Emperor: the field of swords E#3 (38 page)

    “You should get out of our way!” a man shouted from back in the mass. A growl from the crowd agreed with him.

    Brutus sneered. “I’m a soldier of Rome, whoreson!” he bellowed. “I didn’t run from the slaves. I didn’t run from the tribes in Gaul. What have you got that they didn’t have?”

    The crowd lacked a leader, Brutus could see. They milled and shoved each other, but there was no one with the authority to force them onto the swords of the men in the road outside the shop.

    “I’ll tell you this much,” Brutus called out. “You think you’re protected, lads? When Caesar returns from Gaul, he’ll find every one of the men who made threats against his friends. That is written in stone, lads. Every word of it. Some of you will be taking his pay already. They’ll have lists of names for him and where to find them. Be sure of it. He’ll go through you like a hot knife.”

    In the darkness, it was difficult to be sure, but Brutus thought the crowd was thinning as those at the outskirts began to drift away. One of the torches was dropped by its bearer and picked up by another. No matter what hold Clodius had, Julius’s name had been read on every street corner for years and it worked as a talisman on those who could slip into the night, unseen.

    In only a short time, Brutus was left facing no more than fifteen men, no doubt the original ones that Clodius had sent to burn them out. None of those could retreat without being dragged from their beds the following morning. Brutus could see their faces shining with sweat as they saw the numbers dwindle around them.

    Brutus spoke gently to them, knowing their desperation could be pushed only so far.

    “If I were you, lads. I’d get out of the city for a while. Ariminum is quiet enough and there’s always work on the docks for those who don’t mind a bit of sweat.”

    The core of men looked back angrily, undecided. It was still too many for Brutus to think he had a chance to win if they attacked. Their blades caught the light of the torches and there was no hint of weakness in the hard expressions they turned to him. He glanced at the men at his side and saw their tension. Only Teddus seemed calm.

    “Not a word, lads,” Brutus murmured. “Don’t set anything off now.”

    With a snort of disgust, one of the torchbearers threw his brand down onto the street and stalked away. Two more followed him and the others looked at each other in silent communication. In groups of twos and threes, they walked clear until there were only a few remaining in the street.

    “If I were a vengeful man, I would be very tempted to cut you down, right now,” Brutus said to them. “You can’t stand here all night.”

    One of them grimaced. “Clodius won’t let you get away with this, you know. He will raise hell in the morning.”

    “Perhaps. I may have a chance to speak to him before he does. He may be reasonable.”

    “You don’t know him, do you?” the man said, grinning.

    Brutus began to relax. “Are you going to go home, then? It’s too cold to be standing out here.”

    The man looked around at the last pair of his companions. “I think I will,” he said. “Was it true what you said?”

    “Which part?” Brutus replied, thinking of his nonexistent archers.

    “About being a friend of Caesar?”

    “We’re like brothers,” Brutus said easily.

    “He’s a good man for Rome. Some of us wouldn’t mind seeing him come back. Those with families, at least.”

    “Gaul won’t hold him forever,” Brutus replied.

    The man nodded and walked away into the dark with his friends.

CHAPTER 36

    Brutus slept on the floor of the shop for a full week. The night after the failed attack, he visited Clodius’s town house in the center of the city, but found it better protected than a fortress and bristling with armed men. His sense of worry only deepened as the days crept by. It was as if the city were holding its breath.

    Though Tabbic accepted his advice and kept his family away from the shop, Alexandria insisted on staying and grew more and more irritable each day she was forced to spend sleeping on the hard floor. All her wealth was tied up in the new premises, from the walls and roof to the stocks of precious metals and the enormous forges. She would not leave it and Brutus could not return to the north while he felt she was in danger.

    The young men who had stood with them against the collectors also stayed. Tabbic had offered them a salary as temporary guards, but they waved his coins away. They idolized the silver general who had called for their help, and in return Brutus spent a few hours each day teaching them how to use the swords they carried.

    The tense crowds thinned around noon, when much of the city paused to eat. Brutus went out then with one or two of the young men, to gather food and information. At least they could always prepare a hot meal on the forges, but the usual gossip of the markets seemed to have been stifled. At best, Brutus could only pick up a few fragments here and there, and he missed having his mother in the city. Without her, the details of the Senate meetings were unknown, and Brutus felt an increasing frustration and blindness as the city wound tighter and tighter each night.

    Though Pompey had returned to Rome, there seemed to be no order on the streets, especially after dark. More than once, Brutus and the others were woken from sleep by dim, muffled sounds of conflict. From the roof, they could see the distant glow of fires somewhere in the maze of backstreets and alleys. The armed gangs made no second attempt to attack the shop, and Brutus worried that their masters were involved in a more serious struggle.

    In the middle of the second week, the markets were full of the news that Clodius’s raptores had attacked the house of the orator Cicero, trying to trap him inside as they set it alight. The man escaped them, but there was no outcry against Clodius, and to Brutus it was another sign that law in the city had broken down. His arguments with Alexandria became more heated and at last she agreed that they should all leave and wait out the crisis at Julius’s estate. Rome was fast becoming a battleground by night and the shop was not worth their lives. For one who had been a slave, though, the shop was the symbol of everything she had achieved, and Alexandria wept bitterly at leaving it for the gangs.

    Following her directions, Brutus risked a trip to Alexandria’s house to pick up clothes and came back with Octavian’s mother, Atia, to add to those who huddled in the shop as darkness fell.

    Each day became an agony of frustration for the young general as he waited for the right time to shepherd the group to Julius’s estate. If he had been alone, it would have been simple enough to join Pompey’s legion at their barracks. As it was, the crowd of people looking to him for safety seemed to grow each day. Tabbic’s sister had brought her husband and children into the safety of the shop and joined Tabbic’s three young daughters. The families of the young men had swelled their number still further, and Brutus despaired at the thought of moving twenty-seven people through the violent city, even in daylight. When the Senate declared a general curfew at sunset, Brutus decided he could wait no longer. Only law-abiding citizens seemed to obey the edict of the Senate. The curfew had no effect on the roving gangs, and that same night the street next to the shop was set alight, with pitiful screams sounding in the darkness until they were consumed.

    As the sullen city stirred the following morning, Brutus armed his group with anything that Tabbic could find, from swords and knives to simple iron bars.

    “It’s going to be a good hour through the streets, and you could see things that will make you want to stop,” he said to them. He knew they looked to him to save them, and he forced himself to remain cheerful in the face of that trust.

    “No matter what happens, we do not stop, does everyone understand? If we are attacked, we cut and keep moving. Once we are through the gate, the estate is only a few hours away from the city. We’ll be safe there until things have settled.”

    He wore his silver armor, though it was now dulled with dirt and soot. One by one they nodded as he looked at them.

    “The troubles will pass in a few days or weeks,” he said. “I’ve seen worse, believe me.”

    He thought of what Julius had told him about the civil war between Marius and Sulla and wished his friend were there. Though there were times when he hated him, there were few men he would rather have had at his back in a crisis. Only Renius would have been more of a comfort.

    “Everyone ready?” Brutus asked them. He took a deep breath and opened the door to the street, peering out.

    Rubbish and filth had piled up on the corners, and wild dogs that were little better than skeletons growled and snapped at each other as they fought over morsels. The smell of smoke was in the air and Brutus could see a group of armed men lounging at a crossroads as if they were the owners of the city.

    “Right. Move quickly now and follow me,” he said, his voice betraying his tension.

    They walked out into the street and Brutus saw the group of men shift and stiffen as they were spotted. He cursed under his breath. One of the little girls began to cry and Tabbic’s sister picked her up and shushed her as they walked on.

    “Will they let us past?” Tabbic murmured at Brutus’s shoulder.

    “I don’t know,” Brutus replied, watching the group. There were ten or twelve of them, all marked with soot smeared into their skin and hair. Most were red eyed from their night’s work and Brutus knew they would attack the slightest weakness.

    The men drew blades and strolled across the open road to block their path. Brutus swore softly.

    “Tabbic? If I go down, don’t stop. Alexandria knows the estate as well as I do. They won’t turn her away.”

    As he spoke, Brutus lengthened his stride, drawing his gladius in one smooth sweep. He felt a rage in him that men such as these should threaten the innocents of his city. It struck at his most basic beliefs and he was spurred on by the wail of the children behind him.

    The men scattered as Brutus took the head of the first, shouldering the body down and killing two more even as they turned to run. In moments, the rest of them were sprinting away, yelling in fear. Brutus let them go, turning back to the group that Tabbic and Alexandria were shepherding along, trying to stop the children from looking back at the bloody corpses Brutus had left in his wake.

    “Jackals,” Brutus said shortly as he rejoined them. The children looked at him in terror and he realized his silver armor was splashed with blood. One of the youngest began to sob, pointing at him.

    “Keep moving toward the gate!” he snapped, suddenly angry with them all. His place was with the legion of Rome, not shepherding frightened girls. He looked back and saw the men had gathered again, staring hungrily after him. They made no move in his direction and Brutus hawked and spat on the stones in disgust.

    The streets were practically empty as they made their way to the gate. As far as possible, Brutus followed the main roads, but even there the signs of normal city life were missing. The great meat market owned by Milo was empty and desolate, with the wind whipping leaves and dust around their feet. They passed a whole row of gutted shops and houses, and one of the young ones began screaming at the sight of a charred body caught in a doorway. Alexandria pressed her hand over the child’s eyes until they were past, and Brutus saw her hands were shaking.

    “There’s the gate,” Tabbic said to cheer them, but as he spoke, a mob of laughing, drunken men turned a corner into the road and froze as they saw Brutus. Like the group before them, they were filthy with ash and dirt from the fires they had started. Their eyes and teeth shone against their grimy skin as they scrabbled for weapons.

    “Let us pass,” Brutus roared at them, frightening the children at his back.

    The men only sneered as they took in his ragged followers. Their jeering was cut short as Brutus launched himself amongst them, spinning and cutting in a frenzy. His gladius had been forged by the greatest Spanish master of the blade, and each of his blows sliced through their clothes and limbs, so that great gouts of blood sprang up around him. He did not hear himself screaming as he felt their blades slide off his armor.

    A heavy blow stunned him down to one knee, and Brutus growled like an animal and pushed himself up with renewed strength, jerking his gladius up into a man’s chest from below. The blade ripped through ribs just as Brutus was sent staggering by a hatchet. It was aimed at his neck but cut into the silver armor, remaining wedged. He didn’t feel any pain from his wounds and only dimly knew that Tabbic was there with the younger men. For once, he lost himself completely in the battle and made no defense in his lust for killing. Without the armor, he would not have survived, but Tabbic’s voice came through his fury at last and Brutus paused to look at the carnage around him.

    None of the raptores had survived. The stones of the road were covered in scattered limbs and bodies, each surrounded by dark spreading pools.

    “All right, lad, it’s over,” he heard Tabbic say, as if from a great distance. He felt the man’s strong fingers press into his neck where the hatchet was lodged, and Brutus’s mind begin to clear. Blood streamed from his armor and as he looked down he saw it pumping sluggishly from a deep wound in his thigh. He prodded the gash in a daze, wondering at the lack of pain.

    Brutus motioned with his sword toward the gate. They were so close and the thought of stopping was unbearable. He saw Alexandria tear her skirt to bind his leg while he panted like a dog, waiting for breath to tell them to keep moving.

    “I daren’t take that axe out until I know how deeply you’ve been cut,” Tabbic said. “Put your arm around my shoulder, lad. I’ll take your sword.”

    Brutus nodded, gulping rubbery spit. “Don’t stop,” he said weakly, staggering forward with them. One of the young men supported his other arm and together they moved under the shadow of the gate. It was unmanned. As the stones changed beneath their feet, a light snow began to fall on the silent group and the smell of smoke and blood was torn away by the breeze.

    Clodius took a deep breath of the icy air, wondering at the sight of the forum around him. He had thrown everything into a last-ditch attempt to bring Milo down, and the fighting had ripped through the center of the city, spilling at last into the forum.

    As the snow fell, more than three thousand men struggled in groups and pairs to kill each other. There were no tactics or maneuvers and each man fought in constant terror of those around him, hardly knowing friend from enemy. As one of Clodius’s men triumphed, he would be stabbed from behind or have his throat cut by another.

    The snow fell harder and Clodius saw a bloody slush being churned up around the feet of his bodyguard as a group of Milo’s gladiators tried to reach him. He found himself being forced back against the steps of a temple. He considered running into it, though he knew there would be no sanctuary from his enemies.

    Were his men winning? It was impossible to tell. It had started well enough with Pompey’s legion lured away to the east of the city to quell a false riot and a string of fires. Milo’s men were spread all over the city and Clodius had struck at his house, smashing down the gates. He had not been there and the attack had faltered as Clodius searched for him, desperate to break the stalemate of power that had to end with the death of one or the other of them.

    He could not say exactly when their silent war had erupted into open conflict. Each night had forced them closer and closer until suddenly he was fighting for his life in the forum, with snow swirling all around and the Senate building overlooking them all.

    Clodius turned his head as more men rushed in from a side street. He breathed in relief when he saw they were his own, led by one of his chosen officers. Like Milo’s gladiators, they wore armor and cut through the struggling men to reach him.

    Clodius spun to see three figures leaping at him with blades outstretched. He downed the first with a crushing blow from his sword, but the second shoved a dagger into his chest, making him gasp. He felt every inch of the metal, colder than the snow that lay so lightly on his skin. Clodius saw the man dragged off him, but the third attacker scrambled through and Clodius roared in agony as a knife entered his flesh over and over.

    He sank onto one knee as his great strength gave out, and still the man stabbed at him while Clodius’s friends went berserk in fury and grief. At last they reached his attacker, but as they tore him away Clodius sank gently down into the bloody snow around him. He could see the Senate steps as he died, and in the distance he could hear the horns of Pompey’s legion.

    Milo fought a bitter retreat as the legion came smashing into the open space of the forum. Those who were too slow or entwined in their own struggles were cut down by the machine, and Milo bawled for his men to get away before they were all destroyed. He had yelled with excitement when Clodius fell, but now he had to find a safe place to plan and regather his strength. There was nothing left to stand in his way if he could only survive the legion’s charge. He skidded in the snow as he ran with the others, streaming in their hundreds like rats before the scythe.