Rise and Fall

by Michael Whitehead

  Hakor lay on the other bed looking fresher than Garic but not by much. The ex-slave was very well muscled but even he was finding the unrelenting pace of protecting the walls arduous. The ceaselessness was the problem. Fighting a determined enemy was always draining but fighting an enemy that will not rest and cannot be discouraged was nearly impossible. The disheartening thing about it was that no matter how many they killed, a glance over the wall always made you think that there were more undead than there had been last time.

  Not all of the new recruits had been as lucky as Garic, three had been lost so far. Two men had fallen on their first full day. In one case, fallen was exactly right. A Risen had appeared in the air in front of him and he had stepped backward too far. Garic hadn’t even known his name.

  Yesterday had been the worst. A big Gaul, an ex-slave, had been dragged off the wall by a child half his size. He had been fighting a female Risen and his attention was wholly on the task in hand. Before anyone, including the Gaul, knew what was happening the young boy had grabbed at his ankles. The female threw herself at him and he lost his balance. There had been an infinite moment of cartwheeling arms and he had gone over into the sea of undead faces below. The impact might have killed him outright, had he not had the undead to break his fall. For a time he had rolled around on top of the crowd, not seeming to be able to find space to fall into the tightly packed bodies. Eventually he had been sucked down like an animal trapped in quick sand. His screams had lasted much longer than any of the men on the wall could bear to listen.

  “I can’t do this any longer,” Hakor’s voice broke the silence. Garic had been so deep in thought that he had forgotten the big Egyptian was even in the room.

  “I was beginning to think you were unbreakable, my friend,” Garic replied, making light of his friend's comment.

  “I mean it, I can’t carry on. I thought I could cope but if I have to face another day up there I will throw myself off. I can’t face another one of those things.” Hakor sounded despondent, completely unlike his usual stoic self.

  Garic propped himself on one elbow and looked at his roommate. “You’re serious? What will you do?” he asked.

  “I’m going under the wall,” Hakor replied.

  “What do you mean under the wall?” Garic asked, confused.

  “You know there are tunnels under the city?” Garic had heard rumours, everyone had. It was commonly believed that a person who knew the way could make it from east to west or north to south without seeing the sun.

  “I’ve heard it said.”

  “There are also passages out of the city and I think I know where one is,” Hakor said, his voice lowering to a whisper.

  Garic’s eyebrows knitted in surprise. “Where? And I have to ask, how does an ex-slave know something like that.”

  Hakor laughed, it was a deep throaty sound that did Garic’s heart good to hear. “I know because I keep my eyes open, Roman. If you were a little more observant, you might already know as well. As for where it is? It’s about four rooms away.” He laughed again when he saw the look of shock on Garic’s face.

  “Seriously?” he asked. He took a moment to think about what Hakor had said and then asked, “The Centurion's office? The trap door in Horatius’ office?”

  Hakor nodded and smiled. “Not so unobservant after all, Roman,” he said.

  “Couldn’t that just go down to a store room or go elsewhere in the city?” Garic asked.

  “It could,” Hakor admitted. “I don’t think so, though. Have you seen the men who go one way but not the other, into or out of that office?” he asked.

  Garic shook his head and that elicited another rush of laughter from the Egyptian. “Easy living has made you Romans soft, my friend. You walk around with your eyes closed half of the time. You feel too safe.”

  Garic prickled a little at the insult but said nothing to his friend. “Okay, assuming the passage goes out of the city, why leave? Why not just escape this place and hide in Rome? There must be a million places that they would never find you?” Garic asked.

  “Rome is on its last legs. You must see that. You know as well as I do that the numbers of Risen at the wall are growing every day. We can’t keep fighting them and winning. Eventually they will overrun the city. The food is running out. We are trapped and I fancy my chances out there, better than I do in here.” He stopped and looked at Garic, searching his face. “You should come with me.”

  “I have friends and a family. If I were to leave, then I would want to take them with me,” Garic said, shaking his head.

  Hakor nodded, resigned, “Maybe we should all go together.” He had said it half joking but as he heard the words, Garic was almost certain he had just heard his future spoken. Here in this small barrack room an ex-slave from Africa had just told him exactly what needed to be done.

  “Would you wait, if it meant we could leave in a group? We would be safer together than we would be apart, don’t you agree?”

  Hakor nodded, “I was hoping you would see it that way. Who are you talking about?”

  “My wife and child.” He saw Hakor’s face drop slightly but to the Egyptian's credit, he did not object immediately at the idea of taking a child. Garic continued, “A centurion, two legionaries, a senator, his wife, a young woman and a younger boy, he’s maybe fifteen and injured but he was in the legions.”

  Hakor shook his head, “Do you want to invite the rest of Rome with us?” he said, half laughing.

  “Oh, a young boy called Lee, his mother and his grandfather, who is a fine doctor.” Hakor was in fits of laughter by this point and Garic could see the humour in the situation. But at the same time he knew that in order to survive they would need friends around them, people they could trust.

  “So let me get this right, you want us to try to sneak twelve people into the centurion's office and out of Rome?” Hakor asked.

  “Fourteen, including us two,” Garic replied with a grin forming on his face that felt good there.

  Hakor shrugged. “What have we got to lose?”

  “Everything,” Garic replied.

  “Except that?” Hakor laughed. When he did, Garic caught the laugh like an infection and soon the two grown men were rolling on their backs like children. They roared with laughter until tears rolled down their faces. Men in the other rooms must have wondered what was going on but no-one came to check. After a while the laughter died away and the two became serious once more.

  “If we are to do this we must be certain we can get out using that trapdoor. I say we do a trial run before you go to gather the others,” Hakor said.

  “How do you propose we do that?” Garic asked.

  “We watch and we wait and we take our chance when it comes to us. There really is no other choice. Are you sure they will all want to come with us?”

  Garic shook his head. “Not sure at all, but we should give them the chance. Is there no-body you wish to take with us?” he asked his dark-skinned friend.

  “If there was they are dead or gone. I was a slave, Garic, it is not a life that produces many life-long friends.” Sadness filled the big man's eyes and Garic looked away for a moment to give him time to dry them.

  “Then we do this as soon as we can, agreed?”

  “Agreed,” Hakor said and thumped Garic on the shoulder. Garic felt like he had been charged by an ox but just smiled.

  Chapter Seventeen

  Priscus hid in the shadows away from the torchlight. As weak as he was from blood loss, it was a wonder that he had managed to get himself up off the floor but it seemed his will to live was still stronger than his need to give in.

  The guards had woken him from what may have been a terminal sleep, the noise they made preceded them down the tunnel. Priscus didn’t know how many men there were but the sound echoing off the walls made it sound like an entire cohort. Every so often the guards stopped and there was a struggle and quite a lot of shouting. He had struggled to hear what was being said but the distorted sound in t
he tunnel made it impossible.

  There must have been a moment when he had blacked out because all of a sudden the group were much closer than they had been a blink of an eye before. Priscus edged himself as close to one of the support pillars as he could and watched the guards approaching. They were leading a woman by a chain. As they reached a pillar two down from the one Priscus hid behind they stopped. The woman was detached from her shackles and she began to kick and scream at the guards.

  Priscus winced as one of the guards punched the woman hard in the stomach. She began to wretch and fight for breath while her assailant leered above her. He grabbed at her bound wrists and she tried to fight him but the blow had knocked the wind out of her and she did little more than flail at him. He pulled her to the post and another guard took a minute to attach her chain to a ring on the pillar. With this done the party moved on, toward where he was hidden.

  Priscus was sure he must be seen as they approached, the torches gave off enough light that he could hardly be missed. They did miss him, however, passing by whilst making small talk amongst themselves as if they were walking toward an inn for a drink, not spending time chaining people up and leaving them in the dark.

  He waited until all he could see of them was a faint light in the distance, before struggling to his feet. The pain in his shoulder was now a dull ache, he could do little more than hold his left wrist in his right hand in order to take weight off his shoulder. He struggled along the tunnel using the rough earth wall for support.

  In the hours since he had begun his journey, to what he hoped would be Rome, he had become used to the total darkness. He had gone through the panic it had first induced and had almost begun wearing the dark like a coat. His ears had done most of the work. Every now and then he would stop and listen, the silence was reassuring. Now that he had seen the light of the torches the panic was beginning to come back to him.

  “Who’s there?” the woman asked in a terrified voice out of the darkness. She must have heard him sliding along the wall or seen his silhouette in the fading light further up the tunnel.

  “A friend,” Priscus said. His voice was almost a frog croak as he tried to speak through his parched throat.

  “Who are you?” she almost screamed at him.

  “If you shout they may come back and I won’t get the chance to set you free.” He managed to whisper through cracked lips. “I’m a friend. Stay still while I try to feel for your chains.” He felt the woman relax slightly and, using his good arm, tried to find the place where the chains were attached to the wall. There was a ring, not too big, bolted to the wooden support pillar. He thought that, given enough time, he could work it loose with his knife. The job would be made all the harder with the dark and his injured shoulder but he couldn’t leave the girl to die.

  “Who are you?” she repeated but a lot calmer than she had been.

  “My name is Priscus but it doesn’t matter for now, I can’t see what I’m doing so this might take a while but if you stay still I will try to dig the chain out of the wall.” He removed his knife from his belt and worked the point under the ring, digging into the wood. As he worked he tried to listen for the guards coming back down the tunnel.

  “How many of you are there?” he asked her after a while.

  “There were about two hundred I guess, they have chained us all up along this tunnel. I think I was the last.”

  Priscus thought about this for a moment. If they were chaining them up for the full length of the tunnel then that could mean he had made it almost to the far end. He allowed himself to hope this might mean the chance to escape and get help. A wave of dizziness passed over him and he had to stop his work for a second to gather himself.

  “Are you okay?” the woman asked.

  “I was injured before I entered the tunnel. I’ll manage,” he answered. He had managed to make a fairly deep gouge around the ring with his blade and he took hold of the chain to give it a pull but even with the woman helping he couldn’t even wiggle it.

  “I haven’t asked your name,” he said to her.

  “I’m Leda,” she said. “Thank you, Priscus. I can’t believe I’ve found someone to rescue me down here in the dark."

  He dug another chip of wood out of its place and grunted, “I haven’t saved you yet, Leda. Try to keep some pressure on the chain, it might help.” He felt her lean back and put her weight against her bindings. It seemed to help, the wood felt a little more pliant as he used his blade.

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  Ursus looked at the sun and decided the time must be about right. Timing would make such a difference to the whole plan. They needed the Risen to reach the end of the tunnel in time to catch Titus’ army unaware. To trap them between the Risen under the wall and those coming out of the tunnel would be exactly what Otho wanted. Titus was expected to be seen from the walls of Rome by the end of the following day and the distance to the far end of the tunnel was roughly twenty miles. There was no way of knowing how fast the Risen would move inside the tunnel, it was all guesswork.

  The Risen should keep moving forward because the slaves had been left as bait. His men had left early that morning trailing a small army of slaves with them. He had, he guessed, given them enough time to be clear at the far end, before the Risen caught up to them. A hidden opening at the far end had been made, large enough to accommodate the numbers that would need to get out of the tunnel but hidden from the sight of Titus’ expected route.

  If Titus found the opening, hidden in a large fistula of rocks, half a mile from the Via Tiburtina, the plan would be ruined. At best, he would be able to contain the Risen in the enclosed space and destroy them. At worst, he would block the exit and send the Risen heading back the way they had come.

  His men came around the corner carrying three large iron grills. They had been manufactured in Rome and carried by boat to Ostia. It took a dozen men to carry each one and they were still struggling with the weight. He watched as a couple of centurions gave orders and the grills were fixed into place. One on each side of the cage door and a third one that was lifted and fixed in place using a series of pulleys. When the building work was finished the gap between the cages and the tunnel was completely enclosed. It gave the undead nowhere to go but toward the walls of Rome and Titus’ waiting army.

  Finally everything was in place, Ursus turned to one of the centurions. “We go on my say so, stand a watch but don’t move until I return.” The centurion nodded and Ursus turned back toward the town and the second piece of business of the day. His men had been using a large house, close to the cages, as a base and it was there that he headed now.

  The windows of the house had its shutters drawn for protection. There weren’t many undead in Ostia but it didn’t pay to leave things to chance. The house had a gloomy feel to it as he walked through to the yard at the back.

  Outside, stripped to the waist and tied by the wrists between two upright posts was a beaten and bloody figure. His face was so swollen as to make him look like the statues Ursus had seen in African temples, all bulges and bug-eyes. Ursus stepped up to the man to get a better look at him but quickly stepped back after smelling the faeces that lingered around him.

  “My men tell me you won’t even tell them your name,” he said. It was of no consequence, for one thing the man would not live much longer, for another Ursus already knew it. His men had caught five men in Ostia, spies all of them. Four had been closed mouthed even in the face of their own deaths, including this one. The fifth, however, had made Ursus ashamed to be a Roman. He had told them the names of all his companions and confirmed that they were here to find out what was going on in Ostia. Ursus had ordered his eyes and testicles removed before he was thrown into the cage with the undead.

  “The rest of your men are dead, Sergius,” Ursus said and looked for the reaction on the man’s face. There was none, Ursus was beginning to like the man, traitor spy or not. “One of the
m told me everything I needed to know before I killed him. Well, almost everything. He didn’t know one thing, probably the most important thing.” He walked up and spoke close to Sergius’ face. “Exactly how much does Titus know about our little surprise?”

  Ursus straightened up and turned to the table behind him to take a drink. Ever since the bitch assassin had stabbed him in the throat with that needle of hers, his throat was constantly dry. He wondered if she had punctured whatever it was in his throat that produced spit.

  “It’s a simple enough question, Sergius. Were you sent here because Titus knows about our friends in the cages or were you just a scouting party who ended up in the wrong place at the wrong time?” He knew the man wouldn’t answer. He had withstood so much punishment Ursus doubted he would feel another blow to the face. He turned to one of his torturers. “Fetch me one of the Risen.”

  Ursus was gratified to finally see a reaction from the man in the chains. He lifted his head and tried to snarl at Ursus, the swelling on his face gave it a comical lopsided look. Physical pain didn’t seem to hold any fear for the man, but the thought of eternity wandering in an undead limbo apparently did.

  “Just tell me what I need to know, Sergius. It could all be over that quickly.” He kept using the man’s name, it was a trick he had used before, it gave the man in front of you the idea that you were his friend. By now the pain, exhaustion and hunger would be dulling his senses. Something as simple as someone knowing his name might just cut through the fog and get Ursus the information he needed.

  The legionary returned with a snarling, snapping young girl on the end of a length of wood with a loop of rope around her neck. It was the kind of thing you might use to control a savage dog or wild horse. The girl was no more than six or seven years old but she thrashed about, so that the legionary had real trouble controlling her.