4.Conspiracy of Eagles

by S. J. A. Turney

  The legates were taking turns on duty at the bridge construction site and, fight it all he could, today was Fronto’s turn. He’d woken with a feeling of dread and disgust, only to discover that the thong on which his Fortuna pendant hung had broken and the lucky charm itself had vanished somehow, despite never having left his person outside his tent.

  It was a bad omen.

  As was being summoned by the centurion of the works, via a tired looking legionary with a bruise on his face the size of his hand – the result of yet another accident.

  With pulse racing, Fronto stepped the last few yards of the great turf and rubble embankment and placed a foot warily on the timber walkway of the bridge.

  Eleven deaths and twenty eight wounds – seven of them crippling – in just four days of work. Fronto had been determined not to add his own name to that grisly list, and had had a small tent erected near the bridge from which he could watch the work in the safety and comfort of the shelter.

  And now, despite all his precautions, ill luck and the actions of others had conspired to bring him to this point: standing on the recently cut and shaped timbers, watching the grey-brown torrent rushing past below, visible through the side-rail. The bridge wanted him, of that he was beginning to become convinced.

  With a deep breath and a nervous swallow, he took a step forward, alarmed at how the beam bowed very slightly beneath his foot. Lifting it urgently, he retreated a pace. The legionary beside him, sweating from his exertions and wiping away blood from a narrow cut on his forehead, frowned.

  “It’s alright, sir. It’s just settling very slightly. There’s going to be a small amount of give until it’s properly bedded-in. Once a few carts have been across it it’ll be solid as a rock.”

  “And in the meantime, I’m supposed to trust my weight to wood that bends?”

  “Look, sir.” The legionary grinned as he jumped up and down heavily on the plank, his hobnailed boots leaving small indentations, clouds of sawdust billowing out from beneath the walkway. Fronto grasped the rail in horror, holding on for dear life.

  “Stopthatstopthatstopthatdstopthat!” he rattled out nervously.

  “Safe as houses, sir.”

  “I’ve been in houses that have fallen down. Come on.”

  Swallowing his nerves, he took three quick steps before allowing himself a breath. The bridge seemed unnaturally high, and the far bank distant enough that the woodlands covering much of it blurred into a single mass of green.

  Tearing his gaze away from the far side and the river rushing beneath him, Fronto fixed his eyes on the centurion standing close to the current work site at the far end of the walkway, a small group of workmen and engineers gathered around him. Avoiding thinking further on the planks beneath him, he concentrated instead on the men.

  They stood in a knot around a small mound that was barely recognisable in shape – just a grey-brown lump on the timber surface.

  “Legate?” the centurion saluted as he approached. Most of the workers turned and followed suit, others unable to do so due to the burdens they bore.

  “Your man tells me we have another fatality to add to the list.”

  The centurion gestured to the men around him and, saluting, they scurried off past Fronto toward the landward end of the bridge, their passage shaking the timbers worryingly. Fronto gripped the rail until his knuckles whitened and frowned as he looked down at the dirty lump that lay between the two of them. The last workmen lowered their burdens and moved off out of earshot at the centurion’s gesture. Once they were alone, the centurion crouched by the body.

  Fronto couldn’t help but notice with a heart-stopping realisation just how close to the open end of the bridge the man crouched. A strong gust of wind might just blow him back into the water. He resisted the urge to tell the centurion to come away from the edge. Gingerly, he crouched to join the strange conspiratorial tableau.

  “Well?”

  “I tried not to let too much on to the men, sir, but we fished him out from the debris where the next pile was being settled half an hour ago. He’s been in the water a day or two now at least.”

  The centurion reached out and rolled the bloated, discoloured thing onto its back so that Fronto could see what he was explaining. The legate felt the bile rise in his throat and had to swallow it and steady himself with his fingertips on the timber floor. The body was barely recognisable as a human, the skin blue-grey and bloated, with a waxy sheen. A green tint of algae had mixed in with the black, curly hair, along with scum and weed. The man’s white tunic had been stained an unpleasant grey-green.

  “Not pretty, is it, sir.”

  Fronto shook his head, trying not to breathe too deeply.

  “We’ll have to try and check into missing soldiers – see if we can identify him.”

  “That shouldn’t be hard, sir.”

  Fronto frowned in incomprehension. “Meaning?”

  The centurion reached out with a pointing finger and jabbed the stained tunic. “A white tunic, sir. Not a red one. He’s an officer, not a legionary.”

  Fronto blinked. How had he missed something so obvious? A white tunic. His eyes ran down from the face, past the shoulder and to the upper arm. Yes. There it was: a broad stripe. A senior tribune.

  He rocked back on his heels and nearly fell as he realised he was looking at the days-old, bloated corpse of tribune Pleuratus, Caesar’s personal courier. He’d assumed the man was still mooching around the camp waiting for the general’s summons to ride back to Rome.

  “How the hell did he end up in the river?” Fronto asked quietly, already acknowledging the cold certainty in his belly that it had been no accident.

  “That’s one of the reasons I sent everyone away as soon as I’d had a good look at the body, sir. Rumour will get out, of course, but not for a day or two.”

  His pointing finger moved on from the white tunic to the bloated grey-blue flesh of the man’s hands and lower arms. A dark, black ring ran around the wrist. A glance across at the far side confirmed that the mark existed on both wrists.

  “His arms were bound?”

  “Behind his back, I believe. There’s similar marks on his ankles. The rope’s gone somehow. Don’t know whether the knot had come undone, or maybe a fish ate it or something, but whatever the case, the rope’s gone. That means I can’t confirm it, but I’m pretty sure whoever did it tied a big rock behind his back and dropped him in the water. I’d guess they expected it to sink into the mud and disappear, but the rope’s come away and the rock’s sunk, so the body’s floated up to the surface.”

  Fronto stared at the tribune’s body. A horrible suspicion was beginning to form in his gut.

  “Do me a favour, centurion, Keep a lid on this as long as you have to. Threaten all the men who were here or bribe them; whatever you have to do to stop this becoming common knowledge. Help me wrap him up in that sacking over there and we’ll take him to the medical section for now.”

  * * * * *

  “I thought there’d be wine and dice. The ‘loose women’ thing was too much to hope for, but one expects at least wine and dice in the tent of the great Fronto.”

  The legate of the Tenth allowed his customary scowl to do its work in quietening Priscus and then sat back on his bunk.

  “I thought, given the nature of this conversation it would be worthwhile being as sober as possible, though I have to admit to the temptation to be otherwise.”

  He turned to Carbo. “Did you station men like I asked?”

  “Not a man within earshot and no one will get near without trouble. They’re all good, honest men – as far as such a man can be found in Rome these days. The three nearest tents have been uprooted and moved just in case. Now, break the spell and tell us all what’s so damn suspicious that we need such privacy?”

  Fronto allowed his gaze to wander past Carbo and then Priscus, over the rest of the men he’d called to the tent. They represented every man whom he trusted with his life. Each man in this tent he wou
ld willingly leap in front of a pilum for and he was almost certain the same could be said in return. In a way it was an impressive thing to ponder on, but pondering on it too much led to a certain dismay at the diminished number of them, and at the missing faces he would have on that list: Velius and Balbus particularly.

  Representing the Tenth: Carbo, Atenos and Petrosidius, the chief signifer and a long-standing colleague. Priscus: the camp prefect. Varus and Galronus of the cavalry. Balventius, the primus pilus of the Eighth. Crispus, the legate of the Eleventh and Galba, that of the Twelfth.

  Nine men.

  Nine men he felt he could trust beyond reason and word.

  Nine men that he would accept the opinions of and who felt at ease speaking to him as though to a friend rather than a superior or colleague.

  “It’s about these deaths” he said flatly.

  “Deaths?” Crispus sat upright. “You mean Tetricus? I was hoping to share a libation with you to his memory after the funeral, but duty seems to have kept us apart. There are more deaths than Tetricus?”

  Galba shuffled in the seat next to him. “Others caused by… by Romans?”

  Fronto sighed. Time to fill in all the missing details.

  “I realise that we’ve been almost constantly active since we met up in Mediomatrici lands. We haven’t had the customary weeks of reacquainting ourselves and we haven’t had our usual social meet-ups. Let me give you a bit of a rundown.”

  Holding up a hand, he extended his forefinger.

  “Publius Pinarius Posca. I expect some of you know the name. I didn’t. Nephew of Caesar; son-in-law of his eldest sister. He set off from Ostia on the same trireme as myself, as well as Galronus” he nodded at the Remi chieftain who was nodding grimly, “and also the Pompeian centurions Fabius and Furius from the Seventh, and Menenius and Hortius – those peacocks in the Fourteenth. It would appear that we all separated as groups for our journey north. Whether Pinarius took on local guides and guards I don’t know. I assume so, as he hardly seemed rugged and capable – I suspect he was still breast fed into his twenties. Either way, he only made it as far as Vienna, north of Massilia, where he was dispatched with a single pugio thrust to the heart. Stabbed in the back and buried under firewood.”

  The number of surprised looks shared by the occupants of the tent clarified just how little had been said about this.

  “Caesar’s nephew?” Balventius sat forward. “Murdered en route to the army? What has the general done about it?”

  “Precisely nothing. He seemed to be less than impressed with the poor young moron. In fact, he seemed to think it would make his life easier; it was certainly hardly advertised. I was intending to investigate as much as I could and I made a few enquiries, but the business of war has somewhat impeded any investigation.”

  Crispus frowned. “You should have enlisted us all.”

  “At the time, I thought it better to keep it as low-key as possible. Things have now changed.”

  “So,” Varus said, hissing through his teeth as he moved his slung arm without thinking. “So, you’re convinced that the person who put a Roman knife in Caesar’s nephew stuck the same knife in Tetricus? It does seem rather too much for coincidence.”

  Fronto and Galronus were both nodding.

  “It gets better, Varus. The head wound I saw the medicus about a few days ago was not, as is generally believed, a drunken fall. I know the rumours my reputation sows, and in this case I’ve fostered the rumour. But in fact, the thing that nearly took the top of my head off was a sling bullet. Someone hidden in the trees tried to send me to Elysium hot on the heels of Tetricus. Less than an hour later, in fact.”

  Carbo and Atenos exchanged glances. “Then we need to tighten security in the Tenth. It’s time you formed yourself a bodyguard like legates are supposed to.”

  Fronto shook his head in irritation. “Firstly, I can quite do without having half a dozen men accompany me every time I go to the shitter. Secondly, I want to catch these bastard murderers in the act, not make it impossible for them to strike. If they’ve failed to get me once, they’re likely to try again, so I need people to keep their eyes open around me rather than stand with their shields raised.”

  The nods around the room were accompanied by the soft burble of low conversation. Fronto waited for a moment and then cracked his knuckles as he took a deep breath.

  “There’s more to it yet, though.”

  Silence fell, leaving an expectant vacuum.

  “A couple of hours ago, while on duty at the bridge, the centurion in charge hauled a body out of the Rhenus. He’d been there for around three days by the medicus’ estimate. We’ve kept the lid on this so far, but it’ll get out into the rumour mill soon enough. The man was Caesar’s personal courier, a former senior tribune in the Ninth.”

  Priscus unfolded his arms, leaning forward. “Pleuratus?”

  “The very same. Tied to a rock and dropped in the river so that we’d never know had the ropes not come away.” He took a deep breath and leaned back, steepling his fingers for a moment until he realised just how much he must look like Caesar in such a pose and quickly unknotted them.

  “So that’s the situation. Three men dead: Caesar’s nephew, his private courier, and my senior tribune, along with one attempt on my own life. And things seem to be speeding up. Before anything else happens, I think we need to try and shine a light on the culprits. So what links us all and who might want us all dead?”

  Galronus scratched his chin and looked around the group of friends. “Am I stating the obvious when I mention Fabius and Furius? Where have they been on each occasion?”

  “They claim, as you know, to have been travelling separately to Pinarius. They were certainly in the thick of it in the Germanic camp when Tetricus was first attacked. Other than that, Tetricus’ murder, the attack on me and the drowning of Pleuratus have all happened in camp. We can enquire about the pair, but the chances of being able to narrow down their exact location are tiny, especially with Cicero hovering protectively round them like a mother hen.”

  “But you suspect them” Priscus said quietly – a statement rather than a question.

  “I would like to. People keep telling me that it’s my prejudices against Pompeian veterans serving with us, but I hope not.”

  “As an outsider – of sorts” Atenos added, alluding to his Gallic origins and his centurion status, “I would have to point out that if the attackers were anti-Caesarean, then the link is fairly self-evident.”

  “Go on.”

  “Well. Caesar’s own kin. The man to whom he entrusts his personal letters. Yourself?”

  “Me? I argue with the hard-faced old bastard more than anyone in the command.”

  “Yes,” Priscus said quietly, “but usually to save him from himself. You’ve been supporting the man all the way through Gaul. You defend him when he’s attacked. Whatever you consider yourself, to an outsider you’re Caesar’s man through and through.”

  “And what of Tetricus?” Fronto said calmly. “He’s no Caesarean man.”

  “But he’s yours. Perhaps that’s enough.”

  “Or” Varus added quietly, “that’s something different entirely.”

  All eyes turned to him.

  “Well I’m sure I’m not the only person who saw those two centurions cast the evil eye over Tetricus in a briefing a while back. There’s no love lost between the three, I’d say.”

  “So is that what we think?” Fronto said quietly. “That two men, possibly even still in the pay of Pompey Magnus are taking opportunities to do away with Caesar’s closest or most important men?”

  “It seems feasible at least.”

  Fronto nodded as his mind furnished him with a damning image of Furius and Fabius gripping a broken pilum and a bloodied knife. How to get them to reveal themselves without Cicero interfering? Now that was the next problem.

  * * * * *

  Something was clearly screwed up with the planning, that much was certain. Fronto s
tood looking at the ramp from his little duty officer’s tent and thought dark thoughts about Priscus, the man who was almost certainly responsible.

  He had never been that good a student and mathematics was far from his strong point but, to his mind, they were on the eighth day of bridge construction and there were eight legionary legates present. How he had drawn the duty twice was not a question of mathematics, but one of wicked intent.

  Priscus.

  He could almost see the camp prefect grinning as he made the marks on the duty roster by the flickering light of the oil lamp in his tent.

  An unseasonal shower had woken the legate before dawn, pattering on the leather of the tent roof, and had not let up all morning, finally beginning to penetrate into the parched, cracked, dry ground, softening the turf and dampening the moods of the men in general. The drizzle seemed set in for the day, pattering down from a pale grey, gloomy sky and slowing work on the bridge, making conditions on the slippery timber piles even more dangerous.

  Still, it would soon be over.

  The great span of Caesar’s – Mamurra’s – masterpiece stretched out across the wide Rhenus towards the far bank, with only three sections remaining to be put in place. The engineer had confirmed that the bridge would be complete by nightfall the next day – a spectacular nine days and almost to the unrealistic schedule that Caesar had set. Of course, the engineer had set his estimate back by a day this morning, given the turn in the weather, but even ten days was still an astounding feat.

  And Fronto had to admit that when he’d taken the morning stroll across the completed sections, they now felt as secure as any bridge he’d ever crossed.

  He paused in the act of giving himself a shave with his dagger and listened intently, frowning. There had been a change in the general distant murmur of noise. Only a tiny change and only for a fraction of a second, but a change that any experienced officer would spot instantly.

  He was already running, pugio sliding back into the scabbard at his belt, when the cornu rang out with the warning call. As Fronto pounded up the ramp and onto the slippery timbers, he could already see men running back across the bridge. Behind him almost a century of armed and armoured legionaries answered the call, running onto the ramp, shields held ready and blades out, preparing to leap into action.