Scourge of Rome

XXIII

Valerius spent the night on the plateau with the men of the Tenth. The victory celebrations had been subdued because the legionaries knew they’d be on the march at first light. As the sun crept over the eastern mountains they made their sullen, heavy-footed way down the track from Gamala with the Sea of Galilee shimmering like a great bowl of liquid fire in the distance. The sight made Valerius shiver. There was something mystical about this land, mystical and terrible, that he doubted he would ever fully understand.

The fatalism and comradeship of the Judaeans who’d leapt to their deaths and whose shattered bodies now rotted in heaps among the nearby rocks kept coming back to him. You might defeat such men. You might kill them. But you could never destroy their spirit. If one tenth of that spirit existed behind the walls of Jerusalem, many of those he had fought beside at Gamala would die there. Who knew, perhaps it would be the grave of Gaius Valerius Verrens.

But he had lived too long with death to dwell on the inevitable. It would come in its own time, and no doubt sooner rather than later, but that was in the future. For the moment he revelled in the brotherhood of the men around him. They were the best of men and the worst. Illiterate savages who would rape and plunder and slaughter the unarmed and the helpless without compunction or conscience; who would beat an outsider to a pulp for the slightest hint of an insult. Yet they’d give their last sip of tepid water to a thirsty comrade or hold him in their arms as he took his final breath, weep over his body and pay for his gravestone. They were builders, engineers and craftsmen; artists in stone and wood and metal. Given the order, they would climb any mountain or swim any river. It was a privilege to serve with them and a privilege to lead them. All the doubt he had experienced after Paternus’s warning had been swept away by the terror and exhilaration of battle. When he reached the camp below the heights he saw the scarred tribune watching his arrival along with his servant. He ignored them. Whatever threat they posed, and he was still uncertain if any existed, they couldn’t touch him on the march.

Less dangerous, perhaps, but of more immediate significance, were the reproachful looks from Tabitha and Serpentius as he took his place in the column. He’d found a way to clean his armour of blood and borrowed a clean tunic before they saw him or the looks might have been worse. Part of him wanted to go to them and explain why he’d joined the attack, but he had good reasons not to. If he did face some kind of threat from Paternus, making contact might put Tabitha in danger. And then there was the mystery of her acquaintance with Josephus, which neither of them cared to acknowledge. Serpentius was more straightforward. As a former gladiator he believed that anyone who risked their life without good reason was a fool. Nothing Valerius could say would change that.

However, he wasn’t surprised when the Spaniard appeared at his side an hour after the column set off along the eastern shore of the Galilean sea.

‘That old bastard Albinus tells me you were a hero up there.’ Serpentius kept his eyes on the road, but his voice held a grudging respect. ‘Tell me there was a point.’

‘There was a point.’ A dozen explanations came to mind, but the Roman let them lie.

‘Then we’ll say no more about it.’

They rode on for a few moments before Valerius turned to his companion. ‘Has the famous gladiator turned into a mother hen watching over her chick?’

Serpentius suppressed a grin. ‘Watchful enough to notice that your little knife looks as if it’s had some use. Curious enough to wonder why, given that the shield I packed away had more dents and cuts in it than Paternus’s face.’

Valerius told him about the encounter with Josephus in the cellar of the library.

‘You think this Judaean followed him there?’

‘It’s possible.’

The Spaniard nodded thoughtfully. ‘Then there’s another one who needs watching. At this rate we’ll need four pairs of eyes, not two.’

‘What about our other friends?’

‘Nothing suspicious,’ Serpentius frowned. ‘Paternus is an odd one. A man with two faces, but neither of them reveals his true feelings. They keep themselves to themselves. Just sitting around their fire and watching. They remind me of some people I know.’

Valerius’s interest was aroused. ‘Who?’

‘Us.’

That afternoon they camped outside Scythopolis, a city which had stayed loyal to Rome throughout the rebellion. The legionaries constructed their temporary fort on the flat crown of a low rise overlooking the river, the favoured location for such places. While the men worked and Lepidus rode off for talks with the city council, Valerius went to wash away the day’s accumulation of dust in the waters of a nearby stream. He’d been there for only a few moments when Tabitha appeared like a wraith from the scattered bushes lining the banks. He’d stripped off his tunic and stood up to his knees in the water wearing only his subligaculum. His first instinct was to cover himself, but the feeling only lasted until he remembered what they had shared. She wore the dust-stained cloak she’d travelled in and her dark eyes studied his body in frank admiration.

‘I had forgotten you had quite so many scars.’ Her head tilted a little to one side as if that gave her a better aspect. ‘Is the water cold?’

‘Why don’t you come in and find out?’

‘Nothing would please me more.’ Her laugh was like the tinkling of a tiny silver bell. ‘I am carrying so much dust that if I shook myself I would cause a sandstorm. But I fear this stream will soon be very popular with our travelling companions. I only came to give you a warning.’

‘Warning?’ He pulled himself out of the stream and she handed him his tunic, managing it in a way that allowed her fingers to trail through the hairs on his chest. A shiver of pleasure ran through him and she must have experienced something similar because she instantly pulled her hand away as if she’d touched a glowing coal.

‘When first we join Titus it must be as if we barely know each other.’ She paused as Valerius slipped the tunic over his head and belted it using only his left hand. ‘You are wondering why? Because it is safer for both of us. Like every court, those of Berenice and Titus are subject to undercurrents and factions. It is better that I discover who is in favour and who is not. Who is plotting and for whom. When I know everything there is to know I will go to Berenice and create some pretext for us to be together without any need for subterfuge.’

‘I would like that very much.’ He moved closer so he could smell the salt tang of her sweat, and something else that started a fire in his loins. The dark eyes widened and her lips twitched into a smile.

‘Perhaps I will play the spy.’ Tabitha’s voice thickened. ‘Or the concubine.’

He had an overwhelming urge to take her in his arms. Before he could act on it she put her hands on his chest to push back. But he was the stronger and he felt her body melt into his as he held her.

‘No, Valerius,’ she said urgently. ‘Now is not the time. We will be together, but …’

Reluctantly, he released her. Tabitha turned away, breathing hard, as if she knew that there could only be one outcome if she stayed. When she reached the trees she looked at him over her shoulder and he saw the same desperate need he knew was in his own eyes.

‘There is one other thing. Do not trust Joseph Ben Mahtityahu.’

‘Why?’ His voice sounded harsh in his ears. Now was the time to ask her about the discussion Serpentius had witnessed, but some inner voice urged him to keep his counsel.

‘He will flatter you and you will find yourself revealing things you will later regret when they reach the ears of those with the power to hurt you.’

‘Is he some kind of wizard?’

‘No.’ The smile was back in her voice. ‘But, as we say in the East, he was born with a golden tongue. A man who can charm the birds from the trees as easily as the coins from your purse.’

‘Then I will try to resist his charms.’ Valerius returned the smile, but she was already gone.

He stooped to pick up the sheathed sword from where he’d left it on the bank, drawing it free and turning in a single movement at a rustle from the bushes.

‘Didn’t I tell you it’s dangerous to be alone in this company?’ Serpentius appeared a little further upstream.

‘How long have you been there?’

‘Long enough to know things are getting very complicated. Of course,’ he grinned, ‘I wouldn’t have stayed if …’

Valerius felt the blood rush to his face, but he matched the Spaniard’s grin. ‘I’m beginning to wonder if I was wrong to free you. I liked it better when you had to do as you were told.’

For the next two days Lepidus led his legion by the glistening waters of the Jordan until they reached Jericho, where an Imperial courier galloped in to pass on an order from Titus to march immediately.

For Jerusalem.