The Eagle of the Ninth [book I] Read Online Free PDF Page B

attack drew off, the first cobweb light of a grey and drizzling dawn was creeping over the fort. Marcus and his second-in-command looked at each other, and Marcus asked very softly, ‘How long can we hold out?’
    ‘For several days, with luck,’ muttered Drusillus, pretending to adjust the strap of his shield.
    ‘Reinforcements could get to us in three—maybe two—from Durinum,’ Marcus said. ‘But there was no reply to our signal.’
    ‘Little to wonder in that, sir. To destroy the nearest signal station is an obvious precaution; and no cresset could carry the double distance in this murk.’
    ‘Mithras grant it clears enough to give the smoke column a chance to rise.’
    But there was no sign of anxiety in the face of either of them when they turned from each other an instant later, the older man to go clanging off along the stained and littered rampart walk, Marcus to spring down the steps into the crowded space below. He was a gay figure, his scarlet cloak swirling behind him; he laughed, and made the ‘thumbs up’ to his troops, calling ‘Well done, lads! We will have breakfast before they come on again!’
    The ‘thumbs up’ was returned to him. Men grinned, and here and there a voice called cheerfully in reply, as he disappeared with Centurion Paulus in the direction of the Praetorium.
    No one knew how long the breathing space might last; but at the least it meant time to get the wounded under cover, and an issue of raisins and hard bread to the troops. Marcus himself had no breakfast, he had too many other things to do, too many to think about; amongst them the fate of a half Century under Centurion Galba, now out on patrol, and due back before noon. Of course the tribesmen might have dealt with them already, in which case they were beyond help or the need of it, but it was quite as likely that they would merely be left to walk into the trap on their return, and cut to pieces under the very walls of the fort.
    Marcus gave orders that the cresset was to be kept alight on the signal roof; that at least would warn them that something was wrong as soon as they sighted it. He ordered a watch to be kept for them, and sent for Lutorius of the Cavalry and put the situation to him. ‘If they win back here, we shall of course make a sortie and bring them in. Muster the squadron and hold them in readiness from now on. That is all.’
    ‘Sir,’ said Lutorius. His sulks were forgotten, and he looked almost gay as he went off to carry out the order.
    There was nothing more that Marcus could do about his threatened patrol, and he turned to the score of other things that must be seen to.
    It was full daylight before the next attack came. Somewhere, a war-horn brayed, and before the wild note died, the tribesmen broke from cover, yelling like fiends out of Tartarus as they swarmed up through the bracken; heading for the gates this time, with tree-trunks to serve as rams, with firebrands that gilded the falling mizzle and flashed on the blade of sword and heron-tufted war spear. On they stormed, heedless of the Roman arrows that thinned their ranks as they came. Marcus, standing in the shooting turret beside the Praetorian gate, saw a figure in their van, a wild figure in streaming robes that marked him out from the half-naked warriors who charged behind him. Sparks flew from the firebrand that he whirled aloft, and in its light the horns of the young moon, rising from his forehead, seemed to shine with a fitful radiance of its own. Marcus said quietly to the archer beside him, ‘Shoot me that maniac.’
    The man nocked another arrow to his bow, bent and loosed in one swift movement. The Gaulish Auxiliaries were fine bowmen, as fine as the British; but the arrow sped out only to pass through the wild hair of the leaping fanatic. There was no time to loose again. The attack was thundering on the gates, pouring in over the dead in the ditch with a mad courage that took no heed of losses. In the gate towers the archers