The Eagle's Vengeance by Anthony Riches Page A

wrists you’ve got there, sonny, but you’ve no need for the blade. There’s no one round here to offer you a fight, that’s for certain.’ He stepped into what had been the vegetable garden of a half-collapsed house, reaching down to grasp a knee-high plant and pull it up by the roots. ‘Here you are ma’am, ligusticum.’
    Felicia looked down at the herb garden, plants growing uncontrolled in the absence of their previous owner.
    ‘And not just ligusticum either. I see thymus and feniculum as well. Gather it all please, especially the ligusticum. That which we don’t use for cooking can be boiled up to make a very effective means of cleaning wounds and preventing infection. Oh, and I’ll have as much of that as you men can carry …’ Directing the soldiers’ attention to a plant that had grown up in the shadow of the destroyed structure’s remaining beams, she laughed at their mystified stares. ‘That bush isn’t just good for producing rasp-berries in the autumn, the leaves are wonderfully powerful sources of goodness. And we’ll have a strong need of that particular remedy before very long, I expect.’
    She turned to see Lupus stretching up to pick a dark-purple berry from an overhanging bush.
    ‘Leave that, Lupus dear, it’s quite the most poisonous fruit known to man.’ She turned to the soldier. ‘I’ll have a helmet full of those berries though, if you could pick them for me without breaking them please? After every battle there are men whose injuries are too terrible for them to live, and who nevertheless cling on to life for hours or even days of suffering. Even a few drops of the juice of that berry are usually enough to send them on their way without further suffering.’
    Tullo sat back and sipped at his beer again, looking with what Marcus took for calculation at the three men facing him.
    ‘So now you know what we’ve been through perhaps you’ll find it in you to recognise that in our shoes you might be looking just as shagged out and pathetic as we do now.’
    Dubnus held out his beaker and tapped brims with the legion centurion.
    ‘Here’s to you. I don’t reckon our men would have reacted any better if we’d ordered them to sack the villages around our fort on the wall.’
    Julius nodded reluctantly, and Tullo leaned forward again, slipping a wooden tablet out of his tunic and putting it on the table next to his beaker. When he spoke, his words were pitched so low that the Tungrians had to strain to hear them.
    ‘The rumours have it that you’re marching north to get our eagle back.’
    He sat in silence, staring intently at Julius and waiting for the first spear to reply. After a long pause the burly centurion sat forward and narrowed his eyes in question.
    ‘That’s supposed to be a secret. Who the fuck told you?’
    Tullo smiled tightly back at him.
    ‘My first spear. And don’t worry, I know how to keep my mouth shut.’ He pointed to the tablet with a meaningful expression. ‘As it happens I’d say he had good reason for letting me in on that little secret, since he knows what’s written in here.’
    The first spear’s face set in sceptical lines and he shook his head.
    ‘I’ll be the judge of that, if it’s all the same to you.’
    Tullo shrugged, picking up the tablet.
    ‘Suit yourself. Hear me out for just a little longer and then tell me to “fuck off and die quietly” if you like.’ He leaned close again. ‘It wasn’t just me that joined up, all those years ago. My brother Harus came to present himself to the recruiting centurion alongside me, two years younger than me and about twice as good at soldiering as ever I managed. He could’ve done the job of centurion without breaking a sweat, and I reckon he’d have made a bloody good cohort first spear, perhaps even got the big man’s job at the head of the legion’s first century with a little bit of luck. But all of that command stuff wasn’t for him …’ He paused for a moment and looked up at