They should have quit the place long ago, Ajax realised bitterly. They had made themselves too comfortable. They had done what only the greenest of gladiators ever did - they had lowered their guard. The lookouts had failed to do their duty. He felt a moment’s rage course through his veins. The fools had cost their comrades dearly. In the months that the renegades had been at the supply base he had been able to swell their ranks from amongst the slaves on the ships they had preyed on. At the time of the Roman raid, Ajax’s original company of thirty of his closest lieutenants and the survivors of his bodyguard had swelled to over three hundred men, enough to crew both ships in the bay, and even the damaged Roman warship that had unwittingly fallen into his hands shortly before the raid.

Ajax frowned as he reproached himself again. It was inevitable that the warship would be missed, but not nearly so swiftly. As soon as he became aware that the Romans had found his hideout, Ajax marvelled at the speed with which his enemy had guessed the fate of the warship and moved to attack him. The base, all of his ships and all but fifty of his men had been lost in the attack.

Clearly the Romans were being led by an outstanding officer. Now he knew. Ajax had recognised the voice challenging him from the street. The prefect, Cato, who had brought his rebellion on Crete crashing to defeat at the point where Ajax had been certain that he held every advantage. That rebellion had failed. But there would be another, Ajax had resolved. One day, he and his men would be the cadre around which another army of slaves would rise up to challenge their Roman masters. The Egyptian peasants had suffered under the heel of Roman rule, and Ajax’s recent masquerade had exacerbated their discontent. Many would be willing enough to support a revolt. Many, but not all, Ajax thought, as he gazed at the burning village.