Claudius

XXXVIII

The tip of Bersheba’s trunk swept over Rufus’s body in swift, desperate little circles, stopping here or there to pluck at some interesting part of his clothing that might contain what she sought. Eventually, she gave up her search with a tiny groan of frustration and fixed him with a dewy, walnut-brown eye that filled him with guilt.

It had been days since he’d run out of the sweet, moist-fleshed apples and he had been so busy doing Narcissus’s bidding that he had never been able to find time to seek out a new supply. What made it worse was that she had never deserved them more. The Emperor’s elephant was cheered wherever she went in the Army of Claudius. The bravest would touch her wrinkled skin for luck as she passed, and when they went into battle they knew that with Bersheba at their sides they had Fortuna’s favour.

The legions had trudged eastwards from the site of the Emperor’s last victory, until they were a day’s march from the final piece in the complicated jigsaw that would give Claudius his place in history: the fortress named for Camulos, the British war god. Camulodunum had been the capital of the Trinovantes until Cunobelin of the Catuvellauni had claimed it for his own. Now it was the capital of Cunobelin’s son, Caratacus, but he was far away in the west, with Vespasian’s Second legion on his heels and a ragtag army of fugitives at his back. Every day spawned a rumour that the British king had been taken and there was word of a great siege at a place called Mai-den.

Rufus smiled to himself. He had more important things to concern him than the fate of kings or the fall of mighty fortresses. Where would a slave find a reliable source of sweet apples in a land stripped bare by the quartermasters of four legions? He reached into the bullock cart, now free of Bersheba’s golden armour, which had taken its rightful place among Claudius’s imperial treasures, and found the cloth bag that normally contained the elephant’s favourite treat. He picked it up. Strange. It was unexpectedly heavy. He grinned. Maybe he had missed an apple after all.

But, when he fumbled inside, what he found in his hand was more valuable than any fruit. It was a brooch and, judging by its weight, a brooch of pure gold. It was round — slightly less than the diameter of his clenched fist — and the workmanship was as fine as he had ever seen. In the centre was the partially complete emblem of a charging boar, with a fiery red stone for its eye. The stone flashed and glittered in the sunlight as he turned the brooch to study it. On the outer circumference of the metalwork were what he assumed to be words, but in a script that was indecipherable to him: short vertical and horizontal strokes in columns and groups, occasionally joined as if some wading bird with wide-spread toes had walked across them. It was beautiful, and undoubtedly worth a fortune. He felt a thrill run through him. Suddenly freedom wasn’t the slow death he had feared. With the money he could get for this in Rome he could set himself up in business — even rent a small house. He knew a goldsmith out by the Appian Gate who wouldn’t cheat him too much. But where had it come from? He cast his mind over the past few days. His first thought was that the brooch might be a reward from the Emperor, or more likely Narcissus, for his services over the past weeks. But the reward he had already been promised was his freedom, and Gaius’s.

And it would be unlike the Greek to have slipped such a great prize amongst his belongings with so little ceremony. The Narcissus he knew would have made an occasion of its presentation, and ensured that Rufus was bound all the closer to him. So, not Narcissus. Who then?

A vague memory stirred, like the reflection of a cloud drifting across a faraway lake; a scene played out behind a veil of exhaustion at the end of a death-weary day of awful carnage and limitless fear. He saw a corpse covered by a green cloak and another man crouching over it, then rising, triumph written over a face that had aged ten years in an afternoon, ivory teeth shining in a dusty mask. Frontinus. In his hand he held the heavy golden torc of a British chieftain. A wonderful object made up of five thick woven strands of gold. At each end of the torc was a ram’s head the size of a small plum, and between them a golden chain that had secured it round the dead man’s neck.

‘This will buy me a fine wife and a fine position in Rome when my service is done. I will be able to represent my people there and perhaps even influence the Senate on their behalf. See how heavy it is. But wait.’ The Batavian prefect gave a little half-shrug, half-smile, that made him look very young. ‘You killed this man, who is Togodumnus, brother of Caratacus. The reward must be yours. Here.’

Frontinus had held out the torc, but Rufus could see he was offering it out of politeness. He couldn’t take it. ‘No. If anyone deserves a reward it is you, who held the line with your courage and your presence. Keep it and use it well.’

Frontinus’s face had broken into a wide grin. ‘Then at least you must have something. This,’ he held up one of the smaller arm rings Togodumnus had worn, ‘or this…’ But Rufus had already waved a weary hand and turned away. All he truly wanted was rest.

Now he looked down at the brooch in his hand. It was the one Togodumnus had worn at his throat. Frontinus must have waited until he was distracted and placed it in the bag. And there was something else about it, something familiar…

‘That is a pretty trinket.’

Rufus hurriedly replaced the brooch in the cloth bag and looked up to find Narcissus studying him. ‘It’s nothing. Just a piece of rubbish I picked up on the field.’

The Greek’s smile didn’t waver. But Rufus was certain he didn’t believe the lie. Narcissus was a man who knew the value of everything down to the last sesterce. Claudius’s aide shrugged. ‘Perhaps, but I suspect it will be most helpful once you have your freedom.’

That word again, that twisted his heart with both terror and hope.

‘You will have your freedom, Rufus, and soon. I have spoken to the Emperor. Once we have captured Camulodunum, you will take the Emperor’s name, Tiberius, and you will be a freedman, just as I am, with a freedman’s rights and a freedman’s liberties.’

Rufus sucked in his breath. Words like ‘rights’ and ‘liberties’ were not ones a slave heard often, unless it was someone else’s rights and someone else’s liberties. He struggled to place the words into a context that meant something in his regimented, sharply defined world. And failed. It would come, but first there was a reality to face. ‘Is Camulodunum truly as mighty as they say?’

Narcissus’s fathomless blue eyes met his for a moment. ‘No place is strong enough to hold against a Roman legion. But I think you will find that Camulodunum is like no other fortress.’

It was unique in Britain, and perhaps the whole world. A hundred years before, or more, a beleaguered Trinovante king had demanded of his closest counsellors how he could protect his people and their cattle in a land with so few natural advantages. The Trinovantes were many, but their warriors were few. Their neighbours, the Catuvellauni, were strong and took what they wanted. It was the way of Britain. If the king could not stop them, he would be a king no more. The advisers deliberated and discussed, they wandered the land and looked, and looked again, but all they could see was woods, and rivers and bottomless swamps. Men could take refuge in the woods or escape down the rivers to the sea, but the king already knew that. The advisers were ready to give up. But one of them, not a warrior, but a thinker, looked at the landscape in a different way and found an answer.

The walls of Camulodunum.

It took the whole tribe — men, women and children — an entire season to build. A wide ditch backed by an earthen bank five times the height of a man was constructed across the western approach to the settlement. It was three miles long and linked the river which formed the southern boundary of the site with an area of impenetrable marshland, and, when the marsh ended in firm ground, carried on to intersect with the line of a second river in the north. When it was complete, nature and man had combined to create an unbroken barrier that separated the Trinovantes from their enemies to the west and the south. In the coming years they would add others, stronger still. When danger threatened, the tribe streamed in from the surrounding countryside to seek sanctuary behind walls that would be lined with warriors prepared to die to hold them.

This was what faced the Romans.

At noon the following day Plautius had his army drawn up just beyond bowshot of a single gateway in the long grassy mound that split the land straight as a sword blade as far as the eye could see. The legions were in battle formation, with the cavalry on the flanks holding their nervous mounts in check and the auxiliary units in reserve to the rear. Rufus took pride of place in the centre, astride Bersheba, her ceremonial armour gleaming and the howdah on her back ready for the Emperor.

The ranks stirred as a single tall figure rose from behind the rampart to stand at its peak, to be joined by others, until dozens, then hundreds and finally thousands, lined the crest. A faint rattle ran through the legionary lines as the soldiers automatically tightened their grip on their weapons and their muscles bunched in anticipation of what was to come. But there was something unnatural about these enemies. Where was the screaming and posturing of the earlier battles? Where was the menacing clatter of spear on shield? Instead, they stood in silence, staring down at the legions in frank curiosity.

Finally, the great gate opened, and the legionaries tensed anew as a single chariot drawn by two chestnut-brown native horses hurtled from within the walls. It careered in a tight circle, the bare-chested driver parading his skills as the finely muscled warrior who was his passenger stood casually erect beside him. The golden torc round the warrior’s neck showed his high rank and his long blond moustache flowed in the breeze as he studiously ignored the enemy who waited only yards away. The charioteer skidded to a halt in the broad meadow midway between the legions and the wall — and waited. Within seconds the first chariot was followed by a second, then another, and another, until twenty of the two-wheeled vehicles formed a guard of honour leading towards the gate.

Behind him, Rufus heard Narcissus say quietly: ‘Great Caesar, I give you Camulodunum.’