Geraint Jones - Blood Forest

And there was nothing more glorious than a legion’s eagle. The silver totem was the heart and soul of a legion, and as the soldiers of Rome died in the dirt, or fled for the trees, the eagle wavered. The standard-bearer whom I had met on the parade square was forced by wounds to his knees, the bearskin cloak about his shoulders thick with matted blood.

I saw the man sag, a witness to the last stand of the infantry who fell in defence of the eagle. Only when the standard-bearer made no further move to fight did I realize that the man had died with his hand on the sacred staff. That decorated warrior had told me it was better to be lucky than brave, and now his words were proven as the boot of a German cavalry soldier pushed his limp body to the dirt, a rush of blood pouring from his open mouth. The wild-maned German warrior then hefted the totem into the air, cheering himself hoarse, and his countrymen broke from their slaughter to revel in the capture of one of Rome’s most sacrosanct possessions.

It was the final blow. The last cut. Seeing the symbolic eagle fall into the hands of the enemy, the minds of Rome’s soldiers turned to their own survival.

They broke.

‘Go. Run!’ Stumps screamed into my face. ‘Get to the trees! Fucking run. Run. Go. Run!’

I looked down and saw Cnaeus’s lifeless face. The wound to his neck was as raw and open as his dead eyes – they told me to run.

And so I did.

I crossed the open ground littered with the dead and dying, my eyes focused on the forlorn sanctuary of the woods. I ran like an Olympian, and as I hurdled a fallen cavalry mount, I saw a ward of the legion that had slunk, unnoticed by almost all, into the deep green shadow of the forest.

It was a mule, and I knew what was contained within the boxes on its sweat-shined flanks – they were the legion’s pay chests, and in this forest of ghosts, they offered me the promise of being reborn.

I intended to take it.

Branches whipped across my face as I rushed into the treeline, desperate to leave the sound of the tortured screams behind me.

Clear of enemies – at least for a moment – the ruined muscles of my legs finally buckled as my sandals hit a tree root, and I collapsed to the floor like scythed wheat.

I lay there panting, spittle dripping between my teeth. Like a baby, I tried to regain my feet, frantic to find the mule that I had seen disappear into the forest with the legion’s pay chests on its back.

Instead, as I pushed myself up with shaking arms, I found a blade pointing at my throat.

‘You ran,’ the man accused me, and I swallowed at the sight of him.

His huge frame dripped with gore. His eyes burned with hate. He was a vision of nightmare.

‘We all ran,’ I forced myself to say.

Titus lowered his blade. ‘We need to keep going,’ he told me, offering his hand and pulling me to my unsteady feet.

He was right. We had to keep running. The unending chorus of screams told us as much. And yet…

‘There’s a mule,’ I told him. ‘I saw it come in close to here.’

‘We don’t have time to fuck around—’ he began.

‘The legion’s pay chests are on its back,’ I finished, and Titus’s eyes grew wide.

‘You’re sure?’

I nodded, and I knew that there was no way Titus would run with the promise of riches so close at hand. The man was a survivor, but deep down his soul was touched with greed. He had risked much in his sale of arms with the quartermaster. He would risk much to come into possession of a pay chest.

‘Show me where the mule came into the forest,’ he ordered, and I did, taking him the short distance to the edge of the track and a break between the trees. From there, finding the beast was a simple enough task, the mule having followed the path of least resistance through the trees. Avoiding our enemies was not as easy, but Titus was a god of war, and he cut them down as if they were children. Some almost were.

‘There!’ He pointed. The mule made no effort to avoid us, and as I took hold of the loose reins about its neck, Titus hungrily tore open one of the chests on its dirty flank.

‘Fuck me,’ he whispered, his eyes wide as they took in the mass of coin. ‘Something brought us to this point for a reason, Felix. We can take this. You can go to Britain – I’ve got the connections. With this coin, we can do it.’

Britain – the land I had striven for with every torrid step across a continent. The land I had dreamed would offer me redemption. The land I had dared hope would offer me sanctuary from ghosts.

This was it, the moment I had been waiting for since Arminius had first found me in the sacred grove. I was free of the army, its discipline and its punishments. I had coin – more coin than I could have ever imagined. I even had a warrior and a comrade with whom to share the road.

And yet.

‘We can’t leave without the others,’ I heard myself say.

It was a moment before Titus spoke.

‘You saw what happened back there. They’re dead, Felix. The others are dead. It’s just you and me now.’

‘Did you see them fall?’ I pressed. ‘Cnaeus is dead, but Micon? Stumps? Moonface? Did you see them fall?’

Eventually Titus shook his head.

‘Come back to the track with me. We can stay in cover. Maybe we’ll see them. If not,’ I promised, ‘then I’ll come with you. We’ll make a break for it.’

Titus held my eyes. He was no coward, far from it, and yet we both knew that with every moment delayed, the chance of us escaping the forest grew ever smaller.

‘One look,’ he told me as he spat, and so, pulling the mule’s reins, I led us back towards the track where an army had been destroyed.

At least so we thought.

‘Fuck. How?’ Titus whispered, peering out from the trees.

We were looking at an army of ghosts. A cohort of Roman soldiers. Somehow, this band of bloodied men had survived the collapse, and had rallied in an area of open ground. There were perhaps a thousand of them, from all three legions and all manner of auxiliary cohorts, bound together now as a single unit, fighting for survival.

‘It must be the second battle group,’ I guessed. ‘I didn’t see what happened to them. Did you?’

The big man shook his head slowly.

To see such a cohesive force still alive was a surprise not only to myself and Titus, but to Arminius’s army. The Germans had thought the battle won, but this thick tangle of Roman soldiers had hung on doggedly to life. Flush with victory, no German warrior was anxious to die now that the battle’s outcome had been assured, and so a tense lull had descended over the field.

‘It’s stopped raining,’ I heard Titus say in wonderment.

I looked up. For the first time in days, the skies had closed. I noticed then that the branches had ceased to tremble, the winds dying away to nothing. The final act of Arminius’s deception would be played out beneath a beautiful blue September sky.

I ran my eyes over the assembled ranks of the Roman soldiery. What I saw was no surprise, and I recognized men who were resigned to death in this place. Their eyes were hollow. Their cheeks were gaunt. There would be no escape. Only the manner of death was to be decided.

The death of my comrades. The death of my friends.

Stumps. Micon. Moonface. I saw them in the front rank, with overlapping shield, and bloodied blades in hand. For now, they lived, but the German horde was stirring. This lull would end. The tempest had cleared, but death was coming again with more violence than any storm.

‘Titus.’ I pulled at his tunic, but I could see that the warrior had already sighted the men of his section, for his eyes were huge and wet.

And then, without a word, he walked back into the forest.