The Centurion's Empire (11 page)

The physician Milos sailed from Genua to Ostia, at the mouth of the Tiber. He told port officials that he was going up
the river to see Rome, but while the timber and skins were being unloaded from his ship he found another that was about
to sail for Valentia. It was still short of riggers, and he was taken aboard. From Spain he worked his way to Britannia
aboard a ship taking olive oil and pottery to Lon-dinium. Some years later he met a young centurion named
Vitellan Bavalius, a youth with a curious malady that seemed to be treatable with the Venenum Immortale. After a delay
of many years, Vitellan was about to share in the Temporians' type of immortality after all.
__2

pax romana

Wessex, the British Isles: 16 February 870, Anno Domini

The villagers of Durvonum worked their way across the gleaming white field slowly and methodically, harvesting the
newly fallen snow into blocks. They were in teams of four, two shoveling the snow into square wooden pails, one packing
it down with a mallet, and a carrier taking each completed block to an oxcart at the western corner. Although a raid by
the Danes on this particular village was unlikely, a dozen men armed with pikes and axes stood guard near the cart.
Alfred looked closely at the nearest team-All the workers were armed, both men and women.

"Notice how they stay within a short run from the cart," he said to Bishop Paeder. "If Danish raiders burst out of the
woods the snow harvesters could rally together in moments."

"They also have scouts in the woodlands," said Paeder. "The Danes would have a hard, bloody fight, and for nothing
better than a cartload of packed snow. Vitellan trained this first village well."

Alfred considered the words, then nodded. "Just as he is training dozens more. I know that he is my friend, but he still
frightens me. The man could have this land on a platter if he turned against us. He knows the arts of warfare so well, yet
he has no fame or following."

Paeder shifted his weight in the saddle with a rippling jingle of chainmail. "He is on our side, and we cannot do without
him. Let's not tempt fate by prying too much." He glanced casually at the men of their escort.
The sight of the villagers gathering snow was unsettling

to the soldiers, and some crossed themselves in a nervous reflex. The scene had an uncanny resemblance to a grain
harvest, except that this crop was white and cold. There was something here that seemed pointless and unnatural, the
very essence of a pagan ritual.

"So not all churls are so stupid, eh Githek?" Paeder called to the captain. The man was caught off guard. He had been
fingering the pommel of his sword and staring intently at the villagers.

"I—ah, their guards are well deployed," Githek began.

"Not the guards, the ice!" said Paeder in loud and studied exasperation. "They need no expensive salt or smoking to
preserve their meat. Instead they store it in some deep cave with blocks of ice made from snow—which is free for the
taking."

At once the mood of the men changed. Some edged their horses closer for a better view, while others talked excitedly
among themselves and traced outlines of square pails in the chilly air.

"Best to make this seem like a clever local trick, rather than let it go unexplained," said Paeder quietly, turning back to
Alfred. "This way they will talk about the skill itself, rather than where they saw it done."
Alfred nodded. "Yes, Vitellan has always said that he wants the real secret of this place to go no further than us two."
The villagers worked in silence, except for the dull thudding of the mallets on the compacted snow. Over at the oxcart an
elder inspected each block before it was loaded. Paeder pointed to him.

"There's Gentor, the Icekeeper," he said. "He's very particular about the quality of the blocks, and the packing of the ice
chamber."

"It's one of the few times I have seen him away from Vitellan."

"This snow harvest ceremony is very important to the people here, and nothing would make him miss it. It's old, very
old."

"Perhaps as old as Vitellan claims, in fact," said Alfred, frowning. "Do any chronicles give a clue to its age?"

"I once read a chronicle by Augustine of Canterbury describing a village hereabout where they did this—the harvesting
of snow into blocks to preserve meat through summer. I'm sure he was talking about this place. It was written two
hundred and seventy years ago."

"I would like to see that chronicle."

"That is not possible, my young lord—even if your Latin was up to it. The book was in a library that was burned by the
Danes three years ago."

Alfred blew a streamer of breath into the frosty air, and Paeder briefly had the impression of an angry young dragon.

"Vitellan is right," Alfred said in an ominously muted voice. "There is no more dangerous enemy than one who despises
learning. Come Paeder, I've seen enough. Show me the village now."

The thumping of the mallets faded behind them as they rode slowly through the woodlands. Durvonum itself was on a
hillock in a large clearing. Although the huts were as small and crude as might be seen anywhere in the Kingdom of
Wessex, they were arranged in orderly rows behind a low, square stockade. It had earth ramparts with sharpened stakes
pointing outward to break any charge by horsemen. As they approached, a squad of villagers was drilling in a pike-wall
formation.

The villagers looked around quickly as the riders came into view, but relaxed when they saw the colors of the Royal
House of Wessex. As they got closer the churls stared in fascination at the armor and weapons worn by the men of
Alfred's escort. The riders in turn preened themselves as they rode past the staring eyes. To a villager they were
magnificent indeed, true warriors dressed in leather scale mail or iron chainmail, with helmets of banded iron and
leather. Painted roundshields were strapped to their backs, and their axes had never chopped firewood.

"My, but we're pretty," snapped Paeder sarcastically as they stopped before the line of stakes. "Githek, hold your squad
of dandies here and make them watch the churls at practice. They may learn something about real fighting."
Alfred had already dismounted and was walking slowly

through the maze of stakes. Paeder jumped to the ground in a flurry of snow and hurried after him.

"No wonder they managed to fight off five raids by the Danes," said Alfred, pointing along the line of the stockade. "It's
all rough, country work, but under masterful command. In fact there's something almost familiar about the way this
stockade is built."

Paeder grinned. "An outline more often found in old Roman ruins, I'm sure, but there are more marvels to see yet. No
magic, just simple, practical things that work miracles."

It was the first village in Wessex that Vitellan had trained, and after it had withstood several raids by the Danes, dozens
of other villages petitioned for his help. After a year he assembled a'force of two hundred churls and razed a Danish
camp near Leicester as an example to them. When word reached Alfred he invited Vitellan to a meeting, hoping to
dissuade him from setting up a rival state.

Tension had been expected, and the gaunt, enigmatic Vitellan had everyone on edge at first. The discussions began with
politics, fortifications, and strategy, then someone mentioned that Alfred could read. The discussions abruptly became a
dialogue between Alfred and Vitellan on literature, poetry and history. At the end of the meeting the pale, clean-shaven
commander stunned the onlookers by pledging total loyalty to the Wessex throne. He even offered to train Prince
Alfred's own men.

The fifteen heads on stakes that topped the gates of Dur-vonum had by now been stripped down to skulls by the crows.
There was arrogance in the gesture, proclaiming to the Danes that these people had slain their warriors and would be
pleased to do likewise to anyone else who cared to attack.

Because all the villagers were armed and trained—men and women—the place was a total fighting machine. An attacker
would encounter twice as many defenders as would be expected in such a place:
everyone
fought. Children carried
weapons, put out fires, and even helped care for the wounded.

"Mind that you walk only between the little poles," said Paeder, taking Alfred's arm and guiding him.

"But you said we have to go across to that hut."

"Follow the path, my lord. They've planted lilies."

"Lilies? You mean there are gardens under the snow?"

"These lilies are small, conical pits with fire-hardened stakes at the bottom. In winter the snow covers them, in summer
they conceal them with leaves and a thin layer of dust. Your foot would be guided down to the stake, and the point would
skewer it, boot and all."

"Traps? In here, behind their own walls? Where they live?"

"If the Danes breached the wall they would not be expecting to find still more traps. It's cheap, simple, and very
demoralizing for an enemy."

"And Vitellan's idea?"

"Of course."

The chief's hut was unexpectedly neat and orderly, with plank benches for visitors and no litter on the earth floor. Hides
hung on the wall painted with crude Latin declarations of loyalty to the Christian church and to the Kingdom of Wessex.
A crucifix was included for the benefit of the majority of his visitors, who could not read.
Daegryn greeted them in broken Latin that had obviously been learned by rote, then reverted to a Saxon dialect as he
earnestly renewed his allegiance to Wessex and cursed the Danes. He showed them around the stockade and they
watched the villagers training. Even though he had seen it all before, Bishop Paeder whistled at the teamwork and
discipline that the churls showed. At last the prince raised what he thought was the sensitive subject of the Frigidarium.
He had expected Daegryn to become suspicious and guarded, but Paeder had already explained that the prince was in
Vitellan's confidence. The chief led the way, lighting a reed torch as they left the hut.

" 'Tis a great way to save salt for curin' or wood for smokin', sire," he explained. "Aye, and it's been in our village since
the time of Christus. 'Tis true, and when Christus was leadin' his armies against the Pharaoh, so too were my ancestors
packin' ice in the very fields that ye just rode through."

"I must make sure that the local priest comes here more

often," murmured Bishop Paeder in Latin, and Alfred grinned.

The entrance to the Frigidarium was beneath a stone slab fireplace, and this was lifted aside by a dozen men using two
stout poles. Narrow stone steps led down steeply into pitch blackness, and the chief hurried ahead with his smoky reed
torch. Alfred counted ninety-two steps before they reached a small anteroom. With some effort Daegryn opened a
massive, stone-inlaid wooden door. Cut into the stone lintel was rufus me fecit in neat, square letters.

"Observe, sire, the stonemason was literate," said Paeder as they entered. "That makes it very old."

"This place is Roman," said Alfred, holding his torch to the stone lining of the chamber while he shivered with the cold.

"Look at the arches and stonework. The village must have been built over this chamber after the Romans left. Even the

name frigidarium
is a Latin term for a cold bath."

The chamber was about fifteen feet long and ten wide, and one could stand up straight near the middle of the roof's
arches. Each stone block was neatly cut, faced, and fitted, but there were none of the carvings and decorations common in
the Roman ruins that were scattered throughout Wessex. The place was built with a clean, solid grace, and had clearly
been meant to last a very long time. The air was dank and clammy, and utterly still.

"So this place is where Vitellan, ah, lay?" Alfred asked the chief, kicking at the slush from the previous year's ice.
The man looked anxiously to Bishop Paeder.

"It's all right, Daegryn, tell the prince what you first told me," Paeder reassured him.

"Until two winters ago the great Lord Vitellan slept here, aye. He was a great Christian king, and spread the faith so far
and killed so many pagans that Christus said, 'You are too good to go to heaven yet. You will be kept here in this village,
in case the pagans come back.' Us churls were commanded to make fresh ice each winter for his bed and in return could
keep our mutton fresh here, without need of salt orsmokin'.

"Then came the pagan Danes, and they burned our chapel and took the silver chalice. Aye, and they burned most of the
village besides, and killed twenty people—and fifteen sheep, and six pigs, just for sport. They're cruel, godless pagans,
says I to the other village Elders, or those Elders as was still alive, that is. It is time that we called on our sleepin' Master.
We came down here and we called, and blew horns and whistles, but he did not wake. That's when I sent for Bishop
Paeder, who is skilled in learnin' and cures. Gentor the Icekeeper was against me. He said only he had the right to say
when the Master should be wakened and he refused to read out the sacred words that was carved on Lord Vitellan's stone
bed. He called down all manner of curses from Heaven, but none came so I'd guess that Heaven thought that I was right.
Bishop Paeder came—"