Fire in the East (48 page)

Passing the water skin to Maximus, Ballista looked round and caught the eye of his latest standard-bearer, a lumpen-faced Macedonian called Pudens.

‘Dracontius,
take my standard to the Palmyrene Gate. Let the Persians see the white dragon flying there as usual.’ Ballista picked one of his
equites
singulares,
a Gaul with fair hair. ‘Vindex, take my cloak. Put it on and show yourself by the standard. Play at being the
Dux Ripae
for a while. Let the Persians thinkit is just another day.’

Mamurra took his ear from the bronze shield. It was time. Holding it so that it did not clash on anything, Mamurra stepped between the two miners, then between the two men with bows. Putting the shield out of the way against the side wall, he squatted down. In the flickering light of the oil lamps everyone stared at him. Very quietly Mamurra said, ‘Now.’

The two miners hefted their pickaxes, looked at each other, then swung. The noise was very loud after the silence in the enclosed space. Crash-crash, splinters flew. The two bowmen shielded their eyes. Crash-crash, crash-crash, the men with the pickaxes worked as a team, concentrating their blows in one place. Stripped to the waist, their bodies shone with sweat.

Mamurra drew his weapons, an old-fashioned short sword, a
gladius
, in his right hand, a dagger, a
pngio,
in his left. A lot depended on how quickly the axemen could make an entrance in the thin wall of the tunnel. Mamurra fervently hoped he had got it right. By all his calculations, by all his instincts, the Persian mine had advanced beyond the Roman counter mine. The breach should bring the Romans out some way behind the Persian pit face.

Crash-crash, crash-crash.
Come on, come on.
How thick was the wall? Mamurra was sure it would give at any moment. He found that he was humming under his breath, a legionary marching song as old as Julius Caesar:

One of the pickaxes went handle deep through the wall. The miners redoubled their efforts to enlarge the hole. Crash-crash, crash-crash.

‘Enough,’ shouted Mamurra. The men with the pickaxes stepped back. The bowmem stepped forward. They drew and released straight through the hole. The arrows could be heard ricocheting off the opposite wall. They drew again. They shot again, this time one to the left, one to the right. The arrows snickered down the rock walls. The bowmen stepped aside.

Mamurra and the man next to him hurled themselves through the hole and into the Persian mine. Crashing into the far wall, Mamurra turned right. The man next to him turned left. Mamurra took a couple of steps, then waited until another man joined him.

Together they moved forward. Mamurra kept low. Without his helmet or a shield he felt terribly vulnerable. In the distance, a shaft of light came down from one of the Persian air holes. Beyond it Mamurra could see the indistinct shapes of Sassanids. He caught a glimpse of a curved bow. He resisted the urge to flatten himself against the wall — arrows could follow walls. He crouched, making himself as small as possible. He heard the wisp, wisp sound of the feathers as the arrow spun through the air, felt the wind of its passing.

Straightening only a little - he had no desire to crack his head on the jagged roof of the tunnel - Mamurra ran at the Persians. The two eastern warriors at the front drew their swords, stood for a moment, then turned to run. One tripped. The legionary next to Mamurra was on the fallen Persian, a foot on the small of his back, stabbing repeatedly down at the man’s head, neck, shoulders.

‘Hold,’ yelled Mamurra. ‘Bring up the shields.’ Wicker shields were passed forward. Four legionaries improvised a barrier. ‘Where are the miners? Good, bring down those pit props and collapse the reptiles’ mine.’

As the men with the pickaxes set to work Mamurra turned to find out what was happening in the other direction, at the head of the mine. He did not see what gave him the blow, he just felt the terrible dull impact. He stood for a moment stunned, feeling nothing but a vague surprise. Then a violent wave of nausea surged up from his stomach as the pain hit him. He saw the rough floor of the tunnel as he fell. Felt his face smash into the rock. He was conscious just long enough to hear the Persian counter attack, to feel a man stand on his ankle.

The first Ballista knew of the disaster below ground was when a legionary ran out of the entrance to the mine. His hands empty, the man stopped, looking around stupidly. Another legionary followed. He nearly ran into the first man.

‘Fuck,’ said Maximus quietly. They all rose to their feet. The soldiers around the entrance hefted their weapons. Antoninus Posterior started to get them into line. Now there was a stream of men running from the mine. Everyone knew what had happened. The Persians had won the underground fight. At any moment Sassanid warriors would burst out of the mine hard on the heels of the fleeing Romans. Castricius was standing by Ballista, waiting.

‘Bring down the mineshaft,’ said Ballista.

Castricius turned and issued a volley of orders. A group of men with crowbars and pickaxes fought their way into the mouth of the tunnel against the flow of panic-stricken legionaries. Others took up the ropes that were already tied around some of the pit props.

‘No!’ Maximus caught Baliista’s shoulder, his grip tight. ‘No. You cannot do this. Our boys are still down there.’

Ballista ignored him. ‘As quick as you can, Castricius.’

‘You bastard, you cannot do this. For fuck’s sake, Mamurra is still down there.’

Ballista rounded on his bodyguard. ‘You want us all to die?’

The noise offrantic work came from the darkmouth of the tunnel.

‘You bastard, he is your friend.’

Yes. Yes, he is but, Allfather, I have to do this.
Don’t think, just act.
Plenty of time later for recriminations, for guilt.
Don’t think, just act.

The men with crowbars and pickaxes sprinted back out of the mine. A couple more legionaries emerged with them. Castricius bellowed more orders. The men on the ropes took the strain and - one, two, three - began to pull.

Ballista watched. Maximus had turned away.

First one, then another of the gangs of men shot forward, stumbling, some falling as the strain came off their ropes. One by one the pit props were pulled away. There was a low groaning, then a strange roaring. A dense cloud of dust enveloped the mouth of the mine.

There was just enough light to see in the Persian tunnel. Although Mamurra kept his eyes shut, he could tell there was enough light to see. He was lying on his back. There was a crushing weight on top of him, a strong smell of leather. He could hear Persian voices. One of them was obviously shouting orders. Strangely, his ankle hurt worse than his head. The harsh, iron taste of blood was in his mouth.

Cautiously, Mamurra opened his eyes a fraction. There was a boot on his face. It was not moving. Clearly its owner was dead. There was a distant groaning, which changed to a roaring. There was a burst of shouting, the sound of men running, and the tunnel was filled with dust.

Mamurra shut his eyes and tried to breathe shallowly through his nose. He did not dare cough. When the moment passed it was quiet. He opened his eyes again. He tried to move, but only his right arm responded and, in doing so, the skin of his elbow scraped along the wall. He shifted the dead man’s boot a little to make it easier to breathe.

He was at the bottom of a pile of bodies. Somehow that and the roaring and the dust told him everything. The victorious Persians had thrown him and the other casualties aside, out of the way. They had been following hot on the heels of the routed legionaries when Ballista had collapsed the Roman mine. Bastard. Fucking bastard. There would have been nothing else that the northerner could have done, but the fucking bastard.

It was very quiet. Biting his lip against the pain, Mamurra moved his right arm. Both his sword and dagger were gone. He rested for a moment. It was still quiet. Slowly, stifling a whimper of pain, he moved his right hand up and across, pushing it into the neck of his mail shirt, down under the collar of his tunic. Grunting with effort despite himself, he pulled free the concealed dagger. He let his arm drop, the dagger close by his right hip. He closed his eyes and rested.

Death did not worry him. If the Epicurean philosophers were right, everything would just return to sleep and rest. If they were wrong, he was not too sure what would happen. Of course there were the Islands of the Blessed and the Elysian Fields. But he had never really been able to tell if they were one place or two, let alone discover how you entered them. He had always had a talent for gaining access to places he was not meant to be - but not, he suspected, this time. It would be Hades for him. An eternity in the dark and cold, flitting and squeaking like an insentient bat.

It must be easier for the Sassanids. Fall in battle, become one of the blessed, and straight to heaven. Mamurra had never bothered to ask what their eastern heaven was meant to contain - probably shady arbours, cool wine and a never-ending supply of fat-arsed virgins.

It must be easier for a northerner like that bastard Ballista - for sure he had had no choice, but bastard anyway. The bastard and he had talked of it. Fight and die like a hero and the northerner’s high god with the outlandish name might - just might - send his shield maidens to bring you to a glorified northern warlord’s hall where, in a typical northern way, you would spend eternity fighting every day and, your wounds magically healed, drinking every night. No, not eternity. Mamurra half-remembered that, in Ballista’s world, even the gods die in the end.

No, it was not death that Mamurra minded, it was not being alive. It seemed a monstrous, obscene joke that the world could continue and he not know anything about it.
Not
knowing.
He, a man who had ferreted out so many things he was not meant to know.

He knew what being alive meant. Walking through a field of grain, running your hand through the heads of the wheat as the wind moved them; a sound horse between your legs as you rode into the valley, through the trees and down to the clear running water, and to the hills and trees on the other side - for him, that was not really being alive. No, it was waiting in the dark in an alley for the servant you had bribed or threatened to come and unlock the wicket gate, slipping inside, slipping inside to unravel the dirty secrets of the powerful, the fuckers who thought they were above the likes of him. It was lying in the dark, cramped behind the false ceiling, afraid to move a muscle, straining your ears to hear the drunken senators move from nostalgia to outright treason. That was being alive, more alive than at any other time.

The tune started rerunning in his head:

Mamurra heard the Persians returning. He moved his right hand back into his tunic. His fist closed around the hard metal disc. His fingers traced the words. MILES ARCANA. Very soon he would be a very silent soldier, very silent indeed. If it had not hurt so much he might have laughed. The sounds were getting nearer. He moved his hand back to the dagger by his hip. He had not yet made up his mind: try and take one of the bastards with him or end it quickly? One way or another, the fourth
frumentarius,
the one the others had not spotted, was prepared to die. The pommel of the dagger was slick in his hand.

 

The dried peas moved on the skin of the tambourine. Not much, but perceptibly.

Maximus did not like it. It was as if those left below were trying to attract attention. It was as if that great square-headed bastard Mamurra were trying to dig his way out. The poor bastard.

Castricius picked up the tambourine and moved it from the western to the northern wall of the tower. They waited for the dried peas to settle. They lay still for a time, then moved.