Thunder of the Gods

4

When Julius reported to the headquarters building the next morning he found Scaurus waiting for him on the steps.

‘Make your report as we walk, First Spear, your officers are perfectly capable of running morning training without you breathing down their necks this once. I think it’s time we found out how well your man Avidus is doing with those manufacturing jobs I asked him to sort out.’

They walked briskly through the camp to the armourer’s workshops, finding the pioneer centurion waiting for them at the door.

‘Legatus, First Spear, come inside. I’ve got something to show you both.’

They followed him into the armoury, but where the first spear had expected to find trained soldiers working to repair the usual broken armour hinges and lost strap rivets, he was surprised to find the workshop in relative silence. Looking around he took in the neatly stacked bales of linen in one corner, the pile of ox hides in another, and the rack of shields awaiting the skilled tradesmen’s attention. Raising an eyebrow, he looked at Scaurus with a questioning expression.

‘You really think we can make these shields arrowproof with linen and leather, Legatus?’

His superior nodded equably.

‘It’ll work. Centurion?’

Avidus gestured to the shield before him, its red painted wooden surface as yet unadorned.

‘We glue a layer of linen to the wood, give it time to dry and then add another layer, and so on until we’ve laid on a dozen or so. Then we top it off with a layer of ox hide to protect the linen against any rain, and paint the hide with melted beeswax as waterproofing before nailing the rim back into place.’ He grinned at Julius. ‘Given that your boys will be looking for a way to make the bloody things lighter again, the leather also acts as a form of protection against tampering. Anyway …’

He gestured to a soldier who carried forward a modified shield, its painted wood now completely concealed by the linen and leather that had been fixed to the curved surface. Julius took it from him, hefting its weight with a grunt.

‘It’s heavy.’

Avidus nodded.

‘The additional protection weighs about six pounds. But come and see this before you tell me it’s not worth the extra load on our men.’

He led them across the workshop, gesturing to one of his men.

‘Fetch the shields we were using earlier.’

He turned to Julius while the man disappeared.

‘I was more than a bit doubtful that the legatus’s idea would work, so I got one of the Hamians to put a few arrows into a pair of shields at thirty paces. Ah, here’s the first of them, before we glued on all that linen and leather.’

Julius stared darkly at the damage the arrows had done to the painted wooden surface. One of them was lodged halfway through the shield’s wooden boards, but the other three had punched cleanly through. Avidus lifted the shield to allow daylight to shine through the holes.

‘Whichever one of your grunts was carrying that is out of the fight, I’d say.’

The first spear nodded gloomily at his words, turning his attention to the leather-faced shield that had been carried in while his attention had been distracted.

‘That’s …’

The pioneer centurion grinned at him.

‘Hard to believe, isn’t it? I wouldn’t have credited it myself, if I hadn’t seen it with my own eyes.’

Where the first shield had been wrecked by the arrows’ destructive impacts, its leather-covered companion was relatively undamaged, with the missiles’ iron points wedged in its surface rather than having punched through it.

‘Three of them haven’t even fully pierced the wood.’

Julius nodded.

‘And the one that has is only a third of the way through the board. This man’s still fighting.’

Scaurus tapped the waxy leather surface with his finger.

‘So it’s not pretty, it weighs a good deal more than the usual shield, but it stops arrows shot at it from close range. What do you think, First Spear?’

Julius looked at him with a disgusted expression.

‘I think, Legatus, that you knew very well what was going to happen when our man loosed those arrows at this. Let it never be said that you lack any flair for showmanship. Perhaps you should have taken up acting as a career.’

His superior winced at the insult.

‘That’s harsh, Julius, but I take your point. Although considering the effect that our colleague’s demonstration has had on you, imagine the sense of amazement and consternation that will be experienced by the Parthians when their fearsome volleys of arrows fail to make much of an impression on our ranks?’

Julius looked at the protected shield again.

‘How quickly can we have every man in the legion protected like this?’

Avidus pursed his lips.

‘I can convert five hundred shields a day given fifty men to work with. After all, it’s just cutting and gluing for the most part. Dirty work, but not difficult, and the raw materials are already in hand. Eight days?’

Scaurus slapped a clenched fist into his palm.

‘I can’t give you eight days. You’ll just have to go faster. I want a thousand shields a day converting, and I don’t care how you make it happen.’

He grimaced at Julius.

‘There must be that many men in the legion cells after last night’s rather vigorous celebrations. Tell them that their punishment is five days of gluing linen to wood, and that the sooner they get done the quicker they’ll be freed.’

He turned back to Avidus.

‘That’s a good start, Centurion. Now let’s talk about the rest of that list I gave you, shall we.’

The African nodded.

‘Yes Legatus. Now firstly, about these other shields you wanted making? I’m still struggling to see what use they’re going to be when they’re so big they can barely be lifted.’

‘Mules, Dubnus?’

‘Mules, Morban. Four legs, big ears, nasty kick on them?’

The veteran standard bearer looked up at the man who had once been his colleague with an expression of disgust, putting down his spoon and resting his elbows on the taverna’s dining table.

‘I should have known there was more to the offer of a feed in the city with you two than met the eye.’ Dubnus smirked at him from his place alongside his colleague Otho, chewing hard at a piece of gristle. ‘And I do know, Your Highness, what a mule is. I was simply expressing my lack of understanding as to why you should need so many of them.’

Otho, a famously pugilistic officer with a reputation for punching first and then not asking any questions before punching again just to be sure, leaned forward and bared his gaped teeth at the standard bearer in a fearsome smile, his voice permanently hoarse from a lifetime of bellowing at recruits.

‘But if we told you, it wouldn’t be much of a secret, would it, what with your constant hunt for inside information? Before we knew it, the legion would be taking bets on what all the new mules will be carrying.’

‘I can be hurt, Centurion! You may see me as a bluff, hard-faced soldier, but-’

Dubnus laughed, tapping Morban on the chest.

‘Don’t forget I was Chosen Man to Tribune Corvus, back when he was a centurion and you were his statue waver. Which means that what I see you as, Standard Bearer, is a venal bastard with an eye to his own enrichment and an unending thirst for other people’s gold. But while you’re all those things, you’re also the best man I can think of when it comes to buying three hundred mules for the legion.’

He watched as the standard bearer’s eyes narrowed in calculation. Morban took another mouthful of his meal, clearly thoughtful as he chewed energetically and swallowed before speaking again.

‘Three hundred mules? Really?’

‘Three hundred. All to be capable of carrying a heavy load, with plenty of life left in them. If you think you’ll be able to make a profit by buying animals bound for the slaughterhouse, you’re missing one critical factor from your calculations.’

Dubnus hooked a thumb at the man sitting next to him.

‘Him.’

Otho grinned at the standard bearer, ostentatiously raising his vine stick in a fist that was more scar tissue than knuckles, and Morban nodded slowly.

‘I can see the merit in your argument, Centurions. So, you want to buy these beasts of burden without the sheer size of your requirement forcing prices up?’

The veteran centurion raised an eyebrow at Dubnus.

‘You see? I told you he still possesses enough wit to see sense.’

He turned back to the standard bearer.

‘You’ve got it. That’s why if the fact we’re buying mules leaks out I’ll be forced to beat you until that’s not all that’s leaking out.’

His colleague reached out and took a handful of the standard bearer’s tunic.

‘Or to put it another way, if it gets out that the legion wants to buy that many animals, the price going through the roof will only be part of our problems. So, if by any mysterious means that should happen, once Otho here has broken your nose for what will clearly be the twentieth time, I’ll confiscate not only your profits but every coin in your purse, those held for you by your various employees, and in your various secret hiding places.’

Morban shook his head in irritated bafflement.

‘I can take a hint. But if it’s that important to get these beasts bought, why not just gather the city’s donkey dealers and show them the colour of your gold and the edge of your dagger? Since when did the army ever negotiate with a pack of mule mongers?’

Dubnus smirked.

‘You may know how many beans make three, Morban, but you’re not the sharpest sword in the armoury when it comes to outwitting senior officers, are you?’

He shook his head at the older man’s bemusement.

‘The governor has forbidden the legatus to take more than half the legion with him over the Euphrates.’

The standard bearer shrugged.

‘I knew that.’

The centurion turned away, looking about him at the taverna’s other clients and making sure that their conversation could not be overheard.

‘You would have been hard put not to have heard it. The governor has made a point of making it clear to one and all that he intends to protect the city with the other half of the legion. So, what do you think he might make of the news that the legatus is in the market for such a very large number of mules?’

‘Ah …’

‘Indeed, ah. So here’s the bargain, Morban. You will receive enough gold to purchase three hundred mules at the current market price. You will find those mules, you and whoever you choose to join you in the venture, and you will buy them, quietly and without a fuss, within the next two days. You will not pay other men to steal them, which will inevitably attract both attention to our preparations, and Otho’s vine stick to your nether regions.’

Otho smiled evilly, holding up his vine stick again and pointing to a knot on one side.

‘And when you’ve managed to put three hundred more beasts into the legion stables, you can share whatever money you have left with the men you chose to help you.’

The standard bearer nodded swiftly.

‘I’m your man, Centurion.’ He grinned across the table with a conspiratorial wink.

‘And just between us three … say the legatus does manage to smuggle another cohort or two out from under the governor’s nose. It still doesn’t take three hundred mules to carry that much equipment. So what’s the real need for that many animals, eh?

Dubnus beckoned Morban with a crooked finger. The burly centurion leaned closer, his voice so quiet that the veteran could barely hear the whispered words.

‘I can tell you something. Something the legatus said to me …’

The standard bearer leaned closer, his eyes narrowing in concentration.

‘Yes?’

Dubnus nodded, and his battle-scarred colleague whipped his vine stick into Morban’s crotch beneath the table, the standard bearer’s eyes suddenly bulging at its hard intrusion.

‘He specifically told me to bring Otho to this discussion because he knows that you and I go back a long way, which could well reduce the credibility of any threat I might make if you were stupid enough to think in the wrong way. Whereas Otho here would be only too happy to use you for a punchbag.’

The veteran officer withdrew the stick, repeating his horrible grin as he leaned back and picked up his wine cup.

‘Buy the mules, Morban. Leave the rest of it to the grown-ups.’

The next morning saw a repeat of the previous day’s training march, with much the same result once the Tungrians hit their stride. After the lunch break, the legion was sent to weapons practice, thousands of men settling into the mind-numbing routines intended to make the use of their swords, shields and spears second nature when the time came to fight in earnest, but two centuries of the First Tungrian Cohort followed their officers away to a quiet spot between two barrack blocks. Scaurus and his first spear watched in silence as Qadir’s Hamians and Dubnus’s hulking axe men paraded on either side of him, each of the two centuries considering the other with expressions of disparagement. The Tungrians of the Tenth Century loomed over the Syrian archers, every one of them taller and more muscular than the biggest of the Hamians, and Dubnus shared an amused smile with Qadir before barking out an order.

‘Attention!’

The Tenth Century stamped to attention in perfect synchronisation, chests and jaws thrust out pugnaciously, while the Hamians stiffened into the brace with less drama, but equal speed and precision. Julius nodded at Dubnus, and the big man strolled forward, looking up and down the double line of his men.

‘Very good, Tenth Century! The Bear would have been proud of you! You’re still the biggest, nastiest and proudest century in the First Tungrians, but now you’ve got an entire legion to dominate!’

The soldiers stared fixedly ahead, their eyes shining with pride and the memory of their former centurion. Dubnus swept his gaze up and down their ranks with a knowing smile before speaking again.

‘And now, my brothers, you have the opportunity to wield a power so great that it will strike a mortal fear into the hearts of all who oppose the legion’s will. You will be responsible for striking blows into the ranks of our enemies that will demand every ounce of strength in your bodies. And you will perform this duty in combination with our Hamian brothers here.’

He pointed at the archers with his vine stick, fighting to restrain a smile as the eyes of the men closest to him widened with surprise. Scaurus walked forward, beckoning to Avidus, who was waiting with several of his pioneers beside something the size of a small altar that had been shrouded in thick cloth to disguise its purpose. The grizzled centurion nodded to the men waiting around whatever it was that was concealed, and they picked it up, carrying the mystery object forward and placing it between the two centuries. Dubnus grinned at his men.

‘You won’t be needing to lift any more weights to build up your arm strength from now on, my lads!’

The legatus nodded to Avidus, who pulled away the cloth to reveal a machine of wood and metal mounted on a wooden frame. The seam-faced African gestured to the weapon.

‘We have thirty of these beauties, the single most deadly weapon on any battlefield. This, gentlemen, is a Scorpion. It is a lightweight two-man model of the big bolt throwers carried by the navy’s ships and used to protect our legion fortresses. It can throw one of these …’

He took a bolt from Avidus, holding it up to display the missile’s sharp iron point.

‘Out to a range of four hundred paces. It is so powerful that when this bolt hits a man – or a horse – protected by armour at close range, it will tear through that armour and kill the target, quickly and without fail. And this is how it works.’

He pointed at the Scorpion.

‘Load!’

A pair of his men stepped up to the weapon, swinging it to point at three wooden posts joined by a crosspiece one hundred paces distant, the middle post rising above its fellows. Taking a whistle from his belt pouch Avidus blew a single note, and a pair of men hurried out from behind the barrack block closest to the target point. They were carrying between them a shirt of laminated armour and a standard-issue helmet, placing the armour onto the crosspiece and balancing the helmet on the nub of the middle post that rose above it before running for cover. The bigger of the two men standing by the Scorpion had grabbed a pair of winding handles, and was working vigorously to crank a ratcheted slide back down the channel that ran the weapon’s length, his biceps bulging with the effort as he laboured over the mechanism.

‘The Scorpion stores its user’s strength in these …’

Avidus pointed to the machine’s innards.

‘Torsion springs made from animal sinew. As you can see, the bow arms are inserted through them, and are gradually being forced back against the springs’ resistance. When the springs are stretched to the maximum safe extent, the bolt is placed into the channel.’

The soldier working the weapon’s crank stepped back, nodding to his comrade and shaking his aching arms. The other man placed a bolt gingerly into the channel that ran down the machine’s length, sighting carefully on the target.

‘Shoot!’

The waiting soldier pulled a trigger, loosing the bolt in a whip-crack explosion of motion. In an instant the missile was gone, spat across the gap between weapon and target faster than the eye could follow. It struck the armour with a metallic thump, drawing a chorus of appreciative mutterings from the Tungrians.

‘Reload!’

The big man bent to his task again, grunting with the effort as he turned the twin cranks as fast as he could. Sneaking a sideways glance at the Tenth Century’s men, Scaurus smiled to himself at the sight of their massive biceps twitching in sympathy as they imagined themselves working to wind the terrifying weapon. The Scorpion’s operator placed a second bolt into the mechanism, bending to crouch over the weapon, and a hush fell across the parade ground as the watching Tungrians realised what he was attempting to do. With a twang and a thump the bolt smashed the helmet from its resting place on the central post, throwing it back thirty paces to clatter off the wall of a barrack.

‘Cease shooting!’

Avidus blew the whistle again, and the same pair of men re-emerged from their cover of the barrack block, hurrying to collect the battered targets and carry them across to where legatus and first spear were waiting.

‘Look closely, gentlemen.’

The laminated armour was wrecked, a hole the size of a man’s thumb having been punched in the overlapping plates that would have been protecting the wearer’s stomach and back. The helmet was horribly deformed, the bolt that had smashed it almost flat stuck halfway through its thicker iron plate. The soldiers stared at it with expressions of fascination and horror as Scaurus held it up for them to see.

‘The man who was wearing this armour is dead. And so is the man behind him, most likely. The officer who was wearing this helmet is no more than a maimed corpse, with his head burst like a melon that’s fallen off the farmer’s cart. His fellow officers will be terrified to raise their heads for fear of stopping a bolt in the same manner once they see the state of him!’

He strolled across to the bolt thrower.

‘As I said, we have thirty of these beauties, which means we can kill between twenty-five and fifty of the enemy with every shot. But to make the most of this power we need two different types of men.’

He pointed at the Tenth Century’s hulking axe men.

‘Giants, like you, with the strength to make your weapon ready to fire in less than a dozen heartbeats, time after time.’

His gaze turned to the waiting Hamians.

‘And men like you, with the skill to put your shot where it will do the most damage, time after time.’

He grinned at their faces.

‘I know, it’s not what either of you would have expected. But believe me, soldiers, the combination of your brute strength and skill with the bow is going to make the sight of you the most terrifying thing our enemies have ever seen. And quite possibly the last …’

Timon was, by his own admission, having one of his less effective days. It was mid-afternoon, and not one of his half-dozen mules had set a hoof outside the small stable in which they were quartered while waiting for customers. Not so much as the shadow of a buyer had darkened the threshold, and the boy who kept the animals clean and well groomed was lying asleep in the hay, having brushed them so many times for the lack of anything more interesting to do that Timon had told him to stop for fear that he would wear the brush out and turn the day’s disappointment into a full-blooded commercial disaster.

Hearing voices in the street, the trader’s phenomenally sensitive hearing, attuned to the slightest sound of a customer, plucked the word ‘mule’ from the rumble of men’s voices. Darting for the door, he was just in time to find a group of three men, obviously military to judge from their haircuts, turning away from his shop front. One of them was speaking in Roman, a language in which any self-respecting Antioch mule trader made a point of being fluent.

‘No, let’s go back to the one round the corner. He seemed much keener to-’

Timon launched himself into the street with a hearty cry of welcome, taking the nearest man firmly by his arm, his tried and tested means of preventing potential customers from even considering leaving without at least perusing his stock.

‘My friends-’

His practised sales patter dried up abruptly as the man whose arm he was holding turned to stare at him with an expression that promised great pain were he not to release the limb promptly, an impression made all the more forbidding by the two deep scars that adorned his face, one running from his right cheekbone to the point of his chin, the other, shorter but deeper, scoring his nose and running across the first as it ran halfway to his earlobe. Raising his hands in apology, Timon bowed deeply, raising his gaze to find all three men staring at him.

‘We’re not your friends, mule man, although we might well be your customers, now that you’ve bothered to come out onto the street.’

The oldest of them, a stocky man with the face of someone who had tended to fight and lose in his younger days, waved a dismissive hand.

‘Come on lads, let’s go back to the dealer on the main street. He had some healthy-looking animals, and …’

Timon’s eyes widened in horror.

‘Honoured customers, I can only entreat you not to indulge in such an unwise course of action. Whilst it ill behoves me to speak ill of a member of my own profession, the honesty to which my father raised me – for my name is Timon, which in Greek means “honour” – forces me to warn you that my competitor of whom you speak offers a selection of animals which, compared to my own beasts, should hang their heads for shame.’

The three men stared back at him, their expressions dead pan.

‘And besides, I am offering a special discount today.’

The scar-faced man leaned forward.

‘Discount? How much discount?’

Timon groped for a number, and in that instant the oldest of the soldiers took the opening.

‘Ten per cent. Make it ten per cent and we might be interested. Otherwise we’ll be off round the corner.’

Wincing with the pain of having been taken halfway to his bottom price without so much as a protest that he was taking the bread from his children’s mouths, the trader swallowed his pride and smiled broadly.

‘Ten per cent it is! Come in, my fr- no, honoured customers, and feast your eyes on the best mules to be found in all of Antioch! Boy, the wine!’

A swift kick at the sleeping boy sent him scuttling for the cups and flask with a look of surprise that Timon chose to ignore. The three men raised their cups in salute and drained the wine in swift gulps, grinning at Timon’s poorly hidden discomfort as he poured them refills.

‘You’re a gentleman, Timon!’

He laughed nervously at the scar-faced soldier’s praise as the second cup went the way of the first.

‘I am always happy to share a drink with the men who protect us from the eastern barbarians.’

‘But you’re not drinking!’

He nodded weakly at the scarred man, wondering why it was that the soldier’s disfigured face worried him.

‘I do not drink when I am working. It would be …’

‘Fucking unwise!’

The burly man who had introduced himself as Morban slapped his comrade on the shoulder.

‘Leave him alone Jesus, and let’s have a proper look at these mules!’

Timon frowned.

‘You call your friend “Jesus”? He is a follower of the Nazarene?’

Morban laughed.

‘No mate, we call him Jesus because some nasty hairy men got lucky and carved a cross into his face, just like the one your god was killed on!’

Timon managed to keep a straight face.

‘The Christ was not a god, but the son of the God, Our Lord, the only God.’

Morban smiled tolerantly.

‘We follow Mithras my friend, but we’re not against other men’s beliefs. Now, do you want to sell us some mules or not?’

The salesman’s eyes narrowed.

‘More than one? How many?’

The soldier looked around the stable, nodding with pursed lips.

‘Your stock seems sound enough. How badly would you like to empty the stable? We’ve a long way to march, now that we’re retired and heading back north, and we’ll have a lot to carry. So tell me, Timon old son, how about you give us another five per cent discount to take them all off your hands?’

Fighting to avoid the stutter that afflicted him at moments of the greatest stress, Timon pulled at his lower lip.

‘Well …’

The soldiers turned to leave, and with a sudden flash of panic he found himself agreeing to the deal, despite the obvious damage that it would be doing to his reputation.

‘Don’t worry, friend. We won’t be telling anyone what we paid, and in return you can keep this sale to yourself. We’re not the only men taking their diplomas and saying goodbye to the legion, so if the price is right you can do some more business with us, just as long as it stays between us. Ourselves and some of our mates have got it in mind to try some trading between the border and here, make a nice little profit to retire properly on, but we don’t want anyone else stealing the idea, so if you want to sell more mules, you’ll keep it to yourself, right?’

‘Yes indeed. You can be assured of my discretion, noble sirs.’

Never one to beat around the bush where a potential sale might be staring him in the face, Timon felt sufficiently emboldened to enquire as to the sort of numbers the soldiers might be looking for, were more beasts to be required.

‘Forty? Fifty? Of course if you can’t deal with that sort of volume, no problem, we’ll just be on our way, but we’d need them by-’

‘You have assuredly come to the right place, my esteemed customers. I am more than capable of procuring you this volume of mules, and of the same high quality you see here!’

‘By tomorrow night.’

Timon swallowed, considering the lengths to which he might have to go to satisfy such a large order, pondered the potential illegality and then, considering the amount of money involved, put out his hand.

‘Fifty mules, at the price we have agreed for these six prime specimens, to be delivered to …’

‘The Third Legion’s fortress.’

‘I know it well. To be delivered to your fortress by dusk tomorrow evening.’

Assured at length that Timon was a man who could indeed cope with such an order, the soldiers enjoyed the remainder of his wine while precise arrangements were made to deliver the mules. They then made their way into the street a good deal more cheerfully than they had entered his premises. The trader leaned back against the door and wiped the sweat from his brow.

‘You see, boy? Was I not magnificent? I still have the gift …’

The boy shrugged, happy that his day was clearly about to end early given his master’s propensity for celebrating sales with wine and female company, but realised that the trader had fallen uncharacteristically silent.

‘And now I must leave you to close the shop, and feed and water the soldiers’ mules. I have to see a friend of mine with a business proposition.’

‘We’re looking for a man.’

The man to whom the statement had been addressed shrugged, staring back at the two men before him with knowing eyes. They had been waiting outside his premises when the doors were opened for business, which, given he owned a brothel whose staff routinely worked late into the night, was at a rather more relaxed time than the city’s more mundane businesses who raised their shutters soon after dawn. Their entry to his place of business had been respectful enough, but he was nonetheless grateful that his customary bodyguard was close to hand, the cold-eyed Syrian staring at them with just enough menace to make clear that they were tolerated rather than welcomed.

‘One man. In this city? I wish you joy with your search.’

He turned away, but the older of the two men spoke to his back, his tone unchanged despite the obvious brusque dismissal.

‘We already worked that one out, after a day spent drinking watery wine all over this city and getting precisely nowhere. So my Dacian mate here had the one and only good idea I’ve ever heard out of him, which brings us to you. See, this man only has one skill – he knows the roads to the east of the frontier as well as he knows the lines on his palm. And you’re known as a trader who employs men with that skill.’

‘You are soldiers. Am I right?’

Sanga nodded.

‘It’s that obvious?’

‘To a man with my experience. I have been trading in the lands beyond Rome’s borders for most of my life, and it has been a long life. I have seen many soldiers in my time, and they have a certain appearance. You have the haircuts, you have the muscles …’

He looked them up and down, staring intently at both men’s faces.

‘And you have the eyes. So this man you seek, he is a scout?’

‘Was. He left the empire’s service all of a sudden like, and he’s not been seen since he left the fortress at some place called Zeugma, heading for the city.’

The trader smiled.

‘That would make sense. He was part of your lost cohort? The news was never official, but karawan masters who have trodden the northern route to the Sea of the Persians speak of coming upon the site of a massacre, of hundreds of Roman corpses picked clean with their remains strewn across the desert.’

Sanga nodded silently.

‘So, this man made his escape before the Parthians fell upon your comrades, reported the matter to the men who hold the bridge over the Euphrates and then …?’

‘Rode south.’

‘And you believe he came here?’

‘What do you think?’

The trader shrugged.

‘Why would I care?’

Sanga reached into his purse, pulling out a freshly minted gold aureus and dropping it into the trader’s open hand. The Arab looked at the coin, frowning at the head depicted in profile.

‘Which emperor is this?’

Sanga shrugged.

‘Who gives a fuck? I’ve got four more like that, if you help me to find the man in question. I believe his name was Abbas. Here’s his description.’

The trader thought for a moment.

‘It does seem logical for a man seeking to hide from vengeful people like you – and the gods know that your empire has a solid reputation for taking revenge on those who betray it – would seek shelter among the teeming masses of the city. But how do you propose that I might find this man?’

Sanga gave him a pitying look.

‘For five gold pieces I’d say you can do your own thinking. But I’d have thought that if anyone can persuade a man like that to come out of hiding, a trader who routinely uses the roads between here and the east to make his money would be the favourite.’

The Arab looked at him appraisingly, lifting the coin to the tavern’s lamplight.

‘Four more of these?’

The soldier nodded.

‘Five in gold for this man Abbas – that and a night with the pick of the girls upstairs for the two of us. And wine.’ He winked at the bodyguard. ‘Plenty of wine.’

It was dark when Scaurus’s clerk ushered an unexpected visitor into the legatus’s office, taking the man’s travel-stained cloak and helmet.

‘Prefect. I wasn’t expecting to see you again quite this quickly.’

Scaurus shook the Phrygian officer’s hand, calling for cold drinks and directing him to a chair, taking his own seat.

‘Am I to presume from your rather dusty appearance that you’ve ridden here from Hama?’

The younger man nodded, gratefully taking a long drink from the jug of cold water offered to him by the legatus’s German slave.

‘You presume correctly. I left yesterday at dawn and reached the city late in the day, to discover that your man Corvus has not been seen, at least not by the military authorities.’

Scaurus raised an eyebrow.

‘Which is most unlikely. The arrival of a senior officer would have been noted by the men on duty, at whichever gate he entered, for a start.’

The Phrygian nodded with an unhappy expression.

‘Which can only lead me to conclude that he didn’t actually ride for Hama in the first place.’

Scaurus looked back at him, his face expressionless.

‘Those were his orders. But who knows what lengths a man unjustly accused of murder will go to if he fears a show trial and prompt execution, solely to satisfy the spite of a man who should know better?’

The uncomfortable silence was broken by the prefect, who picked up his helmet and stood up.

‘Legatus, you realise that I have no choice but to take this news to the governor?’

Scaurus nodded equably.

‘It was good of you to bring it to me first. Of course, you must report back to your superior, who will in turn doubtless summon me to his palace for a discussion without wine. That is the way of things.’

‘Legatus …’

‘I know. The governor’s most likely reaction will be to assume that I’ve sent Tribune Corvus away to somewhere very far from Hama. Not only will he rail at me for this assumed act of defiance, but he will almost certainly declare that I am to be held responsible for Quinctius Flamininus’s murder in Corvus’s place. He will have me arrested and conduct a quickly convened trial, declare my guilt and oversee my execution which, if I am fortunate, will be conducted in a swift and merciful manner to avoid any stain on his character.’

The prefect shook his head unhappily.

‘And I can see no way to avoid bringing this fate about. I cannot fail to report my findings to the Governor, and when I do …’

‘The summons will be immediate.’

The prefect leaned forward, lowering his voice.

‘I cannot fail to report to the governor. But I can fail to report tonight.’

Scaurus inclined his head.

‘That would be generous of you, Prefect.’

‘What will you do?’

The legatus smiled wanly.

‘Leave the city, obviously. What other choice do I have?’

Timon drove the mules that he had collected from his business partner earlier in the day up the road from Antioch to the barracks’ gates, where a weary-looking sentry took one look and hooked a thumb at the nervous salesman.

‘Up the road to the corner of the wall and turn right. You’ll find the stables easy enough, just head for the sound of your mates and all their mules. Not to mention the fucking smell.’

Making his way round the perimeter of the legion’s base, it didn’t take him long to realise that he wasn’t the only vendor on whom the soldiers had called the previous day. Recognising the faces of several of his competitors from across the city, he exchanged mutually wary greetings with the man he considered to be his closest rival.

‘Three soldiers, one with a cross carved into his cheek and going by the blasphemous name of “Jesus”?’

Timon nodded unhappily.

‘And not that either of us will admit as much to another living soul, but a large number of mules to be delivered in only a day, at a price which despite its keenness left a fair profit for yourself? Such a large number that I have made undertakings to certain people in order to find the money required to procure the animals, procurement that may well not have been of a legal nature. And undertakings that will prove painful to me should I fail to repay them. And now I discover that I am not supplying these mules to retired soldiers, but to the army itself.’

He nodded again, and his competitor sighed in apparent relief.

‘You cannot know how pleased I am to see you here. I was thinking that you had been spared the ignominy of having been deceived by these …’

The other mule dealer fell silent, as the soldier who had conducted negotiations the previous day stepped onto a box to address them.

‘Greetings gentlemen! My name is Morban, as most of you probably remember! I see you’re all here, with the mules you promised to supply!’

A hard-faced officer and a pair of cavalrymen stood beside him, while a legion clerk known to all of the dealers had taken a seat at a desk behind them, and was fussing with his abacus and writing materials.

‘Well done my friends! You’re all busy men, so we’re going to get you all sorted out and paid as quickly as we can. When your name is called, bring your mules forward. They will be examined by my colleague Silus here and his men, passed as fit and entered into the record as having been purchased from you. When all your beasts have been either passed into the stables or rejected as inadequate for service, then the clerk here will record the details …’

He paused to clear his throat, and Timon’s fellow vendor muttered a curse.

‘I don’t like the sound of this.’

‘Will record the details in the legion’s records and then write you a syngrapha.’

Half a dozen angry voices were immediately raised in protest, and the soldier waited with a patient expression until they gradually ran out of steam.

‘The sooner we get on with this the sooner you’ll be able to get away and start planning how to spend the money!’

The man standing next to Timon waved his clenched fist in the air.

‘A fucking syngrapha? A piece of paper promising to pay us at some point in the future? You promised me payment in gold!’

The soldier shrugged.

‘You didn’t ask. You just took the gold I offered for what you had in your stables, and then assumed that we’d pay the same way for the rest of the beasts.’

‘This is robbery!’

He turned to the new protester.

‘There’s nothing making you do business with us. Just take your mules and leave, if you’re that unhappy.’

Silence fell, as each man present reflected on the risks they had each taken in pursuit of the profit they had expected. Theft, loans, and in Timon’s case not only the questionable means by which he had acquired his mules, but also a formidable wife who was yet to be told exactly how their savings had been reinvested and who, he fervently hoped, would never find out.

‘And besides, these syngraphas will be dated for tomorrow. All you have to do is go down to the governor’s palace first thing and the provincial treasury will honour them on the spot. After all, you can’t expect the legion to have that sort of money lying around, can you? A syngrapha with the legatus’s official stamp on it is as good as gold, my friends. You’ll all be paid, you’ll just have to wait a few hours.’

He looked at each of them in turn, and Timon realised with a sinking heart that neither he nor any of his competitors could afford to walk away from the deal.

‘Excellent! Let’s get started then, shall we?’

Passing unnoticed through the quiet pre-dawn streets of the city, the Arab known as Abbas slipped into the brothel by its seldom used side door. Unlike the ornate main entrance, guarded by a quartet of hard-faced former soldiers who job was to keep order and ensure that any legionary who got out of hand left the establishment with a permanent reminder of the event, the side door was used only by men known to the owner. They came not to use the services of the establishment, but simply to frequent the small and exclusive tavern he maintained for the use of men either willing to spend their money in greater amounts than the average customer, and who wanted to avoid the inevitable crowding when the legion came into town with sex on its collective mind, or to provide him with the investment opportunities to best utilise the substantial revenue that flowed in from his various business activities. After waiting for a short time, the Arab was shown into the owner’s presence, bowing deeply to show his respect for a man famed for the size and profitability of his camel trains, which routinely travelled the various routes from the Persian Sea through Parthia to the province’s borders. At such an early hour the only other men in the tavern were a pair of Romans who, having clearly used the brothel’s services well, if not wisely, were recuperating after a hard night with a cup of wine apiece, their eyes barely open as they laid back on their couches. Swiftly laying out his experience, and his desire to find employment in the near future, he was delighted when, after a moment’s thought, the trader nodded acceptance of his proposal.

‘You are well informed. I do indeed have need of experienced men such as yourself.’

‘You’ll take me as an outrider?’

The other man nodded.

‘One of my karawan masters will begin the journey from Antioch to the Gulf of the Persians in three days’ time, bearing enough Roman gold to purchase a two-hundred-camel load of silk and spices. I need a man with extensive knowledge of the roads through Mesopotamia, and one is not afraid to stand behind a sword in the event of attempted robbery.’

The scout nodded eagerly.

‘I have ridden the road of silk for most of my life. I know every pace of every path and goat track between Zeugma and the ocean, and I also have a nose for trouble.’

‘But you can fight? We carry no passengers.’

‘I can fight. As long as you do not expect to be making war on the Parthian empire.’

The merchant sat back in his cushioned chair.

‘The empire does not seek to rob us. Far from it, in fact, for they know that the tax they will take from our karawans over the years will far outweigh any benefit to be had from the short-term gain of theft. And you speak as if the King of Kings has declared war upon Rome, although I think we would have heard of this, were it to be true.’

The scout acknowledged the point with a respectful inclination of his head.

‘Indeed you are right. But I have seen armed men of the army of Parthia take the field against Rome in recent times.’

His potential employer regarded him levelly for a moment.

‘These are interesting times, that I will grant you. But have no fear, no Parthian king would countenance the use of violence against the men who provide the bulk of his income. So, will you join us?’

The Arab nodded.

‘I will be pleased to. I have had the unnatural smell of this city in my nostrils for long enough.’

‘Good. Then meet me at the Oriental gate, at dawn three days from now, and you will have a place in this trading expedition, and at the rate you named.’

The scout bowed deeply.

‘Thank you. In three days.’

He was halfway to the door when the trader spoke again, his question couched in a deceptively light tone, seemingly an afterthought.

‘And how shall we contact you in the event that our departure plans change?’

The Arab turned, meeting the trader’s eyes for a moment and then turned swiftly for the door, only to find himself looking down a long knife blade whose design, he noted with a sinking heart, was distinctly Roman. He reached for his own blade, only to find himself on the floor looking up as the second Roman kicked his feet from beneath him and followed up with a swift knuckle jab into his sternum, briskly relieving him of the weapon while he curled up in agony. Recovering some of his wits, he spat an imprecation at the trader.

‘I’ll make you bleed for this!’

The Syrian shrugged.

‘In truth, I expect not. Given the amount of gold that the Romans have promised to pay me for finding you, you’ll either very shortly be underground with your throat cut or going away with them for a holiday to Nisibis. And we all know that since Governor Dexter is only allowing half the legion to march north, neither they nor yourself are likely to be coming back.’

He held up his hands in a semblance of apology.

‘No offence intended, gentlemen, I have to state the facts as I see them. And now, I believe, there is a matter of payment to be completed, given you have your man?’

The older of the two Romans tapped his belt purse and shot the trader a hard grin as he knotted a fist in the protesting Arab’s hair and dragged him onto his feet.

‘You’ve had one coin. And since you think I’m already a dead man I’m suddenly feeling no need to pay you the rest. After all, you’ll find it hard to collect unless you’ve got a trading route into the underworld.’

His younger comrade wagged a disapproving finger that, combined with the threat of the scout’s confiscated knife, made the trader’s bodyguard settle back into his seat before his attempt to challenge the Romans had progressed far beyond the thinking stage. The Arab raised the single gold coin that he’d received earlier.

‘But this is-’

‘Barely enough to cover the women we’ve spent the night with and the wine we’ve drunk? In truth, the women weren’t up to much, I’d say you’re working them too hard. And I’ve drunk better wine. So that’s all you’re getting, friend. Make the most of it, unless you’d like your teeth putting down your throat as well. No offence intended, I’m just stating the facts as I see them.’

The lamps had long since been lit in the legion’s headquarters by the time Scaurus’s officers gathered to discuss the plan for the next morning.

‘Matters are progressing a little faster than we might have preferred. Before I outline my intentions, I think we ought to review our progress with the various items of equipment and …’

Scaurus fell silent as his clerk stepped into the room, listening as the man spoke quietly in his ear.

‘Really? What excellent timing. By all means have him brought in.’

The gathered officers turned to the door, watching as the duty centurion came through it followed by two soldiers who had a third man between them, his hands tied behind his back and a black hood over his head.

‘Greetings gentlemen! What do you have for me under there?’

Scaurus watched as Sanga pulled off the captive’s hood to leave him blinking in the lamplight.

‘This is the man, Legatus. He was stupid enough to start quacking on about having seen the Parthians having a go at our lads over the border.’

He dropped a purse onto the desk in front of Scaurus.

‘We was going to pay five in gold for him, but the man we used to find him made the mistake of thinking he could piss on us without getting some of it back when the wind changed direction. So we only paid him one.’

Scaurus nodded, looking at his men with a wry smile.

‘Which, speaking of urine, seems mostly to have been spent on entertainment, from the look of you both. Well done once more, gentlemen. You’d better go and sleep it off. I think there are enough officers in the room that this man would deeply regret any attempt to run.’

The captive said nothing, but as he looked about him he seemed to sag slightly. Scaurus stood, walking over to him and looking him over in silence for a moment before speaking in Greek.

‘So you were present when my cohort was destroyed, were you? Or rather you were doing your very best not to be present, eh? You’re the scout who went east of the Euphrates with my men and came back without them?’

The leather-faced Arab stared back at him without speaking, and Julius tapped the vine stick resting on the table beside his wine cup with a questioning expression.

‘I may not speak Greek, but I can recognise an uncooperative bastard when I see one. Should I beat it out of him?’

The legatus shook his head.

‘No, thank you, Julius. I think this one will respond better to a little psychology.’

Fixing the scout with a knowing smile, he sat back in his chair and addressed the man in Greek again.

‘You think I’m going to punish you for my men’s loss. So you think that if you stay silent and play dumb I’ll be forced to let you go.’ The scout’s look of incomprehension remained fixed. ‘I see. That’s a shame. I’d hoped not to have to resort to anything so crude, but if you’re not going to admit to your near perfect command of Greek, I shall simply be forced to pass you on to my legion’s centurions. They’re still more than a little unhappy about the way you made such a swift exit when the Parthians came for their comrades. They tend to frown on that sort of thing in a way I doubt you’d understand, although I’m sure you’ll get the point once they get to work on you. Presumably that’s why you’ve been hiding in the city’s slums all this time?’

The man looked down at him for a moment more before sighing deeply.

‘And if I admit to being the man you take me for, then you’ll execute me, yes?’

‘No.’

Shaking his head in disbelief, the scout folded his hands across his chest, but Scaurus simply looked up at him with a raised eyebrow.

‘Why would I kill you? You were out there with the Sixth Cohort because you know that ground as well as you know the village in which you grew up, right? And you knew they were doomed from the moment you saw the enemy cavalry, not because of their numbers but simply because of the precise place in which the battle was to take place. That’s why you rode away and left them to it, because you saw no way that they could win the battle, given that ground.’

The scout nodded reluctantly.

‘And after you rode away, that entire cohort was massacred, just as you knew would happen.’

He stared up at the Arab with dispassionate eyes, watching the trickle of sweat that was running down the man’s neck until it sank below the line of his rough tunic, then leaned forward suddenly, making the man flinch at the speed of the movement.

‘I plan to take revenge for my men, and to do so I will need every one of the dice to be loaded in my favour when I throw them. I need the right men, with the best weapons, and I need them all to be arrayed on the best possible ground. And you, my friend, are my best chance to put their boots on that fated patch of earth. Whether you like it or not.’

He sat again, his gaze still locked onto the scout’s face.

‘I was going to offer you the choice, either to accompany my legion to the east or to suffer a death every bit as ignominious as theirs, but I’m not much of a man for cold-blooded murder. And besides, any promise you made under such a threat would be meaningless, wouldn’t it? You would promise me anything I asked for, and then the second my back was turned you’d be away like a rabbit, burying yourself back into the city so deep that we’d never find you. So I have a better idea.’

He pointed to Julius.

‘That is my first spear. The centurions you served with have been hard men, but fair. When you ran from the battle that destroyed my Sixth Cohort, their first spear allowed you to make your escape rather than put a spear in your back. Whereas Julius here is somewhat less forgiving.’

Julius growled something in the language of the Romans, his tone clearly uncomplimentary, and the legatus translated with a smile.

‘He says that he’s going to have you crucified if you so much as twitch in the wrong direction.’

He shook his head with a smile at the expression that had crossed the Arab’s face.

‘I know what you’re thinking. The first opportunity you get, you’ll just ride away from us, laughing as you once again show what fools we are. Except you should also meet this man. His name is Silus.’

The officer indicated simply smiled broadly.

‘He commands a squadron of cavalry whose only responsibility once we’re in the field will be to shadow you, night and day. And if you attempt to run, they’ll stake you out, open your guts and leave you for the carrion birds. There are thirty of them, more than enough for there to be a dozen or so of them around you all day. When you sleep they will watch you, and when you squat to empty your bowels they will be there to tell you just how badly your shit smells. Let us hope that you are a man capable of exercising self-restraint when it comes to …’

He made a circle of thumb and forefinger, moving it to and fro to the amusement of the officers.

‘Yes, you’ll be better protected than the emperor himself, with a dozen watchful men like Silus around you at all times. There will never be a moment when you run the slightest risk of harm. Isn’t that good to know?’