The Amber Road wor-6
Page 34
The Angles of Arkil had done well at the battle of Curia. They had resisted the blandishments of Gallienus. One of their leaders, called Wiglaf, and his men had stayed and died fighting a rearguard action. Arkil and the others had got to their horses and cut their way out of the disaster. Arkil had taken a bad wound. Like Xenophon taking command of the ten thousand, a young Angle warrior called Starkad had led the survivors over the Alps back to Postumus in Lugdunum. The Angles had remained true to the oath they had sworn.
The Angles had been the only good thing about the disaster at Curia; an army lost, the province of Raetia lost. The governor Simplicinius Genialis had only just managed to get clear. And it was all caused by the treachery of Bonosus. The Spanish drunkard had suborned Legio III Italica Concors, and with its desertion all had been lost.
It was late in the season, probably too late for Gallienus to mount another campaign. But there was no doubt he would come next year. He had more options now he held Raetia. From that province he could strike north-west into Germania Superior, or he could move west from northern Italy into Gallia Narbonensis. Gallienus had a large Mediterranean fleet; Postumus did not. Superiority at sea meant Gallienus could strike direct at the south coast of Gaul, or even as far afield as Spain.
Bonosus had turned traitor, and he was not the first. The betrayal by Lollianus still hurt. Lollianus had been there from the start. He had been a friend, and he had been well rewarded. If Lollianus had not proved trustworthy, who would? Who guards the guardians? Wearing the purple had shown Postumus that trust and mercy were both finite qualities.
Postumus placed his right hand on his chest and prayed to his patron Hercules Deusoniensis for guidance. What should he do with the Angles? Late the previous night, he had put the same question to his hastily summoned consilium. His councillors had produced various arguments and advice, most of it severe. The Angles of Arkil could no longer be trusted. They would not fight against their own. Of the latter, Postumus was convinced. They should be disarmed and sold into slavery, sent to work in the mines, thrown to the beasts. Simplicinius Genialis had led a minority of voices which dissented. The Angles had fought well at Curia. Outnumbered two to one, they had nearly broken the Pannonian legionaries in front of them. In the face of disaster, they had held true to their sacramentum.
Postumus looked to the sky. There was not a bird in sight. He looked at the fire. It did not waver. Neither Hercules nor any other deity whispered in his mind. He would have to make his decision without divine aid. In the midst of his field army, Arkil and his men were impotent in his power. Postumus had faced a similar decision once before. When the citizens of Colonia Agrippinensis had surrendered the Caesar Saloninus along with Silvanus, the Dux of the German frontier, all options had been open. Postumus had ordered them beheaded; his consilium had urged it. The decision had troubled him ever since. Saloninus had been no more than a child, an innocent child. Saloninus had not desired to be Caesar any more than Postumus wanted to be emperor. All too often, Postumus had imagined the boy’s fear as he was led out, knowing he would be killed, knowing he would be denied burial, and that his soul would be condemned to wander the world for ever without hope. Severity too easily declines into savagery.
Postumus made his decision. The Angles would live. They would not be sold into slavery. Fighting men such as they were not to be thrown aside. But they would have to be far away from their kinsmen. They would be sent to garrison southern Spain, the province of Baetica. From that distant latitude, they could not ever hope to return home.
Epilogue II
The Island of Abalos in the Suebian Sea, AD265
Zeno came out of his hut and walked up through the wood, taking the longer path through the birch and aspen and avoiding the grove of oaks and the marsh. He stopped and knelt to tie a loose lace on his rough leather boots. The wind moved through the trees. The leaves were turning already. It would soon be his second winter in Hyperborea.
Standing, Zeno brushed down his trousers. He was a Hellene, born in Arcadia under the sheer peak of Cyllene. A eupatrid, his ancestors had fought at Plataea. He was a Roman equestrian, a Vir Perfectissimus. He had governed a province, and advised the emperor. Now he lived in a thatched hut and dressed as a barbarian.
It was all the fault of Ballista. Piece by piece on the journey up, the northerner had chipped away his authority. When they were among the Heathobards, Zeno had vowed to bring down the northerner, but accepted that he had to bide his time. Eventually, he had revealed to Morcar the existence of the secret imperial mandata carried by Ballista. His half-brother evidently hated Ballista. It should have gone well, but it had not. With typical barbaric lack of foresight and self-control, Morcar had blurted out the information at the most inappropriate moment. In his profound ignorance, the ruler of the Angles had failed to see the meaning implied in the imperial orders: to take all measures to look to the safety and success of the embassy. In the uproar, Zeno had slipped away from the feast. He had remained out of the way during the duel. Almost insultingly, no one had searched for him. In fact, the Angles had almost completely ignored him, until the embassy was preparing to leave for home.
Zeno entered the settlement by the southern wicket gate. Most of the outbuildings still bore evidence of smoke damage, but the hall at Gnitaheath was clean and raw in its newness. As ever, the session would be in there. There had been nothing he could have done when given the orders. Ballista had the imperial mandata allowing him to take command. Ballista had armed men around him. Zeno was to remain in the north as a Studiis to Ballista’s half-brother Oslac.
Zeno remembered how, on the journey, he had compared himself to Ixion and Odysseus. But the wheel bore Ixion up as well as down, and Odysseus returned home. All the gods, Zeno hated Latin literature, especially Virgil.
Life flutters off on a groan, down among shadows.
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