Eagle's Honour Read online

  Contents

  Cover

  Title Page

  Dedication

  A Circlet of Oak Leaves

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Eagle’s Egg

  1. The Girl at the Well

  2. Marching Orders

  3. Campaign in the North

  4. Eagle’s Egg

  5. The Last Battle

  6. Return to Eburacum

  About the Author

  Copyright

  Eagle’s Honour

  Rosemary Sutcliff

  For

  all four houses of

  Hilsea Modern Girls’ School, Portsmouthv

  (my school)

  who adopted me like a battleship or a regimental goat

  but just a little bit extra

  for Sutcliff House

  A Circlet of Oak

  Leaves

  CHAPTER ONE

  Outside, a little mean spring wind came siffling up from the river, humming across the parade ground of the great fortress in the dark, and tumbling the garbage along the narrow streets of Isca Silurium, but within the open door of the Rose and Wine Skin was lamplight and the warmth of braziers, and a companionable rise and fall of voices.

  Three young Auxiliary Cavalrymen stood propped against the high trestle table at the far end, talking to the retired Gaulish Javelin man who kept the place, but each with an ear twitching towards the nearest corner, where a knot of Legionaries with long-service bracelets and faces like tanned harness leather, had pulled two benches together and were setting the world to rights.

  ‘That’s what I say!’ One of the veterans brought an open hand down on the bench beside him with a slam that set the wine cups jumping. ‘All this talk about the need for more Cavalry is so much moon’s-milk. It’s us, the line-of-battle lads that carry the day, every time.’

  Another nodded, consideringly. ‘It’s the speed and mobility they’re after, of course.’

  And a third laughed into his wine cup. ‘Comes in useful for retreating.’

  ‘It was just the same, that time the Picts broke through the Northern Wall – the time the Legate was killed. Six or seven wings of Cavalry, the 6th had with them, when they went up to deal with that lot of blue painted devils, and so far as I can make out the Dacians were the only ones that didn’t run like redshanks at the first sound of the Pictish yell.’

  The young Auxiliaries had been listening to all this, staring straight before them. Now, one of them, flushing slowly crimson under his ragged cap of barley-pale hair, stepped out from the rest and edged over to the veterans.

  ‘I ask pardon, sir,’ he swallowed thickly. ‘My mates and I couldn’t help hearing. You did say, “As far as you could make out?” You weren’t there yourself, then, sir?’

  The first veteran looked up, his thick brows shooting towards the roots of his hair. ‘No, I’d a brother there, if it concerns you. He lost a hand when the left flank was crumpled up – it helped him to remember.’

  ‘I’m sorry, sir, but that – losing a hand, I mean – mightn’t help him remember very clearly.’

  One of the group gave a snort of laughter. ‘It’s a Cavalry cub. You’ve hurt his honour, Gavrus.’

  ‘Too bad, Hirpinius,’ Gavrus said. ‘I’ve had enough of you, my lad. You’re only a little boy, and you don’t know anything yet but what the recruiting officer told you. Everyone knows the Tungrians and the Asturians ran like redshanks. Come back and quarrel with me when you’ve learned to grow a beard!’

  There was a roar of laughter from the rest of the Legionaries. The boy’s hands clenched into large knuckled red fists. His mates had begun to come up behind him. At any moment there was going to be trouble, and the wine-shop owner looked on anxiously. He had been an Auxiliary himself, and quite clearly, whatever happened, the boys were going to get the sticky end of the vine staff.

  But at that moment a rangy, loose-limbed man, who had been lounging on the bench nearest the door, unfurled himself lazily and came across to join the group.

  ‘The Picts fired the heather, and the flames stampeded the horses.’

  Everyone turned to stare at him, including the shop’s owner, who knew him well enough: head man to old Lyr the horse breeder, who came down a couple of times a year, with wild-eyed, rough-broken three-year-olds to sell to the garrison horse-master. And the man stared back at them out of slightly widened eyes that seemed pale as rain by contrast with his dark hard-bitten face.

  Out of a moment’s startled silence, Gavrus said, ‘And who in Hades are you?’

  ‘My name is Aracos, for what that’s worth; from Thrace in the beginning, from the hills a day’s trail westward now!’

  ‘So. And it was fire that stampeded the horses?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘You were there, I suppose?’

  ‘Yes.’

  There was a general gasp, and somebody spluttered into his wine cup.

  Then Gavrus, still only half believing, repeated, ‘You were there?’

  ‘I’ve lived long enough to be other things before I was a horse breeder.’

  ‘Tungrian Cavalry? or Asturian?’

  ‘Dacian,’ Aracos said, and added obligingly, ‘the ones who didn’t run like redshanks, you know.’

  Gavrus took a long swig at his wine, studying him over the rim of the cup all the while, then set it down. ‘Oddly enough, I believe you. Just by way of interest, why didn’t the Dacian horses stampede with the rest?’

  ‘Because the Dacians teach their horses tricks. Haven’t you ever seen a Dacian squadron showing off? Standing on horseback or clinging under the brute’s belly, or leaping them through the flames of a fire-trench? When the Picts’ fire came down on us, our horses were used to the flames, and not afraid.’

  The young Auxiliaries looked at each other; one of them whisded under his breath.

  ‘So simple as that, eh?’ Abrupdy Gavrus shifted along the bench, his leathery face breaking into a grin. ‘You’ve your cup with you – join us and fill up to show there’s no ill feeling; you too, my bold infants. Hai, Landlord, more wine all round!’ There was a general shifting up to make room, and in a few moments, the Auxiliaries still a little stiff, they were all sitting together, while the shop’s owner himself brought the wine.

  Pouring the harsh red stuff into the cup Aracos held out, he said, reproachfully, ‘It must be four – five times you’ve been in here, and never said you were one of us.’

  ‘You never asked me,’ Aracos said.

  Under the warming influence of the wine, the atmosphere was growing friendly, and Aracos felt the warmth of old comradeship and a familiar world drawing him in again, doing more, had he but realised it, than ever the rough Sabine wine could do, to make him unwary….

  They talked of girls, the price of barley-beer, the evil-mindedness of Centurions, and so came back again to old battles, to the one particular battle, ten years past.

  One of the Legionaries, a dark-faced man more silent than his fellows, looked up abruptly from the depth of his wine cup into which he had been staring. ‘Of course! That was it!’

  ‘Um?’ Gavrus prompted.

  ‘There was something else about that fight – I was trying to remember what it was.’

  ‘And what was it?’

  ‘One of the Auxiliaries earned himself the Corona Civica.’

  ‘Sa ha! ‘Tisn’t often that goes to an Auxiliary. No offence, ‘tisn’t often it goes to anybody, come to that. Any idea who it was?’

  ‘One of the fire-eating Dacians. I’ve an idea it was the pennant-bearer.’ Hirpinius turned quickly to the stranger in their midst. ‘Fools that we are! Of course you’re the one wh
o’d be knowing….’ He checked, his eyes suddenly widening at what he saw in Aracos’s face, his mouth ajar.

  But it was one of the Auxiliaries who said in a tone of awed discovery, ‘It was you, wasn’t it?’

  The Corona Civica, the highest award for personal bravery under the Eagles! They were all staring at him now. ‘You?’ someone said incredulously. ‘You!’

  Something flickered far behind the horse breeder’s eyes. For a moment he hesitated, then shrugged. ‘You could say I earned it – yes.’ There was a note of bitter amusement in his tone, as though he laughed inwardly at an ugly jest against himself.

  ‘But man! Why keep it under your helmet! It isn’t exactly a thing to be ashamed of!’

  ‘I’ve no special reason to talk about it.’

  ‘No reason – Oh, come on, lad, don’t pretend you’re not human.’

  ‘See now,’ Aracos said, ‘I’m out from under the Eagles’ Wings, and all that is in the past. A circle of gilt oak leaves doesn’t carry any weight in the hill horse-runs. Let’s drop it.’

  But Gavrus, who seemed the leader among the rest, was already shouting for more wine to celebrate, and one of the Auxiliaries, who had been gazing worshipfully at the unsuspected hero in their midst, leaned forward and said, ‘Sir – will you tell us about it?’

  Aracos’s face was flushed, and his pale eyes had reckless sparks in them, but at the eager words he set down his empty wine cup, which the moment before he had been holding up to be refilled with the rest, laughed, shook his head, and lounged a little unsteadily to his feet. ‘Maybe another time – another year. Not tonight; I’ve an early start for the hills in the morning.’

  Making his somewhat zigzag way back to the leather merchant’s house on the outskirts of town where he always lodged when he brought the horses down, Aracos cursed inwardly by all the gods he knew.

  What a fool he had been to get caught up in the thing at all. He must have been drunker than he realised. But in his inmost places he knew that drunk or sober would have made little difference. He couldn’t have sat there and let the boys take up the challenge alone and land themselves in the trouble they were heading for. Yes, but he might at least have had enough wits about him, when the Corona Civica came up, not to let the old story show all over his face. Ah well, it would be half a year before his next trip down from the hills; he’d probably never see tonight’s bunch again, and old Sylvanus who kept the wine shop would forget.

  CHAPTER TWO

  But old Sylvanus did not forget. It made too good a story to tell to customers. Finally Aracos simply shrugged and accepted the situation. Being a hero was always good for a free drink, anyway.

  He went on accepting it for two and a half years, and then one autumn day he went down to Isca Silurium with the usual string of remounts, struck his bargain with the garrison horse-master, and took himself to the Rose and Wine Skin to wash the dust of the horse-yards out of his throat.

  Most of the men crowded about the braziers were strangers to him, but two or three Legionaries whom he knew were grouped together in the far corner. He headed across to join them, but mid-way, a voice exploded in his ear. ‘Aracos! Now by Jupiter’s Thunderbolt, if it isn’t Aracos!’ And as he looked round, somebody surged into his path; he saw a lean and beaky face with small bright eyes and a coarse, good-humoured mouth, and remembered it from a long time ago.

  He felt as though someone had jolted him in the pit of the stomach. ‘Nasik! What do you do here?’ The words sounded stupid in his own ears.

  ‘What should I be doing here? The Third Wing’s just posted here – back from Pannonia. What do you do here?’

  ‘Work for a Horse-Chieftain in the hills. Want any remounts?’

  A couple of the older Cavalrymen joined in, grinning and exclaiming at the smallness of the Empire; the younger ones were new since his time. He had a choking desire to turn and thrust his way out into the street again, but that would not stop the thing happening, only mean it happening behind his back.…

  And then old Sylvanus joined his voice to the rest. ‘Here’s a fine reunion. You’ll have been together in that northern fighting, ten years ago? Well now, you’re just the lads we want, for we’ve never yet got him to tell us how he came by the Corona Civica.’

  A couple of the Legionaries whom Aracos knew, had joined the group and added their voices to the rest. ‘Now you can tell us. Come on now, tell the tale; don’t be bashful, my wood anemone!’

  Nasik looked from them to Aracos, puzzled; then burst into a shout of laughter. ‘Corona Civica? It’s a jest, isn’t it?’

  There was a sudden uneasiness among the onlookers, a sharp, startled pause. ‘A jest? No, why should it be?’ someone said.

  Nasik broke off his laughter. ‘You don’t mean to say – did he tell you he got the Civica?’

  Aracos stood quite still, fronting the perplexed and startled faces. There was a little smile on his mouth, as set as though it were carved in stone.

  One of the Legionaries, as though defending himself in advance from the charge of being easily duped, said, ‘One of the Dacians did get the Civica in that fight.’

  ‘Yes, but not this one. Why, by our Lady of the Foals! He’s never been a soldier! He was a medical orderly – an Army butcher’s fetch-and-carry man!’

  A second Dacian had come up beside the first. ‘So you thought you’d snap up Felix’s cast-off glory, did you? He being dead and not needing it any more!’

  The wine-shop owner turned a troubled eye on the silent man in their midst. ‘Well? You’d best be saying something, hadn’t you?’

  The whole shop was silent to hear his answer, and Aracos, looking round at them with that lazy smile still engraved on his lips, saw that they were not exactly hostile – yet – but the startled perplexity was hardening into disgust, and a hint of the delight of boys watching a cat with a pannikin tied to its tail.

  ‘Surely. It’s all perfectly true,’ he said on a note of amusement.

  ‘But why?’ – the wine-shop keeper began.

  Aracos shrugged. ‘It’s dull, up in the hills. I wanted to see if you would be fools enough to believe me – and behold, you were.’

  A growl of anger answered him, and a small red-haired Legionary got menacingly to his feet. ‘Why you – you – I’ll teach you to make fools of us again!’

  But his neighbour seized him by the shoulder and slammed him back on to the bench. ‘Leave him be. He’s not worth getting rounded up by the Watch Patrol for, he looks a much worse fool than we do, anyway.’

  Aracos turned to the landlord. ‘I came in for a drink, but I don’t much care for the smell in here tonight.’ He turned, and pushed out into the windy dark, careful not to betray by the set of his shoulders that he heard the shout of laughter and the insults that followed him.

  One man among the Dacians had looked up with a start when Nasik first shouted the newcomer’s name, and had remained quite still, watching him, through the whole ugly scene that came after. In the somewhat shamefaced silence that followed the laughter, before the shout went up for more wine, he got up with some excuse to his companions, and left the wine shop.

  Outside in the street he checked a moment, then turned uphill towards the Dexter Gate of the fortress, still dimly visible in the gusty autumn twilight.

  Aracos went downhill towards his lodging. He would not think until he got back to the little room under the roof where he could be alone. He must get away from people, from faces in the light of open doorways.

  He came to the leather merchant’s door and went in. The daughter of the house came out from an inner room when she heard him; he had always liked her, but tonight he only wanted to be left alone. ‘You are early,’ she said, ‘but supper will be ready soon.’

  He shook his head. ‘I am not hungry, Cordaella.’

  He went past her, up the ladder to the room under the roof. He kicked the door shut behind him, and sat down on the narrow cot. The small earthenware lamp had been lit ready for him, early
though he was, and he sat staring at it, not seeing it at all, seeing only the faces in the Rose and Wine Skin, hearing the laughter. He wouldn’t come down to Isca Silurium again. Old Lyr could make some other arrangement about getting his horses sold. The small sharp pain that came on him sometimes after an especially hard struggle with an unbroken colt, was flickering under his ribs and down his left arm, but he was no more aware of it than he was of the lamp flame.

  CHAPTER THREE

  A long while later, feet came up the ladder, and a hand was on the latch. Cordaella’s voice said, ‘Aracos.’

  ‘Go away, Cordaella. I’m not hungry.’

  ‘There is someone here to speak with you.’

  ‘Tell whoever it is,’ Aracos said carefully and distinctly, ‘to go to Gehenna!’

  There was a murmur of voices. The latch rattled down, the door opened and closed again. ‘I am sorry,’ said a quiet voice. ‘Don’t blame the woman; she tried to stop me.’

  Aracos swung round to see a slight youngish man with the badge of the Dacian Horse on his belt buckle, and on the breast of his tunic the entwined serpents of Esculapius that marked him for one of the Medical Corps. Aracos had not consciously noticed him in the wine shop, but he knew him again.

  ‘Get out!’

  ‘Presently.’

  ‘Now! Didn’t you have enough fun in the Rose and Wine Skin that you must come after me for more?’

  ‘I would have been here sooner.’ The young Medic ignored that. ‘But had to go back to my quarters to fetch this that I have for you – from Felix.’

  ‘Felix is dead,’ Aracos said dully. ‘I didn’t know, until they said so this evening.’

  ‘He died between my hands, two years ago in Pannonia. He bade me take this, and get it to a certain Aracos from Thrace, who was a medical orderly with the Dacians during the Pictish troubles. But you had left the Eagles, and I could not pick up your trail, so I have kept it with my own gear ever since, just on the chances….’ He bent and laid on the cot a flat bundle wrapped in a piece of old uniform cloth. ‘The Empire is a small place, as our friends said.’