Sounds of fighting from the slopes: the auxilia on guard duty up the trail had finally noticed the attack and doubled back to drive off the archers. From the arrow-struck barricade the men of the Sixth saw running figures on the higher slopes, and heard the distant yell and cry of combat. But it was clear that most of the attackers had fled.
‘Centurion!’ Aelianus called. Castus jogged over to where the man was kneeling. Speratus lay beside him, an arrow in his thigh. Not a mortal wound, unless it had cut an artery, but Speratus was twisted with pain, delirious, his face swelling and turning dark red. As Castus – and the others who had gathered around – watched, Speratus’s body convulsed; his mouth champed and frothed. Aelianus had been holding the wounded man, but now he released him and backed away in horror.
‘Poison,’ somebody said quietly.
Before long, Speratus lay silent, blue-lipped, his body still twisted and racked. Castus eased down his shoulders, and a long-held shudder ran through him.
‘Four of you, bury him and the others, as deep as you can,’ he said. ‘The rest, get back to work.’
There were more barricades further along the valley, but rather than try and cut through them the troops made long slow detours, scaling up the valley sides through the trees, dragging the protesting mules behind them. The column split apart, spreading into three ragged single files, snaking up and down the slopes, scrambling along narrow rocky dirt paths. It was late afternoon before they closed around the next village.
‘We’re flanking,’ Castus told his men, as they gathered around him on the slope in the dapple of light. Some eased themselves down to squat in the bracken, braced on their propped spears. ‘That means we move as quick and quiet as we can down this hillside and across the stream in the valley down there. That bit of yellow you can see beyond the stream is a field of barley – we follow the ditch around the rear of the field and wait there until we hear the trumpets of the main column attacking from over there. Then we go in, through the field and into the town.’
It was all they needed to know. It was all Castus knew himself; the orders had been passed down from Jovianus, and beyond him from the army commanders. There were other small units moving up on similar duties around the perimeter of the settlement; this time, the enemy would not be allowed to run.
The soldiers drank water, then began the descent. The slope was steep, and they felt their way down with reaching spears, clasping at the trees to either side. Already the sun was low in the sky, the long summer day slipping towards evening. From the lower slopes, the men could see the huts and fences below them, the orderly patchwork of fields, the animal pens and the cattle byres. Smoke rose slowly from several of the huts. Smoke of cooking fires and hearths. Soon, Castus thought, there would be far more smoke than that.
Scrambling down the last descent, the century formed a double column and splashed across the stream. Crouched low, they followed the shallow ditch up the rear of the barley field. Once Castus drew level with the largest house at the edge of the settlement he motioned his men to halt. They dropped down gladly, settling themselves along the trench where the wall of barley would screen them from any sentinels in the village.
Castus sat on the baked lip of the ditch, his heels in muddy water. He took a chunk of spiced sausage from his haversack and pared off a slice, then chewed patiently. It could take a while for the main column to move up along the valley. The sun was still hot, and he took off his helmet to cool his sweating head.
‘Centurion,’ said Diogenes, dropping down to sit beside him, ‘may I ask you something?’
Castus just looked at him and grunted, still chewing. The sausage was very tough.
‘Do you ever experience fear, before going into combat?’
Castus chewed a bit more, then swallowed hard. The chunk of sausage jerked its way down his throat. ‘Of course,’ he said. ‘Only madmen and liars say otherwise.’
‘Then you are afraid of death?’ Diogenes asked, as if this were some novel philosophical concept. They were both speaking quietly, barely above a mumble.
‘Never said that,’ Castus replied. ‘What’s death? The ground opens up and down you go, and you know nothing about it afterwards.’ Although, he thought, he would not care to die as Speratus had earlier that day, frothing and writhing.
‘But you say you’re afraid? Of what, if not death?’
Castus thought for a moment. It was something he had never properly considered. ‘Wounding,’ he said at last. ‘Being crippled. When it comes to swords and spears, there’s plenty of sharp iron all around you. Anyone can get a hamstring cut, or lose a hand or an eye. Even a simple wound can fester, then you lose a limb. And then what?’
‘And then… what?’
‘If you’ve served your sixteen years you can get an honourable discharge with pay, land and tax exemptions, otherwise you’re out of the army with the bare minimum.’ He failed to suppress a twitch of superstitious dread. His father had ended his army career like that – fifteen years in the legion, then he lost half his left hand in a skirmish on the Danube frontier and could no longer grip a shield. The army had no use for cripples. The bitterness of that had poisoned his father’s mind, and he had passed that poison on to Castus himself, in kicks and blows and savage words.
Diogenes sat silently for a while, digesting. From the village a rooster crowed, loud and raucous. Birds were wheeling about the sky.
‘I was afraid during the fight on the riverbank,’ Castus said quietly. He wanted nobody else to hear. ‘During it, not before. I thought I’d led the men into something that was going to get them all killed.’
‘Fear of shame, then?’
‘I suppose so,’ Castus said. Shame, he thought, was the worst punishment of all.
The sound of the trumpets was sudden and clear, riding across from the direction of the valley. Immediately afterwards came the echo of a massed war cry as the legions stormed into the western end of the settlement. Castus was already up on his feet, lacing his helmet straps beneath his chin, the rest of the men quickly rising behind him as he swung his shield to the front and strode into the swaying wall of barley.
They moved with a steady crackling step, breasting through the barley with their shields, trampling loose stalks beneath their boots as the pollen dust rose around them. Every man had spear or javelin readied, eyes fixed on the edge of the village. There was a brief noise of clacking chickens from behind the huts, but the only other sound was the rush and swish of the massed stalks parting before the advancing troops. Off on their right flank Castus could see other units also moving, scrambling along culverts and across meadows, closing around the village from all directions. He was braced for the first cries from between the huts, the first arrows or javelins slicing down from the clear sky.
‘After me!’ he shouted as he neared the edge of the field, and broke into a run, kicking through the last of the crop. Behind him his men sprang forward, erupting into a broken roar.
There was another ditch at the field edge, then an earth bank up to a fence of close-woven wattles. Castus leaped across the ditch in a stride, his boots grinding the loose soil from the bank; then he slammed his sword into the wattles of the fence. The dry weave of sticks burst apart, and he heaved his shield against the breach until it was wide enough to pass through.
Inside the broken fence, the smell hit him first; then he felt his boots slide beneath him and managed to catch himself clumsily before he fell sprawling. Wet puddled manure underfoot, and a great muddy sow staring at him from the corner of the sty. Two more men crashed through the fence behind him, then gasped in disgust.
‘Through here,’ Castus yelled over his shoulder. He crossed the pigsty, stamping through liquid shit, and kicked at the gate. The flimsy boards shattered, and he charged through the gap.