From the trees Tarquinus and his men had reappeared. They were leading a large, black bull.
The bull lumbered forward slowly. It was Tarquinus’s magic that he could, by speaking to it softly, control the huge animal and keep it docile; but when its hoofs touched the wooden grid over the pit it halted, unwilling to go on. Still Tarquinus muttered in its ear, his skilful hands coaxed it, and finally the bull lumbered forward, its heavy tread echoing in the pit below. Petrus and the girl looked up at the huge black shadow: they could see the hairs on its long belly and feel its warm breath as it snorted impatiently.
Now came the critical moment. From his belt Tarquinus gently drew a long narrow sword. Still whispering to calm the bull, he stepped back, and then, with a single movement, so smooth that it was hard to believe anything had happened, he drove the sword straight down to the bull’s heart.
For a moment the huge animal stood transfixed, not knowing what had happened; then suddenly its hoofs slipped across the wooden grid with a clatter, and its heavy body crashed.
It was now that the stout wooden grid served its purpose. As Tarquinus moved about, hissing between his teeth, he made small slits in the animal’s carcass so that the blood flowed, not too much at a time but in a steady stream through the grid and into the pit below. Gazing up at the black form outlined against the moonlit sky, Petrus and the girl shifted their position so that the warm dark stream of blood fell on their naked bodies. And all the time Petrus, lost in concentration, murmured half aloud: “May the gods make me pure.”
For this was the sacred rite of the
taurobolium
, an important ceremony of purification that was practised all over the pagan empire. Men and women who had gone through the rite in the pit knew that by doing so they had been purified and drawn closer to the gods, and they often recorded the fact on their tombstones with the word
tauroboliatus
or
tauroboliata
.
For more than an hour, Tarquinus continued his work, cleverly opening new cuts in the bull’s body until he had satisfied himself that all the animal’s blood had dripped into the pit. The two young people below moved about on the earthen floor, now slippery with blood, placing themselves under each new jet. Finally, when it was over, Tarquinus called quietly to them to come up; once again, while the blood dried on their bodies, they knelt before him while he recited prayers and his two assistants carefully dissected the heavy carcass on the grid and carried it away.
At last he motioned them to rise and dress again; when they had done so, all three bowed gravely, and Tarquinus led his niece away.
As she left, the girl turned back and stared at Petrus’s body with a look of secret greed; but Petrus did not notice. Conscious only of the great and mystical event that had taken place, and of the wonderful fact that from this day onwards he was purified and closer to the gods, he turned away and started back towards the northern valley.
In the Orpheus room, Constantius Porteus had been drinking ever since dusk; it was now the early hours of the morning, but surprisingly he was neither tired nor drunk. He was brooding on the events of the day.
Suddenly he saw the form of his son quietly crossing the open doorway on his way to the courtyard. He started violently and rubbed his eyes. The boy was covered in blood.
For a moment even his anger was forgotten. What could have happened? Had the German mercenaries attacked him? Stumbling up, he moved with surprising speed out of the room and caught Petrus before he disappeared.
“My dear son,” he cried, “are you hurt?”
Petrus turned. To his father’s astonishment he wore on his face a look of calm serenity that he had never seen before. He smiled at his father. His eyes, instead of being filled with their customary hostility, were kindly. He cheerfully dropped his bombshell.
“Not hurt, father, purified.”
Constantius’s mouth dropped open. What could the boy mean?
“I am
tauroboliatus
, father. I am returning Sarum to the ancient gods.”
Before Constantius could say a word, he was gone.
For several minutes he stood there, stupefied. His son not only disobedient but a pagan? He wondered if it was a dream, pinched himself, but knew that it was not.
A few minutes later he burst into his wife’s room.
Placidia was not asleep when he came in, and as she looked up she could see by the lamplight that Constantius was very pale, through apparently sober.
He stood in the doorway; it had long been an unspoken rule that he did not enter her bedroom; though after the events of the day, she had nearly, out of simple compassion, invited him in; now, as he stood there, he looked so woebegone that she motioned him to enter.
“What is the matter, Constantius?” she asked quietly.
He made a gesture of desperation and told her briefly about Petrus.
“The
taurobolium
!” he concluded dismally. “A monstrous heathen rite.” He wiped his hand across his eyes. “Did you know that our son was a secret pagan?”
She considered. “I did not know.”
He stared at her.
“Did you suspect?”
“Perhaps.”
He shook his head in disbelief.
“And you said nothing?”
She sat up slowly, pulled a cushion behind her and lay back, allowing her hands to fall palm upward beside her.
“I only suspected. Something about him – secretive. And he is close to Tarquinus, you know.”
“I should have sent that cowherd away,” Constantius moaned.
His wife’s calmness about this terrible business baffled him. As he continued speaking, it was almost to himself.
“This is a Christian house. First heathen Germans, now this.” He looked miserably at Placidia. “What are we to do?”
Poor man. At times, even now, she still loved him; if only he could be wise.
As for Petrus, she did not take this latest enthusiasm very seriously.
“We should do nothing. Petrus is impulsive, but he has a good heart. We must just be patient.”
Perhaps, since the boy was almost all she had, she was too indulgent towards him. But she was far too sensible a woman to be blind to his faults; she knew very well that it was only her balance and good sense, and the hard work of Numincus the steward, that held the household and the estate together. Petrus with his obsessive enthusiasms was very like his father, and her secret fear was that if he failed to achieve anything and did not find a good wife to steady him, he would degenerate just as Constantius had done, despite her own unsuccessful efforts to strengthen him.
But none of these thoughts was apparent to Constantius. Although he had come to her instinctively for guidance, her calmness was beginning to irritate him.
“You seem unconcerned,” he said bitterly. “Perhaps you approve.”
“You know very well that I do not. I am a Christian.”
In truth, she supposed that with her stern and practical attitude to life, touched, she knew, with more than a tinge of resignation, she was nearer to being a stoic than a true Christian. But she was content to be a Christian in name and had little use for heathen magic and the pagan gods.
None of this satisfied poor Constantius.
“You seem to me to
condone
the boy,” he said angrily.
“We must be wise, Constantius. He is headstrong. There are many pagans in Sarum – you know that. Why even Numincus . . .”
At the mention of the steward’s name Constantius stiffened. Only that afternoon, Numincus had disobeyed his orders; he knew very well that, because of his neglect, it was the steward who ran the estate and he was jealous of the hardworking, solemn little fellow who was always, it seemed to him, closeted with his wife.
“Numincus has nothing to do with this,” he flared. “But in the morning he will acknowledge the Christian faith to me: and if he does not, I shall dismiss him.”
Placidia shrugged.
“That would be foolish.”
His wife despised him. It made him furious.
“No doubt it would be a blow to you,” he replied with a bitter anger. “I have no doubt he is your lover.”
Placidia did not reply for a moment. Then she said quietly:
“Please leave me.”
Constantius, feeling once again a sense of defeat descending upon him, and too weary and angry to protest any more, walked out of the room, banging the door behind him.
Placidia closed her eyes. Before her rose the vision of Numincus: his large balding head, his red, pointed nose, his solemn eyes, and his curious, stubby little hands. She knew that the steward was devoted to her; but a lover? She could not restrain a smile.
Two events of significance took place in the next two years. The first was the coming of the Saxons.
They came in the spring: not, as had been expected, a vast horde, but a small advance party. Thirty landed in two boats on the coast of the Solent estuary, twenty miles to the south east. The main contingent travelled towards Venta, looting the farms as they passed; but they did not attack the town, whose strong walls they could not hope to breach. Despite the fact that they came near the town, the force of German mercenaries there, which could easily have sallied out of the gates and wiped them out, remained inside; for the people of Venta had decided that the mercenaries were for the protection of the town itself and refused to let them leave to save the nearby farmsteads.
A smaller contingent of ten men, meanwhile, had moved north west across the rich farmlands towards the little settlement of Sorviodunum.
Petrus had been warned of their approach the day before, and he had prepared with care.
On his orders, the families living in Sorviodunum had evacuated the place and retreated inside the dune; but he had cleverly left fires burning and the gate of the wooden palisade open, so that the Saxons would be encouraged to approach. Inside, Numincus, Tarquinus and half a dozen men were concealed by the gate. Petrus himself, dressed in the armour of Numincus’s centurion father, waited with the six Germans on the little platform of land immediately in front of the entrance to the dune.
In the early afternoon, they came. The ten Saxons approached along the track beside the river; they were large men, though not as large as the German mercenaries. They were fair-haired and had long beards; and they approached Sorviodunum at a lesiurely pace. They had taken several horses along the way, and two of these were pulling a farm cart which was piled high with the goods they had looted. They rode their captured horses carelessly; four of them were singing; and seeing the apparently undefended settlement, they walked their horses confidently towards the gate. Petrus grinned. At a nod from him, the Germans began to move quietly forward down the slope.
Just before the Saxons reached the gate, the men inside slammed it shut and barred it. Taken by surprise, the Saxons paused, wondering whether to fire it or break it down some other way; and it was while their attention was fixed on the gate that Petrus and the mercenaries came out of a clump of trees on the slopes above.
“The gods are with us,” Petrus whispered to himself.
The victory was total. Trapped between the gate, the slope and the river, the Saxons were taken by surprise and hardly had time to defend themselves as the compact party on their sturdy ponies burst upon them, the Germans swinging their heavy axes with terrible effect. Within moments they had been driven to the ford, and several thrown into the water, while Petrus and his men dismounted to finish their work. They hacked mercilessly; and Petrus killed one of the Saxons with a thrust of his sword through the raider’s throat, a blow that earned him a grunt of approval from one of the Germans. Only two of the Saxons managed to escape: the rest were killed. The cart with all its contents was left standing in front of the gate.
The mercenaries obviously enjoyed their work. Though their camp in the dune was comfortable, and they had been well fed, they had been getting bored and restless. Now however, they were smiling contentedly.
It was when the skirmish was over and the bodies of the Saxons had been stripped and tossed into a shallow pit by the river that Petrus found himself faced with a new and awkward situation, that he had not forseen. For now the leader of the mercenaries approached him.
“The cart,” he pointed to the Saxons’ loot, “is ours.”
Petrus frowned and shook his head. Some of the contents doubtless came from local farmsteads. “It will be restored to the owners,” he replied.
The German’s eyes were expressionless.
“Ours.”
“You have been paid.”
“We killed the Saxons. The cart is ours or we go.”
Petrus considered. If the Germans left, they would easily find employment with one of the other settlements; he had no doubt that the Saxons they had just encountered were nothing more than an advance party and that they would be back before long, in greater numbers. It would be foolish to let the mercenaries go.