I fell into a guard position, holding Caledwlch ready to stab at any that came too near. The peasants were not dissuaded, and slowly closed in around me.
“This one has some fire left in him,” one grunted, “bring him down with your spear, Sama.”
The vinegar-faced brute named Sama drew back his arm and left fly. Fortunately, he was a handless buffoon, and the sharpened stick that he called a spear flew harmlessly over my head.
I swallowed and moistened my dry lips, cudgeling my brain for something to say. “I am a Roman officer,” I croaked, unable to think of anything better, “if you harm me, Rome will have her vengeance. Let me go, and you shall be rewarded.”
Months later, when I repeated this little speech to Procopius, he laughed until the tears flowed down his cheeks.
“Poor Coel,” he chuckled, dabbing at his eyes, “your continued survival is proof that God has a certain dry wit.”
He was right, damn him. I should have spared my breath. Staying strong and silent might have made the peasants hesitate, but now they knew I was desperate. And scared.
“Take him!” cried one who seemed to be their leader, a round-shouldered man with a greasy tangle of beard poking from under the scarf that hid the lower part of his face. He had a certain authority, and his robe and fringed mantle were made of finer stuff than the coarse wool of his fellows.
He was also no fool, and hung back while the others rushed me all at once. There were seven of them, too many to repel even I had been fit.
I had no option but to try. A man wielding a pitchfork came screaming at me, jabbing the prongs at my face. I batted the clumsy weapon away and sheared the skin off his knuckles, making him drop the fork and howl in agony.
A flat-headed wooden club cracked against my shoulder. Once again my armour saved me. I swung around to stab at the clubman, and someone grabbed my hair from behind. That was futile, since it was shorn to a smear of stubble, Roman military style. I jerked my head backwards and connected sharply with a jaw.
My satisfaction at the muffled curse that followed was short-lived. Something struck me in the stomach, expelling all the breath from my lungs. Fingers closed around my wrist, and I was unable to lift Caledfwlch.
“Slash the Roman thief’s throat!” someone yelled. I felt cold steel pressed against my neck.
“No, no,” cried their chief, “let him live for now. Spare him for the games.”
The men holding me grumbled, and the one with the knife had murder in his eyes, but the round-shouldered man was clearly in command. From his superior dress and manner I judged him to be some elder or dignitary from the city.
Despite his authority, he still had to wheedle a little. “Think, brothers,” he said in a voice dripping with insinuation, “how we might put this fine Roman officer to the test. Will he last longer than the usual thieves and cut-purses? The Romans make their soldiers tough, so they say. They will not beg for mercy, nor reveal any secrets under torture. Let us challenge that proud boast.”
His words made me quail, but I tried to maintain a stoic front while the peasants laughed and nudged each other. It seemed that the prospect of breaking my body with various unspeakable tortures held more appeal than simply killing me on the spot, quick and clean.
“Give me his sword,” ordered their chief. I stifled a cry as Caledfwlch was torn from my grip and handed reverently to him, like an offering to a priest.
“Pretty,” the devil murmured, his deep-set eyes squinting at the blade as he inspected it, “a fine toy for my children to play with.”
I worked up some pointless defiance. “If you have managed to breed,” I rasped, “then there is hope for every ape in Africa.”
“I shall enjoy you,” he said, tucking Caledfwlch into the sash around his waist, “I shall enjoy you very much indeed.”
They took me into the city, a sprawling and ramshackle place, designed in no particular order or pattern that I could see. As I have said, it had no walls, or drains either judging from the stink. The people were mostly white-skinned Africans mixed with a few Moors. They spat and jeered at me as I was pushed through the streets.
“Look at the great Roman warrior!” they mocked, “see the power of Caesar, and tremble! Shall we bow down before you, soldier, and offer tribute?”
Roman rule was not popular in North Africa, largely thanks to Justinian’s grinding taxes. Belisarius had all but crushed the revolt, and the people of Membresa would soon become part of the Empire again, so this was their last chance to express their resentment of imperial rule.
I was the focus of that resentment. Had it not been for the chieftain, who held back the mob with an extraordinary flow of eloquence – and if that failed, a heavy stick – I would have been torn to pieces long before we reached the prisons.
These were a block of crude single-storey cells built against the eastern wall of the largest residence in the city, a domed and porticoed house that I assumed to be the governor’s dwelling. They were all full, but a space was made for me by the simple expedient of clearing out all the inmates from one cell and cramming them into the others.
“Courage,” one of the other prisoners gasped as he was dragged past me, “the general will save us.”
He was dirty and blooded, but with a start I recognized him as Constantine, one of Belisarius’ captains. Another casualty from the battle, left for dead on the field and taken prisoner.
I was shoved into a dark, foul-smelling chamber with a few wisps of dirty straw scattered on the earthen floor. The iron gate swung shut behind me.
“Rest there, Roman,” cackled the jailer, a grey-toothed savage with a cast in one eye, “rest there until we decide to play with you.”
A few more insults were thrown at me, along with a final burst of spittle, and then they left me alone to brood.
At least, I reflected as I slumped to the floor and rested my back against the slimy wall, I had been in worse places. The dungeons of the Praetorium in Constantinople were no less uncomfortable. Nor was the griddle that Theodora would have roasted me alive on, had I not been saved by Narses.
There was little chance of a rescue here, in this remote fly-blown part of Africa. Men always cling to hope, and I dared to dream that Belisarius would send a troop of cavalry in search of me. If not for my sake alone, then to retrieve Caledfwlch. Julius Caesar’s sword could not be allowed to fall into enemy hands.
Darkness fell across the city. There was no light in my dingy prison, but the barred door faced out onto the torch-lit market square, which was slowly filling up with people. A few of them hurled curses at me, but most of their attention was fixed on a raised platform or dais being constructed in the middle of the square.
The night was cold, but an extra chill flowered in the pit of my stomach as I watched the dais take shape. Another team of workmen brought a wagon into the square, pulled by a team of ponies, and lifted three long iron stakes off the back. The gathering crowd cheered as the stakes were hoisted onto the dais and fixed horizontally into three stone bases. They were about eight feet tall, and thrust into the air like lances, razor-sharp at one end.
My brow furrowed as I watched a type of gallows erected next to the row of stakes. Then I realised it was a crude winch, considerably higher than the stakes, with a rope thrown over the cross-bar.
More wagons arrived, carrying great stone jars containing some form of strong drink. These were passed among the crowd. People quickly became drunk and quarrelsome, and fights started to break out. No-one bothered to quell them. I ignored the violence and watched the men on the dais. They carried pots full of oil or grease, and were rubbing the stuff on the stakes.
My skin crawled. I am blessed or cursed with a prodigious imagination, and my mind conjured up depraved images of the torments that would soon be inflicted on my shrinking carcass. I had heard rumours of the foul punishments inflicted on criminals in the more remote provinces, and never imagined that I might be the subject of them.
“Belisarius w
ill come,” I muttered to myself, over and over, “Belisarius will come…”
Somewhere a drum started to beat, and the more excitable or drunken spirits in the crowd set up a great howling, like the jackals in the desert.
A group of watchmen in ill-fitting leather tunics and helmets marched over to the prison houses. My heart lurched as I thought they would come to mine first. Shamefully, I prayed otherwise, and God heard my prayer. The watchmen chose one of the cells at the end of the row and dragged out the unfortunates held inside.
Their wrists were bound behind their backs, and they were kicked and whipped towards the dais. I thought the crowd would set upon them, but instead a lane opened for the prisoners to pass through.
One of them was Constantine. He looked around, wild-eyed, until he spotted me.
“The general will come!” he shouted, until a laughing watchman clapped a hand over his mouth.
“He will not,” I mouthed silently, leaning against the bars of my cell door.
There were five prisoners. Three of them, including the Heruli, were hauled up the wooden steps onto the dais. The other two were held below to wait their turn.
The games, as the African chieftain termed them, were not very sophisticated. My gorge rose as I realised what was going to happen.
By now the noise in the square was unbearable. Wild, blood-curdling shrieks filled the air. The people wanted their entertainment.
They soon got it. The three men on the dais lost the last shreds of their dignity as their clothes were cut away, and their ankles bound as well as their wrists. Helpless, the first of them was pulled over to the winch, and one end of the rope tied about his neck.
My mind refused to believe what I was about to witness. The cruelties and debaucheries of the imperial court in Constantinople were nothing compared to this. Even Theodora would baulk at it.
As a final indignity, and an aid to the obscenity about to follow, the suffering man’s fundament was slit open with a knife, and some kind of paste slapped onto the wound. As he screamed and wept for mercy, for Jesus, for his mother, six strong men seized hold of the other end of the rope and hauled him into the air.
They might have held him there, suspended by his neck, until he was strangled, but that was not the aim. The cross-bar of the winch overhung all three of the iron stakes, and he was lowered down onto the first.
I screwed my eyes shut and held onto the bars for support as his scream split the night sky. The agony that poor wretch suffered was unimaginable, and yet it would soon be my turn.
It has been many years since I gave up earthly vanities. God and Abbot Gildas have no use for them, and so I have no hesitation in recording that I wept. Wept like a frightened child, in stark terror for the unspeakable death that I was doomed to suffer. What mirthless, random Fate had brought me to this pass, after so many vicissitudes of fortune? Could I, the last prince of the old royal blood of Coel Hen, really be destined to die such a vile and humiliating death, thousands of miles from my homeland?
The man impaled on the stake screamed and screamed, even as those devils laughed and capered in delight at his sufferings. I could not bear to watch or hear, and retreated to the furthest wall of the prison, clapping my hands over my ears.
I feared my sanity might crack under the strain. The screams redoubled as another of the poor wretches was hoisted to his doom, though at least their cries of torment were partially drowned by the excited shrieks and laughter of the crowd.
A shadow fell over me. I looked up and saw the silhouette of the round-shouldered chieftain. He was leaning against the bars of the prison door, regarding me with narrowed eyes. Two larger men stood behind him, holding torches.
“This one is next,” he said, “open the door.”
His words were death. I stood up, looking around in vain for some kind of weapon, anything, while the jailer fumbled with his keys. The floor was worn smooth and bare of anything save straw.
The door creaked open, whining on its rusted hinges. I dropped into a crouch. At the very least, I could spring on the chieftain and snap his neck with my bare hands – a trick the Heruli taught me – before his men dragged me off him.
I was about to leap, but hesitated as he produced Caledfwlch. “See, Roman,” he taunted, holding it up before me, “I thought you might like to look upon your precious sword once more.”
“Here,” he added, and suddenly his voice sounded quite different, “take a closer look.”
To my astonishment, he tossed Caledwlch at my feet. Then he straightened from his stooped, round-shouldered stance, tore away the scarf and wisp of false beard from his face, and there stood no sneering African chieftain at all, but Procopius.
“Close your mouth, Coel,” he snapped, “and pick up the sword. We have no time to waste on explanations.”
I bit back my questions and snatched up Caledfwlch. Belisarius claimed he felt nothing when he handled the blade, but then he had no hereditary right to it. I felt renewed as soon as my hand closed around the hilt.
Procopius’ guards stepped into the cell. They shrugged back their hoods, and I could have laughed with delight as I recognized the brutish faces of the Huns who had guarded me during the voyage to Sicily. One of them grinned and ducked his oversized head at me, while his comrade seized the terrified jailer and twisted his neck, like a farmer strangling a goose.
“We have horses waiting, just outside,” said Procopius, “step quickly, before those clods outside realise what is afoot.”
He moved briskly to the door, beckoning at me to follow. I feared we would be spotted, but all the attention of the crowd was fixed on the two men writhing on the stakes. I averted my eyes from the grisly spectacle as we hurried down the street, but then I remembered the third man on the dais, waiting his turn for execution.
“We have to get him out,” I hissed, seizing Procopius’ arm and jabbing my sword at the dais, “he is a Roman, like us. We can’t leave him to be butchered by these savages.”
“Don’t be an idiot,” replied Procopius, brushing me off, but the Huns grunted in agreement. The secretary was not a soldier, and failed to understand that one didn’t simply leave a comrade to his fate.
Understanding soon dawned, though, when he looked at our faces. “For God’s sake,” he muttered, and threw up his hands, “very well. But don’t expect any peace in the afterlife if all goes awry.”
There were four horses tethered to a rail outside a wine-shop at the end of the street. Mine was a pure white desert pony, a high-spirited beast, and must have cost Procopius a fair amount of silver. I climbed aboard her, feeling like a soldier again instead of the sniveling, broken wreck I had been just moments before.
Now some of the more alert souls in the square had noticed that one of the cells was empty, and the inmate flown. A few rushed down the street, yelling indignantly and waving torches.
They froze at the sight of us. I heeled my pony into life and urged her towards them, snarling in anticipation of drawing blood. I wanted to pay these barbarians back for the fright they had given me.
Procopius and the Huns galloped close behind me. The citizens scattered out of our path and vanished down a side-alley. Then we were into the square. Scores of pale faces turned to greet us. I bellowed a war-cry, ducked low over my pony’s neck and thrust Caledfwlch at the nearest body.
The blade ripped through muscle and flesh with satisfying ease, drenching my sword-hand in blood up to the wrist. My victim jerked as I tore Caledfwlch free, and dropped to the ground like a doll with its strings cut.
Most of the citizens had panicked and were fleeing in all directions. The bravest – or drunkest – showed some fight, and one swung a hatchet at my pony’s head. I drew back savagely on the reins, snapping her head back, and one of the Huns flung a spear through the man’s body.
Now the dais rose before me. Constantine stood on the edge, stripped naked and looking almost comical as he shuffled feverishly from side to side, trying to loosen the bonds on his ank
les.
His bulging eyes were fixed on me. I couldn’t shout at him to jump – his weight would have flattened my pony – so I slid from the saddle and ran up the steps to the platform.
I averted my eyes from the poor wretches impaled on the stakes, and ran to my comrade. He trembled as I sawed at the bindings on his wrists and ankles.
“Hurry, brother,” he cried, “before the barbarians find their courage.”
I glanced down at the square. One of the Huns had seized hold of my pony’s bridle, to prevent her bolting, while his comrade was single-handedly holding back the mob.
He wielded two curved swords, both red with blood, and clashed them both against his armoured chest, screaming like a madman and glaring at the citizens, daring them to fight him. They cowered and declined the challenge, as any sane man would. The Huns are the fiercest warriors alive, matched only by the Sarmatians, and I often had cause to thank God they were on my side.
Procopius gestured impatiently at me. “Move!” he shouted. He had a long dagger in his hand, though I always found it difficult to imagine him wielding anything more deadly than a stylus.
The bonds parted, and Constantine gasped as the blood flowed back into his numbed limbs. There was a spear lying against the base of the winch, abandoned by the cowardly executioners when they fled. He grabbed it and performed an act of mercy, stabbing it through the hearts of the men dying by inches on the stakes.
I seized his arm and led him down the steps. “Here,” cried Procopius, “my horse is big enough to carry two.”
He helped Constantine to mount, while I returned to my own horse, nodding in thanks to the Hun who held his bridle.
Seeing us on the verge of escape, the mob surged forward. The Hun who stood in their way snarled and made his horse rear onto her haunches. Her flailing hoofs made them hesitate, but then a youth ran forward and thrust his torch at the horse’s face. She screamed and twisted away from the flame, spilling her rider and crashing onto her flank.
The Hun was a big man, but lithe as an acrobat, and rolled to his feet with extraordinary grace. Three men attacked him at once, baying like dogs. His swords moved in a blur, and one of the men toppled to the ground, blood pumping from the stump of his neck. His neatly severed head bounced and rolled away. The Hun disemboweled the second man, slashed the throat of the third, and was then overwhelmed by a sea of enraged bodies.
Caesar's Sword: The Complete Campaigns Page 29
