by J. E. Gurley
“Do not inform the men,” Gaius warned. “They are frightened enough. They might attempt to abandon their posts and return to their homes.”
A strangled laugh escaped Sevilius’ lips. He picked up a rock from beside him and hurled it at the hapless jerboa, now sitting on the edge of Sevilius’ gold plate devouring his food. The stone caught the small rodent squarely in the head, killing it instantly. It lay with its lifeblood bleeding into the sand. The senseless act of violence against a hapless creature angered Gaius. He resisted the temptation to run his sword through the useless Tribune; then turned and stalked away, leaving Sevilius to bask in his personal misery.
The moon’s pallid light swept the dunes with a ghostly glow, casting long shadows that danced with the moon’s movement. As Gaius reclined on his blanket looking out over the encampment, he noticed shadows that danced apart from the other deeper shadows, drawing nearer. Alarmed, he leaped to his feet. At that moment, a man’s blood-curdling scream in the distance ripped the night, Allectus, the flogged sentry, giving the alarm as he died.
“To arms!” Gaius shouted. He drew his sword and faced the movement. In the distance behind him, he heard Flavius’ voice calling the men to arms.
He cast a glance at the Tribune. Sevilius stood and held his sword in his hand. Quintus Cantos stood beside him, his head swinging wildly from side to side searching the crests of the dunes for the cause of the alarm. Neither man took notice of the approaching shadows.
“The shadows!” Gaius warned. “Watch the shadows!”
The shadows circled the camp like a dark dust cloud, disappearing as they merged with other, moon-cast shadows. He had difficulty tracking them. A low, mournful moaning, the wretched sound of tortured men’s souls crying out for vengeance, poured from the creatures, a sound Gaius could not decide if a call for battle or a dirge. Then, as if on command, they darted forward into the ranks of men. The screams of the dying mingled with the metallic clatter of swords and shields and the yells of frightened men:
“There! Behind the wagon.”
“Look out!”
“Stand still, damn you!”
“Close ranks! Swords out!”
This last came from Flavius, urging his men toward the center of the camp and the protection of the fires. With a sickening feeling, Gaius realized how alone and exposed he had become at the edge of the encampment. As he raced to join his men, from the corner of his eye he saw a shadow sweeping across the sand toward him. He turned to face it with his short sword, doubting its worth against such an amorphous foe. Inside the dark, shapeless shadow, twin red orbs so intense they dazzled him, gazed at him with an unnatural hunger. A deeper blackness representing the creature’s maw yawned, and a soft keening emerged, like voices whispering in a breeze. The eerie sound chilled Gaius’ soul and raised goose bumps on his arms. Other shadows joined the first and began to encircle him. He spun slowly on his heels, his useless sword pointed toward his enemy, watching their movements.
Suddenly, Rashid stood beside him, holding his amulet in his hand, mumbling words that sound like no Tamazight, the language of the Berbers that he had ever heard. The words exploded awkwardly from Rashid’s mouth, as if unsuitable for utterance by human lips. They sounded ancient, older than even the Berber tongue, perhaps from a time when the older gods walked the Earth. The jewel in the amulet glowed deep azure. Its light swept the sand around them. The sand fluoresced, reflecting the cerulean light. To Gaius’ amazement, the shadows halted, as if obeying the strange words or taking heed of the strange light.
“Stay beside me or die,” Rashid hissed in warning.
Believing the Berber, Gaius obeyed. The shadows didn’t leave, but they drew no nearer. The night became strangely cold, and the familiar odor of death floated in the night air. The shadow creatures surrounding Gaius and Rashid did not attack, but the rest of the camp was not as lucky. Screams rent the night, wrenched in horror from dying men’s throats. Gaius turned his head just far enough to see the thin ranks of his men flounder under a swarm of shadows. The banked fires faded, as if the marauding shadows were devouring their light. Swords flailed uselessly and hurled javelins pierced shadows but fell harmlessly to the sand beyond.
Sevilius and his aide stood apart from the others. As Gaius watched, a shadow moved swiftly across the sand directly toward the Tribune. His aide, Quintus Cantos, leapt in front of him with sword drawn. He disappeared as the shadow engulfed him. His dying scream pierced the black veil covering him, muffled as if coming from afar. The shadow withdrew, leaving only Quintus’ sword behind. Gaius applauded the aide’s noble sacrifice in his attempt to protect the Tribune. He had sorely misjudged the man based solely on his effeminate appearance and mannerisms without bothering to learn more of his character.
A second shadow now confronted Sevilius. The grisly death of his aide proved the last straw in breaking him. The color drained from his face, and his mouth opened, as if wishing to scream but unable to. Seeing the specter now focused on him, the Tribune threw his sword to the ground and ran toward the fires.
“We must save him,” Gaius urged Rashid.
“If we move, we may die,” Rashid replied.
“Stay then,” Gaius yelled in reproach. “I must go. We need him in this quest.”
Gaius detested the fact that the Tribune, the one person who could aid him in regaining his lost stature, was such a coward. He had the ear of the Emperor. His report on the Inyosh, in spite of his personal animosity toward Gaius, would allow the Emperor to set aside his earlier pronouncement without the appearance of having made an error in judgment.
Rashid shrugged. “Very well. Follow closely.”
Gaius resisted the urge to run to the defense of his besieged men, begrudging the Berber’s snail’s-pace approach. Each new scream pierced Gaius’ heart like a dagger thrust. The shadow pursuing Sevilius caught up with him, but to Gaius’ amazement, it did not swallow him as it had the others. Instead, it reached out a shadowy protuberance, touched the Tribune’s face like a lover’s soft caress, and withdrew. Sevilius screamed and ran blindly away from the fires into the night.
Gaius veered away from the fires, intercepted the Tribune, and grabbed Sevilius’ arm as he raced by, arresting his panicked flight by jerking him to a halt. The Tribune’s eyes were wide open with fright, but he saw nothing. A whimper escaped his quivering lips. Spittle oozed from the corner of his mouth and dribbled down his chin. Gaius dragged the Tribune behind him toward the center of the camp.
Finally, as they drew within ten paces of the rapidly dwindling group of survivors, the shadows abruptly withdrew into the night, leaving bloody shreds of clothing, swords, helmets, and sandals littering the blood-splattered sand in their wake, but no bodies. With a quick count, Gaius gauged he had lost over a dozen men.
Flavius, his pale face streaked with blood, hovered on the edge of skewering Rashid with the aclis he held balanced in his right hand. Gaius held out his open palm to stop him.
“Hold, Flavius. We owe him our lives.”
Flavius eyed the glowing amulet Rashid held out with obvious distrust. “What manner of witchery is this?” he said, jabbing the point of the javelin dangerously close to Rashid’s neck to indicate the amulet.
“A talisman, a ward against evil,” Rashid replied. “It has been in our tribe for centuries.”
“I say kill him and take the charm.” Flavius’ angry eyes did not leave the Berber.
Gaius forced a smile at his optio’s straightforward manner – Kill the enemy and seize his weapons. He glanced at Rashid. “I daresay it would be useless without the proper incantations. We need him.”
Flavius seemed unconvinced, but lowered his javelin and jammed the point in the ground at his feet with a disgruntled growl. Around him, the men cowered nervously, their eyes straying from the Berber to the surrounding darkness, fearing attack from either quarter. Just over eighty men remained alive.
“Iron does not stop them,” Flavius said. “I saw them, but they had
no shape, just an amorphous black mist gliding across the sand. They descended on a man, and he was gone, leaving … this.” He kicked at a bloody piece of cloth with his sandaled foot. It landed atop Rashid’s sandals. He stared hard at Rashid. “You know these creatures.”
“I have never seen one. They are the Inyosh, the undead dark spawn of Lilith.”
“How do we kill them?”
Rashid stared at Flavius as he answered, “How does one kill that which does not live?”
Gaius, seeing the sorry state his men were in, had more immediate concerns. “Will they attack again tonight?”
Rashid sighed, “I do not think so.”
The Berber sounded uncertain, but the men were in no shape to face another such attack. They could do no more to prepare against it than they already had. “Flavius, see to the men. Give them a double ration of wine. Build the fires higher and keep the sentries within the perimeter of the camp.” He handed him Sevilius’ arm, like passing a package. The Tribune, lost in a world of his own creation, did not resist. “Take him to safety. In the morning, we move fast for the village. We do not camp until we reach it.”
Gaius noticed that Flavius’ eyes scanned the darkness nervously as he listened, but he nodded. “Aye, I’ll stand watch myself.” He glanced at Gaius. “I do not think I would welcome sleep this night.”
Flavius took Sevilius and escorted him to the nearest fire. The Tribune sat so close to the flames that Gaius feared he would combust. Gaius didn’t blame him. Fire seemed to be the only thing the creatures respected. Certainly, Roman iron did not daunt them.
After Flavius left, barking orders to the men, Gaius turned angrily to Rashid. “You are no salt merchant,” he accused.
Rashid smiled. “Truly I am, but I am also a prince of my tribe. As such, I have access to all the lore of my tribe and the wisdom of the elders. Like this amulet, such knowledge has passed from father to son for many generations.” The amulet no longer glowed. “You look at me as if I hide some great secret. I assure you, I know only what my father has told me. The power of the amulet is beyond me. The Dark Ones fear it or respect it; I do not know which, but it will not kill them, merely protect its bearer and those around him.”
Gaius nodded. He could not argue with facts. He had witnessed the creatures’ reluctance to approach the amulet. “It saved us tonight.”
“Not all, I fear. Many died, yet you still insist on marching on Hamad Rus. What is it that makes you Romans so mad?”
“The need for glory,” Gaius answered truthfully.
“I fear your glory will be short lived.”
“Glory lives on long after the man dies,” Gaius answered, believing his words.
Rashid chuckled, “Yes, chiseled in stone for all to see; yet you have seen Hamad Rus. It, too, once held carved likenesses of its heroes, now crumbled to dust. Rome is like that.”
“Rome is eternal,” Gaius replied, “Like the sky and the earth.”
Rashid said nothing. He simply shook his head and stared into the darkness. Gaius’ blood churned hot in his veins. He desired a foe upon which he could vent his frustration, not some formless shadow of the night. His grip on his sword tightened until his knuckles turned white before he thrust it into his scabbard.
“Why did you withhold the truth about yourself?” he demanded.
A quick smile played on Rashid’s lips. “Romans have held princes for ransom. My people are poor and could pay no ransom.”
Gaius nodded at the truth in the Berber’s words. He had often held dignitaries of the enemy for ransom and sent severed heads or hands if they did not pay.
“If the amulet can protect those around it, why did your men die?”
Gaius knew he had struck a raw wound when a look of distress crossed Rashid’s troubled face. In a voice much softer than earlier, he said, “I grew restless in the night. I walked away from our camp and sat watching the stars, as I often do. I heard screams. By the time I arrived, they were gone, as are your men. I wandered aimlessly searching for them half-mad with distress when I saw your fires.”
“You think you abandoned them.” Gaius guessed at the source of Rashid’s guilt.
Rashid winced. “I am their prince. They were my responsibility.”
Gaius nodded. “I have lost men, too many men. At first, I, too, felt responsible for each death, each maimed soldier. That faded over the years. Soldiers die. I cannot prevent all their deaths. I can only hope to use them wisely.”
“My men were not soldiers. They were herders, wood carvers, and weavers who followed me to gather salt, not sack a city. They did not seek death nor expect death to come for them from the shadows.”
“You can give meaning to their deaths by helping me defeat this common enemy.”
“To me, their deaths have meaning. You Romans venture into the heart of the desert and disturb everything around you. Your presence awoke these monsters.” He stared at Gaius. “You would sacrifice your men to regain your lost glory. Is that using them wisely? You cannot put sword to this enemy. You have witnessed their invulnerability. Why do you persist in this insanity?”
Gaius stiffened. “Because I am Roman.”
Rashid shook his head slowly. “Go home. Save your men. The desert will swallow you as it does everything that opposes it. The desert has endured for thousands of years, some say since time itself. This evil grows restless. Now, it has tasted Roman blood. Do you think your civilization greater than those that once flourished here?” He sneered. “That is typical Roman vanity.”
“Careful you do not evoke typical Roman wrath,” Gaius advised.
Rashid spread his hands wide and bowed. “My apologies. We both bear the marks of our guilt. No scrubbing will wash that stain from us.”
Speaking with Rashid always troubled him, as if the gods had sent the Berber prince to remind him of his inadequacies. Gaius wanted to dismiss him, but one question disturbed him. “Why did you save me?”
“If you died, do you think your optio, Flavius the Distrustful, would allow me to live long? I saved you to save myself.”
Gaius tried hard not to smile at Rashid’s apt nickname for Flavius. “A truthful enough answer,” he replied. “Go, join your countrymen.”
Rashid scowled. “They are not my countrymen. They are of the Tebu tribe from the Harouj Mountains far to the east. They are Roman lapdogs who have too long lived among your people and think they are civilized. They fear me because to them I am a wild Berber.” Rashid stalked away, leaving Gaius angry with himself for allowing the Berber’s words to provoke him.
Gaius knew something of the Tebu people. He had inquired about them before hiring them as bearers, as any good officer would. They were a strange, laconic people from deep in the desert south of Cyrenaica. Many of his fellow Romans considered them vacuous and lazy, but he found them to be proud, intelligent, and assiduously responsible if treated, if not as equals, at least as human beings. Traders who ventured to Gebel Harouj reported a land of dead basaltic volcanoes and hidden valleys, a place of stark landscapes but also great beauty. If the reports were not fantastical whims of the observers, trees did not grow in oases, but in deep pits that marred the hamada, the wind-swept rocky plain. Such a land of extremes created people of extremes. The Tebu were not Romans, but he trusted them, as much as he trusted any non-Roman.
Marcellus, skeptical of Rashid’s estimate that the shadow creatures would not attack again, dogged the men relentlessly, urging them work faster, as they used most of the wood loaded on the wagon to build fires, and then uprooted dried shrubs to build them higher. He constantly twisted his head trying to keep his single good eye focused both on the men and on the surrounding darkness. Deeming the flames insufficient, he ordered oil poured oil on them to make them blaze higher still.
The sharp tang of the blood of the dead drifted on the wood smoke. The disheartened men huddled in the pools of light cast by the flames, as if death itself dwelled in the shadows, which it did. Flavius stalked the camp rel
entlessly, urging the sentries to remain vigilant at their posts. Marcellus followed close on the optio’s heels, stopping beside each soldier to offer a few encouraging words and a friendly pat on the back. The imperturbable veteran’s quiet manner in the face of danger pleased Gaius. The men respected Marcellus almost as much as they feared Flavius. Sometimes respect urged men to greater effort than fear.
The Tebu auxilia once again sat back to back, facing outward toward the darkness. They had lost two of their number during the attack and were undoubtedly reconsidering their decision to join the Legion. Occasionally, one would glance in Rashid’s direction and glare at him, but the Berber seemed oblivious of their disdain. He studied the amulet by the light of the fire as if trying to coax meaning from the undecipherable script around its edges. Gaius wished him luck. The amulet had proven the only protection they had against the Dark Ones.
Gaius had no stomach for magic, witches, or truthsayers. He considered them all charlatans and frauds. No reader of entrails had ever successfully predicted the outcome of a battle. The omens had been good before the battle at White Rock Pass, but he had lost a third of his men and his command. If magic resided in the amulet around Rashid’s neck, he did not trust it any more than he trusted the Berber prince.
Marcellus’s wary glances at Gaius revealed a reluctance to approach, as if the latest calamity had lowered his respect for his new commander. Finally, he summoned his courage and approached. He stood in front of Gaius with blood splatter on the patch over his eye and blood seeping through a crude bandage wrapped around a fresh wound on his left forearm. The wound bled profusely, but he paid it no attention.
“The men are frightened,” he said.
“And you?”
Marcellus scuffed his sandal in the sand and stared at the mark he had made; then erased it before looking Gaius in the eyes. “I fear only failure.”
“Then we must not fail.”
“The men will not sleep this night.”
