Then it hit them.
Within an instant the wind had accelerated from a moderate breeze into a howling gale that strained the ears. The temperature rose and visibility plummeted, so that he could only just make out Magnus sheltering behind his horse two paces away, as the air filled with tiny, sharp particles of sand moving at colossal speeds; they cannoned into the horses’ sides, stinging them sorely even through their coats. Vespasian jerked down his mount’s bridle as it attempted to stand and flee from the all-encompassing rage that surrounded them; despite the horse’s struggling he held it down with every fibre of strength until it acquiesced and lay still. Breathing became increasingly difficult. He pulled his tunic up over his nose, curled into the foetus position and squeezed his eyes tight shut, offering up prayers to every god he could think of, as the wind ripped around him, tearing the hat from his head and dragging relentlessly at his cloak, which cracked like a whip with the unremitting pressure.
The sun went down and darkness became complete.
Vespasian lost all sense of time.
‘Pull, you curly-haired little bugger!’ Magnus shouted, startling Vespasian back to consciousness.
He felt strong hands grasping his ankles, stretching his legs and then he started to slide downhill. Suddenly he could see stars, thousands of them.
Magnus loomed over him. ‘Are you all right, sir?’
Spitting out a mouthful of sand, Vespasian raised his head. ‘I seem to be,’ he replied with difficulty; his mouth was desert-dry.
Ziri held a water-skin to his lips. ‘Sir, trink.’
Vespasian drank and felt the lukewarm liquid course into his body.
Ziri pulled the skin away from him. ‘Sir, stop.’
‘He’s right, I’m afraid,’ Magnus said, holding out his hand to help Vespasian up. ‘It’s the only water we’ve got unless we can dig some more out.’
Vespasian got unsteadily to his feet and looked around. It was peaceful, there was no wind. The three- quarter moon splashed the rippling sand dunes with silver; to the north the monstrous shape of the sandstorm could just be discerned, ravaging its way towards the coast. Here and there Vespasian could see a few figures, no more than twenty, singly or in pairs, digging in the sand. ‘Where’s Corvinus?’ he asked, looking back to where he last saw the cavalry prefect and his mount.
‘He’s fine,’ Magnus replied, ‘he’s organising the search parties, although I don’t know how fruitful they’ll prove to be. Most of the horses bolted, only the lads that kept theirs down have survived. I’m afraid that Aghilas didn’t have the strength to hold onto his.’
‘Shit, we’re lost then.’
‘Not quite,’ Magnus said with a grin, patting Ziri’s frizzy hair like a favoured pet, ‘Ziri knows how to get to Siwa.’
The Marmarides nodded. ‘Master, sir, Ziri, Siwa, yes.’
‘He’s becoming quite talkative,’ Vespasian observed.
‘He is,’ Magnus agreed, ‘and so are we when we should be digging to see what we can salvage.’
The first rays of direct sunlight hit Vespasian’s face and it felt so good to be alive as he scrabbled in the sand searching for his precious water-skin. He had despaired during that timeless oblivion that he had spent curled up in the lee of his now dead horse.
At first he had been able to push away the sand as it piled up near his face but as the storm had intensified great swathes of it had been deposited all around and over him; keeping above it had meant that he was slowly rising and would eventually be higher than his protective mount. Giving up the unequal struggle he had managed to pull his cloak over his head and concentrated instead on keeping a small air pocket in front of his face, which, with the help of his long cavalry spatha acting as a tent-pole, he had maintained until he had lost consciousness in the stifling conditions.
How he had survived he did not know. He could only surmise that the goddess Fortuna had held her hands over him and that she really was safeguarding him for whatever destiny the gods had decreed for him, as he had, at the age of fifteen, overheard his mother profess. That day he had heard his parents speak of the omens surrounding his birth and what they prophesied. Since then no one had been willing to tell him of their content, bound as they were by an oath administered by his mother to all those present on the day of his naming ceremony, nine days after his birth.
At first this had irked him but gradually his curiosity had waned out of necessity and he had put it to the back of his mind. His curiosity had been briefly reawakened, four years previously, after he and his brother, Sabinus, had been read a deliberately obscure prophecy at the Oracle of Amphiaraos in Greece. This had alluded to a brother telling the truth to the King of the East. Whether it had meant anything to Sabinus he did not know as his brother had been unforthcoming, claiming to be still bound by their mother’s original oath.
In the two years between completing his time as one of the
‘It’s not looking too good,’ Corvinus said, tight-lipped, walking up behind Vespasian with Magnus as he finally managed to find his water-skin, ‘there are twenty-six survivors, plus us four, and only eight water-skins, all of which are half-empty.’
‘Nine now, prefect,’ Vespasian replied, pulling the skin from the deep hole in the sand. ‘Surely we can work out where the horses were and dig down to them?’
‘We’ve been trying to but most of the horses and all but one of the mules bolted taking the provisions with them. They’re all lost out there somewhere,’ Corvinus snapped, waving his arm around, ‘we’ll never find them. All we’ve been digging up is dead auxiliaries; I’ve lost three of my four decurions. They didn’t deserve to die like that, it’s a fucking shambles.’
‘Well, if there’s no hope of any more survivors then we should get going quickly before the sun gets too hot.’
‘Go where?’ Corvinus shouted.
‘To Siwa as planned, prefect; it shouldn’t be more than a day away.’
‘And what are we going to do when we get there? We’ve got hardly any men left; you’ve managed to lose most of them on this mad scheme of yours.’
‘Let me remind you who you’re talking to, prefect,’ Vespasian retorted, pointing a finger at the young cavalry prefect’s face.
‘I don’t need to be reminded that I’m talking to an upstart of a New Man with no breeding and a Sabine accent.’
‘Whatever your patrician prejudices might make of me, Corvinus, I am the Governor’s, and therefore the Senate’s, representative in Cyrenaica and you will do as I order without question. And if you think that saving citizens from slavery is a mad scheme then I pray that should that fate befall you there is someone like me around willing to come after you. Now get the men ready to-’
A distant, mournful, wailing cry from high overhead cut him off.
Vespasian looked east towards its source. ‘What the fuck was that?’
‘Another poor sod who’s had the misfortune to follow you into the desert,’ Corvinus spat. He turned on his heel and stormed away, barking orders at the surviving auxiliaries who were looking nervously at the sky.
‘I think that you should have made it clear,’ Magnus said, watching Corvinus go, ‘that you’d only come after him if he has an attractive woman in tow, if you take my meaning?’
Vespasian shot his friend a venomous look. ‘Very funny!’
‘I thought so; and not so far from the truth either.’
Vespasian grunted; he could not deny it to Magnus: if it had not been for his desire for Flavia, they would not be here and a hundred or so men would still be alive. But then, if a man’s destiny was pre-ordained, those men must have been destined to die here; Fortuna had only held her hands over a few of them to be spared for other tasks and deaths. What, he wondered, was the task for which he had been spared?
