Roma Victrix (6 page)

The prospect of hearty food, passable campaign wine and a decent night's sleep in the safety of the camp was certainly reassuring. But, as much as he might want to get out of his sodden clothes and have his slaves prepare a bath, he knew he had work to do first.

Valerian made his way to his cohort's section of the camp. He could have found it with his eyes closed, of course; all marching camps were constructed in exactly the same way and everyone had an assigned billet. From Britannia to Africa, one could walk in any encampment and not get lost.

Fires were now beginning to spark up all over the fortress as men settled down for their evening meal. Valerian quickened his step, anxious to see to his own needs. But Julius Caesar had made it a point personally to see to the welfare of the men under his command first, as had Gaius Marius before him. Valerian was sometimes unsure as to how effective this was as a morale-boosting exercise.

Most of the men seemed to hold the equestrian class in deep contempt, which was hardly fair. After all, without the equestrians there would be no empire. Still, the average legionary was hardly liable to have a philosophical view on the matter.

Valerian fixed a grin to his face as he approached a campfire.

‘Evening, lads,' he said with as much cheer as he could muster.

‘Everything all right?'

The response was a chorus of half-hearted ‘evening sir's' and no one met his eye. Valerian moved on, blowing into his hands to keep them warm. Most of the
contiburnia
, the eight-man squads into which each century was divided, responded to his questions in the same surly manner. Those that engaged in conversation did so only to complain. Boots were leaking, socks were wet, mules were going lame, the locals that came to trade were thieves and liars and their whores were poxy – the usual litany, but Valerian did scratch a note on his wax-tablet to requisition fresh boots and socks.

It took some time to complete his rounds and, by the end of it, Valerian was as thoroughly miserable as the men had attested they were. But on seeing the warm glow emanating from his tent, he was immeasurably heartened. As he pushed the flap aside, a comforting sigh of warm air caressed him. Heraclitus, his slave, had pre-empted him and made the bath already. And to his credit, the instant Valerian got inside, the old Greek was pressing a cup of hot wine into his hand.

‘Let me take your cloak, sir,' Heraclitus said. He tutted. ‘You're almost blue with the cold. Come, let us get you out of those wet things.'

‘Thank you, Heraclitus'. Valerian allowed the slave to undress him. As soon as his
subligaricum
been removed, Valerian tiptoed across the floor and clambered into the ‘bath.' Not that this rude wooden tub could really be called such, but it was heavenly after the deprivations of the day's march.

‘I have a message from the general for you, sir,' Heraclitus advised him as he luxuriated in the water.

Valerian sighed. ‘Read it then, please.'

‘He requests your presence for dinner,' Heraclitus said with the air of a man who had been asked a rhetorical question. ‘I have your clean clothes laid out, of course.'

‘Of course,' Valerian forced himself to smile, though he wanted to shout at the old man to relieve some of his own frustration. If soldiering was all a big adventure to Fuscus, it was nothing of the sort to him. This was a serious job and officers needed their rest and recuperation. The last thing Valerian wanted to do was sit in Fuscus's command tent and listen to the old man go on about his past campaigns. It was not as if he were a novice; he had fought alongside Frontinus himself. But Valerian would take the general's war stories any day over the vacuous waffling of his idiot nephew, Marcus.

The man was an imbecile, and spoke with one of those affected upper-crust accents that they all perfected in the Greek academies.

Dacia was Marcus's first campaign, but he made up for the lack of any soldiering stories to tell by regaling his captive audience with tales of lurid highlife in the capital. It was going to be an excruciating night. And it meant he had to go out in the cold again.

Valerian had to admit that the general did manage to bring a touch of Rome to the field. The command tent, crowded as it was with officers and allies, was as luxurious as could be, all drapes and discreet décor. He had even thought to bring incense on campaign, which meant that the entire proceedings were touched with a gentle haze that fortuitously masked the smell of the vulgar Dacian collaborators present who would profit from their association with Rome once the mission objectives had been satisfied.

All in all, the food and drink were pleasing enough, but of course Marcus had been foisted upon him to entertain. Valerian was ten years older than the general's nephew but listening to his inane chatter, it began to feel like fifty.

‘Simply can't abide Seneca's plays,' the young man was saying, a distasteful cast on his handsome features. He looked altogether too much like that painting of Alexander the Great, all high cheekbones, curly hair and limpid eyes.

‘Quite so.' For once, Valerian found himself in agreement.

Seneca ‘the younger' – which was an amusing title – was a boring old windbag whose stoicism was a product of being able to afford it.

‘Now, if I want real diversion, it's the arena for me,' Marcus enthused. ‘And the emperor is most skilled at providing new entertainments. Why, there are women fighting in the Flavian Amphitheatre now – in the main events! Who would have thought such a thing possible? And, what's more, the mob loves them.'

‘I have seen women fight in the provinces,' Valerian was pleased to surprise the younger man. ‘In Halicarnassus they were all the rage at one time. Why, I even supped with one of the creatures.'

‘No!' Marcus affected a scandalised air, his eyes alive with the need to hear details that he obviously hoped were of the sordid nature. ‘Did the wench
entertain
you, my friend?'

Valerian chuckled despite himself, recalling the night. He had been drunk and made an ass of himself. Frontinus had indulged the matter but for a while it had been a source of great embarrassment to him. ‘She was not the beddable type,' he said, suddenly realising that he had left an overlong pause.

‘A sow then?'

‘Far from it,' Valerian called for more wine. ‘A proper beauty.'

‘So it is in Rome,' Marcus nodded. ‘There's something quite exciting about a creature that can fight… and fuck, don't you think?' He laughed at his own wit. ‘There was one particularly fine piece of German stock that I hear,' – he looked both ways and lowered his voice – ‘that Domitian himself took a fancy to.

But she's ‘retired' now, packed back off to Germania – Auriana I think she was called. But they have a new darling of crowds now.

Aeslon Nocturna
…' he affected a theatrical impression of a man in love.

‘The Midnight Falcon?' Valerian raised an eyebrow. ‘They do so love their colourful names.'

‘You've never seen anything like her,' Marcus enthused. ‘They say that she's a Roman, too. Took up the oath of her own free will: fights for fun and she's damn good at it.' He paused, looking heav-enwards for a moment. ‘What a body! It's as though Venus herself strides out on the sands when she fights.'

‘I'm sure,' Valerian responded. Unlike Marcus and old Frontinus, he was not really a connoisseur of the arena spectacles. He went because it was the thing that men of his stature were obliged to do on occasion. But the truth of it was he was more for the Circus Maximus than the Flavian Amphitheatre. Any brute could pick up a sword and fight, but chariot racing took skill, courage, audacity and guile. To see the races was to see true Roman
virtus
– despite what the gladiatorial fans said. ‘Tell me,' he decided to change the subject. ‘How goes your first campaign?'

‘What would you have him answer, Tribune?'

Valerian started, and felt a rush of angry heat in his ears. Fuscus seemed to enjoy making him jump. ‘Merely asking for the asking's sake, sir,' he snapped, immediately regretting his defensive tone.

Fuscus pulled a couch closer and reclined. ‘Well, Marcus? Valerian asked a question.'

‘It is a fine adventure, uncle,' the younger Cornelius responded at once. ‘I am learning much about soldiering and harsh life on the frontier.'

Fuscus regarded the boy with doting affection and Valerian realised that he was not going to point out that a perfumed tent and as much wine as you could drink was not exactly harsh. ‘And you, General?' he put in. ‘How do you feel we fare?'

‘Not as well as I had hoped,' Fuscus admitted. ‘Progress is slow, and we've seen neither hide nor hair of the enemy.'

‘Uncle!' Marcus scoffed. ‘Of course we have not. The stinking barbarians have seen the temper of Rome's response to their rude incursions. Why, if one were to step out and listen carefully, one would hear their teeth chattering in terror.'

‘That's the spirit, boy,' Fuscus chuckled, but then sobered instantly.

‘But I fear not an entirely accurate assessment. Valerian, your view on the enemy?'

‘My view?' Valerian was pleased to be asked. It proved two things: firstly, that Fuscus evidently rated him as an officer; second, that the old general was not one of those commanders too foolish to listen to the opinions of their subordinates. ‘We know that Diurpaneus is no amateur. This is his land – for now, of course. However, he knows it well, better than we do and, I suspect, better than our local guides. He knows we're here, and he's probably out there watching us right now.

But he won't attack. Why should he? We can march up and down the Olt till we're blue in the face and not achieve a thing. We'll need to turn inland, which will put us into wooded country and stretch our supply lines. It's a risk, but a necessary one to flush him out.'

‘Indeed,' Fuscus waved for more wine. ‘And if you were Diurpaneus, where would you want to face us?'

‘The mountains,' Valerian responded at once. ‘The pass at Tapae is a perfect site for an ambush. We'll have to go through it to getinto Dacia proper, and I suspect that Diurpaneus has hidden his forces in the pass. Once the entire army is bottled up, if I were Diurpaneus… well, that's where I would strike.'

‘This is my thinking also,' Fuscus agreed. ‘It's a conundrum but, one way or the other, we must deal with it. I think I have a solution.'

‘Sir?' Valerian had to ask.

‘We'll swing away from the Olt and cut straight through the forest towards Tapae,' Fuscus said. ‘Once there, we'll dig in for a while and establish a semi-permanent base, and then turn our attentions to finding an alternate route through the mountains. In the meantime, we'll be living off the land. The local farmland, I mean.

If this Diurpaneus is the ‘champion of his people', then I suspect he won't sit idly by while we raze the whole country our side of his mountain stronghold. If he attacks from the pass, he'll be on a narrow front anyway, and we'll crush him. If we can find a way through the mountains, we'll trap him in there and crush him. In either scenario, I can see nothing but complete victory.'

‘To victory!' Marcus raised his cup, and Valerian followed suit.

Like Frontinus, Fuscus seemed to have that innate gift of seeing straight to the heart of the matter. He was, however, a much more cautious commander. Valerian had the feeling that if his old mentor had been in command, the legions would be preparing to assault the pass at Tapae already. But he was forced to admit that whilst Frontinus's audacious tactics won him great renown, Fuscus was putting the lives of his soldiers first and that was a very comforting notion.

Matters current were put aside and Fuscus began a tale of his youth, which Valerian had heard before; judging by the wink that Marcus tipped him, he too had endured this particular epic more than once. However, with his mood buoyed by the wine and promise of a cautious advance, Valerian felt positively mellow towards both uncle and nephew: indeed, a few more nights like this and Marcus could actually become bearable. The weather aside, this campaign could actually turn out to be rather enjoyable after all.

The blackness began to fade to purple, then to green, then finally to a sickly yellow. And there was pain.

Lysandra opened her eyes slowly, her lids as heavy as iron gates. Above her was a plain wooden ceiling and spirals danced at the periphery of her vision, but when she tried to move her head a wave of nausea washed over her. She swallowed, fearing that she would be sick, but the motion caused a spike of agony in her throat.

‘Awake I see.' A man's voice sounded at her side. ‘Here. Some water.

‘Move slowly,' he admonished.

Lysandra steeled herself and struggled to prop herself up on her elbow. As she did, her stomach lurched and she could not stop herself from vomiting. A pair of sandalled feet stepped deftly backwards as she heaved into a conveniently placed bucket. The gagging reflex caused fires of agony in her neck but she could not stop herself from vomiting up a hot rush of purple, stinking liquid.

‘Dear, dear.' The man's tone was sardonic and disapproving.

‘Finished?'

Lysandra nodded, taking the cup that the man offered her. ‘Where am I?' she croaked, sipping gratefully on the water and then wincing as it hit her stomach. She knew that it would not stay down for long.

‘Temple of Asklepios,' the man informed her. He was short, with thinning hair and wore a green tunic that marked him as a temple orderly. ‘A couple of soldiers heard you crying for help last night.

They chased off your attackers and brought you here. You're a lucky girl,' he added.

Lysandra was about to respond waspishly on the nature of luck when the water she had just drunk came up. She felt the man take the cup away as she puked. This time, the pain was worse as her guts heaved emptily.