Begin excerpt (copyright - Skarr One, author. All rights reserved. No part of this may be copied or reproduced without express permission from the author)

Prologue

Somewhere near the borders of Germania and Northern Gaul – 129 BC

The young boy shivered as he crouched in the iron cage and felt the icy blast of the wind touch his naked body.

He drew his knees closer to his chest and could feel his teeth chatter as rough hands at the back of the cart parted the thick hides, allowing the wind to blast its way inside the cage.

The hides covered the cattle cart on all sides, except for a narrow gap at the back that let in enough air for him to breathe. Through the widened gap now, he could see a large man standing on the ground holding a blazing torch in his hand and looking at him.

“Are you sure it’s him?” asked the hulking figure of someone standing close to him.

“Yes” said Cyrix, whose voice the boy recognized as one of his captors, the leader of the band of warriors who had kidnapped him.

Who were these strange men? Why had they taken him? These were questions that plagued his young mind, as the events of the past few days remained a blur in his memory, as he lay within the cage. He missed his mother and the comfort of her arms each night, before he slept. He had led a hard life until that vacation, that trip to the ancestral home of his mother, to the forgotten village that had been sacked years ago and rebuilt by a few survivors from her clan.

All had been peaceful on the way back to their own settlement in the deep forest, when they had been suddenly attacked by Cyrix and his followers.

He was sure to die, he thought, bearing their brutal taunts and blows in silence, as his father had taught him to bear any hardship since a very young age, placing him under a rigorous training regimen along with other boys of his age.

He was weak at the moment as he hadn’t eaten or drunk anything for some days now. His ribs were bruised and he felt intense pain in various parts of his body, as he stared at this bulky man who appeared to be inspecting him like a prized animal that had been captured in a hunt. In most places, the vital ones, he felt strong and he was confident he could still beat off these men easily and escape, if he saw an opportunity. His keen eyes saw Cyrix grip the carved bone handle of his throwing knife and suddenly, he wasn’t so sure, as he had seen him use it with deadly effect before on the man whom they relied on to guard them while they slept, his maternal uncle from the village they just visited. The boy was angry and still defiant, although his body was weak.

The chief was unafraid and tried to look kindly at the boy, as Cyrix continued his tale.

“We followed the Queen for several days, along with her son and her train of servants and slaves. On the third day, and while everyone was asleep, we killed the guards before her tent. Before an alarm could be raised, we already had the boy you wanted, but only after a terrible fight where we lost the son of master Bagi. He was unable to conquer his lust for the Queen who killed him as he tried to violate her honor.”

Cyrix waited respectfully for the chief to respond, keeping a keen eye on the boy, in case he attempted anything foolish. The boy really scared him and he was wary, despite the protection offered by the cage.

“You have done well and she is a worthy Queen, to love and protect my cousin’s spawn,” said the chief Barix, spitting in contempt.

“Soon, his father will come to me, looking for him and I will make him pay for his former insults.”

The chief leaned into the cart, to inspect the boy more closely, holding the burning torch high to throw some more light.

The boy had his knees drawn up about him, clutching his legs in a tight grip with his long, bony arms. Naked and shivering uncontrollably with the cold, he disdained the use of a warm cloak that had been offered by Cyrix earlier, and which lay crumpled on the filthy floor before him.

“The boy seems cold and weak but has a lot of spirit,” said the chief Barix, seeing the discarded cloak and the steady stare of the boy, who looked at him with as fierce a look as he could muster, under those circumstances.

“He is a beast,” said Cyrix in an angry tone of voice.

“Although only a mere boy, he has the strength of many men and it took five men to subdue him before I could get him inside this cage. I was lucky and managed to hit him hard on the head with my club. Otherwise, he would have escaped us, after killing a couple of your warriors, who are still sore from his blows.”

“I hope you didn’t harm his mother,” said the chief Barix, with a questioning look to Cyrix. “That would displease me.”

Kidnapping the son of his rival, his cousin Gerovix, was bad enough. He didn’t want his woman too, as that would mean certain war. With the boy, as his rival cousin already had older sons by another wife, a barbarian woman, it would be a good negotiating tactic. He could possibly get better terms with regard to demands he had made on certain lands that were in dispute. These lands rightfully belonged to him and not to his cousin, who claimed them as his birthright, by virtue of his mother’s claim on the chief Barix’s property as part of her dowry.

It was a common tactic and the chief Barix knew that Gerovix would not back down until he sent him a strong message, forcing him to resettle the tribes who were now occupying the chief’s lands, close to the Italian border. These were nomadic tribes who might choose to migrate again, perhaps even settle in Italy, something which would arouse Rome’s wrath. There were also other reasons, where he had cause to side with Rome, for different purposes altogether. One day, if the citizenship laws proposed by Gaius Sempronius Gracchus, a powerful senator in Rome, were to be enacted, all of Italy would be part of Rome and that worried him greatly, as well as certain senators in Rome who were sympathetic to the chief’s concerns over the tribes allied to Gerovix.

Rome!

The very name frightened him and he constantly wondered how they managed to build such a mighty empire with no real chiefs or rulers, but with someone who was appointed consul and who held office for just one year along with a junior colleague, his co-consul.

The consul, the chief Barix learnt quickly, was often a puppet and easily manipulated by powerful factions in the senate, as Rome really functioned like a true democracy in the Republic which had been established several centuries ago. Although some of the patricians could be bought, there were certain men in Rome who could never be swayed by gold, as they only acted in the interests of the Republic. The letter he was reading confirmed his suspicions and he needed to respond soon to its contents.

Every year, the chief Barix sent an ambassador well before the winter months, as the barbarian lands were frozen and inaccessible for a long period of time. There was nothing to do all day except bathe indoors and relax with his women, waiting for spring to arrive. At least his ambassador would have something to do during those dull months, meeting with various patricians who would help protect his interests in this region, if he allied himself with Rome by signing a treaty.

The chief stepped away from the cart and stomped his feet, trying to keep warm while he pondered over the letter he just received from the ambassador that morning, brought by a weary courier.

In the meantime, Cyrix closed the opening, relieving the boy’s discomfort a little, securing it with ropes that were cleverly looped through iron rings in a crisscross formation.

The chief Barix fished out a letter from a pocket in his cloak and again read some lines slowly in Greek, awkwardly holding the papyrus scroll open with his free hand but careful not to burn it by bringing it too close to the burning brand. It was a short letter with only the essentials, the way he liked it. No greetings or anything of that sort, unlike the formal Roman letters, which were usually so long winded that he would give them to his Greek wife and have her summarize the gist of what they meant to say to him.

The lady Athena, his wife, also acted as his secretary and advisor, helping him navigate through the verbiage that usually accompanied any missive received from a Roman senator. Luckily, all the correspondence was carried on in Greek, a language he was familiar with and which the lady excelled at, having received a fine education from her learned father in Athens.

His ambassador wanted a huge sum of money deposited under the custody of a young senator, a patrician from an old Roman family named Marcus Aemilius Scaurus. Per the letter, Scaurus would use the money scrupulously for various projects that would be beneficial not only for the Republic but also the chief’s interests, which would be recorded in a treaty later, as only the senate in Rome could formally approve such an arrangement.

He needed to make a decision soon and this money under Scaurus’s control would firstly fund the development of a Roman outpost for peaceful purposes. This garrison would be set up within his lands, in order to help defend frequent attacks from his rival on the outlying villages and towns close to the lands which were in dispute, as his cousin Gerovix tried to expand his reach and influence through a campaign of terror.

The soldiers assigned to the garrison that Rome was proposing to build would indirectly be under his control, per the treaty that would be signed with the Republic at some future date in time. His ambassador cautioned him to be patient, as it would take years to formalize a treaty that would meet the senate’s approval. In typical fashion, the senate moved with extreme slowness on all foreign requests for alliance, even though it was in the interests of Rome.

He would be indirectly funding the development of their army!

However, the Romans had a peculiar system and a man like Scaurus, if he could find funds on his own, would act as if the treaty were already signed and could mobilize and raise troops for the garrison, without too much interference from the senate, by simply paying for the costs. He would fight on two fronts, he thought. On the one hand, he would contain the threat the Gracchi represented to his people, if their radical proposals were enacted and on the other hand, he would utilize Rome’s help to consolidate his lands. The last thing the chief wanted was Roman citizenship for all people settled in Italy, right near his borders. Why encourage Roman expansion? His people got along fine with the Italians but things could change if they were to become Roman citizens. The chief Barix thought he could not lose in the current situation, as all advantages seemed to favor him from these outcomes. Scaurus’s increasing influence in the senate would help oust any support for the Gracchi, if he had enough money to wage a war against them and their growing number of supporters. Money, it always came to money, he thought.

However, its judicious use was what concerned him, not the amount of money he had to pay to these Romans.

All the lands that belonged to his cousin were lost by his foolish grandfather some years ago to one of his brothers, whose grandson Gerovix, now boldly seized even more lands from the chief Barix, after his father married the chief Barix’s aunt, a complicated alliance, as the families sought to become closer through various marriages. The relationships were confusing and the chief Barix simply called Gerovix his ‘cousin’. This situation was becoming more alarming now, as Gerovix was also forming numerous alliances with other tribes to strengthen his position, although an all out war was the furthest in their minds at the moment. At best, an uneasy peace reigned between the two cousins.

This boy would tip the balance in his favor, he thought, as Gerovix was rumored to be in great love with the Celtic Queen he married, the mother of this boy he’d kidnapped. Her son would be dear to him and it would be some payback, as he had desired this Queen herself, many years ago, when she was still a lovely young girl, for his second wife.

“We did not harm her,” said Cyrix to the chief, when he questioned him again about the Queen, once he ceased reading and brooding over the scroll’s import, before carefully storing it again in the spacious pocket of his warm cloak.

“However, we had to knock her unconscious as she was also very strong, as these Celtic warrior women are. The ensuing fight with the boy in their tent was terrible and if his mother hadn’t called out to him, I would not be standing here.” Cyrix quickly explained the trouble they had encountered in quelling the boy’s spirit, after their rumble in the Queen’s tent.

“He is a chief’s son and therefore will have a lot of spirit. I’m surprised as I never thought my poor cousin’s bloodline was that strong” said the chief Barix with a sinister sounding laugh. “He must inherit this strength from his mother, who is rumored to be a great warrior herself, despite her considerable beauty.”

“Possibly, you may be right about that” said Cyrix, shrugging at the chief’s response. “Before she was rendered unconscious, she had killed one of my men already with her bare hands, strangling him to death.”

“It was wise of you to take so many men,” said the chief Barix, slapping Cyrix in a friendly manner on his back. “You have earned my trust again and I am grateful for your help.”

Cyrix bowed deeply to the chief, acknowledging the compliment made by him. He was a man of twenty five, with a painted face that made his face look fiercer than it was and wore thick trousers, tough boots made of boar hide, and animal skins over his body, which was enveloped by a fur lined thick woolen cloak with a hood for protection against the cold.

The chief Barix adjusted his fur lined helmet, as a strong blast of wind threatened to dislodge it from his massive head. The helmet was surmounted by the horns of an ox, the ends of which were covered with gold, indicating his status as the chief. He also wore a thick golden chain around his neck with an amulet that carried the image of a Greek vase on one side and a boar’s head on the other. The strange combination of symbols belonged to his family ever since the first chief Barix in his line had laid claim over the vast lands bordering Germania and Northern Gaul a couple of centuries ago, soon after the conquest of Egypt by Alexander the Great.

His own vast estate was set in a mountainous region close to the thick forests that spread for many hundreds of square miles and which were not only impenetrable but home to a number of tribes and settlements scattered in small groups all over that vast region. The chief Barix had no claims there and avoided the deep forests, as those tribes were truly savage and he was scared of them himself.

Thinking for a long time, while Cyrix stood by him on a narrow trail that led further up in the mountains, towards his estates, which were set on a flat plateau encompassing a small lake bordering the deep forests beyond, the chief Barix made a decision.

“Take him to the old man and tell him to take special care as he is dangerous,” said the chief, walking away towards his waiting horse, as he wanted to get back to the warmth of his home, feeling another cold blast of air, that seemed to even penetrate the thick bear skin he wore underneath the long woolen cloak that he wrapped around his barrel chest. The lady Athena would probably be wondering where he was, as she waited in the bath he had abandoned, on receiving a message from one of Cyrix’s men. Although she was his principal aide in all diplomatic matters, he had not revealed to her the purpose of this secret meeting with Cyrix. He would reveal everything to her in time, after he decided his next course of action.

The chief Barix was a tall, corpulent man with a long beard and mustache, bright yellow in color, a prominent feature of the men who descended in the chief’s line. His long hair flowed well past his shoulders and despite his bulky frame, he seemed to move quite agilely and mounted his horse without any assistance.

Nodding to Cyrix, he was about to leave when Cyrix asked him, “Should I leave my men with the old man to guard the boy?”

“Why don’t you ask him yourself?” said the chief, laughing at his question and riding up the narrow trail, without a backward look at Cyrix, who stood there, perplexed by the chief’s answer, wondering again about the boy and the source of his mysterious strength.

Cyrix admired the boy, who had refused any food and water for the past few days. Even a cloak offered by one of his men to cover his naked body had been refused. All that the boy wore was a simple golden chain about his neck, with a pendant, which appeared to be inscribed with some writing. He didn’t know what it said as he and his warriors had been too scared to approach him, especially after their fiery encounter.

What power and energy the boy had!

After that terrible blow to his young head a few days ago, he had continued to fight and resist his capture, even as he was helplessly locked up in the cage.

Cyrix had never seen someone so small, so strong and so ferocious, as he bit, scratched and hit with surprising power, knocking down a couple of grown men during the tremendous fight at the camp, at the time of his kidnapping. The boy fought like one of those mountain wolves he’d seen once, when they descended in a pack upon a bear, when they were hungry and couldn’t find smaller prey. Only in this case, this boy was the wolf and they were like so many deer before him.

Earlier, Cyrix had thought it would be an easy assignment and some of the men wanted to rape the Queen, as they began to desire her, after following the Queen’s party discreetly over several days from the village they visited. She was possibly visiting a relative, as the entire population of the village had come to see the Queen leave, along with this boy and the rest of the party. To his luck, they took a forest trail and for several days while they followed them, Cyrix had been puzzled as to why they chose this particular trail as he knew it led deep into the forest. Maybe there was an unknown branch ahead that led directly to the lands of Gerovix by a shorter route.

He was aware of his chief’s rivalry with his cousin, over lands that belonged to his chief and also a woman they both desired when they were younger. The chief Gerovix had obtained her by force, abducting her one night from her village in a night raid, after sacking and burning it. He wondered if this boy was that same woman’s son. The chief could not have made her his first wife in any case, he thought, as she was not Greek but a Celtic woman, a real beauty, he thought, after observing her closely from a nearby tree where he hid.

In any case, he had the prize in his sight, the young boy he had been charged to apprehend. On the fourth night, while the party camped by a stream, the three guards near the Queen’s tent had begun drinking some of the wine that had been presented by the villagers, at the insistence of the Queen, who was also joined by a couple of her counselors. Her son was already inside the tent, possibly fast asleep, as Cyrix had observed the mother tell him to go inside as soon as the sun’s light faded. The boy had protested but meekly went after his mother yelled at him.

Cyrix and the other men hid in the trees and by the moonlight, they observed the Queen take a bath in the stream, although the water must have been cold. It was early spring and in the evenings, a sudden chill usually descended around this time. The sight of her naked body and her beautiful face with the long, golden hair framing it had aroused all the men’s baser instincts and they began to desire her strongly for themselves, feverishly anticipating the moment when Cyrix would finally give the signal for attack.

They waited patiently for the guards to get drunk and while two of them lounged near a fire, which blazed in the center of a circle formed by the tents, the third guard sat directly near the entrance of the Queen’s tent, armed with a formidable ax. This warrior worried Cyrix, as he had not drunk as much wine while the other two guards were already singing songs and telling each other bawdy jokes. Patience, he signaled to his men as they quietly waited. He made a sign that he would take care of the guard before the Queen’s tent while the others took care of the drunken guards by the fire.

Cyrix was skilled at throwing a knife and rarely missed his target. He eased the weapon slowly out of its sheath and tested its balance carefully. He had only one chance, as he didn’t want to alarm the others in the surrounding tents. He was worried about a couple of huge men in the Queen’s party, who appeared to be counselors, but could also be armed and dangerous. These two men had already retired to their respective tents, attended by their slaves and servants, after bidding the Queen goodnight, who retired to her tent accompanied by two slave girls.

The counselors must be also drunk, thought Cyrix. However, he wanted to take no chances and if these men interfered, the boy could escape in the resulting confusion, a situation he wanted to avoid at all costs.

Once Cyrix noticed the guards almost dozing off by the fire, as they began to lean forward and kept pulling themselves back, barely able to keep awake, he gave his men the signal to attack, imitating the call of an owl. The two by the fire never stood a chance as his men silently crept behind them and quickly cut their throats.

The guard before the Queen’s tent noticed the sudden apparition of the attackers and sprang up to his feet, about to raise an alarm but Cyrix was ready. His knife flew true and straight, catching him right in the throat and cutting off any sound before he could yell out a warning.

Rushing into the tent but careful not to make the slightest sound, Cyrix killed the two sleeping slave girls quickly, slashing their throats as they lay stretched out on the rug covered floor of the tent. In the meantime, some of his other men silently followed him inside the luxurious tent, which was warmed by a huge iron brazier filled with coals. A shielded oil lamp hung from a stand set in the corner of the tent, casting a surreal glow on the scene before him.

The Queen slept on a large bed under a thick blanket of fur and her head was barely visible, while the boy slept on another bed nearby, similarly covered, as the night had turned pretty cold.

Making a motion for complete silence, Cyrix carefully approached the Queen’s bed along with another man. The other man, impatient to see the Queen’s body, suddenly pulled the thick cover down, exposing her body to the waist, revealing her magnificent breasts and her firm belly. She was completely naked underneath and was in a deep sleep.

The sudden chill awakened her instantly and she found herself staring at a fierce man with a heavily scarred face, who held a knife to her neck. She was in shock, but quickly understood that if she moved or made a sound, she would be killed as the sharp blade was a mere inch away from the delicate skin covering her throat. She felt tears coming to her eyes as she saw her slave girls lying on the floor in a pool of blood.

Cyrix, in a low voice said calmly, “Speak one word and your throat will be cut like your slave girls. All we want is your son. He will be our guest for a few days and then we’ll release him. Do not fear for his safety, as we’ll treat him well. Nod if you understand.”

End Excerpt from "Barbarians in the Republic - The Long Journey to Rome" [copyright of Skarr One, author - all rights reserved]