The Horse Changer (40 page)

When I came back to the atrium I discovered the boy standing beside his father. I rode to the front of the building and saw eight men mounted on horseback. A ninth stood on the ground wrapping a wounded arm. The last of their number lay in the grass a short distance away. Slipping off Hannibal, I told Nero, ‘I suggest Livia and the boy mount my horse and wait inside until you and I can engage them. When they have surrounded us, Livia and the boy can break from the house and ride to the city.’

‘And what of you two?’ Livia asked.

‘We’ll follow into the town after we’ve finished with them.’

‘You haven’t a chance against so many men,’ Livia offered. ‘Wouldn’t it be better to go down to the pavilion?’

‘The pavilion? What are you talking about?’

‘There’s a pavilion under the hill.’ She pointed toward the back of the property, ‘It ought to be well below the fire. From there we should be able to get away from them.’

‘There’s no way to get there!’ I told her.

‘Of course there is. We have a tunnel inside the house that leads to it. I shouldn’t think there will be any more fire once we are inside the tunnel.’

Nero put his gladius in its scabbard and picked up both javelins. Livia took the child, and I led Hannibal. When we came to the porticoed garden, which was now thick with smoke, Hannibal began to fight me in earnest, rearing up in terror.

‘Here!’ Livia called and pointed at a burning pile of rubble blocking the way into a wide stairwell. Beyond was darkness, but the slope of the ceiling promised a rapid descent and refuge from the smoke and fire.

Nero began to knock the burning wood away with his javelins. I took the cloak tied to the back of my saddle and covered Hannibal’s head. He could still smell the fire and feel the heat, but with his sight gone he grew calmer. Nero tossed the burning tinder further down the stairwell, spreading the fire and so breaking apart its intensity. That finished, he began swinging his cloak, beating the flames down.

As he worked I stepped around a pile of plaster and stones to have a look at the front of the house. Three men had waded into the smoky atrium. Fearing an ambush they spread out at once, keeping watch on all sides and resisting the temptation to rush through the room.

‘We have to hurry,’ I whispered. ‘They’re coming.’

Livia and the boy stepped into the stairwell, but the hem of her skirt caught fire. She gave a yelp of terror, but Nero was there to beat the flames down

I descended the steps after Nero, going slowly so Hannibal could find his footing. The tunnel’s walls had been dressed in smooth white stone. There were even brackets set into the masonry to hold torches, though they were now empty. The air stank of fire, but it was otherwise clear of smoke and ash. After descending the stairs, we had no more burning tinder. Close to the stairway, however, the dying embers provided enough light for me to discern shapes and shadows on the stairwell. I called to Nero and gave him the reins of Hannibal. ‘I’ll wait for them here,’ I told him. ‘You go on!’

I did not dare look for the bounty hunters; I simply waited beyond the stairway, pressed against the wall and listening for their approach. When they did not come quickly, I thought perhaps the fire now blocked their way. I waited so long I nearly imagined they had given up, but then I heard one of them calling to his companions, ‘Down here!’

Another spoke, ‘Take care now.’

And the next, ‘Don’t worry. They’re long gone!’

The fellow who said this was closest to me. If my guess was correct he was a step or two above me and I had only to turn the corner to meet him. I swung out, swords at the ready. I saw him stiffen in surprise. I took the stairs, knocking his sword away with one gladius as I thrust my second weapon deep into his guts.

But I had lost the element of surprise with the other two. Nor had I time to pull my weapon free. The other two were beside him, their weapons at hand. Spinning, my back pressing into the wounded man, I brought my left arm in low. I caught the second man’s leg just above his ankle and heard the whisper of his sword whipping past my skull.

Using the force of my spin I collided into the third man, getting cut on the arm as I did. My opponent fell back against the wall but not far enough to be out of reach. As he hit the wall he stabbed me. I brought my gladius under his sword arm, cutting him just behind his wrist. I pulled back, feeling the blade of his sword tearing from my belly. Despite my wound, I executed a second pirouette, leveraging my stroke this time. My gladius came up from my knees, the stroke finishing at shoulder height. I heard his sword clattering on the stones even before he screamed. His hand had been severed from his arm. I pulled back a step before running him through.

I went to the second man, who was down and screaming that his foot was gone. I stabbed him through his neck, if only to silence him. Then I grabbed my second gladius from the belly of the first victim. I stepped again behind the wall and waited for the rest of them, but the garden within the house was now thoroughly ablaze and blanketed in thick smoke.

Perhaps three hundred feet below the house I saw a light and followed it as I emerged from the inky darkness of the tunnel. Beyond this I discovered a forested ravine. The pavilion was a bit further down the hill along a stone path.

I looked at my wounds. My arm was cut, but only into the flesh and the bleeding would eventually slow. Pushing my fingers into the wet heat of my guts, I knew this wound was not terribly deep, but it was the sort that will kill a man slowly, especially as the blade had cut through the muscle and gone into the soft inner parts. There was no rush of blood, only a steady, awful leaking. My back had been cut as well, but seemed no worse than my arm. With a surgeon and the proper medicine I might hope to survive all three wounds but of course, at the moment, I had neither.

The forest on the hill above us was bright with fire; treetops were burning like crowns of flame; white smoke roiled thickly toward the heavens. Below at the pavilion the air was clean. As I followed the lane toward Nero and Livia I studied the slope of descent beyond the retaining wall with some trepidation. A creek lay three hundred feet below our position, but the way was unpaved and quite steep. At the pavilion, built for shady summer afternoons, I studied the ground beyond its foundations. Here the slope was guarded by trees all the way to the creek.

I found the safest way and led Hannibal over the retaining wall. We turned together into the descent, as if I meant to lead him down the hill, then, as he started sliding forward, I let him go. He went with his front legs braced, his haunches scooting through the dirt. The danger was he would build speed and begin tumbling out of control, but Hannibal fought the mounting speed and steered himself between the trees, sliding wildly to the bottom of the hill.

I jumped forward after him, aiming my path so that I might catch a tree trunk some feet below. Bracing myself, I turned back and told Livia, ‘Send the boy to me!’

Tiberius refused, but once his mother had grabbed him, they jumped together, sliding into my arms. Nero came more slowly, making his own way down. I turned and slid another thirty paces, catching hold of an outcropping of stone and bushes. I looked below and saw Hannibal already in the stream drinking water. ‘Look at Hannibal! It’s safe, boy! Perfectly safe!’ For all my encouragement Tiberius still needed his mother’s arms.

We descended slowly, losing some skin here and there but coming finally to the water, where we drank our fill. Afterwards, as we hid behind thick vegetation, Nero looked at my wounds. We hadn’t even fire to cauterize the belly wound. So Nero washed the cuts with water and then wrapped my cloak tightly about my waist. The cloth was soon saturated with blood, but this eventually hardened into a kind of plaster. Having no more clothing to spare for bandages, he left the wounds on my back and arm open. While Nero tended me, Livia had kept watch on the pavilion. The bounty hunters, she told us, had apparently abandoned the chase.

We were four or five miles beyond the estates that bordered the great plain of Sparta. Half an hour if we could run; an easy gallop on horseback. But all of that assumed a straight way and a good road. We were in mountain country, far from the only road in the region. So we followed the path of the stream. This made for an easy walk during the first hour and gave me some hope of getting to a surgeon quickly, but after an hour we came to a waterfall. Backtracking now, we climbed a steep embankment, which proved nearly impossible for Hannibal. Then we stumbled through a series of hills as the sun faded behind us and the forest shadows grew long. Where it was possible I rode Hannibal with the boy before me, but as the hours passed I had trouble keeping upright and conscious.

We began talking about the estates before we had found one. Nero knew all the owners in the region. Many had been his clients in happier days. Of course now they were obliged to murder him on sight, and Livia and me as well for being in his company. There was always a good chance however that the owner might be gone. In that case a freedman would be directing the business of the farm. These fellows know a great deal about farming but are not always familiar with the dominant political figures in their region. If Nero assumed the role of a slave, they might not recognise him. That was the hope at least.

But darkness came before we discovered any of the farms. We spent the night buried inside a pit Nero had dug with his gladius; we used leaves for cover against the dew, all four of us huddled close for the sake of heat. As for Hannibal we turned him loose to forage for whatever he could find. We went into the pit exhausted and hungry, but thirst began to set in as the night passed.

At dawn, or actually some hours before, I became acutely aware of my belly wound. I was certain it had become infected. That being the case, it was simply a matter of fading to death over the next few hours.

Departing at first light we moved listlessly. I could not sit upright in the saddle, but I did manage to straddle Hannibal and then lean forward across his neck. I rode by habit, slipping into and out of consciousness as we went. The boy was nearly as weak as I was but too thirsty to complain. He took turns riding his mother’s and father’s hip.