XXII

North west of Nicopolis, some miles from the road

Fifth day before the Ides of May
The thirty-second day of the siege

AS THE SUN set, fires were lit and the scent of stewing and roasting goat meat drifted on the gentle breeze. A man sang, his voice strong and soft with the nasal tone of these lands and he must have been accounted good, for conversation died away as they listened. Afterwards someone played a flute and there was talk and laughter.

This was a good place for a camp, the little stream snaking gently through the middle. The water was low, and in a month or two might run altogether dry, but there was enough for the moment for man and beast alike, and the grass on its banks was higher and lusher than the grazing for a good distance in any direction.

No village was in sight, and only in part because the land formed a shallow bowl, the hills on either side rising so gently that they were scarcely worthy of the name, any more than this place could really be called a valley. Few people lived here, and although the shepherds came here in winter they tended to avoid it at this time of year. The crumbing walls of a dozen or so houses testified that once there had been a settlement, but who those people were, what they had called themselves and what gods they worshipped were all long since forgotten, buried with the dead in their cemetery up on a low rise behind the ruins. There were heaped remains of what had been tombs, a lot of broken pottery and shards of bone in the earth up there. When they first came here the riders had poked around a little, but seen nothing of value. No one wanted to sleep or eat too close to the dead, whoever they had been, but a man did not travel far in these lands if graves bothered him. So they poured a libation to their memory, and did not trouble if any of the horses wandered over to crop the thin grass.

There were half a dozen waggons in the camp, and twice that many tents, most of them big, and one a glorious bright red pavilion that stood out for its height and sheer splendour. Were it not for the row of Roman heads mounted on spears, and the other spoils of weapons and captured horses, the camp had the air of a hunting expedition and was not so very different from the camp of a Sarmatian band or one from any of their kin on the Steppes. The difference was that they did not keep coming back to the same spot during the spring and summer months, and kept a better guard. As night fell, the eating and drinking around the fires, the singing from the royal pavilion and the hubbub of conversation gradually tailed away and the riders and even their servants settled down for the night. There were only a dozen guards, and no outriders patrolling some way out.