Sentius went down them and Ferox followed. To his right were tall houses, and he could not see the breach or the defender’s new rampart. The houses had flat roofs, so there might be a way across, although there was no sign of any stairs. In front were more houses, but there was an alley someway to the left, and if they went down there then maybe they could loop back around and get to the breach. Just a few men coming from behind might well be enough to open the way for the legionaries attacking from outside.

‘Over there!’ Ferox shouted and gestured. The men were streaming down the steps, a mix of Brigantes and legionaries and stopping to sort everyone out would waste precious time when the alarm was going out from the fleeing crewmen. ‘That way! We can try to find our way around!’

‘Do what he says!’ Caecilius shouted.

The alley was narrow, and longer than Ferox had expected. It was empty, so he ran along it, leading the rest. There was no path heading off to the right, only another to the left, so he took that, came to a crossroads with a little fountain, and ahead could see the distant main street they had gone along all those months ago.

With a crash, a heavy tile struck a legionary, crushing his helmet. More missiles came from the high roofs above them.

‘Keep going!’ Caecilius shouted, for there was no point standing to face attackers they could not reach. Ferox ran on, turned right at the crossroads, headed up the narrow street, until he saw an opening on his right and took that. The sound of fighting at the breach was faint, but men appeared, three of them, with oval shields and javelins and they shouted in alarm. One threw a javelin, Ferox flung himself to the side, and it thumped into Sentius’ shield.

‘Kill the bastards!’ the centurion shouted as he charged, and turned the last word into a scream. Ferox pushed himself off the wall and followed. One of the warriors was down, knocked off his feet by a blow from the shield’s boss, and the centurion slashed at the unshielded right of the man next to him, snapping through the spear shaft as the Nicopolitan tried to parry. Ferox went for the other, pushing aside a feeble thrust and then stabbing into the man’s stomach. He was not wearing armour, and up close he could see the lined face and white beard of an old man as he hissed in agony and fell. Sentius finished off his opponent, then slammed the edge of his scutum down to knock out the one on the ground.

‘Which way?’ he asked.

Not far ahead was another junction, leading off to either side, but some sort of high-walled shrine was in front of them and blocking the direction they wanted to go.

‘Go left!’ Vindex shouted, and since he had seen a little more of the city than Ferox it seemed as good a bet as any. He scooped up one of the oval shields, saw that the old man was still alive, but could not do anything for him, so ran on. There were shouts, more tiles, stones and heavy pots coming down at them from the rooftops and a woman’s voice was screaming abuse at them in vilely accented Greek. One of the Brigantians crumpled, his head bleeding from the strike of a tile.