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  The cavalry melee continued, but there could be only one outcome.

  As they breathed their horses, Faraxen watched the infantry. Before the two sides closed, Gordian’s levies on either flank were running. A wave of panicked humanity flooded under the aqueduct, and back through the necropolis towards the ephemeral safety of the city.

  That was that. The battle was lost. Faraxen turned his horse’s head towards the nearby hills. As he led away his tattered little troop, he glanced across, and saw the standards of the few regulars in the army of Gordian dip in surrender.

  Before he rode south, Faraxen would discover all he could. The discipline of every army gave in the moment of victory. Individuals would scatter to loot. After he had questioned one of Capelianus’ men, Faraxen would head for the distant frontier.

  II

  Carthage,

  Ten Days after the Ides of March, AD238

  In the governor’s palace a semi-circle of troops stood like a tragic chorus around the hanged man. An overturned chair and a pool of liquid beneath the dangling feet of the corpse. The front of the tunic of Gordian the Elder was wet. It was said a hanged man ejaculated. By the smell, it was just urine.

  Capelianus studied the bulging eyes and protruding tongue. A coward’s death. Not the steel, but the rope. A woman’s way of suicide. In this moment of supposed triumph, the dissatisfaction habitual to Capelianus consumed his thoughts. There had been a prophesy that the Gordiani would die by drowning. Capelianus had looked forward to making that come true. A butt of wine would have been fitting.

  The aged Gordian had cheated him. Years before Capelianus had been regarded as a young Senator of promise, a man destined for the highest offices, until the old goat had cuckolded him. Reduced to a figure of ridicule, his career slow and second rate, Capelianus had waited half a lifetime for revenge.

  The younger Gordian had cheated him as well. Capelianus shuddered as he recalled the battle. The desertions had not been the end of it. Capelianus had never known such fear as when the tall, powerful figure was hacking his way through the lines towards him, intent on his destruction. Thank all the gods, the legionaries at the last moment – just before Capelianus would have been within reach of those man-killing hands – had stabbed Gordian in the back, had hacked him down by weight of numbers.

  ‘We have captured one of their friends.’

  The man was pushed forward. He was battered, his clothes torn, his arms and legs laden with chains.

  ‘Name? Race? Free or slave?’ Capelianus intoned the traditional beginning to an inquisition.

  The prisoner did not answer. He was staring at Sabinianus, who stood next to Capelianus.

  ‘Name?’

  Now the man gave his attention to Capelianus.

  ‘Mauricius, son of Mauricius, town councillor of Thysdrus and Hadrumetum.’

  Capelianus knew of him. ‘The catalyst of this evil revolt. An arch-conspirator.’

  Mauricius drew himself up in his chains. ‘Friend of the late Emperors, Prefect of the Horse Guards of Marcus Antonius Gordianus Romanus Africanus Augustus, Father and Son.’

  ‘A traitor.’

  ‘No traitor, but a true friend.’ Mauricius looked again at Sabinianus, with hatred. ‘A friend loyal to death. We should have known from the start. The signs were there. We should have listened at Ad Palmam when you said you would sacrifice anyone for your safety.’

  The night before Sabinianus had slipped out of Carthage to the camp of Capelianus. Sabinianus had revealed the ambush of Gordian’s cavalry concealed in the fishponds. To prove his treachery, Sabinianus had executed a prisoner. That prisoner was said to have been like a brother to him. Sabinianus had cut his throat.

  ‘Coward!’

  No emotion showed on the face of Sabinianus.

  ‘Oath-breaker with the heart of a deer!’

  ‘You realize you will die.’ Capelianus cut off the imprecations.

  ‘What is terrible is easy to endure.’ There was a smile on the face of Mauricius, its reason unknowable.

  ‘You will be tortured.’

  ‘You cannot hurt me.’

  ‘The claws will tear your flesh.’

  ‘They cannot touch my soul.’

  A local festival, the Mamuralia, occurred to Capelianus. ‘You will be whipped through the streets of Carthage. Outside the Hadrumetum Gate, by the Mappalian Way, you will be crucified.’

  ‘I am a citizen of Rome.’ There was outrage in Mauricius’ tone, yet somehow his self-control held.

  ‘No, you are an enemy of Rome. As a hostis, you will die. Take him away.’

  Mauricius did not struggle, but he shouted as they dragged him from the room. ‘Death to the tyrant Maximinus! Death to his creatures! You are cursed! The Furies will turn your future to ashes and suffering!’

  Capelianus turned to one of the officers. ‘What of the others close to the pretenders?’

  ‘All dead on the battlefield, apart from Aemilius Severinus, the one they call Phillyrio. He was ordered south some days ago to gather together all the Frontier Scouts. Together with those five hundred speculatores, he was to rally the barbarians beyond the frontier.’

  Capelianus thought about that.

  The corpse moved slightly in the breeze.

  ‘Get him down.’

  Capelianus wondered what could have induced his old enemy and his wastrel son to have bid for the throne. Certainly not justice or duty. They were archaic concepts, suitable back in the days of the free Res Publica, but outmoded and unfitting in the debased age of the Caesars. Capelianus knew what motivated men under autocracy. Nothing but lust and greed. The latter was far stronger; greed for power as well as for wealth. At his advanced age perhaps the father had considered there was little to lose, that it would be no small thing to die clad in the purple. As for the son, his thoughts had been addled by wine and debauchery, his reasoning unsound. Yet even so, they must have appreciated in moments of clarity that they would fail. No legion was stationed in the province of Africa Proconsularis. The secret had long been revealed that Emperors could be made outside Rome, but never without the backing of thousands of legionaries.

  The soldiers bustled about, teetering on chairs, holding the legs of the corpse.

  In Rome what would the Senate do now? The Senate had declared for the Gordiani. They were traitors to a man. Maximinus was born a Thracian, brought up as a common soldier. Forgiveness was not a virtue cultivated by either group. He would show no mercy. Executions and confiscations, a holocaust. Few would survive. Great houses would be extinguished.

  The corpse was down.

  The Senate would acclaim another Emperor. There would be no other choice. It would mean civil war.

  ‘Cut off his head.’

  Who would the Senate clothe in the purple? Surely a governor with troops at his disposal. Maximinus was with the Danubian army. Decius in Spain was his dedicated supporter. So would the Senate turn to a governor on the Rhine or in Britain? Or would it send a laurelled despatch to one of the great commanders in the East?

  Decapitation was never easy. Sawing away, the soldiers were slipping in a welter of blood.

  Or possibly, just possibly, would the gaze of the Senate fall on someone nearer at hand? Would it focus on a man proven in the field, a man who had overthrown Emperors, a man who held all Africa in his hand?

  Some considered ambition a vice, others held it a virtue. Capelianus inclined to the latter view. Yet to be Emperor was too dangerous an eminence. It was to hold a wolf by the ears. Capelianus looked over at Sabinianus. Traitors had their uses. Better by far to be the man who stood behind the throne of the Caesars.

  The head was off. Blood pooled across the marble floor, soaked into the fine rugs.

  Maximinus was a bad Emperor. An uncultured brute, he handled the Res Publica like a goatherd who had climbed into a racing chariot. He was hated by the plebs of Rome, as well as by all men of wealth and status. Yet Maximinus was far from finished. He had doubled the pay of the
soldiers, and they were said to see him as one of themselves.

  Whatever happened, there would be a civil war. Capelianus needed time to assess the odds. Time he would not have in Carthage, only two days sail from Rome.

  A soldier, incarnadine and panting from his exertions, lifted the head by the hair.

  ‘Preserve it in honey. Throw the rest of him out into the Forum for the dogs.’

  Capelianus addressed the assembled officers.

  ‘We have given the troops three days license to sack Carthage. On the fourth day they will parade outside the walls at the scene of our victory. On the fifth day, I will lead a flying column south to the frontier. I intend to hunt down this Phillyrio, and stamp out the embers of revolt.’

  Capelianus felt a tremor of excitement. Hunting big game, hunting men; there was a thrill to both.

  III

  The Oasis of Ad Palmam,

  The Day before the Nones of April, AD238

  ‘May you and yours be safe.’

  Old Nuffuzi had not changed. The high cheekbones in the dark, thin face. The greying hair in elaborate braids, bright with beads. The small beard worn only on the chin.

  ‘No evil, thank the gods.’

  Three years ago Phillyrio had escorted the lord of the Cinithii from the frontier to a meeting in the town of Theveste deep in the province. Of course he had seen him in the distance before that, when Gordian had defeated the nomad chief here at the oasis of Ad Palmam and chased him back into the desert.

  ‘On you, only light burdens.’

  The slow measure of the ritual greetings did not trouble Phillyrio. Over the years commanding the speculatores, he had become a part of the frontier. His skin was darkened by the sun, his frame thin as if desiccated by the sand. He spoke with a local accent, pronouncing his own formal names Lucius Aemilius Sheverinus. It amused him that outsiders took him for an African. The ability to blend in, to disappear in a crowd, had been the object of his early training.

  ‘No evil, thank the gods.’

  The room at the foot of the tower was the largest in the tiny citadel of Ad Palmam. It had a high ceiling, and, with the shutters closed and boys wielding fans, it was dark and cool. Phillyrio remembered another meeting here, before the fight against the nomads. Gordian, Sabinianus and Arrian, Valerian, Mauricius, and Phillyrio himself. Just three years ago. It could have been a lifetime. Now Valerian was gone to Rome, and all the rest were dead, except Sabinianus the traitor, and Phillyrio himself.

  The news brought by Faraxen had been hard to accept. The totality of the defeat. Gordian the Younger cut down in battle. His father ending his life by the noose. The crucifixion of Mauricius. The killing of Arrian by Sabinianus the night before the battle. Yet Faraxen knew his business. Before leading his handful of men south, he had captured a straggler from the army of Capelianus. Men did not lie when Faraxen had a knife and wanted them to talk.

  ‘The fame of the courage of the commander of the Frontier Wolves is discussed wherever men gather; in the bathhouses of the Romans and the tents of my people.’ Nuffuzi spoke the Latin of the camps, but there was an archaic stateliness to his diction.

  ‘As is that of Nuffuzi, noble warleader of the Cinithii.’ Phillyrio could speak Libyan, and another half dozen local languages, but he answered in Latin.

  ‘The length of the frontier Lucius Aemilius Severinus is known for his deep mind. The one they call Phillyrio has never summoned a meeting without serious purpose.’

  That was as near a direct question as civility allowed. The object of the flattery poured Nuffuzi a drink of palm wine before responding.

  ‘When Nuffuzi of the Cinithii calls, men of many tribes saddle their horses and camels, and reach for their weapons. From the Baquates who gaze on the Atlantic to the Garamantes in the South beyond the Black Mountain, there are none who do not heed his call.’

  The old chief took a sip of his drink. He smacked his lips to show that the wine was to his taste.

  ‘The Lord of the Cinithii can raise the border, put a great army in the field.’ Phillyrio had brought it into the open.

  Nuffuzi put down his cup. There was a great sadness on his face. ‘Your friend, the young Gordian is dead, his aged father, and your other companions too. We know this in our encampments. Bad tidings travel on wings. We mourn the loss of those brave men. They were good enemies, good friends. The Cinithii cannot fight Rome alone.’

  Perhaps, Phillyrio thought, it would have been better not to hold this parlay at the sight of the nomad’s previous defeat.

  ‘Rome disposes too many forces – the 3rd Legion, a myriad auxiliaries, and tribal levies beyond number – all the free tribes, those who call themselves Mazices and those styled Gaetuli united, should such a thing be possible, could not face such numbers in open battle.’

  When he had finished talking, Nuffuzi stood. He took Phillyrio’s hands in his, and kissed them.

  The commander of the speculatores returned the gesture.

  ‘My friend Phillyrio, although fighting Rome is beyond my power, you will always be welcome and safe at the campfires of my people.’

  ‘That is gracious. May you and yours travel safe.’

  ‘No evil.’

  Phillyrio went up to the roof of the tower to watch Nuffuzi leave. The centurions Verota and Faraxen were with him.

  The oasis below was hidden by the overlapping fronds of the palm trees. To the west was the great Lake of Triton. A narrow strip of sand, some two miles across, and to the east was the lesser Lake of Triton. The vast salt marshes were still full of water from the winter rains. The sunlight flashed off their surfaces, as if off polished shields.

  The cavalcade emerged from the shade of the palms.

  Nuffuzi waved.

  Phillyrio waved back.

  ‘The old bastard would hand you over, as soon as Capelianus asked,’ Verota said.

  ‘He would have little choice,’ Faraxen said. ‘His son, Mirzi, was a hostage in Carthage. Capelianus will have him now.’

  Phillyrio said nothing.

  ‘We must run,’ Verota said.

  ‘Capelianus will only want me,’ Phillyrio said. ‘You two were soldiers obeying orders. Civil war or not, it makes no difference.’

  Faraxen was unconvinced. ‘Capelianus is a savage. He massacred the levies that fought against him at Carthage. The man I questioned said there was a rumour that he was also going to decimate the regular troops who had opposed him. Unlike Verota, I led troops against him at the battle, and I have no family to keep me here.’

  ‘Where will the two of you go?’ Verota asked.

  ‘The horsemen of Capelianus are coming from the north and north-east. It must be west,’ Faraxen said.

  ‘The Lakes of Triton are dangerous. When there is standing water, the paths are hidden. One false step, and you are in the quicksand.’ Verota sounded appalled.

  ‘A Frontier Wolf does not make a false step.’ Phillyrio smiled. ‘Only one of our own could follow us.’

  IV

  The Oasis of Ad Palmam,

  Seven Days before the Ides of April, AD238

  The oasis was a thin, green-black line on a desolate spit of land between two saltmarshes.

  Capelianus had pushed the men to get here. Down through Ammaedara, Theveste, and Capsa, hard riding all the way. They had made good time. There were still seven days before the Ides of April. Capelianus did some calculations. The Senate would have met the day before. The last word he had had from Rome was already twelve days old.

  When the Senate had heard the news that the Gordiani were dead, they had indeed decided to appoint a new Emperor. But they had not turned to a man with troops at his back; not to a governor in Britain, on the Rhine, or in the East, not to Capelianus himself. Instead they had decided they would elect one of their own, a Senator resident in Rome. Worse still they had deferred their choice until yesterday.

  It was odd. There was a new Augustus, and Capelianus did not know his name, or what he looked like. Whoever the
Senate had acclaimed, the civil war would continue. Capelianus was better off here, out of the way, on the southern frontier. Only a miracle could stop Maximinus winning. But the Thracian was hated, and another revolt was a certainty. Capelianus glanced over at Sabinianus riding beside him. The treacherous patrician might yet find himself wearing the purple, and, if he ever did, Capelianus would be standing behind his throne.

  A flock of doves clattered up as they rode into the oasis. It was surprisingly dark under the palm trees. Everywhere were water channels and conduits, crossing and recrossing each other. Fruit trees were planted between the trunks of the palms, vegetables and grain between the fruit trees. Every inch of soil was cultivated.

  A glimmer of pale mudbrick walls showed where the settlement lay at the southern extremity of the oasis.

  A flash of movement caught Capelianus’ eye. His heart shrank. Was it an ambush? He scanned the trees wildly. Small shapes flitting between the boughs. Children, nothing but a few local children.

  The settlement was unwalled, but the houses abutted each other, and their windowless rear walls formed a perimeter. The track entered the village via a narrow easy-to-barricade passage.

  Inside there was no one on the street. All the doors and windows were shuttered.

  Higher walls and a watchtower ahead indicated the citadel.

  Some fifty or so speculatores were drawn up for inspection in the small courtyard.

  Capelianus reined in, but remained mounted. A centurion stepped forward.

  ‘I am Marcus Aurelius Victorius, centurion of the speculatores stationed at Ad Palmam.’

  Capelianus took his time. ‘You are the one also known as Verota?’

  ‘Yes, sir.’ The centurion looked surprised. As well he might, Capelianus thought. Three of the so-called Frontier Wolves had been captured alive outside Carthage. They had been questioned with diligence, before being despatched to Hades.