The Leopard Sword: Empire IV (19 page)

‘No, the local people are decent enough. I mean you can’t trust him because he’s from in
there
.’ They had reached the bridge’s western end, and Marcus looked out across the river, its surface broken by the stones that marked the shallows which had made it such an obvious bridging point for the road to the Rhenus fortresses. The duty officer pointed to the forested slopes that rose above the small settlement clustered round the bridge’s eastern end, and spat over the bridge’s parapet. ‘Laugh it off if you like, but if you’d served as close to that bloody forest for as long as I have you wouldn’t be laughing. It’s only four hundred paces from here to the tree line, but by the time you’ve walked five hundred you might as well be five hundred miles away. There are men living in that place who don’t see the light of day from one end of the year to the other, half-savage hunters without any of the values that make us the civilised people that we are. We see them sometimes, watching the fort from the edge of the trees, and we used to send patrols in to try to get hold of one, but it was like trying to catch fucking smoke. And it scared the shit out of the lads.’ He looked into the distance through the open gates for a moment before speaking again. ‘I stopped ordering patrols after we lost a man last year. One minute he was there at the back of the column, the next he was gone, disappeared in broad daylight without either trace or echo. We never saw him again, but that night some of the lads reckoned they could hear him screaming, just a faint sound on the breeze that only the young ones could make out, but they swore it was there.’

He spat on the ground and made the warding gesture to the guide’s back.

‘No, that’s one of them all right. If he’d turned up here alone I’d have had his throat cut and chucked him in the river, but since he’s under your protection all I can do is warn you. Where are you going from here?’

Julius pointed a hand to the east.

‘Claudius Colony, then Fortress Bonna.’

‘Straight to the Rhenus, eh? Fair enough. You should be fine as long as you stick to the road and don’t go into the forest. Just watch the little bastard, all right?’

He stood and watched as the party remounted and rode away up the hill to the east, and Julius waited until the fort was completely out of sight before raising a hand to halt their progress. He stared at the densely packed trees for a moment, then turned to Arabus.

‘Time for you to start earning your corn. You’ve been briefed on what we’re supposed to be doing?’

The scout returned his gaze for a moment then looked at the forest, drawing in a deep breath through his nose and sighing as if in satisfaction.

‘Yes, Caninus told me what I am to do. You wish to search the edge of Arduenna, from here down the river’s bank back to the west until we find any sign that the bandits have a camp.’ A look of serenity touched his face as he contemplated the place he clearly considered to be his home. ‘Come, then. Follow me into Arduenna.’

He led them across the hundred-pace-wide strip of ground between road and forest that had been cleared of trees years before as a defence against ambush from the forest. The barren ground had clearly been tended by a gang of local labourers recently, to judge from the absence of any vegetation other than grass and small bushes. On reaching the trees Arabus paused, inhaling deeply as the scent of pine trees washed over them on the breeze.

‘We will lead the horses until we find a track. Watch your footing.’

He pushed forward into the dense undergrowth, moving with deliberate caution, and the centurions followed him into the trees, looking about them in interest. The light dimmed slightly as they walked away from the forest’s edge, taking on the ethereal green shade with which they were all familiar, but apart from that Marcus was unable to discern any difference between the Arduenna and any other forest in which he’d walked. Arabus padded forward, leading his horse through the trees with his gaze on the ground until, after a few minutes’ walking he turned back and beckoned the centurions to him. A faint track bisected the forest floor, and they looked down its visible length to the point where it vanished into the dense undergrowth fifty or so paces to what Marcus could only presume was the south-west. Arabus pointed to the path with a smile of pride.

‘As I expected, this is a hunters’ track. I have not hunted this part of the forest for many years, but my memory still serves me well enough.’

Julius looked up and down the track.

‘If we follow this path surely we must run a risk of meeting other travellers?’

Arabus shook his head.

‘I will scout ahead on foot while you ride a hundred paces behind me, and leave my horse tethered to your mule. I will hear anyone coming up this path before they hear
me
, you can be assured of that.’

And so the party spent the rest of the day working their way along the hunters’ track, moving at Arabus’s cautious pace and with one man always watching the path behind them, until the light shining through the canopy above them started to dim. The guide stood waiting for them as they crested a low ridge, then pointed up the low hill’s spine, deeper into the forest.

‘It will soon be night. We must make camp, and gather firewood before it is too dark to see clearly. Follow me.’

He led them away from the path, climbing until they reached a bowl-shaped clearing high on the hill’s side.

‘Here we can light a fire without the risk of it being seen; once darkness falls it will conceal any smoke.’ He pointed to the ground surrounding the clearing. ‘There should be plenty of wood on the ground. I’ll go this way.’

He walked away up the hill, his eyes on the ground hunting for dead wood that would burn easily, and Marcus looked at the other centurions.

‘If Silus tends to the horses, I suppose the rest of us should spread out.’

They nodded agreement to each other, and Marcus headed off down the slope to the right of the clearing. Finding himself confronted by a thick belt of impenetrable thorns, he diverted to the left, and started to climb the hill again, only to find another belt of hawthorn blocking his path. A fat branch was poking out of the long grass, and he went down on one knee to examine it, wondering if it was sufficiently aged to snap into more manageable pieces. As he weighed up the bough’s condition his attention was caught by a faint noise from further up the hill, and looking up he saw a vague, dark shape moving downhill behind the cover of the trees, crossing his field of view from left to right. Reaching to his belt he drew the patterned sword, the blade scraping fractionally against its scabbard’s metal throat and sending a rasping note across the otherwise silent hillside. Whatever it was that was moving down the slope took fright at the faint noise, and bounded away from him in an explosion of movement that left him frowning, unable to give chase through the thorn bushes.

As the commotion of the hidden animal’s panic-stricken progress through the trees died away Arabus stepped out of the trees to Marcus’s left, his bow held with an arrow nocked and drawn, ready to shoot. Marcus found himself looking down the missile’s shaft and into the scout’s empty eyes, and he involuntarily tensed himself for the missile’s impact as Arabus stared down the arrow’s length at him. After a long moment the scout eased the string’s tension and tucked the arrow back into his quiver, slinging the bow across his back. He strode down the slope to meet the young centurion, shaking his head in apparent amusement. It was the first time that Marcus had seen the dark-faced man smile, and he re-sheathed his own blade as he waited for the guide to reach him. Arabus put both hands on his hips, looking about him for any sign of a threat.

‘I heard a sword being drawn.’

Marcus nodded, bending to pick up the branch he’d been considering when whatever it was that had caught his attention had broken cover.

‘I saw something moving through the trees.’

Arabus smiled again, his seamed face twisting in amusement.

‘Yes, it was a wild boar. I was readying myself to venture an arrow at it when it heard you draw your sword. It ran before I could loose the arrow.’

Marcus shook his head disgustedly.

‘A boar? I mistook it for a
man
.’

Arabus raised his hands.

‘There is no shame in such a mistake. A momentary glimpse through so many trees would deceive the best of men. I had a clear view of the beast, and from the size of it we would have had days of good eating had I managed to bring it down. No matter, it will be dried meat for us tonight, rather than wild pork.’

Marcus snapped the fallen branch into three pieces and resumed his search for more wood, and the guide walked away up the hillside to collect his own bundle of wood. Waiting until the sun was no more than a distant pale gleam on the horizon Arabus quickly and expertly lit the fire using flint and iron, blowing gently onto the kindling until it was well alight and then adding twigs and small branches to feed the small blaze. With the fire burning properly the five men wrapped themselves in their blankets and chewed in silence on their ration of dry meat, hard cheese and bread. The hunter drew his long sword and took a piece of the local whetstone from his pack, spitting on it before passing the blue stone down the blade’s length with a harsh metallic scrape Marcus watched for a moment, admiring the intricate decoration that adorned the blade’s scabbard; it depicted a charging boar ridden by a female figure wielding a bow.

‘That’s a fine piece of leather work.’

The guide replied without looking up from his task, working the whetstone with the delicate care of long practice.

‘I made it myself. Hunting the forest at night gives a man a lot of time to practise such craft.’

The Roman nodded, looking about him at the surrounding starlit ground and the dark bulk of the trees gathered around them.

‘Is the woman riding the boar your goddess?’

Arabus nodded, glancing up briefly.

‘It is. I made two of these, one for myself and one for my son.’ He paused for a while, his eyes misting over with the memory. ‘I honour Arduenna every time I draw my blade, and every time I return it to the leather.’

Marcus looked across the fire at him.

‘You speak of the forest as if it is a person. You call it “Arduenna”, as if you were speaking of a woman rather than a body of trees, and I noticed that Prefect Caninus did much the same yesterday. Do you all feel the same way about the forest?’

Arabus looked at him for a long moment, as if attempting to divine whether the Roman were serious, or making fun of him, but when he saw no hint of levity on Marcus’s face he answered the question with a solemn expression.

‘Arduenna is different things to different people. To you Romans, men not born under her shadow, she is simply a forest. You look at her and all you see are trees, and the animals that live under their protection. You do not feel her spirit, nor hear the slow beating of her heart.’ He fell silent, and stared into the dark ranks of trees without speaking for so long that Marcus was on the verge of prompting him again. ‘For me, and every other man who has lived beneath her canopy for as long as they can remember, she lives and breathes, and we worship her. Which aspect of the goddess a man perceives depends on his origins. To those who live under her protection she is a powerful huntress, fair of face and riding a boar through the forest in search of her prey, which she brings down with her bow. We worship her, and offer her thanks for our success in the hunt.’

Marcus trod carefully, wary of inadvertently insulting the guide despite his desire to know more.

‘Do you offer her . . . sacrifice?’

Arabus’s eyebrows lowered in a disgusted frown.

‘Do you take me for a savage? Do you hope to hear tell of altars deep in the forest where men are put to death in worship of the goddess?’

The Roman shrugged apologetically in the face of the guide’s apparent anger.

‘There are rumours . . .’

The guide bridled at the suggestion, gesturing angrily with his hands.

‘All lies made up by
your
people to explain their fear of what they do not understand! We offer a small part of any game we kill to the goddess, no more!’

Marcus smiled gently.

‘And I apologise. You were saying that the local people see her as a benevolent spirit. So how would an outsider perceive her?’

The guide’s eyes flashed, and for that second Marcus knew he was staring into the man’s soul.

‘As vengeance.’ Arabus’s voice was as hard as his expression. ‘She rides down the unbeliever who is foolish enough to venture into the dark woods, and many are her weapons. Other men like you have ridden into Arduenna to hunt in her kingdom without paying her the appropriate respect, and they have never been seen again. You are fortunate to be accompanied by a believer, to shield you from her anger.’

With that he fell silent again, and after a moment Marcus felt compelled to offer an opinion, glancing round the fire at his colleagues and finding their faces set as sceptically as his own in response to the guide’s impassioned words.

‘There could be . . . other explanations?’

He was about to suggest other causes for a man disappearing in the forest when Arabus spoke again, his voice harsh.

‘Yes, they could have become lost and starved, or been taken by wolves; those things could happen. But I told you,
many
are her weapons. If you knew Arduenna the way that I do, you would not look for complicated explanations for the disappearances when the simplest answer is also the most obvious. We know the goddess, Centurion, we know what she can do, and we choose to respect her power where men like you blunder into her kingdom and pay the price for their lack of caution. But you are lucky. While you are under my guidance and protection you will be safe, as long as you follow the same rules that I follow. Now I suggest that we sleep.’

Julius stirred, shrugging off his blanket and standing up, warming himself in the fire’s glow.

‘I’ll take first watch.’

Arabus frowned.

‘There is little need. We are quite safe here out of sight, and—’