The Wolf's Gold (5 page)

Marcus laughed, staggering backwards slightly as the horse nudged him again, and held out the apple in surrender.

‘Here, take it before you tread on my foot.’ He grinned ruefully at Silus, nodding at the decurion’s knowing look. ‘Her name? I’m tempted to call her “Gobbler”, but that would hardly be fitting for an animal bred for war. Let’s see how she works out before saddling her with anything premature . . .’

Both men turned to look back down the road as a horn blared distantly, watching as the Tungrian cohort’s leading century came into view around the shoulder of the mountain looming over them to the west. Silus turned to his men, barking orders.

‘Get into the trees and gather firewood. Once the grunts have staggered past us we’ll put poor old Bonehead to the torch, as much to spare his dignity as for the protection of any animal that decides to dine on his body.’ He raised an eyebrow at Marcus. ‘And you, Centurion Two Knives, had better go and meet with your superiors and warn them that we’re marching into a fight.’

First Spear Julius looked with professional dismay at the scene before him as his leading century crested the road’s last ridge, and came into view of the mining settlement they had been sent to protect. After a moment he shook his head at the sight opening up before him, an apparently disorganised sprawl of buildings that littered the valley floor as if some distracted god had flung a straggling handful of settlements to earth with no care as to where they fell. The valley ran east for another mile or so before the mountain that reared up at its far end closed it off like the bowl of a gigantic amphitheatre. His superior officer, a tall man with a wiry build that had initially deceived the Tungrians into believing he was unsuited to combat, laughed at the look of disgust on his senior centurion’s face.

‘So this is the Ravenstone valley, eh? Not up to much, is it Julius? I know what you’re thinking – is this why we were sent up here from Apulum without so much as time for a cup of wine in the officers’ mess?’

Julius had not yet got over the indifference with which the Thirteenth Legion’s broad stripe tribune had treated them at the Apulum fortress’s gate. He’d passed on his legatus’s orders for the three-cohort-strong detachment to march on into the mountains with the disdain of a patrician ordering a slave to clean out his toilet, and had allowed them no more of a pause in their march than had been required for a cohort of disgruntled Thracian archers to be chivvied out of their barracks and tagged on to the column.

‘You know what they say, Julius? If you can’t take a joke then you shouldn’t have joined up.’ Tribune Scaurus smiled at the dismay on the other man’s face as Julius found himself on the butt end of one of his own favourite jibes. ‘So, disappointed with what you see, are you, First Spear? Afraid you won’t find enough drinking dens and whorehouses for your liking, or had you forgotten that you’ve a woman to keep you away from all those distractions now?’

The senior centurion shook his head without losing the look of disgust as he took in the scattered buildings spread across the valley before them.

‘It’s not that, Tribune. Annia would have my balls off with a blunt and rusty spoon if I even considered such a thing. Although now that you mention it, given that we’ve been on the road for the best part of three months, the men are going up the wall for the want of some entertainment. No, what’s bothering me is the lack of defensive preparation.’

The tribune nodded, his eyes roaming the scene unfolding before them as they marched up the valley with professional interest.

‘Agreed. So what would you make our priorities, if you were my colleague Domitius Belletor?’

Julius’s reply required little time for consideration.

‘A wall. Something tall enough to keep unfriendly tribesmen from mobbing us. That, and I’d want to be sure that I had control of the heights.’

Scaurus nodded his agreement and then raised a hand to point at a figure advancing down the road towards them, the man’s legion uniform complemented by a staff held in his right hand where a soldier would normally have carried a spear.

‘Ignoring the fact that an enemy warband might well keep us a good deal more occupied than we’d like, if it’s entertainment you want I suspect this gentleman may hold the answer. I suggest you stop the column so that we can find out what it is he has to say to us.’

The lone soldier marched purposefully up to the two officers and snapped off a smart salute, coming to attention with a vigour and precision that raised eyebrows among the veteran troops at Julius’s back. On closer inspection the first spear realised that the legionary’s staff was in fact a standard, albeit one of a type he’d never seen before, the shaft of a spear with a strangely ornate head that seemed to have no obvious military function.

‘Greetings Tribune, Centurion. Welcome to the Ravenstone valley, and to the mining facility of Alburnus Major.’ His blue eyes darted to both of them in turn, giving each man a swift perusal with a glance that seemed both open and calculating. ‘I am Cattanius, a soldier of the Thirteenth Gemina Legion and beneficiarius to the legion’s legatus, sent to assist with the arrival of your detachment. You are the tribune commanding this force, I presume, sir?’

Scaurus stepped forward, returning Cattanius’s salute.

‘Gaius Rutilius Scaurus, tribune commanding the First and Second Tungrian Cohorts, but not, I should point out, the commander of this detachment.’ He jerked a thumb over his shoulder at the long column of soldiers waiting under the mid-afternoon sun. ‘My colleague Domitius Belletor has overall command of our combined force. If you look down the column you will doubtless see a man on a horse coming to see what it is that has prompted this unscheduled stop. But since he will take a moment or two to reach us, perhaps we could pass that time by discussing a few topics of interest to me and my first spear here? And stand at ease man, there’s no need for ceremony.’

Cattanius relaxed a little.

‘What would you like to know, sir?’

Scaurus smiled wryly.

‘You could start by enlightening us as to why we find this precious imperial asset apparently stripped of any military presence. Surely one of the Dacian legions’ main tasks is to keep this place safe, given its critical importance to the province?’

The legionary nodded earnestly.

‘Indeed it is, Tribune. If it weren’t for the threat from the Sarmatae there would be a full cohort in the barracks, but Legatus Albinus decided to concentrate his forces—’

Scaurus raised an eyebrow.

‘Albinus?’

Cattanius nodded quickly.

‘Yes, sir. Legatus Clodius Albinus, officer commanding the Thirteenth Legion, and my beneficium.’

The tribune nodded, his demeanour outwardly unchanged, although Julius wondered if he had imagined the slight narrowing of his superior officer’s eyes when Cattanius had first mentioned the legatus’s name.

‘I see. My apologies. Do continue.’

‘Yes, sir. The legatus decided that in light of the Sarmatae threat—’

Julius raised a hand to stop him again.

‘You’ve mentioned that name twice now. Exactly who or what are the Sarmatae?’

Cattanius stooped, using his finger to draw a half-circle whose circumference pointed upwards in the dust at their feet, running a wavy line along its bottom where there would normally have been a flat side.

‘This is a very rough approximation of a map of Dacia. The wavy line is the river Danubius, and we are here . . .’ He made a mark in the dust just inside the half-circle’s radius, halfway between the wavy line and the curve’s topmost point. ‘And here . . .’ He pointed to the ground outside the half-circle, waving his hand around its perimeter. ‘Here are the Sarmatae. They’re a loose collection of tribes, nomadic and with an equine-based way of life. The grasslands beyond these mountains are swarming with them, a tribe called the Iazyges, and they breed like rabbits.’

Julius nodded his thanks, gesturing for the soldier to continue.

‘So, my legatus decided that he should concentrate his force at the legion’s fortress, ready to strike decisively in accordance with the governor’s wishes. Our scouts tell us that the main enemy threat is mustering on the north-western border. The knowledge that there were reinforcements from Germania within a few days’ march persuaded the legatus that the risk to the mine complex would be minimal, given what we know of the enemy’s dispositions.’

Scaurus leant forward with a look of concentration on his face.

‘Which would seem to have been somewhat courageous of him, given that my horsemen encountered barbarian scouts not ten miles back down the road. Exactly what do we know about
them
, Soldier Cattanius?’

The beneficiarius opened his mouth to respond, but his answer was stillborn in the face of an interruption over Scaurus’s shoulder.

‘What have we here, Scaurus?’

The Tungrian tribune turned away from the beneficiarius, looking up at his colleague Belletor as he loomed over them both from his position on the back of his horse. His fellow legion tribune had reined his horse in behind Belletor’s, and was looking down at Scaurus and his first spear with the poorly concealed curiosity that had been his perpetual expression ever since they had left Fortress Bonna. Scaurus nodded his respect to the horseman, indicating Cattanius with an extended hand.

‘A legionary legatus’s beneficiarius, colleague, sent to guide us into the valley and ensure that we settle into the defence of the mine as quickly as possible.’

‘Excellent!’ Belletor nodded down to Cattanius, who had snapped back to attention. ‘How very thoughtful of your legatus! You can guide us to the bath house, soldier, I’m positively filthy after so long on the road. I assume you can manage to get the men into whatever barracks the legion left for us, colleague.’

Scaurus nodded in reply, his face a study in neutrality.

‘Of course. I’ll talk to you later, Soldier Cattanius, if you can spare me the time. I suspect there’s a good deal more you can share with us as to the legatus’s plans.’

Cattanius saluted, shooting a swift glance of incredulity at Scaurus and Julius before looking up into the tribune’s smug face with his own features carefully composed into perfect neutrality.

‘This way, Tribune. There are both a heated room and a plunge pool in the commander’s quarters, and I took the liberty of having a fire lit an hour ago when we sighted you coming up the valley. We’ll have you sweating that road dirt out in no time.’

Scaurus and Julius watched the two officers ride away up the road, the first spear shaking his head in wonderment.

‘Every time I think there’s no way for that prick to go any lower in my opinion he finds a new way to look even less of a soldier.’

Scaurus nodded, turning back to the waiting column of men.

‘I know. But standing here mouthing insults at his back isn’t going to get these men into barracks and fed, is it? Get the First Cohort moving, First Spear, and we’ll rely on your colleague Sergius to have the sense to do the same for his legion troops.’

Julius saluted, his forehead creased questioningly.

‘It occurs to me to ask you, Tribune, what a beneficiarius is?’

Scaurus grinned back at him, hooking a thumb over his shoulder.

‘Given that the man in question was clever enough to have Belletor’s bathwater hot, I’d say that in this case a beneficiarius is at the very least a bright boy, wouldn’t you?

Once Julius had dismissed the Tungrians from the mine’s parade ground to their camp-building duties, Marcus found his wife and her new assistant sitting in their wagon. Bowing to Annia, he stretched his neck to plant a kiss on the sleeping baby cradled in Felicia’s arms.

‘Well
he
seems happy enough.’

His wife raised an eyebrow.

‘Remind me to check your ears for wax, Centurion. He was howling so hard while you were all parading that I was forced to hide in the back of the wagon and feed the little monster again, despite having filled him up no more than an hour before.’

Marcus wrinkled his nose.

‘Is that . . .?’

Felicia nodded wryly, offering the sleeping infant to her husband.

‘Yes, as night follows day, so your son has followed a good feed by filling his undergarment with his usual impression of a well-ploughed field, grunting away in his sleep like a pig digging for truffles. The gods only know how Annia manages to tolerate it, because I can assure you that I’ll not be having any more of these little beasts for a good long while. Perhaps you’d like to change him?’

Her assistant laughed, her voice rich with a happy humour that had seemed impossible only months before, after her ordeal at the hands of the gang members she had believed to be her protectors, during the events of one fateful night in the city of Tungrorum.

‘It seems your lady is off-limits, Centurion, at least until the memory of constant feeding and bowel movements fades. Here, give him to me . . .’ She reached out for the sleeping baby, taking him from Felicia with a smile of reassurance. ‘You two have a moment together and I’ll see if we have any more clean linen for his delicate little backside. Come on Appius, let’s see what we have back here . . .’

Felicia watched her climb into the wagon’s rear with a smile before turning back to her husband.

‘So, what news, Centurion?’

Marcus shrugged.

‘The usual, it seems. There are sufficient stone barracks for one cohort, plus two dozen wooden huts which are in various stages of disrepair since they’ve not been used in years. Tribune Belletor’s legion cohort will take the barracks, of course, and we’ll camp in tents tonight, ready to start work putting the huts into habitable condition tomorrow.’

‘Which means that Julius will have every man working on the usual marching fort.’

Marcus smiled in reply.

‘Of course, with your tent right in the middle, and fifteen hundred Tungrians between you and anyone that wants to take us on. I must go and help my men put up the turf rampart, so I’ll see you later, once it’s all done. Where will you sleep tonight?’

She smiled, putting a hand to his cheek.