Pavo glanced at the boy-Caesar, then heard an officer cry somewhere outside.
‘Open the gates for a sally,’ the commander barked. ‘A legion readies to strike the flank of the Gothic band.’
The wagon slowed. Pavo stared at Valentinian.
‘Wait, you will see,’ Valentinian continued, his expression like that of a young brother.
A muted whump-whump of boots speeding across dirt grew louder and louder. Pavo saw the army of shadows coming towards the wagon, outlined by the glowing blaze on the western sections of the earth wall. As they approached the earth stockade’s repaired timber gatehouse, the men atop and at the sides hauled on ropes and the tall, narrow gates groaned open, a cohort of scale-draped sagittarii stationed just inside raising nocked bows, just in case it was a trick and Goths waited outside.
Pavo gazed out into the night – no Gothic trick – then back to the approaching legion. In the poor light he saw glinting steely, fin-topped helms, mail shirts, ruby-red shields daubed with Mithraic suns and bull heads. He saw a silver eagle standard and a ruby bull banner. He saw Libo, Pulcher, Cornix, Trupo, and the rest of them, Rectus jostling on the back of his pony. They rumbled towards the earth wall gate, past the wagon, oblivious to the presence of their tribunus and primus pilus.
Pavo felt something cold and heavy being pressed into his palm. He looked down, seeing Valentinian’s hand withdraw.
‘My mother and I will be returning west in the days to come – leaving my Stepbrother to his victory. He does not want me here lest anyone attributes it to us both. In your hands, Tribunus, you hold the key. The one thing that can deny him that victory. The thing this land and its people have craved for so long.’
Uncurling his fingers, Pavo stared at the bronze disc in his hand. Stamped on one side was the likeness of the boy-Caesar, his name written around the edge. He turned it over: stamped on the other side was an image that sent a shiver through him: of a woman, resting by the foot of an olive tree. She carried a sceptre in one arm and a cornucopia in the other. Realisation sped across his skin as he thought of the dream and that wretched road of tombstones and blood, of the singing woman and the tree at its end. Underneath the image was a simple word.
‘Pax,’ Pavo whispered, stroking the likeness of the Goddess of Peace with the edge of one finger.
‘It is a token of sincerity, from me to Fritigern,’ said Valentinian. ‘One of Emperor Theodosius’ men – General Modares – told me that is what the Iudex wants. They said you had claimed it was so.’
Pavo’s jaw slackened. ‘Fritigern may want peace, but many of his reiks do not,’ Pavo explained. ‘He is loath to go against them for fear of the horde dividing again. Indeed, that is likely why the horde assaulted this place. And Theodosius laments that he ever listened to me and my talk of peace.’
‘What do you see in your heart, Tribunus?’ Valentinian reasoned. ‘If there is even a sliver of a chance, we must try. Can it be done?’
Pavo, disarmed by the young man’s gentle question, saw again in his mind’s eye the nightmare of the corpse-warriors on the endless blood road. In the distance, the olive tree and the goddess seemed as far away as ever, unattainable. But he understood what the dream meant now: an impossible journey but one that had to be undertaken. More, he realised that young Valentinian was all that which his supporters believed him to be. ‘I will do all I can to make it so, Domine.’
Justina clasped her hands over his. ‘Go north. May God spirit you from these parts at haste,’ she said, tapping open the wagon door. Pavo and Sura felt a smoke-tinged breath of wind from outside. A whisper of freedom.
‘May the fates see our paths cross again, Domine, Domina,’ he said to them both.
‘They will, Tribunus,’ Justina said, an edge of sadness in her voice. ‘My dreams tell me of shared times ahead. Times of greatness, times of woe.’
Pavo stared at her for a moment. Then, like men slipping into a fast-flowing river, Pavo and Sura hopped down from the wagon and staggered into the passing Claudia mass. They stumbled for a moment then ran at matching speed, pushing in a few ranks – the familiar, disgusting but strangely comforting scent of musty gussets and malodorous boots wafting over them.
‘Here, you clumsy bastard, what in Hades do you think you’re playing a-’ Durio snarled, shield raised to barge these interlopers away. Then his eyes grew moon-like. ‘Sir?’ he whispered. ‘Lads,’ he hissed to the others. Scores of heads twisted to peer at the two.
‘Don’t draw any attention,’ Pavo whispered. ‘Just get us out of the gate, into the countryside.’
‘But you don’t have any armour or weapons?’ Indus complained. ‘How will you manage against the Goths outside?’
‘There are no Goths outside, goose-brain,’ Sura hissed. ‘Now keep your bloody voice down and move!’
They slipped out into the inky night. Thanks to the chaos and confusion near the western end of the earth wall, nobody even noticed the absence of an attacking Gothic force, nor the disappearance of the Claudia legion.
Gratian’s eyes scoured the blazing palisade, his chest tight and his hands clammy. His mind played with images of blazing Goths leaping through the wall of flame, axes overhead, screaming. But then he surveyed the thick banks of legions on the inner slopes, pushing up to the walkway either end of the fire, armed with troughs and buckets, and those serried and ready in the camp, facing the trouble-spot. No horde-warrior could hope to break through such might and make it all the way to him. Even if Fritigern – damn him – waited for the flames to fade then threw masses of his men at the charred gap, these jaws of legionary steel would ruin them. ‘Come on then you hairy cur,’ Gratian purred, ‘run onto my spears and give me my prize. Crown me as victor and saviour of the East… as champion and true leader of the empire entire.’
But then he heard it: the slow, rattling breath of another creature entirely – neither legionary nor hordesman – and the wet squelch of the thing’s boots. His dreams had been creeping into his waking hours in recent times, and here he saw the moor-creature so vividly now. It was blacker than the many silhouettes around him, swaying. It was now so close that he could smell its stink, see it’s sword. But for the life of him, he couldn’t work out who, or what, it was. It was vast, small, stocky and lean at once. Its face was pure shadow yet in that spot of blackness he saw a thousand faces, of enemies old and current. Its every swaying step transformed the backs of his legionaries into that creature, as if it was wading through the steely ranks towards him, shifting to take control of one body at a time like a killer hopping across a stream on stones.
‘You have no dominion over me,’ he hissed to nothing, no one. ‘I have prayed for my actions. I have been penitent.’ He shot a look towards Bishop Ambrosius, who watched the blaze from the nearest stretch of land walls. The man had promised him it would be so: Do that which is expedient, that which an emperor must, but be sure to ask God for his blessing and forgiveness.
A horse spluttered near him, a man shuffled, a coat of scale clanked. Every movement and noise sent a spark of fear through him. And then a hand clamped down on his shoulder from behind.
Like a striking cobra, Gratian tore the knife from under his silks and brought it round to face the stranger. It halted, a finger’s width from Valentinian’s neck. The boy was on horseback like him. The lad had not even flinched. A grain of respect was swamped by a landslide of loathing.
‘What are you doing here?’ Gratian spat.
‘I came to oversee the struggle here, with you. You are always berating me for my meekness. It would be wrong of me to hide in the city while our legionaries face danger here. I am… doing the right thing.’
Gratian stared at him, unblinking.
Valentinian looked down his nose at the knife, tip at his throat. ‘You can put your blade away, Stepbrother,’ he said. Gratian did not comply. Valentinian let his gaze slowly and deliberately wander up to Merobaudes, organising the men on the earth wall. Slowly, Gratian retracted and shea
thed the dagger.
Chapter 10
The Claudia men sped into the blackness. But instead of wheeling left towards the phantom Gothic assault, they kept going due north, cutting over the Via Egnatia and heading for the hills just as Fritigern and the horde had done weeks ago. Sura explained the ruse to the many who did not know what was happening, while Pavo, unburdened by armour, picked his way through the ranks towards the front. He felt the heat of the turf stockade blaze on the back of his neck for a time, before they slipped fully into the veil of night. None on the turf wall noticed the disappearance and soon the clamour of the soldiers fighting the blaze fell away behind them.
‘Good to have you back in the land of the living, sir,’ Libo chuckled as Pavo reached the front. The one-eyed centurion unclipped his ruby cloak and handed it to Pavo. ‘Merobaudes told me what was going to happen, so I made sure to bring a few provisions. We have water and food for twenty days. I say food – I mean disgusting hardtack, but that’s a soldier’s life, eh? We have a few spare helms and the like too. Didn’t want to bring too much because I thought,’ he looked over his shoulder to the fading bubble of orange behind them, ‘we’d need to be quick.’
‘Pray to Mithras we are quick enough,’ Pavo replied quietly, slinging on his cloak, buckling it at the left shoulder.
‘Full-step!’ Libo bawled back over the three cohorts.
Pavo scoured the hilly route north as he led them. The August night was clement and still. The stars winked and flickered and a sickle moon shed a grey light – enough to help them pick their way. Mount Cissus loomed like a slumbering giant. They forged up the trackless hillside, brush rustling as it scraped across men’s legs. Near the mountain’s peak, brooks babbled all around them, and the pale legs and arches of the Thessalonica aqueduct’s beginnings rose from the hillside, capturing the mountain waters, which gurgled and glinted in the moonlight as it trickled back to the city. Hearing the men’s rasping breaths, he threw up a hand to halt them, patting his waterskin and signalling to theirs. ‘Drink and refill your skins.’
As the men guzzled cool water and crouched to replenish their supplies at the nearest brook, Pavo and Sura gazed back downhill across the inky countryside, towards the now-distant orange glow that was Thessalonica.
‘How long before Gratian realises?’ Sura said.
‘The fires are already tamed,’ Pavo mused, seeing the orange speck near the city’s landward side shrinking like a dying candle.
‘Where do we go from here?’ Pulcher asked, wiping water from his lips with the back of one hand.
‘Home,’ Pavo replied instantly. ‘Constantinople. Saturninus is there. He is the only one we can truly trust now.’ He lifted the bronze Pax token from his purse. The men stared at it in awe, all enraptured by the likeness of the Goddess of Peace. ‘This token came from the hand of young Valentinian. It needs to find its way to Fritigern, and it needs to be delivered by a man of high station – a man with peace as his true aim. A good man. Saturninus.’
‘You talk of Constantinople, sir?’ said Opis in a fond whisper. ‘Of home. Of a road to peace…’ He hitched his pack, back straight, ready to march. He clacked the butt of the legion standard against the track three times, and the rest fell in behind him. ‘I will march night and day to make it happen, sir.’
‘Aye,’ rumbled the others.
The Army of the West stood serried outside Thessalonica’s turf wall in the morning heat. Twenty-five thousand legionaries, riders, slingers, archers, artillerymen and more. Behind, almost as an afterthought, the battered remains of the Eastern Army stood like a rearguard. The people of Thessalonica lined the turf walls, cheering and weeping. Timpani rumbled like rampant thunder and flutes whistled and warbled tunes of impending victory. Priests chanted and droned too, circling the army with bright labarum standards and kettles of scented smoke. This was the moment the mighty army would take its first step to hunting down and crushing the Goths.
At the head of the mighty force, Gratian sat astride his silver stallion, encased in his muscled bronze cuirass with the carefully etched ‘battle scars’, a black-sleeved robe underneath and a matching black cloak – threaded with gold – on his shoulders, his jewelled diadem in place of a helm. He stared north along the Sardica Road, the route that would most speedily take them onto the heels of Fritigern’s horde. The grey-green mountains of Macedonia loomed like sentinels on either side. To all, he had the appearance of a young god, benevolent and gracious. Within, fiery talons of indignation ripped through his chest. It had been a blur of a night: the fire, the shouting, the anticipation of battle… a battle that never came, and then the stark, sickening moment when he had returned to the palace to find that his quarry had escaped. Dawn had only sharpened the blow, with his commanders bringing word of confusion amongst the ranks… talk of a missing legion. And not any legion, but the Claudia – the heroes of the recent struggle to save this city. Soldiers wore crumpled expressions, muttered fears for the heroic Claudians, some even prayed and gave libation for the men of the ruby bulls.
‘There is no sign of blood or bodies near the turf wall or even on the plains,’ the nearby Tribunus of the Celtae legion observed, shielding his eyes from the sun to peer north along the road. ‘They must have chased the Goths away from the fire and met their doom somewhere ahead?’
Gratian said nothing. One Speculator who served as a Julia Alpina officer had worked out what had happened. They’re gone, he had said that morning in Gratian’s private palace chambers just after dawn. Melted into the Rhodope Mountains and the Thracian countryside like a breeze. They know this land well. You only have a handful of Speculatores to hunt for them. Not nearly enough. You’ll never find them, the abrupt whoreson had concluded. Gratian glanced down at the pack of Molossian hounds, basking in the grass and grumbling in satisfaction. The man had been a good meal for them, and it had been so satisfying to watch them start on his face. His gaze crept along the army’s broad front and settled upon Merobaudes. The big Magister Militum had been the one droning repeated calls of alarm about the fire and the ‘Goths’ outside. If I discover that it was you behind all this, brute, then my dogs will strip the meat from your face next. And I will keep you alive, with a fleshless skull for a head, for the real torture to begin. His gaze shifted to Arbogastes, on horseback by the Magister Militum’s side. He did not say yes to my offer… yet neither did he decline it. Maybe he could be the one to lure the oaf to his doom?
The talons of fire streaked within him again, bringing his thoughts back to the absent legion, the burning need to find them and punish them. He glanced to his right, where Vitalianus sat astride his horse in a black cloak and his gleaming general’s helm, his Speculatores clustered around him like wraiths. You only have a handful of Speculatores to hunt for them. Not nearly enough. You’ll never find them. For a moment, he wished for an army of these hunters, enough to comb the vast Thracian countryside like a barbed net. His thoughts staggered to a halt, and he realised that he could summon up just that… with only a few words.
His heart soared, and he turned to face the serried legions.
Pavo felt the blow of the corpse-warrior’s mace like a mule’s kick, gouging the iron plate from his shoulder. The armour segment clattered away onto the blood-soaked roadside, and the cool air stung at the exposed skin. He drove forwards, like a man striding into a fierce headwind, using the legion standard like a walking staff, head dipped but eyes rolled up to keep his gaze on the olive tree and the Goddess of Peace. But then a multi-tailed scourge affixed with iron barbs lashed down and bit into his bare shoulder, raking across the skin then digging deep, tearing and mutilating. He cried out, his next step taking him free of the barbs but leaving his flesh in ribbons and sending a thick spatter of blood down his flank, the crimson runnels splashing before him onto the blood road. The mounted corpse king – his lipless, noseless face like a dried prune – heeled his skeleton horse into a trot, moving around Pavo and stabbing a spear down towards his neck. Before he co
uld react, the lance parted the scale aventail and the iron plate on his upper back. The cold steel spear tip ripped down inside the armour, streaking his skin, and then the dead horseman yanked the haft towards his saddle. With a dreadful groan, the armour plating fell away, and Pavo’s blood-wet back was bared for the rotting masses. Next, a sling bullet hammered into one shin, and the already-dented greave there fell away, another sword slashing up across his calf.
‘They can strike and scourge you, but they cannot steal away the strength within,’ the crone beckoned him, her face long and drawn, her sightless eyes glassy as she watched.
Hooves splashed through blood as the corpse king trotted round to stand between Pavo and the crone, unleashed a terrible scream and raised a spear, then thrust it down towards his face.
Pavo leapt from his bed roll, grabbing and drawing his spatha in one movement, landing on his haunches. Nothing, stillness, silence – just a bubble of calm within his tent and the blackness of night outside. He heard the gentle chatter of his night sentries out there. With a sigh, he replaced his blade and ducked outside the tent.
‘Tribunus,’ men said gruffly, saluting and straightening as he walked across the high ridge camp – a site in the heart of the Rhodopes that offered good visibility of the approaches, and sported a small waterfall at one end. They had marched that entire night of their escape, the following day and the night afterwards without halt – Opis’ bold promise of marching without rest holding good. It was Pavo who insisted they stop – seeing some of his men fall with exhaustion – and so for the last six days he had demanded that they halt and make camp each night. On this seventh evening, men sat around their fires, grinding grain into flour and baking bread, or roasting the small amounts of game they caught in the heights. He came to the southern edge of camp. Indus stood watch there, atop a rock – on the lookout for any signs that they were being followed from Thessalonica. He batted the young legionary on the shoulder. ‘Shift’s over,’ he said quietly.
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