Douglas Jackson: Scourge of Rome

With a last regretful glance at the dead assassin he set off again in the direction of the stables. More imperative than ever to ensure the horses were being well cared for and the stable hands were following his instructions. He was fairly certain the killer worked alone, but that didn’t mean there weren’t others nearby ready to take on the job if he failed. Valerius’s enemy was a man who could not be underestimated. Valerius had done that once and almost paid the price. To do so a second time would be suicidal.

He pondered whether to search the assassin’s rooms, but decided he might alert an accomplice he’d missed. The killer must have some means of reporting his success and the man who had sent him was not known for his patience. Did that mean he’d already been told of Valerius’s plan to join one of the caravans heading east for the next leg of his journey?

‘Spare a few as for an old soldier down on his luck?’

The slurred words came from a doorway to his right. Valerius automatically checked his left side in case the approach had been designed to distract him. When he was certain there was no danger he turned back to the man who’d spoken. A single red-rimmed eye shone from a face destroyed by a sword blade. It had caught him high on the right cheek and removed the other eye, half his nose and several teeth. He might have been anywhere between thirty and fifty and sat on a bundle of straw with one leg tucked under him. The stump of the other, removed at the thigh, jutted out in front.

‘What legion?’

‘Tenth Fretensis, your honour, Corbulo’s finest. Honourable wounds taken against the Parthian King of Kings.’

A shiver ran through Valerius at the reminder of Gnaeus Domitius Corbulo, the most successful general ever to wield a sword for Rome and the man who’d been like a father to him. Corbulo had become so powerful that Nero had grown to fear him and, despite his professions of loyalty, ordered him to commit suicide. The Tenth Fretensis had held the Parthian charge at the Cepha Gap as arrows turned the sky black and King Vologases’ Invincibles crashed to their doom, but they’d suffered terrible casualties. Most of the badly wounded died in the unsprung carts carrying them back to the Euphrates crossing at Zeugma. This man must be tough to survive the ordeal – or he’d been graced with Fortuna’s favour. He weighed the assassin’s purse in his hands and threw it to the cripple.

‘Spend it wisely,’ he said.

Before he reached the stables he heard the cackle of laughter as the mutilated soldier discovered the value of the purse’s contents. A roar of ‘The drinks are on old Atticus tonight’ echoed down the street and told him his advice was unlikely to be taken.

The pure joy in the shout made him grin. In truth he could have used the money himself, but he had a feeling the gold was tainted and, in the long run, would bring him bad fortune. Another old memory stirred and he touched his throat where a silver wheel of Fortuna hung on a leather thong. It was his only physical link to Domitia Longina Corbulo, the general’s daughter, the woman he loved and the one who’d saved his life. She’d placed it round his neck on that last day in Rome. ‘You must forget me,’ she’d said. But her advice was easier to acknowledge than to put into practice.

In pursuing Domitia, Valerius had made a mortal enemy of Titus Flavius Domitian. That enmity had grown along with Domitian’s power until it became a homicidal obsession to rid himself of his love rival. When Valerius had knelt in the Forum, falsely accused of treason and with an executioner’s sword at his neck, Domitia had promised herself to his enemy to save him. Instead of death, Valerius had suffered permanent exile from the shores of Italia and been branded an enemy of the state.

Of course it wouldn’t end there. There’d never been any doubt that Domitian would send his assassins in Valerius’s wake. Even with Domitia’s support he wouldn’t have escaped Rome alive without the help of his former colleague Gaius Plinius Secundus. Pliny had loaned him money and supplied him with a list of contacts that allowed him to reach Antioch. Now he was on his own, and Valerius knew his only chance of long-term survival was to reach his friend Titus, Domitian’s brother, and somehow redeem his honour. It meant finding a way to Judaea, where Titus commanded his father Vespasian’s forces.

But Judaea was a province in revolt and a lone traveller’s chances of crossing its war-ravaged deserts and mountains alive were slim. Valerius had sought a place in a well-guarded mercantile caravan that would take him some of the way in relative safety. Thanks to the assassin he must now consider that route closed. He could return to the coast and take ship from Seleucia to Tyrus or Appolonia, but Domitian would undoubtedly have the ports watched.

Which left him with only one option.

‘I do not wish to appear ungrateful, lord, but the pittance I accepted to be your guide and protector on the road to Emesa did not extend to travelling through the hours of darkness.’

Valerius gritted his teeth and resisted the urge to snarl at his companion. He wondered how much longer he could stand the sing-song whine. For two hours now, or was it three, he’d been listening to a litany of complaint. The horse was too high-spirited. He’d have been much better with camels. The night was cold. The saddle was hard. The date was not auspicious. The route …

‘Did I mention that the coast road would be quicker, more comfortable and, now I remember, safer?’

‘I’ve seen enough of the sea.’ Valerius’s patience snapped. ‘I told you I wanted to experience the interior. You assured me this was the scenic route, fit for conquerors, kings and emperors. We will walk in the footsteps of Alexander, you said.’

‘Indeed, lord,’ the other man said patiently, ‘but it is so much more scenic, not to say less dangerous, if one travels it by the light of the sun. Who knows what djinns and sprites haunt the darkness? Foul shape-changers who lure you in woman’s lovely form before turning into monsters with hooked claws and fangs to rend your flesh asunder.’

‘Then you should feel quite at home here,’ Valerius responded through clenched teeth, ‘given the quality of the women in the tavern where I found you.’

Ariston, for that was the name he went by, registered the dangerous quality in the Roman’s voice and fell quiet. Dark-skinned and coarse-featured, he claimed to be of Greek origin, and had astonished Valerius with a laughable boast that he was descended from the Seleucid ruling house. If that were the case his bloodline had been much diluted. He’d been described by the barkeep who pointed him out as ‘part Bedou wanderer, part Palmyran bandit, with a touch of Gandhara Zoroastrian fire-worshipper thrown in to make him interesting’. The result was a hooked nose any eagle would have been proud of and a pair of luminous green eyes that darted restlessly from beneath a bush of curly hair. His almost feminine, thin-lipped mouth never seemed to shut. For conversation he favoured Greek, which suited Valerius well enough, but like many of the nomadic people of the province he could make himself understood in a dozen languages. Wrapped in a shapeless, hooded cloak of patched cloth that might once have been white, he appeared the least trustworthy-looking human being Valerius had ever laid eyes on. Yet when the Roman remarked that he’d doubtless have his throat cut on the first night, the innkeeper insisted that Ariston had a reputation for delivering those with whom he set out.

‘Then why,’ Valerius had asked, ‘if he is such a paragon, isn’t he a guide for the merchant caravans out of Palmyra where the real money is made?’