Master of Rome. John Stack

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СКАЧАТЬ and determination as warriors pushed forward to fight in the front line, eager to bloody their swords, the pressure on the Roman lines never abating until the last man fell under Phoenician steel.

      CHAPTER ONE

      The searing wind swept through the streets of Aspis and beyond to the harbour, the parched air whipping the wave crests of the gentle swell into a fine spray, as if greedily clawing at the water after its five-hundred-mile trek across the arid Sahara. Atticus stepped out from the lee of a building into the flow of air and turned his face into the wind, breathing in deeply, sensing the enormity of the mysterious land in darkness before him, the hostile territory of the Carthaginians that pressed against the boundaries of the Roman-held port. He spotted the man he had searched for at the end of the street, and approached, the centurion turning to acknowledge him.

      ‘Cursed wind,’ he said.

      Atticus nodded. ‘The Sirocco,’ he replied, remembering his grandfather’s teaching, and how that same wind shrouded his home city of Locri on the south coast of Italy with oppressive humidity every spring. ‘Any sign?’ he asked.

      ‘None,’ Septimus replied, and the two men lapsed once more into silence as the predawn light began to illuminate the landscape before them.

      The land along the coast was green and fertile, stretching east a thousand leagues to Egyptus and west to the Pillars of Hercules. For forty generations it had been home to the Carthaginians, protected along its length by a mighty fleet that controlled the trading routes of the southern Mediterranean; until a year before, when the Romans humbled the Carthaginian navy at Cape Ecnomus, and thereafter invaded the once inviolate shores of North Africa. Now, not fifty miles to the west, the Roman army, fifteen thousand strong, were engaged with the Carthaginians near Tunis while the men at Aspis, Atticus and Septimus amongst them, waited impatiently for news.

      Atticus looked to the eastern sky, watching slowly as the crimson skyline dissolved at the approach of the sun, the orb finally cresting the horizon with a spear of white light that flashed across the blue-grey sky. He looked over his shoulder and turned to walk back down the deserted street to the harbour. He paused at the water’s edge, his gaze ranging over the forty galleys tugging gently on their anchor lines near the shore. As a praefectus classis, a prefect of the fleet, these ships were under his command, and his own galley, the quinquereme Orcus, was moored in the centre of the formation. Atticus studied the fleet with a practised eye, watching as men moved slowly on the decks without command, the routine of naval life dictating their actions, the only sound the howling wind that masked all others.

      Atticus had come ashore an hour before, succumbing to a sudden compulsion to escape the confines of the Orcus, anxious to learn if any messenger had arrived during the night. It was an escape he had never sought from his previous ship, the Aquila, and he wondered if there would ever come a time when he would consider the Orcus as anything more than just another ship of the Classis Romanus, the fleet of Rome.

      He turned once more to the figure standing at the end of the street, the centurion’s tall stature imposing even from fifty yards. Septimus was motionless, standing resolutely in the face of the wind, his attention still fully drawn to the far southern horizon. Atticus began to walk back towards him. He glanced left and right down the narrow laneways as he walked, briefly spying individual or small groups of legionaries, the men emerging slowly from the homes that had been commandeered to house them, just ahead of the clarion call of the vigilae, the night guardsmen ending their watch by rousing the camp. He looked once more to Septimus and immediately noticed the tension in the centurion’s shoulders, his body leaning forward at the waist. Atticus quickened his pace but, before he could cover the distance, Septimus swept his sword from his scabbard, the metallic sound caught and whipped away by the wind. The centurion turned, his eyes seeing beyond Atticus to the street behind.

      ‘To arms!’ he shouted. ‘Sound the alarm!’

      ‘What is it?’ Atticus asked, and Septimus indicated over his shoulder to the horizon beyond.

      ‘Drusus!’ the centurion roared, searching amongst the soldiers that were appearing from every street. He spotted him within a second, the optio pushing his way through to the front of the gathering force, his ever-stern expression hiding his surprise at the sudden call to arms.

      ‘Drusus, get to the officers’ quarters. Inform the centurions I want them to form a battle line from this central point.’

      The optio saluted, hammering his fist into his chest plate and turned to push his way back along the street. Septimus was fundamentally of the same rank as every other marine centurion of the fleet; but, given his experience and his position as centurion of the Orcus, the prefect’s command ship, the other officers readily deferred to his orders. Within a minute the soldiers were forming on his position.

      Septimus stood by Atticus as the prefect looked to the southern horizon.

      ‘How many do you think there are?’ Atticus asked.

      ‘Hard to be sure,’ Septimus replied. ‘Over a thousand at least.’

      Atticus nodded, concurring with the estimate. He turned and grabbed a legionary from the throng behind him. ‘Get back to the Orcus and have my second-in-command report here,’ he ordered and the soldier was away.

      Septimus stepped out from the confines of the street on to the flat expanse of beaten earth at the rear of the town. The soldiers surged out behind him and began to form into disciplined maniples, the shouted commands of centurions and optiones filling the air as the ranks were formed and the battle line was drawn. The manoeuvre was repeated along the length of the town, the men keeping their helmet-covered heads slightly lowered in the face of the wind. The entire marine complement of the fleet was ashore, sixty men for each galley, legionaries all, and the line was dressed to form a shield wall over two thousand strong.

      ‘Something’s wrong,’ Septimus muttered, his eyes focused on the approaching force. ‘They’re not formed into ranks.’

      ‘I see it,’ Atticus replied, noting the disorganized approach, so dissimilar to the serried ranks of the legionaries.

      ‘Prefect,’ Atticus heard, and he turned to see his second-in-command beside him. ‘Baro,’ Atticus began. ‘Ready the squadron for battle and station two galleys in the outer harbour.’

      ‘Yes, Prefect,’ Baro replied, and took off at a run.

      ‘Thermae,’ Atticus said by way of explanation, and Septimus nodded, remembering the simultaneous land and sea attacks the Carthaginians had employed there.

      The minutes drew out slowly as the approaching force wheeled towards Aspis, its formation still chaotic, the cloud of dust raised by their feet whipping towards the town on the constant wind.

      ‘Two thousand,’ Septimus muttered as the decreasing distance increased his estimate, his eyes constantly checking the eastern and western approaches for additional forces, but finding none. He glanced down the line and saw many of the men inch forward, the anticipation of battle wrestling with ingrained discipline.

      ‘Steady, boys,’ he roared, and the shout was taken up by the other centurions, the legionaries redressing the line until it became firm once more.

      Atticus glanced over his shoulder, seeing past the ranks and down the street to the sliver of harbour in view, watching as one galley then another passed through his field of vision, the wind robbing him of the sound of shouted orders only a hundred yards away. He looked to his front again, the approaching force now less than six hundred yards СКАЧАТЬ