RETRIBUTION

by Anthony Riches

  A single figure was striding out onto the bridge, apparently heedless of the risk posed by the Tungrians’ spears and bows, coming to rest a dozen paces from the heavy wooden gate that barred his way.

  ‘And now he’s telling them that their resistance will be pointless.’ The centurion shook his head in amusement. ‘You have to admire the man’s balls. There are probably a hundred men on those walls within spear throw of him and he strides out in front of them without so much as a pair of men to hold up shields. He’s telling them that they’ve made their point, burned out a few farms and made a nuisance of themselves alright, but that the time for playing games is at an end. Rome’s rule north of the mountains is at an end whether they like it or not, which means that they’re on their own. He’s willing to accept their surrender if they throw down their weapons and join with us now, and he’ll even spare their homes the fate they’ve dealt out to the Marsaci and Cananefates. He doesn’t mean it, of course.’

  Egilhard nodded, the innocent recruit of a year before replaced by a battle-hardened soldier who had already watched as their leader had casually broken his word and condemned thousands of defeated Roman legionaries to a brutal death at the hands of his German allies.

  ‘The allied tribes won’t allow him to let the Tungri off the hook that easily.’

  Alcaeus shrugged.

  ‘How can they? It’s their farms and villages that Labeo’s been preying on. Their women his soldiers will have been raping, given half a chance. If I were one of his men I would already have either made my peace with my gods or made a quiet exit one dark night, because there’s no way this ends with a renewed brotherhood between us and the Tungri, not the way I see it. No, this is just Kiv rolling the dice to see if he can persuade Labeo’s men to turn him over to us without bloodshed. Our blood, that is.’

  They watched as their leader stood before the fort’s walls with his arms raised in an apparent appeal for sanity to prevail, then lowered them and stood in silence.

  ‘And now Labeo’s telling his men that they can’t trust his former ally. He’s recounting the story of how Kiv turned on him, once he’d played the part they’d agreed, and how the Romans who surrendered to him at the Old Camp were massacred.’ Alcaeus waited for a moment, the sound of the enemy leader’s voice reaching them in snatches as the wind gusted through the trees surrounding them. ‘And now he’s telling them that their position is impregnable, with only the bridge for us to fight from unless we try to swim the river, which of course we won’t dare because they could rush two or three hundred men to any landing site before we could cross the Mosa and meet us head on as we come out of the water. He’d have them believe that this is a stalemate, and that we’ll get tired of the whole thing and march away soon enough.’

  As if on cue, the Batavi leader turned on his heel and retraced his steps, the jeers and curses of the men defending the bridge ringing in his ears as they gave vent to their hatred for everything he represented.

  ‘It’s a fight then.’

  ‘Yes, but not until Kiv’s provided Labeo’s men with an example of what’s awaiting them.’

  Kivilaz stalked back down the bridge, the men on the Batavi’s side of the river waiting until he was out of sight before bringing forward a heavy wooden punishment frame with a man’s body spreadeagled wide across it. Half a dozen soldiers advanced in front of it to the bridge’s eastern end, their shields raised to prevent Labeo’s archers from putting their former comrade out of the misery to which he was about to be subjected, while the captive looked about him in evident terror, the bombast of the early hours of his captivity eroded away to nothing by his evident realisation of what was about to happen to him.

  ‘Distraction.’ Alcaeus stared at the scene unfolding before them unblinkingly, as if committing it to his memory. ‘He’ll keep their attention riveted on that poor soul while the real battle is fought elsewhere. It’s clever. And it will work, most likely. But it is not fitting for the Batavi.’

  The pair of long-haired tribesmen who had accompanied the cohorts west as Kivilaz’s honoured guests stepped forward, the unmistakable glint of knives in their hands loosening the captive’s tongue and bowels in simultaneous emissions of terror, his horrified wails increasing in their intensity as they approached the frame on which he was spread helplessly.

  Alcaeus nodded at Egilhard.

  ‘I don’t think we need to see any more of this unnecessary bestiality. While Kivilaz’s German priest hold the defenders’ attention, we’d best be getting on with playing our part.’

  He led the other two men away to the north along the foliage-lined riverbank, emerging from the trees to find the three-hundred-odd men of his first cohort standing ready alongside their horses.

  ‘What a pleasure, eh gentlemen?’ The centurion raised his voice to be heard by every man. ‘A river to cross, and every last horse that survived the disaster at Gelduba!’ He rubbed his hands in satisfaction at the chance to fight in the way that had been the tribe’s most feared weapon throughout the years of their service to Rome. ‘This is going to be just like the good old days! Chosen Man, go forward and make the signal!’

  Beckoning Lanzo to join him, Egilhard moved quickly and quietly to the riverbank, staying in the cover of its trailing, chaotic vegetation as they stared out across the water at the far bank. He nodded to his comrade, who put his hands to his mouth and blew, imitating the high-pitched call of a coot three times in brief succession, then twice more. Both men stared intently at the opposite bank for several moments, the bushes and long grass at the river’s margin seemingly undisturbed until, with a sudden flurry of movement, the men for whom the signal had been intended struck. After a moment, Egilhard’s nervous expression was split by a grin, as Frijaz appeared through the greenery with a man’s decapitated head held aloft by its hair. He waved, and his uncle vanished from sight to carry out the next part of the plan that had been agreed the previous night, before Frijaz, his brother and nephew had slipped into the river’s ink-black water and crossed with the slow, stealthy strokes of men who had practiced swimming without disturbing the water for most of their lives. Lanzo nudged him.

  ‘Best go and get the cohort, hadn’t you? I’ll watch here.’ Egilhard nodded and turned to go back through the trees, only to stop as his friend put a hand on his arm. ‘And Egilhard, the things that Alcaeus says about Kiv …’

  The younger man frowned.

  ‘Yes?’

  ‘Take my advice.’ The older man leaned closer, lowering his voice in a subconscious signal of his fear of being overheard. ‘Listen to him by all means, he’s our centurion, and we both know that he holds the traditions of the cohorts dear. But don’t ever repeat what he says. Not even to Lataz. Don’t ask me why, it’d take too long to explain, but take my advice in this one thing and you’ll lighten my mind.’

  The chosen man stared at him for a moment and then nodded.

  ‘You’ve never given me bad advice. But sometime soon I need you to tell me what you’re afraid of.’

  He turned and vanished into the thin veil of trees flanking the Mosa. Finding Alcaeus waiting at the cohort’s head, he saluted briskly.

  ‘The men watching the other bank have been dealt with, Centurion. Nobody got away.’

  His superior grinned fiercely.

  ‘Good. Knobby and Stumpy haven’t lost their touch yet then. Are they ready?’

  ‘They will be.’

  ‘Good.’ The wolf-priest turned to face the waiting soldiers. ‘First cohort! Follow! Me!’

  Advancing in a column four horses and eight soldiers wide, he led them through the vegetation to the narrow beach on the river’s bank, the spot where the scouts had entered the water the previous evening, taking a firm grip of the leather handle sewn into the saddle of the horse beside him as its rider expertly walked it into the river without allowing the beast to break stride. Holding onto the handle on the saddle’s other side, pushing his body away from the animal as it began to swim with swift, urge
nt kicks of its hoofs, Egilhard cast his mind back to a cold Italian dawn a year before. The river Po’s water had been bitterly cold on that spring day, numbing his entire body in the time it had taken for the horse that had been his transport to cross fifty paces of swift-flowing snow-melt, rendering the young soldier so cold that he had staggered onto the far bank incapable of fighting, and yet less than half an hour later had killed his first man in a vicious skirmish with enemy troops taken by surprise by the raid’s audacity. Alcaeus raised his head to grin at his deputy over the horse’s back.

  ‘This might … be the last time … we get … to do this! Enjoy it … while it lasts!’

  Egilhard smiled at his centurion’s levity, panting for breath as he fought to keep his armour’s dead-weight from dragging him under the water, straining muscles protesting as his feet found the shelving riverbed and thrashed in the mud for purchase. The horse staggered to its feet and advanced up the bank alongside its fellow beasts while the men who had been dragged across fought their way out of the river’s dark, sticky mud and staggered past the waiting scouts. Lataz took a grip of his son’s armour and pulled him from the river with a grin.

  ‘That trick just never gets old, does it lad? Where’s the centurion?’

  ‘I’m here. Your report?’

  Suddenly the veteran was all business, and Egilhard realised that his father had always been more than competent enough to have achieved something better than a simple soldier’s life, if he had allowed himself to escape the seductive trap in which a blunt refusal to accept responsibility had ensnared him.

  ‘There were three sentries, Centurion, changed every eight hours or so from the look of it. We watched them until my lad there gave the signal, then took them by surprise and killed them all.’

  ‘Well done. Any casualties?’

  Lataz shook his head with a grin.

  ‘Only my youngest boy’s virginity. He took one down himself, once the bastard had given him something to match that.’ He pointed to the scar on Egilhard’s chin. ‘I had to wait until he had his plait cut off before he’d let me dress the cut.’

  Alcaeus grinned ferally.

  ‘Good for him. In that case let’s get the rest of the cohort ashore and join the party.’

  While the remaining horsemen and the soldiers hanging from their saddles were crossing the Mosa, he skirted carefully down the riverbank to the south with Egilhard and a pair of soldiers for an escort, waving them into cover as they came within sight of the bridge, then beckoning his chosen man forward. The Batavi cohorts and their Cananefates allies were still waiting patiently around the crossing’s eastern end while the torturers wrung scream after weary, despairing scream from the hapless Tungrian who was paying a heavy price for his attempted assassination of their leader.

  ‘Depressing though it is, it looks as if Kivilaz’s scheme is working, and he has their full attention. I suspect that our arrival in their rear will come as a complete and very nasty surprise. Come on.’

  Rejoining the waiting cohort, he took his place alongside the horse that had carried him across the river, shouting a command that was repeated by each of his centurions.

  ‘We will advance at the trot to the rear of the enemy defences! If we encounter any opposition we don’t stop, just hit and move on! When I give the command, be ready to deploy into battle line!’

  He waited until the orders had reached the column’s end before speaking again.

  ‘We’ll win this fight in minutes, once they see their rear has been captured and there’s nowhere to run! If they surrender then just remember who you are, and leave any vengeance to the tribes! But if they choose to fight?’

  The response was immediate.

  ‘We kill them all!’

  The column advanced swiftly in a wide arc designed to take them from their landing point to the bridge, their drumming hoofbeats sending coveys of wildfowl to squawking and flapping frantically into the morning air, swiftly drawing the attention of the men watching the Tungrian position’s flanks, but the sentries were able to do nothing more than point at the oncoming horsemen and shout warnings that were too late for the defenders to do anything but stare in hollow-eyed disbelief at their doom as the Batavi column closed off their escape route and sealed their fate. Halting his men just outside of bow-shot from the small settlement’s western edge, Alcaeus waited patiently until the cohort was deployed into line of battle before strolling forward alone into the space between his men and the bridge fort.

  ‘Now let’s see how defiant Claudius Labeo feels, shall we?’

  The rebel leader came out to meet them, shaking his head in disgust at the ease with which his defence had been turned.

  ‘It seems you have me, Centurion. Alcaeus, isn’t it? I don’t suppose I can presume on your fellow feeling for a brother of the tribe to allow me to escape the rather obvious fate that my former ally Kivilaz will doubtless have in mind for me? I imagine it will be rather similar to that being dealt out to my former centurion.’

  The wolf-priest shook his head.

  ‘I think my life would be worth little more than yours, were I to accept your surrender and then allow you to escape. Do you think your men will fight?’

  Labeo shook his head doubtfully.

  ‘I’d be surprised. Kivilaz will come up with a reassuring lie or two about how they’ll all be spared, they’ll throw down their weapons and then we’ll see if he can hold Brinno and his tribesmen back from our throats. Myself, of course, he’ll have other plans for. Something involving a cross and nails, I suspect.’

  Alcaeus shook his head.

  ‘Too Roman a punishment by far. I’d have thought that he’d hand you over to the Cananefates and let them see how long you can live without your skin. But I will make you a bargain, of sorts.’

  Labeo cocked his head to one side.

  ‘What bargain?’

  ‘An oath sworn to Hercules by you, in return for the little I can do to help you escape. And with your life forfeit to me if you choose to break your word, as seems to have become your habit.’

  ‘And your terms?’

  ‘You know that I am a priest. What you do not know is that I am blessed, and cursed, with the ability to see small slices of the days that are yet to be. I see these things in my dreams. And I have seen you, Claudius Labeo, in one such dream. Far from here, but on ground familiar to us both. The dream will come to reality, I know that in my bones, but for that to happen the men I have seen in it so many times must be to hand. And you, Claudius Labeo, are one such man.’

  ‘And the others?’

  ‘Are outside of my control, for the most part, Romans and our own people, great men and common soldiers like myself. But they will be drawn to take part without knowing it, whereas you must seek out your place if you are to complete the picture I dream every night.’

  ‘I see. And what must I do to make this happen?’

  ‘Do you swear to play your part as I instruct?’

  Labeo shrugged with a grim expression.

  ‘It seems that I have very little choice in the matter, does it not? To stay here is, as you say, to invite a slow and painful death.’

  ‘Swear it.’

  The rebel commander shook his head in amusement, then squared his shoulders and looked Alcaeus straight in the eye.

  ‘I swear to Hercules—’

  ‘And to Magusanus.’

  ‘I swear to Hercules and to Magusanus, beloved god of our tribe, that I will follow whatever instruction you give me, if I manage to escape the vengeance of Kivilaz and Brinno. And if I break my oath then you, as Hercules’s and Magusanus’s chosen priest, may do with me as you wish.’

  The priest nodded.

  ‘Time is short, so listen and then act without thought. You must first escape. The ground to the south of here is open, free of any of our people, which means that a man on a fast horse – if that man can detach himself from followers who are likely to see him as a means of bargaining for their own lives – cou
ld easily evade capture. And you must not be taken. If your capture seems inevitable then you must fall on your sword, for once Kivilaz’s priests have you it seems certain I will die alongside you, condemned by your ravings under their knives.’

  Labeo nodded, grim-faced.

  ‘Suicide before capture. That seems … preferable. And what if I manage to get away?’

  ‘Rejoin the armies of Rome. Make yourself indispensable to their general, so that you will be at his side when the time comes for events to play out as I expect.’ He smiled wryly. ‘After all, if my dream is correct you wouldn’t want to miss what will come to pass, I can assure you of that.’

  ‘Tungrian brothers!’

  The words were distant, but audible, bellowed at the top of the speaker’s voice. Labeo turned back to the bridge, both men realising that the screams of the captive’s torment had died away as they had talked, replaced by an almost total silence in which Kivilaz’s unmistakable voice rang out sonorously.

  ‘My Tungrian brothers! You know we have you in a trap from which there can be no escape other than death! But we men of the Batavi did not start this war with Rome with any intention of making ourselves masters over any other tribe! The very thought of such arrogance goes against all that we believe and hold dear! Accept an alliance with us and be at peace!’ He paused momentarily, then shouted a final challenge. ‘See? My sword is sheathed! And I am coming to join you, whether you want me for your leader or as a simple common soldier!’

  ‘He’s good. You have to admit that much.’

  Labeo smiled wanly at the centurion’s wry comment.

  ‘Good? When it comes to swaying the minds of men there’s nobody more convincing.’

  Voices were shouting from behind the defences, strong and clear, men among Labeo’s rebel force urging their comrades to sheathe their weapons and surrender.

  ‘That’s Companus …’ Labeo tilted his head to listen. ‘And there’s Juvenalis. If they’ve both given up then their men’s weapons will already be back in their scabbards.’

  He looked at Alcaeus.

  ‘The south?’