Decimus opened the door to the officers’ mess and peered round before he crossed the threshold. There was no one there due to the late hour and a fire was burning low in the hearth, providing a warm glow that lit up the modest room. He breathed a sigh of relief that he would not have to be in the same room as any of the officers of the Thracian cohort. He quickly shut the door behind him and crossed to the doorway leading through to the storeroom where the officers’ food was stored. General items were shelved on one side, with named shelves for each officer’s private stores opposite. Not that there was much left on any of the shelves, Decimus tutted to himself. There had been little of worth taken from the village, just a few roundels of goat’s cheese, some jugs of their sweet ale and the hard flat loaves of bread that tasted as unappetising as they looked. Decimus picked up two from the common stores and marked the wax slate hanging from a thong by the door. He heard the door open and close a moment later and swallowed anxiously as he emerged from the storeroom and saw the looming bulk of Centurion Quertus standing in front of the door. The glow from the fire cast a gently wavering shadow behind him and lit his dark features with a ruddy glow so that he looked even larger than he did in daylight. His eyes fixed on the prefect’s servant but he said nothing.

Decimus approached hesitantly and nodded towards the door. ‘If you’ll excuse me, sir.’

‘Not yet.’ Quertus spoke in a rumbling undertone. ‘I’m hungry. Fetch me some cheese and bread. And a jug of beer.’

‘Sir, I was just taking these to headquarters.’

‘Later.’

‘The prefect and Centurion Macro are expecting me to return as soon as I can, sir.’

‘Once I’ve finished with you, you can go. Now, build the fire up and then get me my food.’

Decimus hesitated a moment. The Thracian scowled and the servant hurriedly turned about and set the loaves down on a table. He went over to the fire and took some logs from the pile in the corner and stacked them over the embers in tiers before picking up the fan and carefully stirring up some flames until they consumed the lowest logs. All the while he felt the presence of the Thracian officer who had sat down on the nearest bench and watched him work in silence.

‘That’ll do,’ said Quertus. ‘Now the food.’

Decimus scrambled up and made for the foodstore where he heaped a wooden platter with the requested items and returned to serve them to the centurion. ‘There you are, sir. Now if there’s nothing more . . .’