The centurion’s frown was back. ‘Why do you want to go that way? It’s longer, worse terrain, and they say there are bandits and rebels near the mine regions. Sounds like you’re looking for trouble to me.’
Rufinus shook his head. ‘Look… it’s complicated. And a bit secretive. I want to get to Alburnus Maior to comply with my orders from Rome, but the Dacian governor has sent me to Porolissum. I’m hoping to find a way to do both, but it relies upon your willingness to escort us via a strange and troublesome route. All I can do is ask you to trust me.’ He tried to plaster a trustworthy expression on his face, though was fairly sure such an expression just made him look constipated.
Narcissus stretched, and Rufinus was once more reminded of the man’s similarity to a rearing bear.
‘Did you hear about the miser’s will?’
Rufinus frowned, nonplussed. ‘Er… no?’
‘He made himself his heir.’
Narcissus roared with laughter and Rufinus could not help but chuckle, partially at the fairly poor joke, but mostly because the centurion’s attitude was infectious. The big man rumbled to a halt, took a deep breath and patted Rufinus on the shoulder. ‘I will make you a deal. We will travel the Ampelum valley and attempt that route across the mountains, but if we encounter real danger, such as I hear is evident there at the moment, then we might have to reconsider. There are only twenty of us, and we are lightly equipped, not prepared for a proper fight.’
Rufinus nodded. ‘That’s more than fair, Centurion. I cannot imagine there is trouble there now. Albinus brought the Thirteenth back north in order to secure that very issue and ensure gold production goes on. Since he is resting comfortably in Apulum, then I can only assume that Alburnus Maior is business as usual.’
In fact, he was less than sure on that fact. Something was amiss with Dacia and the governor’s gold interests, but there was only one place he was going to learn more, and that was in Alburnus Maior.
‘I will wait for the letters and authorisation from the governor in the morning,’ Narcissus said in rumbling tones, ‘then I shall bring my men and collect your party at the mansio. Do me a favour and have your carriage ready to go by sunup. Your route’s a long way, and I want to get a jump on the day.’
Rufinus nodded his thanks. ‘Can I ask you one last thing?’
‘Go on.’
‘Could you not mention the change of route to anyone until we’re out of Apulum and on the road?’
Narcissus’ brow furrowed again. ‘You’re not one of the frumentarii are you? This smacks of their sort of intrigue.’
Rufinus laughed. ‘No. I’m not nearly devious enough for that.’
‘Not that you’d admit it if you were, of course.’
‘There is that,’ Rufinus grinned.
He bade the friendly centurion farewell until the morning, and strolled out of the building and back toward Apulum’s south gate. The mansio was easy enough to find. He’d seen down which street the carriage had gone when they departed and, following that direction, he found the mansio about half way to the river, on the edge of town. The lamps had already been lit, despite there being over an hour of sunlight left, and a friendly glow emerged as Rufinus walked through the main door. The large common area was busy and noisy and he scanned the room for Senova, Luca and Acheron, but found none of them. Perhaps the noise and smell and heat was too much for them. He strolled over to the counter and enquired after his room. He was informed that his wife was already there and where to find it, and he felt a moment’s relief. He hadn’t realised how much he’d suddenly worried about her until the worry lifted. Moments later, he had crossed to the stairs, climbed them and moved around the left wing of the building, hunting room XV. When he finally found it, he was about to open the door and then paused, knocking politely.
‘Come in,’ came Senova’s voice, and he relaxed further. This sojourn in Dacia was putting him very on edge. He opened the door and was greeted by the sight of not two people, but three. Senova was busy mending a hole in a cloak, with Acheron curled up at her feet. Luca was busy mixing wine and water. And Cassius sat on the couch, upright and tense-looking.
‘Rufinus. You’re alright?’
Rufinus nodded. ‘Too many potential repercussions in Rome to cause me any real harm. But Albinus wants rid of me. They’re sending me to Porolissum to be a bother to Niger there.’
Cassius closed his eyes. ‘Good. I think there might be trouble and you’re best off staying out of it. Trouble might be targeting me, now.’
Rufinus frowned and dropped into a seat opposite the centurion, waving away the drink that Luca offered him. ‘What’s the problem?’
Cassius looked about as though ears might sprout from the very walls. Leaning forward, he spoke in low tones.
‘My friend in the procurator’s office – the one I told you about? – he’s gone missing. And the governor’s had his people going through the place like a wildfire. If there’s anything incriminating there, he will have found it. I’m concerned, Rufinus. Everything in Apulum seems to be drifting along as normal, but there are undercurrents.’
Rufinus nodded. ‘Do what you have to do to keep yourself safe, Cassius. I’ll be out of your hair and heading north in the morning.’ He paused and looked around equally furtively. ‘I’ve persuaded my escort to go via Alburnus Maior. If there is any evidence to find, I will find it.’
Cassius nodded, still wearing a worried look. ‘It seems that the main revolt there is over. Or that’s the talk among the officers here. Officially all is well at Alburnus. But there’s something not quite right here. I can feel it in the air. Watch yourself on your journey. With luck you can complete your mission with Pescennius Niger and return safely to Rome. If so, drop by here on the way and let me know how things went. On the assumption I’m still here, that is.’
‘Keep yourself safe,’ Rufinus said again. ‘And start by getting back to the fortress and not being seen with me. I will try and get word to you if I find anything out.’
Cassius nodded, rose and crossed to the door. He stopped there and turned. ‘Despite everything, it’s been good to know you, Rufinus. Go with luck and may Mercury give you wings.’
Rufinus took the proffered hand and shook it firmly. ‘Good luck to you, too. Stay out of trouble and steer well clear of Celer for a while, though I think he’s more interested in me.’
Cassius smiled wearily. ‘Someday soon it will all be over and we’ll just be proper soldiers again without all this mucking about.’
Rufinus chuckled. ‘I wouldn’t be too sure. One thing I’ve learned this past few years is that once you start to play the game, you don’t get out easily. The players change, but the great game goes on.’
‘Not for me,’ Cassius sighed. ‘Retirement beckons and right now it cannot come soon enough.’ He turned to the others in the room. ‘Goodbye Senova. Keep him safe. Luca.’
Acheron rose and padded over long enough for Cassius to give him a good scratch behind the ears, and then the centurion saluted them in a friendly manner, stepped out of the door and was gone, the wooden portal closing with a click.
‘We won’t see him again, will we,’ Senova said quietly.
‘I doubt it. He’s a good man. I hope he stays safe and that his friend has not come to grief.’
Senova stretched. ‘We are going to your gold mine tomorrow?’
Rufinus nodded. ‘In the company of a score of Germanic scouts and their centurion. Big hairy, ugly fellow with bad wind and worse jokes. It’ll probably feel like being back home to you.’
Senova gave him a black look. ‘The soldier who escorted us to the mansio said that someone would be round late in the morning to take the carriage back to the fortress. I told him not to be overly concerned if it wasn’t here.’
Rufinus’ eyes widened. ‘You can’t just take a legion’s vehicle.’
‘I’m not taking it. They gave it to me. I’m just keeping it.’
Rufinus stared, and finally let out a b
reathy laugh. ‘On the bright side, we’ll be miles from Apulum before they know it’s gone.’
‘Good. Because if you think I’m riding a horse into bandit-infested mountains, you’ve another thing coming, Gnaeus.’
XIII – Mountains of gold
They left Apulum at dawn. It irked Rufinus that the slave boy Luca actually grumbled at having to rise so early to secure the horses and carriage, as though he had the same rights as the rest of them. Had it been Rufinus in control, he would have given the slave a swift backhand and told him that cheek like that got slaves beaten. But Luca was Senova’s slave and had been given unhealthy realms of freedom.
In the end, the carriage was made ready and their gear stowed as the cockerels began to greet the morning and the blast of a horn announced the change of watch up in the fortress. The three of them had eaten a hearty repast in the mansio, which catered well for early morning travellers, and the entire party were waiting outside with Acheron urinating against the front wall when the German scout unit appeared.
Narcissus may have joked that there was only room for one hairy barbarian in his fort, but evidence suggested otherwise. The last time Rufinus had seen such hairy individuals was at Sarmizegetusa, and they had been Sarmatians. He had to admit, though, that the men of the Numerus from Bucium were at least neater. Apart from Narcissus, their beards were trimmed and their hair plaited to keep it out of the way. Two of them wore helmets with the silvered facemasks of Roman cavalry parades and sports, and were armoured in cuirass and greaves, with laminated shoulders. The rest were armed in mail shirts and without helmets, just their oval shields and spears, with a spatha hanging at their side and their scarred faces framed with long, thick hair. They were an imposing bunch, but the way they joked with one another and their plain appearance somehow made them seem genuine and trustworthy, like their centurion.
The party rattled off out of Apulum with the rising sun, passing beneath the eastern walls of the great fortress of the Thirteenth, which made Rufinus slightly nervous since they were taking an unauthorised route and a stolen carriage with them. To the north of the fortress, which brooded but apparently failed to consider a stolen vehicle noteworthy, they left the northern road, marked with Potaissa, Napoca and Porolissum, and took a different route, heading for the hills to the north-west. A marker here mentioned only Ampelum, though Rufinus knew from both maps and conversation with friends that Alburnus Maior lay beyond the Ampelum valley.
The valley was not wide, but relatively shallow at first, with farmsteads dotted around the slopes, hay standing in stooks in the fields, silent sentinels of the gold route of Dacia. The road was, again, well-maintained, and throughout the morning of travel they passed numerous inns and small markets, which had clearly sprouted over the decades to serve the gold route and its caravans.
The first day, Narcissus informed them, he intended to travel twenty five miles to the town of Ampelum, where they would stay at a well-appointed mansio. It would be probably the last good and safe night until they reached Bucium. Between the terrain and the potential of local rebels, they would be moving slower after Ampelum, and the mansios and inns en route would be cruder and smaller, if they were still there and operating at all.
The journey was an interesting one for the company alone. Rufinus had, of course, encountered such speculatores and exploratores units before, particularly during the wars against the Marcomanni under the divine Marcus Aurelius, and he may even have come across this very unit, but he had never spent any time with them. They were always this peripheral and very insular bunch with more native tendencies and habits than Roman, and they were only in the presence of the legions when reporting on the terrain ahead.
It was fascinating, therefore, to spend time with the German scouts, only four of whom, he discovered, were actually German. Also, they took offence at being labelled that, two of them proudly proclaiming themselves Suebi, one Alemanni and one even Batavi. To Rufinus’ mind, given the revolutionary track record of the Batavians, he’d have kept that quiet rather than shouting it from the rooftops, but still the man was defiant and full of tribal hubris.
The men of the numerus were about as undisciplined a bunch on the ride as Rufinus had ever met. None of the men addressed Centurion Narcissus by rank or name, calling him Hailagaz, which it turned out was a tribal honorific for a native priest. Narcissus, it seemed, was more important as a priest of their gods than as a centurion of Rome. Rufinus spoke with interest to some of the men, many of whom were Dacian born recruits, and was fascinated to learn that Narcissus led all religious rites for the unit, incorporating the Dacian gods and several of the more important Roman ones in his devotions.
They swore like no men Rufinus had ever met, using eye-watering language and some words that Rufinus had to ask the meaning of, and often regretted doing so. They belched and farted and snorted and spat and picked their noses and scratched their arses with disturbing regularity. Yet every time anyone did anything that might be considered uncouth in Roman circles, they automatically apologised to Senova, who found the whole thing highly amusing, which in turn concerned Rufinus somewhat. She already had far too many worrying habits, to his mind, without starting swearing like a German and scratching her arse at dinner.
Yet they were also a friendly bunch. None of them seemed to be overly concerned that they were going wildly out of their way and through notably dangerous territory on the whim of their guests. They asked about the history of the three of them, shared their own, and all patted Acheron and fed him from their own meals. They joked and laughed. The jokes were often nonsensical and usually off-colour when they did make any sense, but they were in constant good humour, and when Rufinus or Senova chipped in with a jest of their own, it generally earned them uproarious laughter and a slap on the back.
Moreover, despite the unruly nature of the men, Rufinus’ shrewd military eye cut through the mess and recognised them as men who were clearly very good at their job. Of the twenty one riders, there were only ever fourteen in the column, the other seven constantly roaming ahead and to either side, often an entire valley or two away. They warned of any natural terrain trouble, of settlements or signs in plenty of time, and they cycled their men through the outriding so that their horses were always well-rested. Best still, with most of them being Dacian born, and the Germans having learned the ways of the locals, they were received well by the natives and often came back to the column with fresh bread or fruit, or pots of honey and other treats.
It was an entirely different experience to journeying with the legions, and not for the worse. Rufinus had travelled and quartered with the Tenth Legion, the praetorians and the Thirteenth Gemina, but there was something relaxed and freeing about travelling with Narcissus and his men. They reached Ampelum in the late afternoon of the first day and stayed in, as promised, one of the best mansios Rufinus had ever visited. The fort there, a small affair in place to monitor the gold route, stood silent and empty, its cavalry garrison moved to the border during the recent troubles. Still, the place did not seem to have suffered depredations in their absence though there was no evidence of gold caravans passing through recently. The next day, also as foretold, the terrain changed.
From Ampelum, the valley began to narrow and the forest closed in. The hills began to rise to ever greater heights, and Rufinus was reminded of the first time they had moved into the valleys of the Carpates, what seemed like months ago now. The farms gradually became fewer and fewer, until all they could see to either side of the road and the small but fast river it followed were the tall, narrow trunks of pine trees. It became much easier to imagine Dacian rebels and Sarmatian raiders hiding behind every hill and, though the road remained well looked after, the settlements they passed became gradually more reticent and close-mouthed. The inns they saw no longer bore Latin signs but were marked out in some local script he could not read. Rufinus was, consequently, ever more grateful for Narcissus and his men, who seemed to be more or less treated as locals by the pe
ople they passed.
The second night they stayed in a rough inn that smelled of smoked meat and sweat, and Rufinus tried his best to avoid joining the scouts for a drinking session, especially given that what they were consuming was either a beer that smelled like wet socks and had things floating in it, or that throat-flaying liquor to which Cassius had introduced him. Fortunately, Senova managed to convince the riders that she had imposed limits on Rufinus. This, of course, earned him good-natured derision and the nickname Biosmaz, the meaning of which no one would tell him, but over the past two days the riders had become respectful enough of Senova not to question her decisions, and it had saved Rufinus from trying to explain. Besides which, after Argentulum and Locusta, he was fairly hardened to nicknames. The food when it arrived took some getting used to, since everything he picked up seemed to have either a hoof or knuckles, but he managed, and if he forgot its shape it was actually pretty tasty.
That night brought one of the strangest moments in Rufinus’ life. Rufinus had been sitting in the corner of the room with a cup of water, examining Senova’s map and making notes on his tablet, while the riders had been drinking enough foul ale and burning spirit to drown a small village. Then, suddenly, one of them who had been by the window gestured outside and shouted something. There was a cheer, and the whole place erupted. Narcissus went to speak to the innkeeper, and then grabbed Rufinus’ wrist.
‘What is it?’
‘A good moon. The gods are listening. Time to please them. Leave your maps, Biosmaz, and come with us, lest you want your gods to overlook you in these dangerous hills.’
Rufinus had been about to object and point out that he’d promised an altar to Fortuna and that she’d been quite obliging so far, but Narcissus, with his bear-like strength, simply hauled Rufinus from his seat and dragged him from the building. Outside, he was surprised to see they had also roused Senova from her room and she was grinning and cheering along with the rest of them. Luca looked nonplussed, but had been brought to join them as well, and was cheering dutifully.
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