Beasts From the Dark

by Beasts from the Dark (retail) (epub)

  He stopped and took a breath. ‘I also gave him the rites.’

  ‘Rites? What rites?’

  ‘Is it far, this hole you dug?’ interrupted Dog, and Lentulus hesitated, then sagged a little.

  ‘The Maximus.’

  They stared at him, disbelieving. ‘You dug a hole in the Circus?’ Kag demanded and Lentulus fluttered one dismissive hand.

  ‘No, no – I will say no more on it. I will take you, all the same.’

  * * *

  Drust was grit-eyed and felt sheened with a layer of scum and sweat which even a clean tunic could not alleviate. It did not help that the day was overcast and sultry; the crowds thronging the street kept looking at the sky and, closer to the Circus, muttering about rain.

  There was no more practice, just the ants’ nest boil of people sorting out the Maximus for race day – which was in two days, Drust realised. Slaves polished the dolphins along the spina, fresh white sand was being spread and raked, and the public was only allowed into the shops under the stands. They felt prickled in a familiar way, which wasn’t helped by Kag muttering about leaving tracks and being followed. Twice he swore he had seen the same figures dogging them through the streets. It was likely, Drust thought; the Praetorian would be watching, hoping to be led to what they sought. Which is exactly what we are doing.

  Lentulus led the way to the right, where the dim of the Circus undercroft was split by bright lanterns so no one would miss the wares. Drust knew there were at least sixty shops here, selling everything from sausages to souvenirs – and they were the acceptable ones. In little niches and shadowed holes you could find the unofficial ones, selling sex and drugs. It seemed the perfect place to lose any trackers.

  They went past a shoe seller, his wares on wooden benches and his place marked with curtains hung between columns. Next to him a slave sold bread for his baker master, and next to him a lantern bobbed on a stalk over a table thick with vegetables; somewhere meat was cooking.

  They gave up trying to talk; the noise was loud, relentless and echoed. Lentulus pushed past some cages containing a stock of chickens and hares. On the counter were two bowls of fruit – figs, Drust saw – and a barrel containing cooked milk-fed snails for the customers to snack on while they chose livestock from a fat woman with a colony of chins.

  Kag laughed aloud at the sight of two monkeys chained to the stall which sold boiled chickpeas, eggs and onions, their antics designed to attract a crowd to these race-day snacks. The monkey owner displayed his eggs and onions floating in glass bowls of water so that they looked larger than their actual size. He had a set of scales, universally known as ‘ambushers’ – as in ‘lying in weight’.

  Suddenly Lentulus stopped and everyone had to dance to avoid walking up someone else’s heels. A matron gave a pungent curse, which Dog answered by dropping his cloak hood just long enough to make her squeal and rush off; his face now had the new attraction of a roughly stitched scar.

  ‘Here,’ Lentulus said, and they stared and made faces at a reek they could taste and which they knew well enough – the dye of murex, those tiny shellfish that cost an Emperor’s ransom. The shop sold cloth for the upper end of the market – the murex made the purple of a senator’s broad stripe, the narrower one of an equestrian – and the man standing in it, wearing a striped desert robe and a quiet smile, was a mavro from Carthago.

  ‘Lentulus,’ the man said and bowed.

  ‘Philosir,’ Lentulus replied, then added: ‘These men are friends. They are with me.’

  ‘Are they initiates?’

  ‘All men strive for the Light,’ Lentulus replied, and Philosir frowned and shook his head.

  ‘The rule is clear—’

  ‘Am I pater or not?’

  Philosir paused, then inclined his head in agreement; Lentulus pushed past him into the back of the shop, through the hangings of cloth in all colours. Drust and the others followed after him and Kag clicked his fingers derisively.

  ‘He’s the pater, Phoenician,’ he said, though he had no idea what that meant.

  There was a door, solid and heavy and yet opened with a simple push; they followed Lentulus inside, then down some dimly lit steps. They stopped and stared, up and around.

  It was a domed undercroft, lit with sputtering torches and seemingly empty of everything save echoes. For a moment Drust felt he was back in the Dark, the columned pillars on either side like the fat trees of some sacred glade.

  Then he saw the panel at the far end, lit by two lanterns. A figure in a Phrygian cap was kneeling on an exhausted bull, holding it by the nostrils with his left hand and stabbing it with his right. As he did so, he looked over his shoulder towards the figure of Sol, while a dog and a snake reached up towards the blood and a scorpion seized the bull’s genitals.

  ‘Mithras,’ Kag breathed.

  ‘Unconquered Sun,’ Dog echoed, and Drust remembered the rayed amulet he wore. Dog had been a Sun worshipper since the start and had, though he would not admit it now, once revered Elagabalus, the boy they’d rescued from the far north and who became as infamous as Nero when he was made Emperor.

  Lentulus moved forward, stopped and bowed his head, muttering to the panel. Then he moved in behind the massive slab of it and came out with a leather bucket-shaped scroll case.

  Drust and the others stared; it had just been sitting there, practically in plain sight. He could not help but say it, wincing at the boom of his voice in that cavernous bell of a temple.

  ‘Its safety was assured,’ Lentulus said and indicated the mosaic squares on the floor, each one with a different symbol. Kag got to it first and gave a short grunt of awed realisation.

  ‘You are pater – the Father,’ he said, and Lentulus nodded sombrely. They all knew at once what that meant – they had seen and heard the Mithras worshippers out east, almost all of them legionaries of the Army, the most devout working their way up the grades from the lowly Raven to the Soldier, and up the rest of the rankings to the Father.

  Drust looked at Lentulus in a new light – here was what passed for a high priest of Mithras, and now he knew why he had been so favoured by Antyllus.

  ‘What rank was the general?’ he asked, and Lentulus paused in the act of handing over the case.

  ‘He had received the mysteries of the Lion,’ he said. ‘One day he would have made a Father himself.’

  ‘And you were his guide and teacher,’ Kag finished. There was a muffled shout from behind the entrance door which made them all turn. Lentulus bowed his head.

  ‘I have not been back here since the day I left the case,’ he said. ‘Those hunting me would come here and find only the god – but they have followed us today since we began walking.’

  ‘Then we had better shift out of here,’ Quintus growled.

  ‘My work here is done,’ Lentulus said. ‘Go behind the panel and you will find a door in the floor. It is heavy, but once opened you will access the old tunnels that run from the Maximus to the Flavian. I will close it behind you – but it will be no barrier to the determined, mark me.’

  There was a loud splintering crash. ‘What about you?’ Drust asked and Lentulus smiled. There was no longer the nervous over-the-shoulder tic, no shaking. No fear. It was a startling enough change to make everyone stare.

  Lentulus knelt. ‘My duty is fulfilled. I am here, where Mithras is being born from the rock, with the water miracle, the hunting and riding of the bull, where he is meeting Sol who kneels to him, where he is ascending to the heavens in a chariot.’

  He looked at Drust and smiled. ‘If these soldiers are crass enough to harm a pater in the temple of Mithras, sully the holy of holies and bring down the wrath of the god on them, then I am well placed to beg a lift on the chariot of the god.’

  ‘Fortuna smile on you,’ Kag muttered as they hurried off, chased by the sound of the door breaking.

  ‘Does he know these are probably all Germans of the Palace Hounds, who don’t give a fuck for Mithras?’ Ugo hissed as they strai
ned at the ring of the door. It came up surprisingly easily, revealing darkness and no clear way down, even when Drust held a torch over it.

  ‘Probably not,’ Kag growled back and thrust an unlit horn-panelled lantern at him. ‘Now get in that hole.’

  Ugo, scowling, sat on the lip, took the lantern and dropped himself into the dark. One by one the others followed, and when Drust dropped in last, he heard the grate of stone, the dull thump of it closing and a last breath of voice that said, ‘The Lord of Light go with you.’

  They turned slowly in a circle of torchlight where a faint breeze set shadows to dance on the brick walls and the curved roof of a barrel-shaped tunnel. It stretched in both directions and the flickering flame only made the dark more sinister – four or five steps further on, the torch barely showed the outline of the roof above them.

  ‘Which way?’ Ugo demanded, and Drust looked up and around.

  ‘Away from here – if I have it right in my head, this way leads to the Flavian.’

  No one argued, but that was because none of them knew any better, so they moved steadily through the dark, pooled by the light of a single torch; and if anyone thought of the time they had crept through the corridors of a similarly black temple they did not want to summon up the memory aloud.

  Ugo did mention how this resembled the Dark when they came upon a section dappled with light from far above them, splintered through what appeared to be gratings on both sides. Below it, attached to the wall, was a solid-looking tank of lead. The light, coupled with the half-columns of pillars like giant trees, the shadows and the plants that seemed to have flourished, all made them nod and agree uneasily.

  ‘This is a piece of work,’ Dog muttered, trying not to waggle his jaw as he spoke, keeping the sentences short and terse.

  It had been built over a drain that leached rain off the streets and into the sewers and then down into Father Tiber. That had been ancient when all the workers came down here to carve out a roadstead, building a tunnel over the drain big enough to take four-wheelers with cages and the oxen to haul them.

  It had been built just after the Flavian was finished – a faded inscription confirmed it – when the Maximus was still used for combats and shows. Twenty years later, the Flavian dominated all of that and the Maximus concentrated on the races, for which it was purpose-built and better suited.

  ‘This place was left to moulder,’ Kag added when they had talked this back and forth a bit. ‘It hasn’t been used for a hundred years. Longer.’

  They prowled, looking at the shadows and the strange spidery growths of plants – from seeds spilled out of the grain and fodder and dung of all the exotic creatures that came down, Drust realised. Quintus confirmed it by pointing out shrubs they all knew from the deserts of the Africas.

  They saw a half of wheel, splintered and cobwebbed, crumbling next to a rusted cage which had been abandoned. Ugo peered cautiously at it.

  ‘Might be beasts down here.’

  It had occurred to them all, though no one wanted it said out loud. Drust thought it unlikely anything had survived and bred through generations. No tigers or bears, he said. Or river lizards.

  ‘So those are not the eyes of a hunting beast then,’ Ugo replied, and pointed back the way they had come. Everyone froze, seeing the red eyes Ugo had spotted. Then Drust gave a curse.

  ‘We have been too busy sightseeing,’ he growled, ‘and have forgotten what pursues us. Those are torches in the hands of enemies.’

  Dog drew out both of his swords and spat blood onto the dusty roadway. ‘Fight or run?’

  ‘Run, stupidus,’ Kag spat back and set off at a fast jog. With only the briefest of pauses, the rest followed him along the trackway until Kag suddenly gave a yelp and stopped, pointing.

  They all looked. A dog-sized rat skulked to one side, pausing only to turn and hiss at them, all red eyes and yellow incisors. Another followed it and another after that.

  ‘Gods above and below,’ Quintus said, wiping his mouth with the back of one hand. ‘Bad enough the two-legged kind, but this – do you see the size of them?’

  ‘Hard to miss,’ Kag offered wryly, ‘but they are all running as we are.’

  ‘Perhaps they don’t like Praetorians either. Sensible beasts…’

  Drust glanced around, seeing the wreck of a big wagon, the timbers all collapsed and the wheels broken. It looked like the bones of a giant beast – but it narrowed the walkway.

  ‘Here,’ he said, and the rest of them got it, turned and set themselves. Never run in the harena, Drust thought. You only arrive back where you started, too tired to fight.

  The torches danced closer, like fireflies. For a moment Drust felt his head swim, seeing what appeared to be a lake behind them, boiling up bubbles. He shook his head to clear the vision as the shadows materialised into figures, advancing steadily and falling into a wedge.

  They had tunics, hooded cloaks and the usual weapons you could hide so as not to cause comment on the streets of Rome. Knives and the gladius then, Drust thought. No better armed than us and we are masters in the craft.

  There were a dozen of them, perhaps more, and they were confident – they were Praetorian, after all, the last forging of the best of the Army – so they came in hard and fast, left arm up with a bundled cloak-end as shield, right arm drawn back for the thrust. They were veterans and trained in the way of the gladius, even if it had fallen out of favour.

  Drust slashed, saw the returning thrust, the left arm up, and he knew what the weakness was – they fought like they had their big shields. He ducked a shoulder so that the enemy point hissed past his ear, drove his own point through the man’s protective forearm, cloak padding and all. He saw him go open-mouthed and wide-eyed with shock and pain, then slammed his open palm into the man’s chest, sending him backwards into the one behind.

  Dog weaved and ducked, twin points flicking out; a man screamed and reeled away. Kag punched a man in the face, failed to move out of the way of another, and Drust saw the point of a gladius go in the fleshy muscle of his left arm and burst out the far side.

  Ugo saw it too and bulled his way to Kag’s side, slamming into the enemy with one massive shoulder; the man went sideways with a deep oofing sound, losing his grip on the gladius and leaving it waggling from Kag’s arm.

  Quintus completed the ruin with a slash across the man’s eyes and then thrust his torch into the tunic. His nearest mates pounced and beat out the flames, then suddenly they were standing panting, with the Praetorians a few steps back doing the same. Three of them were down and a fourth was half crouched, moaning and holding his face, smelling of char.

  ‘Give it up,’ one of them called out hoarsely, and Drust took this for the leader. He was about to tell the man to fuck off when he saw Quintus staring and frowning, followed his gaze and squinted.

  The boiling water was closer, popping little bubbles. He couldn’t understand it, but Dog, his face leaking blood, suddenly kicked out at something, then backed off a few steps and shook one arm furiously. A spider popped to the ground and then seemed to spring up, waist height. It did it again.

  ‘Run,’ Kag said through teeth gritted with pain. ‘Run like Dis Pater was chewing your arse.’

  They ran. The Praetorians saw it – and gave loud bellows of victory until their leader demanded they follow. It was too late.

  Drust heard the yells and then the screams of utter terror, remembered the dog-sized rats that had been scuttling in a panic, and he did not look back, just pumped his arms and legs and sprinted, careless of debris, careless of the dark, caring only for what was behind them.

  He followed Quintus’s torch until it stopped and they huddled in the pooled light, hands on thighs, retching and trying to breathe at the same time.

  ‘What the fuck?’ demanded Dog, and Kag, wincing as Ugo worked the gladius out of his arm, put them right.

  ‘Another legacy from this beast tunnel,’ he growled. ‘You remember them from the desert – the jumping spiders?
’

  Drust remembered them at once. Body the size of a denarius, long legs, and the ability to pop into the air if disturbed. They had scared everyone at least once – but Drust had only ever seen one or two.

  ‘Well, here they are the size of my palm,’ Dog muttered, worrying his scar with probing fingers. ‘And there are more than a few…’

  ‘Nothing here that eats them, not even those dog-rats,’ Ugo said, looking back.

  ‘They must hate the light, which starts them moving,’ Kag decided, using teeth and his good hand to bind up the wound in his arm. He worked the elbow a few times and frowned. ‘Our torch wasn’t much but all of the Praetorians’ woke them up. I would wager there are a few shops and insulae above here complaining about fucking big spiders… This arm will get stiffer in an hour.’

  ‘This is not a good place,’ Ugo muttered, glancing round uneasily.

  ‘You think?’ Dog countered viciously.

  ‘Keep moving,’ Drust ordered. ‘We will come up to the entrance to the Flavian soon.’

  ‘If it is an entrance,’ Quintus pointed out morosely. ‘They probably blocked it up.’

  ‘More cheer, that’s what we need – we should sell you for a fossor,’ Dog muttered, and Quintus slapped his hand away from his scar.

  ‘Stop grubbing in that – and stop talking or the scar will be as broad as your face. And we will need a fossor to get out of here.’

  It was a weak jest at best – fossor was the name for a clown in the farces, but it also meant ‘gravedigger’. They laughed all the same, making it another light in the darkness.

  We are like a stick in the hands of a child with a knife, Drust thought as they hurried off. Whittled less and less with every stroke and to no purpose.

  They came up to a place where the road seemed to cross a huge open area. The shadows prevented them seeing the extent of it, but they all felt as if they stood in a basilica; they tasted the musty air and the strange dust in it.