Gordon Doherty - The Scourge of Thracia

Pavo rummaged in his pack to set up his own bedding in the empty space beside Gallus. The tribunus sat cross-legged, bed already laid out, armour already cleaned and polished, eyes staring into the distance. ‘Sir, before I sort out my gear, can I — ’

Gallus looked up, startled, as if he had been in another place entirely. He shook his head as if to clear out whatever thoughts were in there. ‘Your woman?’ he guessed.

Pavo nodded.

‘Go,’ Gallus said, flicking his head to the tent entrance, ‘but return by curfew.’

‘Thank you, sir,’ he nodded, throwing off his damp tunic, roughly towelling himself then pulling on a clean, dry white and purple-edged tunic from his pack. It felt like silk on his skin.

In a flash, he was outside, hurrying through the sodden earth. He knew where Felicia would be. Just as when they were in Constantinople and she had helped out at the barrack valetudinarium , surely she would be in the medical area of this camp too. Though in this light and given the haphazard layout of the camp, it might be more difficult than he had anticipated to find the surgeon’s tent. But across the sea of wandering and seemingly constantly inebriated population of the camp, he spotted one larger tent further along the riverbank. Close to clean water and enjoying a spot on shingle as opposed to mud, this tent had a tall wooden staff erected beside it, bearing a winding, carved serpent — the staff of Asclepius, God of Healing — and a Christian Chi-Rho to boot. His heart thundered as he slowed, then it leapt as, through the sliver of tent-flap, he caught sight of her.

In the orange bubble of lamplight within, she looked like every one of the dreams he had escaped to in those tortuous nights of incarceration deep within Persian lands. Her long amber hair tumbled all the way down to the small of her back, resting on her generous hips and the waistband of her pale green robe. Her milky skin seemed flawless, her lips ripe and glistening. He reached out to pull the tent flap back and enter when a rather grotesque squelching noise sounded — his boot had been pulled right off by the treacherous mud. He hopped to one side, balancing on one leg before tilting carefully to retrieve his boot. Felicia had a way with words; she could reduce a grizzled legionary to tears and pleas of mercy with her acerbic wit, so to hop into the tent wearing one boot or to stagger in splattered in mud would not do at all, he realised. As he wrenched his boot free, he heard her voice. Her throaty, sultry voice.

‘Even that foul wine they make here is tempting right now. It’ll warm my blood and make me numb to my filthy, damp tent,’ she said then craned her neck back and yawned, stroking her neck as she did so.

The words were anything but sensual, but the way she said them sent the blood rushing to Pavo’s loins. Well, it has been a long time, he thought.

‘I hear your man is coming to the camp soon?’ the light voice of some unseen other woman said. ‘So perhaps you will have more than wine to keep you warm at night?’

Pavo frowned. Had word somehow reached her that he was alive and well and coming for her?

‘I know that look,’ the other said. ‘You’re in love! It’s true, isn’t it?’

‘Am I in love?’ Felicia chuckled. ‘No. . ’

No? Pavo’s smile faded and a scowl began to form.

‘Well, maybe,’ she added. ‘Yes. . yes I am,’ she admitted finally.

Pavo’s smile returned and he steadied himself, trying to slide on his boot in the dark as he listened in. Just then, through the sliver of tent-flap, he caught sight of the other woman, older, with grey-flecked hair. ‘Wading in blood and amputated limbs is no place for you. As an officer’s woman, surely you could be anywhere but here?’ she said. Pavo felt his chest prickle with pride, and when one sour-faced off-duty legionary stalked by, scowling at him, Pavo shot him an imperious look, as if to say, I’m an officer, don’t you know?

‘Ah, perhaps, but I came here by choice. I came here to help. And in any case, the life of a primus pilus’ woman is not the life for me.’

Pavo felt a cold pang of confusion. A primus pilus’ woman? This sent him wobbling on his one booted foot.

‘Wanting for nothing in some countryside villa? My mind would eat itself. A marble cage, as I see it. The primus pilus can have his pick of servile women, of that I have no doubt. But if he wants me, then he has to understand me.’

There it was again. Primus Pilus? Who was this Primus Pilus? His chest prickling with jealousy, he made the snap decision to confront her there and then. He wrenched on his boot, stood tall, sucked in a breath, strode for the tent flap. . then tripped over a mud-disguised and badly-placed guy rope, splashed face down in the mire and skidded inside the tent, face and body plastered with filth.

The older woman inside screamed.

‘What the?’ Felicia yelped, leaping back, snatching up a scalpel.

Pavo, clambering to all fours, waved his hands in supplication. ‘It’s me!’ he spluttered, spitting sod from his lips.

But Felicia shielded the older woman and backed around the scarred and bloodied surgical table in the centre of the tent. ‘We’ve had drunks, lechers and thieves crawling in here at all hours. So I don’t care if you’re bloody Mithras himself,’ she hissed as she held the scalpel up like a dagger. ‘Come any closer and I’ll have your balls off!’

Pavo hurriedly wiped at his face and swiped the worst of the mud from his hair. ‘Felicia. It’s me!’ Seeing her eyes dart over him uncertainly, he rummaged to pull a strip of filthy cloth from his belt, then shook the mud from this too, unmasking it as a rather sorry-looking strip of red silk.

She gasped, dropped the scalpel and stumbled back against a wooden cabinet. ‘Pavo?’ she croaked.

Pavo nodded, coming closer, swiping the remnant mud from his face. ‘I. . I. . ’

Suddenly, the older woman, in a fit of boldness, swept up the dropped scalpel and rushed for him, her face pinched and her shrill cry filling the tent.

Pavo leapt back from her wild swipe at his crotch.

‘Lucilla, No!’ Felicia cried. ‘He’s a friend!’

Pavo grasped Lucilla’s wrist, squeezing it so she dropped the implement. The woman staggered back, grumbling, clutching her wrist. ‘I’m sorry,’ he pleaded with her. ‘I’m not one of them, ’ he nodded outside to the flitting shadows of passing drunks and ill-disciplined soldiers. ‘I’m here with the XI Claudia.’

‘You’re. . alive ,’ Felicia stammered. ‘The Claudia live?’

‘I’m here. I’m alive.’ He grasped her by the shoulders, unmindful of his mucky hands.

Felicia’s fair skin was now paler than moonlight. ‘Lucilla, would you leave us please?’

The older woman sighed and nodded, then made for the tent flap. She did pause, however, just long enough to lift the dropped scalpel and replace it on the table, shooting a cautionary glower first at Pavo’s face and then at his crotch.

When she had left, Felicia’s brow wrinkled and she panted in shock. ‘But I heard rumours in the height of summer. They said that the XI Claudia had been lost in the desert.’ She looked him in the eye, more tears welling as she pulled a small purse of coins from under her green robe. ‘They even gave me your funeral pay-out.’

Pavo blanched at this, recalling instantly the moment from his youth when a scowling legionary had sought him out and dropped Father’s funeral pay-out into his hand. It had almost crushed his spirit. Almost. ‘I’m sorry that happened. I should have got word to you, somehow. The first chance I had was the Cursus Publicus messenger I paid to take word to you from Antioch. But he was too late, it seems. I. . I’m here now.’