Hunting the Eagles

by Ben Kane

  Heads began to turn from the moment they ascended to the walkway. Raised more than a man’s height from the ground, and illuminated by the flaming torches, the party stood out from the blackness. At Tullus’ suggestion, Caecina had shed his red cloak, allowing his armour to wink and flash in the flickering light.

  ‘Your general is here!’ roared Tullus. ‘Caecina is here!’

  A loud Ahhhhh went up. Some men cheered, but more threw insults.

  Tullus reached the end of the walkway. A final ladder at his feet led down to the ground by the gate. There was no sign of the sentries, and the cut branches which had blocked the entrance had been hauled to one side. A number of soldiers had left the camp, Tullus decided, but the ones he could see didn’t appear to be in a hurry to join them. In the end, though, the weight of numbers pressing towards the gate would force them outside.

  There was no room to get down from the wall, even if they had wanted to. Hundreds of legionaries packed the space underneath, their pale faces looking up at Tullus, Caecina and their companions with a mixture of fear and disbelief.

  ‘Piss off back where you came from,’ yelled a voice.

  ‘Fucking officers,’ shouted another. ‘Good for nothing whoresons!’

  A fist was waved, and another. Then it was five, ten, a score. Someone lifted a sword, and the mood, which had been wavering between rebellious and fearful, grew ugly.

  It was act now or die, thought Tullus. He drew his blade and clattered it off his greave, bash, bash, bash. The sound wasn’t that loud, but everyone was watching. The shouting died down a little. ‘Sir,’ muttered Tullus to Caecina and, sheathing his weapon, stood aside.

  Caecina stepped forward. ‘Brave soldiers of Rome,’ he shouted.

  ‘To Hades with you, Caecina,’ cried a voice.

  ‘Brave soldiers of Rome,’ repeated Caecina, louder this time. ‘The enemy has not stormed the camp.’

  ‘So you say!’ ‘We heard him with our own ears!’

  ‘It was a horse, I tell you. A horse that had been scared by the thunder,’ yelled Caecina. ‘Centurion Tullus has been to the spot where the enemy is supposed to be attacking. He found nothing out of the ordinary. The savages are not in here with us, but out there!’ he roared with a dramatic gesture at the world beyond the walls. ‘Step outside at your peril, brothers!’

  ‘I know where I’d rather take my chances, and it ain’t here,’ declared a sour-faced legionary among those closest to the entrance.

  ‘Will I have to lie in your path to stop you?’ asked Caecina, his frustration evident.

  ‘I wouldn’t do that,’ warned Sour Face, as an animal sound left the soldiers’ throats.

  Sour Face was the first rock in a landslide, Tullus decided. If he left the camp, the rest would follow, and if Caecina got in their way, they’d kill him without thinking, just as they had other senior officers during the previous year’s rebellion.

  ‘Give me that,’ Tullus hissed, snatching the eagle from a startled Vitellius. Bellowing ‘ROMA!’ Tullus took the steps down two at a time. Shocked, the nearest legionaries gave way a little. Tullus sensed someone follow him – looking back, he was startled to recognise Caecina.

  Brandishing the eagle as if it were a weapon, Tullus pushed towards the gate. ‘Make way! MAKE WAY!’ he ordered.

  No matter how rebellious the soldier, it was impossible to obliterate the reverence felt towards a legion’s eagle. The embodiment of pride, courage and glory, it demanded respect. The crowd fell back, gazing with awe at the golden bird. Tullus shoved on until he stood in the middle of the entrance. Caecina reached his side an instant later, and Tullus stabbed the standard’s spiked butt into the muddy ground, facing the eagle towards the mob. Sensing what he needed, Piso and the other torch-bearers climbed atop the edge of the rampart to light up the scene.

  ‘See this magnificent bird?’ shouted Tullus. ‘It belongs to the glorious Fifth!’

  As he’d expected, a chorus of voices roared back, ‘The Fifth! The Fifth!’

  ‘You don’t want to see this fall into enemy hands, do you?’ Tullus shouted, the hairs on his own neck prickling at the idea.

  ‘NEVER!’ the legionaries roared.

  ‘Listen to me! I served in the Eighteenth for many years. I see you nod your heads – you knew men in it.’ Tullus acknowledged several of the nearest soldiers. ‘As you know, the Eighteenth was one of the legions destroyed by that sewer rat Arminius. Lucky for me, I got away from the ambush, me and about fifteen of my boys.’ The old guilt stung Tullus: that he should have saved more; that he should somehow have prevented the eagle being taken.

  ‘You’re the Centurion Tullus?’ It was Sour Face who spoke. ‘Aye.’

  Another Ahhhhh went up, surprising Tullus. They know of me, he thought.

  ‘Men say you rescued more soldiers than anyone else,’ said Sour Face. His angry tone had become respectful.

  ‘That’s right,’ roared Piso suddenly. ‘Centurion Tullus saved us, when no one else could have.’

  Sour Face had glanced up when Piso spoke. Now he regarded Tullus once more. ‘This officer should say his piece,’ he declared. ‘What say you, brothers?’

  ‘Aye!’ shouted a hundred voices.

  Tullus shot a look at Caecina, a little concerned that he was centre-stage rather than the general, but Caecina indicated he should speak. Tullus rolled his tongue around a parched mouth. His next words were of vital importance. Say the right ones, and the unhappy legionaries would go back into the camp. The wrong ones would see him and Caecina murdered, trampled underfoot as a sea of soldiers fled into the darkness, and the next morning, all four legions would be massacred.

  Tell them the truth, he thought. Say it like it is.

  ‘The shame of losing the Eighteenth’s eagle haunts me every day. I dream of it at night. I see it each and every time I look upon this majestic bird, and the ones belonging to the other legions in this camp.’

  ‘Where’s our eagle?’ demanded a voice. ‘The one belonging to the Twentieth?’

  A barrage of cries followed. ‘And the Twenty-First?’ ‘Where’s the First’s eagle?’

  Tullus pointed. ‘One is at the east gate, and another at the south. They’ve been sent to do the same as this bird here – to stir the men’s pride. The other remains at the headquarters.’

  Sour Face seemed pleased. Heads nodded. Men even started smiling.

  Tullus took heart. ‘Leave this camp, brothers, and I promise it will be the end of you. Arminius is out there with thousands of his warriors, waiting for you to wander around in the dark, up to your knees in mud. Leave this camp and your lives will be forfeit. Your eagles will be lost – taken by the enemy, disgracing each and every one of you for eternity. Is that what you would have?’

  ‘NO!’

  ‘Do you want your bones to moulder in the bog? To have your heads nailed to trees?’

  ‘NOOOO!’ they screamed back at him.

  ‘Return to your positions then. Get what rest you can. In the morning, Caecina will lead us out, to victory.’

  ‘What about the enemy in the camp?’ demanded Sour Face.

  ‘Listen,’ ordered Tullus. ‘Tell me if you can hear any fighting.’ Gods, let the situation have calmed, he prayed as the mob fell quiet. A dozen heartbeats skipped past; in the distance, men were shouting, but the frightened edge that had been present before was gone. There was no sound of combat, no clash of sword on shield. No screams as men died on the sharp end of a blade.

  Sour Face stared at Tullus, long and hard, and then he shook his head. ‘It must have been a horse after all. Curse it, brothers, we were fooled by a fucking horse!’

  Embarrassed laughter broke out and, just like that, the tension began to dissipate. Sour Face turned on his heel and shoved his way into the crowd. ‘Back to our places, brothers!’ he cried. ‘Tomorrow will be a long day.’ His shouts continued as he pressed on into the throng. Nothing else happened for a few moments. Tullus’ heart was thudding in his chest –
there was no way of knowing if enough of the legionaries had been convinced.

  He twisted the standard’s staff a little, so that the torchlight bounced off the majestic gold bird. Similar in appearance to the Eighteenth’s lost eagle, it was depicted lying forward on its breast, a golden wreath encircling its wings, which were upraised behind its body. Its part-open beak and penetrating stare gave off an overpowering sense of arrogance and power. The embodiment of a legion’s pride and honour, the eagle demanded – expected – respect.

  Another reverent sigh escaped a hundred throats, and in dribs and drabs the legionaries began edging away. All were careful to avoid Tullus’ and Caecina’s gaze.

  It took time, but at last he and Caecina were left standing in the gateway, with Piso and the rest watching from above. Only the muddied ground – tramped flat by hobnailed sandals – bore witness to the large crowd that had been present.

  ‘Well done,’ said Caecina, his face paling with delayed shock.

  ‘Thank you, sir.’ Tullus studied Caecina sidelong. One disaster had been averted, but another – in the form of Arminius’ waiting hordes – beckoned. They needed Caecina’s leadership now more than ever. ‘Have you given any thought to our next move, sir?’

  His composure regained, Caecina let out an evil chuckle. ‘The enemy must have heard the commotion. Let him think we are too scared to leave the camp. Let him think the legionaries are bunched together like frightened sheep. Let him attack us here, at dawn.’ He gestured at the ramparts and the intervallum. ‘When he scales the defences, and enters the gate, he’ll find us waiting.’

  The chaos at the gate had curdled neither Caecina’s resolve nor his courage, thought Tullus with delight.

  It was an ingenious plan.

  Chapter XXXVIII

  USING A SPEAR as a staff, Arminius was picking his way through the bog towards his camp. Maelo and a group of his best warriors were with him; they had spent the previous few hours in the darkness close to the Roman fortifications. Drawn at first by the uproar – shouts, cries of fear, and a horse of all things – Arminius had lingered because of the degree of panic among the enemy troops. The cause of the widespread alarm was unclear, but by the time small groups of dishevelled, fearful legionaries began wandering out of the northern gate, it seemed that the chaos was very real.

  Wary still of the possibility of a trap, Arminius had held his eager warriors back. With Maelo by his side, he had crept closer to the enemy camp’s north gate. The staggered construction of the entrance had prevented him from seeing events unfold inside, but he’d been able to glean much of the goings on from the shouted conversations wafting over the defences.

  What a pity he had not slain Tullus six years before, brooded Arminius. The man was indefatigable. First he had thwarted Arminius on the battlefield, and then he had won over the terrified mob of legionaries by the gate with talk of his legion’s eagle, and how their own must not be lost to the enemy. It was infuriating – yet it was also hard not to feel a certain admiration for the man. Realising that Caecina had been there too, Arminius had determined to storm the gate and try to kill both Tullus and general in one fell swoop, but Maelo had stood in his way. Arminius had cursed him for it, but as the first fingers of light stole up the sky from the horizon, he had to admit that his second-in-command had been right. They might have succeeded, but some of the legionaries at least would have fought back. Maelo or he might have been slain.

  Dying didn’t scare Arminius – since Thusnelda’s abduction there had been many occasions when he would have welcomed the oblivion it granted. He had allowed Maelo to step in because without him, the charismatic leader, it would be too easy for the tribes’ assault on the battered legions to fragment and fail. With him, it would succeed. The legionaries were terrified – the evidence of that had filled Arminius’ ears. When they emerged from the camp at last and his warriors fell on them in their thousands, what remained of their resolve would vanish, as it had for Varus and the unfortunates who’d followed him.

  It was bittersweet that despite the magnitude of Arminius’ impending victory, Thusnelda and their baby would never return home. His suspicion had been borne out some time before by news that had reached him from the west bank of the Rhenus. No matter how many Romans he slaughtered, she was gone forever – sent to Rome as a prestigious captive. Arminius ground his teeth until his jaws ached. You bastard, Germanicus, he thought. You cold-hearted, motherless get. I’ll capture you one day, and by the gods, you’ll live to regret the day you were born.

  ‘We’re almost there.’ Maelo’s voice pulled Arminius back to the moment. He dampened his rage. Now was a time for calm, for control.

  ‘D’you want me to wake the others?’ asked Maelo.

  ‘Aye. Every chieftain needs to be here – we haven’t got long. Caecina will want to march soon, before his men’s new-found resolve deserts them.’

  ‘Today’s the day – I can feel it,’ said Maelo, slapping Arminius’ back before he slipped off into the lightening gloom.

  An hour later, neither man’s outlook was so rosy. Encouraged by Arminius’ reports of the panic among the enemy ranks, Inguiomerus had proposed an all-out attack on the Roman camp. To Arminius’ dismay, the other chieftains had loved the idea, roaring their approval at the leaden skies. Again and again, he repeated the risks of fighting the legionaries face-to-face. ‘Why not let them march out, into the wet and broken country? They’re easy prey there.’

  His protests and suggestions fell on deaf ears. Even Big Chin, who had listened to Arminius before, wanted to strike at the Romans. ‘They’re soiling their undergarments like newborn babes – you said so yourself,’ he declared to loud acclaim. ‘Their defences are poor. Better still, the legions are in one place.’

  ‘It will be easy to take the eagles,’ said Inguiomerus. ‘Imagine that.’

  The chieftains cheered. ‘I’ll have one.’ ‘Not if my warriors get there first.’ ‘I want two!’

  Arminius’ foul temper worsened as he watched the grinning chieftains shoving at each other like youths squabbling over a barrel of stolen beer. ‘There’s no need to attack the camp,’ he repeated. ‘Let the filth march out into the bog. We can pick them off there at our leisure.’

  ‘It’s unlike you to be the faint-heart, nephew,’ Inguiomerus mocked. ‘It will be a slaughter – can you not see that?’

  The insult stung Arminius to the quick. He stared at his uncle and then at Big Chin, who was enthusing about spearing fish in a pool. Stick Thin and the others were nodding or miming how they’d stab the legionaries. The attack was going to go ahead with or without his participation, Arminius decided. Frustrated and for the moment impotent, he considered his options.

  If he gave the order, most of his warriors would refrain from taking part in the assault. The men who held back – five and a half thousand spears, perhaps – were a sizeable and important part of the entire host. Trained, better-armed than most, and veterans, their absence would affect the battle to come, and could even hand victory to the Romans. If that happened, a widespread rout was likely, bringing with it heavy casualties. Apart from the human price of such a disaster, there were other considerations. Bravehearted though they were, the defeated tribesmen would lose all interest in pursuing the enemy. They would return to their settlements, and any chance of wiping out Caecina’s army would be lost. Arminius’ entire campaign would have come to nothing.

  He locked eyes with Big Chin, and wondered if the Angrivarii chieftain was thinking the same thing. ‘Fall on them in the open, in the bog, and we’ll fare better,’ Arminius said, trying one more time. ‘Yesterday was just the start.’

  ‘Hit them right now, when they’re groggy with lack of sleep, and still terrified from the panicked horse, and victory will be ours,’ Big Chin responded.

  ‘He’s right,’ declared Inguiomerus in a confident tone. ‘Are you with us?’

  Everyone’s attention turned towards Arminius. He glanced at Maelo, who gave a minute, frus
trated shrug. Curse it, thought Arminius. ‘My warriors will also fight. I don’t want to hear for evermore about the glory being yours, or how you won the day,’ he snapped at Big Chin. ‘The same applies to you, uncle.’

  ‘We can share the glory,’ declared Big Chin, grinning.

  ‘Indeed,’ agreed Inguiomerus, but he wasn’t smiling. He stared at Arminius, his eyes sparking with anger.

  Arminius returned the look with cold intensity. I know what you’re doing, he thought. You’re trying to assume the mantle. Had the situation been different, he would have spoken up, even challenged Inguiomerus to a fight. Today, though, it would be better to wait until the day’s end, when the battle was over and the casualties counted. If his uncle’s plan succeeded, Arminius would face a real challenge to his authority. If the assault failed, as he thought it would, Inguiomerus would have to be put back in his place with an iron fist.

  Cross that bridge when you come to it, thought Arminius. Crush the Romans first.

  Dawn had broken not long before, and Arminius’ warriors had gathered around him. Many bore bundles of branches or sections of heather bushes. Others carried rough-hewn ladders, the result of their labours since he’d given the orders to prepare for an attack. The vegetation would be used to fill the Roman defensive ditch, giving the warriors a chance of gaining a rapid foothold on the ramparts.

  Arminius studied the enemy camp again. The rain had stopped at last, making it easier to see the sentries still pacing the walkways. Fine lines of smoke trickled up into the sky from within the walls, marking the location of the soldiers’ fires. An occasional voice carried through the air, but there seemed to be little activity. Perhaps Inguiomerus was right, thought Arminius. He would have expected the legions to be exiting the north gate by now, and setting out on the wooden road.

  There was no sign of them. It wasn’t as if he could even hear the legionaries preparing to march. Upwards of four and a half thousand men made plenty of noise, and there was no chance that quadruple that number could assemble in silence. ‘They are scared,’ said Arminius to Maelo, by his side. ‘They must be huddled together like frightened pups, hoping we’ll go away.’