Arthur Britannicus

by Paul Bannister

  He’d just decided to take the sea voyage option and had turned his mind to what he’d need when a cry from the pedestrian behind caused him to turn. The man jumped sideways. Carausius began to do the same, not knowing what to expect, but his injured foot made him clumsy. With a rumble and roar, the tenement building alongside him collapsed. A cascade of falling brick blasted a dust cloud but tumbled away from him, although a few timbers fell in the Briton’s direction. One, turning end over end, struck him on the hip and flattened him, pinning him against the limestone pavement. Rats scuttled for safety, and even dazed as he was, Carausius registered the movement, spotting the flash of one white rodent among the dark ones in the billowing dust.

  The big soldier lay trapped by the heavy baulk of timber, although most of its weight was fortunately propped on brick rubble. He dazedly realized he’d have to wait for help. Then the screaming started. Oil lamps inside the building had ignited a blaze and the pinned Briton was hidden in choking smoke. He began to bellow for help before the flames could reach him or the building fell in.

  Out of the smoke appeared an incongruously-cheerful face. The man was not tall, but was heavily muscled. He was carrying a hook and an axe, equipment that signified he was one of the vigiles who patrolled Rome looking for business. Fire fighting crews managed by the immensely-rich Marcus Licinus Crassus, the vigiles turned up to fires and haggled with the building’s owner until a deal was struck, or they watched the building burn.

  “This your house?” the apparition asked Carausius.

  “No, it damned well isn’t,” the soldier said, gritting his teeth. “Get me out from under here.”

  “Not sure about that, lord,” grinned the vigilis, “I’m Stevig, by the way. My mates call me Stupid. I love the smell of the smoke. Got any coin?”

  Carausius nodded. “I have gold,” he said shortly. “Right, let’s get you out of there, it’s dangerous,” said Stevig chidingly.

  “I didn’t bloody choose to be under here,” said the legate.

  “Right,” said Stevig, levering up the bulk of timber so the soldier could inch clear. “One gold aureus, please.” Carausius shook his head, but paid up just as a second vigilis arrived, a tall, dark-haired man with an accent from the south. “My mate, Murrus Antipodes,” Stevig said cheerily. “He was thrown out of eunuch school because he still has a giant hairy nut sack. He claimed it was an apparition, but his master’s wife admitted it wasn’t.” Carausius nodded, swore at the pain in his hip and damaged foot and began to limp away. Antipodes called after him: “I would have helped in the rescue. A tip would be nice.”

  A week later, scudding across Our Sea in a blue-sailed naval galley headed for southern Gaul, Carausius grinned at the memory. He ached a bit, but it could have been worse, and alongside him, smiling as the wind blew her hair across her eyes, was Sucia. “Being a legate has unexpected privileges,” he grinned at her. “No pirate will come near this warship, all we need watch for is the weather, and we’ll be in Gaul faster than any trading vessel. Now, tell me about the merchants’ road from Cathay.”

  So Sucia talked of the Silk Routes, a network of rough tracks that linked remote oases across the east, and how caravans of traders moved between them. Few, she told him, covered the entire distance, because it was too long. Instead, most traders repeatedly travelled the same parts of the routes, making arduous journeys over deserts and mountains. “My trader travels between Samarkand and Damascus,” she told him, “and he brings me some of the world’s most precious fabrics. I send back amber from the Baltic, sun stones from Iceland that show sailors the way, even in fog; the finest wool garments from Britain, and precious black jet from the coast near Eboracum, not far from your birthplace.”

  What, Carausius wanted to know, was the mysterious dark blue crystal she had showed him, from her workings in Britain’s limestone peaks? “It is just the one cavern, formed by an underground river and discovered by the ancients. It contains a band of rare crystal called Blue John that is found nowhere else in the whole world. I have sent beautiful bowls made from it as far as Pompeii and Herculaneum, gifts of imperial purple fit for the emperor. But I will have a gift for you that is just as precious, when we reach Britain. I will give you one the world’s most prized hunting dogs.” Carausius grinned again. Since he was a boy, he’d loved dogs. As an apprentice to the river pilot Cenhud and as a foot soldier of the legion, he had not been able to have a dog. Now, a legate of Rome, a man who commanded thousands of troops, he could do anything he wanted. And he wanted a big war dog. One day soon, he thought.

  As Carausius and Sucia were passing Corsica on their way to the great Gallic port of Massalia, the twins Mael and Domnal were already there, employed in carrying their master’s baggage down the gangplank onto the stone quay built by the Greeks and up into the sun washed town of handsome houses with their red terracotta roofs. Southern Gaul, where the high limestone ramparts of the mountains behind the port gleamed in the bright sunlight, was a wonderful place, a world away from the gloomy fogs and rain of their master’s Belgic home in the north. “I don’t want to go back,” Mael whispered to his brother. “We could lose ourselves in a place this big if we could just slip away.” Domnal nodded. He didn’t care for their master Gracilis, because although the man treated them reasonably well, he was a perverted pederast and sometimes forced the handsome slaves to participate in his performances with catamites. His demands had lessened as they got older because Gracilis’ tastes ran to quite young children and the twins were rarely participants these days, but they still wanted their freedom.

  “If we’re caught, we’re dead,” Mael told his brother. Domnal nodded. A runaway slave faced crippling punishments, or death, but after more than a decade as Gracilis’ body slaves, they were treated with considerable liberty, and escaping shouldn’t be difficult. The hard part would be to stay away, and they could do that easier in the Mediterranean seaport than in Belgica. Their chance came that same evening. The amber trader wanted to sample a Gallic whorehouse that a friend had excitedly told him about, and he left the twins under a solitary guard in the tavern where the travellers were staying.

  The duo acted decisively. While their guard sat in the public room below, sipping wine and flirting with a whore whom he had no intention of paying, they uncovered Gracilis’ strongbox under the floorboards, prized off the hinge with a knife and took the linen-wrapped roll of coin they knew was inside. They had no difficulty in slipping unseen out of an upstairs window, over the red-tiled roofs of the tavern and the next building and dropping into a stable yard where a carpet of horse dung muffled their footsteps.

  “Get rid of our slave clothes, be less conspicuous, then we’ll pay our way out of here,” Domnal said, gesturing at the drab tunics that marked them as belonging to the lowest class of society. “We’ll have to steal some. We can’t buy clothes dressed like this, people will question how slaves got money. Then we’ll find another town and we’ll be free. Maybe we can even get back to Britain.” The pair made their way out of the harbour area and headed for the upper reaches of the old town, intending to find a bath house. “Romans bathe nudus,” Domnal explained to his twin, “so they leave their tunics, togas and sandals with a bath slave. We should have no trouble sneaking through the steam and lifting some new kit.”

  At first, the gods favoured them. They quickly found a bath house on the Via Lacydon and slipped inside, past a drowsing attendant. The other guardian of the door was inside, doing his rounds and shouting out the time. The changing room was empty, and a dozen or more of the cubicles held vestments of various kinds. Mael scooped up a fine linen tunic, grinning as he whispered to his brother, “Very intelligent: one size fits all, no tailoring needed!” Domnal didn’t answer; he’d stripped off his tunic and was reaching for a bather’s discarded clothes when a footfall sounded.

  Two burly mariners walked into the steamy room, followed by the sleepy slave, who was carrying linens for them. “They’re stealing clothes!” the attendant sque
aked as he took in the scene. Mael stood paralyzed, and one sailor grabbed his arm. Domnal ran naked, forcing past the attendant and fleeing into the street. His escape ended as quickly as it began. Two watchmen on fire patrol blocked his way. A naked man running from a bath house slave didn’t look innocent. Domnal was seized and bound. By morning the twins were standing before a furious Gracilis.

  “You ungrateful bastards ran, and you took my gold. I will have one of you flogged to death while the other watches, then I’ll sell the survivor to the Moors for their galleys. You,” he pointed at Mael, “are to die.” Domnal went to his knees to plead for his brother’s life, but Gracilis was obdurate. Then Domnal had inspiration. “We have a treasure,” he told the trader. “That is, we know of something hidden by the Romans in Britain. It’s an old treasure, and we can lead you to it.” He was lying, he didn’t know what the ancient map told, but it was their best chance to buy time, and perhaps to escape again.

  Gracilis took the little metal map and pored over it. He questioned Domnal again and again, but the slave was adamant. He’d lead his master to the loot, but he wouldn’t tell where it was, except that it was in Britain. Gracilis shrugged. The slave could die once the treasure was in his hands. Let him do the leading, give him time to reflect. When he got them back to Hadriani, he’d keep them under close guard until he took them to Britain. Two days later, the chained twins, in riveted metal collars that read: ’I have escaped. Send me back to my master Gracilis Turpilanus for a reward,’ were escorted onto the Rhone river barge that would take them halfway across Gaul on their way back to Forum Hadriani. Gracilis, with the little lead map firmly in his possession, thought he would plan a trip to Britain in the near future. He had more pressing matters for now, and he also needed to consult someone he could trust about the map, and go through the business of deciphering the clues.

  XII. Bononia

  The years had been kind to the escaped slave Mullinus. He had used the heavy purse of gold he found in a murdered man’s cloak and had prospered. Able to read and to write clumsily but effectively, he had a business as an accounts keeper and administrator. His clients were the wealthy traders who were based in the Belgic crossroads town of Hadrian’s Market, where the mighty Rhine and Meuse rivers served as highways for troops and commerce, faster routes even than the great Roman roads that crossed the continent. With the unrest beyond the Rhine, the constant flow of troops through the market town to the frontier made for good business.

  Mullinus was prominent in the town, especially in the taverns, where his trademark heavy amber and silver-spiral brooch that pinned his cloak back from his tunic often attracted jocular remarks about ‘lord’ or ‘baron.’ People trusted the fellow because of his good nature and open, almost simple looks, and he took full advantage in his dealings. In a decade or so, he’d come to own several taverns that sold watered wine and filched army provisions at great profit. He also ran a discreet whorehouse that serviced only officers and the wealthier merchants, and he did a brisk trade fencing pirated goods brought to him by the corsairs who infested the seas from the Gallic Narrows out to the great Atlanticus. He was a success, he’d worked diligently and now, suddenly, the hard-nosed trader was unable to concentrate on his business. He was smitten by a woman.

  Mullinus had spent years indulging his appetites on slave girls or on some of the professional whores who worked to keep his income rolling in, but had never formed an emotional attachment of any depth. This woman was different. He’d noticed her as she shopped the market food stalls for her mistress, a handsome, auburn-haired slave of full figure and flashing smile. “Good teeth and tits,” he professionally appraised her. Attracted, he edged closer as she dropped several loaves of bread into her basket. “Is that fresh?” he murmured, pretending interest. The woman looked up and Mullinus melted. “Still warm, lord,” she said.

  He loved the timbre of her voice, and his ear caught the unexpected accent. Eagerly, he said in British: ’Are you from Britannia?” She stayed mute, staring at his cloak brooch. The colour ebbed from her face but she had enough self-control to murmur a polite response. Mullinus had just met the widow of the true owner of the brooch. Two thunderbolts from the gods had struck at one time. One hit Clinia as she saw her dead husband’s unmistakable badge of office, the other skewered Mullinus as he fell in love.

  The next stage, buying Clinia from her shipwright master was not easy, as he knew the slave’s value from sampling her charms, and he also recognized how much her fellow Briton wanted her, but Mullinus was a skilled negotiator and owned a long purse. The matter took two weeks before the trader took Clinia to his villa and showed her the room that would be hers. “You will not be a slave, but my mistress,” he informed her.

  Clinia gasped as she entered her new quarters. Mullinus’ servants had laid out fresh clothes and sandals for her. A young slave girl stood waiting by the dressing table, where perfumes, an ivory comb and some scented oil were arrayed next to a bowl of fresh flowers and a glass jug of Rhenish wine. “This is not Massalia, where women are forbidden to drink wine,” Mullinus smiled. “This is your home. Please me, and you will be its mistress. Abigail here will bathe you and arrange your hair, then she will bring you to me.” The woman who had once been chatelaine with good lands on the coast of Britain felt tears well in her eyes as she was again treated with respect. She said humbly, “You will be my lord, and I shall come willingly to your bed.”

  It was the beginning of a period of great happiness for them both, but it was still several long weeks before Clinia finally could ask her lover where he had obtained the great brooch that had once been symbol of her husband’s power. As he told the tale of fleeing from a ship brawl with the enveloping cloak hiding him, Clinia realized that the raider Filwen must be dead. How else would the wolf fur cloak she bitterly remembered, and her husband’s badge of office, have come into the hands of two common sailors? But still she did not know the fates of her twin sons, or of Carausius, her little boy. She had spent the past years as a slave to a shipwright as he carried on his trade in the northern islands of Frisia. The twins and her young son could be anywhere. She was not to know that the twins were under close guard in the very town where she now lived, or that her son Caros was an important soldier in Gaul. “Do you know, lord, how I can find my children?” she asked humbly. “I shall find them,” Mullinus said grandly. “I have experience of investigating facts.”

  A few hundred miles to the west, Carausius was on investigations of his own, as he inspected his new command. The recently-appointed legate of two near-complete legions was touring his headquarters fortress of Bononia, on the Gallic coast. He’d come there a few months before, after missing Gracilis and the twins at Massalia. A ship’s pilot in the harbour there had reported seeing identical twin slaves going aboard a Rhone barge just days before the legate showed up at the dockside, and Carausius knew he’d lost that chance to reunite with his brothers. In time, he thought, Mithras will bring me to them. First, he had pressing military matters to attend, and right now, he had a parade to inspect.

  The big, bearded man with the scarred, broken face and distinct limp wore his white and purple-striped robes well and the troops lined for inspection regarded him with a mix of fear and admiration. Already, in the first few months of possessing his cudgel of office, he’d comprehensively crushed two uprisings of the rebellious Gauls, keeping busy his executioner, a lean, blue-eyed man with a leathery face and southern drawl who would never say where he was born except vaguely that it was ‘down in the south a good bit.’

  Davius Perseqius Ansonii saw his duty as carnifex was to keep the Roman Peace by making an example of those who broke it, and crucifixion was a fine way to command people’s attention. He carried out other forms of execution, too, because the magistrates said crucifixion was too harsh for Roman citizens, though Davius had topped a few that way. Strangulation or being bled out through a slit throat was the privileged mode of exit for citizens, and the nobles had it even easier, mer
ely getting their heads lopped off, he mused. In the early days, though, the mad and bad were simply launched off the Tarpeian Rock, an 80 foot cliff on Rome’s Palatine Hill. It was a second-rate spectacle, too brief in Davius’ view. Hanging a felon out on a cross for a day or two really pushed the point home better, he thought. You had to let the punters tremble to see what was in store if they got out of line: hours and hours of agony, not a few seconds’ flight and a messy landing. His job took skill, it wasn’t literally a pushover. He smiled at his own wit.

  Davius had dodged his new legate’s parade, and was sitting in a harbour front wine shop, talking about his profession with several off-duty sailors of the Classis Britannica, Rome’s British Fleet. “We’re getting soft,” he said. “In the old days, it wasn’t just murderers and traitors who got the push, anyone who was badly deformed or mad was regarded as having been cursed by the gods, and he went off the rock, too. Now, I just top rebels, criminal slaves and the occasional poor bastard who knifed someone when he was drunk.”

  He took a pull at the watered wine and considered his first meeting with the new legate. He’d been called into the great man’s presence and found Carausius studying the returns that detailed the numbers of executions. “There are a lot of these,” the big, bear-like admiral said mildly.

  “I hope there were none of my soldiers among them. Are you a man who likes his work too much?” Davius stiffened.

  “All were ordered, lord,” he said.

  “So many?” persisted Carausius.

  “They’re Bagaudae, lord, just scum,” said Davius. “They’ll never like us, but they can fear and respect us. You need to keep a boot on their necks or they’ll take advantage.” The carnifex was not to know it, but his few words influenced the legate considerably.