Arrows of Fury: Empire Volume Two (29 page)

The army marched soon after dawn the following day, each of the two legions supplemented by auxiliary cohorts to make up two forces ten thousand men strong, each with the legion’s cavalry thrown out in front of them to provide a screen against the threat of a barbarian ambush. The 20th Legion turned east a mile south of the wall, shaking out on to a wide front and heading for the charred wreckage of White Strength, while the 6th Legion and its supporting cohorts, including both the 1st and 2nd Tungrians, headed on north through the gate where the road met the wall. Scaurus had briefed his officers fully, making clear their part in the next day’s plan.

‘The governor’s decided to clear the ground to the north and south of the wall before we strike out into enemy territory. He
wants to be sure that our supply line back to the Valley stays open while we dig Calgus out of the hills, so we have to make sure there are no nasty surprises waiting to jump out behind us once we’ve marched north. We’re also to deal with the warband that the Petriana have trapped about ten miles north of here, although there’s still no clear reason why they’d be camped out in such a dangerous spot. So ourselves and the Second Cohort, and the Cugerni, will go north of the wall with Sixth Legion, turn east once we’re clear of the forest and sweep the ground in front of the wall. When we reach the spot where the warband’s waiting for us we’ll split into two groups, one under Tribune Antonius to attack the hill fort and another led by the legatus to form a defensive line to the north and make sure nobody tries to interfere.’

After the briefing he’d spoken with Frontinius, outlining his plan for the next day.

‘I’ve suggested to Legatus Equitius that we take the lead once we’re through the wall gate, and peel off a century to have a quiet wander through the forest and look for any sign of the enemy before meeting the rest of the cohort on the far side. That will get Centurion Corvus safely out of the public eye for another few hours. His men are supposed to be hunters – let’s allow them to do something they ought to be good at.’

Once the Tungrians were well clear of the wall gate Frontinius stepped clear of the column and waved back in the pre-agreed signal. At Marcus’s command the 8th Century peeled off the line of march and stepped on to the twenty-pace strip of ground dividing the road from the forest, cleared of any vegetation to prevent an attacker from falling on marching troops without any warning. The Hamians stood and watched as the column ground past them up the road, the auxiliary cohorts followed by a seemingly endless stream of legion centuries, their layered plate armour marking the difference between them and the auxiliaries that led the column.

‘Your men seem alert enough.’

Marcus turned to find the German, Arminius, at his shoulder, his eyes on the Hamians as they took their short rest break. Casting
a careful eye over his men, Marcus was surprised to note that one man in every tent party was watching the forest’s dark wall intently, and ignoring the legion’s parade up the road.

‘Yes, they seem to have absorbed their lesson about keeping watch well enough.’

He stared into the forest, pleased to see that the ground cover between the looming oaks was light enough for his men to pick their way through it with relative ease. At his command, the century shook out into a long line, with ten feet between each man, and at Qadir’s shouted signal they stepped off into the forest to the east of the road with their shields unslung and swords held ready to fight. Once they were fifty paces or so into the forest each man was as good as alone in the gloomy light that managed to penetrate the thick overhead cover, the mass of vegetation all around them dulling the faint sounds of their passage to near-inaudibility. Scouting through the forest with the apparently instinctive caution that had so surprised Marcus the previous night, they hunted through the shadows for an hour before low whistles passed down the line summoned him to the scene of a discovery. Several men were gathered around a patch of scorched earth. Marcus took one look and spoke quietly to his soldiers.

‘You four, all-round defence, ten paces out, and keep your eyes on the trees and your mouths shut. And
listen
. If a rabbit has a noisy bowel movement anywhere within a mile of here I want to know about it. You and you, signal the century to gather here.
Quietly
.’

He turned back to the object of their interest to find Arminius squatting down alongside the burnt earth, poking at the ash with his finger.

‘These ashes are cold, but recent. And it’s a big fire, enough for twenty to thirty men.’

Marcus waited until the century were gathered around him, their faces both eager and nervous with the discovery.

‘I want a search of the area around this fire, fingertips in the grass, knives in the soil. Thirty-odd barbarians don’t camp out without leaving some clue as to who they were. And do it in silence, no talking. Raise a hand if you find anything.’

Qadir quickly organised the troops to form a search line and sweep across the area around the fire’s black scar on their hands and knees, searching the ground in front of them with their fingers and probing the soil with their daggers for any small item that might have been dropped and trodden into the earth. After ten minutes a soldier put his hand in the air, his find carried across to Marcus by one of the watch officers. The man held out his hand, showing off a small piece of silver that the centurion took from his palm.

‘Jewellery. Very pretty. Someone’s going to be annoyed when he finds this missing from around his neck.’

A replica axe head, crudely fashioned but still recognisable for what it represented, sat on his palm. He showed Qadir the find.

‘Seen anything like this before?’

His deputy shook his head, staring blankly at the glinting pendant.

‘I have.’

The two men turned to find Arminius staring at the tiny silver ornament, his face creased in concern.

It was mid-morning by the time that Felicia was ready to remove the arrow from the wounded cavalry officer. She stood over her patient, his eyes slitted in a deathly pale face as he clung to consciousness with a tenacity that gave her hope for his survival, despite the blood-crusted arrow protruding from his armpit.

‘Decurion? Decurion, can you hear me?’

The exhausted officer’s eyes flickered in her direction, his mouth opening fractionally in a hoarse whisper.

‘I hear you.’ He swallowed painfully, licking his lips.

Felicia knelt by the bed, taking one ice-cold hand in both of her own.

‘My horse …?’

She smiled despite her concern.

‘Your horse, Cornelius Felix, bit two men and kicked several more black and blue while they were getting the arrow out of him, but I’m told he’s happily chewing his way through the fort’s stock of barley even as we speak. And as for
you
, Decurion, you have a barbarian arrow deep in your left armpit. It seems to have missed your lung, and more importantly the artery that runs through your shoulder down your arm, but it must come out immediately. I need to clean out your wound and prevent the onset of sepsis. You’ve lost too much blood already, and you’ll lose more while I remove the arrow, but to leave it there will probably kill you anyway …’

His lips moved again, the smile touching his eyes this time.

‘Get the blasted thing out now, eh?’

She nodded mutely.

‘Do it, but promise me …’

‘Yes?’

‘If the arm has to come off …?’

‘Yes?’

‘Just kill me. I can’t ride that monster Hades one-handed …’

Shaking her head sadly, she gently squeezed the cavalryman’s right hand.

‘My oath forbids me any such act. We’ll just have to make sure this stays attached to you. Now drink this …’

She put a beaker to his lips and patiently tipped the drink into his mouth in small sips.

‘What is it …?’

‘A mixture of wine, honey and the dried and powdered sap of the poppy flower. It will make you drowsy, or possibly even put you to sleep given the amount of blood you’ve lost. What I have to do to you now is going to hurt considerably more than the pain you’re in at the moment.’

The doctor waited for a few minutes, noting the soldier’s gradually slower breathing as the drug took effect.

‘He’s asleep. Let’s move him to the table. You have to keep his arm absolutely as it is now, straight out from his body. We have no idea what the arrowhead might be touching in there …’

She supervised the orderlies as they carried the decurion from his bloodstained bed to the operating table, where so many men had laid in recent months, their wounds open to her gentle, skilful fingers. The table’s surface was criss-crossed with the scars inflicted by her knives and saws, marks left from those occasions when she had decided that the removal of a limb was a safer alternative than risking the onset of gangrene in a shattered arm or leg. The wood’s grain was rubbed smooth by the incessant scrubbing she insisted on to remove each successive man’s blood from the surface before the next soldier was laid out for her attention.

‘Keep his arm steady … that’s it. Now get him on to the table.’

With the unconscious man’s body arranged to her satisfaction, his arm held firmly at right angles from his body by one of the orderlies, she surveyed the wound carefully, noting the blood still leaking from the arrow’s wicked puncture. Stepping away from
the table, she studied her instruments for a moment before selecting a pair of polished concave bronze blades, one with a blunt curved end, the other with small hooks at its end. Turning to her helpers, she addressed the man standing ready to help her by the unconscious patient’s head.

‘So, what do we know about arrow wounds, Orderly Julius?’

‘Doctor, the arrow is often barbed and will cause more damage during removal due to further tearing of the flesh inside the wound.’

‘And so the usual method for the removal of such an arrow is …?’

To push the arrow’s head out of the body through a second wound opened for the purpose, when this can be achieved without risk. This allows the arrow to be broken in half and safely removed.’

‘And given this arrow’s location?’

‘It would be impossible to make a second opening. The arrow must be withdrawn through the original wound.’

She smiled encouragement.

‘Good. Have you carried out this procedure before?’

‘No, Doctor, I have not.’

‘Very well, you shall have your first opportunity shortly. From the look of the wound this is a broad-headed arrow, with only two barbs, and not one of ours. We can be thankful for that small mercy, can we not, Julius?’

The orderly responded dutifully.

‘Certainly, Doctor. A flat-bladed arrow opens a pocket-shaped wound, which will close itself well enough as a result of the flesh swelling in response to the arrow’s intrusion. A wound made by the three-bladed arrowheads used by our archers will not close, however, and requires much more attention during recovery.’

‘And …?’

‘And … it has three barbs …?’

‘Rather than two. Exactly. So, back to this particular patient. Our decurion’s arrow’s upper blade and barb may be close to the large blood vessel that runs along the shoulder and down into the arm, and if we snag that vessel with the uppermost barb we will have a dead man on this table inside a minute or so. I’m going to
use these …’ She lifted the bronze blades to display them to the two men. ‘… to prevent that from happening. These two items are called a dioclean cyathiscus, because their use was invented by the Greek Diocles.’

She bent over the patient, sliding the first blade into the wound, probing gently for the arrowhead.

‘There it is. Now I’m pushing the blade up and over the barb. It’s smooth and blunt, so there shouldn’t be a risk to the blood vessel. That’s it … now there’s a tiny hole in the top of the blade, which I’m going to engage with the point of the barb … got it. That barb is now harmless to the patient. Now the other blade goes in … see? I engage the tiny hooks over the first blade, like so … and I can now pull the arrow from the wound, with the second blade both providing the traction and keeping the first blade in place over the barb. That’s the worst part over with, and not too much more blood spilt either.’

She looked at Julius.

‘There’s another set of blades over there, go and get them. We’ve managed to protect the blood vessel, so now it’s your turn to make the other barb safe.’

The arrow was out of the wound a minute later, the orderly having made a decent fist of engaging its other barb before ceding control of the extraction to Felicia. She drew the vicious iron blade smoothly and slowly from its incision, looking critically at the missile before putting it to one side.

‘There’s a memento for our cavalryman when he wakes up. Now for this wound.’

She explored the wound carefully with blunt-nosed forceps, pulling out a scrap of cloth from deep inside the decurion’s armpit and holding it up for the orderlies to see.

‘See, a fragment of his tunic, punched into the wound by the force of the arrow’s impact. We must never leave such an object inside a wound, it will cause sepsis, possibly gross infection, and frequently end in the death of our patient. Especially a man as weak as this from loss of blood. So, Orderly Julius, what does Celsus advise us to do now?’