The Leopard sword e-4

by Anthony Riches

  In the large tent that he shared with his wife, Felicia, Marcus was slumped in a camp chair while Felicia unlaced his muddy and blood-spattered boots, tossing the first of the pair onto the pile for cleaning. His mail shirt and weapons were already piled in one corner, awaiting the attentions of Lupus, Morban’s grandson. ‘Get that tunic off and I’ll put it in cold water. It’s a good thing it’s not your nice white one.’

  She slyly glanced up at him to gauge his response, but found him staring at the tent’s wall, his expression dulled by whatever was happening behind his eyes. After a moment he realised that she was silent, and started guiltily.

  ‘I’m sorry, I was miles away. What were you saying?’

  Felicia tossed the second boot aside and slowly stood up, her pregnancy now a visible bulge in her stola.

  ‘Your tunic.’

  She held out a hand, waiting while he stripped it off to reveal his pale torso, the muscles finely sculpted by the unremitting daily exercise of carrying his armour and equipment.

  ‘Put this one on.’

  He raised an eyebrow.

  ‘The white one?’

  ‘It looks good on you, and all the others are still damp. You can’t hide it away just because it’s your best.’

  He smiled at her and stood, pulling on the garment and adjusting its belt to ensure that the hem was above his knees, then took her in his arms.

  ‘I hide it away because it’s the one I wore when we got married.’

  She smiled back, poking at a faded stain in the pale wool.

  ‘As if we’ll ever forget, since we have the evening’s wine to remind us.’ He winced, remembering the raucous carousing he and his brother officers had enjoyed that night, after Felicia had gone to bed and sent him back to join them. She smiled again, tugging his ear affectionately. ‘You had a lot of bad memories to deal with, and if the price of doing so was a few stains on a tunic I’d say it was good value.’

  ‘I killed again today.’

  Her smile softened.

  ‘I know, my love. I can always tell, whether there’s blood on your armour or not. You may be a natural with your swords, but you’re not hardened to the results of using them, are you?’

  Marcus shook his head.

  ‘Not only did I kill today, but I watched while Silus murdered three men in cold blood to make the fourth tell us where the rest of their gang was camped out. Yes, I know — ’ he raised his hands to forestall her response — ‘they were bandits, and they’d murdered a farmer and his men not long before, so they deserved their fate. And yet…’

  ‘And yet it seems you’re gradually becoming hardened to this life? Even if you could not kill a man in cold blood yourself, you watched another man do so without intervening? You fear that in becoming strong enough to defeat your enemies, you will perhaps become so like them that you risk losing that part of yourself that your father sought to make strongest? After all, you’ve told me often enough how he always stressed decency to your fellow man when he spoke to you about how a man should live.’

  Her husband nodded, looking to the tent’s roof as he sought the memory of his father’s words, spoken in the precious days before imperial scheming had seen the senator and his family murdered, and their estate confiscated by the jealous and grasping men arrayed behind the young emperor.

  ‘“Dignity, truthfulness, tenacity, but above all, whenever you are able to exercise it, mercy.” That’s what he used to tell me whenever our conversation turned to the ethics that a member of the senate should live by. Slowly but surely I feel my grasp on his teachings sliding away from me. With every enemy I put to the sword I am a little less of the man he raised, and a little more like the men who destroyed our family.’

  Felicia hugged him again, whispering in his ear.

  ‘I’ll never allow you to become anything like the men that performed those dreadful acts, and nor will your friends. But you will only survive this nightmare if you can harden yourself to do whatever you must to stay alive, and to protect those close to you.’

  The tent’s flap opened, and Arminius put his head through it. Seeing the couple in each other’s arms he raised a hand and started to back away, but Felicia beckoned him to come in.

  ‘Exactly what my husband needs: a friend to take him for a drink and listen to the story of his day.’

  Arminius squeezed through the flap, pushing the boy Lupus in front of him then bowing to the doctor and grinning at his friend.

  ‘The drink we can probably manage, eventually. The tribune sent me to fetch you, Centurion. There’s a ritual being held in Prefect Caninus’s temple tonight, and we’re respectfully invited to attend. I’d suggest you wear your cloak though; there’s a bitter wind out here that will cut you to the bone without it. And you, boy…’ He tapped Lupus on the shoulder as the child stood staring in dismay at Marcus’s soiled equipment. ‘You can get stuck into this lot. I want to see it all gleaming when we come back, and make sure you get every speck of blood off those rings. Don’t forget that it’s your birthday in a few days, and if you keep the centurion’s gear in the right condition you’ll see the benefit soon enough. Do a good job of it and we’ll practise with sword and shield in the morning, make a proper fight of it.’

  The boy nodded glumly and sat down among the pile of gear, pulling the rags and brushes he needed from his bag, resigned to the usual nightly routine of cleaning armour and polishing boots that was the price of his morning training sessions with the German. Marcus pulled his cloak around him, picking his vine stick up from the bed.

  ‘Very well, let’s go and see what sort of temple to Our Lord Tungrorum boasts. It’ll have to be something special to match the one at Badger Holes.’

  Arminius laughed, shaking his head.

  ‘Just like a soldier. Everything you people have just has to be the best, doesn’t it? You get more like Julius every day.’

  Marcus shrugged, pinning his cloak into place.

  ‘There are worse men to emulate.’

  The German smiled wryly back at him.

  ‘Just as long as you don’t go off into town at night with a pocket full of gold on the hunt for paid company. He was heading out as we walked past the Fifth Century’s tents, looking cleaner than I think I’ve ever seen the man. He’s even trimmed his beard.’

  Marcus frowned at the German.

  ‘How do you know about Annia’s profession?’

  Arminius smiled in reply.

  ‘I didn’t, until you just told me. You must be tired to have let that slip. No…’ He shook his head to forestall his friend’s irritation. ‘It’ll stay between us. So the good centurion has a friend from his former life here, does he?’

  Felicia raised an eyebrow at him.

  ‘And you’d deny him the opportunity for a little happiness?’

  Arminius shook his head.

  ‘Never. But love and money don’t mix, in my experience. Your friend may be taking a path that ends in disappointment. And he’s not a man that responds well to not getting his own way.’

  Julius found the brothel without much trouble, following the directions he’d been given by the men delivering the centurions’ mess wine ration. Their foreman had smiled knowingly at the big Tungrian when he’d asked the question, nodding and agreeing that he knew the establishment the gentleman had in mind, but adding that he’d best bring a heavy purse if he intended sampling the Blue Boar’s merchandise.

  He paused down the street, watching quietly from the shadows as a pair of men knocked on the door beneath the brothel’s flickering lamps, spoke briefly to whoever was behind it and then stepped inside, the heavy wooden door closing swiftly behind them. The sound of bolts sliding home echoed harshly in the otherwise empty street. Tempted to walk away, and to pretend the chance meeting with his former love had never happened, the big man gritted his teeth and strode forward into the light, knocking firmly on the door’s stout timbers with his vine stick, the only thing approximating to a weapon he’d carried with hi
m from his tent. A viewing slit protected by iron mesh, slid open, and appraising eyes appeared in its opening, a familiar grating voice speaking after a short pause.

  ‘Well, now, look who we have here. Brave of you to come to this door, soldier boy, given that one word from me would set a gang of the ugliest bastards you’ve ever seen loose on you. Still carrying your sword?’

  Julius shook his head, keeping his face free of any hint of irritation at the bodyguard’s air of superiority.

  ‘I was a bit quick to react in the forum, so I’ve come to make my peace. With the lady, and with you and your mate. I just want to drink a cup of wine and have a talk with her, for old time’s sake, and I’d be pleased to extend the same courtesy to you. There was no need for me to treat you so harshly, when all you were doing was what you’re paid for. Officer or not, I’m not too proud to admit when I’m wrong.’

  The bodyguard regarded him through the slit’s stout iron mesh for a moment, then stepped back and slid the door’s bolts from their recesses, whistling sharply as he did so. When the door opened there were three doormen waiting for him, all with the professionally expressionless faces of men disappointed with life’s inability to prevent the brave and the foolish from presenting them with challenges that were only to be met with swift and brutal violence. The man he’d bested in the forum beckoned him inside, then opened his hands in the universally understood gesture to prepare for a search, and Julius stood patiently while the bodyguard’s colleagues ran their hands over his body in a swift, competent and comprehensive search. They stepped back, and the thin man from the forum confrontation shook his head with a vague air of disappointment.

  ‘Nothing, not even a small knife strapped to his dick. Unless he’s got a spear hidden up his arse, this one’s spotlessly clean. Although I’m not sure I like the look of that stick.’

  Julius smiled, raising his vine stick and shrugging.

  ‘Wherever I go, it goes. There’re plenty of disrespectful young fucks in my century would like nothing better than to find this and hide it away, or burn it in a brazier, to get back at me for all the times I’ve beaten some respect into them with it. This one’s been with me all the time I’ve been a centurion, and seen me through three battles with barbarians in the last year, so I’ve become attached to it. But I’ll surrender it, if you like?’

  The bodyguard laughed, shaking his head and waving his comrades away.

  ‘There’s more than enough of us to manage one soldier, and we’ve got every weapon ever invented hidden away around the place. I don’t think a length of wood is going to trouble us too much. You, Baldy, go and tell the mistress that her friend from the forum’s come to visit.’ He leaned close to Julius, his breath smelling of wine and spiced food. ‘Now then, Centurion Julius, your apology was a good one, and I accept it, so welcome to the Blue Boar, the best, the most expensive and the most exclusive whorehouse in Tungrorum. Behave nicely with the mistress, drink your wine like a gentleman, buy some time with one of the girls if you like, but just remember I’ll be watching you. One sign of trouble and your apology will go up your arse, along with that fucking stick. You’re a hard man, that’s clear, and I can see your scars all right, but I’ll have you dealt with right harsh if there’s any bother, right?’

  Julius looked the bodyguard in the eye and held out his hand.

  ‘Right. I may be stupid and hot-tempered, but I never make the same mistake twice. You’ll have no trouble from me. Might I know your name?’

  The bodyguard nodded slowly, taking the offered clasp in a firm, cool grip.

  ‘I go by the name of Slap. Been called it so long I almost can’t remember what my old mum actually called me when I fell out of her.’

  ‘Slap?’

  ‘On account of what I do when it gets late in the evening, and the wine starts to do the talking and makes the customers do things they’d never normally consider. I’m the slap man, the one that gives them a gentle tickle with this.’ He held up a big fist, the knuckles liberally decorated with scars. ‘And it usually calms things down right quickly. And if not, there’s always my mate, Stab.’ He tipped his head to the thin man, who stood with a smirk on his face in front of the curtain that Julius guessed led into the brothel. ‘He’s the one who grabbed your cock to make sure you weren’t carrying iron, although I think he secretly just likes grabbing cock.’

  Julius shook his head, unable to keep a smile from his face.

  ‘Slap and Stab, eh? I’ll have to introduce you to my mates Knuckles and the Badger. You’d get on like a house on fire. Oh, and my “name” is Latrine. You can probably work it out.’

  The underground temple was already almost full of worshippers when Marcus and Arminius walked down the steps and into the chamber’s torchlit gloom, having first passed inspection by the Raven-grade initiates at the top of the stairs. Flicking back the cloak hood that had protected his anonymity, as required by the ritual, Marcus looked with interest at the temple’s crowded space. Nearly thirty men were packed into the chamber’s tight confines, and Arminius had to crane his neck to spot Scaurus through the press. Driving a politely insistent path through the crowded subterranean room the muscular, long-haired barbarian nodded and smiled at the other worshippers, hiding his amusement behind a blank expression as they shrank out of his way. Marcus followed him, keeping an eye on both sides of the big man’s path and watching as the disturbed worshippers, clearly men of money and reputation for the most part, cast angry glances after the German, their muttered asides clearly not complimentary. One or two of them caught Marcus’s eye, and most of them averted their gaze on seeing his frosty expression, although one man in particular returned the stare impassively, a gaze the young Roman found hard to read.

  He looked down the rectangular room, catching a glimpse of an impressive stone frieze fully six feet high and the same in width. The two-inch-thick slab of marble was sculpted with the familiar image of Mithras slaying the bull in the cave into which he had carried it at the end of his long hunt, the main scene surrounded by lavish carvings of the images associated with each of the religion’s seven grades. Scaurus turned as Arminius and Marcus reached his side, and, as was always the case in temple, clasped the two men’s arms as equals, any hint of their formal relationship put aside in the worship of their god. Scaurus’s brow was decorated with the laurel wreath befitting his status as a Lion, the fourth most senior of the religion’s ranks. Prefect Caninus echoed the gesture of greeting with both men, his smile of welcome reassuring amid the congregation’s obvious hostility.

  ‘You’re just in time, my brothers. The priest is about to start the ceremony. Here, we’ve saved you both a space.’

  Marcus looked about him, realising that most of the worshippers were either men in late middle age or boys barely old enough to shave. He leaned closer to Scaurus, not wanting his remark to be overheard.

  ‘A different congregation to that I’d expected.’

  The tribune nodded, his reply equally subtle in tone.

  ‘Our colleague Caninus tells me that the city has been somewhat underdeveloped in commercial terms ever since the plague killed a third of its inhabitants. Any bright young lad that wants to get on tends to head west to Beech Forest, or east to the fortresses on the Rhenus. What you see here are the men that have managed to build successful business, and their sons, plus a few senior people from the municipal authorities. First Minervia have their own temple, of course, which is why these men are all looking at us like men who’ve trodden barefoot on cold dog faeces. They’re not happy to be worshipping alongside the men who’re bleeding their city white, even if we are brothers in Our Lord, and despite the fact that we’re here for their protection. Ah, there’s our good friend Procurator Albanus, and the stone-faced character to his right is Petrus, his assistant. I’m still working out which one of them is the real-’

  ‘Gentlemen, please take your places! The ritual is about to begin!’

  The temple’s pater stood in front of the magn
ificent stone frieze with his arms outstretched to either side, while his acolytes moved out into the room to darken the chamber, as demanded by the ritual. The worshippers settled down onto the stone benches that lined both long sides of the temple, reclining horizontally and propping themselves up on their elbows as the pater watched his assistants take the torches down from their iron wall loops and walk them away up the temple’s steps, the light receding up the stairs in bright haloes until the only remaining source of illumination was a single small lamp which an acolyte, almost invisible in his dark red garments, placed reverently in the priest’s hands. After a moment of utter silence, the only sound that of his congregation breathing in the darkness, the pater raised the pinpoint of flame to illuminate his face, his eyes closed against the flame’s brightness. He blew out the lamp, and the temple chamber was plunged into complete darkness. Marcus’s keen ears picked up a faint rustle from behind the frieze, and then a soft halo of light appeared to surround the marble slab. A point of light rose into view; it came from a small lamp carried by an acolyte, and as he deposited it before the frieze the tiny flame breathed gentle life into the picture it portrayed. The temple’s pater spoke again, still invisible in the darkness.

  ‘Beloved brothers, and welcome visitors from beyond our city’s walls, we now join in the ritual of our beloved Lord, Mithras the Unconquered, who spilled the eternal blood of the bull at the command of Sol, God of the Sun, to save us all. Let us pray that he looks down on us from his place in the heavens with the Sun God, and give thanks for all the wonders he has given us.’