Rikiar thanked him, and went back. At least the Vandal did not yap like an old woman; not like those Harii. Actually, he was too quiet. He needed watching. If he stole anything from Maximus, it would be more than a few mutton bones around his ears the fucker would be getting.
Maximus hunkered down with Tarchon to watch. The Suanian took his duties seriously and was quiet. The water was still, black in the sun. The reeds meant you could not see far. It was more a matter of listening.
From nowhere came a feeling of loneliness. Maximus missed Calgacus. Odd, he never had when the miserable, ugly bastard was alive. The old Caledonian might have moaned the whole fucking time, but you could trust him. Not like a light-fingered Vandal or a couple of superstitious Harii. It had been better when the familia was just the three of them: Maximus, Calgacus and Ballista.
Chewing some air-dried beef, Maximus fished out the one book he owned, Petronius’s novel, The Satyricon. He unrolled the bulky papyrus at random. It was the dinner of Trimalchio, the part where the host tells the story of the midnight hags stealing the body of a baby. It reminded Maximus of something. He scrolled back. Yes, there it was: the story of the soldier who was a werewolf. Gods below, the Romans were no better than a bunch of Harii barbarians from a forest in the middle of fucking nowhere. At times Maximus wished he had never had to leave his own people.
In the mid-afternoon, Maximus and Tarchon were relieved. Back at the boat there was much to be done. Ballista had ordered the oars muffled and the rowlocks greased. The men had to stow all the metal ornaments from their gear and wrap rags around the fittings of their scabbards and bowcases. They were to wear dark cloaks, hoods pulled up over their helmets and blacken their faces and hands. The order was inclusive. Maximus enjoyed watching Zeno and the eunuch Amantius having river mud rubbed into their delicate skins by their slaves.
The sun was low when they set out. The boat glided from shadow to shadow through bands of golden light, hazed with insects. The water was thick with blown leaves, solid like amber. Beyond the screen of willows, they turned south.
Maximus crouched by the pilot. He kept the short sword below the side of the boat, but let the man see it. Ballista was on the other side of the Rugian, the latter once again tethered to the prow.
The sun went down, and they threaded their way in near-darkness. The smells of rotting vegetation and wet mud lay over the tallow and pitch rising from the boat. It was deathly quiet, every slight noise amplified: the run of water down the sides, the soft splash of the oars, the scuttle and plop of night creatures taking to the river, and the hiss of the breeze shifting the reeds. At the pilot’s whisper, they turned now left, now right. Lost, unsure of their heading, Maximus was far from trusting the Rugian. He felt the smooth leather of the hilt, reassuring in his hand.
A light showed through the trees ahead. A yellow-orange fire flickering just above the water level some way off. Maximus readied himself to kill the Rugian without sound. No one else seemed concerned. He looked again. It was the moon, enormous, just past full. Moving branches made its light into dancing flames.
Time lost all meaning. The carved head on the prow led them onward, like a stern deity guiding them to some unalterable fate.
The moon had risen free of the trees. Its light made the shadows along the banks impenetrably black. But when they emerged they could not have been more exposed.
Maximus smelt the open sea long before the guide murmured for utter silence. One more turn and they would be at the mouth of the channel.
Keeping to the shallows, tight against the shore, the boat nosed around the bend. A soft indrawn breath from those at the prow. Ballista gestured back down the boat. The noise of the oars in the water was fearfully loud as they stopped the boat.
Not a hundred paces ahead were two moored longboats.
Maximus covered the pilot’s mouth with his left hand; with his right he brought the blade to the man’s throat.
The warships had their awnings rigged to shelter their crews as they rested for the night. No sound came across the water. But low on the mast of each a lantern burned. In the bright moonlight there could be no sneaking past if so much as a single one of the Brondings was alert.
The boat drifted slightly. Maximus felt the pilot’s breath hot and damp in his palm. His own breathing rasped in his throat. They were near the edge of the moonlight. Ballista had to make the decision now.
As Maximus watched, one of the lanterns blinked as a figure crossed in front of it. Ballista had seen it as well. Quiet as a wraith, the big northerner moved back through the boat, motioning to the men on the benches.
Every creak sounded like thunder as the rowers, with all the care in the world, pushed against their oars. Maximus’s eyes never left the darkness on the longship where the moving shadow had vanished. The man had to hear their blades leave the water, slide in again.
Slowly, slowly, the boat inched sternwards. No alarm rang out. As they gathered a little momentum, the noise increased. The best oarsmen in the world could not back a boat without making a sound. Still no alarm. The deck heeled a little as the steersman brought them around.
A bank of reeds slid across the view of the warships like a curtain. An all too audible sigh of relief, hurriedly shushed.
There would be thumps and bangs if the crew reversed their positions. Instead the starboard oarsmen braced their blades in the water, while the larboard ones rowed circumspectly. With the steering oar hard over, the boat came about in a little over its own length. They stole away south again like thieves in the night.
In the contingent safety of the delta, they pulled into a side-water and brought the vessel to a halt. They did not anchor or go to the bank. They rested on their oars. The water lapped at the sides.
Ballista did not threaten or bluster. He spoke to the pilot as if they were old comrades-in-arms, this just the latest of many desperate ventures they had shared. Was there another obscure channel to the gulf, one the Brondings might have overlooked, one which they could reach before daybreak? The Rugian pondered the proposition. To give the man his due, he was calm, took his time, gave it his full consideration. Yes, there was one further west, but coming to it involved several detours. They would be lucky to be there before dawn. It was both shallow and narrow, thus little frequented except by a few marsh-dwelling fishermen. At this time of year there should be just enough clearance for the boat. But there could be no guarantee the Brondings did not know of its existence. If they were aware of it, everything would depend on their numbers — if they had sufficient ships to blockade it as well as the more obvious places.
Decisions are easy, Maximus thought, when there are no real alternatives.
Like neophytes of some gloomy and clandestine sect, they followed the wooden idol carved on the prow through the marsh again. They moved through an unchanging landscape. The water was glossy and black. The drops from the oars shone like jewels in the moonlight. On either side, reedbeds slid past, the stalks bone-white, the feathery heads black and clear as if etched in metal. Down at water level, the wind had dropped. Up above, clouds chased across the haloed moon.
Again, time had loosed its moorings, drifted away into something immeasurable. The rhythmic creak and splash of the oars, the water slopping down the sides of the boat, lulled Maximus into an altered state. It was like the calm that came over him in battle, but less urgent and more reflective.
If they were alive and not captured, this time tomorrow, Ballista would be well on his way home. The Harii Wada brothers were drawing him back into that world. But Maximus was concerned it would not go well for his friend. All those years in the imperium had changed Maximus. They would have changed Ballista, too. And, leaving aside the nonsense about amber, there was the mission. The Angles were now allied to Postumus. Ballista was tasked with turning them against him, bringing them back into friendship with and obedience to Gallienus. Given the hostages held in Gaul, Ballista’s father and remaining half-brothers were unlikely to welcome that idea. Ballista had said nothing on the subject — the time in the imperium had taught him discretion — but Maximus had little doubt that if the king of the Angles refused to alter his allegiance, the imperial mandata ordered Ballista to replace him with someone more amenable. In Sicily, Ballista’s wife and sons were in the power of Gallienus. There could be no question of Ballista ignoring the mandata. If it came to overthrowing his father, there would be blood. A terrible burden came with patricide.