Altar of Blood: Empire IX (20 page)

‘They do it to scare off the locals, which means we’re getting close. From here we’re silent, right? Move slowly, be careful with your feet and don’t even breathe hard.’

He gestured to Husam to lead them on down the path’s slight gradient, following the Hamian’s example and examining the ground before him with exaggerated care before stepping forward, the arrow nocked to his bow ready to loose in an instant. As the four men drew closer to the grove, the number of bull’s skulls set to warn off the unwary multiplied, drawing nervous glances from the easterners, while a faint buzzing sound caught their ears. Marcus raised a hand to his companions, gesturing for them to stop and hold their positions. Laying down his borrowed bow, he lowered himself to the forest floor and crawled forward down the path with slow, careful movements, pausing every few feet to listen for a moment before resuming his cautious progress. Twenty paces from what was apparently an entry to the grove, the trees on either side intricately carved with runic patterns, he slid off the path to the right and resumed his progress with such caution that he barely seemed to be moving. Worming his way between a pair of bushes, he found himself at the edge of a patch of forest from which all undergrowth had been stripped, towering oaks looming over the open space that was apparently deserted. He waited, breathing shallowly to avoid disturbing the leaves through which he was staring, grimacing as he realised that his assumption as to what was generating the pervasive buzzing sound was uncomfortably accurate.

In the middle of the grove a massive block of stone reared out of the ground, a huge boulder of white rock that had been cut down to form a flat surface and then painstakingly carved across every inch of it with runes of unknown purpose, the primitive symbols made distinctive by a dark brown inlay that made the ornately decorated rectangular slab’s purpose horribly familiar to the Roman. His prone position prevented him from seeing exactly what rested across its horizontal surface, but as he considered moving to a better viewpoint a crow swooped down from one of the trees, sending a cloud of flies up into the air above the altar and alighting atop what Marcus could only assume was the priests’ victim, pecking vigorously at the unseen body. Realising that the grove had to be deserted for the carrion bird to be so brazen, he pushed through the bushes’ cover and cautiously got to his feet with one hand on the ground, ready to thrust himself upright, the other gripping the hilt of his sword.

The sight that greeted him was horrific, if no more so than he had expected. The corpse of the sacrificial victim was stretched out across the altar’s smooth surface, black puddles of dried blood beneath the body apparently the remnant of what had pumped from veins opened during the unknown man’s torture. His eyes had been torn from their sockets, leaving only bloody pits in which flies were swarming, and his nose had been hacked off, leaving a repulsive opening in his face that turned the Roman’s stomach. His face was pocked with bloody craters where, Marcus suspected, the crows had feasted on his pallid flesh, and the skin that remained was tinged blue from the blood loss that had occurred prior to the man’s untimely death. His legs were twisted into unnatural lines, clearly broken and the injuries used to torment him, and their skin was covered in a dozen and more burns whose shape looked dreadfully familiar to the Roman. Stepping forward with the same deliberate care that he’d used to approach the grove, he struggled to ignore the horror as he looked slowly around the tribal shrine, trying to absorb every minute detail to recount later on. The trees were decorated with human skulls, dozens of which had been nailed to the trees, and by fragments of armour and helmets of a variety of ages and models, some almost rusted away, others still relatively new, testament to the tribe’s continuing enmity with Rome. Some of the prizes were accompanied by rusted swords and spearheads. Satisfied that there was no threat to him, he turned his attention to the dead man, frowning as he reached out a hand to touch the tunic that had been cut open to allow the priests’ knives easy access to his penis and testicles. The wool was finely woven, a high quality and expensive weave for a tribesman or slave to be wearing, and his expression hardened with anger as he turned the dead man’s arm over to look for proof of the suspicion that had formed in his mind. The corpse’s hand whipped out, clutching at his arm with the strength of despair, and the tongueless mouth moved in a silent entreaty from between his blue lips.

Resisting the urge to scream in horror the Roman pulled his arm free and whipped his hand up, reflex overcoming his sudden overwhelming feeling of being no more than an onlooker, detached from the scene before him, pinching the dying man’s throat closed and standing stock-still as the sacrificial victim shuddered, straining against the ropes that still restrained his body. With a final racking spasm the dying man contorted, his spine arching, then sank back onto the bloody altar, his death rattle almost inaudible with his throat still pinched shut. Marcus allowed a long, slow breath to escape his body, putting a hand out to steady himself as the shock of what had just happened washed over him. While he stood braced against the altar a quiet muttering from somewhere close to hand reached his ears, and he reflexively sank into the shelter of the massive stone block, looking about him with his sword half drawn.

The sound came again, and with a start Marcus realised that the source was so close that it seemed as if he could reach out and touch the speaker. Sliding the gladius from its scabbard, he stepped quickly and quietly round the altar to stand behind the dead man’s head, looking about him in mystification, then advancing around the stone again as the slurred, unintelligible words were repeated. Looking down as he rounded the block’s corner, the Roman raised his blade to strike, then realised that the man at his feet posed no threat, as a gentle snore escaped from his twitching mouth. The priest, his long black hair shot through with streaks of grey that had fallen to partially cover a face deeply scored with the creases and lines of age, was asleep, blissfully unaware that a cold-eyed nemesis was standing over him, his blade stayed only by the struggle between a need to take revenge for the dead man and his orders to leave no trace of his presence. The Roman stared down at him for a long moment, calculating the hue and cry that must surely follow what he was contemplating, at the same time almost willing the man to wake, and give him an excuse to put the blade through his throat. The sleeper shifted uncomfortably against the altar’s side, muttering more unintelligible words, then let out another snore, and Marcus backed slowly away with his eyes searching the trees around him as he retreated back towards the path.

Turning away from the grove, he hurried back up the slope to where he’d left Varus and the Hamians, raising a hand to forestall their questions.

‘Not now. You can hear the story when I tell it to the Tribune.’

‘What a waste of time and effort.’

Cotta looked about him with an air of exasperation.

‘This lot wouldn’t give us so much as the steam off their piss.’

The neutral expression Arminius had been careful to maintain since they had walked into the settlement was unchanged, but the German’s voice was rich in irony.

‘I can see what my master was thinking when he sent us here, but he has reckoned without the long-standing enmity these people have for your empire. That centurion was right, we need something to get past the barrier of their hatred, or we might as well go and shelter in the forest and try to find our comrades tomorrow.’

Morban’s rejoinder was morose, and edged with fear.

‘We should go and find Lugos, dump the cart and get the fuck out of here before they decide we’re the next offering to their gods.’

Cotta opened his mouth to speak, then closed it as Sanga and Saratos rounded a corner and sauntered over to join them.

‘You’re looking smug Sanga, what have you been up to? Even you can’t have managed to persuade one of this lot to open her legs for you already, not unless you were paying in gold. And you haven’t got any gold.’

The soldier’s grin silenced him, a gap-toothed smile that narrowed the older man’s eyes.

‘Go on. Spit it out.’

‘We need an angle, that chosen man said, a way to break the ice with this set of sulky bastards, right?’

‘Yes. And?’

Sanga smirked again, pointing back the way he and Saratos had come.

‘And I reckon we’ve found it. Might get a bit messy though. And I think this might just be what you brought Morban along for.’

‘You’re sure you weren’t seen?’

Marcus nodded grimly.

‘The priest was sound asleep after his hard night’s work.’

Scaurus snorted without mirth.

‘And the man on the altar was Roman? You’re sure?’

‘He was trying to ask me to kill him, I could see his lips forming the words. And he was wearing a fine woollen tunic, the sort of thing an off-duty soldier might wear for a night in the vicus …’

He fell silent, lost in the memory of the moment when the mutilated corpse had come to life at his touch. Scaurus put a hand out and touched his arm.

‘And …? I’m sorry Marcus, but I have to know everything.’

‘I stopped his windpipe. After all the punishment he’d taken in the night he was so close to death that it only needed a gentle nudge to put him over the edge. Most of his blood was spread across the altar, although there was enough of it scattered about the grove that the priest was probably using it to anoint his followers.’

Scaurus looked pointedly at Marcus’s left hand.

‘You seem to have brought some of it with you.’ Marcus lifted his hand and looked at the palm, realising that when he’d steadied himself against the altar he’d put his fingers into a patch of drying blood. ‘Do you think you left a mark?’

The Roman nodded slowly.

‘It’s likely. But I doubt they’ll think anything of it.’

Scaurus mused for a moment.

‘So they’re abducting our soldiers for the purpose of sacrifice.’ He paused for a moment, studying the look on his friend’s face. ‘But there’s more to it than that, isn’t there? Something you’ve not told us yet?’

Marcus looked up at the trees’ canopy.

‘You’re going to say that I’m imagining it.’

Scaurus raised an eyebrow.

‘You’ve just told me that the Bructeri are kidnapping our legionaries, bringing them out to a clearing in the forest and then torturing them to death piece by bloody piece. I can’t see what else you might have in mind that’s any more disturbing than that particular set of revelations.’

The younger man shook his head.

‘I might be wrong … but there were burn marks on his body that looked exactly like …’

He frowned, pulling the memory of the distinctive markings to the front of his mind.

‘Like what?’

‘An eagle, a legion standard.’

Scaurus’s eyes narrowed.

‘You think he’d been tortured with an
eagle
?’

Marcus nodded in silence, aware that every man within earshot was staring at him.

‘But …’ The tribune shook his head in rejection of the possibility. ‘It can’t have been. The eagles lost in the Varus disaster were all recovered, and we’ve not lost a standard in Germania since then. I really don’t—’

‘Yes, you have.’

All eyes turned to Gunda, who was looking at the tribune with a confident expression. Scaurus shook his head.

‘No, we haven’t. Lost eagles are one of those things that every young officer learns about, usually from the senior centurions to whom that sort of thing is really important, not for career reasons but because for those men the eagle is an object of worship, the heart of the legion. They teach you that the eagle always,
always
comes first, no matter what the personal risk. Eagle bearers are invariably the best men in the legion, trusted to carry the legion’s soul into the heart of the battle, and they usually have a century of the nastiest men available as their personal bodyguard, men whose motivation goes beyond fanaticism. Trust me in this, the only eagles that Rome has lost since Varus are two in Judean revolts, one in Dacia before Trajan conquered the province, and one in Parthia, the Ninth Legion from memory.’

Gunda shrugged.

‘I am forced to disagree with you. There is a story that has been passed down from father to son for generations in our tribe that tells a different story.’

He held Scaurus’s stare until the Roman nodded slowly.

‘Tell us your story then, German, and allow us to consider what you say.’

The guide looked around at his audience, sensing their fascination.

‘It’s a short enough tale. There was a time, so long ago that my father’s father’s father was not yet born, that the Batavi, a warlike tribe who had given long and faithful service to your empire, thought better of their place in the world than to serve a master who continually abused them. Your people called them Batavians, and for a time respected them as the bravest and the best of their allies, but over time this respect turned to contempt between their soldiers and yours. The relationship began to rot, and there was open fighting between Romans and Batavi in the taverns and streets of your fortresses. And just when the relationship was at its worst, a priestess of the Bructeri foretold a Batavi victory over Rome in battle …’ Scaurus exchanged glances with Marcus. ‘And so, encouraged by these visions, they went to war with your people, and with them – and this is the important part …’ he paused, smiling at Scaurus, ‘… went the Bructeri, my people. And, with one thing and another, the war went badly for Rome, and well for the Batavi. At least for a time.’

Scaurus nodded.

‘It was a time of civil war, a year when four men sat on the throne in one year, which meant that the empire’s attention was distracted from events in Germania. Two legions managed to get themselves bottled up in the fortress that was all that was left of Roman rule on the Rhenus, a fortress called Vetera. They held out for a time, their walls of stone being too strong for the Batavians and their allies to defeat, and they were even relieved once, but due to a combination of miscalculation and plain stupidity they were forced to surrender for lack of food, when they had been reduced to eating their horses and mules.’