The Wolf's gold

9

Legatus Albinus rose and came round his desk when Scaurus, Julius and Marcus were admitted to his office, shaking his head in apology at having summoned them so late in the evening. After the ceremonious surrender of the Sarmatae nobles, the process of disarming their men had begun, although it was expected to take two or three more days to march every one of them past the growing pile of their surrendered weapons. Cattanius was standing to one side and snapped to attention, saluting the tribune with his usual precision while his legatus launched into an explanation for his untimely summons.

‘I’m sorry, Rutilius Scaurus, to have dragged you away from your tent after such a long day, but news of a most alarming nature has been delivered to me by my man Cattanius here. It seems that the mine at Alburnus Major has been taken by bandits.’

Scaurus exchanged glances with his centurions, shaking his head in disbelief.

‘I find that rather hard to believe, Legatus. When we left it, the mining facility was secure and under the guard of over a thousand men. I can’t see why Prefect Gerwulf would have had any problem in defending. .’

He fell silent under Albinus’s stare. The legatus gestured for Cattanius to speak, and the beneficiarius stepped forward to explain.

‘The legatus sent me to Alburnus Major along with a century of legionaries to procure sufficient gold from the procurator to pay the soldiers. When I reached the valley, however, I found the gates to the earth wall you built for its defence closed, and manned by Prefect Gerwulf’s soldiers. When I demanded for the gate to be opened they just laughed at me. After a while Gerwulf himself appeared on the wall above me, with Procurator Maximus and the mine owners in shackles alongside him. He told me that he’d decided that when it came to a choice between serving Rome and making off with enough gold to buy an army of his own, the decision was an easy one. It seems that he has turned against the empire, Tribune, an impression I must say was somewhat reinforced when he cut Procurator Maximus’s throat and threw him off the wall to land at my feet. I decided that this was enough of a threat to justify ordering my escort back down the road to Apulum. Once I considered it safe to do so I had their centurion wait in the shelter of the forest beside the road, while I went for a quiet scout over the hills towards the mine.’

Scaurus raised an eyebrow, sharing a glance with Albinus who nodded smugly in reply.

‘What did you expect, Gaius? I didn’t make the man my beneficiarius just because he had his numbers and letters you know! Tell the tribune what it was that you saw, Cattanius.’

‘I went over the mountain that night, and hid on the slopes close to the miners’ quarters. From what I saw the Germans are still sleeping in their own barracks, and using no more than a century of men to patrol the camp once they’ve got the miners locked down. They don’t bring the rest of the cohort out to play until it’s time for the day’s labour to begin again.’

‘I don’t suppose they need much of a presence during the night, given that they’ve probably worked the labourers half to death during the day. What about Gerwulf?’

‘The Wolf seems to have requisitioned the woman’s house, and most likely her body too. I saw him leave the place the next morning, and he was looking about as smug as you can imagine.’

Scaurus nodded grimly.

‘No wonder. He’s putting one over on the empire on a monumental scale, isn’t he? The signs were there to be seen, gentlemen, but they were lost in the enmity between myself and my colleague Belletor. If the man was willing to slaughter an entire village simply to provide his men with sport then I have no doubt he’s capable of murder in support of a robbery on such an epic scale.’ He turned to Albinus with a note of urgency in his voice. ‘I presume you plan to send a relief force to the valley at once, Legatus? Procurator Maximus’s strongroom held enough gold to mint well over a hundred thousand aureii, and every day that passes will see enough for another three thousand unearthed from the mountains. And that’s before we give any thought to the mineworkers, who are probably being worked to death to wring out every last speck of gold before Gerwulf quits the valley and makes a run for the north. Every day we delay will deepen the damage that he’ll do to the mine’s ability to generate wealth, never mind what he makes off with.’

The legatus shook his head with a scowl, waving a hand about him.

‘What I didn’t tell you earlier is that we don’t have quite the strength to hand that we’ve led King Purta to believe. Put bluntly Gaius, there’s no way any of the forces whose threat is keeping the Sarmatae in their camp can be spared. Our two under-strength legions and the auxiliaries supporting them are fifteen thousand men, and we have our boot on the throat of an enemy with getting on for twice that strength. While we give every indication of being in control of the situation, and of having as much time as is necessary for a managed process of disarming and dispersing the Sarmatae host, in truth it’s something of a confidence trick. We keep the barbarians subdued by perpetuating their belief that they are in the presence of overwhelming strength, but if we send even part of a legion away to the south to recapture the Ravenstone valley then there is every chance that they might realise how weak we really are. Purta might decide to take the risk of attempting to smash a way out to his own land through one of the valleys to the north, if he knew that there were only a few cohorts in his path. So, until we have them fully disarmed and dispersed I simply cannot take the risk of putting the entire frontier in jeopardy, which means that I can afford no more than your two Tungrian cohorts. And you’ll have to march before daybreak, in the hope that your departure will go unnoticed.’

Scaurus straightened his weary back.

‘You wish me to recapture the mine, Legatus?’

Albinus smiled indulgently.

‘Ever dutiful, eh Gaius? No, Tribune, I do not expect you to pull off any such masterstroke, although Mithras knows that if you did it would be good for all of our reputations. I do expect you to keep the Germans bottled up though, and give me enough time to disperse these Sarmatae animals back to their homelands. I’ll follow you down the road to Alburnus Major quickly enough, once I’m assured that they can’t simply turn around and come back for another try, and in the meantime all you have to do is patrol their perimeter and keep them from escaping. Think you can manage that?’

Julius opened his mouth to make a comment, but before the words were formed Scaurus had his fist against the bronze of his chest plate and then extended in a vigorous salute.

‘Yes Legatus, we’ll make sure that the emperor’s gold stays where it is until you reach the mine. I’ll go and muster my men to march.’

The three men were silent until they were outside the command building. Scaurus turned to face his officers before either of them had a chance to speak, the breath steaming from his lips as he spoke in low, urgent tones.

‘I know. The men are exhausted, we’ve over a hundred men wounded, and we’ve no more chance of keeping Gerwulf “bottled up” than we have of taking the mine in the teeth of any sort of determined defence. Believe me, I know all these things. And so, if truth be told, does Clodius Albinus. The problem is that he has to be seen to do something. He can’t ignore the problem and simply allow Gerwulf to get away with several cartloads of gold. Nor can he detach enough strength to break into the mine without giving Purta the scent of a chance to turn defeat into victory. All he can do is throw someone he can trust at the problem in the hope that we can pull off the impossible.’

Julius shook his head, his face creased in disbelief.

‘And if we can’t? What if Gerwulf decides to run for it at the very first sight of a Roman uniform? He’ll have his patrols out, that’s sure enough. I very much doubt we could stop that many angry Germans with their tails up, given that they’ll be fresh and we’ll be in an even worse state than we are now after four days’ forced marching. What happens when Albinus finally turns up to find the cupboard empty and us holding nothing but our dicks?’

Scaurus smiled wearily at his first spear’s question.

‘Well in that case, First Spear, I’d imagine you’ll be under the command of a new tribune soon enough. Clodius Albinus knows the realities of life as well as I do. And when he has me stripped of my command and sent home to Rome in disgrace there’ll be nothing personal in it. It’s just the way the empire works. Now if you’ll excuse me for a moment. .’

He ushered Cattanius out of earshot as the beneficiarius left Albinus’s office.

‘Tell me soldier, what state were the mine owners in when Gerwulf had them paraded before you on the earth wall?’

The beneficiarius shrugged.

‘Pretty much as you’d expect, Tribune. They looked as if they’d been through a hard time over the previous few days. Both Felix and Lartius had clearly taken beatings, and Theodora didn’t look very much happier even if she was relatively unmarked.’

Scaurus frowned.

‘Unmarked? She’d not been beaten?’

‘Not from the look of it, although I’d say that she’s probably been suffering in slightly less violent ways. It’s hard to put a finger on exactly what it was, but as I said earlier, Gerwulf seemed very familiar with her. I might have been mistaken. .’

‘Sexually familiar?’ Cattanius hesitated to answer the question, and Scaurus smiled thinly at him. ‘The woman and I shared a couple of encounters, Beneficiarius. I might have found her entertaining but I wasn’t about to ask for her to marry me. Whether Gerwulf has been raping her, or even if she’s just decided to surrender to the inevitable in order to get an easier time of things, either way I need to know what you think. Whatever the situation is, we may be able to gain some advantage from it once we’re inside the facility.’

‘If I had to bet my life on it I’d say she’s decided to make it easier on herself. She didn’t appear to have been beaten, and her bindings were light compared with the way he had the other two trussed up.’

Scaurus patted him on the arm.

‘Thank you. Be ready to march at dawn. We’ll need your detailed memory of the valley’s layout should we be graced with a miracle of some nature and actually get inside.’

Marcus held his wife close, feeling her breath hot on his neck as she clung to his armoured body.

‘It’ll be a non-event. Gerwulf’s far too clever to still be in occupation of the mine by the time we get to the gates, he’ll have made a swift exit to the north with his gold long before we’re close enough to present any problem.’

Felicia pushed him away and held him at arm’s length.

‘All I’ll say to you is what I know Annia’s telling Julius. You’re all tired, and it’ll be much worse once you’ve marched all the way back to that damned mine. None of you will be in any condition to fight, so just make sure you don’t have to. And if that means letting that odious man escape with some gold, then so be it.’ She stared up at him with a fierce expression. ‘No amount of treasure reclaimed for Commodus to spend on circuses will compensate your son if he has to grow up without you!’ Her face softened. ‘And believe me, that was the gentle version. Annia probably has your first spear by his testicles about now, and not in a way he’d prefer.’

Marcus nodded tiredly and bent to kiss his wife goodbye, watching fondly as she ducked out through the tent’s flap. Taking a moment to strap on his swords, he went to follow her, only to stop and stare in amazement at the sight that presented itself as he stepped out into the early morning’s torch lit gloom.

‘No!’ He raised a finger to silence any protest, shaking his head vigorously. ‘No! You’re not coming with us!’

He looked down at the obdurate child standing before him beside his grandfather with exasperation, while Lupus stared back up with a mixture of anger and desperation. The boy was wearing the mail coat and helmet that had been made for him in Germania, and the half-sized gladius with which he was allowed to practise on special occasions was belted to his waist. The Roman shook his head again.

‘You’re not coming because we’ve four days of forced marching in front of us, thirty miles a day when you know very well your legs won’t last more than ten. We’re not taking any carts, so there’ll be nothing to ride on. You’re not coming because at the end of that forced march we’ll probably have to mount an attack on a cohort of barbarians which will turn into a bloody slaughter no matter who wins. You’re not coming because I won’t have the time to look after you, and because your grandfather will be too busy complaining about his feet.’ Morban raised his eyebrows in protest, but kept his silence. ‘And you’re not coming because-’

‘I carry him.’

The centurion spun on his heel to find Lugos standing close behind him with a gentle smile on his face.

‘What?’

The Selgovae tribesman shrugged, rolling his massive shoulders and putting the head of his war hammer on the ground, leaning on its handle and bending down to speak quietly in the Roman’s ear, his voice a rumble.

‘You forbid, I obey. But, Centurion, you think. Boy got warrior spirit, we all see that. Take him with is better than leave with women. I carry him. He weigh less than you, and I carry you before, eh?’

Marcus stared up at the Briton in bemusement.

‘But if we have to fight?’

‘Boy safe with me.’ Lugos straightened his back and folded his arms. ‘Is you to decide.’

The Roman narrowed his eyes, putting his head back to stare at the Briton.

‘You’ll carry him? For four days, thirty miles a day?’

‘I carry him.’

‘Very well. We’ll bring him along.’

Dubnus had joined the conversation while Marcus and Lugos were discussing the matter, and he stood with both hands on his hips as the ten-year-old wrapped himself around the giant Briton’s leg with a squeal of delight.

‘What? You’re seriously planning to bring a child on a mission which is likely to end up with us and the Germans hammering the living shit out of each other?’

His friend nodded, his lips pursed in comment on his own decision.

‘I know, it seems like madness. I should just leave him here with Felicia and Annia, but. .’

‘But?’

Marcus shrugged.

‘I’ve got an idea that I want some more time to mull over before I open it up to general ridicule.’

Dubnus snorted derisively.

‘Any idea that needs the services of a lad whose balls haven’t dropped yet won’t be getting past Julius any time soon. I can assure you that the first words out of his mouth are going to be “the first spear wouldn’t have. .”’

‘I know.’ Marcus shook his head. ‘And this time he’ll be right. Sextus Frontinius would have ripped me a new one just for considering it. I’ll square it with Julius once we’re on the move.’

The cohort mustered before dawn with a general atmosphere of disbelief that muted most of the potential complaints, although a few of the older sweats had still managed to find their voices despite their bone weariness. Centurions and chosen men were roaming the ranks of their men whose fatigued grey faces were near invisible in the pale light, counting and recounting to be sure that every man deemed fit to march was standing in the ranks. Equally as disgusted with the situation as their men, they were taking out their frustrations by ignoring, and in some cases exuberantly punishing, their men’s inevitable questions as to the sanity of their orders.

‘Cocidius knows I’m not a vindictive man. .’ Dubnus ignored the look of disbelief that was promptly focused on him by the half-dozen of Marcus’s men within earshot, all of whom had felt the sting of both his ire and his fists when he had been Julius’s chosen man. ‘But I swear if one more man has the balls to ask me what we’re doing freezing our tits off by breaking camp in the middle of the night, I’m going to follow Otho’s example.’

Marcus nodded absently.

‘In that case you’d better follow it closely enough to be sure not to provide any of them with an excuse to fall out.’

They had already witnessed their battered colleague’s spectacular temper being exercised on more than one of his men, although even in the depths of his anger the pugilistic centurion was delivering his discipline with slaps and kicks rather than the level of brutality to which he was more inclined. Morban muttered a terse comment from the side of his mouth.

‘In that case just give me one good dig now and spare yourself the trouble of having to bury me by the roadside later on.’

Both men ignored him, watching as Scaurus walked past with a nod, his face hard with determination as he spoke to them.

‘We’ll be on the move in a moment. It’s time to go and motivate your men.’

Dubnus sighed and turned away, leaving Marcus at the mercy of his standard bearer’s incredulity. Before the older man could wind himself up to speak again, the Roman shook his head with a look that warned of the danger in failing to obey his unspoken command. Looking up and down the ranks of weary, sagging soldiers arrayed before him, he smiled in the face of their collective disgust.

‘Well now soldiers, here’s a brutal thing to do to a man.’ He waited a moment for the words to sink in, and saw their faces fall further as the realisation that they would indeed be expected to march out into the dawn sank in. ‘You’ve marched, and fought, and marched again, and fought again, in wind, and rain, and snow. And here you are once more, faced with another march and more than likely another fight at the end of it. And you’ll do it, just as you always do. And if you want to know why?’

The soldiers stared back at him with blank faces, some verging on the outright hostility he knew was only to be expected, and which he would tolerate unless and until it spilled over into action.

‘You’ll do it because there’s an imperial gold mine being stripped bare, although I doubt any of you care too much about that. You’ll do it because there are several thousand miners being worked to death, although again, I don’t expect that to be troubling you overmuch, given all this. .’ He raised his hands into the cold night air, watching as a fine powder of snow fell around him. ‘But mainly you’ll do it because that’s what we do, gentlemen. We follow orders, we march, and we fight. Anyone that has a problem with that can take it up with me, after we’ve retaken the mine. It’s time to earn your corn again!’

The long column ground away into the dawn, the lead century initially setting an easy pace at Julius’s command to preserve his men’s remaining energy for the long march before them. By the meagre light of the sunless sky the sullen Tungrians marched away from Stone Fort in silence, and headed south for the Ravenstone valley.

The Tungrians broke their first day’s march at the Fifth Legion’s headquarters in Napoca, a hard day’s forced march from their starting point. The arrival of a strange infantry cohort in a garrison town where the resident troops were absent was usually a cause for both excitement and nervousness among the inhabitants of the fort’s vicus, but on this rare occasion neither would have been justified. The small town’s whorehouses and drinking establishments found themselves somewhat disappointed by the Tungrians’ lack of interest in their attractions, the soldiers swiftly succumbing to an exhausted sleep once the stoves in the empty barrack blocks were hot and their rations distributed and eaten, many of them still fully dressed to ease the pain of an early start the next day.

‘Can you give me another three days at the same pace, First Spear?’

Julius nodded less than enthusiastically at his tribune’s question.

‘Yes, sir. But they’ll be beaten men by the end of it, Tribune, good for nothing much more than leaning on their spears to hold themselves up. It’s a relief that we’ll not have to carve out any marching camps, or they probably wouldn’t even make it as far as the Ravenstone.’

Scaurus scowled despite himself.

‘I know. And if I could take it any easier on them I would.’

Julius stood in silence for a moment, judging his next words carefully.

‘Tribune, what are we going to do when we get there? It’s all very well burning through what’s left of these men’s candles charging back to the mine, but what happens then? Surely all we can do is camp at the front door, and send Silus out to watch the obvious exit routes. And besides that, once Gerwulf gets even a sniff that we’re in the area I’d expect him to make a swift exit over the border and off across the plains with all the gold his men can carry. These lads will be in no state to stop him, even if he does wait for us to get there before making a run for it.’

The tribune shrugged, staring exhaustedly at the floor of his temporary quarter.

‘What will we do, once we’re standing in front of the valley’s earth wall? That’s a work in progress I’m afraid. All I can think about for the time being is getting the cohorts up to the mine and working it out from there. In truth First Spear, no matter how much we might both hate the idea, I’m trusting to luck to provide us with some way to prevent Gerwulf’s escape.’

Julius nodded wearily, saluted, and left his superior officer to his rumination. The barracks in which the Tungrians were housed for the night were for the most part silent, and after making a swift round of the yawning sentries, he headed for the Fifth Century’s barrack to resume his earlier discussion with Marcus. His disbelief on discovering that Lupus had accompanied the cohorts on their desperate mission had swiftly turned to anger, and only his desire to avoid a public argument in front of the soldiery had restrained his temper. But when he stamped into the officers’ quarter at the far end of the Fifth Century’s barrack, he found the room occupied by rather more men than he had expected. Dubnus and Silus were leaning against the wall facing Marcus, who was sitting on the bed explaining something to them. Lupus himself was squatting in a corner alongside his grandfather, listlessly essaying an attempt at cleaning Marcus’s boot with a look on his face that the senior centurion struggled to construe at first glance. Dubnus stepped forward and held a hand up to Julius with a knowing look.

‘Before you rip our colleague’s balls off and offer them to him on a plate, you might want to hear what he has to say.’

Julius looked at Dubnus for a moment and then shrugged, shaking his head.

‘You’ve gone mad as well, have you, Dubnus? Well I don’t suppose my temper’s going to cool much for being restrained for a little while longer, so have your say, Centurion Corvus, before I reach for the rusty spoon and relieve your wife of the risk of having to carry any more of your brats.’ He looked at the drinks in the men’s hands. ‘Is that wine I see?’

Silus passed him a cup with a weary grin.

‘Quite acceptable too, I have to say. Our colleague offered Morban a way out of his rather foolish wager on the subject of ice fighting, if he could procure us a couple of jars of the good stuff. It’s funny how fast the standard bearer can move for an old man when he has to.’

Julius sat down on the wooden floor and took a sip, grimacing at the wine’s rough bite.

‘This is the good stuff, is it? It needs more water. Go on then, what path to insanity has our brother in arms convinced you all we should be skipping down? I presume it has something to do with the boy here, or was that just soft-headed stupidity as opposed to the carefully thought through kind?’

Marcus looked at him from the bed.

‘Our problem’s obvious. If we march fast enough to get to the Ravenstone valley before Gerwulf decamps with the gold, then we’ll arrive with two cohorts of exhausted men fit only for a week’s light duties and sleep. And in any case, the Germans will probably see us coming and march out to the north before we even get to the valley, which means that we’ll never catch them. Whereas if we march at a pace which will leave the men fit to fight, we risk getting there too late to do anything other than bury the bodies. Mithras only knows how many of the miners he’ll have murdered in order to encourage the rest of them to screw every possible ounce of gold out of the place. Either way we lose, the tribune loses his position and we end up at the mercy of whoever gets appointed in his place. We’ll end up being sent who knows where to deal with the next border dispute to arise, and never see Britannia again.’

Julius nodded and raised his cup to drink again.

‘Right enough, I’ve already made just the same point to the tribune. We know it, he knows it, and all he can think to do is throw us down the road in an attempt to catch that German bastard napping. Do you have a better idea? Because he doesn’t, and neither do I.’

Silus spoke up.

‘I do. My horsemen could be in Apulum by tomorrow night, and knocking on the door of the Ravenstone by the middle of the day after.’

Julius shrugged wearily, taking another mouthful of wine before replying.

‘And then what? Ride up to the gates and demand that the Wolf drops his linen and parts his buttocks for you? What can thirty horsemen do that two cohorts of foot can’t?’ He held out his cup. ‘Fill that up, will you?’

‘They can cover ground faster. Much faster. And if they leave the road north from Apulum at the right time, they can work their way around any scouts Gerwulf puts on the road into the mountains.’

The first spear sniffed indifferently, and sipped thoughtfully at his wine.

‘So you can ride around their scouts and if you’re lucky you’ll be able to get eyes on whatever’s happening in the valley without being spotted yourselves. So what? It doesn’t help us to get there any earlier with enough strength to do anything more than watch, does it?’

Marcus smiled tightly at him.

‘That rather depends on how many men we think we need to liberate the valley.’

Julius shook his head in exasperation.

‘Spit it out will you, whatever it is that’s bouncing around between your ears?’

The Roman’s voice took on a note of urgency.

‘There’s a body of men far stronger than our two cohorts, and who’ll be filled with enough anger to rip the Germans to pieces, if we could just unleash them in numbers.’ Julius looked up from the floorboards with a gleam of interest in his eyes. ‘The miners. We can be sure that Gerwulf showed his hand the night after we left, and ever since then he’ll have been riding them as hard as he can, partly to get the most gold out of the ground in the time he has, but mainly just because he can. It won’t have escaped your notice that he’s not only capable of just about anything, but that he takes considerable pleasure in his men’s depravity. He’ll have had them beating and executing the miners at the slightest excuse, and more than likely making free with their women, so if we could just release those angry men at the right time they would do the hard work for us. And do you remember what Cattanius told us? The miners are locked up and lightly guarded at night. .’

He looked into Julius’s eyes for a moment to gauge his superior’s reaction before continuing. The first spear nodded reluctantly, gesturing for him to continue.

‘And here’s the key to making that happen, not that I particularly like it. Rather than try to force our way in through the front door we could send a few picked men into the valley overnight. All we have to do is kill the men set to guard the miners. Once they’re roused and armed it would take more than the strength that Gerwulf has to stop them, especially when his soldiers will be staggering out of their beds still half asleep when the wave washes over them, if we get it right.’

Julius nodded slowly.

‘It makes sense as far as it goes, even if the whole idea feels little better than rolling the dice and praying for sixes. But how would you propose to get into the valley unnoticed, even at night? They’ll have men on the heights watching out for exactly the sort of sneaking about you’ve described.’

Marcus pursed his lips.

‘There’s one person in this room who knows a way into the valley that doesn’t depend on us having to smash the gate in, or climb over the wall, or climb over the mountains for that matter. Don’t you Lupus?’

The men’s eyes turned to the child, who had long since stopped any pretence of cleaning Marcus’s boots. Julius looked at Marcus in amazement.

‘This whole idea depends on a child? And I thought I was a ruthless bastard. .’

‘Yes. He’s the only one of us who’s been inside the mountain. And as it happens, the boy Mus showed him something that might be the answer to our dilemma.’ He ushered the boy forward. ‘Tell the first spear your story, Lupus.’

The child’s voice was small in the room’s silence, and his face was pale.

‘My friend Mus took me into the mine. He showed me a tunnel they don’t use any more, one that opens on the mountain beneath the Raven’s Head. The opening is hidden from above by the rock.’

Marcus patted him on the arm.

‘Well done, Lupus. Julius, the tunnel opening that the boy Mus showed Lupus is on the south side of the mountain, the highest level of the mine that was worked out years ago as the miners were forced to dig deeper to find the gold. Nobody works in it anymore, and it would appear to have been forgotten. A party of men could enter the mine from the south, make their way through the mountain and down into the active levels. From there they could infiltrate the valley without being seen, if they were careful. .’

Julius waved Marcus to silence, turning to Lupus.

‘And if they were lucky. Very lucky. So this would all depend on you, Lupus, wouldn’t it? We’d need you to show us where the tunnel entrance is. Can you remember?’

The child nodded silently, his face white.

‘You can’t ask the boy to-’

Julius flicked his hand at Morban impatiently.

‘Be quiet, Standard Bearer. The boy wanted to come along with us, and he seems to be the hinge on which this entire dubious plan swings, so you can let him speak for himself. Now, Lupus, you’re sure you can find this secret entrance to the valley, bearing in mind it’ll have to be a nighttime approach?’

‘I think so.’

‘You think so. .’ The senior centurion put his head in his hands for a moment before standing up, draining his cup. ‘Come along then, all of you. We’d better lay this whole idea out for the tribune. Although whether he’ll see it as the answer to his dilemma or a good way to warn the Wolf that we’re on our way and get thirty men killed, is beyond me. And bring what’s left of that wine with you. He’s going to need a drink when he hears this one.’

‘If the Gods take pity on you and actually allow you to find the way into the valley, then you are under no circumstances to take on the Germans once you’ve freed the miners. For a start there are far too many of them, and if you do manage to release enough of the prisoners to start a fight, they won’t be able to see the difference between you and the men that have been abusing them. Understood? The best thing that you can do will be to head back for the mine and make your escape. And those are orders, Centurion.’

Julius looked up at Marcus until the Roman nodded his understanding, then switched his attention to the tribune mounted alongside the young centurion’s mare.

‘As for you, Tribune, I strongly suggest that you restrict your part in this scheme to getting into the woman’s house. Once you have the mine owners freed you can step back and let them organise their people, if they have the balls for it.’ He sighed and ran a hand through his hair. ‘I still can’t believe we’re actually doing this. .’

A snort of grim laughter from behind him made the first spear turn to find a big cavalry horse close enough that the animal was nibbling his helmet’s crest.

‘You can’t fucking believe it? You haven’t got to lead this bunch of amateurs halfway across Dacia hoping that none of them falls off or puts his spear up the arse of the beast in front of him. Just when I’ve got one collection of idiots properly trained to handle horses, you make half of them go back to hoofing it and give me a fresh set of virgins to break in.’

Silus had walked his horse back down the line of mounted men, expertly assessing their readiness to ride with his usual mix of jaundiced disappointment and rough humour. Julius cracked a smile for the first time that morning.

‘Every dark cloud conceals a little gold, Decurion! In this case at least the prospect of my having to thrash my poor lads south at the double march will be tempered by the thought of your happy face every time one of these trainee donkey wallopers does something to upset you.’ He turned back to his superior with an expression of renewed concern. ‘And speaking of breaking in virgins, Tribune, I’d be most grateful if you could manage not to get yourself killed? I don’t want to end up being told what to do by some other weak-chinned aristo when I’ve just got used to being told what to do by you.’

He watched with pursed lips as the squadron clattered out of the fort’s gates and into the grey light of dawn, waiting until the riders were out of sight before turning back to his officers.

‘Well then, now that this morning’s excitement is over I think we’d best get back to the challenge of putting another thirty miles under our belts before the sun hits the horizon on the far side. You’d better take Silus’s dismounts under your wing, Otho, I expect the poor lambs will be needing some serious encouragement before we’ve made the lunch stop. Right then, let’s put some hobnails on the cobbles!’

The mounted detachment made better progress than Silus had feared might be the case, although their arrival at Mountain Fort soon after midday was accompanied by postures that spoke of considerable discomfort from some of the less experienced riders. The decurion ranged alongside their short column with a look of disdain for those men grimacing at their saddle sores.

‘We’ve another thirty miles to cover before we reach Apulum, so you can have a short break to water your horses and get some fodder down their necks, and your own if there’s time. Men with sore arses, report to me!’

He was amused to see the tribune join the small group of men brave enough to risk his acerbic humour.

‘Well now, Tribune Scaurus queuing up for the rider’s remedy with his men, that is a sight I never thought I’d see. Here you go, sir.’

He passed Scaurus a jar which the tribune uncorked, gingerly sniffing at the contents. ‘It’s not for sticking under your nose, Tribune; it’s for rubbing on the sore skin. Best quality rabbit fat that is, nothing better for saddle sores.’

He winked at the senior officer as Scaurus dipped a finger into the jar with a look of distaste.

‘No, nothing better unless you can get a skinful of a good rough red. The headache you’ll have in the morning takes your mind right off your sore flaps!’

Arminius dismounted stiffly from his massive beast, reaching up to help Lupus down from the animal’s back where he had ridden in front of the German.

‘Does your backside hurt?’

The boy shook his head, his eyes wide at the sight of his tribune with one hand inside his leggings and a smile of relief as the fat he was rubbing between his legs eased the soreness caused by the saddle’s hard surface. Arminius grinned, ignoring the tribune’s narrowed eyes.

‘That’s the sheepskin for you. I’m just glad I had a spare piece of it in my kit.’ Silus walked across and pointed to the fleece he had given Arminius to fashion a makeshift saddle for the boy before their departure from Napoca. ‘If only we had a few more then we might have been spared the sight of this lot greasing themselves up for the afternoon, eh?’

The raiding party gathered in an empty barrack in the legionary fortress of Apulum that night, once the mounted detachment’s horses had been fed and watered, and those of the squadron’s original riders who had not dismounted and were left to march with the infantry had been provided with food and beds. Scaurus looked around the room at the men he had chosen to make the attempt to infiltrate the valley, meeting each man’s eyes in turn.

‘So once we’re through the mine and into the Ravenstone, I’ll go to Theodora’s villa with Arminius and two of our Hamians, and free the mine owners from whatever duress Gerwulf has them under. At the same time, Cattanius will lead Centurions Corvus, Qadir and Dubnus plus Arabus and the other two Hamians to the miners’ camp along with Martos. Our main objective is to release those labourers, and to protect them for long enough that they can get to their tools and gather enough strength to break out. Once that’s achieved we’ll all meet back at the mine entrance, which will be guarded by Lugos and Lupus. If Arminius and I don’t make it back to the mine at the appointed time then I’ll remind you all again that I expect you to continue as planned and make your way back through the mine to the southern side. There will be no heroic attempts to find or rescue me, since it will be highly likely that we will both already be dead.’

The German pulled a face, but made no comment.

‘Is everyone clear as to their part? We have to get the timing right if this is going to work.’

Silus stood up and saluted.

‘Yes Tribune, we know our part. I’m going to supervise the loading of the cart, and make sure the load’s rainproof. You wouldn’t want all of that shouting at the fortress’s stores officer to have been wasted.’

Scaurus nodded his approval and the decurion went on his way with a smile at the memory of his tribune’s incandescent anger when the Apulum fortress’s storeman had robustly denied being in possession of any of the equipment the party needed. Having reduced the soldier to terrified silence with a violent outburst that questioned both his parentage and his desire to see the next dawn, the tribune had waved his men forward into the stores in search of their requirements. Marcus had walked back down the stores’ length a few moments later with a satisfied smile.

‘It’s all there. Rope, rations, torches — lots of torches — and more than enough lambskin for our boots.’

The storeman had been aghast as the equipment was carried past him, but Scaurus’s rebuttal of his argument had left him floundering for a response.

‘But that won’t leave enough torches to light the fortress!’

‘In which case you’d better spend some of that gold you’ve been creaming off the top all these years and buy some more, hadn’t you, because I’m taking these. And I’ll need a cart to carry it all. Quickly now!’

Satisfied that everyone knew what was expected of them, the tribune dismissed his men, calling to Marcus to stay behind with him for a moment. The younger man turned his back to the iron stove’s glowing metal, enjoying the warmth after a day in the cold winter’s air, and waited for the tribune to speak. Scaurus rubbed wearily at his face with a hand before speaking.

‘Earlier today I suddenly remembered a question that I’ve been meaning to ask you for several days, but which I keep forgetting given everything else that’s been going on. After the battle on the frozen lake, you went across the ice to gather shields from Belletor’s cohort, to replace the ones that had been trampled to pieces on the ice. You had to walk through the men who had made a run for it across the lake, and were ridden down by the Sarmatae.’

Marcus nodded slowly, recalling the lake’s bitter cold through his fur-wrapped feet as he had walked reluctantly towards the scatter of bodies littering the ice.

‘Julius sent me across the lake for shields so that I could look for Carius Sigilis. He knew that the tribune and I had established a friendship of sorts, as much as a man of that seniority ever can with a common centurion.’

‘And?’

‘There’s little enough to tell. The men on the lake were all dead, either killed instantly or taken by blood loss and the cold quickly enough that I doubt any of them suffered for very long.’

‘And Sigilis?’

‘He had a spear wound in his side, deep into his stomach, and another in his neck. He bled to death.’

Scaurus got up, standing alongside his centurion and extending his hands to the stove’s warmth.

‘I watched you, Marcus. You went from body to body looking for him, and then when you found him you were crouched over his corpse for a good deal more time than it takes to ascertain that he was dead.’

Marcus nodded.

‘True. He’d written a last message on the ice with his own blood, the words barely readable but clear enough if a man knew what he was looking at.’

‘Was it “The Emperor’s Knives” by any chance?’

‘He told you, didn’t he?’

The tribune gave him a slow, sad smile, his admonishment no more than gentle amusement.

‘Well of course he did, you fool. When you refused to listen to what he was trying to tell you, he decided that letting me in on the secret was the best way to ensure that you learned the truth about your father’s death, even if he were to die in battle. He respected you, Centurion, he saw qualities in you that he yearned to find in himself, and while he very much wanted to be part of whatever revenge you take for Senator Aquila’s death, he knew there was a risk he wouldn’t survive the campaign. So he told me the story of the men who killed your father.’

‘I’m going to kill them all, if I ever get to Rome.’

Scaurus pursed his lips.

‘Taking on men with that sort of power will be insanely dangerous. You might catch one of them unprepared, but after that the others will know you’re coming, and they’ll be the most dangerous prey you’ll ever hunt. You’ll need the support of someone powerful, if you ever manage to get to Rome, more powerful than I’ll ever be, even if we do manage to pull off a miracle and stop Gerwulf running away with enough gold to buy a provincial city.’

Marcus reached into his purse, pulling out a heavy gold pendant.

‘This was on the ice beside his last words. The Sarmatae didn’t have time to dismount and rob them of their possessions.’

‘And he left it there for you? It carries a heavy burden, Centurion, the responsibility of telling his father how he died. A man like that won’t want to hear that his son was killed as he ran from the enemy, which leaves you with a difficult decision to make. Do you tell him the truth and risk his anger, or would it be better to sweeten the pill with a lie in order to gain his support? I don’t envy you the choice.’