‘How many slaves?’ asked one of the Agraci.
‘Thirty or forty,’ replied Andromachus.
‘That many?’ queried Spartacus.
Andromachus stood. ‘The owner has expensive tastes.’
‘What about guards?’ asked another man with a thick black beard.
Andromachus pointed his dagger at the gates in the perimeter wall. ‘Always two on the watchtower at the gates and another two at the entrance to the villa itself. The guards are housed in a small barracks building beside the wall around fifty paces from the villa.’
‘Numbers?’ asked Spartacus.
‘A score of legionaries at least.’
They left later that afternoon, a guide provided by Andromachus leading them through the thick woods that covered the hills of Daphne, the area where the rich and powerful citizens of Antioch escaped the stench and noise of the city to relax in their expensive villas sited in lush countryside where the endless number of streams and waterfalls fed expansive groves of laurel, walnut, fig and mulberry. They dismounted among a wood of bay trees and then posted guards and waited for night to fall. Spartacus and the guide crept to the edge of the trees to observe the white-walled villa enclosed within a circuit wall positioned in a great clearing on a gently sloping hillside. Two gates gave access to the compound and there was a wooden watchtower overhead that gave an uninterrupted view of the valley below. Spartacus noted the pair of guards above the gates and two more standing beneath them either side of the open gates. There were no people or carts on the single track that led to the villa’s entrance.
When night fell two men were left to guard the horses while the others walked slowly through the wood to the edge of the trees. There was no moon and they all wore black so there was little chance of them being spotted, but there was also no wind and absolute stillness permeated the darkness. The snap of a broken branch would easily carry to the villa.
So they trod carefully and slowly as they inched in a long line towards the shut gates. Spartacus felt a tingle of excitement ripple through him and he gripped the hilt of his sword. All the men with him were accomplished killers, the Parthians being veterans of many of his uncle’s campaigns and the Agraci having been hand-picked by Haytham himself for their ruthlessness. After what seemed like an age they halted fifty paces from the gates and knelt on the soft grass. Torches that flickered in the compound behind illuminated the watchtower and its occupants, making the task of the archers who now nocked arrows in their bowstrings much easier.
There was a quick succession of sharp twangs and hisses as the archers shot their arrows and then the others raced forward. Spartacus smiled to himself as he heard moans and saw the two guards collapse as half a dozen of his men rested their backs against the wall and then clasped their hands together to form a step in which others placed their feet, before being hoisted up and over the wall.
Within half a minute everyone except the archers and Scarab were over the wall. Once inside the compound Spartacus ordered the beam that was slotted into brackets on the back of the gates to be removed to let his dog and the bowmen enter. The latter were directed to find the barracks building and keep its occupants penned inside as two men were left to guard the gates and the rest headed for the villa.
They kicked in the ornate doors and then swept through the villa’s ground floor, past wall decorations showing images of Aphrodite and Dionysus, the deities of love and fertility, to search for the slave quarters. The oil lamps illuminated their passage as they raced into rooms with swords drawn. They knocked over statues of gods and goddesses, the noise waking slaves who staggered, bleary-eyed, into their path.
In the compound shouts came from inside the oblong building with a tiled roof that housed the villa’s tiny garrison. Seconds later the door opened and two legionaries in tunics carrying javelins ran out, to be shot by the archers who stood waiting for them. They fell to the ground and moaned as a third Roman armed with a gladius followed and was felled by an arrow in his belly. The door was slammed shut as two more arrows smashed into it.
The quiet was pierced by high-pitched screams as the Agraci began slaughtering the slaves. A few of the male servants grabbed knives and other kitchen utensils and attempted to fight off the invaders but were swiftly cut down by sword strikes. Women and young girls, terrified and huddling together, were quickly separated and sliced open with knives and swords. They fell to their knees and pleaded for their lives but these men were assassins chosen for their expertise at killing and they were only interested in getting their task done as speedily as possible. Mostly they stabbed and hacked at half-naked bodies, spraying the intricate mosaics with blood and gore, though occasionally they broke a slender young neck.
Spartacus raced up the stairs with four others following, Scarab bounding ahead of them all, and came to a pair of red doors decorated with gold leaf. Spartacus kicked at the doors to force them open and then he was inside the room that smelt of incense. A woman, a servant, lunged at him with a knife in her hand but her arm was severed at the wrist by an Agraci sword. She clutched her stump and sank to her knees, whimpering before being silenced as the man who had cut off her hand sheathed his sword and slit her throat with his dagger, kicking her body to the floor.
Another woman, middle aged, her voluptuous figure draped in a white silk gown, stood transfixed as Scarab leaped at her and knocked her to the floor before savaging her neck and shoulders in a frenzied attack. She squealed in pain and fear as the beast ripped at her flesh, Spartacus grabbing its thick, iron-studded collar to pull him off the prostrate woman. He ordered one of his men to haul the dog, its face covered in blood, away as he squatted beside the woman, her breathing shallow, blood oozing from her neck wound to mix on the floor with her oiled, curly black hair. Her eyes, wide and filled with terror, looked at the hulking figure staring down at her.
‘Make sure every one else on this floor is dead,’ he barked to those behind him before he turned to look at the woman whose life was ebbing away.
‘Queen Aruna, we meet at long last.’
The mother of Mithridates made to speak but Spartacus placed a hand over her mouth.
‘Do not speak; I have no interest in what you have to say. Bitch!
‘I have come to repay a debt. You conspired to have my uncle and myself killed when we visited Antioch. Your treachery killed most of our escort and my friend, who died at the hands of your lover. Well, he too died and now you are about to join him in the pit of the abyss.’
Aruna’s eyes flicked right and left in a desperate search for solace but there was none. She tried to lift herself up but her efforts were feeble as more and more of her lifeblood seeped from her body onto the floor. Spartacus stood up and took a last look at the dying woman who had once been the high queen of the Parthian Empire, before turning and leaving the room, calling his dog after him as he descended the stairs and walked outside.
His men had conducted a thorough search of the villa and all the outbuildings to ensure no one was left alive, the archers still covering the entrance of the barracks with their bows.
‘Burn them out,’ ordered Spartacus to the commander of his Agraci.
The archers shot arrows at the shutters that barred the windows and the door while the warriors collected dry wood from storerooms and hay from the stables and loaded them on two carts that were then doused with oil and set alight, before pushing them against the building. Within minutes the carts were ablaze and the flames were lapping round the building. As the fire took hold of the carts the legionaries inside the barracks charged from the building, preferring to take their chances against men rather than being roasted alive.