Geraint Jones - Blood Forest

I was no sentimental idiot, and knew Rome’s flaws better than most, but I could not understand how such a passionate, popular prince had been able to plot and deceive while maintaining his charisma and inspiring loyalty in those he sought to destroy. That, to me, was the greatest mystery of all.

Rumour of this treason had spread through the legions like wildfire, and when we reached the huddled forms of our comrades, Titus and I were assaulted by a barrage of desperate questions, Moonface dropping to his knees in the mud as Titus gruffly confirmed that Varus and his staff were dead.

‘Pick yourself up,’ Titus ordered. ‘Varus was a fucking coward and a cunt. Don’t sit crying in the mud for him.’

It took Stumps and Cnaeus to haul the distraught soldier to his feet. The myth of Roman glory was the air that Moonface breathed, and in a matter of days he had seen the illusion of invincibility and grandeur shattered.

‘We’re dead,’ he groaned, and no one disagreed with him.

I looked over the faces of the section, seeing all hope abandoned. Chickenhead had ceased to function as a soldier and a man, a hollow-eyed ghost clad in armour. Young Micon and Cnaeus were gaunt-faced and vacant. Stumps veered between moments of outlandish optimism and soul-crushing depression.

‘I don’t want to die,’ Micon stated simply, his blank face showing no sign of emotion.

But die it was certain we would, for the trap had been sprung and an army was leaderless in the killing ground. With such doom in mind, I remembered something Pavo had said in Minden. Something he had told me before the forest and the bloodshed.

No one should die amongst strangers.

He was right.

I did not want to die an outsider, and so I opened my mouth to speak.

‘My name isn’t Felix,’ I told the six soldiers who had become my brothers.

Their dark eyes widened as I laid bare my poisonous soul.

‘It’s Corvus.’

I swallowed, sealing my fate.

‘And I am a traitor.’

‘I am a traitor.’ I breathed the words again, as if hearing them myself for the first time.

The section did not respond; they simply stared. So exhausted and battered were they that my confession bounced like a pebble off the armour of their minds.

‘I’m a fucking traitor!’ I shouted into their faces, desperate now to unburden myself before the bloody end that awaited us beyond the ramparts.

Titus rallied first. He shrugged. ‘This isn’t your first time under the eagles.’ It was a statement rather than question. I knew that Titus had had his suspicions all along, as had the other veterans, and even the boy soldiers. A soldier’s ways were too hard to disguise. From drill, to my movement amongst the trees, I had been betrayed by my experience.

‘Just speak,’ he ordered.

And so I did. ‘Not my first time under the eagles,’ I confirmed, forcing the words out. ‘But my first time on this frontier. My old unit, they were in Pannonia.’

Pannonia . Just speaking the name of the province was torture. When I had first set eyes on the place there had been no land more beautiful, but I had seen that utopia torn apart by bloody rebellion. Since my desertion, the details of that campaign had been mercifully vague in my mind, leaving me only with the impression of chaos and suffering.

‘You were in the war there?’ Stumps asked.

I nodded, but that was as far as my answer would go. I wanted to tell them more – I was desperate to – but that time was a blur of blood and misery, and if I tried to describe those few vivid memories that I could recall, the words would stick in my throat like hooks.

‘I ran,’ I finally choked.

‘Why?’ Stumps asked.

‘I – I don’t remember. I just ran. It was a slaughter. I don’t remember much, but it was slaughter. Every day, it was… slaughter. I couldn’t watch them die any more.’

I don’t know what I expected, then. Perhaps it would have been different had we not been on the edge of our own destruction, our leaders having died within the hour by their own blades. Hard to question a foot-soldier’s honour when his senatorial leaders, his supposed betters, had taken their own lives rather than face the enemy. And so, instead of fists and accusations, I faced only questions.

‘I was going to Britain,’ I answered several voices.

‘Britain?’ Titus asked.

I shrugged. ‘No Roman law. Across a sea. It seemed as good a place as any, and I had friends. Maybe they’re still alive,’ I added, certain that if they were, then I would never see them. Not now that our head was in the bear’s jaws.

‘A long way to walk from Pannonia,’ Titus commented. Pannonia sat against the Adriatic, an entire continent away. I had crossed countless miles of field, forest and mountain range before I had found myself in the sacred grove where I had been discovered by Arminius. I told them as much, my shame-filled eyes focused on the dirt.

A bark of laughter caused me to look up.

It was Stumps. He looked at me in pity. ‘You ran from one war, and ended up…’ He let his words trail away, but spread his arms to encompass the misery and squalor of a dying army.

No one caught the infection of his smile. Instead, Moonface took a step towards me. I saw a flash of something in his eyes. Despite the collapse of Varus’s army, Moonface still believed in the Roman ideals.

‘Cunt,’ he spat.

And then he hit me.

It wasn’t a good strike, his muscles tired and his aim awry, but I made no move to defend myself, and it caught my cheek, the bone beneath my eye singing with heat.

‘Back!’ Titus growled, hauling the soldier away as if he weighed no more than an empty tunic. ‘What the fuck does it matter now if he ran? Have you seen where we are? Have you seen what’s coming?’

‘You’re giving up?’ Stumps asked, suddenly sour.

‘Fuck you, I’m not giving up,’ Titus declared. ‘I’m going to live through this, and so are you, little pricks. Moon!’ he growled, and Moonface met his glare. ‘Forget your fucking eagles, the emperor and every other thing that they ever told us was important. Look around! Seven of us. Seven of us here to fight our way out of this. If you don’t believe we can do it, then fall on your sword now like that fucking governor and his wet-cunt officers.’

Titus’s words hit home like a war-hammer. I looked at the brute and saw a figure that was so large in life that perhaps death would not have the stomach to take him. Maybe – maybe – here was a man who could pull us through the impossible to safety.

Stumps snorted, his eyes lively. ‘Nice speech, Titus. At least if I die, you’ll keep me entertained until the end.’

‘Are you in this or not?’ Titus demanded, in no mood for jests.

‘Of course I am, you soft bastard,’ Stumps told him, spitting for emphasis.

‘And the rest of you?’ Titus challenged them.

None answered with the same enthusiasm as Stumps, but a grudging nod was enough for the big man. Only Chickenhead stayed alone, mute and unmoving.

‘I’ll get him to the Rhine if I have to carry him,’ Titus promised, glancing at the veteran, and I had no doubt that he meant it.

That left only me.

‘I’m a traitor,’ I told him again, as if that explained everything.

‘You’re a soldier,’ Titus snorted. His open palm hit the side of my helmet, and with that blow I knew that I would die for him. I would die for a man I had planned to kill, and I would kill a man that I had adored.

Arminius.

We sat huddled like sheep, a sodden blanket held over our heads. Without warning, it was tugged back.

‘Fuck off,’ Stumps moaned, his eyes closed.