Sergius shook his head.
‘No. Prefect Belletor doesn’t believe in encouraging the use of any but the standard issue weapons. You?’
‘No, our archers are all concentrated in one century. I’ll see what I can do while I’m inside the walls. I’ve got an idea that might allow us to keep Obduro’s men at bay for a while, even if it is a bit risky. It would help if you had a fire burning by the time I’m back, and some torches ready to go. There’s a stack of them on the cart.’
He turned away, one hand reflexively straying to the knife’s handle. Sergius put a hand on his shoulder.
‘Wait. A red tunic will stand out like a horse’s cock once you’re through those gates. You!’ He pointed to a soldier of similar build to the hulking centurion. ‘Get out of your armour and switch tunics with the centurion here.’ The legionary took one look at the determined expression on his officer’s face and put down his weapons, gesturing to his mates to help him unfasten his segmented armour’s complicated straps and buckles. Julius nodded and unfastened his belt once more, pulling off his own tunic to reveal his muscular body.
‘Appreciated, colleague. A different colour will be one more thing to give anyone that comes after me a moment’s pause.’ He winked at the soldier busy divesting himself of his equipment. ‘Mine was clean on today, so it doesn’t smell too bad. And I’ll try not to get blood on yours; it’ll never come out of white wool.’
Julius rapped at the city’s south gate with the handle of his dagger, hammering its iron pommel on the brass rivets that studded the door’s wooden surface.
‘Julius, Centurion, First Tungrians! I need to get back into the city! Open this door or suffer the consequences!’
With the sound of bolts being pulled back the wicket gate opened a crack, and a beady eye regarded him through the opening.
‘Leaving’s one thing, but letting you back in’s another. We’ve got orders from our commander not to admit…’
Knowing that his mission into the city would be over before it even began if the man on the other side secured the man-sized opening, Julius acted without conscious thought, kicking hard at the door and sending it flying open, battering the man behind it with a face full of wood. Stepping quickly through the doorway he switched the knife to his left hand and scooped up the fallen gatekeeper’s spear, looking grim-faced around him at the remaining two men.
‘Recognise me now, do you? I’ve private business in the city, and you’d be wise not to get in my way!’
One of the men, dressed like his fallen comrade in the uniform of the city guard, raised his hands in recognition of the Tungrian’s evident willingness to do them grievous harm, while the other backed away slowly, putting a hand to the hilt of his sword. Julius appraised him for a moment, noting the swirling tattoo that sleeved his right arm.
‘Petrus’s man, are you? I thought I caught a glimpse of someone just like you scuttling along behind us as we marched down from the barracks.’ He stamped forward without warning, slinging the spear so fast that the gang member’s sword was less than half drawn when the flying iron spitted him clean through the sternum. Julius ripped the spear free from the dying man’s body as he lay kicking and gasping on the cobbles, lifting the knife to the remaining gatekeepers. ‘It’s time to make a choice, lads. If I find this gate heaving with Petrus’s men when I come back it’ll be an inconvenience, but nothing more. And if you do sell me out, then once this is all sorted I’ll make a point of coming for you. And when I do, mark me well, what he’s going through now will look tame by the time I’m done with the two of you.’
The city’s streets were almost empty, Tungrorum’s population clearly having taken fright at the threat of impending violence by the gangs that ruled so much of their everyday lives. Whether it was fear of Obduro’s band or Petrus’s enforcers, hardly a soul was out of doors despite the fact that there was still an hour or so to sunset. Julius walked with swift caution into the maze of streets that was the city’s eastern quarter, deliberately taking a roundabout route to his objective in hopes that Petrus’s men would be concentrated mainly to the west. Hearing voices from a street that opened barely twenty paces to his left he ducked into a doorway and hefted the spear, ready to fight if need be, silently cursing himself for not bringing his sword.
‘… so it looks like Petrus missed his chance to grab the gold, and now the bastards have gone to ground somewhere in the city, so it’s a shared venture. Whoever finds them only has to get the word out and make sure they don’t move again, before the other gangs come together around them. They may be soldiers, but there’ll be too many of us for them to hold off, and we can always burn them out if need be. So keep your eyes open for any sign of them; I’ll pay a double share to the man that takes me to them.’
Julius waited in the doorway, barely breathing, and after a moment a pair of men stalked past without sparing his hiding place a second glance, deceived by the way the white tunic blended with the house’s dingy paintwork in the shadowed evening light. Blowing out a long, slow breath of relief, he muttered a quiet prayer of thanks to Cocidius and, once the hunting gang members had vanished from sight, stepped back into the street with the spear held ready, shaking his head at the good fortune with which he had evaded discovery and muttering under his breath.
‘Enough of this subtlety, then.’
Moving quickly, sliding along the walls of the houses on the shadowed side of the street, he made a beeline for the Blue Boar, taking shelter in doorways at any suggestion of the men hunting for gold through Tungrorum. The voices of the hunters echoed through the empty streets on several occasions, but simple luck kept them out of his path, and soon enough he was within a hundred paces of the brothel, peering cautiously round the corner at its imposing bulk and measuring the time it would take him to reach the spot he recalled from his last visit. Without conscious thought he was moving, sprinting across the empty street and fetching up against the shrine with a scrape of hobnails on stone that echoed down the street.
A voice echoed around the corner from the brothel’s entrance, swelling in volume as whoever it was left their position at the main door and headed to investigate the sound.
Fumbling with fingers that felt like sausages he reached behind the tiny statue, slid the heavy key home and pulled it to the right, easing the massive iron bolt out of its stone slot just as he’d done before, then he put his shoulder to the door’s stone-clad wood and heaved it into the passage beyond. Diving through the narrow gap he turned to push the hidden entrance’s door closed, and slid its bolt home with a soft click of well-greased metal, breathing as shallowly as he could. After a moment muffled voices reached him through the tiny holes drilled in the shrine’s wall for the purpose.
‘Well, I know what I heard. And that candle I lit for Arduenna is on the ground. Someone’s been here all right, and not long ago; this wax is still warm. You’d better get inside and get some of the boys out here.’
Another voice answered, unmistakably that of the man called Baldy.