the convoy of women and children and saved thousands of innocent lives. It would have cost him his career and his honour, but that would have been a small price to pay. Was that why he didn’t do it, to save his honour? He shook his head. No. Boudicca had to be stopped, or at the very least tested. If he could stop her here, or even make her check for a day, Londinium might be saved, and with it the entire province. He was right to fight here. Right to leave the town and the temple and make her attack him on his own ground and his own terms.
He looked at the sky: the light was dying. Soon.
The sound of marching feet on the metalled road behind him echoed from the houses lining the street, iron nails crunching on the compacted surface. He turned to watch them pass. The veterans of Colonia, each one a son of Empire. First Falco, at the head of his command, his sturdy figure hidden beneath a scarlet cloak and his eyes lost in the shadow of his helmet brim. At the last moment the proud head turned and the chin lifted and the old soldier gave Valerius a nod that told him more than any words. He answered the gesture with a salute, his fist clashing against his armour, and he saw Falco smile. Behind their standard-bearers five militia cohorts followed him, parading down the slope with their pila on their shoulders and a precision that would have graced an emperor’s triumph. Each of them had lost a loved one today and he felt shame that he’d believed they would be diminished by it. Everything about the way they marched could be encapsulated in a single word. Resolve.
Behind the veterans came the bulk of the men he had brought from Londinium, minus the fifty who remained with Lunaris at the temple complex to strengthen the garrison of civilian volunteers. They must be wondering what gods had brought them to this place and this fate when they could still be back in their barracks. And what of himself? Did Neptune laugh when he called up the storm that delayed the ship carrying his replacement? If things had been different he would have been halfway home by now and, Maeve apart, would he have given the island another thought?
He followed in the column’s wake as Falco dispersed his men, and then wrapped his cloak around him and lay down among the Londinium vexillation on the damp grass beside Gracilis, who had marched with him all the way from Glevum. There had never been much likelihood he would sleep but his choice of partner guaranteed wakefulness. The Campanian muttered unintelligibly through clenched teeth and from time to time he cried out as if he were already fighting the battle that would come in the morning. Eventually, Valerius could take no more and wandered in the dark down towards the bridge.
The last of Bela’s saddle-weary cavalry troops rode across from the north bank as he reached it, guided by the torches of two of Falco’s veterans. The unit’s commander rode with his head bowed and looked to be almost asleep in his saddle.
‘What is the latest news of the rebels?’ Valerius reached up and shook the rider’s arm, taking in the rank scent of hard-ridden horse. The eyes snapped open and the man stared down at him. He had been one of those who had helped rescue Maeve from Crespo but for a few seconds there was no recognition in his eyes. ‘The rebels?’ Valerius repeated.
‘When we left them they were six miles away, beyond the ridge yonder. I think we were on the army’s right flank, but it was impossible to say for certain. They are like a swarm of bees: just when you think you understand their route and their purpose a section will break away for no good reason and march off in a completely different direction. We lost two good men that way, trapped when they got too close.’
‘Their numbers?’
The cavalryman shook his head. ‘I can give you no numbers. All I can say is they are too many.’ Valerius frowned. Insubordination or just plain truth? The horse shook its head, spraying him with sweat, and he caught the bridle to steady it. The troop commander leaned low to retrieve his reins, so there could be no mistaking his whispered words. ‘Take your little army away, tribune. If you stand against them they will crush you into the dust and not even notice.’
Valerius looked round to see if anyone else had heard. ‘A man could be whipped for saying such things,’ he said.
The Thracian smiled wearily. ‘A man does not need to fear the whip when he will be dead tomorrow.’
‘Will you fight?’
‘That is what you Romans pay us for.’
‘Then take your troop and spread them out along the bank to the east. Get what rest you can, but I need to know if the enemy plans a crossing elsewhere. Wait until an hour past first light and return here. Bela will have further orders for you.’
The cavalryman held out his hand. ‘Matykas, decurion of the first squadron. It was good advice, tribune; at least you’re a Roman worth dying beside.’
A few minutes after the Thracians had ridden away Valerius noticed a glow in the sky above the ridge. As he puzzled over it, Falco joined him at the bridge.
‘The rebels?’ the militia commander asked.
‘Perhaps they’ve camped for the night.’
‘A small cooking fire for a large army.’
Valerius grunted noncommittally. He was remembering the two lost Thracian cavalrymen and the tales he had heard of the Wicker Men, the great human-shaped baskets Caesar had written of, into which the Celts threw their sacrifices to be burned alive. He hoped the two troopers were already dead.
They waited, and Valerius knew without looking round that every eye in the meadow by the river was focused on the ridge to the north.
‘There,’ a voice cried.
The first was to the east, just a dot of flame that, as they watched, flared into something much larger. A moment later it was followed by a second, further west this time, and a third, lower down the slope. Within minutes the dark blanket of the slope was dotted with flames like fireflies on a Neapolitan night.
‘They’re burning the farms,’ Falco said unnecessarily.
Valerius didn’t reply, but kept his eye on one particular spark at the top of the slope and to his left, where Lucullus’s farm — Maeve’s home — was blazing. The fact that it now belonged to Petronius and had been stripped of everything she owned provided only a small consolation.
‘Thank you,’ Falco said suddenly.
Valerius looked at him in surprise, and shook his head. ‘You have nothing to thank me for. If I had done things differently, perhaps…’ He thought again of the scared faces and the crying children.
‘What’s done is done,’ the militia commander said. ‘If they had stayed they would have died in any case. You came to our aid when no one else would help us. Catus Decianus,’ he spat, ‘set a flame to a tinder-dry thicket and left his people to burn. Paulinus, too. Where is our governor when we need him? Or the Ninth legion, who could have been here now if our warnings had been heeded? They thought we were just panicking old men. But you came, Valerius, and even when you saw your commission was impossible you stayed. We are grateful.
‘I have a desertion to report,’ he said, before Valerius could reply. ‘Corvinus, the armourer.’ He shook his head sadly. ‘One of our bravest and best. It is hard to believe.’
Valerius remembered the goldsmith’s nervous manner earlier in the day. Or was it yesterday? In any case, he couldn’t find the anger or the outrage befitting a commander who had been betrayed. How much difference would one man make?
‘Can you blame him?’
Falco looked at him seriously. ‘We are soldiers, tribune. We fought together in the legions and sweated together in the militia. When the people of Colonia laughed at us as we exercised with our rusty swords we ignored them because it was our duty. We may be old men, but we still believe in duty. And comradeship. And sacrifice. So, yes, I blame Corvinus, though he is my friend. And, if he is caught, I will nail him to a cross, though he is my friend. If at the end all I can do is die together with these men, I will count it a privilege.’
He turned away, but Valerius called him back and held out his hand. ‘I too will count it a privilege.’
As Falco returned to his veterans, Valerius’s eyes were drawn back to the hillside where Lucullus’s farm still burned, and Boudicca’s horde gathered in the darkness.
XXXIII
