Eagle of the Empire

by Martin Ferguson

  ‘My God, this isn’t a cave, it’s a tomb!’

  I can’t understand it. The Romans never travelled this far from Hadrian’s Wall for fear of the northern Britons… except – no that was just a legend. I look at the caskets again and I have to wonder, are the legends true? On each is the inscription LXXVIII, the number seventy-eight, the year the men fell in battle? Maybe the number of their legion?

  Torches hang from both sides of the chamber, the old kind, the ones that require fire rather than batteries. I ignite the nearest on both sides with the matches, which have squirrelled their way down to the bottom of my rucksack. The whole chamber is illuminated. There are carvings on the floor and my mind flips back to the entrance around the stone door behind me. From my pocket, I take one of the apples and roll it down the chamber into the darkness at the far side. My caution is rewarded – spears rise from the floor and arrows soar out of niches in the walls.

  ‘Defending their dead,’ I say respectfully, knowing only their brothers, the soldiers who fought beside those who perished, could’ve created such a burial guard like this. I don’t blame them. I’d want to do the same for my family and friends, to honour and protect their remains.

  The triggers on the floor are more spread out than the others, making it easier to travel down the chamber, as long as I take care with my footing. I light the next torch on the wall and pull it from its fixings, saving the battery power of those I brought with me. I count the caskets. Twenty, fifty, a hundred. There are other chambers adjacent, housing even more of the fallen. More armaments are stacked against the caskets, the typical Roman tower shield, helmet, and gladius sword easily distinguishable despite the decay of age. This is greater than any museum collection of Roman artefacts I have ever seen. Hell, it’s bigger than any museum I have ever seen. I can’t believe it.

  ‘This is why you were down here, Matt.’

  Arrows are scattered across the cavern floor. My brother has been the possible target of those traps. Amongst the remains of arrows, several objects are spread; a spent flare, a torch, and a pair of glasses, all out of place amongst the honoured Roman dead. The torch particularly worries me as blood covers much of its heavily damaged casing. Then there’s the glasses, too. One lens broken and the other streaked with more blood. Matt doesn’t wear glasses, or perhaps that was just another thing about him I don’t know. I pick up the glasses and tuck them into a pocket on the chance that maybe Matt will want them back when I find him – if I find him. I call out for him again but there is still no reply.

  A rumble sounds out from the far side of the chamber, but the farther I walk, the more certain I am that it's the sound of rushing water. I am proven right as I see the cavern ends in a waterfall, which cuts through the chamber from ceiling to floor, feeding the river from the loch above into the wider cavern beyond the eagle engraved door. There is a gap in the floor to allow the water to flow through of about a metre; easily jumpable.

  Remarkably, there is a small doorway concealed beyond the falling water. I thank heavens it hasn’t been heavier rain or I would have missed it entirely had the water been faster flowing. Taking care to not step on any of the triggers or disturb the graves of the Roman soldiers, I approach the waterfall, and with a deep breath, I force myself to leap across the gap in the chamber, through the falling water that utterly soaks me. Above the doorway, two words are chiselled into the stone. TANTUM DIGNOS. I have no idea what it can mean, but I don’t have a good feeling.

  6

  OPTIO MARCUS AURELIUS—76Ad Caledonia, Britannia

  ‘Hold the lines!’ I shout. My men can barely hear me over the chaos of battle. ‘Force them back!’

  Our shield wall falters as each Roman brother falls. The gaps close swiftly on the barked orders from the remaining optios and centurions. The Britons throw themselves at us. They bear spear, blade, even teeth and nails at us; barbarians – the rumours are true. It is not just men, but women too; thousands of them encircling us on this hilltop, cutting down our legion with an unending hatred.

  ‘Fight for the empire!’ yells Legatus Thadian. He is leading from among the lines as a commander should. ‘Fight for the legion! Fight for your brothers!’

  I take up the cry, ‘Fight for your brothers!’ The men around me roar back in encouragement. Barely two hundred of us still draw breath, but each and every Roman will fight to the last.

  I stand on the blood-soaked ground. I am sixteen years of age, two of those years spent at war. The dead are all around me; crazed Britons and our honoured fallen. We marched north into Caledonia numbering close to four thousand; support had been pledged by dozens of the tribes on route. Almost all of them have turned on us; tens of thousands storming our lines since dawn. The sun is now beginning to set and the dark will bring more slaughter.

  Our wounded crawl behind us. Those who can still stand, fight. If they don’t, they will die. One man, blinded in action, kneels, praying to the gods for salvation. His prayers are silenced by arrows.

  One brute, taller than all others, thunders his blood-coated axe into my shield, screaming an ungodly battle-cry. I hammer the shield into him, stabbing my gladius deep into his chest with swift, controlled thrusts. Another blade swipes down from the man at my left, tearing through flesh and silencing the crazed Briton. But he is replaced by two others, eager for our blood.

  ‘Close shields!’ I yell.

  The men fall in beside me, our shields interlocking before spears, clubs, and all manner of weapons pound against them. Amongst the agony and terror, I hear a cry of pain above all the others. Antonius Thadian, our legatus, staggers back and falls to the ground, weapon lost as his hands clutch the wound just below his neck. It pulses with crimson blood.

  ‘Close shields!’ I yell, stepping out of the line. My men obey, and I hurry to our commander.

  ‘Marcus,’ he says as I kneel at his side. Blood dribbles from his lips. His face is pale. ‘My boy, has aid arrived yet?’

  ‘No, Legatus. No sign of the promised reinforcements,’ I inform him.

  Our legion stands alone, surrounded by enemies, facing oblivion.

  ‘Betrayed by our own,’ he curses. ‘Marcus, this is my fault. It is my pride that led us to this! The Britons cannot be ruled! Fight to the death! Don’t surrender! They’ll do God knows what to our men if they are captured. Fight!’

  I see his eyes wander, struggling to find something.

  ‘The Eagle!’ His voice is barely more than a whisper now. ‘My boy, don’t let me die with it fallen!’

  I find the standard not far behind us, its bearer impaled by two spears through the chest and an arrow in an eye. Another body has fallen on top of him, but I drag the standard clear. The bronze, outstretched wings of the Eagle are coated in the blood of the dead. I force it into the hands of my commander, the Eagle rising above him.

  ‘One last time,’ our legatus says as the dimming sunlight strikes the bronze. Tears run from his eyes – not for his own impending death, but for the death of his men.

  The remaining line begins to buckle; Britons pour through any gap they can. I cut two down before they can reach us. They are thundering towards the shining Eagle, our standard, the most prized of trophies.

  ‘Fight for your legatus!’ I command. The men roar back ferociously as Thadian draws his final breath.

  From the mass of fiends, one rises to face me. The severed heads of Roman soldiers hang over his shoulders, and their blood coats his face. He is clearly a chieftain of his people. He towers over me, spear and club in hands. I turn, thrusting the tip of my gladius towards his stomach, but I meet only air.

  He laughs manically, slamming his club down on my arm. My grip on my blade fails just as he stabs his spear towards me. Swinging my shield round, I smash it across his face, causing teeth to fly free. For a brief moment, the brute is stunned. It’s all I need. I charge the fiend, drawing my dagger and forcing him to the ground. He lashes out; his fists strike my head, casting stars before my eyes and causing ble
eding lips and nose. I stab my dagger down, the blade pushing through his flesh until he no longer moves.

  I stagger to my feet, dazed and spitting blood, but managing to recover my shield and gladius – always the soldier. The lines are breaking; they’ll be overrun at any moment. As five of our foe charge me, I know my end is coming. The afterlife is waiting for me.

  ‘Goodbye, Lucilla,’ I whisper to my young wife, half the world away, readying myself for a final stand.

  ‘FOR ROME!’ Thadian screams with his last breath.

  Everything is engulfed in light and flame. Momentarily, I am blinded, but when my sight returns, I swear I see Thadian standing at my side again, along with thousands of my fallen brothers. They charge as one.

  7

  ADAM—Loch Lomond, Scotland

  I emerge from the waterfall, shaking myself like a dog in a vain effort to dry myself. My flame torch is extinguished, soaked like the rest of me, so I discard it. Fortunately, someone from the past had thought this through, and dry torches are handily positioned on the wall beside me – now I just have to hope my matches are dry enough. The box is a write off, but the matches are dry enough that one quick strike against the wall and they sputter into life.

  Once illuminated, I see the rounded chamber houses, only one solitary casket at its centre. The name Legatus Antonius Thadian is chiselled into its stone above Legio IX Hispana. The chamber was for their commander; the highest place of honour given to the man the soldiers followed into battle. Beneath the inscribed name of the legatus are his helmet and sword, still in its ornate red and gold sheath. Around the casket are piles of weapons and trophies. They are unlike the Roman artefacts; these are more barbaric and archaic – they belong to the Britons. Staring at the IX that marks this grave just like all the others, a trigger in my memory goes off.

  The disappearing legion. The Ninth Legion famed for their battles in the north, and then – its complete disappearance.

  Nothing had been heard of them since; no remains found, no trace. It was as if they were nothing but a legend – until now. Now I am standing in the burial chambers of its men and commander, undisturbed for hundreds of years until my brother found it.

  Carved into the casket is the inscription LXXVIII again, the number seventy-six. It’s the year the legatus marched them north, 76 AD. It’s the year the legion fought its final battle. It’s the year that the legatus and his soldiers were entombed within these caverns, and became immortalised in myth.

  ‘I can’t believe it, Matt,’ I say to myself in amazement, unable to contain my smile. ‘You found it. You found the lost legion.’

  There are no more doors or passages. This chamber for the legion’s legatus is the end of the tomb. Chiselled into the rock walls, I notice words for the first time. They are places. Eboracum: York. Camulodunum: Colchester, and many, many more. To the son of a history teacher, this kind of knowledge is the equivalent of knowing how to tie your shoelaces, or button your coat. And to be fair, the Roman invasion had always interested me. Something about it had captured most of my childhood imagination – war, battle, death, and destruction is how you get young boys to remember things. These place names are where the legion was victorious; a testament to their heroism, remembered for all eternity.

  There are more words, more inscriptions, but most I can’t translate. One I do recognise though. TANTUM DIGNOS, the same as at the tomb’s entrance under the waterfall. I take out my mobile and use the camera to photograph as much as I can; the walls, the casket, everything.

  I look for signs and my heart leaps at what I find. I’ve been blinded by the discovery of the tomb, but now all I can see are the scattered flares, the claw marks, and the blood-stained stone at my feet.

  A roar echoes through the caverns, making adrenalin crash through my system.

  ‘It can’t be,’ I whisper. ‘The monster of the loch?’ Fear roots me to the spot. The roar grows louder as it nears, until I can hear claws on rock and the waterfall erupts before me. The beast emerges from the water, roaring. Red demonic eyes scan the room, searching for its prey. It’s the largest wolf I have ever seen. It roars its giant mouth at me again. I reach for the legatus’s sword, drawing the gladius from its sheath; it’s my only protection. The blade still shines with sharpness even after all this time.

  The wolf doesn’t move; it’s waiting in front of the waterfall, blocking my escape. All at once, the waters erupt and two men emerge. They are carrying the latest climbing equipment, their harnesses still tied about them, and their flashlights attached to the shoulders of their packs. The wolf doesn’t stir at their appearance, looking only at me with those demonic red eyes.

  ‘Wow, that’ll wake you up!’ The shorter of the two laughs loudly in a broad Australian accent as he wipes water from the biker goggles over his eyes. Seeing me, his smile grows. ‘I told you there was someone down here. Pay up, bro.’

  ‘Fine,’ the other man says, pulling out a ten dollar note from his pocket and waving it in front of his partner with a heavily scarred arm. Throughout this transaction, the towering brute’s eyes never leave me. ‘What’s he doing all the way down here? Who are you?’

  ‘Just a local lad,’ I say in my best, but terrible Scottish accent, hoping they won’t know a true accent from these parts. ‘Thought I’d go for a wee bit of a wander…’

  ‘And you ended up down here?’ the big guy laughs, his own accent unmistakeably American. ‘That’s one helluva wander, don’t you think, Leon?’

  ‘Unbelievable,’ the shorter one – who I’ve now clocked as Leon – says. He is eyeing me suspiciously.

  ‘Yeah, I guess,’ I hurriedly reply, lowering the blade in my hands as I try to cover for myself. ‘I saw all the crews and equipment coming over here and had to have a look.’

  ‘And see what you can steal more like,’ the American snarks.

  ‘A guy’s got to live…’ I begin to say but it’s hard to keep up the act when a wolf is growling at you. It takes a step towards me, his red eyes glowing with evil.

  ‘Don’t worry about him,’ Leon mockingly reassures me before the beast howls madly.

  ‘He can tell when something’s wrong,’ Bishop says. ‘Like when a punk is somewhere they shouldn’t be, or when they’re hiding something. Leon, I think he’s lying to us.’

  The wolf takes another step closer. My arm raises the gladius instinctively.

  ‘My bro Bishop here thinks you’re lying to us. Are you lying?’ Leon asks.

  ‘What does it matter to you what I’m doing?’ I ask, dropping the accent entirely. ‘And more to the point, what are you both doing here? What’s with the beast?’

  ‘We’re the ones asking questions.’ Leon’s grin grows across his lips. His eyes are nearly as crazed as the wolf’s. ‘I’ve got to say, it’s impressive. We’re seasoned climbers. Everest, Kilimanjaro, Aconcagua, you name it, we’ve conquered it. Spelunking pros too. That’s cave exploring to you. I know aces who couldn’t get down here, and that’s before you get to the old traps the Romans set up. Yet you got past it all, with hardly any equipment. How?’

  ‘Luck,’ I simply say, giving nothing away. They both fix me with hard stares, waiting for me to elaborate but I will say no more.

  ‘We’ve been down here a few times,’ Leon says as the big American continues to try and psych me out.

  ‘You stole Mike’s boat,’ I accuse them without thinking. ‘You’re nothing but low-life grave robbers!’

  ‘Yep, no point in denying it, although less of the low-life, thanks.’ Leon smirks. ‘Anything for a big fat cheque. Quite the find this place, isn’t it?’

  ‘The world should know about this,’ I say.

  ‘The mystery of the Roman Ninth and its disappearance solved,’ he agrees. He is prowling around the casket, closing in on me. ‘You’re right, it should be known to the world, but not yet. Something’s missing. Something that should be with every legion.’

  ‘Something very important to us,’ Bishop adds, taking a s
tep closer, crushing a flare beneath his boots.

  ‘What?’ I ask, backing away so Leon can’t circle behind me. ‘What are you after?’

  ‘You see, I don’t think you simply found your way down here. No one could simply end up down here by luck. I think you’re part of that team. I think you’re something to do with the guy we found the first time we came down here.’

  Bishop reaches into his pockets and draws a baseball cap, which he pulls onto his head. The cap is frayed, a hole torn through its side near the top. It is dark blue with a crimson stripe. I have seen that cap a hundred times before.

  ‘Where’s Matt? What have you done with my brother?’ I yell at them, threatening him with the blade.

  ‘So you’re here for him!’ Leon laughs, hands raised in mock surrender. ‘And here we were thinking you were searching for the Eagle.’

  I think of Matt’s journal inside my rucksack, the eagle emblem on the page with the other encrypted messages. My expression betrays me.

  ‘You know something!’ Leon laughs.

  Bishop leaps forward in an act of aggression. ‘Your brother told you something. Left something with you? What is it? What do you know?’

  ‘No messing about, punk. Give us what Matt left you. Tell us where the Eagle is!’

  In the dim light of the torches and flashlights I see the barrel of a handgun in Bishop’s hands.

  ‘Where is my brother?’ I yell back at him, trying my hardest to ignore the weapon.

  ‘He’s with us,’ Bishop says with a grin of uncontained glee.

  ‘He’s back at our camp,’ Bishop states, petting the wolf as it continues to growl. ‘And no, it’s not here on this island or anywhere nearby.’