False God of Rome by Robert Fabbri Read Free Book Online

broad-brimmed straw hat.
    The dark-skinned Libu scout pointed towards a small, rocky outcrop shimmering in the heat haze, some two miles distant. ‘Not far, master; it’s in among those rocks.’
    ‘And not a moment too soon,’ Magnus muttered, easing his hot and sore behind in the saddle. ‘It’s only three days since we came down off the plateau and I’ve
already had enough of the desert.’
    ‘You didn’t have to come,’ Vespasian reminded his friend. ‘You could have stayed in the foothills and gone hunting; I’m sure Corvinus would have left you a couple
of guides.’
    Corvinus glanced at Vespasian in a way that assured him that he was completely mistaken on that point.
    Magnus looked ruefully at the stout hunting-spear jiggling upright in a long, hardened-leather holster attached to his saddle and shook his head. ‘No, I wouldn’t have wanted to miss
the fun; I just didn’t realise that there was so much desert.’
    There was indeed a lot of desert.
    Since descending from Cyrene’s plateau, two days after leaving the city, they had headed southeast, over a hard, dun-brown, rock-strewn wilderness that stretched to beyond the
province’s vague southern border and then as far as the imagination; it provided a natural defence against whomever or whatever lived beyond this wasted land. Despite it being November the
sun burned down during the day with a ferocity that belied the season; winter, however, caught up at night when the temperature plummeted and ice would form in the necks of their water-skins.
    The hundred and twenty men of the four turmae detachment of Libu light cavalry, armed with light javelins, a cavalry
spatha
– a sword slightly longer than the infantry gladius
– and curved knives and protected by small, round, leather-clad shields, took the conditions in their stride. Wide-brimmed straw hats shaded their faces and long, thick, undyed lambswool
cloaks, worn over similar woollen tunics, protected them from the sun’s intense rays during the day and kept them warm in the freezing night air – fires were impossible as there was
nothing to burn. Their Roman decurions had followed their men’s example for this expedition, since metal cuirasses and helmets were impractical in the scorching heat.
    Each man carried a water-skin that held just enough for him and his mount to last for two days; that, together with the extra water, as well as grain for the horses and spare rations for the
troopers, carried by the trail of pack-mules following the column, meant they could last for three days without resupplying. Navigation through the almost featureless landscape was therefore
crucial as they were obliged to travel via two wells, part of a network of ancient wells dug throughout the desert by the Marmaridae, generations ago, to enable them to make the crossing from their
grazing lands in the north, near the coast over a hundred miles east of Cyrene, to the oasis at Siwa and beyond.
    ‘How the fuck does Aghilas find his way out here?’ Magnus asked Corvinus as they approached the outcrop where, their guide had assured them, they would find the first well of their
journey. ‘There’s nothing to navigate by.’
    Corvinus looked haughtily at Magnus before deigning to reply. ‘He was taken as a slave by the Marmaridae when he was a boy and lived with them for ten years before escaping. He’s
made countless trips across the desert; I’ve used him before and he’s never let me down.’
    ‘When was the last time you were out here?’ Vespasian enquired, trying to be friendly to this aloof patrician; he had not had much contact with Corvinus, who spent most of his time
at Barca, southwest of Cyrene, where the auxiliary cavalry were based.
    ‘Just before you arrived, quaestor.’ There was almost a tone of mockery in his voice as he used Vespasian’s official title. ‘We chased a raiding party for a couple of
days; didn’t catch them, though. Their camels aren’t as fast as