The Last Legion (26 page)

‘I’ll go and see,’ said Livia. ‘You stay here with the boy.’ Before Aurelius could protest, she dived into the water, crossed the grotto with a few strokes and swam out into the open sea. She continued along the coast until she found a point she could climb on to. She clambered up as high as she could to be able to see a wide expanse of sea and waited, trembling miserably from the cold. The clouds began to clear and the moon cast a pale glow on the waves. On the mainland, Vesuvius hurled red flashes at the rain clouds that galloped through the sky, pushed by the western wind.

She suddenly started. From behind a promontory a boat had appeared with a small light at its bow. An unmistakable figure stood at the stern, manning the rudder.

‘Batiatus! Batiatus!’ she shouted.

The boat altered course and neared the shore.

‘Where are you?’ asked the helmsman.

‘Over here! This way!’

‘At last!’ said Batiatus as soon as he was close enough. ‘I was beginning to lose all hope. Have all of you made it?’

‘Yes, thank God. The others are hidden not far from here, in a cave. I’ll have them come out.’

Batiatus slackened the sail while Livia dived back into the sea and swam to the grotto, where she excitedly informed the others.

One by one, the fugitives swam out towards the open sea in the direction of the boat as Batiatus urged them on: ‘Hurry, hurry! I’ve just seen a ship leaving the port; hurry or they’ll find us!’

Livia swam out alongside Romulus and helped him into the boat before getting in herself. It was Ambrosinus’s turn next. Vatrenus, Orosius and Demetrius followed. Aurelius had climbed on to one of the rocks outside the cave to get a better look around when he saw a red glow spreading over the waves to his left: a warship, oars out. Wulfila was at the bow, and the ship was headed towards Batiatus’s boat. Aurelius did not hesitate an instant. He shouted, with all the breath he had in him: ‘Wulfila, I’m waiting for you. Come and get me barbarian, if you have the courage! Come and get me, scar face!’

Wulfila turned towards the coast and in the light of the torches he saw his enemy standing on a rock, the invincible sword in his hand. He shouted: ‘Put about! Put to shore, I said! I want that man, and I want that sword, at any cost!’

Batiatus understood, and trimmed his sail to the wind, setting off towards the mainland as Romulus cried: ‘No! No! We have to help him! We can’t abandon him. Turn back. Turn back, I say! It’s an order!’

Livia came close: ‘Do you want to make his sacrifice futile? He’s done it for you. He attracted their attention so we could get away.’ She turned towards the island and the image of Aurelius standing on the shore in the light of the torches dissolved into another image, far off in time: a Roman soldier standing immobile on another shore, stormed by a troop of barbarians against the background of a city in flames; herself a little girl, slipping away on a boat full of refugees, over the black waters of the lagoon. Like now.

She wept.

T
HE CREW RAISED THE
fore lantern at Wulfila’s orders, illuminating the rocky shore where Aurelius stood motionless, sword in hand.

Several of the men drew their arrows and aimed, imagining that their commander meant to give them a clear shot at an already easy mark, but Wulfila restrained them. ‘Put those bows down! I want his sword, I said! If it falls into the sea we’ll never find it. Draw up to shore!’ he shouted at the helmsman. ‘I want him alive!’

From a distance, Vatrenus was trying to make out what was happening, and suddenly understood.

‘Strike the sail,’ he ordered Batiatus. Livia was startled at his words and dried her eyes, reading hope into that abrupt command.

Batiatus obeyed without understanding and the boat slowed down.

‘Why are we stopping?’ he asked.

‘Because Aurelius is luring them on to the rocks,’ replied Vatrenus. ‘Look at him!’

‘Ship to starboard!’ rang out Demetrius’s voice from the bow. Another smaller vessel, loaded with warriors, was approaching, lanterns and torches blazing from the parapets and yards. It was still a couple of leagues away, but moving steadily closer.

‘What shall we do?’ asked Demetrius. ‘They’ll spot us soon and then they’ll be on us.’

‘Wait!’ exclaimed Romulus. ‘Let’s wait as long as we can,
please
!’

Just then the din of the wooden hull disintegrating against the rocks reached their ears, immediately drowned out by the much louder roar of the volcano as it belched smoke and sparks into the sky. In his fury to get at his enemy, Wulfila had jammed the bow between the rocks, and the waves were lifting the stern, sending everyone on the deck rolling. They scrambled and grasped for a hand hold at the railing, cursing. Wulfila sought to right himself, still intent on his adversary, but Aurelius dived into the water and disappeared.

Ash began to rain on the deck of Livia’s boat in the deepening darkness, followed by a hail of fiery lapilli.

‘We must leave now,’ said Ambrosinus, ‘or it will be too late. The paroxysmal stage of the eruption is beginning. If the barbarians don’t get us, these lapilli will set the boat aflame and take us all to the bottom with her.’

‘No!’ pleaded Romulus. ‘We must wait.’ He anxiously scanned the black surface of the sea as the second enemy ship approached, shielding their view of Wulfila’s ship being tossed mercilessly now by the breakers. The volcanic rocks rained down faster, igniting small fires on the deck near Livia and on the coiled ropes. The enemy ship had not yet advanced far enough to see the wreck of Wulfila’s ship, but they would soon spot Livia’s.

‘How many of them are there?’ asked a worried Orosius, scrutinizing the enemy crew as they crowded now at the bow, shrieking and waving their weapons.

‘Enough,’ replied Vatrenus. He turned to Livia. ‘If you want to save the boy, we have no choice.’ Livia nodded unwillingly.

‘Set sail!’ ordered Vatrenus. ‘Fast, let’s get out of here!’

Batiatus manned the sheet, assisted by Demetrius at the helm, and they slowly picked up speed, but just then a sword burst from the seething foam, gleaming in the torchlight, followed by a muscular arm, a head and a powerful chest.

‘Aurelius!’ cried out Romulus, beside himself with emotion.

‘It’s him!’ shouted his comrades, rushing to the railing. Vatrenus tossed out a line and hoisted him on board. He was exhausted and only the embrace of his friends prevented him from collapsing on to the deck. Livia held him close, as he swayed, only half conscious, and Romulus couldn’t stop staring at him, not daring to believe that he was alive and well, and not just the figment of a cruel dream destined to fade with the breaking day.

The dense cloud of soot spewed by the volcano spread over the sea, coating the waves which lapped at the shores of the island, and Livia’s boat disappeared from sight. The crew of the second ship could now hear the cries of their comrades, floundering among the floating planks. Wulfila had managed to climb on to a rock and was bellowing orders. The ship drew up, keeping at a safe distance so as not to meet the same fate as the other, and the shipwrecked warriors swam towards it and clambered aboard, one after another. When Wulfila finally reached the ship himself, he gave immediate orders to set off after the fugitives, but the helmsman, an old sailor from Capri who knew those waters well, dissuaded him. ‘If we put out to sea, none of us will come out of this alive. I can’t see past my nose, and it’s raining fire, look!’

Wulfila grudgingly turned towards the mainland. The black sky was scored by a myriad flaming meteors and he could feel the terror creeping through his men, people of the north who had never seen the likes of this. He bit his lip at the thought that he’d let a thirteen-year-old boy and an old man escape from a fort manned by seventy of his best warriors, but what pained him far worse was the loss of that fabulous sword. He’d thought of nothing but possessing it himself, since the very first moment he’d seen it gleaming so awesomely in his enemy’s fist.

‘Back to port,’ he barked, and the ship put about; its sailors were all men from the islands, well aware of the danger they were in, and they rowed vigorously but calmly under the orders of the helmsman. The barbarians, on the contrary, shook with fear at every tremor and watched panic stricken as the fire from hell descended from the sky. The soot spread everywhere, the stench of sulphur filled the air and the horizon throbbed with bloody light.

*

Livia’s boat advanced slowly through the utter dark. Orosius was at the very tip of the foremast from which the lantern hung and he peered out in the attempt to spot sudden obstacles or danger, although it was clear that chance alone would decide their common fate in those frightful conditions. The tension on board was thick; no one spoke for fear of distracting his comrades intent on their manoeuvres as they navigated blindly. Demetrius, perched on the forward yard with his legs hanging overboard, tried to guide their route as best he could, trusting more in his instinct than anything else. Ambrosinus approached Vatrenus. ‘Which way are we bearing?’ he asked.

‘Who knows? North, I hope. It’s the only chance we have.’

‘Perhaps I could help . . . if only . . .’

Vatrenus shook his head sceptically. ‘Forget it, we’re confused enough as it is. I’ve never seen anything like this.’

‘And yet, it’s not the first time. It happened before, four hundred years ago. The volcano buried three cities with all their inhabitants. Not a trace remained of them, but Pliny describes the eruptive stages of the volcano precisely. That’s why I proposed tonight; I thought that the general confusion would make our escape easier. I was wrong. The paroxysmal phase started hours later than what I’d predicted.’

Vatrenus stared at him in surprise.

Aurelius, who had regained full consciousness, approached them. ‘What did you want to help us with?’ he asked.

Ambrosinus was about to answer when Demetrius’s voice sounded from the bow: ‘Look!’

The cloud of soot had begun to clear and the nearly imperceptible glimmer of the waves in front of them announced the first light of day. They were rounding Cape Misenum, which was raising its head above the blanket of smoke and ash that covered the sea, and the dawning sun was illuminating its top. They all gazed at that sudden vision as the soot dissipated and the boat was struck by the rays of the sun rising behind the peaks of the Lattari mountains.

The night was behind them: the terror, the anguish, the exhaustion of their troubled escape and the relentless pursuit of the barbarians, their unspoken fear that hope would vanish like a dream with the light of day. The sun shone on them like a benevolent God, the rumble of the volcano died off in the distance like the last thunder of a storm. The breeze carried intense fragrances from the land, and the blue of the sea and of the sky mingled in a triumph of light.

Romulus drew close to his tutor: ‘Are we free, now?’

Ambrosinus wanted to explain that not all danger had been vanquished, that the journey awaiting them would be rife with hardship and peril, but he didn’t have the heart to dim the joy he saw shining in the boy’s eyes after so long. Trying hard to control the emotion he felt, he answered: ‘Yes, my son. We are free.’

Romulus nodded repeatedly as if trying to convince himself of the truth of those words, then approached Aurelius and Livia, who had been watching him. With a tiny voice, he said: ‘Thank you.’

*

The boat set ashore at a deserted spot on the coast near the ruins of a maritime villa about thirty miles north of Cuma. Livia jumped into the water and made sure she was the first to touch land, to make it clear that the command of the mission was still firmly in her hands.

‘Sink the boat,’ she shouted at Aurelius. ‘Then follow me, all of you, quickly. This way!’ She pointed at a rundown shack, barely visible behind a thicket of trees, a little less than a mile away. Aurelius helped the boy get out into the shallow water as Batiatus and Demetrius started to hack away at the keel with axes, to Ambrosinus’s distress.

‘Why? Why sink the boat? There’s no safer way of getting around! Stop, I beg of you, listen to me!’ he pleaded.

Livia had turned back, frustrated at their stalling. ‘I told you to follow me! There’s not a moment to lose. They’ll be out looking for us by now. Don’t you realize that this boy is the most wanted person in the whole empire?’

‘Yes, of course,’ replied Ambrosinus, ‘but given the circumstances, the boat is really the safest . . .’

‘That’s enough! I want no arguing. Just follow me, and be quick about it!’ ordered Livia harshly. Ambrosinus obeyed reluctantly, turning back to watch the boat as it slowly sank. Orosius was already in the water and Demetrius after him; Aurelius, Vatrenus and Batiatus leapt out and on to the shore as well, promptly catching up with the group that Livia was guiding through the thick vegetation along the coast.

‘I still can’t believe it,’ panted Vatrenus. ‘Just six of us, and we managed to break into a fort and screw seventy armed guards.’

‘Just like the old days!’ exulted Batiatus. ‘With one very agreeable difference,’ he added, winking at Livia who shot him back a smile.

‘I can’t wait to count up all those pretty little gold coins,’ continued Vatrenus. ‘A thousand solids, you said, isn’t that right?’