Free Masters of Rome by Robert Fabbri

to tame him. I think he said that his mother was originally from somewhere around Armenia; he doesn’t know who his father was but I suspect that he was his mother’s owner. She never told him and died when he was ten. That’s all I know about him.’
    â€˜So you’re sure he wasn’t lying?’
    â€˜Yes. So if he didn’t do it, who did?’
    â€˜Well, I don’t know, sir; does it really matter?’
    â€˜Yes, it does; it matters greatly.’
    â€˜Why?’
    â€˜Because last night someone got past the guards at the front, past Hormus sleeping outside my door, into my room and then for some strange reason lit my oil lamp and then walked back out.’
    â€˜Or some thing did.’
    â€˜Now you’re being ridiculous again.’
    â€˜Am I? You know what this island’s like; you heard the stories: the strange spirits, wraiths, old gods that have been here for centuries, from even before the Britons arrived. Things that we don’t understand. Ancient things.’
    â€˜I’ll admit that this is a strange place. Sabinus talked to me about it when I saw him at Plautius’ briefing this winter; he told me about a legionary who had been found dead, with no visible wound and yet there wasn’t a drop of blood in him. Another had been flayed alive and yet was still wearing his uniform; apparently before he died he rambled on about spirits that sucked the skin from his limbs. I pretended to Sabinus that I didn’t believeit, that I thought they were just exaggerated legionary stories designed to frighten the new recruits.’
    â€˜But you did believe them?’
    â€˜I don’t know; I suppose there has to be some truth in them somewhere.’
    â€˜The island is haunted, there’s no doubt. I never like being on my own, especially outside the camp at night. I always get the feeling that I’m being watched and it don’t feel like human eyes on me, if you take my meaning?’
    Vespasian did but did not like to admit it.
    â€˜Do you remember the power of the Germanic gods we felt in the forests of Germania Magna? It felt like our gods were weak there compared to them because we were so far away from their home. Here we’re even further away and, what’s more, we’re across the sea. What chance do our deities have to protect us here in a country full of strange gods and daemons and the druids who seem to feed off their power? I spent my time constantly clutching my thumb and spitting to avert the evil-eye while I was last here and I’m sure that I’ll be doing the same thing this time.’
    â€˜I’m sure you will. But whatever power there is in this land and however the druids harness it and whatever sacrifices they make to their gods to try to ensure that they keep them safe there’s one thing that I’m sure of: no god or daemon or spirit, wraith, ghost or whatever is going to waste its time coming into my sleeping quarters and lighting one little oil lamp.’
    Magnus slumped down on the bed and heaved a sigh. ‘Then as I said: either it reignited because you hadn’t extinguished it properly or Hormus is lying to you.’
    â€˜Master,’ Hormus said, standing in the entrance, ‘Paetus is here.’
    â€˜Back to Rome immediately?’ Paetus looked confused as he stood in front of Vespasian’s desk an hour before dawn. ‘There’s nothing that I’d like more; but my replacement hasn’t arrived yet.’
    â€˜As the senior decurion, Ansigar is more than capable of looking after the ala until he does.’
    â€˜I suppose so; but why now, all of a sudden?’
    â€˜Politics, prefect,’ Vespasian replied, aware as ever of the difference between the young man’s patrician accent and his Sabine country burr; he had always tried to lessen it when talking with Paetus’ father, his long-dead friend, but now he no longer felt the need to obfuscate