The Wolf's Gold: Empire V
Page 40
A miner stepped forward with a pickaxe in his hands, scowling with murderous intent.
‘And to theirs.’
Scaurus pointed at the men behind the soldiers, who were slowly but purposefully advancing with their axes and shovels ready to fight. Holding up a hand, he showed the Germans a nugget of gold the size of a man’s eye, turning it in the air before his face to examine its rough surface as he continued speaking.
‘Strange stuff, isn’t it? It’s just a yellow metal with no obvious benefit other than a certain cosmetic value and the fact that it’s quite rare, and yet it seems that once a person possesses enough it changes them. Take your sister, for example. Even with the miners released and on the rampage she still insisted that two of the men you set to guard us carry a chest full of small nuggets and dust all the way up here. It’s the last sweepings of the Alburnus Major strongroom, apparently, and just too precious to be left behind, even if you have got several cartloads of the stuff waiting for you on the other side of the mountain.’
He hefted a tightly woven bag the size of a grapefruit, licking his finger and dipping it into the bag through a slit cut in the top. Holding the digit up, he admired the glittering sparkle for a moment before rubbing the powder off with his other fingers and causing a cascade of flashing motes to drift to the tunnel’s stone floor.
‘This, apparently, is gold dust. I had a look at it earlier, and I have to say I was quite impressed. Imagine, a powder almost as fine as flour, and yet so very heavy. You know I saw this, and I thought of you. You, and my new friend Karsas here.’
He handed the bag to the silent miner, who nodded to the men around him and behind the Germans. The trap closed on Gerwulf and his men with sudden speed, the labourers to either side of them charging in with their tools raised for battle, overwhelming the bodyguards without regard for their swords. The German saw his men fall under their frenzied attack, then reeled as an axe handle hammered into his helmeted head. Staggering against the passage’s coarsely chiselled rock wall, he felt rough hands tear the sword from his grip and pinion him tightly, forcing him to his knees. A hand grabbed his hair and dragged his head back, and another wrapped itself around his nose and mouth, abruptly closing off his windpipe from the mine’s cold air. Scaurus strolled into his blurred vision, gesturing to the hard-faced labourer beside him.
‘So, as I was saying, the moment I clapped eyes on that bag of precious dust, my thoughts immediately turned to the two of you. You see, earlier this evening I promised Karsas here a chance at taking revenge for Mus, and for his wife and family, and for all of the innocents you murdered to keep your men fed and amused while you were killing time waiting for your sister to call you in to rob the Ravenstone. So I promised to help him if I could, although I wasn’t sure if the chance would ever even become a reality, much less how he might go about it. Then, after we’d taken your sister prisoner and while we were waiting for you, I naturally mentioned the usual methods of which the empire is so very fond, but that all seemed a little tedious for Karsas.’
Gerwulf was already feeling the need to breathe, a dull nagging insistence in his chest for air.
‘And, of course, I reflected that my good friend Clodius Albinus, when he gets here in a week or so, might not really be all that keen on a public execution. I have a feeling that this unpleasantness will be brushed under the rug, you see, and crucifixions tend to be a bit high profile for that sort of discreet house cleaning. So I asked Karsas what he had in mind. He told me that he wasn’t really bothered, just as long as he got to look into your eyes as you die. Yes, I’ve warned him that it’s not half as satisfying as a man imagines before the deed is done, but he does seem somewhat set on the idea – and who am I to refuse the request of a man who’s suffered so badly at your hands?’
The imperative to breathe was pounding in Gerwulf’s chest now, a rending ache that felt as if he were being turned inside out. Scaurus’s words were becoming more distant, seeming to echo down a long tunnel.
‘And then I remembered to open the chest which Theodora had thought so important, and it provided instant inspiration. Why not make the punishment a fitting one? Why not take your life with the one thing you seem to have craved the most? Of course, we’ve both heard of men being killed with gold before, molten gold poured down the neck, stabbing with a golden blade – although Mithras knows how you could ever get the stuff to hold an edge – but I’ve never heard of this particular method before. I think you’re going to be impressed. So . . .’
He gestured to the man behind the German, and as Gerwulf was on the very brink of passing out, his eyes rolling upwards and his body starting to go limp, the hand that was clamped over his mouth and nose was removed. Staring up into the remorseless eyes of the man who was about to kill him, and with no more control over the reaction than he had over his bowels, which had already voided themselves into his leggings, he sucked in a huge, gulping gasp of air that seemed to last a lifetime, filling his lungs with an involuntary groaning whoop. And as he breathed in, sucking the mine’s frigid air deep into his body, the stone-faced miner upended the bag of gold dust onto his face and poured a torrent of the glittering powder down his gaping throat.
‘I have to say it all sounds rather poetic, as justice goes. Did it take him long to die after that?’
Scaurus shook his head, taking a sip from the cup of wine Clodius Albinus had poured for him. The two men were alone in the legatus’s office in the Apulum fortress, the door firmly closed and both clerk and guards dismissed to prevent the conversation being overheard.
‘Not really, Legatus. He flopped about on the floor for a short time and then just stopped moving. It was all rather less dramatic than the whole scourge, crucify and dismember thing we’d have carried out under normal circumstances, but it seemed to work well enough for the men whose lives he’d ruined.’
The legatus sat back in his chair, steepling his fingers and considering the outcome.
‘So to summarise, you freed the miners who then proceeded to tear first the German cohort and then everything else in the valley to pieces. How many of them died in the process?’
Scaurus took out his tablet, reading the small characters he had inscribed in the wax over the preceding days, as the extent of the mayhem wrought on the town of Alburnus Major by the liberated miners had become clear.
‘From what we can gather about four hundred of them died overrunning the Germans, to judge from the bodies we found around their camp and the wall where Gerwulf had his men make their stand. I was expecting more men to have died there, but it seems that the mob was just too strong for them. Another three or four hundred men seem to have died in the fighting that broke out once they had their hands on the Germans’ weapons, at which point most of them did the sensible thing and took to their heels. They came back soon enough though, once they got hungry. By the time my first spear marched up with the Tungrians, the miners were a sad, dispirited collection of men scratching for food in the ruins. It was just as well that I’d thought to tell him to bring a few cartloads of rations up the road from Apulum, or we’d have been fighting off starving men with our spears. We put them back to work repairing the damage, of course, and making sure that the mines didn’t fall so far into disuse that they might become useless.’
Albinus took another sip of his wine.
‘Excellent! I’m delighted to say that you’ve quite surpassed my expectations, Gaius. I was sorely afraid that I would have to send you home in disgrace in order to cover my own backside, and yet here you are having saved the situation, and what’s even better, done so in an utterly deniable manner.’ He looked up at the ceiling in thought for a moment. ‘So let’s see if I have a convincing narrative for my dispatch to the governor on the subject. After all, he won’t want to be admitting the facts to Rome any more than I do. So, the sequence of events here was clearly that Procurator Maximus mismanaged the mine owners, they in turn mistreated their workers, and the workers eventually rioted and killed both t
heir masters and the procurator, tore the place to pieces and then realised the error of their ways. I sent you in to restore the peace, you conducted a vigorous process of pacification, during which you were forced to kill several hundred of the blighters in order to disarm them, and then several hundred more to emphasise the heavy hand of imperial justice. I think that will suffice to get the right heads nodding in reluctant approval. All the bodies were burned, I assume?’
Scaurus nodded.
‘For reasons of public health. I felt it would be cleaner than a mass burial.’
‘And, of course, leaves no evidence into which an imperial investigator might pry. Excellent!’
Scaurus raised an eyebrow.
‘And the Germans, Legatus?’
‘Were never here. I’ll make sure that the mines’ new owners are very clear that any resurfacing of this matter will only end badly for everyone involved, including them. The “Wolf” and his men will be written off as having fallen victim to one of the Sarmatae warbands during their brief but ill-favoured border disputes. I’ll send Gerwulf’s legatus a message to the effect that King Balodi confessed to their having overrun the Germans’ camp in the early stages of the revolt. That should close the book on him once and for all, which is just as well. The last thing Rome needs is another blasted Varus legend to inspire the tribes on the other side of the Rhenus, wouldn’t you say? And none of us wants to be associated with the loss of control over the emperor’s most valuable asset, not when we can safely drop the blame on that idiot procurator. Which only leaves one last subject for discussion before we turn to thoughts of where you might take your men from here.’
‘The gold, Legatus?’
‘Indeed, Tribune. The gold.’
He sat back and waited for Scaurus to speak.
‘We found enough of the stuff to load four heavy carts buried in the forest on the southern side of the Raven Head mountain, Legatus, and a stack of corpses nearby. Gerwulf had clearly worked out that there was an alternative entrance to the mine, and he used it to move the gold through the mountain to a place where it could be hidden by a few trusted men. According to the miners the transfer was carried out at night, when most of Gerwulf’s cohort were asleep or guarding the miners. They used mine labour to do the hard work, promising the men their freedom in return for good behaviour, and simply killed them once the night’s lifting and carrying was done.’
Albinus nodded his understanding through another sip of wine.
‘He really was a crafty bugger, wasn’t he? I’ll bet his plan was to make a discreet exit one dark night, after killing every man who might bear witness to either his departure or the gold having come through the mine, and taking just enough men and gold with him to enable a quiet escape from justice. And then, when the excitement had died down in a year or two, he’d have quietly brought his men back and dug it up at his leisure.’
A thought occurred to the legatus.
‘How did you find the stuff, if it was buried? Presumably there weren’t any obvious giveaways?’
Scaurus smiled, as much to himself as to the man across the desk.
‘Indeed, and Gerwulf’s sister wasn’t about to tell us, no matter what I threatened her with. It happens that I have an enterprising young centurion who seems to attract useful men, and he has a native tracker from Germania Inferior in his service, a man who can read ground as easily as you or I could read a scroll. He ran the hiding place to earth in a matter of hours simply by following their tracks, or so he told us. I suspect that his worship of a barbarian forest goddess may be some part of his secret, but I’m willing to tolerate it as long as he provides results like that.’
Albinus nodded sagely.
‘Quite so. Pragmatism in all things, Gaius, we both know the value of that adage. So do you think we recovered all of the gold?’
He fixed the tribune with a steady gaze.
‘I think so, Legatus, with the exception of the dust that was poured down Gerwulf’s throat. And, of course, the relatively small amounts that I managed to slip into my cohorts’ burial clubs.’
Albinus nodded beneficently.
‘Well I won’t begrudge you that, Tribune. Your men have paid in blood to take this valley, and in defence of the province for that matter, so the least we can do is ensure they have a decent send off. Let’s just not have a rash of ostentatious altars springing up across the province though, or difficult questions may be asked. Who did you make responsible for counting the gold?’
‘We’re back to my centurion again. He has the most amazingly meticulous standard bearer who has counted every last coin and weighed every last nugget. Under the supervision of several of my officers, of course.’
He smiled inwardly, recalling the hawk-eyed attention with which Marcus and Dubnus had watched an increasingly frustrated Morban’s every move while he counted the dead German’s booty. The legatus nodded briskly.
‘Excellent! I’ll have the gold shipped down here as soon as I can, and in the meanwhile I’ll have this standard bearer’s records of the count, if you please. All of the records, Gaius. We don’t want any contradictory numbers coming to light at a later date saying that there was more gold recovered than actually made its way to Rome.’
Scaurus looked at his mentor for a moment before nodding slowly.
‘Yes, sir. Pragmatism in all things.’
Albinus raised an eyebrow at him.
‘As I said before, quite so. I’ll remind you that these are troubled days. We have an emperor on the throne who is little more than a puppet for the Praetorian Prefect, and the distinct possibility of a good deal more terror of the type that led to the murder of the Aquila brothers. You’re familiar with the atrocity, I presume, a pair of trusted senators murdered on false charges of plotting against the throne simply to allow the throne to confiscate their wealth?’
Scaurus nodded.
More familiar than you’d imagine, Legatus.
‘Well then, you’ll understand that everyone with any public profile in Rome needs something tucked up their sleeve. And a box or two of that gold hidden away for a day when the wind blows hard is a precautionary opportunity I won’t be passing up. And don’t worry man; you’ll be well looked after in the fullness of time.’
Realising that this would not be the wisest of moments in which to refuse his mentor’s implicit offer, Scaurus nodded with a carefully blank face.
‘Thank you, Legatus.’
‘A wise choice, Gaius. And in that case, I’m very happy to inform you that I’ve had my clerk write a set of orders directing you to return to your home province as soon as you’ve been relieved from your duties at Alburnus Major. I’ve sent an order to the commander of the Danubius fleet that you’re to be shipped as far upstream as the river is navigable and I’m sure your natural powers of persuasion, combined with orders from the governor, will get you some transport thereafter. You might be wise not to stop at Fortress Bonna though.’
Scaurus stood and saluted briskly.
‘Thank you, Legatus. My men will be delighted, and I am forever in your de—’
Albinus raised his eyebrows in reproach, wrapping his protégée in a hug and slapping him firmly on the back before stepping back to regard him at arm’s length.
‘Legatus? To you, Gaius, I am simply Decimus, once your mentor and now simply your friend. Your grateful friend. And as to your men’s delight at being sent home, just get them to make a modest offering at the temple in my name and I will be happy to bask in the favour of their gods.’
Scaurus bowed, his face set in a grateful expression.
‘Thank you . . . Decimus. The temples of Alburnus Major will be littered with offerings to your name.’
He emptied his cup of the last dregs of wine, saluted again and was turning for the door when he remembered that he had one last question to ask the legatus. Turning back, he found the man waiting for his question with a knowing look, and he realised that he knew the answer without even having to ask.
Scaurus sank wearily into his camp chair, taking the cup of wine that Julius was holding out to him.
‘It seems that I’m surrounded by pragmatists today.’ He raised the cup in salute, smiling gently at Julius’s look of mystification. ‘I mean realists, First Spear. And here’s to realism. Since it seems I have little choice in the matter, I shall now put it from my mind. Now that I think about it, I seem to recall that Legatus Albinus, or Decimus, as I am instructed to call him now that I’ve played a key part in both enhancing his career and making him somewhat richer, never could keep his sausage tucked up safely beneath his tunic when there was a finely turned ankle in sight. And speaking of man’s uncontrollable urges, I take it all these rumours I’m hearing about your woman being with child are true?’
The first spear nodded, a stupid smile creeping onto his face.
‘Indeed they are, Tribune.’
‘And will you be following your colleague’s example in making an honest woman of the lady?’
Julius looked at Scaurus over the rim of his cup, watching as conflicting emotions played on his face.
‘Not at this point, Tribune. We don’t feel that it’s necessary, and since it’s still legally forbidden there seems to be little benefit to the child.’
The tribune took another sip.
‘Very wise, First Spear. A sensible decision, given how hard some women find pregnancy . . .’
‘His decision?’ Felicia laughed out loud, a sound Marcus quickly decided he could do with hearing more. ‘The way I heard it, she told him that given they’re never having intimate relations again as long as she lives, marriage would be both superfluous and a waste of money.’