Enemy of Rome Read Free

after the Senate and people of Rome formally agree my father’s position and he ratifies the sentence. Thank you, Aquila, for your time and your patience.’
    Aquila spluttered with suppressed rage, but he was general enough to know when he’d been outmanoeuvred. He rose from his chair and bowed, and stalked out of the tent, not even deigning to glance at Valerius.
    Titus sighed and called for wine. A young slave brought a silver jug and placed it on a table beside four pewter cups, pouring one for the young legate and vanishing behind a curtain at the rear of the tent. The young aristocrat closed his eyes and savoured his drink. ‘I do so hate disagreements.’
    ‘You’ll forgive me if I’m glad you had this one.’ Valerius reached for the jug and poured two more cups.
    ‘I’m not sure a convicted criminal is worthy of this vintage.’ Titus fixed him with one weary eye. ‘But your Spanish wolf is certainly deserving. Without him the gentleman with the sword would have gone about his business and I would be having this conversation with your head.’
    Valerius carried a cup to the ragged figure who still lounged by the doorway. Serpentius, former gladiator, his freedman and his friend, took the cup and sniffed it suspiciously. Valerius laughed. ‘None of your usual tavern horse piss.’
    ‘It smells like fruit,’ the Spaniard grumbled. ‘What’s the use of wine that smells like fruit? It should make your eyes shrivel and your balls explode. That’s proper wine.’
    ‘So what took you so long?’
    Serpentius lifted the cup unhurriedly to his lips and drank, his nose twitching at the unfamiliar sweetness. ‘That first day, when they caught us by the river, I wasn’t too worried. I thought you’d talk your way out, the way you always do. So I just followed and watched when you were taken into the Thirteenth’s camp. As time passed, I realized you were in a bit of trouble.’ Titus laughed at the understatement and poured himself another cup. The Spaniard continued. ‘I managed to make friends with a couple of the guard detachment …’ He saw Valerius’s look. Making friends had never been Serpentius’s greatest talent. ‘I taught them a few gladiator tricks,’ he said defensively. ‘The old sword spin, and that belly punch that makes you piss blood for a week before you die. Anyway, they were happy to talk and I found out where you were being kept. They said you were a dead man walking because Aquila blamed you for Bedriacum. I thought about breaking you out …’
    ‘You were too closely guarded,’ Titus interjected. ‘So he decided the only way to save you was to find someone with more authority than Aquila and plead your case.’
    ‘I managed to reach the army’s headquarters at Poetivo …’
    ‘But Primus, who commands, kicked him out on his skinny Spanish arse because Primus is a proper patrician and your friend looks like a mongrel mix of rag salesman, latrine cleaner and hired assassin.’ They waited for some reaction from the Spaniard, but Serpentius only rolled his eyes and took another drink. ‘Somehow, he discovered I’d just arrived in the camp, found his way past my bodyguard – which they’ll regret for all eternity – and you know the rest.’
    ‘And he has my thanks for it.’ Valerius raised his cup, eliciting a shrug from the former gladiator. ‘What I don’t understand is how you happened to be here. I thought you would be back in Judaea by now. Oh, and Primus? That’s not Marcus Antonius Primus, I hope?’
    Titus frowned. ‘It is. Why would it matter to you?’
    ‘Because I prosecuted him in a fraud case. He and his friends forged an old man’s will so his nephew would get the proceeds of his estate. They threw him out of the Senate and banned him from Rome. Will that cause you a problem?’
    The young legate waved a hand airily as if the fact had no import. ‘To answer your first question, I was in Cyprus waiting for my father’s instructions when word