The Leopard sword e-4
Page 33
‘We should leave. Arduenna will forgive me for what we’ve done here, but the longer we stay the more we risk her fury. Obduro may return at any time and find us caught like animals in a wooden cage.’
Marcus shook his head, handing the tracker the torch and gesturing to the corpse.
‘We need to go, and quickly, but not because there’s any danger of his returning. He’s led his entire army out, as you thought, but I doubt they’re hunting a grain convoy. It seems to me he has a far greater prize in mind.’
9
‘Mithras, but my back hurts. And I thought I was fit.’
Clodius glanced across at his tribune, grinning wryly at the look of gritty determination on Scaurus’s face.
‘It’s one thing to keep up with the men when we’re moving at the campaign pace, sir, but it’s charging along at the forced march that sorts the men from the boys. You’re keeping up well enough.’
Scaurus smiled tightly back at him.
‘Only because I’m not carrying anything like the weight your men are burdened with. How in Hades are the Hamians keeping it up?’
Clodius grunted.
‘That’s easy enough to explain. The first spear made the decision to keep them in the Ninth Century, but to distribute them through the tent parties rather than let them form their own groupings.’ Scaurus nodded, his thoughtful look telling the centurion that he already understood the point he was making. ‘Exactly. They’re surrounded by big strong country boys, farm horses to their racing ponies, and in the space of a few months they have become Tungrians. For every struggling archer there are two or three big lads who won’t let them fall by the wayside, so they’ll encourage them along, kick them along and even carry their kit for them if necessary. It’s not the Hamians that are worrying me, Tribune, it’s the legionaries. Should we drop down the column and see how they’re doing?’
Scaurus nodded and stepped out of the line of march, allowing his pace to slow to a normal walk, knowing that if he were to stop altogether the effort required to get his body moving again would be agonising. Clodius walked alongside him as the First Cohort’s long column ground past them like a monstrous armoured snake, the soldiers’ heads tipped back to allow them to suck in the day’s warm air. As each century’s centurion passed he saluted the two men with his vine stick, and Scaurus quickly realised that the sight of their commanding officers straightened backs and stiffened resolve, his men’s faces hardening against the march’s agony. After a few moments Titus’s men, the last of the four Tungrian centuries, marched steadily past with their heavy axes held over their shoulders, then the head of the legion cohort came into view behind them.
‘That’s not good.’
The tribune shook his head in agreement with his centurion’s softly voiced opinion. The legionaries marching behind the Tungrians were already looking like beaten men, trudging along with stooped shoulders and with only a semblance of the Tungrians’ tightly ordered ranks. Scaurus’s eyes narrowed at the apparent state of the legionaries.
‘The bloody fool would leave his first spear behind to teach him a lesson for getting friendly with us, and now he’s got no one with the balls to step up and do the man’s job for him. And there’s as much hope of Tribune Belletor instilling any determination into this lot as there is of him getting off his horse and showing them a good example. Colleague, how do we find you?’
He shouted the comment to Belletor as he rode into earshot, and the legion tribune waved a lazy hand in reply.
‘We’re well enough, Tribune.’ He smiled down at the two men from the height of his saddle, raising a sardonic eyebrow. ‘Enjoying your walk, are you?’
Scaurus nodded, grinning grimly in reply as he forced his aching body back up to the forced-march pace.
‘I wouldn’t say the word “enjoying” would be the first one that springs to mind, but it’s tolerable, thank you. And an officer soon gains some measure of the pain his commands inflict on his men when he goes about his business on foot. You really will have to try it some day. Perhaps even today, if the way your horse is nodding its head is any clue. Come along, Centurion, we’d better work our way back to the front of the column. Our men will hammer away the miles at this pace all day if we don’t stop them for the rest halt.’
First Spear Frontinius took a quick glance at the sun’s low position in the afternoon sky as his centurions gathered about him.
‘Here’s the thing, brothers. We’ve been marching for the best part of the day, and we must have covered a good fifteen miles, and yet there’s no sign of the grain convoy we’re supposed to be meeting. We have two choices: either to grind away to the west until it gets too dark to march, then set up camp and wait for them to arrive, or to turn round and head back to Tungrorum. We won’t be back in the city before darkness falls, but we brought a cart full of torches with us for exactly that eventuality, and a bit of night marching will be good practice. So I’ve decided to turn the column around and head back to the east.’ The men around him nodded their agreement. ‘Does anyone have a different view?’ There was silence. ‘Very well, get back to your centuries and get them turned round and ready to march. Just to make it interesting, we’ll start off at the forced-march pace and see how long we can keep them going that quickly.’
One of the 2nd Cohort centurions, a man Frontinius had known since they were both recruits, remained behind as the other officers dispersed to their commands.
‘At the forced march, Sextus? Is there something you’re not telling us?’
The first spear shrugged, a look of unease on his face.
‘Nothing I can put a finger on. I just know that I’ll be a lot happier when we’ve got this many men back to the city. I might have been wrong to only leave five centuries to guard the walls…’
A shout from the eastern end of the column snatched their attention, and the two officers turned to see a party of horsemen, thirty-strong, riding swiftly down the road from the city towards them. Ignoring the customary hail of abuse from the infantrymen, their leader trotted his horse down the column to Frontinius’s position, jumping down to salute briskly, and the first spear raised an eyebrow in greeting.
‘Decurion Silus. I presume you’ve not been sent galloping all the way down here just to give your animals a run out?’
The cavalryman shook his head, holding out a message tablet.
‘First Spear, a message from Tribune Scaurus. The bandits are in the field, and looking to take you from behind without warning from the sound of it. You’re ordered to reverse your march and make all speed to join up with the tribune. He’s coming west with the rest of the First Cohort.’
The first spear took the tablet, nodding to his brother officer.
‘There you go, that’s what’s been bothering me all day.’ A thought occurred to him, and he swung back to the decurion with a questioning look. ‘Silus, did you actually get eyes on these bandits as you came west?’
The decurion shook his head dourly.
‘No sir, nothing at all.’
‘So they might as easily have got round you to the east, and the tribune for that matter, and be moving on Tungrorum. Either way we need to head east at the double! Trumpeter, sound the advance at forced-march pace.’ As the horn brayed out the command for the column to start moving, Frontinius fastened the buckle on his helmet to make it tighter, winking at his friend. ‘Come on, then. It’ll be just like the old days, when that sour-faced old sod Catus used to beat us up and down the military road for a full day at the forced pace, and then expected an hour’s spear and sword drill in the dark at the end of it. You might even think he had a point, with hindsight.’
The late-afternoon sun was warming the walls of the Tungrorum grain store as Julius strode the short distance from the city’s south-western gate at the head of his century. He stopped in front of the store’s gate, waiting patiently until a familiar face appeared on the wall above him.
‘Centurion Julius! I thought you had orders to rema
in in the city and keep the procurator’s gold safe from prying eyes and sticky fingers?’
He grinned back up at the legion cohort’s first spear, gesturing to the cart behind him, a tent party of his century’s soldiers in place of the horses that would usually have pulled the transport. Felicia was sitting alongside the boxes of coin, and she climbed down from her perch to fuss over the cohort’s wounded, who were following behind in a second cart.
‘I had a short but meaningful chat with Petrus that convinced me that we needed to move before he bottled us up in the headquarters building. He’s got a hard-on for this money, and I can’t see him taking disappointment quietly. So here we are, with a cart full of gold and nowhere else to go. Can we come and join you?’
Sergius smiled, shaking his head.
‘So you bring me a few dozen soldiers and so much gold that half the city would happily tear us limb from limb to get their hands on it?’ He looked up at the sky as if questioning the gods, then turned back to his men inside the grain store’s compound. ‘Open the gate!’
The Tungrians ran their heavy load through the hastily opened gates, and Sergius climbed down to meet them, taking Julius’s offered hand with a broad smile.
‘Gold or no gold, it’s good to have you in here with us.’ He bowed to Felicia. ‘You are especially welcome, madam. In the event of an attack I fear that a lot of my men will be wounded.’ He turned back to Julius, waving a hand at the store’s massive, empty expanse. ‘One century of men to hold a facility the size of a legion bathhouse..? Your tribune may be a good man, but I think he’s allowed his balls to overrule his head on this occasion.’
Julius nodded.
‘We’ll just have to pray that the gods really have seen fit to send Obduro away to the west, because if he turns up here I can’t see you and I holding this place for very long against the equivalent of a full cohort.’ He unbuckled his helmet and pulled it off, grimacing at the sweat-stained arming cap nesting inside it. ‘And now, if you’ll forgive me, I’ve an errand to run in the city. You, soldier, help me out of this mail and make sure it doesn’t touch the ground once I’m out of it. I don’t want it covered in dust.’
Sergius watched in bemusement as his colleague unbuckled his belt and handed it to one of his men, then bent over and struggled out of his armour, dropping the heavy mail shirt into the soldier’s waiting hands.
‘You’re going back into Tungrorum in just your tunic? Is that wise? And why would you take such a…’
He fell silent as Julius fixed him with an implacable gaze.
‘A woman I loved a long time ago is being used as a bargaining counter by the local gang leader, who also happens to be our good friend Petrus. If I make any attempt to rescue her by force of arms I’ll have to cut my way through a hundred or so of his men, and more than likely as many of the locals as he can bribe or threaten into my path. It’ll be a bloodbath. I’ll lose more than a few men, and at the end of it I’ll most likely find her with her throat cut.’ He fastened the belt about his lean waist, leaving his sword in the soldier’s arms and taking only his fighting knife. ‘One man on his own though, that’s a different prospect. I can move quickly and quietly, come at them from an unexpected direction, and I have one nice little advantage that they don’t know about. I’ll be back within the hour, but if I’m not you’ll just have to forget me. Focus on keeping this place secure. And for what it’s worth, I’d be most worried about those granaries. The front wall’s easy enough to defend, but they could pick any point along either of the long sides and break through the wall, given long enough, and with the numbers we’ve got it’d be damned difficult to stop them.’ He looked about him. ‘Have you got any archers?’
Sergius shook his head.
‘No. Prefect Belletor doesn’t believe in encouraging the use of any but the standard issue weapons. You?’
‘No, our archers are all concentrated in one century. I’ll see what I can do while I’m inside the walls. I’ve got an idea that might allow us to keep Obduro’s men at bay for a while, even if it is a bit risky. It would help if you had a fire burning by the time I’m back, and some torches ready to go. There’s a stack of them on the cart.’
He turned away, one hand reflexively straying to the knife’s handle. Sergius put a hand on his shoulder.
‘Wait. A red tunic will stand out like a horse’s cock once you’re through those gates. You!’ He pointed to a soldier of similar build to the hulking centurion. ‘Get out of your armour and switch tunics with the centurion here.’ The legionary took one look at the determined expression on his officer’s face and put down his weapons, gesturing to his mates to help him unfasten his segmented armour’s complicated straps and buckles. Julius nodded and unfastened his belt once more, pulling off his own tunic to reveal his muscular body.
‘Appreciated, colleague. A different colour will be one more thing to give anyone that comes after me a moment’s pause.’ He winked at the soldier busy divesting himself of his equipment. ‘Mine was clean on today, so it doesn’t smell too bad. And I’ll try not to get blood on yours; it’ll never come out of white wool.’
Julius rapped at the city’s south gate with the handle of his dagger, hammering its iron pommel on the brass rivets that studded the door’s wooden surface.
‘Julius, Centurion, First Tungrians! I need to get back into the city! Open this door or suffer the consequences!’
With the sound of bolts being pulled back the wicket gate opened a crack, and a beady eye regarded him through the opening.
‘Leaving’s one thing, but letting you back in’s another. We’ve got orders from our commander not to admit…’
Knowing that his mission into the city would be over before it even began if the man on the other side secured the man-sized opening, Julius acted without conscious thought, kicking hard at the door and sending it flying open, battering the man behind it with a face full of wood. Stepping quickly through the doorway he switched the knife to his left hand and scooped up the fallen gatekeeper’s spear, looking grim-faced around him at the remaining two men.
‘Recognise me now, do you? I’ve private business in the city, and you’d be wise not to get in my way!’
One of the men, dressed like his fallen comrade in the uniform of the city guard, raised his hands in recognition of the Tungrian’s evident willingness to do them grievous harm, while the other backed away slowly, putting a hand to the hilt of his sword. Julius appraised him for a moment, noting the swirling tattoo that sleeved his right arm.
‘Petrus’s man, are you? I thought I caught a glimpse of someone just like you scuttling along behind us as we marched down from the barracks.’ He stamped forward without warning, slinging the spear so fast that the gang member’s sword was less than half drawn when the flying iron spitted him clean through the sternum. Julius ripped the spear free from the dying man’s body as he lay kicking and gasping on the cobbles, lifting the knife to the remaining gatekeepers. ‘It’s time to make a choice, lads. If I find this gate heaving with Petrus’s men when I come back it’ll be an inconvenience, but nothing more. And if you do sell me out, then once this is all sorted I’ll make a point of coming for you. And when I do, mark me well, what he’s going through now will look tame by the time I’m done with the two of you.’
The city’s streets were almost empty, Tungrorum’s population clearly having taken fright at the threat of impending violence by the gangs that ruled so much of their everyday lives. Whether it was fear of Obduro’s band or Petrus’s enforcers, hardly a soul was out of doors despite the fact that there was still an hour or so to sunset. Julius walked with swift caution into the maze of streets that was the city’s eastern quarter, deliberately taking a roundabout route to his objective in hopes that Petrus’s men would be concentrated mainly to the west. Hearing voices from a street that opened barely twenty paces to his left he ducked into a doorway and hefted the spear, ready to fight if need be, silently cursing himself for not bringing his sword.
Julius waited in the doorway, barely breathing, and after a moment a pair of men stalked past without sparing his hiding place a second glance, deceived by the way the white tunic blended with the house’s dingy paintwork in the shadowed evening light. Blowing out a long, slow breath of relief, he muttered a quiet prayer of thanks to Cocidius and, once the hunting gang members had vanished from sight, stepped back into the street with the spear held ready, shaking his head at the good fortune with which he had evaded discovery and muttering under his breath.
‘Enough of this subtlety, then.’
Moving quickly, sliding along the walls of the houses on the shadowed side of the street, he made a beeline for the Blue Boar, taking shelter in doorways at any suggestion of the men hunting for gold through Tungrorum. The voices of the hunters echoed through the empty streets on several occasions, but simple luck kept them out of his path, and soon enough he was within a hundred paces of the brothel, peering cautiously round the corner at its imposing bulk and measuring the time it would take him to reach the spot he recalled from his last visit. Without conscious thought he was moving, sprinting across the empty street and fetching up against the shrine with a scrape of hobnails on stone that echoed down the street.