LEGION

by William Altimari

  “His legions live,” Orgestes replied. “And his awesome spirit lives in them.”

  “Shall we fear the ghosts of dead Romans, Orgestes?” Barovistus said.

  Most of the warriors laughed, but others were unsure.

  “Who fights better than the Suebi?” Barovistus asked of the crowd.

  When they had quieted again, Orgestes stepped toward them. “You’re all proud warriors. You fight like bears, ferociously. But the Romans fight like wolves—in a pack, with order, with purpose. In the face of cunning wolves, the most terrible bear is simply dead flesh.”

  “Orgestes speaks well,” Barovistus said. “He’s always spoken well. But now is different from then. Our fathers were ignorant of the Romans. We are not. I was a soldier for Rome. I was decorated by the Romans for valor against the Gauls. I know how the Romans fight.” With a sidelong glance at Orgestes, he said, “They don’t frighten me.”

  Orgestes stared at him in silent anger, then turned again to the assembly. “My friends, beware the man who observes his father deliver a spanking to a brother and then claims himself to know the feel of the lash.”

  He turned away and limped off with undiminished dignity.

  “A great warrior,” Barovistus said to the assembly. “But long since broken by Roman steel. We grieve for him but we cannot let tears rot our spears.”

  The assembly waited. Barovistus paused and allowed the tension to gnaw at them.

  “But no war yet,” he said at last, denying them the sweet release they craved. “We need more weapons. We need good steel. So first we’ll prick the Roman ox and draw nourishment from its wounds. When we’ve fattened on its blood, we’ll be ready. We’ll tear its throat and devour it.”

  A string of Gallic slaves, seven young men and a girl of about eighteen, stood in a line before the mud-daubed wooden hut. All were tied with a three-foot rope between each of them. They gazed mutely forward.

  The Germans had little taste for slaves, though they might keep a female Gaul for work or diversion. This girl, though, was delicate as a spring blossom, and so was worth much. Some leering Roman would pay well to caress such soft petals. For so fine a potential profit, the slave dealer would barter much hard steel.

  Barovistus passed the slaves and entered his hut. The slave dealer rose from the ground to greet him.

  “Hail, Priscus,” the German said to the gaunt Roman.

  “Hail, war chief of the Suebi,” Priscus said. He reached down and pulled aside a brown blanket. Ten fine Celtic swords lay fanned out on the ground.

  Barovistus seized one and drew it from its iron scabbard. A heavy weapon, it had a double-edged, three-foot blade and a rounded point. He tightened his fingers around the bronze grip and cut the air with a slashing “voom” as if he were splitting a Roman skull.

  Priscus’s lips stretched in a smile, but his eyes had the blank stare of a dead reptile.

  “You make a fair deal, Priscus—as always.”

  “And the Gauls?” he asked in a dry voice.

  “All excellent.”

  “And the girl?”

  “What about her?” Barovistus said as he bent down to examine the other swords.

  “Is she unsplit?”

  “Yes, as far as I know. An unplowed field should bring you a sweeter price.”

  “Good. I’ll be back soon,” he said on his way out.

  “Stop.” Barovistus stood. “Share meat with us. Do you still have the two gladiators with you?”

  “Former gladiators. When one travels among the Suebi, one does well to be armed with strong men.”

  “Well said,” he answered with a grin. “Share food and drink now and tell me more about the marble cities.”

  After feasting on venison and milk, the four men lounged on skins in the hut. Barovistus went to a tub and ladled beer into clay bowls and passed them around. Then he dropped back onto his deerskin and drank with the rest.

  “Have you ever been to the fort at Aquabona?” he asked.

  “Yes,” Priscus said

  “Is it a legion or just some cohorts?”

  “A full legion.”

  “Veterans?”

  “Most of them.”

  A scoffing laugh shot from the throat of one of the gladiators.

  “A comment, Longus?” Priscus said.

  “Veterans or not—what difference does it make? They clean latrines more than they pick up their swords. Soldiers fight when they have to. These Suebi fight because they love to. That is everything.”

  Longus might have been handsome had it not been for the legacy of an old sword strike to his face. A scar ran from his upper lip back under his left eye to a spot over his ear where the black hair refused to grow. As thick in the waist and hips as he was in the shoulders, he formed a huge tube of bone and muscle.

  “Longus is right,” said the other gladiator. “We fought more in a month than most soldiers do in a lifetime. They dig ditches and build roads. We killed men.”

  Barovistus smiled. “Sido speaks well. You are not Italian?”

  “My mother was of the Cherusci.”

  “Great fighters,” Barovistus said.

  In his early thirties, and so a few years younger than Longus, Sido clearly gloried in his own physical perfection. His torso formed a flawless “V” as it tapered to his narrow waist. His muscular legs were hairless, and they looked as if they could be cut in half and still support him on their stumps.

  “Maybe I should recruit gladiators for my army,” Barovistus said half-seriously as his eyes ran over Sido’s impressive contours.

  “Spartacus tried that,” Priscus answered.

  “Who?”

  “Never mind. We must be moving.” He rose and gestured to Longus and Sido.

  “Where are you headed now?” the war chief asked.

  “Aquabona. I’m to purchase a Greek slave from one of the tribunes.”

  “Greek?” Sido said with a telling hunger.

  “Not for you,” Priscus said. “You may have one of the Gauls.”

  Barovistus raised a hand. “No words from you, Priscus, about what you heard in this camp.”

  “To the soldiers? My tongue is as tight as my purse. Kill them all if you like. What do I care?”

  Priscus and his group made camp at sundown in a clearing in the midst of the forest. The Gauls were given porridge, and they huddled around a small fire as they ate.

  The Romans had a large fire to themselves about twenty feet away.

  “Will you sell the girl to me?” Longus asked and bit into a strip of salted beef.

  Priscus narrowed his heavy-lidded eyes. “You could never afford her. What you mean is will I give her to you.”

  “You promised one of the men to Sido.”

  Sido smiled.

  “Only temporarily,” Priscus said. “Do you want the girl to keep?”

  “I never ask for much,” Longus said.

  “That’s true. And you’ve served me well.”

  The eager gladiator’s eyes shone like a predator’s in the firelight.

  “But she could bring a fine price,” Priscus taunted.

  “Priscus, please . . . .”

  “Very well, I’ll consider it.”

  Sido sprang to his feet. “Longus, I’m ready.”

  The two gladiators walked over to the group of Gauls, and Sido pointed to a smooth-faced boy of about twenty. Longus untied him from the rest and led him into the forest. Sido went to the cart and took a lump of lard from one of the food sacks, then followed Longus into the woods.

  The Gaul’s arms were pulled forward and his hands tied around the trunk of a tree. He was stripped from the waist down.

  Without a word, Longus walked off and left Sido to his play.

  A shaft of moonlight slashed like a silver sword through the trees and struck the frightened Gaul. The blonde gladiator removed his tunic and linen undergarment as he gazed at the young man’s taut buttocks. Spreading lard around in his hands, Sido began stroking himse
lf leisurely. When he could bear no more, he approached the Gaul, who was trembling. Sido smeared the lard tenderly around his buttocks and down the crevice. Placing his hands on the Gaul’s shoulders, he stepped close and kissed him on the back of the neck as he pierced him with ease. The Gaul cried out and pleaded in a language Sido could not understand. Gently Sido stroked him as the Gaul gasped and groaned. But Sido’s delicate touch soon vanished as he lost control. His buttocks flexed into enormous knots as he hammered the young man repeatedly into the tree. Even the creatures of the forest paused for a moment, startled in the darkness by the bestial growls of pleasure.

  8 TRUTH BREEDS HATRED.

  Terence

  ______

  Not since the summer night that he and Cornelia had lost their virginity in each other’s arms had Diocles felt as nervous as he did now. Again he was a virgin—and of a very special kind.

  The barracks of the First Century of the Second Cohort—like all the other barracks—was a single story timber building at least a hundred and fifty feet long and some thirty or more feet wide. Along the front wall ran a shaded portico. The building was L-shaped, one end wider and protruding from the rest of the long structure. Along the back ran a narrow metalled street with a second barracks block on the other side. Presumably this housed the Second Century.

  A series of wooden trapdoors lay flush with the ground before the portico. Diocles lifted one. Set within the timber-lined hole was a wicker basket partly filled with rubbish. He set the lid back down.

  Ten wooden doors ran along the portico. He approached the end door and opened it and stepped inside. He was in a room about twelve feet square. Despite the warm day, the air in here was cool. Wooden shelves and storage bins lined the walls. Along the right wall, shelves at eye level and slightly below were divided by wooden partitions so each soldier had his own storage space. In each niche was a short sword in its scabbard, a dagger, a chain mail lorica, and a bronze helmet. Below were compartments holding a pickaxe, a saw, a woven reed basket and some string bags and leather sacks. A bigger bin overflowed with three-foot wooden stakes with points at each end and a narrowed area in the middle. A large communal bin was neatly filled with cooking pots and utensils, and a separate one held a small stone grinding mill.

  Along the left wall ran a series of tall bins holding the soldiers’ long curved shields, each one wrapped in a protective goatskin covering. Attached to the wall next to these bins was a wooden rack with about two dozen javelins. Set vertically, each throwing spear was held apart from the others, apparently so the iron heads would not touch each other and suffer damage.

  The penalty for theft must have been severe, for nothing here was secured.

  Diocles crossed the storeroom and passed through a doorway to a second room beyond. Here were the living quarters of some of the soldiers. As wide as the outer storage area but several feet deeper, this room must have housed eight men. Four pairs of bunks were arranged around the walls. In the far wall was a stone and tile hearth, cool now. Before it in the center of the room sprawled a low oak table. Scattered across it were empty plates and drinking vessels and several dice. To the right and left of the hearth was a pair of windows. Their shutters were open to ventilate the living quarters. The walls were plastered and unmarred. The clay floor was an unusual construction he had never seen before. Fragments of terra cotta tiles had been pressed into the clay and rammed to produce a firm but not uncomfortable living surface. It was as clean as if it had just been swept for his inspection.

  No door connected this room with any others, so he went back the way he had come. He entered the next pair of rooms and found them to be similar to the first. The only difference was in little idiosyncrasies in possessions and living arrangements reflecting the tastes and manners of different men.

  He left the soldiers’ living quarters and walked along the portico until he came to the end of the building that was wider than the rest of it. He opened the door and confronted a cluster of rooms that clearly comprised the quarters and the administrative workspace of the centurion. Probus had mentioned that he was not certain if Rufio had moved in yet. Diocles stepped into the first room. This was obviously the century office. Along the walls to both left and right stood bins filled with papyrus scrolls and a lesser number of waxed writing tablets. A window let in light from the far wall. About three feet in front of it sat a heavy oak desk and stool. Above the table, a bronze three-wick oil lamp hung from a chain. Near the far right corner sat a bronze brazier to provide heat against the sharp Gallic winters.

  He stepped further into the room as his eyes grew accustomed to the dim light. Rufio must have begun to settle in, for a scroll and a bronze pen and inkwell lay on the table. Diocles picked up the scroll. Apparently it was some sort of duty roster. A list of soldiers, each with a number preceding his name, formed the left column. The right side was arranged into a series of columns, one for each of the next ten days. Here the duties of the men were written—“street cleaning,” “gate guard,” “escort to Chief Centurion,” “latrines,” “armory,” “training area,” “ road patrol,” “leave by Praefect’s permission,” “duty with Sempronius’s century.” The most common entry was “in century,” presumably meaning that the soldier’s duties were left to his centurion’s discretion, which Diocles had been told was vast.

  While he was reading, a cat jumped onto the table and began licking one of her paws and washing her face. She was a striking animal, with hair longer than what one usually saw. Beautifully blotched with white and black and brown, she seemed very pleased with herself and ignored him completely.

  He put the scroll down just as he had found it. Adjusted now to the room’s half-light, he noticed a marble bust off to the left near the back wall. He stepped closer and was surprised to see that it was not the usual likeness of Augustus. Julius Caesar stared back at him. The large head, the hard cheekbones, the prominent nose were caught just as they must have been. No idealized Hellenic portrait here. The sparse hair combed forward in Caesar’s famed vanity. The etched cheeks, and those eyes—eyes wise beyond the borders of reason, wiser perhaps than any other man’s had ever been, eyes masterful and tragic and reaching. Diocles averted his eyes, humbled by Caesar. Gazed upon from marble as so many had been gazed upon in life, Diocles looked off toward the window. For a while he stared at nothing and then at last looked back. The makeshift wooden plinth on which the bust rested was draped with a piece of purple velvet, a simple tribute from a possibly not so simple soldier. Diocles had not known what to make of Rufio, especially after Probus had told him of the sparing of the slave. Yet though he could not help being touched by this humble shrine, for the moment his judgment remained suspended. For a soldier, who must travel light, to haul across the empire a marble bust of a man he could never have known—even though that man be Caesar—spoke of subtle essences Diocles was reluctant to attribute to a man who lived with his hand on a sword.

  “Welcome.”

  Diocles jumped and turned around.

  Rufio swung into the room with that easy stride Diocles remembered so well from the first day he had seen him. He was wearing his rich blue tunic and seemed fresh and bright, an effect heightened by his fair skin and silver hair. Somehow Rufio always seemed as if he had just stepped from the baths. On the forefinger of his left hand he wore a bronze and cornelian signet ring. Diocles suspected he was something of a dandy.

  “Hello,” Diocles said, surprised at the deference in his voice.

  Rufio leaned back against the edge of the desk and folded his arms across his chest.

  “You seem uneasy, Greek-with-no-name.”

  “Please, may we forget about that day?”

  “If I’d killed that desperate Greek, you wouldn’t have been willing to forget it.”

  “Why should I have cared about that slave?”

  “If I thought you didn’t, you wouldn’t be standing in this room now.”

  Diocles looked at him with a puzzled expression.
r />   “He was a countryman of yours,” Rufio said. “A man should always care about his countrymen.”

  “I’m a citizen of Rome.”

  Rufio smiled. He reached over the desk and picked up the stool and set it down in front of Diocles.

  “Soldiers rarely sit in the centurion’s office. This will be your first and last time.”

  Diocles sat on the stool.

  “You wish to share the life of a soldier?”

  “I wish nothing of the kind.”

  It was Rufio’s turn to look puzzled.

  “I wish to be in Rome tutoring the son of Sabinus.”

  Rufio’s eyes narrowed in a squint Diocles found unnerving. “Then why are you here? You’re a free man.”

  “I shouldn’t need to remind a soldier that no man has perfect freedom.”

  “True.”

  “It’s the wish of Sabinus that I be here. My regard for him is such that the choice is no longer a choice. As it is with you and Probus.”

  “Probus?”

  “He told me you would’ve done this for no one else. That you agreed for me to be here as a favor to him.”

  Rufio lowered his arms and pressed his fingertips against the edge of the desk. “Probus is mistaken.”

  “Then why—”

  “Where are your belongings?”

  “I come to you a scraped tablet. Smooth wax to be etched by your knowing hands.”

  “It looks like I’ll have to get accustomed to having my life seasoned with your Attic salt.” He pushed himself away from the table. “At least until you’re too exhausted to open your mouth—in other words, until tomorrow.” He looked at the scroll. “If this roster is accurate, this century has no optio. I have no idea why. Originally I was going to inflict you on him. . . .”

  “What’s an optio?”

  “The man who takes command of the century in battle if a German spear sends me to Acheron.” He set the scroll down. “So for now you’ll learn from me. You’ll live like a soldier, train like a soldier, and, if you wish, play like a soldier. There are flocks of prostitutes in the civilian settlement if you—”