The Last Legion

by Valerio Massimo Manfredi

  ‘And what if they manage to take ship?’ screamed the barbarian.

  The rex Romanorum shrugged. ‘They wouldn’t get far,’ he said. ‘No boat can compete with my galleys, and we know they’d be headed for Frisia or Armorica; no one would be crazy enough these days to choose Britannia. However, my men will be the ones to capture them, not you.’

  ‘Listen to me,’ said Wulfila in a slightly more conciliatory tone, approaching Siagrius’s throne, ‘you don’t know them. They are the most formidable of fighters, the most cunning of scoundrels, as demonstrated by the fact that they broke out of your prison just hours after they’d been locked up. I’ve been hunting them down for months, and I know all their tricks. Let me go with my men as well. I promise you that you won’t regret it. I’ve been authorized to offer a large sum of money in exchange for the boy. Most importantly, Odoacer is ready to demonstrate his gratitude with a treaty of alliance. He is now the custodian and protector of Italy, and the natural intermediary with the Eastern Empire.’

  ‘You can go as well,’ assented Siagrius, ‘but don’t take any initiatives, of any kind, without the approval of my representative.’ He gave a nod to his second-in-command, a Romanized Visigoth named Gennadius. ‘This one’s for you,’ he ordered. ‘Take as many men as you need. Leave at dawn.’

  ‘No!’ insisted Wulfila. ‘If we leave at dawn they’ll get away. They already have a considerable advantage over us. We have to leave immediately.’

  Siagrius meditated a few moments and then nodded: ‘All right,’ he said, ‘but when you’ve taken them, bring them to me. The jurisdiction is mine, and anyone who violates it becomes my enemy. Dismissed!’

  Gennadius saluted and walked out, followed by Wulfila, and their ship was ready to set sail soon afterwards: a huge galley built of oak, in the Celtic tradition, capable of transporting men and horses over the open sea.

  ‘What’s the nearest port?’ asked Wulfila as soon as he was on board.

  ‘Brixate,’ Gennadius replied, ‘at the mouth of the Seine. It won’t be difficult to discover if a ship has put out to sea: practically no one sails this time of year.’

  They moved along quickly, pushed by the river current, and when the wind shifted from northeast to east, they raised the sail, which further increased their speed. A few hours before dawn the clouds scattered and the temperature dropped, as they saw the lights of the port appear in the distance.

  The helmsman turned a worried gaze seaward. ‘Fog,’ he said. ‘The fog is rising.’

  Wulfila wasn’t even listening, as he scanned the great estuary of the Seine and the open sea beyond. He could smell his prey, and was determined not to let them slip from his hands this time.

  ‘Ship dead ahead!’ sounded the voice of the sailor up in the crow’s nest.

  ‘It’s them!’ exclaimed Wulfila. ‘I’m sure of it. Look: there are no other ships at sea.’

  The helmsman had seen the other vessel as well. ‘How strange,’ he said. ‘They’re headed towards the fog, as if they wanted to cross the channel and land in Britannia.’

  ‘Increase to full speed, quickly!’ ordered the barbarian. ‘We can overtake them!’

  ‘The fog is getting thicker,’ answered the helmsman. ‘We have to wait until it disperses, when the sun is higher.’

  ‘Now!’ bellowed Wulfila, practically out of his mind. ‘We have to get them now!’

  ‘I’ll give the orders here,’ replied Gennadius. ‘I don’t want to lose the ship. If they want to get themselves killed, they’re free to do so, but I’ll have none of it. I won’t enter that fog bank, and I don’t think they will either.’

  Wulfila drew his sword with lightning speed and pointed it at the commander’s throat. ‘Order your men to drop their weapons,’ he said, ‘Or I’ll cut your head off. I’m taking over this ship.’

  Gennadius had no choice, and his men grudgingly obeyed, awed by the sight of the barbarian’s incredible sword.

  ‘Throw the crew into the sea,’ Wulfila ordered his men. ‘Thank destiny that I’m not killing you.’ He turned to Gennadius. ‘The same holds for you.’ He pushed the commander to the railing and forced him to jump into the waters of the Ocean, where his men were already floundering in the waves. Nearly all of them went under, dragged down by the weight of their armour and the chilling cold that paralysed their limbs. Master now of the ship, Wulfila ordered the terrified helmsman to turn the bow north, in the direction of the other ship they could now see distinctly, about one mile away. It stood out against the fog bank, which advanced compact as a wall.

  *

  On board the fugitive ship, faced with that dense cloud that spread over the sea like spiralling smoke, consternation reigned. Teutasius, at the helm, struck the sail because the wind had died down and the ship almost came to a stop.

  ‘It is madness to go forward under these conditions,’ he said. ‘No one would ever dare follow us.’

  ‘That’s what you think,’ replied Vatrenus. ‘Take a look at that ship down there. They’re laying on the oars and heading straight in this direction. I’m afraid it’s us they’re out for.’

  ‘If we wait to be sure it’s them, we’ll have to be ready for a fight,’ observed Orosius.

  ‘If it’s up to me,’ said Batiatus, ‘I’d rather fight those freckled bastards than be swallowed up . . . in there. It feels like we’re descending into the Underworld.’

  ‘We managed it at Misenus,’ Vatrenus reminded them.

  ‘Yes, but we knew it would only be for a very short time,’ objected Aurelius. ‘Here we’re talking about hours and hours of navigation.’

  ‘It’s them!’ shouted Demetrius, who had shimmied up the masthead.

  ‘Are you sure?’ called out Aurelius.

  ‘Absolutely! They’ll be on us in half an hour.’

  Ambrosinus, who seemed to be absorbed in his own thoughts, abruptly came round. ‘Is there any oil on board?’

  ‘Oil?’ repeated the surprised helmsman. ‘I think . . . I think so, but it can’t be much. The men use it for the lanterns.’

  ‘Bring it here immediately in a bowl, the widest you’ve got, and get ready to depart again. We’ll use the oars.’

  ‘Give him what he needs,’ said Aurelius. ‘He knows what he’s doing.’

  The man went below deck and then came back up with a clay bowl, half full of oil. ‘It’s all I could find,’ he said.

  ‘They’re getting closer!’ shouted Demetrius from the top of the mast.

  ‘That’s all right,’ said Ambrosinus. ‘It’s fine. Place it here, on the deck, return to the helm and, when I say so, everyone who’s fit to do so will take up the oars.’ He then took the tablet he used for writing, removed the parchment lining and, under the astonished gaze of the onlookers, extracted a little metal leaf shaped like an arrow, so thin that the wind could have carried it away. He placed it on the surface of the oil.

  ‘Have you ever heard of Aristeas of Proconnesus?’ he asked. ‘No, of course not. Well, the ancients said that he had an arrow that led him, every year, to the land of the Hyperboreans, that is, the far north. This is that arrow, and she will tell us the way to Britannia. We’ll follow her.’

  Under the ever more astonished gaze of those present, the arrow came to life and began to rotate on the surface of the oil, coming to a stop in a fixed direction.

  ‘That’s North,’ proclaimed Ambrosinus solemnly. ‘To your oars, men!’

  They all obeyed and the ship moved, slipping slowly into the milky cloud.

  Romulus approached his tutor, who had carved a notch into the bowl at the point that coincided with the direction indicated by the arrow.

  ‘How can this be?’ asked Romulus. ‘That arrow is magic!’

  ‘I think you’re right,’ answered Ambrosinus. ‘I can’t think of any other explanation myself.’

  ‘Where did you find it?’

  ‘Years ago, in the underground chambers of the temple of Portunus in Rome, inside an urn made of tufa. A Greek
inscription said that it was the arrow of Aristeas of Proconnesus, and that Pitheas of Marseilles had also used it to reach Ultima Thule. Isn’t it marvellous?’

  ‘That it is,’ replied Romulus, and he added: ‘Do you think they’ll follow us?’

  ‘I don’t think so. They won’t be able to stay on course, and what’s more . . .’

  ‘Yes?’ urged Romulus.

  ‘The crew are local people, and they will surely be too terrified to continue. There’s a story, you see, that they tell around these parts . . .’

  ‘What story?’

  ‘That when the fog rises so thick here, it is to hide a boat making its return journey from the island of the dead, where it has deposited the souls of the deceased.’

  Romulus looked all around, trying to penetrate the dense blanket of fog, as a shiver ran down his spine.

  32

  ROMULUS PULLED HIS CAPE around his shoulders, keeping his eyes fixed on the tiny oscillations of the arrow floating on the oil, as it mysteriously pointed to the pole of the Small Bear.

  ‘The island of the dead, you said?’ he asked suddenly.

  Ambrosinus smiled. ‘That’s what I said. People here are quite afraid of it.’

  ‘I don’t understand. I thought the dead live in the afterworld.’

  ‘That’s what we all believe, but you see, since no one has ever returned from the kingdom of the dead to tell us about it, every people has come up with their own ideas about that mysterious world. Around here they say that there’s a fishing village on the coast of Armorica whose inhabitants pay no taxes or any form of tribute whatsoever, because they are in charge of a very important task: ferrying the souls of the dead to a mysterious island shrouded by eternal fog. The name of this island is Avalon. Every night, there is a knock at the door of one of the village houses and a voice softly says: “We’re ready.” The fisherman gets out of his bed and goes to the beach where he finds his boat apparently empty, although it sinks into the water as if it carried a full load. The same voice he heard at his doorstep calls each of the dead by name, mentioning the name of the husband or father of each of the women as well. Then the fisherman takes the helm and hoists the sail. In the darkness and in the fog, he covers – in the space of a single night – a journey which would take an entire week of navigation to cross just one way. The next night, another fisherman hears a knock at his door and the same voice calls out: “We’re ready . . .”’

  ‘My God!’ gasped Romulus. ‘That is a frightening story. Is it true?’

  ‘Who can say? In a certain sense, everything we believe is true. There must certainly be some truth to the story. Perhaps the people of that village are given to ancient practices of conjuring up the dead, and the sensations they experience are so intense that they seem real . . .’ he interrupted himself to give instructions to the helmsman: ‘A little starboard, slowly . . . yes, that’s it.’

  ‘And where is the island of Avalon found?’

  ‘No one knows. Somewhere along the western coast of Britannia, perhaps, or so I heard once from an old Druid who came from the island of Mona. Others say it is further north, and it is the place where heroes go after their deaths, like the Fortunate Islands that Hesiod spoke of, remember? Perhaps one would have to get into that boat one night, at that fishing village in Armorica, to unravel the mystery . . . All is hypothesis, speculation: the fact is, my son, that we are surrounded by the unknown.’

  Romulus nodded his head slowly as if to agree with such a serious assertion, then pulled his cloak up over his head and went below deck. Ambrosinus remained alone with his arrow to govern the ship through the spreading dark, while the others rowed unceasingly, filled with wonder, suspended in a dismal atmosphere without dimension and without time, where their only contact with reality was the lapping of the waves against the keel.

  All at once, Aurelius asked: ‘Do you think we’ll see him again?’

  Ambrosinus sat down beside him on the thwart. ‘Wulfila?’ he replied. ‘Yes, until someone manages to kill him.’

  ‘Volusianus advised us to go anywhere but Britannia. Seems like it’s a real snakes’ nest.’

  ‘I don’t think that any single place is better than another in this world of ours. We’re going to Britannia because there’s someone waiting for us there.’

  ‘How do you know that? It’s that prophecy of yours that makes you so sure, isn’t it?’

  ‘Does that surprise you?’

  ‘I don’t know. You know Pliny and Varro, Archimedes and Eratosthenes. You’ve read Strabo and Tacitus . . .’

  ‘So have you, I see,’ observed Ambrosinus, not without a bit of surprise.

  ‘You’re a man of science,’ concluded Aurelius as if he hadn’t heard.

  ‘And a man of science doesn’t believe in prophecies; it’s not rational, is it?’

  ‘No, it’s not.’

  ‘Is there anything rational in what you’ve done? Is there anything logical in the events we’ve experienced over the past few months?’

  ‘Not much, I’d say.’

  ‘And do you know why? Because there’s another world, beyond the world we know. It’s the world of dreams, the world of monsters and chimeras, the world of delirium, of passion and of mystery. It’s a world that comes to the surface in certain moments and induces us to act in a way which makes no sense, or simply causes us to shiver, like a breath of icy air in the night, or the nightingale’s warble at dusk. We do not know how far this world reaches, if it ends or is infinite, if it is within us or outside us, if it takes on the semblance of reality to reveal itself to us or to hide from us. Prophecies are like those words that a sleeping man pronounces in his slumber. They apparently don’t make sense, but in reality they come from the most hidden abysses of the universal soul.’

  ‘I thought you were Christian.’

  ‘What difference does it make? You could be Christian as well, judging from the manifestations of your soul, and yet you are pagan.’

  ‘If being pagan means being faithful to the traditions of our ancestors and the beliefs of our fathers, if it means seeing God in all things and all things in God, if it means bitterly mourning a greatness that will never come back, then yes, I am pagan.’

  ‘As am I. Do you see this little twig of mistletoe I wear at my neck? It represents my ties with the world I was born in, with that ancient knowledge. Don’t we change clothing when we go from a cold clime to a hot one? Our vision of the world is much the same. Religion is the colour our soul takes on, depending on the light it is exposed to. You have seen me under the bright Mediterranean sun, but when you see me in the light-starved forests of Britannia, I will be another man and yet, remember this, the same. It is inevitable and thus it must be. Do you remember when we were on the Rhine and you began singing the hymn to the sun? We sang all together, Christians and pagans, because in the splendour of the sun rising after the night we see the face of God, the glory of Christ who brings light to the world.’

  Thus the whole night passed. They would call out to each other now and then, to pluck up their courage, or they would row in silence, until the wind picked up and the fog finally began to clear. Demetrius hoisted the sail and his companions, exhausted by their prolonged effort, could rest at last.

  As as soon as the glimmer of daybreak began to spread, Ambrosinus’s voice rang out: ‘Look! Look, everyone!’ he shouted.

  Aurelius raised his head, Romulus and Livia ran to the forward railing, and Batiatus, Orosius and Demetrius left the sheets to admire the vision that was slowly unfolding before their eyes. In dawn’s first light, a land was emerging from the fog: a land green with meadows and white with cliffs, blue with the sky and the sea, encircled by swirling foam, caressed by the breeze, ringing with the cries of millions of birds.

  ‘Britannia!’ shouted Ambrosinus. ‘My Britannia!’ He opened his arms as if to greet a dear and long-missed friend. He was crying: hot tears lined his mystic’s face, making his eyes glow with a new light. Then he fell to his knees
and covered his face, hiding it between his hands. He immersed himself in prayer and meditation before the Genius of his native land, before the wind carrying lost yet never forgotten scents.

  The others watched him in silence, deeply moved, and soon they were startled by the sound of the keel dragging over the clean gravel of the beach.

  *

  Only Juba had accompanied them over the channel of Britannia, because the other horses had been left for Teutasius in payment for their passage. Aurelius led his horse down the narrow gangplank, stroking him to keep him calm. He couldn’t help but admire him, black and gleaming as a crow’s wing in that bright light that seemed a harbinger of springtime. All the others followed, Batiatus last, carrying Romulus on his shoulders in triumph.

  They started walking north, across green fields dotted by patches of snow through which purple crocuses pushed up. The robins perching on red-berried hedges seemed to pause and watch curiously as the little procession passed along the path. Now and then colossal oaks rose in the middle of vast pastures. Golden mistletoe berries glittered on their bare branches.

  ‘See?’ Ambrosinus pointed them out to his pupil. ‘That’s mistletoe, a plant sacred to our ancient religion because it was thought to rain from the skies. The oak is sacred as well, giving its name to the wise men of the Celtic religion, the Druids.’

  ‘I know,’ replied Romulus. ‘From the Greek word drys, which means “oak”.’

  Aurelius called them back to reality. ‘We’ll have to procure horses as soon as possible; we’re too vulnerable on foot.’

  ‘As soon as possible,’ promised Ambrosinus. ‘As soon as possible.’ And they carried on, walking all day through fields scattered with wooden farmhouses covered by thatch roofing. The villages were small, clusters of little houses built close together, and as the evening of that short winter day approached, they could see smoke rising from the chimneys and Romulus imagined families gathered around frugal tables, around the dim light of a lantern, consuming the fruits of their labour. He envied them their simple, humble lives, sheltered from the greed of powerful men.