She pouted and he wanted to kiss her with a terrible ache, to gather her into his arms and make her gasp. The image of it made his senses reel, and he realized the air had filled with a perfume that made him dizzy. Her hand reached out and touched him just at the top of the greave, where inches of his bare brown leg were revealed. He shivered slightly and then came to his senses in shock. He rose to his feet in a sudden movement.
“Are you expecting payment from me?”
The girl looked confused and younger than he had first thought. “I don't do it for love,” she said, a good deal of the softness in her voice suddenly missing.
“Is Servilia here? She will want to see me.”
The girl slumped into the couch, her flirtatious manner gone in an instant. “She doesn't see centurions, you know. You have to be a consul to have a go with her.”
Brutus stared at her in horror.
“Servilia!” he shouted, striding past the pool to the other side of the room. “Where are you?”
He heard a clatter of running feet approaching behind one door, so he quickly opened another and slipped through, closing it on the laughter of the girl on the couch. He found himself in a long corridor with a gaping slave looking at him, bearing a tray of drinks.
“You can't come through here!” the slave shouted, but Brutus pushed him aside, sending the drinks flying. The slave bolted away, then two men blocked the corridor at the end. Both held clubs and together they filled the narrow walkway, their shoulders brushing the walls as they strode toward him.
“Had a bit too much to drink, have you?” one of them grated as they closed.
Brutus drew his gladius in one smooth movement. It glittered, the blade etched like the greave with swirling designs that caught the light. Both men paused, suddenly uncertain.
“Servilia!” Brutus yelled at the top of his voice, keeping the sword leveled at the men. They drew daggers from their belt sheaths and advanced slowly.
“You cocky little bugger!” one said, waving his blade. “Think you can come in here and do what you like? I never got the chance to kill an officer before, but I'm going to enjoy this.”
Brutus stiffened. “Stand to attention, you ignorant bastards,” he snapped at them. “If I see a blade pointing my way, I will have you hanged.”
The two men hesitated as he glared at them, responding to the tone almost as a reflex. Brutus took a furious step toward them.
“You tell me how men of your age have left their legion to guard a whorehouse. Deserters?”
“No . . . sir. We served with Primigenia.”
Brutus held his face stiff to mask his surprise and delight. “Under Marius?” he demanded.
The older of the pair nodded. By now they were standing erect before him, and Brutus looked them up and down as if it were an inspection.
“If I had time, I would show you the letter he wrote to send me to my century in Greece. I marched with him to the steps of the Senate house to demand his Triumph. Do not shame his memory.”
The two men blinked in discomfort as Brutus spoke. He let the silence stretch for a moment.
“Now, I have business with a woman named Servilia. You can fetch her to me, or take me to her, but you will act like soldiers while I'm here, understood?”
As the two men nodded, a door slammed open at the end of the corridor and a female voice snapped out.
“Stand away from him and give me a clear line of sight.”
The two guards didn't move, their eyes locked on the young centurion. The tension showed in their shoulders, but they remained still.
Brutus spoke clearly to them. “Is this the one?”
The older man was sweating with strain. “She is the lady of the house,” he confirmed.
“Then do as she tells you, gentlemen.”
Without another word, the two guards stepped aside to reveal a woman sighting down the length of an arrow at Brutus.
“Are you Servilia?” he said, noting the slight shake of her arms as they began to tire.
“The name you have been yelling like a street brat selling fish? I own this house.”
“I am no danger to you,” Brutus replied. “And I'd ease off on that bow before you shoot someone by accident.”
Servilia glanced at her guards and seemed to find comfort in their presence. With a release of breath, she unbent the bow, though Brutus saw she held it so it could be quickly drawn and fired if he rushed at her. She had known the threats of soldiers before, he guessed.
The woman Brutus saw there was nothing like the one from the room of statues. She was as tall and slim as he was, with long dark hair that hung loose about her shoulders. Her skin glowed with sun and health and her face was not beautiful, in fact was almost ugly, but the wide mouth and dark eyes had a knowing sensuality that he thought would ensnare many men. Her hands were wide and strong on the bow, and gold bangles chimed on her wrists as she moved.
He took in every detail of her and felt pain as he recognized a touch of himself in the line of her perfect throat.
“You don't know me,” he said quietly.
“What did you say?” she said, coming closer. “You disrupt my home and carry a blade into my rooms. I should have you whipped raw, and do not think your pretty rank will save you.”
She walked superbly, he thought. He had seen that sort of sexual confidence in a woman only once before, at the temple of Vesta, where the virgins moved with insolence in every stride, knowing it was death to any man who touched them. She had something of that and he felt himself becoming aroused, sickened by it, but not knowing how to feel like a son. Blood rushed into his face and neck and she smiled sensually, showing sharp white teeth.
“I thought you would look older,” he murmured, and a look of irritation came into her eyes.
“I look how I look. I still don't know you.”
Brutus sheathed his sword. He wanted to say who he was and have shock break through her confidence, to see her eyes widen in amazement as she realized what an impressive young man he was.
Then it all seemed worthless. A long-suppressed memory came to him of overhearing Julius's father talking about her, and he sighed to have it confirmed. He was in a whorehouse, no matter how rich it seemed. It didn't really matter what she thought of him.
“My name is Marcus. I am your son,” he said, shrugging.
She froze as still as one of her statues. For a long moment she held his gaze, then her eyes filled with tears and she dropped the bow with a clatter and ran back down the corridor, slamming the door behind her with a force that shook the walls.
The guard was looking at Brutus with his mouth open.
“Is that true, sir?” he said gruffly. Brutus nodded and the man flushed with embarrassment. “We didn't know.”
“I didn't tell you. Look, I'm going to leave now. Is anyone waiting to put a bolt in me as I go through the door?”
The guard relaxed slightly. “No,” he said. “Me and the lad are the only guards. She doesn't need them, as a rule.”
Brutus turned to leave and the guard spoke again.
“Sulla had Primigenia cut off the rolls in the Senate. We had to take what work we could find.”
Brutus turned back to him, wishing he had more to offer.
“I know where you are now. I can find you again if I need you,” he said. The guard stretched out his hand and Brutus took it in the legionary grip.
On his way out, Brutus passed through the room with the pool, thankful to find it empty. He paused only to collect his helmet and splash a little of the water on his face and neck. It didn't help cool his confusion. He felt dazed by events and desperately wanted to find somewhere quiet where he could think through what had happened. The thought of struggling in the busy crowds was an irritation, but he would have to get back to the estate. He had no other home.
At the gate, a slave came running toward him. He almost drew his sword again at the running footsteps, but the slave was another young girl, unarmed. She panted as s
he reached him and he noticed the rise and fall of her chest almost absently. Another beauty. It seemed the house was full of them.
“The mistress told me you should return here tomorrow morning. She will see you then.”
Inexplicably, Brutus felt his spirits lift at the words.
“I will be here,” he said.
* * *
The pattern along the coast suggested the next settlement would be farther than the soldiers could march in a day. They made better time when they crossed the tracks of heavy animals and could follow them until they turned away from the coast. Julius was unwilling to travel too far from the sound of crashing surf for fear of losing themselves completely. When they turned off a trail, it was hard, sweaty work to cut their way through stalks and thornbushes as high as a man's head and tipped with red thorns as if already marked in blood. Away from the sea, the air was thick with moisture, and stinging insects plagued them all, rising unseen from the heavy leaves as the Romans disturbed them.
As they made camp for the evening, Julius wondered if the isolation of the Roman settlements was evidence of some farsighted plan of the Senate's to prevent these disparate villages banding together as the generations passed, but guessed it was just to give them room to grow. He supposed he could have pushed the men on through the dark, but the officers from Accipiter were far less comfortable in the hot African night than those who had grown up on that coast. Strange animal calls and screams woke them and had hands reaching for their swords, while the recruits slept on, oblivious.
Julius had given Pelitas the task of selecting guards for the watches, matching new men with those he trusted, in pairs. He was well aware that every mile along the narrow game tracks was a chance for the young villagers to desert. With weapons scarce, they went unarmed during the day, but swords had to be given to those on watch, and one or two of them eyed the old iron blades with something like avarice. Julius hoped it was a greed for the things of their fathers, not a desire to steal what they could and run.
Gathering food had presented similar problems. It was crucial that the Accipiter men did not become dependent on their charges to eat. It would be a subtle but significant shift in the ladder of authority Julius had set up. He knew that those who dispense food were the masters, regardless of rank. That was a truth older than Rome herself.
He thanked the gods for Pelitas, who seemed able to trap small animals in these strange lands as once he had poached from the woodlands of Italy. Even the recruits had been impressed, watching him rejoin the group after only a few hours, bearing the limp bodies of four hares. With fifteen healthy men to feed, the evening hunt had become a vital skill, and Pelitas had helped to prevent them splitting into two camps of those who could stalk and those who had to wait to be fed.
Julius looked over to his friend, busy carving slices of pork from the side of a young pig he had caught earlier in the day, breaking its leg with a swiftly thrown rock as it rushed from cover almost on top of them. The mother had not been seen, though squeals had come to them from the distant shrubbery. Julius wished she had come closer so that they could be looking forward to a feast instead of a few hot mouthfuls. There was no spare fat on any of the men from Accipiter, and it would be a while before they lost their gaunt appearance completely. His mouth twitched as he supposed he had the same look. It had been such a long time since he had seen a mirror, and he wondered if his face had changed for better or worse. Would Cornelia be pleased if she saw him, or shocked and upset by the grim look he imagined in his eye, mute evidence to the horrors of imprisonment?
He chuckled to himself at the flight of fancy. He would be the same, no matter how his face had changed.
Suetonius looked up sharply at the laugh, always seeing insult where there was none. It was hard to resist baiting the young man, but in this Julius had set rigid restrictions on himself. He sensed the spite came from fear that Julius would use his new authority to strike back for old injuries. He could not afford to enjoy even a moment of that luxury, in case it broke up the unit he was trying to make. He knew he had to become the sort of leader who was above small grievances, to appear to them as Marius had once appeared to him—cut from better stone. He nodded to Suetonius briefly, then looked away at the rest.
Gaditicus and Prax supervised the camp, marking the perimeter with fallen branches, for want of anything better. Julius heard them go over the sentry rules with the men and smiled in a moment of nostalgia.
“How many times do you challenge?” Prax was saying to Ciro, as he had for all the men.
“Once, sir. They call to approach the camp and I say, ‘Approach and be recognized.' ”
“And if they don't call to approach the camp?” Prax said cheerfully.
“I wake someone else up, wait for them to get close, and chop their heads off.”
“Good lad. Neck and groin, remember. Anywhere else and they can still have enough strength to take you with them. Neck and groin is fastest.”
Ciro grinned, taking in every scrap of information Prax threw at him. Julius liked the big man's heart. He wanted to be a legionary, to know what his father had once loved. Prax too had discovered that he enjoyed teaching all the things he had learned in his decades of marching and sailing for Rome. Given time, the new men would be able to deceive anyone. They would look like legionaries and speak with the same casual slang and expressions.
Julius frowned to himself as he tried to find a comfortable position to lie down. Whether they would stand when all around them had been cut down and the enemy brought certain death to them with screaming triumph . . . that they couldn't know for sure until it happened. It didn't help that the men of Accipiter weren't even sure themselves where such wild courage came from. A man could spend a lifetime avoiding every conflict, then throw his life away to protect someone he loved. Julius closed his eyes. Perhaps that was the key, but not many men loved Rome. The city was too big, too impersonal. The legionaries Julius had known never thought of the republic of free voters, carved out on seven hills by a river. What they fought for was their general, their legion, even their century or their friends. A man standing next to his friends cannot run, for shame.
Suetonius yelped suddenly, leaping to his feet and beating at himself.
“Help! There's something on the ground here!” he shouted.
Julius jumped to his feet and the other men closed in on the fire, swords drawn. A part of Julius noted with pleasure that Ciro stayed at his post.
In the light of the fire, a black line of enormous ants moved like oil over the ground, disappearing back into the shadows beyond the light. Suetonius was becoming frantic and began to tear off his clothes.
“They're all over me!” he wailed.
Pelitas stepped forward to help him and as his foot stepped near the column, part of it slid toward him and he scrambled back with a shout, pulling at his legs with his bare fingers.
“Gods, get them off!” he cried.
The camp dissolved into chaos. Those who had been brought up on the coast were far calmer than the Accipiter officers. The ants bit as deeply as rats, and when the soldiers found them, their bodies broke away to leave the jaws still attached and tearing into the skin in death spasms. The grip was too strong to be pulled away with fingers, and Suetonius was soon covered in the dark heads, his hands bloody with tugging at them.
Julius called Ciro over and watched as he calmly checked the two Romans, breaking off the remaining bodies with his powerful hands.
“They're still in me! Can't you get the heads out?” Suetonius pleaded with him, shuddering in terror as he stood almost naked while the big man searched his skin for the last of them.
Ciro shrugged. “The jaws must be dug free with a knife, they can't be prized apart. The tribes use them to close wounds, like stitches.”
“What are they?” Julius asked.
“Soldiers of the forest. They guard the column on the march. My father used to say they were like the outriders Rome uses. If you stay clear, they
will not attack you, but if you are in their path, they'll make you jump like Suetonius.”
Pelitas turned a baleful eye on the column that still streamed through the camp. “We could burn them,” he said.
Ciro shook his head sharply. “The line is endless. Better just to move away from them.”
“Right, you heard him,” Julius said. “Pack up and get ready to move a mile down the coast. Suetonius, I want you clothed and ready to go. You and Pelitas can work the jaws out of your skin when we're settled again.”
“It's agony,” Suetonius whimpered.
Ciro looked at him and Julius felt a pang of shame and irritation that the young officer was showing such a poor face to the recruits.
“Move, or I'll tie you down over the ants myself,” he said.
The threat seemed to have an effect, and before the moon moved far in the sky, a new camp was set up, with Ciro and two others finishing their watch. They would all be tired from lack of sleep in the morning after the excitement.
Julius's head throbbed slowly, seeming to match the rhythms of the droning insects all around them. Every time he drifted into sleep, he'd feel the sting of an insect settling onto his exposed skin. They left smears of his own blood as he caught and cracked them, but there were always more waiting for him to lie still. He made a pillow of his kit and used a rag to cover his face, longing for the distant skies of Rome. For a moment, he could see Cornelia in his mind and he smiled. Exhaustion hit him moments later.
* * *
With itching red swellings on their skin and shadows under their eyes, they reached the next settlement before noon, less than a mile from the coast. Julius led the men into the square, taking in the sights and smells of a touch of civilization. He was struck again by the absence of fortifications of any kind. The old soldiers who had taken their lands on this coast must have little fear of attack, he thought. The farms were small, but there must be trade between these isolated places and native villages farther into the interior. He saw a number of black faces among the Romans who gathered to see his men. He wondered how long it would take for the Roman blood to mingle and be lost, so that distant generations would know nothing at all of their ancient fathers and their lives. The land would return to whatever state it had been in before they came, and even the stories around campfires would falter and be forgotten. He wondered if they remembered the empire of Carthage here, when thousands of ships had explored the world from ports along this very coastline. It was a chilling thought and he put it aside for later reflection, knowing he had to focus his mind if he was to come away from this place with more of what he needed.
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