The military camp at Zeugma, like most in the eastern provinces, occupied a quarter within the town. It was separated from the civilian settlement by no more than a low wall. In the west, legions, even detached units of auxiliaries, tended to be based in purpose-built fortresses on the frontiers. Civilian communities always sprang up outside their defences, but the troops were not exposed to the temptations of a big city. Baths and brothels, hippodromes and theatres, the seductive luxuries of urban life, were bad for discipline. No wonder the soldiers who kept watch along the Rhine and Danube had nothing but contempt for the fighting qualities of the eastern armies.

Of course, Valens thought, the troops in the north are just as disparaging about my own kind. The pampered officers and men who served the imperial household in the city of Rome. That the Praetorians and Horse Guards received extra pay exacerbated the dislike.

Valens puffed up to the open gate. Four soldiers stood at ease in the shade under the arch. The Capricorn symbol of the Fourth Scythian Legion was carved above their heads. The legion had been based at Zeugma as long as anyone could remember. The vast majority of its recruits were drawn from Syria. The climate and lifestyle of the east had never been conducive to martial virtue.

The indolent and offhand manner of the sentries confirmed all the western prejudices of Valens. After he had stated his business, he was told that those merchants who were putting in a tender to supply hay were to report to the disused barracks, third row on the left, second building along. The sentries asked for no proof of identity, and no one was detailed to accompany Valens.

Inside, the bright sunshine hurt Valens’s eyes as he crossed the open space of the parade ground. The altars at one end were garlanded, dark blood drying in the earth at their bases. From somewhere out of sight came the smell of roasting meat. It was the Kalends of August. For the birthday of the divine Claudius and the divine Pertinax, to the divine Claudius an ox, to the divine Pertinax an ox. The time-hallowed festival would be held in every military camp in the empire. That Claudius had been a stammering fool murdered by his wife, or that the aged Pertinax’s fleeting tenure of the throne had been ended by the swords of his own soldiers, made little difference. Anyway, few under the standards knew anything about the long-dead Emperors being honoured. A festival was a day of leisure, one of its keenly anticipated pleasures a communal feast. On such a day, with the promise of plentiful wine and beef, the sketchy discipline of the Fourth Scythian Legion would be further relaxed. It had to be granted that Severus had chosen a good date to avoid anyone taking an interest in the rendezvous.