The Cursed Kingdom by Peter Darman

Author:Peter Darman [Darman, Peter]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2017-10-16T16:00:00+00:00

Chapter 9

Eastern Gordyene was formally an empty land whose inhabitants had been burned out of their homes by Armenian or Median raiders. It had taken a long time for Spartacus to restore peace and stability to a region of wild meadows, huge forests and fertile river valleys. The villages had slowly been rebuilt and repopulated, crops once again grew in the fields and livestock filled pens and barns. There were no large towns in the area, which was a pity because had there been a garrison it might have been able to repulse the eleven hundred Roman soldiers who arrived just as the first snows were falling on the hills.

Titus Tullus pulled up his horse to take a closer look at the bedraggled column of women and children being herded away from their village, the screams of their menfolk piercing the air as they were nailed to crosses.

‘Should fetch a tidy sum in the slave markets,’ said the centurion’s deputy commander beside him.

Tullus sniffed the air. ‘It’s getting colder. They might not survive the journey north to the Armenian capital. How many have we taken so far?’

‘Three hundred, thereabouts.’

‘That will suffice. Get this lot back to camp and employ fifty horsemen to get them to that Armenian shit-hole. I want them sold before the winter snows us in.’

‘Yes, sir.’

The deputy nodded at the figures being nailed to crosses, other figures lying prostrate on the ground as a result of the brief but bloody battle to take the village.

‘You could double your money if you took the men as slaves as well, sir.’

Tullus sneered at the young pup. ‘If we had just won a great victory and conquered all this miserable land, I would agree. But we are in enemy territory and I can’t spare more men to escort hundreds of captives to slave markets. Old men are worthless so there’s no point in letting them live, young boys are like eels and will try to wriggle free, and men in their prime need shackling and guarding before they turn a profit. Too much trouble, you see.’

Some of the women had collapsed in fits of wailing when they saw their nearest and dearest being nailed to crosses, much to the annoyance of Tullus.

‘Get those bitches moving; use force if you have to. They’ll heal before they’re put on sale.’

He nudged his horse forward into the village, a collection of stone huts with thatched roofs near a small, fast-running river in a heavily wooded valley. It was a pleasant spot and the abundance of timber made the Romans’ task much easier. Tullus slid off his horse and ambled over to where half a dozen legionaries were positioning a reluctant man in his fifties on to a freshly made cross.

‘Murderers, barbarians, the king will have his vengeance on you all, you…’

He emitted a high-pitched scream when a long nail was hammered through his right wrist into the wood, a scream following every blow of the hammer on the nail’s head. He was thrashing

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