‘Orderly! Orderly, you dozy bastard! Fetch the doctor! He’s awake.’
The owner of the voice came back into the room and, fighting his eyes back into focus, Marcus recognised an exhausted-looking Antenoch.
‘Lie still, the doctor’s coming.’
He sat down in a chair at Marcus’s bedside, running a hand through his disordered hair.
‘We thought for a while you might not live, you were out of it for so long. Only the helmet saved you, and you should see the dent in that! You won’t be…’
He stopped in mid-sentence, as another figure entered the room. Marcus gingerly turned his head to see the new arrival, blinking at the sunlight, recognising the doctor with a shock.
‘You… but you’re a…’
‘A woman? Evidently your concussion hasn’t entirely removed your cognitive powers, Centurion Corvus.’
It was the woman from the farm… an image of her fury at the sight of slaughtered cattle flashed into his mind. Felicia…? His memory grasped for the name, making his brow knot with the effort.
… Clodia Drusilla? Felicia Clodia Drusilla! He raised an arm, the limb seeming heavy.
‘Water… please?’
Antenoch put a cup to his lips, the liquid ungluing his mouth and throat.
‘Thank you. Madam, I am…’
‘Surprised?’
Her eyebrow arched in a challenge that Marcus knew was completely beyond his faltering capabilities.
‘… grateful for your care.’
He closed his eyes for a moment, feeling his body sag against the bed with exhaustion. Her voice reached him, as if from a distant place.
‘And now, Master Antenoch, it’s time for you both to get some proper sleep. Go back to your unit and sleep for at least ten hours. Here, I’ll make it a formal written command… there, “to sleep for ten hours without interruption”. Give that tablet to your chosen man. And tell him that the centurion will be ready to receive visitors tomorrow afternoon at the very earliest…’ Calgus stood astride the Wall with his adviser Aed as the sun set that evening, watching his warriors pouring back to the north through the North Road’s smashed gates. They were moving in good order for the most part, one or two supporting comrades clearly the worse for drink, but if individuals had overindulged in captured wine it was of little concern to him. Behind them the fortress of the Rock was still smearing the sky with the grey reek of its smouldering timbers, while torches were being lit by his marching troops to provide illumination for the night movement. All things considered, he mused, he had enough reason to be satisfied as his first attack played to its close. At length his adviser Aed spoke, his opinions delivered with the customary candour that Calgus valued, where most others would tell him simply what he wanted to hear.
‘So, my king, their Wall is broken, the garrison troops huddle anxiously around their forts to east and west, and their Sixth Legion seems content simply to prevent our advance on Yew Grove. Some of our people see this as victory enough, while others argue for striking west or south and destroying the Roman forces before they can join. We must explain our next moves soon, before the tribes fall to arguing among themselves. A lack of Roman shields to batter will have our peoples at each others’ throats before long.’
Calgus spat on to the Wall’s flat surface, his face twisting into a sneer.
‘I will gut the first men who take swords to their brothers myself, you can let that be known. As for the Romans, I’ve told the tribal leaders that our cleverest move is the one we’re making now, to pull back from the Wall and let them follow into the uncertain lands to the north if they dare. The right move is to pull back, and invite them onwards on to our ground. Of course, it would have been different if our western warband had not failed to break the Wall to the west, behind the traitor cohorts. If we could have put the soldiers waiting to the west between two forests of spears and with no place left to run, that would have been a blade to their guts I would have twisted without hesitation.’
Aed nodded, his face impassive.
‘I understand, my lord. Yet I must tell you that at this moment our only real fear is the warband itself, or more particularly its urgent desire for battle. Real battle. The tribes grumble that their war so far has been one of chasing after fleeing Romans and burning empty forts. Lord Calgus, the northern tribes are clamouring for a proper fight, a fight we currently deny them.’
Calgus nodded at the advice. After the council of the tribes the previous evening he was already aware of the problem. He had called the gathering of tribal leaders knowing that he would at the least have to listen to their arguments for their warriors to run amok down the line of forts that garrisoned the Wall. These were arguments made stronger by the speed with which the defenders had evacuated their forts, rather than fight for their homes. Put simply, the defenders seemed ripe for taking, ready to fall under the tribes’ attacks. He’d listened patiently until their arguments dried up in the face of his silent contemplation. When silence had fallen and all men in the gathering he’d called were waiting for him to say something, he’d voiced his opinion.
‘What you propose is exactly what the legatus commanding that legion down the road to Yew Grove wants, for us to waste our time and strength destroying empty forts. They will simply retreat in front of us, leaving us to spend our energy on pointless destruction. Or worse, they will attempt to pin us between their two forces. I’m not entirely sure our warriors would stand their ground if that happened.’
One of the tribal leaders had stalked forward to stand in front of him, a dead Roman’s head held casually by the hair in one hand, a Roman infantry sword in the other. He turned to the assembled chiefs, holding both in the air above his head.
‘I say we fight! My people have tasted Roman blood, taken heads, taken weapons. To retreat now will bring shame upon us in the eyes of Brigantia — who knows whether she will look with anger upon a retreat in the time of victory, and punish us for avoiding battle.’
The gathering held its collective breath, waiting for Calgus to pounce from his chair, perhaps even draw the sword that hung from his waist and take the other man apart with it for the slur. He was more than capable of such sudden violence, as they all knew from experience. After a long silence, allowing time for the suddenly isolated noble to realise what he had done, Calgus laughed softly. A collective sigh of released breath greeted the sound.
‘Balthus bids us storm more of the Wall forts, while the legion to our south hide in their camp, and yes, we could easily fire another half-dozen of their camps, knock the gates out of a dozen gateways, kill a few hundred careless Romans, take more swords and spears…’
He paused, looking around the gathering, meeting each of the leaders’ eyes in turn.
‘How many heads have we taken already? Five hundred? A thousand? What good will another five hundred do us? Do any of your men lack for swords, or shields? And as for their weapons, well, I ask you… Balthus, would you fight me here and now, man to man, you with that toothpick and me wielding the sword of any other man here?’
He paused again, waiting for the implication to settle in.
‘I thought not. If we delay here we simply give the Romans more time to bring their legions together in a massive armoured fist that will smash our warbands. I have information on that subject, and it isn’t good news. The southern legions started moving north several weeks ago, anticipating our attack, and will be on the Wall inside a week. And when they arrive, my brothers, the western legions will move through the Wall farther to the west, and move east to pin us here on the wrong side of their defences. And then, in all truth, we will be done for, outnumbered and unable to fall back to join the other warbands, and all because we were desperate to win a few more heads and some Roman spears?’