Jack Whyte: The Singing Sword

"How much more time?" I asked him. He did some fast calculation and we agreed to meet again in June. Feeding his greed, I told him my wagons could easily carry a thousand pounds each. For every hundred pounds, therefore, over five thousand pounds, I would pay double if he would throw in the carts and horses. We shook on the deal, and when we parted the following day, Statius was a happy merchant, firmly convinced that he had found the biggest fools in the Empire.

On the way home, we kept to the south coast road in order to avoid the towns we had passed earlier. It almost doubled our journey, but I had sound reasons for the circuitous route, the main one being that I wished to attract no attention to the richness of the train we were escorting. On the way, we picked up our two wagonloads of salt and passed by Durnovaria in the dark hours before dawn, trying to make no noise and attract no attention. Just beyond that town, the road runs along the seashore for several miles. There are no other towns out that way except Isca in the far west, and the road was seldom travelled, even that long ago — a truth attested to by the amount of grass and weeds growing between the cobblestones.

We travelled slowly. The wagons were fully loaded and we had managed to acquire a fair-sized herd of horses of all descriptions. Most of them we had bought along the way; gold is a powerful persuader. Others we had found, and many of these were wild.

At one point, where the road ran very close to the sea, the horses took it into their heads to stop and graze. In trying to get them moving again, one of my men panicked them and they scattered. With difficulty we rounded them up, and then one of them, a big black gelding, the finest horse in the bunch, decided to show us his heels and headed off at full gallop for the west. Three of us chased him. The going was dangerous because of the wetness of the grass, and we were a long way from the road, which had swung north, by the time we finally ran him down.

I tied a halter around his head and handed the rope to Bassus, the young soldier who had ended up with me. We were just turning back to the road when I heard a shout, seemingly cut off in mid-breath. We froze, both of us listening for more. There was only silence, broken by the sound of waves on the pebbled beach a hundred paces away and the whisper of the rain, which had lessened, in the leaves around us. We were in a grassy hollow, surrounded by hawthorn bushes. I turned to look at young Bassus.

"Where did that come from?"

He shook his head uncertainly. "It sounded as though it came from over there." He pointed towards the beach.

"Where's the young fellow who came with us?" I had just noticed that he was nowhere in sight. "What's his name? Anicius. What happened to him?"

Bassus shrugged. "He was behind me to my left last time I saw him."

I tried to tell myself that he had only fallen from his horse, but even to me it sounded like a lie. "Tie up the horses and follow me," I whispered, suddenly aware of a need for silence. "And don't make any noise!"

I climbed out of the hollow and began to head cautiously towards the beach. The ground was rough and stony beneath the turf, and I cursed my limp for forcing me to move more slowly and more awkwardly than I wanted to. My palms were sweating, which is my mind's way of letting me know that it does not feel good about something. I glanced backwards and saw young Bassus following me, coming fast. I signalled to him to slow down.

There was a flash of brown to my right. Anicius's horse. It had begun to graze. I headed towards it, moving very slowly now, and then I heard noises off to my left: a grunt, and the rattle of metal.

They were down in a hollow like the one we had been in when we heard the shout. Anicius's body lay sprawled on the grass, its head, still in its helmet, about five paces away; there was a surprised expression on its face. The whoreson crouched above him was working fast, stripping the corpse. There was bright-red blood all over the grass between the boy's head and his body.

I fumbled at my belt for my skystone dagger, thinking to throw it at the assassin's back, but there was a hissing sound close by my ear and then that unmistakable thunk! of an arrow hitting a human torso. Bright-yellow feathers gleamed between his shoulders and he arched his back, reaching behind him, almost gripping them before he fell face down across young Anicius, an agonized moan the only sound he made.

"Well done, lad," I said, and stepped down carefully to where the bodies lay, my feet slipping on the wet grass.

As I stood above them, I heard Bassus retching behind me. Probably his first killing, I thought, and his first sight of violent death. I knew how he felt.

I bent down and hauled the killer away from Anicius, turning him over as I did so. He was big. A round shield and a bloody axe lay a short distance away. The shield was covered with scrollwork. Celtic. But not from Britain. At least, not from this part of Britain, for I knew my Celtic design. I went and picked it up, holding it in both hands. Bassus came down to join me.

"Who is he, Commander Varrus?"

"I don't know, but you can bet he's not alone. He's not from these parts, judging by his clothes and by his shield. I think he's a Scot."

"From Hibernia? How did he get all the way down here?"

"Same way they get everywhere, son. By boat."

"A galley?" Bassus looked around him as if expecting to see a boat tied up to a bush.

"Aye, and if I'm correct, it won't be far from here. Let's take a look. But watch your step — you'll get no second chance and no mercy from the likes of these." I looked around and pointed ahead to my right. "You go that way, to the west of that headland. I'll take the left. And be careful!"

Less than five minutes later, a yellow-feathered arrow smacked into the ground ahead of me and scared me half to death. Bassus was about sixty paces from me, waving excitedly for me to join him. I retrieved his arrow and went to him.

"It's beached below the headland, Commander! I saw three men. One of them almost saw me."

"Are you sure he didn't?" I held out his arrow to him.

"No." A quick headshake. He took his arrow from my hand. "Thanks, Commander. I didn't want to shout."

"Quite. Well, let's take a look, then."

They had drawn their galley up onto the beach below the headland, in the lee of the cliff, where it would be safe both from observers and from the prevailing tides. I counted three guards on my first glance, pulling my head back quickly after getting a glimpse of them and placing them in my mind. My next look was more confident and I bellied as close as I could get to the edge of the cliff, chilled to the bone from the wet grass. There were six of them visible this time, three out of the line of sight of our first view. Six seemed like a reasonable number to guard the boat, which looked as though it would hold about thirty men, fully crewed. But there was one more dead in the hollow behind us, making seven. How many more? I did not have much time, I guessed, before somebody noticed that the dead one was missing.

I crawled backwards and jerked my head in the direction of our horses.

"Let's go, but keep your eyes open. There's room for another two dozen in that boat. God knows where they are, but we could run into any of them at any time."

My head was buzzing as we made our way back to the horses, which were still tethered to the bush where Bassus had left them. How many more men were there down on the beach? Where were the others? How many of my men would I need to be sure of winning a tussle without serious loss? Rats' teeth! One man lost already was too serious! We vaulted onto our horses and took off at the gallop, back to the road, leading Anicius's horse and the black gelding with us.