Legionary: The Scourge of Thracia (Legionary 4) (39 page)

‘It’s dawn . . . ’ Dexion said, his tone flat, resigned.

Gallus glowered to the sliver of daylight beyond the bars, then to Dexion, then to the tunnel.

Birgir flitted down the steps to the stony corridor where Clothar’s prisoners were held, his horn vest clicking as the plates rose and settled with every stride. The place reeked of decay – mainly because of the corpses that languished in the chambers here. He held his breath, then beckoned his two bleary-eyed comrades with him towards the cell at the end.

They stopped by a cell halfway along, peering through the small grate on the doorway. Inside, the bald noble that had dined with Clothar and the Romans the previous evening lay in the corner, clutching his knees to his chest. The king had thrown the other noble to his hounds, watching with glee as the man had been torn apart. This morning, one of the hounds had been running around with the cur’s red-haired scalp clutched in its jaws. ‘We will bring you bread soon,’ he called through the grate. ‘You will be plump and hale for the dogs tonight.’ He watched long enough to see the noble curl up into a tighter ball and heard the man’s gentle weeping, then laughed and waved his two comrades on to the end of the corridor and the cell there.

‘Get back, Roman filth!’ he spat, pushing his face to the grate on this door. ‘Back against the wall!’ His eyes scoured the room in search of them. Once, twice.
Nothing?
Then his gaze snapped onto the odd, dark shape on the cell’s left-hand wall.
A hole . . . a tunnel?

‘The bastards have escaped!’ he snarled, his fingers fumbling with the keys, his mind racing with what tortures King Clothar might subject him to for losing these prisoners on his watch. In a blur, he thrust the key in the lock and barged the door open, his two men bundling into the room with him. He hurried over to the narrow hole and climbed in, but stopped, seeing that it only went a few feet into the thick walls. It led nowhere. His spinning thoughts came to a halt upon hearing the strangled half-cries behind him, and the wet rip of steel across flesh. He ducked back from the tunnel and spun round to see his two comrades lying dead on the floor, and the wolfish Roman – who must have been hidden, pressed flat against the wall by the door – rushing for him, stolen axe hefted. He felt only a dull thud and then blackness as the axe blade chopped down on his crown, splicing his head in two.

‘Be silent and swift!’ Gallus whispered as he and Dexion stalked through the prison corridor, heads twisting this way and that. He stopped by the door of the cell holding the whimpering man, then pushed the keys lifted from Birgir’s corpse under the door and moved on. They flitted up the winding stone steps and into the open square at the heart of the fort, which was streaked with mist and edged with colonnade. They ducked behind a set of barrels within the shadow of the colonnade, peeking between the gaps. A pair of Quadi were milling by a brazier, cooking a spitted hare over the flames. The main gate was just beyond them. Three of Clothar’s hounds – fierce, black mastiffs – lay asleep nearby, enjoying the heat.

‘They’re on watch, just like the men on the westerly road. They will not move,’ Dexion cursed.

‘No, they
will
move,’ Gallus growled, picking up a piece of loose mortar from the flagstones, then hoisting it, ready to throw. Just as he did this, one of the hounds roused. Its eyes were sleepy but its ears had pricked up and its head was turning towards the barrels. Gallus hurled the piece of mortar, watching as it arced across the square, then landed on the brazier, nudging one jutting piece of glowing red-gold kindling. The men never noticed, but the dog did, its head switching to the brazier. The kindling snapped and toppled onto the dog’s rump. The hound’s howl brought Gallus and Dexion’s hands to their ears and shook the fort, and in moments the other dogs had woken. The first dog leapt upon the nearest of the two sentries – its supposed attacker, then the others attacked the second.

From the walls above, Gallus heard dark laughter from the merciless Quadi sentries up there, no doubt enjoying this impromptu bout of dogs feasting on men. ‘Come on,’ he beckoned Dexion with him. They skirted round the edges of the square, staying in the shade of the colonnade, the fort’s open gate only paces away. They came past the doorway to Clothar’s feasting hall, saw the two leather bags which held their armour and snatched them up, then hurried on and down the darkened slope that ran through the gatehouse and outside into the wet sand and thick mist. Through the fog, they could see the Danubius’ rushing waters but nothing of Singidunum on the southerly banks.

‘Slowly,’ Dexion whispered, stopping Gallus from running too far from the shadow of the gateway, pointing up to the guards on the quadriburgium’s four protruding watchtowers. ‘Stay close to the walls until we come round to the boat,’ he motioned, pressing his back to the wall and edging round to the western side.

They rounded one of the towers and beheld the grim white elm trees with the riven cadaver still dangling from the tops. Gallus peered into the shroud of mist beyond until he saw the outline of the fishing vessel at the waterline, then clasped a hand to Dexion’s shoulder. ‘On my word . . . ’

But another voice cried out; ‘archers!’

Gallus and Dexion’s heads shot up – from the tower above, Clothar glowered down on them, his wan skull face reddening with ire. A moment later, a cluster of Quadi archers bent over the wall tops, nocking arrows to their bows.

‘Run!’ Gallus bundled Dexion forward.

Arrows thumped down, quivering in the sand and in the bark of the elm trees. One skimmed Dexion’s neck, sending up a spray of blood. Another tore past Gallus’ thigh. He hobbled on, sure the next arrow would take him, but the hail had stopped, the mist had obscured them from the archers’ sights. Grunting, he and Dexion shoved at the fishing boat. After what felt like an eternity, the craft moved freely in the water. Dexion threw and oar into Gallus’ outstretched hand as if agreeing a tacit plan, then both men leapt into the craft and hauled at the oars, willing the water back, fighting against the current of the great river, desperate for the shore to slip into the mist. The quadriburgium began to fade and was gone, then the elm trees began to grey, then . . . then Clothar loped into view on the sandy shore. ‘Stop them!’ he cried, waving to some unseen warriors behind him.

Gallus dropped his oar and stood.

‘Sir, what are you doing?’ Dexion gasped.

Gallus ignored him, hoisted the axe stolen from Birgir and hurled it. It flew true and pierced Clothar’s breast, ruining his heart and pinning him to the trunk of the nearest elm. ‘I can’t live with that bastard breathing the same air as me,’ Gallus said, shooting Dexion a wild look, then sitting to take up his oar once more.

As they slipped into the mist and further upriver, they saw the hounds racing out to the shore, then gnashing and tearing at Clothar’s twitching and bloodied corpse.

Next, they heard a war horn wailing. From the shore, jagged shouts rang out and bells rang from the direction of Singidunum’s dock. A splash of oars just beyond the curtain of mist sounded, followed by another and another, coming after them.

Gallus dropped and hoisted his oar again, then fixed Dexion with an iron look. ‘Row, Primus Pilus . . .
row!
’

Reeds crackled and snapped and their boots splashed in the shallows as they hauled the fishing craft up onto the southern banks of the river. Gallus’ arms were numb and almost powerless. His breath came and went in rasps and the blood pounded in his ears. Hours of frantic rowing upriver had brought them two miles, maybe three, Gallus hoped, west of Quadi-held Singidunum.

‘Out of sight . . . a little more,’ he gasped as they hove the ship into the gorse bushes. They hadn’t seen or heard their pursuers for the last hour. Had they given up? Surely two Romans were of little consequence?

Dexion groaned then dropped the colossal weight, staggering back, his face wet with fog and perspiration, leaves and grime clinging to his skin. He swiped the moisture from his chestnut brown locks and rested his hands on his knees, squinting downriver from whence they had come. The mist was burning off now, the cloak of grey lifting.

‘First, we should find the westerly road,’ Gallus panted, scouring the foliage of the riverbank and looking beyond at the mesh of pine and birch forest. ‘Once we’re upon it, we can gauge whether . . . ’ his words faded as Dexion’s panting halted. He shot a glance at his primus pilus, saw how Dexion’s hawk-like features were tensed, eyes wide, then looked downriver with him.

Nothing. Then . . . shadows. Next, the gentlest lapping of oars over the thunderous river torrents.

He saw the shadows take shape: a Quadi warrior, lifting a horn to his lips, his savage features unveiled just as he emptied his lungs into the war horn. The terrible wail shook Gallus’ heart. Another two vessels flanked this one. Thirty or so men, a nest of spears, bows and eager faces.

Two Romans were indeed a great prize, it seemed.

A tacit glance with Dexion, and they both darted from the riverbank, thrashing through gorse and reeds and towards the forest. Gallus’ fatigue derided his every stride. Branches thwacked into his face, gouged stubbornly at his legs and arms, knocking him from side to side. The damp, freezing air seemed to catch in his lungs and the stink of decay grew stronger as they plunged through semi-frozen swamp.

‘They’re ashore,’ Dexion gasped, looking over his shoulder.

Gallus heard the scraping of the Quadi boats being dragged into the shallows, then the thick, jagged cursing of the barbarian warriors and the crackling and crunching as they pursued. ‘Look forward, think only of what lies ahead,’ he urged Dexion, fighting for breath. ‘The westerly road cannot be far and if the empire has retained control of this stretch of the river then . . . ’ his words tailed off as he heard something up ahead. Hooves. Clopping hooves . . . on flagstones. Coming from the west.
Imperial riders?

‘Equites?’ Dexion panted, sharing his thoughts. ‘Let it be so!’

Gallus spotted the frosted grey flagstones just a few bounds ahead through the branches, the road cutting through this forest and across their path like a scar. He saw everything he had staked on this journey spin before him like a dice. Olivia, Marcus . . . justice for them and vengeance for the curs who took them from him. The men of the XI Claudia, the closest thing he had to family . . . left stranded by him, depending on him, trusting him. But the unruly weave of thorny undergrowth seemed determined to hold him back, ripping at his flesh, snaring his legs. He drew his spatha and hacked through this snare in a frenzy, and Dexion followed suit. The guttural curses of the following Quadi seemed just an arm’s length behind him, when at last he slashed through a last coiled tendril of gorse and tumbled onto the road. At once, Dexion was by his side, both men with spathas raised towards the woods they had just left, seeing the cluster of Quadi bounding for them from those dark depths.