himself at him, sword pulled back for a deadly thrust to the groin. At the very last moment Faustus deftly stepped to his left and, as Caelus overbalanced past him, brought the hilt of his gladius crashing down on the back of his neck, sending him sprawling, semi-conscious, to the ground. Faustus quickly relieved him of his weapon and turned to address the bemused legionaries.
‘This piece of filth was using you to sabotage a Roman mission,’ he bawled at them. ‘Those men are ours; they had no choice but to fire at you. Tribune Vespasian, bring your men forward.’
Vespasian led his comrades up to the legionaries and pulled off his Getic cap.
‘When I saw Caelus leading his men back through the gate I knew he’d be after you so I legged it over here,’ Faustus told him as the legionaries recognised Vespasian and started to mutter amongst themselves.
‘Thank you, my friend,’ Vespasian replied, ‘I’m afraid we missed the priest though, he’ll be well away by now.’
‘Well, we’ve all had a bad night then; the attack was a fucking shambles. We didn’t seal off the village properly and almost a thousand of the Getae broke out and torched our tower as it reached the fortress walls, killing a lot of my lads, before forcing their way out through the gates in the siege-wall. But at least we’ve dealt with the rest of them, the fortress is ours.’
‘Come on, little brother, we’d best be going,’ Sabinus said. ‘There’s still an outside chance of catching Rhoteces if he’s taken a boat downriver.’
Vespasian sighed. He was exhausted, but knew that even if there was just the smallest of hopes they should try. ‘What are you going to do with him?’ he asked quietly, looking down at Caelus, who was just starting to come round.
‘Well, I couldn’t kill him in front of the men,’ Faustus replied in a low voice, kneeling down over Caelus. ‘One of them would talk and Poppaeus would have me for murder, so I’ll take him back to the fight and finish him off there.’
A quick series of shrill whinnies caused them both to turn. The air filled with the rumble of hooves.
‘Shit! The horses are coming back,’ Vespasian cried.
‘Form a wedge, shields both sides,’ Sabinus yelled. ‘Pila to the front!’
The confused legionaries, aware that there was a danger fast approaching but unaware of its nature, quickly ordered themselves around their erstwhile opponents into a pilum-bristling V-formation as the first of the horses appeared out of the night, surging towards them.
In the confusion Caelus took his chance; he whipped his pugio from its sheath and rammed it into the side of Faustus’ neck; as the blood spurted from the jugular vein he leapt to his feet and pelted towards the fort. Vespasian made to run after him but one glance left, towards the dark tide of terrified beasts now only feet away, checked him. He let the doomed centurion go and instead knelt by Faustus, desperately trying to stem the gushing stream of blood.
The stampede reached the wedge.
An instant before contact the leading horses, perhaps sensing more than seeing the solid-looking, spike- ridden obstacle in front of them, veered right and left to avoid it; the rest followed their lead and the stampede flowed around the wedge like a river streaming around an island. From the relative safety of the interior Vespasian, hands pressed to Faustus’ neck, glanced back to see Caelus flick a terrified look over his shoulder and put on another turn of speed before disappearing, with a curtailed shriek, under the torrent of hooves.
The legionaries stood firm as the stampede washed around them; the ground shook with such force they were obliged to loosen the tension in their knees to soak up the shock waves pulsing up through the earth. The cries and the hoofbeats of the maddened, wild-eyed, foaming beasts enveloping them were deafening as they passed not an arm’s length from the shields; some animal instinct kept them just clear of the pilum points.
Finally the tip of the wedge appeared through the tail of the stampede and the last horses passed either side to be sucked together again, sealing the rend in the herd as if it had never existed.
They were clear.
It was a while before anyone moved.
‘Fuck me! I think I shat myself,’ Magnus said eventually in a hoarse whisper, ‘not that you’d be able to tell over the smell of these trousers. How’s Faustus?’
Vespasian looked down at Faustus who smiled weakly. ‘I told you the horse-fuckers wouldn’t get me,’ he whispered. ‘My Lord awaits me.’
His eyes glazed over and he was gone. Vespasian closed them with the palm of his blood-soaked hand and stood up. ‘Take Centurion Faustus back to the camp with honour,’ he ordered the legionaries, ‘and scrape up that lump of shit as you go,’ he added pointing to the battered and raw body of his friend’s murderer lying in a mangled heap a few paces away.
The dazed legionaries gave a few ragged salutes and lifted their primus pilus on to their shoulders. Sabinus touched Faustus’ chest and muttered a few unintelligible words over him, and then, without a word, they walked slowly away.
As he watched his friend being borne away Vespasian’s eyes were drawn to the fortress walls. They were now clear of Getae. Small squads of legionaries sauntered along them with the nonchalance of soldiers who have survived the rigours of battle and have nothing now to fear. A small, solitary figure appeared and looked out towards the river; his high-plumed helmet and crimson cloak glowed in the firelight. Vespasian knew that it was Poppaeus; the general raised his gladius and shook it at them. Whether he could see them or not Vespasian did not know or care.
‘Let’s go,’ he said to nobody in particular, and started to trudge towards the river.
It took a while to find the place where they had left Varinus and his mates in the boat.
‘Varinus,’ Vespasian called softly.
The prow of the boat appeared out of the reeds with Lucius and Arruns rowing; Varinus steered it to the bank.
‘We might have what you’ve been looking for, sirs,’ Varinus said with a grin as Vespasian and Sabinus stepped aboard.
‘What?’ Sabinus asked absently.
‘Well, we was watching the keep and then after a while we saw fires in the windows. Then suddenly a rope came out of a window and two men climbed out, then one was hauled back in but the other one jumped; then you all came sliding down. So I decided to modify my orders slightly and Lucius and me, we crept ashore; it weren’t long before we caught him about to get into a little boat hidden just downstream.’
Vespasian was suddenly alert again. ‘Did you kill him?’
‘Well, I figured that if you’d gone to all that effort to find him I should leave that pleasure to you.’ Varinus replied, flicking back a piece of waxed material at his feet. Under it, bound hand and foot, eyes brimming with hatred, lay the priest, Rhoteces.
‘You!’ he spat when he recognised Vespasian. ‘You should be dead. I sent men to do the gods’ work and kill you,’ he snarled, baring his sharply filed front teeth.
Vespasian crashed his fist into the priest’s face. ‘That’s for all the lads that you managed to kill instead.’ He pulled back his arm and punched the stunned Rhoteces again. ‘And that’s for Decimus Falens.’
Vespasian felt a restraining hand clasp his wrist as he went for another blow.
‘I think that it would be a pity to beat him to death, sir,’ Magnus whispered in his ear, ‘especially after all the trouble we’ve been to.’
‘You’re right,’ Vespasian replied, taking a rapid series of shallow breaths. He jerked his arm free, looked down at the unconscious body of Rhoteces and spat in his bloodied face. ‘But I do loathe the little shit.’
CHAPTER VII
The small boat slid with the current and the help of a light, westerly breeze down the Danuvius; past the siege wall, past the main Roman camp just beyond that and headed towards the faint pre-dawn glow in the eastern sky. Lucius and Arruns rowed steadily with Varinus at the steering-oar keeping a course as close to the shore as possible so as to avoid the attentions of the Danuvius fleet, bobbing to the left of them, faint shadows in the gloom.
