Conn Iggulden - The Death Of Kings

In the gray light of morning, Tubruk felt he would be spotted immediately, but the soldiers moved without hurry amongst the slaves as they ate, clearly intending to be thorough with the task they had been given. As well they might be, Tubruk thought sourly. If they missed him here and then he was identified at the gate, they would be severely punished. He wondered if Sulla had eaten the poison, and knew that he might not be sure for days or even weeks, if the Senate chose to delay the news. The people of Rome hardly ever saw the Dictator except from a distance over a crowd. They would continue with their lives unknowing, and if Sulla survived they might never learn of the attempt at all.

A rough hand reached under his chin as he chewed his food slowly. Tubruk allowed his head to be raised and found himself looking into the hard eyes of a young legionary. He swallowed the mouthful and tried to look unconcerned.

The soldier whistled softly. “This one's had a kicking,” he said softly.

Tubruk blinked through his swollen eyes, nervously.

“He insulted my wife, officer,” Fercus said. “I administered the punishment myself.”

“Did you now?” the legionary continued.

Tubruk felt his heart pump powerfully in him as he looked away, remembering too late that he had been meeting the gaze where he should not.

“I'd have ripped his stomach out if he insulted mine,” the legionary said, letting Tubruk's chin fall.

“And lose my profit?” Fercus replied quickly.

The officer sneered and spat one word: “Merchants.”

He moved on to the next with Fercus, and Tubruk cleaned his bowl, gripping it hard to hide hands that shook with anger. Minutes later, the soldiers were gone and the guards entered to kick them to their feet, ready to be fastened into the cart that would carry them out of Rome and to their new homes and lives.

Julius pressed his head up to the bars of the little cell below the trireme deck, closing his left eye to see what was going on more clearly. With it open, the blur brought on his headaches and he wanted to delay that as long as possible each day. He pulled a deep breath into his lungs and turned back to the others.

“Definitely a port. Warm air, and I can smell fruit or spices. I'd say Africa.”

After a month in the cramped semidarkness, the words caused a stir of interest in the Romans, who sat or lay against the wooden sides of their prison. He looked at them and sighed before shuffling back to his place, levering himself down carefully to avoid putting weight on the splinted arm.

The month had been hard on all of them. Denied razors and water to wash with, the usually fastidious soldiers were a ragged crew, filthy and dark-bearded. The bucket they had been given as their toilet was filled to overflowing and buzzed with flies. It had a corner to itself, but excrement had slimed the floor around it and they had no cloths to wipe themselves. In the heat of the day, the air had the stench of disease and two of the men had developed fevers that Cabera could barely control.

The old healer did what he could for them, but he was searched thoroughly every time he brought their food or tended their sick. The pirates still kept him busy with their own ailments, and Cabera said it was clear they had not had a healer on board for years.

Julius felt a headache beginning and stifled a groan. Ever since recovering consciousness the pains had been with him, sapping at his will and strength and making him snap at the others. They were all irritable and what discipline they had once had was being eroded in the darkness day by day, with Gaditicus having to step in more than once to stop blows as tempers frayed.

With his eyes closed, the headache remained quiescent, but Cabera had told him he must not stop using the blurred eye and to spend hours of each day focusing on the near and far or it would be lost to him when they were finally back in the sun. He had to believe it would end. He would return to Rome and Cornelia, and the misery would become memories. It helped a little to imagine it had already happened, that he was sitting in the sun on the estate wall, with his arm around Cornelia's slim waist and cool, clean air off the hills ruffling their hair. She would ask him how it had been in the filth and the stench of the cell, and he would make light of all of it. He wished he could remember her face more clearly.

Julius held his hand up and squinted at it, then the barred door, over and over until the headache began to throb in his left temple. He let his hand fall and closed his eyes to its wasted condition after a month on rations that kept them from death but did little more. What he wouldn't give for a cold oyster to slip down his throat! He knew it was stupid to torture himself, but his mind produced bright visions of the shells, as real as if they hung before him and as sharp as his sight had been before the fight on Accipiter.

He remembered nothing of that day. As far as his memory told the tale, he had gone from healthy and strong to broken and in pain in a moment, and for the first few days of consciousness he had been filled with rage at what had been taken from him. He had been blind in his left eye for long enough to believe he would never see again, and never be able to use a sword with any degree of skill.

Suetonius had told him that one-eyed men couldn't be good fighters, and he had already found he was missing things as he reached for them, his hand swiping the air as he failed to judge the distance properly. At least that had come back with his sight, though the shimmering outlines he could see with his left eye infuriated him, making him want to rub the eye clear. His hand rose to do just that again in habit, and he caught himself, knowing it would do no good.

The headache seemed to find another channel in his brain and worked its way into it until that spot throbbed in sympathy with the first. He hoped it would stay there and not go on. The thought of what had begun happening to him was a fear he had barely started to explore, but three times now the pain had swelled into flashing lights that consumed him and he had woken with his lips bitter from yellow bile, lying in his own filth, with Gaditicus holding him down grimly. In the first fit, he had bitten his tongue badly enough that his mouth filled with blood and choked him, but now they had a strip of grimy cloth torn from his tunic to shove between his teeth as he convulsed, blind.

All the red-eyed, stinking soldiers raised their heads at the tread of steps on the narrow rungs from the deck above. Anything unusual was seized upon to break the endless boredom, and even the two who were feverish tried to see, though one fell back, exhausted.

It was the captain, who seemed almost to glow with clean skin and health compared to the men of the Accipiter. He was tall enough to have to duck his head as he entered the cell, accompanied by another man, who carried a sword and a dagger ready to repel a sudden attack.

If his head hadn't been pulsing its sullen sickness, Julius might have laughed at the precaution. The Romans had lost their strength, unable to exercise. It still amazed him how fast the muscles became weak without use. Cabera had shown them how to keep themselves strong by pulling against each other, but it didn't seem to make much difference.

The captain breathed shallowly, his eyes taking in the full slop bucket. His face was tanned and creased from years of squinting against the glare of the sea. Even his clothes carried a fresh smell in with him, and Julius ached to be out in the air and the open spaces, so powerfully that his heart hammered with the need.

“We have reached a safe port. In six months, perhaps, you will be put down some lonely night, free and paid for.” He paused to enjoy the effect of his words. Just the mention of an ending to their imprisonment had every man's gaze fastened to him.