The Eagle of the Ninth

Gruen is acutely aware that Esca and Marcus are being pursued across the North. Multiple tribes have united with the Epidaii in the hunt for the eagle. Marcus asks that Gruen help them by providing food and directions to a path by which they might travel undetected to Hadrian’s Wall. Gruen explains that it would be impossible for them to navigate alone and insists that he take them himself. Marcus is deeply concerned by the risk this undertaking poses to Gruen, but Gruen is certain that his absence will not be noticed by the time he has safely conveyed them along, as his homestead is relatively isolated. He leads Marcus and Esca through a labyrinthine bog. In exchange for his help, when they part, he asks only that he might see the eagle, which leaves him greatly satisfied. Marcus invites him to return with them, concerned that his participation will be discovered, but Gruen declines, offering Marcus the salute of the Roman legion as they bid each other goodbye for the last time.

Two days later, Marcus and Esca are still approximately 14 miles from Hadrian’s Wall, though they expected to have reached it by now. Heavy, disorienting mists and the need to conceal themselves have blighted their ability to maintain an efficient trajectory. Marcus’s leg becomes increasingly burdensome, and it is only as a result of Esca’s adeptness as a hunter that they make any progress toward the Wall at all. Just as Esca declares that they should find a foxhole in which to conceal themselves for the night, the mists part, and they are sighted by a horseman scout. Escaping into some nearby woods and up a hill, Marcus and Esca are pursued by a swarm of tribesmen. In their scramble to evade their captors, they happen upon an abandoned Roman signal tower. They can go no further, with nowhere else to conceal themselves, and with Marcus’s leg deteriorating to the point where Esca must help him just to reach the tower. They accept the inevitability that they will be located, and Marcus, who long before decided that he would rather destroy the eagle than allow it to return to enemy hands, is satisfied that the deep waters of the lake below the tower will be a fitting resting place should he and Esca meet their end here.

Confronted with the notion that they are facing imminent death, Marcus considers the sacrifice that Esca has made for him and asks, “For me, there has been the eagle; but what had you to win in all this?” (180). For Esca, it is reward enough to have existed once again past the bonds of his enslavement, and he tells Marcus, “I have been once again a free man amongst free men. I have shared the hunting with my brother, and it has been a good hunting” (180), giving name to the fraternal affection he shares with Marcus. Marcus agrees, “It has been a good hunting […] A good hunting; and now I think that it is ended” (180), but he has only a few moments to embrace the sense of peace that comes over him before the arrival of horses confirms that their hiding place has been discovered.

Marcus and Esca discover that there are only three men in the party of warriors who have found them. Both equally skilled in combat, Marcus and Esca quickly subdue the tribesmen, one of whom they realize is Liathan. Esca binds and gags the two men in Liathan’s company. Marcus tells Liathan that when the others in his contingent arrive, Liathan must tell them that Marcus and Esca are not inside, or Marcus will toss the eagle into the lake below. Liathan complies, deterring the other tribesmen, but no sooner have they left than Liathan attempts to attack Marcus and is put down once more. Liathan asks why Marcus presented such a ruse to his people, pretending to be a healer to steal the eagle. Marcus points out that the eyes of Liathan’s nephew have indeed been cured, so he was not so deceptive after all, and that his motives were not to steal but to recapture it and return it to its rightful dominion. He tells him, “I came to take back—not to steal, for it was never yours—take back the winged god, because it was the eagle of my father’s Legion” (185), emphasizing its true ownership and origins, which he believes Liathan may respect, if not understand.

Liathan reveals to Marcus that his grandfather Tradui was right. Tradui has insisted since the eagle was discovered to be missing that it was Marcus who took it. The familiarity that Tradui recognized in Marcus’s face as he told the story of the eagle’s capture remained with him: “He said you had the face of that Chieftain of the Red Crests he had seen killed under the wings of the god and that he had been blind and doting not to know you for his son” (185). Tradui therefore sent Liathan with Marcus’s father’s ring to return it to Marcus, regardless of the outcome of their eventual clash, believing that the ring belongs with Marcus. Marcus asks that Liathan thank his grandfather for him. He has no choice but to leave Liathan and the other two warriors tied up in the watchtower, afraid they will only recapture them once more. Darkness is setting in, but Marcus promises that when he reaches Hadrian’s Wall, he will send word that Liathan and the other two men are there so that they will not be left stranded and undiscovered.

Disposing of their weapons, Esca and Marcus take the warriors’ mounts and complete the final leg of their journey to Hadrian’s Wall. Their appearance is significantly changed since they first undertook their quest: They are haggard, ragged, filthy, and bloodied. When they arrive at the nearest sentry post, Marcus’s friend Centurion Drusillus, with whom he served back at Isca Dumnoniorum, at first does not recognize him but then greets him with recognition, giving him a warm welcome as he announces that he has brought back the Hispania’s eagle.

When Marcus and Esca return at last to the home of Uncle Aquila at Calleva, Legate Claudius Hieronimianus is visiting with him, and Marcus and Esca announce that they have returned with the eagle. Uncle Aquila immediately recognizes the emerald ring on Marcus’s finger, and they defer the retelling of their adventure until all four can gather and it can be told at length. Marcus is disappointed to find that Cottia is not at home next door. She is traveling with her aunt and uncle and appeared before her departure, frustrated and angry, to return Marcus’s bracelet he had asked her to watch for him in his absence. Cub is overjoyed that Marcus has come home and looks the worse for wear, having refused food since Cottia’s visits have ceased. Cub’s attachment to Marcus is clear in the warmth of the homecoming he receives. When the four men are set to gather to relate the story of the eagle’s rescue, Esca is at first hesitant to join in, as the chamber in the watchtower is off limits to enslaved persons. Marcus confronts Esca, impressing upon him the legitimacy of his free status and the significance that this change has conferred. Convening in the intimate sanctum, Marcus and Esca take turns relating the story of their retrieval of the eagle.

Claudius Hieronimianus will present the account of Marcus and Esca’s accomplishments to the Roman Senate, but he is sorry to say that the legion will never be reformed, even with the return of the eagle. Eventually, word of the eagle’s recapture, however distorted the tale may become, could swirl in rumors traveling south past Hadrian’s Wall, but the decision is made that that the fate of the Ninth and the eagle’s return to Roman territory should not be spoken of further, but rather kept between those few who already know of its existence. The legate suggests that the eagle be given a ceremonial burial, a sacred gesture worthy of its power and significance. Uncle Aquila suggests that a secret compartment he built into the atrium of his house is the perfect place. Marcus wraps the eagle in the cloak he once wore as a centurion, and it is placed in the vault. Claudius Hieronimianus recites the Valedictory, or departing address, over the eagle, and the tile in the floor concealing the eagle in its secret chamber is replaced, imperceptible to all but the four present for its internment.

The Senate has reached a decision with respect to the affairs surrounding the recapture of the eagle of the Ninth Legion. In a powerfully significant gesture, the Senate has decided to confer upon Esca the status of Roman citizen, and Marcus impresses upon Esca the change in his standing in Roman society. Marcus will have conferred upon him all the rights he would have received had he retired after a full tenure as a soldier. As is customary, Marcus will be granted land in Britain where he last served, but Claudius Hieronimianus has it on good terms that if Marcus were to request to return to the Etruscan hills and settle there, the arrangements of a land holding would be made for him there. Marcus realizes that, like his Uncle Aquila, he is at home in Britain, and he plans to choose fertile land further to the south that he and Esca will endeavor to farm together.

Marcus has become vehemently against enslavement in any form, and as such the two will hire their laborers instead. When at last Cottia returns to Calleva, she is furious at Marcus for having been gone so long, and it is evident that her frustration is masking her hurt over having missed Marcus for so long. She has matured significantly, though she does not spare Marcus her wrath over the concern for him that has plagued her since he first set off. When Marcus realizes how attached she has become to him and how fond he has grown of her, he declares that he will make arrangements with her Uncle Kaeso to take her hand in marriage. With his Uncle Aquila’s assurance that Marcus may call upon him in any time of need, having no son of his own, and his blessing upon Marcus’s future endeavors, Marcus feels a sense of hope and excitement for the next phase of his life. His delight is further compounded when his Uncle Aquila bestows upon him the finest compliment Marcus could ever hope to receive, calling him impossible like his father. This assertion echoes the many comparisons that have been made between the two by Roman and native Briton alike.