Lykoi

October - A.D. 9 The rain fell hard upon Publius Quinctilius Varus and his remaining men. They were exhausted and hungry, but they had to keep moving at any cost. They had to reach an open space where they could dig in and fight. With the rain and the onset of night, the Romans could no longer see their pursuers. But they could hear them. Oh, yes. They could hear them. A sound to chill the Gods themselves. “Use the last of the pitch to light torches, Tribune,” Varus commanded. The man obeyed without a word and within minutes a ring of fire encircled the shield wall that protected the legate, his few remaining officers, and three broken centuries. How is it possible? Varus wondered. Three centuries left of my three legions… Varus removed his helmet with the broken crest and looked up at the three golden aquilae of his savaged legions. Firelight played on the golden breasts of those symbols of Rome’s might. The commander thought they still looked proud, strong. His men were anything but. For three days they had been harried through the Teutoburg forest, that Germanic Hades. The legions had been ambushed over and over and over…from all sides, at all hours. For days, all Varus had heard were the cries of his men in the black, gnarled woods. The nights were the worst. That sound… an incessant howling that tore into one’s person as efficiently as any gladius. Varus closed his eyes in the face of the sputtering rain-slapped torches and tried to imagine his villa at Baiae, the scent of jasmine, the heat of the sun. But all he felt was the cold, and the wet. All he heard was the terrifying sound of ripping flesh, and the harsh breaking of bones like dried twigs. “Commander!” The tribune came up beside Varus. “They’re forming up for a charge, sir!” “So they are, Tribune.” Varus opened his eyes and looked at the surrounding tree lines where black shapes cursed in ugly guttural intonations, spears, scythes, and clubs waving madly at the Romans. “What shall we do, Commander?” the tribune pressed. “We shall die, Tribune. Like all the rest.” The tribune shook his head in frustration and moved past Varus. “Form up! Prepare to receive attack!” he ordered as he placed his helmet on his head and hefted a pilum. Varus hears the insubordination in the tribune’s voice but thinks only of the eagles and the rain upon his face. He no longer thinks of Arminius and how the man had betrayed him, and Rome. He cares little for the civilians he had abandoned to the Germans once the attacks had begun. When the pained, tormented, and raging howls of the enemy begin anew, Quinctilius Varus thinks only of the ancestral gladius at his side. When the barbarians’ visages begin to transform, when the teeth begin to gnash and rip through Roman shields, armour, and bone, then does Varus draw his sword and plant the handle in the deep mud. As the beasts rush in, huge and dark and matted with gore, Varus watches his men crumple on all sides. The body of Varus’ last tribune flies over his head as he drops on his old knees and places the tip of his blade beneath the rim of his ornate cuirass. Varus falls on his sword, even as Arminius struts up to him and hacks the head from his body without hesitation. The hunt comes to a violent end as the moon cuts through the clouds and shines upon the field. It is full, and bright, and all at once, several thousand of the enemy begin to bay at its light. Thick mist shrouded the early morning fields that surrounded the city of Rome. Peasants and slaves were making their way to the places of their assigned tasks - tilling fields, moving animals from one pasture to another, fixing a water wheel, or loading a wagon. They all moved around in ignorance of the world beyond their everyday. Gaius Justus Vitalis ran past them every day since he had returned to Rome. But he ignored the labouring drones by the wayside. He only ran, was driven to do so. Every morning, Gaius plunged into the pre-dawn darkness to run out of the city along the Via Appia almost all the way to Tarracina, to the south. There, he would drink water, and then return to Rome. His legs drove on, relentless. His arms pumped hard, timed with his breath. The peasants and slaves beside the road stared at the shirtless soldier who raced past them every morning as though the Furies were at his heals. He never stopped. His eyes were always forward, his mind elsewhere. They made the sign against evil as he passed, though they knew not why. They did not know of Mithras, or of immortui, nor that the Heliodromus who sped by them had run with a god out of the very depths of Hades. When he came to the white tomb of Caecilia Metella, Gaius Justus Vitalis, centurion in the legions of Emperor Augustus, lashed himself to a speed unattainable by most men. Run with me, Sun Runner, the voice in his mind said, urging him on faster and faster until he was at the city gates. The soldiers had come to know the running centurion well and waved him through at a jog. Gaius poured sweat as he passed the cliff of the Palatine Hill where the emperor was building his sprawling palace complex. He pressed on up the Caelian Hill to the home that had been in his family for generations, and where his wife and daughters now waited for him to break their fast together. He rapped on the door and immediately Ludo, the door slave, opened. Gaius entered, touching the image of Mithras on the wall as he passed into the small atrium. “Did you have a good run, Master?” Ludo asked, running a hand over his closely shaved head. “Yes, Ludo. I did.” Gaius accepted a towel and dried his face, chest and arms. “I do wish you would take Pugio with you, Master. There are bandits on the Via Appia.” Gaius smiled at the old slave who had been his father’s. “Worry not, Ludo. There are no bandits that would bother me. Besides, Pugio cannot keep up with me. Gladiators are not meant for long distance running. “Nor are dearly-missed husbands who leave their wives’ beds in the small hours.” Gaius turned, smiling for the first time that day, to see Fulvia coming toward him. She wore a silver and blue stola, and her hair fell loosely about her shoulders. She was the most beautiful woman Gaius had ever seen, and though he had been home over two months on his furlough, he felt each sight of her as sharply as the first time, when he had finally come home to her arms. Ludo slipped away, beckoning to Nisica, Fulvia’s body slave, to follow him. Gaius took his wife into his arms and kissed her. She did not shrink from his sweating body. “Good morning, my love,” he said. “Good morning to you. It would be even better if you stayed abed, you know.” She smiled and ran a finger between he muscles of his chest. “I’ve had too many lonely mornings these past years.” Gaius gazed at the floor a moment and then stood back a half step. “I had a particularly brutal dream, and needed to run it out.” “Another?” Fulvia stepped closer to him. “Why do the Gods torment you with these dreams every night?” “I don’t think it’s the Gods, my love.” “Who then? What?” She looked at her husband and remembered him momentarily as he had been - dark and curly of hair, strong, muscular, and calm. Now, Gaius’ hair had gone more to grey and was short. His body was still beautiful and well-muscled, but scarred, angular, tight, and quick as a wild beast’s. “I don’t know,” he lied. The laughter of those mountains where his men had been slaughtered, where he had killed his friend, Julius, still echoed in his mind. And with the laughter, dreams of blood, of death and dying, and crimson waves thrashing him. “Gaius?” Fulvia’s hand was on his cheek and he realized he had been away for a moment. “It’s nothing.” He forced a smile. “Go rouse the girls and I’ll bathe quickly.” She smiled a little pitifully, turned, and went to their daughters’ cubiculum. “Master?” Pugio’s great bulk appeared down the corridor. “You bathe now?” “Yes,” Gaius answered. Pugio handed him a fresh towel and strigil, and followed Gaius down the hall. A short time later, Gaius and Fulvia were seated in the triclinium with the table laid out with fresh bread, cheese, boiled millet, figs, and honey. They enjoyed the rare moment of peace together on the couch. Soon, in came Aemilia and Faustina wearing pink and yellow tunics. They walked arm in arm in mock regality, their heads high, and proud, and topped by delicate olive crowns with braided ribbons which Nisica had fashioned for them. “Good morning, ladies,” Gaius stood, his hands on his hips. The two little heads turned to him slowly as if they had only just noticed him. “And who is this before us, sister?” asked Aemilia. “I do not know, sister,” replied Faustina. “But he seems to have eaten most of our cheese.” Fulvia stifled a laugh behind her husband who furrowed his brow in anger. When the girls’ act wavered, Gaius burst out in laughter and lunged for them, scooping them up and tickling them. Their laughter rang through the domus and washed over Gaius like a healing rain, helping him to forget his blood-soaked nightmares for a time. “You’ll wake the whole Caelian!” Fulvia chided, however much it did warm her heart to see Gaius and the girls laugh together. Their home had been too quiet in his absence. “Let the lazy folk wake!” Gaius roared with Aemilia slung over his shoulder. “Oh, they shall,” Fulvia gazed out to the garden where the builders’ materials lay scattered about. “They already turn their noses at our run-down home.” Gaius stopped laughing. He knew Fulvia could handle any of their snobby neighbours, but their criticisms of their family home set his teeth on edge. “Well, soon they’ll have no reason to do so, our prickly neighbours.” “No,” Fulvia smiled as Gaius and the girls settled themselves down to eat. “Calista!” Fulvia called their kitchen slave who came running. “Yes, Mistress?” “More cheese for the girls.” The slave nodded and went back to the kitchen. “Are you happy with the architect’s plans?” Gaius asked his wife. The bonuses and increased centurion’s pay had made it possible for Fulvia and Gaius to retile the roof, redesign the perystylium and atrium, and to expand the triclinium. Fresh paint and frescoes were being added throughout the house as well as mosaics. The cost was great but now, it seemed, they could afford it. “I’m happy to be able to brighten up our home, but nothing does so more than having you here.” “It will not last, I’m afraid.” “Then let’s enjoy the time we have, Gaius. All of us.” He nodded, knew she was right. What good was the present joy if he only spent his time worrying over the morrow? A shadow passed swiftly in front of the doorway. Gaius jumped up, but calmed himself immediately. He was always edgy now. There was only one person missing from the gathering. “I’ll go.” Gaius went out of the triclinium and into the sunlit garden to see the boy sitting against a column among the buckets and plaster trowels. “Daxos?” The young Thracian sat there trembling, his eyes hidden by his long black hair. “Why don’t you come and eat, Daxos?” “I not want to disturb you family, Centurion.” “Come now. You’re our guest here.” “I had the dreams again. Of immortui eating. Of my parents.” Gaius breathed deeply, full of pity for the boy. He had thought bringing him to Rome and showing him the wider world would help him to forget. He had been wrong. Daxos’ nightmares had followed him, the horror more persistent than ever. It was something that they shared. Gaius sat down beside Daxos, and stared at the same dusty plaster bucket. “I have the dreams too. Every night.” Daxos looked up for the first time. “You?” “Yes. Me. All twelve of us who survived will remember and have dreams.” Gaius paused a moment as he thought of something. “You’ve not told your dreams to Aemilia or Faustina, have you?”