They stepped back, looking up nervously as the leaves above them started to rustle and the wicker man began to twist and sway as the man ascended higher.
Thumelicatz glanced at the swinging man. ‘Careful, Hrulfstan, don’t shake the branches so much.’ The pace of the climb slowed and the wicker man’s movement lessened.
A cry of alarm followed by the creaking of straining ropes caused Thumelicatz to jump back. ‘Get down!’
The strained creaking grew; two huge logs, sharpened to points at either end, swung down from the treetops, lengthways, arcing through the clearing so that at their lowest point they were chest high, passing just either side of the altar. The creaking rose in tone and volume as the logs swung through to their zenith, straining at the hemp ropes, pausing for a heartbeat at the extreme of their pendulum, before reversing their direction.
As they flashed back through the clearing it became apparent that they were not independent but, rather, joined by a thin iron blade at their centre that passed between the top of the altar and the feet of the wicker man. ‘That was designed to slice anyone in half who tried to take the man down.’
‘Nice lot, these Germans,’ the street-fighter growled, as the logs swung back through with lessening force.
‘And you think you Romans are nicer because you crucify people or throw them to the wild beasts?’ Thumelicatz asked, getting to his feet.
‘Another fair point.’
‘Aldhard, cut the ropes.’
The swinging lessened; Aldhard grabbed the logs and stilled them. His men began sawing through the ropes with their swords; they did so cautiously stepping back quickly as they cut each one, looking nervously up at the trees, but no more traps sprung from the heights.
‘Can you see any more ropes up there, Hrulfstan?’ Thumelicatz shouted.
‘Just the rope for the wicker man, my lord.’
‘He can’t see any more ropes up there other than the one supporting the wicker man,’ Thumelicatz translated for the Romans, ‘we should be safe to approach it.’ He climbed onto the altar and stood up so that his head was knee-height to the wicker man. ‘They’re made so that they can open, for obvious reasons,’ he said examining the thick wickerwork. ‘This one opens along either side; we’ll have to get it down.’ He drew his sword and stood on tiptoe; the end of the blade just reached the rope that hung dead-centre between all four trees disappearing into a thin mist that still clung to their dark, upper reaches. He started to saw; two of his men came to stand either side of the altar to catch the wicker man as it fell. The rope thrummed as the sharp edge worked its way through it.
Thumelicatz sawed harder as the strands of the rope sprang back, one by one, until there were only a couple left. He looked down at his men, checking that they were ready to catch and then worked his blade for the final cut. The rope parted; the loose end flew up into the trees and the wicker man fell, its feet landing with a crunch on the altar. His men grabbed the legs, preventing it from toppling in any direction as a faint metallic ring sounded from above. Thumelicatz thought for an instant and then turned his head up towards the noise as the sun broke through the mist; his eyes and mouth opened in alarm as flashes of burnished iron dropped out of the canopy like lightning bolts. ‘Donar!’ he shouted at the sky.
Two swords plummeted down from above.
A blade entered his throat at an exact perpendicular, slicing its way down through the internal organs until it came to a jarring halt on the base of the pelvis. The second hit the altar, bending and rebounding with a thunderous roll. Thumelicatz shuddered; his eyes focused in disbelief at the hilt just before them protruding from his mouth, like some cross perched upon a hill of execution. Blood flowed freely around it, trickling into his beard. He knew that his oath had not been cancelled. His legs started to buckle; a grating gargling sound exploded from his throat and blood slopped onto the pommel and the twine attached to it, leading up into the mist-shrouded branches. He fell against the wicker man, pushing it back off the altar, its centre of gravity being too high for the shocked men holding it to support it. Leaving an arced trail of blood globules marking his descent, Thumelicatz fell with it, crashing onto its chest as they hit the ground and then bouncing up slightly, owing to the springiness of the branches woven together. As he thumped back down a second time the wicker man broke open; a bundle wrapped in soft leather rolled out. His eyes began to mist over, white and swirling; as the younger brother picked up the bundle, he could see that it was heavy; it was the Eagle, he knew it.
Thumelicatz looked at the younger brother holding the Eagle and felt triumph as the life seeped from him; Rome had her prize and she would use it to lead her armies away to the north. Rome was about to make her greatest mistake. Germania, the land of All Men, the land his father had liberated from the conquest-hungry empire, was safe for generations. Safe to breed warriors, safe to grow strong, safe to wait until the time was ripe for Germania’s tribes to burst out from their dark forests and crush the hated empire.
The white mist thickened and Thumelicatz knew that he would soon meet his father, Erminatz, for the first time; he would be able to stand tall in his presence, look him in the eye and revel in the fact that between them, father and son, they had ensured a Germanic future for the West. With a final effort he grasped the hilt of the sword to ensure that Walhalla awaited him.
The mist became complete and all was white; white as the frost of the Ice Gods.
AUTHOR’S NOTE
This work of historical fiction is based upon the writings of Tacitus, Suetonius, Cassius Dio, Josephus and Velleius Paterculus.
Thumelicus was born in Rome and was forced to become a gladiator. Tacitus says that he will tell us of his fate at the appropriate time; the fact he never does points to it being part of the missing text, either 30–31 or 37–47, thus giving me the freedom to have him still alive at the time of the story.
As a hostage in Rome, Arminius would, more than likely, have lived in Drusus’ house as it had been to him that Siegimeri had surrendered and given his pledge. Because of this I have felt free to have him be a part of the elite society of Rome and to be befriended by Lucius Caesar. Lucius’ excessive character is my fiction but not out of the question.
Arminius was given equestrian rank by Augustus.
Gaius Caesar did go on a mission to Parthia to conclude a treaty with Phraates V; there is nothing to suggest that Lucius went with him, although Sejanus did go as one of the tribunes. Phraates was the son of Musa, a hetaira who had been given, illegally, by Augustus to Phraates IV as part of his negotiations for the return of the Eagles lost at Carrhae. Josephus tells us that she married her son but that was too much for the Parthians and they were overthrown.
Lucius died in suspicious circumstances in Massalia in AD 2; Sejanus being a part of his entourage is my fiction. Gaius did die two years later forcing Augustus to recall Tiberius – coincidence?
Tiberius was planning a mass invasion of the Marcomanni in ad 6, planning to push all the way to Maroboden, modern-day Prague, when news of the Pannonian revolt came through. He spent the next couple of years suppressing the revolt and Arminius served with him as auxiliary cavalry prefect. Varus being present for the invasion of Bojohaemum was my fiction.
The Battle of the Teutoburg Wald I have based mainly on Cassius Dio’s account of the four-day fight, which happened pretty much as described. The tribes did join in, one by one, and there was a terrible downpour. With the fantastic work that Major Tony Clunn did to identify the site of the final day at the Teutoburg Pass, it’s now possible to walk much of the ground – and I highly recommend a trip to the museum if you are ever that way. Paterculus tells us of Eggius’ surrender, Vala’s flight with the cavalry and Caedicius holding out at Aliso.
Strabo is the only writer to preserve Thusnelda’s name although it is Tacitus who tells us that Arminius abducted her whilst she was engaged to another; that it was Adgandestrius is my fiction.
Tacitus gives us good accounts of Ge
rmanicus’ campaigns and I have based my narrative mainly on them. For those of you who wish to read more on the subject, I can recommend Rome's Greatest Defeat, by Adrian Murdoch.
Arminius and Flavus did have a conversation across the river before the Battle of Idistavisus and Flavus did end up losing his temper. Arminius was wounded before the final battle at the Angrivarii Ridge and that was blamed for his less than lustrous defence. Tiberius did recall Germanicus before the re-conquest was complete, ostensibly to celebrate his triumph but, more probably, because he was jealous of Germanicus’ success.
Arminius was killed by a kinsman; whether it was Flavus and Segestes we do not know but I felt that they seemed to be the appropriate two to do the deed.
Publius Gabinius did retrieve the Eagle of the Seventeenth in ad 41. To find out how he gets it you’ll just have to read Rome’s Fallen Eagle!
Although this is a stand-alone novel it is connected with Rome’s Fallen Eagle in that I conceived the idea for writing the story of Arminius’ life when Vespasian meets Thumelicus in that book. Both books therefore share a couple of chapters although they are told from different points of view, Thumelicus’ and Vespasian’s. I hope, dear reader, that you will forgive me for repeating myself.
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
I would like, as always, to thank my agent, Ian Drury, at Sheil Land Associates; I wrote this book over four summers and the encouragement he gave me in the third of those summers when I was in the depths of writer’s despair was invaluable. My thanks also go to Gaia Banks and Melissa Mahi in the foreign rights department. My best wishes for you in your new job, Melissa.
Thank you to everyone at Atlantic/Corvus, especially Sara O’Keeffe and Will Atkinson and their continued support for my books. Also thanks to Louise Cullen, Alison Davies and Lucy Howkins, to name but a few, for all their work on my behalf.
Thanks again to Tamsin Shelton for doing such a thorough copy edit and wheedling out all those little gremlins that my eyes just can’t see.
Finally, thank you to the two people who always come along with me for the ride: you, dear reader, and my lovely wife, Anja.
Also by Robert Fabbri
THE VESPASIAN SERIES
TRIBUNE OF ROME
ROME’S EXECUTIONER
FALSE GOD OF ROME
ROME’S FALLEN EAGLE
MASTERS OF ROME
ROME’S LOST SON
THE FURIES OF ROME
Coming soon…
ROME’S SACRED FLAME
SHORT STORIES
THE CROSSROADS BROTHERHOOD
THE RACING FACTIONS
THE DREAMS OF MORPHEUS
THE ALEXANDRIAN EMBASSY
Coming soon…
THE IMPERIAL TRIUMPH
First published in hardback in Great Britain in 2017 by Corvus, an imprint of Atlantic Books Ltd.
Copyright © Robert Fabbri, 2017
The moral right of Robert Fabbri to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted by him in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act of 1988.
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without the prior permission of both the copyright owner and the above publisher of this book.
This novel is entirely a work of fiction. The names, characters and incidents portrayed in it are the work of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or localities, is entirely coincidental.
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A CIP catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.
Hardback ISBN: 978 1 78239 700 7
Trade paperback ISBN: 978 1 78239 703 8
E-book ISBN: 978 1 78239 702 1
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