Legionary

Chapter 62

The fire roared, the night sky glowing orange from its light. No point in hiding now, Gallus mused wryly as he stared into the flames. Fifty more had died of their wounds since the previous day and now, as darkness fell upon them again, he looked over his tired and hungry bunch. Numbering seven hundred and eighty three, only a few hundred more than a single cohort, they had still worked like a full legion. Now the place was armed to the hilt with every form of projectile, incendiary and obstacle they could harvest from the plateau. The bushes had been stripped of berries and a precious pair of wild mountain goats had been herded inside the fort. The cistern brimmed with fresh water. They were ready in so many ways. However, Gallus sighed, he knew they could never be truly ready for what waited on them down below.

Anxiety had settled in once the fort modifications had been completed. Too much time to think was never a good thing for a legionary, Gallus knew, and he had set them to the task of piling up this fire; a reward of roast goat waited at the end of the task. He pulled the meagre scrap of goat meat from the rib he held — the sweet fatty juice running down his wrist. Starvation wouldn’t be an issue for a few days yet, but by then it would be too late; tomorrow, the Huns would climb the hill and come at the fort with all they had.

The scouts had moved expertly — like snakes in the grass — to observe the activities in the Hun command camp. Until now, the Huns had ringed the base of the hill, content to starve the XI Claudia into submission. Then, at dusk, one scout had stumbled into the fort, rasping foamy blood with every breath before he collapsed from the arrow lodged in his lung. His dying words had sent the fear of the gods around them all; some report had come into the Hun camp, not long after the curious blaze in the docks, something which stirred the dark Hun leader into a rage and to at once issue the order to prepare battle lines.

Only one thing could have stirred such a reaction, Gallus mused as he chewed down on another mouthful of goat meat. Somehow, Felix and his men must have escaped the peninsula. He lifted an eyebrow wryly as he imagined what sort of ploy the group must have conjured to pull off the impossible. But they must have been spotted, or somehow the Huns now knew about it. At least the initiative had been seized back, even if it was meaningless. For now the Huns would move in on them and they would be pulverised long before the days passed that it would take for any kind of meaningful relief force to be mustered and then to arrive.

He perked up as a legionary on the far side of the fire struck up a lilting tune on the strings of a kithara. Then his gaze fell into the fire again as he chewed on the meat. Olivia’s face danced in the flames.

‘Who are you thinking about, sir?’ Zosimus asked quietly beside him.

Gallus blinked, turning to his new optio. ‘It’s a long story, I wouldn’t know where to start,’ he sighed.

‘My little daughter’s going to be four this year,’ Zosimus continued. ‘Lupia was talking of having a family feast to celebrate. On the fields to the north of Adrianople. The sun stays bright and warm all day long there. Just the chattering of the insects. Only place I can relax these days.’ He fell silent for a moment as the fire crackled. ‘Don’t suppose I’ll be going there again.’

The bluntness of his statement caused no visible reaction, but Gallus felt an empathy with Zosimus and the other men around him. Acceptance was no bad thing, but one thing was for sure; if they were to be annihilated by this black swarm from the wilderness, they would fight with the fire of wronged men.