“Look out, Optio!”
Gaius turned to see one of his men coming down on him from within the circle, his eyes aflame. Gaius brought up the ball of his hastile to hold the creature back and sliced through the neck leaving the head hanging by a string of tendons.
“Throw the body over the stockade!” Gaius yelled. Antonius and two others helped him. As soon as it landed, six immortui began devouring it, gorging themselves on blood and guts.
“We can’t hold here, Optio!” Antonius gasped. “They’re too many.”
“I know, I know!” Gaius searched about. The stakes were giving and the men tiring. Mithras, guide me, he thought. More immortui were pouring from the forest now and, on the wind, that same laughter he had heard before. He turned, slicing at a mangled hand and bloody face covered in pustules a
