Across the gulf of open space on the far side of the arena roof, a few of his men stood ready to begin. He turned to them and saw even in the darkness, their eager eyes waiting for his command. Down on the arena floor, more legionaries worked to finish their preparation.
After returning to the house on the Palatine, Secundus had reported to Praetor Domitius, informing the senator of his findings in the matter of the shop sign. He explained that he had seen the Risen drawn to the sound and how they had tried to attack the sign, despite the fact that there was no living prey.
Domitius had listen intently and asked, “So, what do you propose we do with this information?”
“I intend to lay traps for them,” he answered. “We set up metallic objects to make noise and attack the Risen when they arrive.”
Domitius had looked concerned, “I realise you are eager to fight back, Secundus, but I would hate for you to do something rash. Would it not be as unsafe to do this as it would to stand in the street and start shouting?”
The soldier had conceded the point. It would be too easy to rush into something and get themselves killed. So the choice had been made, they would hold back from attacking the undead and use their new idea in a different manner.
He began sending units out with the materials to make the same traps that they had discussed. They set up bundles of metal objects tied with twine. Setting fire to the twine before leaving the area, giving themselves time to escape before the sound started to attract the Risen.
This way they managed to create areas of the city that were almost Risen free, and by grouping the undead together they found that they could take back a measure of control.
The plan had not been executed without casualties. All but one member of a unit had been lost to the undead when the twine that tied the bundle had snapped. The survivor, a young man with almost no experience in the legions had made it back after three days of hiding, scared and almost starving. He told them of seeing his fellow legionaries torn to pieces and Secundus had heard the man screaming in the night.
This plan had worked well, and over the next few weeks they had been able to set up a number of traps across the city, but continued to brood over the idea that the system could be turned into a weapon. He had been out on a food patrol when his eyes had lit on the new amphitheatre, and an idea had sparked in his mind.
As well as food, he had instructed his men to find cloth and lamp oil in whatever quantities they could manage. Bedding, curtains, even rugs were brought to the house on the Palatine. Oil was drained into flasks wherever it was found and in more than one case amphorae were found in the bigger houses.
After a while they began to realise that they were creating work for themselves, and Secundus ordered the finds to be taken directly to the arena. The cloth that was already at the house was taken a bit at a time to join the new stores, but after a while they had managed to gather enough fabric.
It was one of his men that had found the warehouse that finally made the plan a reality. He'd been down by the Tiber in the docks, working alone as a scout when he had returned to Secundus and reported the discovery of the crates of amphorae. At first he had thought they were full of wine, but further investigation showed they were full of oil. It was more than they had managed to gather over the previous weeks, and more than enough to make Secundus's plan a reality.
Night after night the men had carried the jars across the city to the arena, the streets mercifully free of the undead. Always aware of danger and ready to drop their prizes and run, the men had soon emptied the warehouse.
Secundus spent much of the time familiarising himself with the arena - a marvel of modern building. Never in all his travels with the legions had he seen anything so magnificent, which made what he intended to do almost sacrilege. The idea of seeing so many people in one place, gathered for a reason other than war, would have been a wonder to behold. It would never happen now. For all any of them knew, there were not that many people alive in the whole world.
Down on the arena floor the men were putting the finishing touches to the trap. They had covered the sand with a thick layer of dry straw, and the bundles of cloth had been rolled out on top. Then the whole thing was soaked in lamp oil. Pouring out jar after jar of the flammable liquid, they were working their way from the centre outwards so that they were not covering themselves.
Finally the men on the ground gave the signal and they started to evacuate the arena, leaving two men behind. He looked down on them from above and remembered the meeting where they had discussed this plan.
Domitius had called all of the legionary men into one of the great rooms in the house on the Palatine. The floor was one huge exquisite mosaic that clattered under the hobnailed boots of the soldiers, and on the walls painted frescos of ancient battles looked down on them as they talked.
Secundus had spoken to the men and explained exactly what they were expected to do. Most of them already knew, having carried the cloth and oil to the arena for weeks.
“We will cover the floor of the arena with straw and cloth soaked with oil, draw the Risen to the arena and then set fire to it. With the help of the gods, we can destroy hundreds of them in one go,” Secundus had said. He had looked across the room and saw determined faces. These men had spent too much time hiding and sneaking about, they were ready to fight back. Two faces had not held the same look.
The two men were the oldest in the room, they sat next to each other, both grey haired and scarred. Secundus had frowned but one of the men had smiled back at him, obviously waiting to be asked to contribute.
“Decimus, do you have something to add?” he asked. All eyes turned to the ancient grizzled warrior.
“Sir, how do you intend to attract them to the arena?” Decimus asked.
“Using the same method we’ve used before. We will station men on the highest point of the arena so that the sound travels across the city, then use the traps to draw them onto the arena floor,” Secundus answered, waiting to hear why the retired legionary thought this was a bad idea.
“Sir, some of the traps haven’t worked, we put them in the wrong place.”
“Explain, please.”
“Sir, we hid them too far out of the way. I know we wanted to keep groups of Risen off the streets but we also hid the traps out of the wind. Those traps only need a breeze to work but if we hide them on the floor of the arena, they won’t get any.” Decimus turned to the man next to him and caught his eye, the man nodded back.
“You two seem to have a better idea, lets hear it,” Domitius said, stepping forward from his place behind Secundus.
“Praetor,” the older man began respectfully, “we feel the only way to be sure is to leave some men on the arena floor. We would like to be those men.”
Domitius stepped back from the table, shaking his head. “I’m sorry, I won’t send men into this knowing they will die.”
“Sir, we know what we are volunteering for, and we are proud to do it.”
The praetor turned to Secundus, judging the man’s reaction to this offer of suicide.
“Tell me why and I’ll consider it.” Secundus ordered.
“Sir, I could give you a speech about honour, wanting to save food for other people, or even revenge. The fact is we are too old to keep doing this. One day I’m going to be out there and one of those undead bastards is going to sneak up on me and that’ll be the end of it. I’d rather take as many of them as possible with me, and so would he.” Decimus motioned to the man next to him, Canis, who grinned in the same way that his friend had.
Secundus began to nod, understanding the sentiment. Legionaries understood the realities of death, and that it came to them all. If you were really lucky, you got to choose the manner of your own end.
“Fine,” he said, and actually saw a smile draw itself across the man's weathered face. “If, and I mean if we can’t come up with a better idea, you two will set the trap on the arena floor, damned fools that you are.”
The
meeting had ended and Secundus saw more than one of the men in the room slap Decimus and his friend on the back as they left.
Now he looked down on Canis and Decimus and waited for them to finish what they were doing. They attached the bundles of metal and began raising them onto poles that were placed around the arena.
As they did this, Secundus stepped over to the edge of the high walkway and tried to see the rest of his unit leaving, but the darkness down on the street was almost complete and the men were lost to his sight.
The two men on the floor signalled up to him. He in turn held up a hand to the three other men waiting at the top of the arena. Each was armed with a shield and a gladius with which to make a lot of noise. He received a raised arm in return from each of them.
Feeling his heart pounding in his ears, he began to shout. It was the first deliberately loud noise he had made since the first day after he had entered Rome. It felt good, and it felt feral. Like the roar of a lion or the bellow of a bull, full of power and rage.
He banged the flat of his sword on the front of his shield and made as much noise as he could. Across the arena the other men did exactly the same. He could not know how far the sound travelled but in the silence of the city, it felt like a cacophony able to reach the ear of the gods.
Moving to the edge of the walkway, he watched the street below, hoping he would be able to judge the time right so that the men on top of the walls would know when to stop. It would do no good to have the Risen climb the walls and not enter the arena floor.
Black stains moved across dark streets. Faint at first, then more dense as the numbers of undead continued to grow. Secundus carried on shouting, drawing all these creatures of Hades to him. He couldn’t tell how many Risen were running toward the arena but it looked like thousands. He moved across to look down at Decimus and Canis who were shouting and banging on the metal traps, but the noise was lost to him in the volume of his own voice.
Walking back to the outer edge, Secundus was just in time to see the first of the monsters reach the outside of the arena. He signalled for the men up on the roof to stop their noise. The two men below continued but the sound seemed distant and lost from so high up.
As planned the men on top of the walls lay down, hiding themselves from view to the creatures below. Each man had food and water, knowing they might be trapped there for days.
Crawling to the edge, he looked down the outside of the wall, waiting to see if the undead would move into the arena or up toward him and his men. Either way they would eventually find the men in on the arena floor, but if the men on the top of the arena died, there would be nobody left to set off the final part of the trap.
To his relief none of the undead were climbing toward him but a steady flow of dark shapes were passing into the arena through the arched openings and the statues that looked out over the city.
He moved to the opposite edge, looking for the first undead to reach the arena floor and the two men that waited for them, shouting and clattering the traps. The moonlight revealed the moment that the first undead poured down onto the floor of the arena. They came from all sides, spilling down the walls and onto the sand and the oil soaked cloth.
Decimus and Canis stopped shouting, confronted by their own death. The Risen poured over them, unstoppable. The two legionaries were swallowed by a sea of dark bodies, and if they screamed Secundus did not hear it. He breathed a silent prayer to Mars for the two men before turning to the final part of the plan.
Beside him on the walkway were two metal buckets, loosely covered with wet leather. He removed the hide, working quickly. In one was a number of thick lengths of fabric tied into heavy knots and soaked in lamp oil. In the second was a small pile of smouldering coals. He had not wanted to leave lighting the rags subject to chance or the whim of the gods.
He reached to one side of bucket to where a heavy pair of leather gauntlets had been placed. One of his men had found the gloves in a metalworkers shop. He reached into the bucket and grasped a glowing red coal.
Blowing on the ember, he was soon able to produce a flame. He took one of the knotted cloths and, before lighting it, looked back down to the floor of the arena. Decimus and Canis were gone, lost in the sea of undead monsters. The arena floor was thick with the creatures, and more joined the crush with every passing second.
Sending up a prayer to the gods, he touched the flame to the cloth and saw it light with a small but satisfying whooshing sound. He did not hesitate, throwing the cloth out and across the arena, and watched it sail out and down leaving a tail of fire in its wake. It reached the boiling mass of Risen below and was lost to sight. Nothing happened.
Secundus cursed. Below them an undead probably had a burning tunic, but unless it fell to the ground it would not ignite the oil. He prayed once more that he had not left it too late to spring the trap.
He lit another knot of cloth, blowing on the ember to help it catch. He threw it out into the night and watched it fall once more. Secundus whispered prayers to every god he could think of, offering his every remaining breath in exchange for the plan working this time.
There as an eternal moment of waiting, watching the miniature fireball fall through the air and the ground below them finally caught fire.
It was not quick, there was no explosion and no rush of flames. It was a lazy, almost sleepy glow, picking out the individual shambling undead. Secundus could see them moving in the orange light, like a shoal of fish.
Their movement was aimless, each seemingly waiting to be told why they had come to this place by his fellows. Then the flames built into a roaring blaze that swallowed the crowd on the arena floor. A rush of warm air lifted itself out through the open roof and the night sky turned a dull orange against the moon.
Chapter Twenty Three
“Garic! Garic! Where are you?” Lee shouted as he ran through the complex of caves looking for his friend. The butcher heard him coming and smiled at the excitement in his voice. Since Vitus and the others had left, he had been maudlin and angry. He had cried when he'd found out they had left without saying goodbye, not understanding that they did it to make it easier for everyone, including him. Since that day, this was the first time he had sounded excited.
“Slow down boy, you’ll knock your brains out on a rock or something,” Garic said laughing at the happy, flustered expression the boy wore as he came into view.
The lad didn’t even give the chastisement a second thought, so eager was he to tell his news, “the legions are here!” he said, waving his hands as if there were armoured men floating around his head.
“Lee, slow down,” he tried again. “What do you mean, the legions are here? They are where?”
“In the village. They are camped near the road but there are legionaries in the village. One of the lookouts saw them. They want men to sign up and fight. I’m going to join.”
Lee said the last with such certainty that Garic did not even argue. The boy seemed to be growing every day but was still too young to consider fighting the Risen, yet Garic would not quash the enthusiasm that had been so recently absent.
He felt a sinking feeling deep in his stomach. Life had been almost peaceful in the time since Vitus had left. The raiders had not returned since their ill-fated attempt to steal from the cave dwellers, and even the Risen had been less active. Scouts had reported seeing them moving along the road but said their behaviour had changed. They were less aggressive and not attacking unless they were provoked. They stayed to the road with some heading north across the mountains and others south, toward Mutina and Rome so life in the cave had become comfortable, even enjoyable. This report of the legions arriving suddenly felt unsettling.
“I suppose we had better go and take a look, young man,” laughing at the joy written on the boy’s face.
News of the new arrivals must have been spreading because the big man could feel the increased excitement as they made their way through their little community as people were gathering and talking, pas
sing the gossip.
The morning sun was low in the sky and he had to hold a hand to his eyes in order to see down to the road going through the village. It hadn’t been so many days ago that he and his friends had fought and killed on that very ground, but at the far end of the street he could now see men in uniform speaking to people he recognised from the caves.
Lee ran ahead as they made their way towards the legionaries, eager to speak to the soldiers. Garic felt a grin creep across his face at the change in the boy. He had been so sullen since the friends had split up that his mother had approached him, asking him to look after her son. Finally, there seemed to be something for the lad to smile about.
Garic caught up with Lee the youngster to find him standing and staring in awe at a heavily muscled legionary with a long scar that cut across one eye. The butcher nudged a gentle elbow into the boy’s shoulder who promptly closed his mouth and turned to smile at him.
“We should both join,” he said. “We will be heroes of Rome. Fighting the Risen will be easy when we’re in the ranks. We can go back to Rome and take back our homes.”
A boy, not much older than Regulus turned as he heard Lee speak, “You come from Rome?” he asked.
“We do, I was born inside the walls,” the big man replied, feeling a little proud despite himself.
The young man held out his hand “My name is Julius, I’m pleased to meet you.”
Garic introduced himself and then laughed to see his young friend bouncing on the balls of his feet, eager to be included in the conversation. “This is Lee, one of the best fighters in Rome,” he added.
Julius held out a hand to the boy who could manage little more than a stutter in his excitement.
“We are heading back to Rome.” the young legionary said, turning back to Garic.
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