There were other legionaries there, of course – having swords or javelins sharpened, boots repaired, or links in their armor refitted – so Lucius’s presence was not unusual. Still, he hoped to blend in as best he could, and did not wish to call attention to himself. He did not want word to get out that he was snooping around.
A smithy’s hammer rang out in long repetitive beats. Horses and mules muzzled with feedbags munched silently. Harnesses were repaired and made ready for the next day’s march. Groups of men idled around fires talking casually. Some glanced at him with a moment’s curiosity, but most paid no attention to him. He had brought his gladius, in the event that he needed an excuse for being where he was, though the blade had been sharpened only two days before.
A ruckus sounded from a well-lit tent nearby. The tent flaps were open, and he could see that it was full of men, cheering on an arm-wrestling contest between two shirtless men. Lucius entered and found a spot to sit between two of the onlookers. He nodded and smiled to the man next to him, and the man smiled back. The man held a cup of spirits and appeared to have already imbibed in several cups of the Gallic brew.
“Long march today, soldier, eh?” The man said pleasantly, as if to make small talk. “It’s been a long time since I’ve pushed my teams this fast.”
From the man’s dress, Lucius assumed him to be a mule driver, and a Cisalpine Gaul, like the two men from last night.
“It was indeed.” Lucius replied.
“Care to put out a wager?” The man asked Lucius, cutting his eyes at the contest of strength that was about to begin. “The black Nubian is favored ten to one.”
So that was the motivation for the man’s friendliness. It would serve Lucius’s purpose. He produced five denarii from the purse at his belt.
“Five on the Nubian,” Lucius said, smiling.
“I will take that bet, soldier,” the man said, producing the two sestertii that he would put at stake.
The wrestling match was no contest. The Nubian’s opponent, a short barrel-chested Gaul, was much stronger than he looked – either that, or he had the proper technique down – because the Nubian’s arm went over like a wet reed. Lucius had fully expected that, and pretended to part with his money reluctantly.
“Sorry, soldier,” the Gaul said, smiling. “Better luck next time. Care to place another?”
“Maybe. But first, I was thinking that perhaps you could help me.”
“With what?” the Gaul eyed him suspiciously.
“There were two men found dead outside the fort last night. They were team handlers, like you. Did you know them?”
The man's smile faded. He glanced around the room, and then made to move elsewhere, but Lucius flashed another five denarii, prompting him to sit back down.
“Yes, I knew them,” he said guardedly.
“One man had a tattoo on his face, on the left cheek.”
“Bren was his name. But I don’t believe I caught your name, soldier.”
“My name isn’t important, but five more denarii for you might be.”
Again the man glanced around the room, before taking the offered money and pocketing it. “What do you want to know?”
“I played a game of dice with Bren a fortnight ago,” Lucius lied. “I must admit, he beat me squarely, as you just did. I could only pay him half at the time. I still owe the other half, and I am an honest man, to the living as well as the dead.”
“I see,” the man said, in a tone that indicated he did not believe a word of Lucius’s story.
“Anyway, I want to clear my conscience of the whole thing and pay my debts in full. Did Bren have a wife? Did he have any children? Someone I can send the money to?”
The man chuckled and took a drink. “I did not know him well enough to tell you any of that.”
“Can you tell me who might know these things?”
The man looked around at the dozens of other jabbering spectators who were busy placing bets for the next round, and then gestured with his cup to the opposite side of the tent.
“Finnan,” he said. “Finnan was his friend. That’s him, over there.”
Lucius followed his gaze to see a short, round-bellied man looking back at him from the other side of the crowded space. Finnan’s eyes looked nervous when they met Lucius’s, and he abruptly rose and walked out of the tent. Obviously, he knew something, and Lucius nearly clawed his way over the other spectators in an effort to not let him get away. Once outside, Finnan broke into a sprint, and Lucius bolted after him. It did not take long to overtake him. Finnan was paunch and in no shape to run, and could not hope to escape the swift muscled legs of a legionary. Lucius caught up with him and violently pulled him by the hair into the shadows between two tents. The man started to yell out, but stopped mid-yell as the cold steel of Lucius’s drawn dagger touched the fat skin around his neck.
“If you call out, I will slit your fat throat. Is that understood?”
The man nodded, his jowls shaking as he did so.
“I want to know about your friend Bren. I want to know why he was outside the fort last night, and I want to know who sent him there.”
The man shook his head, struggling not to brush too briskly against the sharp point of the dagger. “I have no idea. I don't know what you're talking about. I drive the carts. I don't get involved.”
Lucius clapped him on the ear, and then pressed the pugio harder into the fatty folds. “I think you’re lying. Your friends were waiting for me in the forest. I want to know why. And you're going to tell me.”
“They were paid.”
“By who?”
The man looked reluctant and resisted but more pressure from the dagger point made him start talking again.
“It was the tribune’s adjutant. The one with the golden curls. He said that if they killed you, they would each get three hundred denarii.”
Lucius gasped, not so much at the murder plot as at the amount. Evidently, he was worth a small fortune – dead.
“I want to know more.” Lucius said, pressing the knife harder. “Tell me more!”
“I don’t know much more than that.”
“Try harder.”
“I only know that they tried to kill you before, but something went wrong with that. I'm just telling you what I heard. I don't know any more. I swear it. I swear I was not involved.”
“Is anyone else involved in this?”
“I-I do not know. All I know is they want you dead. And they are willing to pay handsomely for it. And they will kill anyone who tells you or warns you in any way.”
Lucius considered for a moment. If the Tribune wanted him dead for some above board reason, some infraction he had committed in his duties, there would have been no reason to go about it in such a surreptitious manner. The tribune certainly would not have brought the two mule drivers in on the plot for fear of a scandal. There had to be another reason, something personal. But what grudge could the tribune possibly hold against him? It seemed absurd that Piso would pay six hundred denarii just to have him killed.
And then there was Vitalis.
“Were there any other Romans involved in this?” Lucius demanded.
“I don’t know.”
“Were there any?”
Finnan struggled, appearing much agitated by the question. After a swift box on the ears, he started talking again. “I don’t know, I tell you! I saw a centurion, a big fellow, leaving the tribune’s tent that night. I can't remember his name.”
“Was it Vitalis?”
The man did not answer. But he did not have to. His eyes were confirmation enough.
Lucius released his hold on the man and sat down on the ground, speechless, and crestfallen. He did not even move to stop Finnan from regaining his feet and timidly walking away, all the while looking back to see if the stupefied legionary was following him. But Lucius did not follow. Vitalis had betrayed him – his confidant and trusted comrade of so many campaigns, whom he had fought alongside, whom he had saved on c
ountless occasions. The whole affair about his mother must have been an elaborate ruse, albeit a somewhat imaginative and cold-hearted one. To think that Vitalis would play on his loyalty in such a way. It seemed on the verge of fantasy.
Lucius stumbled back to his tent with his mind in a daze, and he did not think of much else for several hours after.
V
“Leave the mounts here, Centurion,” Piso said, throwing a leg over the rain-spattered mane of his own horse to dismount. “Two men to guard them, no more, Vitalis. We go the rest of the way on foot. Better for the element of surprise, you see.”
Two squads of legionaries moved in a line through the trees – twenty-one men – following Piso and Amelius. They were far from the column, having marched away from the road at the bidding of their tribune. Now they followed, obediently but reluctantly, as the two nobles worked their way closer to the clearing that marked the edge of a small farm. Piso halted the two squads, still concealed just inside the tree line.
“Get down!” Piso commanded the soldiers. The tribune and his companion moved behind a large moss covered trunk, shrouded in brush, where they would have a good vantage point to survey the place. Snickering like trickster schoolboys, the two watched and waited.
“Are we to scavenge the farm for wheat, sir?” Vitalis said with controlled impatience, after stewing for several moments.
Piso looked back contemptuously at the veteran and whispered harshly, “You are to do what I tell you, Centurion, and when I tell you! Now get back with your men!”
Vitalis returned to the rank red-faced.
“What are we doing here, Centurion?” Jovinus whispered, leaning on his spear, his standard left back with the rest of the century. “This place couldn’t feed a – ”
“Shut up!” Vitalis snapped.
Vitalis was on edge. Lucius could sense it, as surely as he felt his own skin crawling with perspiration from the infernal humidity. The centurion still avoided looking him directly in the eyes, and Lucius now knew without a doubt that his old comrade was part of the conspiracy, no matter how outlandish that seemed.
Lucius caught a short glance from Piso over the tribune’s shoulder. He had received similar glances from Piso and Amelius all morning, and he knew the two nobles were up to something. Lucius surmised it was no coincidence that his squad was one of those chosen for this little foray away from the column, and he was ever vigilant in his search for some clue that would unravel the two nobles’ plan before it could be put into execution.
The column had marched early that morning, and Piso had pushed the cohorts hard, as if he had an appointment to keep. The young noble evidently had expected to reach the main Roman army this day, and thus he and his companion were bedecked in their finest attire should they encounter the legate of the Seventh Legion or, Jupiter forbid, the proconsul Gaius Julius Caesar himself. They wore scarlet cloaks that were so deeply colored that they must have been packed away for the duration of the expedition. Their bronze corselets carried a shine that must have kept their slaves up all night to attain. Their mounts were freshly brushed and combed as if they bore a triumphator’s chariot.
All throughout the morning’s march, they had encountered farms of various size situated between banks of trees and rows of hedges, but they had found all to be abandoned, and the surrounding fields stripped bare to deprive the Roman invaders of forage. The Nervii were nowhere in sight, but fresh tracks in the mud gave ample evidence of large numbers of men and horses moving about.
“I want two squads, Vitalis, nothing more,” Piso had said, after reining in his horse next to the halted century. “That damned Aeduan horse is off gallivanting, otherwise I’d use them.”
The column had stopped for a rest interval at midday, just as the heat of the day intensified, and the bubbling clouds began to rise above the tree line.
Piso had glanced dismissively at the perspiring file of men that comprised Lucius’s squad. “They will do.” The tribune had said casually, as if he did not know one rank from another, but Lucius knew better.
“Weapons and shields only, Vitalis,” Piso had added, as the first flash of lightning and the rolling crackle of thunder announced the arrival of the afternoon rains. “Leave kits behind. There is a farm I wish to examine a few miles off. It shouldn’t take long. Your men can ride on the mounts we took from the village.”
The twenty-one man contingent – two squads – including Piso and Amelius, had left the column and had set out onto a narrow forest path under darkening skies. The clouds released a light rain that pattered the helmets of the legionaries and wetted the manes of their horses. From his mount near the rear, Lucius had watched the scarlet cloaks and plumed helmets of the nobles at the head of the formation. He had concluded on the previous night, as he had tossed and turned in his bedroll, that he had never seen either of them before they had joined the Seventh. Aside from the small loot he had taken at the Nervii village, he could think of nothing he might have done in the small time they had been with the legion to incite them to murder him. He had wracked his brain to come up with a reason for the plot against him, and no matter from which angle he considered it, he kept drawing the same conclusion – that this had to do with his life before he had joined the legions – those tragic events that had so thoroughly shaped his destiny.
It was the only thing that made sense.
Now, as he stood on the edge of a clearing, looking out over the small farm with the rest of his squad, his nearly forgotten past was coming back to haunt him.
Tucked away in a small valley where the forest had been hewn back to form several small fields, the Nervii farm did not seem significant, or worth the tribune’s time, in any way. It was nothing more than a small hut with a low rock wall, a small stone mill somewhat removed, and a few animal pens. The fields could not yield much wheat, perhaps enough to feed a handful of families – nothing more. The only thing that distinguished it was the fact that it was intact. For some reason, the Nervii had spared it from the destruction they had meted out upon the other farms of the region. Perhaps it belonged to someone important among the Nervii.
After more waiting with no activity at the farm, Piso began to sigh heavily, and a look of disillusionment came over him, as if he were a child told he could not play.
“Are you sure about this, Amelius?” he said, resting his back against a large tree trunk. “We’ve been waiting for ages.”
“Just wait a little longer, my friend,” his blonde-haired companion replied, expectantly. “I rode by here earlier this morning. I know what I saw. Give it time. I'm sure she will come out.”
“I bloody well hope so. This had better be worth it. We had best be getting back to the column as it is.”
Piso looked up at the gray clouds above the treetops, and then at the rank of legionaries, his eyes finally settling on Lucius. This time he was not smiling, and Lucius felt a hatred in that stare that he had not felt before.
“But not without taking care of our other business first,” Piso mumbled, his eyes still on Lucius.
The tribune’s attention was pulled away by Amelius’s hand on his shoulder.
“You see,” Amelius whispered, pointing at the small hut. “Just as I said.”
Two people had emerged from the dwelling. One was a boy, no more than ten years old and weighed down by a large bucket that he embraced in order to carry it. The other was a young Belgic maiden with long blonde hair. Even under the gray sky, her golden hair seemed to shine like fields of grain. It was tied once near the nape of her neck and hung all the way down to her waist. Like the boy, she, too, was encumbered by a large bucket, but she sang merrily as she worked, bending and kneeling as she and the boy fed the penned animals. Though her gray woolen dress was plain and tattered in several places, it revealed a bosom and curves that caught the lustful eyes of every legionary hiding in the woods.
“Oh, now that is something!” Piso said excitedly.
“I knew you would be pleased.” Amelius smile
d delightedly, apparently pleased with himself.
“She will do nicely,” Piso said, practically salivating.
So, that’s what all the waiting was about? Lucius thought. This was not a scavenging foray at all, but merely the tribune and his companion seeking carnal pleasures in the middle of the day. Evidently, the schoolboys had not had enough rape and murder in the village. The two nobles whispered to each other and giggled as they concocted deranged designs of what they were going to do to her. Glancing once at Vitalis, Lucius saw that the centurion’s face was set in a disapproving grimace beneath his rain spattered helmet.
Feeling remorseful for the woman as he watched her, Lucius came close to shouting out a warning to her, but he knew it would do no good. She could not get away. Little did she know what horrors awaited her. She looked to be in her late teenage years, and might be the farmer’s widow or daughter or wife. Judging from her attire, she had little to show for it, but she was attractive. Unfortunate for her, that blessing would turn into a curse today.
An outburst of barking sounded from one of the pens. Even from this distance, Lucius could see the flash of white fangs and the black, pointed ears of the large grey-coated dogs. There were two of them, penned together inside a sturdy wooden cage. Lucius had encountered the same breed in battle with the Germans, and knew them to be vicious when riled. The disturbance had interrupted the young woman’s singing, and she ordered the boy to stop work while she scanned the tree line around the farm. The hounds must have barked habitually whenever they caught the scent of any creature, man or beast, because, after a few moments of looking, the maiden dismissed their nervousness and was soon lost in her work again. Again, she began to sing, and not even the noise of the beasts could spoil the transcendence of her song. She sang a Celtic tune of which Lucius could not understand a word, but the haunting melody seemed to carry the voice of the very hills and trees around them.
Rome: Fury of the Legion (Sword of the Legion Series) Page 5
