Saluting, the riders hurried into the press, risking their lives to deliver the messages.
He became aware suddenly of something brushing his left leg, and almost swung his sword at it out of instinct. The capsarius flinched where he had been examining the wound.
‘What are you doing?’ the Remi frowned.
‘My job, sir. Sit still.’
‘I haven’t got time for medical attention yet.’
‘Then you’ll be dead before you do. Sit still.’
The Remi had spent long enough among the legions now to know how their medical personnel considered themselves almost a different species to the rest of the army, and that their skills gave them the right to issue commands even to officers. The sad truth was that they were more or less correct.
Galronus sat still while the soldier tore open a stretch of his ruined trousers and carefully probed the wound, wincing and hissing every time the medic’s fingers caused him fresh waves of pain.
‘Bite down on this,’ the man said, handing him a piece of well-chewed thick leather. Bracing himself, knowing what was coming, Galronus did as he was told, and spent some time weeping and whimpering as the soldier none-too-carefully stitched his wound. As the soldier tied off the last knot, the Remi noble heaved in a sigh of relief and spat out the leather, handing it back to the man, who took it delicately in two fingers and dropped it into a bag. He then washed down the leg, mopping it gently dry with linen before liberally slathering it with a compound that smelled of honey and vinegar and spices. Then, the man expertly bound the upper leg tight and finally pinned the wrappings in place.
‘Have someone help you dismount and don’t try to walk on it without a crutch,’ the capsarius said authoritatively. Galronus nodded. Given how much it hurt, he could barely imagine even falling off the horse, whether with or without help.
His attention returned to the fight. Such was the efficiency of the Roman medical corps that he had had the entire treatment in less than a quarter of an hour. The gambit seemed to have been successful. His units were gradually pulling back, but they were killing with every step they took, and the number of the enemy had dropped visibly, while he had lost at most a hundred more men.
Yes, a fresh count suggested he had now lost half his men. The time was upon them.
‘Good luck, Fronto,’ he muttered under his breath, and then found his musician sitting alone to the side and waved his arm. The man nodded and took a deep breath before bending and blasting out a triple cadence.
The Caesarian horse broke and ran for it, heading at an angle away from the army and towards the hills on the northern edge if the field, opening up the flank for Pompey’s horse to press home their advance as they had planned.
This was it. The critical moment.
May Fortuna be with the legate of the Tenth.
Chapter 22
Three notes rang out across the field of battle, and though they were much the same as many other legionary or cavalry signals and could easily have been lost in the cacophony of war, they rang out like the tolling of a doom-laden bell, summoning Charon and his boat to cross that final river. For those three notes placed the weight of Caesar’s world squarely on Fronto’s shoulders. He swallowed nervously, the worry born not of the dreadful conflict to come – he had fought the most dreadful of all battles in the world at Alesia, and no man could fight worse – but of what it meant, and how much rode on its back.
As he rose and then dropped his own hand in signal, off to his left, he could see the third line of the legions, as yet uncommitted, which meant that things were bogged down at the heart of the fighting, but at least Caesar’s legions were not being forced back and losing ground, else those rear ranks would by now have been sent in to supply extra strength to weakened sections of the line. On the other hand there was no exultant roar, and no calls for the melee that would inevitably result when one line or the other was completely broken. The fighting would be thick and dreadful, still, then. His thoughts went briefly to Atenos and to Salvius Cursor, deep in the press of it, but he swiftly dragged them back. He had other matters to deal with.
It was impossible to see Pompey’s cavalry from here. They were on the other side of Galronus’ horse, and he had absolutely no idea how strong or depleted that enemy force now was. He remained confident that his Remi friend would not have put out the call until he had done all he could, and Galronus’ certainty that his men were individually far stronger and better than Pompey’s gave him heart that his thousand horse could give considerably better than they got. At worst, they would have killed a thousand, by Fronto’s reckoning. At best no more than three thousand, though. And that left Fronto with just two thousand foot against anywhere between three and five thousand horse.
No pressure.
Now, the Caesarian cavalry were leaving the field. Pulling back, they angled north, breaking for the hills, looking for all the world like a force determined to save their skins and flee the carnage. Of course, Fronto and his men were already running. He had given his own signal the very moment he had been certain that Galronus was on the move, mere heartbeats after those three notes. He could see the horse and, as the six cohorts under his command broke into a run, the back of Galronus’ cavalry became their whole world, all they could see. They were swift, and Fronto estimated that they had taken perhaps a fifty per cent casualty rate. Galronus had fought as long as he could, but had given the order at precisely the right point, may the gods bless him.
For heart-stopping moments, it looked to Fronto as though his timing had been wrong. It appeared for all the world as though they were about to hit the rear of their own fleeing Caesarian horse. Then, like a drape being swept back from a window to reveal the view, Galronus’ cavalry were gone.
In their place, Pompey’s horse were revealed in all their dreadful power. Perhaps four thousand horse now at an initial blind estimate, yelping and whooping their exultant victory, for they had won and would please their general. They had driven Caesar’s cavalry from the field and now the way would open for them to turn the flank, smash into the Tenth and begin the process of utterly collapsing the lines of Caesarian infantry.
For important moments the oncoming cavalry, spotting Fronto and his men suddenly revealed by the exit of the Caesarian horse, couldn’t figure out what it was they were looking at. Fronto could imagine what was going through their minds. They knew that Caesar had a third line that had not been committed, and that line would be their main concern at this point, but they had to be wondering where this fourth line of reserves had come from. They would be wondering why it had been stationed behind the cavalry and, critically, at the last, they would be wondering why they were armed like some sort of bizarre auxiliary spear unit.
Then Fronto’s men let out a roar. It had not been planned. Fronto had given no signal and called for no such thing, and he marvelled as perhaps a hundred voices bellowed out the name of Mars, then again, with perhaps a thousand, and then a third time with two thousand, every voice hoarse and straining with the effort.
As though their voices alone had the power to wound, the enemy cavalry faltered, panic rippling through them.
Then Fronto’s cohorts hit Pompey’s cavalry.
The legate himself was armed with his sword alone, not one of the spears like his men, yet he was among them in the second line as they hit the horse like a low wave breaking on high, black rocks. His eyes went to a horseman before him in some sort of antiquated linen armour, and then so did his blade. His gladius punched up. The ancient-style linothorax was strong enough to turn a blade straight on, but not from beneath, an angle unanticipated for such a panoply. The point sank up through the hanging pteruges and plunged into the man’s pelvis. Fronto was forced to rip his sword free swiftly and dance out of the way, for there was still momentum in the cavalry and he really did not want to get crushed.
Spinning to select a second target, he could already see his men pressing into the swathe of horsemen. The selection process for
his unit had been more than merely successful. The legionaries, showing no fear of the horses in a most un-infantrylike manner, were moving among the Pompeian cavalry and using their short spears to truly deadly effect. Even as Fronto swung left and right, he saw one Thracian horseman howl for the briefest moment before the cry became a clotted gurgle, a spear thrust from below ignoring all the protection of helmet and shirt, the lead-blade slamming into the man’s neck, piercing his throat apple and punching into his spine before being expertly hauled back out by its wielder. Then, to the right, a horseman learned the danger of looking down to target one of the dreadful footmen among them. A spear slammed into his unprotected face directly between the cheek pieces, ruining his nose before skipping off bone and burying itself in his eye. He lurched back, already dying and the soldier yanked on the shaft, hauling the spear back out with blood, eye and brain still clinging to it.
Good. One thing that had been drilled into the men was the need to keep hold of the spear, as it was a valuable weapon in this situation, giving the men the perfect reach to deal with the riders, and from an unexpected and less-protected angle.
Of course men were losing spears. Some were snapped, some lost still buried in a victim, and it was here that their mettle, adaptability and expertise as legionaries of Rome came to the fore. Losing their primary weapon, those men simply drew their swords and went to work on the horses or on any rider’s leg that presented itself.
It was carnage.
Legionaries were dying, of course, but the vast toll of death was being dealt to Pompey’s cavalry, unable to react adequately to this unexpected and horribly efficient attack.
It had been Caesar’s plan, of course. Ever the great tactician, the general had reasoned that they had to meet cavalry with like, but that there was simply no way to win with the odds as they were. Galronus’ force was doomed, but if they could weaken the enemy and at the same time make them overconfident, then deliver them into the arms of a second unit, then their job was done. The general had planned to meet the cavalry with unexpected auxiliary spearmen, deploying them hidden behind the cavalry rather than on the flank by the river where they in fact ended up.
It had been Antonius and Galronus both who had suggested legionaries instead. Antonius because he feared the inability of the auxilia to carry out the task. Galronus because he believed that the tactics of the mixed infantry and cavalry he had trained and seen at work with the water carriers would be the one to carry the day. Such a force, he argued, could destroy the Pompeian cavalry, as long as his own horse wore some identifying mark to avoid a repeat of the river bank. Caesar had agreed, but not to field them as a mixed unit, but just the legionaries, equipped as spear men, behind the cavalry. If they could show the same skill and spirit as they had against the water party, they might just be able to break Pompey’s horse.
And it would appear that the general’s belief was being borne out.
‘Forwards, push deep!’ he bellowed. They could not allow the cavalry time to recover from their shock and panic. Indeed, they needed to increase that terror and prevent the rear ranks of cavalry rallying. Close to him a legionary fell with an agonised cry, a Syrian blade cleaving his neck. Fronto turned in the press, sword raised, and brought it down with all his might, severing the Syrian’s arm just above the wrist. As the legionary fell away, Fronto reached out urgently and grabbed the spear with his free hand, tearing it from the man’s dying grip. The Syrian was staring in horror at his stump, and the expression froze on his face as the spear buried itself in his armpit.
Fronto nearly lost the weapon. He was totally unfamiliar with the use of a spear, as well as using it in his off-hand, and he hauled it out so inexpertly that he pulled a muscle in his arm doing it. The Syrian fell from the horse and Fronto had to leap out of the way to avoid being flattened beneath the corpse. He felt his knee give and for precious moments dropped to the ground amid the pounding hooves, before gritting his teeth and forcing himself back up. Casting a quick prayer up to Aesculapius, he wondered momentarily whether it might be worth obtaining a figure of the healing god for his neck, but dismissed the idea in a trice. If he had every god he’d need to call on hanging around his neck, he’d walk with a permanent stoop.
Hoping against hope that his knee would hold up for the duration he stepped forwards, ducking a spear that had not been aimed at him but merely flailed this way and that in the press, its owner finding great difficulty in using the weapon from horseback against the man beside him in this press.
For a moment, just a tantalising moment, Fronto caught sight of a familiar figure. Labienus was dressed in the uniform of a general, complete with red cloak and knotted ribbon, an honour Caesar had accorded him on more than one occasion. The defecting officer had a face filled with a difficult mix of hope, fury and uncertainty. His career would ride on this action, if not his life. For the briefest of moments, Fronto considered pressing hard through the mass of horsemen to reach Labienus. Of course, that would carry the most dreadful mortal danger, but killing a commander, especially when their unit is a strange, disparate one only held together by the chain of command, could change a whole battle. Still, at the base of it all, Fronto was less than convinced that if it came to it he could plunge his blade into Labienus. The man might currently be the enemy, but he had long been a friend before that, and somewhere deep within would surely still be that thoughtful, incisive and noble Roman Fronto remembered.
He turned his gaze from Labienus. If the man died on the field today it would not be by Fronto’s hand. His spear lanced out at an Illyrian rider, finding an easy target in the unarmoured horseman, plunging deep through white wool and into giving flesh before Fronto yanked it out once more with only a little more skill than last time. The rider howled and Fronto almost fell as a sword blow slammed into his back. He felt the heavy strike across the bronze shoulders of the shaped cuirass he wore and thanked Fortuna that he’d plumped for a traditional officer’s armour this morning and not for the chain shirt he had taken to wearing at times for ease. The chain would have stopped the blade, but the bruising and possible broken bones would have knocked him out of the fight for sure. The cuirass was considerably less practical than chain in so many ways, but when turning a slash of a blade, it won out every day. He felt the blade skip across the bronze, ding off the neck guard of his helmet and disappear into the air. Instinctively he turned and thrust, not with the spear in his left hand but with the gladius in his right. His aim was true. He’d understood simply from the direction the sword had gone, how the rider had opened up one of the true attack points for a swordsman. The gladius plunged into the unprotected flesh of the armpit and was immediately and expertly twisted and withdrawn.
It was not a killing blow as it would be against a foot solider, because of the angle. He had pierced neither organ nor artery, but the damage would be crippling and agonising, and would certainly remove the man from the fray. Similar stories were being played out among the entire mass of cavalry. The enemy simply did not know how to effectively deal with this unprecedented threat that moved among them with impunity and without fear, striking up from unseen places and, where unable to do so, felling the horses and then falling upon their panicked riders.
It was at that moment, deep in the press and at the heart of the battle, that Fronto knew he’d done it. The weight of responsibility that had weighed him down like a yoke about his shoulders suddenly shattered and fell away. Whatever happened now, he knew he had done that which he had been tasked with doing. He had beaten the Pompeian horse. There were other roles to play, of course, for Caesar’s stratagem was not yet done with, but the one part that Fronto had been uncertain would work had done so, and admirably.
Around him, riders were dying so fast and in such quantity that they fell in waves and the legate could almost identify whole areas amid the cavalry that were opening up, their only occupants corpses, both human and equine. Riderless beasts milled, and they were becoming more of a danger to the legionaries than
were the Pompeian cavalry who, having been exultant in the belief they had broken Caesar’s horse, were now only a hair’s breadth short of complete rout. Confusion had become fear and fear had become panic. Few of them pressed forwards now, and Fronto estimated that more of the riders he could see on the field were attempting to get away than to fight.
A sword from nowhere smashed into his spear and cut it in half, making his hand throb with the impact, and Fronto turned and dispatched the man with no ceremony and little thought. He was more concerned with the battle as a whole now. There was still a danger, after all. If the enemy could somehow recover their wits, they likely still had two thousand men intact. They could fight back, and possibly even beat Fronto’s men, but only if they managed to master their terror.
The best way to guarantee a fight against cavalry was, of course, to remove the horses from the equation. If they could somehow feed the panic of the beasts, it would spread further among the riders. As Fronto parried and killed, he pondered how to spook the enemy’s mounts. Loud noises sometimes frightened horses, though that seemed rather redundant in the middle of the monstrous din already filling the air.
Taking a deep breath, Fronto began to chant.
‘Caesar… Caesar… Caesar…’
Turning, he thrust his blade into a target of opportunity, and spotted two men with spears back to back. He nodded meaningfully as he continued to chant. The two men took a moment to understand, and by the time one of them had joined in, the other had fallen to a Cappadocian spear.
‘Caesar… Caesar… Caesar…’
But it began to spread, and rapidly. In moments the chant was rising like a tide among the press.
A horseman close to Fronto made to swing his long blade at the legate, and Fronto moved his own sword forwards to parry, but the necessity disappeared in a heartbeat as the nervous horse backed away from him and then reared and threw its rider.
Marius' Mules XI: Tides of War Page 33
