Hunting the Eagles

Chapter XX

Arminius was riding hard. He was, he thought, less than three miles from his settlement, and individual twists and turns of the woodland path were becoming familiar. A little way to his left, there, was a good spot for fishing the nearby stream. In the distance, he could see the low hill favoured by the local priests.

He’d been riding at breakneck speed for some time, and his mount was floundering. Strings of saliva ran from its open mouth and down its neck, and its sides were dark-streaked with sweat, but Arminius didn’t give a shit. Infuriated by its gradual loss of pace, and without a whip, he had taken to slapping its haunches with the flat of his sword. If the beast died beneath him, so be it. Getting back was all that mattered.

Over the course of the previous two days, he’d crippled one horse and exhausted several others in his efforts to return. The warriors in his party had long since been left behind, but he didn’t care about that either. ‘On, curse you!’ he cried, bringing down his blade on the horse’s rear again, eliciting a deep grunt of pain. There was only a fractional increase in speed, which soon fell away. Arminius was about to strike the horse again, but it staggered, and he lowered his arm. There were no farmhouses in sight. If his mount collapsed, he would lose valuable time searching for a fresh one, or running to the settlement. Better, then, to ride on slower than he wished.

The news of Thusnelda’s abduction and the freeing of Segestes could have reached him in few worse places. He had been on the far side of the River Albis, visiting the Semnones tribe, who lived to the east of the Cherusci lands. At the time, it hadn’t mattered that the chieftain he wanted to talk to was on a hunting trip a day’s ride further east. That was until a warrior sent by Maelo had come looking for Arminius with the calamitous tidings. He could still see the fear – of his reaction – in the warrior’s eyes, and his ears yet rang with Maelo’s gut-wrenching words. ‘Your brother Flavus has raided the settlement. Your wife has been taken, and Segestes freed. Our horses are gone too, but I have given chase.’ A throbbing fury pulsed behind Arminius’ eyes, causing a momentary darkening of his vision. Thusnelda! he wanted to scream.

Maelo got it wrong, he told himself. The fool has addled his brain with too much barley beer, and dreamed the whole thing. The tactic didn’t work for even two heartbeats. He knew that his second-in-command was more loyal, more dependable than anyone. The stars would fall from the sky before Maelo sent such a message in error. Arminius ground his teeth. I’ll find you, Flavus, brother, he thought, and cut your beating heart from your chest – but not before I’ve fed you your own balls.

He could see the first longhouses now. The chances of Maelo having rescued Thusnelda were slender, but Arminius’ heart quickened anyway. ‘Come on, you useless creature,’ he shouted, hitting the horse again. This time, it didn’t speed up at all, and despite his frustration, Arminius had to accept that its energy was spent. He threw himself from its back and began to run. ‘Maelo? Where is Maelo?’ he shouted, haring past a surprised-looking woman carrying two pails of water. He was past her so fast that her reply was lost. Arminius broke into a sprint, making for his longhouse.

He found a smouldering ruin. The walls remained, and the great oaken truss at each end that had held up the roof, but that was it. Even the doors had been burned away. The smell of charred flesh, whether animal or human, lingered in the air. The shock brought him to his knees, slumped his shoulders and bowed his head. Tears, such as Arminius never cried, welled in his eyes and poured unchecked down his cheeks. ‘Thusnelda,’ he whispered.

The attack was beyond anything he could have imagined from the Romans. It was so fucking clever. They must have known my warriors weren’t here, Arminius decided, and that I was away. The realisation crashed in at once. Flavus had sent spies to the settlement beforehand. Finding its defences weakened, he had gone ahead with the raid, taking not just Segestes but the extra prize of Thusnelda.

‘You’re here,’ croaked a familiar voice.

Arminius twisted around. Shock filled him. His left arm wrapped in a grubby bandage, his face spattered with mud and sweat, and with hair sticking out at every angle and purple craters under his eyes, Maelo was almost unrecognisable. Filthy-clothed, limping, he looked like a bog-buried corpse brought to life. Arminius rose. ‘What news?’

Maelo shook his head, and the motion sent knives stabbing through every part of Arminius.

‘I’m sorry,’ said Maelo. ‘I sent warriors after Segestes and Thusnelda on foot the moment I got back from my uncle’s village, while we tried to round up the horses. Doing that took more than half a day. We then rode after them day and night, but the Romans’ lead was too great, and Germanicus had five cohorts lying in wait thirty miles away to meet them. I led one attack anyway, and lost more than half the men with me. I thought about going at the whoresons again, but it would have been suicide.’

Arminius bunched his fists, and breathed deep, and unclenched them again. ‘Tell me everything. Do not leave out a single detail.’ He listened in grim silence as Maelo laid out the sorry tale from beginning to end.

‘I should have been in the settlement. If I had, maybe I could have got her away to safety,’ said Maelo, his eyes tortured. ‘Forgive me.’

‘Why shouldn’t you have been visiting your uncle?’ The words almost choked in Arminius’ throat, so great was his own feeling of guilt. Why hadn’t he been here? ‘Gods,’ he said. ‘She’ll be on the Roman side of the river by now. With her father.’

‘Aye.’ Again Maelo’s gaze met Arminius’. ‘Do you want me to raise a war party and see if we can free her?’

Arminius sighed. ‘You’re a good man, Maelo. There’s nothing I would like more, but think of the strength of the Roman forces on the west bank of the Rhenus. We would be throwing away our own lives, and those of the warriors with us, for nothing. Thusnelda will be taken to Italy at once, as a trophy. The Romans want to ensure I never see her again, and that my son grows up without a father.’ A wall of grief hit him, and he closed his eyes.

Maelo’s hand on his shoulder, unasked for, gave him strength and focused his mind. The situation could have been far worse. The casualties suffered during the raid had been light. If Germanicus had attacked with greater force, they would have been cataclysmic. Not to do that, Arminius decided, had been a grave mistake by the Roman general. He let his rage swell again, letting its power fill every corner of his being.

‘I will renew my war against Rome, not by treasonous means, nor against pregnant women, nor in darkness, but with honour, attacking its soldiers in daylight. If our fellow tribesmen love their lands and forefathers and their ancient ways more than life under the emperor’s heel, then they will follow me. I will lead them to glory and to freedom rather than Segestes’ – Arminius spat the word – ‘who would give them nothing but shame and slavery.’

‘Give me the chance, great Donar, and I will slay not just Segestes and my motherless get of a brother, but Germanicus too,’ he vowed, his voice throbbing with fury. ‘And every legionary and auxiliary that follows in their wake.’

Vengeance had become the sole reason for Arminius’ existence.