7 I The Fury Faelan had not been born a slave. He was the son and heir of Conall, a nobleman in the Iceni tribe. Faelan had remained free until the year 61, when his cousin Queen Boudicca, leader of the Iceni, had led them and other Britons in a revolt against the Romans. The tribe had heard that the Romans had one million mouths to feed in their capital city alone. They could not possibly grow all of the grain they needed, so they conquered and took and ate. In leaner years, when the crops were smaller, the Iceni were left with even less. Farmers stood by, faces hot with shame and anger, as the Romans hauled away bushels of their grain. Their young children did not grow as they used to, and they were listless instead of running and playing as they had before. Roman rule over the Iceni, an ancient, powerful, and proud Celtic tribe, had begun as something of an alliance. When the Roman army invaded Britian in the year 43, the Iceni paid for protection and independence through taxes and tributes. As time passed, however, and new Roman governors replaced old ones, the freedom and the respect that the Iceni tribe had previously enjoyed slowly disappeared. The Romans took lands that were the property of Iceni noblemen; centurions plundered their homes, seizing whatever they wanted.
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