Chapter XI: The Search

Hurrying on without pause, and impressed with but the one overpowering thought of the danger of all he loved on earth, Theodore soon reached the banks of the Danube, and gazed onward upon the road, which for several miles lay straight before him. But nothing met his sight, either to raise his hopes or increase his apprehensions; all was open and clear, and not even a cart or a beast of burden from the country, no, not a single peasant bringing in his basket of fruit or flowers, arrested the eye, as it wandered down the long, straight avenue. A pair of enormous eagles, whirling slowly round, high up in the blue morning sky, was the only sight of animated being that presented itself; the singing of a light bird, too lowly and insignificant to fear those majestic tyrants of the skies, and the dull roar of the great river, were the only sounds that broke upon the ear.

Hope sets her quick foot wherever fear leaves the space vacant; and Theodore trusted that Ildica might have passed on ere the Huns had crossed the river. He paused not, however, at the voice of the siren, but still urged on his horse, gazing anxiously forward, and listening for every sound. The five freedmen who had remained with him followed as fast as they could, but the superior power and swiftness of the young Roman's charger left a short but increasing interval between them. That interval was less, perhaps, than half a mile, when Theodore reached the wooded rocks, round whose immoveable bases the road was forced to wind; but his faithful Cremera saw him disappear behind them with apprehension, and urged on his horse with eager haste, till he and the rest had also turned the angle of the rocks, and once more beheld his master.

Theodore was now at less than a hundred yards' distance: he had dismounted, and, with the charger standing beside him, was kneeling over some object which had attracted his attention on the road. When the freedmen came up, they too sprang to the ground to look upon the sight which had stopped him. It was the body of one of their companions, who had been selected, like themselves, to bear arms upon the dangerous journey they had been forced to undertake. His spear was in his hand, with the iron red with blood, and in his heart was fixed a reed arrow, such as some of the Scythian nations used in their wars.

Theodore pointed in silence to the corpse, gazed for a moment round, and followed with his haggard eye the long track of the road, apparently to discover if any new object of horror lay before him; and then, after once more looking sternly upon the dead man, he shook his sword from the sheath, sprang again upon his horse, and galloped on his way. As he went, however, his eye searched anxiously on the ground for further traces regarding the too evident fate which had befallen Flavia and her company; nor was he without finding such marks; the ground was dented and beaten with horses' feet, and stains of blood here and there showed that there had been a contest of a fierce and desperate kind on the spot over which he passed.

Scarcely three hundred yards from the place where lay the body of the freedman, a small road turned off to the left, leading down through the woods, with which that part of the country was thickly strewn, to the banks of the river Margus, higher up than the city. At that point, too, the traces, which had hitherto marked so plainly the course which those he sought for had pursued, no longer afforded him a clew; for, separating as it were into two distinct streams, the footmarks of the horses went on in either track, leading, on the one hand, towards Tricornium, and, on the other, into the thinly-peopled and half-cultivated country towards Illyria.

He paused in doubt; and the agony of impatience, even at a moment's delay, was only equalled by that of apprehension lest he should mistake the path, as he turned from one to the other. However, the sun, just rising above the trees that fringed the bank, suddenly poured a stream of light upon the left-hand road, and the rays caught and glittered on some shining substance, which lay at about a bowshot distance. Theodore darted forward, and his doubts were removed at once; for that which accidentally flashed back the sunshine to his eye was the collar of emeralds which he himself had borne to Ildica from his father Paulinus. He hesitated no longer, but hurried on; and, ere he had proceeded more than a quarter of an hour, the sound of voices and the neigh of horses told him that his speed had brought him near to those he had pursued.

What was his purpose? he himself scarcely knew: it was vague, undefined, uncertain: it might be to save, it might be to live or die with those whom he loved.

The spot where he then stood was a wooded covert, near the brow of a high hill, which, sloping down on the other side beyond him, left the forest on its summit, and stretched into natural meadows, covering the bottom of a sweet and tranquil valley. He knew not, however, what was the scene beyond the brow; but he heard voices and barbarian tongues, and was hurrying on to meet the fate in store for him, whatever that store might be, when the figure of a woman darted through the wood; and Flavia, pale and sad as a statue on a tomb, stood by his horse's side, and threw her arms up to clasp him as he sat.

"My children! my children!" she cried; "oh, Theodore! my children are in the power of the Huns!"

"Where?" demanded Theodore; and his fierce and flashing eye, and knit determined brow, told that he was prepared to do those deeds which were once common among the children of his native land: "where?" he demanded, and it was the only word he spoke.

"Down in yon meadow," replied Flavia, "over the brow of the hill. But listen: oh God! they might yet be saved if we had but fleet horses: there are few of the barbarians with them; those few are revelling at their morning meal: the rest are gone to pursue the party from Tricornium."

"What party?" cried Theodore: "is there a chance of any aid?"

"Alas, no! my son," she replied, in the same rapid tone; "alas, no! We met a centurion and his soldiers coming from Tricornium to Margus, and while we were in parley with him, the barbarians suddenly fell upon us, like a cloud of brown locusts upon the fertile land: there was resistance and strife, and I sought to flee with the children. I know not how it happened; for it was like struggling with the waves of a tempestuous sea, all terrible, and nothing distinct; but at length, when I could discern anything, I found myself alone, defended by Acer, the freedman, against a single Hun, who lingered behind to seize upon me as his prey, while the greater body of his companions pursued the centurion along the high road, and a few hurried down hither with their captives and plunder. Though wounded, the freedman defended me as if he had been a Roman, and struck the fierce barbarian with his spear a blow that made him fly; but, as he galloped off, he drew his bow, and in a moment an arrow was in Acer's heart. I was alone; my children were in captivity, and I followed hither; for I had only sought to save myself with them, but not to live without them."

Theodore sprang to the ground. "My mother," he said, "I will deliver them or die;" and making the freedmen dismount, he chose four to follow him, leaving the Arab Cremera to remain with Flavia. His orders were few, but they were distinct. "When Eudochia, Ammian, Ildica, are here," he said, addressing the freedman, "mount them and the Lady Flavia on the horses: speed back to Margus, and bid the bishop save them at any price. Should you find the city in the hands of the Huns, pronounce the name of Onegisus; and when you have found him, tell him that the youth Theodore, to whom he made a promise, claims his protection for those who are most dear to him on earth. Mother," he continued, embracing Flavia, "mother, I go!"

Flavia gazed mournfully in that sad, firm countenance. "Theodore," she said, pressing him in her arms, "Theodore, thou goest to destruction!"

He made no reply, but wrung her hand; and, waving to the slaves he had chosen to follow, burst from her embrace and hurried over the hill.

In another moment the resting-place of the Huns was before his eyes, though the branches of the trees still waved between him and them, affording concealment while he observed them. He paused but for an instant, but that instant sufficed to show him the barbarians scattered on both sides of the stream, gathered in groups of eight or ten, with their small rugged horses feeding beside them, and their weapons cast upon the turf whereon they sat. The heart of Theodore rose to see that they were so few, for not more than two hundred were there; and the number of the captives, who sat apart, with bending heads, and the self-neglecting look of utter despair, had their arms been free, might have offered no slight support in the bold attempt he was about to make. "Our object," he said, turning to those who followed him, "is to free Ildica, Eudochia, and Ammian. Let whoever reaches them first cut their bonds, and bid them fly up the road over the hill. Then free your fellows, and oppose the pursuit of the barbarians! Thou art pale," he added, addressing one of the freedmen; "thy lips are bloodless; if thy heart be faint, turn back."

"Thou goest to death," replied the man, firmly, "and I will go with thee. I feel that death is horrible; but it must be borne once, and I can bear it now."

"Follow, then!" said Theodore, "but cautiously, under the covering of the trees, till we are close upon them."

It was a great, a mighty, a sublime thing, that determined resolution unto death, which possessed the young enthusiastic Roman; which did away boyhood, and made him at once a strong and valiant man, in vigour, in powers, in intellect, in energy. To die for her he loved; to ransom her from the barbarians at the price of his own blood; to see her for the last time as her deliverer, and to know, in dying, that his hand had freed her, was the last aspiration, the only remaining hope that rested with Theodore, of all the many sweet and probable dreams of happiness which haunted his fancy but one short month before.

Calmly and deliberately he led the way through the trees to a spot where, with irregular sweeps, the forest met the meadow. Within fifty yards sat Ildica and her companions, mourning, like the enslaved Hebrews, their captivity, by the banks of the strange waters. Beside them, as a sort of guard--though the bonds by which they were tied rendered their unassisted escape impossible--lay spread upon the grass some ten or twelve of the dark and filthy barbarians, with their rude and frightful countenances, scarred with ancient gashes and sallow with long-accustomed dirt, distorted by wild merriment, as they feasted near the first captives whom they had taken in their invasion of the Roman state. At the feet of one who sat closest to the prisoners lay a gory human head, the short cut hair and beard of which showed that it had belonged to no barbarian form; and--while Theodore, pausing behind the trees, let his eye run over the other groups of Huns, as they were scattered about at a greater distance, some eating and drinking, some playing with their unbridled horses, some erecting tents of skins, as if their numbers were soon to be greatly increased--the fierce barbarian ended some speech in his own tongue by a wild and ringing laugh, and, with a stroke of his foot, kicked the trunkless head into the river.

It was the signal for his own destruction. "On!" cried Theodore, "on!" and, with the sudden stoop of the eagle on its prey, he bounded forward upon the barbarian. The Hun started on his feet, but that instant the sword of the young Roman cleft him to the eyes; and rolling back in the convulsive agonies of death, he plunged into the river, where he had so lately cast the head of his adversary.

Scarcely was the blow struck when it was followed by another, which laid a second Hun prostrate and disabled at his feet: two more fell before the spears of the freedmen; and the rest, conceiving that much greater numbers of enemies must be approaching, fled to their comrades farther down the stream. There was a thirst in Theodore's heart to pursue and smite them still, but he remembered Ildica, and turned to where she sat. A moment freed her from her bonds: Eudochia and Ammian were set at liberty.

"Up! up! over the hill, beloved," cried Theodore: "quick as light, Ildica! No words! you will find horses ready. Cut their bonds quick," he continued, mingling his orders to the freedmen who had accompanied him, and to the captives as they were liberated. "Snatch up what arms you can find! There are the swords, and arrows, and javelins they have left behind. Fly, Ildica! I beseech you, fly! Ammian, hurry her and Eudochia up the hill; your mother is there with horses; we follow in a moment. Quick! quick! see, the barbarians are pouring back upon us! form a phalanx across the road! Away, away! for God's sake! for my sake! Away, my Ildica!"

There was no time for further words; the Huns were upon them; but, happily for Theodore, thirsty for immediate vengeance, they poured upon him with the sword and spear, instead of trusting to the missiles which they might have used with more fatal effect. Supported by twenty of the most resolute slaves and freedmen, some hastily equipped with the arms they had snatched up, some heaving masses of stone, the young Roman, active and skilful in the use of all the weapons of the day, barred the path between the Huns and their liberated captives, and met them with a courage and a fierceness even superior to their own. Every tree, every broken mass of rock, formed a point of resistance; and, though hurled against him with still increasing rage and impetus, the Huns recoiled, like javelins cast against a rock, leaving some of their number dead or dying at his feet.

Each moment, however, their numbers increased, as the scattered parties from the different spots of that wide meadow hurried up to the scene of conflict; and Theodore, grim with the blood of many enemies, but, alas! not unstained with his own, slowly retired step by step towards the spot where the road entered the wood. There he had resolved to make his last stand and die; but, ere he reached it, a broad tremendous form, which had just come up from the farther part of the meadow, mingled with his assailants, and, armed like himself with a heavy sword, seemed to single him out for destruction. His countenance, however, was nobler than that of the Huns in general, as his height was greater; and when Theodore heard him exclaim, in a tongue near akin to the Alan language, "Leave him to me! leave him to me!" he thought that, if he must die, it might be sweeter by his hand.

Still, however, he contended with him with but little disadvantage; for, as a Roman, he had greater skill, if the barbarian had greater strength. Brow to brow, and hand to hand, blow following blow, and thrust succeeding thrust, they stood almost alone, while the youth's companions were driven back; and with flashing eyes and slow irregular breath, pursued the lightning chances of the combat. Neither had gained a step, though Theodore's blood was trickling fast away, when a wild scream from the hill above caught his ear, unnerved his heart, and brought dim despair of his last dearest desire's result, like a dark cloud before his eyes.

He turned but for an instant to listen to that sound, but that instant was enough. His guard was beaten down; he fell upon his knee: though hope had abandoned him, courage had not, and he strove to struggle up, but it was in vain; his mighty adversary poured blow after blow upon the weak defence which his sword could now afford. He rose, fell again, staggered even upon his knee; exposed the arm which held the weapon over his head to the descending stroke of his enemy; dropped the sword itself from his disabled hand, and saw the shining steel, thirsting for his heart's last drop, raised high in air above his defenceless head. The hour he had expected had arrived, and he was prepared to die!

As with quick and heavy sweep the blow fell with a vehemence which he himself who struck it could not restrain, another weapon interposed, caught the keen blade upon one no less strong, and turned the stroke aside.

"Spare him, Ardaric! spare him!" cried the deep tones of a voice that Theodore had heard before. "Spare him, for love of me!"

The young Roman started on his feet, and gazed wildly round upon the scene about him. When last he had time to look around, nothing had been seen but some two hundred Huns contending with himself and his small faithful band. Now, sweeping round in a semicircle which hemmed him in, down to the very river's brink, was seen an innumerable multitude of those dark ferocious horsemen, while thousands on thousands more appeared streaming down from the road, and spreading themselves out over the whole meadow.

The space for nearly forty cubits immediately about himself and his adversary was clear, except where stood beside him the same dark chief who had been his guide on the other side of the Danube, and where, a pace or two behind, a barbarian attendant held the powerful horse from which he had just sprung. But as Theodore gazed along the dusky line of savage foes around him, a sight more painful to his heart than the impending death which had just hung over him struck his eyes. There, where a multitude of banners, rudely embroidered with a black eagle crowned, marked a particular spot in their irregular line, stood Flavia and her family, once more in the hands of the barbarians!

But the hope of still purchasing their safety followed instantly upon the agony of that sight. Theodore at once cast himself at the feet of the Hunnish chieftain. "Oh, Onegisus!" he exclaimed, "oh, noble Onegisus! Thou hast promised me, unasked, thy favour and protection. Now, for the first time that I have ever required a boon at the hands of man, I beseech thee to grant me one. Let this brave man, from whose arm thou hast just saved me, plunge his sword into my heart! But let yon women and children, bound to me by the ties of blood and love, go free! Send them, oh send them, to the dwellings of my mother's race, beneath the snowy Alps, where they may find safety and protection! I adjure thee, by the God in whom I believe! I adjure thee, by the gods whom thou thyself worshippest! Spare them, oh spare them, and send them forth in peace!"

The dark chieftain gazed upon him for a moment with an aspect stern but not fierce.

"Ardaric," he said at length, "he is the captive of thy hand. Wilt thou give him unto me, and the first ten captives that I make they shall be thine?"

The other chieftain, whose brow had relaxed from the stern frown of contest, and on whose face was a mild and not unpleasing smile, thrust his sword back into the scabbard, saying, "I give them to thee all, oh mighty king! I give them to thee, without recompense or bargain. Let them be the first spoil taken in the land of the Romans, which Ardaric offers to Attila the King."

At that tremendous name, already shadowed over with a cloud of vague but fearful rumours of wide lands conquered, kings bent to homage, and nations, as savage as that over which he ruled, overthrown by that mighty hand, Theodore drew a step back, and gazed with doubt and surprise on the dark features and sinewy limbs of him who had just saved his life; and if his feelings had been strange and mysterious when he had first seen that powerful but ill-proportioned form, what were they now, when he heard the stranger called by that fearful name.

"I am Attila!" said the monarch, answering his wondering and inquiring look. "What sayst thou now, young man? If I will send these women and slaves free, and on their way, wilt thou be the bondman of Attila?"

"Oh, not a bondman!" said Theodore, letting his head droop upon his bosom: "I can die, oh monarch! but I cannot be a bondman! Let him slay me, and let them go free; but bind not the limbs of a free Roman!"

Attila gazed on him a while with the same grave majestic air which he had never lost even for a moment, and then added, "I understand thee: I will not bind thy hands; I will not demand thy service against thy native land--thou shalt draw no sword for Attila against Rome--thou shalt fill no servile employ--honoured and caressed, thou shalt be the friend of Attila; and, if thou showest the same wisdom in other matters as in this, thou shalt be his counsellor also. Not his first friend--not his first counsellor," he added, "for here stands Ardaric, whose place none can supply; and yonder is Onegisus, found faithful in all things--but thou shalt be among the first. Hearken, thou shalt promise me for seven years to be to me a faithful friend and counsellor--except in war or counsel against thy native land--and I will send these thy people upon their way, with the king's pledge for their safety till they reach the land of thy kindred."

"Surely the king has some secret motive!" exclaimed Ardaric, king of the tributary, or rather subject, nation of the Gepid[ae]; "surely the king has some secret motive for showing this favour to a captive--though the boy is brave!"

"I have, Ardaric!" replied Attila, "I have! There is a strange bond between me and him--but that matters not. Wilt thou accept the offer, youth?"

"I will!" replied Theodore; "but cannot they go with me?" and he pointed with his hand to Flavia and her companions.

"Thou knowest not what thou askest!" cried the king, with a cloud darkening on his brow. "It were evil with them, and not good, to go. I will send them in safety and in honour to the land of the Alani, if thou wilt be as obedient to my commands as a son to a father's during seven years, except in the things which are against thy country; dost thou accept the terms?"

"I do," replied Theodore, "I do; and deep and heartfelt gratitude will I ever show to thee, oh monarch, for thus befriending me in my hour of need!"

"For seven years!" said the monarch, gazing up thoughtfully towards the sky, while the light of wild but mighty aspirations illuminated his harsh but striking features--"for seven years! Ere seven years have fled, I shall have conquered the whole earth!"