A centurion from the guard came striding up from the naval party on the wharfside, where Fabius had noticed a commotion a few minutes earlier beside a transport ship. The centurion slapped his breastplate in salute. ‘Ave, primipilus. I would speak with Scipio Aemilianus.’
‘What is it?’
‘We have a deserter.’
Fabius pursed his lips, and led him to Scipio. The centurion spoke quickly, and pointed back to the ship’s crew, who were assembled on the quay. Two legionaries dragged a man from among them and brought him before Scipio. Fabius looked at the man in astonishment: it was one of the marines who had accompanied him on the liburna, who had fought alongside him when they had boarded the lembos. The centurion turned to Scipio. ‘This man was a marine with the special assault unit, but his true identity was revealed when a veteran of the Macedonian war identified him. He then ran, discarded his armour and weapons and tried to join that transport crew in disguise, but he was recognized. It turns out that he had first deserted at the Battle of Pydna, twenty-two years ago. He changed his name and lived a quiet life as a fisherman near Ostia, but says that he could not bear the remorse and joined up again three years ago, when he saw that the galleys were being fitted out for the assault on Carthage. His optio in the marines says that he has been a brave fighter in several naval actions, killing many of the enemy and putting himself in front of the other men, including the action with Fabius.’
Fabius looked at the man, and at Scipio. They were about the same age: tough, sinewy men with grey-flecked hair, the sailor darker-skinned and more swarthy from years at sea, but both hard-eyed and strong. They were men whose lives had been shaped by the battle they had experienced as teenagers: Scipio to live up to it and the reputation of his father, the other man to make amends for the guilt of desertion that had clouded his life. They stood together now in front of the walls of Carthage as they had stood before the Macedonian phalanx all those years before — one of them resolute and unwavering, the other baulking and abandoning his comrades.
Scipio turned to Fabius. ‘What do you have to say for this man?’
‘He personally accounted for many of the enemy. On one occasion he put himself over a fallen comrade to protect him. Had I been of sufficient rank to do so, I would have recommended him for the ornamentalia. He fought bravely and with honour.’
‘Then he shall be spared being beaten to death by his comrades, and will be yours to deal with as primipilus.’ Scipio nodded to the trumpeter, who raised his horn and blew three shorts blasts in quick succession, over and over again, a signal bound to provoke dread and fascination in any legionary: the call to witness field punishment. When the final blast died away, Fabius ordered the two legionaries to drag the man back into the centre of the wharf, in full view of several thousand men around the harbour, including his former marine unit who had been mustered to attention to watch. Fabius knew what he had to do: he was primipilus now. The legionaries held the man with his arms pinned behind, and Fabius stood before him. ‘Do you have anything to say for yourself?’
‘I have a wife and child, in Sicily,’ the man said hoarsely. He fumbled with a leather pouch at his waist, and pulled out a little lead dog, his hand shaking. ‘My son made this for me. It’s our dog. It’s to bring me luck, so that Neptune will spare me.’
The man’s knees gave way, and the two centurions held him up, his head lolling. He dropped the dog, and it hit the stone with a leaden thump. Fabius stood over him, unflinching. They all had wives and children. It was the lot of soldiers, everywhere. Sometimes they returned to them, sometimes not. He reached down and picked up the dog, remembering his own dog Rufius, and put it into the man’s hand, closing his fist around it. ‘Neptune may have spared you death at sea, but Mars will not spare you now that you are on land,’ he said. ‘Your son’s prayers will speed you to Elysium, where you must await him, just as those who fell in battle at Pydna await their loved ones. To those comrades whom you deserted in their hour of need, you must account for yourself.’
He drew his sword and ran one finger along the blade, feeling its sharpness. He stood back and slowly turned around, the sword held high, so that all of the assembled soldiers could see. The man bowed backwards against the two legionaries, who had twisted him round and pinned his legs with their own to stop him from kicking. He was wild eyed, panting and foaming at the mouth, and Fabius saw the brown wetness down the legs that he had so often seen at executions, and smelt the foul odour. For a split second he remembered the boy Gaius Paullus, another casualty of Pydna all those years ago — whether he too had been a coward or a hero, and whether had he survived he might have proved himself as brave as this man had been in battle: the truth could never be known, only that the fortunes of war could break a man as easily as make him. He stood before the man, and spoke quietly. ‘Remember your son. Do not dishonour him. Remember who you are. You are a legionary of Rome. Stand to attention. Salute your general.’
Fabius nodded at the two legionaries, who looked at him uncertainly and then released the man, leaving him reeling and staggering backwards, slipping on his own faeces and urine. He fell down heavily on one hand and stayed there, panting and grimacing. Fabius gestured to the two legionaries to keep back, to give the man a chance to stand up without help, to allow those of his comrades who were watching the chance to tell his wife that he faced death with dignity. The man wiped his face with the back of his other hand, and then raised himself slowly up, wobbling back to where he had stood before and bringing his hand up in salute to Scipio, his fingers still bunched around the little model of the dog.
Fabius grasped the back of the man’s neck with his left hand and with the other thrust the sword below his ribcage, driving it up through the heart and lungs and windpipe until the tip came out through the back of his neck. The man exhaled once, a moaning gargle, and then died, his eyes wide open and his mouth gushing blood in pulses with the final beating of his heart.
Fabius let him fall, withdrawing the sword as he did so. He held the blade up, dripping with blood, and looked around. All of the men around the harbour were watching him. He knew what he had to do now. He had shown the man compassion in life; there could be none in death. He gestured to the nearest of the two legionaries. ‘Give me his tunic.’ The man went over and ripped the clothing off the corpse, leaving it rolling naked in its own blood and faeces, and passed it to Fabius. He wiped his sword on it, carefully and deliberately so that all could see, and then sheathed it and tossed the bloody tunic back on the corpse.
He walked back to Scipio, who turned and spoke to the centurion. ‘Get those navi of the transport ship, those who helped to conceal him, to clean up this mess and toss his body on that pile of Carthaginian corpses by the harbour entrance. Nail a board to his head saying ‘Deserter’ and have every cohort march past, close enough to smell it, before sundown today. The navi of that ship are to stand down and be replaced, and put on cremation duty. The captain and his officers are to be taken in chains to the outer harbour, stripped naked and given fifty lashes in full view of the fleet. If they survive that, they are to be distributed among the liburnae and chained up as galley slaves. That is all.’