Marius' Mules VI: Caesar's Vow (24 page)

Asadunon and the Epona shrine were yet another bump in this seemingly-interminable lumpy pallet. And Crispus. Poor, young, promising Crispus, had been brutally murdered by Gallic traitors.
A lump to be flattened
. Caesar’s current policy may be dangerous, but there were times when Fronto could hardly deny the pull of it. Crispus would never rest well until revenge had been taken.

‘You stay safely outside. I’d send my Belgic singulares out with you, but they have to be reliable, and I have to know that they will do what must be done.’

Again, Galronus nodded.

As they neared the top of the slope they slowed, remembering the words of the scouts. Asadunon was now lost in the mist almost half a mile to the south. The white blanket that covered the rumpled pallet of the land deadened noise so effectively that he could hear no sign of the thousands of men less than a mile away, moving to take Asadunon.

At the crest of the low hill, they were afforded their first view of the shrine compound of Epona.

A low rampart with a palisade surrounded a circular area perhaps fifty paces across. Despite what the scouts had said, the rampart here was, to the experienced eye of a Roman officer, nothing like the one that enclosed the village. This was lower and simpler. More a social divide than a defence. Inside, the trees had been trained into two concentric circles, surrounding what appeared to be a paved, central oval, bounded by low steps and squat standing stones. At the northern end stood a small hovel - a shrine apparently, built in the stone-and-timber style of almost all northern Gallic structures. There appeared to be tall wooden posts standing to either side of that temple building, and half a dozen other structures evenly-spaced around the outer edge.

Only two figures were visible from here, both at the near edge of the central oval, one seated on a stone, while the other appeared to be raking or hoeing the ground. It looked so sickeningly peaceful and pleasant that Fronto had momentary cause to doubt his plan.
Only
momentary, though. Images flashed through his mind of druids cursing him, defiant as they drove the Gauls to rebellion, of the maiming and burning of horses and riders by Germanic priests back in their first year in Gaul, of that bastard druid with the sword and the iron crown in Britannia who had tried to carve him into a new shape.

Don’t be fooled by their apparent pacifism
! He grunted to himself.

‘How do you want to do this?’ Galronus muttered.

‘Quickly and simply. Send your men out in both directions and surround the place, then close in until you’re just outside the rampart. In this fog there’s little chance of us getting a signal and Asadunon could already be under attack. We’ll go straight in.’

Galronus nodded and, with a couple of simple gestures, sent his riders off to the east and west to surround the sacred enclosure.

Fronto looked back at his small force. They were still short three men, until they returned to the rest of the army - Palmatus and Masgava had been adamant about saving space for someone, but with sixteen in total, and all fighting men, they could hardly expect trouble from a dozen priest-folk.

With the assurance of a force superior in every way, Fronto and his singulares rode down the gentle slope and towards the gate which still stood wide open. As they approached the defences, Fronto felt the hair rise on the back of his neck. For a moment, he chided himself on his over-superstitious nature, but then Bucephalus wrenched his black head this way and that, his muscles bunching unnecessarily, breath coming in short heavy snorts, steaming in the air, betraying his state of heightened nerves.

The shiver began and Fronto noted that several of his companions were looking apprehensively back and forth. The place was exuding an almost tangible aura of something unpleasant, and everyone felt it, especially the horses.

‘There’s no wildlife,’ Masgava whispered on his left side. Fronto cocked his head. There was certainly no birdsong and no rustle in the grass or undergrowth, but that was not necessarily a surprise, given the conditions.

‘Could be entirely natural.’

‘Why are the horses nervous?’ Palmatus added, struggling to control the steed over whom he had minimal mastery at the best of times.

‘Same reason as us, I guess.’

‘But isn’t this a shrine to a horse Goddess?’

Fronto’s shiver came back and brought some friends.

‘Swords out, lads. Something’s amiss.’

The men around him unfastened the carrying straps and lifted their shields from their backs, each still encased in its leather cover for travelling, shouldering the shields and drawing their swords.

Knowing that despite his nerves it was his duty to enter first, he pushed Bucephalus out front, Masgava and Palmatus hurrying to join him, the rest following on closely.

The gate remained open. There was no sound of movement from within. No shouts of alarm or running feet. All there was, floating almost ethereal on the top edge of the air, was a haunting melody of strings and a hollow, childlike voice, raised in sad song.

The family of shivers formed into a thorough, spine-tingling shudder as Fronto passed across the threshold of the sacred site and between the carefully manicured trees towards the central oval. It reminded him - somewhat unpleasantly - of walking down a darkened corridor to enter the oval floor of an arena, something he’d done once or twice in his life.

‘Can we just leave and say there was nothing here?’ muttered Palmatus, his horse struggling for dominance over the rider. Even Masgava, a master horseman, and a man Fronto had never yet seen fazed by anything, looked distinctly uncomfortable.

‘Just be prepared. Things could turn horribly ugly at very short notice.’

The Roman force, walking their beasts, moved into the centre of the sacred enclosure and Fronto reined in close to where they had observed the two men. A long rake stood leaning against one of the taller stones, the gravelled ground surrounding the oval ‘arena’ perfectly weeded and raked flat and neat. The taller figure had disappeared. The shorter one was still seated on the stone and Fronto now realised, as they closed on the youth with the delicate lyre, picking out a sad tune and warbling along to it, that it was a girl. With surprise, he found himself suddenly re-evaluating his plans. The death of pre-pubescent girls was not high on his list of priorities, whatever her religion or people.

While his eyes took in every part of the
nemeton
, a part of him wondered what the tune was, though a quick glance at the Remi and the Condrusi among his party suggested that he’d be better off not knowing. The colour had drained from their faces.

Despite the eerie stillness and the neatness of the place, there was a faint aroma of horse dung that they had not brought with them. Remembering the nature of this shrine, Fronto wondered if Epona had sacred horses in her groves and - if so - were they in one of the huts rather than roaming free among the trees?

Shudder
.

‘This compound,’ he announced, his voice cracking irritably, ‘is now under the control of Rome, as is the oppidum of Asadunon across the hill.’

The girl seemed to ignore him completely, continuing her song. The reaction unnerved him more than ever. Quietly, he turned to the nearest of the Remi riders, who looked close to panic.

‘Your druids have girls with them?’

‘
Uidluia
.’ The man announced, his voice shaky.

‘And for those of us with less command of Gaulish?’

‘A seer-poet, sir. Revered. Blessed. Sacred.’

Well, Fronto thought to himself, he had wanted to test the loyalty and obedience of his new unit, and this looked like it would probably be the strongest test he could ever throw at them.

‘You,’ he gestured. ‘Girl? Where are the others?’

Expertly edging the lyre into the crook of her elbow so that she could continue the tune one-handed, the girl used her other to point to the small temple of Epona on the far side of the oval. He gestured to the capsarius in his group.

‘Damionis, come out front and watch her. Don’t hurt her.’ His words seemed to resonate well with his Belgic men, and they settled their skittish horses as best they could, as the reedy, pale figure of the capsarius rode out to the girl.

Fronto gestured for Masgava and Palmatus to follow him and, dismounting, he led Bucephalus to one of the larger standing stones which had iron rings driven into it, almost as if designed for a hitching post.

The three men continued on foot, crossing the oval and approaching the shrine. The structure was the same as most of the better class of Gallic buildings - of stone courses half way up the door frame, and then of timber and thatch. A step up from the wattle and daub of peasant dwellings, but still poor compared to the great temples of the Roman world. There were no windows in evidence, and the door was shut.

Fronto quickly pictured every possibility, from hidden archers in the darkness to traps devised to behead in the doorway, and approached the door nervously, reaching up with his free hand, the other wrapped whitened around the hilt of his glorious sword.

He swung the door open…

…and had to swallow down the bile that rose to his mouth. The smell of an abattoir hit him in the face, filling his nostrils with the stench of meat and blood and faeces and flies. He took a step forward, coughing up bile, and his foot skidded on the mess that had leaked as far as the door on its way outside. After all, the small temple was at least a finger-breadth deep in liquid.

But the
source
of that liquid…

Both Palmatus and Masgava gasped behind him.

The two horses, which had apparently been fine beasts, had been killed quickly, with a slice across the throat, but someone - actually at least three someones from the animals’ size - had taken the time and effort to prop them in a pose, slumped to either side of the old woman, their big, sad, dead heads on her lap. The woman had removed her own tongue and then cut her own throat, as was evident from the open mouth, the sheets of blood, and the knife still gripped in her hand.

It was a grotesque parody of the frieze that stood behind her, spattered with their blood, which showed the Goddess Epona with her twin sacred horses by her side, nuzzling her.

Around the floor were the rest of the druids and helpers from the shrine, all suicides, apparently - no warriors like that British nightmare with the crown, just old men in robes.

Getting as much of a grip on himself as possible, Fronto leaned down and prised open the mouth of an ancient, grey-bearded man, confirming his fears. The druid had also removed his tongue before slitting his own throat.

‘What in the name of seven hills of shit happened here?’ Palmatus breathed as he stepped back into the light with Masgava.

‘Defiance.’ Fronto sighed as he stepped out and joined them. ‘Defiance and certainty. They’re informing us they will never be taken alive, and the tongues are to be certain that they will never talk to us, whatever world they find themselves in. Stupidity.’

‘Why the girl alive, then?’

Fronto shrugged. ‘Don’t know, but let’s get her back to the army before…’

He heard a shout and turned to look across the oval arena, his heart sinking as he realised all too late that the song had ended just as they stepped back outside. He had only moved two steps before the dead girl fell from the stone, the lyre clattering across the ground beside her. The capsarius had leapt from his horse and run across, not quite in time to catch her.

‘Why didn’t you stop her?’ he yelled at the rest of his singulares. But he knew the answer. Well he knew it for
two
answers: None of them had expected it. And even Damionis, close by, had failed to react in time, so entranced was he by her song. And even if they’d had a
week
to react, the Remi who were nearest would not have stopped her. While he could easily throw his weight around and bring them up on charges, in all fairness, Fronto was not at all sure that
he’d
have stopped her in the same circumstances. There was something almost otherworldly about the whole event.

‘Saddle up. Ambiorix’s men are long gone and Asadunon is dead to us. We’ll find out nothing here, so let’s get back and hand the good news to Caesar.’ He looked down at Damionis. ‘You can’t help her; or any of the others.’

Reaching out to untie Bucephalus, he breathed deep of the fresh, misty air, trying to clear his nostrils of the stench of death and his throat of the taste of bile. He tried not to look down at the girl’s twisted, leaking corpse as he passed. The sooner this land was under Roman control the better, if only to get rid of the damned, sickening, idiotic and dangerously-unbalanced druids!

* * * * *

‘So what now?’ Antonius sighed, leaning against the gatepost of Asadunon and watching the last of the slaves being led away. The legionaries were occupied removing anything of value from the village, torching the buildings and tearing down the ramparts. In an hour’s time all that would remain to show that Asadunon had existed would be an encircling mound and a pile of carbonised timbers.

The general, his face lined with fatigue - and bubbling, barely subdued anger - looked around at his senior officers.

‘Since there is no sign of Ambiorix or any other Eburones here, we need to turn our attention beyond the Nervii. Their power centre is gone, the place of their treaty is empty and burned. Our trail has run cold and left us at their most distant border empty-handed.’

‘So which tribe is next?’ Rufio asked quietly. Despite having looked over the maps whenever he’d had the chance, the new officer still had only a tenuous grasp of tribal geography.

‘The Menapii,’ Priscus sighed where he leaned beside Antonius.

‘Is that a problem?’ Rufio asked, seeing the weary look on the camp prefect’s face.

‘We’ve gone at them before, but they just melt away into the delta and the forest and swamps like fog on a hot day - which I wish
this
was, incidentally. Then it’s a matter of hunting down and taking out endless small settlements on reedy islands or hidden in wet woods. Awful.’