Her mouth was dry; she could feel sweat trickling down her back. Aurelia walked the few steps to Hippocrates’ couch. He was a slim man, perhaps twenty-nine or thirty years old. A close-shaven black beard couldn’t conceal his slender features. There the softness ended, however. His lips were thinned; his eyes glittered black and cold. She made sure to meet them for a moment before dropping her gaze. ‘I am at your disposal.’ The words tasted bitter in her mouth.
‘Agathocles said you were a looker.’
She didn’t know how to reply. Did he agree with the sentiment or not? ‘Sir.’
‘You are, I suppose, in an unusual way. I hope that your reputation is deserved. Get undressed.’
Aurelia couldn’t stop her gaze from flashing to the guards, the nearest of whom was only fifteen or so paces away. What did it matter? she thought. Many more people than these had seen her naked at the slave market. Doing her best to appear graceful, she slid the top of her dress off her shoulders. Slowly, she let it fall to her waist. There she paused, aware of Hippocrates’ keen eyes upon her. Swaying her hips, she walked to stand over him. He stared up at her, his lips open. He wasn’t ugly, Aurelia decided. It was a tiny consolation. When his hands reached up to pull her dress down further, she didn’t resist. Instead, she smiled.
Gods, help me through this, she asked. Gods, help me and Publius.
Chapter VII
Even at a distance of more than half a mile, Syracuse could impress. Its wall filled the whole southern horizon, the limestone blocks that formed it turned golden by the setting sun. Westward from the sea’s edge it ran, across the coastal plain and up on to higher ground beyond, where it disappeared into the orange haze. According to the messengers who carried orders between the Roman camps, it extended for a good twenty miles around the city. Quintus and his comrades had only seen this section, opposite the vast camp that their legion had built on its arrival, but it was more than enough to impress. Assaulting it by land or sea would be no easy matter.
Quintus, Urceus and their tent mates were standing on the packed-earth rampart a short distance from their unit’s tent lines. A sentry would move them on soon, but until then the view was worth it.
‘Which is worse?’ asked Quintus, belching. ‘Having your skull smashed by a stone from a catapult, or drowning when your ship sinks?’
Urceus drank deep and smacked his lips in appreciation. ‘That’s not bad stuff,’ he said, proffering the wine skin. ‘Like some?’
His friend was dodging the question, but Quintus wasn’t surprised. He and the rest of Corax’s maniple were part of the force that would assault the defences of Achradina, which lowered over the smaller of Syracuse’s two harbours. They would be attacking by sea, and Quintus had no doubt that there would be catapults and bolt-throwers aplenty where they’d land.
‘Give it here.’ He lifted the skin up by its end. Misjudging how much there was in it, he was unprepared for the tide of wine that rushed down his throat. He managed to swallow a couple of gulps while hurriedly lowering the leather bag, but couldn’t stop himself from coughing a good amount of it on to the ground.
There were chortles from the rest.
‘Don’t waste it,’ Urceus cried, grabbing the skin from Quintus.
‘Sorry,’ muttered Quintus, hating the burning feeling of the wine that had gone up into his nostrils. He’d drunk more than he had thought. It was all in an effort not to think about the hell that awaited them the day after tomorrow.
‘I’d rather drown,’ pronounced Felix, a skinny man with buck teeth. Forever dogged by misfortune — mainly at gambling — he was always being ribbed about his name. ‘Unlucky,’ everyone called him. ‘I can’t swim. I wouldn’t know a thing about it after a few mouthfuls of water.’
‘You’d know more than you would if your brains were splattered ten paces in every direction by a stone from a ballista!’ challenged Quintus.
‘What if I saw it coming, though?’ retorted Felix with a shudder. ‘No. Drowning would be better.’
A couple of the other men voiced their agreement, but Wolf gave a vehement shake of his head. He was a taciturn man who’d been a sheep farmer before enlisting, and who still wore the strip of wolf skin on his helmet that had marked him out as a veles. ‘I hate every bastard wolf that lives and breathes,’ he’d say to anyone who listened. ‘This bit of skin reminds me of the day I get my discharge. The first thing I’ll do is to go hunting.’
‘What is it, Wolf?’ asked Quintus.
Wolf ran a dirty fingernail down the links of his mail shirt. ‘Imagine trying to get this damn thing off as you sink. I can’t think of a worse way to die.’
Unlucky snickered. ‘That’ll teach you to go all fancy with your armour. For once, I don’t mind only having a breast- and back plate.’
‘You’d like a mail shirt too, Unlucky, admit it! If you weren’t so shit at dice, you’d have had one long ago. Two of them, even,’ Wolf flung back at him to a chorus of laughter.
Unlucky flushed and muttered something under his breath, but he didn’t dare challenge Wolf, whose unpredictable temper had won him few friends.
Even though Wolf was right, Quintus felt a little sorry for Unlucky. Nearly all the hastati in the maniple had mail shirts now: bought with their saved pay, won on a bet or through gaming, or pilfered from the dead after battles. Unlucky had taken one once from the body of a bandit that he’d killed, but lost it the next day in a wager. If Corax hadn’t been such a disciplinarian — missing pieces of equipment was not tolerated — Quintus reckoned that Unlucky would have long since gambled away his square chest and back plates too. His desire to wager was like a disease. He’d bet on anything: two slugs crawling on the ground, who’d fart the most times in one sentry watch, what the weather would be like the next day. As a consequence, he never had two obols to rub together. Wine was a luxury beyond him. ‘Give Felix a sup,’ Quintus said to Urceus.
Urceus popped the stopper in and flung the skin through the air.
Unlucky shot a grateful look at Quintus as he caught it. ‘Which do you fear more?’ he asked Quintus.
‘Drowning, for sure.’
‘Why?’
‘I’m not good at swimming and, like Wolf says, our mail shirts are damn heavy.’
‘Don’t wear it, then,’ advised Urceus with a leer.
‘If I did that, I’d get a sodding arrow in the chest,’ said Quintus.
‘It won’t make any difference what you do,’ said Wolf. ‘If Hades has picked your name, he’s picked it. You can’t do fuck all about it.’
Everyone laughed and Quintus finally let himself smile. There was no point in brooding over the coming offensive. It was going to happen, and he would be part of it. He had survived the fields of blood, had he not, and the years of war since? Plenty of men would die when Marcellus sent them to take Syracuse, but he didn’t have to be one of them.
‘Enjoying the wine?’ asked a familiar voice.
They all swung around, mumbling, ‘Yes, sir.’
‘At ease, at ease,’ said Corax, clambering up on to the rampart. He jerked a thumb at the skin, which Unlucky was still holding. ‘Anything left in that?’
‘Yes, sir.’ Unlucky passed it over.
Everyone watched as Corax drank several mouthfuls. ‘It’s not complete horse piss,’ he pronounced at length. ‘Who stole it?’ He eyed Wolf first, who was known for his ability to purloin everything from spare pieces of kit to rounds of cheese.
‘Not me, sir,’ protested Wolf, grinning.
‘You, Crespo?’
‘No, sir!’ replied Quintus.
‘I actually bought it, sir,’ said Urceus. ‘Thought I’d spend a bit of money on some half-decent stuff before the attack. In case, you know-’
‘That’s as good a reason as any.’ Corax lifted the skin. ‘Can I have another drop?’
‘Drink away, sir. Finish it if you like,’ urged Urceus.
‘I’m not about to do that. You might not say, but it’d piss you off,’ replied Corax after he’d slugged a final mouthful. ‘I need you on my side, to watch my back when we’re fighting those Syracusan bastards.’ He threw the skin back to Urceus.