Jack Whyte - The Eagles' Brood

I thanked the woman who had fed me and left some silver coins on the table. My horse was tethered right outside the door and as I swung into the saddle I scanned the empty street, looking vainly for one of my men. Two streets further south, I met a party of them on foot, all reasonably sober.

"Quintus," I called to the biggest of them. "I am recalled to Camulod with Commander Uther. Extreme emergency. Illness in the family. Find Dedalus, give him my apologies for not taking the time to contact him personally, and tell him he is now in command. Commander Uther and I will ride alone. Dedalus is to finish the patrol as planned. Tell him Commander Varrus is dying and we must ride on ahead. There are search parties out looking for Commander Uther, but I think I know where he is, and they won't find him. If I am wrong, and he is still here in Glevum, I will be waiting for him at the hostelry ten miles south of the town. I will have extra horses with me, so tell him he need not waste time with that. Do you understand?" I waited while he repeated it back to me verbatim, then I returned his salute and kicked my horse into a gallop to our depot where I picked up two extra horses and some food before heading out of town.

I remember riding those first ten miles trying to think of anything that would take my mind away from Uncle Varrus and what his death would mean. I was eighteen years old and although this was my fourth patrol, it was the first that Uther and I had commanded jointly without overt supervision. It crossed my mind that our first responsibility should be to the patrol before all else, but I dismissed the thought very quickly. Dedalus was a senior centurion and my father had charged him with the authority to override our orders if he believed Uther and I were acting foolishly or rashly at any time.

It had hurt my pride at the time to think that we were only nominal commanders, but my intellect had reassured me that this last patrol with Dedalus was to have been our final test. Now it turned out that we could not complete it.

It was late afternoon by the time I drew near to the hostelry, and as I did so I began to get a bad feeling in my gut, a feeling that my boyhood Druid teachers had taught me to respect, since they believed that what we call intuition is a natural gift that man has allowed to grow rusty. I have always been glad of the emphasis they placed on that teaching. It almost certainly saved my life that day.

I drew rein about a hundred paces from the place and sat there looking at it, remembering that I had not liked the looks of some of the characters who had been there when we arrived two days previously. If Uther had gone in there alone, and I reasoned that he would have, because of who and what he was, he could have bought himself trouble along with a jug of beer. If, on the other hand, he was not there at all and I rode in alone, mounted on one horse and leading two more, I would be buying myself trouble of the same kind. My uniform would not save me, nor would any air of authority I might command. I was a man alone who could be dealt with quickly and disposed of cleanly. Any search for me later would produce nothing. I looked around for signs of Uther's horse, but there was nothing to see. It would have been stabled in one of the outhouses at the back or at the side of the main building.

I almost talked myself into believing that I was being foolish. Thank God I didn't believe myself. I left the road and made my way through the trees and around the place without being seen, and tethered the horses safely off the road on the south side, and then I walked back. I left my war cloak, my shield and my long-sword with the horses and carried only my short-sword and dagger. My helmet felt heavy on my head and my nailed boots rang loudly on the cobbled surface as I walked. I stepped right to the centre of the main courtyard entrance and stopped there, looking around the interior of the yard with care. It was empty. There were no signs of life at all. I crossed the yard quickly, making my way to the main door, and as I did so I heard shouting and commotion from inside. I knew what I would find even before I entered, and I wished I had not left my shield back there with the horses. I paused on the threshold, took a deep breath, then swung the door open and stepped inside, moving immediately to bring my back against the inside wall.

The place was more like a barn than anything else, one huge, communal room with dried rushes on the floor and trestle tables scattered here and there for the clientele's eating needs, if not their drinking. A long table standing against the wall to my right held amphorae and casks of ale. A massive, open fireplace in the opposite wall held spits for roasting meat. Directly across from where I stood, a wide, open flight of wooden steps led to a second level, like a loft, which served as sleeping quarters and business premises for the women.

Uther had thrown a table of some kind lengthwise across the top of this stairway and was hard set defending it, sword in one hand, dagger in the other, against a mob of eight or nine desperate-looking rogues. I didn't know how long he had been there, but I had the distinct feeling that the fun had only just begun, there was not enough evidence of violent action lying around for the fracas to have been older, and he could not have hoped to hold out for long against so many. They were crowded together at the top of the stairs, hampering themselves, but all they would have to do was take their time and they would overwhelm him sooner or later. As I took all of this in, one of the girls up in the loft with him leaped onto Uther's back, wrapping her legs around his waist and attempting to pin his arms to his sides and render him defenceless. There was a concerted roar from his assailants and from him as he broke the grip of her arms, wrenched her free and threw her over his shoulders and down towards his attackers. She screamed as she landed among the men, sweeping one of them with her off the open edge of the stairs to crash to the stone floor beneath. The scattered rushes did nothing to break their fall, and they both lay still. I glanced around me, looking for something I could use as a better weapon than my short-sword and dagger and there, on the floor beside me, lay a spear that I recognized as Uther's. I picked it up, hefting it for balance, and then I was across the floor and up the stairs, feeling the blade of it bite deep between the shoulders of the first man I could reach. I jerked the spearpoint free and pierced the kidney of another man before the first fell back and past me down the stairs. This time I jerked to my left, pushing and guiding my victim off the edge of the stairs, almost losing my balance as the weight of his body fell free of the spear's blade. They still did not know I was there behind them.

"Caius! What kept you?" Uther's welcoming roar told everyone I had arrived and they swung round as one to face me. As they did so Uther's long blade decapitated the rearmost of them and he kicked the headless, spouting corpse to fall among the legs of the others. The man who owned the hostelry, a one-eyed misanthrope who clutched a Roman sword, was right in front of me. I jammed the spear into his belly, just below the ribs and saw death come into his eyes as he dropped the sword and grasped at the shaft of the spear, stopping me from pulling it out. I gave it a vicious twist to lock the barbs and jerked him down towards me, stepping to my left to avoid his fall and almost plunging myself over the edge of the stairs. I hung there, my arms waving in the air, while they all had time to get over their surprise. I saw Uther plant his sword in another's back, but there were still three of them facing me with Uther's sword embedded and me defenceless.

One of them came at me with a roar just as I found my balance. I saw an axe whistling towards me and I jumped, out and backwards, flexing my knees and hoping to land without breaking a leg. In midair, I saw the axe bite deep into the step where I had been standing, and I saw Uther pick up the table that had sheltered him and rush the others on the stairs, sweeping all three of them off balance into a fall. By sheer good luck, I landed like a cat, easily, on all fours, and I was on the whoreson who had swung the axe before he landed at the bottom of the stairs. I had no thought of mercy in my head. The point of my sword grated on the stone floor beneath him and I had to plant my foot on his chest to pull my blade free. I heard a grunt, a chop and a death rattle as Uther clove another of them, and then came scuffling footsteps and the slam of a door. It was over. I collapsed onto the stairs, my head hanging between my knees as I fought for breath, and I heard the sound of the door again.