Caesar's Sword: The Complete Campaigns

by David Pilling

  He was a vision in rich silks of many hues, green and gold and crimson and God knows what else. Pale gold rings flashed on his fingers of his right hand as he delicately stifled a yawn. No mean soldier himself, the company of soldiers evidently bored him.

  I cared nothing for either of them, and looked eagerly among the crowd of red faces for my son.

  Arthur had already spotted me. He rose from his divan and strode across the floor to embrace me, his face suffused with wine and joy.

  “Father!” he shouted, “is it really you?”

  Unlike most of the others, he still wore his armour, and Caledfwlch was bound to his hip. I submitted to his crushing embrace, wincing as I felt my ribs creak, while he roared and pounded me on the back.

  The Bear of Britain, they used to call my grandsire, or so my mother told me. Arthur senior had been a big, fearsomely strong man, and his descendent was no weakling. I was glad of that, but also needed to breathe.

  “Loosen your grip a little,” I wheezed, “else my lungs will pop.”

  He subsided, still laughing, and held me at arm’s length. His green eyes sparkled, and for a moment I fancied his mother was looking at me through them.

  “They said you were dead,” he said, giving me a shake, “drowned off the coast of Sena Gallica. God’s bones, how I wept for you! Where have you been all this time?”

  His bull-horn of a voice rang in the silence. The din of music and conversation had died away, and over Arthur’s shoulder I saw Narses watching me with a cold glitter in his eyes.

  “I see a ghost has come to join our little celebration,” said the eunuch, “one I thought laid to rest at the bottom of the ocean, many months ago.”

  I gently pushed Arthur aside. “I am no ghost,” I replied, “but solid flesh and bone. Bessas, prove it.”

  Bessas gave one of his rare grins and punched me on the arm.

  “Coel is alive,” he declared, “if a trifle bruised.”

  Narses steepled his fingers and glanced sidelong at John, who was glaring at me with an expression I can only describe as two parts disbelief to one part sheer hatred.

  “Well, well,” said Narses, “perhaps you walked ashore across the seabed. You are a hard man to kill. No wonder Britain proved so difficult to conquer, if all the natives are like you.”

  “You admit it, then,” I said accusingly, “you admit deliberately plotting my death at Sena Gallica, by placing me aboard one of the condemned transports.”

  Narses gave a little shrug. “Not at all. I bear you no particular ill-will, though you have proved relentlessly stubborn in your refusal to serve me. It was John who tried to kill you at Sena Gallica. If you had been in my employ then, I would not have allowed it.”

  John’s handsome head snapped around, and he glared venomously at his friend. “Damn you!” he hissed, “you dare accuse me of such a thing, in public, in front of fellow officers?”

  “I accuse you of nothing,” Narses replied, unmoved, “I state it. I am in command here. Everyone present would do well to remember that simple truth.”

  He inclined his oversized head to his left, to a man who was clearly no Roman officer. Rather, a high-ranking barbarian, possibly a Frank, with long yellow hair and drooping moustaches. His intelligent blue eyes studied me carefully, and Arthur, and occasionally dropped to look greedily at Caledfwlch.

  “This is Pharamond,” said Narses, “an envoy from Theodobald, King of the Franks. He is our honoured guest.”

  I failed to see the envoy’s relevance, but Narses never said or did anything without a carefully planned reason.

  “Theodobald is a young man,” he prattled on, “a very young man indeed, just sixteen years old, and new to power. I am glad to say he is a sensible youth, and wishes to be a friend to Rome. Hence the presence of Pharamond, who witnessed our victory today.”

  “The young king seeks to learn wisdom from history. He has read of the exploits of his warlike forebears, and eagerly devours the legends and chronicles of other nations. Including those of your own fair isle, Coel.”

  I kept a careful eye on Pharamond while Narses talked. The envoy had a lean and wolfish look about him, and kept toying with the hilt of his sword.

  “Your return was an unlooked-for gift from God,” Narses continued, “I see that now. Theodobald is gathering not only wisdom, but all the relics of the ancient world he can find. Relics, as everyone knows, hold power.”

  “The sword,” growled Pharamond, “the sword that belonged to Caesar, and was forged by the gods. Give it to us.”

  I looked to Arthur, whose face had darkened with anger. “What is this?” he cried, clapping his hand to Caledfwlch, “you mean to give my inheritance to some barbarian chieftain? Not while I live!”

  “Nor me,” I said, moving to stand beside him. “Caesar’s sword belongs to our family.”

  I looked to Bessas, but the veteran stood silent, frowning into his grey beard. He had always lacked for resolution, and was one of those who failed to support Belisarius when the general needed him at Ravenna.

  The other officers were all young men, bold and valiant in their way, but hopelessly drunk, and unable to comprehend what was happening. Narses held us all in the bowl of his hand.

  “Caesar’s sword is the property of the Empire,” Narses squealed, “as the Emperor’s chief representative in Italy, it is mine to dispose as I see fit. King Theobald has heard the stories of your famous ancestor, Coel, and wants his magic sword. He thinks it will bring him good fortune in war.”

  His eyes narrowed to slits. “It is also the price Theobald demands for not supporting the Goths in this war. They are all kin, these barbarians. Unless we give him the sword, he will lead a hundred thousand warriors over the Alps into Roman territory. There will be no famine to stop them this time.”

  “Come,” he added, spreading his hands, “it is only an old sword, after all. Place it on the carpet at Pharamond’s feet, and let there be an end to the matter.”

  I became aware of the presence of armed men at my back. Narses’ guards had shuffled into the pavilion. At least one of them, I knew, would relish the chance to stick his sword in my liver.

  A tense silence filled the silken chamber. Narses sat upright, his short legs dangling over the edge of his divan. Beside him, John looked distrustfully at everyone, long fingers curled about the jewelled hilt of his dagger. Pharamond glared at me and my son, willing us to give up our rightful property.

  I turned my head slightly to the left. “Beware of rust,” I whispered, and ripped out my sword.

  Arthur threw himself aside in time, else I might have taken his head off. I struck blind, knowing there were at least two men behind me. The blade smacked against a silver helmet, severing a cheek-guard and knocking its owner to the floor.

  Chaos ensued. The sound of clashing steel jerked Bessas to life. He threw himself at one of the guards, and they went down in a roaring, cursing heap, scrabbling for their daggers.

  “Stop this madness!” shrieked Narses, his voice resembling a kettle coming to the boil, “guards! Guards – someone turn out the guard!”

  Most of his guests remained where they were, frozen in shock, but one or two saw an opportunity to win their general’s favour. They struggled to their feet, looking around blearily for their swords, only to have Arthur descend on them like a raging giant.

  His fists smashed them to the floor, and then John flew at him, curved dagger raised to strike. Arthur blocked the strike with his forearm, kneed John in the crotch and threw him bodily across the pavilion. The screeching nobleman crashed into Narses’ divan, overturning it and sending the eunuch flying.

  He landed heavily against the pillar carrying the bust of the Emperor Elagabalus. The bust toppled from its perch and landed next to Narses, who lay stunned, staring into the late emperor’s marble eyes in dumb confusion.

  “Run!” shouted Bessas, who had got on top of his opponent, “run, you fools!”

  I beckoned at Arthur, and together
we ducked out of the pavilion into the night. Four more of Narses’ guards were running towards us, drawn by the noise.

  “Get those horses,” rasped Arthur, pointing to a pair of beasts tethered to a tree beside the pavilion. They were being tended by a small, fair-haired servant boy, and probably belonged to Pharamond.

  He bounded towards the guards, Caledfwlch whirling in his hand. The sword was like an extension of himself, and I could only watch in admiration as he made short work of the four men, killing one and severely wounding two. The last wisely took to his heels, howling for aid.

  I had the easier task of dealing with the boy, who required only a sharp word and a cuff round the ear before he yelped and ran off into the darkness.

  My fingers shook as I fumbled to untie the reins. I picked out the smaller of the horses for myself, a roan mare, and handed Arthur the sleek black stallion.

  “He will better carry your weight,” I said, throwing him the reins. He nodded and leaped into the saddle, while I scrambled aboard the mare with distinctly less grace.

  Oaths and shouts came from the pavilion, mixed with the crunch of steel, as we steered our stolen horses to the north and heeled them into a gallop. None tried to bar our way. Arthur was popular among the soldiers, and in place of a hail of arrows we were sent on our way by laughter and encouraging shouts.

  They were the last Roman voices I ever heard.

  16.

  Just a little longer, and I reach the end of my tale. The mere effort of writing and remembering has drained the last of my strength.

  Abbot Gildas, poor man, has watched me slowly fade away these past two years, since I first took up my pen. Only his respect for my age, and the knowledge that it would strip me of purpose in life, prevents him from forbidding me to write.

  I began this, my last despatch, with an account of how I lost my son. It ended with me lying half-dead near the banks of the Po, bleeding my life out from a host of wounds.

  The Frankish soldiers left me there to die. I was no value to them. They had pursued us all the way from the Roman camp at Taginae, to seize Caledfwlch and deliver it to their avaricious young king. If that meant killing me, and Arthur, then so be it.

  I would have crawled to my horse, but the Franks had taken her. In any case, I could not ride, or even stand. My injuries were too great. As I lay in the mud, weeping in pain, I knew I would never be whole again.

  All my concern was for Arthur. I last saw him riding west, towards the border of Liguria. The Franks would give chase, but he was a better rider than the lot of them, and had a fine horse.

  I had no means of knowing his fate. All I could do was lie there, a used-up wreck, and wait for the spectre of death. All my contempt for Narses and his crippled state came back to haunt me. I was the cripple now, alone and friendless, and destined for a miserable end.

  God was not quite done with me. Somehow I lasted the night, and in the morning an unwanted saviour came in the form of a Perugian priest. Like the Samaritan, he knelt by my side, whispered soothing words, and did his best to bind up the worst of my wounds.

  “Leave me, father,” I begged, but he would have none of it. He was an old man, lacking the strength to help me stand, so he went and fetched a couple of farm boys from the nearest village. They brought a cart, drawn by an ox, and lifted me aboard under the priest’s careful supervision.

  For weeks I lingered, hovering between life and death in the back room of a farmer’s cottage. He resented my presence, and the duty of caring for me, but the old priest’s word was law in the village.

  “You are not well, my friend,” my saviour said to me one chill winter’s morning, “we have done our poor best, but your leg…God denies us the skill to heal you entire.”

  He was lonely in his little church, and wished me to remain with him, as his assistant. I had no intention of ending my days as the lackey to some village priest, no matter how kind he was.

  My left leg was badly twisted, but I could limp well enough with the aid of a stick. One moonless night, while the farmer was lying abed, swine drunk and shaking the rafters with his snoring, I crept into the stable and took his horse.

  I had not ridden for weeks, and the horse was a fat old mare, ruined by years of heaving ploughs. Grunting with pain, I managed to fix a saddle and bridle onto her, opened the stable door, and led her out into the night.

  We made a fine pair, one ruin riding another, but she bore my weight without protest for many miles, across the rolling Perugian landscape. I had half a loaf of rye bread in my pocket, and a little flask of water, and these sustained me until we reached the next village.

  The details of my long, wearisome journey into the West need not concern these pages. I lived to find my son, to know whether he had escaped our pursuers, but encountered no word or sign of him.

  I fell in with groups of travellers, merchants and pilgrims and the like, and passed through Frankia and Gaul, living off the charity of strangers. My damaged state, and claim to be a holy man travelling back from visiting Our Lord’s sepulchre in Jerusalem, melted the hearts of many.

  Only once during my wanderings, in the far west of Amorica, did I pick up a faint trace of my son. I found an abbey, a small place perched on a bluff overlooking gentle seas, where the brethren were kind and offered me shelter.

  The abbey was dedicated to Saint Armel, a local soldier-saint whose jawbone rested inside a jewelled casket on the altar.

  “Armel is a recent saint,” explained the abbot, “when I was a boy, he came to Amorica from Britain, gravely wounded and accompanied by a few of his warriors. He was a great soldier in his time, the Bear of Britain.”

  My heart thumped as I gazed upon the casket. I heard my mother’s voice, drifting across the long years, telling me how my grandsire’s body was never found after the final slaughter at Camlann.

  “Arthur vanished into the mists,” Eliffer’s soft voice echoed in the vaults of memory, “borne away, some say, across the sea to the Isle of Avalon. He waits there, immortal, until Britain shall have need of him again.”

  Armel is an Amorican variant on Arthur, but sufficiently different for my grandsire to shelter under his new name. Here, in this quiet house of God, he recovered from his wounds and spent his old age in prayer, far away from the endless treachery of men.

  The uncertainty of Arthur’s demise gave rise to the legend of his return: a sleeping warlord, waiting under a cave somewhere in the mountains of the distant West, surrounded by his warriors. Some day, the horn would blow, and they would all rise again to their duty.

  I could hardly speak as I looked upon the mortal remains of my grandsire. Taking my silence for awed reverence, the abbot continued his story.

  “Some three months ago, a young man came to this abbey. He pretended to be a pilgrim, but I could tell he was a fighting man. The soldier shone through, even under his soiled and ragged garb.”

  “He seemed to know all about our saint. I left him alone here to pray awhile. Then he left. He said little, and never gave his name.”

  The abbot was taken by surprise as I started to weep, and kindly helped me kneel before the altar. I knew the identity of his mysterious visitor.

  Arthur had come here to worship the remains of his ancestor. It seemed strangely fitting that they should come together in such a fashion. After visiting so many cruelties and hardships on my head, God had granted me the knowledge of their meeting.

  I might have made my home there, in the last resting place of my ancestor. The brethren would have welcomed me, a sinful man come to spend his last days in fasting and prayer. But I still cherished the hope of one day finding my son, and feeling his warm embrace again.

  It was sheer vanity. I had been given all the mercy I deserved, and could not hope for more. I left the abbey, and wandered a little while longer, until God guided my faltering steps to the Abbey of Rhuys in the south of Amorica.

  And Gildas. He took me in, the great churchman and scholar of our age, even though I was of the li
ne of Arthur, whose memory he despised.

  Here I have remained, inside these blessed walls, for the best part of twenty years. I have little hope of seeing my son again, but all my prayers go to him. Let him find peace, O Lord, and trust not in the wiles of princes.

  As for Caledfwlch, I trust Arthur has long since thrown it into the sea. Let the Flame of the West be doused forever. Caesar’s sword was nothing but a bane, sent by the Devil to drag all the men of my blood to ruin.

  Where are the horsemen now, where the heroes gone?

  Where is the jewelled city, and where the towers

  of silver and gold? Where are all the joys of battle?

  Alas for the dimmed eye, the withered frame,

  The brief glory of the warrior. That time is over,

  Passed into night as it had never been

  Into shadow.

  Into shadow. The long night beckons for me, and I lay down my pen.

  AUTHOR’S NOTE

  The final part of the Caesar’s Sword trilogy takes place during the end of Belisarius’ first campaign in Italy (537-40) and the start of the campaign led by Narses (551-554). Despite his physical weaknesses and lack of military experience, Narses proved to be a superb general, and eventually drove the Goths out of Italy. When the Franks tried to invade the country, he smashed them too, and spent his last years repairing and reorganising the war-torn Roman homeland.

  Narses succeeded where Belisarius failed, largely because the Emperor Justinian gave his favourite all the support he had denied his general. Justinian’s reasons for distrusting Belisarius are unclear. He may not have been ‘the last great general of Rome’, as Lord Mahon called him, but Belisarius was unfailingly loyal and did everything his Emperor asked of him. Perhaps Justinian was all too aware of the fate of previous emperors at the hands of ambitious generals, and was tainted by envy of Belisarius’ military talents.