‘Hurry everyone. We go before dawn.’

‘Sir, what garrison do we leave here?’

‘Five hundred men and no more. Drawn from all the infantry in proportion. Tell them to select the oldest and least fit for marching hard and fast until we have enough.’

‘Sir?’ The centurion dared to hint at his doubts, but the legatus was not listening for he was already clattering away.

Hadrian felt the thrill before a hunt and urged the horse into a gallop, hoofs pounding on the planks of the bridge. The cavalryman was already yards behind him, struggling to keep up. This was a moment to cherish, as doubts faded and he faced the challenge of a hard task, but one that he knew would succeed. This was the moment. All of his stars were aligned in a way he had seen only two or three times before and always at a time when his life changed drastically for the better. He did not need a professional astrologer to tell him that the next nine days were his moment and that after that the heavenly bodies would move and all become uncertain again. He must win and he must win now.

The horse raced along, and Hadrian laughed with sheer joy as the wind rushed through his hair.

XXVII

Piroboridava

The Nones of June

THEY HELD OFF one more big attack, and Ferox never understood how they had managed it, shooting away the last bolts and stones for the artillery, the last arrows for the handful of archers still on their feet, and all the stones and javelins. The Dacians gave way before the Romans, and just maybe they were almost as tired. Enica led a charge along the top of one of the ramparts, the vexillum of the goddess behind her, and the enemy gave way. Even Piso fought well, clumping along on his bandaged leg and bawling out encouragement. Yet by the end they were almost spent, with about a hundred more men dead or too injured to fight anymore. As Ferox chivvied the men to gather whatever weapons they could find and to tip the enemy corpses over the walls, the men moved like sleepwalkers, unseeing, emotionless, and if ever a man stopped for a moment his eyes shut and he passed out.

The next attack came at night, as Ferox had feared, and for the first time in many days the mist rose again in the early hours, so that the attackers were very close before they were seen and the alarm sounded. All that meant was that the enemy swarmed up and over the walls even faster than they might have done if there had been men waiting to do their feeble best in repelling them.

Ephippus was dead, but his acropolis was finished in spite of Piso’s scorn.

‘If we can’t stop them with high walls and ramparts,’ he had said many times, ‘how will low barricades help us? You cannot show fear to these people. If you do, they’ll walk all over you. That’s what Longinus let happen at Sarmizegethusa – only found his courage when it was too late, the silly old sod.’