Marcus shook his head, fumbling with the buckle of his belt.
‘There’s no choice. I’ll go with this reptile and face the “justice” that’s been stalking me ever since the throne decided my father’s estate would make a nice contribution to the treasury.’
He met Excingus’s eyes with a contemptuous stare, but the corn officer’s shrug was eloquent in its indifference.
‘I don’t judge the men on whom I’m ordered to exercise the imperial will, Valerius Aquila, I’m simply an instrument of my master. If Prefect Perennis says that you have to die, that’s simply the way that it is. Shall we? You too, Decurion Felix, although obviously you’ll be staying with us for a while longer. I have so many questions to ask you.’
Marcus tossed his belt and swords aside, and tried to lift the heavy mail shirt over his head but was frustrated both by the armour’s weight and his own sudden exhaustion in the face of his impending death.
‘Let me help you, Centurion.’
Martos stepped forward with a look at Scaurus, and took a firm grip of the heavy mail coat’s shoulders, lifting the armour over the Roman’s head. As he did so, Scaurus stepped forward with renewed anger, putting a hand on his sword’s hilt and sliding the weapon halfway from the scabbard before Licinius caught his arm and stopped the movement. Excingus, momentarily startled, resumed his confident pose as he watched the two tribunes’ momentary battle of wills, grinning smugly as the older man tightened his grip on Scaurus’s arm and clamped his other hand on to his incensed colleague’s sword hand. Shaking his head firmly, Licinius pushed the blade home into its scabbard, ignoring the rage in his colleague’s eyes and speaking to him calmly, in a tone akin to that used by a father to a recalcitrant son.
‘I don’t know about you, Rutilius Scaurus, but I’d like to keep my family out of this mess. If you draw that sword he’ll have his praetorian animals rip apart the lives of everyone we care about. Think about it.’
Scaurus stood stock still for a moment, his body shaking with repressed anger, and then turned away, putting a hand to his eyes. Excingus smiled wryly at the sight, shaking his head.
‘You really do need to learn to take this sort of thing with a touch more equanimity, Tribune. If this is the worst thing that ever happens to you then you’ll have had a fortunate life by comparison with most of us.’
Marcus stepped past his tribune with a reassuring pat on the other man’s arm, staring up at the mounted man with a look of disgust.
‘Very well, Centurion, if you’re ready?’
Excingus gestured wearily to the horse alongside his own.
‘Climb aboard, Valerius Aquila, and let’s get this over and done with. You, Decurion, can ride your own beast. A fine-looking animal, you really are a very privileged young man.’
The three men turned and rode away from the knot of officers and soldiers watching them, while Scaurus, Licinius and Martos stood and watched them disappear over the ridge. Licinius raised an eyebrow at his colleague, his tone reflective.
‘That went about as well as we could have expected. The rest is up to the pair of them.’
Martos walked away from the tribunes briskly as soon as the corn officer turned his horse away, knowing that Arminius wouldn’t be far from his master at such a moment. He found the German waiting a dozen paces distant, his arms folded with disapproval.
‘We should have fought. Allowing them to take our friend away without any resistance shames us all.’
The Votadini prince shook his head.
‘They have his woman. And that bastard was very clear that he will tear through the tribunes’ families if he even suspects them of attempting to rescue the boy.’
They shared a dour glance before Arminius spoke.
‘All of these things will happen whether we resist or not. Those animals are strangers to any idea of honour.’
‘So you think we should follow them?’
The German nodded.
‘They’ll be looking behind them for horsemen, but they won’t see a pair of dirty barbarians trailing them along the forest edge if we stay far enough back.’
Martos snorted with laughter.
‘If we stay far enough back? With them on horses and us on foot? Staying far enough back isn’t going to be much of a problem. Come on, then …’
He turned for the treeline, only to find Lugos standing behind them, towering over both men. Martos raked him with a hostile stare.
‘What do you want, Selgovae?’
The warrior flexed his shoulders, great ropes of muscle moving beneath his scarred skin, and hefted the war hammer that he had liberated from the growing pile of captured barbarian weapons. Similar to Drust’s heavily decorated weapon, the hammer hanging nonchalantly from his hand was, if anything, heavier, its iron beak sharpened to a point and the handle’s counterweight formed from a disc of iron which had been patiently worked to produce a ragged edged and a viciously hooked half-moon blade.
‘Roman spared my life, now I pay back debt. And you not call me Selgovae. I have no tribe.’
The prince grimaced at Arminius, tightening his sword belt a notch in readiness for their run to the east.
‘It’s up to you. Does he run with us?’
The German nodded, tossing aside his round wooden shield.
‘Yes. Since you and I are also both dispossessed of our tribes, it seems we have no option but to accept a fellow exile. Now run!’
Marcus managed to hold to his initial resolve, to treat the corn officer with a frosty silence as they rode to meet the praetorians waiting on them, for no more than a minute. Felix kept silent as his friend’s indignant anger boiled over, stroking Hades’ neck gently as if savouring the feeling one last time.
‘So this all means nothing to you? You’re happy to carry out your master’s instructions without giving any thought to the innocent lives you’re destroying?’
Excingus’s response to the question was a look of near-incredulity.
‘And what would you have me do, Valerius Aquila? Tell the second-most powerful man in the Empire that I’m sorry, but the man you’ve sent me to kill isn’t really guilty of anything, other than being born into the wrong family at the wrong time. Should I tell him that his son, far from being the innocent victim of a fugitive from justice, was in reality a traitor who betrayed his legion and caused the loss of their eagle, one of the worst possible military reverses possible? Because believe me, I’ve heard all those stories before over the space of the last couple of months. And doubtless most of them are true …’
Marcus snorted his derision.
‘Most of them?’
Excingus laughed, shaking his head.
‘Very well. All of them, if that helps you to feel better, and more besides, no doubt. The fact remains, young man, that I am an imperial enforcer, and, having reached the dizzy rank of centurion in the Camp of the Foreigners, therefore without any real choice in this matter. Gentlemen, I am an urbane version of the men that collect their tribute from the businesses of the Subura district, but no less of a hired sword for all that, and I am as subject to the praetorian prefect’s will as if he were riding alongside us. Were I sufficiently weak minded to yield to the “justice” in your words, and release you to run again, what do you think would happen to me, eh? I would be dead before the sun kissed the western horizon, of course, and dead, I should add, at the hand of the very man with whom Prefect Perennis has paired me for the task of finding you, and erasing you from this pathetic existence that you’ve chosen as being preferable to a quick death. I have neither illusions nor any choice in this matter, Valerius Aquila, and neither do you, but to play your part, and die with as much dignity as can be managed under the circumstances.’
A long silence held for a few moments before Marcus spoke again.
‘And the decurion here? What has he done to merit whatever torture you plan to subject him to?’
Excingus raised an eybrow at the cavalry officer.
‘Do you want
to tell him? No? Very well. Cornelius Felix is here because on the day of the battle in which the Sixth Legion lost their eagle he watched you take part in the violent death of the man who had betrayed the legion to the barbarians. Since that man was Prefect Perennis’s son, our pursuit of you has been invested with more than a little of his personal interest. But that wasn’t the end of it. The decurion here told a friend of his, a legion tribune called Paulus, what you’d done as you walked past them one night in camp, and that friend got drunk and told his colleague Quirinius, the legion’s senior tribune. Quirinius was then sent back to Rome, fell on hard times and imagined that he could bargain with Prefect Perennis. He sought to trade the identity of his son’s killer for some favour or other. Fool …’ He shook his head sadly. ‘He had a beautiful wife, and a sweet child, and I had no choice but to turn my colleague the praetorian and his thugs loose on them as part of the routine cleaning up after such murders. Anyway, he told Perennis who it was that had told him about your hiding place here on the edge of the world. The prefect, being rather unhappy about a series of letters he’s received from Britannia, threatening him that the truth about his son might easily become public knowledge, gave us a second mission, more important to him than the quest to find you and put you down, believe it or not. He ordered us to find the letter writer and to silence him for good, and that trail leads from Quirinius to Paulus and from Paulus to Felix here. After that I’ll wager there’s only one more link, the letter writer himself. I’m pretty sure that the final link in the chain is your tribune, in fact I’d put good money on it, but I’ll need to be quite sure before unleashing the hounds on him and his family, which means that your questioning is likely to be somewhat enthusiastic …’
He tipped his head to the two riders set to watch his approach to the Tungrians, who had left the shade of the trees, and were cantering their horses towards the three horsemen.
‘And so that, Centurion, is why your friend Felix is accompanying us back to our camp. And now, I suggest, you might want to keep your complaints about the injustice that you’re about to suffer to yourself for a while. I like to pride myself on having a good deal more understanding of the contradictions inherent in the role that my kind and I play than my companions, but I think you’ll find these particular gentlemen a little less informed than me. That, and a lot more willing to take out their frustrations on an unarmed prisoner. So, unless you really want your woman to suffer at their hands as a means of teaching you to keep your mouth shut …?’
He raised an eyebrow, waiting until Marcus had wearily conceded the point with a dispirited nod before looking away, speaking out into the empty landscape as if talking to himself.
‘Good lad. I knew you’d see the sense of it.’
12
‘They’re here, Centurion, Excingus has them both!’
Rapax nodded at the man he’d set to watch for his colleague’s return, getting up from the fallen tree on which he’d been sitting.
‘Good. Once this Felix tells us who witnessed the death of Perennis’s son we’ll be able to finish the job and get out of this shithole of a province and back to some sunshine. Come along, my lovely, let’s you and I get ourselves out of sight before your boyfriend gets here. You two, come with me. The rest of you can provide the centurion with a suitably warm welcome once I’ve got his woman squawking.’
He pulled Felicia into the trees, retreating far enough into their cover that he could see out into the clearing without being visible. The remaining soldiers spread out in a half-circle to receive the riders, who rode into their midst and stopped at the corn officer’s command, the two praetorians who had escorted them in peeling away to either side. Rapax dragged Felicia deeper into the forest’s cover, his hand clamped over her mouth to prevent her from calling out to Marcus.
‘All in good time, he’ll hear you screaming for me to stop soon enough, but let’s not spoil the surprise, eh?’ He turned to the guardsmen following him. ‘You two, stop gawking and stand guard. I don’t want anyone creeping up on me while I’m otherwise occupied. Now then, Doctor, let’s get down to …’
In the moment of his distraction Felicia, knowing that she could wait no longer, reached under her skirts and pulled the razor-sharp blade free from its scabbard. As Rapax turned back to her, and before the watching soldiers could shout a warning, she struck with all the speed and strength she had, plunging the knife up into the soft skin beneath his jaw until only the bone handle protruded. The praetorian staggered backwards, his eyes flickering as the weapon, stabbed up through his tongue and palate, ran with blood that streamed down the bone handle and on to his boots. He reeled back another step with his eyes rolling up to show only their whites and then straightened, gripping the knife and tearing it free from his jaw with a terrible groan.
Slack jawed at the sight of their officer’s wound, the guardsmen failed to notice that their prisoner had turned and run deeper into the trees, wrenching their attention back to the fleeing woman only when the stricken centurion pointed after her.
‘Ged ’er!’
Turning away from their officer as he swayed and staggered, blood running down the front of his armour in rivulets, the praetorians did as they were bidden, Rapax’s plight quickly forgotten as they chased the running woman into the forest with the smiles of men who intended to fully enjoy the fruits of their hunt when they ran her to ground.
Marcus looked about him at the praetorians gathered in a half-circle around the three horsemen, shaking his head wearily.
‘Eight of you? To kill one tired soldier?’
Excingus shrugged, gesturing for his prisoner to dismount.
‘My colleague Rapax is a thorough man, and your reputation with a sword goes before you. Now do get down and meet your fate with a little composure. The decurion and I will provide an audience for your commendable stoicism.’
Marcus frowned and spread his empty hands before him.
‘If I had a sword I could understand your colleague’s caution. But then if I had a sword you’d already be face down with your guts hanging out, and this scum would be in the fight of their lives, rather than putting an unarmed man to death.’
One of the praetorians stepped forward, resheathing his gladius with a slow metallic scrape.
‘Well then, sonny, why don’t you come down here and show us how tough you are without a weapon in your hand. But keep your ears pricked for the sound of your woman squealing her lovely little lungs out, our centurion should be putting it to her any time now. Beating you to death with our bare hands will give you more time to appreciate the thought that we’ll all be taking a turn at her once he’s done.’
Marcus climbed slowly down from his horse and turned to face the men gathered in a loose half-circle around him, his face white with anger both at the guardsman’s words and the look of satisfaction on his face. Taking up a loose stance with his hands hanging by his side, he looked the praetorian up and down, shaking his head slowly and sighing loudly.
‘Very well, then, come and put me out of my misery!’
He watched through eyes slitted in concentration as the guardsman turned to his mates with a confident smile.
‘Hold off, boys, I’ll take first turn at him. It isn’t every day that I get the chance to knock an officer about.’
He stalked towards his would-be victim, clenching his impressive fists in readiness to fight.
‘You see, Centurion, the advantage I’ve got over you is that I fought my way up from the gutter to where I am today. I’ve beaten hundreds of men into the dirt in my time and you’re going to be just the same as all of them once you’re on your back seeing stars. I’m going to …’
He leaped forward in mid-sentence, clearly intending for his words to have distracted Marcus sufficiently for the sudden attack to take him by surprise, throwing a fast punch at the Roman’s face with the intention of putting his opponent on the defensive. Swaying back to evade the blow by the width of a finger, Marcus hooked the guardsman’s
forward leg with a swinging boot and dumped him on to his back, the breath audibly knocked from the praetorian’s body as he hit the ground. Reaching into the neck of his tunic, following the thin leather cord that ran down across his chest, he grasped the handle of the hunting knife that Martos had slipped over his head during the act of removing his armour and ripped it from its hiding place. Then, dropping to one knee, he thrust the knife’s blade up under the praetorian’s jaw and ripped his jugular open in a spray of blood, pulling the dying man’s sword from his scabbard and jumping back to his feet. The remaining guardsmen gaped for a moment before one of them drew his sword, prompting the others to reach for their own weapons. His knife-hand red with blood, Marcus turned to face them, speaking to the wide-eyed corn officer without turning to face him.
‘If I were you, reptile, I’d run while you still can …’
Excingus backed his horse away from the knot of men, shaking his head in amazement as his erstwhile prisoner stepped forward to meet the armed soldiers, raising the bloody knife for them all to see and nodding at the dead guardsman’s corpse.
‘You can all either run now, and save yourselves, or you can add your blood to his.’
One of the soldiers shook his head, raising his sword to fight.
‘You can’t fight all of us, not if we come at you together.’
Marcus smiled, shaking his head at the man who’d spoken and pointing the sword at him.
‘Well volunteered, you can be first in that case.’
Fortress of Spears Page 35
