Knight of Rome Part II

by Malcolm Davies

  “Men… Men…” They began to pay full attention. “We are to be permanently garrisoned between Luca and Pisae in a camp yet to be constructed. For those of you approaching honourable discharge, the Emperor has graciously agreed to found a new veterans’ colony in the immediate area. Land will be allocated between Spedia, Luca and Pisae, the exact locations to be determined. So that is it, comrades; we are going home with honour, undefeated; having held-fast to our soldiers’ oaths through every difficulty in the face of a ferocious enemy. I salute you, my soldiers.”

  He stepped down and walked away, fighting to avoid a tear and preserve his Roman dignity. He held individual consultations with his senior officers. Tertius Fuscus was first.

  “I shall be retiring from the army when we reach Italy. The Emperor has accepted my resignation and offers you command of the legion, Senior Tribune Tertius Fuscus. Will you accept?”

  Tertius did not hesitate for one second.

  “Gladly, sir although it will be a wrench to see you go.”

  “Decent of you to say so, Tertius, even if you can’t wait to take command. We shall speak further but in the meantime, do not mention my departure and your promotion to the other officers. I naturally wish to tell them myself.”

  Titus Attius was quiet for some while after he heard the legate’s news.

  “I have served under you…” he began at last.

  “… with me, Titus,” Quadratus interrupted.

  “.. served with you, sir for over twenty years. I cannot imagine a new commander. No, it is time for me to say goodbye to the legion as well. I shall stay on for a year or so to see the lads properly established in their new camp before I go.”

  “I am relieved to hear it. What will you do then?”

  “I’ll buy an inn and sit back in the Spanish sunshine and grow soft and fat.”

  “Why Spain? Do you have family there?”

  “No, no-one that I know of but I did have long ago. Because it’s warm, sir and a bloody long way from the Rhine.”

  Corvo’s interview was more complicated.

  “Temporary Acting Prefect Corvo, what is your first name by the way? I never asked, how rude of me.”

  “It is Marcus sir,”

  “Well then Marcus Corvo, with the active assistance of the Emperor’s secretariat we have established that you are entitled to equestrian status. I can therefore confirm your commission as prefect of artillery and drop the “temporary acting”. But, there is always a “but” in these matters, to have your name enrolled in the Equestrian Order, you will have to show sufficient wealth. I take it that you are unable to do so at present?”

  “No sir.”

  “Not even with your officer’s share of the Marcomanni loot?”

  “That might take me half-way sir.”

  “That’s a start. Thinking that this would probably be the case, the Emperor has confirmed your status and commission and deferred enrolment until the end of your military service, unless you find yourself in the financial position to act before that arrives.”

  “Thank you, sir.”

  “You should thank your Emperor.”

  “I am grateful to him sir, but I am also sure you had a lot to do with this.”

  “That’s as maybe. Now, under your particular circumstances, you have a choice. If you return to Italy with the legion, you will lose command of your century. It will return to purely infantry duties. Cretan archers and Balearic slingers will be recruited to take over their special function. You will command the auxiliaries and your artillery. If you wish, you can transfer to headquarters as an artillery prefect. You still lose your archers and slingers but you can take any specialised artillerymen who want to go with you.”

  “And their equipment sir?”

  “…Along with their equipment. The new legion has their own and it will save dragging a lot of heavy artillery pieces all the way home.”

  “May I have a word with my men before giving you my decision, sir?”

  “Of course; if you decide to go to headquarters, it will be with my recommendation. If you decide to stay with The Second Lucan, you will be welcome.”

  Otto looked stricken.

  “Without you, sir? I’ve already lost Boxer and now you?”

  “Otto, the life of a soldier is one of farewells. Comrades fall, they are transferred or they leave the service. It is as natural as the turning of the seasons. You have friends in Luca, your estates are there, this could be ideal for you. Know that I am in your debt and shall never cease to answer if you call on me. As long as I live, you will never lose the friendship of Publius Quadratus.”

  Two days later, Prefect Marcus Corvo, with thirty artillerymen and their weapons, headed north to join the army of General Drusus.

  The jubilation the soldiers were feeling did not long survive First Spear Centurion Titus Attius.

  “No-one is going to able to say The Second Lucan did not leave its camp in spotless order,” he told the men. “Right then, get busy.”

  They swept, scrubbed, re-arranged, cleaned until they were dropping with fatigue. When they had dealt with the buildings, walls, walkways and parade ground, he said how pleased he was at their efforts but that they all looked damnably scruffy. The next days were a frenzy of polishing, sharpening, combing out crests and parade after parade where he managed to find some fault and make them do it all again. He had new latrine pits dug and the earth used to fill in the old ones. The new facilities were off-limits.

  “What am I supposed to do, first spear centurion?” one of them dared to complain.

  “You can shit in your helmet for all I care but make sure you polish it afterwards,” was the unhelpful response.

  The changeover was more complicated than Quadratus had said but he was fundamentally correct; as one legion left the other would take up occupation. The new legion was coming up the Rhine from the west. Five thousand men and officers with their horses, transport animals artillery train and stores carried in ox wagons arrived over a period of two days on what had been the farmers’ fields before the Marcomanni had either chased them off or slaughtered them. Some of the officers were invited in to inspect their new home and plan how they would occupy the camp. All seemed satisfactory other than the diagonal wall across the northeast corner. Titus Attius explained why it was there.

  “Fine bit of military initiative,” he told Titus. “First thing I’ll do is get my lads to square it off again. Keep the idle sods busy and it’ll help to make the place their own….”

  The day of departure dawned with high, white clouds flying on a stiff easterly breeze. The fleeting sun had minimal warmth but at least it neither rained nor snowed. The gates were flung open and The Second Lucan marched out, eagles glittering and flags snapping in the wind. Quadratus took up the rear, behind his cavalry which was screening the priests carrying their statues of the Gods, altars and the legion treasure in a stout wagon. Horns blew and the column rumbled over the remade bridge across the stream to the south. As Legate Publius Quadratus passed through the Porta Decumana, his replacement entered through the Porta Praetoria. The fortification that had cost so many of their comrades’ lives to defend, was given up in military pomp and without a backward glance.

  Their progress was slow. They made fifteen miles on a good day but less than ten if the weather was against them or the terrain difficult, or both. Ten days and one hundred and twelve miles south-west of their starting off point, the German scouts were released from their service. The legion was well clear of the Rhine and the dangerous tribes alongside it so the scouts no longer had a useful role to play. They would return to Prefect Aldermar but not empty-handed. Quadratus presented each of them with a gold piece and their spare horses were loaded with sacks of provisions for their journey north. When they were mounted and ready to leave, Otto took off four of his many arm-rings and gave one to each of the scouts. They raised their lances in the air and chanted in their own language before wheeling their mounts and trotting away.

>   “What did they say?” Quadratus asked.

  “Oh, just a farewell,” Otto mumbled, clearly uncomfortable.

  “Prefect Otto Longius, I order you to repeat to me in good Latin what was said to you a moment ago,” the legate ordered.

  “They said goodbye to the killer of kings and mighty warriors until we meet again in the next life, sir. Nonsense really…”

  “No, it is not “nonsense”; it is a measure of the high regard they have for you.”

  After weary weeks on the road, they crossed the border into Italy. The spring air was balmy, almond and fruit trees were in blossom. There were fat farms and villages on either side of the paved road on which they marched. They had almost forgotten how different Italy was from the dark, cold and menacing forested landscape in which they had lived and fought for so long. It lifted their spirits simply to look around and breathe in the sweet-scented warmth. They changed their route of march to the west approaching the Tyrrhenian Sea coast and that is where Quadratus left the column. He headed south towards Rome and was gone. Tertius Fuscus was now the commanding officer of The Second Lucan. It had happened so quickly and with so little ceremony that it was impossible to believe such a major change had occurred in the life of the legion. For days afterwards when anyone referred to the legate, Publius Quadratus came to mind but gradually, the new order was established.

  Their garrison fortress was impressive on first view. A great rectangle of high stone walls stood near the head of a gently sloping valley fanning out towards the distant sea. A small river ran close by. It was spanned by a good stone bridge over which lay the road leading to another bridge some miles away which crossed the River Arno. It was twelve miles from Pisae and ten from Luca. Spedia was twenty miles away and the sea eight as the crow flies. Inland, the ground rose to wooded slopes with naked rocky mountains rearing above them. There were no villages or farmsteads in the valley although stock grazed on the free grass and drank in the river shallows. There had been a battle in this place during the Civil War during which the locals had been indiscriminately slaughtered by both sides. They had never re-settled the immediate area. At first glance, it was idyllic. Then they marched closer.

  There were no gates, the ditch was choked with brambles out of which well-grown saplings raised spindly arms to the heavens. The walls to the north and west were covered in moss and ivy. When Tertius Fuscus and his officers rode in, they were met with a rich aroma of goat. Dried sheep and cattle dung crumbled to powder under their horses’ hooves. The interior buildings constructed of pink, thin bricks, lacked roofs, doors and windows. Weeds grew in every crack in the parade ground.

  “Seen and smelled worse,” Titus Attius commented. “Marching-camp, sir?” he asked Tertius.

  “Definitely, Titus,” the legate replied. “It will be some while before we can move in.”

  Even in peaceful Italy, they were not about to take any chances; with practised efficiency, the ditch and rampart were dug and the palisade erected in less than two hours.

  The legionaries began to scrape, sweep and weed under the ever-watchful eyes of their centurions who were in turn aware that First Spear Centurion Attius was always lurking, ready to bellow at them, even when they thought he was somewhere else. The first logging party was sent up to the hillside to collect the timber they would need. A helmeted optio in full armour led a century of soldiers in tunics to the lower edge of the treeline accompanied by two ox-drawn heavy wagons.

  They stopped by a fine, straight tree. The optio slapped the trunk and shouted to his men.

  “Right lads, this ‘un will do to make a start with….”

  But he fell silent when he heard shouting and saw two figures hurrying up on a footpath. One was a sturdy man with a broad, sun-burned face. The other was very old; a few strands of white hair barely covered his head. His skinny legs and back were bent and he hobbled leaning on a stick.

  “What’s your game? You can’t just come along of us and cut down our trees. Go on, bugger off!” he shouted in a quavering voice.

  Half of the legionaries sniggered but the other half looked worried. Their optio was quite capable of sending his sword plunging into the old man’s guts.

  “I don’t think you understand citizen…” the optio tried to explain.

  “I understands all right. You’re one of they soldiers. We ‘ad enough of you lot last time; having battles and killing folk,” he shouted then burst out coughing and sat down with his back to the tree-trunk.

  “Grandad don’t mean to cause no offence, sir,” the younger man said. “But that there tree is a chestnut and it’s a wicked shame to chop ‘im down. Us collects the nuts, see, in autumn, like.”

  The optio sighed; there was always an added difficulty.

  “No need to get off on the wrong foot,” he told the pair of them. “You show me what trees my lads can have and we’ll leave the ones you need alone. How’s that?”

  “Better. What you doin’ ‘ere anyway?” the old man asked

  “We’re moving into the fortress down there and we need wood to rebuild it, granddad.”

  “I ain’t your granddad,” he replied.

  “Well you could be; I never knew my granny,” the optio told him and this time the men felt safe to laugh aloud.

  On his return with two wagonloads of freshly cut timber, the optio reported the encounter and what he had done to his centurion. The centurion reported it to Titus Attius who approved.

  “Tell him he did the right thing; no need to antagonize the locals,” he said and issued a general order to all logging parties; oak, ash and birch only.

  Otto and his men had nothing practical to do during the period of reconstruction once they had scrubbed out their stables. Stalls and doors would be fitted when the carpenters got round to them; the priority was replacing the gates and re-roofing the praetorium and barracks. Legate Fuscus sent for him.

  “I have a task for you, Otto,” he said. “We want recruits and if we can get them locally so much the better. I want to you ride to Spedia, in the first instance, and deliver a message to the magistrate. We need eighteen hundred men to bring us up to full strength, including as many fit veterans as we can get. Of course, Spedia cannot supply all our needs so I’m asking for six hundred. The magistrate is to proclaim this in the city square and we shall return in two weeks time on market day to inspect any volunteers who have come forward.”

  “What day is the market held, sir?”

  “No idea; you can find that out for me and also, have a good look at the condition of the roads and make a note of anything which might be useful to the legion. You know the sort of thing; bridges, fords, and all that. I want you to go with your entire force, flags, best armour; make a show. A bit of military finery always encourages farm-boys to sign up.”

  The round trip to Spedia took a full day after an early start. The subsequent mission to Pisae and back was accomplished in a few hours. Otto came back with formal greetings from both cities, a note of the market days and a detailed sketch map of his route in each case.

  “I believe you have connections in Luca?” Tertius enquired.

  “I do, sir. It is the home of Tribune Lucius Longius.”

  “Very well, send my greetings to his family and take three days to renew your acquaintance with the city.”

  “Thank you, sir. I think I should send my men back more or less straight away and keep a small escort with me. No sense in straining relationships by expecting the authorities to feed and stable an entire ala for longer than necessary.”

  “They should feel honoured to accommodate the Emperor’s troopers. After all who else keeps them safe from the barbarian hordes on our borders?”

  “Exactly, sir; I completely agree. But in practice, it would be an awful lot of fodder to find without prior notice.”

  “You may be right,” Tertius grudgingly conceded.

  Centurion Massus had seen the cavalry column approaching when they were two miles away. He had plenty of time to
form an honour-guard of his men so that Otto rode through the city gate between two rows of legionaries who snapped to attention as he passed. Massus threw a salute which Otto acknowledged with a smile and a nod of his head. The square resonated with the click of iron-shod hooves on paving stones, the clink of armour and weapons, the jingling of bits and the snorting of horses. One hundred and twenty cavalrymen and their officers and a two-mule cart filled the square as they formed ranks and came to a halt facing the city courthouse. Their arrival had caused so much noise and excitement that people hurried out to see what was going on. The court waiting room emptied. One of the clerks ran in to say an army had come. The magistrate snorted his disbelief but strode out of his office and pushed through the onlookers at the top of his steps. He found himself at eyelevel with a glittering officer mounted on a black charger which pawed the ground with his front feet sending sparks flying.

  “Greetings sir, on behalf of Legate Tertius Fuscus of The Second Lucan. You will be aware that the legion is occupying the previously derelict fortress on the Pisae road. I have the honour to serve our Emperor as prefect of the legion’s cavalry.” All this was said in a loud enough voice for most of the onlookers to hear. Otto stepped down from the saddle and walked up to stand beside the magistrate, towering over him; the difference in their heights exaggerated by the high-crested parade helmet he wore. Otto handed the official the scroll confirming his orders and half-turned to make sure as many as possible could catch his next words. “The legion seeks to recruit six hundred sound young men of Luca. On market day two weeks from now, officers will be here to inspect and enrol suitable volunteers. We hope you will make this known throughout the city and surrounding villages, sir.”

  “I know, you don’t I?” the magistrate asked. “Aren’t you that friend of Lucius Longius?”

  “Yes, I am; pleasure to meet you again, sir. Now if you would excuse me?”

  He remounted Djinn and walked him over to Massus, still by the open gate. He leaned down and shook hands.

  “Can you put me and half a dozen of my men up for three days?”