“Dear gods,” Alasdair said quietly.
“What is it?” Kiana asked. She was not aware of the sentence passed on those who failed to pay their ransoms or were found to be former slaves or criminals.
Alasdair spurred his horse and rode towards the caravan. Roman auxiliaries, mounted on horses, flanked the long train of prisoners; their menacing presence preventing Alasdair from getting any closer. Kiana rode up beside him, her eyes widening as she saw some of the faces that peered out from behind the bars of their wheeled cages. Though most were the ragged countenances of thieves and slaves, she recognized one or two who were friends of Farquhar’s.
“Alasdair, what is happening to them?” she asked.
The young man swallowed hard. “They are the ones whose families refused to ransom them. They are being sent to the mines in Mauretania.”
“They are slaves?” Kiana was in shock. After the suffering and horror she had witnessed, this just added salt to the wounds. It was the final, and by far most brutal, retribution to come from the Romans.
“Once nobles with a future full of hope, promise, and prosperity,” he replied. “Now they are but slaves, to be sold and disposed of at the will of their new masters. The sulfur mines will break them. It would have been better had they died in battle.”
Kiana turned her gaze towards Alasdair. His face was set hard, and she could not help but notice that he somehow seemed much older; as though he had suddenly aged from a young boy into an old man.
“Come,” she said, “let us leave this despair behind. You still have a future, Alasdair. You may not have the life of privilege and wealth you had before, but at least you are alive and free. Farquhar would have wanted you to live life once again.”
Alasdair turned towards her and smiled weakly.
“Farquhar was, indeed, a lucky man, to have had you in his life. He loved you so much.” He then took a deep breath and exhaled hard through his nose. “Go home, Kiana. Know that I will always cherish our friendship; however, this journey I must finish alone.” With that he turned and slowly rode away.
Kiana did not protest as she watched him. Once he was out of sight, she turned and rode back towards her home. She had stayed with and comforted Alasdair as much as possible. It had been done out of the love she still bore Farquhar. The two had been like brothers. She then made a vow to herself that she would visit his grave on the anniversary of his death, placing one flower on the small monument his father had erected. Though she was still but a young girl, Kiana could not help but feel as if she, too, had been aged considerably by the Sacrovir Revolt.
Chapter XVIII: The New Assignment and Indus’ Horse
Silius sat with his hands behind his head, eyes closed. The ransoming of the prisoners was finally complete, those that remained on their way to enslavement in the mines of Mauretania, and the execution of the captured leaders of the rebellion had also been accomplished. Broehain had been allowed to be ransomed along with the prisoners. However, the rest of the rebel leaders had been crucified in full view of Augustodunum. He was physically and mentally exhausted, the rush of the full effects of the rebellion and its aftermath coming down on him. Suddenly, there was a knock at his door, and Calvinus walked in. Silius did not bother to open his eyes.
“Sorry to bother you, but I had to bring this to your attention,” the master centurion stated, a rolled parchment in his hand.
“What is it?” Silius asked with his eyes still closed.
“The cohort from Lugdunum is being recalled to their garrison station, their three-year tour in the region being complete. I took the liberty of looking at the rotation schedule for the Lugdunum garrison, and we happen to be next.”
“Damn it, I had forgotten about that,” the legate replied as he leaned forward and rested his forehead on his hand. He figured a spell at the bathhouse and brothel would do him good, except he was too exhausted to even leave his quarters. “I remember looking at that before we were distracted by the rebellion. We are fairly close to Lugdunum as it is, so whichever cohort we dispatch may as well head straight there from here. No sense in them even going all the way back to Cologne.”
“I agree,” Calvinus asserted. “Lugdunum is a rather posh assignment. I think it should fall upon whichever cohort distinguished itself the most on this campaign.”
“You are not taking the First,” Silius remarked wryly.
Calvinus only laughed at that.
“No, I did not mean my own cohort. Rather, I was thinking we should send the Third. They are the ones who took out Florus and brought Indus’ cavalry back with them. They also distinguished themselves during the main battle at Augustodunum.”
Silius nodded his consent.
“Very well, inform Proculus to get his men ready to move to Lugdunum. That is, if you haven’t done so already!” Calvinus could only grin at that.
Silius knew full-well that his master centurion had already given Proculus his orders, and he wouldn't have been surprised at all if the Third was already on the march. His trust in Calvinus’ judgment was absolute, and if he had said the Third Cohort needed to go to Lugdunum, then the Third Cohort needed to go to Lugdunum.
Indeed, the Third had been on the march for several hours by the time Calvinus informed Silius of their new assignment. Lugdunum was approximately four or five days march away, and the soldiers of the Third Cohort were looking forward to new horizons.
“Lugdunum, now that is the place for us!” Carbo asserted. “Warmer weather, prettier ladies. . Valens eyes lit up at Carbo’s last statement.
“Come again?” he asked.
“What he means is you won’t have to dip your wick into the vaginal wart holes of trashy frontier whores anymore,” Decimus answered.
“Decimus, you are eloquent as always,” Artorius rolled his eyes. “I have not heard what kind of billets they have for us, though.”
“I already checked into that,” Decimus answered proudly. As the section’s resident gossip, he took pride in rooting out information and had an alarmingly vast circle of sources. “It would seem there are blocks of flats at one end of town that the state purchased for our use. It seemed more practical than having to build us an entire fort. The only things they had to build were the drill halls, as well as an extra bathhouse.”
On the fourth day of the march, the Third Cohort chanced upon the same slave traders that Kiana and Alasdair had had the misfortune of coming across. Two young lads were being thrown to the ground by their merciless captors. One was sobbing incessantly while the other just lay limp. This fellow was being whipped by a burley slaver who wore nothing but a pair of breaches and a rag on his head.
“Get up you worthless little shit!” the man spat. He thrashed the lad thrice more with his barbed whip before kicking him hard in the ribs, which gave a sickening crunch. He then stood looking dumbfounded.
“Bugger it, I think this one’s dead,” he said to his companion, who was struggling with the other boy.
The rest of their caravan kept creeping along, both slavers and their quarry paying no heed to what was going on behind them.
“Just leave him to rot,” the other slaver retorted. “Meanwhile, I’m going to use this one for a bit of sport!” A deviant sneer crossed his face.
The lad, his own eyes full of terror, bit the man hard on the forearm. As the slaver screamed in pain, the young prisoner used the last of his strength to attempt to run from the scene. He was delirious with fear and had no idea he was heading straight for the column of Roman soldiers.
“Hey, you!” the slaver screamed, as his companion laughed at his plight. “Somebody stop him!”