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The mail was fringed with a serrated tip pattern and hung well on his slight frame. The metal was of a lighter hue than normal mail and gleamed dully in the daylight streaming in through the tent flaps.
    ‘Comfortable, is it not?’ the Syrian purred. ‘You could march in that all day and fight a battle at the end of it and be only half as tired as you would be wearing your old cuirass. And it does not hamper your movements as much. A warrior needs to flow in his movements, no? This armour will give you the freedom of an Achilles, noble sir.’
    Cato twisted on his hips and tried a few movements with his arms. It was true that the mail felt a little less cumbersome than mail vests he had worn in the past. He turned to his friend. ‘What do you think?’
    Macro cocked his head slightly to the side and looked Cato up and down. ‘It looks like a good fit, my lad, but what matters is how good it is at keeping out the weapons of your enemies. Mail is good enough for the slash of a sword, even though a decent blow will break the bones beneath. The real danger is from the point. A decent javelin or arrowhead will pierce mail easily enough.’
    ‘Not this vest,’ the merchant intervened, and pinched a fold of the mail. ‘If I may explain, sir? See here, the links are riveted. That gives added strength and will keep the barbarous points of your enemy at bay. Your learned companion, the formidable Centurion Macro, will surely know that a riveted vest is far, far better than those whose rings are merely butted up, or overlapped. Moreover, as you can see, the rings are smaller, making it harder still to pierce this superb example of my cousin’s fine workmanship.’
    Cato tilted his head to look at the mail on his shoulder. It was as the merchant said: each ring sealed with a tiny rivet, a time-consuming process that meant that it took far longer to produce this vest than those worn by the majority of soldiers in the legions and auxiliary units. That would be reflected in the cost of it, he reflected as he chewed his lip. He had recently received his first pay since landing in Britannia nearly four months before. It had been six months since he had officially been appointed to the rank of prefect, with an annual wage of twenty thousand denarii. He had drawn five thousand in advance to cover the modest wedding feast following his marriage to Julia, and to pay for his kit and travel to take up his command. The dowry paid by her father, Senator Sempronius, had been left with Julia so that she could buy them a small house in Rome, furnish and staff it and have enough on deposit to live off the interest until Cato returned, or sent for her. Meanwhile he had received the second quarterly payment of his salary and could afford to buy some new kit.
    Not having the benefit of coming from a wealthy family, like many men of his rank in the army, Cato was growing conscious of the simpleness of his small wardrobe and his armour. He was not unaware of the haughty glances cast at him by some of the other officers every time General Ostorius summoned his subordinates to the daily briefings at his command tent. Despite his fine military record, there had been no mistaking the disdain in the voices of those who placed more value on aristocratic lineage than raw ability and proven achievements. Even the general himself had made little secret of his disapproval of the youngest auxiliary cohort commander in his army.
    That, Cato was certain, lay behind the general’s decision to put him in charge of guarding the army’s baggage train. The baggage escort comprised the survivors of the garrison of the fort at Bruccium, a wing of Thracian cavalry, brigaded with Macro’s cohort of legionaries from the Fourteenth Legion. Both units had suffered heavy losses during the siege of the fort and there was little chance of being assigned to other duties before the end of the campaign season when the army went into winter quarters. Until then, Cato, Macro and