They were close now, the track three-quarters of a mile away or near enough. Ferox was keeping low, and looking through a dried-up bush as he lay on the sloping side of the gulley. Whenever there was a storm, water would flow through here like a torrent, but today it was dry as a bone, so they had to keep the horses as still as possible to prevent them stirring up dust, apart from making any noise. It was nearly noon, and they had come here during the night and thought to bring plenty of water because otherwise the animals would have been parched and suffering by now. In another country he would have hunted for some woodland, to give them shade, but the only patch here was a long bowshot ahead and to his right, and he had good reason not to go there. This was the spot, the spot he would choose if he were in the enemy’s place.

The leading outposts had already passed. At the front were the usual pairs of riders, spread out in a wide screen, almost half a mile ahead. A dozen men riding together and led by a decurion were a few hundred yards back, and an entire turma the same distance behind them. More pairs of men acted as screen on either flank, and made up the rearguard. The prefect Caius Gellius Exoratus was in charge, and from what Ferox had seen was a man who understood his job, even though this was his first posting to the army. He was a Spaniard, in charge of cohors IIII Callaececorum Lucensium equitata, which had been raised in Iberia by the divine Augustus, probably as much as anything to employ the warriors who had fought with such determination against his armies. Nothing much changed, thought the Silurian prince turned centurion. Augustus had also sent the cohort off to Syria, keeping them far away from home and the temptation to use their newfound discipline, drill and weaponry on their new masters. They had stayed there ever since, and Ferox would lay good money to bet that Exoratus was the only man from the Iberian Peninsula in the entire unit. The men would be Syrians and Cilicians, half-starved waifs from the slums of the cities, or the burlier, barely better fed sons of farmers and tenants. No one else tended to be that keen on joining the army.

Ferox could see Exoratus riding up to check on the advance guard. He rode well, head forward as Iberians tended to from the habit of hunting. The man was barely twenty, and both keen and well connected to hold this responsibility so young, for he had been in the post for at least two years. Everything he did was careful and controlled, and with his curly black hair and watchful eyes Ferox could understand why some Romans believed that the Silures were kin to the Spanish. As well as the bulk of his own cohort, apart from detachments left with the main force, Exoratus had cohors III Augusta Thracum equitata, another outfit that had been in and around Syria for nearly a century. There might be some Thracians in the ranks, since after all, the province was closer than Iberia, but the bulk of the men were from the same places as the other cohort. All told, Exoratus had some two hundred horsemen and three hundred and fifty infantry, along with a hundred or so army slaves, some of them armed galearii, and he was using them as well as he could. The cohortes equitatae usually got the dullest, most difficult jobs and this was no exception.