A tale of war, greed and heroism set in the late Roman Empire
Easier to split the sky, than part a soldier from his blade.
386 AD. The Eastern Roman Empire faces a trident of threats. The Gothic truce grows unstable. The standoff with Persia escalates. And the ambitions of the usurper on the Western throne grow dangerously unchecked.
Pavo, a broken veteran of the legions, cares for none of these things. His life is one of pastoral seclusion on his Thracian farm. A life of love, of peace. His wife and young son are his world. Still, every so often, things seen and done in his old life haunt him, like a cold and unwelcome breeze. But that is all they are, echoes of the past…
…until the past rises, like a shade, to rip his world and the Roman Empire apart.
Excerpt
The misty swamp reeked like a sewer. The slick waters lapped and bubbled around the chests of the wading Claudian legionaries, seeping inside their ringmail, soaking their tunics, filling their boots, staining their crimson and golden shields. Worse, a mist of flies buzzed around and bit at them. Just then, the swamp gurgled and released a belch of gas. All in the party groaned at the rotten stench.
Centurion Betto, who also doubled as the legion’s aquilifer, used the butt of the regimental standard to test the way ahead, both the silver eagle atop the staff and the ruby bull banner hanging from the crossbar plastered with slime and mud. He gazed at the weak reflection of his delicate features and the sickle moon in the swamp, then up at the night sky. ‘Easy is the descent to the Gates of Hades,’ he whispered, ‘but to escape to the upper air is indeed a toil.’
‘Pack it in,’ grumbled Centurion Pulcher, close behind, his oily and pox-pitted face scrunching up like a walnut. ‘The last thing we need now is you and your fancy quotes.’
‘Seldom are the times when a man cannot benefit from the wisdom of Virgil,’ Betto replied calmly, ‘especially in such graveolent surrounds as these.’
‘Graveolent?’ Pulcher pulled a face. ‘What does that even mean? I’ll give you a bit of the bloody wisdom of my foot in a mome-argh!’ He ducked down from the low branch upon which he had just whacked his head, clutching the spot where a runnel of blood dribbled from his greasy curls of black hair. He glared at Betto then his comrades then all around the swamp. ‘Of all the missions we have been sent on… this, surely, is the shittest one yet.’
Centurion Darik, tall, swarthy and chiselled, smiled that perfect ivory smile of his. ‘Shitter than the time we had to raid that brothel?’
Libo, the one-eyed Primus Pilus, second in command of the legion, tilted his head one way and then another, his wooden eye staring madly askew as always. ‘The smell in that brothel was probably worse than this swamp.’
‘At least the sights were better,’ said the young legionary, Durio, with a chuckle.
‘Eh?’ His marching partner, Indus, cocked an eyebrow. ‘That chap and the camel in the side room? Each to their own, I suppose.’
Durio quickly reddened. ‘No! The women, I meant.’
But Indus wasn’t listening. ‘You used to like camels, didn’t you, Sir?’ he asked Centurion Darik.
Darik shot him a foul look. ‘I used to be a desert camel guardsman. There is a big difference.’
Indus shrugged. ‘Not really, you and the brothel chap both liked riding camels.’
Darik’s head snapped round, mouth peeling open to berate Indus, who quickly raised both hands to pacify: ‘I jest, sir. I know you were a Persian camel warrior.’
This only stoked Darik to new levels of anger. ‘A Persian? How many times? I’m not a Persian, I’m a Maratocupreni.’
Completely misreading the moment, another young voice piped up from further back. ‘I heard camels drink through their cocks. Is it true, sir?’
Reaching unprecedented levels of ire, Darik’s mouth flapped like a fish out of water.
Now the red-cloaked officer leading the whole grim procession swished round in the water to face his charges.
‘Enough,’ hissed Tribunus Sura. ‘We’re drawing close to the fort. Any noise will carry across the water’s surface and they’ll know we’re coming. Not a sound from here on in, understood?’
Sura twisted forwards again, peering through the mist. For all the world he wanted to turn back and answer the ridiculous question with an equally apocryphal answer: yes, camels drink through their cocks and shit through their ears. But that was not the way anymore. Commanding a legion meant commanding respect. The days when he had been in the ranks, and even those when he had been second in command to Pavo, had allowed for japes and waggish mischief. Not so now. It was a heavy burden to know that the lives of the few hundred legionaries here were in his hands.
Since Pavo’s medical discharge from the legion three years ago, Sura’s and his paths had crossed only twice. Ironically, it was during this time apart and while serving as Pavo’s successor that Sura had come to understand better than ever his oldest friend’s taciturn and brooding ways.
A swamp bird sped across their route, its wings rapping on the water’s surface. Sura jolted, then spotted a huge mound ahead, standing proud of the water. Pitched on top of the mound was a stone fort – an ancient thing, the huge masonry blocks damp and veined green with algae. He threw up a hand. All halted.
‘Argedava,’ whispered Libo, edging up to Sura’s side, his good eye narrowing and the false one bulging.
‘That’s not Roman,’ muttered Pulcher.
‘Or Gothic,’ added Darik.
‘It’s Dacian,’ Sura confirmed. ‘It was here before this land was conquered by the empire, and has stood like this, abandoned, in all the years since our legions withdrew.’
‘An eternal echo from the lungs of Decebalus, the last King of Dacia,’ Betto said, enunciating every syllable perfectly.
Sura eyed the place, annoyed by the crawling mist that obscured full view of it. This new tribe of Goths that had been spotted roaming on the northern banks of the Danubius had always behaved in the same manner: coming to the northern berm of the river, hunkering down and noting the Roman positions on the southern banks, then peeling back in this direction. On the evening previous, they had done the same again. Yet this time, none of them had been aware that the Claudians had rowed across the river earlier that day, and were bellied down in the brush nearby. So this time when the Goths peeled north, Sura and his men had shadowed them. All throughout the day they had followed the trail. In the early evening, Sura had spotted torchlight, leading this way. It was as he had suspected – these mysterious new Goths were using Argedava as their base. A base for what? Invasion?
And there were things far more deadly than Goths out here, he knew. The Huns had been suspiciously quiet in these parts over the last few summers. The thought of those roving, merciless hordes caused him to shiver, the swamp water suddenly feeling like ice. Huns dominating the north, these new mysterious Goths, and the restless, so-called ‘settled’ Goths in the Haims of Roman Thracia. What a dangerous balance. The legions – few as they were – were the thin grout holding the mottled mosaic of the East together.
‘That’s our way in,’ Libo whispered, planting a hand on Sura’s shoulder and pointing towards a stone culvert at the base of the mound, the iron grating within long-ago rusted away.
Sura shot a look towards where the fort battlements should have been, but there was only a ceiling of fog.
‘Perfect. That fog will cover us all the way. Pulcher, Libo – with me. Darik, you stay here with the rest of the legion. Wait here until you see us signal from within the fort.’
‘Signal? What kind of signal, sir?’
Sura eyed the fort sourly. ‘It’ll be a flash of light from the battlements… or my severed head splashing down into this swamp.’
Professional Reviews
Peter Gibbons, author of the hit 'Viking Blood and Blade' series & winner of the 2022 Kindle Storyteller Award
"Doherty once again proves himself a master of Roman fiction. His ability to weave detailed knowledge of the Roman world into a rip-roaring adventure is second to none. This novel is authentic, enthralling, and a must read for anyone in search of swords, adventure, or just to be transported to the ancient world."
Historical Novel Society
"The novel is thick with adventure, intrigue, and high drama. Doherty is a skillful author who draws the reader in with the force of his vision." - Historical Novel Society
Griff Hosker, author of over 150 bestselling historical novels
"I loved this book. You are gripped from the moment you begin to read. Intrigue and treachery ooze from every word of the prologue, guaranteeing that you will read on. An epic story of life in a decaying and self-destructive empire, I can highly recommend the latest book from a master of his craft."
Fifth Book of the Southern Swallow Series. Nan Ya and his crew take a final adventure into a mythical Chinese universe and become entangled in court intrigue.
Fourth Book in the Southern Swallow Series finds the Academician Li K'ai-men in exile on Hai-nan Island. China has a new invasion threat. A showdown between ingenuity and technology explodes as the Sung Dynasty tries to preserve itself.
