The Fort

by Adrian Goldsworthy

  ‘We have heard, my lord.’

  ‘Then perhaps you had better tell me about your situation. Be a few days before this leg heals and I am fit for dancing, so you must command until then, but it is good if I know what has happened.’

  Ferox told him, and sensed the tribune’s disappointment as he spoke of their meagre supplies, growing losses, and rapid depletion of missiles.

  ‘But help will be on its way, no doubt,’ Piso said, as if trying to convince himself.

  ‘It is to be hoped, my lord, but as long as we hold on here, we protect the route down to the Ister and the great bridge. We are doing our duty.’

  ‘Yes,’ Piso sounded unsure. ‘Yes, that is good. I saw them working on a couple of siege towers, so that is what you can expect next. Struck me as rickety affairs, so more than likely fall down on their own, but I would judge that they will be finished in a day or two.

  ‘By the way, I’ll not take up space here that might be needed by those in a worse state. I will take a room or two in the praetorium. Won’t need much, but I’d be obliged if you could spare a boy and maybe a girl or two to see to my needs.’

  ‘I will see what I can do.’ Sulpicia Lepidina was behind Piso and gave Ferox a look that made clear that no female slave or anyone other than the oldest of the men would be let anywhere near the tribune on their own. ‘Of course we can oblige.’

  Enica as queen had already spoken to Ivonercus, but Ferox wanted to see the man before the medicus tried to cut out the head of the arrow lodged in the bone.

  ‘I want to be with my own folk,’ the Brigantian said. ‘And if they are fighting, then I want to be at their side not against them. I have sworn to the queen and I will not break my word. My quarrel with you is over – for the moment.’

  Ivonercus appeared sincere, which did not mean that he was not lying. Ferox put a couple of guards outside the hospital and doubled the sentries at the gates and protecting the monâkon just in case he had been sent into the fort for a reason, or still had friends among the Brigantians who might help him. That meant an extra burden on his ever-diminishing garrison, although a score of men with lighter wounds had asked to return to duty.

  The day passed visiting the walls and work parties, issuing orders, encouraging, praising and now and again chasing weary men to work harder. The mood had changed, and he suspected the arrival of Piso and his breaking the truce was making men wonder whether he would bring down ill fortune on them all. No one seemed pleased to see him, and Sosius, who was working hard and showing a deal of skill in fletching arrows, hinted that the aristocrat was not to be trusted.

  Half an hour before midnight, Ferox ate a little food and went to get a few hours’ sleep before he needed to inspect the sentries and check that all was well. To his surprise there was a large wooden frame bed with its own roof and curtains somehow squeezed into his small chamber. It belonged to Lepidina and Cerialis, and had remained on the cart with the belongings the lady had not unpacked. In fact, Ferox had been wondering whether to ask for it and several other bulky pieces of furniture to help with the barricades needed for Ephippus’ sanctuary.

  Ferox blinked, wondering whether he had taken a wrong turn, then undressed mechanically, wishing that there was time for a bath, because he knew that the hot water would relax him. Still, sleep should not be a problem, for he ached in body and mind. He was half asleep already, otherwise he might have guessed.

  ‘I had almost given up,’ Claudia Enica said as he drew back the curtains. She smiled as he stood there, wholly naked, for the nights had grown sultry and oppressive.

  ‘I am so tired, my love,’ he stammered.

  ‘We shall see about that,’ she said, pulling back the blankets to show that she was as bare as he was.

  Piroboridava

  The next day

  RHOLES WAS DEAD. The day after the grand attack on the fort, the old warrior had spoken in the morning of how they would win next time and of all that they must do to make this happen. He was pale, his eyes dark-rimmed, but his voice was steady and he filled all the council with confidence. Brasus cherished the praise he gave for his foresight in taking a tree trunk with him, so that he could batter at the gates once they were weakened by the stones from the catapult. That was what had got them in, only to find the way blocked by carts and barrels, javelins coming from all sides and horsemen galloping up in support.

  In the afternoon Rholes’ bowels opened and would not stop for all that day and the night. When Brasus went to his tent the next morning the stench made him gag, even before he got a glimpse of the sick man through a gap in the tent flap. His skin was by then yellow, shrunken around his bones, and the eyes of his woman were glassy with tears on the verge of spilling out. If Rholes saw him at all he said nothing, and then he gasped and his face was wracked with pain as his muscles strained again. By the morning he was dead, along with a dozen others among the army, all of them with the same sickness.

  An army camp meant filth and stink, and everyone knew that. So many men and so many animals meant the reek of sweat and dirt, of urine and manure, both human and animal. The patches where the deserters pitched their tents were neater and cleaner than the rest, and one of their leaders kept urging Diegis to make the rest of the army copy.

  ‘We are not Romans but free men,’ was all that the man now in sole charge of the army would say. So the filth piled up, and men drank from the river downstream from where hundreds relieved themselves, and more and more were falling sick, adding to the piles of excrement and the appalling reek. By now the whole camp smelled like Rholes’ tent and more men were bound to die. Brasus could not help wishing that Diegis would be one of them for the man was a dangerous fool.

  The siege towers had been Rholes’ idea, and two of them were rapidly taking shape, but it took constant prodding to remind Diegis that they would need the Roman ditches to be filled in and the earth well enough packed and supported to hold their weight.

  ‘There will be time enough the night before we attack,’ he declared. Brasus ignored him, and had some of the deserters and one of the Black Sea Greeks with the army making covered sheds and extending the attackers’ rampart ever closer to the outer ditch so that it could be filled properly. Diegis mocked but did not stop him, and seemed uninterested in supervising the siege, and instead let each chieftain or leader act as he willed. Some did nothing, others were busy, but all too often did not speak to the rest so that they did not help or even hindered each other’s efforts. Brasus managed to get a few to work with him, persuading because he could not order.

  The army was restless, the animals’ bellies swelling from eating too much grass as they were left to pasture all day, and more and more men began vomiting or spent half the day squatting over their own filth.

  Diegis revived with the arrival of the captive Roman tribune and the news of the death of Longinus. He spoke openly of his hatred for the man, and the number of insults the Roman had directed at him in councils, and did not seem aware that the king’s plan had been to use the man as a hostage.

  ‘This will show them that it is hopeless to resist,’ Diegis declared after an hour spent alone in his tent save for his bodyguards, one or two advisors, the captive Piso and – strangest of all – Ivonercus. ‘We will send the tribune to speak in his own voice so that they know the truth.’ There was much that Brasus did not understand and rumours passed through the camp that the Roman tribune had sworn an oath to Decebalus and was now his man. Someone else said that the tribune had murdered the Legatus Longinus, or had it arranged, for some dark scheme of the king’s to outwit the enemy.

  Brasus was relieved not to be sent with the envoys, for he feared seeing the queen again. She had been there when they broke through the gate, snatching his victory away as she rode behind her warriors, urging them on. Brasus and his men had had to fall back or be slaughtered for no purpose, but as they stepped back, shields facing the enemy, he had seen the queen throw a javelin which had struck the man beside him in the face.
To see a woman kill like that was new to him and wholly disturbing.

  Instead of Brasus, Diegis chose another chieftain, and it was hard to know whether this was a mark of favour or punishment. Yet the commander had been as surprised as any at what had happened, and his rage stirred the anger of the men into that rash and futile attack. It did not seem feigned, but Brasus wondered whether the plan had always been to get Ivonercus or Piso or both inside the fort. Men whispered that they were spies and would open a gate during the night or murder the Roman centurion who led the defence. Brasus was more than ever convinced that Ferox was a great leader and warrior and part of him did not like the thought of such a man being murdered rather than falling in honourable combat. He also doubted that Ferox was the key to unlocking the fort, for he had seen a small figure with long red hair up on the tower when the envoy had been killed and the prisoner escaped, and he sensed her power everywhere.

  Brasus was not sleeping well, unable to clear his mind, although so far he was healthy. He had always considered cleanliness a fitting accompaniment to purity of the soul. Yet all around him he saw pollution and he knew that his spirit was succumbing. Sleep had become harder, his mind refusing to empty of thoughts no matter how tired he was. When he did sleep he dreamed, and each night it seemed to be of the queen. Sometimes she stood over him, driving a spear deep into his naked flesh and sometimes she was naked too, as desirable as she was terrifying. Yet the other dreams were almost worse, when he pictured encounters, whether amid the crunching leaves of an autumn forest or a meadow rich with spring flowers, and she smiled at him, a little afraid, a little excited. Each time he woke up as he was undressing her and felt such bitter loss. For a man to take a woman as bride was right and natural, for the pure must father more souls to climb to purity of their own. Brasus should have longed and lusted for his bride to be, even though on the one occasion he had met the king’s daughter she had struck him as insipid, albeit pretty enough. Now a spell had fallen on him, cast by the sorceress from Britannia and his soul was growing dark. Brasus worried that his mistrust of Diegis was fuelled by her magic.

  The commander did not help. Brasus’ men bridged both the ditches, supporting the sides of each hard-packed earth ramp with timber driven fast into the ground, so that one path wide enough for a tower led to the Roman rampart. It meant that the defenders knew where the attack would come, but at least ensured that the tower should reach their wall. At long last Diegis had realised the wisdom of this, and ordered a favoured chieftain to supervise the construction of another crossing, so that each tower could approach at different ends of the front rampart. Brasus doubted that the man put in charge understood what he was doing and his offers of advice were rejected, yet, perversely it seemed, Diegis ordered him to lead the column supporting the second tower. The whole business also meant a delay of another day before the attack was launched, as they worked on the second path. The towers had already been raised, clearly visible to the Romans even if Piso and Ivonercus had not already told them about the Dacian plan.

  Brasus felt the power of the queen seeping into the camp like the mists that floated up from the river each night. Dark thoughts came and would not let themselves be pushed aside, and he wondered whether her magic brought the sickness that was killing more and more and leaving others too weak to stand, while clouding the mind of Diegis. Brasus feared for the army as he feared for his own soul.

  XXV

  Piroboridava

  The day before the Kalends of June

  FEROX HAD ORDERED the standards brought to the top of the tower over the porta praetoria. The carpenters had made a wooden block with grooves to take the three butt spikes so that the vexilla could stand in a row and be wreathed in garlands for this was the second day of the rose festival of the standards, twenty-one days after the first. He doubted that there would be much chance for a proper supplication, but had done what he could.

  The enemy had taken longer to prepare their assault than Piso had predicted, even though the two siege towers had been ready the day before. Ferox had always wondered when the enemy planned to create routes across the ditches, as it seemed unlikely that they would try to come up the tracks leading to any of the gates, since the towers would merely be the same height as the ones over the gates and lower than the tall ones at the porta praetoria. The Romans had done their best to hinder the work, especially of the engineers toiling to the right of the track because those men seemed to know what they were doing. Perhaps a few had died from bolts and arrows, but the work had hardly slowed.

  Piso had declared himself fit that morning, although he had sat in silence through the consilium after saying that he wanted to help and not take over. The arrow had come out cleanly and done little damage, so although he limped with his bandaged leg, he was sprightly enough when he climbed up to the top of the tower, shaking his head with amusement when he noticed the Brigantes’ flag. His admiration for Claudia Enica’s bare legs was as obvious, prompting her to leave and walk back to the road behind the gateway, where she was to command a score of her men, but for once not Bran and Minura, for they had another task. All save a handful of the horses had been killed in the last few days, so that the reserves were all stationed closer to the walls, with a unit behind each stretch of rampart facing the approach ramps for the towers. There were fewer reserves though, and fewer men on the walls, for although there had been no more major assaults, there had been plenty of smaller ones, and all the while the archers and engines shot at the slightest hint of a target. Plenty of men took their second, third or fourth light wound, so that barely a quarter of the garrison remained unscathed, and every day a few more died and others were hit badly. Petrullus was lucky not to have lost an eye, and would have a big scar on his cheek for the rest of his days, although he swore that he was fit for duty and remained at the east gate. Ferox had had to order his own men to save their missiles, for they were running low. The archers could shoot back any arrow they found in good enough condition, but the rest were to be saved for the next assault.

  ‘They are coming!’ someone shouted as the big towers lurched forward. Their timber fronts and sides were covered in hides, just as the ram had been, and they rolled on six big solid wheels.

  ‘No rams,’ Ephippus said after studying them for a moment. ‘Just bridges to lower once they are close.’

  ‘Good,’ Ferox said. He had expected as much, for the softness of earth ramparts made them absorb a lot of the force of a ram and made them hard to undermine quickly.

  ‘They should burn well.’

  ‘If we get the chance,’ Ferox agreed. There was little oil and tar left, so they had prepared torches and clay pots full of oil. Delivering them was another matter, and meant a big risk. ‘Now get ready.’

  ‘Are you sure, my lord?’

  ‘Positive.’

  Piso waited until the engineer had gone before he spoke. ‘These Greeks need a firm hand, you know. Always want to argue, always have their own ideas.’

  ‘The Lord Hadrian holds a high opinion of his talents, and in the last month I have come to share it.’

  ‘Well, one would-be Greek is bound to like another,’ Piso sneered. ‘Better all offer hetacombs to Zeus, Aphrodite and Ares if we are relying on that bearded bugger to save us.’

  Ferox felt it better not to be drawn. If this did not work, then he would have problems enough for the moment. ‘I must go, my lord. The engines and archers will shoot when you give the order.’

  ‘Good luck, Ferox,’ Piso said, managing a smile.

  ‘You too, sir.’

  Ferox went down to the lower platform on the tower, waiting to be sure where the siege towers were heading. They were getting close to the crossings, and he heard Ephippus shouting at the crew of the monâkon to shift the great machine just a little. Hopefully that would not take too long. The tower on his left was moving steadily until it stopped, and with some care and little pushes this way and that to turn it, the men lined it up with the ramp across the ditches
. The one on that side was narrower and less well made than the other. On Ferox’s right the second tower would move a few paces and then stop, but did not need to be turned and was pretty much squarely in the middle of the ramp.

  Piso must have given the order, although Ferox did not hear it, for scorpiones cracked and bolts started to fly. Both towers quivered slightly when missiles hit them, but for the moment the archers on top were crouching behind cover. Some of the men pushing began to fall, for they were sheltered only from the front and vulnerable to missiles shot at an angle from the rest of the rampart and tower. Horns were blowing and men were cheering in the usual Dacian manner, and their own archers and engines kept up a steady barrage. A light-coloured stone came straight at them and men shouted to take cover, so that no one was hurt, but with a resounding clang it struck the bronze front piece of the scorpio over on the left, leaving it bent and one arm hanging down loose.

  ‘Bugger’s buggered,’ Naso said ruefully, and went to help the crew of the remaining machine.

  The monâkon’s high arm slammed into the pad above its high frame and a great stone went high and straight towards the first tower, the one on the left. Ferox thought that it was going too high when at the last minute a figure popped up. The stone shattered the man into fragments, flinging some high into the air.

  ‘Daft sod,’ an auxiliary said. ‘Teach him to be nosey.’

  ‘Shit! Look at that!’ one of the Brigantians shouted. The first tower was on the causeway, coming across the outer ditch, when suddenly it lurched to a staggering halt, the front wheel sinking down into soft earth and the whole thing leaning sideways.