Harry Sidebottom - The Wolves of the North

The crowd bellowed in the affirmative to the rhetorical question.

‘At the Tanais, did I command that any man who left the ranks would be killed?’

Again the crowd roared its assent.

‘Aruth led his men out of the line against orders,’ Naulobates said.

A babble of shouts rose. ‘Bastard, string him up!’ ‘To Hell with him, bend down the trees!’ ‘Kill the dog!’

Not all were for summary execution. ‘Let him speak!’ ‘He is a great warrior, a Herul; just sit him in a tree for the day!’ ‘No, he must be heard first!’ ‘Let him speak, it is his right!’

Naulobates raised his spear. A measure of quiet returned. ‘It is his right as one of the Rosomoni, as a Herul.’

Aruth gave a searching look at the front ranks, then fixed his gaze back on Naulobates. ‘I did not order the advance. The bandits rode out from the line. The farmers from the Rha followed, then the Eutes. I could not hold them.’

His voice was drowned by shouts. The majority were hostile. ‘Cowards blame others!’ ‘Take responsibility like a man!’ ‘Kill the bastard!’ ‘Throw him in the thorns!’

A few persevered for clemency. ‘It was not his fault!’ ‘Spare him!’

Here and there, scuffles broke out, as the tribesmen debated with their fists. The outnumbered adherents of Aruth were soon pummelled into submission to the general will. ‘Kill him!’ ‘Kill the dog!’ ‘Bend down the trees!’ ‘Tear him apart!’

Naulobates had the drum beaten. ‘I hear your counsel. I will pass sentence.’

The First-brother looked at the sky and brooded dramatically. Ballista wondered if Naulobates was communing with the world of daemons, or, at least, if that was the desired impression. The silence stretched. Aruth’s fist clenched and unclenched, the red snake flexing its coils.

Ballista, pressed unhappily against Andonnoballus, Pharas and Uligagus, found himself hoping Aruth would be spared.

‘Aruth,’ said Naulobates, ‘did not disobey the order. But he could not control his riders. Men died unnecessarily under his command. He shall be punished as an unintentional killer.’

‘The box, hang him in the box!’ the open, red mouths of the crowd chanted.

Crushed in the press, Ballista felt light-headed, slightly sick.

Naulobates waved his spear. ‘He shall be hung in the box from the high branches. He shall have three loaves and one jug of water. For nine nights and days he will hang. It is decided.’

The multitude echoed the sentence. ‘It is decided.’

Two men shouldered through the throng. They were battered and bloodied. One spoke for both. ‘We are Aruth’s brothers by the sword and the cup. What touches our brother touches us. We will share his fate.’

Naulobates nodded. ‘You are true Heruli.’ The assembly murmured its approbation.

The three men stood, shoulder to shoulder, as timber was brought out, and the hammering commenced.

Andonnoballus turned to Ballista. ‘For nine nights and days Woden hung in the tree. Sometimes the Allfather succours those who suffer the same.’

Ballista did not answer. His thoughts were roaming far away. The Heruli prided themselves on their freedom. Certainly in their assembly they seemed able to say what they liked. But was it any better than in the imperium? In the consilium of the emperor, fist fights were not encouraged and opinions tended to be expressed more decorously, but those summoned were meant to speak their mind openly. Yet both the First-Brother and emperor could ignore the counsel they received; ultimately, they made the decision.

A long time ago — when he was young — Ballista had thought freedom unproblematic. You either had it, or you did not. Either you were a slave, or you were free. Either you were a free man in Germania, or you lived in servitude in the imperium. His own enforced travels had undermined his childish certainty. Different peoples had different ideas about freedom. Freedom itself over time could change its meaning in one culture. He thought of the histories he had been reading on this mission. For the senators in the Res Publica written about by Sallust, libertas had meant the unfettered freedom to compete with each other openly for election to high office and the rewards they would then reap from exploiting their position. In the principate, as set out by Tacitus, libertas had narrowed down merely to freedom of speech under a monarch in everything but name, and freedom from unjust condemnation and the confiscation of estates. Yet, for both historians, most men had used libertas as nothing but a fine-sounding catchphrase devoid of real substance.

Ballista wondered how the vaunted freedom of his own people under the rule of his father would strike him now, if he were ever to return to the far north and the lands of the Angles. Perhaps the philosophers were right: the only true freedom was inside a man.

The hammering had stopped. The man condemned by the assembly, and the two condemned by custom and their own courage, did not have to be manhandled into the rough, slatted boxes. The water and the loaves were given to them and the cages nailed shut.

With much hauling and grunting, the cages were hoisted into the branches of a huge, spreading oak. The mood of the throng had turned to profound admiration. But the three men were left suspended between heaven and earth, their only possible salvation in the hands of a distant, capricious god.

Publius Egnatius Amantius to Lucius Calpurnius Piso Censorinus, Praetorian Prefect, Vir Ementissimus.

Dominus, I doubt you will ever receive this despatch, or the others I have written. It is said the Alani will be upon us tomorrow. The Heruli lost the last battle, and there is no reason to think they will do better in this, which shapes to be the final one. It is most certainly a judgement of the gods on their disgusting customs.

Faithful to your orders, and in the vain hope that some deity will deliver it into your hands, I am prompted to write this last time to give one final piece of information I have gleaned. From a conversation I overheard between the Legatus extra ordinem Scythica and his Caledonian freedman Marcus Clodius Calgacus I learnt that Odenathus of Palmyra has sent ambassadors to Naulobates and the Heruli. I know neither the timing nor the purpose of this embassy, but it must give cause for concern as to the loyalty of the Syrian our sacred Augustus Gallienus has appointed Corrector totius Orientis.

It has been an honour to serve you, Dominus. I have no real hopes of returning safe to the imperium. Even if by some vagary of war the Heruli prevail tomorrow, it is an inordinate distance back to humanitas. And although the exigencies of war have driven it from all other minds, I have not forgotten the fate of my friend Publius Egnatius Mastabates and the others.

A Herul camp on the Steppe, some time in late summer.

Calgacus was unsurprised when Naulobates’ prediction came true. It had been two days since Aruth and his blood-brothers had been hoisted into the trees, where, their cages turning gently in the wind, they remained defiantly alive. The previous evening the scouts had reported that the Alani would reach the camp this morning. It was quite possible a daemon had told Naulobates. He had the look of one haunted by unworldly things. It was a look Calgacus had seen over the years in Ballista.

The torches were beginning to pale as Calgacus walked through the camp with Tarchon. The Heruli horde had ridden out long before dawn, and it was strangely quiet except for the lowing of oxen. Perhaps the beasts could sense the unease in the humans. Things would be decided one way or the other today.

Calgacus had got Tarchon to carry most of the food and drink for breakfast. The Caledonian’s right arm and shoulder were still strapped, and both his years and his war gear were heavy on him. It was a long walk. Rather than continue the futile retreat north, Naulobates had ordered the encampment put on a war footing. The hundreds of wagons had been set out in a great circle on the southern bank of the stream. They had been chained or lashed together, and any gaps barricaded. The thousands of draught oxen had been corralled in the middle. The non-combatants had gone. They had driven before them the horses, camels, sheep and goats to join the other herds in more distant grazing. The women and children were scattered in the vastness of the Steppe. Of course, should the battle be lost, it would only postpone their rape and enslavement, or rape and death, by a day or two.