Legionary: The Scourge of Thracia (Legionary 4) (3 page)

‘When we next attack the mountain passes . . . they
will
fall,’ Farnobius roared. ‘The heart of Thracia and all its fine cities will soon be ours to plunder!’

A great, guttural cheer erupted and washed across the Moesian Plain, shaking the land.

Chapter 1

The dipping mid-September sun silhouetted Constantinople’s skyline: mighty stone walls that encompassed seven hills packed with palaces, gardens, markets, baths, columns and marble temples to the old gods competing with the great new domed Christian basilicas. The air remained disagreeably hot and dry, carrying with it a tang of dung and vintage armpits. The main way that ran from the Imperial Palace region at the tip of the peninsula all the way to the land walls was bustling as usual; thick with a sea of sweating faces and jostling wagons moving to and fro in a chorus of clopping hooves and babbling voices, a haze of red dust lingering above the throng. The people shoved and shouldered past each other to buy bread, wine, fabrics and spices at the street-side stalls. But there was one face amongst the throng entirely disinterested in trade: a young, lean man with a crop of short, dark hair and a sun-burnished, hawk-like face, heading west along the main road at haste.

Pavo barged past a pair of squabbling shoppers, straightening the sleeves of his fresh white tunic and brushing a hand across his smooth jaw. After some five months in the burning sands of Persia, such simple pleasures as shaving and clean clothes were still a novelty to be savoured. The very fact he had survived the fraught journey east was a blessing he would never forget.

A two-hundred-strong
vexillatio
of the Claudia had been sent into Persia that spring. Yesterday, just five had returned. They had sailed from Antioch, enduring a stomach-churning fortnight at sea before reaching Constantinople and docking at the Neorion harbour in the north of the city yesterday morning. Utterly spent, they had staggered to the dusty little barrack compound that they had left behind earlier that year. His itchy hay-mattress bunk had felt like a silken cradle, and he slept dreamlessly for the rest of that day and most of this one too. Waking just hours ago, he had eaten like a starving beggar with his four surviving comrades in the barracks. Half a pheasant, three bowls of mutton stew mopped up with half a loaf of bread, then yoghurt and honey, finished with a small lake’s worth of chilled water. They had said little as they ate, each man exhausted and acutely aware of their many absent comrades who had fallen in the east. So much had changed during those months in the burning sands. So many questions had been answered, he realised, gulping back the swelling in his throat as he thought of Father. And so many new questions posed, he mused, glancing down to the leather bracelet on his wrist – Father’s last gift to him.

Numerius Vitellius Pavo, Hostus Vitellius Dexion. Every beat of my heart is for you, my sons.

He could even hear Father’s voice as he read the etching on the bracelet one more time. A father lost, the promise of a half-brother found. It truly had been a monumental time in the fiery east.

A sudden waft of floral perfume from a passing group of lead-painted ladies on the way stirred him from memory and reminded him of his destination. All throughout the unpleasant voyage home, he had yearned for the moment when he would be reunited with Felicia. Again, his mind’s eye taunted him with images of her. Her amber locks, her floral scent. Her warm, soft skin against his. Soon it would no longer be a fruitless longing. Before setting sail from Antioch he had sent her a message on the
Cursus Publicus
, assuring her he was well and would return to her. The imperial messenger would have reached her in a fraction of the time their sea voyage had taken. She would have had days to eagerly anticipate his return.

He noticed his surroundings growing less salubrious as the road skirted the foot of the seventh hill – with crumbling
insulae
tenements becoming more dominant than marble edifices. Regardless, the sight evoked a thousand precious memories within him. His early years had been spent here with Father, and now it was home for him and Felicia. He came under the shade of the city walls and the Saturninus Gate and then veered off down a narrow and relatively quiet alley. His boots clattered on the uneven flagstones, drawing glances from the few characters lingering in doorways and looking down from windows. Pavo noticed one hooded fellow with a scarred face straighten up a little as he passed. From the corner of his eye he saw the tell-tale shift of something under the cloak. Lightning-fast, Pavo swung and shot out a hand, fiercely grappling the man’s wrist through the cloak until the sinews in his arms bulged. The man winced and a dagger fell from the bottom of his cloak.

‘Go and haunt some other street,’ Pavo snarled.

The mugger’s eyes darted over Pavo’s face, panicked. He backed away, then turned and ran, leaving his fallen blade.

The moment was gone like an unwelcome breeze, and Pavo turned his attentions to the listing tenement before him. His heart pounded as he looked up to the third floor and let anticipation run riot. He bounded up the rickety timber stairs onto the third floor landing, his face broadening with an incontrollable grin . . . until he beheld the vacated apartment, door ajar. His Cursus Publicus scroll lay unopened where it had been shoved under the door. The room was bereft of her things. Just a bare bed and a scarred table sat there, an irate-looking mouse scowling at him from its surface, interrupted from its meal of a bread crust. Then he saw a lonely-looking strip of red silk on the table, layered with dust. He stalked inside and lifted it, shaking the dust clear and holding it to his nose, inhaling the weak trace of Felicia’s scent. It was just like the piece she had given him which had been lost in Persia. Her farewell to him? A way of leaving the past behind? His pounding heart stumbled to a near standstill.

‘Ah, so you’re alive?’ a voice remarked glibly behind him.

He swung round to see a glass-eyed old man in the doorway of the adjacent apartment.

‘Where is she?’ Pavo panted.

‘Long gone. Back in the summer. She left here with a faceful of tears.’ The old fellow wagged a finger at Pavo as if in reproach. ‘She heard word that your lot had been slain out in the Persian deserts.’

Pavo cast a bitter look at the Cursus Publicus scroll, wishing he had been able to get word to her sooner.

‘She left the city to help at the Great Northern Camp and the five mountain passes,’ the old man added. ‘For months now, trains of workers and oxen have been leaving Constantinople in droves to help supply and maintain the camp. She felt it was the best place for her. Things are dire out there from what I hear – legions cobbled together from the few bands of men who survived Ad Salices, and more Goths than a man can count trying to break through the passes.’

‘Aye, aye, we’ve heard much talk of this Northern Camp since we returned to the city,’ Pavo said, his eyes darting as he tried to make sense of things. Felicia seemed to be enticed to danger like a bee to a bloom. Indeed, he snorted, she had been drawn to him. The flash of amusement faded and he wondered if their time together was over. If Felicia thought he was dead then he had to get word to her at this distant camp. He ploughed his fingers through his hair in frustration.
Why, why didn’t you wait just a little longer?
he thought.

‘Where are you headed?’ the old man said as Pavo staggered past and trudged down the stairs.

Pavo looked back up, his face sullen. ‘Where else does a man go after he has lost his woman?’

‘Have one for me,’ the old fellow chuckled.

The bustle outside seemed smothered and distant and he felt numb as he made his way back up the main street towards the Forum of the Ox. This square space was set in the dip between the third and seventh hills. The place was dominated by the glistening bronze sculpture of a bull at its centre – still bearing black stains from its days as a method of execution, where Christians would be roasted alive in its hollow belly. These days, the forum hosted no such spectacles. Now, the Forum of the Ox knew only trading by day and unfettered iniquity by night. And, rather fittingly, it was where he had arranged to convene and drink with his few surviving XI Claudia comrades.

Dusk descended as he entered the forum. Torches and lamps blinked into life and the first shrieks of laughter and crashes of breaking glass sounded from the gathered crowds of carousing folk. Cackling drunks stumbled across his path, groups roared out chorus after chorus of ribald song, and near the middle of the square, some furious short man endured the indignity of a circle of his taller friends throwing him up in the air again and again, each time with a great cry of merriment. A violent ripping sound rang out, and the next time he was tossed up in the air, his trousers were absent, and watching women squealed in mock horror at the short man’s flailing genitals while his friends roared with laughter. The sound of gaiety along with the reek of cheap wine and roasting meat hastened Pavo’s step.

Watered wine. Stick to the watered wine
, he nagged himself as he made his way over to one open air tavern bearing a vine wreath and ale-stirring pole above the arched entrance and shoved his way through. The place was separated from the street by a red-brick half-wall, and contained twenty or more overpopulated tables and benches, with wine and ale barrels and jugs lining a snug in the rear wall. He scanned the myriad ruddy faces for the few he sought. He could not help but chuckle when he caught sight of Sura, standing by a brick pillar. The brash, blonde-mopped and fair-skinned legionary, Pavo’s closest comrade since enlisting nearly two years ago, was in his element, it seemed, in mid-flow of some doubtlessly fanciful tale – his hands waving in illustration – while two local women close to twice his age listened intently. He stepped a little closer to listen in.

‘The Persian Shahanshah?’ Sura snorted derisively in response to one woman’s question. ‘He was a worthy foe but, ultimately, he came up short against me. Now I’ve returned to these parts,’ he waved his hands, palms down, in a calming gesture, ‘so hopefully I can sort out the trouble in Thracia. Unofficial King of Adrianople, you see,’ he said, jabbing a thumb into his chest. ‘They say I’m cut out to lead a legion. I can see where they’re coming from. If I had a few cohorts at my command, I’d . . . I’d . . . ’ Sura stammered as he realised he hadn’t thought his story through and, as usual, his efforts began to unravel. His cheeks grew rosy as his lips flapped soundlessly.

‘You’d have Durostorum and all in the north back in imperial control?’ Pavo offered, stepping in next to him.

Sura did a double-take at this suggestion then grinned, seeing it was Pavo. He shoved an untouched cup of wine from a cluster of several on a shelf into Pavo’s hand then turned back to the women, nodding hurriedly. ‘Aye, er . . . all of the north.’

The women cackled as they latched onto Pavo’s game.

‘Reconquer old Dacia north of the river too maybe?’ Pavo added.

Sura now fired a swift and sour glare at Pavo. ‘Pavo for fu-’ he started then stopped, seeing Pavo was alone. ‘Where is she?’ he asked.

Pavo shook his head. ‘Gone.’

Sura frowned, turning away from the women, his brow furrowing in deep ruts. ‘Gone?’ he said, his mouth agog as he reached out to place a consoling hand on Pavo’s shoulder. ‘You mean . . . ’

‘No, she’s well – as far as I know. But she left the city and headed out into Thracia for this
Great Northern Camp
we’ve heard so much about,’ Pavo replied.

‘The Northern Camp?’ Sura spluttered in a mix of relief and dismay. He shook his head and cocked an eyebrow. ‘I shouldn’t be so surprised really. Drawn to trouble like a whore to the docks, that girl. Er . . . ’ he shrugged in apology at the inappropriate analogy then clasped a hand to Pavo’s shoulder. ‘Look, we’ll find a way to get to her and to protect her.’

Pavo said nothing, simply clasping a hand to Sura’s shoulder in reply. Sura glanced at Pavo’s leather bracelet, made to speak, then hesitated.

‘Sura?’ Pavo coaxed him.

‘Eh, oh, nothing.’

Pavo saw how Sura was working hard to avoid his gaze. Then he noticed his friend glancing at the leather bracelet again. Sura knew what Pavo had found, out in the east, and had sworn to help find this half-brother. ‘You have found something? Come on, tell me.’

Sura shook his head. ‘Well, yes, something and nothing. I tried asking around in here,’ he nodded towards one gnarled drunk and then swept his head across the others nearby. ‘Nothing. Then there was one whose eyes lit up.’

Pavo’s breath stilled.

‘A veteran from the Thracian legions, discharged just a month ago – lost an arm in a clash with the Goths.’

‘He knows of Dexion?’ Pavo said.