The Scourge of God

They turned their horses and ran.

Now hundreds of tons of rock were sluicing over the precipice like a stone waterfall, and when they struck the bridge there was an eruption. Planks kicked skyward as if catapulted. Aging beams exploded into a spray of splinters.

The avalanche punched through the bridge as if it were paper, taking two Huns and their horses with it, and then the plume of rubble hit the torrent with a titanic splash. Bridge bits rained down.

We climbed to the top of the talus, where Eudoxius was, and looked back. I was jubilant. It was as if a giant had taken a bite out of the mountain. A haze of dust hung in the air.

Below, the middle of the bridge had disappeared.

The surviving Huns had reined in on the far side of the stream and stared upward, quiet at the damage.

“It will take them days to find another way around,” I said with more hope than knowledge. “Or at least hours.” I patted Zerco. “Let’s pray Aetius got your message.”

XIX

I

THE ROMAN TOWER

The guard tower of Ampelum overlooked the junction of two old Roman roads, one going west to the salt mines around Iuvavum and Cucullae, the other south to Ad Pontem and the mountain passes beyond. The tower was square, fifty feet high, crenellated at its crest, and topped by a tripod-hung kettle in which oil could be lit to send signals to distant towers like it. The fire had been lit many more times than help had ever arrived, given the depleted nature of imperial resources; and so this garrison, like so many, had learned to depend on itself. Rome was like the Moon: ever present and far away.

Around the tower’s base was a wider fortification of stone walls eight feet high, enclosing a courtyard with stables, storerooms, and workshops. The dozen occupying Roman soldiers slept and ate in the tower itself, relying on cows stabled on the ground floor to provide some warmth.

This animal heat was supplemented by charcoal braziers that gave the air a stale haze and, over the centuries, had stained the beams black.

To call the garrison “Roman” was to stretch the historic meaning of the term. It had been ages since legions consisted primarily of Latins marching out of Italy. Instead, the army had become one of the Empire’s great integrating forces, recruiting men of a hundred conquered nations and training them under the common tongue. Slowly, the universality of language, custom, and armament had slipped away, and so what manned the tower now was a collection of mountain farm boys and recruited vagabonds, all under the command of a gruff decurion named Silas who originated in the marshes of Frisia. One soldier was Greek, one Italian, and one African. Three were Germanic Ostrogoths, one a Gepid, and the other five had never ventured more than twenty miles from the fortress and thus were simply inhabitants of Noricum. While these men owed nominal allegiance to Rome, they principally guarded themselves, plus a few villages in surrounding valleys from which they extracted provisions and a few coins in taxes. Travelers passing the crossroads were required to pay a toll. When reminders from the clerks in Ravenna became insistent enough, a small portion of this levy was shared with the central government. The soldiers did not expect, and did not receive, anything in return. They were responsible for providing their own food, clothing, weapons, and any material needed to repair the guard tower. Their reward was permission to levy taxes on their neighbors.

Still, these men had at least nominal allegiance to the idea of Rome: the idea of order, the idea of civilization. I hoped they represented refuge. Our destruction of the bridge several miles back had delayed but not necessarily stopped the Huns. A Roman garrison might force Skilla to give up and go home.

“What the devil is that? ” greeted the commanding decurion Silas, who had come to the gate and, after observing that four of us were crowded on two exhausted horses, was peering at Zerco.

“An important aide to General Flavius Aetius,” I replied, reasoning it would not hurt to exaggerate the truth.

“Is this a jest?”

“His wisdom is as tall as his stature is short.”

“And that sack of grain across your saddle?” He looked at the trussed and gagged Eudoxius, who wiggled to communicate outrage.

“A traitor to Rome. Aetius wants to question him.”

“An aide, a traitor?” He pointed to the woman. “And who is she, the queen of Egypt?”

“Listen. We’ve important information for the general, but need help. We’re being pursued by a party of Huns.”

“Huns! This is a joke. Any Huns are far to the east.”

“Then why are four of us on two horses while our other grows Hunnish arrows?” Zerco piped up. He slid down from his mount and waddled over to the Roman captain, peering up. “Do you think a man as big as me would stop in a sty like this if I weren’t in dire peril?”

“Zerco, don’t insult our new friend,” Julia interjected.

She too dismounted. “I apologize for his rudeness. We’re being chased by Attila’s men, decurion, and only the collapse of the bridge below saved us from capture. Now we ask your protection.”

“The bridge collapsed?”

“We had to destroy it.”

He looked as if not certain whether to believe anything we said, and to dislike us if he did. “You’re with him?” The commander nodded from Julia to me.

“It’s this rude one who is my husband.” She put her hand on Zerco’s shoulder. “He’s a fool and sometimes makes jokes that others don’t find humorous, but please don’t mind. He’s taller in spirit than men twice his size, and it is true, he serves the great Aetius. Do you know where the general is?”

The soldier barked a laugh. “Look around you!” The tower was mossy and cracked, the courtyard muddy, and the stabled animals thin. “I’m as likely to see Aetius as I am Attila! There was a report he was in Rome or in Ravenna or on the Rhine, and even a report he was coming this way, but then there was also a report of a unicorn in Iuvavum and a dragon at Cucullae. Besides, he never stays anywhere for long. With winter coming on, he may retire to Augusta Treverorum or Mediolanum. If you’re to reach him, you need to move quickly before the passes are snowed in.”

“Then we need food, fodder, and another horse,” I said.

“Which means I need a solidus, a solidus, and another solidus,” Silas replied. “Let’s see your purse, strangers.”

“We have no more money! We’ve escaped from Attila’s camp. Please, we have information that Aetius needs to hear.

Can’t you requisition help from the government?”

“I can’t get anything myself from Rome.” He looked at us and our meager possessions dubiously. “What’s that on your back?”

“An old sword,” I said.

“Let me see it. Maybe you can trade for that.”

I considered a moment, and then climbed down and un-wrapped it. Black and rusty, it looked like it had been pulled from the mud. Which it had. Only the size was impressive.

“That’s not a sword, it’s an anchor,” Silas said. “It wouldn’t cut cheese, and looks too big to swing. Why are you carrying that piece of scrap?”

“It’s a family relic that’s important to me.” I wrapped it back up. “A token of our ancestors.”

“Were your ancestors ten feet tall? It’s ridiculous.”

“Listen, if you won’t provision us, at least let us spend the night. We haven’t slept under a roof in weeks.”

He looked at Julia. “Can you cook?”

“Better than your mother.”

Silas grinned. “I doubt that, but better than wretched Lucius, without a doubt. All right, you will cook supper; you will fetch water; and you, little man, will carry wood. Your prisoner we’ll tie to a post in the tower and let him sputter.

Agents of Aetius! The garrison at Virunum will laugh when I tell them that one. Go on, I’ll let you fill your bellies and sleep in my fort. But you’re on your way in the morning.

This is a military post, not a mansio.”

If the decurion seemed a reluctant host, his bored soldiers welcomed our company as entertainment. Julia cooked a hot and hearty soup; Zerco sang them ribald songs; and I told them of Constantinople, which to them seemed no more or less distant and incredible than Rome or Alexandria. Eudoxius, his gag removed, insisted he was a prince of the Huns and promised all of them their weight in gold if they would free and return him. The soldiers thought him as funny as Zerco. They assured us that Huns did not exist in these parts or, if they did, were no doubt on their way home by now.

Forts less than a day’s ride apart guarded the approaches to Italy, and we could travel from one to the next. “Sleep well tonight,” assured Lucius, “because we don’t allow barbarians in upper Noricum.”

At the gray smudge of dawn, that time when sentries finally become dark silhouettes against a barely lightened sky, just two Romans were still awake in our small outpost.

Both died within moments of each other.

The first, Simon, was at the gate and looking in sleepy boredom down the lane. He hoped that Ulrika, a local milk-maid who had udders like a cow, might make her delivery before he was called off duty to breakfast. He was thinking of her breasts, round as melons and firm as a wineskin, when a pony trotted out of the gloom and, before he could call challenge, a Hun arrow took him squarely in the throat. He gurgled as he sank numbly down, wondering what the devil had happened to him, and what had happened to Ulrika. It is oft remarked that a common expression on the dead is surprise.

The second man, Cassius, was at the top of the tower and was pacing back and forth to keep warm. It was a strange humming that caused him to look up before a dozen arrows hissed down like a sudden squall. Four of the arcing missiles found their mark, and the others rattled on the tower roof like hail. It was this, and the thump of his body, that woke me and the others.

“Huns!” I cried.

“You’re having a dream,” Silas grumbled, half asleep.

Then an arrow sizzled through the chamber’s slit window and banged off the stone wall.

We heard a rumble of hooves as Skilla’s men galloped to the compound wall in a rush, leaped from their pony’s backs to the lip of the wall, and then streamed over like a ripple of shadow. So far, remembering the lesson of yesterday, they had not let their voices make a sound.

They dropped lightly down into the courtyard like the softest of warnings, the quiet broken only by a dog that barked before it could be speared and a donkey startled and braying before it was brained by an ax. It took the barbarians a moment to explore the kitchen, storerooms, and stables, running lightly with swords drawn. Then, learning quickly enough that all of us were in the tower, they charged its door and found it barred. Now Roman heads were popping from the tower windows and shouting alarm. It was Silas who was the first to strike back, hurling a spear from a third floor window. It struck so fiercely that it staked the Hun it found like a tent peg.

“Awake!” he roared. “Grab your sword, not your sandals, you oaf! We’re under attack!” He stepped aside an instant before another arrow whistled through the window. It struck a beam and quivered.

I’d rolled out of my sleeping mat with loincloth and the Roman short sword I had killed Attila’s sentry with. Julia still had the spear with which she’d gutted my horse. Beyond that and the dagger I’d taken from Eudoxius, we fugitives were virtually unarmed: my skills as an archer were still indifferent. Now I ran for the rack of javelins, grabbed one, and peeked outside. It was barely light, and the Huns below were scuttling back and forth across the courtyard like spiders. One paused, looking up, and I threw. The man saw the motion and dodged. There was something familiar to his quickness. Skilla?

Now more Romans were throwing javelins or firing crossbow bolts, even as Hun arrows clicked and ricocheted off the stones of the tower.

“Who in Hades is attacking us?” Silas demanded.

“Those Huns you said would be scurrying home by now,”

I responded.

“We have no quarrel with the Huns!”

“It appears they have a quarrel with you.”

“It’s you! And that prisoner, isn’t it?”

“Him, and that rust you called an anchor.”

“The sword?”

“It’s magic. If Attila wins it, he will conquer the world.”

Silas looked at me in wonder, once again not certain what to believe.

“Julia, heat the soup!” Zerco cried, gesturing toward the pot of beef and millet broth that remained warm in an iron pot. Then the little man ran up the stairs toward the top of the tower, his boots pounding.

Heat the soup? Then I realized what the dwarf had in mind. Julia was fanning and feeding the coals. Meanwhile I looked and waited for another target from my window. Finally a Hun made a dash for the door at the base of the tower. Reminding myself of my combat with Skilla, I waited for a covering arrow to clang off the stonework and then leaned out and threw. The weapon fell like a thunderbolt, and the Hun fell with it, dying halfway to the door.

I felt nothing but satisfaction. I was not the boy I had been.

The Romans were fully aroused now and the growing light was helping. But with our dead and wounded—two more had been struck by arrows—we were outnumbered more than two to one. More ominously, the Huns were dis-mantling the shed roof of the stable, loosing the tile covering from its posts and gathering men around it. Their intention was obvious. They would use the roof as a shield to get themselves to the gate. Other Huns were gathering straw and timber to start a fire at the door.

With both sides fully alert now, the arrow volleys were slackening as the battling warriors became wary about exposing themselves. Our supplies of missiles needed to be hoarded. Insults in Latin, German, and Hunnish echoed back and forth across the bloody courtyard in lieu of volleys.

“Give up our slaves!” Skilla called in Hunnish.

None of the Roman garrison could understand his demand.

Zerco came pounding back down the stairs, his eyes bright with excitement. Penned as he was in a fortress, he was something of an equal in this fight or even had an advantage, since he didn’t have to crouch so much to stay away from the arrows. “I lit the signal fire. Lucius and I have loosened some of the stones at the top to throw down on them when they charge the door. Is the soup hot?”

“Beginning to bubble,” said Julia.

“Get Jonas to help you pour. Stick that bench plank out the window to make a sluice. When their makeshift roof breaks, pour our lunch down on anyone in the wreckage.”

“What if I get hungry?” one of the soldiers tried to joke.

“If you can’t get to the courtyard kitchens by the time your stomach growls, you’re already dead,” the dwarf replied. Then he pounded back up the stairs.

Outside there was a shout and a volley of arrows shot upward again, many keying accurately through the windows.

“Keep down until our friends drop the stones!” Silas ordered. “When the Huns run back for cover, rise and use the crossbows!”

I watched from one side of the narrow slit window. The detached stable roof suddenly rose, rocked slightly as the Huns positioned themselves better to carry it, and then began to trundle forward. Crouching toward the rear were warriors with combustibles and torches. The rhythm of Hun arrows from their archers discouraged us from trying to hit the oncoming barbarians. I couldn’t help but flinch each time a missile whizzed through the narrow windows. There was a thud as the lip of the roof struck the base of the tower, and then harsh shouts as hay, wood, and torches were passed forward.

“Now!” came Zerco’s piping cry from above.

I could hear the rush of wind as the parapet stones plum-meted. There was a brutal crash, cries, and oaths as the stones, half the weight of a man, punched through the roof and shattered its tiles.

“The board!” I ordered. A soldier slid the bench out the window and tilted it downward to direct the soup away from the walls. Then I and Julia, our hands wrapped in cloth, hoisted the black pot off the hearth fire, staggered with it to the window, and poured. It was clumsy, a gallon or two of good food splashing inside our chamber, but most of the hot liquid gushed outward as planned and hissed downward in a plume of steam to strike the Huns entangled in the wreckage. Now there were screams as well as curses.

The Huns broke, running, and the aim of their companions faltered as the barbarians came streaming back. Now we Romans filled the windows to shoot or throw, and two enemies were hit in the back and fell, skidding, as they tried to flee. Two more lay insensible or dead in the roof wreckage, and a few more were limping or staggering.

The odds were beginning to even.

We cheered until smoke began ominously rising up the face of the tower. I risked ducking out the window to look, jerking back just in time as an arrow bounced by my ear.

“A fire has started in the wreckage and it’s against the door,” I reported. “We need water to put it out.”

“No water!” Silas countermanded. “We barely have enough for a day, let alone a siege.”

“But if the door burns—”

“We pray it doesn’t, or kill them on the stairs. We need to be able to wait for help.”

“What help?”

“Your little friend’s signal fire. Let’s pray that your Aetius, or God, is watching.”

The Huns were beginning to shout and howl in excitement at the sight of the flames burning outside the tower door. One suddenly darted across the courtyard with an arm-ful of hay and wood and hurled it into the makeshift bonfire, then dashed back before any Roman could successfully hit him. A second pulled the same trick, and then a third.

The fourth who tried it was killed, but by that time the fire was roaring. Smoke made it hard to see from the tower windows. Silas and I ran to the ground level to see the effect.

The cows penned inside the tower were lowing in panic, their eyes rolling as they pulled on their stable bridles.

Smoke was filtering through every joint in the door and drifting upward, and I could hear the Roman soldiers above us beginning to cough. We could feel the heat.

There was a howl above. Another Roman had been hit with an arrow.

“Let me go!” cried Eudoxius from the post where he was tied. “It’s me they want! If you give me to them, I’ll tell them to spare your wretched lives!”

“Don’t listen to him!” I shouted to no one in particular.

“When they rush us we’ll use the cattle,” Silas muttered to me. “Julius and Lucius will be waiting with crossbows.

We have to kill enough to make them tire of this game.”

“Aim for their leader if you can,” I told the crossbowmen.

“He’s the one who won’t give up.”

The Huns were chanting now, singing a death song for us. A third of each side had been killed or wounded.

Skilla let the fire eat at the door for a full hour while he busied his warriors with dislodging a heavy beam from the kitchen. The Huns used cleavers to sharpen a blunt point.

Holes were drilled and handles hammered into each side, giving the nomads an air of industry I’d never seen before.

This would be their battering ram. They were as energetic at war as they were indifferent to farming.

Finally the fire began to die. The door was still standing, but it was a sagging, blackened hulk. A new flock of arrows soared skyward, providing cover, and the Huns charged under its shelter, holding the ram. In a rush they were across the courtyard and the beam hit the door with a crash. It burst inward.

“Yes!” Skilla cried. The Huns hurled the beam in with it and drew swords.

Yet suddenly the doorway filled with horn and hoof. We were beating the flanks of our cows, and cattle crashed into the grouping of surging Huns like Carthaginian elephants, knocking them askew. The Huns tried to drive them back the other way, but the momentum was ours. Horns twisted, gor-ing, and hooves trampled any Hun who fell. In the moment of confusion more stones and spears rained down, and two more Huns fell in the maw of wreckage. Finally the attackers had the sense to let the cows burst outward, but all their speed had been lost. When the surviving attackers crowded through the doorway once again, determined to end things once and for all, we were ready.

Two crossbow bolts sang and two more Huns fell, tripping those pushing behind. I cursed that Skilla wasn’t at the forefront. All the advantages the horse warriors had in normal battle had been lost in this close-quarter contest, and I knew the casualties were maddening to the enemy. If we lost, there would be no mercy.

Silas’s soldiers were furiously cranking to recock their crossbows, backing up the stairs as they did so. But the Huns with bows pulled and shot.

Lucius and Julius came tumbling down the stairs.

Another charge upward and now our iron soup pot was hurled down at the Huns, knocking them backward. Spears stabbed out, one striking home and another grabbed and jerked away. The fighting on the stairs was desperate; and Skilla could see me among the Romans blocking the way, chopping with a sword in grim determination. I saw it in his eyes. Now I have you!

Suddenly someone behind the attackers was calling in Hunnish in a familiar, irritating voice. “I am a minister of Attila and you answer to me! Fight harder! Get the sword!”

Eudoxius!

“How did he get loose?” I shouted in outrage.

“A fool soldier cut the man free, thinking he could parley,” Julia answered from behind me, passing javelins we could throw. “The Greek stabbed his benefactor through the throat and leaped out the window.”

“Burn the base beams and the tower will fall!” Eudoxius advised.

“Another crossbow!” Silas demanded, clubbing a Hun backward with a shield. He was bleeding from wounds, and no one answered.

Step by step, grunting as they pushed us upward, the Huns climbed. There were too few of us left. I hurled down the bench we’d used for the soup and they knocked it aside with a snarl. We gave them the first floor and tried to use furniture to block the entry to the second. Arrows thudded into it.

“Burn them, burn them!” Eudoxius was screaming.

And then far above I heard the dwarf’s high, piping voice. “Cavalry! Cavalry!”

There was a distant, distinct call of a Roman lituus; and the Huns milling below us looked at one another in consternation. Reinforcements? Our survivors, recognizing the sound, began to cheer.

Skilla was using a small trestle table to shield himself from whatever we hurled at him. Now I saw him hesitate in an agony of indecision. His enemy and Attila’s sword were so close! Yet if the Huns were penned inside this fort by a fresh force of Roman cavalry, all would be lost.

One last attack!

“Tatos! What’s happening!” he called anxiously.

“Romans are coming! Many of them, on horses!”

“We still have time to kill them!” Skilla lifted the table.

I took a crossbow and shot. The bolt punched through its surface, narrowly missing his nose, and his head jerked backward.

With his face turned, he saw that his men were melting.

“We have to flee!”

“The sword! The sword!” Eudoxius was pleading.

Skilla still hesitated.

I was cranking desperately.

Finally he leaped downward as I fired again, the bolt missing him by inches. Then he was running out of the shattered doorway, hurtling the bloody mess. The badly wounded Huns were left to Roman justice while the rest ran for their ponies that had been picketed outside the wall.

Skilla jumped from the parapet and landed neatly on his horse’s back, slashing to cut its tether. Even as we hooted in triumph, the Huns were getting away.

I craned out a window to look. There was a flash of armor in the rising sun, and an unusually well-uniformed and well-armored company of cavalry began to round the brow of a hill to the south, where the high mountains lay. Skilla lashed his pony and rode north the other direction, back the way the Huns had come. His retreat was downhill, and no soldiers anywhere were better at melting away than the light cavalry of the People of the Dawn. By the time the Roman cavalry had thundered up to the beleaguered tower the Huns were a mile distant and galloping fast, scattering until they could regroup later.

The battle was over as suddenly as it had begun.

We gaped. The leader of the reinforcements was on a snow-white stallion, his cape red and his helmet crested in the old style. His breastplate bore an inlaid swirl of silver and gold, and it seemed for a moment as if Apollo were descending from the rising sun. He galloped through the fortress gate and up to the wrecked door of its central tower with a turma of cavalry behind him, reining up to stare in wonder at the havoc. We defenders staggered out to meet him, and what must he have thought: a woman whose sweaty hair hung in tendrils on her face; a grimy dwarf; and me, bearing in two arms a great old iron sword almost bigger than I was.

The officer blinked in recognition. “Zerco?”

The newcomer’s surprise was no more than the dwarf’s.

He, too, let his mouth open in shock and then fell to one knee, displaying a humility he had never displayed to Attila.

“General Aetius!”

“Aetius?” Silas, bleeding and triumphant, stared as if he were indeed observing that rumored unicorn. “You mean this fool was telling the truth?”

The general smiled. “I doubt it, from what I remember of his slyness. So what in Heaven and Hell are you doing here, Zerco? I got your summons, but to actually find you . . .”

Aetius was a handsome and weathered man, still hard muscled in his fifth decade, his face lined with care and authority, his hair an iron gray. “We saw the signal fire. You always did have a knack for trouble.”

“I was looking for you, lord,” the dwarf said. “I have decided to change employers again, since Attila has tired of my company. This time, I brought my wife with me.”

Julia bowed.

“Well, the saints know we need laughter at perilous times like these, but it doesn’t look like you’ve been joking, fool.”

He looked at our bloody mess with a grim kind of satisfaction. “It appears you’ve started what I barely have hopes of finishing. I’m inspecting our alpine posts because of your warnings of war, in case Attila advances on Italy. Your message of escape caught up with me two days ago.”

“More than warnings, general. I’ve brought you dire news from Attila’s camp. And I’ve brought you a new companion, a Roman from Constantinople who almost killed the kagan himself.” Zerco turned. “You have a gift for him, do you not, Jonas Alabanda?”

I was happy to be rid of it. “Indeed.” I walked up to his horse with the sword.

“You tried to kill Attila?”

“I tried to burn him, but he has the devil’s luck. My luck was this talisman.” I raised the pitted relic. “A gift, General Aetius, from the god of war.”

XX

I

THE DRUMS OF ATTILA

A.D. 451

Snow came, and the world seemed to slumber. Yet from the capital of Attila on the frozen plains of Hunuguri, a hundred couriers were sent to a thousand barbarian forts, villages, and camps. No mention was made of the loss of the fabled sword. Instead, Attila evoked other magic, telling his followers that Rome’s own prophets had foretold the city’s final end.

All the historic currents—the plea of Honoria, the promise of Gaiseric, the defiance of Marcian, and the petition of Cloda for help winning the throne of the Franks—made a river of destiny. In all the world, no land was sweeter, greener, richer, or more moderate than the lands still farther to the west: Gaul, Hispania, and Italy. Every Hun should ready himself for the final battle. Every ally and vassal should renew his pledge.

Every enemy would be given a last chance to join the barbarians or, if they balked, utterly destroyed. In spring, Attila would unleash the most terrifying army the world had ever seen. When he did, the Old Age would come to an end.

As pledges of fealty, the couriers brought back the horsehair standards, cloth banners, and sacred staffs of the subject tribes. The warlords would be allowed to retrieve them when they joined their forces with Attila. Boards were drilled and the poles that carried the tribal insignia were erected in the newly rebuilt great hall, its wood raw and green. By winter’s end, with the grass blushing green and the sun once more climbing the clear blue sky of Hunuguri, the chamber was entirely full of standards, and Attila and his chiefs were meeting outside.

Ilana had to watch all this. She’d been let out of her wooden cage after two months of confinement and exposure threatened to kill her. She slept in a corner of the kitchen now, fed on scraps, and walked with a chain connecting her ankles. Guernna rejoiced in the haughty Roman girl’s subju-gation and would have liked to give her periodic abusive kicks. The first time she tried it Ilana had slapped her back, so now Guernna kept her distance. Ilana’s burns and bruises had healed, and her heart once more held desperate hope.

Skilla had come back, and with him word that Jonas was still alive.

The Hun brought back the Greek named Eudoxius but not the sword. Skilla was uncharacteristically quiet, more mature and more somber, and he did not visit her. The rumor was that he’d fought bravely but that the young Roman had beaten him again. Despite this, Edeco treated him with new respect, promising him a finish to things in the spring. Attila, in contrast, pointedly ignored Skilla, a silent rebuke that kept him in anxious agony.

The grass grew higher, and the first flowers appeared.

Animals fattened for slaughter and fodder was plentiful. It was time when marching armies could be fed, and thus time for war. Attila signaled his intentions by ordering an assembly at the old Roman fortress of Aquincum near the great bend of the Danube. There, next to the roofless barracks and weedy arena, the Huns would prepare to strike west. Attila announced he’d been asked to be the rescuer of the princess Honoria, sister of the Roman emperor! He would marry her and become king of Rome.

The Hun host came from all points to the ruined fort and consisted of not just the myriad Hun tribes but their barbarian allies. Riding or marching into the sprawling encampment were the Ostrogoths, the Gepids, the Rugi, the Sciri, and the Thuringi, as well as representative contingents of Vandals from Africa, Bagaudae refugees from Gaul, and seaborne raiders from the frozen lands across the Baltic.

Some came in armor and some came in rags, some favored the spear and some the ax, some were bowmen and some were swordsmen, but all sensed that Rome had never seen an invasion such as this. The growing army, and rumors of its might, created a gravity that drew in runaway slaves, fugitive thieves, exiled politicians, discredited aristocrats, unemployed mercenaries, and old soldiers bored with retire-ment. Many brought wives and children with them to help carry the booty as long as their husband and father stayed alive, and to claim it should he fall. There were whores, con-jurers, seers, wizards, priests, prophets, merchants, horse traders, armorers, tanners, cobblers, wheelwrights, carpenters, siege engineers, sutlers, gold dealers, and Roman deserters. The tent city grew, and grew, and grew still more, the grass trampled into spring mud and a third of the army soon sick and coughing. Attila began sending forward contingents of cavalry up the Danube simply to make supply of the mammoth camp feasible. As each advance division left for the west, the kagan had them march through one of the ruined arched gates of Aquincum, as if through a triumphal arch of Rome.

“The whole world is in motion,” Skilla murmured to his uncle as they watched fresh troops march out toward the west, even as newcomers were arriving from the east. “I didn’t know so many people even existed.”

Edeco smiled grimly. “There will be fewer by season’s end.”

At the new moon of late spring, Attila called the most important warlords to a final conference before a great pyramidal bonfire. This would be his last opportunity for some time to address them all in person with his charismatic intensity. Once the host fully set out and spread like an engulfing wave, he could communicate only by messenger until they gathered again for battle. Once more he dressed humbly, his armor plain, his head bare, his clothes rugged.

The only concession to ornament was a gold brooch to hold his cape, in the shape of a golden stag. The Goths wore the oath rings that pledged loyalty, and the Gepids the colored sashes of their clans. Attila’s eyes held them all like a fist.

“The People of the Dawn,” he began, “are destined to march as far as the setting sun. This is our fate, and has been since the white deer led us out of our homeland.”

There was solemn nodding by the Huns in the assembly.

“We will rule from the endless grass to the endless ocean, which none of us have yet seen. All men will unite under us, and any of you here will have your pick of a hundred women and a thousand slaves.”

There was a low growl of anticipation.

“The campaign ahead will not be easy.” Attila’s look was stern. “Rome’s western emperor is a fool; all know this. But his general is not a fool, and Aetius, who I know well, will do all in his power to oppose me. As children we were the best of friends, but as men we have become the deadliest of enemies. It must be so, because we are too much alike and want the same thing: empire.”

Another murmur of assent.

“The princess Honoria has begged me for rescue from her insipid brother. As the greatest king in the world, I cannot ignore her plea. She yearns for my bed, and who can blame her?”

The warlords laughed.

“Moreover, I’ve had communication from our brothers the Vandals. Their king Gaiseric has sent word that if we strike the West, he will as well. Cloda will bring his Franks to our side. Rome’s own prophets forecast our victory.”

Another solemn nodding of heads. All knew that fortune was on the side of the Huns.

“Here is what will happen. We are not going to raid. We are going to conquer and stay, until all men swear fealty to the People of the Dawn. We are going to destroy the West in what has become its heart, Gaul. We will defeat the Romans there, enlist their German allies, and descend on Italy and Hispania and make ourselves masters. Then I shall marry Honoria, and rut with her, and make new Attilas.” He grinned.

They roared, stamping their feet in an enthusiastic drumming. “Attila! Attila! Attila!” Only his eldest sons scowled.

“Then, with all the West under my banner, I will destroy Marcian and the East.”

“Attila!” they cried. They bayed like dogs and screamed like eagles. They howled and yipped and growled. They drummed the ground with spear butts in a rumble so loud that all the camp could hear their enthusiasm.

Attila held up his hands for quiet. “The Hun will win, and why? Because he is not soft like the Roman. A Hun needs no roof, though he can take one. He needs no slave, though he can conquer one. He can sleep on horseback, wash in a stream, and shelter under a tree. The People of the Dawn will triumph not because they come with much, but because they come with little! Every battle has proven this. Cities turn men into weaklings. Their burning will make our women sing.”

There was less certainty this time. These men had learned the comforts of a snug hearth or heated bath. They liked fine jewelry and gilded swords.

“Listen to me, all of you! We are going to make the complicated places simple! I want the purity of fire. I want the cleanliness of the steppe. Leave no stones together. Leave no roof intact. Leave nothing but the ashes of new birth, and I swear to you by any god you hold holy, victory will be ours.

This is what the gods truly wish!”

“Attila!” they roared.

He nodded, grimly satisfied but knowing the human nature of his followers. “Do this,” he promised them, “and I will make you rich with the wreckage.”

Like thunder heralding the approaching storm, rumors and reports of the Hun assembly filtered steadily to Aetius. He had made his winter headquarters at Augusta Treverorum in the valley of the upper Mosel, a city with the same hollow heritage as his army. Once a headquarters for emperors, Augusta Treverorum had been sacked, rebuilt, and rewalled.

Constantine’s palace had become a church, since no imperial delegations came this far north anymore. The baths had closed and the newcomer Franks and Belgicans had turned them into apartments, wooden floors subdividing what had once been great arching halls. The games were no longer held, so the arena had become a marketplace.

Yet Treveris was the most intact and strategic Roman city left in the region. From there, Aetius took ship on the Rhine and traveled up and down, anxiously preaching the strength-ening of defenses and the need to burn the river bridges when the time came. Messages went out to the Alans, the Burgundians, the Franks, the Armoricans, and the Saxons, warning that the Hun aim was to destroy the West and make them vassal nations. Only by uniting, he warned, could they hope to stand.

The barbarian kingdoms answered him cautiously. Most sent queries about a great sword they had heard of, the sword of Mars, which Aetius had somehow captured from Attila. Did it really exist? What power did it have?

Come to me in the spring and see for yourself, Aetius replied.

At the same time, spies from Attila reached these same courts and urged surrender and obeisance as the only chance of tribal survival. The coming invasion could not be with-stood, they warned, and to ally with the tottering Roman Empire was folly.

The key, for both Aetius and the wavering tribes, was Theodoric, king of the Visigoths and the most powerful of the barbarian chieftains. If he joined with the Romans he gave Aetius and his allies a slim chance of victory. If he remained neutral or went over to Attila, then all was lost.

Theodoric was well aware of his own strategic importance, and wary of the wiles of Aetius. The general had manipulated the Germanic tribes too many times before. In response to every missive and every blandishment, he kept putting Aetius off. “I have no quarrel with Attila and none with you,” he wrote the Roman general. “It is winter, when men should rest. In spring, the Visigoths will make a decision in our best interests, not yours.”

The emperor Valentinian seemed equally oblivious to the danger. In response to Aetius’s pleas for more men, weapons, and supplies, he responded with lengthy letters complaining about the incompetence of tax collectors, the miserly ways of the rich, the dishonesty of bureaucrats, the treasonous plotting of his sister, and the selfishness of military planners. Couldn’t the army appreciate the problems of the imperial court? Didn’t Aetius understand that the emperor was doing all he could?

I suspect your spies are quite misinformed about the intentions of Attila. You may be unaware that Marcian has suspended the tribute payments that the East has made to the Huns and has recalled troops from Persia.

Isn’t it more likely that the Hun’s wrath will fall on Constantinople? Isn’t Attila one of your oldest friends? Have not the Huns served bravely as mercenaries in your own campaigns? Is not my half of the Empire poorer than Marcian’s? Why would Attila attack here? Your fears are exaggerated, general. . . .

It was like the prattle of a nagging and self-pitying wife, Aetius thought bitterly. He knew Valentinian had committed large portions of the budget to circuses, churches, palaces, and banquets. The new emperors refused to acknowledge they could no longer afford to live like the old. Legions were at half strength. Contractors were corrupt. Equipment was shoddy. Maybe the prophets are right, the general thought.

Maybe it’s Rome’s time to die. My time, as well. And yet . . .

He looked out at the green Mosel, swollen with spring rains. This river had long since lost the thick traffic of imperial trade but still led to a remnant of Roman agriculture and commerce in the northern reaches of Gaul. The barbarians might disdain Rome, but they also copied it in inferior, almost childlike, fashion. Their churches were rustic and their houses crude, their food plain, their animals unkempt, and their contempt for literacy impregnable to reason. Still, they pretended at Romanness, preening in plundered clothing and living in half-ruined villas, like monkeys in a temple.

They tried to cook with aniseed and fish oil. Some men cut their hair short in Roman style, and some women traded their clogs for sandals, despite the mud.

It was something. If Attila won, there would not be even mimicry. The future would be a return of wilderness, the eclipse of all knowledge, and the extinction of the Christian Church. Couldn’t the fools see it?

But of course one fool could: Zerco. It was odd how the dwarf had become a favored companion. He was not just funny, he was perceptive. He came back not just with information about Attila’s power but about the Hun himself: His fear that civilization was corrupting. Aetius remembered Attila as the quietest and most sullen of all the Huns he’d met while a hostage in their camp. Aetius had wondered if the unhappy man, nursing some secret wounds, was simple.

The opposite was true, of course, and while Hun warlords had preened and boasted, Attila had made secret alliances with a fierce, quiet magnetism. He had proved to be as masterly a tactician off the battlefield as on. While others had strutted, he had risen, wooing, allying, and killing.

And what had been a plague of raiders had turned, under Attila, into something far worse: a horde of would-be conquerors who wanted to go back to a salvation of animal-like simplicity.

All this Zerco tried to explain and more: that the core of the Hun army was not huge, that the barbarians often quarreled like dogs over a scrap of meat, and that their spirits were winded quickly if they could not prevail. “They will win only if the West believes they must win,” the dwarf argued. “Fight them, sire, and they will back off like a jackal looking for an easier meal.”

“My allies are afraid to stand up to them. They have cowed the world.”

“Yet it is often the bully who is the most fearful and weak.”

The young man Zerco had brought with him, this Jonas from Constantinople, also had spirit. He was in love with a captive woman—ah, the age when such longing could consume you!—and yet hadn’t allowed it to entirely cloud his reason. He had proved to be an able diplomatic secretary, despite his fantasies of rescue and revenge. While the youth chafed under his scholarly duties—“I want to fight!”—he was too useful to waste as a mere soldier. He was as interesting as Zerco, recounting how he had outlasted the arrows of a rival in a duel and arguing that Rome could do the same. As dusk fell in a March chill, Aetius ordered a fire lit and these two friends brought to him. Leaves were budding, and as soon as the grass was high enough to feed their horses, the Huns would come. On this side of the Rhine, every ally would be watching to see how many would unite under the Roman general. If he could not hold firm, all would come apart.

“I have a mission for each of you,” Aetius told them.

He could see the Byzantine brighten. “I’ve been practicing with your cavalry!”

“Which will serve, eventually. In the meantime, there’s a more important and pressing task.”

The young man leaned forward, eager.

“First, Zerco.” He turned to the dwarf. “I’m going to send you to Bishop Anianus in Aurelia.”

“Aurelia?”

“It is the capital of the Alan tribe, whose name the new rulers corrupt in their tongue so that it sounds like ‘Orleans.’

It is the gateway to the richest valley of Gaul, the Loire, and the strategic key to the province.”

Zerco stood up in self-mockery, his eyes at belt level. “I am certain to stop him if he gets that far, general.” His eyes twinkled. “And enjoy myself if he doesn’t.”

Aetius smiled. “I want you to listen and talk, not fight. I send you to Anianus as a token of friendship and, indeed, one of your tasks is to befriend him. I’m told he is a particularly pious Roman who has inspired great respect among the Alans; they think him holy and good luck. When the Huns come he will be watched closely by the population.

You must convince him to lead in our cause.”

“But why me, a halfling?” Zerco protested. “Surely a man of greater stature—”

“Would be watched too closely by Sangibanus, king of the Alan tribe. I have received word that Sangibanus is listening to emissaries from the Huns. He fears Attila, and wants to keep what he has. Once more I need you to play the fool, caper in his court, and pass me your judgment on which side he’s leaning toward. If he betrays Aurelia to Attila, then all of Gaul is opened to invasion. If he holds, we have time to win.”

“I will learn his mind better than he knows it himself!”

Zerco promised.

“And if there is a plot of betrayal then I will fight to stop it,” Jonas chimed in.

Aetius turned to him. “No, you have an even more important and difficult task, Bringer of the Sword. I am sending you to Tolosa.”

“Tolosa!” Far in the south of Gaul, it was two weeks’

journey away.

“Somehow King Theodoric must be persuaded to ride with us. I have reasoned, argued, and begged in correspondence, and still he refuses to commit. Sometimes a single visit is worth more than a hundred letters. I am making you my personal envoy. I don’t care how you do it, but you must bring the Visigoths to our cause.”

“But how?”

“You know Attila. Speak your heart.”

While Zerco and Julia set out for Aurelia, I ascended the Rhine by boat. All seemed quiet in the greening valley, war a distant dream, and yet change was in the air. Cavalry clattered by on the old Roman roads, evidence of preparations, and when the ship put in to deliver goods and messages or take on provisions, there was a solemn and watchful atmosphere in the riverside villages and old Roman forts. In the evenings the men honed weapons. The women smoked meat and loaded the last of the previous year’s grain into bags in case flight became inevitable. All had heard rumors of stirrings to the east. Few had ever seen a Hun. At inns I warned of Hun ferocity. At fortresses, I reviewed troops in Aetius’s name.

Aetius had asked me to detour to the legionary fortress of Sumelocenna. “I told the tribune named Stenis there to make his men into wasps,” the general recalled. “I want you to see if he has succeeded and write me the result.”

The fort seemed low and unimpressive as I approached, one tower broken and its paint long peeled away. Yet as I drew nearer I took heart from what I saw. The ditches had been cleared of brush and weeds. A hedge of wooden stakes had been planted within crossbow range to ward off siege towers and battering rams. The old walls were dotted with pale new stones. Peasant recruits were drilling in the courtyard.

“We are a nut Attila might not want to bother cracking,”

said Stenis with rare and welcome pride in his voice. “A year ago a child could have captured this outpost, and Aetius recognized that in an instant. Now I’d like to see an army try.

We’ve built twenty new catapults, a hundred crossbows, and recruited seventy-five men.”

“I will tell this to the general.” I decided not to reveal the size of Attila’s army.

“Just tell him that I am ready to sting.”

I traveled southwest to the Rhone where a barge carried me downriver toward the Mediterranean. As I traveled south, the sun brightened and the land grew lush. It was beautiful country, greener than distant Byzantium, and I wondered what it would be like to live here. Yet the oncoming rush of spring also heightened my apprehension.

Time was hurrying, and so would Attila. How could I persuade Theodoric?

I bought a horse near the river’s mouth and took the main Roman road west toward Tolosa and the Visigoths, occasionally spying the glittering sea far below to my left. How far I had come! From home. From Ilana. From dreams to nightmare.

It was late April when I finally came to the Visigothic capital in the old Roman city, its central fortress rearing above the red tile rooftops. I paused a minute before the city’s gray stone walls and wondered how I would convince these semicivilized barbarians to ally with the Empire they had half conquered, resented, envied, and feared. Frighten Theodoric with stories of Attila? My mission was absurd.

Yet destiny has its own devices. Unknown to me, watching secretly from a slit window high in a tower, was my answer.

XXI

I

THE SCOURGE OF GOD

The armies of Attila were too huge to advance on any single road or path, so they ascended the Danube valley in a series of parallel columns, engulfing the ancient border between Rome and Germania like a wave. The Hun cavalry went first as the tip of the arrow, striking ahead of any warning and overpowering weak garrisons before they had time to prepare. The heavier Ostrogoth cavalry came next, their big horses, heavy shields, and long lances crushing any line that resisted. Should the inhabitants instead try to seek refuge in a tower, fort, monastery, or church, they then would be left for the long snake of infantry, its ranks speck-led with mercenaries and engineers with the skill to build catapults, siege towers, and battering rams. Roiling columns of smoke marked where each pocket of resistance had been overcome.

Never had the Huns assembled so great an army, and never had its supply been so challenging. They stripped the land like locusts. Those who hid emerged to desolation. The upper Danube valley had become a wasteland. Every house was burned. Every granary was emptied. Every vine and fruit tree was chopped down. It was not so much conquest as depopulation. After slaughtering the men and raping and enslaving the women, the Hun cavalry took particular care to kill infants and pregnant women. No generation would be left to seek revenge. The few surviving orphaned children shivered in the woods like animals. Abandoned dogs went feral and fed on the corpses of their former masters.

One by one the outposts of civilization became ruins. As-tura, Augustiana, Faviana, Lauriacum, Lentia, Boiodurum, Castra Batava, Castra Augusta, Castra Regina . . . all were erased from history. It was as if the earth was swallowing civilization. Ash drifted in the air instead of apple blossom, and every smashed home had the forbidding smell of burnt timber, rot, and damp decay. Dried blood spattered intricate mosaics. Wall murals were smeared with the brains and effluent of the owners who died looking at them. The prophets were right: The armies of doom were signaling the end of the world. Never in a thousand years would Europe forget this march. Evil had come on shaggy steppe ponies, and the angels had fled. It was the spring when days grew darker.

Attila was well pleased.

He paused one afternoon to eat the looted rations of a ruptured Roman fort called Sumelocenna, its garrison massacred with particular fury because it fought so uncharacteristically bravely. Attila rested his boots on the body of a tribune they said had been named Stenis, noticing that the dead man’s tunic was closed by a golden clasp in the shape of a wasp. The king bent to rip the brooch free. He had never seen its like before and would give it to Hereka. “The man who wore it stung,” he would tell her.

No officers had trained Attila in the arts of war. No courtiers had coached him in the grace of nobles. No singer had persuaded his rough fingers to touch harp or lyre. No woman had soothed his constant anger, that simmering rage from a childhood of beatings and harsh training and a manhood of treachery and war. No priest had explained to his satisfaction why he was here, and no prophet had dared suggest he could fail. He was a primeval force, sent to cleanse the world.

Huns were different from other men, he believed—so different that perhaps they weren’t men at all but gods. Or perhaps there were no fellow men but rather that his people preyed on a world inhabited by odd forms of lower beings, mud men. He didn’t know. Certainly the deaths of these Romans had no meaning to him. Their lives were too foreign, their habits inexplicable. He understood that life was struggle, and the joy that some found in simple existence utterly baffled him. One was either a killer or a meal. This belief that life was pitiless colored everything he did. Attila would lead his Huns to glory but he trusted no one. He loved no one. He relied on no one. He knew there would never be any rest, for to rest was to die. Wasn’t it when he’d slept that the Roman bitch had almost set fire to him? What a lesson that had been. He slept only in snatches now, his features aging, his dreams troubled. Yet this was how it should be. Killing was the essence of life. Destruction held the only promise of safety.

Attila was no strategist. He couldn’t envision the lands he planned to conquer. Their desirability, or lack of it, was almost immaterial. Attila understood fear, and he was con-cocting a catastrophe, but a catastrophe that was to fall on Aetius. For every Roman he killed, two or three went running to his target in Gaul. Each had to be fed. Each carried panic like a plague. In every story his horsemen grew uglier, their aim more deadly, their stench more rank, their greed more insatiable. This use of terror was necessary. His horde, vast though it was, was small compared to the millions upon millions in the Roman world. Its strength was its seeming invincibility. Huns were never defeated because no one believed they could be defeated.

He didn’t know that Aetius began to intercept tens of thousands of fugitives like a net, drafting the men into his forces and sending the women and children to help farm.

Attila had no intention of fighting Aetius if he didn’t have to; the man was too good a soldier. But if he did fight him it would be when Aetius was nearly alone, his allies fragmented and quarreling, his cities burning, his food supplies stripped by the homeless, his legionaries sick and demoralized, his emperor wavering, his lieutenants betraying. Attila had never lost a fight because he never fought fairly. Surprise, deception, treachery, superior numbers, terror, and stealth had let him win every contest, from the murder of his brother to the destruction of the eastern provinces. Only the loss of the old sword secretly troubled him. He knew it was only a talisman, shrewdly invented by himself, but his followers believed in its magic. Leadership was all about belief. Its disappearance was never spoken of, but it planted a seed of fear.

Victories would make up for the loss of symbol. The barbarian led his entourage of warlords and messengers up a grassy slope to look back down the Danube valley at the long winding columns making up his attack force, stretching back to a hazy horizon, the hard men resting on tough ponies that cropped the grass. Attila never lost because if he did lose, he knew, these jackals would turn against him. His warlords could be kept in harness only with the booty that was corrupting them. The more they took the more they craved, and the more they craved, the more like Romans they became. Attila saw no way out of this dilemma except to destroy everything. In desolation, he believed, was the salvation of the Hun.

He looked forward to the wasteland.

And to what he would finally do to Ilana when his sword was recovered.

It was the way of the world, a cycle that could never end.

Ilana had become an exhibit in Attila’s bizarre zoo.

Like Attila’s wives and slave girls, she had been brought for the invasion. But instead of a comfortable rolling wagon with felt canopy and carpets, her home was a trundling cage of wooden poles, its grid roof open to sun and rain. It was one of a dozen wagons in a train that included some captured bears; a lion liberated from a Roman villa; a pacing wolf; three captured Roman generals squeezed into a single iron enclosure; and squalling badgers, Attila’s favorite animal. The wagons were normally used for transporting slaves and prisoners, but any Roman slaves were pressed into Attila’s great army and any liberated criminals were simply executed. So Attila had decided to load the transports with curiosities—among them the woman who had tried to burn him alive and who, for purposes not yet fully explained, had been allowed to remain living.

His temporary mercy was torment. Ilana’s life had been reduced to animal-like squalor as she sat dully in the lurch-ing wagon amid a great, dusty, fly-plagued army: her clothing filthy, her privacy gone, her station abased. At noon she was hot and at night she was cold. She got barely enough water to drink, let alone bathe. Her keeper was Guernna, who enjoyed mocking her from a safe distance.

“I’m sure he’ll come to your rescue at any moment,” the German girl cooed to the Roman when she brought her scraps of food. “He’ll cut his way through a half million men with that sword he stole.”

“He’s waiting for both of us, Guernna,” she replied with more spunk than she really felt. “Your liberation, too. When battle is joined we’ll both have a chance to escape to the Romans.”

“Do you think there’ll be any Romans left, Ilana? Edeco says this is the biggest army the world has ever seen.”

Ilana believed it. The wagon had bogged down once in a rut at the crest of a hill. While a dozen Gepid infantry heaved to clear it, she’d had a chance to gaze backward in wonder at the great host stretching to the horizon. Fields of spears rocked like wheat in a breeze; herds of horses churned up dust like thunderheads; and wagons heaped with tents and booty crawled across meadows like elephants, grinding the grass to stubble.

“Aetius and Jonas will have a great army, too.”

Guernna smiled. “We are all wondering what Attila will eventually do to you, Ilana. Most of the women suggest fire, since that is what you nearly did to him. Some think crucifixion, and some think a rape by Ostrogoths or perhaps by animals. Some think you will be flayed; and some think Attila will wait until he has enough Roman gold to melt and pour down your throat, burning you from inside out and making a cast of your body.”

“How amusing all this speculation must be. And what do you think, Guernna?”

“I think he is devising an execution so clever that none of us has thought of it yet!” Her eyes danced at the thought.

Guernna had little imagination and admired it in others.

“And you will help him.”

Guernna looked reproachful. “Ilana! I am the only one feeding you. You were wrong to attack our master, yet still I bring you water and throw a bucket to wash out your filth.

Don’t you expect the best from me?”

“The best, as you know, would be a spear between my ribs. I think I could expect that from you, given your betrayal when we tried to escape that night.”

Guernna smiled. “Yes, killing you would consummate our relationship. But I must think of the other women, too, sweet Ilana. It is always exciting to watch torture. We have all discussed it, and what we really want to do is hear you scream.”

Aetius had planned to burn the Rhine bridges, but Hun cavalry arrived three days before defenders thought it possible.

They swept across at midnight, arrows plucking away the engineers, and so crossed the Rhine as if the great barrier of the river hardly existed. Attila himself crossed two days later, watching with interest the bodies from upstream floating by on the current, bloated and bearing Hun arrows. His soldiers were doing their work. Aetius had established his own army at Argentorate, a hundred miles to the south, and the Hun plan was to outflank him through the forested high-lands of northeastern Gaul and break out east of Luttia. The cavalry could then sweep southward over the fertile flat-lands, take the strategic crossroads of Aurelia, and hold the strategic center of the West.

Attila rode toward horizons of smoke, with more smoke behind—a ring of smoke that marked the devastation of his armies in all directions. No cohesive resistance had formed.

The Franks had retreated, and the other tribes were hesitat-ing. If the Huns struck hard enough and quickly enough, they would annihilate Aetius before he could gather a credible force. Cities were emptied, armories were captured, aqueducts were deliberately broken, and granaries were looted. Crows were so bloated from feasting on the dead that they staggered on Roman roads like drunken men.

Thousands of opportunists, traitors, and the fearful were joining Attila’s invasion: craven chieftains, escaped slaves, greedy mercenaries. Some were fleeing a bad marriage, broken heart, or debt. There were not as many as the Hun king had hoped, but those who did enlist joined the slaughter with a kind of hysteria. All rules had ended. Hell had triumphed over Heaven. Anarchy and pillage provided opportunities to settle old scores, act on resentment against the rich, or take by force a maiden who had spurned earnest advances. As each law was broken, the next seemed easier to shatter. The indiscipline carried into the Hun army itself, where quarrels quickly turned murderous. The warlords had to separate feuding soldiers like snarling dogs, and maintained some semblance of order only by whip, chain, and execution. So huge was the army, and so far-flung were its wings and columns, that it was barely controllable.

Attila knew he was riding a whirlwind, but he was the god of storms.

It was at a clearing in a wood in Gaul that he encountered the Roman holy man who would give him a different title. A patrol of Huns had roped a Christian hermit who was apparently so stupid that he’d been making a pilgrimage right into the path of Attila’s army. The cavalry laughed as they trotted the pilgrim first one way and then another, jerking on the lines. The hermit was screaming, perhaps trying to egg on his own martyrdom. “Enjoy your triumph because your days are numbered, Satan’s spawn!” the old man cried in Hunnish as he staggered. “Prophecy foretells your doom!”

This interested Attila, who believed in destiny and had bones thrown and entrails read. After killing a few prognosti-cators in blinding rages, his prophets had learned to tell him what he wanted to hear: so much so, that they bored him. Now this hermit had a different view. So he ordered the Hun soldiers to back up their horses until the ropes were taut and the man was trapped in place. “You speak our tongue, old man.”

“God gives me the gift to warn the damned.” He was ragged, filthy, and barefoot.

“What prophecy?”

“That your own sword will smite you! That the darkest night heralds dawn!”

Some warlords murmured uneasily at this mention of a sword, and Attila scowled. “We are the People of the Dawn, hermit.”

The man looked at Attila quizzically, as if scarcely able to believe such nonsense. “No. You come in dust and leave in smoke, and blot out the sun. You are night creatures, sprung from the earth.”

“We are restoring the earth. We don’t cut it. We don’t chop it.”

“But you feed off men who do, old warrior! What nonsense Huns spout! If Attila was here, he’d laugh at your foolishness!”

The Huns did laugh, enjoying this little joke.

“And where do you think Attila is, old man?” the king asked mildly.

“How should I know? Sleeping with his thousand wives, I suspect, or tormenting a holy pilgrim instead of daring to face the great Flavius Aetius. Aye, easier to pick on the pious than fight an armed foe!”

Attila’s face lost its amusement. “I will face Aetius soon enough.”

The hermit squinted at the rider more closely. “You’re Attila? You?”

“I am.”

“You wear no riches.”

“I need none.”

“You bear no sign of rank.”

“All men but you know who I am.”

The holy man nodded. “I wear none, either. God Almighty knows who I am.”

“And who are you?”

“His messenger.”

Attila laughed. “Trussed and helpless? What kind of God is that?”

“What god do you have, barbarian?”

“Attila the Hun believes in himself.”

His captive pointed to the haze of smoke. “You ordered that?”

“I order the world.”

“The innocents you have slaughtered! The babes you have made orphans!”

“I make no apology for war. I’m here to rescue the emperor’s sister.”

The hermit barked a laugh, and his eyes lit with recognition. He waved his finger at Attila. “Yes, now I know who you are. I recognize you, monster! A plague! A whip, sent out of the East to punish us for our sins! You are the Scourge of God!”

The king looked puzzled. “The Scourge of God?”

“It is the only explanation. You are a tool of the divine, a wicked punishment as dire as the Great Flood or Plagues of Egypt! You are Baal and Beelzebub, Ashron and Pluto, sent to lash us as divine punishment!”

His men waited for Attila to kill the crazy man, but instead he looked thoughtful. “The Scourge of God. This is a new title, is it not, Edeco?”

“To add to a thousand others. Shall we kill him, kagan?”

Attila slowly smiled. “No . . . the Scourge of God. He has explained me, has he not? He has justified me to every Christian we meet. No, I like this hermit. Let him go—yes, let him go and give him a donkey and gold piece. I want him sent ahead, sent to the city of Aurelia. Do you know where that is, old man?”

The hermit squirmed against the ropes. “I was born there.”

“Good. I like your insult, and will adopt it as my title. Go to your native Aurelia, hermit, and tell them Attila is coming. Tell them I come to cleanse their sins with blood, like the Scourge of God. Ha! It is I who am His messenger, not you! ” And he laughed, again. “I, Attila! A tool of the divine!”

XXII

I

THEODORIC’S

DAUGHTER

Tolosa had been a Celtic city, then Roman, and now Visigothic; and the new rulers had done little more than occupy the decaying buildings of the old. Their famed prowess in battle was not matched by any expertise in architecture. The strategic city on a ford of the Garumna had long dominated southwestern Gaul, and when the Visigoth king Athaulf agreed to give up Iberia and send the Roman princess Galla Placidia back to Rome in return for new lands in Aquitania, Tolosa became the natural capital. The barbarians did front the old Roman walls with a ditch and dike, but inside the city it was as if a poor family had moved into a fine house and added tawdry touches of their own. The stone and brickwork was old and patched, the streets were pot-holed and poorly repaired, paint was older than the inhabitants, and dwellings of stucco and marble had additions of timber, daub, and thatch.

Yet under the great barbarian king Theodoric—who had reigned so long, thirty-six years, that most of his subjects had known no other king—Tolosa throbbed with activity. As Roman culture had been layered upon Celtic, so now was German tribal culture layered upon Roman; and the result was a fusion of pagan artisan, imperial bureaucrat, and barbarian warrior that had given the city an energy it hadn’t seen for a hundred years. Traders and farmwives bawled in half a dozen tongues from the crowded marketplaces, Arian priests ministered to thick crowds of illiterate tribesmen, and children chased each other through the streets in numbers not seen in living memory.

Their ferocity was still there, however, and it was this ferocity that Aetius hoped I could somehow help harness. The Visigoths were as haughty as Huns and as regal as Greeks.

They were as famed for the long lances of their heavy cavalry as Attila’s men were for their bows; and the palace guards looked like mailed, bearded giants, their pale eyes glinting from beneath the brow of iron helmets like bright, suspicious jewels. Their legs were like tree trunks, their arms like thighs. When the tips of their long swords rested on the chipped marble floor, the pommels came to their chests. Here were men who should have no fear of Huns.

Why weren’t they riding with us?

Perhaps they hesitated because their ancestors had been put to flight by the Huns three generations before. Had the Visigoths journeyed across Europe only to be faced with this peril once again? Would they at last make a stand? Or become vassals of Attila? I had to convince Theodoric that survival was with Aetius and the hated Romans.

My arrival had already been promised by correspondence from Aetius. A Visigothic captain helped stable my horse, gave me watered wine to quench my thirst, and finally escorted me to Theodoric. There was a courtyard in the palace, familiar enough except that its fountain was dry because no one could be found with the skill to repair it, and its plants dead because no barbarian could be bothered to keep them alive. Then we entered the reception hall beyond. The old Roman standards and symbols of office were long gone, of course, the pillars hung now with the bright shields and crossed lances of the Goths. Banners and captured tapestries gave color atop faded paint, and the marble floors were obscured by rushes that had been strewn to catch the mud of barbarian boots. High windows let in a crosshatch of light.

Nobles clustered and gossiped behind a railing that separated Theodoric’s carved wooden throne from petitioners and courtiers. A single aide stood by to make notes—could the fifty-six-year-old king read?—and the monarch’s crown was a circlet of simple steel. His hair was long, his beard gray, his nose curved, and his expression set in a permanent frown. This was a man used to saying no.

Theodoric beckoned me forward through the wood railing to stand where we could talk without being overheard. I bowed, trying to remember the formal manners of Maximinus, my diplomatic mentor, and marveling at the odyssey that had brought me here. “I bring you greetings, King Theodoric, from your friend and ally Flavius Aetius. Great happenings shake the world, and great deeds are needed.”

“General Aetius has already sent me such greetings a hundred times in missives this winter,” the barbarian replied with a deep, skeptical voice. “The greetings always come with tidings, and the tidings with requests. Is this not so, Hagan?” He turned to his scribe.

“The Roman wants us to fight his battle for him,” the scribe said.

“Not for him, with him,” I corrected. “Attila is marching on the West, and if we don’t stand together, all of us will perish separately, frightened and alone.”

“I have heard this talk from Aetius before,” the king replied. “He is a master at playing on the fears of the tribes.

Always there is some dire peril that requires us to muster our armies for Rome and shed our blood for his Empire. Yet even as he begs for our help, he is reluctant to promise how many legions he will muster or what other tribes will join.

Nor can he explain why Attila should be my enemy. I have no quarrel with the Huns.”

This would be difficult. “The world has changed, sire.” I recited what Theodoric already knew: the plea of Honoria, the accession of Marcian in the East, and the claim of the Frankish prince Cloda in the north. He listened impatiently.

“And then there is the matter of the Greek doctor Eudoxius,” I tried.

“Who?” The king turned in curiosity to Hagan.

“I think he is referring to the man who stirred up the Bagaudae in the north,” the scribe said, “an intellectual who led a rabble.”

“In the revolt that Aetius crushed a few years ago,” I added.

“Ah, I remember this Greek now. What about him?”

Theodoric asked.

“He fled to Attila.”

“So?”

“He persuaded Attila to send him as embassy to Gaiseric in Carthage. It was when Eudoxius came back from the Vandals that the Huns decided to march on the West.” At these words something moved in the shadows, jerking as if startled. It was a shrouded figure, I realized, listening from an alcove. Who was that?

“Gaiseric?” Theodoric’s gaze narrowed at mention of the Vandal king. “Why is Attila talking to the Vandals?”

“An equally pressing question, sire, is why are the Vandals talking to the Huns?”

I had at last struck a nerve. Attila was distant, and the Roman emperor Valentinian impotent, but Gaiseric and his haughty Vandals were the one group the Visigoths truly feared. They were a powerful tribe of Germanic origin like themselves, lodged in Africa, and no doubt they coveted Aquitania. I could see that this news had a powerful effect.

I remembered hearing that the Vandals had humiliated the Visigoths by rejecting and mutilating Theodoric’s daughter.

“Gaiseric is marching with the Huns?” he asked.

“Perhaps. We don’t know. We only know that to wait and do nothing is folly.”

Theodoric sat back on his throne, fingers drumming as he thought. Gaiseric, whose warriors were the equivalent of his own. Gaiseric, who alone matched Theodoric in age, longevity of rule, and list of bloody victories. Gaiseric, who had shamed him as no man ever had by scarring Berta, his beloved child. He squinted at me, this young Roman before him. “What proof do you have of what you say?”

“The word of Aetius and the favor of God.”

“The favor of God?”

“How else to explain my possession of the sword of Mars? Have you heard of this relic? I stole it from Attila himself and carried it to Aetius. It is reputed to be a sword of the gods that Attila has used to arouse his people. Now Aetius is using it to rally the West.”

Theodoric looked skeptical. “That’s the sword there, on your belt?”

I smiled at this opportunity to cite more evidence, and lifted out the knife I had taken from Eudoxius. “This is a dagger I took from the Greek. For the sword, imagine something a hundred times larger.”

“Humph.” He shook his head. The hooded figure in the shadows, I noticed, had disappeared. “The Huns are advancing on Aetius, not the Visigoths,” Theodoric insisted.

“What proof do you have of Vandals? I want to know about Vandals, not Huns.”

I hesitated. “Eudoxius himself told me that Gaiseric had pledged to make war with Attila, meaning the Huns and Vandals are one. Gaiseric hopes Attila will crush you.”

“Yet how do you know this?”

“We captured the doctor. I was captive in the Hun camp, and when we made off with that sword we took the Greek with us.”

“So this Greek could tell me himself.”

Here I dropped my head. “No. The Huns pursued us, and there was a fight at a Roman tower. He escaped.”

The Visigoth king laughed. “See? What proof for any of what Aetius claims!” His secretary Hagan smiled scornfully.

“The whole Empire and world are in peril!” I exclaimed.

“Isn’t that proof enough? With you, Aetius can win.

Without—”

“What proof?” Theodoric demanded softly.

My jaw was rigid with frustration. “My word.”

The king looked at me quietly a long time, and finally softened just a little. “I do not know who you are, young man, but you have spoken as well as you could for a master who is notoriously elusive. My frustration is not with you but with Aetius, whom I know too well. Go, let my stewards show you lodging, while I think about what you have said. I do not trust Aetius. Should I trust you? I tell you only this: When the Visigoths ride, it will be for a Visigothic cause, not Rome’s.”

I was depressed. Theodoric’s faint praise seemed only to presage failure. That happy moment when my father first announced that I had an opportunity to accompany an embassy to Attila seemed an age ago. What I had hoped would make my future seemed only to cloud it. Our diplomacy with the Huns had been a disaster. My attempts to win or rescue Ilana had come to nothing. Now, here I was again, a fledgling diplomat, and the one proof I needed to persuade the Visigoths—the testimony of Eudoxius—I had lost at the tower.

So this embassy seemed unlikely to be any more fruitful than the earlier one! I’d never really persuaded anyone, now that I thought of it, from the fetching Olivia in Constantinople to this barbarian king. What a joke that I was an envoy at all!

I could wait here in Tolosa for the end, I supposed. My presence would make little difference to the poor army of Aetius, and it would take a while for Attila to ride this far.

Or I could return and hurl myself into battle and end things sooner: There was a certain finality in that. There would be no unity against the Huns; Rome was too old and too tired.

There would only be hopeless battle, fire, oblivion. . . .

A knock came on the door to my chamber. I was in no mood to answer, but it came again and again with insistence.

I finally opened the door to find a servant bearing a tray with dried fruit and meats, a gesture of hospitality I hadn’t expected. The figure was wearing a long gown with a hood pulled over her head. “Sustenance after your journey, ambassador,” a woman’s voice said.

“I’m not hungry.”

“Even for company?”

I was wary. “What kind of offer is that?”

“To hear more of what you know.”

Hear more? Who had heard any of my quiet discussion with Theodoric? Then I remembered. “You were listening from the shadows, from that pillar behind the throne.”

“As one who understands your warning better, even, than you.”

“But who are you?”

“Hurry.” The tone was nasal. “I’m not supposed to go to a man’s chambers.”

So I let her in. To my surprise she kept her head covered, her face in a dark hole. She put the platter down on a side table and stood back. “I need to watch you eat.”

“What?”

“I’ll explain.”

I looked at the food doubtfully.

“It’s not poisoned.”

I took a dried apple and bit tentatively, then sipped from the ewer of water. There was nothing peculiar. So I took out my dagger and cut a piece of meat.

“Yes.” Her breath was a hiss. “Where did you get that knife?” The question was as sharp as a slap.

I glanced down, suddenly realizing what her interest was.

“From Eudoxius, the Greek doctor. I took it from him when he tried to escape. He almost stabbed me with it.”

“And where did he get it?”

I looked more closely at the weapon. Once more I noticed the fine carving of the ivory handle, the inlaid ruby, and the pretty glint of the blade. “I don’t know.”

“I do.”

I looked at her in mystification.

“Surely you must know who I am by now. The whole world knows the shame of Berta.” Reaching up, she pulled back her hood like a curtain.

Involuntarily, I gasped in horror.

She was a woman, yes, but a horribly disfigured one, puckered with pink and purple scars. One ear was almost entirely missing and another slit so that its two pieces ended in wrinkled points. Her lips had been sawn crosswise, turning any smile into a grimace. Worst was her nose, its tip cut off and the remainder flattened so that her nostrils were like those of a pig.

“Now you know who I am, don’t you?”

My heart was hammering. “Princess, I did not imagine . . .”

“No man can imagine my shame or the humiliation of my father or the need to banish mirrors from my quarters. My own king cannot bear to look at me, and keeps me locked away unless I cover my head or mask my face. I scuttle in the shadows of this palace like a ghost, an unwanted reminder of the arrogance of the Vandals.”

“You were the wife of Lochnar the Vandal.” I said it with pity.

“Daughter-in-law to the great Gaiseric himself, a symbol of unity between my people and his. How proud I was on my wedding day! Great armored regiments of the Goths and Vandals lined the processional path in Carthage, and Gaiseric paid a small fortune in dowry to my father! And yet when Valentinian offered Lochnar a Roman princess instead, I was forgotten by him in an instant.”

“But why . . . ?” I was shocked at her ugliness.

“Lochnar demanded a divorce so he could marry a Roman Christian, but no daughter of Theodoric is going to be so easily cast aside. My father wouldn’t give him one. So finally my father-in-law, Gaiseric, in a drunken rage at our intransigence about giving his son a divorce so he could ally himself with Rome, turned me into a monster. It would have been kinder if he had murdered me.”

“Why do you ask about my dagger?”

“Because I know who owned it.” She looked bitterly at the weapon. “I knew of your mission and watched you ride here from a tower window. I know Gaiseric as well as you know Attila, and I’ve been warning my father that the one is simply the twin of the other. Then you strode into our chambers and I almost fainted to see the hilt of that knife at your side. That”—she pointed—“is the blade that Gaiseric used to cut me.”

I dropped it as if it were hot. “I didn’t know! Please, I’m sorry! Eudoxius tried to cut me with it, so I took it from him!”

“Of course you didn’t know.” Her tone was calm as she walked forward and picked the weapon up, balancing it in her palm. “Even the bravest or craziest fool wouldn’t bring this into my father’s house if he knew its history. Only someone innocent, from ignorance, would do that.”

“Eudoxius must have gotten it from Gaiseric—”

“To show Attila.” Her voice was low but bitter. “To unload his own sin. Do you know what Gaiseric said to me?

That because of my stubborn pride no other man would ever have me and that I would have a face to frighten children and revolt lovers. He said he hoped I lived a hundred years, and that every day of those years I think of my folly for having dared defy a prince of the Vandals.”

“Lady, it was a truly monstrous thing that he did.”

“Can you imagine my hatred? Can you imagine my burning desire for revenge? Yet so embarrassed is my father that he sits frozen in this old palace, too afraid to challenge Gaiseric by himself and too proud to ask for Roman help. But now Rome asks for him! Now my deepest enemy has become allied with yours!” Her eyes flashed fire. “You are a gift from God, Jonas Alabanda, a messenger sent like the archangel to shake my father from his lethargy. He allows himself doubts, but I had none when I saw your dagger. You have a token of challenge from the Vandals, which you didn’t even know you bore.”

I saw hope. “Then you must convince your father that what I say is true!”

“I will demand the justice that is every Visigothic woman’s right. Attila thinks he has guaranteed his victory by allying with Gaiseric. But I say every person who bargains with that wicked Vandal is poisoned by fate, and Attila will be, too.” She held up the knife, her knuckles white and fist trembling. “By the blade that ended my happiness, I swear that my people will ride to the aid of Aetius and Rome, because to join with him is to defeat Hun and Vandal . . . once and for all!”

The signal fires were lit and the horns sounded from ridge crests to the deepest valleys. All Aquitania was stirring, from the shores of the great western ocean to the peaks of the central massif. The king was calling the Visigoths to war! The arrows fletched in the long dark days of winter were bundled and strapped, the long swords of the Germans were rasped on oiled stones, and the stout lances with their leaf-shaped tips of silver were carried forth. Great shields were shouldered, armor strapped, and helmets polished. Anxious boys were chosen for the campaign, while, groaning disappointment, their younger brothers were ordered to care for home at least one more season. Somber wives packed satchels of dried meat and grain while daughters stitched campaign clothing and wept at what might come. The Visigoths were going to war! Saddles were oiled, boots soled with new leather, belts cinched, and travel cloaks tied. The gathering men could be seen coming down from a dozen hills into every village and from a dozen villages into every town, rivulets becoming streams and streams becoming rivers.

The word had gone out. At long last, Berta would begin to be avenged.

In Tolosa, a thousand knights were waiting on horseback for their king. Their horses were huge, the hooves heavy, the tails tied with ribbons and the manes decked with coins. The Visigothic helmets were high peaked and plumed, their horse shields oval, and their spears were as high as a roof. It thrilled me to wait with them.

Finally stepping out onto the old Roman portico was Theodoric himself, tall and resplendent in gilded mail and a shield embossed with bright bronze. His sons Thorismund and Theodoric the Younger came with him, just as proudly armored and armed; and at the sight of them the assembled warriors roared greeting with a cry that made me shiver.

Their king spoke deeply but quietly, his words repeated like a ripple through the crowd. “Our fathers wrested this rich land. Now, it is our turn to defend it. Hun and Vandal have joined in league, and if either wins then our world is lost. My daughter asks vengeance. So hear me, my warlords! We ride to seek it!”

A thousand spear shafts banged against a thousand shields in acclamation. Then Theodoric mounted, raised his arm, and they were off. A thick, muscled parade flowed down the streets of Tolosa for its great Roman gates, thundering out to meet the far greater hordes of fellow tribesmen waiting in the fields and woodlots beyond. Thousands would become tens of thousands, and tens of thousands an army.

The host of the Visigoths would ride to join Aetius, and the West would rally behind them.

Would it be enough to stop Attila?

I galloped ahead to bring my general this glad news, looking back at the tower that Berta watched from. Now she would have her revenge.

P A R T T H R E E

I

THE BATTLE OF

NATIONS

XXIII

I

THE SECRET STOREROOM

Aurelia was a walled Roman city that stood in the path of any armies marching through the lowlands of Gaul. Situated on the Loire River, it was the heart of Rome’s most fertile province. If the Huns could occupy it, they would have a strategic capital from which to dominate western Europe. If the Romans could hold it, their defense would be simplified.

Attila hoped that treachery would deliver the city. Sieges were costly; betrayal cheap.

It was one of the ironies of history that the Alan tribe that had come to control Aurelia, and the Loire, were distant cousins of the Hun. They now were part of that patchwork confederacy of Roman, German, and Celtic peoples that made up the Western Empire. The tribal migrations that had upended the region two generations before had settled into an uneasy coalition of chieftains, generals, and opportunists who had carved out spheres of influence. Each tribe owed nominal allegiance to the Empire, and yet each enjoyed a measure of independence, because that empire was weak.

Each tribe had been placed by the emperor to check its neighbor. The barbarians depended on Rome, envied Rome, disdained Rome, feared Rome, and yet thought of themselves as newly Roman.

If the Visigoths were the most powerful tribe, the Bagaudae, Franks, Saxons, Armoricans, Liticians, Burgundians, Belgicans, and Alans each had territories and armies of their own. Two months before the Hun armies marched, emissaries had come to Aurelia to sound out the king of the Alans, the wily Sangibanus. Attila was coming with the greatest army the West had ever seen, the king was warned.

Sangibanus could fight for the Romans and be destroyed, or join the Huns and remain a king, albeit a vassal.

It was a grim choice, made worse by the fact that Sangibanus’s own belligerent warriors had no intention of submitting to anyone. Worse, if the king’s treachery was discovered before the Huns arrived, Aetius might make an example of him. Yet to fight Attila was to risk annihilation.

“You cannot sit out this war—you must choose,” insisted the young and rising Hun sent to persuade Sangibanus. “You can rule under Attila, or you can die under the Romans.”

“My people won’t follow me to the Huns. They already flatter themselves that they’re Romans and Christians. No one wants to go back to the ways of our grandfathers.”

“They need not make the choice. You must, for their safety. Listen, I have a plan so that even the gate guards need not choose. Here is all you have to do . . .”

The Hun’s name was Skilla.

“A child to see you, bishop.”

“A child?”

“He doesn’t have the manners of one. Or any manners at all, as far as I can see. He says it’s about the safety of the church. It’s really quite peculiar.”

“This is a bold child.” Bishop Anianus looked thoughtful.

“He insists on keeping his head covered. Were he an assassin—”

“Bertrand, I am the easiest of all men to kill. No one need send a child to do it, in a cape. They could assault me in the street, stampede a wood cart across me, drop a brick from a parapet, or poison the daily sacrament.”

“Bishop!” But of course this was true. If this visitor was strange, their own bishop was stranger. He had the habit of disappearing for weeks at a time as hermit and pilgrim, talking in his own way to God. Then he would suddenly reap-pear as if never absent. He visited the sick and lame without fear of contagion, gave penance to murderers and thieves, and conferred with the powerful. In an increasingly lawless world, he represented divine law. His piety and good works had made him not only popular but also a leader.

“But they don’t harm me because it is God’s will,” Anianus went on. “And it is His will, I think, that I see this mysterious visitor. These are strange times, and strange people are afoot.

Demons, perhaps. And angels! Let’s see which he is.”

Their visitor had overheard. “Too ugly to be an angel and too charming to be a demon,” he proclaimed, pushing back his hood. “Of strangeness, I will confess to.”

Bertrand blinked. “Not a child but a dwarf.”

“An emissary from Aetius, bishop. My name is Zerco.”

The bishop’s face admitted surprise. “Not the usual representative.”

“When I’m not representing my master I amuse him.”

Zerco bowed. “I admit to being unusual but not useless. Not only am I a fool by profession, but I came through the gates with Burgundian refugees. No one notices a halfling if there are children all around.”

“I thought it was the business of a fool to be noticed.”

“In less perilous times. But there are agents of Attila in Gaul as well as agents of Aetius, and I’d prefer not to meet them. I bring you greetings from the general and a warning that Aurelia is in the path of the Hun. Aetius wants to know if the city will hold.”

“The answer to that is simple. It will hold if Aetius will come.”

“His army has temporarily retreated to Limonurr in hopes that, by offering such proximity and support, Theodoric will bring his Visigoths. If Aurelia can buy my general time while he rallies the western tribes—”

“But what are the Visigoths going to do?”

“I don’t know. An able friend has been sent to urge them to join us, but I’ve had no word of his success or failure. My assignment is to know what Aurelia is going to do.”

Anianus laughed. “Everyone is waiting for everyone else! Surely there is a parable about such meekness, but I can’t remember it now. Yet what choice do all of us have? If the Huns succeed, the Church is finished before it has properly begun, and I will be roasted as a preview of eternal punishment. I know more of Attila than you might expect, halfling—enough to have taken the time to learn Hunnish!

There is no question what I intend to do: resist, and resist with all my breath. But the king has shut me out of his councils. His soldiers don’t want to submit to the yoke of a new empire, but neither do they want to die for nothing. Every man is asking if the next man is constant, and none has the courage to be the first to step forward. The Franks are feeling out the Alans, the Alans the Burgundians, the Burgundians the Saxons, the Saxons the Visigoths and the Goths, I suppose, the Romans! Who, besides Aetius, is going to stand?”

“Let it start with you and me, bishop.”

He smiled. “A man of peace and a dwarf? And yet isn’t that the message, in essence, of our Church? Of taking a stand against evil? Of belief in the face of fear?”

“Just as you know something of Attila, I know something of you. People sang your praises the closer I came to Aurelia, Bishop Anianus. They will unite behind you if Sangibanus allows it. But Aetius fears that the king of the Alans has no faith in him or anything else and will sell himself to the Huns.”

Anianus shrugged. “I am bishop, not king. What can I do?”

“I will listen to Sangibanus, but I need the eyes and ears of your priests, nuns, and prelates to find out what is really going on. If there’s a plot to betray the city we need to learn of it and stop it, and convince the Alans to hold until Aetius comes.”

Anianus looked sober. “If he doesn’t, Attila will kill us all.”

“If you give up Aurelia and put Attila in a position to win this war, he will kill the entire Empire, bishop, and with it the Church. The world will go dark, and men will live like beasts for the next thousand years. I, too, know more of Attila than most men, because I’ve played the fool for him.

One thing I always remember: I’ve yet to make him laugh.”

If the Huns had an emissary in Aurelia he was well hidden, but the news from the east was grave. An ever-growing flood of refugees was pouring into the city. Mediomatrica had been entered on the eve of Easter, its inhabitants slaughtered and its buildings burned. Durocortorum was destroyed when its population fled. Nasium, Tullum, Noviomagus, Andematun-num, and Augustobona went up in flames as Attila’s vast army split into arms to sustain itself. The bishop Nicacius was beheaded, and his nuns raped and speared. Priests were crucified, merchants flayed until they revealed the hiding place of their valuables, children enslaved, and livestock slaughtered. Some Aurelians were already fleeing toward the sea. Yet the news produced grim determination as well. In the depth of despair, some people were finding courage. Aurelia was bitterly divided—as Axiopolis had been, far to the east—

on whether to resist or surrender.

In the end, Zerco’s discovery depended on luck. A boy assisting a new unit of hastily organized militia had gone to the city’s weapon shops and had curiously slipped through a narrow passageway briefly revealed by a shifting of shelves.

Inside, the boy glimpsed a glittery cache of weapons and armor. The youth always prepared earnestly for the sacrament of the Sabbath, but always had difficulty during confession to find some sin with which to practice penance. It was hard to be venial enough to occupy the confessional’s time when you were only eight! He finally remembered to confess his trespass, and it was the room’s very existence that caught the priest’s ear. He thought the hidden cache of weaponry peculiar enough to mention to a prelate, who in turn remembered the bishop’s request to report anything unusual. Anianus mentioned it to Zerco.

“It seems strange to lock armor away.”

Zerco thought. “Saved for an elite unit, perhaps?”

“For when? After the city has fallen? And that’s not the only peculiar thing. The boy said all the helmets and shields and swords looked alike.”

Now this was intriguing. The tribesmen who had settled in Gaul retained individual taste in weaponry. Every man had his own armor, every clan its own colors, every nation its own designs. Only the thin and depleted Roman units managed by Italians retained a uniformity of equipment. Yet Roman troops were far away, with Aetius.

“Perhaps it is innocent or a boy’s imagination. But I’d like a look at this storeroom, bishop. Can you get me in there?”

“That’s the province of the marshal, just as the altar is mine.” He considered. “But I might send an altar boy to fetch Helco, the youngster who made his confession. Someone of your stature, in a vestment, might just get close enough. . . .”

“An altar boy I shall be.”

Zerco was helped by the confusion the approach of the Huns had caused. Men were assigned to the armory at morning and reassigned to a tower by noon, and then posted to the granary at dusk and a well by midnight. Private arms were being sold, donated, and redistributed. As a result, a small altar boy with a concealing hood, sent by the bishop to find another lad, did not cause much notice at first. Zerco spied a narrow opening behind the regular armory storage, and when eyes were turned tried to slip inside.

But a guard challenged him. “Hold up, boy. That back there is not for you.”

“The bishop has sent me to fetch Helco. The captain said to look there.”

“The captain of the guard?”

“Ask him if you must. But Anianus is impatient.”

The man scowled. “Stay until I come back.”

Once the guard left, Zerco didn’t pause. There was a tight twist in the rocky corridor and a wooden door with a heavy lock. The dwarf had brought a hammer and chisel, and with a bang, the lock parted. If he was caught, his means of entry was the least of his worries.

The room was dark, so the dwarf lit a candle to reveal the gleam of steel and leather. It was much as Helco had described, except the boy had omitted a crucial detail.

“Roman!” There was enough Roman armor to equip a troop of cavalry, yet no Roman troops would come to Gaul unequipped, and none would report to Sangibanus before reporting to Aetius. This was for barbarians, but why? And why was this equipment kept secret? Because any men wearing it would be assumed to be Roman. . . .

Zerco heard voices and snuffed out the candle, melting into the shadows. He discarded the hood and took out the signet medallion assigned him by Aetius, in hopes it would make the guards hesitate long enough for the dwarf to remind them that Anianus knew where he was.

The corridor filled with approaching light and then the broken doorway filled with men and oaths. There was the guard who had challenged him and a second, older, grizzled soldier, probably his captain, angry at the broken lock.

These two put their hands to the hilt of their swords. A third man, shorter and stockier and with a brimmed hat concealing his face, stepped up behind them. They came inside with a torch.

Zerco, his discovery inevitable, stepped out. Even as he displayed the medallion, the dwarf could see the third man’s eyes widening.

The stranger spoke in Hunnish. “Little mouse!”

It was Skilla.

“That man is a Hun!” Zerco cried in surprise.

The guard captain shook his head. “We warned you not to come here.”

Skilla spoke to the Alans in Latin, his accent thick. “I know this dwarf. He’s an assassin, kidnapper, and thief.”

“I’m an aide to Aetius and Anianus! Harm me at your peril!”

“If allowed to speak to your bishop,” Skilla warned, “he will mislead him.”

“He’s not going to speak to anyone.” Blades were drawn.

“Listen to me! This is a trick to betray your city—”

A sword swung with a whistle, narrowly missing. Zerco hurled his hammer at Skilla’s head, but the Hun knocked it away, scoffing at the attempt. The dwarf dropped and tried to scuttle, but blades clanged against the stone floor, blocking his way. So he somersaulted backward instead, knocking over a rack of spears and shields to slow his tormentors. The men laughed. This was play!

“The Huns are going to enslave you!” the dwarf warned from the darkness.

A spear sailed at the sound of his voice and nearly pinioned him. “Come out, little mouse,” Skilla called in Hunnish. “The cat is here to eat you.”

He needed a mouse hole. There was no back door and no window. A drain? He hadn’t noticed one. He looked for a spot darker than the darkness, the boots of his assailants treading heavily on the stone as they moved to corner him.

And there, in the corner where wall and ceiling met . . .

The men charged, and the dwarf leaped. He sprang past a sword thrust and clutched at the mail of the guard who had challenged him, temporarily blinding the man with a poke that elicited a howl. Then he clambered like a squirrel to the man’s head and leaped, half landing in a tight cavity. His fingers scrabbled for a hold.

“Get him! Get him! I can’t see!”

A hand slithered on his ankle. Zerco kicked, connecting with something hard, and pulled himself upward with all his might, wriggling up a passageway as narrow as a pipe.

“Boost me up!” someone cried.

He could hear an arm thrashing behind him. “He’s like a damned rabbit. It’s too small! There’s no way I can follow.”

“What is that hole?” Skilla asked.

“Who knows? Probably a vent, to give air.”

“Can he get out the other way?”

“There are grates on the outside to keep out animals. He can’t go anywhere, but we can’t get him, either.”

“Maybe if we boost up a dog . . .”

“Why bother,” Skilla said. “Aren’t men working to reinforce the walls? Get some stones and a hod of mortar. We’ll seal him in and have no corpse to explain.”

Even as they worked, Skilla felt cursed by the dwarf. The little man was grotesque and scuttled like a spider, and he seemed tied to every moment of the Hun’s torment by Jonas and Ilana. The witches had told him forest legends of squat and scabrous gnomes from the German woods who plagued ordinary men with magic and tricks. The annoying Zerco was one of these, Skilla believed, and sealing him in a stone tomb would be a gift to the world.

The warrior watched impatiently as the guards clumsily bricked. How Skilla hated it down here! No Hun liked crowded, dark, or confined spaces; and these underground passageways that the Romans had built were all three. He was proud of having been assigned the mission of conspiring with Sangibanus—it was a mark of his uncle’s growing trust in him, despite his setbacks—and he knew success would eventually bring him overdue recognition, and Ilana.

But the past week in Aurelia was almost more than he could bear. It was never quiet in the city. His senses were battered with noise, color, crowds, and ceaseless clanging. How he longed for the countryside! But soon Sangibanus would betray his own capital and Aurelia would fall. Soon the Huns would be masters of everything, and the clever men who made life complicated would be no more.

The king of the Alans dared not simply surrender his city, Skilla knew. His own warlords, who distrusted their cousin Huns as much as they distrusted Romans, might turn on him.

Sangibanus could not convince them of the West’s weakness without seeming a coward. Nor could he simply organize a party of traitors to overwhelm the sentries at his own gate. If too cowardly to fight Attila, he was also too cowardly to murder his own soldiers, because the chance of betrayal and civil war was too high. So instead Skilla had offered a different way. With Roman armor and a persuasive Aurelian officer, a party of Huns could seize the gate with a minimum of bloodshed, holding it open just long enough for other Huns to gallop through. With that, the battle would be over before it began, and no one—including King Sangibanus—

need die.

Now they had to act more quickly than planned. If Zerco had found this hidden armory, who else might know? Aurelia must fall before the dwarf was missed.

XXIV

I

THE GATE OF AURELIA

There are few things more difficult, Zerco supposed, than listening to men brick up your tomb. He tried to laugh at his predicament, just as he had tried to laugh at his entire bizarre life. How he’d wanted to be an equal in the councils of the big people! His humor was a mask for his bitterness about his own ugliness, of course—just as it covered up his astonished wonder that he could marry a woman as fine as Julia or have a friend as promising as Jonas. Now he would pay for pride and ambition! Sealed in a little catacomb without the mercy of oblivion. Should he back out before they finished and hope for a quick death instead of torture? Or stay out of reach and suffocate instead? For a little man who depended on agility and wit, the latter seemed a particularly pathetic way to die. Yet life had taught the dwarf to keep hoping. He was a freak who advised generals and consulted with bishops. So perhaps it was not time to wiggle backward to certain death but to squirm forward. Even as the final stone was wedged into place, Zerco was climbing the steep incline of his tunnel to find where it led.

What followed, his mind would long shy from remembering. He would not recall if he had been suspended in darkness for hours or days, and if the overwhelming feeling had been of cramped heat or numbing cold. He’d simply remember wedging himself ahead. A ridge of stone could seem as insurmountable as a mountain, and he’d peck at it with his fingers, loosening key bits and letting them rattle down behind him. Then he’d shimmy, expelling all air to shrink and surge forward some impossibly small amount.

He’d jam, gasp, his middle squeezed by what felt like the entire weight of the Earth, ears hammering, expel air again, wriggle forward, breathe, gasp against the pain, expel . . .

again and again and again until finally his hips would be past the obstacle and he would lie panting in a tube no roomier than a cocoon, his heartbeat the only sound, his sweat the only lubricant. Somewhere, fresh air was keeping him alive. As his clothes disintegrated he left the pieces behind except for strips with which to wrap his hands. His blood made him slippery; and as it leaked, he shrank. Never before have I wanted to be small, he thought, drawing himself out like a snake. Occasionally he started to panic, his lungs working wildly, but stifled any scream by thinking of Julia. “Stop sobbing and get yourself out of the hole you climbed into,” she lectured him. “What is so hard about crawling forward? Babies can do it!”

So he did. He passed an even smaller hole, its rank smell tying it to an old Roman sewer, slimy effluent dripping down like a baptism from Hell. Praise God! It made him slicker! The worst came when he spied a glimmer of light but only beyond a narrowing of the cavity that at first seemed too small even for him. As tight as the cunt of a virgin, he cursed, as if he’d had all that many virgins. But what choice did he have but to be reborn? He put his arms forward as if diving, his already-narrow shoulders pressed to his ears, and kicked forward like a fish. Each rib clicked by the stones like a bead on an abacus, the pain as excruciating as if he were being flayed. Then his stomach was through and his hips jammed tight— I’m as wide as a woman!— until he found handholds and pulled the last inches by brute strength, jamming his teeth against the agony. Then the air was cooler and fresher, the light brighter. He came with his nose to an iron grate.

Thank the saints for rust and the laziness of barbarian conquerors. The metal had been no better maintained than Aurelia’s walls, which is why the Alans were working so frantically now. With his last bit of strength he pounded on it like a madman, on and on, until suddenly it fell away with a screech and clang. He waited for shouts but heard nothing.

He was still far under the city’s central fortress. Zerco popped out into a wider tunnel, big enough to crawl on all fours, lit by light coming down from grated shafts too narrow and sheer to climb. The new passageway seemed a hopeless labyrinth, making him panic all over again, but finally there was the sweet smell of steam and the chatter of laundry girls in a fortress washroom. A pipe from the room vented the steam, and Zerco was the only inhabitant small enough to slip down. He popped out into a clothing pile, a demon sheathed in bright blood. One laundress screamed and fled; another fainted and would later tell tales of the end time. Zerco merely stole a sheet and crept back to the bishop.

“I think I know what they’re planning,” he announced.

Then he collapsed.

No wonder Romans fought so clumsily and slowly.

Skilla felt as encased as a sausage in the heavy Roman armor, his vision restricted by the hot helmet and his torso confined by the weight of mail. The oval shield felt as un-wieldy as the door of a barn. The lance was a log, the sword as straight as their rigid roads, and the heavy clothing wet with sweat. Once they got inside the gates of Aurelia he would abandon this nonsense and reach for his bow, but in the meantime the disguise would get them unchallenged to the city wall. Once the portal was seized, Edeco’s division of five thousand men could follow and the hapless Sangibanus would remain blameless.

It was midnight, the moon dark, the city sleeping, and the Huns supposedly far away. Edeco had led his division two hundred miles in three days, outdistancing any warnings.

Now his men waited in the woods while Skilla’s disguised company of a hundred men trotted toward Aurelia’s wall with a great clank and creak of Roman equipment. As always, Skilla found himself studying the walls with a soldier’s eye. The ramparts and towers of fresh stone glowed noticeably lighter than the weather-stained wall below, even in starlight. A few torches flickered to mark the gate, and the Hun could see the heads of Alan guards peering down as he approached.

The Alan captain, paid well to keep the armory a secret, had left the city with Skilla and came back with him now, the new gold jingling in his purse as he rode.

“A company from Aetius to reinforce Sangibanus!” the henchman cried when they came under the central tower.

“Open the gate for friends!”

“We’ve had no word of Romans,” a sentry responded cautiously.

“How about word of Huns? They’re not far, you know.

Do you want help or not?”

“What unit are you?”

“The Fourth Victorix, you blind man! Do we look like Norican salt merchants? Open! We need to eat and sleep!”

The gate began to ponderously swing. It was going to work!

Then it stopped halfway, giving just a glimpse of the city beyond. A voice called. “Send in your officer. Alone.”

“Now!” Skilla cried.

They charged, and even as the soldiers began to swing the gate against them the Hun horses bashed into it and knocked the sentries backward, pushing the entryway wide. Through the short arched tunnel that led through the wall was the courtyard beyond. The Huns kicked their horses.

And a wagon lurched from one side of the inner arch and rolled to block their way. A torch made oiled hay explode in a fireball of flame. The ponies reared, screaming, and warriors cursed, reaching awkwardly for the unaccustomed Roman weapons. Before they could act a dozen arrows buzzed through the fire, some igniting as they flew, and struck home. Men and horses spilled in the crowded portal.

The Alan captain’s gold coins of betrayal spilled with him, rolling on the stones. Meanwhile, men beyond the flames were yelling alarm. “They’re not Roman—they’re Hun!

Treachery!” A bell began to ring.

Priests were running past the burning wagon and charging at the front rank of horsemen with long pikes. The butts of the wicked weapons were planted in the ground and the spearheads set to form an impenetrable hedge of steel.

Horns began blowing. In the light of the fire, Skilla could see soldiers were spilling from nearby buildings and dashing to the wall. Buckets of rocks began raining on the Huns bunched behind. Then sluices of oil came raining down and ignited. The trick had become a trap.

Skilla’s horse wheeled uselessly at the hedge of pikes.

Had Sangibanus double-crossed them? No . . . who was this halfling taking aim?

On a stairway to one side of the gate, a midget was whirling a sling. Skilla cursed and reached for his bow.

Could it be?

A rock whizzed by Skilla’s ear even as he drew back his bowstring. Then Tatos grabbed his arm. “There’s no time!”

An iron portcullis was rattling down to cut off the Hun leaders from their followers.

“Blow the horns for Edeco!” Skilla cried.

“It’s too late!” Tatos jumped down and hauled Skilla from his horse, an action that saved his life when another volley of missiles scythed into the gateway and toppled half a dozen more men and horses. Skilla’s own horse screamed and went down. The gate had become a slaughterhouse of kicking hooves, broken legs, and discarded Roman weapons. Skilla and his companion ran to where the portcullis was descending, slid, and rolled. They made it to the outer side just as the grate bit into the causeway. Behind, the priests who had attacked his men charged with a howl and began killing the wounded with axes and scythes. Here was none of the meekness of the monastery.

Skilla stood at the outer end of the portal. Everything was chaos. Huns were on fire. Others were milling helplessly.

One stone struck a warrior’s head and it exploded like fruit, spraying them all with blood. Hundreds of Alans were running to man the wall. Skilla heard with dread the thunder of Edeco’s charge and ran to turn it back.

The oaken gate itself slammed shut again against them.

It was all the damned dwarf!

“Fall back! Fall back! The Wolverine retreat!” Yet even as his men tried to flee out of range, Edeco’s huge division of screaming Huns swept Skilla’s stunned company forward like a wave against the wall, the formation breaking against the stone like surf. The Alans were electrified by this sudden appearance of their enemy, bells pealing and horns sounding all over the city, and any opportunity for Sangibanus to surrender had disappeared in an instant. Instead, the Huns found themselves mounting a cavalry charge against a wall fifty feet high.

There was a brief period of confusion and slaughter before the failure to breach the gate was at last fully communicated to Edeco’s surging Huns and they all pulled back.

By that time scores were dead and wounded, and flaming ballista bolts chased them for four hundred paces. The ruse had become a disaster.

“The priests were waiting for us!” Skilla seethed.

“So much for the promises of Sangibanus,” Edeco said.

“It was Zerco, alive from the dead, who warned them!”

“Zerco? I thought you buried that damned dwarf.”

“He passes through walls like a ghost!”

Edeco spat. “He’s just a sly little man. Someday, nephew, you’re going to learn to truly finish your enemies, from that ugly dwarf to that thieving young Roman.”

I rode to an Aurelia that had a halo of orange, the glow of fires casting a corona against the night clouds, that I could see from ten miles away. Well past midnight I came to the crest of a hill overlooking the Loire River and saw the besieged city on the northern bank in a dramatic play of light.

A thousand Hun campfires ringed the town. Buildings within Aurelia sent up plumes of glowing smoke. Catapults on both sides shot flaming projectiles that cut lazy parabolas of fire across the darkness, like a tracery of filigreed decoration. It was quite beautiful and quiet from a distance, like stars on a summer night, but I knew full well how desperate the situation must seem within. The hope I carried was vital to Aurelia’s resistance.

If the city could hold, Theodoric and Aetius were coming.

I was in temporary disguise. I’d become a Hun by killing one, a straggler I caught looting the farm of a slain peasant family. The hut’s plume of smoke and a chorus of faint screams had drawn me, and I’d cautiously observed the warrior, drunk on Roman wine and weighted with booty, staggering from outbuilding to outbuilding, looking for more.

The bodies of the family he had murdered were scattered on farmyard dirt, smoldering from the hut fire that had driven them outside to their slaughter. I’d taken my own bow, with which I’d been earnestly practicing, and slain the Hun from fifty paces, the man grunting in perplexity as he went down.

Such a kill no longer seemed momentous to me, given the apocalypse that was enveloping us. Taking his clothes and shaggy pony, I’d set out under a dirty Hun jerkin for Aurelia, knowing dried blood would arouse no suspicion in these dark days.

Now, under cover of darkness, I rode down into the Hun encampment. Unlike a Roman one, the encirclement was a haphazard affair. The Huns erected no fortifications of their own, as if to dare the defenders to come out and fight them.

Their lines were thin south of the river, the Loire inhibiting assault or escape. Accordingly, this part of the barbarian encampment had a desultory air. The Huns were huddled around campfires, watching the city wall across the river.

“I’m looking for the Rugi,” I said in Hunnish, knowing my features and accent would betray any pretense I was a Hun. “I satisfied myself with a wench too long and lost my lochus. Now I’ve been riding two days to let my sword catch up with my cock.”

Such a confession would earn me a flogging in a Roman army, but the barbarians laughed and made a place for me by the fire, offering kumiss. It burned my throat as I drank, and they laughed again at my grimace. I grinned foolishly and wiped my mouth. “How long do we have to wait at this stink hole?”

This was not the kind of battle a Hun liked to fight, they said. Their cavalry had outrun their engineers, so there were not enough siege engines. Besides, the Huns preferred to fight in the open like men, not crouched behind machines of war. Yet the cowardly Alans wouldn’t come down from their walls. And while the Huns enjoyed shooting at the helmeted heads of defenders, so many thousands of arrows had been used that Edeco had finally ordered a halt to the sport until the attackers were ready for a coordinated assault. That left the warriors bored, some drifting away to loot, like the Hun I had killed.

“I thought you Huns tricked your way in,” I said.

The plan to open the city had been betrayed by a dwarf, it was said, which seemed like an ominous joke. Now the Alans were as aroused as ants. Good Huns had been killed trying to take a place these men no longer wanted. “We should go home.”

“But it’s a rich land, is it not?” I asked.

“Too many trees, too many people, and too much rain.”

I left them as if to piss and made my way to the river. A firebrand arced across the water, leaving a path of pink. The Loire was broad but dotted with sandbars that I could rest on as I swam. I slipped into the cold and began swimming on my back, kicking off my rancid Hun garments as I did so.

My head was like a little moon against the current, and I waited anxiously for a bolt from either side, but none came.

I paused on a bar to catch my breath, studied the walls, and then swam on my belly for the stone quay of Aurelia. In the shallows near it were carcasses of the city’s boats that had been burned and sunk to prevent the Huns from using them.

I grasped one of the iron docking rings to lift myself. Was there someone I could call to?

As if in answer, there was a flicker, and a projectile banged next to my cheek. I dropped back into the water immediately, still hanging on to the ring. Crossbow! “Don’t shoot! I bring a message from Aetius!” I called in Latin.

Another bolt ricocheted, drawn by my sound.

“Stop! From Aetius!” The name, at least, they should recognize.

I waited and finally someone called down in Latin. “Who are you?”

“Jonas Alabanda, an aide to Aetius! I’ve come through the Hun lines with a message for Sangibanus and Bishop Anianus! Throw me a rope!”

“What, you want in? All of us wish we could get out!”

But a line uncoiled; and I heaved myself onto the quay, crawled, and grasped.

“Pull quickly, because the Huns are bored!”

They hauled so fast I almost lost my grip. I was dancing upward on the rough stones, trying not to think of the drop below, when a fresh firebrand soared overhead, illuminating the wall. I heard excited shouts across the river and knew what it meant. “Hurry!” Mailed arms reached out to seize me. There was a sigh, and a nearly spent arrow pinged off the stone by my shoulder. “Pull, damn you!” Another missile whisked overhead and a third clipped my ankle. Then I was through the gap in the stone and could collapse on the parapet, wet, cold, and gasping for breath.

A gnomelike face peered down to check mine. “You missed me so much that you’ve come to Hell to see me?”

Zerco looked raw, half swaddled in bandages, and entirely satisfied with himself.

I sat up and looked back at the ring of fires around the city. “I’ve come to promise you salvation.”

At dawn the garrison of Aurelia gathered in the city’s great church, built from the Roman temple of Venus, to hear Bishop Anianus tell them what to do. Their king Sangibanus was present as well, but this dark-featured and dour man stood to one side, surrounded by his lords and also half shunned by them. Sangibanus had protested he had no knowledge of the ruse that nearly captured the gate, but his protests were too quick and too loud, and the rumors from priest and prelate too sober and convincing, to absolve him of blame. Was their monarch a coward? Or a realist, trying to save them all? In any event it was too late: Battle had been joined, and the city’s only chance now was resistance. A Roman courier had climbed over the walls the night before, bringing news for bishop and king. Now Anianus had called them to hear it. The assembly knew there was not much time. The Huns had begun a great drumming, signaling preparations for attack, and the rhythmic pounding carried inside the thick walls of the church.

Anianus commanded not just from faith but by example.

Had he not, with the dwarf’s help, organized a secret defense of the gate that gave soldiers time to rally? Had he not marched around the walls during the attacks since, bearing a sacred fragment of the True Cross and exhorting the soldiers to stand firm? Had not Hun arrows not always missed his mitered head? Already, people were murmuring of sainthood and miracles. As the Huns drummed, at last he spoke.

“You cannot fail.”

The words hung there, like the haze of incense in the morning’s growing light. The soldiers stirred, a mongrel mix of eastern horseman, gruff German, sturdy Celt, aristocratic Roman—the mix, now, that made up Gaul.

“You cannot fail,” the bishop went on, “because more than the lives of your families are at stake. More is at stake than this city of Aurelia, more than my own diocese, and more than the lineage of your own king or your own pride.”

He nodded, as if to confirm his own words. “You cannot fail because this Church is part of a new truth in the world, and that truth is part of a great and venerable Empire. We are in-heritors of a tradition that goes back twelve hundred years, the only hope mankind has ever had for unity. You cannot fail because if you do—if the Huns breach these walls and overthrow your kingdom and win the strategic heart of Gaul—then that Empire, that tradition, and that Church will come to an end.”

He held them in silence a moment, his gaze circling the room.

“All life is a fight between light and darkness, between right and wrong, between civilization and barbarism, between the order of law and the enslavement of tyranny. Now that fight has come to Aurelia.”

Men unconsciously straightened. Fingers flexed. Jaws tightened.

“You cannot fail because the Holy Church is behind you, and I say to you this morning that God is on the side of our legions and that Heaven awaits any man who falls.”

“Amen,” the Christians rumbled. They put their hands on the hilt of sword, mace, ax, and hammer.

Anianus smiled at this ferocity, his gaze circuiting the room and seeming to rest for a moment on each man in turn.

He spoke softly. “And you cannot fail, brave warriors, because a messenger came to us last night with great tidings.

Theodoric and the Visigoths have joined the alliance against Attila, and even as we speak they are riding with Aetius to the relief of Aurelia. They are just days, perhaps hours, away. That is why you hear the drums, because the Huns are panicking and wish to conquer us before reinforcement arrives. They will fight desperately to get inside these walls, but they will not succeed because you cannot allow them to succeed. You need only fight and win for a little while, and then deliverance will be at hand.”

Now the assembly in the church was stirring and whispering, realizing that in an instant the entire complexion of the war had changed. Without Theodoric any resistance was desperate. With him, there was a chance to defeat Attila’s entire horde.

“Can you fail?” Anianus asked in a whisper.

“No!” they roared.

And then the bells and trumpets began sounding the alarm as the barbarian horns rang out from beyond the walls.

The great attack was beginning.

The Huns had outridden their best mercenary engineers and couldn’t make a proper siege. What they did have were arrows, ladders, and an abundance of courage.

They attacked Aurelia from all sides but the river, a wild rush designed to stretch the defenders thin. As the scale of the attack became apparent, it was necessary for nearly every inhabitant of the city—from unarmored women to children as young as ten—to join the men on the ramparts and hurl down stones, tiles, and cobbles. The air was thick with flying shafts, each side shooting back some of the arrows shot at them; and there was an ominous humming in the air like the sound from a hornet’s nest. Scurrying priests and nuns gathered spent Hun shafts in baskets to carry back to their city’s own archers; and occasionally a plunging arrow would catch one of the clergy in the crown of the head, plunging with such force that its point would jut through the lower jaw and sew the mouth shut so tightly that the dying couldn’t scream. He fell, but another priest picked up his burden.

As the missiles flew, the barbarians surged, boling, across the ground outside the city, hundreds struck by the defenders’ salvos but thousands more bunching at the base of the walls. Pots of oil and boiling water, poured from the ramparts, cut swathes of fire and pain in the ranks. Plunging stones snapped limbs and shattered helmets. Yet all this seemed a dent. There were simply too many Huns. Scaling ladders soared skyward like an uncurling fist of claws. Hun archery began in earnest, each volley of arrows timed to follow the last so that it was impossible for the Alans to poke their heads above the protective stone crenellation without being killed. At the same time, attackers swarmed up the ramparts. So the Alans crouched and pitched rocks over the lip of the wall blindly, waiting for that cease in the hiss of arrows that would signal when the first Huns reached the top. Then a great shout went up, and they rose in their iron and leather to clash with the snarling attackers, wrestling on the lip of wall. Here a ladder was overthrown, there the Huns gained a toehold; and desperate battle raged back and forth on the parapet.

The ferocity of the fight made the combat in the lonely tower of Noricum seem leisurely in comparison. Here was battle of an entirely new scale—men swinging, chopping, and biting like animals because even a moment’s pause meant instant death. Some of those wrestling toppled off the wall together, throttling each other as they fell; and if a defender somehow survived such a plunge the Huns waiting below dismembered him and hoisted his limbs as bloody trophies.

I’d borrowed armor to join the battle, now that my message had given hope. I felt more practiced at this grim craft now, rising after the arrow volleys to slash with sword and club with shield, sinking out of sight when more arrows came, and then rising once again. A misstep in this rhythm and I was dead. There was no courage to it because there was no time to be afraid. To lose meant death, so I did what all of us did, what we had to do. We fought.

Soon the parapet was littered with the fallen, defender and attacker alike, some groaning and some already still, festooned with arrows. Many of the dead were women and children, yet new ones constantly clambered up the steps on the city side to drag them aside and bring fresh stones, arrows, or pots of hot oil and grease. At the base of the wall many of Attila’s men were thrashing on the ground and twisting in agony from cruel burns or trying to crawl away on broken legs. The luckiest rocks we dropped struck the ladders themselves, snapping enough in two to seriously limit the routes the attackers could take. Yet to aim a rock was to invite a dozen arrows, and many a broken ladder was purchased at the price of a defender’s life.

On the eastern side of the city where I was stationed and where the Hun concentration was greatest, the defenders had erected a Roman tolleno, a huge pivoting beam with a hook on its end that could be manipulated by a counterweight to swoop down outside the walls like a bird of prey. The hook whistled down, snared a Hun, and hoisted him, kicking, high into the air before the wetness of his entrails made him slip off. The machine did not kill that many, but the huge whir it made as it dived was cruelly effective in throwing the attackers into disorder.

Yet all this furious fighting was really a mask for the primary Hun assault, which was the advance of a wheeled battering ram to destroy Aurelia’s main gate. What the attackers had not gained by stealth they would break open by brute force.

The ram rumbled forward, surrounded by a swarm of upended shields like an undulating roof, and our arrows against it were feeble as rows of Hun archers suppressed our own.

The ram, we knew, could spell disaster. Shouts of warning attracted our bishop, and Anianus waved his cross like the standard of a general to draw more troops to this crisis point. Yet what could we do? And then Zerco appeared.

Where he’d been I had no idea, but just as he’d shown at the Roman tower in the Alps, he seemed to have a presence of mind in battle the rest of us lacked. Now he stayed below the wall’s lip, busily tying a huge grappling hook to a rope stout enough to tether a ship with. “What are you doing here, little friend?” I wheezed when the fighting momentarily slackened. “You’re likely to be stepped on.”

The dwarf smiled. “But not shot. Envy me, Jonas. I do not have to duck.”

“Don’t try to be a hero in a sword fight.”

“Hero! I scuttle between their legs, and they dance like chickens. Here, let the others hack at the Huns while you help me finish my toy. My brain is as big as anyone’s, but I’ll need a broad back like yours to make this work.”

“What is it?”

“A ram snagger. The tolleno gave me the idea.”

The battering ram traversed the last few yards, running over broken bodies; and then with an ominous boom it slammed into the oaken gate. The entire wall trembled. Our garrison let loose a small avalanche of rocks and they crashed on those pushing the log, momentarily stunning or scattering some of them; but then the wounded and injured were dragged aside, new hands took the handles of the wheeled device, and it struck again. Inside, yellow cracks appeared in the gate like the ruptures of an earthquake. We were running short of stones; and those defenders who rose to hurl what we had left were picked off by arrows.

“They’ll pull it back in a moment to get some momentum for the next attack,” Zerco said. “When that happens, be ready. Anianus! Get us some strong backs to help!”

The bishop quickly understood what the dwarf was trying to do. He shouted for men to stand in a line along the rope, his clear, earnest voice quickly assembling a company.

I, too, saw what the dwarf intended. “We’ll be skewered by arrows.”

“Not if our archers aim for theirs. Get them lined up and ready.”

The dwarf scuttled along the parapet, line uncoiling as he dragged the heavy grappling hook. He was counting his paces as he walked. Finally he got to a point as far from the gate as the wall was high, and stopped. At his direction, I drew the line taut. Other men crouched behind me, holding the hemp. The dwarf was looking at an angle through the crenellation, watching what the Huns were doing. Finally we could hear the hoarse shouts as the ram was readied to be hurled against the gate again, perhaps breaking it this time.

“Ready?” Zerco shouted.

I nodded, wondering if this could possibly work.

“God be with us,” Anianus intoned.

The Huns roared a command to advance, and we used it as a signal to fire a volley of arrows. They flew toward the Hun archers, momentarily spoiling their aim. Zerco took the brief opportunity to stand on tiptoes and push out the hook while I held the line above the gate. The grappling hook clanged on the outside wall, bounced, skipped past a ladder, and dropped in a predictable arc for a point directly below where I held the rope. Just as the battering ram surged forward, the hook slipped neatly into the side of the pointed log like a hook in a fish.

“Now!” the dwarf cried.

We heaved, straining backward. The rope came up and with it the snout of the ram, jerking it clear of the gate. The rear end swerved, and Huns cursed as they lost their grip on their weapon. Higher and higher the front of the ram rose as we pulled, the attackers milling in consternation and leaping futilely to cut our rope. We’d bested them. Only one brave and clearer-thinking Hun started scrambling up a scaling ladder, since our trick had momentarily robbed a stretch of wall of defenders as we pulled. Clearly, he meant to cleave the rope from above. I left my own place to intercept him.

I got there as he was coming over the wall, and we met on a charge, swung, clashed, and recoiled. I swung again, the man parried, we pushed off each other with a grunt and then crouched to duel, sweating. This one had rare courage, I acknowledged.

Then I recognized him behind his captured helmet, as he did me.

“You!” Skilla breathed.

“Zerco thought maybe he’d killed you,” I said.

“As I thought I had killed your little rat friend.” He edged sidewise, looking for an opening. “Where’s the sword you stole, Roman?”

“Where it belongs—with Aetius.”

Skilla attacked, swinging, and I blocked the blow, my hands throbbing from the ring of steel. Again we swung and again, and then we were apart once more, looking for weakness. I’d lost all thought of the main battle.

The Hun grinned. “When I kill you, I will once more have Ilana. Attila has her ready with him, in a cage.”

That cost me my concentration. “She’s alive?”

It was enough for the Hun to charge before I was ready.

My parry now was one of desperation. I stumbled backward over a body and fell as Skilla swung down. But then Zerco came from behind, stabbing with a dagger, and Skilla howled in frustration to turn and swat at the little man who had cut his leg. I scrambled up as Skilla retreated, and risked a glance over the wall.

Now the wheeled ram was completely vertical, its end dragging in the dirt as fifty men strained to take the weight.

I looked back at Skilla. He had frozen, too, watching this contest.

Hun arrows started slicing toward the suspending rope, fraying it. Finally it snapped, spilling the hauling crew backward but letting the ram fall sideways. It hit with a crash that snapped all its axles. Wooden wheels rolled like scattered coins.

Taking advantage I lunged at Skilla. He leaped back, his eyes flicking with doubt. He was alone on the wall, and Hun horns were blowing retreat. Free of the rope, Alan soldiers ran up to support me, forming a half ring around my opponent. I stayed their attack.

“You’re on the wrong side, Skilla,” I gasped. “Aetius is coming. Don’t fight for your monster.”

“I want Ilana!”

“Then help us rescue her!”

“I can rescue her only by killing you.” It was near despair. And then, knowing the odds had become impossible, he turned and leaped.

I thought it might have been to the death and ran to see, surprised by my sudden feeling of dread. I didn’t want to be robbed of this Hun. But Skilla had caught the fragment of rope where the ram had broken and was swinging now, halfway between the top of the wall and the ground. He let his sword drop at one end of the swing and then dropped at the other, falling thirty feet and rolling, even as arrows and spears tried to pin him. Hun arrows arced up to cover his retreat, catching one defender in the eye and another in the shoulder; and then the fighter was up and limping back to his own lines, pausing to help a comrade carry one of the wheels that had sheered from the battering ram. They would fix it to a new one, I knew. Skilla would never give up.

I could see him looking back at me as he withdrew. The other Huns were drawing off into the trees as well. Had we beaten them?

“We should have killed him,” Zerco said.

I looked around. The parapet was a charnel house. Bodies littered it so thickly that rivulets of blood were running down the gutters and spouts like rainwater. Half Aurelia seemed in flames; and everyone was blackened, bloody, and exhausted.

We could not survive such an assault again.

So we slumped, wondering how long it would take the enemy to prepare a new ram. Women and old men clambered up to bring skins of wine and water. We drank, blinking at a sun that seemed to have gone stationary. Then someone shouted about glitter spotted in the trees to the south, and we heard Roman horns. Aetius!

XXV

I

A GATHERING OF

ARMIES

The Huns melted away like snow. One moment it seemed as if Aurelia was being strangled by enemies, and the next as if the death grip was an illusionary nightmare. Siege engines were abandoned, a new ram undone, campfires left to smoke unattended. The barbarians mounted their horses and rode back northeast, away from the tramp of Roman and Visigothic troops approaching from the opposite direction.

We looked at our retreating tormentors almost in disbelief.

Yes, our bishop had promised deliverance, but who in his deepest heart had really trusted? And yet there from the southwest came Aetius as promised, with tramping legions, Gothic cavalry, old veterans, and raw teens. I had tears in my eyes as I watched them approach. Zerco capered gleefully, singing a nonsense song.

I watched the allied leaders march through the battered gate with a combination of pride and impatience. Yes, my mission to Tolosa to convince the Visigoths to join the alliance had been a success. Yet this vast maneuvering of armies seemed suddenly inconsequential compared to Skilla’s momentous news. Ilana was alive! How, and where, the Hun hadn’t said, but the news set afire my whole being, making me realize how quietly her loss had been gnawing at me since escaping from Attila. A burden of guilt was lifted, and a burden of worry replaced it. I knew how selfish such sentiment was in this time of peril, and yet in turning over Skilla’s brief statement, uselessly picking at it for meaning, a hundred memories came rushing back. She had saved Skilla at the duel, yet nursed me afterward. It had been her idea to set the fire and steal the sword for Aetius. Her voice, her manner, her eyes . . . I wanted to ride after Skilla right now, trailing the Hun as the Hun had once trailed me. Perhaps I could disguise myself as a barbarian again, skirting Attila’s armies while I gathered information . . .

“Jonas Alabanda?” A centurion had found us on the wall.

I stood, stiffly.

“The general is waiting for your report.”

The council of war that evening gave only brief thanks for lifting the siege of Aurelia. All knew a far greater task lay ahead. Some of the Alan captains who had been present at the morning assembly were now missing, having died on the walls. Their place was filled by men from neighboring barbarian kingdoms. Most had never joined in alliance before.

Aetius was our acknowledged leader, and yet there were few present who hadn’t fought or quarreled with him at some point during his decades of maneuverings. Each tribe was proud of its individuality, even while assembling for the unity of Rome. Theodoric and his Visigoths were the most numerous and powerful military contingent. Sangibanus and his Alans were the bloodied hosts of the gathering, the heroes of Aurelia. But there were also the Riparian Franks from the banks of the Rhine; the Salic Franks; the Belgicans; the Burgundians; the Saxons of the north; the Liticians; the Armoricans; and the Roman veterans, the Olibriones. Their weaponry was as varied as their tactics and origins. We Romans fought in traditional fashion, with shield walls and war machines, but the barbarians were as individualistic as their clothing and armor. Some favored the bow, some the ax, some the stout spear, and some the long sword. Hired Sarmatian bowmen would match their expertise with the Huns, and slingers from Syria and Africa would add new missiles to the fray. There were crossbowmen, light infantry with javelins, heavy cataphract cavalry who depended on the shock and weight of their armored horses, sturdy infantry with long pikes, and fire wizards specializing in tipping missiles with burning pitch.

All this expertise depended on our combined will to stand up to Attila. That’s what Aetius wanted to cement this night, in the afterglow of our first great victory. “Attila’s foremost column is retreating,” Aetius told the kings and warlords around him. “He’s lost control of his broader army, scattered across northern Gaul. If we strike now, fast and in concert, we can defeat him once and for all.”

“Is he retreating or regrouping?” Sangibanus asked warily. “Let’s not risk losing the victory we’ve already won.”

“A war half fought is a war almost certainly lost,” Aetius replied. “The Huns exploit every hesitation. Is that not right, Zerco, you who have lived among them?”

“We’ve defeated a finger of Attila’s army, not Attila,” the dwarf said. “Had there been any disloyalty in Aurelia, we would have failed to do even that.”

The comment hung in the air.

Sangibanus glowered. “We Alans have done more than our share already, little man. You can hear the wailing as the dead are carried off our walls. I had no quarrel with Attila to begin with, and cease to care about him if he leaves my kingdom.”

“And where does your kingdom stop?” Aetius asked.

“What do you mean? In this river valley, given to us by the emperor of Rome. We have answered his call by defending our holdings and his. Who knows what Attila will do? Maybe he will go back all the way to Hunuguri.”

The others laughed at this suggestion, and Sangibanus flushed.

“I mean, Sangibanus,” Aetius went on, “that as long as Attila threatens Rome, he threatens all of us. Including you.”

“I’ve heard this argument a thousand times. To hell with your Empire! It means my warriors die for the rich of Italy!”

“It means that failing to unite means the end of what your people migrated here to get. Rome has stood for more than a thousand years. Gaul has been Roman for five centuries.”

He turned to the rest of us. “Listen to me, all of you. Your ancestors came to the Rhine and Danube and found a world of power and riches beyond all imagining. The deeper you marched into it, the more you wanted to be a part of it. The emperors have granted you lands, but only on the condition that you defend the civilization that accepted you. Now you must pay that debt. If Attila succeeds, the world will fall into permanent darkness. If he is defeated, your kingdoms become heir to a thousand years of civilization. Your choice is simple. You can fight to live as free kings in a world of promise. Or wait to be destroyed individually, one by one, your people enslaved, your daughters raped, your wives tortured, your houses burned. Are we cowards, throwing ourselves on the mercy of the Huns? Or are we the last and the greatest of the legionaries?”

There was a low rumble at this speech, most muttering that Aetius was right. There were already too many fallen cities, too many refugees, and too many stories of Hun slaughter. Now there was a chance for revenge.

“The Alans are no cowards,” Sangibanus said sulkily, knowing that Aetius had challenged his courage before every man in the room.

“Indeed they are not, as this siege has proved,” Aetius replied with seeming generosity. “Which means that I give your people the place of honor, Sangibanus: the middle of our line, in the coming battle.”

The king started. The center would undoubtedly mark some of the hardest fighting. It was also the place most difficult to flee from, or switch sides. Once placed in the center, Sangibanus could only fight against the Huns for his life.

Aetius waited. Every eye was on the king of the Alans, knowing that the Roman had outmaneuvered him with words, challenging his manhood and the reputation of his people. Sangibanus gloomily regarded the hundreds of warlords watching him. Then, swallowing, he haughtily raised his head. “The Alans will fight nowhere but the center, and I shall be in their front rank.”

A shout of acclamation went up. Now the assembled kings debated over who should have the honor of occupying the dangerous but potentially decisive right wing. That task was finally acceded primarily to Theodoric and the Visigoths.

One by one, the other kingdoms were assigned to a rough order of battle. Princes preened and boasted as their roles became known. Anthus, king of the Franks, wanted to lead the attack on the left in hopes of forestalling the claim to the throne of his brother Cloda. The veterans called the Olibriones asked to stiffen the Alans in the center. The Burgundians wanted a crack at the Ostrogoths.

“What about me?” Zerco piped up, getting a laugh.

“You will be my adviser, little warrior.”

“Let me ride on your shoulders, general, and together we will tower over Attila! He is as squat as he is ugly!” The men laughed again.

“I have a better use. You know the Huns and their language better than almost anyone. Some will be captured and others wounded. I want you to interrogate them about the condition of Attila’s army. If he is indeed regrouping his forces, it will probably be in the rolling farmland beyond the Seine where his cavalry can maneuver. But he will be assembling in a wilderness he has burned. I want to know how long he can feed his men.”

“The rest of us will give him fewer men to feed,” I boasted.

Aetius turned. “No, Jonas of Constantinople, I have a special task for you as well. Rumor persists that this war began in part because Gaiseric and his Vandals agreed to aid Attila in an attack upon Rome. So far, no word of such an attack has come, but if it does all our efforts may be in vain.

We desperately need help from Marcian. I need you to return to your home by ship, with my signet ring, and try to persuade the Eastern emperor to march on Attila’s rear.”

“And thus force the Hun to retreat?” I said.

Aetius smiled. “You have a growing grasp of strategy, young man.”

I bowed. “But not the heart, general.”

He raised his eyebrows.

“You do me a great honor by showing so much confidence,” I went on. “What you wish is indeed important. But it will take me many weeks to reach Constantinople by even the fastest horse and ship, and—even if I persuade him—

many months for my emperor to muster his armies and march to Hunuguri. Or to fight Gaiseric. It seems doubtful he could do so this season. So there is time, my lord, to make such a plea this winter, when the West and East can plan together. Our own battle with Attila will be decided long before then. Please don’t make me miss what I suspect will be a contest sung of for a thousand years.”

“Surely you’ve had enough blood already, Alabanda.”

“I’ve had enough for a lifetime. But more than almost any man here, I’ve seen what Attila represents. I watched him crucify a friend for no reason. He kept me from my love, humiliated my embassy, and sent men to kill me and Zerco. Let me stand in the ranks.”

My words drew approval from the assembly. A personal grudge the tribesmen understood.

“I admire your courage,” Aetius said slowly, “and know too much of your cleverness to believe that serving as a common soldier is all that’s on your mind.”

I shrugged. “Attila still imprisons the woman I love, general. I intend to kill him, cut my way through to her, and beg her forgiveness for having left her.”

Now there was laughter and shouts of encouragement.

“You fight for love, not just for hate?” Aetius asked.

“I fight for the idea of a good, simple life.”

Theodoric abruptly stood. “As do we all!” he thundered.

“Let the boy ride with us for his woman, as I do for my daughter! Let him ride with me!”

“For our women!” his chieftains cried.

Aetius lifted his hands for quiet. “No, Theodoric, I think I’ll keep him with the legions,” he said with a smile. “He fights for himself, but something tells me that Alabanda was sent to us for other reasons and that his full usefulness is not yet revealed.”

One hundred miles to the east, Attila’s vast train of wagons had been halted for two days. Ilana didn’t know what this meant. The sun was near its summer’s peak, and the fields were hot and hazy from the dust of countless thousands of horses and driven livestock, spilling across the rolling Catalaunian Plain of Gaul. Ilana had never dreamed the world was so big until she’d been driven like a penned animal across it, and now she wondered if she was coming to its end. Augustobona, called Troyes by its more recent inhabitants, was to the south, her driver had told her. Durocata-launi, the place the Franks called Châlons, was to the north.

Or rather, had been. Columns of smoke marked where each had existed.

The driver’s name was Alix, he had lost half a leg to a battle with the Byzantine Romans, and now he earned his keep by being a teamster in the kagan’s train of captured plunder, wives, and slaves. The thousand-mile trek had turned his initial contempt for the caged would-be murderess into something closer to pity. Ilana was bruised from the constant jouncing, filthy from the weeks of dust, thin from being fed only table scraps, and stiff from being confined in a cage. She spoke little, simply watching as they trundled across the famed Rhine, wound through wooded mountains, and now came to this open country reminiscent of Hunuguri.

Only when they stopped did she begin to grow dimly curious. Had Attila finally found a place he liked enough to stay? Had Jonas and Zerco escaped somewhere ahead? Were the Huns finally near the fabled ocean?

Probably not, Alix told her. There had been a battle ahead, and the Huns were falling back to gather their strength.

This was intriguing news.

Ilana had thought it her fate to rock hopelessly westward forever, but now more and more wagons were arriving to make a vast laager of wagons, surrounded by another that was bigger still. Regiments of Huns were beginning to con-gregate. Something in the tempo of invasion had changed.

Then Attila himself arrived, with a thundering contingent of warlords.

As always, his arrival caused an eruption of excitement.

He traversed the broad front of his forces like the wind, dashing from one wing to another, sending back an endless stream of looted treasures; captured food; jars of wine; stolen standards; pillaged church relics; kidnapped women; shocked slaves; and the ears, noses, fingers, and cocks of his most prominent enemies. He was the Scourge of God, punishing the world for its sins! He played the role like an actor.

He could laugh at an efficient massacre, weep for a single dead Hun, and impose his will on his lieutenants by rages so complete that his eyes rolled and blood gushed from his nose.

Now, with news that Aetius had marched to the relief of Aurelia, he had come to this cavalry ground of open, rolling hills. So the Romans had marshaled their forces, winning over even the reluctant Visigoths. Then so would he! All would be decided on a single great and bloody day, and when it was over he would either be dead or king of the world.

Never had he felt such excitement.

Never had he felt such foreboding.

That night, with his thousands of campfires an infinite mirror of the heavens overhead, he disdained most food, drank sullenly, and then, unexpectedly, sent for Ilana.

“Clean the girl, dress her, and make her beautiful. Then bring her to me.”

She came at midnight. Her hair had curled after its wash-ing, its darkness gleaming like wave-washed stones on a moonlit beach. Her gown was red silk, captured from the Romans, brocaded with silver and girdled with gold chain studded with rubies. A larger ruby the size of a goat’s eye was at her throat, and her sandals were silver. Under threat of death if she demurred, rings of slain matrons had been slipped onto each of her fingers, and the heavy earrings she’d been made to wear hung like trophies. Her eyes were lined with lampblack, her lips highlighted with red ochre, her skin had been scrubbed and moisturized with lanolin-rich sheep’s wool, and her breath purified by chewing mint leaves. The woman who had crouched in her cage like an animal just hours before now stood stiffly, like a child bewildered by fine new clothes. She’d no more choice in this dressing up than in being imprisoned, and it seemed equally humiliating.

“Kneel before your kagan,” he ordered.

Eyes lowered, cheeks blushing with anger, she did so. To refuse would only result in her being pushed down by Attila’s guards. From the corner of her eyes she looked for even the feeblest of weapons. Ilana had no illusions that she could kill Attila, but she knew that he or his guards would kill her, if she tried. That would be release, wouldn’t it? Did she have the courage? But there was nothing to even threaten him with.

“Do you wonder why I brought you here?”

She looked up. “To your tent or to Gaul?”

“I could have ordered you a hideous death a thousand times, and yet I stayed my hand,” Attila said. “It amused me to watch young Skilla long for what I hate. From all reports he’s fighting like a lion to win my favor and your company.

It reminded me to be wary of desire and greed, because they change like the weather and have no more explanation. This is why I eat from a wooden plate, sleep in animal skins, and spit out soft bread in favor of meat and gristle. To long for too much is to risk losing it.”

Somehow, she found voice. “To fear to hope is the mark of a coward.”

He scowled. “I fear nothing but the stupidity of those I must deal with. Like you, who longs for what is out of reach: the past. A Hun like Skilla would make you a princess. A Roman like Jonas has reduced you to a cage.”

She rocked back on her heels, her carriage more upright now. “It is your cage, kagan. And I know you can slit my throat in an instant. So, yes, why did you bring me here?”

He leaned back in his camp chair, lazy in his power. “Alabanda is alive.”

Instantly she was tense. “How do you know this?”

“Skilla saw him on the walls of Aurelia. They fought, but again there was no decision.” He saw her confusion, not just at this news but at his willingness to tell her. He was quiet for a while, amused by her little dreams, and then spoke.

“Have you ever considered that I brought you to Gaul to give you back to him?”

She trembled. “Give me or trade me?”

“Sell you, if you want to call it that, for the sword.”

“You don’t even know he has the sword.”

Attila sat abruptly upright and his fist crashed onto the arm of his chair, making her start. “Of course I do! Why else does Theodoric ride with Aetius? Why else do the tribes of Gaul refuse to join me? Why is there no news of Gaiseric and his promised Vandals? Because Rome has been given courage by the sword of Mars, that’s why! But that sword is mine, by discovery and by right. He stole it from me, and I want it back before the battle!”

“You brought me all this way for that?” It was odd how courage ebbed and flowed, and now came unbidden. She even smiled. “Surely you know the Romans would never trade the sword for me. Even Jonas wouldn’t do it.”

Attila’s fingers drummed in that habit he had, his dark, sunken eyes regarded her dourly. “He will if you ask him to.

He’ll only do it if you ask him to.”

Her heart began to hammer.

“Why do you think I’ve dressed you like a Roman whore, had the pig smell scrubbed off you, and painted your lips the color of your cunt? Why would I do this to a witch who helped the thief steal what was rightfully mine and who set my house on fire and who almost burned me in its flames?

To persuade your lover.”

“I wish we had all burned,” she said quietly.

“We will, witch, if I lose the coming battle because I have lost my sacred sword. We will burn together, you and I, on a pyre that I will build of my choicest possessions—and while I might stab my own heart to quicken things, you’ll be left to the flames.”

“You fear the Romans, don’t you?” she said in sudden realization. “You, the king who professes to fear nothing. The Westerners are uniting to fight you. That’s why we’ve stopped. You fear Aetius. You even fear Jonas. You regret that you’ve come here. It is all going wrong.”

He shook his shaggy head. “Attila fears nothing. Attila needs nothing. But it will spare many lives, Roman and Hun, if the final battle is an easy one instead of a hard one. If you meet Jonas, and he brings the sword, I will let you go with him.”

“What about Skilla?”

“Skilla is a Hun. He will forget you in a year. I’ll have a thousand women for Skilla, all of them more beautiful than you. Just help me get back what you stole.”

She looked at him in wonder, this king trying to strike a bargain with the most helpless member of his retinue. “No.

If you want the sword back, then take it from Aetius.”

Attila sprang out of his chair and towered over her, his face enraged, his voice a howl. “I want it stolen back from Aetius! Do it or I kill you right now! I can rape you, strip you, flay you, and give you to my soldiers to use and my dogs to eat!”

His rage was weakness, and it gave her hope. “You can do anything you wish, but it will not bring back the sword,”

she said quietly. Here was power, she realized, the power to play on his fears. He had the look of a man haunted by nightmares. “I have cursed you, but it’s a curse you earned when Edeco treacherously killed my father. Rape me, and the curse is redoubled. Kill me, and I’ll be at your shoulder in the battle, whispering the breath of the grave. Abuse me, and you’ll lose your empire.”

His look was wild. “If we lose this fight, you will burn on my pyre!”

“And go happier that way than living to watch you win.”

XXVI

I

FIRST BLOOD

The Huns who had assaulted Aurelia were but a tree in a wood. Now we were approaching the immensity of the full forest.

Attila was gathering his forces on the Catalaunian Plain, and that is where Aetius would face him. A hundred kings and warlords rode from the council to direct a hundred armies into one mighty host. Some were from the decimated garrisons of cities and forts that had fallen. Some were proud retinues of the high kings of the Germans. Some were Roman legions whose standards and histories dated back centuries, marching now to this last and greatest battle. And some were the hastily organized regiments of men who had fled in fear and now, with a mixture of desperation and hope, wanted to recover their pride and avenge their burned homes. The Huns had put more than a million people to flight, creating chaos, but also churned up a vast reserve of potential manpower that Aetius was now furiously arming.

Some of these men were old veterans. Others were untried youths. Many were merchants and craftsmen with little knowledge of war. Yet all were able to hold a spear and swing a sword. In the havoc to come, skill might not count as much as numbers.

I felt swept up in the current of a river, carried toward Ilana by an irresistible flood. My decision not to go as an envoy to Marcian in Constantinople had reduced my importance from diplomat to soldier and aide, but I found my new anonymity strangely comforting. I need do nothing more complicated than take orders, fight, and wait for an opportunity to find the woman I’d been forced to leave behind. As the columns marched forward, long glittering spears of men on the straight Roman roads, it seemed to me we marched with the ghosts of countless Romans who had gone before us: with Caesar and Trajan, Scipio and Constantine, legion upon legion who had imposed order on a world of chaos.

Now we faced the greatest darkness. It seemed ominous and appropriate that in the heat of late June a range of thunderheads formed to the east, lightning crackling in the direction of Attila’s army. The air was humid and heavy, and the storm seemed symbolic of the test to come. Yet no rain fell where we were, and huge columns of dust rose as herds of men, horses, and livestock moved toward collision. Ordinary life had stopped, and every soldier in Europe was migrating toward the coming contest.

Zerco rode with me on his own short pony, saying he wanted to see the finish of what we had started. We trailed Aetius like loyal hounds. Accompanying us, strapped to a staff like a standard and carried as a talisman by a veteran decurion, was Attila’s iron sword. Its presence was proof, Aetius told his officers, that God was with us, not them.

We gained a slight rise and paused to see the progress of our alliance. It was thrilling to see so many marching under the old Roman standards, rank after rank on road after road, to the left and right as far as I could see. “It looks like veins on a forearm,” I remarked.

“I’ve seen boys of twelve and old men of sixty in the ranks,” Zerco said quietly. “Armor that was an heirloom.

Weapons that a few days before were being used to turn soil, not kill men. Wives carrying hatchets. Grandmothers with daggers to still the wounded. And a thousand fires that mark where Attila has been. This is a fight of revenge and survival, not a test of kings.”

He was proud, this little and ugly man, that we’d had some small role in this. “Don’t get lost in the battle, doughty warrior,” I advised him.

His seriousness retreated. “You’re the one who is going to cut his way through the entire Hun army. I’m going to stay on Aetius’s shoulders, like I said.”

The landscape we traversed was rich and rolling, fat with lush pastures, ripening fields, and once-tidy villas. In many ways it was the loveliest land I’d ever seen, greener and more watered than my native Byzantium. If my body was to fall in Gaul, it would not be such a bad place to stay. And if I were to survive . . .

That night I stood in the background of the headquarters’

tent as Aetius received reports of each contingent and its direction. “There’s a crossroads called Maurica,” Aetius told his officers, pointing to a map. “Any armies crossing between the Seine and the Marne will pass there, both the Huns and us. That’s where we’ll find Attila.”

“Anthus and his Franks are drawing near that place already,” a general said. “He’s as anxious to find his traitorous brother as that boy there is to find his woman.”

“Which means the Franks may stumble on Attila before we’re ready. I want them reined in. Jonas?”

“Yes, general.”

“Exercise your own impatience and go find impatient King Anthus. Warn him that he may be about to collide with the Huns. Tell the Franks to wait for our support.”

“And if he won’t wait, general?” I asked.

Aetius shrugged. “Then tell him to take the enemy straight into Hell.”

I rode all night, half lost and nervous about being acciden-tally shot or stabbed, and it was mid-morning before I found Anthus. I had snatched only a little sleep, and felt I needed hardly that. Never had I been so anxious and excited. Lightning flashed without rain, leaving a metallic scent, and when I dismounted to rest my horse I could feel the ground quivering from so many tramping feet.

The Frankish king, helmet off as the day’s heat rose, listened politely to my cautious message and laughed. “Aetius doesn’t have to tell me where the enemy is! I’ve run into some already, and my men bear the wounds to prove it! If we strike while the Huns are still strung out, we can destroy them.”

“Aetius wants our forces collected.”

“Which gives time for the Huns to do the same. Where is Aetius? Are the Romans mounted on donkeys? He’s slower than an ore wagon!”

“He’s trying to spare the men’s horses for the battle.”

Anthus put his helmet back on. “The battle is here, now, if he would just come to it! I’ve got the enemy’s butt in my face! Not Huns, but other vermin.”

“Gepids, lord,” one of his lieutenants said. “Hun vassals.”

“Yes, King Ardaric, a worm of a man hoping for a scrap of Hun favor. His troops look like they’ve crawled from under a rock. I’m going to put them back.”

“Aetius would prefer that you wait,” I repeated.

“And Aetius is not a Frank! It isn’t his homes that are being burned! It isn’t his brother who has gone over to Attila! We wait for no man and fear none. This is our land now.

Half my men have lost families to these invaders, and they starve for vengeance.”

“If Attila turns—”

“Then I and my Franks will kill him, too! What about it, Roman? Do you want to wait another day and yet another, hoping the enemy will go away? Or do you want to fight him this afternoon, with the sun at our backs and the grass as high as the bellies of our horses? I heard you boast you’d cut your way to your woman! Let’s see it!”

“Aetius knew you wouldn’t listen to me,” I confessed.

“Which means he was sending you to battle!” He grinned, his eyes glinting beside his nose guard. “You’re lucky, Alabanda, to taste war as a Frank.”

Ram’s horns were lifted to begin the call. Heavy Frankish cavalry trotted forward, each kite-shaped shield bearing a different design and color, their lances thick as axles and tall as saplings. The knights’ hands were gloved in dark leather, and their mail had the leaden color of a winter pond.

Their helmets were peaked, and the cheek guards were tied so tightly against chins that those who shaved in the Roman fashion had white lines pressed into their faces. Barbarian long hair and beards, I realized, served as padding.

As I joined them a hundred smells assaulted me—of horseflesh and droppings, dust and sweat, high hay and tim-othy, honed metal and hardwood shafts. War is a stink of sweat and oil. It was noisy in a cavalry formation, too, a vast clanking and clumping as the big horses moved forward, men shouting to each other or boasting of their prowess in war or with women. Many of the words had the high, clipped sound of men under tension, afraid and yet master-ing their fear, waiting for the charge they’d trained their whole lives for. They were as different from the Huns and Gepids as a bull from a wolf: tall, thick-limbed men as pale as cream.

Only a minority of the Franks could afford the expense of horse and heavier armor. Thousands more were paralleling the wedge of horsemen by loping on foot across tall grain.

Their mail shirts ended at thigh instead of calf and their scabbards rocked and banged against their hips. These would take the Gepids on the ground.

Our foe was an undifferentiated mass of brown ahead, bunched against a slow but deep pastoral stream at which they’d paused to drink. Half had already waded the chest-high water to join Attila’s main force to the east. Half were on the near bank closest to us. I saw that Anthus was not just hotheaded but a tactician, whose scouts had told him of this opportunity. The enemy formation was divided by deep water.

“See?” the king said to himself as much as to anyone.

“Their cursed bowmen won’t want to risk crossing to our side. Their distance will give us an edge.”

Now the enemy seemed to be milling with indecision like a disturbed ants’ nest, some urging a quick retreat across the creek, which would turn it into a protective moat, and others a braver fight with the oncoming Franks. Attila’s orders to regroup had been obeyed with bitterness by warriors used to driving all before them. And now their foes had come to them: not the rumored vast army of Aetius but just a wing of eager and reckless Franks who’d pushed too far ahead!

We watched King Ardaric, marked by his banners of royalty, ride off looking for Attila, apparently wanting the Hun to tell him what to do.

It was just as Anthus hoped. “Charge!”

I had expected more fear, but what drunken pleasure to join them! The sheer power and momentum of the Frankish cavalry was intoxicating, and never had I felt more alive than when galloping ahead with this stampede of knights.

The ground shook as we pounded, and there was a great cry on both sides as the distance closed, the Frankish horse and the more numerous Gepid infantry hurriedly forming a line.

When we neared, they shot and threw, a heave of javelins meant to swerve our charge. There was a curling wave as some of our foremost horsemen collided with this bristle and fell, skidding into the Gepid ranks. Then the rest of us crashed over and past them, shredding the enemy line, the Franks spearing and hacking all the way to the bank of the river before turning to take the survivors from behind. The violence of the attack was a shock to the Gepids, who had become used to having their victims flee. The big Frankish swords cleaved enemy spears and helmets in two, even as Gepid infantry desperately speared the flanks of Anthus’s horses, spilling some of his knights on the ground where they could be overwhelmed. For a perilous moment the Gepids vastly outnumbered us, but then Frankish foot began swarming in support, pouring into the edges of the fight with great cries amid a cacophonous beating of drums.

For long minutes it was pitched battle that could have gone either way. I used my horse to butt and unbalance the Gepid infantry, striking down with my sword, but I also saw Frankish nobles swallowed by the maelstrom. Then the fury of the Franks began to tell, Gepid courage began to break, and the enemy was pushed to the water. There they realized their peril. The bank was steep and if they slid down it they couldn’t properly fight, so their choice was either to abandon their comrades and swim for safety or be speared or shot by Frankish bows where they stood. They began shouting for help to their comrades on the far bank. Some plunged in to come to their aid while others called for withdrawal before it was too late. It was chaos, and the Gepid generals, accustomed to being under the domineering thrall of Hun warlords, seemed at a loss whether to counterattack or withdraw. As more and more Franks came up to the battle, the beleaguered Gepid troops became packed and they panicked.

A regiment of Huns rode up on the far side and began firing arrows in support, but, as Anthus had hoped, distance and the melee of combat made the volleys ineffective. The Hun archers killed as many Gepids as they did Franks. Had the horsemen crossed upstream and circled to the Frankish rear, they would have had better effect, but they were loathe to be cut off from Attila.

Yet the Gepids on the far shore were equally reluctant to abandon their kinsmen by retreating. They fed themselves piecemeal into the fray, plunging into the water and wading or thrashing slowly across, some picked off by arrows, some simply drowning. The survivors clambered up the Frankish side to try to stiffen the barbarian line even as it was dis-solving. This prolonged the fight but did not change it. Our cavalry chewed huge gaps in the Gepid formations, swords and axes hewing down at the tangled footmen and grinding them under hoof. Meanwhile, Frankish infantry exploited the gaps to take the Gepids from the side and rear. The fight began turning to a rout, and then the rout into slaughter. Attila’s henchmen broke to plunge back into the river, desperately pushing, and Frankish archers tormented them from the bank. As each invader tried to save his own life, most died in a waterway that had turned red.

Our victory won on the western shore, a few of Anthus’s cavalry splashed across to continue the pursuit; but now the enemy had the advantage of a high bank and greater numbers, and these impetuous Franks either died or were forced to a quick retreat. Finally the Gepids themselves drew back farther, both sides temporarily disengaging from the embat-tled river, and this preliminary battle died. Raggedly forming, the shattered rear guard of Attila’s army shambled up and over the far hill. The supporting Huns, mustered from Attila’s main force, rode back and forth on the crest as if to continue the fight, but finally thought better of it. The day’s shadows were long, the western sun was in their eyes to blind bow aim, and they could see the shine of other Roman formations coming up in support of the Franks. Better to wait for the morrow, when Attila could bring his full might to bear.

They turned, and vanished from the crest.

I caught my breath. My arm ached from the shock of striking shield, helmet, and yielding flesh. My sword was red and myself, miraculously, unhurt. I looked back at the carpet of bodies, thousands of them, and was appalled to realize that this was only a beginning. It wasn’t the first time I’d seen battle corpses, of course, but the sheer number sobered me. The bodies lay still and strangely deflated.

There was no mistaking the dead.

At the same time I felt exhilarated by my survival, as if infused by the glow of the storm’s earlier lightning. Was it a sign that no missile or blade had touched me? We’d crushed the rear guard as the Frankish king had predicted, and for a briefly insane moment my greatest fear was that the Huns would keep running before I could get to Ilana.

Anthus hauled off his helmet again, his sweaty hair in strings and his eyes bright with triumph. “Come, let’s get a look at the rest of them before we lose all the light!” he roared. “This battlefield is mine, and I want to claim that hill!”

A thousand Frankish cavalry foamed across the stream in a body, now that the enemy was gone, and rumbled to the crest of the ridge that the enemy had just left. We reined in, the ground pockmarked with hoofprints, and looked eastward in awe.

The dying sun emphasized the darkness of the clouds to the east, turning them jet-black, while bathing in gold the panoply before us. The effect was dazzling, and the panorama was one I will never forget. We were seeing, it seemed, every person born east of the Rhine.

A few miles away the lines of the Hun camp began, great swaths of men settling in for the night. There was an enormous double-laager of wagons beyond, canvas hoop tops and yurts blossoming like gray mushrooms. We could see the crossroads of Maurica in the far distance and tens of thousands—nay, hundreds of thousands—of Attila’s warriors around it like a vast browsing herd. There were also chains of ponies, flocks of bleating sheep, and pens of oxen.

The very ground seemed to move and twitch like an animal’s skin. The smoke of ten thousand cooking fires created a purple haze, and the metal of countless stacked spearheads sparkled with menace. It was as if every man from every place was at last coming here, to settle world supremacy once and for all.

“Look and look well, my brothers, for no man has seen such a sight in a thousand years,” Anthus solemnly said.

“Does it look like a fight worth fighting?”

“It looks like every nation on Earth,” a Frankish captain said in awe. “My hands ache from swinging my sword, lord, and yet we’ve barely begun.”

“Aye, but the Romans and the Visigoths and the rest of them are coming up now, so they’ll help finish what we started. We’ve shown them how to do it.” We turned and saw tramping columns of our allies converging from all directions, swallowing the last few miles before Attila’s camp.

Their dust had turned the setting sun bloodred, and their armor looked like an advancing tide of water.

“Look at this sight and hope to remember it for your children,” Anthus murmured. “Look and never forget.” He nodded, as if to himself. “Not only has no such gathering ever happened but never will it happen again.”

“Never?” the captain asked.

The king shook his head. “No. Because by nightfall tomorrow, many of them—and us—will be dead.”

XXVII

I

THE BATTLE OF NATIONS

What I remember of the night before the great battle is not fear and not sleep but song. The Germans were great singers, much louder and more demonstrative than we quiet and methodical Romans; and as regiment upon regiment, division upon division, and army upon army marched up to take the places that Aetius assigned them, settling down to a restless night on the grassy plain, they sang of a misty and legendary past: great monsters and greater heroes, of golden treasure and bewitching maidens, and of the need for each man to convince himself that on this night, of all the nights of his life, it was necessary to conquer or die. If dead they would pass to an afterworld, a jumbled mixture of the pagan great hall and Christian Heaven, and take their places in a pantheon of heroes and saints. If they survived, they’d live free of fear. As the words lifted to summer’s great starry night, the air warm and still humid from the thunderstorms that had dissipated, song built on song into vast resolve, giving our soldiers courage.

The Huns sang as well. In the aftermath of their invasions they have been remembered as virtually inhuman, I know: an Eastern plague of such unworldly ferocity that they seemed to belong to Satan or older, darker gods. Or, as Attila called himself, the Scourge of God. Yet while I knew they had to be defeated, I also knew them as people: proud, free, arrogant, and secretly fearful of the civilized world they had hurled themselves against. Their words were hard to catch from such a distance—overladen as the songs were by the Germans’ singing nearby—but its hum was strangely softer and sadder, sung from deep within their squat frames.

The Hun songs were of a home they had long left, of the freedom of the steppes, and of a simplicity they could not regain no matter how hard and far they rode. They sang for a time already gone, no matter who won this battle.

The Romans were quieter at first, trying to sleep or, giving up on that, sharpening their weapons and wheeling into place hundreds of ballistae that would hurl bolts capable of cutting down a dozen enemies at a time. Their habitual discipline was silence. But near dawn of this shortest of the year’s nights, the mood caught some of them as well. They finally sang, too, choosing new Christian hymns. Bishop Anianus had followed us from Aurelia; and now I watched him walk among these rude soldiers, dressed like a simple pilgrim, blessing and confessing the believers and offering encouragement even to those who had not yet been won by the Church.

The sun rose as it had set, red through smoldering cloud.

It glinted in our eyes, and Aetius ordered his generals and kings to brace our disorganized ranks in case the Huns used the light at their backs to charge while we were relatively blinded. But the enemy was no more ready for combat than we were. Such numbers had never been assembled for a battle; and there was considerable confusion on both sides as men were moved first here, then there, grumbling about the anxious waiting as the sun climbed higher and hotter. There was a small stream that tantalizingly ran between the armies, but it was within bowshot of either side so none dared venture there. Instead, women passed down the ranks with skins and jars of water drawn from the captured river in our rear.

The men drank thirstily, sweating in their armor and pissing in place until, by the time it was noon, the battlefield already smelled like a privy.

“When will it start?” we grumbled.

The plans of the two sides were opposites of each other.

Attila placed himself and his Huns at the center of his line, clearly hoping to use his cavalry, the fiercest of his forces, to split our army in two.

Attila’s Ostrogoths with King Valamer were on his right, facing our Roman left, as were his battered Gepids and the rebel Bagaudae. Cloda, the Frankish prince who wanted the crown, would there face his brother, Anthus.

The Rugi, Sciri, and Thuringi tribes allied with the Huns were, in turn, on Attila’s left. These were stiffened by a force of several thousand Vandals who had come to kill Visigoths.

Aetius, in contrast to Attila, put his best troops on either wing and, as promised, Sangibanus and the Alans in the center. “He does not have to win. All he has to do is hold,”

Aetius said. This force was stiffened by fresh troops as yet unblooded, the Liticians and the Olibriones. What the old Roman veterans lacked in youthful vigor they more than made up in experienced determination.

Theodoric and his Visigoths formed the Roman right flank. They were the most powerful cavalry we had, arrayed against the Rugi, Sciri, and Thuringi.

Finally Aetius and his Roman legions—combined with the Franks, Saxons, and Armoricans—made up the Roman left. Except for the Frankish heavy cavalry that had fought so well the afternoon before, these were primarily foot soldiers, shield linked to shield in unbroken walls, who would advance like a lumbering dragon against the German infantry on the enemy side. What Aetius hoped was that as the Huns hurled themselves against his center, he could close on the Hun allies on either side and push the invaders together, trapping and slaughtering them as the Romans had been slaughtered at Cannae by Hannibal or at Hadrianopolis by Fritigern and the Goths.

“All will depend on two things,” he told us. “The center must hold, or Attila will run rampant in our rear and cut us down with arrows from behind. Second, our own wing must seize that low ridge before us, because from there our infantry can hurl spears down on any enemy charge and turn it back. The decisive blow will then be delivered by Theodoric and his Visigoths. If the Huns are in confusion, his cavalry can win the day.” He put his helmet on his head.

“I told Theodoric all the riches of the West and East are waiting in Attila’s camp. He told me that in that case, he will either be wealthy beyond measure or dead by the nightfall.”

His smile was grim, and not entirely reassuring. “That prophecy works well enough for all of us.”

History has recorded these battle plans as simple and clear. The reality is that both sides were a babble of languages and a coalition of proud kings; and so neither the patient diplomacy of Aetius, nor the terrifying charisma of Attila, could easily maneuver men into position. We could scarcely understand one another or grasp the scale of the field, which ran for miles. It could take half an hour to relay an order.

How many were assembled that day no man will ever know for sure. Tens of thousands of escaped Roman slaves had swelled the ranks of Attila. Tens of thousands of merchants, shopkeepers, farmers, scholars, and even priests had swelled the Roman ranks, knowing Aetius offered the only chance to sustain civilization. Any attempt at counting was impossible in the milling throngs and swirling dust, but the numbers on each side were in the hundreds of thousands, I believe. It was as if this was Armageddon, the final battle in the history of the world, and every man had pledged his soul on its outcome.

Accordingly, hour upon hour passed with the two armies essentially in awe of each other, and still separated by more than a mile. The ridge remained unclaimed, and the tempting brook was a pale line in high grass promising water to the first army that could seize it. Yet neither was ready to advance for some time, because to go forward in disarray was to invite annihilation. I grew tired of sitting on my restless horse, and the infantry grew so weary of standing that many sat in the grass.

I said I remember the night as one of song, but the noon was one of stillness. It was apparent by midday that both sides had achieved some semblance of order and that combat must soon begin, and a curious quiet descended on both sides. For some it was silent determination, I suppose, for others fear and for still others prayers and superstition—but all knew that the test was finally at hand. I had nothing useful to say, either. Never had the Romans faced such a fearsome enemy. Never had the Huns faced such a determined foe: our backs, in a sense, to the great western sea, even though the ocean was far away. There were at least a thousand standards and banners held upright among the endless ranks of soldiers, and they formed a thicket as quiet as a grove before the storm. I saw the golden legionary standards of the Romans; the horsehair banners of the Huns; and the flags, crosses, and pagan symbols of all the diverse tribes and nations that had gathered here, each man identifying himself in part by the symbol that was before him. The suspense seemed almost unbearable, my mouth dry paper despite the water I sipped, and I wondered where past that vast and innumerable horde Attila’s own laager might lay. That was the goal I must fight toward, because that was where Ilana would be.

I had no idea what she might look like after months of imprisonment, whether she had been burned and tortured, whether she felt I’d abandoned her to the Huns or done what she wanted by fleeing with the sword. It didn’t matter. She was Ilana, a memory as sharp and vivid as a steel blade. The greater this conflict became, the more I cared about my own small happiness. No matter who won this day I myself would know no peace until I found her, won her back, and took her from this nightmare. Kings fought for nations. I fought for my own peace.

As if he read my thoughts, a lone horse and rider detached himself from the Hun center and began a long, easy lope that angled toward our lines, the horse a chestnut color and the Hun erect and proud, his queue bouncing as he rode, his quiver of arrows rattling. The clop of the hooves was startling in the pregnant silence. He splashed across the little stream, but no one shot at him; and at a hundred paces from our lines he turned slightly and rode parallel to our ranks, coolly surveying the thousands upon thousands upon thousands of men we’d arrayed, his gaze clearly searching for someone. Then, as he drew abreast of the Roman formations on the left I recognized him at last and knew precisely who it was he was looking for: me.

It was Skilla.

His horse slowed as he came abreast of the little forest of standards around Aetius and his officers, hunting for my face, and with a feeling of dread and destiny I dully raised my arm. He saw my gesture, and I took off my helmet to make sure of his recognition. He halted his pony and pointed, as if to say it was time to renew our fight. I saw him grin, a flash of teeth in the tan of his face. Then he wheeled and galloped back to his own army, taking a place on the Hun right now, roughly opposite my own. The men of his new lochus cheered.

“Who was that?” Aetius asked curiously.

“A friend,” I replied without thinking, and surprised myself by what I said. But who better understood me than the man who wanted Ilana for himself? Who more intimately shared my experiences than the man I’d battled so often?

Aetius frowned at my reply, regarding me a moment as if it were the first time he had really seen me and wanted to lodge this curious sight in his memory. Then he nodded to Zerco, and the dwarf waddled forward, almost staggering under the weight of Attila’s great sword of Mars strapped to its pole. The general leaned to take it and then, the muscles of his arm straining, he lifted the weapon as high overhead as he could. Ten thousand faces swung to look at it, and then, as word filtered down the ranks, ten times ten thousand and more. Here was the signal at last! Even the Huns stirred, and I knew they could see it, too—this talisman that had been stolen—and I could well imagine Attila exhorting his followers to look at the long black blade held against the sky of the west and telling them that the man who won it back would win his weight in gold.

Then, to the steplike thud of drums, the long lines of the Roman and allied infantry picked up their resting shields and in easy unison swung them forward like the closing of a shutter. With that, our wing started for the ridge.

I was mounted like the officers, giving me a better view.

On my horse, I and the other cluster of aides followed our ranks at a slightly safer distance, marveling at the disciplined cadence of the sea of heads with rocking spears and helmets that marched to a steady beat before us. Beneath the sound of the drums was the background sound of creaking leather and clanging equipment and the tread of a hundred thousand feet. It was as if a great, scaled monster had at last roused itself and was advancing from its cave, hulking and hunched, its gaze fixed with dire intent. As we neared the low hill that Aetius meant to seize, the Ostrogoths opposite us were momentarily lost to view, but as the ground began to rise we heard a great shout from the far side and then an eerie rippling scream like the screech of a thousand eagles.