The two gladiators looked at him in disbelief.
‘You can’t-’
‘Just do it.’ Valerius barely recognized his own voice. He knew that if he hesitated for even a second he would turn and walk away. With Rodan’s Praetorians surrounding the villa there was only one way into the baptism chamber — through the subterranean passage ten feet below him. He was more frightened than he’d ever been in his life. More frightened even than in the final suffocating hours of the Temple of Claudius. There, he had persuaded himself he was already dead. Here, he had to live. For Olivia and for Lucius.
Reluctantly, Marcus used the bronze mirror to send the single flash that warned the men in the water castle to stop the flow.
‘Help me with this.’ Serpentius hesitated and Valerius’s fear made him snarl. ‘Help me or by the gods I’ll send you down there instead.’
The Spanish gladiator scurried to Valerius’s side and together they heaved the stone aside. Serpentius took an involuntary step back as the shaft opened up at his feet.
Valerius stared into the dank black opening. The inspection holes they’d checked at ground level had been perhaps three feet deep, with the water clearly visible at the bottom. This disappeared into the darkness like a wormhole leading to the River Styx. It was two feet in diameter with rough steps cut into the rock to allow a man to descend safely.
‘A lamp and a rope, at least,’ Serpentius pleaded. ‘I will fetch them quickly.’
‘We don’t have time. If the Christians finish their ceremony they’ll walk out into a trap and my father and Olivia will be taken.’
Valerius stripped to his loincloth and handed his clothes to Marcus, but took the belt with his dagger and hung it from his neck. He sat on the lip and closed his eyes. His father had talked of faith in his God. Now Valerius called upon his own faith. Faith in himself. Faith in his courage. He was a Hero of Rome, he wasn’t frightened by a little dark passage. Messor had given him the idea. Messor, the skinny legionary his comrades had nicknamed Pipefish, who had shown more bravery than all the rest put together when he had slithered into the soot-blackened hell of the hypocaust below the Temple of Claudius. The attempt had been doomed, of course, and poor Pipefish had died nailed to the temple door as the flames of Boudicca’s fire ate at his flesh. But he had got through the hypocaust and that was what gave Valerius hope.
Hope, but how much? Pipefish had been whip thin and greased with olive oil. Valerius was probably twice his breadth and his shoulders were heavily muscled from his daily training with sword and shield. How wide was the tunnel? How deep? He heard the water sound change below him from a violent rush to a musical gurgle. Soon. How wide? How deep? He wouldn’t know until he got down there. At least if it was too narrow he would be able to turn back, with his honour and his conscience intact. His father and Olivia might die, but he would have done his best. He tried not to hear the voice in his head willing the shaft to be impassable.
The gurgling faded to a whisper. It was time. He turned and his foot searched for the first step.
‘Wait!’ It was Marcus. What now? ‘The diversion. How will we know when you are ready to come out of the villa?’
Valerius cursed himself. Of course he should have thought of that. One more mistake that could kill him. He cast his mind back to the front of the villa. It was a large building, surrounded by a walled garden, with a heavy door set back from the street. He remembered three windows at first floor level, all of them visible from the alleyway where he would have to make his escape.
‘Give me my cloak and tunic.’ Marcus handed over the clothes and Valerius bundled the heavy cloak into a ball with the tunic at its centre. ‘I’ll wave the cloak at the window above the doorway. Count to one hundred and then start the diversion. I don’t care what you do, just get them away from the alley, but don’t set the city on fire.’
Though the sun was high above them, he had never felt so cold; chilled to the very centre of his being. With a last glance towards his companions he climbed into the shaft.
XXXIV
The chamber stank of damp and the steps under his bare feet felt as slippery as if they were coated with ice. He had to grip tight with his single hand until his toes found and secured each foothold, whilst holding the bundled cloak in the crook of his right arm. At least he had the comfort of the circle of light above him and the anxious faces of Marcus and Serpentius that almost filled it. He reached the bottom of the channel, identified by thick, oily weed between his toes. The fear was more palpable now, as if someone was gripping his legs and pulling him downwards. He filled his head with Olivia’s face and fought the feeling with all his strength. Carefully, he manoeuvred so that he was facing in the direction of the villa, before dropping to his knees. There was just enough space left to allow him to wriggle his legs backward into the opposite section of the tunnel. His nose was two inches from the brick face of the shaft and still he couldn’t bring himself to break free from that life-giving circle of light. For a moment he felt a wave of claustrophobic terror and his bladder filled with ice water. Rope. Serpentius had been right, he should have waited. With rope he could have tied a line round himself and they would be able to pull him back if he became jammed. If he went without rope he might be trapped down here for ever. He could go back.
Coward. He heard the word Ruth had never spoken ringing in his head. He closed his eyes. ‘I call on Messor and the spirits of Colonia to aid me.’ The whispered words sounded hollow in his ears, but the very act of saying them had the effect of the herb-infused ale the Britons drank before a battle. He felt warmth again, and his courage returned. He lowered his head and inched his shoulders forward into the pitch black of the tunnel mouth.
It was tight. Very tight. He had to hunch his shoulders to avoid being wedged against the ragged masonry. But was it tight enough to give him a reason to turn back? He wriggled to make himself more comfortable. How far? Maybe seventy paces to the villa. And what then? But he knew there was no use thinking about what then, because that could drive a man mad. What then meant the channel narrowing to a tiny pipe, or diving deep underground where a man would die screaming with no hope of ever being heard. He felt for the hilt of the knife to make sure it was still attached. If…? Don’t think. Just go.
At first, he tried to use his hands to haul himself along, but the walnut of his right could gain little purchase on the weed-covered stone and he made slow progress. Eventually he discovered that by pushing the bundle of his cloak forward, then digging his elbows into the walls and wriggling as if he were a snake, he was able to create a rhythm that gained him a few precious inches at a time. The tunnel roof was so low he felt it pressing down on his back and he suddenly realized that there truly was no going back. From nowhere the raw acid of panic filled his throat and poured like liquid fire into his chest. His head roared. He couldn’t breathe. He couldn’t move. His limbs thrashed helplessly in the confined space and he knew that if he didn’t stop now he would truly go mad. Think. His mind screamed the word. Think. His brain frantically clawed for some memory that would save him. A face. No, faces meant people and people died. Faces meant Ruth and Maeve and Cornelius and Publius Sulla and the girl whose baby he had promised to save. Faces meant people he had failed. Suddenly he was in a battle line, his shield tight against the next man’s, a sword firm in his hand. Death was all around him, but it meant nothing here, for this was the brotherhood of the warrior. The brotherhood of the shadow. And, in the shadow, he felt calm return. He was still trapped in a dark, airless tomb, but he was Valerius again, a Hero of Rome. He gritted his teeth, rammed his elbows into the walls and edged another six inches.