Eagle's Honour (2 page)

‘And what was it?’

‘One of the Auxiliaries earned himself the Corona Civica.’

‘Sa ha! ‘Tisn’t often
that
goes to an Auxiliary. No offence, ‘tisn’t often it goes to anybody, come to that. Any idea who it was?’

‘One of the fire-eating Dacians. I’ve an idea it was the pennant-bearer.’ Hirpinius turned quickly to the stranger in their midst. ‘Fools that we are! Of course you’re the one who’d be knowing….’ He checked, his eyes suddenly widening at what he saw in Aracos’s face, his mouth ajar.

But it was one of the Auxiliaries who said in a tone of awed discovery, ‘It was you, wasn’t it?’

The Corona Civica, the highest award for personal bravery under the Eagles! They were all staring at him now. ‘You?’ someone said incredulously. ‘You!’

Something flickered far behind the horse breeder’s eyes. For a moment he hesitated, then shrugged. ‘You could say I earned it – yes.’ There was a note of bitter amusement in his tone, as though he laughed inwardly at an ugly jest against himself.

‘But man! Why keep it under your helmet! It isn’t exactly a thing to be ashamed of!’

‘I’ve no special reason to talk about it.’

‘No reason – Oh, come on, lad, don’t pretend you’re not human.’

‘See now,’ Aracos said, ‘I’m out from under the Eagles’ Wings, and all that is in the past. A circle of gilt oak leaves doesn’t carry any weight in the hill horse-runs. Let’s drop it.’

But Gavrus, who seemed the leader among the rest, was already shouting for more wine to celebrate, and one of the Auxiliaries, who had been gazing worshipfully at the unsuspected hero in their midst, leaned forward and said, ‘Sir – will you tell us about it?’

Aracos’s face was flushed, and his pale eyes had reckless sparks in them, but at the eager words he set down his empty wine cup, which the moment before he had been holding up to be refilled with the rest, laughed, shook his head, and lounged a little unsteadily to his feet. ‘Maybe another time – another year. Not tonight; I’ve an early start for the hills in the morning.’

Making his somewhat zigzag way back to the leather merchant’s house on the outskirts of town where he always lodged when he brought the horses down, Aracos cursed inwardly by all the gods he knew.

What a fool he had been to get caught up in the thing at all. He must have been drunker than he realised. But in his inmost places he knew that drunk or sober would have made little difference. He couldn’t have sat there and let the boys take up the challenge alone and land themselves in the trouble they were heading for.
Yes, but he might at least have had enough wits about him, when the Corona Civica came up, not to let the old story show all over his face. Ah well, it would be half a year before his next trip down from the hills; he’d probably never see tonight’s bunch again, and old Sylvanus who kept the wine shop would forget.

CHAPTER TWO

But old Sylvanus did not forget. It made too good a story to tell to customers. Finally Aracos simply shrugged and accepted the situation. Being a hero was always good for a free drink, anyway.

He went on accepting it for two and a half years, and then one autumn day he went down to Isca Silurium with the usual string of remounts, struck his bargain with the garrison horse-master, and took himself to the
Rose and Wine Skin
to wash the dust of the horse-yards out of his throat.

Most of the men crowded about the braziers were strangers to him, but two or three Legionaries whom he knew were grouped together in the far corner. He headed across to join them, but mid-way, a voice exploded in his ear. ‘Aracos! Now by Jupiter’s Thunderbolt, if it isn’t Aracos!’ And as he looked round, somebody
surged into his path; he saw a lean and beaky face with small bright eyes and a coarse, good-humoured mouth, and remembered it from a long time ago.

He felt as though someone had jolted him in the pit of the stomach. ‘Nasik! What do you do here?’ The words sounded stupid in his own ears.

‘What should I be doing here? The Third Wing’s just posted here – back from Pannonia. What do you do here?’

‘Work for a Horse-Chieftain in the hills. Want any remounts?’

A couple of the older Cavalrymen joined in, grinning and exclaiming at the smallness of the Empire; the younger ones were new since his time. He had a choking desire to turn and thrust his way out into the street again, but that would not stop the thing happening, only mean it happening behind his back.…

And then old Sylvanus joined his voice to the rest. ‘Here’s a fine reunion. You’ll have been together in that northern fighting, ten years ago? Well now, you’re just the lads we want, for we’ve never yet got him to tell us how he came by the Corona Civica.’

A couple of the Legionaries whom Aracos
knew, had joined the group and added their voices to the rest. ‘Now
you
can tell us. Come on now, tell the tale; don’t be bashful, my wood anemone!’

Nasik looked from them to Aracos, puzzled; then burst into a shout of laughter. ‘Corona Civica? It’s a jest, isn’t it?’

There was a sudden uneasiness among the onlookers, a sharp, startled pause. ‘A jest? No, why should it be?’ someone said.

Nasik broke off his laughter. ‘You
don’t
mean to say – did he tell you he got the Civica?’

Aracos stood quite still, fronting the perplexed and startled faces. There was a little smile on his mouth, as set as though it were carved in stone.

One of the Legionaries, as though defending himself in advance from the charge of being easily duped, said, ‘One of the Dacians
did
get the Civica in that fight.’

‘Yes, but not this one. Why, by our Lady of the Foals! He’s never been a soldier! He was a medical orderly – an Army butcher’s fetch-and-carry man!’

A second Dacian had come up beside the first. ‘So you thought you’d snap up Felix’s cast-off glory, did you? He being dead and not needing it any more!’

The wine-shop owner turned a troubled eye on the silent man in their midst. ‘Well? You’d best be saying something, hadn’t you?’

The whole shop was silent to hear his answer, and Aracos, looking round at them with that lazy smile still engraved on his lips, saw that they were not exactly hostile – yet – but the startled
perplexity was hardening into disgust, and a hint of the delight of boys watching a cat with a pannikin tied to its tail.

‘Surely. It’s all perfectly true,’ he said on a note of amusement.

‘But why?’ – the wine-shop keeper began.

Aracos shrugged. ‘It’s dull, up in the hills. I wanted to see if you would be fools enough to believe me – and behold, you were.’

A growl of anger answered him, and a small red-haired Legionary got menacingly to his feet. ‘Why you – you – I’ll teach you to make fools of us again!’

But his neighbour seized him by the shoulder and slammed him back on to the bench. ‘Leave him be. He’s not worth getting rounded up by the Watch Patrol for, he looks a much worse fool than we do, anyway.’

Aracos turned to the landlord. ‘I came in for a drink, but I don’t much care for the smell in here tonight.’ He turned, and pushed out into the windy dark, careful not to betray by the set of his shoulders that he heard the shout of laughter and the insults that followed him.

One man among the Dacians had looked up with a start when Nasik first shouted the newcomer’s name, and had remained quite still,
watching him, through the whole ugly scene that came after. In the somewhat shamefaced silence that followed the laughter, before the shout went up for more wine, he got up with some excuse to his companions, and left the wine shop.

Outside in the street he checked a moment, then turned uphill towards the Dexter Gate of the fortress, still dimly visible in the gusty autumn twilight.

Aracos went downhill towards his lodging. He would not think until he got back to the little room under the roof where he could be alone. He must get away from people, from faces in the light of open doorways.

He came to the leather merchant’s door and went in. The daughter of the house came out from an inner room when she heard him; he had always liked her, but tonight he only wanted to be left alone. ‘You are early,’ she said, ‘but supper will be ready soon.’

He shook his head. ‘I am not hungry, Cordaella.’

He went past her, up the ladder to the room under the roof. He kicked the door shut behind him, and sat down on the narrow cot. The small earthenware lamp had been lit ready for him, early though he was, and he sat staring at it, not
seeing it at all, seeing only the faces in the
Rose and Wine Skin,
hearing the laughter. He wouldn’t come down to Isca Silurium again. Old Lyr could make some other arrangement about getting his horses sold. The small sharp pain that came on him sometimes after an especially hard struggle with an unbroken colt, was flickering under his ribs and down his left arm, but he was no more aware of it than he was of the lamp flame.

CHAPTER THREE

A long while later, feet came up the ladder, and a hand was on the latch. Cordaella’s voice said, ‘Aracos.’

‘Go away, Cordaella. I’m not hungry.’

‘There is someone here to speak with you.’

‘Tell whoever it is,’ Aracos said carefully and distinctly, ‘to go to Gehenna!’

There was a murmur of voices. The latch rattled down, the door opened and closed again. ‘I am sorry,’ said a quiet voice. ‘Don’t blame the woman; she tried to stop me.’

Aracos swung round to see a slight youngish man with the badge of the Dacian Horse on his belt buckle, and on the breast of his tunic the entwined serpents of Esculapius that marked him for one of the Medical Corps. Aracos had not consciously noticed him in the wine shop, but he knew him again.

‘Get out!’

‘Presently.’

‘Now! Didn’t you have enough fun in the
Rose and Wine Skin
that you must come after me for more?’

‘I would have been here sooner.’ The young Medic ignored that. ‘But had to go back to my quarters to fetch this that I have for you – from Felix.’

‘Felix is dead,’ Aracos said dully. ‘I didn’t know, until they said so this evening.’

‘He died between my hands, two years ago in Pannonia. He bade me take this, and get it to a certain Aracos from Thrace, who was a medical orderly with the Dacians during the Pictish troubles. But you had left the Eagles, and I could not pick up your trail, so I have kept it with my own gear ever since, just on the chances….’ He bent and laid on the cot a flat bundle wrapped in a piece of old uniform cloth. ‘The Empire is a small place, as our friends said.’