Marius' Mules V: Hades' Gate

by S. J. A. Turney

  The legate of the Fourteenth legion was becoming horribly aware that he was losing the support of the men, who were falling easily to Sabinus' words. "But…"

  "No, Cotta. You command the Fourteenth, but I have seniority here. At dawn the army will move out back to the west. We will accompany this King Ambiorix at least as far as Cicero's camp and consolidate forces with him while we send missives to Caesar. We will travel light, taking only the quick horse carts. No oxen. We will have to leave the ox-carts and the artillery here, along with a quantity of the supplies if we want to travel fast. We take the most important weapon and ammunition supplies and light personal goods and leave everything else, right down to the tents themselves. I want this army moving back to Cicero's position as fast as a legion can really hope to."

  With an angry glare, Sabinus turned to the two tribunes.

  "Go back to the Eburones and tell their King we will accompany him at dawn. In light of the situation, however, he will have to make camp more than a spear's throw from our ramparts until that time, lest he draw a pilum or two from our men."

  The tribunes saluted and scurried down towards their horses.

  Sabinus' angry glare scanned the faces of those nearby, searching for any sign of argument. When all remained silent, he turned away and stamped down the bank and off towards his quarters. Cotta and Balventius exchanged a look.

  "I know you tried not to overstep, centurion, but I would have welcomed just a little support there."

  Balventius ground his teeth. "He might be right, sir."

  "He might. But he's not, is he? You know that as well as I. If you had seniority, would you really lead the legions out of their nice safe defences and off into the wilds? On the say of a possible enemy?"

  Balventius struggled with his answer. In his entire career he had never openly disobeyed a command in the field, and certainly never taken a contrary position - Fronto and Balbus didn't count, to his mind - and it came with difficulty.

  "He might be wrong, sir. I very much fear he is. I would sooner put my trust in these earthen banks than in a man who could very well be harbouring druids and grudges. But Commander Sabinus is the man Caesar placed in command, and he's one of the longest-serving and most experienced men in the army - one of very few left these days."

  "Gods, I hope he's right, Balventius. I really do."

  As Cotta strode off to deliver the orders to his legion, Balventius looked out over the parapet to the two tribunes and their guard of legionaries converging on the party of Gaulish nobles.

  "So do I" he agreed, quietly but emphatically.

  * * * * *

  The early morning sun streamed along the shallow valley from the army's rear, glittering off mail and helmets, the reflections dancing and leaving yellow-purple shapes in the eyes of the men. The cavalry rode at the front of the army, some hundred paces ahead, acting as a van. Then came the five cohorts of Balventius, behind whom the officers and their accompanying Gallic party rode along with the standards and musicians, high above the dust cloud kicked up by those in front. Behind them came the Fourteenth, followed by the rear guard and the faster moving carts pulled by horses.

  The primus pilus of the Eighth was striding out on foot with his legion, despite the opportunity to ride with the officers as the nominal commander of a large vexillation. In addition to the discomfort caused by the constant wrangling of the two senior officers and a foot-march being his natural place in things, Balventius was doing everything he could to avoid the accusatory looks Cotta kept slinging at him whenever Sabinus asserted his authority, which he was doing with worryingly increasing regularity. For all the fact that Sabinus had a great deal more field experience in command than Cotta, it was hard to see him now as anything but a petulant child endangering everyone in order to prove himself right.

  Not for the first time, Balventius glared at the shapes of the Eburones nobles back there, throwing all the weight of his irritation into the glare.

  But this time something was different.

  With astonishment, he saw that the entire party of Gauls were departing up the slope of the valley through which they travelled, casually and freely.

  "Tapapius? Keep the men on track but be ready for anything. In fact, have the men unstrap their shields and get them on their arms ready."

  "Sir?"

  "Just do it!" Transferring his discomfort and irritation onto his own officers was less than professional, but this entire situation was starting to ache in his belly like an old wound. As Tapapius gave out the orders, echoed by the other centurions and optios, Balventius turned and jogged back along the line of his cohorts, failing to acknowledge their questions or comments, his good eye fixed on the party of Gauls nearing the crest of the hill.

  Finally, he reached the level of the officers and had to waft the dust cloud aside to see Sabinus and Cotta.

  "Sir?"

  Both men looked down at him. Sabinus had an air of haughty superiority and rode casually with his head uncovered, his helmet in the carts at the rear. Cotta, he noted, was as battle ready as his own men of the Eighth, and showed the signs of fatigue and sleeplessness in the grey beneath his eyes and the cold sheen of his complexion.

  "Yes?" Sabinus asked in a business-like tone.

  "Respectfully, sir, where are the Eburones going?"

  "To get their bearings, centurion."

  Balventius blinked. "Sir, shouldn't we send our own outriders and scouts for that?"

  "They know their own lands better than us, centurion."

  "Then they shouldn't need to get their bearings, sir. Something here stinks."

  Cotta was nodding "He's right Quintus. It's wrong."

  "Do you really think…" Sabinus' eyes narrowed. "Where did they go?"

  Balventius turned with a sinking feeling, horribly aware now of the fact that Ambiorix and his party had vanished at the point when the valley narrowed and deepened into a worrying defile.

  "Call the men to arms, sir."

  Sabinus was shaking his head. "I don't think…" Beside him, Cotta leaned forward in his saddle. "Tribune Junius: have the men unshoulder shields and prepare for trouble."

  As the command echoed along the line accompanied by the sounds of thousands of shields being pulled from their carry straps and gripped tight, still in their leather covers, Sabinus opened his mouth to berate his fellow commanders, but fell silent at the sudden commotion.

  "What in the name of Venus was that?"

  Balventius didn't have to look - a good thing, since he was a third of the way back along the line and his vision was obscured by the dust cloud. "That, sir, is the sound of horses in pain and men under attack. I would surmise that the van have come across anti-cavalry pits dug across the valley."

  Without waiting to hear what Sabinus would say next, Balventius turned and ran back along the line of his men. He was not half way when the first man shouted a warning. A quick glance confirmed the cry.

  Along both sides of the valley, hundreds upon hundreds of men were appearing at the crest. While the majority began to descend, coming to rest on the upper slopes - still out of comfortable pilum reach so high up - behind them came the archers, the slingers and the javelin throwers.

  By the time Balventius reached the front of his cohorts, the army had come to a halt. The Bellovaci cavalry who had come to their rescue so bravely and effectively only the previous day were already half gone. A wide swathe of the valley had been decorated with covered pits disguised with thin turf on a lid of interlaced sticks, interspersed with scattered caltrops. Fully a third of the horsemen had collapsed into the pits or fallen foul of the caltrops, horses lying shuddering half in and half out of holes, others with broken limbs or intact but trapped and screaming in terror. Their riders lay mostly mangled among the equine wreckage.

  The rest of the cavalry had been forced around the edges to escape the trouble, only to encounter the enemy warriors running forward with long spears - the perfect anti-cavalry weapon. The attack terrified the
surviving horses and many, in a blind panic, ran straight into the mess of pits, caltrops and bodies. Driven back by the spear men with their hedge of sharp points, the cavalry were useless, being herded into the men of the Eighth legion, who had drawn up and stopped to prevent themselves being crushed by panicking horses. Even as events started to unfold, the remaining horsemen were pushed by the spearmen into an ever-tightening circle in front of the legion. A few of the attackers fell to javelins cast by the riders and one or two enterprising legionaries who had anticipated the command to throw.

  A command decision had to be made.

  Balventius ground his teeth. There were perhaps a hundred horsemen left from the four hundred or so that had formed the van. They could be saved, drawn back into the fold, but only at the expense of the infantry. Already missiles were starting to rain down from the heights. To open the ranks and allow the horsemen to retreat behind them - safely away from the spearmen - would prevent any effective defence from missiles, and Balventius could not afford such a move. The cavalry would have to be abandoned; sacrificed to give the rest a chance.

  "Shields up. Tighten those lines!"

  As the cohorts pulled into a more compact unit, well-protected by the large, squared-oval shields with their bull emblems, Balventius ran past them. It looked from here as though little was being done with the Fourteenth towards the rear. If Sabinus and Cotta didn't do something soon, the valley would become one mass Roman grave.

  As he jogged alongside, the doomed cavalry, having run out of places to go, hurtled past him, back down the valley. As they rode, several were picked off by well-aimed arrows, spears and sling bullets. There was nowhere else for them to go but straight at the enemy, either into the hedge of spears - which their horses would refuse to do - or up the slopes where they would be at the mercy of the bulk of the enemy. And so they rode to the rear. Desperate and foolish. If the Eburones had planned to halt the van and pour in at both sides, it was pretty certain that they had also sealed in the rear.

  "Dismount and join the legions!" he bellowed at them as they passed, the only hope for their survival being on foot. None paid any attention in their panicked need to get away.

  The five cohorts of the Eighth legion were now fully shielded all along the valley, swords drawn and ready to take anything the enemy could give. Balventius noted with approval that the centurions and optios had had them discard their pila, jamming them, butt-spike first into the ground. With the gradient of the slopes there was no point in even attempting a pilum volley. Every man's attention was better focused on keeping their shield in the way of falling missiles and having their sword ready to deal with close attackers when they finally came.

  Conversely, as Balventius passed the last ranks of his men, the Fourteenth seemed to be in chaos. Sabinus was nowhere to be seen, but Balventius could hear his voice, loud and angry, bellowing orders towards the back. No one seemed to be paying any attention to him. The men of the Fourteenth had at least had the presence of mind, despite their officers, to form a shield wall for protection against the missiles, which were coming in increasing force as the number of archers, slingers and spear throwers at the valley sides increased.

  It took a moment of searching before he found any sign of Cotta. His dappled white mare danced around riderless among the command section while two musicians, their curved horns over their shoulders, tried to steady it and prevent it bolting. Cotta himself was struggling to rise from the ground. Striding over, Balventius reached down and helped an over-burdened signifer who was trying to pull the legate to his feet. Cotta surrendered himself to the pair and they lifted him easily to his feet, where he reached up to his helmet twice - missing it entirely the first time - and undid the strap letting it fall to the ground. As it did, Balventius noted the enormous crease in the bronze from a sling bullet that was still wedged in it. The metal had buckled inwards and cut through the felt cap inside to slice into Cotta's forehead just below the hairline. Blood was running down the side of his face.

  "Legate?"

  Cotta swayed a little and took a moment to focus on him.

  "Hmm?"

  "Legate, can you hear me?"

  "Yes, centurion." The signifer let go of his commander and Cotta immediately staggered to the side until he regained his grasp. "Sorry. Head hit."

  "Yessir!" Balventius replied. "Can you still command?"

  Cotta let go of the signifer and staggered a little before regaining his stance. "I think so. Damn that was painful. My ears are ringing like bells at the Bacchanalia!"

  "You need to pull your legion into tight formation so we can protect against missiles and start to break out of this situation."

  "What of the carts?"

  "Piss on the carts" Balventius said, forgetting his composure for a moment as he heard Sabinus yelling conflicting orders that would only be making matters worse.

  "You’re right, Balventius. To Hades with the carts." He turned to the musicians and signifers. "Sound the call for both legions - Eighth and Fourteenth - to combine into a defensive circle."

  Balventius nodded, despite his disapproval - A circle was good to defend against a mob of barbarians, but precious little use against falling missiles. "I'd best get back to my men, sir. Are you alright here?"

  "Yes, centurion. Let's show them a defensive wall while I try and find Sabinus and see what he wants to do."

  Balventius shook his head in irritation as he turned and started to jog alongside the column once more towards his men at the front. As he ran, the cornicen began to blast the call for the new formation, relayed by waving standards, centurions' whistles and optios' shouts.

  The falling missiles were becoming steadily more troublesome as the attackers found their range and settled into their shots. Worse yet, now that the army had come to a complete halt, a large number of scruffy barbarian lowlifes and womenfolk had joined the missile troops, throwing rocks of all sizes from pebbles to boulders down the slope. To begin with not many were striking home, but it would not be long before they, too, found their range, and even a small pebble could blind or incapacitate in this situation.

  Balventius found he was still grinding his teeth.

  They had consolidated to minimise the damage, but not a single barbarian was suffering, while every count of ten found another Roman falling with a scream to a pierced limb or a shattered face. It was, quite simply, a disaster. If they didn't do something soon a legion and a half would die in this valley. In an uncharitable moment, he found himself wishing that Cotta had died from the head wound. Then Balventius would have had no compunction about taking command and shouting out the orders. He'd disagreed with Cotta on the formation, since it simply saw them settle into a position they could hardly maintain. As soon as the legions were in formation, they should start to pull out of the valley. A quarter of a mile back they would be safe from overhead attack, with the valley sides so much lower. And perhaps two miles back was the abandoned camp.

  Now, with the huge oval formation, leaving would involve detaching a few cohorts at a time in smaller defensive units, forming essentially giant testudos and heading at a good, solid pace back east for the safety of the camp. The further they got from this valley, the safer they would be. Oh, they would have to fight the enemy that were blocking their rear on the way, but then at least they would be doing something other than cowering behind shields and hoping not to be hit with anything.

  It irked him almost to breaking point that even now, when his men's lives depended upon the command decisions, Cotta would not attempt to move until he had discussed it with Sabinus, who seemed to be doing his best to get everyone killed.

  Well the pair of them had best sort it out quickly, before the entire Roman force went to Hades hand-in-hand.

  Chapter Fourteen

  The first Balventius knew of Sabinus' presence was when the men he was busy yelling orders at snapped to attention and ignored him entirely, their gaze rising over his left shoulder. Dreading the ensuing moments and knowing
what the men were reacting to, the veteran centurion turned, coming to a salute before he even faced the officer.

  Sabinus sat astride his horse amid the legionaries like a well-dressed haughty rock in a muddy puddle. The common soldiers would see only a senior officer who demanded respect by his very presence. Balventius - used to the company of such commanders - saw the tell-tale signs of a man on the edge. Despite his apparent demeanour, Sabinus' eyes were wild and staring: the look of a man watching his world falling apart and knowing that he is directly responsible.

  "Centurion: We need to break out of this valley!"

  Balventius felt his irritation smooth over somewhere deep down inside. Despite his panicked and uncontrolled beginnings, the commander had finally grasped the vital need of falling back.

  "Definitely, sir. We'll form an arc with a testudo roof and provide rear-guard. We can keep them off you while the Fourteenth…"

  "I think you misunderstand me, Centurion. I need you to take a cohort and break out to the front, driving a tunnel between those spearmen so that we can continue west towards Cicero."

  Balventius blinked.

  "Sir?"

  "Do you have a hearing problem, centurion? Break me out forwards!"

  Balventius gripped and ungripped his free left hand repeatedly as he stared at the commander, his voice coming out as a low, angry growl.

  "Sir: that would be foolish at best; suicidal at worst. The land in front of us is covered with pits, caltrops, thrashing horses and corpses. We'll have to clamber over and around everything, all under missile attack from both sides, while the enemy poke us with spears." He looked up and around the valley. "And those infantry are ready to pour down on us the moment we move."

  "Are you refusing an order, centurion?"

  Balventius felt his fingernails bite into the palm of his hand. Once in his career had he deliberately disobeyed an order - the arrest of Paetus three years ago - and that had been under extremely unusual circumstances. For a centurion to actively refuse to carry out an order in the heat of battle was unheard of and unforgivable. If he refused he could face any punishment - and looking at Sabinus' expression, crucifixion seemed likely.