Marcus nodded, patting the wet-faced tracker on the shoulder.
‘Stay here, then, and take this in case any more of them appear.’ He handed Arabus the bow. ‘I’ll have a quiet look around, and see what I can find.’
He drew the patterned sword again, stealthily easing his way down the stone stairs into Obduro’s underground lair with slow, silent steps, listening intently for any sound that might betray the presence of a bandit waiting to ambush him. The dungeon was lit by crackling torches, as had been the case during his previous visit, and his soft footfalls were lost in the hiss of burning pine resin. Having proven the underground room to be empty he was about to turn and leave when a faint line of shadow down one wall caught his attention. Frowning in unconscious puzzlement he slipped the sword’s point into a hair-thin gap, gently levering open a concealed wooden door whose surface was painted to resemble the stone around it. The room beyond was in darkness, and he pulled a torch from the wall before entering it, starting at the sight revealed by the brand’s light. A set of four shackles secured to the rock wall by short chains was holding the dead man’s body in a kneeling position, as if the corpse was caught in a never-ending act of obeisance to whatever deity the man had followed in life. Marcus knelt before the corpse, holding up the torch and examining the walls and floor before taking one of the hands and staring at it intently. A scrape of leather on rock made him turn, to find Arabus standing silently behind him in the doorway, Grumo’s head held by the hair in one hand.
‘We should leave. Arduenna will forgive me for what we’ve done here, but the longer we stay the more we risk her fury. Obduro may return at any time and find us caught like animals in a wooden cage.’
Marcus shook his head, handing the tracker the torch and gesturing to the corpse.
‘We need to go, and quickly, but not because there’s any danger of his returning. He’s led his entire army out, as you thought, but I doubt they’re hunting a grain convoy. It seems to me he has a far greater prize in mind.’
9
‘Mithras, but my back hurts. And I thought I was fit.’
Clodius glanced across at his tribune, grinning wryly at the look of gritty determination on Scaurus’s face.
‘It’s one thing to keep up with the men when we’re moving at the campaign pace, sir, but it’s charging along at the forced march that sorts the men from the boys. You’re keeping up well enough.’
Scaurus smiled tightly back at him.
‘Only because I’m not carrying anything like the weight your men are burdened with. How in Hades are the Hamians keeping it up?’
Clodius grunted.
‘That’s easy enough to explain. The first spear made the decision to keep them in the Ninth Century, but to distribute them through the tent parties rather than let them form their own groupings.’ Scaurus nodded, his thoughtful look telling the centurion that he already understood the point he was making. ‘Exactly. They’re surrounded by big strong country boys, farm horses to their racing ponies, and in the space of a few months they have become Tungrians. For every struggling archer there are two or three big lads who won’t let them fall by the wayside, so they’ll encourage them along, kick them along and even carry their kit for them if necessary. It’s not the Hamians that are worrying me, Tribune, it’s the legionaries. Should we drop down the column and see how they’re doing?’
Scaurus nodded and stepped out of the line of march, allowing his pace to slow to a normal walk, knowing that if he were to stop altogether the effort required to get his body moving again would be agonising. Clodius walked alongside him as the First Cohort’s long column ground past them like a monstrous armoured snake, the soldiers’ heads tipped back to allow them to suck in the day’s warm air. As each century’s centurion passed he saluted the two men with his vine stick, and Scaurus quickly realised that the sight of their commanding officers straightened backs and stiffened resolve, his men’s faces hardening against the march’s agony. After a few moments Titus’s men, the last of the four Tungrian centuries, marched steadily past with their heavy axes held over their shoulders, then the head of the legion cohort came into view behind them.
‘That’s not good.’
The tribune shook his head in agreement with his centurion’s softly voiced opinion. The legionaries marching behind the Tungrians were already looking like beaten men, trudging along with stooped shoulders and with only a semblance of the Tungrians’ tightly ordered ranks. Scaurus’s eyes narrowed at the apparent state of the legionaries.
‘The bloody fool would leave his first spear behind to teach him a lesson for getting friendly with us, and now he’s got no one with the balls to step up and do the man’s job for him. And there’s as much hope of Tribune Belletor instilling any determination into this lot as there is of him getting off his horse and showing them a good example. Colleague, how do we find you?’
He shouted the comment to Belletor as he rode into earshot, and the legion tribune waved a lazy hand in reply.
‘We’re well enough, Tribune.’ He smiled down at the two men from the height of his saddle, raising a sardonic eyebrow. ‘Enjoying your walk, are you?’
Scaurus nodded, grinning grimly in reply as he forced his aching body back up to the forced-march pace.
‘I wouldn’t say the word “enjoying” would be the first one that springs to mind, but it’s tolerable, thank you. And an officer soon gains some measure of the pain his commands inflict on his men when he goes about his business on foot. You really will have to try it some day. Perhaps even today, if the way your horse is nodding its head is any clue. Come along, Centurion, we’d better work our way back to the front of the column. Our men will hammer away the miles at this pace all day if we don’t stop them for the rest halt.’
First Spear Frontinius took a quick glance at the sun’s low position in the afternoon sky as his centurions gathered about him.
‘Here’s the thing, brothers. We’ve been marching for the best part of the day, and we must have covered a good fifteen miles, and yet there’s no sign of the grain convoy we’re supposed to be meeting. We have two choices: either to grind away to the west until it gets too dark to march, then set up camp and wait for them to arrive, or to turn round and head back to Tungrorum. We won’t be back in the city before darkness falls, but we brought a cart full of torches with us for exactly that eventuality, and a bit of night marching will be good practice. So I’ve decided to turn the column around and head back to the east.’ The men around him nodded their agreement. ‘Does anyone have a different view?’ There was silence. ‘Very well, get back to your centuries and get them turned round and ready to march. Just to make it interesting, we’ll start off at the forced-march pace and see how long we can keep them going that quickly.’
One of the 2nd Cohort centurions, a man Frontinius had known since they were both recruits, remained behind as the other officers dispersed to their commands.
‘At the forced march, Sextus? Is there something you’re not telling us?’
The first spear shrugged, a look of unease on his face.
‘Nothing I can put a finger on. I just know that I’ll be a lot happier when we’ve got this many men back to the city. I might have been wrong to only leave five centuries to guard the walls…’
A shout from the eastern end of the column snatched their attention, and the two officers turned to see a party of horsemen, thirty-strong, riding swiftly down the road from the city towards them. Ignoring the customary hail of abuse from the infantrymen, their leader trotted his horse down the column to Frontinius’s position, jumping down to salute briskly, and the first spear raised an eyebrow in greeting.
‘Decurion Silus. I presume you’ve not been sent galloping all the way down here just to give your animals a run out?’
The cavalryman shook his head, holding out a message tablet.
‘First Spear, a message from Tribune Scaurus. The bandits are in the field, and looking to take you from behind without warning from the sound of it. You’re ordered to reverse your march and make all speed to join up with the tribune. He’s coming west with the rest of the First Cohort.’
The first spear took the tablet, nodding to his brother officer.
‘There you go, that’s what’s been bothering me all day.’ A thought occurred to him, and he swung back to the
