by George Green
Brutus looked back down the hill. ‘Your friends just made a meal of those Romans,’ he said.
She looked in wonderment down at the remains of the Roman pursuers. ‘They went alone?’ she said. ‘Just the three of them?’ Brutus nodded. ‘And you let them? You let them go without me?’
‘We didn’t know where you were,’ said Drenthe, breathless from running back up the hill. ‘They knew what had to be done.’
The woman’s face hardened. ‘You let them fight without me? Let them die and me live?’
Drenthe drew herself up. ‘This isn’t a time for thinking about yourself.’
‘We swore an oath.’
‘The gods will understand.’
‘I should have been with them. We have always fought as one.’
‘You were not here, or you would have accompanied them. Now I need you alive and here.’
The bodyguard drew her sword. ‘I cannot stay here while their work is not finished.’
‘It would be a waste,’ said Drenthe. ‘Stay. There will be other opportunities to avenge them.’
She smiled. ‘You ask what I cannot give. My oath binds me.’
‘Your oath is to me.’
She made a courtly gesture. ‘My oath to you is great. You are my Chief. My life is yours to command, and I will die for you.’
‘Then I command you to live now.’
The bodyguard pointed down the slope at the Roman soldiers standing and lying on the grass at the edge of the trees. ‘Not while my sisters fight down there and I stand here.’ She kicked the horse’s flanks once and cantered down the hill, the horse’s front legs jabbing rigid into the turf.
Brutus let out a sigh and drew his sword. Drenthe put a hand on his arm.
‘Stay,’ she said. ‘This is not your fight.’ Brutus didn’t speak. He smiled at Drenthe, then held up a palm to Decius to indicate that he was to stay with her. He and Serpicus exchanged glances. Galba held out a hand which Brutus clasped briefly and then he pushed the horse forward. The slope allowed the tired animal to get up speed. By the bottom of the hill both horses were at full gallop and thundering straight for the soldiers at the tree-line.
There were a dozen dismounted soldiers in front of them. Eight could still ride and carry a sword. As soon as they saw the woman coming down the hill towards them with Brutus not far behind the officer jumped onto his horse, shouting orders. The other soldiers tried to join him, but the horses were still nervous from the fight and several of the legionaries had difficulty keeping them still enough to get on their backs. The wounded men tried to mount too, but needed help and so delayed their friends. By the time the two riders reached the Romans only half a dozen men were mounted and riding to meet them. Brutus held his sword at his side. The woman with him rode with an arrow fitted to her bow-string and two more clamped between her teeth. Her first shot took the officer through the upper sword-arm. He dropped his weapon with a hiss of pain and swung away. Before the sword hit the ground another soldier was falling from his horse with an arrow through his side. There wasn’t time for a third shot and she hurled the bow at the men closing on her and drew her sword.
Two Romans rode straight at Brutus, one approaching from each side. Serpicus watched, the situation cutting through the fog in his mind. His friend was in a bad position. A horse-soldier is trained never to allow this situation to develop; whichever one he strikes at, the other has a clear chance at him. Had Brutus been carrying a shield he could have dropped the reins, blocked one attack with the shield while striking with his right arm and hoping that his horse would keep galloping straight, but he had only a sword.
Serpicus stood up on the crest of the hill and called out involuntarily. He had seen this fight before, and the lone fighter always lost. Brutus was a dead man. Serpicus was too far away to see exactly what happened next, but he saw Brutus’ arm come up high, and the sun catch his blade as it twisted in his hand. The Roman on his right threw his arms back and fell from his horse. The other Roman reached Brutus a moment later and slashed down at his head, but Brutus was no longer there. He had swung his legs over and jumped down holding the pommel of his saddle. His feet hit the ground as the Roman’s blade flew across the horse’s back where he had sat a moment before. The horses were past each other and he leapt back into the saddle. He was safe, but unarmed. He swung the horse to the left, to where Drenthe’s bodyguard had run into a clump of four Romans. She had unhorsed one and left him dead on the ground and was now fighting a second man who was defending himself left-handed, his right arm smashed and useless. The other two were working their way around behind her and she had to keep changing the angle of her attack to stop them striking her from behind. Only the ferocity of her assault and the nimbleness of her mount were keeping them out of reach, but she was hard pressed.
Brutus rode up behind the Roman with the broken arm and, as the Roman raised his sword to chop down at her, seized the man’s wrist and yanked it backwards hard. Serpicus thought he heard the sound of the bone cracking from where he was standing. Brutus snatched the man’s sword and smashed the pommel backhanded into the man’s face. With both arms broken the Roman had no defence, and the blow sent him backwards over the horse’s rump.
‘He’s good, you have to give him that,’ said Galba judiciously.
Now the odds were even. Serpicus saw one soldier raise his sword to parry a blow, but Brutus brushed past his defence and a moment later the soldier rolled sideways, his head caved in. At the same moment the bodyguard feinted left then swung right and her sword went under the soldier’s guard and into his side.
They turned to face the remaining Romans. There were five of them, but only one was armed and still on horseback, and he was leaning forward, bent over as if hurt. A couple more seemed fit to fight but were on foot The other two were kneeling on the ground, obviously badly wounded.
There was a pause. For a moment Serpicus thought the Romans would charge, then he saw the two dismounted men take a step backwards behind the wounded horseman. They were defending their casualties, not pressing the attack.
‘Leave them,’ he murmured urgently.
Brutus walked his horse slowly in an arc around the Romans and went into the forest. The woman stayed, watching the Romans, who didn’t move.
‘What’s he doing?’ asked Decius.
‘Looking for more Romans. Can’t get enough of them,’ said Galba.
‘Looking for my guards,’ said Drenthe, watching intently.
For a hundred heartbeats nothing happened, then Brutus reappeared alone and went back to where the woman was waiting. Drenthe shielded her eyes to watch as the two horses walked slowly back past the injured Romans. Suddenly she gasped and cried out, ‘Watch him, look…’
Serpicus saw one of the Romans raise a bow behind the woman’s back. Decius called out quietly, as if realizing it was too late and too far. The woman beside him toppled backwards from her saddle and fell to the ground.
Brutus didn’t hesitate. In a moment he was amongst the Romans, slashing with his sword. The man who had shot Drenthe’s bodyguard died at once, his head split as he fumbled with the bow. The other uninjured man turned to run and lost his head to a single swing of Brutus’ sword.
The three remaining men knelt with their hands raised in surrender. Brutus advanced on them with his sword raised, then stopped and turned the horse and went back to where the woman lay still. He looked down at her for a long moment, then pulled the exhausted horse round and rode slowly back up the hill.
Serpicus took several quick paces forward until he was standing beside Brutus. He put a hand on his friend’s arm and looked up into his face. Brutus smiled, but his expression was strained. Drenthe came to stand beside Serpicus carrying a waterskin and motioned that Brutus should get down off his horse. He shook his head.
‘Better stay put,’ he said quietly.
Serpicus and Drenthe could both see a red stain on Brutus’ tunic and blood running steadily down his thigh and off his saddle. If he once got off hi
s mount he might not be able to get back on it.
Galba came up beside Brutus. The two men looked at each other and both nodded silently. Decius saw the blood and gasped involuntarily. He put a trembling hand on Brutus’ arm.
‘It’s all right, lad,’ Brutus wheezed. ‘Doesn’t hurt.’
Drenthe turned away decisively and remounted.
‘All gone?’ she asked Brutus, looking back at the forest.
He let out a sound like a sigh. ‘Surrounded by dead Romans. It must have been some fight.’
She nodded slowly, as if considering the information. ‘They kept their promise,’ she said simply, and turned away. ‘Come, there will be more Romans. The forest will protect us.’
Chapter Thirty-Four
They rode their tired horses through the trees until late afternoon. Decius rode beside Brutus all the way. At the beginning Brutus growled at him to keep his hands to himself, but by the end Decius was preventing him from falling to the ground, and Galba was doing the same on the other side. The stain was spreading across Brutus’ tunic and blood was dripping off the end of his foot.
The forest thickened and they slowed, allowing the animals to rest.
They came to a clearing. The ground was dark and mossy underfoot. The trees around it were almost leafless and the weak sun in the northern sky barely filtered through the thin branches.
‘Better give the horses a break,’ Drenthe said. Serpicus could feel his mount trembling with exhaustion underneath him. The animal’s wind might already be broken; even if not, he would take a long time to recover.
Serpicus went to help Brutus off his horse but was told by a silent look to leave him alone. The wounded man warned Decius off the same way, and then very slowly dismounted. He slumped against a fallen tree covered in dark moss.
Serpicus swung stiff legs off his horse and slid off the saddle. The toe of his shoe hit something solid in the thick grass, something like a large stone, but it wasn’t heavy and it made a dull metallic noise. He bent down and picked it up.
It was a Roman helmet.
The leather straps were almost rotted away to thin knotted strings and the metal was covered with verdigris, but the shape was unmistakable. He turned it in his hands and a peaty smell rose from it.
‘What’s that?’ asked Decius. Serpicus passed it to him without answering. Decius took it and his eyes widened.
‘Romans? When have they come this far into the forest?’
Galba appeared behind him. ‘Didn’t they teach you any history?’ he said. He took Decius by the arm and turned him around. ‘Look.’
The trees were closely arrayed and cloaked in shadow, and Decius had to lean forward to see where he was indicating. He let out a startled yelp and took two quick paces backwards before peering intently into the gloom. He looked as if something large and unpleasant might be about to come flying out of the forest straight at him.
Serpicus glanced around, and suddenly saw what Decius was looking at.
Every tree looked misshapen in the shadow. The straight dark lines of the trunks were broken up with bulbous knots that looked like cooking pots, and strips of material hung from them as if cloth and sticks had been roughly bundled together and tied there.
Except that they weren’t cooking pots, or bundles of cloth, or sticks tied together.
Serpicus moved closer to the nearest tree. A rounded protuberance half-way up the trunk suddenly resolved itself. He saw teeth, eye-sockets, and the white bone of the skull. The left side of it was caved in and there was an arrow driven deep through one of the eye-sockets.
Next to that tree was another. A thick branch extended almost horizontally at chest-height, and from it three skeletons hung upside down, nailed through the ankles to the living wood. One leg on the nearest skeleton had worked free, as if struggling to release itself from its bonds, and it now hung sideways like a broken piece of rigging. A breeze moved the branches, and from all around the forest there was the groan and clack of bone rubbing on bone. Everywhere he looked, Serpicus saw bones nailed to the trees, bits of what might once have been men hanging from branches, and skulls lying on the ground like mushrooms. There were broken weapons too, and everywhere under their feet rotten pieces of uniform and equipment.
Serpicus had been here before. He knew what this place was.
‘Varus’ legions,’ he whispered softly.
Decius looked at him. ‘Varus? The one who lost the Eagles?’ he said.
‘Yes.’ Serpicus looked around and a shiver ran across his shoulders. ‘Even when the Romans eventually defeated the tribes and retrieved the Eagles, Germanicus never found exactly where Varus’ last stand took place. He tortured dozens of captives, but they never spoke of it. No one would tell him where it was.’ Serpicus realized that he was almost whispering. ‘This is a sacred place.’
‘Anywhere in Germany where a Roman dies is a sacred place,’ growled Drenthe. She trotted off to scout the clearing.
Decius looked around. Everywhere the empty skulls of men leered back at him. ‘There must have been hundreds of them.’
‘Three legions in total, and their camp followers.’ Serpicus gestured to the west. ‘There were bodies strewn all along the trail, but the final fight took place some distance away.’ He could remember it all, see the storytellers around the camp fire, hear their voices rising as they told the tale. ‘The Romans had been in the dark for days, and we had killed hundreds of them without them even being able to see us. Romans are used to the sun; it was as if they sought it out before they died. So they pushed deeper into the forest, looking for a clearing. When they found one, they made their stand.’ Serpicus looked around. ‘It was a larger space then. There was a great fire that day. The flames cleared the land so that the trees were able to grow back more thickly than before.’
Galba looked at him with curiosity. ‘You were here?’
Serpicus nodded. ‘I was too young to fight, but I was here.’
Decius looked around. ‘Have you noticed how quiet it is?’ he said.
Serpicus listened. He was right. No birds, no rustling undergrowth, no animal cries. They seemed to be the only living things there.
A branch snapped and everyone turned towards it. Drenthe came out from the gloom. ‘Nothing useful that I can see,’ she said. ‘All the weapons were taken away. Everything left behind is broken or rusted through.’
‘Nothing left but spirits,’ Serpicus said, surprising himself. Drenthe raised a wry eyebrow.
‘I never had you down for a superstitious man,’ she said.
‘I’m not,’ he said, feeling embarrassed.
‘If it is true that something lives on after a man dies,’ said Decius, ‘then this is the sort of place where you would be able to sense it.’ He had a strange expression on his face.
There was a pause. Drenthe stood with her fists on her hips and looked at them both with amusement. ‘Did your grandparents have a lot of fun sending you to sleep with ghost stories?’ she asked.
There was a sharp report nearby, a branch cracking under its own weight. Decius and Serpicus both jumped and then pretended they hadn’t.
‘There are Romans chasing us,’ said Drenthe. ‘D’you think perhaps we should give that matter some attention?’ Serpicus shook himself as if to get rid of a damp cloak that someone had draped over his shoulders, and tried to look attentive. She pointed towards the afternoon sun. ‘They will come from that direction. We can either go back into the forest and hide, or we can stay here.’
‘Come on then,’ said Decius. He turned to help Brutus, who was sitting leaning against the fallen tree with his eyes closed. His skin was pale. He held up a hand.
‘I’ve come far enough,’ said Brutus in a distant rasp, quite unlike his normal voice. ‘I’m going to stay here.’
His face was lined with pain. Serpicus bent over him and started to lift his shirt to check the wound underneath. Brutus put a hand on Serpicus’ arm to stop him. The touch of his palm felt dry, like onion skin
left out in the sun all day.
‘Leave me alone,’ he said quietly. ‘I’m done. I can’t walk, I can’t ride. I can’t stand being dragged through the forest any more. Give me a bow and a sword and leave me here. I’ll keep them talking long enough to give you a chance.’
Decius shook his head. ‘No. We won’t leave you.’ A tear ran down his cheek and he sat down on the fallen tree beside Brutus. He looked around at the others. ‘We can’t just leave him.’
Brutus managed to smile at Decius. ‘You know you must. My day is almost finished. No point in us all dying here.’
Serpicus glanced up at Drenthe. She met his gaze for a moment and then looked away. Serpicus took Brutus’ hand and held it. Galba came and stood beside him. Brutus smiled and Serpicus felt his fingers press against his palm. ‘Go on, you two,’ he said huskily. ‘Say hello to the girls in Ox’s for me.’
Galba leant a bow and a dozen arrows against the tree. ‘You think they’ll remember you?’
Brutus smiled. ‘Oh, I think one or two of them will.’ A brief shadow of pain passed over his face. ‘Drink my health with them when you see them.’ He winked slowly at Serpicus. ‘Go, now. The Romans can’t be far away.’
Serpicus stood up and pulled Decius to his feet. ‘Come on,’ he said. Decius hesitated and wiped his sleeve across his eyes. Brutus looked at Decius for a long moment, winked at him and then turned away.
Decius stood looking at Brutus, his face contorted with grief and indecision. He looked at Serpicus for help. Serpicus stepped forward and handed Brutus his sword. For a moment Serpicus thought that Decius was going to hit him. Then the tears started to run down Decius’ face. He turned away and plunged into the forest.
Brutus watched him go. ‘Look after him for me,’ he said.
‘Of course,’ Serpicus said.
Drenthe silently raised the handle of her sword to her forehead in salute. Brutus nodded to her and she turned to follow Decius. Galba followed, leaving Brutus and Serpicus alone.
‘What exactly would you like me to tell Ox’s girls for you?’ Serpicus asked, uncomfortably aware that his voice was roughened with emotion.