They could not stop, with the slave army running before them toward Ariminum. Fleeing the field in the dark had given them half a day’s start, and Pompey had sent out the order to run them down. The gap hadn’t closed in seven days, as the legions pursued an army far fresher than themselves. Julius knew they could lose many more men, but if the slaves turned south, Rome stood naked for the first time in her history.

He fixed his eyes on the legionary in front of him. He had been staring at that back all day and knew every tiny detail of it, from the patchy gray hair that showed under the helmet to the spatters of blood up the man’s ankles where he had stamped for a mile to break his blisters. Someone had urinated up ahead, darkening the dust of the road. Julius trudged through the patch indifferently, wondering when he would next have to do the same himself.

At his side, Brutus cleared his throat and spat. There was nothing of his usual energy showing in him. He was hunched under the weight of his pack, and Julius knew his friend’s shoulders were raw. Brutus rubbed cooking fat on them at night and waited stoically for the calluses to form.

They had not spoken since dawn, the battle with endurance and the road going on without a public show. It was the same for most of them. They marched with slack and open mouths, all awareness narrowed to a point just ahead on the road. Often when the horns sounded a halt, men would stumble into those ahead and wake almost from sleep as they were cursed or struck.

Julius and Brutus chewed on stale bread and meat as it was handed out to them without a halt. As they tried to find saliva to swallow, they passed another fallen soldier and wondered if they too would be left on the road.

If Spartacus wanted to exhaust the legions in a chase, he could not have done better, and always there was the knowledge that there would have to be another battle when the slaves and gladiators finally found a place to stand. Only death would stop the legions.

Cabera coughed dust out of his throat and Julius glanced at the old man, marveling again that he had not fallen with the others. The poor rations and the miles had reduced his thin frame further, so that he looked almost skeletal. His cheeks were sunken and dark and the march had stolen away his humor and his talk. Like Brutus and Renius behind him, he had not spoken since the moment they were forced to their feet by weary optios, using their staffs on officers and men alike without interest, their faces as thin and tired as the rest of them.