‘Later,’ was all that Enica would tell him, for she clearly knew all about it, but later had not yet arrived. Ferox had looked at the body, seen the hair dyed red and tied into a knot on the right-hand side of the man’s head, the thick beard and the pale grey eyes and the little tattoo on his left wrist. With his dark, almost black trousers and the striped tunic, he was clearly one of the Quadi from across the Danube near Pannonia. Yet he wasn’t just that, for there was the look of a soldier about him, something hard to pin down, but obvious even before he pulled up the man’s sleeve and saw another tattoo, this one of the she-wolf suckling the twins on his arm. That was the relic of some drunken furlough outside an army base. Too young to have served his full stipendia and too hale to have been invalided out, this one was surely a deserter turned bandit or trader or both. Whether originally one of the Quadi who had crossed into the army and stayed as long as it suited him or a soldier who had gone over the rampart and found a new life among the tribes was hard to say. He thought of the former slave they had met with the Roxolani. People ended up in odd places – like a good Silurian boy turned Roman centurion and stuck out here in charge of a fort, he thought grimly. Bran and Minura had not chosen this captive by chance, that was for sure, and must have been sent to fetch him and bring him here. Ferox had overheard the young warriors asking Enica whether ‘he’ was here, seen her shake her head and say, ‘Ah well, it does not matter now.’
There were mysteries aplenty, but for the moment the dangers they might pose were distant, and there could well be a real enemy waiting for them up ahead, so there was no sense in thinking about anything else.
‘Is Brigita well?’ Ferox asked. He had fought alongside the children and seen one Mother die to protect her pupils. She had been succeeded by Brigita, once queen of an Irish tribe, who had trained on the island in her youth.
‘The Mother cares for her children,’ Bran replied.
‘Sister, have you given the Lord Ferox the Mother’s message?’
Minura shook her head just slightly, and for the first time seemed abashed.
‘Come, it is what she asked of you.’
Minura kicked her horse so that she caught up with Ferox and rode alongside, staring straight at him, reins loose.
‘The Mother asks you to remember,’ she said, still gazing into his eyes. Then her left hand shot out and grabbed his shoulder, her right went to his chest, and for all his surprise his arms moved to grab her, until she kissed him full on the lips. Ferox pulled her body towards him, as he kept his mouth pressed to hers.
Minura started to pull away. Ferox held her for a little longer before letting her slip free. Her cheeks were red, although he doubted with passion so much as embarrassment.
‘The Mother said that I might be curious. Now I am curious no longer.’
Vindex roared with laughter, and Ferox smiled as he remembered Brigita saying much the same to him all those years ago. He was relieved to see that Enica was as amused as the rest.
‘Does that mean you’re going to hit me again?’ he asked, grinning.
‘I probably shall not waste the energy,’ Enica replied. ‘One of the soldiers can do it for me when it becomes necessary.’
‘Always happy to oblige, lady,’ Vindex announced. ‘Want him beaten up, just say the word.’
Ferox hissed for silence and raised his hand. One of the outriders was holding his spear above his head as a signal.
‘Wait here!’ Ferox told them and urged his gelding into a canter. He heard the hoofs coming up behind him as Vindex came up on one side and Enica on another. The bright green silk of her trousers shimmered in the sunlight.
‘You should not be here,’ he told her.
‘Neither should you, husband.’
‘It is too much of a risk,’ he said, ‘and it is unnecessary.’
‘No more than the commander of the garrison galloping headlong into trouble.’
‘Want me to rough him up, lady?’ Vindex asked cheerfully. ‘Wouldn’t be any trouble.’
‘There you are, I told you it was dangerous,’ she said, and the scout laughed so much that when they reached the man who had signalled to them he was obviously baffled.
‘Ignore them,’ Ferox said as he shaded his eyes to see better. ‘I see them,’ he added. It was not difficult. There were nine dark shapes in the grass a few hundred paces away. Smaller than the dead horses and mules, but standing out because they were so pale were the white corpses of the men. Ferox counted. ‘Looks like all of them,’ he said and was not surprised. ‘You,’ he said to the cavalryman who had signalled. ‘Ride back to the main force and tell them to come up and wait here, just where you have been. Tell the decurion not to do anything else unless I signal.’
‘My lord,’ the Brigantian said and trotted away. Ferox could not get used to soldiers calling him lord, but so far it was proving difficult to persuade the Brigantes to call him plain sir.
‘Suppose there is no point in asking you to wait?’ he said to Enica, who responded by walking her horse forward. ‘Didn’t think so,’ he added and joined her. ‘But nice and easy, all of us.’ He waved his arm for the other outriders to keep level with them.
His senses told him that the enemy had long gone, but sometimes feelings were wrong and there was no gain in taking a chance. He walked his horse steadily, scanning the ground ahead and especially the treeline only a hundred paces away. That was the obvious place if there was an ambush – and was clearly where the attackers had been earlier. Still, doing the obvious was something the best leaders would avoid whenever they could. He remembered that there was a little gulley up ahead, just beyond the furthest of the dead horses. It was only a few feet deep, with a tiny stream in the bottom rushing down to join the main river, but if a man did not mind getting a bit wet and was good at keeping still, then there could be a dozen or more in there, already within bowshot. Vindex was staring at the same place, so he must have remembered the ground as well. They were half a mile from where Vepoc and his men had been attacked and on that day they had come past this patch as well.
If they were waiting then they were good. There were carrion fowl picking at the dead men and beasts, and they flapped noisily into the air, voices harsh when Ferox suddenly put his horse into a run, wanting to rush at the gulley and spring any ambush if it was there.
Nothing happened. The birds complained and the wind hissed through the grass, but no warriors appeared and no arrows sped towards him. Ferox sighed before dismounting to take a better look.
‘What was that little gallop in aid of?’ Vindex asked as he and Enica rode up. Ferox was crouching, ignoring the nearest corpse and instead studying the ground. ‘Trying to be a hero?’
Ferox stood and shouted at the outriders to keep going and form a line nearer the wood. ‘From this distance they could drop every one of us as quick as boiled asparagus.’
Vindex frowned. ‘What?’
‘Don’t show off, husband,’ Claudia Enica said. ‘The divine Augustus could get away with using vulgar expressions, but you are not granted the same licence.’
‘Vulgar? Didn’t sound very vulgar to me. Not like…’ Vindex chuckled. ‘No, not in front of the queen.’
‘She’s probably heard it already,’ Ferox said automatically, without really paying attention.
The pommel of a sword bounced hard on the top of his helmet. ‘Next time I’ll use the blade,’ Enica assured him.
‘Next time I wish you would stay back,’ Ferox said. ‘I mean it.’
‘I am sure some fool will rush ahead to distract the enemy,’ she said, but there was a warmer smile than he had seen for a while. She was so close that he brushed against her silk-clad leg without Vindex seeing.
‘He’s right, my queen,’ Vindex said. ‘Be a shame for the lassies to grow up without a mother.’
‘If that mother is daft enough to let herself be killed they will feel no great loss.’ Enica edged her horse on, and this time tapped Ferox’s shoulder playfully with the
flat of her sword. ‘My story does not end here or for a long time yet. This much I know.’ There was neither humour nor a trace of doubt in her tone.
‘Wonder if these poor souls thought the same,’ Ferox said, gesturing at the corpses, their places and the marks in the earth and flattened grass telling him of the story of what had happened as clearly as if he had been watching. There were seven Brigantes, one of Vindex’s Carvetii and an auxiliary duplicarius who had been in charge. The little fight had not lasted long as fifteen or more archers shot from the trees. Horses and men fell, as one flight of arrows followed another before the first had struck home.
The patrol had been careless as soldiers often were when nothing had happened on all the other long patrols. Half the horses were down and the rest wounded when warriors had come from the gulley and the archers had followed from the wood to hack down the survivors. Only two of the Brigantes had no arrows in them, and the rest were dead or staggering and bleeding as the little charge swept over them. One of the unwounded men had his whole chest opened by a savage cut. He cannot have been wearing armour, which would have taken some of the force from the blow, and Ferox made a note to check that all the Brigantes had been issued with a cuirass and that all wore it, whether it was uncomfortable or not. The other had a hole in the top of his skull, fairly small and neat, which probably killed him outright after punching through his helmet, which lay broken and discarded a few yards away. Ferox sighed, for he had seen wounds like that before, many years ago and knew what caused them.
‘Why not steal the horses?’ Vindex asked.
‘Too easy for us to track,’ Ferox said. ‘And they didn’t want anyone to get away.’
‘They took the clothes though. Stripped the poor buggers bare.’
‘We will probably find most of it dumped nearby. They will only take what they need.’ Ferox did not bother to explain that pieces of the men’s clothing would help some of their killers purify their bodies. Instead he went over to his own gelding. ‘We need to take care of them. Perhaps you two can deal with that and I’ll take a couple of men and see where the trail leads.’
Enica was by him now, holding his bridle. ‘That is not your job. Not anymore.’
‘It’s mine,’ Vindex said. ‘I am supposed to be in charge of the scouts.’
Ferox did not bother to argue. They were right, much as he regretted the days when he could head off alone or with just a handful of companions. ‘Don’t go far and don’t take any risks.’
‘Always sensible, me.’
‘Take Bran and Minura,’ Enica commanded. ‘And be careful.’
Vindex, already grinning at the mention of the young woman warrior, beamed. ‘For you, my queen, anything.’
After he had called the others, the scout headed towards the trees, the tracks that far very obvious.
‘Why can’t you be like that?’ Claudia Enica asked Ferox.
‘I am of the Silures,’ he said. ‘And I do not understand women – at least not the ones worth understanding.’
She treated him to another smile. ‘Your folk are all liars.’
They did their best for the bodies, by which time Vindex and the others returned. The trail was clear, heading through the woods. Bran gave a terse report. ‘About thirty or so, going up the valley, heading for the old tower or the pass. Weren’t trying to hide anything, so did not push our luck.’
Ferox patted him on the shoulder and praised Bran which for a moment made him seem like the happy little boy instead of the stern warrior. The ride back was easy, helped by the lengthening days, although Ferox missed the far longer spring evenings of Britannia and suspected many of the others did as well. It was two hours into the night by the time they rode back through the porta praetoria. Sabinus was waiting anxiously for their safe return and carrying news. Piso was awake.
A cave near the pass
Just before dawn, five days later
BRASUS SAT AND tried to keep his mind clear of everything. That was never a good sign and he knew it, for the emptiness should come naturally and not be forced. Wise men and old, the truly pure were said to be able to sit or lie and almost at once be empty of worldly thoughts, a vessel waiting to be filled with enlightenment. Once or twice, such peace had come to him, or he thought later that it had, but only when he was weary and a treacherous part of him wondered if that had simply been fatigue.
He opened his eyes and could see the faintest hints of the rocky chamber around him. Dawn was coming outside, the light seeping in from the distant mouth of the cave and soon it would be time to leave this place and take food and drink. His fast had begun two dawns ago, a day before he came to the cavern.
A drip of water plinked into a puddle. He had not seen it when he entered the holy place at sunset yesterday, but all through the long hours of the night the noise had gone on and on. Brasus had not slept, that much he knew, and had only shifted his posture a few times as he sat cross-legged or squatted on the bare stone. He had felt the cold of the rock, his limbs going stiff and then numb, and he had listened to the dripping water while outside the moon rose and the stars turned in the Heavens. Several times he had thought of them and tried to work out how far into the night it was. Some men were said to be transported by their visions into the Heavens themselves and spoke of walking among the stars. His was no vision, but yet more of the thoughts he could not prevent.
Brasus wondered whether he was different, but that was surely vanity, and instead once again wondered whether he was a fraud, pretending to be pure so that others would treat him with honour. The king had been very kind in his words when Brasus had gone to his stronghold, and also in his gestures. He had been permitted to meet his bride to be, the king’s youngest daughter, who had presented him with a tress of her deep brown hair, neatly plaited and tied with a ribbon. One day soon he would learn her name – her real name not the one that was used by others in daily speech – and he would know one of life’s great mysteries. A woman’s path was a different one, but in marriage he would glimpse a little of her world and hope to learn from it.
Thoughts of marriage, of a girl, round-faced with the wide nose and mouth of her family, had come into his mind often, and especially during the night. Brasus was not quite sure whether he had seen fear as well as anticipation in her eyes, and wondered about his own feelings. His father had once said that the best of wives made a man relish this life and cease to long for death and the transformation it gave to the pure. A mean-spirited part of him sometimes made Brasus wonder whether his mother’s death from fever months before the last war had done as much to inspire his father’s stubborn fight and the taking of his own life as his quest for a pure life.
Thoughts were treacherous, and brought doubt and suspicion. Brasus wondered whether the men who claimed to find emptiness lied and had spent the hours pondering one thing or another or whether he was the liar for pretending to be faithful and pure. So the night passed, with the water dripping and Brasus worrying about so many things.
Oddly enough, Brasus had spent less time wondering about the trial to come than other things. He was worried by some of the king’s choices. It was an honour to be tasked with leading the advance guard, the men who were to storm the fort and seize the bridge by surprise. Yet he wondered why the king had chosen Diegis and Rholes to command the main army that would follow. Diegis was said to be a man of great piety, rigorous in thought and life, but was also widely known as a fool who struggled to make up his mind and was sometimes timid and sometimes reckless in battle. Rholes was rare among the king’s advisors, one of the Getae rather than the Daci and a man who wore his hair long and piled into a ball on top of his head so that the cap he wore was tall, like a bag. He drank wine like a Thracian, ate all meats like a Roman, was crude of speech and an open whoremonger. Rholes was also a great warrior and an even greater leader, shrewd in thought and cunning in action.
Brasus wished that Rholes was in sole command and knew that this was wrong, for Zalmoxis would surely guide only
the pure to serve his purpose, but Rholes won battles and Diegis led men to needless deaths, puffed up by his royal name. The court of the king was not a comfortable place, for all that most of his noblemen were held to be of the pure. Brasus had overheard some of them talking after the plan was announced, and saying that Decebalus was too wise to trust an army to one man’s command, lest a new hero emerge, just as Decebalus had once made his name in war and been able to supplant the old king. Another surprise had been Diegis’ interest in Ivonercus the Briton, which surely can only have come from the king, since how else would he have heard of the deserter and known his name.
The night had seemed long, even endless, for he felt that every moment had been filled with ideas and confusion. He wondered about marriage, about his bride to be, for he knew that the lust was growing, and he thought of kings and nobles, wars and lies, but most of all he felt hungry, while the dripping water was a torment for reminding him of his desperate thirst.
Far and faint, there came the notes of a horn greeting the rising sun. That was one good practice copied from the Romans, rousing soldiers to be ready. Brasus now had some six hundred warriors, almost a third of the force he was promised, and the latest band were camped just below the pass. Today he would lead them to a hidden place within the woods on the south side of the valley, for until the last moment he wanted to conceal his strength from the Romans. First he would sting them, like the ambush of their patrol several days ago. Ivonercus had helped with that and shown no reluctance to slay his own kin. Deserters could be useful, as could their ideas, although Brasus still felt that this was an unclean way of making war.
Getting up was painful, his body and especially his legs hurting with the movement, and he doubted that he could have stood upright even if the roof of the cavern had been higher. The fast was done, the time of waiting in the bowels of the earth complete. There had been no emptiness, no real peace during the long night, although he wondered whether he would lie if anyone asked him about his experience. Stumbling up the passage, he also wondered whether men had lied to him of their visions and insights. He had been alone and he had thought long and hard and that was all there was to it.
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