Atticus was silent for a couple of minutes as his mind dwelled on the other issue. ‘So with Varro embroiled in all this political trouble, you think I’m off the hook,’ he said.
‘That’s not what I said,’ Septimus replied, ‘I said there’ll be no formal charges, but there’s no way Varro will forget or forgive what’s happened. Would you?’
Atticus shook his head. Not a chance. He turned to the window once more, propping his chin on his forearms again as he gazed over the twilight lit courtyard. Tomorrow’s dawn would see Varro fighting the political battle of his life and for one day more Atticus knew he would be forgotten. Beyond that it was only a matter of time.
CHAPTER SIX
Belus stood with his sword drawn but the blade hung loose by his side, his shield similarly lowered, strapped to his left forearm. He was breathing deeply, his chest heaving beneath the metal breastplate of his armour. The armour was heavily scored and Belus winced slightly as he felt the bruise swell on his chest beneath the mark. It had been a good strike, and if he had not being wearing armour, as so few were on the pirate galley, he would surely be dead. Instead his attacker lay slain at his feet, his final expression of violent aggression forever etched on his face.
Belus stepped over the body, and then many more as he made his way aft where Narmer, the pirate captain, was ordering his men to assemble the surviving crew of the Roman trading galley. The Roman merchantmen had fought like demons, like men possessed, like men who knew that death walked amongst them and that none would be spared. It created an intensity to fighting that Belus had never experienced before, even at Mylae, where his own ship had survived a full assault against the Roman legionaries because of his men’s sheer refusal to yield. Belus had now fought in five of these pirate attacks and he was yet to get used to the level of ferocity that marred each encounter.
Belus sheathed his sword as he reached the confluence of men on the main deck. The pirates had circled the disarmed survivors, like a pack of baying wolves, their bloody swords still drawn and charged against the doomed Romans. Belus felt a sting of shame as he watched the spectacle, his honour sullied by the barbarity. In his fifteen years as a captain of a Carthaginian trireme he had always held to the code his father had taught him. The enemy were to be fought until beaten but quarter should be given to those who surrender. On board his own galley these captured Romans would already be in irons, chained to an oar for their eternity. Here their lives were forfeit, a crime against honour he had been ordered to commit and one the pirates did not pause to perpetrate.
Suddenly one of the Romans bolted for the side-rail, a headlong rush, his shoulder lowered in an attempt to break through the circle. The pirate he aimed for sidestepped the charge and swung his drawn blade under the Romans shoulder, slicing clean into the man’s exposed side. The Roman fell with a cry of pain and the pirate instantly spun around, slashing his sword down in a blur of movement, slicing through the Roman’s neck, killing him instantly. The rest of the pirates roared as their blood lust was enflamed once more and they instinctively began to edge forward against the remaining terrified Romans.
‘Enough!’ Belus shouted, causing some of the pirates to hesitate, while others continued, oblivious to the Carthaginian’s orders. One of the pirates darted the tip of his sword forward, striking one of the Romans on his thigh and the man screamed in pain, his leg buckling beneath him. His crewmates grabbed him by the shoulders and dragged him back, the circle ever collapsing, their line of retreat nonexistent.
‘Captain!’ Belus shouted, looking directly at Narmer. ‘Tell your men that’s enough!’
Narmer looked over his shoulder at the Carthaginian, a look of disdain on his face. He turned around once more, watching his men as they continued to close the vice, the bloodlust in his veins calling for slaughter, sick of the game this Carthaginian was making him play. Another Roman was struck and the pirates laughed as the terrified men finally ran out of room, squeezed into a pitiful huddle, their arms outstretched in a plea for mercy. Narmer felt the men around him ready themselves to surge forward and for a second he craved to issue the order to release them, to finish the fight as they always had, always, that was, until he made a deal with the Carthaginians.
‘Hold!’ he shouted, rage in his voice. For a heartbeat the men wavered and Narmer felt their hesitation. He whipped his sword down on the outstretched blades of the two men to his right, the unexpected strike knocking the swords from their hands. ‘I said enough!’ he roared.
His men backed off, anger in their expressions although Narmer immediately noticed that a few men now had a look of malicious expectation on their faces. He smiled inwardly. They knew what was coming next, and for these men, it was a lot more enjoyable than simply putting a crew to the sword. He turned once more to the Carthaginian.
‘You would do well, Belus,’ he growled, charging his sword forward, its tip just beneath the Carthaginian’s neck, ‘to remember that this is my ship and I give the orders here.’
‘And you should remember,’ Belus spat in reply, ‘that you are in the paid service of the Carthaginian Empire and you will follow my instructions or forfeit the gold you have been promised upon our return to Tyndaris.’
Narmer lowered his sword and turned his head, spitting onto the dead body of the Roman at his feet. Belus ignored the insult.
‘Now finish your work here,’ he ordered. ‘Find out what you can from these prisoners and then fire the ship.’
Narmer snorted in derision but issued the orders, glancing at Belus one last time before turning his anger towards the remaining crew of the Roman ship.
Varro felt a trickle of sweat run down his back beneath his tunic as arguments and accusations raged across the senate floor around him. Only moments before he had stood down from the podium, his carefully prepared speech still clenched in his left hand. He had been unable to finish it, his announcement mid-way through of the defeat at Thermae stifling all attempts to continue, the Senate erupting into a wall of sound. His eyes darted left and right, searching for his father amongst the three hundred white robed senators. He was seated near the centre, beside Gnaeus Cornelius Scipio, the two men deep in conversation.
Suddenly, as if he knew he was being watched, Scipio turned to face Varro, the young commander holding the former consul’s gaze for a minute before its intensity caused him to turn away. When he looked back Scipio was once more engrossed in conversation.
His father’s censure, spoken so vehemently the night before, flooded back into Varro’s mind and he tried to block the memory, the shame, the look of disgust on his father’s face. He had not told him of the Greek captain’s attack and had thereafter vowed to keep the event to himself, knowing his father’s censure would run deeper if he knew his son had not immediately challenged his attacker. Afterwards Varro had sat in silence as his father dictated the speech he now held in his hand, the carefully chosen words that had been cut off by the uproar of the senate. Varro had tried to reassert control, tried to shout the senators down in an effort to finish his account, the skilled trap, the impossibility of perceiving the threat, his selfless actions and courage that saved the hastati of the Ninth, but it was for naught.
The reverberating sound of a gavel brought the Senate back to some semblance of order and all eyes turned to the podium. The speaker of the house stood tall at the rostrum, patiently hammering the gavel until he judged he could be heard.
‘In light of the news delivered by Titus Aurelius Varro!’ he announced. ‘The Senate will recess for one hour!’
Varro stepped back to allow many of the Senators to sweep past him on their way out of the chamber, purposefully avoiding the accusatory and derisive looks that shamed him. Again he searched for his father, spotting him once again with Scipio as both men made their way towards the exit. Varro cut across the flow of the crowd, the men before making no effort to step aside and ease his passage while twenty feet away he saw his father enter a small ante-chamber adjacent to the main exit.
‘It is out of my hands, Calvus,’ Scipio said, his face a mask of empathy while inside he secretly rejoiced at the humbling of such a powerful magistrate. ‘The fate of your son is in the hand of the senior consul. He is the supreme commander.’
‘I am not blind, Gnaeus,’ Calvus replied. ‘It is widely suspected that you were the driving force behind the election of Regulus.’
