a moment. I’ve not been in yet, but if Carbo’s following his standing orders, there’ll be a dozen cups and two amphorae of good Latin wine.”
Labienus raised a questioning eyebrow, his eyes flicking momentarily to the two tribunes, and then he nodded, his gaze searching out the meaning in Fronto’s dour expression and finding none.
“Come, Piso. Let us avail ourselves of Fronto’s wine. He always has an excellent stock. Hopefully he’s got water for it too, though you can never be too sure with Fronto.”
With a smile and a last curious glance, Labienus escorted Piso inside.
Fronto waited until the two tribunes finally noticed he was watching, and then beckoned them with a crooked finger and turned, walking toward Tetricus’ tent nearby. Lifting the flap, he motioned for the two fops to enter and then followed them in, allowing the flap to drop behind them.
Tetricus’ tent was exactly as Fronto would have expected. The engineer’s logical, analytical mind was reflected perfectly in his surroundings: every item in the interior placed with precision and nothing out of place. A wooden cabinet stood to one side with half a dozen drawers. A rack for two dozen scrolls stood on top and it crossed Fronto’s mind for a moment to pry, before he forced the urge away.
The two tribunes stood, looking somewhat befuddled, in the centre of the tent, almost lost in the dim light.
Fronto walked round them in a circle, looking them up and down. He wasn’t sure exactly what he expected to find, but he needed to be sure that these two men had nothing to do with Pinarius’ death. The two tribunes watched him move like a prospective buyer at the slave market, probably wondering if he was going to open their mouths to examine their teeth.
Both men wore white leather tunics with white pteruges hanging in two rows from both waist and shoulders, each strip edged with gold and ending in a gilded fringe; ostentatious in the extreme. Though they wore no cuirass, helm or greaves, their boots were enclosed, soft leather efforts, a fleece lining poking from the top. Under normal circumstances, they would have attracted the same disparaging mental comments as the tunics in Fronto’s mind, but he was also painfully aware of their similarity to the boots he currently wore, courtesy of Lucilia’s mania for renovating him. Perhaps he could acquire a new pair of boots from Cita and start pissing them into shape over this summer? He made a mental note to do so.
He frowned as he sniffed. Rose petals and camphor? It was a cloying scent. He wondered for a moment why the two men stood together wearing scents that combined to such appalling effect until he realised that, in fact, both men wore the combination individually. His eyes watering, he stepped back and faced them.
“Tell me about your journey.”
The two tribunes exchanged a slightly baffled look, and then Hortius smiled.
“I had a piebald mare. I called her Aphrodite, because she was so sleek and beautiful. I used to have a horse like her on the estate at Alba Fucens, only I called her Hector, because I was initially confused about sex, and…”
Fronto pinched the bridge of his nose and held up his hand to stop the tribune, who may well still be a little confused about sex as far as Fronto was concerned.
“Too much background detail, Hortius. Tell me about Massilia to Divoduron.”
Menenius smiled. “He cannot help it, legate. He likes horses. We were rather swift actually. I went into Massilia, but not to the military staging post. You see my uncle, who was a praetor two years ago, retired to a villa above Massilia and he has enormous influence with both the Greek council there and the local officials at Arelate. I managed to secure us a constant change of horses at the courier stations until we passed Vienna, where we purchased several fast horses and just gave the tired ones to some poor sad-looking local each time we changed mounts thereafter. It’s amazing what a little money and influence can achieve.”
Fronto held his tongue, his own opinion of nepotistic and monied influence being unlikely to sit well with these two.
“So you were here before any of us.”
“I would imagine so.”
“And you travelled alone, through Gaul? With no escort?”
Menenius frowned in incomprehension. “Yes. Gaul is conquered, and no uneducated barbarian would interfere with a Roman officer on official duty. You took an escort?”
Fronto blinked. “Well, no. But I had a Gaul with me, and anyway, we’re more…” his voice tailed off as he could find no way of saying what sprang to mind without levelling an insult or two at the pair. “Fair enough. What of Publius Pinarius Posca?”
Hortius’ brow furrowed. “Pinarius? Did he not travel with those two burly brutes of centurions? He stayed in Massilia to see the sights; wouldn’t accept our offer of relay horses. I think, to be quite honest, that he’s not quite the man we all are, eh, legate? Cannot imagine young Pinarius riding a horse. Probably had a silk-lined wagon.”
The two men burst into an annoying cacophony of snorts and giggles at the idea of Caesar’s wet nephew riding a courier horse. Fronto rolled his eyes, fighting the urge to complain about being lumped in with them as ‘men’ almost as heavily as the urge to try and beat some sense of military decorum into them..
“Thank you. That’s all I wanted to know.”
The two men slowly recovered from their humour and shrugged.
“Any time, legate, my lovely.”
Fronto managed to leave the tent somehow, miraculously, without laying a hand on either of them. He found himself simply grateful that they were not assigned to the Tenth, else he would have buried them both up to their necks in a latrine trench before they ever got as far as war.
The two men exited behind him and moved across the camp, giggling like idiots while Fronto, still breathing deeply in annoyance, strolled back towards his tent.
Throwing the flap aside, he found Labienus and his friend sitting in camp chairs beside his table, with cups of wine, a third poured ready for him. With a nod of thanks, he sank gratefully onto his bunk, undoing his boots and letting them drop to the floor. Labienus shuffled his chair a few feet further away, his eyes quickly beginning to water.
“New boots, Marcus?”
“Bloody women” was his sole reply as he let the other fall, peeled off the now-greyed woollen socks and wiggled his toes, releasing a fresh waft of four-day stink.
“There’s a bath tub in a bathing tent in the command section for senior officers, Marcus, and there’s always heated water ready.”
“How nice.”
“So if you’d like to scrub off your journey first…?”
“No, you’re alright, Titus. I need to rest and have a few cups first.”
Labienus glanced across at his friend, who had also moved his chair a few feet further away.
“I’d like you to meet Piso, Marcus. He’s a chieftain among the Aquitani and now one of the senior cavalry commanders along with Varus and Galronus. They’ll command a wing each, with Varus in overall charge, of course.”
Fronto nodded his greeting, scratching his toes and rubbing his feet with a free hand while consuming the prepared wine with the other, noting with distaste how Labienus had already watered it for him.
“I thought I’d best introduce you. There are still a great number of blinkered officers in this army who will not consider a non-Roman officer worthy of their attention, but I know you’re not one of them. Galronus, after all…”
Fronto nodded as he placed the cup on the table and stretched back on his bunk.
“Pleased to meet you, Piso. You seem, like Galronus, to be a man fond of our custom?”
Piso shrugged. “In weaponry, art and devotion to the Gods, the Aquitani will always be paramount, but I am not beyond being able to see the advantage of a comfortable tunic and a clean-shaven neck. It is my staunch belief that both Roman and Gaul have much to learn from one another.”
Fronto smiled appreciatively and nodded toward Labienus.
“A seductive viewpoint that our officer friend here has propounded to me before.”
“Marcus, there’s a particular reason I wanted you to meet Piso. Beyond being an embodiment of what I see for the future of Gaul.”
