Cato laughed. ‘That’s better! There’s been too much doom and gloom of late . . .’
Then his expression changed and he clenched his mouth shut tightly for an instant before he regained control over the grief that threatened once again to overwhelm him. He knew that he could not afford to give in to his private tragedy. Not now, when the lives of his men depended upon him concentrating all his efforts on doing his duty. There would be time to dwell on Julia’s death later. And if he did not survive the challenges of the coming days, then so much the better. He would be spared the awful anguish of losing his beautiful wife and they would be reunited in the shades that followed this life. He did his best to thrust all thoughts of Julia aside as he drew a long, deep breath and his expression became serious.
‘You must get your men out of here, Centurion.’
‘What about the wagons, sir?’
Cato looked round and saw the vehicles, snow drifting up against the wheels. The mule teams stood in their traces, heads down, as flakes settled lightly on their hides before immediately starting to melt.
‘Leave them behind. They’ll only slow us down.’
‘And the mules?’
That was a different matter. Mules were valuable and could not be allowed to fall into enemy hands. In other circumstances Cato would have ordered Macro to kill them all, but they might be of use to the army. ‘Unharness them and take ’em with you. They can carry kit, or casualties. And if the time comes, they are always useful as meals on the hoof.’
‘Yes, sir.’ Macro made a face. ‘Not my first choice of meat.’
‘With what may lie ahead, I doubt it will be the worst thing we eat. You’d better get going, Macro. And be certain to take that horse I assigned to you.’
They clasped forearms and Macro spoke. ‘Don’t take any unnecessary risks, you hear?’
‘We’ll be fine. The mounts are fresh and we’ll be able to keep ahead of the enemy. Just make sure you’re ready to turn and support us when we rejoin the column.’
‘I’ll see to it. Good luck, sir.’
Macro released his grip and they exchanged a salute before he turned away and called the order for his cohort to form up. The legionaries waded calf-deep through the snow to take their places, and when all were ready, Macro gave the order to advance. Cato watched as his friend climbed into the saddle of his mount and trotted to the front of the cohort to lead his men away through the flakes drifting down from the night sky. Soon they were gone, leaving the Roman lines to Cato, his men and the dead. The latter were like sculptures, thought Cato, as he watched the snow building up against them and settling on their heads, where there was no longer any warmth to melt it. They would be covered by dawn if the snow continued. Ill-defined hummocks in the winter landscape, waiting to be discovered by the enemy.
Cato pushed the morbid image aside and made his way forward to the centre of the line, where Miro and the reserve squadron stood with the Blood Crows’ standard. The men were walking up and down to keep their feet from freezing, and cupping and blowing into their hands. Their mounts stood, heads down, as a slight breeze picked up from the direction of the mountains and blew down the valley.
Cato exchanged a nod with Miro before the latter spoke. ‘How long are we staying here, sir?’
‘Long enough to give Valens and the others time to reach the main column. Till dawn at any rate.’
As he spoke, Cato realised that he had lost all sense of time, thanks to his mind being dulled by exhaustion. At that point he would have given a year’s pay just to be sitting by a fire in the warmth of a barrack block in Viroconium, sipping heated wine. Or better still, back in Rome, with Julia at her father’s house. The sharp stab of agony that came with the unbidden image drove away his weariness at once, and he cleared his throat.
‘Better make sure the horses are fed. They’ll need their strength later. Pass the word to the other squadrons.’
Miro bowed his head and spoke to his men before climbing into the saddle to carry out his orders. Cato was relieved when he left, as he had become weary of the decurion’s constant fretting. He began to pace up and down in front of the standard to keep his limbs from growing numb. The snow was already seven or eight inches deep, and he kicked it up until he had worn a narrow track as he strode to and fro, thirty steps at a time. At length Miro returned and they stood waiting as snow began to sweep in at an angle on the strengthening wind, until it became a blizzard, swishing past Cato’s ears.
It was an hour or so later, as best he could estimate, when a rider came in from the right flank, snow bursting from the ground as his mount’s hooves kicked it up.
‘Beg to report, enemy’s on the move, sir!’
‘What are they up to?’ Cato snapped. ‘Exactly.’
The rider swallowed and drew a breath. ‘We sighted a party of infantry moving to outflank us. Decurion Themistocles says he will shadow them until he receives further orders.’
Cato nodded to himself. It was time, then. The natives were clearly keen to clear the mouth of the pass as soon as possible, so that their army could move against the Romans at first light.
‘Tell the decurion to wait for the trumpet signal. The moment he hears it, he is to fall back to the campfires. Go!’
The rider pulled on his reins, swung his horse round and galloped back through the snow. Cato turned to Miro and the others. ‘Mount up!’
The men needed no encouragement to climb into their saddles, and the squadron swiftly made ready. As they waited, spears in hand, Cato stared directly ahead, squinting into the gloom. At last he saw them, a line of figures advancing across the snow. At the same time, he heard muffled shouts from his left and he turned to the trumpeter.
‘Give the signal!’
The trumpeter raised his brass horn, pressed his lips to the mouthpiece and blew. A thin, uncertain note issued from the flared end, and Cato realised that the cold must have chapped the man’s lips.
‘Spit, for Jupiter’s sake! Spit, man!’
The trumpeter turned his head aside and hawked up a gobbet before turning back to his instrument. This time he puffed his cheeks and blew, and the note was sharp and penetrating. He repeated it three times before resting, then gave the signal again. As he did so, the enemy warriors in front of the squadron halted, unsure of what lay ahead of them. Then a voice bellowed, angrily, and they came on again, apparently heedless of the caltrops that had surprised them the previous day.
‘Blood Crows!’ Cato called out. ‘Fall back!’
The Thracians wheeled about and trotted towards the glow of the fires, which still burned faintly through the gloom. A short distance further on, Cato glimpsed more horsemen to his right, and for an instant wondered if they might be the enemy, but then he saw the squadron pennant and breathed a sigh of relief. He halted Miro and his men close to what was left of the fire where he had last seen Macro. The blaze had died down and only small flames flickered in the wind amid the embers and ash. Around the fireplace, the bodies were almost covered in snow. Cato waited anxiously for the first squadron to reach them, then two more came in: those assigned to patrol the front. Then the left flank. Only Themistocles and his squadron remained out in the blizzard.
Corvinus approached Cato with an anxious expression as he reined in alongside. ‘They’re moving round the left flank, sir. We saw ’em just after I heard the signal.’
‘They’re trying to force both ends of the line. Makes sense,’ Cato replied. Then he heard shouts to his right, and the unmistakable clash of steel. All the men with him instantly turned towards the sound, and it took a beat before Cato recovered his wits and shouted the order to form a line to the right. The Blood Crows hurriedly fanned out, hefting their shields up to cover their bodies and adjusting the grip on their spears. The sounds drew louder, and then Cato saw the first of the flank squadron’s riders tearing through the snow towards them. He rode ahead of the line to intercept the man and saw that he had been wounded in the leg, blood dripping from his boot, black in the night.