Cato 03 - When the Eagle Hunts (13 page)

Cato trembled as he realised the full implication. He slammed down the lid of the chest and scrambled out of the pit.

'Find the others, and get them to the centre of the village as fast as possible. I'm going on ahead to find the centurion. Get moving!'

Cato hurried through the brittle remains of the burned-out buildings where only the stoutest timbers and blackened stone walls still stood. He heard Macro calling out orders, and made for his centurion's voice. Emerging between the walls of two of the more substantial buildings arranged around the heart of Noviomagus, he caught sight of Macro, and a few of his men, standing beside what looked like a covered well, about ten feet across. A waist-high stone parapet encircled it and the whole was covered with a conical hide roof. Strangely, the roof had been left intact by the raiders, apparently the one thing they had not tried to destroy.

'Sir!' Cato called out as he ran towards them. Macro looked up from the well, a distracted expression on his face. Seeing Cato, he stiffened his posture and strode to meet him.

'Found anything?'

'Yes, sir!' Cato could not restrain his nervous excitement as he made his report. 'There's a pit filled with spoils near the main gate. They must be intending to come back this way. Sir, we might have a chance to spring a trap on them!'

Macro nodded solemnly, apparently unmoved by the prospect of ambushing the raiders. 'I see,' he said.

Cato's impulse to run on about his discovery was stilled by the peculiar deadness in the face of his superior.

'What's the matter, sir?'

Macro swallowed. 'Did you find any bodies?'

'Bodies? No, sir. None. It's a funny thing.'

'Yes.' Macro pursed his lips and jabbed a thumb towards the well. 'Then I guess they must all be in there.'

Chapter Ten

In the failing light Centurion Hortensisus formed a dull silhouette, almost devoid of detail as he leaned his hands on the stonework and peered into the well. Macro and his men hung back, keeping as far from any lingering spirits of the dead as possible. Diomedes sat alone, his back against the blackened stonework of a ruined building. His head was bowed, face buried in his arms, body wracked with grief.

'He's taking it a bit hard,' muttered Figulus.

Cato and Macro exchanged a look. Both had seen the twisted pile of mutilated bodies that almost filled the well. Given the extent of the settlement, there must have been hundreds of them. What horrified Cato more than anything was that no living thing had been spared. The tangle of bodies included even the villagers' dogs and sheep, as well as women and children. The raiders had made it clear what fate would befall those who sided with Rome. The young optio had reeled before the dark vision in the well, and had felt a chilling pang of horror and despair as his eyes fell on the face of a young boy, barely more than an infant, sprawled on top of the heap. Beneath a wild thatch of straw-blond hair, a pair of startling blue eyes stared up in wide-eyed terror. The boy's mouth hung open to reveal tiny white teeth. He had been killed with a spear thrust to the chest and his coarse wool top was stained black with dried blood. Recoiling from the charnal pit, Cato had turned, bent over and thrown up.

Now, half an hour later, he felt cold and weary with the profound sorrow of those who have seen the utter grimness of life for the first time. Violent death was something he had lived with ever since he had joined the eagles. That was barely more than a year ago. So little time, he reflected. The army had succeeded in hardening him without his really being aware of it, but in the face of the bloody handiwork of the Druids of the Dark Moon cult, he was consumed with horror and despair. And as his mind tried to come to terms with the actions of men who so outraged every civilised standard, a steadily swelling urge to wreak savage revenge upon them threatened to overwhelm him. The image of the boy's face flashed through his mind once more and instinctively his hand twisted and tightened on the pommel of his sword. Now the same Druids had their hands on a Roman family, no doubt destined for the same fate as the inhabitants of Noviomagus.

Macro noticed the movement. For a moment he was almost moved to place a fatherly hand on his optio's shoulder and try to comfort him. He had grown used to the optio's presence and tended to forget that Cato lacked experience of the absolute brutality of war. It was hard to believe that the clumsy bookworm who had turned up with the other bedraggled recruits back in Germany was the same man as the scarred junior officer standing silently beside him. The lad had already won his first decoration for bravery; the polished phalera gleamed on the optio's harness. There was no doubting his courage and intelligence, and if he survived the harsh life of the legions for long enough, a good future lay ahead of him. Yet he was still little more than a boy, inclined to a painful degree of self-consciousness that Macro could not understand. Any more than he could understand the depths of the lad's occasional moods, when he seemed to shrink into himself and wrap himself up in a tangle of unfathomable threads of thought.

Macro shrugged. If the boy would only stop thinking so much, he'd find life a lot easier. Macro had little time for introspection, it merely confused the issue and prevented a man from doing things. Best left to those idle intellectuals back in Rome. The sooner Cato accepted that, the happier he'd be.

Figulus was still tutting at Diomedes's shameless display of emotion. 'Bloody Greeks! They turn everything into a drama. Too much tragedy and not enough comedy in their theatres, that's their problem.'

'The man's lost his family,' Macro said quietly. 'So do him a favour before he overhears you, and fucking shut up.'

'Yes, sir.' Figulus waited a moment, and then casually wandered off, as if looking for something else to divert his attention while the century waited for orders.

Centurion Hortensius had seen enough, and briskly strode over to join Macro.

'Bloody mess in there,'

'Yes, sir.'

'Best get your lads to fill it in. We haven't got time for a proper burial. Anyway, I don't know what the drill is for the local version.'

'You could ask Diomedes,' suggested Macro. 'He'd know.'

They both turned to look at the Greek guide. Diomedes had raised his head, and was staring towards the well, his features twisted and trembling as he struggled with his grief.

'I don't think so,' decided Centurion Hortensius. 'Not for a while at least. I'll take care of him while you see to the well.'

Macro nodded, before another thought occurred to him. 'What about the loot my optio discovered?'

'What about it?'

Cato looked up irritably at the senior centurion's failure to grasp the significance of his find. Before he could give voice to any insubordinate explanation, Macro intervened.

'The optio reckons the raiders intend to return for their spoils.'

'Oh, does he?' Hortensius glared at the young optio, angered that so young and inexperienced a soldier should presume to understand the enemy's intentions.

'Otherwise, what would be the point of putting them to one side, sir?'

'Who knows? Maybe it's some kind of offering to their gods.'

'I don't think so,' Cato responded quietly.

Hortensius frowned. 'If you've got something to say, you say it properly, Optio,' he snapped.

'Yes, sir.' Cato stood to attention. 'I merely wished to suggest that it looks to me as if the raiders have put aside anything they can carry with them when they retreat back into the territory of the Durotriges. That's all, sir. Other than the fact that they could pass back this way at any moment.'

'Any moment, eh?' Hortensius mocked him. 'I doubt it. If they've any sense they're already safely tucked up back where they came from.'

'Even so, sir, the lad might have a point,' said Macro. 'We ought to post a watch on some high ground.'

'Macro, I wasn't born yesterday. It's taken care of. The cavalry scouts are screening the approaches to the village. If anyone comes, they'll be spotted long before they threaten us. Not that I believe the raiders are still out there.'

He had barely stopped speaking when a thrumming of hooves sounded in the dusk. The three officers turned, and moments later a scout galloped his horse into the centre of the settlement. He reined his beast in and slipped from its side. 'Where's Centurion Hortensius?'

'Over here. Make your report!'

The man ran over, saluted and took a deep breath. 'Column of men approaching, sir! Two miles off.'

'Which direction?'

The scout turned and pointed towards the east, beyond a dip between two hills, where a track wound its way along the coast.

'How many?'

'Two hundred, maybe more.'

'Right. What's your decurion doing?'

'He's pulled the squadron back into the trees on the nearest hill. Except for two men, unmounted. They're keeping an eye on the column.'

'Good.' Hortensius nodded with satisfaction and dismissed the scout. 'Off you go. Tell the decurion to stay under cover. I'll send a runner with orders as soon as I can.'

The scout ran back to his mount and Hortensius turned to his officers. He forced himself to smile slightly.

'Well, young Cato. Seems you might be right. And if you are, then those Druids and their friends are in for a great big fucking surprise.'

Chapter Eleven

'And just for a change it's snowing,' grumbled Cato as he looked up into the first flurry descending from the night sky. A cold wind was blowing in from the sea and brought a swirling mass of white flakes down on the men of the Fourth Cohort as they lay hidden in and around the ruined settlement. The clear weather of the last few days had left the ground dry and the snow began to settle at once, speckling the dark cloaks and shields of the legionaries as they shivered in silence.

'Won't last long, Optio,' Figulus whispered. 'Look there!' He indicated a clear patch of sky to one side of the dark looming clouds. Stars, and the dim crescent of a half-moon, glimmered faintly in an almost black sky.

It seemed a long time since night had fallen, and the tense anticipation of the men sharpened their senses as they waited for the raiders to fall into the trap. The Sixth Century was concealed in the ruins around the centre of the settlement. Peering over the waist-high stonework of a hut, Cato could not see any of the other men of the century but their presence was palpable. As was the presence of the dead piled up in the well close by. The image of the dead boy came unbidden into Cato's mind and his bitter appetite to exact a terrible revenge on the Druids and their followers was given a new edge.

'Where the hell are those bloody British bastards?' he muttered, then immediately clenched his jaw, furious with himself for displaying his impatience in front of his men. With the exception of Figulus, they had sat in silence, according to their orders. Most of them were seasoned veterans who had been posted to the Second Legion the previous autumn to bring the unit up to strength. Vespasian's unit had suffered grievous losses in the early battles of the campaign and had been fortunate enough to have first pick of the replacements from the reserves shipped in from Gaul.

'Want me to go and look, sir?' Figulus asked.

'No!' snapped Cato. 'Sit still, damn you. Not another sound.'

'Yes, sir. Sorry, sir.'

As the recruit shuffled off a short distance, Cato shook his head in despair. Left to his own devices that idiot would wreck the hurriedly laid plans of Centurion Hortensius. In the short time before the enemy column came within sight of the settlement, two centuries had been deployed in the settlement itself, the other four hidden in the defensive ditch, ready to close the circle that would snare the raiders. The cavalry scouts were concealed along the fringes of a nearby wood and had been detailed to emerge as soon as the signal to attack was given. They would then watch for and chase down any of the Britons that managed to escape from the settlement. Not that Cato intended to give them much chance of that.

The charred remains of the settlement were already disappearing under a thin mantle of snow. As Cato watched for the enemy, the loom of the fallen snow reminded him of the finest white silk, and suddenly he was thinking of Lavinia — young, fresh and filled with an infectious enthusiasm for life. Too soon the image faded and was replaced by her startled expression in death. Cato forced the vision from his mind and tried to focus on something else. Anything else. He was surprised, then, to find himself thinking about Boudica — her face fixed with one arched eyebrow in the gently mocking expression he had become peculiarly fond of. Cato smiled.

'Sir!' Figulus hissed, half rising to his feet. The other men of the section glared at him.

'What?' Cato looked round. 'Thought I told you to still your tongue.'

'Something's happening!' Figulus jabbed his finger towards the opposite side of the settlement.

'Shut your mouth!' Cato growled through clenched teeth, raising a fist to emphasise the order. 'Get down!'

Figulus squatted back under cover. Then, as cautiously as he could, Cato looked out on the open space before the well. His eyes strained for any sign of movement. The low moan of the wind frustrated his hearing, and so it was that in spite of the darkness he saw the enemy before he heard them. The dark outline of one of the ruins opposite shifted its shape, then a shadow slowly emerged from between two stone walls. A horseman. On the threshold of the open space he reined in, and sat quite still on his mount, as if sniffing the air for signs of danger. At length the horse whinnied and raised a hoof, scraping a dark gash through the snow. Then, with a clearly audible click of the tongue, the Briton urged his beast forward, towards the well. The dark shape moved slowly through the speckled swirl and Cato got a clear sense that the man's eyes were scouring the silent ruins. He hunched down behind the wall as far as he could go and still see over the blackened stonework. As the horseman reached the well, he reined in again, then edged alongside the rim for a better view down the well shaft. Cato's hand tightened on the handle of his sword, and for a moment the temptation to draw the weapon was almost unbearable. Then he forced himself to release his grip. The men around him were tense enough to jump into action at the slightest hint that he was preparing to rush into the attack. They must wait for the trumpet. Hortensius was watching from the top of a burial mound outside the settlement and would only give the signal to spring the trap when all the raiders had passed inside the ruins of the main gate. The orders were clear: no man must move an inch until the signal was given. Cato turned towards his men, silently waving them down. From the way they were crouched and holding their shields and javelins ready, he could see that they were ready to move.