Адриан Голдсуорти - The Fort

‘Bitch!’ he hissed and punched, catching her on the cheek as she tried to twist out of the way. Her sword fell with a clatter that seemed loud. ‘We’re all dead,’ he screamed and taking hold of her pushed with all his weight. ‘All dead! So nothing matters, nothing!’ She tried to strangle him, but his brute strength broke the lock and then he lifted her up onto the table. Her hand found a cup and she flung it at him, but missed and then he had both her arms and was pinning her down, his weight pressing onto her.

‘You’ll do better.’ The words were soft, almost tender and so surprising that she stopped struggling, wondering whether this was all some perverse joke. ‘You are so beautiful. A lady rather than some slut.’ His breath reeked of wine, and pressing her down with one elbow she felt the other hand take the hem of her tunic. He stood beside her, and she kept her legs tight together, but could not work out how to kick him. ‘Steady, girl, gently now,’ he whispered as if soothing a nervous horse. ‘It’s all right, it’s all right.’

Enica pulled her head away from his rank breath and the gaze of his mad eyes, and saw a chance. She relaxed, stopping her struggles.

‘You’re a hero,’ she said softly. ‘A great hero.’

Piso’s head swayed as if struggling to understand the change. He glanced down. The tunic was tightly bunched under the woman, so he began to yank hard at the material until it started to tear. Anger and hate filled his eyes again as the tunic ripped open from hem to neck. ‘And you’re no lady,’ he shouted, realising that she was wearing nothing underneath it.

‘I’m a bitch,’ she said, licking her lips. Piso started to drool, and the feel of it on her skin revolted her, but she had a plan and just one chance, so ignored it. He felt for her legs, and Enica helped him to lift her a little further onto the table top, and let her knees part.

The change in her mood for some reason made his eyes burn with new anger.

‘Bitch!’ he growled and hit her on the face again.

Enica’s legs were in the air and the tribune was trying to wriggle so that his breeches would drop, but the trousers remained stubbornly in place so he felt for them, trying to work out what was wrong. Her right hand reached the bone-covered haft of a table knife on the plate beside her. Piso was staring down at his trousers, then grunted with satisfaction as the breeches at last dropped. Enica crossed her legs, grasping the tribune tightly and used that to lever her torso up, the knife in her hand. Piso’s eyes widened and then the tip of the blade drove into his left eyeball with less force than she had hoped. He squealed, a noise more animal than human and reached up to his face. Enica clung on to him, ripped the blade free, dragging the remnants of the eye out of the socket, and plunging it into the man’s neck. His arms flailed and she let go with her legs, slamming hard onto the table and losing her grip on the knife. Piso staggered, moaning, and when he pulled the blade free a jet of blood sprayed all over her bare skin. Yet the tribune would not die and came at her. Enica half rolled, half fell from the table, losing the rest of her tunic and the dying man dropped onto her. His face pressed against her and she was not sure whether he was trying to bite her or kiss her, and the blood was everywhere so that it was hard to take firm hold and lift him off. She had finally managed to shift the corpse and push herself away when the door opened.

‘Bugger me!’ Vindex said. Bran was behind him, face grim as if he had failed, but then Sulpicia Lepidina pushed past them. She took in the dead tribune, his mutilated face staring one-eyed at the ceiling, and Enica, standing up, naked save for her boots, her white skin half covered with blood. The tribune had fouled himself in his last moments, adding to the stench and the wreck of the room.

‘Are you all right, my dear?’ Lepidina asked.

Vindex undid the brooch on his cloak. Claudia Enica gasped for breath.

‘Are you all right?’ Lepidina’s voice was eerily calm. Vindex held out his cloak and she took it and went over to her friend.

‘I am,’ Enica said, amazed that her words were level. She pulled the cloak around her. ‘I am.’

‘Did that bastard…?’ Vindex could say no more. His fingers were clenching and unclenching in his fury.

‘He tried.’ Claudia Enica managed a thin smile. ‘And failed. My honour is preserved – and he is dead.’

‘Good,’ Vindex said.

‘Perhaps, but he is a tribune and the son of a senator.’ Claudia looked over her shoulder at Lepidina. ‘What should we do? And what should we say? He has fought well in the last few days and won the men’s respect.’

‘Sometimes the truth is not only the simplest idea, but the best,’ Lepidina said, patting her friend on the shoulder. ‘A bad blow to the head can change a man’s character, sometimes forever, and wine does not help. Whatever respect he may have won, the men love you – all of them.’

‘You too, lady,’ Vindex said.

‘Perhaps, but a blind man could see that you are the heart and the head of this defence. So we will say that he tried to rape you and that you killed him. They will hate him for this crime and admire you more for your strength and skill.

‘As for later, his family is in disgrace and he was here to redeem himself and perhaps one day redeem his fool of a father. Whatever is said in public, I doubt that many will miss him.’

Claudia Enica had the odd feeling that what had happened was no more than a dream from which she had woken. ‘I do wonder if he was sent here to die.’

‘Perhaps. Which may mean that some will be grateful, although whether or not they can show it is harder to say. But those are problems for another day, if we live to see it. And to do that we need you fresh and restored. Go and wash again, and put on some clean clothes.’

‘Yes, mother, right away, mother.’ Enica did a little curtsey, making the cloak fall open. Vindex and Bran turned away and she thought how strange that was, especially for the scout.

After she had washed again and dressed in her last clean tunic, Claudia Enica fussed with her hair and then took another look in her mirror. The eyes that stared back at her were the eyes of Cartimandua. She did not smile, for her grandmother had rarely smiled, but she felt stronger.

‘LET’S KILL HIM and get out of here,’ the leader jerked a thumb at Ferox. ‘Bastard will only get in the way and slow us down.’ The centurion had his hands tied behind his back and was astride a mule. Above them the clouds were heavy with rain, and the air seemed thick with the scent of flowers.

‘The general wanted to see him,’ Ivonercus insisted. ‘That’s my orders.’

‘Orders!’ The leader leaned to the side and spat, then cursed his horse when it shied. ‘Piss on orders! Didn’t run from the legion just to be ordered about by some ape of a barbarian.’

‘The Lord Diegis was very clear—’

‘Diegis! That useless bastard!’ The leader tried to spit again, but his lips were too dry. ‘Marcus, the wine!’ he called to one of the other riders, before taking the proffered wine-sack and raising it high, spilling as much as he drank. For all his long hair and beard the man still looked like the legionary he had once been before deserting to the Dacians almost a decade ago. For one thing, Ivonercus thought, he rode with all the grace of a sack tied up with string.

‘Forget Diegis! Can’t you use your eyes?’ They were riding down the valley, and all the while passing warriors going the other way. Some were in groups and some on their own, and some still had weapons and shields, but many did not. All walked or rode, heads bowed, exhausted and silent. ‘Or have you never seen an army in rout? That daft sod Diegis has fought the legions and taken a kicking.’ There was almost pride in the man’s voice. ‘Diegis has lost, and from all I’ve seen old Decebalus doesn’t take too kindly to chieftains who lose. What Diegis thinks about anything ain’t going to matter.’