The Blood Road (Legionary 7): Legionary, no. 7
Page 6
Judda strode to and fro along the wagon plinth. He crouched down and forward – something that only made him more toad-like – and clenched and shook a fist. ‘Constantinople!’ he cried. The massed nobles and reiks around the wagon cheered. The sea of faces beyond them did too – warriors, wives, elders, children on their shoulders.
‘That is the answer for us,’ Winguric agreed, standing high on the crate beside the wagon. ‘Smash the gates, seize the palace hill within and then we are masters of that peninsula as they are now. The place is thinly guarded with just the remains of the legions we trampled at the Scupi Ridge. We were once repelled by the sight of those walls, but have we not now the means of throwing them down?’
Fritigern followed the man’s outstretched hand: a trio of Roman engineers sat, back-to-back, tied to a stake, mouths gagged. Judda and Winguric had gone out of their way in the last week to find an answer to his refusal to do battle with Roman walls, riding with their private retinues into Roman villages in search of imperial siege engineers. They had questioned and beat farmers and townsfolk until they found these three. They were grubby, weary specimens with stooped backs and shuffling gaits. More, it had transpired that they were not siege engineers, but in fact retired soldiers who had once served as artillery crewmen. Useful perhaps in crafting stone throwers, but not the top engineering minds that might pick apart a bastion like Constantinople. It was time to say his piece.
‘I will not throw my people against those confounding walls. The peninsula upon which it sits is bristling with redoubts and they have plentiful legionaries inside the city to make any assault on the place an endless and bloody affair,’ he said, striding amongst the Gothic Council, stepping up onto the wagon beside Judda, using his spear like a walking cane. Up on the wagon, the blue hawk banner tied to the lance caught the breeze. ‘Constantinople is not impregnable, but what kind of prize would it be, if half of our fighting men – your sons, fathers, husbands – were to die in seizing it?’
‘Fighting men?’ said Winguric. ‘We are a nation of warriors. Yet when was the last time our men even drew a sword?’
‘When was the last time any of us here went hungry?’ Fritigern countered. ‘The towns and farmsteads pay us as their masters, thus we have no need to draw steel upon them.’
‘Men used to say you were strong as a bear, brave and fast as a lion,’ Winguric grumbled. ‘Yet you dodder here, hobbling and shaking like an old man, afraid to take the prizes that glitter around you.’
‘Fools act in haste,’ Fritigern reprimanded both, lifting his spear to point it like a finger, wincing as his full, unsupported weight sent white-hot pain through both knees. Why can you not-’
The words caught in his throat as he saw four figures cutting through the crowd: Hengist, his bare-chested brute of a bodyguard parted the gathered peoples like a bull. Following him were a pair of his royal guards in visored helms, dark red armour and embroidered cloaks. The fourth one was obscured. ‘The council is in session,’ he snapped at them as they bustled through to the semicircle of free space before the wagon plinth.
‘But you should hear this, Iudex,’ said Hengist. ‘A messenger, from Constantinople…’
Fritigern’s senses sharpened as if a spirit had drawn a whetstone across his heart. There had been no diplomatic contact with the empire in either direction since the failed overtures prior to the Battle of the Scupi Ridge. The last thing even close to such talks was the unexpected chat with the officer, Pavo, in the Rhodope Mountains. Since then, he had considered sending envoys of his own to the emperor, but how could he, given the last one had been murdered? If talks were to resume then it had to be Theodosius who initiated it. Was this it? The moment he had longed for – if not expected – for months? The thing that might shut up the likes of Winguric and Judda – lop off all of the Hydra’s heads at once?
The two royal guardsmen parted like a door to reveal a Roman. An auxiliary, Fritigern guessed, going by his poor leather armour and antiquated helm. A strange choice of messenger – envoys were usually decked out in faux-senatorial robes or some such finery designed to inspire awe in the intended recipient. More, he realised, the fellow was a Goth. A Goth in Roman service. Not an uncommon sight these days, though most had turned from the empire and joined his horde, but not this one.
‘I bring you news from my Commander,’ he said as Fritigern eased himself down from the wagon.
A strange opening line, thought Fritigern. ‘Surely it is your Emperor, Theodosius, who is due to speak with me? Why would an officer send me a message? And who might he be?’
‘Eriulf, Comes of the Thraciana Auxiliaries,’ said the messenger.
The name sent a shiver of memory through Fritigern. ‘You mean Eriulf, son of Arimer?’
The messenger nodded. ‘In times past, aye.’
Fritigern’s skin tingled as he realised what was happening. This was no missive from the imperial court. ‘And what does Eriulf wish to tell me?’
‘To warn you, Iudex Fritigern. You are in great danger.’
The watching crowds whispered and hissed in shock and intrigue, pressing closer.
‘Emperor Theodosius – that fickle lord – and the Romans right now devise a scheme to trick you with overtures of peace. He plans to lull you into thinking that accord is an option… all the while manoeuvring his forces and the Western legions around you to strike while you are unprepared. They plan to use you and your people as a sacrifice, a testament to the folly of the Arian ways and the righteousness of the Nicenes.’
The masses heard it. All of it. They exploded into a frenzy of shouts and yells, wails and whimpers.
‘Emperor Gratian right now gathers his forces at Aquileia and prepares to lead his legions across the West-East borders. The rumours you have heard are true. They are coming to crush you. They will be here by summer. If you are still here on this open plain, then that is what will happen.’
Winguric batted a fist against his chest and roared: ‘Is this not the truth you have been avoiding for so long, Iudex… too long.’
‘Athanaric too will march against us, I presume?’ Fritigern asked the messenger, ignoring Winguric.
The messenger’s face darkened. He shook his head. ‘Athanaric is dead.’
The clamour all around faded, changing to whispers as some nearby heard the news and spread it behind them.
‘Dead?’ Fritigern croaked.
‘Murdered. The Romans welcomed him to their capital… then poisoned him.’
‘They were never interested in his few thousand warriors,’ Winguric bleated. ‘They wanted only to slay him. Athanaric failed as the Iudex of the Thervingi, but his blood and ours was the same. The Romans killed him and now they seek to slaughter us. All of us. The end is coming unless we rise up once more and strike first.’
The people were close to hysteria now. Groups of men tossed swords to one another and recounted war songs in breathless, throaty cries as if battle was upon them right now. Mothers gathered up their children and backed away from the crowd, horror-filled eyes swinging over the horizon as if expecting to see Roman legions there right now. Fritigern recognised the moment: so close to a mass panic breaking out, from groups doing irrational things, from splinter bands racing away from the great camp to do what they thought was right… from all order and harmony crumbling to dust.
Winguric continued to bawl over the crowds: ‘Take up your weapons. Saddle your warhorses!’
Fritigern gave Hengist a well-practiced look. The hulking brute flashed a half-mouthed grin and malevolent eyes, then turned and booted away the thick oak beam that was holding the plinth-wagon at bay on the slight slope. The wagon lurched forward. Judda flailed and fell onto the grass, then the wagon crunched over the crate upon which Winguric stood. Winguric’s passionate monologue ended as he too fell with a girlish scream, under the wagon. The vehicle trundled on over him and came to a rest by itself thanks to a slight up-turn in the turf, revealing Winguric, cowering, hands over his head.
The chorus of panic ebbed a little. Slowly, the crowds realised that there was no Roman army in sight, that Fritigern was right – the beacon fires on the faraway hills in every direction were unlit, the horns of warning unblown. The swords were stashed again on the wagons, the songs of battle faded, the mothers set down their children. As they dispersed, he was already close to finalising his plan. Winguric and Judda were right after all. They could not tarry here. To linger in hope of a peace deal with the Romans was to wait for the cold touch of a killer’s knife on their necks. This land – a virtual paradise for these last months – was now a death-trap. They could not be caught in the jaws of the Eastern and Western armies. They might win, he thought with a spike of hubris, but there would be few men left to tell of any such victory. Move they must, but where?
His eyes darted across the hazy horizon. North offered only the icy barrier of the Danubius and the Hun nightmare beyond. West and they would run into Gratian’s advancing legions. East, then, and an escape across the seas? He thought of the Pontus Euxinus and the bare shoreline – no way across those waters. The same too with the south, where the Macedonian ports harboured only fishing skiffs. There were hundreds of them moored at some of those towns, but they were small and unfit for crossing deep waters – certainly not suitable for ferrying his many people and herds. His gaze drifted in the direction of Constantinople, of the impossible defences there. It could not be broken – captured engineers or otherwise. The hundreds of broad-decked galleys in the city harbours – themselves walled like forts – could not be had.
He sensed Winguric, Judda, Fravitta, young Alaric, Hengist and his royal guards gather around him now the masses were gone. ‘What is to be done, Iudex?’ they hectored him.
But already, his mind was skinning the problem like a deer. The galleys housed in the stony harbours of Constantinople, known as the Classis Moesica, were there for a reason – to ferry grain, wine, meat and honey as well as soldiers to the capital from other major coastal cities. Other cities with defences that could be breached. If it could be timed well, then city and fleet might fall into an attacker’s hands.
His eyes slipped southwards a little, thinking of the Macedonian coastline…
Pavo looked down over his body: encased in iron like a dismounted clibanarius rider, his face protected by a visor. He held the Claudia legion’s silver eagle standard, the ruby bull banner hanging still in calm air. Before him, a road stretched out like a silvery finger, pointing to the horizon. The sun blazed its last of the day, bathing the Thracian countryside in the colour of fire. At the end of the road, silhouetted in the dipping sun stood a lone olive tree. A strange figure sat underneath the tree’s boughs. A woman, he realised when he heard her song. A song as sweet as honey.
‘Go to her,’ a familiar voice said gently by his side.
Through the corner of the visor, he could see the crone’s hunched form, her milky, sightless eyes affixed on him. She had guided him well in the past, and so he would do as she asked.
‘Why?’
‘Because it must be you. Because there is no other who can.’
Pavo stared at the route. There was no danger, no sign of others, no pitfalls. So he set off along the road, his breath echoing within the iron helm like gentle waves rolling across a bay. As he went he noticed the flagstones underfoot were not normal silver slabs… but tombstones, laid flat. Each bore a name and a faded image of a man – some in the garb of a soldier, some as craftsmen, others depicted with their families. An endless road.
The sky began to grumble, drowning out the distant woman’s song. Pavo felt early spots of rain land on his armour, then blinked, seeing it splash on the tombstone road. Not rain. Blood. The spots grew into a stinging shower. ‘What is this? He cried over the roar of the deluge. But the shower ended as quickly as it had begun. Now the road was wet with blood. The earth at the roadsides too.
‘Wait,’ said the crone, raising a hand to halt him, her ancient face lengthening in fear.
A cold shiver ran through Pavo. Never had he seen her look afraid. Then he noticed something up ahead: the blood-wet earth by the sides of the road was trembling, vapour rising from the drying blood there. He stared, transfixed, as the soil blistered, rising in hundreds of lumps. Then the soil began to slide away, revealing strange, bulbous shapes, emerging like crops fed by the blood rain, rising to life.
‘They are coming…’ the crone whispered, taking a step backwards. Her sightless eyes grew wide as moons. ‘They are coming!’
Pavo jolted awake, head spinning, heart thumping, his confused grunt echoing around the upper chamber in the Neorion Barracks’ corner turret. It was mid-afternoon, and the two small, high windows in the chamber stared back at him with a grey disapproval. He stood up from the bench and cursed himself for having drifted off – it was no way for a legionary to behave, let alone a tribunus. And that dream, that same damned dream that had robbed him of restful sleep for over a month now. What did it mean? With a foul head, he threw on his ruby cloak over his white tunic’d shoulders and stomped out through the arched doorway and onto the barrack compound’s parapet.
The spring skies over Constantinople had been bruised since dawn, the waters grey and choppy, and the seabirds agitated. Wringing his fingers through his short crop of hair and over his face to squeeze the sleep away, he drew in a deep breath, smelling the mix of cool sea air and spring heat – the perfect ingredients for a storm. He cast his eye across the interior of the stony billet: a small parade area; a stable; a medical house; a grey-brick principia, his headquarters; a row of twelve white-walled barrack houses with red-tiled roofs, outside which the men of the legion sat in groups, polishing their armour with olive oil and listening while Pulcher and Opis held court with ribald tales. Libo and Rectus played dice in the porch of their quarters. Herenus, the chestnut-skinned Cretan, led his seventy slingers in a practice session at the range in one corner of the compound. Rat-tat-tat-tat, went the volleys of smooth stones as they punched into the timber targets. Cornix the wiry, scar-faced Chief Centurion of the Third Cohort stood at a bench by a cooking fire, grating carrots and dicing garlic on a board, sweeping them into a vat of what would become tonight’s meal. Trupo Chief Centurion of the Second Cohort jogged round and round the barrack pomerium, berating two of his charges – the young, swarthy Indus and the flame-haired Durio – to keep pace behind him. Twelve hundred men in all, one-third less than their full complement – but in this desperate age that made them one of the stronger legions. The sight of them together, and in the safety of Constantinople’s walls made him feel momentarily calm. A stiff breeze picked up, sending a chill across his neck, and it reminded him of times past.
The legion had been stationed here before, in a different era. Before the disaster at Adrianople that had forced the East to its knees. Tribunus Gallus had been the one standing here, watching his charges. Quadratus, Zosimus, Felix… so many more. All gone. It made him feel utterly mortal. The higher a man rose in the army these days, the closer to death he rode. I will look death in the eye, for all of you, he mouthed, seeing Gratian’s face in his thoughts. I will avenge you, brothers lost and living.
For a moment, he felt charged by his own hubris, but then it faded and he felt a terrible sense of a watcher’s gaze upon his back. He swung to look out over the sea walls and across the Neorion docks. Nothing. Just fishermen shinning up the jutting masts, stowing their sails in expectation of a storm, and traders and travellers shuffling to and from the wharf with bags, carts, wagons. The shanty huts and bivouacs that packed the inner city streets peppered the stony wharf too, the feeble shelters buffeted by the sea wind and the stink of rotting fish heads. A crunch of shredding timbe
r jolted him, and he looked into the city, across the flagged streets and up the rising slopes of the third hill. Amidst the rich men with their bodyguards and the famished, wandering masses, a wagon lay canted, a wheel having jarred and broken in the well-worn ruts in the road, the crates of apples on board had split, and the green fruits were now racing and bouncing down the slope. The driver was inconsolable, on his knees and lamenting, while refugees darted out from the alleys in their dozens to snatch up the bounty, stowing as much as they could in cradles made of their tunics before vanishing again. A man stopped to help the poor fellow, picking up what fruit hadn’t sped off treacherously or been stolen, then helping to hoist the wagon and prop a crate under it so the wheel might be replaced. Pavo’s eyes drifted on up the slope of the third hill. He saw the balcony of Eriulf’s villa up there – one side on stone stilts and jutting from the slope like a ship’s prow. And there was the man himself, standing like a helmsman, his cloak rippling in the now blustery wind, staring out at the choppy sea. It was not a surprise: every morning Pavo saw him like that. Such an effervescent character face to face, so sullen and silent when he was alone. For a moment, Eriulf’s head turned and it appeared that he was looking at Pavo. Pavo raised a hand in salute. Eriulf stared for a time, not returning the gesture, then stepped back from his balcony, vanishing inside his home.
Confused, Pavo made to turn away from the goings-on in the city and back to the fort, when his gaze snagged on the stricken wagon. For a moment – just a moment – he thought he saw the one helping the wagon driver. He had had his back turned until now. Dark hair, flashed grey at the temples. Was that… but when he looked again, the man was gone. The wheel had been replaced and the wagon drove off.
The wind whooshed and a thick splosh of rain struck Pavo’s neck, then another and another. In a few breaths, a furious deluge drummed down. Shouts and cries rang out as people pulled cloak hoods up or ran for cover – rich men back to their homes, beggars and refugees to their street side shelters. Soon, the streets were shiny wet and the ruts gurgling like brooks, the smell of damp stone rising through the air. Pavo, half-drenched already, lifted the paenula that lay on the barrack parapet and threw it on. The hooded leather poncho blocked out the wind too.