‘Can we talk our way out?’ Dasius shouted.
‘Auxiliary cavalry a hundred miles from their unit and a man with a wooden hand and a scroll case with the wrong Emperor’s seal?’
‘Then we must fight.’ Dasius barked an order and Laslav dropped the leading reins of the surviving pack animal. Valerius drew his sword, but the Thracian laid a hand on his arm. Dasius’s eyes were bright, but his voice held no fear. ‘Your mission is too important. If we cannot stop them, at least we can delay them. Ride!’ He slapped the rump of Valerius’s horse and in the same instant hauled his own mount to face the enemy. ‘Ride!’ he repeated. Valerius knew he had no option. To hesitate would be an insult to their sacrifice. With his heart feeling as if it were torn in two, he urged his beast up the snowy track. Behind him he heard the distinctive whoop of the Thracian auxiliaries followed by a cry of mortal agony. He dared a glance over his shoulder and was greeted by a whirling free-for-all of mounted men. In that instant he saw that Dasius had failed. Four of the enemy cavalry broke free from the skirmish and galloped in his wake, the iron points of their spears glinting in the low winter sun. With a muttered curse he dug his heels into the mare’s ribs in a vain bid to gain another few yards. His mind whirled as he calculated speed and distance. Could he outrun them? That depended on how fresh their mounts were and how exhausted his own after six days in the mountains. Fight? If it came to it, better sooner, before his horse was blown. But against four? He risked another look, trying to gauge the fighting potential of his pursuers. Germans, or Gauls, judging by the long hair streaming from beneath their pot helmets and the rough plaid of their trappings. Well mounted and riding in close formation, two by two, to make better speed through the snow. When they closed on him they’d spread out to make the most effective use of their long spears. He cringed at the thought of one of those iron blades chopping into his spine. But what choice did he have? If he turned and fought, they’d come at him from four different angles. He might take one, possibly two if he was quick, but by the time the second was dying one of the others would have taken his throat out or pinned him like a rabbit on a spit.
The ground raced past in a blur of white and he almost missed it. A patch of disturbed snow at the entrance to a gully fifty paces ahead. He felt his heart quicken, the heat rising up from his belly. So be it. If he was going to die at least he would die trying to live, not like a frightened deer fleeing from the hounds. The gully flashed past to his left and he let the mare carry on another forty paces before he pulled her up and turned to face his pursuers, throwing away his cloak to give him more freedom of movement. The cavalrymen whooped their encouragement at his defiance. This was better sport than chasing some helpless civilian. Timing. Timing was everything. Every instinct told him to kick the mare into motion. In a cavalry fight a stationary man was a dead man. Speed and mobility were as much his weapons as the sword he held low in his left hand. But for his plan to work he needed them to stay bunched until the last moment. So he gritted his teeth and willed the horse to stay still. It was his good fortune that after Serpentius’s departure Dasius had insisted he take one of the cavalry-trained spares, which would respond to knee and heel in a fight. Now! When the auxiliaries were a hundred paces away he urged her into motion. She came swiftly to the canter, but by the time she reached a gallop the enemy had already covered fifty paces. He saw daylight between two of the horses. Don’t break yet. Not yet. He had deliberately angled his attack to come at them from their right and their attention was concentrated entirely on the fool who wanted to commit suicide on their spear points. None of them noticed the roan blur that erupted from their other flank.
Serpentius’s throwing axe took the rearmost rider precisely on the earpiece of his helmet an instant before the Spaniard’s horse crashed into the shoulder of the man in front’s mount, cannoning him against his comrade. Valerius saw the flash of a sword, a spray of scarlet and a flurry of snow as one of the horses went down. He didn’t have time to enjoy the moment because the rear man on the right flank swerved past the chaos and came directly at him, crouched low in the saddle, spear held loose in his right hand. He would be calculating where his point would strike and rejoicing that his opponent had no shield or armour. Valerius could almost feel the auxiliary’s elation and he knew that in the other man’s mind he was already dead. But Gaius Valerius Verrens had fought Boudicca’s snarling champions without a backward step. More important, he had ridden against Parthian horse soldiers born in the saddle and weaned on mare’s milk. Three months on campaign as Corbulo’s cavalry commander had taught him more about horsemanship and cavalry tactics than another man would learn in a lifetime. When the time came the grip on the spear shaft would tighten, the arm would tense and the iron tip of the spear would whip up to rip his throat or tear through his heart.