Marius' Mules VIII: Sons of Taranis

by S. J. A. Turney

  ‘I owe Fronto a debt. He released me from slavery in a Roman camp. My people consider such a debt paramount. It is a life debt in effect. When the Sons of Taranis no longer threaten him, that debt will be paid, and into the bargain there will be no new great rising. The people of our tribes will turn from war to the fields, nurturing crops and children, trying to rebuild within the arms of Rome.’

  ‘Would that many Roman nobles could express so noble a sentiment,’ admired Balbus. ‘You would do well in our senate.’

  Fronto smiled at the look of horrified fascination that crossed Cavarinos’ face at the very thought.

  ‘What was that?’ interjected Masgava sharply.

  ‘What?’

  The four of them fell silent, and then they all heard the clanging of the bell at the front door. In two heartbeats the alarms were clanging all over the villa. ‘Where?’ Balbus asked.

  ‘The first alarm was the front door,’ Masgava replied, snatching his sword from close by and belting it as he made for the exit. Behind him Cavarinos was already moving. Balbus grabbed his own gladius, sheathless since he had taken it into his bath house. Fronto gripped his Gaulish sword with the slight kink near the tip where he’d levered up the slab. He’d had the chance to retrieve his own sword he supposed, but over the evening he’d grown comfortable carrying the big weapon. It gave him a surprising reach.

  Through the villa the four men ran, joined by a sleepy looking Arcadios and Aurelius who had clearly just hauled themselves from their cots and grabbed a weapon without even taking the time to belt their tunics.

  The front door was ajar, and Catháin was peering out into the darkness.

  ‘What is it?’ Fronto shouted.

  ‘Archers, Fronto. At least three, from the regularity of the strikes. They’re not particularly good – I’ve seen better – but they’re getting close. Once they’ve found their range they’ll be able to take anyone at a door or window at their leisure.’

  ‘I’d not seen them as archers in my head,’ mused Fronto.

  ‘Remember young Aneunos?’ replied Cavarinos. ‘He was an archer, and a good one. There will be others. Molacos had been a hunter himself.’

  The door to their left opened to reveal the brothers Pamphilus and Clearchus. Both had their blades drawn and a trickle of blood ran from the latter’s scalp down into his eye, which blinked repeatedly.

  ‘Bastards have found the range for the windows,’ grunted Clearchus.

  ‘Why did you open the shutters, then?’ sighed Fronto, wondering at how two such numb brothers had survived the streets of Massilia for so long.

  ‘Can’t see the enemy through solid wood, sir.’

  ‘I swear that if either of you had an original thought…’

  His insult went unfinished as an arrow whispered through the open crack in the door, almost catching both Catháin and then Fronto, and clattered off along the floor into the atrium.

  ‘Bastards, bastards, bastards!’ roared Clearchus, wiping the blood from his eyes. ‘C’mon.’

  Pamphilus reached past them and yanked the front door wide open, almost pulling Catháin from his feet. Brandishing their blades, the brothers ran into the open door, straight towards the unseen archers. Neither made it across the threshold before Masgava’s huge meaty hands slapped down on their shoulders and jerked them back inside. Two arrows filled the air, one tearing the shoulder fabric of Clearchus’ tunic and drawing blood, the other missing Masgava’s ear by a finger-width as it rattled off across the atrium.

  Without waiting for the order, Catháin pushed the door to so that only a narrow sliver remained. Enough to see through, with very little danger to the observer.

  ‘They are improving their aim rapidly,’ Arcadios said quietly. ‘Let me give them something to think about.’

  Catháin nodded and stepped aside. As the others watched, the Greek archer withdrew three arrows from his quiver, nocking one, with the other two held by the point in the fingers that gripped the bow.

  ‘When I say, open the door, count to six quickly and then close it.’

  The northerner who managed Fronto’s business nodded, turning a lopsided grin on his employer. ‘While I like a punch-up as much as the next man, proper battles are extra. I shall be expecting a raise tomorrow. Or at least a healthy bonus.’

  He was still smiling wide as Arcadios breathed ‘now!’

  The door pulled inwards and in the most fluid movement Fronto had ever seen from an archer, Arcadios released the first missile out into the night, dropping the second to nock even as his shoulder rolled, bringing back the string and releasing, the third arrow following suit in perfect timing like some kind of machine.

  As he stepped back and lowered the bow and Catháin muttered ‘six’ and closed the door to a sliver again, they all heard a yelp and shouts of alarm outside. For a long moment there were no further thuds of arrowheads hitting door and wall, and when it started up again, it was slower, more cautious.

  ‘Nicely done,’ Balbus complemented the archer.

  Arcadios smiled shyly. ‘It’s an eastern technique. Hard to get right, and not easy to be accurate with. But when what you need is speed and surprise, it can be very effective.’

  ‘It sounded pretty accurate to me,’ Fronto whispered, impressed. ‘Into the dark against hidden targets and it sounded to me like you hit one.’

  ‘Luck,’ muttered Arcadios, though Fronto suspected self-effacement rather than chance.

  ‘Let’s hope you got the son of a dog in the heart or the eye,’ Catháin grinned.

  ‘Why are they doing this?’ Cavarinos mused.

  ‘What?’

  ‘Why the arrows?’

  ‘They already tried a direct assault,’ Fronto reminded him, ‘and look how that one turned out. Their quarry managed to get into hiding in time. Maybe they’re just trying to keep us contained until it’s light so that they don’t miss anyone this time?’

  Cavarinos shook his head. ‘No. They’d wait for daylight to begin if it was darkness that was hampering them. This is different. There are maybe three or four of them out there… so where are the rest?’

  Fronto’s eyes widened. ‘A ruse? A decoy?’

  Cavarinos nodded. ‘How well protected is your rear?’

  Fronto noted sourly the presence of Arcadios. Without the expert archer at the back door, the answer was: a lot less protected than he’d like. Arcadios had been called from his bed to the front door because of the archers.

  ‘Who’s looking after the rear door?’

  Arcadios frowned. ‘Zeno and Evagoras.’

  Fronto gestured to Catháin and Arcadios. ‘You stay here. Keep trying that little trick every now and then and keep them busy. You two,’ he pointed at Pamphilus and Clearchus, ‘stay with them. Let no one in.’

  With a beckoning finger to Masgava, Aurelius, Cavarinos and Balbus, Fronto raced through the villa, heading for the rear door. As he rounded the final corner, his heart in his throat, he was dismayed, though far from surprised, to see the door wide open and the two Massiliot mercenaries sprawled across the threshold in a wide pool of their own blood.

  ‘Shit!’

  He looked at the four men with him.

  ‘Masgava, you stay here. Don’t let anyone in or out. You are my rock, alright?’ The Numidian nodded, drawing his blade at last and standing, implacable like a colossus, at the door’s side. Fronto turned to the others. ‘Balbus, can you check the private suites. That’s where they’ll have made for straight away, but they’ve probably found them empty by now. Cavarinos, look after my father-in-law.’

  Despite Balbus’ sour look at the command, he nodded and Cavarinos gave Fronto a supportive squeeze of the shoulder before running off to check the family’s rooms.

  ‘Aurelius? You’re with me. Let’s hope the wine store’s still secure.’

  * * * * *

  The wine store was a large, brick-vaulted room built into the substructures of the villa proper where the hill began to slope away w
ith a view of the sea. It had two doors: one down a short flight of steps from a corridor in the rear of the house, and a second from the grassy slope outside. Yet despite it having an external door Fronto had deemed it a safe location, partially because the enemy would naturally seek them out in the living areas of the house, but also because that rear door was as secure as the villa’s walls unless opened from the inside. The outer door was wide and high and formed from oak planks over a hand-width thick, reinforced with cross spars also of oak. For this door, when opened, came down rather than swinging out, forming a shallow ramp, up which to move heavy loads of amphorae. It was one of Catháin’s modifications to the business and had sped up movement of the huge jars no end. But with the enemy inside the villa now, such external security measures were immaterial.

  Fronto and Aurelius hurtled round the corner at a run and the former legate felt his heart leap as he saw the open door at the top of the stairs. For a heartbeat or two he found himself wondering in a panic where Pamphilus and Clearchus, who were supposed to be guarding the door, were and then he remembered them emerging from that room by the front door. The idiots! They had heard the troubles and run towards it, abandoning their position here. He made a mental note to beat them black and blue for that, once he had control of the villa again.

  Furious, he turned into the doorway. He could hear swearing in Latin in an elegant female voice, which could only mean that Lucilia was still alive. His heart in his mouth, he took the steps three at a time, Aurelius right behind him.

  His worst fears were realised as his gaze took in the room. Pamphilus and Clearchus had given that large external door a little extra security when they had moved his wife’s living quarters down here, in that they had shifted all the racks of heavy amphorae and propped them against the door. Of course, in doing so they had also effectively cut off the only escape route from the room if it were breached from the inside…

  The far side of the bare brick room held his wife’s well-appointed bed and the smaller ones of the two boys, as well as temporary cots for the four women on the house’s staff. A table and two chairs and a single chest completed the furnishings, the whole lit by three oil lamps in niches on the walls.

  Close to the stairs entrance, Fronto could see four cloaked figures with their backs to him. There had clearly already been a brief altercation as two of the villa’s slave women lay in the middle of the floor in a spreading pool of blood. Beyond that stood Lucilia and Andala, his wife holding his glorious orichalcum-hilted gladius defensively as she let forth a stream of curses and invective that would make a centurion blush, while the Bellovaci girl brandished his second best sword in a very purposeful manner. Behind the two women, the remaining two slave girls sat on the bed, holding back Balbina and little Lucius and Marcus and brandishing small eating knives desperately.

  Rage threatened to take hold of Fronto. He’d felt it happen a couple of times before in his life – the ferocity that took him so thoroughly that he lost all sense of time, place and self, simply surrendering to the killing fury until there was no one left to fight. Britannia had been the worst. Not here! With immense difficulty, he forced it back down. This was no time for unchecked rage – he had to remain in control and make sure the women were safe.

  As he stepped into the room, Aurelius coming up beside him, three of the four cloaked men turned their eerie, expressionless masks on him. For a moment, Fronto wondered why the four men had stopped in their attack in the first place. Even though Andala was whirling the sword as though born to it – and had clearly struck well with it, from the blood running down the tallest enemy’s free arm – they could still have easily overwhelmed the remaining women if they’d so wished. He realised rather sourly that they had held off killing the women so that their screams – or curses in his wife’s case – might draw their true prey to them. They might delight in killing Roman women and children, but it was Fronto they were here for.

  Even as the three men facing him raised their weapons and stepped forward to strike, Fronto was bringing his own sword up. The centre one, tall and thin and willowy and with the wounded arm, stepped aside despite the press, twirling, and brought his wide blade across in a sweep that would have bitten deep into Fronto’s side had Aurelius not been there instantly, smacking the blow away with his gladius before whipping it back in an attempt to skewer the attacker, but the short, bull-shouldered man to the side was there immediately, blocking that blow.

  Fronto’s sword lanced out forwards in a practised lunge, but the third, lithe, figure to the right simply turned sideways and the blade tore through his cloak alone. Not only was the man exceedingly fast, but Fronto was still largely unused to this long Gallic weapon and the weight and balance for such a thrust was all wrong.

  Steel clashed and grated as he and Aurelius and the three men facing them danced their lethal jig, whirling, lunging, stabbing and swiping. Despite the two Romans’ skill and experience, they were still doing little more than defend their selves, holding off the three men. The Gauls were good at what they did and they outnumbered Fronto and Aurelius. It couldn’t go on like this. The Romans would tire first.

  In brief snatches Fronto caught a glance of the room beyond their clash. Lucilia was still standing protectively in front of the children with the sword brandished, cursing the attackers like a foul-mouthed sailor, but Andala was weighing into the fray like a gladiator, her blade flashing and whirling as she parried and fought off the man facing her with far more style and skill than Fronto could have imagined her having.

  As he repeatedly turned and parried blows from the front and the right, trying to hold off two men at once, in one of those clarity-in-battle moments, he instinctively felt rather than saw his opponent’s mistake. The lithe one on the right suddenly over-extended, trying to bring his blade around to Fronto’s unprotected side. Gritting his teeth, the Roman took advantage, bringing his own sword up and striking at that extended arm, driving the point into the muscle.

  As the lithe one cried out, his sword falling from shaking fingers, Fronto almost died there and then. In attacking that man so, he’d opened himself up in exactly the same manner to the tall one in the middle, whose blade had been aimed unerringly for the point just below Fronto’s collar bone until it was caught by the desperate upswing of Aurelius’ blade and knocked aside.

  There was no time to thank the man. Even as Aurelius, thrown off-balance in trying to protect Fronto, took the third warrior’s blade in his left arm, the middle Gaul came in for a second strike with surprising speed. Fronto found himself back-stepping towards the stairs, the tall one lashing out again and again at lightning speed, like a snake’s flicking tongue, forcing him on the defensive. The Gaul he’d wounded was recovering from the shock, using his good arm to draw a dagger from his belt, and would soon be in the fight once more, helping force Fronto back.

  Aurelius clashed again and again with the man in front of him, and Fronto noted that even Andala was in trouble now, the fourth Gaul pressing her back towards the bed and his wife. As he swung and parried, desperately holding off their blades, Fronto saw brief flashes between the figures. He saw Lucilia motion for the slave women to keep the children back as she herself stepped forward. He felt his heart stop for a moment at the sight of his wife stepping into the fray, handling her blade inexpertly, but with a willpower he recognised as unstoppable.

  Even as he fought, he reached up with his free hand and touched the Fortuna figurine at his neck. Across the room, Lucilia’s initial blow was clumsy and easily turned. But Andala was proving to be smart. Despite the failure of his wife’s attempt, the cloaked Gaul had been distracted by the attack, and gasped as Andala drove Fronto’s second best blade deep into his neck, turning it as she did so, ruining windpipe, gullet and arteries all in one, mincing the man’s throat before ripping the sword back out. She was of the Bellovaci, a tribe of the Belgae, and Fronto could remember their first campaigns up there six years ago. Even the women were dangerous, they’d said. Thank
the gods, they had been right!

  There was no shriek from her victim – he had no throat with which to do it – and as he staggered and dropped to his knees, Andala stepped forward like a victorious gladiator, ripping away the torn cloak and driving her blade down into his chest from above, executing him swiftly.

  All this came to Fronto only in brief flashes, and his attention was pulled away as he felt a nick to his side, slicing through his chiton but leaving only a light flesh wound. Hissing, he dipped to the side, knocking the dagger from the third Gaul’s hand with his sword’s pommel and leaving that man unarmed once more.

  Aurelius staggered as a heavy blow from the bull-necked one facing him slammed his blade back against his face and almost did for him.

  And then Andala was there like one of the furies unleashed, stabbing Fronto’s gladius into the back of Aurelius’ opponent repeatedly and ripping it out – stab, rip, stab, rip, stab, rip.

  The bull-necked one shrieked and stumbled forwards, but Aurelius just pushed him back and added his own blade to the flurry that was killing him so viciously, stabbing him in the chest even as his back continued to be ravaged. For a moment, Fronto wondered why Andala had concentrated on that one when Fronto was busily struggling to hold off two men, but the look in her eyes and that in Aurelius’ when they met across their keening victim answered that question readily enough.