RETRIBUTION

by Anthony Riches

  ‘He had a message from Tungria, or at least that’s what he told the men at the gate before killing their chosen man and making this attempt to put me at the end of his sword. In truth, however, I suspect that he will sing a different song with a little encouragement from fire and iron, a song that includes the name Labeo. This suicide mission bears the stamp of my former colleague’s plotting, and it has set me to thinking that perhaps I have ignored his flea bite incursions onto our lands for too long. Added to which, I am forced to conclude that this attempt to decapitate the tribe’s war leadership might well have been successful if not for this soldier. After all, Labeo only has to get lucky once. Which makes me wonder if the time has come to deal with Claudius Labeo once and forever, after the matter of the Old Camp has been satisfactorily concluded.’

  Alcaeus nodded at Egilhard.

  ‘Hludovig?’

  The younger man straightened.

  ‘The chosen man is dead, Centurion. This man struck him with his dagger without warning.’

  Hramn snorted derisively, kicking the supine Tungrian in the side.

  ‘Another act of cowardice to add to the long list perpetrated by Claudius Labeo and his followers.’ The Tungrian ignored him, sunk in his own misery, and the prefect spat on him with a growl of disgust. ‘We’ll make an example of you that won’t be forgotten by your people for a long time, the next time we see each other across a battlefield.’ He shot Alcaeus a knowing glance. ‘It seems that the position of chosen man in your century is a perilous one, Centurion, almost as if the gods have decided to single your deputies out for some reason. Do you have any thoughts as to who should replace this latest casualty and be the next man to risk their displeasure with you?’

  The wolf-priest stared at him for a moment, a look of murderous calculation in his eyes, then slowly relaxed as he regained control over his fury at the jibe. He gestured to Egilhard, who stared back at him in amazement.

  ‘I have a man in mind, Prefect. If there’s anyone in my century equipped to survive the risks the position seems to present, I’d say he does.’

  The Old Camp, Germania Inferior, January AD 70

  ‘I didn’t think I could be any more downcast than I already am, Herennius Gallus, but here you are to help my spirits sink to a new low.’

  The former legion legatus nodded dejectedly at his senatorial colleague’s bitter disappointment on discovering the defection of what had remained of Vocula’s army. The arrival of a cohort from each of the two traitor legions along with their captive legati had initially caused excitement within the Old Camp’s walls, a state of near-delirium at the prospect of rescue, which had swiftly been dispelled when it became clear that the newcomers, far from being the vanguard of a relieving force, were in fact firmly under the control of the Batavi and their Gallic allies.

  ‘You might try being in my position, Munius Lupercus, if you want to know what being abject feels like. You’re not the one under sentence of death. You don’t go everywhere in the company of half a dozen of men who used to obey every order issued to them and now want nothing more than to kill me. They watch me all the time, Munius Lupercus, they watch me eat, they watch me sleep, they even watch me defecate.’

  Lupercus shrugged.

  ‘You had your chance to make a dignified exit. If you’d drawn your sword when they came for Dillius Vocula, and stood alongside him like the Roman you’re supposed to be, you wouldn’t be suffering this humiliation. Would you?’

  Gallus shook his head disconsolately.

  ‘No.’

  In the silence that followed, Marius considered the news that the former legatus had brought with him to the Old Camp, knowing from the look of concentration on Aquillius’s face that he was doing the same thing.

  ‘So, let’s be sure I’ve understood these depressing tidings, shall we?’ Lupercus fixed a hard stare on his colleague. ‘Vocula marched his army north from the Winter Camp with the sole purpose of relieving this siege and getting us out of this death trap?’

  ‘Yes. He said that a promise had been made, and that he wasn’t going to be the man to abandon two legions to their fate.’

  ‘Although he already knew that the Gauls were planning a revolt?’

  Gallus nodded again, laughing bitterly.

  ‘Yes. As conspirators they lack a certain finesse. There’s not one of them would last a day in Rome. Spies were sent into our camp at night when we were camped alongside the auxiliaries, and it didn’t take long for the more loyal among our officers to report the approaches they were making to our men.’

  ‘Join with us, murder your senior officers and participate in the glory of the Gallic empire?’

  ‘Yes. And given the enmity the men were feeling towards us, it was an easy sell for them.’

  ‘Because they felt betrayed by your support for Vespasianus.’

  Gallus nodded with an expression of misery.

  ‘I didn’t realise how bad it was until the mutiny at Novaesium. You will have heard that they dragged Hordeonius Flaccus from his residence and tore him to pieces like wild beasts?’

  His fellow legatus nodded grimly.

  ‘The Germans made very sure that we knew of his murder. You saw it?’

  ‘Vocula’s man Antonius smuggled us away dressed as slaves, but I saw them mobbing Flaccus in the moment that we passed the gates of his residence. Animals …’

  Lupercus shrugged and Gallus flinched at his flint-hard look of disdain.

  ‘I know, you think I’m a coward.’

  ‘You can find your own label. But you’re not fit to be called Roman. And Hordeonius Flaccus was the agent of his own destruction, so you can save your pity at his violent end for your own likely fate, when your usefulness to the Gauls is at an end.’ He shot a hard-eyed glance at Gallus, who recoiled fractionally at the hatred in his gaze. ‘Continue.’

  His former colleague swallowed.

  ‘We marched north again, but without the Twenty-second Legion that had been the only thing standing between us and the threat of another mutiny. Vocula had orders from Rome to leave them behind to reinforce the Winter Camp.’

  Lupercus shrugged.

  ‘And Rome was right. If the Winter Camp falls then who knows how long it’ll take to re-conquer Germania with all the major fortresses in rebel hands? And without the Twenty-second Legion to stand between you and another mutiny, the Gauls finally revealed their intentions.’

  ‘Yes. The legions refused to advance past Gelduba and Julius Classicus gave up any pretence of loyalty, so we gave up all hope of relieving you and headed south. But the Gauls followed us, and when we got to Novaesium they must have issued some sort of command to their men within the legions, because that was that. The First and the Sixteenth both turned their faces against us, refusing to listen to our orders. Vocula addressed them that morning, and for a moment I thought his words might work the same magic as they had half a dozen other times, but this time it was different, as if the animals he’d cowed by the force of his personality were no longer afraid of his threat. He sent Antonius and his men away, and then went back into the camp to face them. He knew he’d be killed, of course, it was common enough knowledge that the Gallic leaders wanted him dead as a demonstration of their power, but no one would face him. Not one man was willing to take the final step and kill him, so he retired to his tent to await his fate. In the end it was a deserter from my legion who came for him, sent by the Gauls to do what the legions wouldn’t. He cut Vocula down, slaughtered him like a dog in the street, and then the rest of them came for us.’

  ‘They didn’t kill you though.’

  Gallus shrugged.

  ‘They will. When the time requires it, when the Gauls give the order, I’ll be used as a public spectacle of the new empire’s ascendancy over Rome.’

  ‘And until then you’ll spend your time waiting for the blow to fall.’ Lupercus turned dismissively away. ‘Go back to your shadow-life, Herennius Gallus, and leave those of us who still defy this revolt t
o defending Rome’s tattered reputation.’

  ‘But what about the message? Surely—’

  ‘No.’ The legatus turned back with real anger. ‘I won’t even deign to answer the offer that you were sent to make. Surrender? To what end? Why would I offer my enemy possession of something I’ve shed so much blood to keep? The Old Camp will not be surrendered, not while we have food to eat.’

  Gallus shook his head in amazement.

  ‘But the legions from Italy will be months getting here, even if they can fight their way through the Gauls and Germans. And I know how much food you have, I was part of the planning for the convoys that restocked your granaries before Saturnalia. You can’t have much more than—’

  ‘None of it matters, Herennius Gallus!’ Lupercus rounded on his former colleague with sudden ferocity, shaking his head in angry denial. ‘It doesn’t matter that we’re trapped in here with the nearest formed legions so far away that they might as well not exist! It doesn’t matter that we’re on half-rations, and starting to wonder what the few pack animals we have left are going to taste like! And it doesn’t matter that the men gathered around this camp get more and more frustrated every day, making it ever more likely that they’ll fall on us like wild dogs when they eventually get inside these walls, which, as we both know, unless some miracle happens they eventually will! All of these indisputable facts are of no interest to me whatsoever!’

  Gallus looked at the two senior centurions standing behind their legatus and found their faces set equally hard.

  ‘You feel no fear as to what must result?’

  Lupercus laughed aloud.

  ‘Well of course I do! How could a man not fear the death that awaits him under these circumstances? There is one man who doesn’t feel that dull blade probing his guts when he wakes in the morning, and remembers where he is …’ he gestured to the taller of the two centurions, ‘but then First Spear Aquillius is one of a kind, and perhaps not quite as sane as the rest of us. And the rest of us, I can assure you, are all shitting ourselves at the thought of what awaits at the end of this siege. But I fear the dishonour of surrendering before my command is incapable of resistance more than the pain of death itself. You’ve chosen the former, colleague, and in consequence you die a little every day in anticipation of your actual end. Whereas I will hold my head high until the moment that I’m relieved of my burden. So go and tell whoever it is that sent you in to share the news of your craven capitulation that the Fifth and Fifteenth Legions will not be surrendering today, and not anytime soon either.’ He turned away in dismissal, his voice that of a tired man seeking rest. ‘Now get out.’

  Gallus turned to leave the office, stopping as the bigger of the two senior centurions spoke for the first time, his words as harsh as his stare.

  ‘Legatus Gallus, there is a way that you could regain that honour you threw away.’ The scrape of iron on iron as his gladius rasped against its scabbard’s throat tightened the other man’s features in an involuntary flinch. ‘Take my sword and kill yourself, while you have the chance to do so. It is a chance you will not have again.’

  The disgraced legatus stared at him for a moment before shaking his head and looking at his own feet, no longer able to meet the centurion’s stare.

  ‘I … can’t.’

  Lifting his gaze he looked at all three of them in turn.

  ‘I envy you more than you can imagine. The simplicity of your refusal to betray Rome, and your acceptance that your deaths will result, both baffle me and leave me in awe. If I could find it in me, nothing could make me happier than to fall on that blade and end it here. But I can’t. It isn’t in me.’

  Aquillius nodded, re-sheathing his sword.

  ‘I understand. And perhaps your ancestors will understand, when you join them to explain how it was that your family’s honour came to so small an end. Do you have children?’

  Gallus nodded.

  ‘Three boys.’

  The big man nodded.

  ‘Then it is to be hoped that they can find it in themselves to make amends for you. Go well, Herennius Gallus. And pray that your end is as swift and merciful as the one you have refused.’

  Graian Alps, February AD 70

  ‘What a glorious landscape, wouldn’t you agree, First Spear Pugno? To see the view from the top of the world like this makes all our hardships of the last week worthwhile, don’t you think?’

  The senior centurion looked up at his legatus from his place marching at the head of the Twenty-first. Pontius Longus was riding alongside Legatus Augusti Cerialis, both men wrapped in double thickness cloaks and comfortable in the saddles of their horses. He gestured out across the sea of mountain peaks that marched away from them to the north in a gentle downward slope towards the distant valley of the Rhenus, still far beyond the distant horizon.

  ‘It is indeed most impressive, Legatus. Although I daresay my men will be a good deal more interested in exchanging all this ice and snow for grass and some warmer air.’

  The legion’s long column was stretched out along the road that descended from the pass’s highest point, the legionaries eager to put some miles behind them and descend to the gentler conditions of the lower valleys, having spent a bitterly cold night camped at the fort beneath the summit, wrapped in their cloaks and blankets and huddled together for warmth. Cerialis smiled down at him from his horse.

  ‘Come now, Pugno, surely your men are more than capable of living with a little cold weather!’

  While Pugno was groping for a suitably diplomatic answer that still managed to point out that the senior officer had spent the night in the warmth and comfort of the mansio at the pass’s highest point, while his men had cursed and shivered around their campfires through a night cold enough to freeze water solid, the man marching alongside him interjected.

  ‘Indeed they are, Petillius Cerialis, but perhaps we can be grateful that the Twenty-first has already crossed these mountains through this very pass, and at much the same time of year, because I suspect that without the precautions that First Spear Pugno and his officers took, we might well have lost more than a few men to the cold. After all, we hardly shared their hardships last night, did we?’

  The legatus augusti nodded graciously in appreciation of the point the former praetorian prefect was making. Alfenius Varus had elected to march on foot early in the long journey from Italy, and had shown no sign of regretting the decision despite suffering all of the usual discomforts that were suffered by soldiers as their feet adapted to the brutal pounding of day after day on the road.

  ‘True enough, colleague, true enough. Although I did feel some hint of their privations while I was sacrificing at the mansio’s altar to Jupiter this morning. Hopefully his goodwill will keep the weather this fair, and grant us somewhere to sleep with a little more sophistication in both board and bed, eh?’

  Varus and Pugno exchanged knowing glances, Cerialis’s sexual appetite having already become very evident in the course of their march from Rome, his aides discreetly but routinely procuring a woman from among the prostitutes that were to be found at every overnight halt, even one so distant from civilisation. The sky above them was a bowl of blue, the low sun’s meagre warmth just discernible through the layers of clothing that Pugno had insisted the men of his legion be equipped with before they had set out from their camp in northern Italy. With every legionary wearing three tunics and two pairs of socks, and wrapped in thick woollen cloaks whose bright red dye had been the legatus’s choice once he realised that gold was going to have to be spent to get his legion across the mountains intact, most of Pugno’s men had thus far avoided frostbite, and the legion medicus had only been forced to amputate toes from a handful of the less wary who had been foolish enough to sell their socks to wiser men in order to whore and drink prior to the climb to the freezing pass.

  ‘So tell us, Alfenius Varus, since you have been sent with us to treat with the Batavians, what do you make of them?’

  ‘I found them unruly
, headstrong, self-interested and vain.’ Cerialis nodded, and was about to comment when Varus continued. ‘I also found them brimming with martial prowess, skilled with spear, sword and shield to a degree that I have rarely seen in any other body of men, and possessed of such remarkable courage that they appeared unbreakable by any normal standard of assessment. You saw them in action, First Spear, what did you think?’

  Pugno nodded agreement.

  ‘The Twenty-first is the emperor’s foremost legion when it comes to ferocity in battle, and the reason for that is simple – my centurions and their leading men foster the iron truth of our invincibility with every new man that enlists to serve under our eagle, telling them that they are lucky to have been given the opportunity to join such a bloody-handed legion and encouraging them to match the tales of heroism and sacrifice that are told around the campfires. No man in my legion is under any illusion as to what is expected of him. And yet I would say that these Germans are every bit as dangerous as the Twenty-first. They yearn for battle, and the chance to cover themselves in glory with which to challenge their sons and grandsons to even greater feats.’

  ‘All true. They swear on their swords at the start of every parade, promising to do the blades carried by their fathers and grandfathers before them great honour, and never to step back in battle.’

  ‘I see.’ Cerialis looked back down the marching column. ‘So while the Twenty-first is the most martially-minded of the emperor’s legions …’

  He glanced at Pugno, who nodded firmly.

  ‘You can count on it, Legatus Augusti. My officers and I will give you victory on any battlefield you care to put us on.’

  ‘Thank you, Pugno, I’ll be counting on that. And yet the Batavians have long been the fiercest and most dangerous of Rome’s allies. And here we are, one solitary legion marching north to meet them in open battle now that my colleague Annius Gallus has taken the route through the western Alps to secure Gallia Lugdunensis. And, for all we know, by the time we reach the Rhenus, the legions besieged in the Old Camp may have been forced to surrender. And if these latest tidings of a Gallic revolt are true, the army of the Rhenus itself may be under such threat that we are indeed the only surviving legion on the river, until the reinforcements from Hispania and Britannia arrive. Can we face them across a battlefield and hope to win, even with the support of the auxiliary cohorts we’ve been promised?’