When all the loot had been counted, a group of about twenty men and women were brought before him. They wore clothing of good quality, although some of their garments were very much the worse for wear. They stared about them apprehensively, clearly alarmed by these outlandish soldiers who had appeared from nowhere and displayed such ferocity.
"You are the captives of this little band of pirates, are you not?" Norbanus asked them in Greek.
"We are," said one of them, a tall, distinguished man who appeared to be Greek.
"Are you the spokesman of this group?"
The man looked at the others, who looked back at him blankly. "It would appear so."
"Excellent. I am Titus Norbanus, proconsul of Rome. You have heard of us?"
The man inclined his head. "We have heard reports of your return to Italy, Proconsul. We scarcely expected to see you in Cilicia. Might I inquire of our fate?"
"You may well rejoice in our advent among you. Rome is mighty, and Rome is orderly. I am offended by the disorder of this pirate business. Rome will correct this evil, in time. In the meanwhile, like the other captives in the other pirate towns we have liberated, you will be returned to your homelands by the first available transportation. Rome is just, and Rome wants only friendly relations with the people of the Middle Sea." He paused a moment. "Except, of course, for Carthage. We will destroy Carthage."
The tall man bowed, as did the rest. "Rome is merciful, indeed."
"I said just, not merciful," Norbanus corrected. "Mercy isan attribute of weakness. Justice and clemency are attributes of the strong. Nothing is stronger than Rome."
A woman stepped forward. "Proconsul, I am Atalanta, from Herakleion, on Crete. My ransom of two thousand Athenian drachmas has already been delivered. I was waiting on the next ship bound for Crete."
"Your ransom will be returned to you," Norbanus said grandly. "If any others among you have already been ransomed, report the sum to my quaestor and you will be repaid. Of course, I will want to see receipts. These pirates seem to be meticulous in their accounts, so there should be no problem." No sense letting them take him for a fool, he thought.
The liberated captives were led away, thanking him profusely, some of them coming forward to kiss the hem of his cloak.
"Nice bit of diplomacy, that," Lentulus Niger commented.
"It costs us nothing," Norbanus said, "and it spreads goodwill. These people we liberate will spread word throughout the eastern half of the Middle Sea that Rome has arrived and Rome is their friend, if they are wise. Without conquering a foot of ground, we've put much of the East in Rome's debt and made the rest terrified of us. When Roman armies show up for the real conquest, our enemies will already be half-defeated by their own fears."
By afternoon, Norbanus had sold all the captives to the Syrian slave traders who followed the army like vultures. He made arrangements for the liberated prisoners to be taken to the nearest port city, where they could take a ship for home, and as always reminded the escort what a terrible fate awaited them should their charges not reach their destination safely. Norbanus found it a wise policy always to assume the worst of foreigners and took precautions accordingly.
Preparations for dinner were well under way when lookouts stationed on a headland jutting into the sea signaled that a ship approached. Shortly thereafter the vessel appeared and they saw at once that it was not a pirate ship returning to its base. It was a small galley under sail in a favorable wind, and upon its square sail was painted Jupiter's eagle, clutching thunderbolts in its talons.
Cato set down his cup. "The Roman navy appears at last!" Previously, they had seen only Greek ships commandeered by Rome, usually carrying orders from the Senate which Norbanus always found excuses to ignore.
"Whatever does the noble Senate want now?" Norbanus grumped. "Does anyone want to wager that it's something other than 'come home right this minute'? As if I weren't hurrying there as fast as I can!"
The others maintained detached expressions. Norbanus had had plenty of opportunity to arrange for sea transportation to Italy. He just had no intention of doing so. He was embarked upon his own personal epic and wanted no interference with it.
An hour later the ship was made fast to the town's wharf and a Roman official strode into the square and up to the house where Norbanus and his staff sat at dinner. He wore a silvered cuirass and helmet and his tunic and cloak were blue. Romans had not used blue as a military color since giving up their navy more than a century previously.
"Servius Papirius Caldus," the man announced. "Naval quaestor of the Brundisium fleet. Which of you is Titus Norbanus?" Of course there was no question which was Norbanus, but no Roman would admit to recognizing another purely because of his splendor.
"I'm Norbanus. Have a seat, Papirius, you look hungry. I never heard of a naval quaestor or a Brundisium fleet, but times are changing fast, it seems. Is your ship truly all Roman?"
Papirius took a seat and accepted a cup of wine. "We have a Greek sailing master and a few experienced Greek crewmen, but the rest are Italian. We'll depend on the Greeks for a while, until we've more experience at sea. I'm carrying messages from the Senate, plus a sealed letter from your father, the consul." He looked around at the officers seated at the table, all hard-faced men wearing an unusual amount of gold. He looked at the great heap of loot before the steps, then he turned back.
"We sailed too far east at first and learned in Tarsus that you'd already passed. Then we turned around and just followed the smoke of burning towns until we caught up with you. You certainly seem to have made your mark on this part of the world."
"We have made the presence of Rome felt," Norbanus said modestly.
"It looks like it's been fun," Papirius said. "But I think your adventure is about to come to an end. These are excellent figs, by the way."
Norbanus's eyes narrowed. "End? What do you mean?"
Papirius spat out an olive pit. "There's a big fleet of transports just been built and undergoing sea trials when I left Brundisium. They'll be coming this way to pick you all up and fetch you back to Italy. They could be sailing this way already."
Everyone looked at Norbanus, whose face had turned to stone. "Excellent," he grated at last. "We shall be home sooner than anticipated."
"Unless," said Lentulus Niger, "the omens prove unfavorable to a sea voyage." He eyed his plate innocently as he said it.
"And," Cato commented, "we are well into fall. The good sailing days are numbered." He eyed Norbanus above his cup.
Titus Norbanus suppressed a smile. These two had been loyal in the field, but they had been his adversaries in all else. But he had enriched them beyond their wildest dreams, giving them leading parts in the greatest adventure in the history of Rome. Now they were his, their fortunes committed to his.
"Of course," he said, "anything could happen."
Papirius nodded. "I suppose." He dipped a piece of bread into a pot of olive oil in which fragrant herbs steeped. "You got word about the defeat on the Arnus?"
"We heard," Niger said grimly. "The report that came with the last ship from Rome didn't give us much in the way of details."
Papirius launched into a colorful description of the debacle. As always happened, a few survivors had made it across the river and back to Rome in the days after the battle, so the people had a fairly clear account of the fighting to supplement Aemilius's bare-bones dispatches to the Senate. While Papirius spoke, Norbanus turned over the possibilities in his mind. It was not in his nature simply to defy the Senate. He was far more inclined to turn this annoyance somehow to his own advantage.