What if the Germans had taken them alive? What if the Germans were killing them by inches? Raping them? Skinning them? Burning them?
‘I should have died with them,’ I croaked, overcome with guilt and pity.
I didn’t see the hand coming. One second I’d been miserable and hunched on the stool, the next I was on the floor, my head singing from the blow.
Titus lifted me to my feet by the scruff of my tunic. ‘Finished feeling sorry for yourself?’
‘I shouldn’t have—’
He hit me again. I tasted blood in my mouth. Anger built to replace self-reproach.
‘What am I supposed to do?’ I spat at the man. ‘They’re out there, and I’m here! What do I do if they don’t come back?’
‘What the fuck do you think you do?’ Titus shook his head. ‘You remember them, and then you pick up your sword and you kill for them. This isn’t your first bad night, Felix, and you’re still standing.’
‘Well, maybe I don’t want to stand any more!’ I shot back.
‘Stop talking like a fanny. You were born to kill, whether you like it or not. And it’s still dark. It’s not over.’
‘And how am I supposed to wait until dawn? Tell me that, Titus? How am I supposed to sit here with my thumbs up my fucking arse while our friends are out there, dead or dying? How the fuck do I do that?’
‘I can help you, if you like?’ he asked me earnestly.
I gave him a pleading look. I just wanted to know. I wanted it to be over. I couldn’t stand the agony. The wait.
‘Please,’ I asked him, wondering what miracle he could work.
I saw nothing but a blur, and then his huge fist crashed into my jaw.
41
I woke in my barrack block, excited calls from the walls the first signs of the raiding party’s arrival, these heralds followed closely by the pounding tramp of sandals as soldiers and civilians rushed to the battlements, every soul within Aliso desperate to set eyes on the returning formation.
At least, what was left of it.
Reaching the top of the battlements, my heart dropped into my stomach. By the grey light of the dawn I saw a skeleton of a century limp its way towards the gate. Roman supported Roman, and behind them, arrows nocked as they crept backwards, were the Syrian archers.
‘Open the gates!’ a voice called from the walls. ‘Stretcher parties out! Surgeons, triage and then get them to the hospital!’
I went to join them, but something – someone – held me back.
Linza. My heart leaped and sank in the shock of seeing her.
‘Let them do it, Felix. You’re too tired,’ she told me, and from the ease with which she had stopped me, I knew that she was right. Instead, I searched the faces of the returning soldiers for men that I knew. Still cloaked by the last dregs of night, and the shadows of their helmets, I recognized only one man amongst the few dozen, his wide shoulders and height raising him above his comrades.
‘Brando!’ I shouted, my voice cracking. This time, there was no way for Linza to stop me, and I reached my comrade as he set weary feet inside the fort’s gate, throwing my arms about his mailed back as if I were a child.
‘Felix?’ he asked, puzzled, seeing a ghost. ‘How…’ His words trailed off. Instead, the Batavian embraced me.
I looked quickly for the other faces of my section, shrugging off the mystery of arrows that protruded from the bloody wounds of some of the raid’s survivors.
‘Felix!’ I heard, and in the scrum of bodies I turned to find Stumps, his arm over the shoulder of a bloodied Micon.
I pulled them both close to me, their heads touching mine. I was not the only soldier who let loose tears at this reunion between comrades.
‘Micon.’ I was worried, seeing the blood thick on his arms and face. ‘Are you hurt?’
The boy soldier shook his head. ‘Not mine,’ he mumbled.
‘How did you get back?’ Stumps managed. ‘We waited, but…’ His voice trailed away, racked with guilt.
‘It doesn’t matter,’ I told him, meaning it. ‘Where are the others?’
‘Folcher’s dead,’ Stumps told me, his eyes on the fort’s dirt. ‘Dog, too.’
I pressed the heels of my hands into my eyes.
‘Dog.’ I breathed out. ‘How?’
‘Took a spear in his chest,’ my friend told me, swallowing at the memory. ‘It was over for him quickly.’
‘Statius?’ I asked.
‘Around here somewhere. Arrow sliced his arm.’
‘An arrow?’
Stumps’s face turned grey as he shot a look at the Syrian archers. These men were unbloodied, their heads bowed. Under command of a Roman centurion, they were being quickly shunted away. For the first time now, I noticed that abusive cries in Latin followed in their wake.
‘Sleep with your eyes open!’ one veteran of the Nineteenth called after them. ‘You’re gonna be waking with open throats!’
‘What happened?’ I asked Stumps, noticing now half a dozen Romans being loaded on to stretchers, the shafts of arrows sticking out of their flesh. With horror, I saw that Centurion H was amongst them.
‘When we left the rally point, H ran us to where the archers were waiting,’ Stumps explained, his voice dark. ‘He called out his part of the watchword, and we got an arrow back instead. It hit someone, they screamed, and then the next moment there were arrows everywhere.’
I swore, imagining the chaos. The terror.
‘Eventually they realized what they were doing,’ Stumps concluded, spitting pathetically on to the dirt. ‘But by then we had men down everywhere, the fucking lizards.’ He snarled.
‘Fifth Century!’ came the shouted order, cutting short my friend’s tirade. ‘Fall into formation. Don’t worry about sections, just get into three ranks. Move!’
The words had come from Malchus, and he cajoled the weary soldiers into obeying his orders. Within moments, those of the raiding party who could still stand were formed up in formation before him. Casting a quick eye over the ranks, I estimated that less than half of the century had escaped death or wounds to the point where they could still stand.
‘Century will form open order,’ the cohort commander then called. ‘In open order, march!’
The front rank took a pace forwards, the rear a pace backwards. Now, there was space for Malchus to walk by the men one by one. As he came closer, I heard words of encouragement. Praise for their deeds. He would not let the survivors of the raid slink away into the barracks like whipped dogs. He would remind them that they were soldiers. Killers.
‘Show me your blade,’ I heard him ask a young soldier, congratulating the young man on the steel painted red with German gore. ‘You made him dance, didn’t you?’ Malchus encouraged him. Then: ‘Did you lose a friend tonight?’ he asked.
‘I did, sir,’ the boy answered, attempting to rouse his courage.
‘Remember him every time you ram that blade into German guts. Make them pay for it. Every one. Understood?’
‘Yes, sir.’
‘And what about you?’ Malchus asked Stumps beside me. ‘Missing fingers and an ear? You’re not a stranger to this, are you, soldier? Show this young lad your blade. Show him what it means to be a man in this army.’
For a moment, Stumps did nothing.
‘Did I speak into the wrong ear?’ Malchus asked, an edge of amusement to his iron tone. ‘Show him your blade.’
Stumps drew the short sword from its sheath; it was clean.
‘I like to stick them on the javelin, sir.’ Stumps covered, feigning confidence. ‘I like to see them wriggle on it.’
‘Good man.’ Malchus grinned, slapping him on his shoulder.
And then he came to me. We exchanged no words, just a look. A look from veteran to veteran. A look which acknowledged we had been fucked that night, and that the chances of the fort’s survival had ebbed along with the blood from those men who had been lost beyond the walls, and those who now screamed in the hospital as the surgeons set to their gruesome work.