Legionary(11)

The pirate leader held the purse out towards Zosimus, grinning weakly.

Zosimus looked him up and down, then swung a tree-trunk leg up and into the man’s crotch. The resulting thud conjured a chorus of pained gasps from the watching men of the century. The pirate leader could only mouth some obscenity soundlessly as he doubled over, eyes bulging. Zosimus turned away from the man and jabbed his elbow back sharply. The captain fell from the side of the vessel, flailing, then plunged below the waves.

Pavo stared at the spot where he had stood, and heard the man’s last gurgling cries of terror before they were cut short and replaced by the ripping of meat and crunching of bone. He felt not a pinch of sympathy for the man as he counted eighteen felled legionary comrades lying still on the bloodied decks. He sheathed his spatha, nodded to Sura and followed the century back onto the trireme.





From the cliff top overlooking the limestone cove, a figure watched as the two triremes set sail once more to the east. The brief had been simple; crush the Roman expedition before it even reaches Antioch. So he had furnished with coin the overly confident Cretan pirate captain to sink the escort and the main expeditionary fleet. But the foolish brigand had been more interested in torturing the escort crew than looking out for the main expeditionary force. And the crew of the two triremes seemed a hardier lot than expected. Limitanei, or so he had been told, but this group seemed as battle-hardened as anything he had seen on the eastern frontier.

Just then, something on the shoreline caught his eye. A ragged man had crawled from the waves, bleeding profusely from one thigh where much of the flesh had been ripped away. He noticed the gold hoops dangling from the ears. Was this the foolish captain, somehow having thrashed his way clear of the feasting sharks to drag himself ashore – surely not? He flitted down the rough staircase hewn into the cliff, then scuttled across the white sand to the bloodied man. The pirate captain looked up at him weakly, stretching out one hand, his face ghostly white.

‘He-help,’ the captain trembled.

‘Yes, yes,’ the figure nodded. ‘I’ll see you right.’ He crouched by the captain’s side, plucked the leather purse with the tawny gold lion from the man’s grasp and tied it onto a chest strap he wore under his tunic. Then he slipped a serrated dagger from his belt, grappled the captain’s sodden locks, wrenched the head back and tore the blade across the man’s throat. A surge of dark blood erupted from the captain’s severed windpipe and his body sagged then flopped onto the sand lifelessly.

The figure wiped his dagger on a rag, stood and looked again to the departing triremes. A stiff grimace wrinkled his face; he would have to hurry back to the Antioch before he was missed. More importantly, he would have to send messengers to his paymasters to report this failure. His mood darkened as he thought of those who had gone before him and failed. Their deaths had been far, far darker than anything he had witnessed here today.





Chapter 3





Just after noon on the eleventh day, the triremes reached the Syrian coast, left the open sea and entered the estuary of the Orontes River. The sea winds died and the remiges worked the oars to take the vessel upriver. They passed by shimmering green crop fields, clusters of juniper woods, stretches of golden dust and sun-bleached rocky hills before coming to a small timber dock. Two auxiliaries stood at the end of the jetty, wearing light linen tunics and felt caps to protect their scalps from the sun. This pair helped dock the ships and then showed them onto the road to Antioch.

So the vexillatio set off along a road that followed the banks of the Orontes, through a series of valleys carved by the great river. At first, the march was a welcome relief after weeks at sea. Pavo marched at the rear of Zosimus’ century, clacking his cane on the flagstones to keep the men in formation, occasionally marching ahead to talk with Zosimus and Sura.

But as the afternoon wore on, the dry air seemed to sap the spring from their steps. The cicada song grew ferocious and the dust seemed to cling to their throats. After a while, the only noise was the crunch-crunch of boots and the grunting of Centurion Quadratus slapping a persistent mosquito from his neck repeatedly, then swiping at it with a volley of curses as it buzzed around his head. When he threatened to rip its wings off, the insect seemed to take heed at last and leave him alone – only to buzz across Pavo and Sura’s heads and set about feasting on Centurion Zosimus’ stubbled scalp.

Pavo chuckled at this, then winced, feeling the sun sting on his arms – more than at any time on the deck of the trireme. He had noticed how Sura’s fair skin had become dappled with freckles from their time at sea. But now his friend had definitely turned a shade or two pinker, with his neck approaching an angry red.