12 July 609
Malaca
Flavius Iustinianus Mauricius tightened the rope tying the corpse to the saddle and stepped back to examine his work. It was fairly good, if you didn’t look too hard it looked like he had only died recently. He tied the horse’s lead to the back of his saddle and mounted his own.
He was riding through a part of Hispania that would have been quite nice if it weren’t for the burning buildings and corpses scattered across the road. He spurred his horse on and tried not to look at them.
After a few hours of riding in the hot sun and dry, dusty wind he was drenched in sweat and a foul stench was starting to come off of the body. Not good, if it smelled too bad they might not believe him. He shook his head and kept riding.
The sky was streaked with red and pink when the wind began to change. The feeling on his face went from a hard, course stream to a soft ocean breeze. A small grey dot appeared on the horizon. He smiled. Malaca.
The stars were already high in the sky when arrived outside the city. The area around the city was desolate, with no trees or plants and the only sound the rustle of the burnt grass. He rocked back in his saddle and shouted over the wall, “Sentry!”
The only response was the soft rustle of the grass.
“SENTRY!”
“What?! What the hell is it that you can’t wait till morning!”
A head popped over the walls, a faint orange glow lighting up the side of his face closest to his lantern.
“Magister Militum Quintus Decius, here to take command of the province.”
“Sure you are. Go back to Vagrila.”
The head disappeared.
“Well, I’m not him. I’m the magister equites. And you might want to get a look at him.”
The voice came quieter. “Sure I do.”
“’Cause he’s got an arrow in his neck.”
There was a faint sigh from on top of the walls.
“Fine. But if you do anything I’ll cut your balls off myself.”
He rolled back forward in the saddle and looked expectantly at the gates. They were heavily scarred with cracks, both the new fresh white and the old dark tan. After a few minutes the gates creaked open, slowly drawing backwards until there was a space barely wide enough to ride through. Behind the gates was a gatehouse, with another pair of gates behind them, similarly opened. It opened onto a courtyard, faintly lit by sputtering torches but empty. He reigned in just outside the second gate. A bloodcurdling screech echoed from behind him and he whirled around to the gates closing. And he felt the press of cool metal against his neck.
“Don’t move.”
His eyes flicked sideways. A group of spearmen were crowded against the wall next to the gates. By all rights he should have seen them. Shit.
“Felix, go around and untie the magister militum.”
He tracked Felix as he circled around to the second horse. The man took one whiff of the corpse and turned away, hand over mouth.
“Kentarches! He’s dead!”
The man with the spear to his throat glared at Felix. “Of course he’s dead. You couldn’t smell him coming in?”
“No.”
He looked up at the sky, grimacing and no doubt screaming internally. After a few seconds he looked back at the man and said “Go through his pockets. He should have a paper with the imperial seal on it.”
Felix pulled the coat off of the corpse and started going through the pockets, the kentarches kept the spear at Iustinianus’ throat the whole time. After a few minutes a wad of papyrus was produced.
He frowned as he scanned it. “Yeah, it says he was appointed by… Tiberius III.” He looked up at stared at the kentarches. “Did we have a Tiberius III?”
The kentarches blinked. “I don’t know.”
Iustinianus coughed, only to feel the spear press harder against his neck. He choked out a quiet “Yes, between Mauricius and Phocas.”
The kentarches stared at him with cold eyes. Shit, he knew. He’d slipped up and was going to die for it. And then the man turned to Felix and said “Oh yeah, I forgot. He was between Mauricius and Phocas. Reigned 602 to 603. Now stable the horses and bury the poor man.”
He turned back to Iustinianus. “Now, what was it, magister equites? If you’d be willing to come with me then Felix’ll take care of your horse.”
Iustinianus nodded and dismounted
