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‘Miro! Mount the men and start the pursuit! Ride ’em down before they can get away.’

If the decurion acknowledged the order, Cato never heard him, but a moment later he was relieved to see Miro vault into his saddle and lead the Blood Crows into the gorge at a trot. They passed through the barricade and fanned out on the far side, their longer cavalry swords drawn, ready to cut down any of the enemy they encountered. Those who had been injured and were slowly making their way to safety were the first to be dispatched without mercy. The rest had started up the slope, and now Cato could readily understand why their leaders had picked such difficult ground over which to make their escape. The inclination of the valley side and the runs of scree made it impossible for mounted men to follow them, and he realised that there would be no effective pursuit of the fleeing tribesmen. It was bitterly frustrating, but he reminded himself that at least the path before the advancing army had been cleared and the column could continue on its way. Or at least it might have done had it been earlier in the day. Looking up at the low angle of the sun, Cato saw that it was a scant few hours before dusk. Quintatus would have to give the order to halt the army soon to allow the men time to construct their marching camp.

The enemy had achieved their goal, Cato mused as he watched them make their escape. It had been a classic delaying action. They had held up the Roman advance for half a day and inflicted a number of casualties. More importantly, they had bought themselves time for whatever plans they had to counter the advance. He felt an icy tingle in the back of his neck at the possibility that the Druids and their Deceanglian allies were plotting something and Quintatus was unwittingly playing into their hands. Then he smiled bitterly at himself. Of course they would try to delay the Romans. This was their land, their home, and for the Druids, Mona was their most sacred soil. They would take every chance to keep the Romans from it. There would be more attempts to delay them long enough for the onset of winter to force Quintatus to withdraw from the mountains. It would be a hard-fought campaign, Cato knew. Contested every step of the way. This afternoon’s brutal action was only the first taste of what was to come.

The warmth of the late-afternoon sunlight was causing vapour to rise from the tunics of those around him so that they seemed to be smouldering. As they noticed it, the soldiers began laughing at each other, as men will gladly seize on anything light-spirited after a desperate action against the enemy. Despite his sombre mood, Cato indulged them. Once again the Blood Crows had proved themselves, and they deserved the brief moment of respite.

CHAPTER TWELVE

‘Hey, Optio!’ one of the men called out. ‘Since they’re handing out promotions to the rank and file, do you think you could put in a word for me? I’m sick of staring at your horse’s arse at the head of the line.’

The other men of the patrol laughed loudly, and Pandarus shifted in his saddle to look back down the narrow track.

‘Diomedes, if they ever promote you, then the rest of the rankers will be hard pressed to tell you from the back end of your horse. The army could not afford such confusion.’

The men laughed again, this time at their comrade’s expense, and after the briefest of delays, Diomedes joined in, anxious to be seen to take it as well as he dished it out.

It had been a month since Optio Pandarus had been elevated to his new rank, and yet he was still being ribbed by his comrades. And mightily wearing it was becoming too, he mused with a flick of the reins. He was leading the patrol along the forest track that angled up the side of the valley towards a prominent ridge. In the last few days the sky had been mostly clear. But the change in weather had been accompanied by a sharp drop in temperature, and the morning frosts had been bitter indeed. It was close to noon, yet the sun was still low in the sky and gave off little warmth.

The clouds and mists had dissipated, and Pandarus hoped to gain a clear view over the surrounding landscape from the top of the ridge. It would be good to have something of note to report back to the centurion when the patrol returned to the fort at the end of the day – rather than the usual run of fleeing shepherd boys and abandoned villages that had greeted their approach. Occasionally they had seen women and children disappearing into the forests, but there had been no sign of any men. And that was concerning Pandarus and the fort’s commander, since it implied only one thing: that the men had gone off to fight somewhere. Perhaps against rival tribes, or, more worrying, they might be gathering to cause grief to the nearest Roman outposts.

Still, he reflected, there had been no sign of any problems yet, and no attempt to make trouble for the garrison at the fort. Which was just as well given the poor state of the Illyrian auxiliaries sent to replace the Blood Crows and the cohort from the Fourteenth Legion. Although they had been drilled hard over recent days, they would only be able to mount a token resistance against a determined enemy attack. Pandarus wondered if they were typical of the reserve formations called forward to garrison the frontier forts stripped of good fighting men to fill out the ranks of the army advancing deep into the mountains. If that was the case, then the first line of defence of the new province was very delicate indeed.

Despite his lowly rank, Pandarus had a sound grasp of the perennial problem afflicting every Roman commander since the invasion of Britannia had begun. Namely that in order to claim new territory, or to meet a threat, it was necessary to concentrate all available forces, but to maintain control over territory it was necessary to disperse forces. Either way, the initiative passed to the enemy, who could harass the frontier defences and then retreat into the mountains at the first sign of a larger Roman force, only to emerge again and continue their harassment once the danger had passed. It was the kind of warfare that the Deceanglians and their allies excelled at, resulting in the long years of attrition as the frontier rippled forward and ebbed back. The tribes’ only weakness lay in the occasional desire of their leaders to quench their thirst for glory by meeting the Romans in battle. It had been the undoing of Caratacus, and in time it would be the same for those that succeeded him. At least that was what the Roman high command was depending on, thought Pandarus.

‘We should be heading back to the fort,’ said Diomedes, breaking into his train of thought. ‘At this rate it’ll be dark before we do.’

‘Scared of the dark, are we?’ another rider chuckled. ‘Perhaps you joined the wrong cohort, Diomedes. You sound more like one of them Illyrians than a Blood Crow.’

Pandarus looked back over his shoulder and saw Diomedes rein in and drop back alongside his comrade with an angry expression.

‘You can fuck right off with that notion, mate. Call me one of those good-for-nothing bastards again and I’ll take your bloody head off.’

The man raised a hand and leaned away from Diomedes. ‘Easy there! I just said you sounded like one of ’em.’

‘That’s enough!’ Pandarus snapped. ‘Get moving, Diomedes. We’ll turn back to the fort when I say. Not before. Now, all of you, keep your mouths shut and your eyes and ears open. This is the enemy’s turf, and it’s better that we see them before they see us.’

The men fell silent and the patrol continued up the track. They were passing through a belt of pine trees beneath which dark shadows crowded in on either side, and Pandarus felt a light chill at the base of his neck. He could understand the men’s nervous chatter, their need for relief from the wearisome tension that came with every patrol into the enemy’s lands. The bitterness of the conflict between Rome and the mountain tribes meant there were few illusions about the fate of any Roman unfortunate enough to be captured. The Celts had a fondness for decorating their huts with the heads of their enemies.