The Night Witch’s crew were already hard at work digging a grave for their comrades when he reached the river, Thracius nodding his respect as the Roman pushed the bloodied spear’s head into the ground, dropped the shield he had taken from the dead man beside it and dismounted. They dug in silence, Martos and Lugos taking spades from the first men to tire and working alongside the sailors to deepen the hole until the master judged it sufficient to protect their comrades from carrion animals.
‘Get them in and fill it up. We’ll say the words later, when we know we won’t be joining them for a quick trip across the Styx.’
Marcus made his way down to the Night Witch, releasing Gurgen from his bonds and placing the shield beside the king, who had fallen into a deep sleep despite the hectic events taking place around him.
‘This may prove useful for the king’s protection.’
The noble looked dourly at the blood speckled across the Roman’s tunic, then at the pool of blood left in the boat’s curved bottom by the crew member who had fallen to the thrown spear.
‘His blood, or another’s?’
Marcus looked down at the stains.
‘One of yours, a wounded scout. He probably wouldn’t have lived long, there were two arrows in him.’
‘A mercy killing then.’
The Roman looked up, but where he had expected to find a stare of irony, Gurgen’s face was sympathetic.
‘Perhaps. He was still trying to kill me, when I put him down.’
‘No man can do any more to bring honour to his name. He would have been grateful for the speed of your strike, at the end. As you may come to understand, when we reach Ctesiphon …’
Bodies buried, and with the dead Parthians and their horses left to lie where they had fallen, the vessel’s crew reboarded and cast off, raising the sail at the master’s command.
‘They’ll be too tired to row after that, and I reckon the river’s running too fast for oars in any case. I’ll let half of them get some sleep while the rest help me steer this bitch.’
Marcus watched while he skippered the boat through the seemingly unending succession of bends in the river. Those crew who hadn’t rolled themselves into their hides and immediately fallen asleep worked constantly to adjust the sail’s angle to the wind, while Thracius steered the vessel expertly around the river’s meanderings. He looked round to find Marcus studying his expert use of the rudder to cut each bend in the river as closely as he dared, and pointed back at the storm-laden northern horizon.
‘If you want to do something useful Tribune, you could keep an eye open back the way we came? I’d like some warning if we’re going to be run down by several hundred of those bastards, because being taken alive by those animals isn’t on my list of good ways to die. And wash that blood out of your tunic before it dries hard, you’re supposed to be a Roman emissary but you look more like a river pirate.’
‘A pirate? There are bandits on the river?’
The master laughed tersely.
‘Why else do you think we carry weapons? You’re not sailing the Middle Sea now, young sir, the river we’re heading for carries enough wealth to make an unscrupulous crew who aren’t afraid of the sight of blood rich very quickly indeed, if they don’t pick the wrong ship to attack. And trust me, when you consider just how much fun it is to earn a living from fishing, it’s no surprise that more than one village on the Euphrates harbours pirates.’
The Night Witch ran south before a freshening northerly wind, the oncoming storm’s gusts bellying her sail, and after a while the master told his men to bring down the canvas and raise a smaller sheet in its place.
‘The wind’s getting too strong, the mast’ll break if I leave that sail up! And the river’s running so fast that all I really need is enough of a push to keep control of her heading!’
The shouted words were torn from his mouth by the wind’s scream, barely audible to Marcus from less than a foot away, the two men watching the crew fight to pull the sail down without losing it.
‘If it gets much worse we’ll have to take shelter against the bank!’
A yell from behind made them both turn, to find a sailor pointing back up the river into the mass of darkness that dominated a third of the sky, his eyes fixed on the horizon. Against the brooding tower of iron-grey cloud, the smudge of ochre dust was almost invisible as it blew straight towards them, and Marcus shook his head as he realised that their pursuers were almost certainly riding into the gritty, choking fog churned up by their horse’s hoofs. The master looked at the dust plume for a moment, then turned back to the river ahead of them, turning the rudder to accommodate yet another bend.
‘That puts mooring up out of the question! There’s another two or three miles to run before we reach the Khabur, so it’s going to be a close thing whether they catch us before we make the turn, from the look of it! But if we do get there first, the river runs straight and true for a few miles, pretty much, a chance for us to lose them by running as fast as this bitch’ll go when she doesn’t have to make a turn every few dozen paces!’
Cupping his hands he bellowed an order at the struggling sailors.
‘Leave that sail up! I want every last bit of speed out of the old cow!’
Listing violently under the wind’s harsh treatment, with the crew taking turns to lean out over the hull’s side to keep the Night Witch from turning over, Thracius guided his vessel through the Mygdonius’s remaining bends with cool-headed precision, never once looking back to check on their pursuers’ progress, so intent was he on cutting each turn as finely as possible. After a few moments Marcus saw a second, smaller dust plume separate itself from the main body and begin to outpace the larger group. He shouted to the master, pointing back to the north.
‘They’ve detached a party of outriders on the fastest horses! How much more of this river do we have to cover?’
The older man shrugged, putting the rudder over and aiming for the apex of the next bend.
‘A mile or so? I’ve been concentrating on not sinking, not bend counting!’
The enemy advance party came on swiftly, thrashing their horses mercilessly as if they knew that they would lose the chance to stop the boat’s escape if they didn’t reach a shooting position before the Night Witch made her imminent turn south into the Khabur’s course. Marcus momentarily considered getting Martos to string a bow and ready himself to shoot back at them, then realised that with the wind so strong in their faces the effort would be futile. The master shouted encouragement to his crew, pointing to a massive rock on the riverbank as he guided the vessel round the next bend so tightly that Marcus could have reached out and touched the enormous boulder.
‘We’re almost there! I recognise that rock! Just three more bends!’
The boat was heeled over in a turn to the west, and in the moment before the master snapped the rudder over to haul her around the river’s bend to the east, Marcus stared over the vessel’s right-hand side at the oncoming riders. The main body were too distant to be any threat, but the outriders were close enough that he could make out individual horsemen, spectral figures engulfed in the dust of their passage. Thracius flicked a swift glance over his shoulder.
‘How close are they?’
‘A mile or so!’
The older man’s scowl of concentration hardened, his eyes locked on the next bend, and with nothing to contribute the Roman stared back over the stern, attempting to calculate the fast closing distance between the hunters and their intended prey.
‘I’d be amused, if it weren’t for the fact that I’ll soon be dead if we don’t outrun them!’
Martos had come to stand next to him, bracing himself against the boat’s side as the master threw his rudder over and slewed the vessel into another hard turn.