‘Will you help me find my boy?’ she asked.
Pavo reached down to take her hand and help her rise. ‘I… I…’ he started, but could say no more as he saw in his mind’s eye the lad and his lamb wandering, lost, at the tail of the great grey army of the fallen.
A hand slammed on his shoulder. Sura, caked in red and black blood, his face grim. His head and heart were at once awash with grief for the mother and relief that his friend was alive.
‘Pavo, come with me,’ Sura said, ripping him away.
Pavo looked back at the woman, his heart breaking for her, knowing there would be no happy conclusion to her search. Then all of a sudden a dark and cool veil fell over him. His and Sura’s footsteps echoed inside the basilica Sura had brought him to. He guided Pavo up a set of stairs.
‘What is this?’
‘You’ll see,’ Sura said.
They emerged onto the basilica roof, affording a fine view of the city, the fiery fingers of sunset searching through the widening patches of dusky shade. The horde was gone from sight. Pavo’s eyes swept at once to the massive crescent of silver arriving at the city in its place. A party of them entered through the ruined, corpse-heaped earth wall and then the city gates. He watched them as they came down the triumphal avenue towards the agora, making for Emperor Theodosius. At their head was a wing of green-robed Alani, the silver-garbed Heruli legion, a knot of black-cloaked men… and the Emperor of the West.
‘At last, he has come to the East,’ Pavo said, chill fingers of a malevolent spirit walking up his spine as he looked down upon Emperor Gratian. ‘Sura, we’re trapped. What now?’
Sura stared at him with a dark, strange scowl. He took one step towards Pavo. ‘Now?’ he burred. ‘Now… you die.’
Chapter 8
Seven days passed. The Army of the West and the battered remnant of the Army of the East set up a huge camp in the space between the turf bastion and the city walls. They rinsed the city streets of blood and set about the grim task of countless burials and burnings. The sound of wailing children, wives and parents filled the air day and night. Legionaries stood around pyres in solemn silence, or whispering final valedictions to slain comrades. It was like this, under a waxing moon, that the Claudia men bade farewell to their tribunus.
‘Numerius Vitellius Pavo, Tribunus of our ancient and proud legion, hero of the Gothic War,’ croaked Opis – keeper of the legion’s funeral fund. Indus and Durio carried the blanketed body towards the cedarwood pyre and set it upon a platform there. The onlookers raised their spears in salute. Rectus trudged over and sank to one knee, taking a torch offered by Libo. He moved it towards the kindling, halting for a moment as his shoulders shuddered in grief, before guiding the torch under the firewood.
‘Wait,’ a voice cut through the night. All turned to see a troop of soldiers approaching. A ring of Alani, screening the Emperor of the West and his dark-cloaked General, Vitalianus. Gratian’s youthful face was serene, his blonde hair swept immaculately and his pale blue eyes so sincere.
The Claudians jolted round to face the party.
‘I come to pay my respects,’ he said.
Rectus stepped back, his eyes wet with tears, gesturing for Gratian and Vitalianus to approach the pyre.
Vitalianus stepped forward and hook a finger around the linen sheet covering Pavo’s body.
Gratian stared at the body and its cavernous wound, his lips twitching in an odd and ill-fitting way. ‘It looks as if he died… horribly,’ he said.
‘Aye,’ Rectus said quietly.
‘At the end of the fray – and so unexpectedly,’ Gratian continued, his eyes growing distant as if trying to imagine what he had not been there to see. He nodded once, letting a disappointed sigh slip from his lips. ‘Burn him,’ he said phlegmatically, spinning on his heel to leave. Vitalianus glowered at the Claudians, then swung to follow his emperor.
Rectus covered Pavo’s body again, then crouched to light the kindling. A fresh whoosh of flame shot up, and the glassy-eyed Claudians watched their leader burn. As the flames rose high, they trooped solemnly around the pyre in a circle, chanting a low ode to Mithras.
Through the narrowest gap in the goatskin flap of Libo’s tent, Pavo watched his pyre burn brightly for an hour, then fade to a glow of embers. He whispered words of farewell to the brave Helvius – the third cohort veteran whose face had been pulped by a winged Gothic mace – as the man’s body turned to ashes. Only a handful of Claudians knew the truth.
He watched as the Claudia men dispersed back to their campfires. Most wore grubby bandages of sorts, some with bloodied heads or legs, others walking with crutches or their arms in a sling. Libo, now Tribunus of the legion, trudged over to Pavo’s old command tent at the centre of the Claudia area, sighed, and ducked inside. One group settled by their campfire to share a pot of creamy wheat porridge, then they played a game of ‘bandits’ on a wooden board. They laughed and supped sour wine as they played. But every so often, they fell silent, every man’s eyes drifting away from the board, some reddening and growing wet as they looked to empty spots around the fire – the places where the true dead had once sat – before they donned masks of cheer once more and returned to their game.
Of the twelve hundred Claudians he had led here, six hundred and twelve remained. The five hundred and eighty eight fallen men had been burnt on the pyre over these last few days, and Pavo had not been there to offer them a final word. Instead, he had been hiding in this damned tent – this stinking, sweating tent – through the heat of the days and the endless nights. At least it had given him time to rest and heal: for the first time since the frantic battle for Thessalonica, his body seemed whole again. The wound in his side was turning to scar, his sword hand felt strong again and the bruises were now yellow-black and fading.
A series of splashes and hisses sounded outside as the nearby campfire and all the rest were quenched and the legionaries retired to their tents. All fell quiet and dark as the Armies of East and West slept. Yet Pavo had learned never to trust the darkness. There was something about the Western Emperor’s visit to the pyre that felt odd, unfinished.
And then he saw it…
Vitalianus emerged from the night and approached Pavo’s spent pyre, stepping around it, eyeing the now-cold ashes carefully. Pavo stiffened, his hips shuffling a little like a cat ready for a fight. The Optio Speculatorum crouched there on one knee, an elbow resting across his thigh. He dipped a gloved hand in the ashes, rubbing the black soot together and then sniffing it like a hunting dog seeking a scent. His eyes combed the rows of tents, oh-so slowly. When they swept past Pavo and the sliver-gap in the tent, they seemed to slow down. Pavo caught his breath and shifted back from the gap.
‘I know you’re here…’ Vitalianus whispered, the gaze sweeping on. ‘That butchered body was not you, was it? So come, show yourself. I may be able to convince my emperor to afford you some leniency.’
Silence. Only after an eternity, he rose and left. Pavo felt his presence remain, even after he was long gone. It was as if he had sucked the life from the camp. Even the cricket song was absent. All was so still and quiet Pavo was sure he might hear a feather land on the ground.
Then a grunting snore, right behind him, sent the icy fear of the gods through his heart. He turned to shoot a sour look at Sura, asleep behind him – a fugitive in his own camp just like Pavo. Indeed, this whole ruse had been Sura’s idea. When he snored again, Pavo gave him a thump on the leg. This seemed to stir Sura into a semi-slumber.
‘Hmm. Camels,’ he said in full voice as he sat up, eyes still fogged with sleep.
Another punch from Pavo.
The webs of sleep fell away and his voice dropped to a whisper. ‘Trouble?’
‘Vitalianus… but he’s gone now,’ Pavo said, turning his back on the flap to face Sura, both sitting cross-legged.
‘I’m losing my mind in this tent, Pavo. I don’t know how you managed to stay sane in the months you were hiding out in the Neorion Barrac
ks. And of all the tents… why this one?’ Sura looked around the goatskin walls as if they were smeared with excrement. In fact on the first nights in here, both had been convinced this was the case, such was the smell. ‘What does Libo do in here?’
‘There are rumours, but it’s best not to ask.’
‘I found a marching sock,’ Sura continued. ‘Solid, it was, standing upright as if a foot was inside it. And why did I not bring my own bedding with me? That lamb testicle I ate at the tavern – it tasted vile. But the smell was the worst part about it – the evilest thing to have ever offended my nostrils. Until now.’ He held up Libo’s filthy pillow roll – originally white but now with a night-black, head-shaped stain in the middle – like a piece of inculpatory evidence.
‘Libo is the new Tribunus, or so the men are telling anyone who asks,’ Pavo reasoned. ‘So it makes sense for us to hide out in his old tent while he has mine.’
‘Well it was a close thing: today, while you were asleep, I lay by the flap, watching the goings-on outside. One of the Gemina lads, Dulcitius, was looking for me. I owe him money from a dice game. He was stalking around this section of the camp, mouthing off, asking for me. Where’s Sura? he said, voice like a bloody cornu. He doesn’t know about our situation, of course. Pulcher was up and out to him quickly, telling him how you and I had perished. He even stayed and watched my cremation, the macabre bastard that he is. He seemed to be buying it, but then he pulled that same face, just like the moment he caught me cheating at dice. Wait a moment: I was there in the agora when the battle ended. Sura was there too. I saw him and Tribunus Pavo slinking into the basilica. Durio did well to cut him short, ‘accidentally’ bumping into him and sending him flailing. The two nearly came to blows about it but at least it distracted him and shut him up.’
‘Durio?’
Sura sighed. ‘Aye, he knows we are in here now. Knows all about the situation with Gratian too.’
Pavo sighed deeply. He had tried to limit such knowledge to just his best men, to spare the others should they be accused or arrested. If young Durio knew, then his close comrade Indus would know too, and Indus was loose-lipped. Any notion of attacking Gratian had to be abandoned. These men would suffer terribly for hiding him, and their lives were too high a price to pay for vengeance. He sighed again and wrung his fingers through his hair.
A half-moon passed, and never once did he or Sura leave the tent. It was a suffocating existence. On the nineteenth day in the tent, word spread that the next phase of the Gothic War was upon them: the following day, there was to be a grand ceremony of sorts, and then the Western legions would march north to find and confront Fritigern’s horde, while the Eastern legions were to return to Constantinople and ensure its safety.
That night, Pavo and Sura shared a quiet meal of wine-soaked bread. Pavo twisted to look over his shoulder, through the tent flap. No sign of the shadows tonight. Yet.
He lifted a spoonful of bread to his lips, the punchy meal a welcome distraction. ‘One more day, and then it is over. We can slip away from this camp with the legion and back to Constantinople.’
‘Constantinople. Home. Wide open streets. Taverns,’ Sura fantasised.
A cracking twig outside snagged Pavo’s attention. He glanced again at the gap in the tentflap. Nothing. Shrugging it off, he thought again of Constantinople. ‘When we return to the Neorion Barracks, I will try to arrange new identities for us. I can pay off your debt to Dulcitius and give the lads enough for each and every one of them to spend a week at the taver-’
A whoosh sounded right behind him and a cold wind struck across the back of his neck. Sura mirrored his horror, jolting in fright, eyes bulging over Pavo’s shoulder.
Libo let the flap close behind him and came to sit beside the two, then unleashed a jagged belch. ‘Do excuse me,’ he said, patting his chest. ‘Had too much milk earlier.’
Pavo and Sura glared at the one-eyed centurion.
‘Something wrong?’ he chirped. Sitting, he tutted and scowled at Sura, flicking a finger at the wine and bread bowl in his hands. ‘Do be careful about where you eat, sir,’ he said, aghast. ‘I don’t want bread crumbs and wine splashes on my bed roll.’
Sura spluttered in disbelief, while Libo prissily swiped a finger along the top of a small leather box of his possessions at the back of the tent, then tutted in disapproval at the amount of dust that had been allowed to gather.
‘You risk your life, ours and those of every man in this legion by coming in here, Centurion,’ Pavo said hotly.
‘For good reason,’ Libo said.
‘You managed to get word to Emperor Theodosius?’ Pavo said, straightening. It was the one vein of hope while they had hidden in this tent – that the Eastern Emperor might shield them.
Libo’s face darkened. ‘I got close to his quarters in the palace, but his Inquisitors barred me from entering. I tried to explain to them that I had a message that only the emperor could hear. They wouldn’t listen. He appeared then, from a doorway, and asked who I was. I told him, and I explained I had comrades in need of his help. Comrades hiding from Gratian.’
‘And?’ Pavo and Sura said in unison.
‘His face… changed. His eyes became hard, baleful. You are a Claudian? he whispered. The last time I listened to one of your kind, it brought me to the edge of disaster. Pavo, your tribunus, was killed in the fray, aye? I hesitated, but nodded. He convinced me to sue for peace… a delay that allowed this city to fall under the Gothic hammer, shaming me before God!’ Libo licked his dry lips and shook his head. ‘He turned away then, half looking back to say: Whoever your comrades are, they will have no help from me. In any case, there is little I could do, for tomorrow, anyone Gratian seeks will be found.’
Pavo leaned forward. ‘Tomorrow?’
‘This ceremony,’ Libo nodded. ‘Gratian wants the camp struck before it begins. He wants a military parade at the agora. He has organised his Heruli guards to be sure every tent here is dismantled and that every soldier enters the city. He will even have men posted along the triumphal way to watch them walk to the agora.’
Pavo and Sura stared at one another. ‘He’s flushing the camp. Hunting for a rat,’ both said in unison. They would have to stand in line with the rest of the Claudia men in stark daylight.
‘You’ll be in the rear ranks, both of you,’ Libo assured them. ‘And we’ll think of disguises. That bastard will not have his prize tomorrow. Every man in the Claudia will die before that happens.’
Pavo looked Libo in his good eye, his face slackening. ‘That’s exactly what I’m afraid of.’
After Libo left, Pavo and Sura lay down to sleep. While Sura drifted off into a low, snoring slumber, Pavo stared at the tent ceiling, alert and sharp, sure he would find no rest tonight. He cycled over old memories of his youth, where Father lived on. It was the sweet recollection of summer days when the pair of them built a fort of cherry wood branches in the countryside that finally spirited him off into a light doze. His thoughts were sweet and restful… until he toppled into the dark abyss of deep sleep and it all changed.
He stood, caged in iron armour, the silver eagle standard in one hand. Ahead, the blood-wet tombstone road stretched out towards the blazing sunset, the lone olive tree and the singing maiden under its branches. Between here and there stood the corridor of shrieking corpse-warriors. The golden-vested skeleton horseman rode up and down to rouse his charges, their raised weapons swaying like the branches of a windblown forest as they filled the air with a shrill song of excitement, awaiting Pavo’s arrival. The nearest pair of them struck their swords together to create a shower of sparks that erupted into an archway of flames. A warm greeting…
Pavo stared along the road. The song of the woman under the tree was fading, he realised.
‘Few would blame you if you turned back,’ the crone sighed by his side.
Pavo dunted the legion standard on the ground once. ‘You asked me to go to her… and so I will go to her.’ With that, he stepped forw
ard, through the arch of flame, into the corridor of the dead.
Cocks crowed to waken the citizens of Thessalonica and the legions. Pavo’s eyes pinged open, the chilling image of the dream crumbling. He rose, rubbing at his eyes with balled fists. He and Sura shared a look. No words were needed. Both knew what lay ahead.
Soon, the waft of woodsmoke, crackling bacon and fresh porridge seeped into their sanctuary. Rectus entered the tent and began bandaging each of their faces, covering one of Pavo’s eyes and providing Sura with a thick headband to hide his distinctive golden mop, dabbing each dressing with a spot of red dye for authenticity. The chatter and bustle of a camp being dismantled rose around them. After a time, a voice whispered through the goatskin. ‘Now.’
The pair rose and crept outside. After so long in hiding, the full light of the summer morning was blinding. The sky was blue apart from a canyon of white cloud in the south. Keeping their heads down they dutifully set about unpegging the tent. From the corner of his eye, Pavo saw how the Claudia men were making a veil of sorts around them, each fussing over their own tent leather, taking an age to fold them up.
Mithras bless each of you, he thought. But the city walls and the turf rampart both overlooked their efforts. Pavo saw Gratian’s flame-haired Heruli legionaries on the former, and the Alani pacing up and down on the latter. And where is Vitalianus? he thought.
‘Time to don iron, sir,’ Pulcher said in a low drawl, handing a pile of mail and iron to him. Pavo slid on the mail shirt then pulled the helm on too. The helmet was a little tight, and lacked the striking iron fin he had become so used to. It made him feel smaller, less officer-like. It was perfect. More, weeks of stubble covered his face from nose to chin in a layer of black. Sura placed an equally dull and unremarkable helm on his head, slinging a shabby brown cloak on instead of his usual, pristine, white one. Both kept their heads down as the Claudia formed up under ‘Tribunus’ Libo’s barking orders. One by one, the legions of the West and the few remaining ones of the East filed from the camp area and funnelled through the land gates to enter Thessalonica proper. When it was the turn of the Claudia, they moved off with a clank-clank of iron. Sweat stole down Pavo’s back in beads. He felt the eyes of Gratian’s men combing over every rank. The Heruli stood in threes, one trio either side of the gate, one on the gatehouse and looking down… alongside Vitalianus and Skull-face. His blood turned to ice. Head down, keep moving, he demanded of himself, staring at the arch of the land gates, longing to be inside and past this first point of ‘inspection’.
The Blood Road (Legionary 7): Legionary, no. 7 Page 17