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  With a weary sigh Vespasian ducked under the hospital tent's flap and nodded a greeting to the legion's senior surgeon.

  The Eagles Conquest

  Chapter Two

  'Bestia's dead.'

  Cato looked up from his paperwork as Centurion Macro entered the tent. The summer shower thudding down on the canvas had drowned out Macro's announcement.

  'Sir?'

  'I said Bestia's dead,' Macro shouted. 'Died this afternoon.'

  Cato nodded. The news was expected. The old chief centurion's face had been laid open right down to the bone. The legion's surgeons had done all they could to make his final days as comfortable as possible, but loss of blood, the shattered jaw and a subsequent infection had made death inevitable. Cato's first instinct was to welcome the news. Bestia had made his life a grinding misery throughout the months he had spent in training. Indeed, the chief centurion had seemed to positively enjoy picking on him and a smouldering hatred had grown in Cato in response.

  Macro undid the clasp of his wet cloak and threw it across the back of a camp stool which he pulled up in front of the brazier. The steam from a variety of garments drying on other stools rose in orange wisps, and added to the muggy atmosphere of the tent. If the rain outside was the best weather that the British summer could offer, Macro wondered if the island was worth fighting for. The British exiles accompanying the legions claimed that the island had vast resources of precious metals and rich agricultural lands. Macro shrugged. The exiles might be telling the truth but they had their own reasons for wanting Rome to triumph over their own people. Most had lost land and title at the hands of the Catuvellauni and hoped to regain both as a reward for aiding Rome.

  'Wonder who'll get Bestia's job?' Macro mused. 'Be interesting to see who Vespasian will pick.'

  'Any chance of you, sir?'

  'Hardly, my lad!' Macro snorted. His young optio had not long been a member of the Second Legion and was not wise to the promotion procedures of the army. 'I'm out of the running for that job. Vespasian has to choose from the surviving centurions of the First Cohort. They're the best officers in the legion. You must have several years of excellent service behind you before you get considered for promotion to the First Cohort. I'll be in command of the Sixth Century of the Fourth Cohort for a while yet, I think. Bet there are some pretty anxious men in the First Cohort's mess tonight. You don't get a chance to make chief centurion every day. '

  'Won't they be grieving, sir? I mean, Bestia was one of their own.' 'I guess so.' Macro shrugged. 'But that's the fortune of war. Anyone of us could have been for the Styx crossing. Just happened to be Bestia's turn. Anyway, he had had his time in this world. Two years from now he'd only have been going quietly mad in some dull veterans' colony. Better him than someone with something to look forward to, like most of the other poor sods who've copped it so far. And now, as it happens, there are quite a few vacancies to be filled in the centurionate.' Macro smiled at the prospect. He had been a centurion for only a few weeks longer than Cato had been a legionary and had been the most junior centurion in the legion. But the Britons had killed two of the centurions in the Fourth Cohort, which meant that he was now officially fourth in seniority, with the happy prospect of having two newly appointed centurions to lord it over. He looked up and grinned at his optio.

  'If this campaign goes on for a few more years, even you might make centurion! '

  Cato smiled at the back-handed compliment. Chances were that the island would be conquered well before anyone credited him with enough experience and maturity to be promoted to the centurionate. At the tender age of seventeen that prospect was years away. He sighed and held out the wax tablet he had been working on.

  'The effective strength report, sir.'

  Macro ignored the tablet. Barely able to read and write, he was of the opinion that attempting either was best avoided if at all possible; he depended heavily on his optio to ensure that the Sixth Century's records were kept in order. 'Well?'

  'We've got six in the field hospital – two of those aren't likely to survive. The senior surgeon told me that three of the others will have to be discharged from the army. They're to be conveyed to the coast this afternoon. Should be back in Rome by the end of the year.'

  'And then what?' Macro shook his head sadly. 'A pro-rata retirement gratuity and the rest of their lives spent begging on the streets. Some life to look forward to.'

  Cato nodded. As a boy he had seen the disabled veterans scrabbling for a pittance in the filthy alcoves of the forum. Having lost a limb or suffered a disabling wound, such a lifestyle was all that was open to most of them. Death might well have been a more merciful outcome for such men. A sudden image of himself mutilated, condemned to poverty, and an object of pity and ridicule caused Cato to shudder. He had no family to fall back on. The only person who cared for him outside the army was Lavinia. She was far from him now, on the road to Rome with the other slaves in the household of Lady Flavia, wife of the Second Legion's commander. Cato could not hope that, if the worst happened, Lavinia would be able to love a cripple. He knew he could not bear her pity, or her staying with him out of any misguided sense of duty.

  Macro sensed a change in the young man's attitude. It was strange, he considered, how much he had become aware of the lad's moods. Every optio he had ever known had been just a legionary on the make, but Cato was different. Quite different. Intelligent, well-read, and a proven soldier, yet perversely critical of himself. If he lived long enough, Cato would surely make a name for himself someday. Macro could not understand why the optio did not seem aware of this, and tended to regard Cato with a mixture of guarded amusement and admiration.

  'Don't worry, lad. You'll live through this lot. If you were going to cop it, you'd have done so by now. You've survived the worst army life can throw at you. You'll be around for a while yet, so cheer up.'

  'Yes, sir,' Cato replied quietly. Macro's words were false comfort, as the death of even the finest soldiers -like Bestia – had shown.

  'Now then, where were we?'

  Cato looked down at the wax tablet. 'The last man in the hospital is making a good recovery. Sword slash to the thigh. Should be back on his feet in a few more days. Then there's four walking wounded. They'll be back on our fighting strength soon. Leaves us with fifty-eight effectives, sir.'

  'Fifty-eight.' Macro frowned. The Sixth Century had suffered badly at the hands of the Britons. They had landed on the island with eighty men. Now, only days later, they had lost eighteen for good.

  'Any news on the replacements, sir?'

  'We won't be getting any until the staff can organise a shipment from the reserve pool back in Gaul. Take them a week or more at least before they can ship them over the Channel from Gesoriacum. Won't join us until after the next battle.'

  'Next battle?' Cato sat up eagerly. 'What battle, sir?'

  'Easy, lad.' Macro smiled. 'The legate told us at the briefing. Vespasian has had word from the general. It seems the army is facing a river. A nice big, wide river. And on the far side Caratacus is waiting for us with his army, chariots and all.'

  'How far from here, sir?'

  'Day's march. The Second should arrive at the river tomorrow. Aulus Plautius doesn't intend to hang around, apparently. He'll launch the attack the following morning, as soon as we're in position.'

  'How do we get at them?' Cato asked. 'I mean, how do we get across the river? Is there a bridge?'

  'You really think the Britons would leave one standing? Just for us to use?' Macro shook his head wearily. 'No, the general still has to figure that one out.'

  'Do you think he will order us in first?'

  'Doubt it. We've been pretty roughly handled by the Britons. The men are still feeling very shaken. You must have sensed it.'

  Cato nodded. The low morale of the legion had been palpable in the last few days. Worse still, he had overheard men openly criticising the legate, holding Vespasian responsible for the heavy casualties they had suffered since
landing on British soil. That Vespasian had fought the enemy in the front rank alongside his men was of little account to most legionaries who had not witnessed his valour in person. As things stood, there was considerable resentment and mistrust of the legion's senior officers, and that did not bode well for the next engagement with the Britons.

  'We'd better win this one,' Macro said quietly. 'Yes, sir.'

  Both men were silent a moment as they gazed at the flickering tongues of flames in the brazier. Then a loud rumble from the centurion's stomach abruptly shifted his thinking to more pressing issues.

  'I'm bloody hungry. Anything to eat?'

  'There on the desk, sir.' Cato gestured towards a dark loaf of bread and a hunk of salted pork in a mess tin. A small jug of watered wine stood beside a battered silver cup, a memento of one of Macro's earlier campaigns. The centurion frowned as he looked at the pork.

  'Still no fresh meat?'

  'No, sir. Caratacus is doing a thorough job of clearing the land ahead of our line of march. The scouts say that nearly every crop and farm has been fired as far as the banks of the Tame sis, and they've driven their livestock away with them. We're stuck with what comes up to us from the victualling depot at Rutupiae.'

  'I'm sick of bloody salted pork. Can't you get anything else? Piso would have got us something better than this.'

  'Yes, sir,' Cato replied with resentment. Piso, the century's clerk, was a veteran who had known every dodge and scam in the book, and the men of the century had done very well by him. Only days before, Piso, a mere year off his honourable discharge, had been cut down by the very first Briton he encountered. Cato had learned much from the clerk, but the more arcane secrets of working the military bureaucracy had died with him, and Cato was on his own now.

  'I'll see what I can do about the rations, sir.'

  'Good!' Macro nodded as he bit into the pork with a grimace and started the long process of chewing the tough meat into a consistency soft enough to swallow. As he chewed he continued to grumble. 'Much more of this stuff and I'll quit the legion and take up the Jewish faith. Anything's got to be better than putting up with this. I don't know what the fuck those bastards in the commissariat do to the pigs. You'd have thought it would be almost impossible to screw up something as simple as salted pork.'

  Cato had heard it all before and got on with his paperwork. Most of the dead men had left wills bequeathing their camp property to their friends. But some of those named as beneficiaries had died as well, and Cato had to trace the order of bequests through the documents to ensure that the accumulated possessions reached the right recipients. The families of those who had died intestate would require notification in order to claim the man's savings from the legion's treasury. For Cato, the execution of wills was a new experience, and since the responsibility was his, he dared not risk any errors that might lead to a lawsuit being brought against him. So he carefully read through the documentation, and checked and rechecked each man's accounts in turn, before dipping his stylus in a small ceramic inkpot and writing up the final statement of possessions and their destinations.

  The tent flap swished open and a headquarters clerk hurriedly stepped inside, his sodden army cloak dripping all over the place.

  'Here, keep that off my work!' Cato shouted as he covered the scrolls piled on his desk.

  'Sorry.' The headquarters clerk stood back against the flap.

  'And what the fuck do you want?' Macro asked as he bit off a piece of brown bread.

  'Message from the legate, sir. He wants to see you and the optio in his tent, at your earliest convenience. '

  Cato smiled. A senior officer's use of that phrase meant at once, preferably sooner. Quickly ordering the documents into a pile, and ensuring that none of the leaks in the tent were dripping anywhere near his campaign desk, Cato stood up and retrieved his cloak from its position in front of the brazier. It was still heavy with moisture and felt clammy as he pulled it round his shoulders and fixed the clasp. But the warmth in the folds of greased wool was comforting.

  Macro, still chewing, pulled on his cloak and then waved impatiently at the headquarters clerk. 'You can piss off now. We know the way, thank you.'

  With a longing look at the brazier, the clerk pulled his hood up and backed out of the tent. Macro crammed in a last mouthful of pork, crooked his finger at Cato and mumbled, 'Come on!'

  The rain hissed down on the glistening ranks of the legion's tents and formed disturbed puddles on the uneven ground. Macro looked up at the dark clouds in the night sky. Away to the south occasional flashes of sheet lightning marked the passage of a summer storm. The rain streamed down his face and he flicked his head to clear a loose strand of drenched hair from his forehead. 'What crap weather this island has.'

  Cato laughed. 'I doubt it'll get much better, sir. If Strabo is anything to go by.'

  The literary allusion caused Macro to grimace at the boy. 'You couldn't just agree with me, could you? Had to bring some bloody academic into it.'

  'Sorry, sir.'

  'Never mind. Let's go and see what Vespasian wants.'

  The Eagles Conquest

  Chapter Three

  'At ease,' ordered Vespasian.

  Macro and Cato, standing a pace back from the desk, adopted the required informal posture. They were rather shocked to see clear signs of exhaustion in their commander as he leaned back from the scrolls on his desk and the light from the overhead oil lamps fell on his heavily lined face.

  Vespasian considered them for a moment, unsure how to proceed.

  A few days ago the centurion, the optio and a small party of Macro's hand-picked men had been sent on a secret mission. They had been tasked with retrieving a pay chest that Julius Caesar had been forced to abandon in a marsh close to the coast nearly a hundred years earlier. The Second Legion's senior tribune, a smooth patrician named Vitellius, had decided to seize the pay chest for himself and, with a gang of horse archers he had bribed, had fallen on Macro's men amid the mists of the marsh. Thanks to the fighting skills of the centurion, Vitellius had failed and fled the scene. But the fates seemed to favour the tribune; he had come across a column of Britons trying to outflank the Roman advance and had been able to warn the legions of the danger just in time. As a result of the subsequent victory, Vitellius was now something of a hero. Those who knew the truth about Vitellius' treachery felt disgust at the praise that was showered on the senior tribune.

  'I'm afraid I can't press any charges against Tribune Vitellius. I've only your word to go on, and that isn't enough.'

  Macro bristled with barely contained rage.

  'Centurion, I know the type of man he is. You say he tried to have you and your men killed when I sent you after the pay chest. That mission was secret, quite secret. I suspect that only you, me and the lad there knew about the chest's contents. And Vitellius of course. Even now it is still sealed, and on its way back to Rome under heavy guard, and the fewer who know about the gold it contains the better. That's the way the Emperor wants to keep things. No one will thank us for exposing this in court if charges are bought against Vitellius. In addition, you might not be aware that his father is a close friend of the Emperor. Do I need to say more?'

  Macro pursed his lips and shook his head.

  Vespasian let his words sink in, well understanding the expression of resignation settling on the faces of the centurion and his optio. It was too bad that Vitellius should be the one to emerge from the situation smelling of roses, but that was typical of the tribune's luck. That man was destined for high office, and the fates would let nothing stand in his way. And there was far more behind his treachery than Vespasian could ever let these two men know. Besides his duties as a tribune, Vitellius was also an imperial spy in the service of Narcissus, the Emperor's chief secretary. If Narcissus ever came to know he had been fooled by Vitellius, the tribune's life would be forfeit. But Narcissus would never find out from the lips of Vespasian. Vitellius had seen to that. While gathering information on the lo
yalty of the officers and men of the Second Legion, Vitellius had uncovered the identity of a conspirator involved in a plot to overthrow the new Emperor.

  Flavia Domitilla, the wife of Vespasian.

  For the moment, then, a stand-off existed between Vitellius and Vespasian; both had information that could fatally wound the other if it ever came to the ears of Narcissus.

  Aware that he must have been staring vacantly at his subordinates for some time, Vespasian quickly turned his mind to the other reason he had summoned Macro and Cato.

  'Centurion, there is something that should cheer you up.' Vespasian reached to the side of the table and picked up a small bundle wrapped in silk. Carefully unfolding the silk, Vespasian revealed a gold torc which he gazed at momentarily before holding it up in the dim light of the oil lamps. 'Recognise it, Centurion?'

  Macro looked a moment, then shook his head. 'Sorry, sir.'

  'I'm not surprised. You probably had other things on your mind when you first saw this,' Vespasian said with a wry smile. 'It's the torc of a chief of the Britons. It used to be the property of one Togodumnus, fortunately no longer with us.'

  Macro laughed, suddenly recalling the torc as it had been, worn round the neck of the huge warrior he had killed in single combat a few days earlier.

  'Here!' Vespasian tossed the torc and Macro, caught by surprise, fielded it awkwardly. 'A small token of the legion's gratitude. It comes out of my share of the spoils. You deserve that, Centurion. You won it, so wear it with honour.'

  'Yes, sir,' Macro replied as he examined the tore. Plaited bands of gold gleamed in the wavering light, and each end curled back on itself round a large ruby that sparkled like a blood-soaked star. Strange swirling designs had been worked into the gold surrounding the rubies. Macro felt the weight of the tore and made a rough calculation of its value. His eyes widened as he registered the significance of the legate's gesture.