Like all druids, he was arrogant and sure of himself. Like all Celts, he fought as though attack was all. Like all their kind, he overextended and opened himself up to quick attack by a trained soldier of Rome. Fronto raised his shield and angled it slightly to ward off the spear thrust as he lunged with his gladius. The tip tore through the dirty robe of the druid but to Fronto’s surprise met the unyielding metal of a finely-forged mail shirt beneath, striking sparks as it skittered across and past the man’s ribs, becoming lost in the voluminous folds of the man’s robe.
Almost in a panic, Fronto felt himself overbalanced and falling forward with the momentum. Just as surprised, the druid tried to step back to allow this Roman room to fall gracelessly forward where he could easily deliver the killing blow, but the press of his fleeing countrymen around him prevented the move. Desperately, Fronto toppled like a falling tree — his soft, useless boots unable to find purchase in the soaking mud — and was suddenly jerked straight as some unseen hand grasped the back of his cuirass and hauled him upright.
The druid had already recovered and had both spear and sword raised and pulled back ready to strike. That bubbling seething feeling in the pit of Fronto’s stomach began to boil. Anger coursed through him, vying with embarrassment.
He had been effectively babysat by his own legion, prevented from getting himself into trouble and, determined to do his part like a spoiled child — something he was beginning to recognise in himself, much to his irritation, he had found a way to involve himself in the fight only to seriously underestimate his opposition and have to have his arse hauled out of the fire by the same damn babysitters, proving them, beyond a shadow of a doubt, right!
Furious at himself, his men, this damn druid and his irritating people, this drizzly, wet and hopeless island, the endless bickering, backstabbing and uncertainty of Caesar’s army, his own limitations and even his apparent abandonment by Fortuna, Fronto snarled, his ire and anger forging a white hot spear in his brain.
He snapped.
Two hours later, lying propped up on a raised bench with a relatively soft pallet beneath him as the medical staff worked on him, he talked to Atenos, who, it turned out, was the man who had grabbed him and hauled him back up.
The huge man shook his head with a disbelieving grin.
“I’ve never seen anything quite like it!”
“What happened? I seem to remember punching that druid a few times.”
Atenos laughed out loud as the medicus stitched the cut on Fronto’s shoulder. “You really don’t remember? I honestly thought you might take them all on yourself!”
Fronto could feel himself flushing and knew he should be angry, but somehow there was not enough anger left in him. He just felt exhausted.
“It was like the great berserk rages of the heroes of our legends. You actually threw your shield at him.”
“You should have stopped me then. That’s stupid enough in itself. If a legionary did that, you’d have him beaten for his negligence.”
“I did try to stop you, legate. How d’you think I got this black eye? A Briton?”
Again, Fronto flushed.
“By the time I’d recovered,” the centurion grinned “so had the druid. You’d confused him a bit, I think, when you threw your shield at him, but that was nothing to his expression when you kicked him between the legs.”
“I did what?”
“Went down like a sack of grain, he did. I swear his eyes even crossed. I think you beat him about half a mile past the point of death. He looked more like a lamb stew than a man by the time you’d finished with him. All we could do was put a shield wall around you and stop you getting trampled as they fled.”
“Oh for the love of Juno!”
“Legionary Palentius tried to haul you off him. The other medicus is looking at him now to see if you broke his jaw.”
Fronto rubbed his head in a mix of embarrassment and tiredness.
“Anything else I need to know?”
“Not really, sir. After that you just sort of started laying about you among the fleeing Britons. I hate to think how many of them you sent to Elysium this afternoon. They only got you four times, and none of them bad — miraculous, really. Of course the men were around you as best they could manage, but it wasn’t easy. You were like a damned hedge-pig with that sword.”
“I honestly remember very little. I think I saw Galronus, but the first thing I really recall with any clarity was when you hauled me up off the floor. I think the enemy had gone.”
“It was over. I think you’d blacked out.”
Fronto leaned close to the huge Gallic centurion. “I’d take it as a personal favour if you tried to stamp on this before it becomes common knowledge?”
Atenos grinned. “I’ll do my best, legate, but you were in the middle of the army, and a bit of a sight. I suspect the story’s already spreading round the campfires.”
Fronto leaned back and winced as the suture the medicus was tying off pulled tight.
“Sit up, legate.”
Fronto looked across at the surgeon. “I’m trying. So tired. Sorry. Atenos, I think I’ll stay in the hospital for the night. You know… just in case.”
The big centurion nodded sympathetically.
“I’ll leave you in peace, sir. Get some sleep.”
Fronto was unconscious before the centurion had reached the door.
Chapter 19
(Beachhead on the coast of Britannia)
The ships looked distinctly unseaworthy to Fronto. He sat on a folding campaign stool on the beach under the shelter of a large leather awning watching the relentless driving rain batter the sea, the pebbles, the ships and everything in sight — which was not a great distance in these conditions. The sky was a leaden grey and the weather had not let up for more than an hour at a time in the three days since the battle had ended.
Kicking a pebble down the beach in irritation, he realised he was brooding on his actions in that conflict yet again, in spite of himself.
In the aftermath of the fight, Fronto’s reputation seemed quickly to have reached almost legendary status. Every time he heard the story of his frenzy the tale grew in magnificence and by rights he should probably be deified by now. Gradually, pieces of the struggle had returned to him, and the medicus had confirmed, much to his relief, that he’d received a blow to the head during the fight that was the most likely cause of his fragmentary memories of the attack rather than a simple complete loss of control and wit.
Still, despite Atenos and Carbo swearing to try and suppress the tale, it had exploded, and the legate had the sneaking, though unprovable, feeling that the two centurions may well be at the heart of its speedy spread.
By the end of that first day, he’d taken to closeting himself away, and by the afternoon of the second he’d been forced to go in search of new places to hide from people. If anyone had ever suggested that he might spend days hiding from people who wanted to buy him a drink, Fronto would have laughed in their face, but that time had somehow come.
In the end, this cold and blustery location was one of the few where he was almost guaranteed peace. Due to the value of the ships, the fortified beachhead was under constant guard, and only those with business here were allowed through the gate, meaning that the only soldiers the legate stood any chance of bumping into on the beach were sailors, engineers or other officers, all of whom had their own business to attend to.
It was not the most comfortable of places, though. The shelter had been erected days ago for the duty officer and his staff to oversee the repair and loading of the ships and, while it held off the rain from above, it did not keep the ground below dry or prevent the biting winds from along the beach or off the sea from whipping at him.