‘Soldier Caius, isn’t it? Well, Caius, you know why I need a man to stay behind and watch this rabble while the rest of us are seen to ride south? I don’t have the luxury of waiting for the Venicones to move, so instead I must use deception to bring them out of their hole. So tell me, Soldier Caius, how will you carry this trick off? The bastard that leads that rabble will promise to reward the man who finds you beyond his dreams, because he will know beyond a doubt that you will be lurking somewhere within sight of those walls, waiting for them to make their move. You know what they did to Centurion Cyrus?’
Caius nodded, just a touch of obstinacy showing in his face at the attempt the tribune was making to talk him out of the reward he’d been told was on offer, if he survived the barbarian search, and delivered news of their movements to the riders lurking far enough to the west to be undiscoverable.
‘You heard that he took a long time dying, and left this life with his guts cooling in a wide pool of his own blood? And you’re still determined to take this risk?’
Caius nodded again, with more pride than irritation this time.
‘So tell me, just how do you plan to live through the hours after we leavathen, and yet still keep your eyes on their camp?’
Caius looked him in the face before replying, his own face set in an expression of utter confidence in his own abilities.
‘Tribune, before I was a soldier, I was a cattle thief. I was the man that watched the herds until the men paid by the farmers to keep us away from their animals were distracted. I would watch for days at a time, and never once did anyone catch sight of me. I’m going to dig myself a hide, and when it’s done I ask that you should walk away for fifty paces before turning back to look for me. Walk closer, and every few paces look again, until you’re back where you started. Then decide if you believe I can perform this task for you. I shall need my brother to help me with this. He serves in the same tent party.’
And with that he took up the sharp-bladed spade he’d carried with him from his tent and set to work, quickly digging out a two-foot-deep trench long enough to accept the length of his body lying flat, while his brother went to find branches of the right thickness and cut them down to the necessary length, dropping twenty of them at his feet and then standing back to watch him work his magic. Digging each one of the sticks into one side of the trench, two inches below the hole’s lip, and then forcing each one’s other end laterally into the facing wall’s earth, he inserted them at finger-length intervals to form a slatted roof to the hide, then arranged the waiting turf strips across them in exactly the order they’d been removed. Working with slow and painstaking care, he made sure that the joins between each piece of turf were invisible, packing small sticks between the roof slats and the turfs where the resulting effect looked unrealistic, working until the hide’s roof appeared no different to the ground around it. Nodding to his brother, he slid into the remaining gap with painstaking, delicate care, and then watched from below ground as the last turf was packed carefully into its place to complete the deception.
Standing to one side and watching, Licinius’s face remained impassive, but his eyes narrowed as the soldier wriggled into his hiding place and the last turf was eased into the deceptive layer of cover arranged over the trench. With one final adjustment, a gentle touch to slightly flatten the turf, the remaining brother turned to face him and saluted, gesturing with a hand for the tribune to conduct the test that had been requested of him. Licinius nodded to him and turned away, walking a brisk fifty paces before turning back to scan the ground beneath which he knew the man was hiding. While he’d had no expectation of discerning any clue as to the hide’s location at that distance, he was at first impressed and then bemused by the lack of any betrayal of its presence the closer he got to the spot where he assumed it to be. After a moment more he was standing more or less where he’d started, looking about him with resigned amusement.
‘Go on, then, show me where he is.’
Caius’s brother let out a piercing whistle, clearly intended to be heard in the hide, and to the tribune’s astonishment the ground at his very feet erupted upwards, making him step back involuntarily as the hidden soldier burst from his hide with a broad grin.
‘Jupiter’s hairy balls! I nearly died of bloody shock!’ Putting a hand to his chest and rolling his eyes, Licinius peered down into the freshly revealed hole. ‘I would never have believed it. Can you do this at night, so that the blue-noses don’t have the chance to see you digging yourself in?’
‘Yes, Tribune, with enough moonlight to work by the result is no different.’
The tribune turned to his first spear, waiting impassively to one side.
‘Very well, then, it seems that we have a scout. Detail a tent party, a steady one, mind you, to take this man and his brother out tonight, and dig him in somewhere with a good view of Three Mountains. Make sure it’s well away from anything that the blue-noses might be poking with their spears once we’ve ridden off tomorrow. We don’t want any of them falling through Soldier Caius’s turf roof, do we? And detail a party of message riders to wait for him at a safe distance, ready to bring us the news once Drust has his savages on the move. I don’t have a bloody clue where he’ll lead them, but I’ll bet you a flask of Falernian to a cup of warm piss that the one place he won’t be taking them is straight back home.’
Dubnus surveyed the men the tribune had detailed to his command with a jaundiced eye, turning back to the centurion who had guided him to their barrack and called them on to parade to meet their new officer.
‘What the fuck happened to this lot? They look like they couldn’t fight their way out of a whorehouse, never mind take their iron to the blue-noses.’
The legion officer looked down his nose at the remains of what had clearly been a century at some point.
‘That, friend, used to be our Third Century. Our genius of a tribune decided that it would be a good idea to send a century south to scout the road to Sailors’ Town.’ He shook his head, raising an eyebrow at his auxiliary colleague that encompassed the idiocy of senior officers across the empire. ‘Eighty men sent marching south straight into a tribal revolt. I wouldn’t have fancied my chances of getting to Sailors’ Town with anything less than a full cohort. They got about ten miles south before the local nutters decided that enough was enough and jumped them in strength. Their centurion, a decent enough officer and a friend of mine, as it happens, seems to have realised that they’d bitten off far more than they could chew, but that they’d all be chopped to ribbons if they ran. So he rallied them, and led the front rank into the fight with their shields up and their swords drawn. It seems the rear rank weren’t quite so keen…’
‘And this is the rear rank?’
‘Right in one. Bastards. The last thing they saw as they ran for it, or so their watch officer told Tribune Paulus, was their centurion’s head being waved around. This lot are good for nothing more than scraping the latrines out, in my opinion, so if you’re relying on them to put up a fight for you once you’re north of the Wall… well, I’d be thinking very carefully before depending on any of them. And look out for the watch officer, he’s a damage case. He got knocked about by one of his men once they were back in camp, and it’s not done him any good.’
Dubnus nodded his thanks, watching the other man walk away until he turned the corner and disappeared from view. Turning back to face the ragged lines of soldiers, few of whom were managing to meet his level gaze, he folded his arms, biceps bulging against his mail armour, and looked up and down their ranks with a look of undisguised contempt.
‘So you’re what’s left of the Third Century, are you? You’re the men that abandoned your mates in battle and legged it home with your tails between your legs, or so the story goes. Anybody want to tell me otherwise?’ He waited for a slow count of ten, running his eyes slowly over each man’s face in turn and looking for any sign of dissent. ‘No takers, it seems. So, you really are the lowest of the low, men that not on
ly turned their backs on a fight but who left their officer, chosen man and forty good men to the bluenoses.’
He walked slowly, deliberately, across the open space to the first rank, his face twisted with disgust.
‘If this were my cohort you’d already have drawn lots to choose which four men would get beaten to death by the rest of you, and then you’d have been sent out again in the company of real soldiers in search of another fight. The legions must be getting soft, allowing men like you to fester in your barracks rather than set a nasty bastard of a centurion on to you, with orders to clear out the rot.’ He went face to face with the watch officer, his nose less than six inches from the other man’s bruised features. ‘Well, gentlemen, and fortunately for the army, I am that nasty bastard of a centurion. Life’s about to get interesting for you men, and not in any sort of way you’re going to enjoy.’
Turning away, he held his vine stick up for every man to see.
‘Now some of you will already be thinking that I’m not a legion centurion, which means that I have no power over you. And you’d be right…’ He waited for a precisely judged moment before continuing again. ‘… and yet so horribly wrong.’ Turning back to face them, he slapped the stick into his calloused palm with a smack that made more than one man twitch involuntarily. ‘You see, it’s true, I’m not a legion officer, which gives me no formal power over you. And yet since I’m not part of your legion, I can do whatever I like to any or all of you tunic-lifting cowards and get away with it. Anything. I. Like. So, and here’s where we see who’s got any balls about them, do any of you useless ration thieves want to take me on, man to man? If any man can put me down I’ll walk away and leave you to stew here in your filth. Come on, there must be one man out there that fancies taking me on. No? All right, then, any two of you. Any two men that think they could put me on my back. Come on!’
The century stood in silence, some of the soldiers shivering under his angry gaze, but not a man moved a muscle. Dubnus glared back at them, his mask of anger fading slowly to a sneer.
‘No? The offer stands, gentlemen. If any two of you can put me on my back I’ll leave you all in peace. Just one warning, though, in case one or two of the smarter among you wonder if it still counts if you try to hit me from behind. The answer is yes. It still counts. But if you decide to try it, make sure your first punch is a good one. Because if you don’t put me out of the fight with that first punch, I’ll break one or even both arms of every man involved, depending what sort of mood I’m in. And now, gentlemen, you’ve got a count of five hundred to fetch your marching gear and present yourselves in formation on the parade ground, ready to march north. Full armour, shields, spears, swords and your packs. Whoever looks after the century’s cart had better be quick, because I want it loaded with your tents and ready to move inside another five hundred. Any man not on parade by the time I’ve strolled up to meet you will soon be getting used to the feel of my vine stick on his back. Move!’
After the lunchtime meal the volunteer squadron turned east, away from the road’s course towards the east coast and down a long shallow valley that ran north-west for miles, down to a river plain lost in the misty haze. Double-Pay Silus looked down the valley’s long slope and smiled happily, turning back to Marcus and pointing to the palm of his right hand.
‘Well, Centurion, this is my ground now. I’ve ridden these hills a dozen times or more over the years, and I know it as well as I know this skin. The road runs almost to the coast, where the Tuidius meets the sea, but we’re going to ease down this nice little valley and leave the stone path to the mules…’ He glanced quickly up at Marcus, but found his officer’s face set in a wry smile. ‘… if you take my meaning. They’ll follow the road until it finishes close to the river late this afternoon, given that they’re forced-marching, and camp out of sight of the ford tonight. Tomorrow morning they’ll turn west to find the ford and they’ll probably be crossing by mid-morning, ready to climb the hills on the far side of the valley. All of which will allow plenty of time for anyone set to watch for their approach to get a warning back to the Dinpaladyr, after which any idea of taking them by surprise goes out of the window.’ He raised an eyebrow to Marcus, his face alive with the prospect of a hunt. ‘And there’s our opportunity. Anyone who’s been set to watch for any sign of Romans is going to watch the road, since that’s the way they know our infantry to make their approach. We, on the other hand, can sneak quietly down this nice little valley as far as the edge of the river’s plain, cross it unseen when it’s misty, early tomorrow morning, and then turn east and flush out any watchers in the hills on the far side before they even know we’re there. And if we can deal with the watchers before they ever get sight of the infantry, then they can make their approach to the fortress of the spears with the advantage of surprise. And your improbable plan for getting inside without starting a massacre might just get a chance to work, eh, Centurion?’
By late afternoon the exhausted soldiers of Dubnus’s temporary command were marching on little more than willpower, and the fear that whatever momentary relief might be gained from falling out of the line of march would be far outweighed by the punishment that their tormentor would bring down on them in the event that any man flagged. The auxiliary centurion had marched alongside them without any sign of discomfort since the half-century had marched through the Noisy Valley gates, despite the rumour that he had discharged himself from the fortress’s hospital with a spear wound not yet completely healed.
‘It’s a right bastard, this road, don’t you men think?’ Dubnus’s voice rang out along the small column as steady as if he were standing at ease, not marching along beside them at the standard pace. ‘I’ve never liked it. The bloody thing goes up and down like a whore’s skirts, so that one moment your calves are burning with the climb, and then the front of your legs feel like they’re being caned with the pain of stopping them from running away with you in the dips. Whichever idiot engineer laid this one out straight needed his head examined.’
He looked up and down the detachment’s length with a grim smile.
‘On the other hand, it does provide you ladies with something a bit more testing than lazing around your barrack waiting for the tribune to decide what to do with a half-century of cowards.’ A man in the file closest to him allowed a hint of a scowl to show on his face, and the auxiliary centurion bore down on him, putting his mouth six inches from the soldier’s ear before speaking loudly enough for the entire detachment to hear him. ‘Ah, so at least one of you doesn’t like being called a coward. A pity that he’s stuck with the rest of you, then, isn’t it?’
The unit was breasting yet another crest, revealing the shape of a burned-out fort at the summit of the next hill. Dubnus turned and walked backwards, pointing his left arm at the shattered ruin coming into view.
‘That, soldiers, is our home for the night. Fort Habitus, named after a legion centurion who served here soon after the Wall was first built.’ He turned back to the line of march and strode alongside the detachment’s front rank. ‘Habitus was a proud old bastard by all accounts, old enough that he should have retired, but the locals weren’t all that happy when the Wall went up and divided them from each other, and they expressed that unhappiness by killing Romans whenever and wherever they could, given the chance. Anyway, old Habitus was ordered to take his century out on patrol one day not very far from here, or so the story goes. He probably thought that patrolling in such limited strength was a good way to get attacked, but he was too much of a soldier to question orders and so off they went.’
He spat on to the road’s surface.
‘Poor bastards. They were ten miles or so from camp when the local blue-noses jumped them. Sounds familiar, eh? The barbarians were three hundred strong, or thereabouts, more than three of them for every man in the century. Old Habitus had seen it all by that stage of his career, of course, and he knew that if he allowed his men to run they’d all be dead inside a count of five hundred, and so he shou
ted at them to form a square, to stop the tribesmen from getting round their flanks, and to stand and fight.’
He glanced across their ranks, finding every man’s face turned to his and their expressions taut with interest.
‘And fight they did. Retreating when they could, with blue-noses surrounding them on all sides and the day wearing on into afternoon, and still they fought. A wounded man was a dead man, that far from help, and more than one dying soldier tried to take one or two of the savages with him by stepping out to fight man to man, but for the most part they held their ranks and slowly hacked their way back along the route they’d come earlier in the day. They left a trail of corpses behind them, their own and those of the tribesmen attacking them, but they held their nerve even when half of them had been killed and the remaining men were almost dead on their feet. The trumpeter kept calling for help, when he wasn’t spearing blue-noses, and eventually, with evening drawing on, they heard the sound of an answering trumpet. There were Roman soldiers close by, and an end to their torment. The barbarians, well, they knew that their chance to take a centurion’s head was slipping from their grasp, so they mounted one last wild attack, swarming around the detachment’s shields in a desperate charge, but old Habitus shouted for his men to hold on for just a little longer, and his soldiers stood firm in a circle of men that shrank with every casualty until another three centuries came over the hill and chased off the barbarians. There were thirty of them left standing, and not many of them without a wound of some kind, but they marched back into their camp with their heads up and their spears black with dried blood.’
He paused for a moment before continuing. The detachment was almost at the top of the hill, and the fort’s burned and shattered timbers were looming on the skyline.
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