By nightfall, fires burned low and bellies growled. But Taranis was restless the unease that came before the breaking of something old.
He walked to the ridge alone, where the land dipped toward the flooded ford. The air stank of wet earth and smoke from distant hearths.
He spoke softly, almost to himself. “Once, this road ran to Rome. Now it runs to ruin.”
A flash of lightning tore the sky open white veins across black clouds. In its light, he saw them: Roman scouts, three of them, creeping along the far bank, cloaks slick with rain.
Taranis smiled grimly. “So, the eagle still claws at the storm.”
By the time the thunder rolled, the first spear had already struck.
The fight was over quick steel on steel, mud and breath, the hiss of rain on blood.
When it was done, two Romans lay dead. The third crawling back toward the ford with half a helm and a broken arm.
Taranis knelt beside him. “Tell your centurion,” he said, voice low, “Pennocrucium belongs to the storm now.”
He rose, letting the rain wash his hands clean.
Behind him, Byrin and Caedric watched, silent.
“Yow reckon they’ll send more, lord?” Byrin asked.
Taranis turned toward the woods. Where torches burned faint between the trees his men gathering, more arriving from the north and the marshes.
“Aye,” he said, voice steady. “Let ‘em all come. Rome’ll find no peace ‘ere. Not while the storm still breathes.”
The thunder rolled again, closer now, echoing through the Chase like an oath renewed. Somewhere in the distance, the old road cracked underfoot stone splitting where the spiral mark had been carved.
The storm had woken.
© 2025 E.L. Hewitt / StormborneLore. All rights reserved.
Author’s Note:
This chapter draws from the old Roman site of Pennocrucium (modern Penkridge), a key post along Watling Street. Local dialect echoes through “yow,” “nowt,” “lord” the living voice of the Black Country and Staffordshire’s borderlands. These stories honour the land itself where history and myth still meet in the rain.
Formorestories on Taranis please see http://The prophecies and tales of Taranis
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