‘So much for your oath.’ Serpentius went quiet for a while. ‘Are you saying we’re not normal?’
The rock-strewn hillsides echoed with their laughter.
XXIII
They rested for a day at Fanum because Valerius’s wound was acting up but next morning he felt fit enough to take the Via Aemilia towards Ariminum, with the hills a constant presence to their left, the misty grey of their peaks combining with leaden cloud to make land and sky a single claustrophobic entity. As they rode further north, Valerius felt the atmosphere around them change very gradually. It wasn’t something in the air, but in the people they passed. Faces that had been indifferent became first wary, then openly fearful. Beyond Bononia the road reached out into a flat plain of rich, dark-earthed farmland. Yet despite the evident prosperity they met few fellow travellers, apart from local farmers who scurried away when they saw them, and they found every door and window shuttered and closed against them. Valerius said it was as if they were approaching the heart of a plague-hit province. At the outer reaches the fear was little more than a shadow, but the closer you got to the centre the more it took form, until it materialized as a traveller dying by inches at the roadside or the disturbed earth of a new-filled grave. They found one Imperial way station closed and seemingly abandoned, and by the time they reached Regium Lepidum their animals were close to breaking down.
‘If we can’t change the horses here, we’ll end up carrying them,’ Serpentius complained.
The staging post at Regium formed part of an auxiliary cavalry base on the outskirts of the town. By now they were well used to the nitpicking pedants in charge of these places: petty officials who studied every word of the warrant, seeking a mistake that would allow them to refuse two mere civilians. This one was no different. The gate guard led them to a sour-breathed ex-legionary seated at a wooden table beneath a rough shelter overlooking the post’s exercise ground and horse lines. The man had a suspicious cast to his eyes Valerius didn’t like, and a wariness beyond the usual bureaucratic temporizing.
‘From Rome, eh?’ The clerk sniffed and threw the warrant back across the tabletop. ‘Not worth the paper it’s written on. First Nero, then Galba, now this Otho, and who’s to say he’s still the Emperor, eh? Or that whoever signed this is still in a position to enforce it? We hear there’s a new man, the governor of Germania, and he has the legions to back up his claim. It would be more than my job’s worth to hand out horses on the strength of this. Why should I risk that?’
‘Because if you don’t I’ll personally ram it down your throat,’ Serpentius pointed out cheerfully.
The man glanced towards the exercise ground, where two stable boys were collecting manure.
Valerius shook his head. ‘My friend here would eat them alive.’ He looked around the outpost and the depleted horse lines. ‘The post seems very quiet. Just a few guards and no one on the parade ground. That’s unusual in a cavalry fort. Who garrisons this place?’
Normally, the official wouldn’t have submitted, but the times weren’t normal. The thin one with the scarred head looked well capable of carrying out his threat, even if Didius and Philo intervened, which they wouldn’t. Traders, the warrant said … ‘Perhaps I can spare you a couple of remounts,’ he said carefully, pointing to the rail where his spare horses were tethered. ‘Take the two closest to us.’
Valerius nodded to Serpentius, and the Spaniard went to check the animals, which turned out to be a pair of bow-backed, short-legged specimens fit only for pack duty and as worn out as the mounts they had arrived on. ‘I think I’ll take a look at these.’ He pointed to the far end of the lines where a dozen or so fitter-looking cavalry horses stood with their noses in bags of hay.
The man rose from his chair in protest. ‘They—’
‘You didn’t answer my question.’ Valerius pushed him back into his seat.
‘Two troops of the Ala Siliana …’
So that was why the man was so nervous. The Ala Siliana had served under Vitellius when he was proconsul in Africa. Valerius, as his military adviser, had led them on punitive expeditions against the tribes in the hills south of Thevesitis, and ridden with them again in Egypt when they had been sent there as part of Titus Vespasian’s cavalry forces. Vitellius and the Siliana’s commander Tiberius Rubrio had been friends, and if the governor of Germania Inferior was looking for a powerful ally in Italia, Rubrio was the man he would turn to.
‘And where are they now?’
The administrator shrugged hopelessly. How had he become trapped up to his stupid neck in politics? He was only an insignificant bureaucrat whose sole joy was to make life difficult for people even less significant than himself. ‘They rode north the day after they heard Vitellius’s army was marching. They said Rome only has one Emperor, Aulus Vitellius, and I should remember that if I knew what was good for me. I didn’t know what else to do.’
Valerius ignored the self-pitying whine. ‘You say Vitellius’s army is on the move? Where and when?’ he demanded.
‘I don’t know for certain, but one of the troopers let slip that they were heading in the direction of Augusta Taurinorum.’
Valerius left him at the table, a small man overwhelmed by events he did not understand, but who could see trouble on the horizon as clearly as if it were a storm cloud. The two stable boys were preparing the horses Serpentius had chosen and loading the replacement pack animal.
He explained the situation to the Spaniard. ‘If what he says is true, Rubrio will have ordered his cavalry to prepare the ground for his old comrade from Africa. They’ll scout the length of the Padus valley and the mountain passes west of Segusio that control the road to Gaul, and try to work out which units will stay loyal to Otho and who will support Vitellius. Augusta Taurinorum means his main force is advancing down the Rhodanus.’ He frowned. ‘I would have thought he’d have waited another month, but I suppose it makes a kind of sense to act before Otho can gather his strength, even if conditions aren’t perfect.’
‘Does that mean we go back to Rome?’
Valerius thought it over. They could return and present the information to Otho, but some instinct told him that, even though his army was on the move, Vitellius himself would remain at Colonia for the moment. Winter campaigning might be fine for his legions, but the man who would be Emperor would wait in comfort a few more weeks. He shook his head.
‘If this fool,’ he nodded towards the administrator, ‘knows Vitellius’s legions are marching, Otho will already have heard from the governors of Belgica or Gallia Narbonensis. I think we can do more good by carrying on. We’ll push north and try to get past Placentia the night after next. If we stay clear of any troops we see, it will avoid any awkward questions.’
Before they left Regium, Valerius wrote out a dispatch for the Emperor, telling him what they had heard and that they would continue north. ‘Whether it will get through, or if he’ll act on it even if it does, is another matter, but maybe it will confirm someone else’s information. Who knows, he might even call off his hunting dogs?’
He calculated that it would take two days to reach Placentia and a further two to reach Mediolanum, where he would have a decision to make. The two main routes through the Alps depended on the high passes being open, and that was his greatest concern. He hoped to discover which, if either, was the more feasible. If he had a preference, it would be for the northern route, which he’d studied before he left Rome. It would take them by a safe road to Bilitio and then Curia, through the tribal lands of the Suanetes and the Caluci, and far enough from events in Germania for those tribes to be untouched by the conflict. But Valerius recognized that he might have no option but to take the westerly path. That would lead them to the eastern shore of Lacus Lemanus; too close to the advance of Vitellius’s legions for comfort. Either way, they would need a trustworthy guide who could be relied on to keep his mouth shut. The mountains were already visible as a hazy blue line on the far horizon, and he knew that despite the unseasonably mil
d weather on the plain the conditions would be very different in the high valleys. They would need winter clothing and to replenish their supplies, with little prospect of doing so until they reached the land of the Helvetii.
They rode in silence for another mile; then, without a word, Serpentius handed the leading rein of the pack horse to Valerius and turned his own mount round. Valerius watched him go and felt the hair rise on the back of his neck. By now he knew trouble when he saw it. The Spaniard was gone for an hour before he caught up.
‘We should camp by the road tonight. I do not think we have time to make the next town by dark.’
They exchanged glances and Valerius nodded. A few miles further ahead they found an open clearing in an olive grove close to the road. Valerius used flint and iron to light a fire and they cooked a legionary’s supper of porridge and bacon over the meagre flames, washed down with wine, of which Serpentius swallowed more than his fair share. The Spaniard began to talk loudly of their time in Africa and then roared out a legionary marching song of more obscenity than originality, urging Valerius to join in with the chorus. Valerius caught his mood and they sang and talked until the fire burned low. They set their blankets in the shadow of an ancient olive, leaving saddles and pack close to the glowing ashes. It was their second day of pushing hard and Valerius’s rough bed had never been more welcome. He closed his eyes.
When he opened them he took a moment to realize where he was. The ashes were dead, but the cloud-veiled moon provided what might be called light and created a tangle of contorted shape and shade below the olive branches. On the far side of the clearing something moved, something as swift and silent as a hunting leopard. Serpentius? But the Spaniard’s bed was where he had set it, with the shape of a man clearly defined by his blanket. The shadow moved again and now Valerius lost sight of it. His hand went to his sword, but he knew that whoever was hunting him had the advantage. The last thing he would know was the flash of dull iron in the moonlight and the sting of a blade at his throat. His eyes tried to drill into the night, and in a fleeting patch of lighter gloom there it was, slipping menacingly through the darkness towards him. Even as he watched, a second shadow seemed to sprout from the ground at the feet of the silent attacker. A flurry of movement followed and the two figures merged into one, wrestling and falling to the ground. Valerius rushed towards the struggling mass even as one of the shadows raised an arm ready to plunge his knife into the other. His arm snapped out by pure instinct and the man gave an awful cry as the point of the sword speared into his spine. As he slumped forward Valerius pulled the sword free and stepped back, shaking.
A wiry figure hauled himself free from beneath the shuddering body.
‘How did you know it wasn’t me?’ Serpentius’s voice held no hint of how close to death he’d just come.
Valerius could find no answer. The truth was that he’d reacted without conscious thought. Only the gods would ever know why he had struck. He stood on shaking legs above the man he had killed. Serpentius tossed him a wicked-looking curved dagger that glinted in the dull light.
‘The boy?’ the Roman choked.
‘I must be getting slow,’ Serpentius sighed. ‘At least he was alone. Better this way. He would never have given up: it was in his eyes. He was that kind of man.’
‘We humiliated him. Maybe that was a mistake.’
The veteran gladiator snorted. ‘His mistake. It wasn’t the humiliation or the pain that made him come. It was because he talked. His pride couldn’t bear that.’
Valerius stared down at the handsome young face that was already losing its definition against the bones of the skull. ‘We should bury him.’
Serpentius ignored the remark and wrapped himself in his blanket. ‘He can wait until morning. He isn’t going anywhere.’ When Valerius didn’t move, the Spaniard sat up. ‘Go to sleep, Valerius. It’s going to be a long day tomorrow and the day after and the day after that. And don’t waste your time mourning the boy. I have a feeling he won’t be the last corpse we see before we’re done.’
XXIV
It was still early when they reached the next town. In the middle distance they could see a queue of animals, carts and people at the gates. Valerius drew up his horse and pulled the map of Imperial staging posts from the knapsack tied to his saddle.
‘This must be Parma.’ He frowned. ‘What do you think?’
‘Looks like some sort of checkpoint. They’ll be questioning everybody who enters. Could be a patrol from the Ala Siliana, or maybe the town has declared for Otho and they’re keeping the rebels out. Friend or enemy doesn’t really matter. We don’t want to get involved.’
They turned off to the right, through anonymous nut-brown fields criss-crossed by trackways and drainage ditches, avoiding the rough huts, farmsteads and occasional small villas that dotted the fertile countryside. Valerius studied the landscape around them. Away from the Via Aemilia the country was free of the threat posed by the bigger garrison towns. Politics and war held no sway here, only the all-encompassing, unbreakable cycle of the seasons and the weather. He felt the gait of his mount alter as its hooves pushed into the soft earth and the bitter-sweet scent of the soil filled his nostrils. The very land exuded a kind of eternal peace that he prayed would never be broken by the armies gathering beyond the western and southern horizons. East, too, because by now Otho’s messengers would have reached the legions in Noricum, Pannonia, Dalmatia and Moesia and it could only be days before they marched to meet the threat from Vitellius’s army.
Serpentius caught his mood. ‘It’s good to be away from the road for a while.’
Valerius smiled. ‘Yes, but don’t be fooled. This tranquillity is deceptive. Somewhere not far from here land just like this was fertilized by the blood and bones of thousands of legionaries who marched north to stop Hannibal’s advance on Rome. They failed, but their sacrifice was not wasted, because the delay and the freezing weather killed off all but one of the Carthaginian war elephants.’
Serpentius made the sign to ward off evil; the nearest he would ever come to showing fear.
Without warning, a hole appeared in the previously unbroken layer of cloud blanketing the sky above them and for a few seconds a shaft of sunlight burst through to turn some hamlet on the far horizon into a glittering jewel. For no reason, an image of two towns they would pass on the way north appeared in Valerius’s head as they had on the map he had studied less than an hour before. Cremona and Placentia had been founded as military camps to protect Italy from the Celtic tribes of what was now Gallia Transpadana, the lands between the Padus and the Alps. It struck him that, along with the river that divided them, they formed a kind of intricate brooch that held the four corners of the Empire together; a Celtic knot that had to be unravelled before any invader could enter the Roman heartland from north, west or east. Vitellius would have to untie that knot if he wanted to secure the purple. Unless Valerius could persuade him to accept Otho’s offer the Rhenus legions would be marching this way, and it was possible that here on this rich plain the future of Rome would be decided. He felt a physical pain at the thought. Was it not enough that they had risked everything to rid the world of Nero? Now Romans must suffer for the greed and ambition of his successors. A kind of hardness developed inside him, as if a stone grew to fill his belly and chest. Gaius Valerius Verrens had never shirked a challenge, but this was his greatest test. He had to succeed, because if he did not war was coming. A war that would divide friends. A war between brother and brother. The worst kind of war. Civil war.
By the time they sighted Placentia Valerius’s legs chafed against his mount’s flanks and man and beast were weary beyond measure. Even Serpentius rode slumped in the saddle. They had little option but to enter the city, if only to replenish their supplies and seek fresh horses. But the lure of a bed after days of having the cold earth clawing through their blankets and into their bones provided an added incentive. Dusk was falling when they reached the town, which guarded the only crossing point
on the Padus for twenty miles and was surrounded by stout walls that showed recent signs of repair. As they made their way to the entrance, Valerius noticed Serpentius cast a sour glance at the city’s amphitheatre, a massive wooden structure that dominated the cluster of streets beyond the original city boundary. The former gladiator had fought for his life in a dozen stadiums like it and his friend reflected that it was no surprise he had little love for such places or the people who frequented them. The heavy wooden gates had already been barred and a decurion stepped sharply from a rough hut in the shadow of the twin towers that flanked them. Four spearmen appeared at his back and raw, suspicious eyes looked the two strangers over. Valerius saw the grip on each spear tighten when the men noticed the Imperial brand on their horses.
‘Your names and your business?’
‘Gaius Valerius Verrens, on the road to Mediolanum, and this is my freedman, Serpentius of Avala. We seek a room for the night.’
The decurion had the lined face of a man who’d been forced to make too many tough decisions lately. He studied the Spaniard, taking in whipcord muscles and the menace in the dark eyes. ‘Freedman, eh?’
Valerius shrugged. ‘These are dangerous times. Even a humble trader in wheat and barley needs protection. We are on our way to negotiate a price for the next harvest with the farming commune of Claudius Cornelius, though I fear our timing could be better.’
‘I’ll grant you that,’ the soldier agreed. ‘But still I cannot allow you entry until I know where your loyalty lies.’
‘A trader doesn’t concern himself with politics, only with profit,’ Valerius said airily. ‘But Marcus Salvius Otho was still Emperor when I left Rome, and it is in his name this travel warrant is signed.’ He handed over the paper and the decurion studied it. ‘Will that suffice?’
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