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Show II The march to Verulandum was sweet with taste of Roman victory again. The soldier in him stiffened to the stride, the double-time, the sway of armament. His javelin was clean; his shortened sword was stained to show his courage under war to younger comrades and auxiliary recruits from nearby provinces. Unique among the pillars of his class, with just the formal crust as was required, yet vicious in the heat of war, this Alban was the imaginifer, the standard-bearer of the cult of Rome, the face in bronze of Septimus. He thought of summer training raaneuvres: the vault of horses, swimmng in the Thames; stabbing at the dummy in the field of practice near the ampitheatre. Yet sometimes how he could escape, to be like Bacchus riding on the panther's back; or even like the spirit of his friend, dead Cassius Secundus, who laughed the most, and placed the highest bets upon the gladiators at the festivals... to walk alone along the rampart wall at night without the vigilance of sentry time. The valleys held the mists of evening's light; the columned courtyard reddened in the dusk as Gaius, chief commander of the Ninth, convened the ceremonies grateful to Minerva, daughter of the lord Jupiter, and each man slowly passed her sacred shrine. He bowed politely for he knew the cult of homage to the gods of soldiering and fortunes close to Rome. But in his heart he held respectful silence for his doubts. If only he had had the dream of Sextius Marcianus: to place a votive offering to Victory in hopes centurion promotion came, But in the body of his history there lay a playing card, its face turned up, unsmiling to competitors of chance, but trump to him who held the hand. |
