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  "I see smoke ahead," he said as William and Dahmus pulled up beside him. "This must be our destination. Come, let us find somewhere to hide our horses; we go the rest of the way on foot."

  The men dismounted in unison, guiding their horses off the road and into the nearby brush. Fortunately, plenty of foliage was available to serve as cover. The trio tied their horses to a tree thirty feet off the road, hoping that the surrounding terrain and plant life would serve to shield the mounts from sight, then began to gather up their weapons.

  "Are you ready to make these bastards pay, men?" Marcus asked. William and Dahmus nodded enthusiastically. Savage grins painted both of their faces. "Good. Remember, do not speak unless absolutely necessary. We're going to need to scout the perimeter before we do anything. No matter how tempting the prospect, we cannot simply charge into the middle of their settlement and start hacking away at everything that moves. Keep in mind that we will be outnumbered more than seventy to one, so please do not attract any attention just yet. Are there any questions?"

  "Just one," William said. "When do we get to spill some Sicambrii blood?"

  "Soon enough," Marcus said. "Once darkness falls. Now, if there's nothing else?" The lack of reply served Marcus as an affirmative response. Motioning with his head in the direction of the Sicambrii encampment, Marcus slipped into the bushes quietly, taking great care to disguise his presence as thoroughly as possible. It was a testament to his remarkable prowess at this sort of covert scouting that he could move with any sort of silence at all while burdened with not only heavy armour, but also a bow, arrows, his sword, dagger, and a spear. His companions followed, making only slightly more noise despite being just as heavily burdened. They half-marched, half-crawled through the brush for what seemed like an eternity before the Sicambrii settlement finally came into sight.

  The settlement was smaller than the village of Alealnar, though not significantly so. Unlike the Roman village, however, the Sicambrii settlement was composed of haphazardly constructed huts. A huge bonfire was already burning in the centre of the settlement, and even from his perch nearly four hundred feet away Marcus could see Sicambrii gathered around the fire. The racous noise of their dancing and shouting was easily audible, and the heady smell of roast pork wafted on the gentle breeze.

  "Perfect," Marcus whispered to his companions. "We've caught them in the middle of a feast. In a few hours, they will be so drunk that we will be able to cut them down without them even realizing what is happening."

  "What do we do in the meantime?" Dahmus whispered in response.

  "We wait," Marcus whispered, setting his spear and bow down. "And we watch. If any of the barbarians wander away from the village, we can kill them, but in the meantime we wait for the opportune moment."

  "You mean like those two?" William whispered, pointing at two Sicambrii who were stumbling away from the settlement in their direction.

  "Do you think they've spotted us," Dahmus asked quietly, "and are dispatching guards to stop us?"

  "No," Marcus said. "Not unless the Sicambrii have begun to embrace the love which dare not speak its name. Those two are obviously looking for somewhere to...get romantic, if you will."

  "So what do we do? They're coming this way," William whispered. "Do we just run out there and kill them?"

  "Not unless you want me to put an arrow through your ass before you take your first five steps," Marcus said. "No, we shall let them come to us. Back up. Come on, move into the shadows." Marcus picked up the weaponry which he had laid upon the ground and slowly creeped backward, never taking his eyes off the pair of the Sicambrii. William and Dahmus followed suit, waiting tensely as the couple slowly approached. Marcus grasped his spear lightly, gesturing silently for William and Dahmus to do the same. An eternity seemed to pass as the drunken couple stumbled their way towards the trio, pausing every few steps to grope and kiss before stumbling on further. Finally, the couple came to a stop within a few paces of Marcus and his companions. Marcus looked at William, then at Dahmus. They were both watching him intently, awaiting his signal. He nodded to them, and without a single word the three men charged from their position amongst the bushes, brandishing their spears at waist level. The Sicambrii, totally engrossed in their romantic interlude, did not even see the men approach. Their deaths came quickly as the spears thrust upward and into their bodies. Marcus' spear tore into the Sicambrii man's throat, snapping his head back with the force of the blow. William's blow skewered both Sicambrii, piercing through the woman's back, through her stomach, and into the man's chest. Dahmus' aim with his spear was shaky; a blow intended to pierce the Sicambrii man's heart instead sliced through the muscles in his chest, skipping along the bones of his ribcage. Dahmus lost his footing and plunged down to the ground, swinging his weapon with him. The spear's backstroke drove the tip into the female Sicambrii's shoulder. The couple dropped to the ground, dead before they even had the opportunity to utter a sound. Pulling his spear free of the entangled corpses, Marcus creeped back into the bushes, indicating that he expected both Dahmus and William to follow suit.

  "Shouldn't we retrieve their bodies?" Dahmus asked once they had retreated to suitable cover.

  "I don't think it will be necessary," Marcus said. "Do you see the way they collapsed on top of each other? They're far enough away from their brethren that, even if someone should spot their bodies on the ground, the natural assumption will be that they are...occupied."

  Marcus was correct; over the next several hours, no more Sicambrii had approached their position, or even left the settlement. As the time gradually passed, the trio was able to watch the Sicambrii pass out around the fire, one by one. Those who did not pass out by the fire retreated to their respective huts, and by the time the settlement was engulfed in the darkness of the night, there were no traces of conscious life remaining in the settlement.

  Slowly edging closer to the settlement, Marcus nocked an arrow in his bow. Once he had crept to within roughly two hundred feet of the nearest Sicambrii, he signalled to his companions.

  "Stay close," he whispered, "and do not make a sound. When I give the signal, kill every one of these damned barbaric heathens. Try to do it silently; if they wake up and fight back, this will take far longer than it has to."

  Taking great care to be absolutely silent, Marcus slowly drew his sword from its sheath. The orange glow from the nearby fire glinted off the polished blade, casting shadows across Marcus' face. William and Dahmus followed suit, drawing their swords quietly from their sheathes. When he was certain that the group was prepared for the task before them, Marcus grinned savagely, and gestured at the settlement with his sword.

  "Kill them all," he said. Marcus scuttled forward, trying to remain as well hidden as the shadows would allow. Closing in on the nearest Sicambrii man, Marcus dropped to his knees and plunged the blade of his sword into the man's throat. The force of the blow was enough to sever the man's head from his body and force the blade several inches into the ground; a spray of blood erupted from the wound, coating both Marcus and his sword. The grisly shower did not slow Marcus down at all. He pulled his sword from the ground and moved on to the next unconscious man. A quick downward chop was all that was required for his sword to slice through the man's neck, severing muscle and bone. Marcus continued his grisly foray, stepping from body to body, slicing, chopping, and stabbing until he was covered nearly from head to toe in the blood of the Sicambrii men he had killed. He was morbidly pleased with how smoothly the assault was proceeding; after nearly half an hour, he had personally slain forty men, and estimated that seventy five had been killed in all. This is how Odysseus must have felt, Marcus thought,as he and his friends leapt from the wooden horse and stalked through the streets of Troy.

  Any pleasure Marcus was feeling about their progress was quashed by the sound of a scream coming from one of the nearby huts. He whirled around instinctively to face the source of the sound to see an enraged Sicambrii warrior standing several feet away, standing o
utside the doorway of his home. The warrior charged directly at Marcus, brandishing a waraxe. Desperate to silence the warrior, Marcus stepped forward into his charge, dodging to the side in order to avoid the warrior's axe while thrusting his sword upward into the warrior's belly. Marcus averted his gaze just in time to avoid the horrid onslaught of entrails which spilled from the hole in the warrior's stomach. Although he had succeeded at silencing the warrior, a quick glance around the settlement confirmed that he had been too late to prevent the man's war-cry from waking his compatriots.

  "Ah, damnable fates!" Marcus exlaimed in horror, watching as the Sicambrii laying around the fire began to stir and rise. Well,he thought,it's too late to abandon the mission. If we run for cover, they will stop us. I suppose there is no alternative but to resign ourselves to outright conflict.

  Switching from his two-handed grip on his sword to a single-handed grip, Marcus drew his dagger with his left hand. Lunging forward, he hacked and slashed at the drunken Sicambrii warriors, who were still struggling to gain their footing. His hands acted independently, weaving a constant pattern of attack on two seperate fronts. Five more Sicambrii fell under his blades before any of the warriors near him had even managed to stand. A noise behind him caused Marcus to whirl around with a vicious war-cry, raising his sword above his head, poised to strike downward. The sight of a child standing before him forced him to hesitate; the tiny, unkempt boy stared up at Marcus in disbelief, utterly unable to comprehend what was happening around him. In the fraction of a second that Marcus hesitated, William lunged in from his position fighting a warrior several feet nearby. William showed no trace of the mercy which had stayed Marcus' hand, and his blade pierced through the child's shoulder, running cleanly through the body and out the child's back. Rather than simply pulling his sword straight out of the wound, William forced his sword upward in a sharp movement. The weapon erupted upward through the boy's collar bone, causing him to drop straight to the ground in an unseemly heap. William gave Marcus a quizzical look; he had obviously seen the hesitation in Marcus' eyes, and had not understood it. Marcus pretended that he had neither hesitated nor noticed William's puzzled look; he twisted to his left to hack at another warrior, but before he could drive his sword into the man's flesh, a hot flash of pain ran through his right shoulder. He did not need to look to realize that Alexandra's careful stitching was not holding up well to his strenuous activity.

  Marcus leapt back into the relative safety of the nearest hut's doorway. He quickly and unceremoniously wiped blood off the blades of his weapons with his cloak, then sheathed them carefully. Reaching around his back to pick up his bow, Marcus dropped to one knee in the doorway, setting his quiver down beside his knee. With speed befitting an expert archer, Marcus swiftly nocked an arrow and drew the bowstring back. Uttering a quiet invocation to Mars, he let the arrow fly, picking up and nocking another arrow before the first had even struck its intended target. Releasing five more arrows in quick succession, Marcus watched five more Sicambrii men and women fall to the ground under the deadly hail. As he nocked his next arrow, he took a fraction of a second to assess his companions' respective situations. William was apparently having the time of his life, hacking one warrior limb from limb while simultaneously dodging wild blows from a Sicambrii woman. Dahmus was having a worse time of it; he was surrounded by three armed warriors and a single child who had somehow managed to heft a battleaxe which was nearly twice as large as he was. Without a second thought, Marcus released two arrows at the warriors battling Dahmus. The warriors fell, only to be replaced by three more from the chaotic crowd which was milling around the bonfire.

  The battle raged in this manner for nearly three full hours; for every barbarian who fell under sword or arrow, two more seemed to spring up to take his place. Marcus had run out of arrows, and was forced to resort to wielding his sword in his left hand as he waded ankle deep through corpses and a veritable river of blood, hacking awkwardly at man, woman, and child as he tried desperately to maintain his footing. When he had been fighting so long that his legs felt as if they were made of rubber, and he could hardly support his own weight anymore, William delivered a stunning blow to the last standing Sicambrii warrior, dropping the man onto a pile of his fellow warriors, a torrent of blood rushing through the gash in his throat.

  Wiping blood from his sword once more, Marcus sheathed the weapon and laughed. The sound was an almost unearthly howling which was soon joined by similar laughs from both Dahmus and William.

  "That," Marcus said between howls of laughter, "is how battle is done!"

  The laughter gradually tapered off, leaving the three men standing amidst heaps of corpses. Each of them was covered in blood from head to toe; most of it belonged to the fallen Sicambrii warriors, but there was undoubtedly some Roman blood mixed in the crimson mass. Wiping his brow with one hand, William left behind a streak of blood and grime which was arguable worse than what had been there originally.

  "So," William said with one last grisly giggle, "what do we do now?"

  "Did you bring the oil and flint as I instructed you to?" Marcus asked.

  "Of course," William replied.

  "Then burn it. Burn everything to the ground, and leave these damnable corpses to rot in tomorrow's sun."

  ***

  The trip back to Alealnar was marked by an uncomfortable silence between William and Marcus, and a constant stream of chatter from Dahmus. William seemed to be weighing and judging Marcus mentally; he had obviously decided that Marcus' split-second hesitation in battle was something which bore serious consideration. Dahmus, on the other hand, was overjoyed at having finally experienced what he called "the thrill of battle". He seemed intent on recounting every instant of the battle from his perspective to Marcus and William, seemingly forgetting that the two men had both been present at the incident in question. Marcus heaved a sigh of relief as the village finally came into sight; dawn's first rays of sunlight were beginning to peer down on the village, illuminating the battle-weary travellers in a golden glow. Since there was no source of water on the road back to Alealnar - save for the Sicambrii settlement's well, which was now little more than a pile of ash and collapsed stones - the men had not even bothered with the pretense of cleaning off the blood and muck which covered every inch of their bodies.

  Alexandra was waiting at the outskirts of the village, her eyes fixed on the road before her. She leaped to her feet as she saw the men approach; several children from the village were sitting beside her, just as eager to witness the arrival of the soldiers as Alexandra. Their excitement quickly mixed with wonder and a little fear as Marcus and his companions came close enough to be properly seen.

  "Marcus," Alexandra said, breathlessly approaching his horse, "what happened? Is it..."

  "It is done," Marcus said, gazing down at Alexandra with a tired smile. "Those Sicambrii will not trouble this village again. Where is Tamanash?"

  "I am here," Tamanash said, stepping out from behind a house. "I must admit, I almost didn't believe it when my daughter came dashing into our home, screaming that you were back here in one piece...although, by the Gods, it looks like 'one piece' may not be entirely true."

  "No," Marcus said with a laugh, "it is true, though I trust that you will make some sort of bath available to us at the earliest convenience. Although none of us have suffered more than minor wounds, our appearances have suffered some temporary setbacks. We may be left with a few scars after today, but we are certainly in much better shape than the Sicambrii."

  "You killed them all?" Tamanash asked incredulously. "Tallur will not be pleased. Do you know that he approached me after you three left last night and told me that he thought we should send a rider ahead to warn the barbarians? It seems he is of the mind that it is better to garner favour, and hopefully protection, from the barbarians, rather than to fight them. I do not agree with him, but I must say that he did make one good point: the Sicambrii will eventually discover what has happened, and they will seek retr
ibution."

  "Perhaps," Marcus said. "Yes, perhaps they shall. That is why we will set to work on constructing a training camp here, so that you will be able to defend yourself should that day ever come."

  "Of course," Tamanash said. "When will you want to begin, by the way?"

  "As soon as possible," Marcus said. "In fact, if you would be so kind as to oblige us by providing a bath right now, we should be able to begin as early as this afternoon."

  "That will not be a problem," Tamanash assured Marcus. "In fact, I would ask that you accompany me to my home - you are more than welcome to bathe there. I would first ask you one final question, if I may."

  "You may," Marcus said.

  "What would you have us do about Tallur?"

  "Do you believe that he intends to betray us to the Sicambrii, or just that he wants us to avoid open hostilities?"

  "In the end," Tamanash said, "is there a difference?"

  "I suppose not," Marcus said. "I will entrust the situation to your capable hands, Tamanash. We will stand by any decision you make. Now, if you would be so kind..."

  "Of course. Follow me, please."

  Tamanash lead the way to his home, and the three soldiers were soon surrounded by an entourage of villagers rushing out to see the returning heroes. The men smiled and waved at the villagers, but did not dismount from their horses until they had arrived at Tamanash's home. For all three men, the dismount was less of a graceful step-down, and more of an exhausted flop to the ground. The soldiers followed Tamanash into his home, maintaining a dignified stride despite being so exhausted that they could hardly stand. The reward was well worth the difficulty, however; the bath in Tamanash's home was far more luxurious than one would normally expect from such a small town. It was spacious enough for half a dozen people to comfortably bathe simultaneously; a frescoe depicting a gladiatoral contest decorated the west wall, though the heavy steam which pervaded the room obscured the artwork somewhat.