Marius' Mules IX: Pax Gallica

by Turney, S. J. A.

  With that , the Remi noble leapt several paces toward Ategnio without warning, bringing his sword up and driving it in from the side. Ategnio moved to block, but his sword thudded against a s upporting timber, too cumbersome to bring up so close to his enemy. Galronus’ blade bit into Ategnio’s shoulder . The blow was too restricted to be truly damaging, but it cut through the layers of leather and sent chain links scattering across the boards, drawing blood and making the Arenosio a little less confident of an easy victory . Ategnio backed away a few paces, eyes narrowed as he reached up with his free hand and felt his shoulder, pulling the hand away and seeing the red smear across it.

  ‘No man has wounded me in years.’

  ‘Get used to it. It’s about to happen a lot.’

  Galronus stepped a pace back, allowing space to open between them. He needed to think and to work out a way to gain further advantage. Ategnio would not let him close ranks the same way twice, and in every other way he was at a disadvantage. Even as he listened to himself taunt the mountain warrior, the Remi shook his head at how much Roman behaviour was beginning to seep into his being. That kind o f talk was not endemic of Remi warfare .

  ‘Come on, little man. Let’s end this.’

  Ategnio took a step forward and lunged again, the only true manoeuver he could attempt which was in no way disadvantaged by the closeness of the chiselled cliff or the wooden posts. Galronus saw it coming and swept down and to the side with his new Roman blade, only to have his opponent change direction mid-lunge, his arm twisting like a snake in long grass, the blade, which had been coming left, now stabbing to the right. For the second time in as many flurries Galronus was grateful he bore the nifty Roman short blade and not his own comfortable Remi sword. Where his own would have been simply too unwieldy, he managed to twist the shorter Roman blade back across and catch the clever thrust, turning it just far enough aside that it tore away a piece of tunic but did no damage.

  The Arenosio warrior snarled as he came on. Having recognised in an instant that his blow had failed and that in withdrawing he would leave himself open to the neater, shorter blade , he barrelled into Galronus and the two fell back against the gantry, which shook alarmingly with the force of the fall , chalky dust billowing out in clouds from where the wooden walkway touched the rock face.

  Galronus gasped in pain as the big warrior landed on top of him. Struggling with his good arm, tears of pain pricking his eyes as Ategnio’s weight ground against his broken bone, the Remi gradually succeeded in shifting the man enough to breathe . The Arenosio rose to his knees, towering over Galronus with sword still in hand , and lifted it. There was no room while kneeling to turn the blade down to face his prey, so he slammed the pommel down at Galronus’ face. The Remi, scrabbling to pull his sword closer, saw the blow coming in the blink of an eye and twisted his head desperately. The pommel smacked into the timber, raising another cloud of dust , but Ategnio was not done. Snarling, the warrior pulled back the sword and smashed the heavy bronze pommel down again and again, Galronus thrashing around beneath, desperately avoiding having his eyes burst open or his brains smeared across the wood with each blow. Finally, howling in frustration, Ategnio changed tactic and with his last strike, shifted his blow .

  The pommel of the sword hit Galronus at the meeting point of his collarbones and something gave a loud crack, sending waves of pain through him. For a long moment he was blind with agony, struggling to breath or make any sense through the cloud of pain, and then his eyes opened to impending death. While he had been incapacitated with pain, Ategnio had taken the opportunity to rise to his feet once more, cursing and growling, and had lifted his sword with both hands wrapped around the hilt, ready to plunge it down through his prey. Galronus panicked. Instinct alone made him shuffle backwards, away from the sword point, but closer and closer to the deadly drop. His whole body was in agony, his upper torso and arm afire with pain, but certain responses are born in the bone and require no conscious decision. He inched back again and again, a nd each tiny move brought forth an angry snarl from Ategnio as he shuffled his feet forward, trying to position his sword point over the chest of the shuffling, writhing body beneath him.

  Shuffle, shuffle.

  Left foot, right foot.

  Angry shout .

  Shuffle, shuffle.

  Left foot, right foot.

  Cursing in Aquitanian.

  Shuffle.

  Left foot…

  Galronus moved with a grace and speed born of desperation, his hand snapping upwards, grasping the Arenosio warrior by the belt and heaving forward while the man’s right foot was still slightly raised . Unbalanced, Ategnio gave a cry of shock and stumbled, tumbling forward. He had room to fall safely, but as his surprised gait faltered and his feet tottered, Galronus let go of the belt and kicked out at his enemy’s leading knee.

  Ategnio staggered and fell, wavering forward , and the agonised Remi rolled into his path, tripping him just as he almost righted himself. The big sword clattered useless against the timbers as the Arenosio warrior, shocked and recognising a disastr ous end upon him, fell forward out into space above the quarry floor.

  Galronus watched him go, twisting in an attempt to keep out of the way. He was damaged and weak . Too weak to stop what happened next. With a snarl of defiant disbelief, Ategnio went over the lip of the gantry, but even i n death he was deadly. His hand lashed out as he fell and grasped Galronus by the belt almost in mimicry of his own downfall , dragging the Remi backwards across the timber s and out into the air.

  Galronus shouted something as he fell, but he knew not what it was.

  * * *

  Fronto tried to ignore the fact that the wooden ladder was vibrating and jumping with every move of Galronus and Ategnio above. The whole edifice seemed alarmingly fragile from the way it moved and the regular clouds of white dust that rose into the morning air . The Roman slid the last few steps and landed on the wooden walkway lightly. He had almost no strength left. He had almost died so many times over the years. From that first close call against the Ilergetes alongside the man before him now, to the many brutal fights in Gaul and Rome, he had almost met a cruel end so many times. And yet he had never felt so close to death as now. He was near to bleeding out and losing the last of his energy. And then, unless Galronus somehow managed to beat Ategnio, which even the Remi deemed unlikely, Fronto would die anyway, unable to reach medical attention.

  But he had made a deal with Caesar. Whatever happened to him or Galronus, he had succeeded on his side of the contract, settling Aquitania. And now Caesar would see Lucilia and the boys back to safety and security once he sorted out the problem with Pompey and the senate. I t would be awful not to see the three of them any more, but it was far more important to stop Verginius from embarking on his next mission. Because Fronto had little doubt that if his old friend wal ked away from this quarry alive then Caesar would die, and consequently the Falerii would fade from history.

  ‘Fronto, put down your sword. You can hardly lift it.’

  Verginius stood at the ladder down to the next gantry. He was unarmed and unarmoured, wearing get-up that was much more Aquitanii than Roman. No matter what he wore, though, in Fronto’s mind he bore a military tunic and was a decade younger, missing that disfiguring smile.

  ‘I can’t let you do it, ’ he said.

  ‘You can’ t stop me, Marcus. Look at you. You’r e a dead man still on his feet.’

  Slowly, deliberately, Fronto lifted the blade so that the point hovered in front of Verginius’ eyes, wavering and dancing, barely held in place.

  ‘I don’t want to hurt you, Gnaeus. I really don’t.’

  ‘Do you know,’ his old friend noted conversationally, ‘that that’s the first time you’ve used my name since all this began. Verginius this… Verginius that… You won’t hurt me, Marcus. We’re brothers. We always were. My own true brothers paled beside you. You won’t kill me any more than I would kill you.’

  ‘You’re wrong.’
>
  Fronto stepped forward with his sword point close to Verginius’ neck. ‘I loved Gnaeus Verginius Tricostus Caelimontanus like a brother, but you keep telling me that he’s dead. Well I’m starting to believe you. The Gnaeus I remember wouldn’t put petty revenge above his friend’s well being .’

  ‘ Petty revenge?’ Verginius looked genuinely astonished.

  ‘You know what I mean. You told me this is a place of healing and that Janus is watching. Endings and beginnings, right?’

  ‘Correct.’

  ‘Then I’m giving you a choice, Gnaeus. End your vengeance. I will take whatever punishment you think you’re due for breaking a vow on to my own shoulders. I will stand by you. But take a new vow. To me. To your old friend. Give me your oath you’ll not seek Caesar’s demise and we’ll all walk out of this place alive and well.’

  There were thuds and a shout of pain from the gantry above and the whole edifice shook again, dust rising in puffs from the cliff.

  ‘Two good men, neither of them Roman, are busy killing each other up there, and t hey’re both doing it out of loyalty to us . Can we not manage that level of trust with one another after all this time?’

  Verginius sighed and his hand dipped to his belt, drawing a pugio from behind his back.

  ‘I had no intention of using this. It’s the one you gave me all those years ago. Do you remember?’

  Fronto blinked. ‘In this quarry.’

  ‘In this quarry. I lost mine during the exercises and you knew that the quartermaster didn’t like me. You gave me yours so that I wouldn’t have to go begging for a new one. And you went and got a replacement yourself.’

  ‘Actually, I bought the new one in the forum,’ Fronto snorted. ‘From a dubious Greek with a lisp and a gammy leg . It fell apart a year later, after the battle. I’d never even drawn blood with it.’

  ‘My vow is immutable, Marcus. I cannot change any more than you can. I destroyed tribes and levelled towns, executed innocents and murdered Romans just to get Caesar into my lair , and I failed. You cannot imagine that I would stop now, even if it m eans pitting myself against you? Go home. Save yourself while you still have enough blood to walk .’

  Another thud above brought shaking and clouds of dust.

  ‘Then we’re stuck,’ Fronto said flatly. ‘I won’t let you go after Caesar and you won’t abandon your plan.’

  ‘It would seem so.’

  Fronto struck, wi thout warning, if also without power. His jabbing blade was knocked aside by the dagger in Verginius’ hand, but only just, and only with effort.

  Fronto staggered and recovered , trying to raise his sword. He was dying, and quickly. He had hardly the strength to grip the sword, let alone lunge with it . Finally, with much trouble, the sword point came up again.

  ‘Marcus…’

  Fronto lunged, staggering and almost collapsing to his knees. Verginius knocked the blade aside just in time once more, stepping back out of reach. ‘Give it up, Marcus. You can’t win. Whatever happens here, neither of us wins.’

  Fronto’s next lunge barely reached as high as Verginius’ thigh, but as the man with the dead smile twisted to the side , using his dagger to block the blow, his foot slipped on a large stone shard and skittered from under him. Fronto watched him step back into the open air, eyes wide, disbelieving. The former legate felt unaccustomed panic thrill through him and tried to lurch forward to grab his old friend, but his strength had gone. Weak as a new-born lamb , he fell to the timbers, his face at the edge, and watched Verginius plummet through the air, landing with an unpleasant thud on the dusty rock so far below.

  Fronto passed out.

  He was in the blessed blackness for mere heartbeats – l ong enough to experience the very beginning of a dream and no more. Verginius lay dead, shattered upon the rocks of his dreamscape, but a voice was still calling from his dead mouth, reaching up into the air.

  Fronto….

  Fronto…

  FRONTO …

  For the love of Taranis, Fronto, wake up!

  He woke with a frown. He was lying in a pool of his own blood and felt weaker than he believed a human could feel. Something was urgent, and he couldn’t think what.

  ‘Fronto…’

  Taranis?

  Fronto rolled with some pain and effort onto his back, the whole gantry shuddering with the movement. His befuddled eyes took a moment to make out the shape at the far end of the gantry. An elongated shape. No… two shapes…

  He was up a moment later and staggering forward, sword still in hand . Galronus was hanging precariously from the gantry above at the far end, one hand gripping for dear life, scrabbling and re-gripping periodically. His broken arm was hanging limp by his side. Ategnio of the Arenosio hung from Galronus’ belt, swinging in t he open air, trying to grab hold of the gantry below upon which Fronto stood.

  ‘Arsehole,’ Fronto snapped, and staggered across the timbers, lifting his sword. Somehow there seemed to be a reservoir of energy in him that had not been there when fighting his old friend. But the sight of Galronus about to di e purely because of Ategnio hanging from him was something d ifferent. As Fronto approached he twisted, bringing his gladius back and to the side. Some soldiers – most in point of fact – kept the point sharp for stabbing and the edge just enough to break a bone. Those like Fronto , who had experienced the true chaos of battle, kept a sharp edge too, since you never knew what you might be required to do in order to survive.

  With every ounce of strength he could muster, Fronto swung the razor-edged blade, hacking through Ategnio’s arm below the elbow. The warrior fell without a shout, plummeting and landing with a thud, almost mirroring his master at the far side.

  ‘Help me, you pillock,’ grunted Galronus, his fingers slipping.

  With some difficulty, Fronto used one arm to anchor himself to the gantry and grasped Galronus around the waist with the other. There was a heart-stopping moment as the Remi let go of the timbers above and both men almost followed Ategnio out into the air, but the two men hit the timbers together and lay there, heaving in deep breaths.

  ‘Verginius?’

  ‘Dead,’ Fronto replied quietly.

  ‘Then we have to get you to a medicus before you follow him into the mist.’

  ‘Soon. First I have to visit the body.’ He gestured to indicate where Verginius had fallen and Galronus rolled his eyes. ‘He’s dead. Leave him, or you might join him.’

  ‘Get the horses. Bring them down the slope and into the bottom of the qua rry. Meet me at the bottom of the ladders. Then we’ll go. Besides, I have the strength to slide down from here, but I’ll not make it back up two ladders.’

  Galronus gave him a calculating look but, apparently coming down on the side of concord , he nodded and started slowly, with barks of pain, climbing the ladders once more. Fronto waited only a moment, and then started to part-climb, part-slide, part-fall down the successive ladders, slowly closing on the ground level of the q uarry. After what seemed like an age, he staggered out across the rock and to the broken form on the rock, close by one of the water tanks.

  Healing water? He remembered what his friend had said about the native temple and momentarily staggered over to the tank, gulping down handfuls of the cold, clear liquid, then scrubbing his face with it before rising and approaching the body. Verginius lay broken in a pool of his own blood that had collected and hardened with the dust of the quarry . As Fronto, a tear emerging in the corner of his eye, closed on the corpse , he was astounded to see Verginius blink.

  ‘Gnaeus?’

  ‘Marcus? Gods but this hurts more than I expected.’

  ‘You’re not dead!’

  ‘It’s a matter of moments, Marcus. That’s all.’

  ‘If I could turn back time. Stop this…’

  ‘I know. Me too, Marcus. But one of us had to fail. In a way I’m glad it’s me. Caesar is a cancer, but I’d hate to sacrifice you just to remove him. I will be one of the lemures, now, you realise? I will never ge
t to rest, for I left a vow unfulfilled.’

  Fronto shook his head. ‘I have coins. I’ll put one in your mouth. Charon will take you across, I know. The gods are not that cruel.’

  ‘Oh they are, Marcus. You have no idea. It has been good to see you again, though. But before I die, I charge you with something, Marcus. I want your promise, and then I want you to kill me. I could linger an hour or more in agony. Put a sword through me and make it quick, as a friend should.’

  ‘A vow?’

  ‘You know what it is,’ Verginius said, quietly.

  ‘What?’

  ‘Caesar has to die. The boatman will not take me with a n unfulfilled oath . Take on my vow and let me pass in peace. I’ve done ten years as a ghost. Don’t make me go on longer.’

  Fronto shook his head. ‘Gnaeus, I can’t.’

  ‘You can . You have years ahead of you, Marcus. You can watch Caesar help your family rise again while he begins to ruin Rome . You have that luxury. But one day, when you realise I’m right and your own deal with the proconsul is long forgotten, you must fulfil my vow so that we can both rest. You must. You must !’

  * * *

  Galronus walked the horses across the dusty gravel, his eyes locked on his friend ah ead who was leaning over the body , as if listening . Then, sharply, the Roman rose to his knees, fiddled at his belt and then did something with the body’s mouth. Then, with care, he raised his gladius, placed the point above the heart, and put all his weight on it, driving it through the body and into the stone. Galronus waited respectfully some distance away with the horses until Fronto stood, yanking out the sword. Finally the deathly-pale figure registered Galronus’ presence and staggered over, grasping the horse and pulling himself up into the saddle with some difficulty.

  ‘You know any medici in Tarraco?’ Galronus said quietly.

  ‘I’ll be dead before Tarraco. It’s five miles away. But the villa is only about three miles and Arius is a good man with needle and honey. He can save me if we’re quick.’

  Galronus nodded as the pair started to ride toward the quarry entrance and the coast beyond.