EMPIRE OF SHADES

by Gordon Doherty

  ‘But what happens after that?’ the other said. ‘How do we get down those stairs?’

  Molacus’ gaze traced over the sea of tents as, one-by-one, the Gothic people and the legionaries drifted away from the fires and turned in. ‘There’s got to be another way off this thing,’ he murmured, first glancing at the pair of Gothic warriors guarding the top of the rock-cut stairs and the other few watching the rest of that southern edge, then at the black, unguarded north, east and western edges of the plateau. Word was that it was sheer and safe from attack on those sides.

  The last few chattering voices faded, and the final few bubbles of light within tents blinked away into darkness. Molacus gestured for his crony to wait for his return, then rose to his haunches, stealing across the legionary tent area, staying low so as not to be seen by Pulcher and Stichus. As he passed each tent, he heard a variety of noises that he would soon no longer have to suffer: the frantic squelching of one legionary in the throes of self-pleasure, another snoring like a boar, and a third farting so hard Molacus feared the man might just have passed his own spleen. And all too soon, he was free of the Claudia area and safely veiled by the night. He crept along the western edge of the plateau, hands patting the grassy tufts of the brink so he would not stray over the edge, eyes straining to see anything that might resemble a way down. Far below, he saw just a few pin-pricks of light, dotted around the forest. The fires of Hun foraging parties, he realised. Not so many that we won’t be able to dodge around them, he mused confidently. So on he went, around the northern edge of the plateau. But still no hint of an alternative way down. Grumbling, he worked his way along the eastern edge, his last hope. Just when he was drawing back closer to the legionary tents, he halted, his fingertips feeling something. Just below the precipice was a rocky ledge – little bigger than a foot. He edged one boot down onto it then gingerly felt out and a little lower with the other… another outcrop! he mouthed. Another set of steps? When he found a third outcrop leading further down again, he halted, then twisted back in the direction of the Claudia tents – Pavo’s in particular. Tempting as it might be to make a break right now, alone, I’m not giving up my chance to cut open that bastard’s throat. And I’ll need his coins and my dullard of a tentmate to shield me should we run into the Huns. He looked down in the direction of the unseen steps. But first I need to make sure this leads all the way to the forest floor so we can make our escape once the deed is done.

  He took a deep breath and continued to edge his way down the perilously narrow steps, back pressed to the bluff-face as he did so. But as he descended, his triumphant visions of slitting Pavo’s throat faded, his every sense instead turning to an odd noise nearby. Whispers, carried on the night breeze. So faint, but definitely real. He craned his neck to look up towards the bluff edge, wondering if someone was up there. But the point from which he had descended had been quiet and deserted, he was sure. And he was too high above the forest floor for whispers to carry up here, surely.

  Molacus shook away the distraction and carried on until his foot found not another crude step but a less-narrow ledge of sorts. He carefully stalked along the ledge, left hand staying in contact with the bluff-face, leading foot seeking out another downwards step at the ledge’s far end. When the sensation of rock on his fingertips vanished, he halted, his hand hovering over an opening of some sort. A cold, deathly breath stroked the back of his neck: the whispers suddenly took on a new form of life in the shape of low, sibilant voices.

  ‘The worthy will prevail,’ one voice droned from within the opening.

  ‘Vesiii…’ many voices whispered together as if in reply, unseen but right beside him on the ledge.

  Molacus’ head turned to the sound, terror scampering through his guts like a rat.

  Pavo woke with a start. The short, sharp note of some cry, quickly cut short, had penetrated his blessedly dreamless sleep. An owl or some other night hunter, he supposed. He stared at the roof of his tent for a time, churning over the freshly awakened troubles: so many people relying on him to be their saviour, a river swollen and dangerous determined to thwart his efforts, and the Huns… eventually, he accepted defeat. Rising and throwing on his tunic and boots, he ducked under and out of the tent flap. To his pleasant surprise, he spotted Sura, sitting by the embers of the main campfire.

  ‘You’ve thought about it too?’ he said, sitting next to his friend.

  ‘The way back?’ Sura replied.

  ‘Aye,’ Pavo sighed. ‘The rope rail and shield-float might work for the warriors here, but not for their families. The old ones, the women heavy with child and the tots, they will need a safe crossing. Good, sturdy boats.’

  Sura nodded in agreement. ‘And the Danubius’ waters will stay swollen until late summer. Even good boats must be guided carefully in those churning waters.’ He dug at the earth with a twig. ‘There is that point in August when the waterline falls and the current eases. That would give us time to build boats. But…’

  ‘But that’s nearly four months away. The way they’re talking, some of the men seem to think we’ll be back at Novae by tomorrow night.’

  Sura shrugged and clapped a hand onto his shoulder. ‘I’ll break the news. I’m good at that kind of thing. The Negotiator, they used to call me – the silver-tongued legend of Adrianople.’ His smug look crumpled as he added: ‘Until the day a fellow asked me to find him a whore for a good price. I picked one – a nice one too, and brought her to him. Turned out it was his daughter. His guards were brutal: one held me and the other put on hard leather boots and volleyed my balls over and over.’

  Pavo chuckled, but the humour soon faded. He looked over his shoulder towards Scapula’s tent.

  Sura followed his gaze. ‘Scapula knows nothing. About what happened at Sirmium. About any of it. We were just two faces in a crowd of many.’

  ‘I told you what Saturninus said. Gratian is on the scent. He found my plumbata.’

  ‘One of a million,’ Sura said with a dry chuckle, ‘just like you, Brother.’

  Pavo slapped his shoulder, both rising. ‘Until morning.’

  ‘Until morning,’ Sura grinned, then left him.

  As Pavo approached his tent, he noticed the usual posting of men by the entrance was absent. His top lip flickered in annoyance and he made a note to confront the offenders in the morning. Just before he reached the tent though, big Pulcher stalked into view, shoving one of the ex-Batavians over towards the spot one sentry should have been occupying.

  ‘I’m sorry, sir,’ Pulcher said. ‘Stichus and I finished our stint, but there was some confusion. Molacus and this one were supposed to be relieving us,’ he made eyes towards the dripping water skin, now hanging flat. ‘Molacus didn’t show up but this one did, insisting his partner would only be a latrine-visit late. Then I got to my tent and looked back over and saw this one trying to slouch away. Left your tent unguarded, the bastard.’

  Pavo stared at the ex-Batavian until the man’s spirit crumpled.

  ‘I’ll stay on for another three hours with this mutt, sir,’ Pulcher volunteered. ‘Show him how it’s done.’

  ‘Aye, that would be best. I’ll make sure you have a night off the next time it is your turn,’ Pavo said absently, rubbing his temples as he finally ducked inside his tent.

  As the tent flap fell shut behind him, he froze. A figure sat in there, cross-legged, by his bed roll.

  ‘Scapula?’ he said quietly.

  ‘Ah, Tribunus,’ Scapula said, his eyes glinting like opals.

  ‘What are you doing in my tent?’ Pavo growled.

  ‘I noticed your usual night watch was momentarily absent, so I took it upon myself to sit this lonely vigil.’

  ‘Did you,’ Pavo said in a desert-dry burr.

  ‘Many strangers lurk on this rocky height, Tribunus,’ Scapula said. ‘And within your own ranks, I see malice. The Batavian pair, they are not trustworthy. They salute and smile when you look upon them, but then when you look away, I see how their faces chang
e. Baleful and scheming, they are.’

  Pavo and Scapula remained locked in a stare for some time. ‘Dismissed,’ Pavo said at last.

  ‘As you command,’ Scapula whispered, rising like an offering of black smoke and wafting past, leaving to a muffled chorus of surprise from Pulcher. Pavo slumped to sit where Scapula had been. The speculator had saved his life earlier today, and had now taken it upon himself to watch Pavo’s tent. And the Batavian thing – did Molacus and his cronies still bear their old grudges?

  Just then, he noticed something awry. In the corner of his tent, his armour and weapons had been disrupted. The shield had rolled a little away from the simple timber frame from which his scale vest hung. He stepped over to right it, then noticed something: on the rear side, the plumbatae – each branded with the mark of the Constantinople fabrica – were clipped in upside down. Pavo’s eyes darted madly. Scapula had been inspecting them.

  Chapter 10

  They rose on the morning of the third day at the plateau to a warm sun and clusters of pillowy cloud drawn across the sky by a clean breeze. Pavo stood back, helm underarm, letting Libo and Sura lead the roll-call on the eastern tract of this strange new home. The men of the cohort shouted their replies when their names were read out, while the Goths of Arimer watched on, bemused by the procedure. Every barking reply throbbed in Pavo’s head. And then…

  ‘Molacus?’ Libo called out.

  Silence. The same as yesterday.

  Pavo turned away.

  ‘Molacus,’ Sura tried again, resignation lacing his voice.

  Pavo saw from the corner of his eye the slight movement of his men around the gap where Molacus should have been. A firebrand, true enough, but a veteran nonetheless and in that sense indispensable. He walked to the southern edge of the plateau, lifting one foot onto a boulder there to gaze out over the woods. ‘Where are you?’ In the distance to the south he saw glimpses of the Danubius, meandering through the land like a murky green ribbon.

  Had the Batavian fallen back into old habits and fled his post? A Gothic archer claimed he heard someone creeping around on the night Molacus was last seen.

  ‘Same as yesterday,’ Sura said, moving up beside him.

  ‘I heard,’ Pavo said.

  ‘Should we question the Goths again?’ Sura whispered.

  Pavo shook his head. ‘We can’t. They trust us and we need that to continue.’ Last night, they had shared meat and beer again. Pavo had noticed a few of his soldiers talking with Eriulf’s men, them in rough Gothic and the Goths in broken Greek. Some played dice. Another group decided to have a wrestling match: Goth vs Roman. Opis ended up as a mangled wreck, and no other legionary stepped forward to take on the bull-like Gothic champion. ‘Forget Molacus. Once a deserter, always a deserter,’ he averred in a low murmur.

  ‘He was a strong soldier,’ Sura mused, ‘But strong, swift… and clever enough to pick his way off of this rock? I’m not so sure. We should ask his Batavian crony again. He’s hiding something.’

  ‘I could question him for you, Tribunus,’ the snake-voice of Scapula cut in. Somehow, the black-robed speculator had appeared beside them, like a living shade.

  Pavo’s face hardened, hand moving under his cloak towards his spatha hilt. ‘You will obey my commands as any of my legionaries would.’

  ‘As you wish,’ Scapula half-bowed.

  Pavo wondered just what the speculator had garnered from the inspection of his darts the other night. The markings would be the same as the one he tried to throw at Gratian in Sirmium. But the fabrica at Constantinople had surely made many thousands of darts all with the same stamp. Gratian’s noose suddenly felt slack and wide, incapable of tightening around his neck as a culprit.

  ‘You are a strong leader, just like your predecessor, I am led to believe,’ Scapula added.

  The hairs stood on Pavo’s neck.

  ‘Gallus, wasn’t it?’

  Pavo stared into the half-shade of Scapula’s hood. One glinting eye betrayed a hint of something: playfulness? Realisation? Gallus had despised Gratian and Gratian had known this. Pavo had been Gallus’ protégé… had Gratian known this too? Suddenly the wide noose rasped as it drew right in.

  They gazed at one another for what felt like an eternity.

  Until a hand slammed on Pavo’s shoulder. ‘It is time to spill blood,’ Eriulf said.

  Pavo – only just managing not to leap from his skin – swung to the reiks. Eriulf wore hunting mud-streaks on his face and leaves and moss on his knotted, spiked hair and had donned dark brown hide garments, just like that first day he and his men had surprised the Claudia cohort. He flicked his head to the southern steps leading down into the forest. ‘Our meat supplies dwindle again, the berries have spoiled and our barley is low. We need to forage and hunt. I have despatched eight parties already but we need more. I am about to head out with my best huntsmen. You should come too.’

  Pavo thought of the woods and the roaming Huns, then of his own words. We need them to trust us. He looked around the Claudia men: itching like caged animals up on this cramped high ground. Centurion Libo bounced his false eye off a rock like a ball, over and over. Opis was polishing his already immaculate mail. Stichus was organising the grain from his ration into patterns on the ground.

  Within the hour, Pavo followed Eriulf and a clutch of eight Gothic warriors down the steep, stone-carved steps. He noticed Runa, the daughter of the missing Arimer, was with them, painted in mud and dressed as a hunter too. Pavo had accepted the offer of hunting clothes and wore just a Gothic hide tunic, his legionary boots and carried a tribal self-bow and a Gothic spear. Opis, Stichus, Libo and Sura were his chosen hunter-companions.

  They hopped across the bog-moat one by one, coming to the thick pine woods. Eriulf motioned with his hands like a blade, first to the left, ‘boar forage near the streams there,’ then to the right, ‘deer roam in grasslands that way. I will lead the boar hunt with my men. You, Roman, catch rabbits and hares. Runa, Siward, show them the way.’

  Pavo couldn’t help but feel he had been given a child’s task, but said nothing.

  ‘And be mindful that the Huns are all over this land. They hunt us as we hunt game,’ Eriulf added. With a parting look, he led his party off in a careful run, heads switching left and right, knowing they were both predator and prey.

  Siward’s lips twitched in a sneer as he looked over the Romans. Runa eyed them as one might regard a fresh cat turd. ‘Move fast, in my wake. Strike when the bird sings, yes?’ she cupped her hands to her lips and made a harmonious, trilling call.

  Pavo nodded, then she turned away from him and leapt on into the woods with Siward. The legionaries scurried on behind her. Her tail of blonde hair swished as she bounded over every raised root or fallen tree like a doe. They sped through a stand of pine, then crept round an opening where a waterfall tumbled into a tarn, before fighting through a jungle of tangled gorse. Come mid-morning they saw a band of light and emerged into a green meadow freckled with red poppies and yellow, honey-scented broom. The grassland stretched all the way to some low hills in the distance. At once it felt as if they had escaped the oppressive woods forever, the sun’s warmth splashing across their skin.

  Runa slapped away the momentary elation, turning her hard face on the legionaries then speaking like a stonemason’s chisel striking rock. ‘Slow!’ Her eyes were fixed on a point in the middle of the meadow. Pavo saw a cluster of small brown shapes there. One of the hares’ heads shot up, ears erect, nose twitching.

  She held a wetted finger in the air to check the direction of the wind then flicked her head to beckon them round the edge of the meadow to stay downwind of the hares. She slowed once again, drawing the bow from her back and nocking an arrow to the string, ‘The key is to loose as one, for they will scatter after the first strike.’

  ‘You think because we are Roman we have never had to hunt for our food?’ Pavo muttered, drawing his own bow.

  ‘You have slaves drop boiled goat and garum in your
mouths do you not?’ she snorted.

  ‘I was once that slave,’ Pavo snapped back, ‘and since then, I’ve ground my own flour with my men, caught game like this and worked hard for every morsel I’ve ever eaten.’

  ‘It’s true,’ Sura piped up, ‘even that time Quadratus farted on his bread for a laugh, he still ate it.’

  Pavo shot Sura a look sharper than a dagger.

  Sura shrugged in a protestation of innocence.

  ‘Be silent, and draw,’ Runa hissed.

  Seven bows creaked. One hare’s head shot up again. Twang!

  The arrows rained down and the husk of hares shot off in every direction like the pieces of a shattering bowl. Three shapes lay still, run through with arrows.

  Runa and Siward shared a look of self-congratulation then looked at the Romans. ‘Three kills. One of you at least can shoot.’

  ‘Assuming that you two are responsible for the other downed pair,’ Pavo scoffed.

  ‘I definitely hit one,’ Sura replied. ‘Back in Adrianople, they used to call me “The Archer”. Made a killing, I did, hustling citizens out of their coins by challenging them that I could shoot a follis off the top of a post. Kept me in wine and posca money all summer that year… until someone put me off by coughing and I accidentally shot the governor’s horse in the arse. Thing went crazy, throwing the governor and charging up and down the street. I hope the fellow with the cough is proud of what he caused. Personally, I-’

  ‘Runa,’ Libo interrupted, ‘how do you say “shut the fuck up” in the Gothic tongue?’

  Runa’s hard face twitched a little then – a tendril of humour almost taking root. ‘Enough, let’s collect the hares then seek out more.’

  They roped the slain hares to their spear poles then trekked on across the meadow. When they spotted a pair of deer grazing, they crouched and froze: this would be a fine catch and feed many mouths. Pavo noticed how the hills beyond were low but steep, and might act as a corral into which they could drive the deer, were it not for a cleft in the landscape.