The plateau of Cyrene had been growing larger for the past three days. Vespasian estimated that the foothills were now less than ten miles away and they would be camping among the sparse vegetation that clung to their lower reaches that evening.
It was the morning of the sixteenth day since leaving Siwa and he knew now that they would make it back. There had been many times on the painfully slow journey across the baking, featureless wilderness that he had doubted it. The auxiliaries without horses, and those few of the ex-captives who were able to, had ridden on camels but the rest had been obliged to walk. Starting before dawn and carrying on until well after sundown, with a halt for a few hours during the day in order to avoid the worst ravages of the midday heat, they had managed to average about twenty miles a day. As the water was used up, more space had become available on the sleds for the women and children and the weaker of the men; they spent the journey being dragged over the rough ground, semi- delirious in the scalding heat. The first death from sunstroke had been on the fourth day and not a day had passed since without at least one more body being abandoned on the desert floor to mark the progress of the column.
Vespasian had noticed Yosef tending to the sick as they lay on the sleds, trying to keep their heads covered and helping them to cups of water during the few instances in the day when he, Vespasian, allowed the precious skins to be broached.
Sitting at ease upon a camel, Ziri had guided them; keeping to the south of the Marmaridae’s wells and then veering back to the northwest, he had avoided the routes frequented by the slavers at the cost of extending the journey by a couple of days. Seemingly impervious to the heat, swathed in his woollen robe and headdress, he had maintained Vespasian’s, Magnus’ and Capella’s morale by his attempts to speak Latin — his proficiency was growing by the day — and his throaty renditions of Marmaridae songs. On a few occasions, as a more poignant ballad came to an end, Vespasian caught him looking mournfully towards his people’s grazing lands to the north as if saying farewell to the life that he could never know again.
As the day wore on and the foothills got ever closer, the speed of the column seemed to increase as the desire for relief from the torment that they had endured put energy into the legs of all those still obliged to walk. Before long they started the ascent to the plateau, weaving through the huge boulders and wiry scrub that littered the ground. A pair of jackals — the first signs of life that they had seen since leaving Siwa — darted across their path, startling Vespasian’s horse.
‘How do you get the slaves to Garama, Ziri?’ Vespasian wondered, having calmed his mount. He looked back and pointed at the bedraggled column as it trailed up the gentle incline. ‘They’re almost dead after three hundred miles; Garama’s seven hundred.’
‘Garama, very slow, two moons full,’ Ziri replied, flashing his white teeth. ‘One well three days, slaves live. One well four days, slaves die.’
‘It’s worth the effort, though,’ Capella said, ‘the Garamantes pay handsomely for slaves and can afford to; it’s a surprisingly rich kingdom.’
‘Have you been there?’ Vespasian asked as he kicked his horse forward again.
‘Once, to trade slaves for wild beasts; I can get a lion there for just two slaves. It’s an amazing place; there are six or seven towns built upon a range of hills that just rise up out of the desert. The Garamantes have dug wells and found a seemingly endless supply of water, which they channel through irrigation canals.’
‘Much water,’ Ziri agreed, nodding his head.
‘They have fountains and running water in the streets, in the middle of the desert — it’s incredible. They grow wheat and barley and figs as well as vegetables; they even grow grass and graze cattle on it. They’re completely self-sufficient apart from wine and olive oil and of course the one commodity that they need most: slaves to work the land. There are thousands of them, more slaves, in fact, than Garamantes.’
‘When the slaves realise that, the Garamantes will be in for a nasty shock,’ Magnus put in.
‘Oh, they’re well guarded, in fact-’ Capella was cut short as his horse shied as a couple more jackals raced across its path. As he got it back under control a gazelle sprinted past following the jackals. ‘Shit, I’ve never seen that before: jackals chased by a gazelle.’
Vespasian laughed and turned to Capella; the laughter froze on his face as he realised the true cause of the animals’ flight. A massive shape leapt up onto a boulder and, without pausing, descended, with a bellowing, guttural roar, upon the wild-beast master.
‘Lion!’ Vespasian yelled, pulling on his mount’s reins as the lion crashed onto Capella, sinking its razor-like claws into his shoulders and hurling him, screaming, to the ground.
The roar of the beast mauling its prey drowned out the neighing of the horses as they bucked and reared, throwing their riders; Ziri’s camel bolted. Vespasian landed with a bone-jarring thud next to Magnus, three paces away from the now limp Capella. They froze rigid, staring at the huge male lion; it raised its mane-crowned head and snarled at them, baring its bloodied teeth while pawing Capella’s chest, shredding his tunic and ripping his flesh.
‘Where’s my fucking hunting spear when I need it?’ Magnus muttered, slowly drawing his spatha.
‘Propping up a camel,’ Vespasian replied, reaching carefully for his sword.
‘We’re going to have to kill this bastard, sir; if we run it’ll have us as sure as a vestal plays with herself.’
The lion gave another heart-stopping roar as Corvinus came running up with a dozen auxiliaries.
‘Stay back, Corvinus,’ Vespasian ordered while keeping his eyes fixed firmly on the lion. ‘Any sudden movement and it will have one of us.’
The lion’s tail flicked menacingly from side to side.
‘One of us is going to have to face its charge,’ Magnus said out of the corner of his mouth, ‘while the other takes it from the side.’
‘Well, you were the one who was so keen to go lion hunting; I’ll take it from the side.’
‘I was hoping that you would’ve forgotten about that.’
Vespasian started to edge to his left. The lion tossed its head and gave out another mighty roar as it spotted the movement; Vespasian froze.
‘Here puss, here puss,’ Magnus called out.
With a low growl, the lion turned its attention back to Magnus, and Vespasian carried on moving cautiously a couple more paces to the left.
‘Ready, sir?’
‘As I’ll ever be.’
Magnus tensed himself; the lion crouched on Capella’s chest, sensing a threat. With a yell Magnus leapt forward, sword arm extended; the lion pounced straight at his head. Vespasian sprang to his feet and ran, aiming the tip of his spatha at the beast’s muscular neck as Magnus ducked under the outstretched paws, punching his sword blindly up at the mass of fur flying over him. The lion twisted around, swiping a paw at Magnus’ back as Vespasian jumped at it, thrusting his spatha into its mane; with an agonised roar the beast thrashed round at his new assailant in a blur of fleet motion, snapping his teeth at him, catching his tunic sleeve and bringing its hindleg up to claw its way bloodily down Vespasian’s left thigh. Magnus propelled himself upright, punching his shoulder into the beast’s soft underbelly to send its hindquarters up into the air and pushing its head forward and down. It crashed to the ground, dragging Vespasian with it by his sleeve; he landed on its right shoulder blade, his spatha still lodged in the neck. The lion twisted onto its back, throwing Vespasian off it as Magnus dived between the claw-tipped legs scrabbling in the air and thrust his sword into the midriff, rotating it as it sliced through muscle and gut and pushed it on up under the ribcage. With the unnatural strength of a desperate animal, the lion flashed a giant paw at Magnus’ chest; claws sliced through his skin. The blow knocked him away, leaving his sword still buried within the creature. Vespasian grabbed the sword, heaved his body up and fell on its hilt as the lion sank a claw into his shoulder. Screaming with agony, he pushed down with all his might and forced the point into the beating heart of the beast. He felt the lion’s claw in his shoulder tense as its heart exploded inside it; its thrashing hindlegs suddenly stiffened then went limp, and it fell back pulling Vespasian with it, the claw still lodged in his flesh.
Magnus got painfully to his feet and stumbled over to him. ‘Hold still, sir,’ he said, and grasping the huge paw he prised it off Vespasian’s shoulder, tearing the claw out of the puncture.
Vespasian felt dizzy with pain. ‘Fuck me, that was one savage beast,’ he said through gritted teeth.
‘But what a fight, eh?’ Magnus grinned, breathing heavily; blood oozed from four slashes running diagonally across his chest.
