He smiled, and Felicia recoiled again at the blank look in his eyes. ‘Of course, the legatus couldn’t tell my new superiors why he was moving me on, or they would have refused to accept my onward posting, and so here I was with no one any the wiser as to my very particular needs. Nemesis, daughter of justice? Hah! There is no justice.’ He squatted down, bringing his face close to hers. ‘If there were I would not be locked up safely in the prefect’s residence waiting for a quiet and ignominious departure tomorrow morning, or so everyone else but you and me believes. Which, of course, gives me licence to do whatever I please with you, my dear, and without fear of discovery as long as I cover my tracks well … I presume you’ll be well aware of what I like to do to my partners, given that you examined one of my victims once I was done with her?’
The horrified doctor nodded slowly, unable to take her eyes from the face in front of her. Furius smiled slowly, then reached out with sudden speed and gripped the collar of her tunic with both hands, rending the garment apart with his immense strength. He put a hand around her throat and forced her to her feet, pushing her up against the wall while using the other hand to tear away the ruined tunic, revealing her body to him.
‘Oh yes, exactly what I need. You, my dear, are going to be squealing like a stuck pig in a minute or two.’
He pulled down the linen band restraining her breasts, allowing them to bob loose, and gripped a nipple with a fierce tweak. The abused flesh stiffened in protest, as an amused grin played across his face.
‘See, your body is already betraying you … you bitches always enjoy what I’ve got to offer, even if you pretend to resist!’
The door opened behind him with a groan of hinges. Cornelius Felix walked gingerly through the doorway, his right arm tightly bound in a sling.
‘Doctor, I … good grief, what in Hades are …’
Furius pivoted swiftly, driving a bunched fist into his face and catapulting him across the corridor and off the far wall. The wounded cavalry officer slumped to the floor, already unconscious. Furius turned back to find the naked woman clawing frantically at the room’s shutter. Pulling her away from the window and pushing her to the floor with a triumphant laugh, he delivered a stinging backhanded slap to her face.
‘No you don’t. Let’s have those undergarments off, shall we. Open wide!’
In the officers’ mess Marcus drained his beaker, putting it down on the table and picking up his helmet, looking around for a moment.
‘Damn.’
Rufius raised an eyebrow.
‘My vine stick. I must have left it in the hospital.’
His friend drank his wine and picked up his own helmet.
‘It’s only round the corner, I’ll come with you. It’ll give us a chance to see how Dubnus is doing. You coming, Martos?’
The Briton nodded, tipping back the contents of his drinking horn and shoving it into his belt. Julius picked up his helmet, shooting Marcus a wry smile.
‘I’ll come too. Someone’s got to make sure you come back to your barrack nice and promptly, or we’ll have a repeat of what happened the last time you were left alone with her. Can’t have you turning up on parade in the morning looking like you’ve been pulled through a hedge, can we?’
The four men made their way to the door, stepping out into the cold night air under a blaze of stars and strolling down the street towards the hospital. The light of a lamp flickered through the shutters of the doctor’s office window, making Marcus shake his head.
‘She’s still at it. So much for “you go and get some slee …”’
‘Quiet!’
They turned and looked at Martos, his head cocked the better to listen. In the silence they all heard the sound, a woman’s cry of distress. Rufius made the connection first, dashing off along the street with the other men in close pursuit. He took the steps into the hospital’s lobby two at a time and lunged into the corridor, his pace hastened further by the slumped body at its far end. Drawing his sword, he sprinted down the length of the building, kicking the office door open to find the helpless Felicia pinned to the floor with Furius on top of her, her legs forced open by his muscular thighs, one hand stifling her screams and the other between their bodies, his buttocks moving slightly as he readied himself to thrust into her. The doctor saw Rufius over her attacker’s shoulder, her eyes bulging as he stepped into the office and stooped to put his blade’s point against her rapist’s anus. Furius froze into immobility with the weapon’s first touch, looking over his shoulder in amazement at the furious centurion.
‘Get off her now, or I’ll put my iron so far up you it’ll stop your heart without ever disturbing your ribs, you piece of shit.’
The other officers appeared in the door behind him, Julius sizing up the situation in an instant.
‘Keep him there. Lady, bring yourself out from under him, nice and easy.’
Felicia struggled out from beneath Furius’s weight, spitting into his face with shocked anger. Julius tapped Marcus on the shoulder hard, seeing his friend’s ash-white face and knowing that the man was seconds from taking a blade to the prostrate former officer.
‘Get your woman out of here, Centurion, and give her some decency. We’ll deal with this bastard once she’s safely out of the way.’
He stepped into the office and put an iron-nailed boot on to Furius’s neck, crushing the man’s face into the hard stone floor.
‘Tie his hands behind his back with your belt.’ He waited while the older man secured their prisoner’s wrists. ‘Good. Now sheathe your blade, Rufius; this one won’t struggle, not now he’s dealing with fighting men and not trying to violate a defenceless woman. And besides, I’m rather looking forward to seeing his face when we scourge his back off and then nail him up tomorrow morning. That is your preferred method of punishment, I believe …?’
Furius lay helpless under the centurion’s booted foot, but his snarled response was anything but.
‘You won’t dare bring me to justice, Centurion, I know things that you can’t afford to have made public!’
The boot pinning him to the floor pushed down harder, Julius turning to his brother centurion.
‘Go on; get whoever that is lying outside sorted out.’
Rufius sheathed his sword, leaving the room and allowing Martos through the door to get his first glimpse of the prostrate Furius. Julius bent and took a handful of Furius’s hair, pulling his head off the floor despite the foot pinning his neck.
‘Go on, then, let’s hear these things we don’t want to be known.’
Furius spat his frustration into the words, half choked by the position the angry centurion had forced him into.
‘Your centurion … the boy with the … unconvincing name … I know he’s a fugitive … and that you’re all … hiding him.’ He paused, swallowing painfully. ‘You put me on display … and I’ll shout that so long and loud … the gods will hear it.’
Julius laughed, wrenching the helpless man’s head to one side so that he could see the centurion standing over him.
‘Very good, ex-Prefect. You’ve just earned yourself a private death.’ He pulled a dagger from his belt, putting the blade close to Furius’s face. ‘I might blind you first, and then we’ll truss you up and take you out into the woods. I fancy staking you out and leaving you for the animals to find you …’
Disquietingly, the former officer laughed back at him in spite of his discomfort.
‘That would be … brave of you … No, I mean it!’
Julius had pulled his head back farther, threatening to finish the job of choking him to death, and he exchanged an uneasy glance with Martos.
‘Brave, eh?’
‘Yes … anything that brings … the corn officers … will bring your lies … crashing down … expose the fugitive … crush you all.’
Martos tapped Julius on the shoulder.
‘I think that what’s needed here is for this man to die an unremarkable death. Something to arouse no suspicion, perhaps?
’
Julius nodded, raising an eyebrow.
‘And you know how to make this happen?’
The Briton nodded, pulling the drinking horn from his belt and pointing to their captive’s bare backside. Julius frowned uncomprehendingly.
‘We’re going to bugger him to death with a drinking horn?’
Martos shook his head, raising a hand to forestall any more questions.
‘I’ll be back in a moment.’ He leaned in closer, bending to slap Furius’s ear hard enough to provoke a howl of rage that covered his brief whisper to the centurion. ‘Make him believe he’s won. He mustn’t struggle for the next few minutes; we want no marks on his body. Just do one thing for me while I’m gone …’
Having explained what he wanted, he left the office and went to the surgery, looking around for the tool he wanted. Finding a suitably robust bone saw he worked swiftly, cutting off the last inch of the horn’s tip to reveal a hole as wide as his middle finger.
‘Perfect.’
He pocketed the horn’s tip, and then went in search of the other centurions. He found them both in the main ward, watching as the doctor, dressed in a spare tunic and apparently recovered from her ordeal, fussed over the young man they had found unconscious in the corridor.
‘He seems to have nothing worse than a slight concussion. Poor man, I thought that animal had managed to do what the barbarian archers had failed to achieve.’
She looked up as Martos approached the small group. He nodded to her, speaking to the two centurions.
‘Brothers, I need your help with our prisoner.’
Rufius and Marcus followed the Briton to the office door, where he stopped them and spoke quickly, showing them the horn and explaining what he proposed. All three men crowded into the office, almost filling the small room with their bulk. Julius gave them an exasperated stare, while Furius, hearing the rapping of boot nails on the stone floor, renewed his harangue of his captors.
‘Just surrender to the inevitable, you fools! Release me now and I may choose to overlook this stupidity. Hold me here any longer and I’ll insist on fucking the doctor’s lovely tight arse as part of the deal!’
Julius stared down at the prone figure, clearly at the end of his patience with the man’s imprecations.
‘Whatever it is you have in mind, Martos, could we just get on with it?’
Martos nodded, showing him the truncated horn with raised eyebrows. After a second the realisation dawned on the centurion, and a slow smile spread across his face.
‘Very well, Prefect Furius, I suppose you’re right. You two, unbind his wrists.’
Marcus and Rufius unfastened the belt tying Furius’s arms, but rather than allowing him up as he expected, they each pinned an arm to the floor, spreadeagling him across the stone while Julius deftly wrapped a powerful arm around his legs, preventing him from kicking out. With his neck no longer under Julius’s boot the disgraced officer craned his head round in amazement.
‘What?! Free me now, or you’ll leave me no option but to …’
He went quiet as Martos squatted down by his head, showing him the ruined drinking horn.
‘This was my father’s, and his father’s before him. I don’t appreciate having to destroy it for the sake of a piece of shit like you, but I have. A man that will attack a woman like that, one of his own people, does not deserve either to live or to leave this life quietly. And so …’
He picked up Felicia’s undergarment from the floor where the disgraced officer had discarded it in his haste to violate the helpless woman. Wadding the linen into a ball he slapped the man’s ear again, then deftly pushed the gag into his mouth as he opened it to bellow another protest.
‘Make the most of that, it’s the last contact with a woman you’ll have in this life.’
He joined Julius, taking a strong grip of one of Furius’s legs. The two men nodded to each other, pulling the man’s legs apart and revealing the Roman’s genitals and his puckered anus. Moving quickly, the Briton pushed the tapered end of the horn into Furius’s rectum, ignoring the muffled protests the helpless captive was now making.
‘Hold this.’
Passing the leg he was gripping to Julius, who flexed his powerful shoulders to hold the limbs in place despite Furius’s increasingly desperate struggles, he picked up the remnants of the doctor’s torn tunic and wrapped it round his hand before reaching for the poker, whose blade Julius had plunged deep into the fire’s coals moments before. Regarding the red-hot metal critically, he pushed it deep into the fire again, stirring up the coals for maximum heat.
‘Well, Roman, it seems we have a moment or two to kill, so I’ll tell you a story.’
Furius goggled at him, his eyes bulging in disbelief.
‘You will probably have heard it before, it’s as old as the hills themselves, but that’s no reason not to spend a moment telling it again. There was once, my grandmother told me when I was very young, a snake whose delight was to bite and kill other creatures, even those – or perhaps especially those – it could not eat. The other beasts of the forest hated and feared the snake in equal measure, since it killed simply to enjoy the sensation. One day, at the height of summer, there was a fire in the forest, and the flames leapt from tree to tree faster than the snake could slither. The snake was afraid of being burned to death, but just when all seemed lost he saw a fox, an intelligent and wily animal, running towards him, for foxes, as I am sure you know, can run fast enough to outpace a forest fire, and for many miles too.
‘So, he called to the fox and begged it to carry him away to safety. The fox, of course, was unimpressed with the request. He knew of this particular snake’s reputation, and he feared that to carry the snake on his back would be his death sentence, but the snake had one powerful argument that he knew would sway the fox. “If I bite you,” he reasoned, “I will burn to death when I fall from your back. Why would I do such a stupid thing?” And so the fox agreed to carry the snake to a safe distance from the fire in return for the reptile’s future favour.
‘Of course, halfway across the forest, where the trees were at their thickest and the fire threatened to overtake them, the snake suddenly sank his fangs into the fox’s neck and delivered a dose of poison that was sure to kill him in seconds. As the fox was struggling in his death agonies, with his sight going dim and his ancestors calling him to join them, and as the fire started to rage around them, he raised himself up with one last mighty effort, and asked the terrified snake the obvious question: “Why have you killed me, when it means your own death?” And the snake, sliding off his back and into the flames that would burn him to death, hissed the answer with fear and shame, but with the certainty of truth. And do you know what he said?’
The Briton gave the gagged Roman a moment to respond. Furius stared at him mutely, his eyes filled with hate.
‘No? What he said was simply this: “I can’t help it. It is in my nature.”’
‘By now, of course, you will have guessed why I have taken this time to tell you this story, apart from the fact the poker needed a little more time to be hot enough for my purposes. You, although I have not known you for very long, clearly have the same lust for death and suffering as the snake in my story. You are a man who is dangerous to all around you, and you will remain so for as long as you live. Some people would be filled with curiosity as to what can lead a man to become so debased, but I am of a more practical mind. I simply want to put you out of this misery you call a life without your evil leading to any more death. And now, it seems that the means of delivering you to Hades without springing these traps of which you speak is ready.’
He hefted the white-hot poker in front of the Roman’s face, watching a bead of sweat trickle down the man’s forehead, then moved to where the horn protruded from between his legs.
‘Brace yourselves, he’s going to struggle with the strength of a bear once this starts.’
He slid the poker into the horn’s conical opening, the smell of burning
filling the air as the hot metal seared its interior, then pushed the metal forcefully through its tip and into the prostrate man’s body. Without the gag Furius’s anguished screams would have woken the entire camp, and his body thrashed across the floor despite the four men fighting to hold him down as the hot metal blade tore through his internal organs. With one last massive shudder the dying man sagged lifelessly to the stone floor, his eyes suddenly glassy and empty of life. Martos withdrew the poker, filling the room with the stench of buring offal, then pushed it back into the fire to burn off the residue of Furius’s organs clinging to its surface, and tossed the ruined drinking horn on to the coals. Julius stared down at the body, shaking his head in wonder.
‘The perfect murder. No signs on the victim’s body, and no trace of the means of death. Get him dressed, brothers.’
Tribune Licinius, summoned from the bed into which he had just gratefully slumped, took one look at Furius’s corpse laid out on the operating table in his boots and tunic and called for the doctor.
‘What can you tell me about this, my dear? I’ll have to explain this to more than one very senior officer and I’d like to get my story straight before the questions begin.’
If he noticed the tense air in the room he chose to ignore it, waiting for Felicia to make her reply.
‘He had come to see his men. He was talking to me in my office when he collapsed without any warning, clutching his chest and shouting with the pain, then passed out. I couldn’t find a pulse, so I called for the officers here to help me.’
Arrows of Fury: Empire Volume Two Page 37