Centurion Dubnus shifted uncomfortably on the examination table, feeling the doctor’s cool hands gently probing around the fresh scar that would be his permanent reminder of the battle at the Red River. The spear wound had been inflicted by a barbarian who had run full pelt into his century’s line and punched his weapon’s iron head through the big man’s armour, burying it deep in his side to put him out of the fight, and into the hands of the Noisy Valley fortress’s medical staff.
‘I can’t feel anything to indicate any infection, Centurion, and your wound seems to have healed nicely enough. You’re a lucky man. You can get back on your feet for a few hours a day, nothing strenuous, mind you, and no clever ideas about sneaking back to your cohort either. I know you’re desperate to get back into the fight, but you won’t be fit to get back into armour for at least a month. Do you understand what I’m saying this time?’
Dubnus returned her questioning stare with a rueful smile. He had been caught at his room’s window a few days previously, watching the legionaries practising with their weapons when he was supposed to be confined to bed.
‘I understand, Doctor. I’ll sit in my chair and listen to the idiots comparing the size of their scars.’
She nodded firmly.
‘Good. And no trying to make your way down the corridor unobserved either. You need at least another week of inactivity before we can be sure that your wound is really healed.’
He nodded, sitting up with the help of the doctor’s orderly Julius, a quiet and good-natured man rarely without a smile on his face.
‘Is there any news from the legions?’
Julius answered after a moment’s silence, shooting a troubled glance at his mistress.
‘Yes, Centurion, a message rider arrived last evening. I would have woken you when I heard the message he was carrying, but you looked so…’
‘And?’
The orderly smiled at the questioning tone, but the doctor turned back to him and wagged a finger.
‘Calm yourself, Centurion. There’s nothing either of us can do, whatever the news might be. As it happens, the news is good, or so it seems. The rebellion is broken, their camp stormed and destroyed, and those barbarians who escaped are scattered, and running for their lives. And no, there’s no detail as to which units took what part in the fight.’
Dubnus pulled his tunic back on gingerly, feeling the fresh scar tissue flexing with his movements.
‘Doctor…’
She shook her head.
‘After all that’s happened in the last few months I think you should call me Felicia, Centurion.’
‘Very well, Felicia. Whatever fighting he might have seen, Marcus will have come through it in one piece. He’s faster with two swords than I am with one, his century are determined not to let “their young gentleman” come to any harm, and he’s got Tiberius Rufius to keep him from making an idiot of himself. He’ll be back here soon enough.’
Her eyes moist, Felicia reached out for the big soldier’s hand.
‘I know. And if anything were to have happened to him, I could cope with it. It’s just the not knowing…’
Dubnus gave her a wry smile.
‘I know. Believe me, cooped up in here, I know exactly what you mean. And now I must give you this.’
He picked up a small cloth-wrapped package and handed it to her, catching Julius’s eye and tipping his head at the door. The orderly took the hint and made his excuses while the doctor unwrapped the cloth, revealing a small knife in a soft leather sheath.
‘What…?’
‘It’s for your protection. I asked the soldier that you discharged yesterday to bring it in for me. I want you to promise that you’ll wear it until Marcus can come for you. You need to be able to protect yourself if the need arises. You know where a man is vulnerable to a small blade just as well as I do, and that one’s long enough to open a throat if need be. It will strap around your leg above the knee, and be hidden under your stola. Promise me that you’ll wear it.’
She drew the knife from its sheath, examining the razor-sharp six-inch blade with a critical eye well used to gauging the sharpness of her surgical tools.
‘Dubnus, I took an oath to protect human life, not to take it.’
The big centurion shook his head, but his reply was gentle.
‘These are difficult times, and you’re too precious to my friend for me to see you without some way of defending yourself. What if the Brigantes break into this fort?’ He took a deep breath in through his nose, then exhaled and raised a questioning eyebrow. ‘And besides, it’s not just about you any more, is it?’
The Tungrian cohorts marched two abreast down the well-beaten track that ran from the barbarian camp to the edge of the forest, and which would bring them out on to the flatter land of the Red River’s flood plain. The gently waving branches above their heads cast sun-dappled patterns across their ranks until they marched out on to the rolling plain, leaving behind the forest in which Calgus had planned to ambush and destroy the legions, before the presence of his Venicone allies had been detected by a chance encounter with one of Marcus’s soldiers. Emerging from the trees on to the plain’s gently undulating ground, the centuries drew up in parade formation and waited for the other components of Tribune Scaurus’s command to make their appearance. Marching at the head of his 9th Century, and still wrapped in the grief of Rufius’s sudden and violent death, Marcus was nevertheless aware of a collective melancholy sitting heavily on his men, a feeling he was himself quite powerless to resist. When the cohort’s column halted he stood his men at ease and strolled out in front of them, staring hollow eyed up and down the Tungrian cohort’s line and noting with a sudden pang the absence of Rufius’s 6th Century, and the stocky figure of his friend out in front of them. After a few minutes a column of legionaries began to emerge from the trees, their centurions drawing them up in front of the Tungrian line and standing them to attention until the cohort’s full strength was arrayed across the plain. First Spear Frontinius spoke without taking his eyes off the legion detachment’s flag, the representation of the leaping boar that the 20th had made its badge over a century before.
‘We are honoured. The Twentieth’s legatus has given you their First Cohort to play with. He must have a soft spot for you, Tribune.’
Scaurus nodded, watching as the cohort’s five centurions walked the lengths of their double-strength centuries, checking their men’s line and equipment with an attention to detail that would have done honour to preparation for a triumphal parade through Rome. He answered his deputy’s question in a matter-of-fact tone, not taking his eyes off the legion cohort’s fluttering detachment banner.
‘Indeed. I believe that Postumius Avitus Macrinus had a good relationship with my sponsor, before he left Rome to serve in Britannia. Ah, here comes their tribune. I’d suggest, First Spear, that you leave the talking to me. No matter what the man says. This man is the son of a most distinguished family, and I’m not sure that he’s going to find this very easy.’
They stood in silence as the detachment’s tribune walked across the gap between the two cohorts, his first spear walking at his shoulder and one pace behind. He halted in front of Scaurus and nodded brusquely, while his senior centurion snapped to attention and stared blankly over Scaurus’s head. A man of about twenty-five, Tribune Laenas was of above-average height, with black hair and a broad face which, unsurprisingly under the circumstances, was set in a look of deep dissatisfaction.
‘Marcus Popillius Laenas, tribune, Twentieth Legion Valiant and Victorious, reporting for duty as ordered.’
Scaurus stood in silence, holding the younger man’s gaze and waiting patiently. After a long moment’s wait Laenas raised an eyebrow.
‘Ah, is there something wrong, colleague?’
‘A small matter of military courtesy, Popillius Laenas. I fear that it is usual for the officers of a detachment to salute its commander.’
Laenas raised both eyebrows with surprise. Scaurus nodded in confirmation, willing his face not to reveal the amusement he was feeling at the look on the other man’s face.
‘I am your commanding officer, Popillius Laenas, and when I gather my officers I expect them all to salute me, including you. When I give a command, I expect the appropriate respect and a speedy response, with a salute. In short, Tribune, I expect you to behave in a way that recognises our relative ranks while your cohort forms part of my command.’
The young aristocrat stared at him in amazement.
‘You’re seriously expecting me to salute you? But I’m…’
Scaurus nodded, raising a hand to forestall the other man.
‘Yes, I know, you’re a broad-stripe tribune and you’ve only ever saluted your legatus who, like you, is of the senatorial class. And I, as we are both only too well aware, am an equestrian. The broad stripe on your tunic far outweighs the narrow stripe on mine, and in any other situation I would be the one deferring to superior rank. If I meet you in the street in Rome some day, then I will be the man showing respect for his social better, and I will do so promptly and with all due deference to your rank. Today, however, Tribune Laenas, you will have to adjust to the idea of saluting me, and you will have to make that adjustment quickly. Unlike some senior officers of my class, I do not intend to ignore the correct disciplines of this military life which we have chosen.’
Laenas looked at him for so long that First Spear Frontinius was convinced he had decided to be deliberately insolent, and was tensed for the explosion that he knew such a reaction would elicit from Scaurus, but, to his relief, the young tribune simply raised one hand to his forehead, a look of bemusement on his face.
‘You’ll have to forgive me, Tribune, I’m not used to taking orders from anyone below the rank of the legion’s legatus. I’ll do my best to remember in future.’
Scaurus nodded impassively.
‘Thank you, Tribune Laenas. I’m sure we’ll both soon get used to the idea, strange though it may be. And this is your first spear, I presume?’
‘Yes, Tribune, Senior Centurion Canutius.
Canutius saluted crisply.
‘Tribune, the first cohort of Twentieth Valiant and Victorious is ready for detached duty. We have seven hundred and forty-three men fit for…’
He stopped speaking as Scaurus raised a hand and pointed at something over Laenas’s shoulder.
‘My apologies, First Spear, but I think our detachment from the Petriana has arrived.’
The horsemen of the Petriana wing were indeed making their appearance, each rider leading his horse down through the trees and into the morning sunlight. More than a few of the cavalrymen were leading a second horse, and as the squadrons began to form up facing end on to the infantry cohorts, Marcus realised that there were thirty or so empty saddles among the two-hundred-odd horsemen of his cavalry squadrons.
Frontinius leaned close to his tribune’s ear, speaking quietly to avoid being overheard.
‘That’s strange, I thought we were being loaned six squadrons? I can only see five. That, and a lot of riderless horses.’
Scaurus nodded thoughtfully.
‘You’re right. Let’s see what Tribune Licinius has to say on the subject.’
The Petriana’s commander was the last man out of the forest, and he strode briskly across to Scaurus with a businesslike air, a vaguely familiar decurion walking behind him and leading a magnificent spirited black stallion which jerked at the reins every few seconds, its evident desire to be away across the rolling ground at a gallop manifest in every movement. His own grey horse was waiting for him at the forest’s edge, along with his personal bodyguard. Scaurus snapped to attention, followed by the three first spears and, a second later, Popillius Laenas. Licinius smiled lopsidedly, shaking his head gently.
‘There’s no need for you to be saluting me, Tribune, we’re of an equal rank now and you’ll only go embarrassing me in front of the governor or, worse still, a legatus.’ He looked around at the three first spears and Laenas, favouring them with a wintry smile. ‘Morning, gentlemen. Please do stand at ease while I take your tribune off for a quick chat.’
He took Scaurus by the arm and led him a few paces away from the group of his officers, stopping to talk once there was no chance of their being overheard.
‘I haven’t got long, so we’ll have to make this quick. The rest of my command is champing at the bit to go north and get stuck back into those Venicone bastards. You’ve probably already worked out that I’m stretching my orders just a little, and giving you five full squadrons and one more consisting of horses whose riders were killed yesterday. We had a bit of a time of it, I’m afraid, so I’m assuming that you can spare me from giving you another thirty men by putting some of your own in their saddles. I’m putting my men under the command of Decurion Felix, a young man who’s not just an excellent officer, but also very well connected, if you take my meaning. Unlike some sons of influence, however, he insisted on starting his service as a cavalry squadron commander, despite the fact that his father could have pulled a few strings and seen him start off as a legion tribune like that fool Laenas. Apparently he wanted to see the life of a soldier from the ground up, a position which I find myself forced to respect given the capabilities of a certain legion tribune not far from here.’ He raised an eyebrow at the look on Scaurus’s face. ‘And yes, I can see you trying to work out where you’ve seen him before. He’s the man you rescued from the Votadini during the disaster at White Strength.’
Scaurus nodded.
‘Oh yes, now I remember him. He had a barbarian hunting arrow stuck in his armpit less than a fortnight ago, as I recall. Are you really sure he’s fit for duty?’
Licinius nodded briskly.
‘Centurion Corvus’s wife-to-be seems to have worked miracles, got the bloody thing out without causing any more damage than it had already inflicted on him, and I’m told he’ll make a full recovery soon enough. Just give him time for the wound to fully heal and you will find him to be not only an efficient officer, but a good fighting man to boot. I can’t take him back into the fight yet, though, and I can’t spare you anyone that’s fully fit, so you’re both going to have to make the most of it. Oh, and watch out for his horse, he’s a magnificent animal but he’s also an evil-tempered bugger. And now I must get back to my men, before they decide to ride north for revenge without me. I wouldn’t put it past them either, not with the mood they were in last night. The best of luck with your mission to liberate the poor old Votadini!’
He clapped Scaurus on the shoulder and turned away, mounting his horse and riding back up the path with his bodyguard in close attendance. The tribune turned back to his own men, taking the measure of the decurion standing slightly apart from them.
‘We’ve met before, I think, Decurion Felix?’
The other man nodded, raising his right arm gingerly in a careful salute.
‘Indeed we have, Tribune. I was lucky enough to be saved from the barbarians by that large German gentleman standing behind you and one of your centurions. They found me as good as dead, with an arrow sticking out of my armpit and poor old Hades here not much better off.’
Scaurus nodded.
‘You’re the man that rode through the barbarian warband during the battle for White Strength and lived to tell the tale. You must have balls the size of goose eggs.’
The decurion tilted his head to acknowledge the compliment.
‘Amulius Cornelius Felix, Tribune.’
‘And I’m Gaius Rutilius Scaurus, tribune commanding First and Second Tungrian Cohorts, and temporarily appointed to lead this detachment. How long is it since you were wounded, Decurion?’
Felix frowned in concentration for a moment.
‘Fifteen days, Tribune.’
‘Just over two weeks? Are you sure that you’re fit enough for field duty?’
The cavalryman smiled slightly.
‘Not really, but given another week I’ll be perfectly fine. In the meantime I’m more than capable of riding and issuing these layabouts with orders, and we have another four decurions who can do the running around until I can lift a sword again.’
‘Tribune Licinius commends you as a competent officer, and tells me that you’ll be worth the wait. He also tells me to keep an eye open for your horse?’
Felix smiled easily, pulling his mount’s head down until it was alongside his own, stroking the animal’s long face affectionately.
‘What, dear old Hades here? He’s what I suppose might be called a lively character, if he were a man. The first time I set eyes on him he was busy kicking lumps off another poor horse through a gap in the fence between them, and I knew straight away he’d be perfect for me. Just don’t get too close to his hindquarters, because like any good soldier he doesn’t like anybody or anything behind him that he can’t see. And he kicks like a bolt thrower.’
‘The tribune also explained why I can see so many empty saddles in your ranks, Decurion. He suggests that I find thirty riders from my three infantry cohorts, and group them into a sixth squadron. I think I may have an officer with the appropriate skills to lead them, but he’ll need a good double-pay to help him knock them into shape. Do you have anyone in mind?’
Felix smiled easily, nodding slightly.
‘A man with the tact and diplomacy required for turning infantrymen into cavalrymen? Oh yes, Tribune, I’ve got just the man for the job.’
‘Fuck me, you lot have got to be pulling my bowstring!’
Decurion Felix’s double-pay man stalked down the line of volunteers with a pained expression, shaking his head unhappily. Tribune Scaurus’s announcement of a requirement for men with riding skills had prompted twenty or so men from each of the Tungrian cohorts to step out of the ranks of their centuries, ignoring the insults and abuse their fellow soldiers had rained upon them, and a similar number of legionaries had volunteered from the 1st Cohort. Marcus had stayed put with his century until Tribune Scaurus had taken him to one side, and bluntly ordered him to volunteer.
‘For one thing, those men are going to need an officer, and you’re probably the only man on the field other than me with anything like proper cavalry training. And for another, just in case I need to remind you, your heroics of yesterday have once again swollen your reputation in the army to the point where the wrong people are going to be asking questions. You’ll be better off out of sight scouting out in front of the main force for a while, I’d say. You can take my man Arminius with you, it’ll be amusing to see him on a horse again, and perhaps he’ll be of some use to you.’
Nodding his understanding with an impassive expression, Marcus had saluted and walked out to join the group of men nervously waiting to see what being a cavalryman was going to mean to them. Double-Pay man Silus gave him an astonished glance before turning back to face the volunteers, recomposing his face into the expression of disgust he’d been wearing before noticing the centurion’s unexpected presence.
‘Cavalrymen? Most of you lot – yourself obviously excepted, Centurion – wouldn’t have been judged fit to shovel shit out of the stables when I joined up. You’re not bloody cavalrymen, you’re just a shower of footslogging mules, and that’s all you’re good for. Come on, there must be some of you that want to fuck off now, and spare me the bother of telling you to bugger off once it becomes clear that you’re all bloody useless? No…?’ He sighed and shook his head with exasperation. ‘Are you sure about this, Decurion?’
Felix nodded tersely.
‘Yes, Double-Pay, and preferably before the three cohorts standing watching us die of boredom.’
Evidently exasperated, Silus beckoned one of the riders forward from the ranks, spoke to him for a moment and then turned back to the volunteers. The cavalryman led his horse out of the squadron’s ranks and stood waiting, the animal bending its neck to crop at the plain’s lush grass.
‘We’ve got forty-seven of you mules, including the officer, and that needs to be reduced to the thirty-one men who’ll be riding instead of footslogging today, since that’s all the horses we have spare after yesterday’s fighting. So, here’s a simple test. All you have to do is get on that horse over there.’ He pointed to the sturdy mount now being held by its rider beside him. The horse was fully equipped, complete with a four-horned saddle and a leather chamfron to protect its snout, the eyes covered with perforated bronze eye guards. ‘She’s a docile enough beast, so I don’t expect she’ll kick too many of you, not unless you climb aboard her like you’re trying to take your pork sword to her after a night in the beer shop. Perhaps you’d like to go first, Centurion, and show the rest of your men what we’re looking for…?’
Marcus gave Silus a long stare, holding his gaze until the other man looked away, before turning to the mare, taking stock of her size and apparent demeanour as he walked over to the animal. He took the bridle from her rider and gently pulled the beast’s head towards him, talking quietly into her ear, and stroking her muzzle gently. Once the animal was apparently comfortable with his presence, he took a slow sideways step towards the waiting saddle, continuing to stroke her neck, talking to the horse in soft tones. Grasping the saddle’s projecting front horn, he vaulted into the saddle, making light of the weight of his armour, and turned to address the watching infantrymen.
‘Soldiers, look closely and you’ll see that I’m deliberately relaxing on to the saddle here, and allowing it to flex under my weight, rather than sitting up stiffly. I’m doing that because that allows these saddle horns to grip my thighs, and that will keep me astride this horse no matter what I might ask her to do. There’s another reason for taking a relaxed saddle as well, if you can manage it, apart from the benefit of actually staying on the horse – if you try to sit up for any sort of time your legs will start to hurt more than you can imagine! Save all that standing up in the saddle stuff for the first time we see some fighting.’
The mare stood quietly, then allowed herself to be encouraged into a sprightly trot around a tight circle before the young centurion swung his leg back over its back and dropped neatly to the ground. Double-Pay Silus nodded his reluctant respect, his mouth twisted into a tight smile.
‘Very good, Centurion, it’s nice to see an officer that understands horses. You’ve got a lovely loose seat, and your mount and dismount were as good as any soldier in the Petriana wing could have managed. I’d like to see you handle a spear up there, mind you, but you’ll do for today. Now, let’s have another one of you mules up here and see what you’re made…’
Marcus’s voice rode over his instructions, harsh enough to raise Decurion Felix’s eyebrow.
‘A word, Double-Pay?’
Silus walked across to where Marcus was waiting for him, a wary look on his face.
‘Centurion?’
‘Come and look at this.’
Marcus took his arm and led him around to the horse’s far side, pointing to the shoulder straps there to disguise his true purpose from the watching soldiery.
‘These men standing around us, Double-Pay, are Tungrians.’
The cavalryman frowned, unclear as to this unknown officer’s purpose but unnerved by the harsh tone of his voice.
‘Sir?’
Marcus sighed, shaking his head slightly.
‘As I thought. You haven’t got a clue what you’re dealing with. Allow me to educate you. You will remember, if you’ve been with the Petriana for any length of time, the battle of Lost Eagle?’
He raised an eyebrow, waiting for the other man’s response, which was still bullish, despite a slight uncertainty in his voice, unclear of where this strange and apparently cavalry-trained officer was taking the discussion.
‘It would be hard to forget, Centurion. We took hundreds of blue-nose heads that day, once the fuckers broke and ran. It was bloody wonderful…’
He flinched as Marcus interrupted him again, his eyes wide with barely restrained anger.
‘And do you remember, Double-Pay, sitting on your big fat arse and watching some bunch of dozy mules hold off those blue-noses for an hour or so, before they broke and ran, and you big brave horsemen decided to actually take part in the battle?’
The other man’s face took on a nervous look with the sudden hostility in Marcus’s voice.
‘That’s a bit unfair, Centurion, we…’
‘Not from where my men were standing!’
The cavalryman flinched at the anger in Marcus’s voice. Decurion Felix, standing a dozen paces from them, heard his fellow officer’s angry tones and smiled slightly, taking a sudden interest in the hilt of his spatha.
‘We fought ten times our strength in barbarians to a standstill that afternoon, while the Petriana sat and did nothing to aid us. The Tungrian soldiers standing around you, Double-Pay, spilled blood and lost friends that afternoon, while you sat and waited for us to send them running for you to chase down. You all rode back from that hunt with heads by the half-dozen, but my men were too tired, too damned numb, to take their swords to the corpses of the men they’d killed. Every one of these men has been blooded, Double-Pay, and stared into the eyes of men that could have been their brothers as they died on our iron. They’ve seen more fighting in the last few months than is good for them, I’d say, or good for anyone else that tries to play the fool with them. If your intention here is to humiliate them because they can’t vault into the saddle like a man that’s been practising the trick for the last year, I’d advise you to consider what a man that’s been humiliated, and who has no concern for the consequences of taking revenge for a slight, might consider doing to you once night has fallen across tonight’s camp.’
Silus swallowed nervously, without even being aware of it.
‘I see your point, Centurion. Perhaps I could…’
Marcus nodded, his disgust evident in the curl of his lip.
‘Yes. Perhaps you could, Double-Pay.’
He gestured to the waiting infantrymen.
‘After you.’
The cavalryman gave his decurion a swift glance, finding little in Cornelius Felix’s face to encourage him. He coughed, groping for the right reaction, the words spilling out a fraction too quickly for any of the men gathered around him to be fooled.
‘I think you’re right, Centurion, that strap does appear to be worn. I’ll have the saddler replace it once we rejoin the rest of the wing.’
Marcus nodded magnanimously.
‘Quite so, Double-Pay. And now, you were saying? Time for my fellow infantrymen to take their turn displaying the cavalry mount?’
Silus shook his head decisively.
‘I don’t think they can be expected to perform to that standard, Centurion. A hand up into the saddle, I think, and a quick trot round, that’ll be enough to show me what they’ve got.’
Marcus nodded, shooting a quick glance at Cornelius Felix to find the decurion indicating his own approval, a hint of a smile on his face. He turned back to the volunteers, taking stock of the men from his own cohort who had stepped forward, looking for the chance to become cavalrymen. Lurking among them was a familiar figure, and while Silus took the next man out in front of the group to try his hand with the waiting horse, Marcus strode into the group, tapping the man on the shoulder and pulling him to one side.
‘Scarface? I didn’t know you could ride? In fact, if I didn’t know better I’d say you were determined never to let me out of your sight, no matter what you have to put yourself through. Can you even get up on a horse without falling over the other side and breaking your neck?’
The soldier blushed, but stuck his chest out in response to the challenge.
‘I was born on a farm, Centurion. I learned to ride young. And you’re not going to go charging around the hills with this shower of donkey wallopers without one of us to keep an eye out for you.’
‘Us?’
The soldier blushed a deeper shade of red, his eyes narrowing with something close to, but not quite, righteous anger.
‘You’ve been a bit of a wild one ever since you joined the cohort, Centurion. All summer you’ve been running from one fight to the next, and never a thought for your men, or for the pretty girl that’s waiting for you at Noisy Valley. All the lads that matter in the Ninth Century think you’ve a death wish, and we’ve decided to keep you alive until winter at least. And I’m the only one that can ride…’
He stopped talking, having realised that Marcus was looking over his shoulder, a wry smile creasing his face.
‘Perhaps you are, Scarface. And perhaps you’re not.’
The soldier turned, to find Qadir standing behind him. Marcus raised an eyebrow.
‘And are you another one of “us”, Qadir?’
The Hamian shook his head, giving Scarface a disgusted look.
‘Well done, then, soldier. You’re alone with the centurion for a moment and it seems that you’ve already spilled the beans to him. Go and climb on that horse, and leave us to talk.’
Red faced and abashed, the soldier slunk away to take his place in the queue to mount the long-suffering mare, while Marcus gave his deputy a puzzled frown.
‘So how do you get to walk away from the Ninth so easily, given their lack of an officer?’
Qadir shrugged.
‘I just told the tribune what I can do on a horse. He thought it would be a good idea if I were riding alongside you, so he gave Morban my stick to poke in the soldiers’ backs for a while, and your trumpeter gets to polish Morban’s standard twice a day.’
‘And just what can you do on a horse?’
Qadir smiled, and Marcus caught a brief glimpse of a relaxed confidence he hadn’t seen in the man’s demeanour at any point in the weeks they had spent together since their first meeting in the port of Arab Town.
‘I have some small skill in the saddle. I…’
Something behind Marcus caught the Hamian’s eye, and his jaw dropped fractionally.
‘Oh, Deasura, that’s not a sight you’ll see every day!’
Marcus turned and stifled a laugh in the face of an irascible German sitting uncomfortably on the now distinctly unhappy-looking cavalry horse. He walked around the mare, his face alive with the first smile since Rufius’s death.
‘Well, Arminius, I can’t say you’re the most natural horseman I’ve ever seen.’
Arminius sneered down at the men standing around him, then leaned out of the saddle and put a sausage-sized finger in Double-Pay Silus’s face.
‘Just so we’re clear, I hate horses. Tribune Scaurus says I ride like a mule tender with bleeding piles, and that I have all the skill in the saddle of a sack full of shit. And despite that, before you open your mouth, I’m one of your thirty-one horsemen and that’s official. You don’t like it, I don’t like it, but the tribune couldn’t give a toss what either of us think. Wherever Centurion Corvus goes, I go. So there it is.’
He climbed down from the horse and clenched both of his massive fists, scowling around him.
‘And anyone that finds that funny had better be ready for an unscheduled sleep.’
Double-Pay Silus looked at him thoughtfully, then beckoned his pay-and-a-half across to join him.
‘See that?’
He pointed at the German, and the other man nodded with pursed lips.
‘What have we got that’ll carry him thirty miles in a day without breaking down inside a week?’
South of the Wall, in a copse overlooking the Sailors’ Town fort, Centurion Rapax and his colleague Excingus were exchanging uneasy glances. The fort was silent, without any movement, and Rapax had been watching its walls intently for long enough to be sure it was deserted. Excingus fished out his pocket tablet, once again checking their route against the directions he’d been given in Yew Grove two days before.
‘North from Waterfall Town ten miles, across the river dam and then another nine miles north up the road to Vintner’s Way, then carry on to Sailors’ Town.’ He paused, giving the silent fort another long, searching stare. ‘Well, that’s bloody Sailors’ Town right enough, and it looks just as dead as the first two ghost towns we’ve ridden past this morning. I say we push on, and get to this Noisy Valley place soonest.’
Rapax spat on the copse’s dry earth.
‘That centurion you got the directions from was close to soiling himself, and there he was with half a cohort between his precious skin and the local thrill seekers. He had no patrols out looking for information, so he had no idea of what might have happened up this way in the last few days. I didn’t like the last place, but we were close enough to friendly forces for the locals to be keeping a low profile. Here, on the other hand…’
Excingus nodded and stared across the three hundred paces that separated copse and fort.
‘We’re too far out to see what’s in there. Perhaps we should get a little closer?’
His colleague shook his head decisively, sniffing the air.
‘Smell that? It’s faint, but we’re downwind from the fort. That’s the smell of rotting meat, old son. Once you’ve had a noseful of that reek you never forget it. That fort’s full of nothing but corpses and flies, and the tribesmen are out there somewhere, lurking close to the road and waiting for some more soldiers to blunder into their trap. We can only guess what the men who were manning the place went through before they died, but I don’t intend sharing their fate. We’ll go round it, my friend, and give the barbarians plenty of chance to show themselves.’
The small party mounted their horses and walked them carefully and quietly round to the fort’s east, putting the higher ground between it and them to mask their movements from any watchers in the fort as much as possible. Only when the fort was completely out of sight was Rapax willing to allow them to return to the road, and even then it was clear he was still reluctant. He gathered his men about him, looking hard into each man’s eyes as he spoke as if weighing them for their ability to deal with the pressure they were all feeling.
‘There are fifteen of us. If we bump into anything more than a couple of dozen of them we’ll have no option but to run away from them as fast as these horses will carry us.’ He cast a dark glace around his tent party. ‘And any of you that decide that keeping your skin intact might best be achieved by outpacing the rest of us had better be ready to see the colour of your guts when I catch up with you. Right, then, march.’