‘Up there on the hillside? I never actually got round to praying, if the truth be told. I was rather too busy discovering what it was like to take sharp iron to my fellow man.’ He gave Julius a sideways look. ‘If I might have a moment with the centurion, First Spear?’
Julius raised an eyebrow, nodding slowly.
‘Of course, sir.’
He walked away down the wall, and the two men smiled at the sight of the soldiers in his path stiffening under his scrutiny.
‘Any second now he’ll see something that doesn’t match his expectations, and then there’ll be fur in the air. .’
Almost on cue Julius snapped down on a soldier who had unwittingly attracted his ire, withering the offender with a swift and vicious tirade of abuse, and the two men shared a look of sympathy. Sigilis leaned forward and spoke quietly.
‘We still need to talk, Centurion. I had thought to wait until you decided that the time was right, but since you seem determined to put yourself in harm’s way it’s important for you to know that you may still have some blood relatives left alive. I don’t know who or where, but my father’s investigator told us that he suspected some other members of your family might also have avoided the destruction of their line, although he was unable to prove anything.’
Marcus nodded, his face set in stonelike immobility.
‘That’s not a hope I can afford to encourage, given the likelihood of disappointment should I ever find myself in Rome again, but I thank you for the concern.’
Sigilis shook his head urgently.
‘One more thing. When they lower you down from the wall, just remember that there is still revenge to be taken for all those who died unjustly alongside your father. Make sure you climb back onto this parapet, Centurion, since you are likely to be the only man left alive in the entire world with the ability to exact that revenge.’
He nodded to Marcus and turned to his colleagues. Julius walked back to join his friend, signalling to his chosen man, who promptly issued orders for a rope ladder to be lowered from the parapet. Turning to his friend, he took Marcus’s hand and put an arm around his shoulders.
‘Good luck. Come back alive.’
The Roman eased his weight up and over the raised turf parapet, climbing carefully down the ladder until he felt solid ground beneath his boots, then looked up, gesturing to Julius for the ladder to be pulled up. Turning to face the Sarmatae, he saw that his presence on the ground before the wall had already been noticed. Half a dozen men had run forward to the edge of the safe distance from the defences, just outside the Thracian archers’ maximum range, and now stood with arrows nocked to their own bows, while another ran shouting to the sprawling mass of tents that had sprung up late the previous evening when the barbarians had realised that a swift victory would not be forthcoming. Taking a deep breath he stepped forward out of the wall’s shadow, pacing slowly forward with both arms raised well away from his sides. As he walked towards the barbarian camp, a group of horsemen cantered out of the tents, trotting steadily up the valley’s slope until they were abreast of the waiting archers. Continuing at the same slow pace, he walked to within a few paces of the bowmen, close enough to see that the bone heads that tipped their arrows were blackened and discoloured with the same poison that had killed his horse. One of the riders waiting behind them called out to him, his face grim below a helmet that was the matching twin of the one taken from their captive the night before, and which Marcus was carrying in his right hand. A long lance was couched loosely in his right hand, the point only feet from Marcus’s mailed chest.
‘No further, Roman. If you’ve come to gloat then you’ve picked the wrong man to make sport of. We saw the glow of your pyres on the northern peak reflected in the clouds last night, and I see you carry my father’s helm.’
Marcus bent slowly, placing the helmet on the ground before him with what he deemed to be appropriate respect for its wearer’s status. The rider placed both hands on the horn of his saddle, bending forward to look at the Roman more closely.
‘I am Galatas Boraz, son of King Asander Boraz and in my father and my uncle’s absence, the leader of this host. State your purpose in putting your life in my hands, and do so quickly. My patience is not at its best today.’
Marcus stepped forward a pace, and the arrowheads tracked his movement, the archers’ knuckles whitening on their bows. The men arrayed around the prince were hard faced, their expressions giving him nothing beyond simple enmity, while the warrior mounted on Galatas’s right stared down at him with evident disgust from beneath the brim of a dented legionary’s helmet clearly looted from the scene of a recent Roman defeat.
‘I am Marcus Tribulus Corvus, Centurion of the First Tungrian Cohort and deputed by my tribune to enter discussions with you as to your intentions. I-’
Galatas leaned back in his saddle, his laughter both harsh and terse.
‘My intentions? I intend getting my horsemen around that wall and riding down every man that hides behind it before I carry off the gold that waits for me.’ He sat forward in the saddle and regarded Marcus levelly for a moment before speaking again. ‘I will trade information with you, Roman, since you face my kontos without any sign of fear. Only a few of my father’s men have returned to our camp with the tale of defeat, and none of them know what happened to the king. Tell me truly, what was the fate of my father and my uncle?’
Marcus grimaced.
‘For a time it seemed as if your attack would force us off the hill, but we were reinforced at a vital time in the fight, and took the field with much slaughter. We burned a thousand bodies and took twice as many prisoners, including your father. He is being treated with the appropriate respect due to a king, but he is badly wounded. Our doctor is providing him with the best medical care possible, but it is not yet clear whether he will live or die. As to your uncle, I have no news.’
The rider nodded grimly, shooting a meaningful glance at an older man on his left.
‘Very well.Your turn. What would you know from me?’
Marcus looked up at him for a moment before speaking again.
‘You speak excellent Latin. I would very much like to know how this is.’
Galatas pulled a face at the unexpected mundanity of the question, but answered quickly enough.
‘My father had all of his sons taught the Roman speech and letters. He said that we could never really understand our enemy unless we could read their writings, and so it has proven. Which makes it my turn again. What is so important that you have been sent out here to discuss? The news of my father’s capture could just as easily have been shouted down from your wall without putting a man such as yourself at risk of being killed by an overeager archer, or dragged apart by my household guard. I must warn you, the men around me are eager to have you for a plaything to avenge the harm done to our king.’
The Roman looked up at the hard-faced man on Galatas’s right, meeting the murderous intent in his eyes with a flat stare.
‘You will have noted that I came to you unarmed, as a mark of our seriousness in seeking to negotiate some form of agreement to end this dispute.’ His voice hardened from its carefully controlled tone of reason, an edge of iron creeping in as his anger swelled at the looks being cast down at him. ‘But I will back down before no man. Grant me the loan of your sword and then release your dogs, and we’ll see who’s left standing by the time twenty heartbeats have passed.’
The Sarmatae leader laughed again, a little less tersely this time, and the smile that spread across his face appeared genuine.
‘If only you sat where I did, Roman! You must have fruits the size of an ox’s danglers to threaten this man.’ He gestured to the warrior wearing the captured helmet. ‘Amnoz here is the champion of my father’s bodyguard and a murderous bastard besides. There is not a man in this camp who could best him in combat.’