Varro held up his hand to indicate that she should stay by the fire and the two soldiers moved off into the darkness at a crouch. Salonius paused for a moment and looked into the darkness. Varro glanced at him and then used his free hand to motion around the back of the villa ruins. The young man nodded and they both moved off once again.
The terrain within the walls was rough and difficult, consisting of the rubble of collapsed or demolished ancillary buildings long overgrown with grass and weeds, all interspaced between hidden rabbit holes that lay in wait for unwary feet and thick brambles and thorns. Some care was required to pick a clear way through the ‘open’ ground.
Salonius stumbled among the rocks for a moment, almost losing his footing as he felt his ankle wrench, when Varro suddenly grasped his shoulder and hauled him to the ground where he landed painfully among ruined brickwork. The captain pointed ahead and Salonius raised his head to look over a fallen lintel. In the pale moonlight, two men were stepping slowly and deliberately among the tangle in their direction.
Salonius swallowed and held up two fingers. Varro nodded and made indicated that the third figure had likely taken the other direction and was moving around the back of the ruined mansion. All to their advantage, since it gave them even odds; better than even, given that their prey were not expecting them.
At a gesture from Varro, Salonius shuffled as quietly as possible down the mound of rubble, being sure to remain out of the enemy’s sight behind the jumbled stonework. The enemy were still around twenty yards away from them and all sounds of movement were somewhat disguised by the twittering of the bats and the shuffling of the ruin’s resident wildlife. At the base of the rubble heap, the young man looked up. They were now at the outer wall of the crumbled residence itself; the wall along which the two men were creeping and closing on them.
Here, the residence’s outer wall had collapsed in the centre, leaving a ‘v’ shaped breech. The room beyond had once been magnificent, a grand hall of some kind, colonnaded along both sides and with a decorated facade at the far end, with friezes and carvings above a pair of now long-tarnished bronze doors. The roof had fallen in many years ago and the moonlight playing among the columns of the colonnades created interesting patches of starkly lit faded glory among the stygian gloom.
Varro pointed up to the breech in the wall, back at his own chest, and nodded. Salonius’ eyes followed his finger up to the crumbling masonry and went wide. He returned his gaze to the captain, who grinned at him. He mouthed the word ‘seriously?’
Varro nodded and slipped over to the fallen wall, grasping the stonework and climbing with care and held breath. Salonius watched nervously as small flecks of plaster and showers of dust dropped to the grass. What the hell was he doing? Swallowing, he shrank back behind the protection of a huge piece of fallen lintel. The two men were getting tremendously close now and both he and Varro were aware that they had to dispose of these soldiers silently and quickly. Sighing gently, he drove his sword point-first into the grass.
He raised his eyes once more and saw Varro about twelve feet from the ground, leaning around the crumbled edge of the wall. He was levering a large, loose stone from the wall. As the stone came away in a small shower of mortar, he grinned in triumph and hefted the heavy block. Moments passed as the two men came ever closer and finally, after what seemed like an age passing in slow motion, they drew level. Salonius glanced up once more and, at a nod from Varro, tensed and leapt.
The captain released his grip on the heavy stone he held and with deadly accuracy, the missile plummeted around ten feet and hit the front most soldier square on the top of the head. There was a quiet but audibly sickening noise and the man’s skull exploded under the weight, shattering his spine in multiple locations and killing him instantly. The remains of the body collapsed to the ground with a gently thud.
His companion did not have time to register the impact, let alone scream. As the stone his the first man, so, from his perch among the rocks, Salonius landed on the back of the second man, his left hand going round the man’s head and muffling any sounds he might try to issue. The hand was, in the event, unnecessary, as the impact drove the man to the floor and knocked all breath and sense from him. Before the soldier could recover, he placed his right hand on the back of the man’s skull and repositioned his left on the jaw. Heaving with all the tremendous strength in his powerful arms, he twisted the man’s head through one hundred and eighty degrees with a nasty cracking noise, staring in disgust at the strange sight of the glazed eyes now settled on him accusingly. He dropped the body and, retrieving his blade, stood and walked over to the wall. Varro descended the first few feet slowly and then dropped the last distance to the ground, landing with his knees bent.
“We’ve got to get that other one before he gets round to Catilina” the young man said quietly, pointing through the ruins of the building to the imagined figure of the third soldier creeping through the undergrowth. Varro nodded and gestured along the wall.
“You go round; I’ll go through” he whispered. “Hopefully we can catch him by surprise.”
Salonius frowned.
“Do we need surprise all that much now?”
Varro gestured for him to lower his voice.
“There’s more out there. If Cristus sent men out to find us, there’ll be at least a squad out there; probably more.”
Salonius nodded. Of course, he was completely correct. With a last glance and Varro, he began to pick his way quietly along the ruined wall in the direction from which they’d come. Varro watched him go and then turned into the darkness of the ruins.
“You’ve stayed up for twenty years,” he addressed the mouldy walls of the great vestibule quietly. “Try not to fall on me tonight.”
With a deep breath, he set off through the wide, colonnaded room. Fragments of masonry and broken roofing tiles lay scattered here and there among the dark grass and shrubs. Picking his way as carefully as he could, he thanked the Gods for the moonlight that made this a less than life-threatening trip. At the far end a set of wide, shallow steps led up to the great bronze doors. Trying to picture the palace as it had once been, he realised that this must have been the grand entry way into the villa itself. The various doorways that led from this room to either side, beneath the arches of the colonnade would open onto waiting rooms, cloakrooms and other public spaces. The facade before him at the top of the steps heralded the entrance to the private areas of the villa.
Climbing the five steps, he was impressed at the quality of the marble used in their creation. The porphyry alone would be worth a year’s wage for a merchant of even above-average means. Sadly, many steps were now missing. Any place where marble was going to waste, some enterprising folk would remove it and burn it down for more useful lime.
The doors had, in their time, been magnificent. When burnished they must have shone in the sunlight from the high windows, situated above the colonnade, much like the golden gate of Vengen. Now, sadly, they were decayed and blue-green. One door miraculously remained in position, rusted shut many years ago. The other hung at an awkward angle, the central and lower hinges having long since given way.
Very carefully, Varro stepped between the doors, being certain not to touch the precariously-hanging portal.
The interior was almost pitch black. The roof above this small octagonal chamber had remained largely intact, though the stars were visible here and there in places. Squinting into the dark, he made out the glow of moonlight through the doorway ahead. Stepping as carefully as he could in the darkness, he made his slow way toward the light.
The next room was wide and long. Most of the roof was missing, allowing the moon to clearly light his path now. The grass and weeds here were patchy, leaving areas of rich mosaic faded but clearly visible. This must be a great reception area or dining room. Varro could imagine the parties that had been held in this great space. A shallow granite bowl had been a fountain, clearly once decorated with a number of statues. A peculiar sense
of sadness and loss settled on him as he traversed the room, his eyes now locked on the great aperture at the far end that had once been an ornate window.
As he approached the outer wall at the far end, he began to tread lightly and quietly once more. Creeping up to the window, he carefully edged his head past the stonework and glanced left and right. The figure of a man was moving along the wall, almost invisible in the moon shadow.
With a frown, he realised that the man would likely reach the corner before Salonius. Racking his brains, he suddenly grinned. Reach down to the floor, he collected a small pebble and hefted it, testing the weight. Squinting along the wall at the retreating form of the soldier, he swung his arm back and cast the stone out into the undergrowth roughly halfway between them but further out away from the building. He held his breath.
The soldier stopped dead in his tracks and turned. The shadow in which he was standing obscured his face, though Varro could imagine his expression. Very, very slowly, the man began to move away from the walls in a half crouch, toward the source of the unexpected sound. Varro nodded to himself in satisfaction.
Waiting until the man was at a good distance and facing away, Varro quickly and quietly climbed onto the ruined windowsill and dropped lightly to the soft, springy grass in the shadows outside. Something moved out of the corner of his eye and he glanced sharply along the wall to see Salonius echoing his steps from the corner. He nodded toward his companion and pointed at the figure now lurking by the undergrowth and Salonius returned the nod, drawing something from his belt and waving it at the captain.
Varro frowned. What the hell was the lad up to now?
He stopped in the shadows and tried to discern what Salonius was doing as the young man rummaged and fumbled until suddenly he lifted his arm above his head and began to swing it. Varro jumped. What the hell did he think he was doing? He waved his arms frantically, trying to get Salonius’ attention. The building ‘whoop, whoop’ sound of the sling as it completed each circuit would easily attract the attention of the lone figure.
And yet, while he was still trying desperately to get the young man to stop his noisy attack, Salonius let go of the strap and the stone flew with a gentle whistling sound. Sure enough, the man by the undergrowth turned at this new sound, but not fast enough. Before he ever saw the two darker shapes lurking in the shadows by the wall, the lead shot took him in the side of the head and knocked him clean from his feet.
Varro blinked, impressed despite himself.
With a quick glance at the young marksman, he jogged across to the prone soldier. The side of his head had been staved in and was oozing dark matter onto the grass. He wouldn’t be crying for help any time soon. The captain jumped at Salonius’ quiet voice by his shoulder.
“Bigger than a coney and considerably slower moving.”
Varro turned and grinned at him.
“That’s some bloody aim you’ve got there.”
“Almost a year assembling and dismantling catapults, bolt throwers and so on. That was my principle job. Every time you do it you have to check the aim and adjust to new conditions. After three months, it’s second nature. I could hit a sparrow with a siege engine, given a couple of minutes to sight.”
Varro laughed quietly.
“Come on. Let’s check the lie of the land.”
Catilina sat hunched up against the wall of the gatehouse, staring off into the gloom in the direction Varro and Salonius had taken. Her night vision was being seriously hampered by the dancing flames of their small fire and, after a few moments, she shuffled along the wall so that the fire was behind her. If she really strained her eyes, she could just about make out the shapes of her two companions moving like ghosts among the rubble and ruin near the centre of the complex.
She smiled. The noble women and the other girls she’d grown up with at Vengen and at the Imperial court in Velutio had always treated her with an aloof and distant attitude. It was, of course, no mystery why that was the case. Her brother was studious and interested in politics, history and rhetoric; her mother had been a fascinating woman, though. Catilina was always saddened when she thought of that beautiful, mysterious figure that had passed away when she was still a young girl. She knew what her mother had been like though: a genteel court lady, with hobbies and habits as befitted her station, but with a hidden side that only came out with her husband and children. Her mother had loved to ride and to explore; she had travelled with her husband on campaign in those early days of the Imperial restoration. She was no wilting flower, and neither was her daughter.
That was why the court ladies were never sure what to make of her: she had never settled into the sedate court life. Indeed, the only time she had spent any real length of time in a courtly situation was at Vengen those few years ago, and that had been when she’d met Varro and her life had changed forever. Her father had pleaded and cajoled, then demanded and shouted and finally, in the end, gave up and let her be who she wanted to be. He would never change her and, since he’d obviously come to realise that, she was sure he was just that smallest part more proud of her for it.
She had never been happier that at times like these, living roughly by a campfire with a constant threat of danger and puzzles to solve. Except for the ever-present knowledge that Varro was going to be taken from her. As soon as the thought occurred to her again, she pushed it back out of her mind. Every time she let her guard down, she risked being washed away by the turbulent emotions that pounded her. She was too strong for that. And Varro was refusing to let it get in his way, so she had to be all the more strong to keep him from despair.
The man behind all this…
Something behind her made a snapping sound. Her mind raced for a fraction of a second. Twigs popped and crackled in the flames, but there was something different about this sound. This was not a burning twig.
Gritting her teeth, she held her breath and listened as hard as she could.
Very, very quietly, she heard a footfall. Good. Between the crack and the quiet step, she had enough information to see it all in her mind’s eye. The man was directly behind her, and perhaps two paces away. She held her breath a moment longer and heard the next footstep, slow and soft. This one was close enough that she felt the faintest vibration on the ground.
Her eyes hardened as, without moving any other part of her, she swung the needle-pointed knife up with her right arm straight behind her until her arm reached back as far as it could, but not before it met resistance. There was a horrible noise and a trickle of warm liquid down her hand and wrist as she immediately released her grip on the knife handle and, turning, leapt to her feet.
She had only a moment to take in the scene. Her aim had been precise and unfortunate, the height of her seated form having driven the blade as far as the hilt into the man’s crotch and up through his bladder. His eyes were wide with shock and his mouth formed an ‘O’ as he fought to find his voice. The arm out to his side that held his sword twitched and the blade dropped from his fingers.
Panic hit her momentarily. Varro and Salonius had been so careful to remain quiet and this man was about to scream and ruin it all. Instinct took over and, pulling her arm back at the shoulder, she threw a solid punch directly at the man’s face. The low groan as he began to howl was cut short and ended in a crunch as the blow broke the man’s nose and two of Catilina’s fingers simultaneously.
He spun, his eyes rolling up into his head, and collapsed heavily to the ground.
She stared down at him for a long moment, stunned by the sudden violence and then, slowly, the pain in her fingers began to make itself known. Shaking her head to clear it, she stared out into the darkness past the fire. Even with her hampered night vision, she could see the gap where the attacker had removed a single board in their fire shield. He had been alone.
Grimacing, she stepped out of the gatehouse and edged round the corner into the darkness where she would be less visible and scanned the gloom for a further sign of her two friends. After a lon
g moment, she saw Salonius creeping along the wall of the central building and then he disappeared around the far corner and into the darkness. She heaved a slow breath and then settled down to wait, her ears pricked for any sign of movement.
Varro and Salonius clambered to the top of the wall walk. The flight of steps they had found was missing a number of stones and covered with creeping undergrowth, rubble and dust. Slowly and carefully they approached the battlements and peered cautiously around the merlon.
“Shit!”
Instantly, the pair ducked back into the protection of the walls. Below and perhaps fifty yards from the walls scattered soldiers sat astride their horses.
“How many d’you reckon?” Salonius whispered.
Varro shook his head.
“I’d say about ten down there, but you can bet we’re surrounded, so we’re looking at forty or so. Shit, shit, shit!”
Salonius nodded.
“Shit indeed.”
They stood crouched for a moment, deep in thought, and then raised their heads in unison.
“Catilina!” they both whispered.
Moments later they were scrambling down the stairs and running across the rough grass towards the gatehouse, all concerns over being observed forgotten.
As they approached the great defensive structure, Varro’s heart leapt into his throat. The archway, lit by the flickering flames, was empty. He and Salonius slid to a halt just as Catilina stepped out from the shadows by the gate.
Varro visibly jumped at her sudden appearance.
“Shit, don’t do that!”
Salonius flexed his shoulders.
“Varro…”
The captain turned to find his companion pointing at the blood-soaked body lying next to the fire. He turned to Catilina and raised his eyebrows.
“Lucky.” She said, flatly, cradling her sore fingers in her other hand.
“I think our luck might be running out” Varro replied. “Looks like there’s several dozen men out there, waiting for us.”
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