‘And so, Tungrians, I have news for you!’ A sudden and profound hush fell over the parade, as the usual fidgeting and whispering died away to utter and complete silence. The tribune paused for a moment before continuing as if weighing his words before speaking, smiling into the face of his men’s eager anticipation. ‘You are doubtless all very keen to return to your barracks on The Hill — and in due course, I am sure that you will! For now, however, we will be based at another fort a little more distant …’ He paused for a moment, and the entire parade seemed to hold its breath. ‘We will be marching north, to take up a position on the wall built by Antoninus Pius!’
The silence was gone in an instant, chased away by the muttered comments and curses of hundreds of men as this news sank in, and Scaurus looked around again with the same knowing smile while his centurions swung and faced their men with hard faces, more than one of them striding forward to wield his vine stick at a hand or a knee in swift punishment. Silence fell again, the front rank’s faces now mostly set in lines of sullen disappointment and, in a few cases, pure anguish.
‘I realise that this news is unlikely to delight you gentlemen, that much is obvious! But we will do our duty as ordered!’
He stepped back with a nod to Julius, and the first spear advanced until he was only a few yards from the grim faces of the cohort’s front rank.
‘Like the Tribune said, we will do our duty as ordered! If any of you cunt hunters entertain fond ideas of slipping away after darkness, now that you’re so close to the pleasures of home, think again! Firstly, the local fornication opportunities are limited to a few worried-looking cattle …’ He paused for effect. ‘And no, the nearest brothel is not close enough for you to ride to it on an ox. And secondly, if any man here is missing at tomorrow morning’s roll call then not only is he under an immediate death sentence when he’s recaptured, but I’ll have his tent mates flogged until their backs are raw meat.’ He paused again, smiling at the soldiers arrayed before him. ‘And just so we’re clear, if an entire tent party decides to go missing together then I’ll have the rest of their century punished, so don’t any of you try to get clever. Centurions, fall your centuries out into the transit barracks and send your men to the fort’s stores in numerical order for rations and urgent equipment replacements, starting with the Tenth Century and counting down. We march north at first light tomorrow.’
‘The little that we know as to the whereabouts of the Sixth Legion’s eagle is the product of only a very little hard information, and rather more supposition than I like if I’m completely honest, now that Fulvius Sorex isn’t here to put the optimistic side of the story. If ever a man was destined for high office …’
Camp Prefect Castus leaned forward and tapped a finger at the map he had unrolled across the table between himself and Scaurus, watched intently by Julius and Marcus. Tribune Sorex had ridden west once the Tungrian cohort’s tribune had agreed to undertake the proposed mission, leaving his colleague to impart what little they knew as to what had happened to the Sixth Legion’s standard after its capture. The four black-cloaked men that Marcus had seen standing behind him on the parade ground were arrayed across the room’s rear wall, their faces closed to his scrutiny by expressions of boredom and disinterest.
‘This is the place where I believe the eagle is to be found. And given the location, its retrieval will be no simple task.’
The Tungrian officers leaned over the map to see where his finger was planted. Scaurus inhaled sharply, shooting a hard glance at Castus before looking back to the map with a calculating expression.
‘Gods below, Artorius Castus, I might have been a little slower to accept your challenge had I known where it would send us!’ He turned to his first spear and shook his head. ‘How much do you fancy that then, eh Julius? It seems that this missing eagle has chosen to roost a day’s march north of the Antonine Wall, and deep enough into Venicone territory that we could find ourselves facing more of those tattooed maniacs than we can handle. Not to mention the fact that one or two of them might well recall the day we left the Red River clogged with their dead.’
The Tungrian first spear looked down at the map with obvious disgust.
‘Can we rely on any support from the legions based on the wall?’
Castus shook his head with an expression of regret.
‘To be blunt, First Spear, I’m afraid not. The legions’ detachment commanders are all very clear that the first man to stir from his given position without clear orders to do so will be taking a risk with his rank, and that such a loss of status might well be the very least of his problems. There’s not a man among them who will send out anything more aggressive than a party to gather firewood.’ Castus shrugged at them with an apologetic expression. ‘Sorry, but there it is. There’s no point trying to polish this particular turd …’
Marcus cleared his throat as he stepped forward, drawing curious glances from the men around the table.
‘But you do have some assistance to offer us, don’t you, Prefect? Why else would those men standing behind you be privy to the preparations for a mission which needs to be planned with as much secrecy as possible?’
Castus nodded, clearly suppressing a smile.
‘All in good time, Centurion. First we’ll be clear as to exactly what it is that you’ll be faced with.’ He waved a hand at the land around the eagle’s presumed location. ‘The Antonine Wall was built along the line of two rivers, the Clut to the west and the Dirty River to the east. The ground to the north is open, in the main, but there is a range of hills that runs away from the wall to the north-east, and that’s where we think the eagle has come to rest. The range is split in two by the valley of the Dirty River, and where the hills rise again to the north of the stream there’s a particularly steep peak on which the Venicones have built themselves a fortress so strong, and indeed so difficult to even access, that it has never been attacked by our forces, not even during the glory days when Gnaeus Julius Agricola briefly conquered the far north. He was wise enough to leave a pair of cohorts to stop anyone getting in or out of the place, and the tribesmen eventually staggered out half dead from hunger, after which the commander on the spot tore out the fortress’s gates and knocked some good-sized holes in the walls to make it indefensible. While the wall was manned it was kept under close watch, but the Venicones rebuilt it pretty much straightaway once we’d pulled back to the southern wall and left them to their own devices twenty years ago.’
He looked about the gathered officers with a wry smile, tapping at the Venicone fortress’s place on the map.
‘Imagine, a fortress built from stone atop a five-hundred-foot-high hill, a hill with a southern slope so steep that an armoured man would struggle to climb it even if he weren’t being showered with rocks and arrows. It looms over the valley of the Dirty River like a tooth poking out of the hilltop, and the Venicones have long since called it “The Fang” as yet another way to intimidate their enemies. One of their tribesmen we captured a fortnight ago coughed up the news that your old enemy Calgus has taken up residence there, bringing the Sixth’s eagle with him, and has managed by some devious means to install a new king, a man who is therefore well disposed towards him. So, far from lying dead where you left him with his bones scattered by the wolves, the man that sparked this bloody mess of a rebellion is now the controlling influence behind the deadliest of the northern tribes. And the Venicones, should I need to remind you, were never completely smashed. Unlike the Damnonii and the Selgovae they retain much of their strength, and all of their threat. So your task is simple enough, gentlemen. You must cross the valley of the Dirty River, an unmapped morass of swamps and sinkholes that will swallow an armoured man whole in an instant, never to be seen again. That done you must enter The Fang, by means either overt or covert, recover the eagle and, if at all possible, finish the job with Calgus while you’re at it. That man will continue to plague us until his head decorates the legate’s desk in Yew Grove.’