War Raven: Barbarian of Rome Chronicles Volume One (7 page)

His loved ones soon came to him, and as each scene of their lives together slipped by, he was stung by a deep sense of loss. Then the hurt collided with something else; an itching to do violence, to do anything that would chase away the powerlessness.

Shaking, he curled up, and drawing his cover over his body, settled to wonder on what the new dawn would bring.

*

At sun-rise, Guntram’s door was thrown open with a resonant clang. He recognised some of the guard’s gruff words of command, “Slave...Move...Quickly.”

His sleep had been broken, and his heel ached badly. He remembered the searing pain when the metal was pressed to his flesh, and that bastard – Belua he was called, watching, when he’d been branded like a goat.

Guntram blinked some clarity into his eyes, before ducking out of his cell to join others emerging from similar quarters bordering the grassy square. He was roughly prodded into a line, and then ushered towards a building that ran along the school’s eastern flank.

They entered a large ground floor room and were handed two clay bowls; one for drinking, the other for food. Two attendants situated at the entrance dispensed fresh water and a large portion of barley porridge to each of them. They were then directed to low benches set around a heavy wooden table that ran the length of the room.

Not knowing when his next meal would come, Guntram wolfishly shovelled the porridge into his mouth. His Gaulish travelling companions and the grinning Spaniard were seated opposite him, and attacked the gruel with equal relish. The food was good, the best he’d had since leaving his village. He recalled his home, his mother, and the food she’d cooked him. Food, he realized bitterly, that he’d never taste again.

Meal consumed, they were quickly assembled on the training area, the
palaestra,
watched by the ever present armed guards. There were twelve of them, and Guntram’s group was separated and herded to a section of the
palaestra
where a line of six foot posts waited, set permanently into the hard surface. Each man was positioned in front of a post
and issued with a heavy, wooden sword.

Guntram felt his hackles rise as Scar appeared, accompanied by his two companions of the previous night. Scar, equipped with a wooden sword, demonstrated two sword attacks, striking out at one of the posts. Firstly, an underhand thrust to the mid-section, the disembowelling strike, and secondly, an overhand downward thrust at an opponent’s upper chest and throat. Then, without preamble, the
tiros
were directed to practice these strokes by repeatedly attacking their wooden quarries.

An hour passed and sweat streaked Guntram’s face, and his arm and shoulder burned from the continuous assault on his post. He clenched his teeth, forcing the pain aside. His three companions had earlier briefly halted their practice, appearing exhausted. A barrage of vicious strokes from Scar’s stick had galvanised them into renewed action and left them sporting a brace of painful wheals across the backs of their legs.

The Spaniard spoke to him between rasping gulps of air, and Guntram recognised his new name...Cae...Caetes. He bridled at its sound. He glared back in return, spitting on the ground at his feet, before turning his attention back to the training post. Each blow was struck with venom, as if driven deep into Scar’s flesh.

Then Scar’s voice rang out, bringing all talk to an end.

The sun was on its way up into a flawless blue, when Guntram noted the advent of a new group onto the
palaestra.
He watched with interest as they practised with an array of metal weapons, noticing that although these gladiators practised vigorously, they spoke to one another and with their trainers, laughing easily and exchanging shouts of encouragement, as well as taking intermittent breaks from their practice. Their air of camaraderie contrasted markedly with his own grinding practice.

The drill continued unabated until mid-day, with the trainers signalling a break in the practice and a return to the refectory. After prising the wooden practice sword from the raw flesh of his palm, Guntram followed his fellows into the welcome shade of the dining area once more. The meal comprised of a stew filled with vegetables and chunks of dark meat, a wedge of coarse brownish bread and plenty of water. Guntram ate it all.

Fed, the company was shepherded out onto the training field, although the trainers were now noticeable by their absence. The mid-day heat rendered vigorous training impractical, and the men were permitted to rest awhile in the shade of the school’s porticoes, being able to recuperate from the rigours of the morning.

Guntram sat in the shade of the colonnade, his back against the cool stone. His attention was drawn to the lofty mountain that loomed majestically in the near distance. Clouds escaped its peak to blot out the sun’s rays. Like a giant of legend it towered over the bay. A fly tickled his right hand and he looked down, noticing that it no longer shook.

With a drop in temperature the trainers reappeared, Scar’s distinctive bark shattering the temporary calm of the
palaestra
. The
tiros
were spurred into action, mechanically repeating the morning’s drills.

Eventually, the afternoon tipped towards evening and Guntram’s practice at the posts was called to a halt. His vision swam and his right arm was on fire. Out of the corner of his eye he saw that his fellow trainees staggered as if drunk. After surrendering his wooden blade to one of the beckoning guards, he saw that his hand, sticky with fresh blood, was shaking again.

The guards wasted no time in providing him with a battered pail of cold water and a bundle of clean rags. Paired with the Spaniard – the newly named Ellios – Guntram doused his body down before briskly rubbing himself dry. He quickly redressed, his flesh quivering under the coarse woollen tunic. Joining the now familiar queue of gladiators, he headed once more in the direction of the refectory. It would be his last meal of the day.

Afterwards, sitting in the shadowed gloom of the
palaestra,
he winced as he straightened his right arm. He cradled it against his chest.
I feel so tired
, he thought.
Too tired to even think.
He closed his eyes, it seemed only for a moment, and then Scar’s voice rang out, and he knew that it was time to return to his cell.

*

He watched the dim twilight fade, the narrow band of light from the door’s aperture retreating slowly across the stone floor. There was no skylight, nor any means of communication with the cells on either side or above, and Guntram was soon enveloped in darkness. To one such as he, who’d lived his life amongst the vast, open forests of Germania, it was the worst type of prison.

His gut an aching hollow, he mulled over his fate. This place was training him to fight, but who? He’d noticed the strange armour worn by some of the warriors who trained with real weapons, and who wielded swords and spears that were both familiar and strange. He’d even seen one warrior practising a fighting style using a fishing net and harpoon. And, he knew that Rome had its own warriors, its iron legions, to fight their enemies. Whose blood was he then being trained to spill? The questions like lost sheep ran circles in his mind, until baffled, he forced himself to think of happier times, before the death of his family.

He remembered the night last summer when he and Jenell had slipped out of the village at just gone midnight. Two dark silhouettes, they left the settlement perimeter to silently blend into the surrounding forest. Like two ghosts, whispering and holding hands, they hurried towards a secret place in the nearby wooded hills.

A narrow hill valley led them steeply upward through a belt of trees, where they followed a stream flowing through a meadow. On either side of the valley, peaks tottered overhead as if yearning to touch across the sky. The land dropped off at the meadow’s edge, the stream water-falling off into a pool in a sheltered hollow. The summer air was warm, heavy with the scent of pine, and a half moon washed the pool with pale light. They descended to the pool’s side, and wasting no time discarded their clothes and entered the water. Jenell had never looked more beautiful.

He remembered the shock of the cool water and the feel of goose-bumps on Jenell’s arms as he pulled her close. Her lustrous hair, unbraided, fanned across the pool’s surface and he covered her mouth with his own.

He’d placed a bear rug on the grass, and this was where they moved to; warm in each other’s arms after the chill of the water. Their love-making was tender, unhurried, and afterwards Jenell cradled his head in her lap and crooned a song of a hawk who became a prince. Much later, when they dressed to leave, he watched her as she stood straight, wringing the water from her hair – the tilt of her head, the soft curve of her lips. After, she spoke to him in quiet tones, as if the world listened. “My love, this private place will always be ours, and will always have a place inside me.” She touched her heart.

He mouthed Jenell’s words, clear in his mind, and had to swallow hard, damming back the moisture in his eyes. Easing back onto his mattress, he studied the night’s stillness for a while. His tired lids closed and sleep came, and with it the slipping away of all he had seen.

* * *

Chapter VII

A
DEATH
IN
CAMPANIA

“The soul becomes dyed

with the colour of its thoughts.”

Marcus Aurelius

Servannus watched the young slave boy refill his guests’ wine cups as they reclined beneath the villa’s make-shift awning. The day was hot and their thirst seemed insatiable. Other slaves cleaned blood-stains from a close by grassy area where the gladiator matches had been fought.

As the new master of the estate, he’d ruled that every bout was fought to the death; the occasion being the funeral rites of his father, the late Marcus Tullius Titus. Heir to Titus’s considerable holdings, Servannus spared no cost in purchasing six gladiators of above average skill. The paired contests were over relatively quickly but had nevertheless pleased him.

“A satisfactory display,” Servannus addressed his two drunken companions. His statement was geared to elicit a predictable response.

“E...excellent, tr...truly excellent Servannus,” responded Marius, a well known socialite. His slurred words were quickly echoed by his companion, Gallio.

Servannus gave a short laugh, aware that his guests knew little of the gladiator’s trade. Rather, they simply agreed with anyone who was likely to fill their cups, and kept refilling them. It was the price he paid for company.

None of his father’s friends and associates had come to the villa at Herculaneum. They said their farewells at the family tomb at Pompeii earlier in the day when the old man was interred, and then left. He knew they had no time for him, with some doubtless suspecting that he’d played a part in old Titus’s sudden death. The suspicions were unfounded, with him being away kicking his heels on the empire’s northern borders. Not that the thought hadn’t crossed his mind. He’d just never had the nerve to attempt it. The old noble died in his sleep, with his physician diagnosing that his heart had simply given out. Servannus had wasted no time returning home on his receipt of the tragic news and he was now a very wealthy young man.

He was his father’s sole heir, his mother succumbing to the lung fever when he was barely old enough to walk. His father over-indulged him as a boy but they were never close. Servannus recalled the scoldings he received when his father learned of his mistreatment of a slave or household’ animal. But, the reprimands only succeeded in teaching him to use cunning and veiled threats to conceal his misdemeanours. He knew that his father had hoped he would outgrow his meanness, and that military service might engender a sense of camaraderie in him. It didn’t, and he returned home, unchanged.

He’d been bored with events on the frontier, and the news of his father’s death was the timely gift from the gods that he’d prayed for. He now possessed the finances to engross himself in his pleasures to the full. There was the continuous supply of women, of course, as well as the feasts and drinking sessions with those shallow enough to keep his company. Yet, it was the gladiator contests that captivated him more than anything else.

More importantly his new status gave him greater power to control the lives of others, to shape their futures according to his will. And now, there was no over-bearing old fool to sanction his actions.

Servannus tilted his wrist and his wine cup was re-filled. The fair headed slave quickly moved around him to refill the cups of his companions.

“Will you form your own troupe now that you’re home Servannus?” the red-faced Gallio asked.

“Yes.” Servannus suppressed a yawn.

“Anyone in mind?”

“I’ve already purchased two men who I believe will perform reasonably well.” Servannus frowned slightly. “But I’ve seen nothing special...As yet.”

“Egypt for whores and Campania for gladiators my friend.” Gallio swigged from his cup, then after coming up for air, stated, “I’m sure you’ll acquire what you want.”

“Of that there is no doubt,” Servannus agreed.

“A judgement then,” Gallio proposed. “Marius and I have a matter to settle.”

“Something of interest I hope.” Servannus forced a smile.

Gallio belched, and then continued with the conviction that only a man with a belly full of wine can have. “Marius professes that Ludus Quaracalla trains the best gladiators in Pompeii. Would you agree?”

“It’s the biggest, but perhaps not the best of the gladiator schools,” Servannus replied, his tone more serious. “Ludus Gordeo, although small, is building quite a reputation for itself. I’ve been informed that its trainers are excellent and that it’s a school to be watched. I’ll reserve my judgement until after I’ve seen its best perform.”

His remarks were met with nodding heads and empty cups.