Imperatrix (Gladiatrix Book 3)

by Russell Whitfield

  Mucius could hear them now, shouting their defiance at the legion as it bore down on them, their faces twisted in rage, fear and hate. What few archers they had were loosing shafts at him and his men. Here and there, he heard the sharp pang of a spindle careening off a helmet or a curse as one found its mark. He wasn’t going to order the testudo for these amateurs, he thought. ‘All right,’ he shouted. ‘Double time boys, by the right . . . double . . . time!’

  At his word, the First of the First broke into a trot, their easy strides eating up the distance between them and the breach. It was packed with men now, cursing and brandishing their weapons. Flanking them on the less damaged portions of the defence, he could see steaming pots being hefted into position. Boiling water or boiling oil, it made no difference when the stuff fell on you. ‘Mind your step,’ Mucius shouted out – needlessly as every man knew that the debris from the wall would make footing treacherous.

  By the gods, the Dacians were big. Mucius had faced barbarians before but even so, nothing prepared a man for going up against a foe who towered over him. The only comfort was that these were probably blacksmiths, tanners and masons – amateurs who would do all right when things were going well and would cave in as soon as the going got tough. That was what he always told himself.

  The ground began to rise and Mucius was forced to look down every so often as the debris from the wall threatened to trip him. He glanced along the line of legionaries – it was not as straight as it could be, undulating, bowing and curving as men struggled over the rough ground. ‘Keep those fucking shields up!’ he shouted as a fresh volley of missiles flew from the breach and the walls. He heard Roman voices cry out as, at closer range, the arrows and spears of the Dacians began to take their toll. The legionaries were not carrying their pila for the assault – the spears would only encumber them as they tried to take the breach.

  Mucius ducked involuntarily as an arrow thudded into his shield. They were close now and his soldiers were bunching up behind him, forming a wedge that would slice through the breach. On either side, the rest of the legion was advancing, siege ladders to the fore. The First of the First’s advance would have sucked in men to hold the breach – thus leaving the rest of the walls not so heavily defended. Good on Valerian, Mucius thought.

  Mucius gripped his sword tight and his shield tighter, peaking over the top as he came closer to the breach. They were close enough now to hear the individual shouts and taunts of the Dacians. Mucius singled one out, their biggest, armed with their cursed sica – the strange, angled sword designed to cleave through Roman helmets that had spilled the brains of many of Fuscus’s men. He steeled himself and ran forward, shouting incoherently. The barbarian screamed and hefted his weapon and then, in an instant, the battle was joined.

  The Dacian hacked down with the sica but Mucius punched forward with a raised shield, catching the man under the arm to deflect the blow; at the same time, he stabbed out with his gladius, hard enough to cut through the Dacian’s leather armour, not so hard the blade would become wedged. The Dacian fell and began screaming as he was trampled by the hobnailed boots of the First.

  The momentum of the men behind him propelled Mucius forward faster than he would have liked, but there was no stopping the First now. It was loud – the cacophony of battle, the screams, the clashing of iron on iron, the endless whump-whump-whump of shields colliding – so loud that a man couldn’t hear his own shouts over the din. Off to the sides, though, the piercing wail of burned men cut through the clamour of war as the boiling pans ditched their deadly contents.

  Mucius plunged his sword into the guts of an unarmoured man, feeling the hot spray of blood on his arm as the man screamed, but even as he fell, the centurion was staggered by a blow to the head. A man to his left was raising a sword to strike again but Livius was there, smashing the boss of his scutum into the Dacian’s face before finishing him with a stab in the chest.

  It was a melee now, men pressed in tight together – and it was here that the Roman superiority of armour and kit began to show its worth. The Dacians, with their bigger weapons could not easily bring them to bear in the crush. But the short, stabbing gladius was designed for this. You didn’t have to spill a man’s gizzards or split him from shoulder to neck to kill him – he died just as easily with finger’s-worth of iron in him. Slower maybe, but dead was dead.

  A big man grabbed at Mucius’s shield, trying to wrench it from his grasp – the centurion let the man pull, surprising him and causing him to lose balance. Mucius did not give him the chance to regain it, slamming the gladius into his groin. Gouts of dark blood erupted from the wound as the man fell into the Tartarus that was the ground of any fight. A man standing had a chance, but a man on the ground was as good as dead – a slow, agonising way to go, trampled by friend and foe.

  Mucius kept going, though his body was protesting, breath coming in short gasps. But he could feel the fight leeching out of the enemy as more and more of his men poured into the breach. He killed a man and risked a look up and behind him – the rest of the lads were on the walls and cleaving through the defenders and the First of the First continued to pour through the breach. His head whipped back to the front to see the man before him turn his back and run. He was not alone, the Dacians holding the breach were in full retreat, heading back to the warrens of the rathole town.

  Though he was shattered, Mucius pursued. ‘After them, lads!’ he managed to shout, voice ragged with exhaustion. ‘Kill them! Kill them all!’

  The First of the First poured past him into Durostorum and he felt Livius’s hand on his arm, steadying him before he’d known that he’d faltered. ‘Fucking hell, centurion,’ Livius enthused. ‘You don’t have to kill all of them on your own!’

  Mucius was too tired to quip back. ‘Come on,’ he said. ‘Let’s finish this.’

  So this was vengeance.

  Valerian stood atop the walls of Durostorum, alone in the dark, listening to the song of victory. Begging. Screaming. Laughter. The crash of doors being broken in and the wailing of infants. It should have felt sweet. It should have been a cleansing fire, wiping away the shame of Tapae and the stealing of his virtus by the Dacians.

  Should have. But did not.

  He had never been involved in the sack of a city or town before. The Silurians had little villages and hillforts – nothing like this. This was a place with homes, business and families. No longer, though. Now it was Tartarus come to life with his men acting as the Furies to inflict tortures on the people of Durostorum. They were raping women in the street, dragging their babes from their arms and killing them before their eyes.

  Valerian had stomached it as long as he could, but there was one moment he could not get out of his head. A soldier held a babe by the ankles whilst his mates gang raped its mother. It was screeching and the soldier had, casually, swung it against the wall of the house they had dragged them from. The screeches were cut short and the impact of the child’s head had left an almost perfectly round disc of blood on the wall.

  What was it Horace had said? Wars . . . the horror of mothers. Valerian drained his cup and tossed it into the darkness. The small mercy was that no mother or father would survive this night. But they would suffer before the dawn.

  Dacia. Gods-cursed Dacia. It was his nemesis, he realised. He had come here before and it had broken him, taken everything from him and left him a burned out shell of a man until he had found love with Pyrrha – Varia as he had learned her name was, after she too was taken from him. Now he was back here again – a new man, a legate and a defender of Rome. Virtus and vengeance were his to regain. He had everything he wanted within his grasp.

  ‘We should often be sorry if our prayers are answered,’ he whispered to himself.

  A raucous shout of greeting made him jump. Settus was striding along the wall towards him. Even in the darkness, he could see the little man beaming from ear to ear. ‘What a night!’ Settus enthused.

  Valerian bit down a harsh retort.
Settus was a soldier. This is what soldiers did. ‘I want to call a halt to this soon,’ he said.

  ‘But . . .’

  ‘We’re here to do a job not have a fucking party. I can’t have two thirds of the legion nursing hangovers tomorrow.’

  ‘Too fucking late,’ Settus said.

  ‘Just get it done.’

  Settus shrugged. ‘I know you’re not keen on all this, but anyone would think we lost the way you’re acting.’

  ‘Anyone would think we lost, sir,’ Valerian snapped. ‘And we’ve won nothing yet. The orders are to hold this ground.’

  Settus shrugged, taking that on the chin. ‘Very good, sir,’ he said. ‘I’ll have the bodies slung in the river.’

  ‘Burn them.’

  ‘With respect, that’ll stink this place out for days. If we sling them in the drink it’ll shit the life out of the barbarians when they see a river full of corpses, sir. And also, piss them off. Bring them to us like flies to shit. Which is the plan.’

  Valerian sighed. ‘You’re right of course.’

  ‘Years of experience,’ Settus acknowledged with a grin.

  ‘I want work started on the wall at first light,’ Valerian told him. ‘We need to plug the gap between these rivers before the Dacians’ allies get here.’

  ‘Don’t worry, ‘Settus was airy. ‘The lads’ll sort it.’

  ‘See that they do.’

  Settus saluted and turned to leave. He stopped and turned back. ‘Permission to speak freely?’

  Valerian nodded his acquiescence.

  ‘Are you all right, mate?’

  ‘I’m fine.’

  ‘You know as well as I do that this is war, right? This is how it is. How it was. How it’s always going to be. The thing is, we won, they lost. We’re alive, they ain’t. That’s the important thing. I know you read a lot and that makes a man think too much. Well think on this. Those Dacian cunts fucked you over royally. And if this was Rome and they’d won and we’d lost, how do you think it’d go, eh? Eh? Fuck’ em. They’re barbarians and they deserve to die. You keep in mind what happened to you before, all right. We can’t show no mercy to them, Valerian. This is the way it has to be. The Emperor said so. We’re soldiers – even you, legate. We do our duty. Summa exstinctio.’

  Valerian was silent for a moment. ‘Thank you, Settus,’ he said.

  Settus held his gaze for a moment before walking into the night and once again leaving Valerian alone with his thoughts.

  There was nothing here, Lysandra noted. Under a grey and roiling Dacian sky, endless fields of green undulated towards the horizon. Forests grew in great clumps with a cold mist as their skirting, mist that was brought by the river and the rain.

  It was not real rain that came and went; rather it was an incessant cloud of moisture that seemed to have no substance but somehow soaked everything and everyone. And it was cold – though she could not admit feeling the discomfort of the harsh weather, Cappa, Murco and everyone else – save Kleandrias – made up for it with their continual carping. Indeed, Lysandra thought it impossible for one group of people to elicit such a volume of complaint on one subject for five days in a row, but her friends seemed determined to prove her wrong.

  She had taken to steering the Galene – with Bedros’s guidance – to get away from the chorus of disapproval and seize upon a little measure of peace. ‘Rivers are different to the sea,’ he told her – needlessly, but he was the captain after all. ‘Slow and steady is the key,’ he advised. ‘More haste, less speed. We’ll end up hitting the bottom and that lot,’ he pointed to behind them where the flotilla followed on, ‘will snarl up behind us. A good idea not to use warships, Lysandra,’ Bedros added. ‘Merchant ships were made with sea and river travel in mind.’

  ‘You are ever an inspiration, Bedros,’ she acknowledged making the seaman’s weathered face split into a grin. She looked past him as Kleandrias approached, raising his hand in greeting. He and Bedros exchanged a glance and the captain stood around for a moment, clearly feeling a little uncomfortable – as though it were he and not her countryman that had interrupted. Mindful of Illeana’s words to treat Kleandrias gently, she did not snap at him: she was steering so that she might find some peace.

  Bedros coughed. ‘Well – slow and steady like I said. I’ll . . . err . . . you know,’ he muttered and made off, acting as though he were checking up on his sailors – who, like everyone else – had nothing to do but watch the boring scenery roll past.

  ‘A strange place,’ Kleandrias rumbled. ‘Eerie.’

  Lysandra glanced at him. ‘You are not scared, are you?’

  ‘Spartans fear nothing.’

  ‘Except boredom, maybe?’

  Kleandrias did not reply; he looked into her eyes for a moment and she saw again what Illeana had seen. Lysandra looked away, turning her attention to the river.

  ‘What do you think you will do when this is all over?’ Kleandrias asked her.

  ‘I had not thought,’ she admitted. ‘Perhaps I will return to Sparta.’ ‘That was my thought too. We will be rich,’ he added.

  ‘I am already rich. Well, I was until all of this. Domitian will reimburse me; though I have spent a mighty fortune, Kleandrias. Maybe he would prefer if we all died – that way he would not have to pay his debt.’

  Kleandrias laughed. ‘If we all die, he will not be far behind us. Rome cannot bear another defeat – and he would be the first to get the blame.’

  ‘There is truth in that,’ Lysandra agreed. She was about to say more when something caught her attention on the northern shore. A large group of locals had gathered on the bank; it was hard to make out their number, but she could afford to take no chances. ‘Call Bedros,’ she snapped. Kleandrias did not need to be told twice; he jumped down from the steering deck and rushed to the captain. Lysandra looked to the south bank where, here too, people were gathering.

  As soon as Bedros had control of the ship, Lysandra took a deep breath. ‘To arms! Archers and shield bearers!’ she shouted. ‘Contact on both banks! Pass the word!’ Chaos erupted all down the flotilla, shouting, cursing, the thump of feet on the wood decks and the distinct clattering and ringing of weapons being brought to bear.

  Something hit the Galene at the water line, a soft, thunking sound. One at first and then more. ‘What is that, what is that?’ Lysandra ran to the side and peered into the water. Even though the black surface was obscured by the omnipresent mist, she could see distended corpses wallowing in the river. The stench hit here then, foul and rancidly sweet.

  The Galene drifted on and the strew of bodies became thicker. Lysandra could hear the sound of wailing and crying coming from the people gathered on the banks. There were children among them, but the majority were adults and thus could be considered a threat. Lysandra had no idea if she would find herself facing these people with sword in hand in the days to come – and she could take no chances.

  ‘Archers will commence shooting once in range!’ she shouted. ‘Pass the word!’ Bedros looked at her, the shock evident in his face. ‘They are not like us, Bedros,’ she said. ‘They are lesser creatures. And our orders are clear.’

  Thebe had taken control of the middle deck. ‘You heard the strategos!’ she walked up and down, making herself heard. ‘Nock arrows!’ Lysandra was proud that none of her Priestesses of Artemis looked behind themselves to question the order. These women had been with her for years – they placed their trust in her and the goddess they served. This mission was Olympus born, and they would not shirk from it.

  The Galene came closer to the crowd and she saw that the river was utterly corrupt with the dead now. They stared up at her, eyes and mouths open, as though they were shouting at her. Accusing her. Let them, she thought. Better Dacian corpses than Hellene.

  ‘Draw!’ Thebe’s voice made her head snap back around. ‘Loose!’

  The first flight of arrows spat out from either side of the ship arced towards the Dacians on the banks and, moments, later, shouts and
screams of pain erupted. ‘Draw . . . Loose!’ Thebe cried out once again and the Priestesses of Artemis obeyed – but even now, the Dacians were gathering their children and fleeing, leaving only a few dead bodies on the ground. ‘Cease!’

  They drew back to a safe distance, watching the ships as they floated by. Even from here, Lysandra could feel the anger and hatred emanating from them. They shouted, shrieked and cursed the vessels, no doubt swearing all kinds of vengeance. Better empty words than action, she thought.

  ‘I have to sail back this way,’ Bedros told her. ‘Now, everyone hates us.’

  ‘You are being paid well,’ Lysandra told him. ‘You knew there would be risk.’

  ‘I didn’t except you to go out of your way to antagonise them!’

  Lysandra regarded him coldly. ‘You will bring us to Durostorum. And you will uphold our bargain to keep us supplied. That was the deal.’

  ‘I am an honourable man,’ he said. ‘But these others will now know the danger that you have brought upon us.’

  ‘If you renege on this, Rome will hear of it, Bedros. Make no mistake; I love you and count you as my friend, but do not cross me. It is more than our lives at stake. It is the lives of all Hellenes and the Empire itself.’

  ‘So you say. But women and children?’

  ‘What of your men’s women and children, Bedros? Your own? If we fail here, they will know rape and slavery. Is that what you want?’

  Bedros did not reply.

  ‘Is it?’

  ‘No. Of course not. I just . . . was that necessary?’

  ‘Yes,’ Lysandra said. ‘It was.’

  The corpses in the river grew thicker but there was no further incident with the locals. Lysandra kept her eyes ahead, peering through the mist. It had grown heavier now and she was glad that the encounter with the Dacians had happened before the clouds had fallen on them.

  ‘Miserable, isn’t it?’ Illeana said as she came to stand by Lysandra. ‘What a place. Have you ever seen anything like it?’

  ‘It is like the River Styx,’ Lysandra said. ‘After we fought, I had a vision of myself there. It was much like this place, Illeana. Cold and grey.’