‘Civilised or barbarian,’ Egbertus went on, ‘a man is a man. And he can’t make a fool of himself in public like that, not without proving his manhood afterwards. So Quintus has ridden out on a quick hunting trip. He’s taken troopers with him, so even if he does meet northern warriors, he should be safe enough. He’ll find this boar or bear or lynx or aurochs or whatever—the hills are full of them—and bring it back at his pony’s tail. It’ll make a fine tale for the governor to hear…’
‘I can’t believe the governor is allowing it,’ complained Theodoricus. ‘He could lose an important man.’
‘An important man who stands to lose face,’ said Egbertus. ‘Rome is full of senator’s sons like Quintus. If the governor loses him, some other fellow will be there to take his place. But if Quintus returns from his rash hunting expedition…’
‘He’ll have a tale to tell the family back in Rome,’ said Theodoricus.
‘But more important than that,’ said Egbertus, ‘the governor will be able to demonstrate to the emperor that the Caledonians truly are crushed. And then he’ll get permission to take his own journey into the North. And think what a reputation that will bring him.’
Theodoricus wagged his head slowly. ‘So it’s all to the good for the governor,’ he said. ‘He must be a cunning man… But how do you know all this?’
Egbertus shrugged. ‘I don’t,’ he admitted. ‘But if I was in his situation, it’s what I do.’
Theodoricus grunted. ‘I still say that Quintus should have thrashed his wife.’
The heather swathed hills north of the Wall were bleak, barren and deserted at this time of morning. Only flocks of carrion crows disturbed the skies as Quintus rode in quest of prey. At least there had been no barbarians lying in wait.
In his mind, the Wall was like the wall round his parents’ estate on the edge of Rome. Inside all was peaceful and tranquil; outside was nothing but danger. As a boy, he had often climbed to the top of the garden one evening and watched the bustling street outside, and seen some terrible sights which had persuaded him to stay indoors and work hard at his studies.
And now here he was, no longer a beardless boy but a tribune and aide to the governor of Britain, still working hard, and yet he had allowed himself to be inveigled into going beyond the Wall. Hadrian had created an empire like his parents’ garden on a cosmic scale: inside the Wall all was safe, outside lay only sudden death for anyone fool enough to set foot there. And yet they had ridden so far that the Wall was no longer visible if he looked back; only an endless vista of dark hills could be seen, mirroring that which lay on either hand.
‘Don’t look back, husband,’ Publia called from her mare, raising her voice over the thunder of the hoofs of the auxiliaries’ pony. ‘We’ve not sighted that beast you vowed to catch. Think about that, my love, and then we can go back.’
‘Yes, my dear,’ said Quintus through gritted teeth, and turned to survey the road ahead of them.
They had remained on the road since leaving the fort, not wanting to abandon it for the trackless heather while it was still dark and they could easily lose their way. The road was more of a native trackway than a Roman road; it was in a bad way, too, not having been maintained since Agricola had been governor, what, fifty years ago? That was when the retreat from the northern regions had begun. Hadrian had seen the sense to call a halt, drawn lines in the sand, built walls, known when to say, “No more!”
Quintus wished he had known when to be so firm. He should never have married Publia in the first place. She was Roman, that was true, but hardly of colonist stock, despite her olive skin and dark hair. Really, he had little idea about her family when he thought about it. She said she was an orphan, having lost her parents during the Brigantian Rising before the Wall was built. They had met in Eboracum where she had been staying with an aunt, and one thing had led to another. He hadn’t even written home to tell the about the wedding. When he did go home, he knew his father would disapprove, his mother even more so. His mother had always bullied him. But Rome—and mater—was more than a month’s journey away. Publia was right here, at his side.
As they reached the crest of a rise he lifted a gauntleted hand and called for a halt. Publia sawed at her reins and hauled her pony round to face him; the auxiliaries formed up into a square surrounding them.
The first red line of the rising sun had broken the eastern skyline.
‘Why are we stopping, husband?’ she asked him, her voice a little cold. ‘We’ve not yet sighted so much as a hare!’
‘That’s just why,’ he said to her. He turned to look at the massive Thracian in charge of the troop. ‘No good riding aimlessly into the heather, is it, decurion? We need to find hide or hair of our quarry first. And now the sun is rising there will be more hope.’
‘Aye, sir,’ the Thracian replied, his oiled moustaches bristling. ‘I’ll send two of my best hunters to look for tracks.’ He gazed up at the hills as they became more visible in the dawning light. Firs and pines grew in the valleys some way from their current position. ‘Looks like good hunting country over there,’ he said, and issued orders to his men.
Soon two of them were riding towards the trees.
— 19—
Bodotria Estuary, Caledonia, 7th June 125 AD
Flaminius had come ashore a week earlier. Bidding farewell to the crew who had brought him to a secluded bay near the mouth of the Taon, he had jumped into the shallows, hauling his ass with him, and waded, waist deep, dragging the honking creature through the surf and up onto the shingly strand. Crags lowered and beetled above him. A path led inland through sparse grass, and he took it without a single glance over his shoulder.
The ass he had bought in Gesoriacum honked and hawed, tried to stop to chew at a stand of sea holly, and he struck it angrily. It struggled against the restraining rawhide reins and he hauled back, refusing to budge. Weighed down as it was with his bags and chests, it soon gave in, and they trotted placidly along the sandy path, up through a gully in the cliffs which was thick with sloe bushes, splashing alongside an eager young stream, finally coming out onto a stretch of grass fenced by walls of trees. Through gaps in the forest as he led his ass further inland, he caught glimpses of the distant blue smudge of the mountains.
This was the first time he had set foot in Britain since the governor banished him, years ago now. Thinking about it, it could only be two or three. But so much had happened to him since then. His time out in Egypt had changed him. He had contracted fever, he had fought in the arena as a gladiator, he had travelled across the swamps of the Nile Delta and the endless sandy wastes of the Libyan Desert… It seemed a long time since he was last here, and of course, he had been a younger man then. Rash and impetuous. His time in Egypt had taught him caution.
He was clad in the garb of a travelling oculist, and the bags and chests that festooned his bad tempered beast of burden were filled with the salves and tools of an oculist’s trade. It was standard disguise for a commissary man going undercover amongst peregrines and barbarians, and he had received the necessary wherewithal from his friends who had smuggled him into this land at the back of beyond. Although he was in Britain, he need not worry if Platorius Nepos’ men might find him. This quiet, seemingly peaceful land was Caledonia—Britain north of the almost completed Wall.
Turning a corner in the path he stumbled to a halt. His nostrils had caught a whiff of something that belied the apparent peace. Rotting flesh, burnt wood.
The stench drifted through the trees from somewhere to his left. Unwillingly, he led the ass off the main track and into the undergrowth. After some time forcing his way through a prickly undergrowth of holly he stumbled out into a clearing where the blackened timbers of a burnt hut stood stark against the blue sky. Heaped on the ground in front of the ruin were what looked like piles of old sticks. But Flaminius didn’t need the clouds of angry flies that rose at his approach to tell him they were the bodies of the hut dwellers.
He went no further.
Clearly the man and woman who lay with their throats slit, surrounded by slaughtered children and goats, had been dead for some time. Whoever had done this had moved on. But there was no point in tempting fate. Quieting the complaining ass, he led it back to the main path.
He had been hoping to ply his adopted trade while he made his way inland to his intended destination. But this would not be possible if tribal warfare had denuded these lands of their inhabitants. For a while he considered abandoning the ass and the eye medicines it carried, moving on without them to slow him down. But if he did that he would have no cover. A man of obvious foreign origin travelling as an eye doctor in Caledonian territory was one thing, a welcome thing he knew; so he had been assured by his friends. But a tribeless man found wandering in without any good reason would be recognised as a spy immediately. He would never get as far as the ruined fort.
That night he camped in the middle of another stretch of forest, having seen no one all day, only a few more burnt out settlements and overgrown fields or straying flocks. The next morning he continued, following the narrow trails through the woodlands, going always inland and uphill whenever it was possible. For some time he followed the banks of the river, knowing that it would lead him closer to his goal.
Pinnata Castra stood in a curve of the Taon. He remembered it from his first and last visit, five years ago. He had left not long before the Ninth Legion fought their final battle[14]. Ever since then the fort had been deserted.
It had already been abandoned once, but the governor at the time had had it rebuilt while he was negotiating with Brennos, king of the Caledonians. Flaminius remembered the governor’s concubine Medea. He shied away from that memory. It was a long time since her death, but the memory still pained him.
He turned his mind to Drustica. What would the warrior woman be doing now? He had heard nothing of her since he was banished from the province. He remembered her defiant glare, her ‘I am a Roman citizen!’, her people’s halting attempts to build a villa in the Roman style in her settlement at the further end of the Wall…
On the evening of the second day, he found a settlement where tribesfolk still lived, and where there was a demand for his trade. Speaking in a lingua franca combining words from Latin, Greek and the Celtic tongue these barbarians spoke, he traded his skills, attending to weeping, crusted, inflamed eyes in return for a pot of honey mead and his fill of hearth baked oaten bannocks, and the guest’s sleeping place by the fire in the main hut. He left the following day and went on with his seemingly aimless wanderings.
The folk said that the villages nearer the coast had been burnt by men from the north, but they had been forced back by their own lords who dwelt up in the hills. And he found more settlements along the track as he went on, thriving places that showed no sign of the ravages of war, filled with poor folk, many of whom suffered from eye complaints.
Word spread far and wide of this quiet magician who would accept bed and board in return for his vital services, and his progress was slowed by a sudden influx of patients. He began to imagine he could make a living like this, turn his back on a life of espionage and do some real good for once. Then he remembered that he was no longer a member of the commissary. He remembered Probus’ death. He remembered that he was a man alone. A man in search of answers.
At last he reached the plain between coast and mountain, where he hoped to begin finding them. A hill fort stood on a height above him, one he remembered well from his last visit to these parts, but it was not where his attention was drawn.
He led the sulky ass over the heather towards the overgrown ruins of a Roman fort. As he approached the Decuman Gate, he was almost overcome by an overwhelming sense of loss. The fort lay in stark ruin beneath the sky that now threatened rain, bleak and desolate. It was only five years since he had last been here but it looked as Pinnata Castra had been abandoned since the days of the Trojan War.
As he led the ass through the broken down gateway, he looked up as a croaking crow or raven shot overhead, turning to sail in a spiral, wing feathers stretched like the fingers of grasping hands. It vanished behind the further wall with a derisive caw.
He stood in the middle of overgrown devastation. Everywhere he looked were signs that the fort had been fired by the victorious Caledonians, then left to rot. Grass and heather swamped the place, and what had once been rows of barracks were unidentifiable hummocks. Birch trees grew in profusion. It was hard going making, his way further in, almost like forcing his way through a small but overgrown forest.
At last he found himself on a narrow path that led along what had once been the Principal Way of the fort. It might as well have been a beast track; he could see it was seldom used. As he followed it to the right, towards what had been the site of the governor’s headquarters, he heard something that made him turn.
By the time he had done so, they had ducked back into cover, whoever it was he had briefly seen out of the corner of his eye. But a birch tree shivered where there was no wind, and he felt that eyes were watching him from deeper in the bushes that grew where once had stood the Praetorium. He was about to investigate when the ass began heehawing as if it had gone crazy. It took a while to quieten it and by that time whoever had been following him was clearly deep in cover. He cuffed the ass, and it brayed at him sullenly.
He turned round. Before he could take a step forward, dark figures were rising up from the bushes and birch trees on every hand. He dropped the ass’s reins and raised his hands. As he did so, the angry creature broke free and went galloping down the Principal Way until one of the dark figures turned and flung a spear after it with lethal accuracy. The ass fell, the spear jutting from its side.
Flaminius turned calmly to the men who had appeared. Tall, solemn, barbaric figures, their skins blue with tattoos and woad, they surrounded him with a hedge of spears.
And that was when it began.
By night he had been taken south, bound securely and slung over the back of a pony. After many hours of painful travelling he smelt the salt tang of the sea. By then it was night, and he saw little as they led him down a wooded slope. Then they came out into the open and the cold wind from the estuary hit his bruised and battered face, and he saw the spreading water below, and far out to sea, an island. The island. The one he had heard of. And that had been his destination.
He had been here for some days—and nights—bound to this withered tree. He was starving, in desperate agony from their tortures. But now that the Archdruid himself had come looking for him, he felt a glimmer of hope.
He was important. He mattered to them. He was a mystery they were eager to solve. And it would not be long before his true significance became apparent to this man who even now peered up at him as the dawn light glinted in his eyes.
‘Did who send me?’ Flaminius said at long last.
The Archdruid’s eyes narrowed. Mist swirled around him, and little could be seen of the island now that the sun had risen. In the distance, Boduua capered and wailed. ‘Don’t pretend you don’t know. Someone must have sent you. Only one man, other than I, is aware of the gold’s location now.’
‘Perhaps more than one,’ said Flaminius. ‘But no one sent me. I came of my own accord.’
‘Who are you?’ the Archdruid demanded uneasily. ‘Why have you come here? It’s not because of the gold, is it?’
‘It’s because of the gold,’ Flaminius admitted. ‘But it’s not simple greed that brought me here. I hoped to solve a riddle. A riddle that has been troubling me, on and off, for five years. Since I was first in these parts. I’ve happened upon fragments of the mosaic from time to time, but I’ve never had enough of them to piece together the whole picture. Now I think I am close to the truth.’
The Archdruid gave a cracked laugh. ‘You’re close to your death,’ he told him assuredly. ‘How many more nights can you stand, hanging here? You’ll die—unless you tell me the whole tale. Who you are and why you came here. You’re after my gold, you say?’
‘Ah, but it’s not your gold, is it?’ Flaminius taunted him as the morning light grew. ‘You found it.’
The Archdruid looked uncomfortable. ‘It was a gift from the gods,’ he said defensively. ‘And none but the gods and those who walk with the gods would ever have found it.’
‘You barbarians must have been too fearful to set foot in the fort after it had been burnt down,’ said Flaminius; ‘fearful that the spirits of the dead Ninth Legion would kill them. All but folk like you, druids, who don’t believe in such superstitions.’
The Archdruid hissed. ‘You know too much of our mysteries, spy,’ he said angrily.
‘What?’ Flaminius said. ‘Are you afraid I’ll reveal you to your people as the frauds and charlatans you are? I’ve seen bigger and better conjuring tricks in Egypt than you could ever hope for, and seen through them. There are no gods. What god would trouble himself with this benighted world?’
‘You are very full of bragging words for a man who is at my mercy,’ the Archdruid said. ‘I came here because I thought you were willing to talk. I wanted to know who else is aware of my treasure. I found that gold not long after the battle. Only I was brave enough to explore the ruins, and I found more gold concealed there than I had ever seen at Brennos’ court. Strange, outlandishly wrought. Not like Hibernian gold. Not like Roman work either. I have never seen its like. I used it—some of it, a fraction—to make myself the only real power in Caledonia when the tribal wars began. But now, if my secret is known, I must make plans to transport it to a new hiding place. And yet I cannot move the gold by myself so others must help me. And so they must die…’
The Archdruid was talking to himself. Flaminius, who had only been half listening, his attention drawn by sounds from below, interrupted him suddenly. ‘Did you come here alone?’ he asked.
Still the wild woman capered and keened in the gloaming, drawing closer until she was just at the edge of the torchlight. She waited, watching the Archdruid.
The Londinium File Page 15