Legionary: The Scourge of Thracia (Legionary 4) (22 page)

Sura nodded. ‘The wine,’ he whispered to himself, glancing back to the amphorae in the culina, ‘just think of later . . . and the wine.’

Gallus eyed the darkening eastern horizon, then swept his gaze across the streaked orange-gold of the western sky and to Vergilius’ blackened villa an arrowshot ahead. Darkness was but moments away and the men of his legion were again out in the open countryside.
Imperial lands,
he scoffed,
but infested with Gothic warbands
. He looked around the two centuries of his legion. Nervous, youthful faces, each knowing that a chill early winter night on this open ground by the Via Militaris with no fires and probably little sleep awaited them unless they could take shelter within the villa. He glimpsed over at Zosimus and Quadratus, each of the centurions keeping watch down the highway’s eastern and western stretches. They had not uttered a word so far. The recruits posted nearer the villa’s grounds with Dexion were equally silent. His eyes scoured the villa.
Come on, Pavo, come on!

Suddenly, Dexion’s white-plume rose. For a moment, he was still, then the primus pilus twisted round and silently but urgently beckoned Gallus.

Gallus darted north, crouching by Dexion’s side, the door of hope creaking open ever so slightly as he eyed the villa, sure Pavo had given some signal that it was deserted and safe. But one look at Dexion’s face slammed the door shut. His skin had paled in alarm and his eyes were wide, staring.

‘Goths to the north,’ he whispered, flicking a finger up and in that direction, as if casting an imaginary stone over the villa’s roof. ‘On foot. Four hundred, maybe more.’

Gallus’ eyes narrowed to slits and a wraith’s cold hand searched his skin as he saw them. Thervingi spearmen and archers. Had Fritigern’s horde ridden ahead of them? No, he realised, seeing that they were an independent warband – one of the roaming bands that had avoided the mountain corral and had been raiding these parts since Ad Salices, he guessed. Like a steely herd, they jostled as they marched, many wearing Roman helms and scale or mail vests. Another Roman vexillation had been caught on the road, he realised – or perhaps a wagon-train from the imperial fabrica at Naissus had been ambushed and pillaged of the weaponry and armour meant for recruits just like those he led. They also carried with them spoils of rapine: sacks of clanking silver and gold coins, plates, cups and jewels and the few horsemen with them led wagons heaped with forage.

‘Sir?’ Dexion gasped as the Goths converged on the villa, spilling round its grounds and entering.

Gallus saw from the corner of his eye his new primus pilus’ angst, the beads of sweat darting down his face, yet he maintained his flinty demeanour.

‘We have to act, sir!’ Dexion implored him.

Gallus had heard such words a thousand times before. He shared the man’s thoughts, felt the same fears gnawing at his gut.
Pavo, Sura . . . another two brothers consigned to the death-march of my nightmares?
And so many had fallen directly due to his orders. He looked over the two centuries of his men. He saw the icy fear sparkle in their eyes. They knew nothing yet of soldierly life other than these few days of marching and the shattering blow a horde of Goths could deliver to a legionary line – as so ably demonstrated at the Tonsus and the Great Northern Camp. They had to be trained to face odds like these. But tonight? No, they were not ready.

‘We pull back,’ he said stonily, nodding to the south and across the Via Militaris, where a shady beech dell offered some hope of concealment.

Dexion gawped, while the recruits peeled back without a moment of hesitation.

‘How can you . . . with just a few words, they are dead. My brother is as good as dead?’

The words were like a knife in Gallus’ breast, but the wounds there were old and gnarled, and he did not flinch. He felt Dexion’s hands grapple his cloak as if to shake him to his senses. ‘At the Great Northern Camp, we stayed on the waterline and fought by Saturninus’ side, despite the odds, did we not?’ he pleaded, his eyes searching Gallus’ distant stare. ‘They only outnumber us two to . . . ’ he stopped, gasping, frustration crumpling his features as more Goths poured around the villa, ‘ . . . three to one.’

Gallus did not make to push him away. Instead, he fixed him with a gimlet stare. ‘Pull back, Primus Pilus. That is an order.’

Gallus saw something in Dexion’s golden eyes – a spark of hubris. Dexion’s crouched legs stiffened as if ready to spring towards the villa. Gallus knew what was coming next and swept out his spatha instinctively, resting the flat of the blade across the man’s chest. ‘Two of my men are beyond saving. I do not wish to lose another today.’

As the order was passed around, the men of the XI Claudia swept over the highway like a shadow. Gallus was last to cross. Dexion with him, head bowed. As they crouched in the dell, Gallus cast a last look to the darkening north. For a moment, his eyes betrayed a glimpse of the wistful storm inside.

Mithras, if you have any strength left to give, then give it not to me, but to them.

The inky pool before them grew darker as they descended the stony staircase. Pavo ran his palms along the wall, feeling the stonework grow dank and cold as the stairs wound round and down.

‘This is torture,’ Sura hissed, behind him. ‘I can’t see a bloody thing. And the steps are a bit sli-’

His words ended abruptly, and Pavo felt something heavy slam into his back. The pair tumbled down the last few steps in a flurry of curses and yelps. At the bottom, they both leapt to their feet and drew their weapons, facing one another, sword to sword, then breathed a sigh of relief as they realised what had happened. ‘A bit slippy, aye?’ Pavo said sarcastically.

When he saw Sura’s furtive, flicked, single-fingered hand-gesture of a reply, he made to protest, then realised something. He could see. He glanced around and saw the weak shaft of twilight that was piercing the gloom, streaming in from a ground-level grating near the top of this cellar. It was enough to discern a collection of barrels on a rack lining the near wall. Wine, no doubt. There were a pair of spears leaning against the wall and a pile of dry, cracked hides in the corner next to them. The only other thing in the room of note was on the far wall. A door. It was no ordinary door, this was a bulky, iron-strapped timber ingress, more akin to a side gate on a grand city wall.

The pair approached it. Pavo saw fresh scars on the thick timbers, and traced a finger over them. ‘A strong room? Someone’s been hacking at this recently.’

‘I wonder who?’ Sura scowled.

‘There’s something else though. Something’s missing.’ Pavo glanced over the hinges, the iron strapping and skirt. ‘There’s no handle?’ He crouched to peer through the keyhole and the hole where the handle should have been, seeing nothing but darkness . . . and the faintest glimmer of something.
Gold?

‘No handle? Nonsense!’ Sura scoffed, nudging him aside. ‘I used to be known as the finest locksmith in Adrianople, you see,’ he said, crouching, hands resting on his knees as he winked through the hole adroitly.

‘Sura, I’ve been there, I’ve picked locks. That one is no simple latch,’ Pavo sighed.

But Sura ignored him. ‘Thing was, most of the time I was hired by folk wanting to get in to other people’s property,’ he looked up, flicking his eyebrows up as if in admission of ill-behaviour. ‘I gave it up when I was caught and they tried to ram the keys up my-’

‘Quiet,’ Pavo hissed.

Sura frowned, midway through a gesture of looping one thumb and forefinger together and forcing the other forefinger through it. Then his face paled as he heard it too.

Scratch-scratch.

‘It’s coming from inside,’ Sura whispered, leaping back from the bolstered doorway. ‘How?’

‘There must be someone inside,’ Pavo realised. ‘They must have taken shelter in there and locked themselves inside.’

‘But who would have the keys?’ Sura replied.

Both shared a look of realisation. ‘Dux Vergilius?’

Pavo crept forward again, ready to call out to whomever was behind the door, when Sura slapped a hand across his chest. He followed his friend’s frozen stare. Up the well of steps, orange torchlight danced. Shadows jostled on the walls.

The legion?
Pavo mouthed, hearing a dull babble in the villa up above.

Sura cupped a hand to his ear, then shook his head, his face falling.
Goths,
he mouthed in reply. A heartbeat later and the babble grew louder, the torchlight brighter and the shadows larger, stretching out and down into the cellar along with the thrum of descending footsteps.

Pavo’s heart hammered on his ribs.

They both looked for somewhere to hide, then their eyes simultaneously locked onto the pile of dried hides.

Gaufrid the Goth scratched roughly at his crotch and swigged the last of the wineskin he had picked up from the villa’s larder, then belched loudly as he descended into the cellar. The eight men who shared his plan followed closely behind. He beheld the bulwark of a door that had defied him and the men of his warband so obstinately over this last week, still grinning back at him, unsullied apart from the few scrapes he and his comrades had subjected it to. He tossed the wineskin to the floor and snarled, drawing the axe he had picked up from an abandoned forester’s cabin and hacking at it once more. Splinters of wood flew in every direction, but the door held firm and he only stopped when he became breathless.

‘Damned Romans and their barriers,’ he panted.

‘There is little point in blunting another weapon on it,’ a comrade remarked.

Gaufrid swept his collar-length fair locks up into a knot and tied them above his head. ‘Then what are we to do; let the greedy bastard who leads this warband continue to take the spoils of our efforts, or break this door down and take whatever treasure lies behind it for ourselves?’

‘If there
is
gold in there
and
we find a way in, do you think he’ll let us waddle back up the stairs and keep whatever we take?’ the other countered.