Swords Around the Throne

by Ian Ross

  ‘Out of the way,’ he said, and the crowd shrank back against the walls to let him through. Getting his shield up in front of him, Castus clambered over the bleeding man and stamped up the steps, his body primed for the first attack. He had almost reached the top when a spear came stabbing down at him, thudding loud against the shield boards. Castus angled his blade out from below the shield and pushed on upwards, almost tripping on the narrow steps. The spearman struck again, and the force of the impact almost sent Castus staggering off his feet. But then he was up, bursting from the steps into the upper chamber of the tower, two soldiers falling back before him.

  ‘Surrender!’ Castus yelled, but his opponents were already lunging at him again. He smacked the spear away with his sword, then rolled himself into a low crouch with his shield lifted, sweeping a horizontal cut that chopped the spearman’s legs from under him. The man toppled, screaming, as the second soldier’s swinging blow thundered onto Castus’s shield. Castus flinched from the impact, then straightened and hurled the shield towards his opponent. It collided with the man’s body, and before he could regain his balance Castus had closed the space between them and stabbed the blade of his sword up under his ribs. The soldier choked blood, fell against Castus, and was dead before his body folded to the floor.

  Up the last flight of steps, no more than a wooden ladder this time, and Castus dragged himself up onto the flat roof of the tower. Not yet sunrise. Sagging against the rampart wall, he heaved air into his lungs. His legs felt numb, and the wound in his side was throbbing, pain shooting up into his left armpit. When he looked back he saw that he had left a trail of blood behind him. The land to the north was still hazy in the pre-dawn darkness. No sign of approaching troops. No movement at all. From the city Castus could hear cries of alarm and the brassy blare of horns.

  Brinno raised his head from the ladder. ‘Brother – the beacon hasn’t been fired yet.’

  Castus shoved himself away from the wall and jogged back to the ladder, following Brinno down to the walkway above the gates.

  The beacon had not been fired, he discovered, because the stack of straw and tinder in the iron basket had been soaked by the night’s rain and not replaced. Beneath it, under cover, the clay lamp still burned, but that small flame alone would not be enough to send a clear signal.

  ‘Get down to the chamber below,’ Castus ordered, not even sure who was listening. ‘Bring bedding, straw mattresses, anything else dry that’ll burn.’

  He sank down to sit beside the crenellated wall. Brinno knelt beside him, calling for water as he pulled the folds of bloody tunic cloth away from his wound.

  Castus closed his eyes, feeling the rapid ebb of his strength. Still no sound from the dark land outside the walls. Soon the city troops would muster to retake the gates; the civilian mob could never stand against them. Keeping his eyes closed, gritting his teeth, Castus remained seated as Brinno washed the wound in his side. Then somebody was binding it – the prostitute Ofilia, he noticed. No trace now of the killing frenzy that had possessed her only moments before. Quick and deft, she bound clean linen around his torso, padding it over the wound and tying it tight. Castus thanked her with a grunt, then pulled himself up against the wall. His guts burned, but he could stand, and when he raised his arms he felt only the dullest ache.

  The iron basket of the beacon was piled with blankets and dry straw now. Brinno lifted the lamp from beneath it, then, shading the flame carefully with his palm against the damp gusting breeze, brought the fire to the heap of tinder. Straw crackled, smoke twisted, and then the flame burst upwards. A cheer came from the people thronging the tower doorways.

  Fire-warmth lit his face for a moment, then Castus turned and stared out into the darkness beyond the gateway. Still nothing, no sound of marching boots, no shouted order to advance. He eased himself down again, sitting against the rampart. Had the message even got through? Above him, he could see Brinno on the top of the tower, standing on the rampart with a bow in his hand. As Castus watched, the Frank aimed and shot, then shot again. He was picking off the men advancing along the wall walkway below.

  Then, just at the edge of hearing, Castus made out a familiar sound. He hauled himself up, gripping the merlons and staring into the grey gloom. The steady crunch of hobnailed boots, marching fast. Then, with a wave of euphoric relief that almost made him shout, Castus heard the voices of the centurions as they urged their men on. He could see them now, a tight column of infantry advancing at the jog up the road that led to the gates. He saw the standards swaying above them as they flowed across the breach dug in the causeway, the curling tail of a draco streaming in the sea breeze. Then he made out their shields: the winged Victory emblem of the Sixth, his old legion.

  ‘Constantine Augustus!’ came the shout from the head of the column.

  Castus raised his sword, the flame from the beacon fire flashing off the blade, and shouted hoarsely into the morning mist.

  ‘Ever Victorious! Ever Victorious!’

  27

  The vaulted passage between the gates stank of blood and filth, and was thunderous with the noise of men. Castus emerged from the doorway to the stairs and saw shields and helmets and armoured bodies packed close in the torchlight. Six spears were immediately levelled at his face.

  ‘Weapons down!’ their centurion cried. ‘Let him through!’

  Beneath the helmet rim and nasal guard were the dark features of Rogatianus. The African pushed through his men and threw an arm around Castus’s shoulders, punching him lightly on the chest.

  ‘Good to see you, brother!’

  ‘Good to see the Sixth in the vanguard again,’ Castus said. He was shouting – everyone was shouting.

  ‘We didn’t volunteer. Somebody thought we might be the only ones to recognise you!’

  ‘Buggers in the other legions might have taken you for the enemy and killed you.’ Castus recognised Modestus, and grabbed him by the hand.

  ‘They might have tried,’ he said.

  Now Rogatianus was re-forming his men in the tunnel before the inner gateway, throwing out a screen of skirmishers to watch the approaches from the city. Castus stood swaying, drinking in the scene. The noise, the faces, the shouts of command: they were music to him. Music and wine. All pain was gone from his body, and he felt strong, ready for anything.

  The troops behind him parted, and a squat man in a gilded breastplate and gem-studded helmet came striding between them. It took Castus a moment to recognise his chief, Hierocles, Primicerius of the Corps of Protectores. Two tribunes of the horse guards followed him.

  ‘Dominus!’ Castus shouted, saluting.

  Hierocles acknowledged the salute with a brief nod. ‘What do you know of the forces arrayed against us?’ he snapped.

  ‘Dominus, there are men in the towers along the wall to either side. We’ve seen nothing from the city so far, but Maximian has his reserves garrisoned around the temple of Apollo on the heights to the east of here, and half a cohort of Praetorians at the palace above the western docks. If they heard the alarm they should be moving against us already.’

  ‘Very good,’ the primicerius said. He was glancing down; the bandage wrapping Castus’s torso was already spotted with blood. ‘Are you fit to fight?’ he asked.

  Castus squared his jaw and nodded.

  ‘Then fall in behind me. I may need you to guide us once we’re into the streets.’ He turned to the troops massing in the tunnel, his cry echoing under the stone vaults. ‘Centurions: battle formation! And somebody get this rabble of civilians out of the way...’

  They moved out in a tight column, light infantry of the auxilia screening their flanks. First came the men of the Sixth, then a cohort of Legion I Minervia. Despite Hierocles’ order, the civilians moved forward too, flowing along either side of the advancing column. Castus saw Nazarius run out of the throng.

  ‘Praise be to God,’ the deacon cried, taking Castus by the hand. Tears were flowing down his face. ‘Praise be to God!’
/>   ‘Praise be to us,’ Castus told him.

  The column had advanced only two blocks down the narrow street towards the agora when the enemy appeared before them. A solid wall of shields, Praetorians and men of the Spanish legions, blocked the street ahead. Castus heard the horns blowing, and the Constantinian column broke at once into an attack charge. Boots clattered on the cobbles, a couple of men slipped and fell, then the leading wedge of the column smashed into the wall of Maximian’s men and the din of colliding shields volleyed along the street.

  At once men were screaming, spears lashing and stabbing. The enemy line gave a little, staggering back under the weight of the Constantinian charge, then the Spanish centurions yelled and soldiers bellowed a cheer, locking their boots to the cobbles and shoving back against the pressure of their attackers. Flung darts whirled in the air above them. Beside him, Castus saw Brinno calmly lofting arrows over the battle lines into the rear ranks of the enemy.

  ‘Heh!’ his friend cried as he reached for another arrow. ‘I’d forgotten how much fun it is to kill men with this thing!’

  Craning up from his position near the back of the fight, Castus saw the solid mass of Maximian’s men beginning to push forward. Spears clashed together. Swords swung, battering against the shields of the opposing line. Slowly, slowly, the momentum of the Constantinian charge was being turned, men in the front ranks falling.

  Then a ripple went through the enemy formation. Looking up, Castus saw people scrambling across the roofs of buildings on either side of the street, pelting tiles down into the massed soldiers beneath them. Others appeared at the upper windows, hurling bricks. A cauldron tipped from a window ledge, dropping a steaming torrent of boiling water onto the frenzied men below. The advance of Maximian’s troops faltered as panic spread from their rear. Then their line broke, and a wedge of Constantine’s legionaries surged forward through the breach, driving the enemy before it.

  Noise of horses behind him, hooves clattering on the paved street, and Castus looked back as a troop of armoured cavalrymen from the Schola Scutariorum came riding down from the Sea Gate. But the battle here was done. Everywhere the enemy soldiers were casting aside their weapons, fleeing into the alleys or surrendering. Castus saw the men of the Spanish legions ripping the images of Maximian from their standards and throwing them down. They were dropping their shields, emblazoned with his name, and stamping and spitting on them. He noticed with surprise that it was growing light. The faces of the soldiers were distinct now, and the blood pooled in the street looked violently red.

  ‘We have to get to the palace,’ he said, taking Brinno by the arm.

  ‘The emperor’s wife is there.’ Even as he spoke Castus saw the terrible images appearing to him. Not only was Fausta in the palace, but Sabina too. If Maximian decided to fight – worse, if he chose to die – he could take both of them to Hades with him. Castus pictured the halls painted with blood, a slaughterhouse. He broke into a run, and Brinno came after him.

  Down the street towards the agora they shoved through the last of the civilian mob and the surrendering soldiers, and then they were on their own. The fight seemed to have swirled through this district and then ebbed away eastwards, leaving a wrack of fallen weapons, and occasionally fallen men too. Most of the dead were soldiers; clearly the citizens of Massilia had been taking their revenge. Castus drew his sword as he ran.

  A section of cavalry came cantering past as they entered the agora, then a scattered unit of soldiers moving at the jog. Whether they were Constantine’s men or Maximian’s it was impossible to tell. But at the far end of the agora Castus could make out the shields of the Praetorians in the gathering daylight, and they were holding a steady line as they retreated towards the quays below the theatre.

  He halted, gasping, and clung to a pillar. The wound in his side was like a burning coal lodged in his flesh, and clammy sweat was running down his face. A tide of pain rose through his body, and for a moment he thought he would vomit. Then it passed. Brinno gave him a questioning look, and Castus nodded and heaved himself away from the pillar again.

  There were more soldiers advancing around them now, legionaries of I Minervia and XXII Primigenia, with a horde of Germanic auxilia in support. They moved steadily across the agora in a skirmishing line, but the Praetorians were falling back fast and were not about to make a stand. Castus snatched up a fallen shield and shoved himself forward between the skirmishers, Brinno at his shoulder. They had reached the far end of the agora, moving through the colonnades and into the wide area of open ground between the theatre and the sea, and now they could make out the little column of troops and fugitives descending the slope from Maximian’s palace towards the gateway of the western docks. The sun was just up to the east, and the scene was flooded with a golden morning light.

  ‘There he is!’ Brinno cried, pointing. Castus stared, and picked out the figure in the purple robe, hedged by soldiers on all sides as he paced quickly towards the dock gateway. In the sunlight everything appeared very clear, very bright. A moment later Castus saw a red parasol raised above the hurrying column, an open litter being carried beneath it by four slaves. In the litter was Fausta, and behind it, on foot, was Sabina.

  The soldiers raised a great snarling cheer as they too caught sight of the usurper. They surged forward, but the Praetorians had formed into a solid wall, shields locked, protecting an open avenue between Maximian and the dock gateway. Some of Constantine’s men still had their javelins and darts; they hurled them at the enemy formation, but most fell short. There seemed to be no officers among them, nobody to give the order.

  ‘For Constantine!’ Castus yelled, raising his sword so all along the line could see him. ‘For Constantine! After me!’

  He kicked himself forward into a charge, directly across the open ground towards the Praetorian line. Bellowing as he ran, he felt agony filling his torso and feared he would stumble and fall. But the Constantinian troops were surging forward after him, raising their own ragged cheer, and even before he had covered half the distance Castus could see the Praetorians beginning to fall back. Then their line collapsed, men fleeing to either side, and he was through.

  Maximian had already passed the gateway into the docks. Fausta’s litter followed behind him, and then the usurper’s bodyguard peeled aside and re-formed to block the gate behind their master and ensure his escape.

  Castus slowed as he drew closer. The men in the gateway formed a solid barrier. A soldier ran up beside him and hurled his javelin, and Castus saw one of the defenders fall. Brinno shot one arrow, then shot a second. Within moments all the advancing troops had begun to add their own missiles to the barrage, and the men packed in the gateway could only crouch behind their battered shields and wait to die.

  Their resistance did not last long. Once half of them had fallen wounded or dead the rest broke and scattered away along the quayside behind them. Castus drew breath, ready to charge forward again. Then he saw the last defender, still standing in the open gateway.

  ‘Sallustius!’ he cried. ‘Surrender! It’s over...’

  But Sallustius, sword in hand, clad in his silvered scale cuirass, just shook his head and raised his shield. Something flickered past Castus’s ear; Sallustius took one staggering step back, then dropped his shield and grasped at the arrow jutting from his neck. He staggered again, then fell.

  ‘He was a traitor,’ Brinno said, shrugging grimly.

  Castus paused only briefly to gaze down at the dying body of his former comrade; two soldiers pushed past him, and then he was running after them through the gateway onto the quay.

  The sunlight was dazzling off the calm water of the harbour, gulls wheeled and screamed overhead, and a light twelve-oared galley was moving away from the quayside with Maximian’s purple-clad bulk seated at the stern. From the far end of the quay came the clash of sudden combat, screams of pain; the last men of the usurper’s bodyguard were gathered in a tight knot around the landing steps, still holding their positions e
ven as their emperor was deserting them. The two soldiers that had passed Castus only moments before were already down, dying on the worn stones of the quay.

  Slowing to a walk, Castus approached the group of men around the steps. He held his sword low, but kept his shield up. Behind him he could hear the mass of other soldiers gathering at his back. He kept walking, drawing closer.

  ‘Throw down your weapons!’ he cried hoarsely. ‘Your emperor has fled!’

  The knot of bodyguards drew tighter, closing their shields. Then a gap opened between them and a single figure stepped forth into the glare of sunlight. His scarred face looked like creased leather, and his mouth was twisted into a mirthless smile.

  ‘So we meet on the battlefield at last!’ Urbicus said, raising his sword.

  Castus halted, only a few long strides between them. For over a year he had waited for this confrontation, but his body was flowing with pain, his limbs were heavy with fatigue. Urbicus was no callow soldier; he was a true warrior, a veteran of twenty years and more in the legions. In his eyes was the cold fury of certain death.

  ‘We don’t need to do this,’ Castus heard himself say. ‘It’s over.’

  ‘Over for him maybe,’ Urbicus replied, making the slightest gesture towards the departing boat. ‘For us? I don’t think so. I’m bound for Hades, it seems. But I’m sending you down there before me.’

  Maximian’s other bodyguards were drawing back, closing ranks again. Castus kept his eyes on his opponent, but could sense the soldiers massing behind him. Both sides watched their champions: this would be a single combat, a bout of gladiators. Urbicus swung his shield up as he edged closer, already in a fighting stance with his blade levelled.

  Castus focused on the man before him, trying to still the thunder of blood in his head and clear his mind of everything but his adversary. The morning sun was bright; death lay on every side. From the deepest well of his body he dredged up the last reserves of strength, of speed.