Marius' Mules V: Hades' Gate (55 page)

"We're heading back towards the sea?" Palmatus enquired.

"Yes. The villa's a cliff-top one."

"Seems surprisingly sparse out here" the former legionary noted. "I'd have thought that with the climate
all
these slopes would be covered with vines and villas.

"Puteoli region's not over welcoming of strangers" Fronto said with a wry smile. "The ground smokes, bubbles and moves in places. Only long-term locals or brave adventurers sink their money into villas here. We have tremors in the land every few years, too - some are quite bad. Parts of our villa have been repaired three or four times before now and a few years ago we had to rebuild the barn."

"Delightful" Palmatus noted, the news of the terrain drawing his attention towards what looked like a forest fire in the distance to their left - a haze of white smoke wafting up into the grey sky. "The ground smokes, you say?"

Fronto turned and looked off to the north-east at the haze rising from the rolling hill tops.

"That's Vulcan's Forum. Never stops. The more superstitious call it Hades' Gate - they think it's the way down into the underworld. Personally I think it's the very ground rebelling against us cultivating it. As I said: not welcoming, although the mud and steam's supposed to be good for ailments. Lucilia's dragged me up there 'for my health' before now and we used to play up there as children."

"Delightful" Palmatus repeated, eying the haze suspiciously.

"There's the villa" Fronto announced, reining in his horse on the crest of the slope. The others peered ahead at the Falerii's family holdings and Masgava whistled through his teeth.

The villa proper consisted of a surprisingly large double-storeyed main building with north and south wings embracing a courtyard garden that was enclosed with just a low wall, a single simple gate allowing ingress from the road. Beyond, and connected to the villa by terraced walkways were a low, wide building that could only be a bathhouse from the smoking chimneys, a large structure reminiscent of rural warehouses and farm stores with a squat quadrangular building attached, and a small porticoed structure facing the sea. The land all about was cultivated with vineyards and vegetable plots and dotted with occasional small sheds, and a herd of goats roaming a slope, contained by a low fence.

But it was not the sizeable and wealthy villa, nor its cultivated surrounds, that drew the gaze of the new arrivals; it was the terrain.

The buildings had been constructed on terraces gradually stepping away towards the sea, connected by stairways and paths, and beyond the final grassy lip, simply open air all the way down to the crashing waves far below. Puteoli centre was visible off to the right as a distant, low-lying mass by the water, so far down it gave the impression of being part of another world. Baia and Misenum watched jealously from across the water.

Palmatus swallowed noisily. He pictured a man rolling down the slope beside that house. If he picked up enough momentum and failed to grasp one of the terrace edges in his descent, he could quite simply roll past the entire complex and then out over the cliff and into nowhere.

The very thought of the drop he couldn't quite see beyond that grassy horizon made his backbone shiver.

"Your family picked a magical place for a villa. Hope none of them ever sleep-walked!"

"Not the surviving ones" Fronto replied with a straight face, and Palmatus could not decide whether or not he was being serious.

Figures moved around the courtyard garden, going about their daily tasks and the sight was instantly reassuring. Clearly they had beaten their enemies here and things were running normally. Balbus turned. "You all do your planning. Elijah, Balbina and I will go inside and meet with the ladies. Give me half an hour."

Fronto nodded and clasped his friend's arm. "Fortuna go with you Quintus. Be gentle."

He and the three other warriors watched the two men and the girl descend to the courtyard, where they were greeted by one of the slaves. Fronto deliberately paid no further attention to them. Some things had to come first, given the trouble heading their way, and this would hardly be a happy reunion.

"As you can see," he announced to the others "it's quite defensible in some places, but hopelessly open in others. Peaceful area, you see. Never expected to have to defend it, so it's a residence with no thought for martial security."

Masgava nodded. "What are the buildings?"

"Come on. I'll show you."

Fronto kicked his horse into life and took them off to the west, skirting the built-up area on the city-side. In the same fashion as most rural villas, the outer faces of the Falerii's home were plastered in white with small windows at regular intervals, their shutters thrown back to allow in the light. Both storeys of the main building were of uniform shape and construction and the roof was of good red tile. As they passed around the side, they could see the arcaded portico that ran along the rear on the ground level, an entrance in it allowing access to the path which forked and ran down to the next terrace and other buildings.

"The main house is far larger than it ever really needed to be" Fronto noted. "This villa doesn't come from the Falerii you see - came from my great-grandmother's side. She was from a rural family of modest equite rank but with an almost bottomless purse. She and her brother believed that half the battle for acceptance into the elite was having an impressive house. They failed, of course, though her daughter married my grandfather - who was insufferably noble but low on available money. It was a marriage made in social-climber's heaven. So we ended up with a pleasant and rather over-sized country estate and everyone was happy."

"Just the two entrances?" Galronus enquired.

"Hardly. Three off the central courtyard - a main public one, a private one into the apartments, and a servants' one. There's two at the rear, out onto the portico, too - one for the family and one for the slaves, but the portico has only the one way in or out, so I guess you could call it one."

"Not easy to defend" Palmatus observed. "One man could hold the portico entrance, but an agile warrior would just climb in through the arches. So to be sure, you'd need a man at each inner door. That would leave us with three for the front. That's just one for each door into the courtyard. A man at every entrance but no reserve."

"There will be other men. But you don't think we could hold the perimeter wall to the garden?" Fronto enquired, already convinced of the answer, but seeking confirmation.

"Wall's too low and too feeble. Even if you stockade it or build it up, the whole thing was covered with vines. Looking at how well-tended and neat they were, they'll have been there a long time and they'll have screwed the stonework. A well placed shield barge would probably bring down a section of the wall."

"So that
would
be all of us with one door each" Masgava frowned. "Rather thinly spread. Can we discount the house for defence and concentrate elsewhere, or do you have plenty of other guards?"

Fronto shrugged. "There should be a small army of hired swords if Posco's done his job right."

"That makes things easier, then."

"Perhaps" Fronto said, kicking his horse forward again. "But present company excepted, I'm no believer in the quality and loyalty of hired swords. The sort one might hire in port cities are not the finest to be bought, loyalty-wise, and despite having plenty of money and his heart in the right place, Posco's no judge of a fighting man. Until I've looked them in the eye and seen them at the palus, I'll reserve judgement."

The cavalcade veered to the right, descending the slope towards the cliff between the edge of the nearest vineyard and the bath house that clung to the terrace, resting on vaulted substructures. The baths were bigger than any such private establishment any in the party had laid eyes upon - almost as large as the main villa building.

"Big baths" Palmatus noted, trying not to look too closely at the cliff edge coming ever closer at the bottom of the slope.

"Got its own pool for swimming and more than one of each bath. While my great grandmother was one for glory and ostentation, my grandfather took his bathing rather seriously."

"Only two doors there?"

"Three. But I've had bad experiences fighting in bath houses recently. I'd rather avoid that. Besides, it's quite dark in there apart from the natatio, which has windows big enough for someone to climb in."

"So we rule that out" Galronus nodded. "What's that place?"

Fronto looked ahead to the small porticoed structure on the lowest terrace.

"My mother's sun house. Just three small rooms and a portico. Three windows; one door. Only real way of accessing it is from the cliff side."

Palmatus swallowed noisily and eyed the edge. "Has no one ever thought to put up a fence or a rail?"

"Why?"

"I dunno. To stop some poor bastard rolling off it onto the rocks?"

Fronto smiled. "No. But the sun house is probably the most defensible place. The only other buildings out at the other side are the barn and stables. Too many arches, doors and windows there. Or there's the caves, of course."

Galronus and Masgava looked at one another and the big Numidian raised an eyebrow. "Caves?"

"There's a small system under the grass off towards the left. There are stairways down into them from two of the small sheds you keep seeing in the fields, and three holes in the cliff side about a third of the way down."

Palmatus shuddered. "Doesn't sound good. Hate to be trapped in them."

Fronto scratched his head. "Good fall-back position, though." He scanned their surroundings and his gaze fell upon the bulk of the main building, towering above them higher up the slope. Behind it, he could see the distant haze of the steaming ground in the vast crater of the Forum Vulcani. Slowly a smile spread across his face.

"Of course it doesn't have to be
anywhere
in the villa."

"What?"

"Well we've just been thinking how to defend the villa. What if we just quit the villa and drew them somewhere different? Problem with the villa is we think too traditionally and we have to consider what to do with the women and the slaves and servants, and everything else. We're very constricted - like being besieged in a fort. And if everything goes wrong, there's no way to escape."

Galronus shook his head. "And if we plan to meet them elsewhere and they come here first, what if they ransack the house?"

"I don't think they will if they know we're not here. These people are murderers and killers - and probably rapists - but I doubt they're thieves. Thieves would be too careful to sign themselves up on something like this. Besides, Pompey and Berengarus will have selected the more brutal prisoners to set on us. I think they'll be intent on blood, not robbery."

"So what do you think?" Palmatus asked, trying not to let the relief at the possibility the cliff-side may no longer be involved show on his face.

"The Forum Vulcani… the door to Hades. I know this is going to sound stupid, but I know the place like the back of my own hand. My friends and I used to sneak away as children and play there against the wishes of the elders."

"You think it would be better?" Masgava asked.

"I think so. There are a dozen hazards for the unwary thrown in by nature, let alone anything
we
do. Admittedly, the dangers tend to change from time to time, so we'll have to familiarise ourselves with the place as we prepare, but I think it might be just the thing." He grinned at Masgava. "You put me back on the right track, my friend, and you've taught me a few things, but now we need to marry your ingenuity and adaptability with my experience at strategic defence. I think we might be able to spring a surprise or two on them."

"And what of the women and servants?" Galronus asked quietly. "You can't put them in the same danger, and you can't leave them in the villa, in case you're wrong and the killers come straight here to rummage around."

Fronto nodded as he kicked his horse into life again. "Our family has associates all around the bay. Most of my actual friends are in Rome or serving in the military or on the staff of various governors, but their parents will look after the family for us. We'll send them with most of the hired blades off to the Sennii over in Baia or the Tineii at Cuma. They'll be safe and totally out of the way, which will allow us to concentrate on our work. What do you think?"

"I think you're perfectly mad" Palmatus grinned. "Let's do it. Just us four and master Balbus? Or do you want to bring any of the hired men?"

"Just a few. Too many would be more of a hindrance than a help, given their likely unfamiliarity with the land - I'll pick four of the most violent looking ones. Now, I think we need to see the women and settle in for a few hours, and then I'll take you up to the Forum Vulcani and show you around while there's still enough light. Has it been half an hour yet?"

As the small party rounded the far corner of the villa and made their way back towards the entrance, they became aware of the sound of raised voices.

"Perhaps we should do another circuit first" winced Palmatus.

As they approached the front, Balbus was blocking the courtyard wall's gateway. Fronto caught sight of Lucilia standing in the middle of the garden. She had a sword in her hand - Balbus' probably, looking at the blade - and was gesturing angrily at her father. The Jewish physician stood behind her, by the door to the villa, holding Balbina's hand and looking on with a concerned expression.

"Get out of the way, father."

"Be realistic, Lucilia!" Balbus snapped. "Where will you go? You think to hunt a pack of murderers? I've always been proud of your self-assurance and strength, but on this occasion it's misdirected. You're being a foolish girl!"

Fronto winced at the comment and Lucilia stepped forward, the gladius point coming up unwavering at her father's chin.

"Don't be childish, Lucilia."

In a move quicker than Fronto could have expected, Balbus reached out and snatched the blade, wrestling it from her hand. Lucilia threw herself at him, her fists balled and hammering on his chest. Calmly, with more emotion showing on his face than Fronto had seen in over a week, Balbus tossed his sword aside into a flower bed and wrapped his arms around the girl, who continued to pound his chest angrily even as he pulled her tighter into his embrace.