Siege of Rome

by David Pilling

  It has been many years since I gave up earthly vanities. God and Abbot Gildas have no use for them, and so I have no hesitation in recording that I wept. Wept like a frightened child, in stark terror for the unspeakable death that I was doomed to suffer. What mirthless, random Fate had brought me to this pass, after so many vicissitudes of fortune? Could I, the last prince of the old royal blood of Coel Hen, really be destined to die such a vile and humiliating death, thousands of miles from my homeland?

  The man impaled on the stake screamed and screamed, even as those devils laughed and capered in delight at his sufferings. I could not bear to watch or hear, and retreated to the furthest wall of the prison, clapping my hands over my ears.

  I feared my sanity might crack under the strain. The screams redoubled as another of the poor wretches was hoisted to his doom, though at least their cries of torment were partially drowned by the excited shrieks and laughter of the crowd.

  A shadow fell over me. I looked up and saw the silhouette of the round-shouldered chieftain. He was leaning against the bars of the prison door, regarding me with narrowed eyes. Two larger men stood behind him, holding torches.

  “This one is next,” he said, “open the door.”

  His words were death. I stood up, looking around in vain for some kind of weapon, anything, while the jailer fumbled with his keys. The floor was worn smooth and bare of anything save straw.

  The door creaked open, whining on its rusted hinges. I dropped into a crouch. At the very least, I could spring on the chieftain and snap his neck with my bare hands – a trick the Heruli taught me – before his men dragged me off him.

  I was about to leap, but hesitated as he produced Caledfwlch. “See, Roman,” he taunted, holding it up before me, “I thought you might like to look upon your precious sword once more.”

  “Here,” he added, and suddenly his voice sounded quite different, “take a closer look.”

  To my astonishment, he tossed Caledwlch at my feet. Then he straightened from his stooped, round-shouldered stance, tore away the scarf and wisp of false beard from his face, and there stood no sneering African chieftain at all, but Procopius.

  “Close your mouth, Coel,” he snapped, “and pick up the sword. We have no time to waste on explanations.”

  I bit back my questions and snatched up Caledfwlch. Belisarius claimed he felt nothing when he handled the blade, but then he had no hereditary right to it. I felt renewed as soon as my hand closed around the hilt.

  Procopius’ guards stepped into the cell. They shrugged back their hoods, and I could have laughed with delight as I recognized the brutish faces of the Huns who had guarded me during the voyage to Sicily. One of them grinned and ducked his oversized head at me, while his comrade seized the terrified jailer and twisted his neck, like a farmer strangling a goose.

  “We have horses waiting, just outside,” said Procopius, “step quickly, before those clods outside realise what is afoot.”

  He moved briskly to the door, beckoning at me to follow. I feared we would be spotted, but all the attention of the crowd was fixed on the two men writhing on the stakes. I averted my eyes from the grisly spectacle as we hurried down the street, but then I remembered the third man on the dais, waiting his turn for execution.

  “We have to get him out,” I hissed, seizing Procopius’ arm and jabbing my sword at the dais, “he is a Roman, like us. We can’t leave him to be butchered by these savages.”

  “Don’t be an idiot,” replied Procopius, brushing me off, but the Huns grunted in agreement. The secretary was not a soldier, and failed to understand that one didn’t simply leave a comrade to his fate.

  Understanding soon dawned, though, when he looked at our faces. “For God’s sake,” he muttered, and threw up his hands, “very well. But don’t expect any peace in the afterlife if all goes awry.”

  There were four horses tethered to a rail outside a wine-shop at the end of the street. Mine was a pure white desert pony, a high-spirited beast, and must have cost Procopius a fair amount of silver. I climbed aboard her, feeling like a soldier again instead of the sniveling, broken wreck I had been just moments before.

  Now some of the more alert souls in the square had noticed that one of the cells was empty, and the inmate flown. A few rushed down the street, yelling indignantly and waving torches.

  They froze at the sight of us. I heeled my pony into life and urged her towards them, snarling in anticipation of drawing blood. I wanted to pay these barbarians back for the fright they had given me.

  Procopius and the Huns galloped close behind me. The citizens scattered out of our path and vanished down a side-alley. Then we were into the square. Scores of pale faces turned to greet us. I bellowed a war-cry, ducked low over my pony’s neck and thrust Caledfwlch at the nearest body.

  The blade ripped through muscle and flesh with satisfying ease, drenching my sword-hand in blood up to the wrist. My victim jerked as I tore Caledfwlch free, and dropped to the ground like a doll with its strings cut.

  Most of the citizens had panicked and were fleeing in all directions. The bravest – or drunkest – showed some fight, and one swung a hatchet at my pony’s head. I drew back savagely on the reins, snapping her head back, and one of the Huns flung a spear through the man’s body.

  Now the dais rose before me. Constantine stood on the edge, stripped naked and looking almost comical as he shuffled feverishly from side to side, trying to loosen the bonds on his ankles.

  His bulging eyes were fixed on me. I couldn’t shout at him to jump – his weight would have flattened my pony – so I slid from the saddle and ran up the steps to the platform.

  I averted my eyes from the poor wretches impaled on the stakes, and ran to my comrade. He trembled as I sawed at the bindings on his wrists and ankles.

  “Hurry, brother,” he cried, “before the barbarians find their courage.”

  I glanced down at the square. One of the Huns had seized hold of my pony’s bridle, to prevent her bolting, while his comrade was single-handedly holding back the mob.

  He wielded two curved swords, both red with blood, and clashed them both against his armoured chest, screaming like a madman and glaring at the citizens, daring them to fight him. They cowered and declined the challenge, as any sane man would. The Huns are the fiercest warriors alive, matched only by the Sarmatians, and I often had cause to thank God they were on my side.

  Procopius gestured impatiently at me. “Move!” he shouted. He had a long dagger in his hand, though I always found it difficult to imagine him wielding anything more deadly than a stylus.

  The bonds parted, and Constantine gasped as the blood flowed back into his numbed limbs. There was a spear lying against the base of the winch, abandoned by the cowardly executioners when they fled. He grabbed it and performed an act of mercy, stabbing it through the hearts of the men dying by inches on the stakes.

  I seized his arm and led him down the steps. “Here,” cried Procopius, “my horse is big enough to carry two.”

  He helped Constantine to mount, while I returned to my own horse, nodding in thanks to the Hun who held his bridle.

  Seeing us on the verge of escape, the mob surged forward. The Hun who stood in their way snarled and made his horse rear onto her haunches. Her flailing hoofs made them hesitate, but then a youth ran forward and thrust his torch at the horse’s face. She screamed and twisted away from the flame, spilling her rider and crashing onto her flank.

  The Hun was a big man, but lithe as an acrobat, and rolled to his feet with extraordinary grace. Three men attacked him at once, baying like dogs. His swords moved in a blur, and one of the men toppled to the ground, blood pumping from the stump of his neck. His neatly severed head bounced and rolled away. The Hun disemboweled the second man, slashed the throat of the third, and was then overwhelmed by a sea of enraged bodies.

  “Come away,” said Procopius, “he cannot be saved.”

  The remaining Hun was of a different opinion. Instead of obeying his ma
ster, he spurred his horse into the howling mob as they hacked and stabbed at his comrade.

  My courage was exhausted, and I had no intention of joining the Huns in death. I caught one last glimpse of them standing back-to-back, singing their death-songs as they fought with desperate fury.

  I raised Caledfwlch in salute to their heroism, and wheeled my pony to follow Procopius out of the city.

  8.

  No pursuit followed us during the fifty-mile dash from Membresa to Carthage. Either the people of the city lacked horsemen, or their spirit had been knocked out of them by the bloody last stand of the Huns.

  This was fortunate, for Procopius’ horse could not carry two men at the gallop over a long distance. For most of the way we rode at an easy canter. To me our progress was nightmarishly slow, and I cast anxious glances over my shoulder, expecting to see the dark shapes of riders on the horizon.

  We rode through the night, and the morning sun was already high in the sky by the time we arrived within sight of Carthage. I was drooping with fatigue, and could scarcely keep my eyes open to take in the blessed sight of the city’s ancient walls.

  Constantine was in an even more pitiful state. Snatched from the jaws of a hideous death, obliged to ride naked over fifty miles of rough ground, he was overcome as we rode through the city gates, and slid quietly from the saddle.

  The guards on the gate recognized him, and helped us to scrape the fallen man off the cobbles and carefully lift him onto a stretcher fetched from the guardroom. Their captain was full of tender concern for a fellow soldier, and went puce when I told him what had passed at Membresa.

  “Those filthy, dung-ball savages,” he exclaimed, shaking his fist in the vague direction of the city, “if I was Belisarius, I would lead the garrison out in force again and crucify every living thing in Membresa, down to the last babe in arms.”

  “Is the general still in Carthage?” asked Procopius.

  “No. He sailed yesterday for Sicily. Word reached here of some mutiny in the garrison at Syracuse. He left Hildiger and Theodore in charge until Solomon returns.”

  Hildiger and Theodore were two of Belisarius’ subordinates. The general must have withdrawn immediately to Carthage after his victory at Membresa, which meant the rebellion in North Africa was not quite extinguished.

  “It seems Belisarius is doomed to spend his days rushing from one crisis to another, stamping out fires wherever they spring up,” said Procopius as our comrade was carried to the palace, “I had hoped to find him here.”

  I was so tired I could barely stand, but full of questions. He forestalled them by placing a finger to my lips.

  “Peace,” he said with a rare gleam of kindness, “you look ready to collapse, and I prefer not to trouble the captain for another stretcher. Go to the barracks and sleep. I will tell you all on the voyage back to Sicily.”

  There was no question of returning to Sicily. We were both sworn to serve Belisarius, and Rome, and had no further purpose in Africa. I was only too glad to leave that benighted continent behind me for the second time.

  After I had slept a full day, washed, eaten and felt something like a man again, I was summoned by Procopius to his private quarters on the upper floors of the palace. Naturally, his quarters were of the best, and had a balcony overlooking the harbour and the Gulf of Tunis. A slave admitted me, and I found Procopius drinking wine in the company of Constantine.

  I returned Constantine’s bow, noting how different he seemed, washed and rested and back in uniform. Something of the visceral terror of Membresa remained in the depths of his blue eyes. I, who had suffered my share of near scrapes with death, knew that the memory of those iron stakes would never leave his nightmares.

  The formalities done, he seized me in a warm embrace. “My saviour,” he cried, “I shall forever be in your debt, for as long as breath lasts in this body.”

  I thought he might start weeping on my neck, and stared helplessly at a grinning Procopius. Thankfully Constantine desisted.

  “Procopius has told me your name, and your quality,” he said, stepping back and recovering some of his military poise, “you are a prince of the old blood of Albion. I am honoured to know you, Coel ap Amhar ap Arthur. I bear the name of one of your royal ancestors. Constantine the Great is said to have had a British mother, herself the daughter of Coel Hen.”

  “The honour is all mine, Constantine,” I replied with a wary smile, “and it is always good to make new friends. You must not consider yourself in debt to me, though. Debts make men resentful.”

  “Not this man,” he said, thumping his fist against his chest, “but for you, I would be rotting in the desert sun. Do not talk of resentment. Such ignoble sentiments do not exist between men of honour like us.”

  I wasn’t convinced that I was a man of honour, particularly, but it seemed a shame to disappoint him. I let the matter drop and accepted a cup of wine from Procopius.

  “All is arranged,” he said, “I have hired a vessel to take us to Syracuse this evening.”

  I groaned at the prospect of another trial by sea. “At least it is a short voyage. What news of the mutiny in Syracuse?”

  Procopius gestured vaguely. “Nothing yet. Some revolt over pay, I understand. Belisarius will whip the curs to heel. God help the Roman state if he falls overboard in the Gulf of Tunis, or trips on landing and breaks his neck. The Empire could not survive the death of Belisarius.”

  “Oh, come,” I replied, “he is a good soldier, perhaps the best since Aetius, but Rome has other men to lead her armies. What of Mundus, and Bessas, and others like them?”

  He swept these names aside with a sweep of his hand. “Pygmies,” he said dismissively, “competent enough, I grant you, but base of soul. Hirelings and mercenaries. Only Belisarius has something of the spark in him that animated the Romans of old. It is difficult to describe.”

  “A greatness of spirit,” said Constantine, who had listened to our exchange with interest, “he fights, not for himself, but for the greater glory of the Empire. Money and fame and personal glory are of little importance to him.”

  I disagreed with that, since during the course of his campaigns Belisarius had made himself a very wealthy man. He loved ceremony, and being the focus of attention, and had accepted all the elaborate glories heaped on him by Justinian without a qualm. Another man might have refused the rank of Consul, which had been in abeyance for centuries, as an outdated absurdity.

  However, I was in no mood to argue, and something about my companions’ manner made me uneasy. I detected a hint of fanaticism in Procopius’ voice, and there was an intensity about Constantine that I disliked. My naturally sceptical nature prevented me from succumbing to the worship of so-called great men. I knew, all too well, the vices and failings of one of the greatest of all, my grandsire Arthur, and cannot help but smile when I hear the fables and legends in which he features as a sort of demi-god, a perfect warrior and immortal saviour of his people.

  I changed the subject, and asked Procopius how he had come to rescue myself and Constantine from the stakes. As vain as he was clever, the secretary loved to speak of himself and his deeds, and preened a little before launching into the tale.

  “It was well for you both that I chose to rise from my sick-bed in Syracuse,” he said, “and take ship for Carthage shortly after Belisarius left. Solomon’s failure to crush the rebels was, I felt, partially my own, and I wished to make amends.”

  He paused to glance out of the doorway at the glistening blue seas beyond, and savour the taste of his wine. “I reached Carthage to find that Belisarius had already ridden out – none can match the speed of that man, when his blood is roused! Determined to be in at the death, I followed the trail of the army, only to meet his vanguard returning from the battle. The rebels were already defeated, and Stoza and his survivors driven into the desert. Belisarius stopped to talk with me. He was greatly distressed by your disappearance, Coel, and ordered me to search the battlefield for any sign of you.”
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  I felt a twinge of guilt. Belisarius had not simply abandoned me after all. For him to worry over the fate of one lowly officer argued that he was indeed the great man his admirers claimed him to be.

  My cynicism asserted itself. “He wanted Caledfwlch,” I said, “he wanted my sword, so he could take it back to Constantinople and hide it away somewhere in a palace strongroom.”

  “If all Belisarius wanted was your sword,” Procopius replied tartly, “then he could take it easily enough. You are but one man, Coel.”

  He resumed his tale. “I knew that scavengers would be prowling the battlefield. Subtlety was called for, so I assumed the guise of an African nobleman, and arrived in Membresa claiming to be an equerry from Stoza. I speak many languages, and have some skill as an actor. Stoza was not beaten, I assured the citizens, but would raise a new army in the desert and return to sweep the Romans out of North Africa. The fools warmed to my words, and after that I had little difficulty manipulating them.”

  He plucked a purple grape from the bunch on a silver dish on the table between us, and winked at me as he peeled it.

  “You see, Coel, I have many layers,” he said, popping the grape into his mouth, “my mother, God rest her, often said I was six souls packed into one body. Shrewd woman.”

  His complacency was laughable, but not without foundation. Shamefully, I had not yet thanked him for saving me, and did so with all due humility.

  “Enough of that,” he said carelessly, flapping a languid hand at me, “you are not the first I have rescued. Some men perform their duty in the battle-line with sword and shield. I do mine in other ways.”

  I finished my wine and left them, claiming that I was still tired and needed my rest before enduring another voyage. That was true enough, but I had had my fill of their unsettling company. Constantine kept staring at me with disturbing intensity, and I was beginning to suspect that Procopius had only rescued me for some dark purpose of his own.