swathed in heavy bandages from thigh to calf and splinted to remove any mobility from the knee joint. He subsided onto the bed, his back still towards the now more or less wakened Marcus, and he was looking down at the wounded leg with evident disgust, to judge from his tone of voice. ‘If I could just get this fucking stick off, then I could bend the bastard enough to walk on it.’
You’ll be sorry if you try that, Marcus mused, knowing the doctor and her temper as well as I do. He tried to speak, but the combination of bandage and pain prevented him from making any sound other than a grunt.
The soldier turned as best he could, whipping up a hand in salute.
‘Sorry, Centurion, I didn’t realise you was awake! I suggested you might be better off in your own room, but Centurion Dubnus reckoned you’d be happier with some company. Here, I’ll get the orderly. Orderly! ’ He bellowed the summons at the top of his voice, and quick footsteps hurried down the corridor. Felicia appeared at the door, taking in the scene in an instant.
‘Get back in your bed, Soldier Sanga! And if I see you out of it without an orderly in attendance at any time before I give you permission to get up, I’ll have your centurion put you on punishment duty once you’re fit and well. And keep your hands off that splint; it’s there to stop you bending the leg and undoing all my good work in getting the arrow out without having to cut lumps out of your knee.’ Sanga raised a hand, and the doctor shook her head in further admonishment. ‘I’m not your centurion, Sanga, so you don’t have to raise a hand to speak to me. What is it?’
‘Need the latrine, ma’am.’
‘Is that all? Manius!’ The orderly put his head round the door, clearly as much in awe of the new doctor as the abashed Sanga. ‘This man needs to use the latrine. Front or back?’
‘Eh? Oh. Front, ma’am.’
She nodded to the orderly, who came into the room and pulled out a pan from beneath the bed. He helped Sanga to roll over until he could direct his urine into the pan, and the soldier emitted a long sigh of relief as he emptied his full bladder. Manius took a long hard look at the contents, then put his nose close to the surface and inhaled deeply, ignoring Sanga’s surprised expression. He passed the pan across the recumbent soldier’s body to the waiting doctor, and Felicia repeated the routine.
‘This seems healthy enough. Thank you, Manius.’ She passed the pan back to the orderly, and he carried it away down the corridor to the latrine, for disposal. ‘So now, Soldier Sanga, with your bladder safely emptied, you can lie quietly while I attend to the centurion here.’ With a practised eye she bent across Marcus and examined the swelling along the line of his jaw, then gently rubbed some more of the knitbone salve into the bruised flesh. ‘You mustn’t try to speak, or even open and close your mouth, until I tell you it’s safe to do so. We’ll feed you with soup through a tube, and you can use this to communicate.’
She passed him a hinged wooden writing tablet, its interior surfaces coated in soft wax. Marcus thought briefly, then took the stylus and wrote busily for a moment.
‘“When will I be allowed out of bed?”’ Her face creased into a smile. ‘That’s my husband. When I say so, Centurion! I want you to rest and get your strength back, what with the beating you took and the effect of the drugs I had to give you. Not for a day or two, at least. Now sit back and keep still, and you’ll be asleep again in a few minutes. From what I’ve read, the effects of the mandrake don’t wear off completely for a day or so.’ She kissed him on the forehead and turned to leave, only to find Sanga’s hand back in the air. ‘Yes, soldier?’
‘Ma’am, begging your pardon for being crude, but what should I do when I need to do — ’ he paused, searching for a word that wouldn’t offend the lady — ‘you know… the other?’
She looked at him in bafflement before making the connection.
‘Do the other? Ah, you mean when you need to open your bowels. Orderly Manius will bring you the pan, you will defecate into the pan, and then the orderly and I will have a good look at the results to ensure you have no problems in that respect either.’
Sanga’s face creased in incredulity.
‘You’re going to look at my sh-?’ He shook his head, clearly too bemused to express his amazement. ‘Oh well, if that’s what you have to do. Oh, and ma’am…?’ His face recovered a little of its usual cockiness. ‘Do I get a goodnight kiss too?’
Felicia’s face softened.
‘Of course you do, soldier.’ Sanga raised an eyebrow, too startled at having his bluff called to do anything as the doctor came round Marcus’s bed. She paused at the doorway, raising her voice to call down the long corridor. ‘ Manius! ’ The orderly put his head round the door again. ‘The soldier here needs a goodnight kiss.’ As she disappeared out of the door her last words on the subject floated back over her shoulder. ‘In your own time, gentlemen.’
When Marcus woke again there was daylight streaming into the room, and Sanga was sitting up in bed playing with a set of knucklebones.
‘Morning, Centurion!’ He saluted, then tossed a bone into the air, deftly flicking another into the space between the fingers of his other hand as it rested flat on the bed, before catching the falling bone. ‘All the horses are in the stable. Again.’
He sighed, with the expression of a man who had been playing with the bones all morning. A noise at the door made them both turn their heads.
‘And what have we here? One rather soiled-looking centurion, temporarily forbidden to speak on pain of having all domestic privileges removed…’ Dubnus, standing in the room’s doorway, raised a hand to forestall any attempt on Marcus’s behalf to speak. ‘No you don’t! I’ll not have your woman coming down on me like a chosen man with a sore arse just because you’re too dim to follow instructions. And a soldier with a hole in his knee, forbidden to walk and so reduced to sitting in his bed and playing children’s games. Scarface! ’ Sanga’s comrade appeared round the doorframe with another of Marcus’s men behind him, and Dubnus pointed to Sanga. ‘I’ve received permission from the doctor for these two to pick you up and take you outside for some fresh air, while Qadir and I have a chat with the centurion here.’
‘Best news I’ve had all day.’ Sanga beamed at the prospect of escape from the room’s confines. ‘Drop me off at the latrine, eh lads? I’ve got the turtle’s head as it is, and if I can avoid that bloody orderly picking through my crap I’ll be a happier man. The bastard was sniffing my piss last night…’
Scarface bustled into the room and grinned at his mate, taking in the knucklebones lying on his bed.
‘Bones, eh? Used to be right handy with them as a lad. Perhaps we can have a little contest, all in the interest of entertainment o’ course.’
He scooped up the bones and nodded to the other soldier. They lifted Sanga up, each with an arm over their shoulders, and carried him from the room, and the three centurions smiled to each other as they heard Felicia admonishing them not to allow him onto his feet for any reason, and Scarface’s reply.
‘No danger of that, ma’am. I don’t want him trying to leg it away from the losses he’s going to take once we get these bones jumping!’
‘That’s better, eh, a little bit of peace for you?’ Carrying a bowl of hot water and a cloth Dubnus advanced into the room, followed after a moment by Qadir. ‘Your wife asked us to get you cleaned up, since all you’ve done since we brought you in is lie about snoring.’ He set to with the wash cloth, and within minutes Marcus was sitting up with his writing tablet, while Dubnus and Qadir sat on either side of the bed. He wrote on the tablet’s wax, holding it up for them to see.
‘“Thank you for bringing me back”?’ Dubnus laughed. ‘You might not be thanking me in a week’s time, when you’re still not allowed to talk. How’s your head?’ Marcus rubbed the wax smooth and wrote his response across the clear surface. ‘“Better. Headache gone. Face still hurts.” And it’ll go on hurting for a few days. What hit you?’
In a series of one-line statements on the tablet’s limited writing surface Marcus explained what had happened. At length he sat back, already tired by the mental exercise. Dubnus, recognising the signs of his rapid exhaustion, asked one last question.
‘So their camp’s pretty much invulnerable, they reckon?’
Marcus nodded, smoothing the tablet’s surface again and writing a last comment. Dubnus patted his friend on the shoulder and stood up, pushing his chair back against the wall.
‘You look all in. Get some more sleep, and we’ll come back and see you tomorrow, eh?’
Qadir bent over his centurion, muttering a few quiet words. Marcus wrote a reply on his tablet, turned it for Qadir to read and raised his eyebrows in challenge, wearily lifting a clenched fist. The big Hamian looked at him for a moment, before solemnly tapping Marcus’s fist with his own. Then Qadir turned and followed Dubnus out of the
