Robert Fabbri: False God of Rome

‘Yes. Plus, of course, my own private expenses.’

‘Which will be how much?’

‘Oh, no more than Capella can afford to pay; say, one woman?’

‘How much further, Aghilas?’ Marcus Valerius Messala Corvinus, the young, patrician prefect of the province’s Libu light cavalry snapped, wiping away the sweat that flowed freely from beneath his broad-brimmed straw hat.

The dark-skinned Libu scout pointed towards a small, rocky outcrop shimmering in the heat haze, some two miles distant. ‘Not far, master; it’s in among those rocks.’

‘And not a moment too soon,’ Magnus muttered, easing his hot and sore behind in the saddle. ‘It’s only three days since we came down off the plateau and I’ve already had enough of the desert.’

‘You didn’t have to come,’ Vespasian reminded his friend. ‘You could have stayed in the foothills and gone hunting; I’m sure Corvinus would have left you a couple of guides.’

Corvinus glanced at Vespasian in a way that assured him that he was completely mistaken on that point.

Magnus looked ruefully at the stout hunting-spear jiggling upright in a long, hardened-leather holster attached to his saddle and shook his head. ‘No, I wouldn’t have wanted to miss the fun; I just didn’t realise that there was so much desert.’

There was indeed a lot of desert.

Since descending from Cyrene’s plateau, two days after leaving the city, they had headed southeast, over a hard, dun-brown, rock-strewn wilderness that stretched to beyond the province’s vague southern border and then as far as the imagination; it provided a natural defence against whomever or whatever lived beyond this wasted land. Despite it being November the sun burned down during the day with a ferocity that belied the season; winter, however, caught up at night when the temperature plummeted and ice would form in the necks of their water-skins.

The hundred and twenty men of the four turmae detachment of Libu light cavalry, armed with light javelins, a cavalry spatha — a sword slightly longer than the infantry gladius — and curved knives and protected by small, round, leather-clad shields, took the conditions in their stride. Wide-brimmed straw hats shaded their faces and long, thick, undyed lambswool cloaks, worn over similar woollen tunics, protected them from the sun’s intense rays during the day and kept them warm in the freezing night air — fires were impossible as there was nothing to burn. Their Roman decurions had followed their men’s example for this expedition, since metal cuirasses and helmets were impractical in the scorching heat.

Each man carried a water-skin that held just enough for him and his mount to last for two days; that, together with the extra water, as well as grain for the horses and spare rations for the troopers, carried by the trail of pack-mules following the column, meant they could last for three days without resupplying. Navigation through the almost featureless landscape was therefore crucial as they were obliged to travel via two wells, part of a network of ancient wells dug throughout the desert by the Marmaridae, generations ago, to enable them to make the crossing from their grazing lands in the north, near the coast over a hundred miles east of Cyrene, to the oasis at Siwa and beyond.

‘How the fuck does Aghilas find his way out here?’ Magnus asked Corvinus as they approached the outcrop where, their guide had assured them, they would find the first well of their journey. ‘There’s nothing to navigate by.’

Corvinus looked haughtily at Magnus before deigning to reply. ‘He was taken as a slave by the Marmaridae when he was a boy and lived with them for ten years before escaping. He’s made countless trips across the desert; I’ve used him before and he’s never let me down.’

‘When was the last time you were out here?’ Vespasian enquired, trying to be friendly to this aloof patrician; he had not had much contact with Corvinus, who spent most of his time at Barca, southwest of Cyrene, where the auxiliary cavalry were based.

‘Just before you arrived, quaestor.’ There was almost a tone of mockery in his voice as he used Vespasian’s official title. ‘We chased a raiding party for a couple of days; didn’t catch them, though. Their camels aren’t as fast as horses in a gallop but they can do eighty or ninety miles in ten hours without stopping for water; at that speed and in this heat our horses just collapse.’

‘Have you ever caught any?’

‘No, not once in the seven months that I’ve had the misfortune to be stationed here. And I don’t know what makes you think that it’ll be any different this time; you’d have to surprise-’

A sharp cry from Aghilas as he fell from his horse cut Corvinus short; an instant later his own mount reared up, tipping him onto the ground. Vespasian heard the hiss of an arrow passing just over his head followed immediately by the cry of a trooper behind him.

‘Form line by turma,’ Corvinus shouted, jumping to his feet as his horse crashed, screeching, to the ground next to him; a blood-soaked arrow protruded from its chest.

The four thirty-man turmae fanned out across the desert; the whinnying of wounded horses and the shrill blare of the lituus , a cavalry horn, filled the air.

A hundred paces away among the rocks Vespasian could see their attackers breaking cover and sprinting towards a dozen or so similar-coloured, smaller, more rounded rocks. A few moments later these rocks seemed to spring to life as the fleeing men jumped on them and they rose from the ground, as if they had suddenly grown first back legs then front; they turned and galloped away southwards.

‘Decurion, take your turma and get those camel-fucking Marmaridae bastards; we’re close enough to catch them. I want one alive,’ Corvinus bellowed at the nearest Latin-looking face.

As the turma peeled away Vespasian shot Magnus a questioning glance.

‘I don’t hold with fighting mounted but I suppose it’ll make up for not hunting lions,’ Magnus said, kicking his horse forward.

With a grin Vespasian followed, urging his mount into a gallop. The wind immediately tore his hat from his head and it fluttered behind him attached by the loose, leather strap around his throat.

They quickly cleared the outcrop and Vespasian felt that they were gaining on the slower but more durable camels, less than two hundred paces ahead; he could count about twenty of them. The turma had spread out into dispersed order, the troopers expertly guiding their horses around the larger stones that littered the baked, cracked ground. The occasional wild shot passed overhead or to one side but there were no hits — accurate archery from a moving camel at an enemy behind you would prove difficult, Vespasian surmised from the ungainly gait of the strange beasts.

After a half-mile, the Marmaridae were less than a hundred paces away; sensing that they would certainly catch their attackers, the troopers urged their horses to greater efforts. Sweat foamed from under their saddles and saliva flecked from their mouths as they responded to their riders’ wishes.

Vespasian reached behind him and pulled one of the ten light javelins, which each man carried, from the carry-case strapped to his saddle and slipped his forefinger through the leather thong halfway down the shaft. Their target was now little more than seventy paces ahead and Vespasian felt the familiar thrill and tension of imminent battle; he had not been in combat since the attack on his parents’ estate at Aquae Cutillae over four years previously and his desire for it was heightened by the ennui of the last few months.

With only sixty paces separating the two groups, the Marmaridae, realising that they had no chance of escape, suddenly turned their camels and charged the turma, releasing a volley of arrows. To Vespasian’s right a trooper was punched out of the saddle with a scream; his horse raced on, taken up by the excitement of the charge.