“Actually, Praetor, I don’t think that willbe necessary.”
Primus spun about, surprised, and not alittle irritated.
“Oh? And why might that be, Prefect?”
I pointed to the man in the middle of thethree bound prisoners, whose eyes were wide with fear, sweatrolling down his forehead.
“Because that man speaks Latin.”
I was prepared for Primus either beingangry, or disbelieving me altogether. I did not expect the look ofsurprise and fear that flashed across his fat features.
“How do you know?” he asked warily. Insteadof answering him, I walked over, pulling the gag out of the mouthof the middle man.
“Do you want to tell him, or should I?” Iasked him gently, in Latin. At first, he said nothing, his eyeslooking everywhere but at me, and I had to sigh.
“Perhaps I was wrong, Praetor,” I saidloudly. “We’ll take them to the torture detachment immediately.” Onimpulse, I added. “I think Varrus is on duty tonight. He’s one ofour best, and he really, really hates Thracians. Something abouthis grandfather being killed by Spartacus.”
There was no such man in the torturedetachment, and even if there had been, they were all tucked awayfast asleep, yet the Thracian clearly did not know that, because heblurted out, in heavily accented but understandable Latin, “No!Wait! I will talk!”
In fact, we could not get the man to shutup. Ignoring the glares of his comrades, he answered every questionwe put to him, and for us the news could hardly have been worse.The force of Thracians camped a short distance away from us was infact an informal confederation of three tribes: the Sapaei, theTralles, and the Bessi. That the Bessi were there wasunderstandable, because we had just marched through theirterritory. The same went for the Satrai, the second tribe in thisconfederation; we were currently passing through their lands andtheir territory adjoins that belonging to the Bessi. Finally, therewere the Medi, who lived on the opposite side of the Strymon andfavor the falx as their main weapon. The surviving man myteam had captured was Satrai, while the other two captured byScribonius’ team were Bessi. The Satrai’s name, as I recall, wasAndrysios, though I am not sure of that since I did not know himthat long. As I said, he was extremely cooperative, to the pointwhere I was suspicious that he was telling the truth, so the othertwo were turned over to the torture detachment the next morning andconfirmed his story, if a little more unwillingly. When we hadfinished with him, I could see that I was not the only one dismayedat the news; both Lucullus and Masala were plainly worried. Theonly man who was completely unruffled at the prospect of fightingthe combined forces of three tribes of Thrace, none of whom wereour original target, was Primus. I could not tell if it wasbravado, or if he was completely unhinged. Even Masala was moved toask, “Praetor, aren’t you concerned that we are facing these threetribes?”
Primus looked crossly at his aide.
“Masala.” His tone was scolding, like he wascorrecting a favorite pupil. “Surely you are not afraid of a fewThracians, no matter what tribe they are from?”
Masala jerked as if he had been stung.
“Certainly not,” he replied indignantly.“But none of those tribes are either the Triballi or the Serdi.Surely we can’t afford to engage all of them?”
He posed it as a question, yet in my mind,it was a simple statement of fact.
“We can and we will,” Primus saidconfidently, except that when he saw my expression, then glancedaround at Lucullus and Masala, added, “but only if we are forcedto.”
Rubbing his hands, he looked around, thenannounced, “It has been a busy evening, and I need to get somesleep.”
The Praetor turned without another word, ahuge breach of not just military etiquette, but plain courtesy, andI heard someone, I assume it was Lucullus. gasp. While I was notparticularly surprised, I was angry. Again, it was Masala who cameto the rescue, since I was just opening my mouth, only the godsknowing what would have come out. Hurrying to catch up to Primus,he whispered something in his ear, causing the Praetor to stop inhis tracks. Turning about to face me, I saw that he did lookchagrined, but he made no apology; I suppose that would have beenexpecting too much.
“Oh, yes, Prefect. You are dismissed.And…well done.” Somehow, he managed to make it sound like anythingbut a compliment before he spun on his heel, his gown flowingbehind him. Without looking back again, he called out, “Oh, yes.And see that wound attended to. I can’t afford to have you lollingabout on the sick list in the event that these Thracians do decideto attack.”
I stared at the retreating man’s back, and Istill would have said something if Masala had not looked over hisshoulder from his spot a few paces behind Primus to mouth anapology. I heaved a sigh, making me wince from pain and a freshleak of blood trickle down my side as I left thePraetorium.
Scribonius, as he had promised, was waitingin my tent with the camp physician, not Primus’ personal doctor,suiting me perfectly. I missed Philippos, but the Greek had beenMarcus Crassus’ personal physician, returning to Rome with him,though I did not know if he shared his employer’s fate of exile.The camp physician was another Greek, except he was from the islandof Crete and not the mainland, and had a distinctly differentaccent. His manner was thorough enough, though, and as he gentlyprobed around the wound after peeling the tunic and underpaddingaway, I appreciated his soft touch. It still hurt like someone hadthrust a lit oil lamp against my side, but even I could see that itwould not require sutures. The physician confirmed this, cleaningthe wound before wrapping a white linen bandage tightly about mybody.
“I would tell you that you are going to besore, but you already know that, judging from all those,” he said,pointing to the other scars across my torso. I do not normally paymuch attention to such things, but I suppose it was normal that
