Cerialis laughed so loud that he startled the horses.

‘I think they know we’re coming now,’ Ferox said. In truth they had encountered no one and that made him wonder a little, although the presence of so many troopers riding in close column was hard to miss. The locals had enough reason to be wary of any bands of men riding in the darkness, given the slavers and the nomads who might just decide that a bit of robbery with violence would be profitable and entertaining. Vindex and several parties of Brigantes were scouting ahead of the column and he could trust them to spot any threat. His instincts told him that no armed men were out there, waiting in ambush, but it was wiser to assume the worst. For all the excitement of the night ride, which brought back childhood memories of hot winter fires and bards telling of raids and murder, he did not like this business. He did not expect the plan to succeed, which meant a siege which might or might not capture the city, and if it did, most likely meant slaughter and rape, for men who stormed a fortress boiled over with rage and hate. He did not know the people of Nicopolis well enough to dislike them and think that they deserved any of that. Not that it was up to him. He had orders and must obey.

‘Strange to meet up so far from home,’ Cerialis said after they had ridden for a while in silence. ‘Makes you marvel at the sheer size of the empire, and an army that can pluck men up from one place and send them off thousands of miles. When you consider it, it is amazing what we have built.’ Ferox wondered whether the true genius of Rome was to make a Batavian king think of himself as Roman.

‘How do you find your Britons?’ Arrian asked, using Greek on the assumption that none of the closest troopers would understand. Flavius Cerialis commanded ala I Flavia Augusta Britannica milliaria civium Romanorum torquata ob virtutem – and Ferox wondered how long it must take to start morning orders if they used the full name. Raised over thirty years ago in Britannia, mostly from the southern and eastern tribes, that first generation of soldiers had done very well on the Danube under Domitian and then won particular distinction during Trajan’s Dacian victories. Their yellow shields – now protected by calfskin covers – bore a painted green wreath as a battle honour and all the men in service under Trajan had been granted Roman citizenship, which normally was a prize for their retirement. Perhaps a quarter of the men still serving had that honour, and the rest were dead or discharged.

‘Rogues, every man of them,’ Cerialis said happily. ‘And all the better soldiers for that.’ His Greek was clear and correct, with an overemphasis on each word typical of a man from the north west of the empire. It lacked the almost liquid flow of anyone who had grown up with it as his first language. ‘We’re not as wild as Ferox’s bandits, of course.’