‘Shield… wall!’
Fifty-six shields clashed together in a rapid percussion, locking like tiles on a sloping roof. Fifty-six armoured bodies in four ranks, crouched and standing with spears levelled through the gaps. Each midnight-blue shield was painted with the emblem of the Sixth Legion: a winged figure of the goddess Victory with gold palm and laurel wreath. Castus waited for three heartbeats then yelled again.
‘Half-step… ad-vance!’
The block jolted forward, the men moving together with shields tight. One step then pause, another step then pause, the low collective chant: ‘Vic-trix, Vic-trix…’ From the rear ranks Timotheus, who looked far too young to be an optio, kept the formation steady.
‘Halt! By the right – open ranks!’
The block of men shuffled and then spread, the wall of shields opening into a skirmishing line with the second and third ranks moving up to cover the gaps. It was a difficult manoeuvre, and the century managed it well. Castus felt a brief warm glow of satisfaction. From the margins of the drill field, men and officers from other units had gathered to watch.
‘From the rear – ready wasps!’
A hollow rattle as the rear-rank men plucked the darts from behind their shields. The legion had not made much use of the weighted throwing dart before Castus had joined them. A hundred yards away across the drill field stood the row of straw-stuffed practice targets.
‘Loose!’
With a combined grunt, the rear-rankers hurled their darts. Then, in practised sequence, came more darts from the forward ranks, each volley arcing against the dull sky and raining down. Castus flicked his eyes between his men and the targets – most of the darts had fallen short or gone wide, but a few thudded home into the straw.
Now a volley of javelins followed the darts, the century advancing steadily by half-steps, kicking up the gravel of the drill field. Then swords rattled from scabbards along the line and the men halted, waiting for the order to charge. They could see the straw targets bristling with darts and javelins.
Castus felt his chest swell with fierce joy. These were his men; he had trained them and formed them, and he could sense the pride they took in their abilities now, their collective strength. He threw back his head to cry out the order that would send the wedge of armoured men into a charge. Would it be like this, he thought, in a real battle? Would they be so determined then, so disciplined? And would he have the nerve to command them effectively?
‘You’re showing me up, young man!’
Castus turned on his heel. Ursicinus, the legion’s senior drill instructor, stood with fists on hips. He was a wiry man, and looked like an old grey rat. Castus was a head taller and a foot broader, but the habit of deference was hard to break; he straightened at once and touched his brow in rapid salute.
‘Oh, don’t let me stop you,’ Ursicinus said, smiling sourly. His own drills usually involved marching practice, and leaving the men standing at attention for hours in the rain – the best way, he claimed, to instil a habit of patient obedience.
‘Probably enough for today,’ Castus muttered. He was tempted to continue anyway – order his men to charge, yelling, at the practice stumps with levelled blades. But Ursicinus was one of the highest-ranking veterans in the legion, and Castus knew enough not to try and antagonise him.
‘Optio! Fall the men out.’
Timotheus raised his staff, then he barked the order and the formation broke apart.
‘Impressive, I suppose,’ the drill instructor said. He tapped Castus’s mailed chest with his staff. ‘Just don’t think you’re going to turn them into one of those crack Danube legions! There’s not much call for them out here, y’know.’
‘What would you know about that?’ Castus said under his breath as the older man stalked away. Months of training his century whenever he got the chance – whenever they were spared from mending roads or walls or digging out latrines, or being sent off to guard the supply convoys – had turned what had been a shambolic set of men into something approaching soldiers. They had hated him for it at first, Castus knew that; he had beaten them hard, and managed to discharge some of the worst idlers into other centuries. But now he liked to think that they appreciated the distinction. Now it was only the disdain of the other officers he had to contend with: men like Ursicinus, forty years in the legion and never fought in battle, ground smooth by the routines of camp life and resentful of any suggestion that he might be wrong.
Pfft! Castus said to himself, and twitched an obscene gesture at the departing instructor. Optio Timotheus caught his eyes and grinned – the younger soldiers had picked up his enthusiasm much more quickly.
‘Shall I take them back to barracks, centurion?’
Castus nodded. Young Timotheus was tough on the men, bit too much vinegar in his blood, but would make a good officer one day. As a deputy, he was perfect. His harsh yells drifted away over the gravel of the drill field as he formed up the men and set them marching back towards the fortress gates. He even got them singing as they left the field.
‘You rile him up and he’ll find some way to get back at you,’ Evagrius said. ‘Or make things hard for the rest of us.’
‘I know,’ Castus said. They were in the office room of his quarters, a whitewashed cell set aside for the routine administration that fell to every centurion’s duty. Like most of the leaking old barrack block, it smelled strongly of damp plaster and mould. Julius Evagrius, standard-bearer and clerk, sat on a stool on the other side of the desk with a heap of wax tablets before him. Castus, leaning by the door, tried not to stare too dubiously at the documents.
‘They don’t mind it, though – the men. Ursicinus is a mean old goat, so they like it when you stick him one in eye!’
Castus grunted, shoving himself away from the door and looming over the table. ‘You should know not to speak about another officer like that,’ he growled. ‘’Specially not to me!’ He jutted his jaw, giving his profile the look of a stack of broken bricks. But he was trying not to smile.
Evagrius assumed a grave expression and busied himself with his documents. ‘Sorry, centurion.’
Standard-bearers, as clerks for their centurions, often had a slightly informal relationship with their superiors, but Evagrius more than most. Besides being a reasonable soldier and an excellent clerk, he also knew Castus’s secret: his centurion could neither read nor write. In the years he had spent with II Herculia, Castus had barely spent six months under a roof, and there had been no time to learn even the basics of literacy. This was fine for a legionary, but since his promotion it had been a constant embarrassment, and one he liked to keep quiet. One of these days, he told himself, he would learn, but for now, squinting at the squirm of letters and figures covering the clerk’s tablets made his head hurt.
‘So what’s the roster looking like?’ he said, gazing out of the window into the darkening portico.
‘Four men still absent on supply escort duty,’ Evagrius said, darting his nib down the list of names, ‘three men – Macrinus, Flaccus and Modestus – in the hospital, two more – Terentius and Claudianus – on leave. Macer detached to the river patrol. Aurelius Dexter still not returned from leave. That’s ten days he’s over now. Shall I mark him down as a deserter?’
‘Better do that. Good riddance to him too. He’s welcome to his flogging if he shows his face here again.’
‘So that’s fifty-eight men present for duty, centurion.’
‘Right – sign that off for me.’ Castus’s own cramped scribble would never pass as a signature, but the standard-bearer had devised a reasonable-looking alternative.
‘There’s a memorandum here from Tribune Rufinius. Faulty brothel tokens are still turning up and they haven’t tracked down the source. He asks all centurions to check before issuing new ones.’
‘I’ll leave you to see to that. Anything else?’
‘That’s everything,’ the standard-bearer said. He closed the last wax tablet and slipped it in his pouch. Castus was sure that the canny Evagrius himself, together with his fellow clerks in other centuries and the merchants in the city, was behind most of the assorted scams and ruses in the fortress. Corruption was an institution in military camps all over the empire, and Eboracum had many a blind eye.
‘Dismissed,’ Castus said, although Evagrius was already on his way out, whistling.
The hospital building occupied almost a full block between the praetorium and the grain silos. Castus never liked going there – the dim complex of rooms contained a heady reek of sour vinegar that turned his stomach, and he had a suspicion that illnesses somehow travelled through the air – but owing to the legionaries’ habit of constantly injuring themselves and picking up diseases, he was obliged to pay regular visits.
Now he followed the medical orderly along a corridor between starched drapes and into one of the wards. He was trying not to breathe too deeply, just in case.
‘These three are yours, I think,’ the orderly said. Castus merely glanced at the first two: they were legitimate enough. One had managed to impale his foot with the throwing dart on the drill field; the other had broken his leg falling off a horse. Both were eager enough to be discharged back to barracks: the hospital diet of herbal soup and blood pudding was designed to be unappetising.
‘And this is Julius Modestus, who still has a fever.’
Castus stood by the bed, glowering. Modestus was looking more than usually sallow and sweaty. He opened his eyes and gave a weak cough. This was his third time in hospital since Castus had taken command of the century, and between his illnesses and his frequent punishments he had spent barely ten days on duty.
‘What are you doing for him?’
‘Oh, just herbal infusions and bed rest. A little light massaging of the limbs is often efficacious…’
Castus gave him a sideways glance. Medical orderlies were known to take bribes to keep shirkers in hospital, but this one looked sincere. He nodded, waited until the orderly had moved away, and then stooped over the bed.
‘I want you back on your feet in two days, Modestus,’ he said in a low voice, ‘or I’ll send Timotheus and Culchianus over here to give you the sort of massage you won’t appreciate. Understood?’
‘Understood,’ Modestus croaked, then gave a few more coughs as Castus paced quickly back towards the fresh air.
‘Ah, the terror of the Tigris is here! The despoiler of the Euphrates!’
‘Watch what you say, Balbinus, or he may despoil you – he has that Herculian look in his eyes!’
‘Only joking, my dear Knucklehead. Come and despoil a cup of beer with us!’
Castus tried to smile – how the unfortunate nickname from his old legion had managed to follow him across half the empire he had no idea. He sat down at the table, and the other three centurions shuffled along the bench to give him room.
The centurions’ messroom was at the back of a small warehouse beside the main market. It was gloomy, and smelled of stale beer, but there was a fire burning in the brazier in the corner. The walls, painted with crude colourful murals of nude shepherdesses being chased by satyrs, were covered in scratched graffiti: the names of generations of centurions and tribunes of the Sixth, with accompanying obscene comments. There was a sense of heritage, if nothing else.
‘Still enjoying life at the edge of the world, then?’ Balbinus said, and stifled a belch. ‘Or are you pining for the delights of Antioch, eh? The dark-eyed gazelles of Ctesiphon?’
‘It’s all right,’ said Castus, and took a heavy slug of the warm sour beer. Balbinus was obviously drunk, but he barely understood most of what the man said at the best of times.
‘Leave him be,’ said Valens, the third man at the table. ‘I smell the hospital on him.’ For a moment Castus thought that the stale vinegar odour really had clung to him somehow; then Valens tugged at the end of his long nose and winked.
Of all the fifty or so centurions in the Sixth, Valens was only one Castus could consider a friend. Perhaps because he too was a relative newcomer – he had been transferred from one of the legions on the Rhine five years before. Although he had a wry sardonic air that Castus often found baffling, Valens at least had the bearing of a soldier. Not a stewed drunk and a gambler, like Balbinus and his friend Galleo.
‘Man of few words, our Knucklehead,’ said Galleo, scooping a fistful of coppers across the table. ‘That’s what they teach them out there on the Danube – act first, speak later… Mind you, with that barbarous accent he’s got, you’d hardly know what he was saying anyway!’
Castus stared across the rim of his cup, unblinking. He kept his expression neutral, his hands loose. Let them think what they liked about him. Let them joke if they wanted. One swift jab of his arm and he could shatter the cup between Galleo’s eyes, grab the other man by the hair and dent the table with his face. He enjoyed the bitter flavour of that thought, the intention idling in his mind.
When he first arrived at Eboracum, he had been given the usual initiation. In the corner of the messroom behind a barricade of benches and tables, they’d set upon him: he’d been expecting it, and managed to wrestle all six of the centurions in the cohort to surrender at the cost of a second broken nose and a cracked rib. Valens was the only one who took it lightly now – the rest all treated Castus with a sly mocking disdain. He had hurt their pride, he supposed, but they all knew he could beat them again if he wanted to – he was like a half-tamed bear brought to a feast, for the revellers to goad and dare themselves.
Still, he tried not to blame them for it. Service on the north British frontier held few rewards, and the centurions had little to boast about. So what if they mocked him for his military experience? So what if they laughed at the way he kept his boots and belts oiled and shining, his tunics cleanly laundered, his metal bright? He worked hard at training his men, and he drank little, and if they hated him for that he did not care. The army was his life, his only love. He had seen his father slump into indignity and be destroyed by it, and he would do anything to avoid that.
‘Easy, brother,’ Valens said quietly, leaning across the table. He nodded towards the door. ‘I’ve got a couple of spare tokens for the Blue House, if you’re interested.’ Balbinus and Galleo were busy rattling dice in a cup. Castus drank down the rest of his beer and upended the cup on the table.
‘Leaving so soon?’ Balbinus cried, flinging the dice down. ‘And you haven’t even told us again how you beat the King of Persia at arm-wrestling!’
‘You worry me sometimes,’ Valens said as they walked together past the warehouses. ‘You fall into one of your silences, and I think you’re about to start breaking people’s heads open.’ The air was still, the crescent moon bright; it was as close to a pleasant summer’s evening as Castus had known in this country. ‘Mind you, I’m sure nobody’d think any the worse of you if you did…’
‘They’re just talking,’ Castus said, shrugging lightly. ‘Nothing better to do.’ The mood of irritation still gripped him; but there was only one person he wanted to see now, and he knew where to find her. He could still taste the beer on his tongue, and worried that his breath might smell of it – cupping his hand over his mouth, he breathed and sniffed.
The sound of rapid hoofbeats came along the wide central street from the north-west gate. Both centurions stepped back into the shadow of the portico; a solitary horseman in a thick native cloak was riding hard along the street. He reined in before the gates of the headquarters building, shouted a reply to the sentries as he dismounted, and then ran inside.
‘Looks like he’s late for his supper,’ Valens said as they continued across the street and down the broad colonnaded avenue towards the river gate. Knots of men passed in the darkness, some of them saluting when they noticed the centurions’ staffs. A wagon loaded with barrels from the legion brewery groaned by, and then they were passing beneath the arches of the gatehouse and out of the fortress.
The road ran down from the gates to the stone bridge that crossed the river. On the far side, the lights of the civilian settlement spread along the banks. The colony of Eboracum, capital city of Britannia Secunda province, was almost as old as the fortress; Castus had been surprised at its size when he had first come here, although compared to the cities of the east it wasn’t much. Tiled roofs caught the moonlight, and the smoke of a thousand hearths and kitchen fires rose towards the tattered night clouds. City and fortress depended on one another, but the soldiers of the legion did not mix much with the civilians on the other side of the river.
Crunching over the cobbles, the two men descended towards the bridge. Just before it, they turned off to the right along another road that traced the strip of sloping ground between the ditch and wall of the fortress and the river. Along the riverbank there were low buildings: warehouses and shacks, crude taverns and brothels. Valens shoved a couple of staggering soldiers out of his path, while Castus paced along behind him, rolling his shoulders.
The Blue House stood at the far end of the row of buildings. Narrow and two-storeyed, with a rickety balcony overhanging the street, it was painted all over with a sky-blue wash. A side gate gave access to the yard, and a miserable-looking sentry was posted there to deny entry to anyone except centurions and tribunes. The Blue House was what passed for a high-class establishment in Eboracum.
An elderly eunuch in a blue chiton met them as they stepped through into the yard. Valens passed over his two tokens, and the eunuch held the leather discs up to the light of a lamp.
‘Don’t worry, they’re genuine,’ Valens said, and smiled over his shoulder to Castus. The eunuch made a weary bow and gestured them into the house.
‘Welcome, welcome, brave and handsome centurions!’ Dionysia, the madam of the house, was a woman in her fifties, wearing garish cosmetics and heavy earrings that chimed. ‘Come in and be seated – you’re our only visitors tonight! Sit down and I’ll send for wine!’
In the blue-walled sitting room, Castus eased himself down onto a shabby divan and spread his knees. He always felt uncomfortable in brothels, even if Valens appeared entirely relaxed. A boy brought cups and a bronze pitcher of earthy brown wine. There was a thick smell in the air, like burnt flowers.
‘The only visitors?’ Valens said dubiously. He glanced up at the ceiling, as if he expected to see it shuddering.
A bell sounded, the beaded curtain across the inner doorway opened, and a group of girls filed into the room. Castus gazed at them: a couple were familiar from his previous visits, but the face he was looking for was not there. One of the girls, a skinny redhead who looked about fifteen, was trying to stifle a cough.
‘Cleopatra!’ Valens cried, getting up and seizing the hand of a tall dark-skinned girl. ‘You’re for me. Castus, which do you fancy?’
‘Is Afrodisia not here tonight?’ Castus asked, turning to the woman lingering by the door.
‘Ah, Afrodisia,’ Dionysia replied, rolling her eyes to the ceiling. ‘Yes, but she’s… she’s bathing at the moment. Perhaps you’d like to wait?’
Castus nodded and settled back on the divan.
‘Bathing!’ Valens grinned. ‘She’s bathing in something, but I’ll bet it’s not mare’s milk. Choose another one…’ He gave the dark girl a slap on the buttocks and herded her out through the bead curtain, and the other girls followed behind him.
Afrodisia was really called Claudia Galla, but clients were supposed to use only trade names. Castus had met her only a month after arriving in Britain: a blonde woman, a few years younger than himself, with a soft womanly body and a tired ease about her that he found deeply attractive. Sometimes he had fantasised about marrying her, but the idea was absurd, the sort of misty notion that bored soldiers concocted when they spent too long in barracks. Even so, he wanted her now – wanted to see her and talk with her more than anything. The wine was stripping away whatever vague ardour he might previously have possessed.
Settling himself heavily on the narrow divan, he wondered at the gathering frustration he had felt these last months, the sense of barely tethered anger. Was it something he had inherited from his father? His promotion to centurion had seemed like a reward once, but now the fortress was coming to feel like a snare. He could lose himself here. All day he had been baited: by Ursicinus on the drill field; by Balbinus and Galleo in the messroom; by all the head-scratching routines of unit administration and hospital visits. He felt a raging violence inside him, a need for release. The disappointment at not seeing Afrodisia was just the latest of his vexations.
From somewhere upstairs he heard a man shout. Not Valens. A woman screamed – it was her, he was sure – and at once he was crossing the room: three long strides to the curtain with his centurion’s staff gripped in his fist. Swiping aside the beaded curtain, he stared down the wooden passageway to the stairs: the big Frankish slave rising to his feet, Dionysia’s startled expression through a doorway to the right.
‘Centurion?’ the madam said. ‘Please, be calm… nothing is wrong!’
A woman’s laughter came from upstairs. Castus lowered his staff and the beads dropped back into place, swinging and clattering. Embarrassment creased through him. A stupid mistake, that was all.
Another voice now, from out in the yard. Hurried words. Castus turned as the eunuch appeared through the doorway, stooping a bow.
‘Would the dominus be Centurion Aurelius Castus?’ he asked.
Castus glared at him, and the eunuch swallowed thickly.
‘There is messenger for you, dominus. From the prefect. He claims it’s an urgent matter.’
He stepped away from the curtain. Dionysia was still peering at him through the swinging beads, her earrings chiming.
Now what? ‘All right,’ he said. ‘I’m coming.’
The praetorium was in darkness, only a few lamps burning in the upper rooms and the sentries at the door almost asleep against their spears. Two months had passed since Castus had last entered here, for his strange interview with Arpagius and the notary Nigrinus. This time things were different – the messenger had told him nothing, but had led him through the streets of the fortress at a rapid pace.
Up the stairs, he followed the corridor along to the same room he had entered before. The doors opened to orange lamplight and a huddle of figures around the central table. Castus took three strides across the floor, stamped to a halt and saluted.
‘Dominus!’
‘Yes, yes, quietly, please, centurion. Stand at ease.’
Arpagius had a creased look, as if he had been woken recently. A quick glance took in the other men in the room: two tribunes, Rufinius and Callistus; a long-haired man in a native cloak whom Castus recognised as the rider he had seen outside earlier; and a bearded balding man with a round face and startled eyes.
‘What’s the current duty strength of your century?’ the prefect asked.
‘Dominus! Four men still absent on supply escort duty, three men in the hospital, two men on leave, one detached to the river patrol, one absent without leave. Fifty-eight men present for duty, dominus.’
Arpagius raised an eyebrow. ‘Impressively detailed,’ he said. Castus suppressed a smile, and gave silent thanks to his standard-bearer.
‘I want you to prepare those men you have available for immediate departure,’ the prefect went on. Castus said nothing.
‘You may want to sit down, centurion,’ one of the tribunes said, pointing to a stool. Castus winged his shoulders, then he sat down stiffly on the stool with his back straight.
‘One of our frontier scouts,’ Arpagius said, gesturing to the man in the native cloak, ‘has just brought some potentially troubling information from north of the border. It appears that Vepogenus, who you may know is High Chieftain of the Pictish confederation, has died. Apparently a case of accidental food poisoning – he was feasting on mushrooms – but there are necessarily doubts about what’s happened.’
Castus nodded, staying silent. He had never heard of Vepogenus, or the Pictish confederation. The Picts were a savage people who lived far north of the frontier, past the wall of Hadrian and the settled lands beyond, but he knew no more about them than that.
‘Since the death is in dispute,’ Arpagius went on, ‘Vepogenus’s military commander has declared himself regent until the tribal leaders can be gathered to select a new high chieftain.’
‘The Picts have a multitude of leaders,’ said the second tribune, Callistus, a solid military-looking man with hard eyes. ‘But they’ve taken to… electing a chieftain to stand above the others. It’s a new thing – easier for us when they just fought among themselves!’
‘Vepogenus fought against us in the past,’ Arpagius said, ‘but he agreed to a treaty several years ago. He swore to keep the peace and not to attack the settled tribes to the south who are clients of Rome, and he’s stuck to it. With him gone, there’s potential for troublemakers to step in – the Picts are a very backward people, and believe treaties are made between individuals, not states. Therefore we must send an envoy, with a diplomatic party, to the tribal gathering and ensure that the old treaties are honoured by the newly elected chieftain, whoever he may be. I want your men to act as a bodyguard.’
‘Prefect, with respect,’ the tribune Callistus broke in, ‘will a single reduced century be enough? Less than sixty men? We should send a cohort, surely…’
‘No. This is an honour guard, nothing more. If we sent a whole cohort the tribes would suspect we were invading their land. Which we have no intention of doing.’
Watching the exchange, Castus was surprised by the change in Arpagius. On his last meeting the prefect had seemed worried, irresolute. Now he was much firmer, with a decisive note in his voice. Even so, the plan lacked appeal. Castus knew nothing of Picts or any other savages, and the notion of standing around acting as a ceremonial guard surrounded by howling barbarians tightened his stomach. He thought enviously of Valens, still at the Blue House with his dark-skinned Cleopatra…
‘Would a mounted escort not be faster?’ asked the bearded man. Castus had ignored him until now.
‘Over that distance, no,’ Arpagius replied. ‘There’s limited horse fodder north of the wall – the stunted little ponies the natives ride seem to live on air – and a cavalry force of that size would have to carry its own provisions or spend half their time foraging. Our soldiers can cover twenty miles a day on foot. Besides, I want legionaries there – the savages respect our legions; they fear them. They’re Rome, to the natives’ understanding. Centurion, you have a question?’
Castus paused, unaware that he had been staring quizzically. ‘Dominus,’ he said, ‘I just thought… why choose my men for this?’
Arpagius gave him a thin smile. ‘Because I warmed to you on our last meeting, centurion! You’re the sort of plain, honest soldier I like. And because you’ve turned an unpromising crop of men into the smartest century in the legion. They look good and they march hard, and that’s what I need at this moment. Besides, I suspect you’ll impress the natives. They’re quite puny, on the whole.’
Nothing more to be said then, Castus thought. He recognised a foregone conclusion when he heard one. Standing up, he clasped his hands at his back, raised his head and stuck out his chest. ‘Dominus! What are your orders?’
Arpagius nodded slightly, pleased. ‘The decision of the tribes,’ he said, ‘is scheduled for the first light of the new moon, which is in fifteen days’ time. The party will consist of one of my secretaries, Flavius Strabo’ – he gestured to the bearded man, who bowed his head – ‘and our envoy, to be collected from his villa a day’s march north of here.’
‘I’m not sure about that plan either,’ the tribune said quietly, but Arpagius ignored him.
‘Prepare your men to leave before dawn. I’ll supply a docket to draw all necessary supplies from the commissariat, and eight mules to carry the baggage together with slaves to handle them. I’ll also write an order to the commander of Bremenium fort to detach some mounted scouts to accompany you north of the Wall. I must remind you, centurion, that your force will not be expected to fight – they are an honour guard alone. Your first responsibility will be the protection of the envoy himself, then the security of your own men. You will have no say in any diplomatic negotiations, and should keep yourself and your men separate from the natives at all times. Do you understand?’
‘I understand, dominus. We will do what we are ordered…’
‘…and at every command we will be ready,’ Arpagius said with a smile, finishing the customary soldier’s pledge. ‘Dismissed, centurion.’