‘Delivered to the duty centurion just now, sir, with your name written on it.’
Julius frowned, taking the scroll and turning it over to read his own name in tidy handwriting.
‘Delivered? Who by?’
The soldier shook his head.
‘Just some kid or other running an errand for a coin. He gave it to the men on the gate and legged it before anyone could ask any questions.’
Julius nodded, dismissing the man with a distracted gesture. By the light of his lamp he unrolled the paper, squinting in its dim illumination to read the short message. You are no longer welcome in my establishment, Centurion. Do not visit again, or it will end badly for you and for the woman. This matter is now closed.
Shaking his head, the hulking centurion muttered angrily into the room’s silence, his fist clenched around the paper.
‘ Closed? Not by a long way it’s not. You’ve just signed your own death sentence…’
Squaring his shoulders he turned to the door, only to be brought up short by another knock. Wrenching the door open he drew breath to bark out his irritation, finding himself toe to toe with the tribune, dressed and equipped for battle. Snapping to attention he stood under his superior officer’s scrutiny for a long moment before Scaurus spoke.
‘Interesting, Centurion. I thought I’d have to get you out of your bed, given the hour, and yet here you are fully dressed and ready for duty, from the look of things. And you seem to have a piece of paper screwed up in one hand.’
He held out a hand, and Julius reluctantly surrendered the note. Smoothing out the paper, Scaurus turned to read it by the light of the nearest torch.
‘It seems that your liaison with the mistress of the Blue Boar is at an end, Centurion.’ Julius frowned, his puzzlement evident, and Scaurus laughed dryly at his bemusement. ‘If you were first spear of this cohort, Centurion, you’d be very sure to know anything and everything that might compromise the performance of your officers, wouldn’t you?’ He waited for Julius to nod before continuing. ‘Exactly. So when Sextus Frontinius received reports of one of his centurions heading off into the city after lights out, and not returning until the small hours, you can be assured that his interest was sufficiently strong to override your colleagues’ initial reluctance to enlighten him as to exactly what business you were about. And whilst the company you keep in your own time is your own business, when it starts to affect your performance in the role for which the empire pays you a quite generous amount of money, then it becomes his business, wouldn’t you agree? Not to mention mine.’
Julius nodded again, his face stony under the tribune’s scrutiny.
‘So, all things considered, it shouldn’t be any surprise to discover that your attempts to regain what you lost when you left the city are known to your superiors, should it? And for the time being at least, whoever wrote this note has the right of it. If, as it appears, you were about to head off into Tungrorum on a one-man mission to hack your way through the Blue Boar’s doormen and rescue the woman in question, then I’ve arrived at just the right time. You are absolutely forbidden to go anywhere near that blasted place, on pain of reduction to the ranks and enough administrative punishment to keep your head down in the latrines until the end of your term of service. Is that understood?’
Scaurus stepped closer to his centurion, his hard stare forcing a blink from the otherwise stone-faced Julius.
‘Is. That. Understood? ’
‘Yes, sir.’
The tribune smiled tightly and stepped back, looking him up and down.
‘Good. Because I’m not minded to lose my best centurion just because he can’t recognise when he’s beaten, even if only temporarily. Apart from anything else, if you as much as show your face at Petrus’s door he’s more than likely to punish you by killing the woman.’ Something in Julius’s eyes must have betrayed his surprise, and Scaurus laughed again. ‘Yes, Centurion, we know all about Petrus’s real place in the governance of this miserable city. The First Minervia have been here long enough for Sergius to have worked it out several months ago, and unlike his tribune he’s not a man to keep useful information to himself. When the time comes I’ll deal with Petrus, and if you can hold onto your temper until then you’ll be a part of putting him in his place, but for now we’ve a bigger and more immediate problem.’
Prefect Caninus’s face was a study in perplexity, a frown of incomprehension greeting both the unexpected sight of a full century of soldiers filling the street outside his headquarters and the peremptory tone with which the Tungrian’s tribune addressed him.
‘Tribune Scaurus? I was just going off duty for the night. Perhaps we can-’
Scaurus stepped forward and cut him off with a raised hand, his voice stern and uncompromising.
‘Bring your men out and disarm them, Prefect! I won’t ask you twice! My soldiers are still frustrated after that debacle in the forest, and they’ll do the disarming for you if I slip their collars. But it won’t be pretty.’
Caninus spread his hands in a placatory manner, looking to either side at his bodyguard, then he gestured to the soldiers surrounding his small party, their spears glinting in the torchlight.
‘Best to do as the tribune says, gentlemen. I don’t want your blood on my hands, or my own, for that matter. Stand your men down, Tornach, and drop your weapons.’
His deputy grunted an order and unbuckled his belt, easing his sword down onto the cobbles at his feet. His men followed suit, then stood in silence as a pair of soldiers came forward and picked up the weapons. Scaurus stood where he was, pointing to the prefect himself.
‘And your own weapon, Quintus Caninus.’
The soldiers tensed, visibly readying themselves to fight, and with a wry smile Caninus drew his blade, placing it on the road’s surface.
‘Have a good look, Tribune. I think you’ll find it to be standard issue, and nothing more dangerous than the sword you carry. The man you’re hunting for carries something a good deal more exotic, I believe?’
Scaurus ignored him, nodding to Julius, who was waiting for instructions beside him.
‘Accommodate the prefect’s bodyguard for me, if you will, Centurion? There’ll be no need for any rough behaviour unless they offer resistance. And you, Prefect, you can accompany me inside. I have questions for you that won’t wait until morning. And post some men to guard the door please Julius, I’ll call if I need them.’
Caninus turned back to the doorway to his headquarters and entered the building, followed by Scaurus, who had taken a torch from one of his men and kept one hand on his sword’s hilt. The prefect lifted fresh torches into the iron loops set in the wall to hold them, and Scaurus followed him around the room, lighting each one in turn. With the room lit, Caninus turned to face his colleague, his quizzical expression replaced by a look of growing anger.
‘So now, Tribune, what is it that’s so important we have to discuss it at this time of night, and with your sword very nearly kissing my throat?’
The tribune shook his head, his voice level and dangerously calm.
‘Too little too late, I’m afraid, Quintus Caninus. The time for righteous indignation was back there in the street, when I humiliated you in front of your men. Simulated anger doesn’t fool me, Prefect, so you can drop the act and assume the demeanour of a man who’s been caught out in a lie before I decide to call my centurion in here and have it beaten into you. Believe me, I’m sure there’s very little that would give Julius any more pleasure than a few moments of toe to toe with you, given the way his friend Centurion Corvus was so cruelly knocked about in the forest.’
The prefect stepped back, his face sliding from bemusement to horror in the space of a heartbeat.
‘You actually think…?’
Scaurus dismissed his incredulity with a wave of his hand.
‘No, Caninus, I actually know. I know who you are. I say “Caninus”, but perhaps I’d be better to start calling you by the name your men have given you. What do you think, Obduro?’
The other man shook his head slowly, his eyes widening in shock.
‘But I’m not-’
‘You took my centurion prisoner in the Arduenna, and then you spent the night telling him how terrible an enemy you are, how much you despise the prefect of Tungrorum, and how your bandit gang can never be defeated. But your disguise slipped by a tiny fraction when he fooled you into coming close enough for him to see your eyes in the daylight through your mask’s eyeholes. He’s a bright young lad is Centurion Corvus, and he recognised you
