by C J Brown
“What?” Attila shouted. The young man’s unorthodox ways had gone too far. Attila was not about to enter the palace of his enemy and ask for an alliance. That would be tantamount to a defeat. “I do not want to ally with that coward. I want to take the throne from under him.”
“You will, sire. You will. The alliance is temporary. We have to leverage the men he has and continue to chase Arthur up the coast so that they come straight into our line.
“Once we have Arthur and his father, you can kill Lucius with your bare hands and take the throne. Arthur’s legions will scatter, leaving only the three legions Lucius has, spread across all of Italy. Our ten thousand men will seem like a hundred thousand.”
Attila had to agree. It was a good plan. “Proceed,” he thundered. “We will do as you suggest.”
***
Bishkar arrived at the hamlet where a small company of Roman soldiers had just left. Commanding his men to don the uniforms of dead legionnaires, they pretended to be Roman, although none of them, except Bishkar, spoke a word of Latin. He entered the inn and struck a conversation about the hassle the whole affair had brought about on the country. It didn’t take long, with Bishkar’s social skill-set, to take the innkeeper into his confidence. It wasn’t long till he found out that the old man on the bluff was once under Constantine III’s command.
It was all the information he needed.
Without delay, Bishkar galloped to the farm and had his men circle the property while he strode up to the front door. In fluent Latin, he presented the master of the property with a proposition as an agent of the emperor. The old man listened, at first incredulous, then in fear of losing the comforts he had become accustomed to.
Then he listened some more. He could tell right away that the man in the uniform was not Roman. He couldn’t tell if he was Visigoth or Ostrogoth, but it had to be one of the two. There was a northern look about the man. From the pallor of his skin to the features of his face, the sunken cheeks indicated malnutrition as a child. The steep forehead indicated hard surfaces at birth, and both factors indicated poverty. That was not a characteristic of a commander in most Roman legions—especially not one that wore the insignia he was wearing.
The old man was right. Bishkar was an Ostrogoth orphan that Attila had taken under his wing. Even though his Latin was strong, his accent had been corrupted with years of tribal dialects. If loyalty to Uther’s father was not enough to keep his silence, the irritation at the man pretending to Roman sealed the deal.
Bouncing between acquiescence and reticence, the old man finally decided that he would not give in. Come what may, he decided, he would not reveal all he knew. But in addition to all of his qualities, Bishkar could read men with high accuracy. The old man had made a mistake of considering his next move—it was a signal to Bishkar that there was something to consider, and that, therefore, there was something to hide.
The only thing to hide now was the location of Uther and Arthur and that became his only objective for the moment. All other thoughts fell away from the young man who could turn his focus down to the last detail in his head and not back out of it.
Bishkar glared into the man’s eyes, intent on extracting the information that lay behind them. Unsheathing his gladius, he presented the tip to the old man’s throat and pushed it gently, signaling the old man to move back. The old man, petrified at first—a normal response—quickly steeled his resolve and prayed to his god for a swift death.
With the old man at the kitchen table, Bishkar reached for the washbasin and the kettle over the fire. He poured the water in and instructed the old man to place his shriveled hand into the scalding water. The old man found too much pride in him to resist but the reflex of pain and the fear of mutilation overrode his will. Eventually, Bishkar forced his hand in and let the old man squirm in pain as the boiling water scalded his hand and wrist.
The excruciating pain was not enough to unlock the secret from his chest, and this angered the general. He yanked the hand out of the water, pruned and scalded, then took his gladius and began peeling the skin of the old man’s hands, all the while prompting him to reveal the location of the Uther and his son.
The old man died without a single revelation but not before spitting on the fake Roman.
Bishkar commanded his men to sack the farm and to take all they wanted but to leave the gold for him. As they ransacked the house, then the barn, they tripped on the passage that led to the underground vault.
It was clear to Bishkar who came to inspect it that it had been used recently. The wine and valuables that lay in the three chambers and the passageways was a large haul for the men and worth every minute they had spent traversing the peninsula.
Footprints on the floor, scrapes on the wall, told the sharp-minded Bishkar that something lay behind the rack on the southern wall. After an hour of trying, the door swung open to reveal another passage, now dark. Introducing the torch to the passage, he followed it till it reached the room where the occupants had already left. He couldn’t figure how long, but it had to be no more than three days.
He was close, and more importantly, he had found their trail. But, unfortunately, he was too late.
16
Valley of Death
Vipsanius had a plan to fall back on. If they were to push the city into chaos, then the plan to rendezvous with Arthur would be at a location only known to him. He knew that Arthur, if successful, would ride with Uther to that location and they would meet later. His job was to keep that location a secret and just lead his men in a series of routes that would ferret out anyone who betrayed the company.
Once they had razed the south of the capital and rebellion had now reached critical mass, the signal to have his men leave the city was given. Each company knew where it had to go. They could not travel the roads out of Rome as one legion. Doing so would get them killed. To tip things in their favor, they jettisoned their armor and swords and donned old tunics that covered whatever tattoos they may have had.
Before Lucius came to know of the uprising and that Uther had been liberated, Vipsanius and his men had filtered through the city, moving north, then exiting on different roads, some traveling alone, some in pairs, but never in groups more than three. Everyone had predetermined locations to meet. Once they were there, the next location would be given to them.
On the following black moon, Vipsanius was happy to see that three diversions later there had been no surprise attacks from the emperor’s men. It assured him that none of his men had leaked the information and it was time to redirect the legion to the final rendezvous, a day’s ride away. The soldiers were now reunited with their families. Ten thousand men now had swelled to twenty-five thousand men, women, and children.
As they lay amidst the trees of their homeland, each man dreamt of reuniting with their leader and of a day when the war would end, or a day when Rome would stop hounding them. It would come one day, but that was not on the horizon yet. But still, for now, for however brief, they felt a sense of peace descend in the silence of the valley. Pisae lay on the horizon, a mere league in distance. With a few tired lookouts perched on the perimeter, the rest fell asleep.
***
Horses neighed on the outskirts of the camp as fires burned to shield shivering soldiers from the blistering cold. As the heavens scattered snow, Attila and his lieutenants huddled in the main tent, where the old man’s barn once stood. Having struck the alliance he needed with the emperor, he and the five thousand men in his charge rendezvoused at the old man’s farm.
“We are fifty leagues from Rome, low on provisions and in range of a small town. The garrison there should be like any other. No more than five hundred men. We number ten thousand,” Attila bellowed, hungry for another sacking.
“Reports have come in, sire,” Bishkar said, “of Uther’s legion a few leagues east of here. We could vanquish them now. After we sack the town, we march to engage t
hem! They will be the first legion we defeat since the beginning of this campaign.”
“They are well-trained. It will not be an easy fight,” another one of Attila’s commanders said.
“We’ve done it before,” Albern, one of Attila’s lieutenants, said. Attila didn’t bother with his comment. He was nobody to the king of the barbarians.
“With the entire Hun army at our back,” Rolstein added. The lieutenant in the rear guard was not as confident as some of the others in the tent. He felt the attack would be foolish. It didn’t take long for the entire tent to erupt in dispute as the men shouted in typical Hun fashion.
“Enough!” Attila shouted, banging on the table with his fist, cracking the wood along its grain.
The room fell to silence.
“We are strong! We are the Huns!” he boomed. “We have fought the Empire for longer than any of us here can remember. We can beat them even if we are outnumbered. For it to be an even fight, every Hun has to be faced with five of those puny Romans.”
The men roared at this imagery.
“They may have won with those odds before, but our fierceness has grown. Our skill and our drive are stronger than their puny swords. At dawn, we forget the town and we finish the Romans in the valley. We will defeat them, and send a rider back to Rome. He will tell Lucius of our victory, and the emperor will tremble at the thought of our existence. Any resistance or doubt will be met with punishment,” he continued, to more cheers.
Hours later, dawn saw the Hun army assemble on the plains west of Pisae. The rains of the night had mustered a morning fog that swirled around the barbarian army as they stood there, brandishing their captured Roman weapons and their battle-axes.
Attila’s commanders had already prepared the men—ten thousand hungry Huns awaited their prize. Attila rode out on his horse to the front of his army.
Donning his helmet, he spurred his horse into a run and led his army across the muddy plains, the black banner of his tribe streaming in the wind. Behind him, the men shouted as they charged. Thundering over the ridge as their feet pounded the ground, the sound served as an advance warning to the tired Romans still in slumber.
As they swooped down past the lookouts hanging from the trees with arrows in their necks, the horde rushed the center of the crowd, plowing through men, women, and children unprepared for war.
Attila brought his horse to a stop. As it neighed, rearing as it came to a stop, his men came to a halt behind him.
“Prepare for battle, men!” he shouted, and rode into a gallop again, leading his soldiers towards center mass as they shouted.
Within minutes, men in Attila’s army began hurling javelins at the soldiers, and they landed accurately into the unprepared Romans. Chests, necks, and limbs were blown open by the javelins raining from behind the trees. By the time they saw a javelin, it was too late to move.
Attila drew his sword and shrieked with glee, an emotion that he always had before the thick of battle. Once the javelins ended, arrows began to rain down instead. Smaller, but with lethal accuracy, they took out soldier after soldier, many of whom hadn’t even had the opportunity to find their weapon.
Chaos erupted as Attila’s men surrounded the Romans, but were cut down in droves as they attempted to scatter the legions.
Rank after rank of Hun soldiers fell on the swords of the Romans who had taken a while to get focused, but once they did, they were as lethal as the attackers. Blood of Huns mingled with Romans’ as each Hun took down three Romans, and each Roman only managed one Hun.
Bishkar slashed whatever came up beside him, banging on the shield of one Imperial soldier until he moved his shield and pushed his sword up to him. He dodged the blow and swung his sword to take the soldier’s head off. As the Roman collapsed on the ground, he turned to engage the next soldier, his face mad and a loud growl emanating from his throat.
Many were not as lucky as him since most of them no longer had weapons, and they were forced into hand combat.
By the time it was all over, only a thousand Romans remained as they fled on foot.
***
By the next black moon, Arthur and Uther, and the thousand men who fled the valley with Vipsanius rendezvoused at the predetermined point just north of Mediolanum. The men who had arrived earlier had already set up camp. The ground was frozen mud. The air around them was bitter cold. With just a fraction of the men they once had, their fates were sealed. Whatever hopes they may have harbored to take back Rome, was now gone. Uther embraced his loyal commander.
“Vipsanius, you have done well, my old friend, under the circumstances. I am sorry for your loss.”
“My lord, it is I who am sorry. We were tired and did not choose the best place to camp. The Hun army attacked at dawn and we had no chance. Most of us had no weapons, many of us had families. We lost over twenty-four thousand men, women, and children.”
The pain of the news showed on Uther’s countenance. In contrast, Arthur’s face showed anger.
Arthur pulled his father to the side, beyond earshot of the rest of the men.
“Father, I am afraid we have to leave tonight. Right away in fact. The only good thing about moving a thousand men is that we have horses for almost all of them, and we can move swiftly. The Huns cannot be far. We cannot allow them to close in on us as they now have a significant advantage.”
“How many soldiers do we have?” Uther asked as he pondered Arthur’s observation.
“In total, seven hundred soldiers, two hundred and thirty women, and seventy-eight children.”
“I see no flaw in your assessment. I think it is wise we depart this night. See to it that the women and children ride in the center and men shield them in the front and rear.”
Arthur relayed the order to Vipsanius who was exhausted but believed it to be the best course of action to begin the journey.
“Where are we going, my lord?”
“My old friend, I don’t think even father knows that. For now, we will head to Aquitania. We can’t go north as the Ostrogoths have allied with the Huns. We can’t go west as the tribes there have allied with Lucius. Our only option is to thread the needle and head northwest. From here onward, we carry no more Roman titles and insignia. My father and I are merely Uther and Arthur.”
“I understand. My… my apologies. It will take some getting used to. We will be ready in under an hour, Arthur.”
17
Vanished
“Where are they? It has been a month and we are still tooling around the Italian peninsula,” Attila barked.
Bishkar stood silent. His king was upset with him, but no more upset than he was with himself. How did they vanish? The Huns had searched the remains of the Romans in the valley but had not found any sign of Uther and Arthur. The men were happy with the loot they had amassed in the last week, but the objective had not been met and now they were down to five thousand men.
“Sire, we have to head north.”
“Yet, by my calculation, Rome is in the south,” Attila shot back.
“Well, yes. But it depends on what your priorities are. Do you want the seat of the palace, or do you want Uther’s head on a platter?”
“I want it both and I want his son drawn and quartered.”
“Which do you want first?”
Attila turned silent. He had watched how Bishkar had conducted himself this far. All their gains were because of him and he had performed better than Adolphus could have. Attila knew what Bishkar was asking him. And he had done it without any malice. In fact, he was doing it as an ally.
“My priority is to vanquish Rome.”
“Well then, the answer is clear.”
“How so?”
“If you want to vanquish Rome, then you have to go after Uther. If you want to vanquish Uther, you have to kill Lucius.”
Attila, for the first time in his lif
e, stood bewildered. He did not understand the logic of the strategy, and Bishkar could see that.
“So where do we go since we do not know where Uther is going?”
“I can guess that he is going to Paris. That would be one of two options. He has to go as far away from Rome as he can and Rome’s influence with the Franks is diminishing. That is the only safe harbor he will have.”
“We can’t travel on Visigoth land.”
“But we can travel on Ostrogoth land and that will take us all the way to Divodurum, and from there, we can head west to Paris. And, along the way, we can bulk up our expendables. We have none now, and the expendables can make up the largest part of our defenses. Those who survive after three battles can be inducted into another division. That division will be able to share in the booty. It will give them something to live for.”
“The men are not going to like it.”
“Leave that to me, sire.”
Attila nodded. “So we sack every town between here and Paris?”
“Not every town, only the towns on the Visigoth land. We can also recruit more men among the tribes in the east. I believe by the time we get to Paris, you should be thirty-thousand men strong.”
“Make it happen. When will we leave?”
“We can leave in three days. We have much to prepare for, and we have plenty of loot to organize. Three days will give us enough time to do all that.”
“So be it.”
***
“Titus, where are Attila and his men?” Lucius had grown grim. Events beyond the palace where he sat fat, were not moving at the pace he had hoped.
“They are still outside Pisae, sire.”
“Why hasn’t he apprehended Uther?”
“Reports indicate that the Huns have all but decimated the two legions along with their families.”
“All of them?”
“Pretty much, sire.”
“Are you telling me that Uther no longer has an army?”
