Legionary: The Scourge of Thracia (Legionary 4)

by Gordon Doherty

  He looked at his sentry in the tower enclosure. Only now was the man paying attention, his mouth agape, staring to the north at the russet dust cloud beyond the green knoll there, his face as white as his knuckles. The man fumbled a buccina to his lips and filled his lungs, when a dark streak sped across the morning sky like a swarm of raptors, then plunged into the trumpeter’s chest. The buccina sounded a discordant, single note as the trumpeter toppled from the tower, riven with short, thick arrows, then crunched to the ground.

  The men of the camp gawked, frozen, many in just grubby tunics and carrying no arms or armour as they went about their morning business.

  ‘To arms!’ Saturninus bellowed as if to shock Barzimeres’ stunned legions to life.

  Pavo stared at the fallen trumpeter, lying in a broken heap only paces away from him. The man’s legs were bent backwards over his head, a white shard of spine jutting from his horribly broken neck, his eyes staring and tongue trailing from his death rictus. Dread crept across his shoulders as he looked up to where the arrows had come from. The knoll across the river was empty apart from the dust cloud. A heartbeat later, it swirled and puffed, and a jostling, vast band of tall, fair warriors surged to the top of the knoll. Gothic spearmen in their thousands, archers too. And on the flanks, riders poured into view. Like some army of risen dead, they wore a mixture of plundered Roman helms and mail shirts, along with hardened red leather Gothic armour and bronze helms.

  Saturninus’ words echoed in his mind. The Shipka Pass has fallen. Thracia is at the mercy of the Goths.

  The Gothic archer’s bows pointed skywards. Another dark streak sped across the sky, this time far larger.

  ‘Shields!’ Pavo cried instinctively as the hail sped for them. But the few hundred young soldiers of the XI Claudia were slow, panicked, some crying out in fear and staring at the incoming hail. Some came to their senses and hoisted up their shields in time before the arrows battered down. Pavo heard the din of arrows pounding down on his shield and others. But this was drowned out by screams as fledgling legionaries were struck down by these first edges of steel they had ever faced – arrows in their foaming throats and torn limbs. Behind the cluster of XI Claudia men all was chaos too. Arrows had hammered down amongst the unprepared throngs – those struck disappearing as though hauled down by some underground creature with a spurt of their blood cast up in their place. Women screamed, snatching up their children and taking flight. Commanders barked to their scattered and unprepared men. Then the Gothic war horn wailed across the river like a vengeful shade and their mighty Greuthingi cavalry walked forward, lances pointing skywards. With them came the Huns, bows nocked, swords and lassos ready. This wall of riders came down the slopes of the knoll and splashed into the river shallows on the far side.

  All around Pavo, men tripped over one another, shouting, arguing and wrestling to take the nearest mail shirts and spears for themselves. Lowing oxen thrashed in distress, dogs howled and whined. The Claudia recruits were edging away from the riverside, chests rising and falling in fear.

  ‘Stand your ground!’ Gallus cried, halting most with the ferocity of his order.

  The blood thundered in Pavo’s ears. He saw the tribunus look this way and that, searching for a modicum of order in the panic. The waterline had to be held, he realised, but an organised army was needed for that.

  ‘Defend the riverbank,’ Saturninus cried, marshalling his few hundred V Macedonica men over beside the XI Claudia. ‘Form a line.’

  At last, something akin to a defensive line took shape in the shingle of the southern bank, the depleted XI Claudia centuries forming the left and the Macedonica men the right, with Gallus, Dexion and Saturninus in the centre. Just over four hundred men. Then another few hundred partially-armoured legionaries bunched onto the right end of the line, more coming in pockets of tens and twenties – though some had not even brought a spear in their haste.

  ‘Shields together!’ Zosimus roared.

  ‘Push up!’ Pavo demanded, barging his shoulder into the young lad at the left end of the line and locking his shield into place. He felt the lad tremble violently, heard the youngster’s breath come in snatched gasps.

  ‘I . . . sir . . . I can’t . . . I ca-’

  ‘Stay together, stand firm and do as I do,’ he roared in a tone devoid of fear. Yet inside it was different: his heart crashed like a war drum, some cursed god had seen fit to drain the moisture from his own mouth and direct it to his bladder as he readied his spear at the right edge of his shield and peered over the rim at the approaching masses. Sura barged into place with Zosimus by his side. Both men trembled with the visceral awakening that came before battle.

  ‘Come on you bastards!’ Zosimus snarled, leaning forward as if eager to lunge for the coming Gothic front. Sura rapped his spear on his shield and unleashed an animal howl, his eyes glassy with tears, spittle flecking the dawn air. This spirit seemed to spread across the recruits, who stiffened and stood a little taller. Still though, the fear was bettering these young lads.

  A cluster of archers heeded Saturninus’ order too, rushing to the top of the lone watchtower, ducking and rising from behind the balustrade to loose their quivers on the Gothic horsemen, now wading saddle-deep across the centre of the river, raised shields taking the brunt of the Roman arrow hail – just a few fell foul of this weak volley, sliding from their saddles and splashing into the Tonsus to be carried downriver in a crimson-streaked current. The many thousands of Gothic infantry were now following, wading into the deeper water behind their cavalry.

  Pavo locked eyes with the giant rider in the centre of the Gothic advance. Unmistakeable with his hulking frame, obsidian eyes, dark hair and trident beard . . . and the welt of scab on his bicep from Quadratus’ plumbatae marksmanship that night at the Gothic camp. Farnobius glowered at Pavo and across the XI Claudia section of the Roman line, the grip on his great axe tightening. You, he mouthed, recognising the Claudia veterans.

  As the Gothic cavalry waded clear of the deepest section of river, their pace increased, spray puffing up in their wake, dotted with haloes of sunlight. It was a walk, then a trot, then the ground shook and the air filled with whinnies and cries of Ya! as the Gothic riders urged their mounts into a canter. Then an iron rasp rang out as longswords were drawn and spears were levelled.

  ‘Hold the line,’ Saturninus cried, and some men fell to their knees to brace their spears.

  Pavo flicked his head left and then right to see that the thin legionary line now stretched to cover the shingle banking. Beyond either end of the line were rugged sections of broken, steep banking or fen that would halt or delay the Gothic crossing. They had a chance, just a sliver of a chance . . . then he saw the darting mass far to his left: a handful of Hun riders leapt from the waters, their ponies making light work of scrambling up the broken banking. They swept round the end of the Roman line and into the camp, coming round on the rear of the Roman line.

  ‘Sir!’ Pavo bellowed to Gallus and Saturninus at once. ‘They’re behind us!’

  Gallus and the magister equitum looked to him, wide-eyed, faces paling. With a whirring, the Huns’ lassos licked out like lizards’ tongues, looping over men in the Roman line from behind, yanking and breaking necks, leaving gaps in the line like a bad set of teeth. One rope hooked round the fin of Pavo’s intercisa and slid down as if to strangle him, but he ducked out of it just before the Hun on the end of it yanked the rope tight. Men swung round to face this threat while others roared for them to turn back to the Gothic horsemen, now clear of the shallows and breaking into a charge over the short stretch of shingle.

  The recruit by Pavo’s side gawped at the Gothic rider bearing down on him on a wild-eyed stallion, then looked over his shoulder, trembling in panic, hearing the Hun lassos whirring again.

  ‘Eyes forward,’ Pavo snarled. ‘The line is our strength!’

  ‘But sir, the Hu-

  The lad’s words ended with an almighty clatter of thousands of spears hammering i
nto the Roman shield wall. Pavo was driven back some fifteen paces such was the force of it. Legionaries fell, trampled or run through. Horses reared, faces smashed with Roman shield bosses. Gothic riders screamed as they were pulled from the saddle and gutted on legionary blades. Once more, the Tonsus riverbank was sodden, this time with blood.

  Pavo thwacked his spear shaft into one rider then another – no time to execute a thrust that might disable either of them, then swept his shield out to catch the blow of the first of the Gothic infantry surge. He bedded his spear butt into the reddening mud just as another rider came at him. The horse ran onto the tip and issued an agonised whinny as it toppled to the dirt, taking the lance with it. Pavo drew out his spatha and hacked the hand from an onrushing Gothic spearman, then parried the blows of another two. The cap of some unfortunate legionary’s skull spun past him, showering him with stinking grey matter and blood, and he saw two Macedonica legionaries being torn apart by a cluster of frenzied Goths, loops of gut being thrown up on the end of their spears. All the while, he realised the thin Roman line was bending. No, capitulating. Back they stalked, then staggered, then he realised they were warped out of shape. His heart plummeted when he saw the young XI Claudia recruits had turned to flight while others were left as islands in the sea of Goths. Here the handful of legionaries who strived to hold the line were being driven towards the lone watchtower, he realised as he came together with Sura, Zosimus and a clutch of the recruits once more. Then Dexion, Gallus and Quadratus were with them.

  ‘We can hold the ground around this tower?’ Dexion gasped, blocking a spear that was thrust towards Pavo then glancing up at the watchtower.

  Perhaps, Pavo thought, until he saw the Hun lassos shooting up to grapple the timber joists near the top.

  Barzimeres blinked in disbelief, his mount pacing backwards as the Goths surged forward. The Roman line before him was buckling, bending and being driven back towards the lone watchtower. He guided his mount back in step with them, using them as a screen. His guts seemed to be in the hold of a giant, icy hand and he shook uncontrollably. A palisade might have saved them, he realised now. Gallus had been right.

  Aye, but he’s also a fool! he thought, seeing how Gallus fought on beside Saturninus and a few hundred legionaries in the fragmenting line before him while the rest of the camp broke south in flight. Why should I give my life just to let some other beggars live?

  He readied to join the fleeing masses, then hesitated. Here, screened by the fighting legionaries and obscured by the watchtower, he was momentarily safe from the Goths. His fear ebbed just a fraction. If he was to wait here for just a moment and be one of the last to flee . . . then they’ll hail me as a hero, he surmised, a hero who stood to the last. A Gothic arrow flashed past him and suddenly, his stomach heaved. A moment later, he heard the whirring of ropes and the cracking of timber from above. Hun lassos had taken a hold of the tower joists. The tall watchtower groaned, shuddered and was wrested from its foundations. It toppled into the river, splintering like kindling, walls of foaming water leaping up from either side as the cries of the archers in the tower top were swiftly muted. Those who survived the fall were dragged from the water to have their throats sliced or their bellies ripped open – steaming guts and organs toppling into the shallows. With this tumult, the legionary line’s last vestiges of cohesion crumbled and the retreating front shattered, some men running, others falling back in small groups, still fighting.

  As the line dissolved before him, Barzimeres’ bowels clenched. He was alone, his screen of protection gone. Then one of the Huns loosed an arrow that tore out his mount’s throat. The black stallion reared up, tossing Barzimeres into the dirt. He scrambled back from the thrashing beast, all thought now on saving himself and nothing else. As he glanced back he saw the Gothic spears and longswords swinging to and fro casting fingers, hands, arms and heads up in the air with spouts of blood. Coming through the melee like a titan was the trident-bearded giant with the axe.

  Barzimeres stumbled for the south with the fleeing crowds, panic utterly controlling him as he sensed the giant Goth coming for him. ‘Get out of my way!’ he cried turning to flee only to bash against a legionary running towards the struggle on the riverside. He recognised him as the primus pilus of his Cornutii.

  ‘Sir?’ The feather-helmed officer gasped. ‘What’s happening?’

  Barzimeres saw the man’s eyes searching his, saw that they had found the truth of his cowardice, heard the giant Goth’s axe singing through the air behind him, readying to come down on his skull, then realised what he had to do. Grabbing the officer by the shoulders, he swung the man round and into the path of the giant Goth’s axe strike like a shield. The primus pilus’ helmet was cleaved as was his skull. Brain and blood pumped from the awful wound and showered all nearby. He shoved the corpse at the giant then hurried on southwards until he came to the rest of the Cornutii, armed and rushing towards the conflict as their primus pilus had been moments ago.

  ‘Retreat – to the south!’ he waved them back ‘The camp has all but fallen.’

  ‘But sir, the primus pilus, he is in the fray.’

  ‘It is too late, I saw him fall. I tried to save him but I could not. Now turn around!’ He saw his Scutarii too cantering towards the battle, and waved them back likewise.

  As his palatinae legions pulled back reluctantly, he stumbled on after them. In moments, he was lagging behind them, wheezing for breath and realised he needed a horse. He looked in every direction for some hope of salvation, then saw a terrified boy standing with Saturninus’ still sweating, frothing grey mare. He hurried over to the boy, yanking on the reins.

  But the boy held on tight. ‘Sir, no, this belongs to the magister equitum. He told me to hold onto it.’

  The boy’s words faltered and his eyes bulged as Barzimeres rammed his dagger into the lad’s gut, then twisted the blade. ‘Saturninus is otherwise engaged,’ he growled, then leapt upon the mare and heeled her off through the camp and on to the south, overtaking his regiments then crossing the hills, passing fleeing women and workmen on the plain.

  The cool autumn wind roared in his ears and he cast glance after glance behind him, seeing the brave but futile last stand of the legions of the Great Northern Camp by the riverbank. The last traces of the Thracian armies would surely perish there. He had done the right thing in saving his two palatinae regiments, he affirmed. Then he thought he heard a clopping of hooves behind him, racing, catching him. He swung round in fright, bringing up the still-bloodied dagger, only to see nothing there. Nothing but a fresh autumn wind, and a burning sense of shame.

  The fragments of the watchtower were swept off downstream and the equally fragmented Roman defensive line fled or fell further and further back into the Great Northern Camp. Pavo and Sura became separated from the other Claudian legionaries. They staggered backwards, barely resisting the Gothic press, a trail of blood and broken corpses littering the ground in the wake of the retreat and a vile stench of open bowels wafting through the mild air. They stumbled as they backed over fallen tents, still-burning campfires and discarded crates and belongings. Sura slashed the chest of one Goth and Pavo booted the foe back then stabbed out at another. The pair backed through a cluster of tents and for a blessed moment, they were free of the battle – but they were also separated from their legion.

  A thudding of boots startled them and they swung to the noise, swords flicking up. Dexion halted just inches from the tips. ‘Whoa – easy!’ he cried, a wry grin on his face as the swords were lowered.

  ‘What now?’ Sura gasped.

  Buccinas cried from behind them. The order to retreat sounded over and over again.

  The three turned to see that the open ground south of the camp was already streaked with fleeing Roman soldiers and people. Every cluster of legionaries still fighting within the camp now broke and fled as well. Pavo swivelled on his heel as if to join them, then he froze and his stomach fell into his boots as a terrible thought snared him. At
the same time, Dexion gasped and Sura’s face fell agape.

  ‘Felicia?’ the three said in unison.

  Pavo’s eyes swept across the mass of tents nearby. The foremost Goths were leaping over tents on horseback, cutting down a few scuttling survivors who had chosen to hide, tearing down or setting light to Roman tents and crying out in victory. They were just paces from the area with Felicia and Lucilla’s tent.

  ‘She might have been carried clear of this place already,’ Sura said, guessing their thoughts.

  ‘We have to be sure,’ Pavo said.

  ‘Then by Mithras, we’d better be swift,’ Dexion added.

  Like deer rushing for a pride of lions, the three hared across the sea of Roman tents, bounding over debris as a thickening cloud of black smoke swept over them and the pillaging Goths converged upon them and Felicia’s tent.

  Be far from here, please, Pavo mouthed as they rounded the smith’s hut. Then they stumbled to a halt. In the clearing before the tents there, Farnobius stood, his great axe dripping with blood and plastered with hair and skin. By his feet lay a handful of corpses. A man, chest cleaved . . . and two women. He stared at Felicia’s pained expression, lifeless eyes staring skywards, mouth agape as if calling for him. The wound across her neck was deep and her milky skin was now grey. Lucilla’s corpse lay by Felicia’s side, her back dark red where it had met with some blade, her arms cast over Felicia as if to protect her.

  He fell forward, reaching out, hearing numb, other-worldly cries and not recognising them as his own. He saw Farnobius’ giant frame jostle in glee, saw the pack of Goths that flooded into the space to flank their leader and stalk towards the legionaries. He rose, hefting up a jagged boulder and hurling it. The rock ended Farnobius’ laughter abruptly as it smashed into his face, staving in his nose. The giant fell back, clutching his face as blood pumped from his shattered nose. Pavo leapt up, tearing his spatha from his scabbard to finish the job, heedless to the nest of Goths he was about to leap into. But rough hands hauled him back.