Altar of Blood: Empire IX
Read Altar of Blood: Empire IX Online
Authors: Anthony Riches
Contents
Empire
series
Wounds of Honour
Arrows of Fury
Fortress of Spears
The Leopard Sword
The Wolf’s Gold
The Eagle’s Vengeance
The Emperor’s Knives
Thunder of the Gods
Anthony Riches holds a degree in Military Studies from Manchester University. He began writing the story that would become the first novel in the Empire Series,
Wounds of Honour
, after a visit to Housesteads Roman Fort in 1996. He lives in Hertfordshire with his wife and three children.
Find out more about his books at
www.anthonyriches.com
.
Empire: Volume Nine
Anthony Riches
First published in Great Britain in 2016 by Hodder & Stoughton
An Hachette UK company
Copyright © Anthony Riches 2016
The right of Anthony Riches to be identified as the Author of the Work has been asserted by him in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.
All rights reserved.
No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means without the prior written permission of the publisher, nor be otherwise circulated in any form of binding or cover other than that in which it is published and without a similar condition being imposed on the subsequent purchaser.
All characters in this publication are fictitious and any resemblance to real persons, living or dead is purely coincidental.
A CIP catalogue record for this title is available from the British Library
ISBN 978 1 444 73203 0
Hodder & Stoughton Ltd
Carmelite House
50 Victoria Embankment
London EC4Y 0DZ
For Helen
As ever with any inventor of stories for the entertainment of others, there are those who suffer what might best be called collateral damage when the pressures of making stuff up become too much for one (admittedly only moderately sized) brain to cope with. So I’ll keep the thank yous short and sweet for this one in order to say a proper thanks to the person who absorbs most of my emotional shrapnel.
Industry types are important: Carolyn as editor, for her immense patience and occasional despairing email exhortation to just deliver something; Robin as agent, selling books to enable the creative stuff to have some point and Kerry as publicity, putting me in front of unsuspecting audiences. Booksellers matter hugely too, and none more so than David Headley and Daniel Gedeon at Goldsboro Books, bucking the trend and showing some others the way to make it work, quite apart from being lovely blokes.
Friends in the business matter too: people like Ben Kane and Russ Whitfield for armoured charity walking idiocy, Harry Sidebottom and Giles Kristian for excellent socialising, Robyn Young for the same and for also coming up with great book names while under the influence and Simon Turney for a series of more than generous reviews on his website. And, for that matter, a whole load more bloggers like Robin Carter, Kate Atherton and Gareth Wilson for the time they put into showing their love for the genre and posting objective criticism of my and many others’ work.
‘My’ beta readers get a big thanks too, Viv, John and David, for waiting a year for a book which I then expect them to read in ten minutes and provide me with insightful criticism (and catch my stupid mistakes, which they almost invariably do).
The biggest individual thank you has to go to the person who tolerates my inevitable mid-book paranoia, who tells me to go and write when the words aren’t coming naturally and TV looks infinitely preferable, and who helps me to celebrate when the book comes home and a brief respite from constant making stuff up is allowed. Helen Riches, you’re the sail, the rudder and sometimes the anchor too, on this boat of ours, and I couldn’t have done it without you.
Which only leaves you, the people who continue to read the
Empire
series, and provide me with the motivation – and sometimes even the character inspiration – to continue chronicling the Roman empire’s travails of the late second century as seen through the eyes of a small group of soldiers who find themselves used as (if you’ll forgive me the
20
th century military term) the emperor’s ‘fire brigade’. I sincerely hope that you enjoy this, the ninth in the
Empire
series. Marcus and the Tungrians (to abuse the Bondian cliché) will return, but the next three books will be a trilogy with the series title
The Centurions
, chronicling the Batavian Revolt of AD
69
–
70
from the perspective of both Romans and rebels. I hope you’ll stay with me for this new story: it has all the ingredients to be properly gripping.
December AD
184
‘Bructeri warriors, your king is dead!’
The gathered warriors of the tribe, five hundred of the bravest an
d best men sent from all over the tribe’s lands raised their gazes to look reverently at the bearded man lying on the funeral pyre around which they were gathered in the torch-lit darkness. As one they chanted the words expected of them in response to each pronouncement by the dead man’s brother.
‘Wodanaz, take him!’
‘He ruled over us with a fair and strong hand!’
‘Wodanaz, take him!’
‘He made us stronger, to resist our enemies!’
‘Wodanaz, take him!’
‘His life was long and fruitful, and he fathered a strong son!’
‘Wodanaz, take him!’
‘His life is ended, and he goes to greet his ancestors with pride!’
‘Wodanaz, take him!’
‘Now is the time for him to leave us!’
‘Wodanaz, take him!’
The noble took a blazing torch from a waiting priest and put it to the pyre’s wooden base with a symbolic flourish, then handed it back to allow the holy man to ensure that the fire was properly lit.
‘Now is the time to anoint his successor!’
The encircling warriors’ chanting became more urgent, the responses pitched as if demanding an answer.
‘Wodanaz, name him!’
The dead king’s brother ushered forward a younger man dressed in the ceremonial armour of a prince of the Bructeri, his body clad in enough iron to equip a dozen men of the tribe for war.
‘The king’s son Amalric is his son and successor!’
‘Wodanaz, anoint him!’
He swiftly smeared holy oil across the younger man’s forehead, tracing an ancient rune of power over the pale skin.
‘We his warriors declare him our king!’
‘Wodanaz, crown him!’
Bowing solemnly to the prince, the noble held a simple gold crown, taken from the tribe’s treasury for the occasion, over his head, then lowered it into place and stepped back.
‘Will his warriors give their loyalty?’
A sudden hush fell, and the assembled men sank as one onto their knees, the iron helmets of the new king’s household companions gleaming in the firelight.
‘Swear the oath!’
The words were shouted proudly by every man present like an unstoppable force, a profession of their willingness to serve until death, at their king’s command in all things, for his glory, for the glory of the Bructeri people and in the name of their god Wodanaz. When it was done they turned to the blazing pyre and bowed three times, each time roaring out their approval of the dead king’s life, then repeated the homage for his son, their new ruler. The dead monarch’s brother held up his hands to command their silence, and after a moment all was quiet once more.
‘I, Gernot of the Bructeri, swear to serve this new king with all of the devotion that I gave to my brother, and to share what wisdom I have with him, to guide him on the path to equalling his father’s glory and that of his father before him. I will strain every muscle in my body to help him outdo them both, and make our tribe’s name echo in the halls of our neighbours, a name to inspire respect, and where needed, fear. In the halls of all our neighbours. In the halls of the Marsi!’ The warriors cheered. ‘The Chamavi!’ They cheered again. ‘The Angrivarii!’ Again. ‘And in the halls, my brothers …’ They knew what was coming, and five hundred men drew breath to shout ‘Of the
Romans
!’
When the tumult had died down he signalled to the priest, who nodded in turn to his acolytes. With great ceremony a wooden frame was carried into the gathering, a frame on which was suspended a man’s naked body. Bound to the wood, his arms and legs spread wide, he was gagged to prevent any foul word sullying the ceremony, the rolling of his eyes his only means of communicating his terror at what was about to happen to him. He had been denied both food and water for three days to prevent any loss of bodily control casting a bad omen on the new king’s succession. Gernot gestured to the prisoner, calling out to his warriors once more.
‘See, I bring you a sacrifice to consecrate our new king’s reign! A Roman soldier, the symbol of our tribe’s oppression since the days of our forefathers! King Amalric, will you do us the honour as our chief priest of making the first cut?’
The younger man nodded graciously, taking the proffered knife from the priest the tribe called The Hand of Wodanaz, who would shortly be hard at work on the captive with his own tools – fierce, workmanlike knives, flenses for peeling away a man’s skin from the flesh below, and the terrible saw with which he would liberate the greatest prize of all. He held up the knife, its blade liquid orange in the pyre’s flickering light as the flames consumed his father’s body, and the encircling warriors bayed for the helpless Roman’s blood. Approaching the struggling captive, now writhing ineffectually against the ropes that held him tightly, he raised the blade theatrically before placing it against the sacrificial victim’s right index finger, taking the digit in his other hand as was the accepted practice, pulling it tight for the first cut that had to remove the finger with one cut if the omens were to be favourable.