Adrian Goldsworthy - Vindolanda

Crispinus was still talking when he returned.

‘I had assumed you Britons would all be much alike,’ the tribune declared, ‘but in fact you vary a great deal, far more than the tribes of Gaul.’

‘You’ve studied a lot then,’ Vindex said sarcastically, as if the young aristocrat had just announced that rain comes from the skies.

Crispinus darted him an angry look and was ignored. He smiled. ‘I do remember my uncle telling me that the Silures were different from everyone, perhaps from every nation on earth.’

‘Oh well, everyone knows that,’ Vindex agreed. ‘Odd people. Funny customs. Don’t talk much. Don’t swear much either and you cannot say that is natural.’

‘Is it true?’ Crispinus asked. ‘Now that you mention it I have not heard you swear.’

‘Waste of good anger,’ Ferox said without looking at him. It was something his grandfather had often said. Do not waste rage. Nurture it, cherish it and use the strength it gives. Hot anger gets a man killed. Cold anger will put the other man in the earth.

‘Silures like killing.’ Vindex was enjoying stirring things up. ‘They like it more than food or drink – even women.’

Ferox said nothing. For the first time in years he wished he was back with his own people, men of sense who enjoyed silence for its own sake. He was tempted to say that his people most liked winning, but saw no point in the conversation. Things were as they were, and the tribune was marching into the lands of the Selgovae, not the Silures.

‘My uncle Frontinus,’ Crispinus went on, ‘the man who conquered your people, did say that the Silures were cruel and cunning, that they killed without remorse and tortured without mercy. He said that they despise everyone and have no honour. According to him half of what a Silure told you was a lie and the other half wasn’t true.’

Vindex roared with laughter, then explained in their own tongue to his warriors who found it just as hilarious. Ferox shrugged, half his mind wondering about what the tribune had said earlier. Some of what Crispinus said was more than idle talk. ‘But Uncle also said that if one did give you his word, then he would keep it until the end of the world.’

Ferox would keep his pledge to Crispinus and his father as long as it did not interfere with his oath of allegiance to the emperor. The question was which side was the tribune really on – apart from his own, like any other ambitious aristocrat. Ferox said nothing, but heard his grandfather’s deep voice telling him that a solemn oath could never be broken, that a faithless man was lower than the dust, doomed to grim punishment in the Otherworld. He also remembered standing in the hall of a principia thirteen years ago and swearing loyalty to Rome and emperor. At the time he had been young enough to thrill at the grandeur of the big parade where the oath was taken. These days the sense was one of habit as much as anything else. It was simply part of him, but that oath held him forever in a vice, and in life he could not be free of it unless the empire crumbled into ruin and was no more.

‘There’s someone waiting to meet us up ahead,’ he told Crispinus after the man had finally relapsed into silence, broken only by occasional guffaws from Vindex and his men. ‘We will see them soon, when we crest that rise.’

A Brigantian scout appeared, riding back with the same news.

‘Should we wait for the column?’ Crispinus asked.

‘Let’s take a look, sir. Walk the horses on the way so that we can run if needs be. They’ll know the main force is coming, and this way we look as if we have no doubt that they will do what we ask and not give trouble.’

The tribune looked pale, but nodded assent.

There were several hundred Selgovae standing or sitting on the hillock. They wore dark trousers with faded patterns of tartan, and some had striped or checked tunics and long cloaks. One or two in the front wore helmets and armour and carried swords. Most of the rest had a spear or javelin and a little round or square shield. Ahead of them were forty or so warriors sitting on their ponies, and a chariot, the wooden frame brightly painted in red and blue. It was drawn by one black and one grey pony, and carried a charioteer, naked from the waist up and covered with tattoos, and a short, stocky warrior in mail, an old legionary helmet clasped under one arm and his long red hair falling down his back. As they approached the driver twitched the reins and the chariot came towards them. The warrior spread his arms high, waving the helmet in one, but apart from the long sword on his right hip he carried no weapon.

‘He wants to talk, sir,’ Ferox told the tribune. ‘It would be wise for us to meet him so that he can see your face and decide whether or not to trust you. And by the way, I’ll lay good odds that he is letting us see no more than half his warriors at best. The rest are in the trees on either side of us.’

‘Are you sure?’ Crispinus glanced around. ‘I don’t see anything.’

‘That’s why you know they are there,’ the centurion assured him, and then the chariot came round in a wide arc and slewed to a halt in front of them.

The chieftain was named Egus and he did not want to fight unless the Romans gave him no other choice. Ferox had met him before, although he did not know him well as it was less than a year since the man had succeeded his brother as leader. His reputation was as a good lord to his people, and the clan had always paid what was due to the empire on time, or near enough. This Egus was willing to do, but he resented the levy being demanded early.

‘It takes time to gather and sort the grain, and even longer to kill the animals and prepare the hides,’ he told Ferox, who interpreted. In ten days they would have everything as usual.

‘You should accept, sir,’ Ferox told the tribune. ‘He is offering his own son as hostage until everything is delivered.’

Crispinus was unsure what to do. ‘Do you trust him?’

‘Don’t look at me,’ Ferox said in a low voice. ‘Keep your eyes on his and do not smile. He needs to know that you are a serious man and one he can trust.’ He switched back into the language of the tribes and spoke to the chieftain in short, clipped sentences, getting similar replies. At last Egus held out his right hand to the tribune.

‘I have agreed to the terms,’ Ferox told the young officer.

‘You take a lot on yourself, centurion,’ Crispinus whispered, but took the outstretched hand and shook it firmly. ‘I agree,’ he told the chieftain, hoping that the man either knew a little Latin or would sense the meaning from his tone.

The boy was brought, and all the while more and more warriors appeared on the edges of the woodland. Egus’ son looked to be about nine or ten, skinny and with a drooping lip. The warrior attending him was the man with the painted face they had seen earlier in the day. By the time they all went back to join the rest of the party, there were hundreds more tribesmen watching them from the hillsides.

‘You were right,’ Crispinus conceded. ‘There are a lot more of them than we saw. A fight would have been harder than I thought. Yet I believe that I command. As I said, you presume a great deal to decide without consulting me.’

‘It’s my job,’ Ferox said. ‘Usually there is no time to seek approval. I am here to keep Rome’s peace, if I can. Once the main body came up we could have beaten this lot – probably. But we would have lost men, they would have lost a lot more and the rest of them would hate us. This way everyone is alive and we have a loyal ally.’

It started to rain, which made the wait for the column to arrive seem even longer. They pitched camp on the fairly level ground in front of the hillock where Egus and his band had waited. By now there were probably over a thousand Britons watching the soldiers as they went through the routine of entrenching and laying out the tent-lines.