Hammer of Rome

by Douglas Jackson

  Agricola cleared his throat. ‘The Emperor is pleased to allow us to continue our campaigns in the north,’ he said. ‘But he looks for a speedy and successful outcome. That should please you, Valerius. I know you had doubts about my strategy.’

  ‘I’m happy that the campaign is to continue, sir. As always, whatever you propose will have the full support of the Ninth legion.’

  Agricola’s head came up. ‘But not the full Ninth legion.’

  Valerius froze. What was going on? ‘I don’t understand, governor.’

  ‘No? I thought I’d made it clear in my letters that the Emperor intends a campaign to subdue the tribes of the Upper Rhenus and Danuvius. In fact, he told me he based those plans on a report prepared for his father by no less an authority than Gaius Valerius Verrens.’

  Valerius frowned, remembering the discussions he’d had with officials in Augusta Raurica and Moguntiacum on the way to Britannia. Vespasian had asked him to check on the morale and discipline of the frontier legions. He’d found them in good condition, but the governor of the Upper Rhenus had championed an advance across the river to bring the local tribes under Roman control. Vespasian had carried out limited actions as a result of the information, but it seemed his surviving son would do more.

  ‘I’m honoured.’ He tried to inject some enthusiasm into the words.

  ‘Don’t be,’ Agricola snapped. ‘His intervention makes it all the more difficult for us to achieve victory. To ensure the success of the German campaign Emperor Domitian is stripping my legions of troops. He has ordered the transfer of most of my auxiliary infantry.’

  ‘But—’

  The governor held up a hand. ‘That is not all. He commands that they be joined by vexillations from all four legions. Adiutrix, Augusta and the Twentieth Valeria will each supply two cohorts. The Ninth, in which he appears to take a special interest, will supply four cohorts.’

  ‘That’s almost half my legion,’ Valerius protested.

  Agricola’s voice took on a mocking tone. ‘The Emperor has graciously allowed us to make up the numbers by recruiting new auxiliary cohorts from within Britannia.’

  ‘Untrained, ill-disciplined barbarians.’ Valerius knew Agricola was perfectly aware of what he was saying. ‘And when we do train them they’ll be an even greater danger to the province. Has he forgotten what happened when Vitellius used our Batavians to garrison their homeland? Two years of rebellion and four legions consigned to oblivion.’

  ‘I believe the Emperor is aware of that fact.’ Irritation gave Agricola’s voice a ragged edge. ‘He did help put down the rebellion as part of his uncle Cerialis’s command. I had thought to involve your scout, Rufus, in the selection process – he knows the tribes better than most – but I see from your distraught reaction that it would be an imposition too far. And, of course, he has a dog-like devotion to you. I seem to recall you planned to send him north when last we met?’

  Valerius knew there was no point in further protest. He gave Agricola the details as Rufus had presented them in a report dictated to a clerk at the Ninth’s winter camp on the north side of the marshes.

  To Gaius Valerius Verrens, legate Ninth legion Hispana, from Gaius Rufus, scout. I followed the main force of Celts until they camped for the winter by the bank of a river on the flatlands between the mountains and the sea. Those from the north and west dispersed to their homes, but even so food seemed to be scarce and there will be empty bellies before spring. I have warned the camp prefect about the possibility of a raid on our supply lines if the weather holds and he has taken steps to increase security. You said your greatest concern was to find the location of the oppida or tribal capital of the northern federation. If such a place exists it was not within my powers to discover it. The mountains of the northlands are almost beyond my comprehension and entirely different from those of the Brigantes or even Ordovice country. A man could wander for a hundred years and still have no greater understanding of their geography. They are so steep as to render travel only possible through the valleys. These are narrow, sometimes only gullies, and often further constricted by lakes, which made it perilous to advance, even for a single rider. Their extent appears to be endless, their occupants barbarous far beyond the standards of the tribes we have encountered thus far. Each valley supports a single extended family, or small tribe, who may have congress with those in the neighbouring chasms, but otherwise seem to be entirely independent. They live in scattered huts, tending their fields and their cows, and their warlike activities appear limited to cattle-stealing from their neighbours or slave-taking from anyone they regard as an enemy. I could only penetrate a limited distance into the interior, but it seemed to me that the pattern of their existence was as I’d observed. I would conclude that there is no great mountain power, and that Calgacus has all the numbers available to him. I would also suggest there is no sanctuary for his army in these mountains. If he is forced to retreat there he will have no choice but to disperse them or starve.

  Agricola considered the information with a frown of concentration. ‘So Rufus concludes there is no threat from the mountains?’

  ‘So it appears,’ Valerius said. ‘At least not in the kind of strength that should concern us. I would trust his judgement.’

  ‘Oh, I do. It is just a question of what to do about it. If Calgacus has nowhere to hide that makes all the difference,’ the governor mused. ‘He must be pressed and continue to be pressed until either his army disintegrates or we can bring him to battle and destroy him.’

  ‘Better the second, I think.’

  ‘Yes, he is much too dangerous a man to leave free. Have word sent to your fellow legates to prepare to march the moment I join them.’ Agricola laid a hand on Valerius’s arm. ‘Before the summer is out I will present Calgacus as a gift for the Emperor.’ Without warning his mood changed. ‘You may leave me now. I must sit with my son.’

  XLIX

  ‘He’s split his force into three groups,’ Gaius Rufus told the gathering of officers in the governor’s tented pavilion. As always Agricola had ordered a sand table set up and the midget scout used his knife to outline the position.

  ‘Like a trident. This river line is the base, along with the valley that cuts off to the east. The prongs are three awkward passes to the north. Here in the east, a rocky cut through the mountains. To the west a winding trackway across the hills and over open moorland. And in the centre,’ he stabbed at the table with real venom, ‘a proper bastard. A deep gully as tight as a virgin’s crack, with steep wooded slopes and heights that would frighten a mountain goat.’

  ‘You said he wouldn’t go into the mountains.’ Agricola didn’t hide his frustration.

  ‘I said if he sought sanctuary there he’d starve,’ Rufus said evenly. ‘Calgacus isn’t running.’

  ‘He wants us to follow him?’

  ‘That’s right, legate.’ Rufus nodded to Valerius. ‘But he can’t tarry long. His warriors are carrying their rations on their backs. Everything he needs to keep his army together is out on the farmlands towards the coast.’

  ‘We should burn the farmers out and starve the bastards,’ Julius Ursus, legate of the Twentieth, grunted.

  ‘And we will, in time,’ Agricola said. ‘But it does no good to take territory. We need to destroy this barbarian rabble once and for all. And this,’ the governor pointed to the sand table, ‘is where we will do it.’

  His words and the confidence with which he spoke them brought a growl of approval from the gathered officers. Valerius had sailed from Londinium with Agricola and they’d reached the Boderiae estuary with a month of the campaigning season wasted and Naso already cursing at the delay. However, despite his assurance that he trusted Rufus’s intuition, Agricola had quickly reverted to the cautious tactics that had previously hampered them. Every valley and potential rat hole on his left flank must be probed by a full cohort, followed by patrols deep into the interior.

  He justified his care by sending engineers with the legionari
es to map out positions for forts which, he said, would guarantee the security of the province after a final victory. Valerius and the other legates merely exchanged looks and shrugged. Calgacus and his army pulled back as they advanced over the same ground as the previous year. When he reached the river Tav he surprised everyone by following the line of the mighty stream north and west, away from his granaries and his herds. Agricola and his officers had puzzled over the change and the governor became even more cautious.

  When Calgacus finally disappeared into the mountains the army halted and made camp a few miles downstream on a riverside plateau Agricola had marked down as a potential legionary fortress. Now, it seemed, he was ready to strike. Valerius was as jubilant as any of them.

  ‘If he wants us to follow him that’s exactly what we should do, but not the way he expects.’ He studied the three prongs of the trident. ‘He expects us to follow his main force up the centre. Instead …’ The finger of his left hand trailed through the sand to the western pass Rufus had identified. ‘Could you lead the army through these hills?’

  The little man grinned. ‘With my eyes shut.’

  ‘Then Calgacus has destroyed himself.’ He turned to Agricola with a smile. ‘By dividing his forces he invites us to defeat them in detail.’

  ‘You mistake me, legate.’ Agricola was also smiling, but his was a smile of consternation. ‘I do not intend to go anywhere near those mountains with my legions. No one will remember Gnaeus Julius Agricola because he lost three eagles in some northern bog.’ The mantra that ruled his every decision. ‘To force the passes is to invite not victory, but ambush. Anything could happen.’

  ‘My apologies, governor.’ Valerius bowed. ‘I believed it was your intention to bring Calgacus to battle.’

  ‘And so it is. But I intend that he comes to us. You say he is short of supplies?’ He aimed the question at Rufus.

  ‘Yes, lord.’

  ‘And does he have an alternative route to the coastal flatlands?’

  ‘Not that I’ve found, your honour.’ Rufus didn’t hide his puzzlement. ‘He either goes through these mountains or over them.’

  ‘So you were right, Valerius.’ Agricola smiled. ‘Calgacus has been the architect of his own defeat. He has trapped himself and his army. All we need to do is block his route back to his supplies and he must fight us or face starvation and the disintegration of his forces.’

  Valerius said nothing. It was a credible enough strategy, even if it did depend on Calgacus compounding his error, which seemed doubtful.

  ‘So where do we make camp while we wait for them to come to us?’ Herenius Polio of the Second Adiutrix mused. ‘I’ve been over this ground. There’s a low ridge east of where the rivers meet, a place the locals call Pinnata. It would be large enough to accommodate all three legions and what’s left of our auxiliaries and it’s well placed for defence. Like a stopper in a wineskin.’

  ‘That will be one of our camps,’ Agricola agreed.

  ‘One?’

  ‘We cannot allow any of Calgacus’s warriors to escape. He has split his force into three columns, therefore I will divide my legions. Not one stopper, Herenius, but three. Placed here, here and here.’ The point of his finger made three small indents in the sand. ‘Close enough for mutual support.’

  Valerius waited for Polio or Ursus to speak out against what was clearly folly, but the two men only looked glumly at the table. Eventually he could stay silent no longer.

  ‘Herenius is right,’ he insisted. ‘It makes more sense to concentrate the legions. If they are close enough to provide mutual support they’re not in position to do the job you require of them. This rise dominates what is essentially a crossroads created by the junction of these two valleys. If we place scouts at the mouth of the northern valley to warn of Calgacus’s approach and keep cavalry patrols in the hills we’ll have time to deploy our troops to meet a threat from any direction.’

  ‘Are you questioning my orders, legate?’

  ‘It is my duty to point out …’

  ‘No! It is your duty to obey.’ He turned to the other commanders. ‘Twentieth legion will defend the centre, Ninth legion the western valley and Second Adiutrix the heights to the east. Maintain extra vigilance. We must be able to respond to the first sign of a threat. You may leave us, gentlemen. Valerius, you will stay.’

  Gaius Rufus gave Valerius a troubled look as he left the tent. ‘Scout?’ The little man hesitated in the doorway. ‘Pass the governor’s orders to the camp prefect,’ Valerius went on. ‘You will know better than I where the camp needs to be sited. Within signalling distance and close enough to the main axis of march and the Twentieth for mutual support, but tell him he must not compromise on defence. A wild beast is always at its most dangerous when it is cornered.’

  ‘No compromise on defence, lord.’ Rufus saluted. ‘I’ll see to it.’

  When Rufus was gone Valerius and Agricola stared at each other for a moment before the governor spoke. ‘You will stay with the Twentieth as part of my headquarters until battle is joined.’

  ‘Are you arresting me?’ A snort of disbelieving laughter accompanied Valerius’s words. ‘Am I being relieved of my command?’

  ‘No,’ Agricola admitted. ‘But I cannot have you continually casting doubt upon my orders. You are no longer the Emperor’s man, Valerius. You do not have the same leeway. As it happens I am merely carrying out the Emperor’s wishes. He seems to know you well. He suggested you were inclined to recklessness and acts of impulse. In times of strain, I advise keeping him close. His very words.’

  ‘Then why do I still command the Ninth?’

  ‘You would have to ask the Emperor for an answer to that question. For the moment you will attend my conferences and assist Ursus in preparing the Twentieth for battle.’

  ‘And the Ninth? My legion?’

  ‘Naso is perfectly capable of taking command for a few days. After all, you and Titus intended him to have the legion when Titus wanted you to replace me, is that not true? The Emperor showed me a letter.’

  There had been no letter, but Valerius made no attempt to deny the accusation. It was true, after all, even if the agreement had been unspoken.

  ‘If that is all, governor?’

  ‘Do not take it badly, Valerius. As soldiers we must all accept the rise and the fall with equal equanimity. Within the week Calgacus will be forced to attack and I promise you will have your share of the triumph.’

  L

  ‘We will never have a better opportunity.’

  Cathal looked at the others for agreement, but he understood all they really wanted was leadership. Colm and Emrys, the commanders of his sword brothers, and the Selgovae warriors who called him king. Donacha, ruler of the Venicones, and his druid brother Oenghus, who had left their people because they believed he could lead them to victory over the Romans. Vodenos, who led the survivors of the Brigantes’ champions, and Rurid, war chief of the Caledonians. How he wished Olwyn could be here, but he knew she and the children would be safer with Donacha’s family on the flatlands.

  Gwlym stared at him with empty red-rimmed eye sockets that saw more than all the others combined. Only Gwlym knew the bitterness of the disappointment that burned like raw bile in his chest at the Roman failure to follow him into the gorge where he would have fallen on them like a swooping eagle and torn their vaunted legions to pieces. How he cursed the Roman commander’s timidity. Yet he should have known, or at least guessed. Had he not puzzled over the caution that had left him to gather his strength for two whole years? Before he died a Roman prisoner had talked of the death of an emperor, but that did not explain the regular pattern of advance followed by retreat. Was it tactical astuteness or a sign of fear? Still, none of that mattered now.

  The men who stared at him from their positions around the leather tent were all lean, honed fighters, but none of them, or the men who followed them, were hungry. They trusted Cathal to keep it that way. He urgently needed supplies, and now that the
y were in the mountains the only place he could appropriate them was from the Romans. When the legions hesitated at the mouth of the gorge it appeared his plans were in ruins, but that had changed overnight. By sheer necessity he’d needed to split his army into three to converge on the gorge by different routes. The gods favoured him. Why else would the Roman commander have followed his example and established camps at the head of three different passes?

  ‘Two hours after dark our main force, the Selgovae and the Venicones, will fall on the weakest of the camps, that of the Ninth, here in the west. We will cross the walls, slaughter the garrison and take what supplies we need, firing the rest to deprive the Romans of them. You will take a Roman eagle, the eagle of the Ninth, and your names will be sung round the campfires of your people for ever.’ He paused to allow them to digest his words. One or two pairs of eyes gleamed with anticipation of the glory to come, others frowned in fierce concentration, but some faces were blank and he couldn’t be sure what lay behind the dark eyes glittering in the lamplight. ‘The flames will draw reinforcements from the Twentieth legion in the central camp by the river. You, Rurid, will wait in ambush on the track between the two camps and destroy the replacement column.’ The Caledonian war chief growled his approval. ‘Once that is done we will combine to attack the remaining garrison of the central camp.’ He turned to Vodenos. ‘Your Brigantes will have the most difficult task. The eastern camp is too distant to interfere with the initial assault, but at all costs you must stop any reinforcements attempting to reach what remains of the Twentieth’s garrison. It will mean waiting and sacrifice, but it is the key to the utter destruction of the Romans. We must have time to destroy the first two elements before we can move on the third.’ Vodenos nodded agreement, but his swarthy features told a different story. ‘You will have your chance for glory when we move south again, my friend,’ Cathal assured him. ‘And you will sup Roman wine with the rest come the morning.’