Defender of Rome

XXIII

A powerful voice called from the rampart. ‘Approach, friend, but do it slowly and keep your hands where we can see them.’ Valerius heard Marcus laugh. It was a typically cautious frontier welcome. Better to be nervous than dead. He took a deep breath and kicked his horse forward.

To meet Publius Sulla.

At first sight, the interior of the camp was as unimpressive as the exterior. He doubted whether familiarity would improve the experience. Lines of worn leather tents, sufficient to house a full century, filled the centre, beside a larger tent which would be the commander’s quarters. Horse lines and latrines had been set up beside the turf banks of the parapet, all contained within a dusty space sixty paces square. A painfully small squad of men went about the daily business of the fort while the rest manned the ramparts. Two weeks in this place would wear down any soldier’s morale. Two months would drive him mad.

Publius Sulla, tribune of the Seventh and brother of the traitor Cornelius, waited alone in the centre of the dirt square that passed for the parade ground. A terrible melancholy overcame Valerius as he recognized the man he had come to take back to Rome. When last he’d looked into those pale eyes they’d been staring at him from a blackened skull. He’d expected a likeness, but no one had warned him that Publius Sulla was Cornelius’s identical twin. Different characters, certainly — Publius was leaner, harder and more earnest than his brother — yet in looks they were indistinguishable. A vision of a writhing column of flame engulfed Valerius’s mind and whatever he had meant to say died stillborn in his mouth.

‘Is this all?’ The young commander broke the silence. ‘I was expecting a column with a month’s rations. What I see is four more mouths to feed.’

Valerius handed his reins to Marcus and the veteran gladiator led their mounts to the horse lines. ‘Gaius Valerius Verrens, at your service. I apologize, tribune, but we were parted from our escort and ambushed a few miles south of here.’

‘Ambushed?’ Publius instantly forgot the missing rations. ‘That’s impossible. We have a truce with the Dacian king and I spoke with his representatives not five days ago. If the situation had changed my spies in Coson’s camp would have informed me before now. Clodius!’ A veteran legionary appeared from his place at the parapet. ‘Increase the alert and send out a patrol. I want to know if there’s any movement within a mile of the fort. It’s possible we have a renegade band trying to stir up trouble. But tell them to act defensively. I need information, not heads.’

Valerius was impressed by the young man’s professionalism. He issued his orders without any sense of panic or confusion. The ambush was just a new dimension of this complicated command to be dealt with. ‘An interesting posting to volunteer for, tribune,’ he ventured.

‘Volunteer?’ Publius’s laugh betrayed his bitterness. He led Valerius up a set of wooden steps to the top of the rampart. ‘No one would be foolish enough to volunteer for this. You’ve seen our position. This should be an auxiliary command. Instead, those men lining the walls are the dregs of the legion; the moaners and the shirkers and the brawlers. I have eighty of them, plus twenty horse, to cover fifty miles of frontier, and they stay alert because I’ve managed to convince them that if they do not they will die here. Not that they should need much convincing. We’re ten miles beyond the Danuvius and any chance of reinforcement, and we’ve been down to half rations for five days. The moment Coson decides to break the truce, which he will, the Dacians will gobble us up like a wolf pouncing on a newborn lamb. This post is meant to be a show of Rome’s strength. The reality is that it is a sacrifice to my general’s vanity.’ He looked directly into Valerius’s eyes. ‘Now, to your business, Praetorian. Even a lowly junior tribune knows that it does not take four men and an auxiliary escort to deliver orders.’

Valerius nodded distractedly. He had been wondering why Vitellius had lied to him about Publius Sulla’s posting. If he’d lied about that, what else had he lied about? He had planned a quick, dispassionate arrest the moment he arrived at the post. Any hope of that had disappeared when he saw Cornelius’s eyes in his brother’s boyish face. The longer he was with Publius, the more he found himself liking this young man he was about to destroy. ‘Perhaps we may discuss it in private,’ he suggested quietly.

Publius caught something in the other man’s voice and produced a bleak smile. ‘As you see, privacy is in short supply in our little home from home. Join me in my tent. My orderly will see that your men are fed what little we can offer.’

He pulled back the flap and they entered a dusty, humid interior lit by vents in the ceiling which allowed in the sun. The tent was perhaps five paces wide by ten long with a floor of beaten earth. The only luxuries were a portable desk and stool to one side, which were faced by a second chair, and a campaign bed set against the rear wall. The tribune removed his helmet and gladius and invited Valerius to do the same. Valerius realized he should have insisted that Marcus and Serpentius accompany him, but he could hardly refuse now. He placed his sword belt on the bed beside the other man’s.

Publius took his seat at the desk and Valerius sat facing him. ‘Please.’ The tribune nodded for Valerius to begin.

‘I am here to escort you back to Rome.’

Valerius saw the colour drain from Publius Sulla’s face, but otherwise there was no reaction to what they both knew could be a death sentence.

‘And may I know the reason?’ Somehow the young tribune kept his voice steady.

‘Only that it is by the direct order of the Emperor.’

The younger man breathed out a long sigh. ‘So. That means Cornelius is taken and…?’ He looked to Valerius for confirmation of his unspoken question. Valerius nodded. For a moment Publius’s face twisted in pain and he shook his head like a man fighting the iron of a sword buried deep in his vitals. He struggled to regain his composure but when he spoke again his voice held only defiance. The earnest blue eyes drilled into Valerius. ‘Our work will continue, you know. All through the Empire men like Cornelius are spreading the message of Jesus Christus. Every day, more and more are willing to do God’s work, and I doubt that even Nero can kill us all. He seeks to destroy us because he fears us, and he is right to fear us, because no matter what he does to us we will only become stronger. You might think that the legions are stony ground in which to plant the seeds of change, Praetorian, but you would be wrong. Who needs his god by his side more than a soldier about to march out and die? Tell him they are out there, waiting for the day. When the day comes it is God’s will that must prevail. But then I doubt you understand what I am talking about.’

‘I understand.’

Publius looked up in surprise and something flickered in his eyes. Hope? ‘You know about the great forces at work here, yet you still do his bidding?’

Valerius straightened. ‘Like you, tribune, I am a soldier, and soldiers follow orders.’

Publius rose to his feet and walked in three strides to the bed. Too late Valerius remembered where he had left his sword. He heard the familiar, almost musical hiss of a gladius being drawn from its scabbard. Publius kept his face to the tent wall so that Valerius couldn’t read his expression. ‘Cornelius was strong, but he lacked physical courage. It was something he was always ashamed of,’ he said softly.

‘He did not lack courage at the end.’ Valerius remembered the crimson streak running down the tar from the young aristocrat’s torn lip. ‘I have never seen a braver man.’

Publius nodded to himself. ‘Yet he would not have fought them. He would have gone with them like a lamb. A lamb to the slaughter. Well, know this, Gaius Valerius Verrens.’ He turned at last, the naked blade bright in his hand. ‘Publius Sulla is a soldier and will die like a soldier. I will not go gently like a lamb to Nero’s slaughter.’

Valerius tensed, ready to meet the tribune’s attack. He knew he had little chance of surviving if Publius was as comfortable with the sword as he appeared but he vowed to die trying. When he was dead, Publius would have Marcus, Serpentius and Heracles arrested on some trumped-up charge, perhaps even for Valerius’s murder, and there would be an unhappy accident on the way back to Viminacium. Maybe this was the way General Vitellius had planned it all along.

But Publius hadn’t finished. ‘Senators, soldiers and slaves, men and women of all ranks, aye, to the very highest, even in the heart of the monster’s lair at the very centre of Nero’s court, are already waiting to replace me. I have only one last request, Praetorian, and I make it because I sense a decency in you that belies your words and your mission. Do what you can for my family.’

With his final words Publius Sulla placed the point of the gladius against his sternum and used all his strength to drive its length up into his heart.

‘No!’ Valerius dived across the room, but it was already too late. With a sharp cry, Publius fell back on the bed, his whole body shuddering, hands still locked on the sword hilt and eyes bulging as his boyish face turned old in a heartbeat. Valerius knelt at the young man’s side and cradled his head. ‘Publius,’ he whispered urgently. ‘I will help your family if I can. I will help them all. But you have to tell me how to find Petrus. I must find Petrus.’

Publius opened his mouth, but Valerius would never hear his answer. Dark blood welled up in the tribune’s throat and spilled like wine from his lips. He gave one last convulsion and was still. With a sigh Valerius looked down on the dead boy.

Gradually it dawned on him that with his emotional final words Publius might have revealed more than he had intended. ‘Senators, soldiers and slaves, men and women of all ranks… even at the very centre of Nero’s court.’ Cornelius had been a member of Nero’s court, but a peripheral figure, never at the very centre. It meant that someone at the highest level had a powerful incentive for thwarting the investigation, and, more important, the power to ensure that happened.

He pulled the tent flap aside and looked across the parade ground. Marcus, Serpentius and Heracles were talking together by a rampart where the cook’s fire had been set into the dirt mound. Valerius called them across. Inside the tent Serpentius produced a low whistle and Marcus gave the sign against evil. Heracles just stared with his mouth open.

‘We don’t have much time,’ Valerius warned them. ‘I suspect Publius was a popular officer and the likelihood is that the men will take their officer’s death badly. We are going to call the senior legionary. When he gets here, flank me, and for the gods’ sake try to look like Praetorians.’

He went to the door and asked a passing legionary to send Clodius to the tent. The man shot him a puzzled look, but saluted and ran off in search of the duplicarius. When Clodius appeared, Valerius drew him inside. Seeing the dead man, the veteran gave a low growl and his hand went to his sword. Before he could draw it he froze with the needle tip of Marcus’s gladius against his throat.

‘Soldier.’ Valerius kept his voice steady. ‘Do you recognize what this is?’ He held up the chain with the imperial seal. Clodius had to look twice, but eventually he nodded.

‘Publius Sulla was an enemy of Rome and has paid for his crime with his life. My name is Gaius Valerius Verrens, tribune of the Praetorian Guard, and I am taking temporary command of this outpost.’ Valerius paused and Clodius clearly expected the next order to be for his execution. ‘But when I leave, the fort will be your responsibility. Do you understand?’

Clodius frowned, but he risked another nod. Valerius’s next words surprised him.

‘I can’t order you to abandon your position, but with your officer dead and rations running out you would be justified in returning with us. If you choose to leave, the men have an hour to demolish the fort and pack up their gear. My report will state that the decision was made with my full support.’

Clodius hesitated. This wasn’t the kind of judgement he expected to have to make. He shot a frightened glance towards Publius’s body.

‘Whatever you decide nothing will happen to you,’ Valerius assured him.

The duplicarius shook his head. ‘No. I’ll stay, and if I stay the men stay. I was accused of cowardice after I discovered my officer had been selling horse feed to the merchants at the river market for his own profit. That’s why I am here. If I stay I have a chance to win back my honour. General Vitellius is not a bad man, just badly advised. Ask him to send a month’s rations and a new commander.’

‘Can you control your men when they hear that the tribune is dead?’

‘I think… yes. He wasn’t their regular officer. They liked him well enough, but most of them had only really known him for a few weeks. If I can assure them that help and food is on its way, they’ll behave. Will you stay the night, sir?’

Valerius shook his head. There was still enough light left to reach the river. ‘No, we’ll leave as soon as we’re ready. Put together what rations you can for us. I’ll speak to the men before we go.’

They felt like deserters as they rode from the fort with the demoralized garrison watching from the walls. For all his fine words about honour and courage and his pledge to send reinforcements, Valerius doubted any of the legionaries he left behind would ever return to Viminacium.

He kept his eyes to the front. Behind him came Marcus and Serpentius, and at the rear Heracles led Publius Sulla’s horse, with its master’s body across its back wrapped in a bedding sheet. Eight of the fort’s cavalry troopers escorted them for the first mile and when they left Valerius felt as vulnerable as when they’d been abandoned by the patrol. The others sensed it too.

‘If I ever see that bastard Festus again, I’ll cut his throat,’ Serpentius spat.

Valerius shook his head. ‘Vitellius will make sure he’s tucked away somewhere safe. I doubt if you’ll ever see him again.’

He couldn’t have been more wrong.

They rode for close to an hour before they found the first body. The Dacians had hung it by the heels from a tree with a leather strap cut through the tendons of both ankles. He had been stripped naked, but the pale torso and walnut brown arms tied behind his back marked him as a Roman soldier. His captors had suspended him head down a few inches above a large fire, and Valerius didn’t like to think about the agonies he had experienced before his skull had exploded.

‘Do we bury him?’ Marcus asked.

Valerius shook his head. ‘It would only tell them where we are and we don’t have the time.’ And where there was one, there would be more.

‘Could have been us. Serves the bastard right,’ Serpentius muttered without conviction.

Festus was recognizable when they found him, if you looked carefully, and alive, if you could call it alive. Strange that the young port prefect in Acruvium had described the Tungrian’s fate so accurately. The words had been chilling enough: Their favourite method of passing the time with a prisoner is to flay him alive and then impale him on the branch of a thorn tree. The reality was fit to drive a man to madness. Festus’s eyeballs danced in his skull like white beads in a jar. As well as his skin, his Dacian torturers had removed his lips, his eyelids, his nose and any other useful protrusions. He was no longer a human being, but a mess of blood and tissue wriggling obscenely on a four-foot stake. Valerius wondered why he hadn’t mercifully bled to death until he noticed that the gaping wound where his genitals had hung had been stuffed with earth to stop the bleeding and prolong his agony.

‘I’ll do it,’ the Spaniard said. Serpentius dismounted and approached the shivering horror that had once been a man. With a short prayer and a single, almost tender stroke of his sword, he sliced through the vertebrae at the base of Festus’s neck. The Tungrian’s head flopped forward and his body went still. After that they rode on in silence, each man alert for the first sign of danger and at the same time alone with his thoughts and fears.

It was Marcus who heard the shouts, away to their left. The survivors of the cavalry patrol must have believed they’d reached the relative safety of the plain when they were caught. From a nearby ridge Valerius saw immediately that their surviving leader had chosen to go to ground rather than fight his way out. It had been a mistake. Now the patrol was surrounded on three sides of a bare hilltop by a jeering horde of Dacians who danced among the trees and darted out to hurl spears, scream insults and no doubt threaten them with the same fate as Festus. The only thing keeping them at bay was the wall of cavalry spears the Tungrians had set up on the approaches to the hill, which backed on to a sheer cliff face. The Dacians seemed in no hurry, but how long that would last only the gods knew. At least the auxiliaries still had their horses, hobbled together in a shallow dish at the base of the cliff.

He slithered back to where the others waited. ‘What now?’ Marcus whispered.

Valerius looked at each of them in turn. He had brought them to this. They owed him nothing. They owed Rome nothing. ‘Take Publius Sulla’s body. Once you’re out of the hills, keep riding west and you’ll arrive at the river. Just follow it upstream until you reach the bridge.’

‘What about you?’ Serpentius asked.

The question had only one answer. ‘I’m a Roman soldier. I can’t leave other Roman soldiers to die, not even these bastards.’

Serpentius and Marcus exchanged a glance of agreement. ‘This uniform says I’m a Roman soldier too,’ the Spaniard said. ‘Even if I’m not happy about it. Besides, if you get killed who’s going to pay us?’

‘And you, Heracles?’

‘If it wasn’t for you I would probably already be dead.’

‘Then this is what we will do.’