by Ian Ross
‘You! And you – with me now!’ He was grabbing at men, hauling them from the mesh of combat and dragging them after him. They stumbled together, still shocked by the ferocity of the fighting, confused now. ‘North wall – run! Go!’
Then he was running with them, urging his heavy body on across the expanse of damp scrubbed turf, screaming to the men on the other walls to join him. Already he could see that he was too late: there were Picts swarming up from the northern slopes, beating aside the men at the wall and scrambling in over the defences. As he watched, a group of them kicked down the piled stones to form a breach.
‘Orders, centurion?’ Timotheus was at his side, bringing six men from the east wall.
‘Shield wall!’ Castus yelled, not even knowing how many were with him. Shields swung and battered together. Castus himself took the right wing, raising his shield before him.
‘On my command, advance,’ he said, and his voice grated in his throat. ‘Ad-vance!’
It was only a ragged double line, but it moved together, shields tight, spears raised. Across the open space of the enclosure, the Picts were massing in front of the broken wall, shrinking back now as they saw the block of soldiers advancing towards them.
Castus felt a javelin jar off his shield, then another punched through the wood and leather and stuck, swinging wildly. Something else – a flung axe – wheeled through the air and he bashed it aside.
‘Spears!’ he called, and at once the men beside him canted back their arms and threw. The volley drove lanes through the Pictish mass.
‘Swords – and charge!’
Blades rattled from scabbards as the formation broke into a run. Six paces, and they were kicking the bodies of the slain underfoot.
‘Drive them out! Stick every bastard of them!’ A crash and a jolt ran along the formation as the shields met the bodies of the attackers. Swords stabbed out between the shield rims, long blades aimed and reaching. The Picts were crumbling in the shock of impact, most of them fleeing back across the wall.
Castus saw the tumbled stones just ahead of him, the last few Picts turning at bay. Left and right, shield and sword: he turned a spearpoint, punched it aside and slashed the man down. Blood spattered his chest. He cut a second man across the face, then with all the strength of his arm he drove his blade up to the hilt in the belly of a third. He could hear himself yelling, a distant sound over the thunder in his head.
Breathless, reeling, he pushed the dead man down with his shield and hauled the sword free. Someone grabbed his arm and he spun on his heel, roaring – it was Timotheus, the optio falling back in fear, but then grinning. There was blood around his mouth.
‘…out!’ the man was telling him. ‘Out!’ Castus could not hear properly.
‘South wall,’ he tried to say. ‘Get back there…’
‘All driven out,’ Timotheus said, his mouth working but only scraps of words audible. Castus felt a pop in his ears and the world rushed back. Pump of blood, cheers of the men around him.
Another attack like that, Castus thought, and it’s over. He paced the circuit of the defences, jaw set, trying to keep the anguish from his face. Five more men and two of the armed slaves dead, and eight too badly wounded to fight again. Vincentius was among the wounded, as was Evagrius: the standard-bearer was tight-faced, lying with a smashed arm and a jagged gash in his side. But Castus smiled at the men as he passed, smacking them on the shoulders, clenching his fist. Another attack like that – he did not dare to think about it.
The ground below the southern wall was marshy with blood and heaped corpses. To the west it was hardly better; only a few of the attackers had dashed from behind their corpse-shields and made an attempt on the rampart, but the fresh bodies lying among the twisted slain had a ghoulish look. The dead Picts had been cleared from inside the enclosure and heaved back over the walls, the breach to the north repaired with piled stones. Now the light was coming in low from the west, under the dark lid of clouds.
‘Vincentius is gone,’ Culchianus told him quietly. ‘There was a second wound – lung I think. He was choking on blood.’ Ten men of his century dead, Castus thought. Ten wounded now. He bowed his head for a moment, nodding. Vincentius had never been a good soldier, but he and Culchianus had been close.
‘Wrap him in his blanket and put him with the other slain.’
Forty men left, and the four unarmed slaves. When would the moment come that they could no longer hold the walls? When would he give the order to fall back and form a shield ring at the heart of the enclosure as their enemies swarmed in across the rampart? He gazed up at the sky and felt the steady drizzle flecking his face. Was this really their fate? What good would it serve, whose god would it benefit, for them all to die in this place?
The Picts attacked again just before sunset, rushing up out of the dusk. One group came from the east, up the steep slope from the river, while another band of them swung around to the south. But they broke and fell back almost at once, as if the ebbing light had stolen their courage, and left only one man dead and another wounded.
As night fell, the hillock was surrounded by a ring of fires. Torches moved like wandering fireflies between them, and from behind their rampart the Romans could hear the wailing sounds of lamentation, the rising and falling songs praising the great deeds of the slain. The fires burned until the third watch, then one by one all were doused and the smoky blackness closed over the plain and the hills. All night, strange and savage cries rose from the darkness below the walls, inhuman, unnatural.
Castus woke to the grey light of dawn. His blanket was damp with dew, and he threw it aside and stretched his aching back and shoulders. He rubbed his face with a damp rag – the water supply was too limited for washing – then he stumbled to his feet and began his tour of inspection.
‘I hoped they might have all gone home in the night,’ he said as he stood at the western wall. The Pictish horde was a huddled mass on the plain, stirring and shifting now.
Timotheus grinned, and the dried blood smeared around his mouth cracked. The optio’s face looked as if he had been suspended over a smoking fire all night.
‘Let the men sleep as long as you can. But make sure the sentries stay alert. The enemy may try and sneak up here while we’re dozy.’
Castus crossed the enclosure to where the wounded lay. Evagrius was awake, but hooked and hollow with pain. He tried to struggle upright as his centurion approached, and Castus motioned for him to stay down. His wound was bad, but might not be fatal if it was properly dressed. Not much chance of that, though. Castus raised the man’s head and gave him water.
The sudden brass yell of the horn jolted him back, the canteen slipping from his hand. Everywhere men staggered up from their blankets, thrashing from sleep, grabbing for shields and weapons. Castus had covered the ground to the western wall before he even realised he was moving.
‘Messenger coming up!’ the sentry cried. ‘Least, I think it’s a messenger…’
The plain in front of the hillock was still grey with mist, but Castus could see the Picts moving forward, gathering in their warbands. Ahead of them was a rider on a tall horse, with a man behind him carrying the green branch of parley. It was not a Pictish horse. The rider was not a Pict.
Julius Decentius rode closer, leaning forward in the saddle as the ground rose beneath him, the fur cape humped over his shoulders. Even from a distance, Castus could see the familiar cold smile. Worst time for this to happen, he thought, and surely the renegade knew that well.
‘What does he want, do you think?’ Timotheus asked, jogging up to the wall beside him. More men were crowding the rampart now.
‘Think we can guess. Keep those sentries sharp on the other walls, though. Might be a ruse.’
Fifty paces from the wall the renegade drew to a halt. The stink of the dead was bothering his horse, and he kept a tight grip on the reins. For a long moment there was silence, only the cawing of the crows.
‘Brothers!’ Decentius
called. ‘You look tired!’
‘Piss off, traitor!’ a cry came back from the wall. ‘You’re not my brother!’
‘Get back home to your Pictish bitch!’
Castus felt his chest swell and his throat tighten with pride. They had heart yet, even after the long night, the fierce day before. There was still fight in them.
‘Centurion! I can see you there, centurion. Will you answer for your men?’
Castus jumped up on the crest of the wall, feet spaced wide. He hooked his thumbs in his belt. ‘What do you want?’
‘What I want…’ the renegade replied, ‘is to save your lives. We’re all Romans, after all!’
‘You don’t look Roman to me.’ Castus felt the press of men at his back, the raised shields, the ready javelins.
‘You think…’ the renegade called, raising his hand to address the gathered soldiers, ‘you think the Picts are savages, but they’re not! I’ve lived among them for over a decade, and see! I’m still alive! You’ve fought well – you’ve fought bravely. The Picts respect that. They respect you. They don’t want to destroy you, but they will if you continue to resist. They’ll kill you all and mutilate your bodies! Do you want that, centurion?’
‘I can’t hear you,’ Castus shouted. ‘Speak up or move closer.’ Forty paces, he thought. Extreme range.
Decentius nudged his horse on up the slope a few steps. ‘If you lay down your arms now, you can surrender with honour!’ he cried, his voice cracking. ‘You can march home with your wounded. Return to your wives. Your families. The Picts will let you go! Or – or you could stay here. Make your homes here. The empire has betrayed you, brothers!’
There was a long pause. A stir through the men along the wall. Whispers.
‘What does he mean?’ Timotheus asked. Castus hissed at him.
‘It’s true – you’ve been sent here to die! Your commanders want a cause for war, and your deaths will give them one!’
Castus glanced to left and right, scanning the men for signs of weakening, of wavering. But the grey faces along the wall were taut and defiant.
‘Ox shit,’ he shouted, and then leaned down to the man beside him. ‘Pass me up a wasp.’
He held his hand behind his back, and at once the shaft of a dart slapped into his palm. It was still sticky with clotting blood. The renegade’s horse blew through its nostrils and shook its mane, and Decentius urged it on up the slope another few paces.
‘Romans! Brothers! Don’t die for emperors who despise you!’ His grin looked painted on his face. ‘Come with me – live among the Picts! You’ll have good lives, long lives here… You’d be treated as heroes, the pick of their women would be yours! Beautiful girls for brave warriors!’
‘We’ve heard enough,’ Castus cried. He held both hands clasped behind him, the dart point downwards. ‘Get back to your friends, or that bit of foliage won’t protect you!’
‘Centurion, think carefully.’ The renegade stretched out his hand, his horse climbed another few paces up the slope. ‘I’m offering life, for you and your men! Lay down your arms now and your honour is secure…’
Castus waited, swaying slightly on his heels. Decentius stared up at him, his grin stretching into a sour grimace.
‘Well? What’s your answer, centurion?’
‘Here’s your answer, take it!’
Castus jumped back off the wall, braced himself on his right leg, and hurled the dart with all his strength. Decentius saw it a moment too late – his face blanched, and he hauled the horse’s head round. Then the iron spike buried itself in his thigh and he screamed like a woman. The horse shied, reared, and he clung to the saddle as it bolted back down the hill.
Cheering all along the wall, spears clashing against shields. ‘VIC-trix! VIC-trix! VIC-trix…!’
‘Nice throw,’ Timotheus said, grinning.
‘No. I was aiming for his head.’
The attack came soon, and it was savage. The soldiers inside the rampart barely had time to eat and to clean their weapons before the first rush of the enemy surged across the plain and up onto the slopes. They came on slowly now, moving in a mass and pausing every ten or twenty paces to dress their ranks, howl their war cries and rattle their spear-butts against their shields. While the main body of them advanced from the west another band ranged around to the south, streaming up over the ridge through the scattered stones of the old wall.
The soldiers were silent at the defences, too hoarse, too worn with fatigue to shout back. Crouching behind their shields, they readied their javelins and darts, drew back aching arms and threw. Again the front waves of the attackers were felled; again the warriors behind them pressed forward.
Castus ranged across the enclosure, sword in hand, calling encouragement to his men. ‘Mark your targets and aim high – the javelin will drop as it falls. Don’t throw until they’re in range. Keep to the walls – don’t move back. Don’t budge.’ His mind was foggy with despair and fatigue, but his body still burned with sour energy. This is how it is, he thought. We fight to the end, and then die fighting. We are soldiers.
A wild yell and a clatter from the west as the first charge reached the wall. Spears and blades flickered against the dull sky. Castus ran, feeling as though he was swimming through thick fluid. He hurled himself between two of the soldiers, smiting down at once and bursting the skull of a Pict crouching beneath. The roaring noise was all around him. If I feel like this, he thought, how must the others feel? He stabbed out at a shouting face. The attackers had smeared themselves grey with the ashes of their mourning fires. He punched with his shield and knocked a man down into the bloody mess on the far side of the rampart.
The wave crashed and broke, then the attackers ebbed away. Soldiers pelted them with darts as they retreated. Their harsh cheer sounded more like a groan. Now there was fighting to the south as well – running again, Castus reached the wall just as Culchianus and his men threw themselves against the attackers. Shoulders behind shields, they shoved the Picts back and stabbed out with spears and blades, punching holes in the packed mass of bodies. The Picts dropped back, piling together, scrambling to escape. Castus was up on the wall, wheeling his arm, slashing down at the enemy below. His hand, his arm, his chest were bright and wet with blood. He could taste it in his mouth, and feel it in his eyes.
A dull bleat from the Pictish horns and the attackers turned and ran back, scrambling away and leaving their dead in twitching piles before the rampart. Castus sagged against his knees, gulping breath. For a moment he felt sick, but he swallowed the urge down. He had seen enough of the other men vomiting already.
‘Centurion! Message from the optio – you’d better come quick.’
Castus grunted himself upright, wiped his sword on the hem of his tunic and slammed it back in his scabbard. Then he followed the runner back across the enclosure to the western wall.
‘Looks like another parley,’ Timotheus said. ‘One of their chiefs, I think.’
There were five riders coming up the slope this time. One was Talorcagus, and behind him rode his brute-faced nephew Drustagnus. Castus was pleased to see that both men were bloody – they must have led one of the charges the day before. The third rider carried the swaying green branch, and the fourth was dragging something behind him. Castus stared. At the back of group rode Senomaglus, the old chief of the Votadini. There were two men behind the fourth horse, led by a rope, staggering. Two men stripped to the waist, with sacks over their heads. His breath caught, and he gripped the wall. His leg trembled as he tried to climb.
‘Gods! Timotheus, help me up here!’
Leaning on the optio’s arm, lifting his massive frame onto the wall, Castus straightened his back and stood steady, glaring down at the approaching riders. Talorcagus pulled up just outside the range of the darts. Before him, the slope up to the rampart was clotted with his own dead warriors, their corpses flung on the dull red grass.
‘Find the interpreter and bring him here,’ Castus said. He had l
ast seen Caccumattus the night before, down at the south wall, flinging javelins with a look of furious rage on his thin face. Culchianus had sent him back to tend to the wounded. Now the little man, more ragged than ever, came running across the enclosure.
‘Centurio! I here!’
The Pictish chief had already started to bellow out his message. As he spoke, the two bound captives were marched up the slope and made to kneel. Their captor ripped the sacks from their heads. Marcellinus and Strabo, gasping and blinking in the daylight.
‘He say: Romani fighting well. Too much bravery! His heart wanting for to make deal.’
Castus stared down at the two captives. They knelt in the grass, the corpses spread before them. The man behind them had a short-bladed knife in his hand.
‘He say: Picti let Romani soldiers to go. March with weapons. Picti no to attack – he make promise word. Senomaglus of Votadini go with Romani, guide them to safe country.’
Castus stood on the wall, swaying slightly. His body felt as thin and light as a lath-wood mannequin, but sweat was pouring down his back beneath the hug of his armour. All along the wall behind him he could hear the other soldiers translating for their comrades. A steady stir of whispers. Senomaglus wore a look of humiliation, and did not glance up.
‘What about the prisoners?’
‘He say: If you no say yes to go, he make to kill prisoner mans.’
The guard stepped around behind Strabo, dragging his head up by the hair and placing his blade against the stretched column of his neck. Strabo rolled his eyes, terrified. The cross of hair on his bare chest was slicked with sweat. Marcellinus, kneeling beside him, was saying something… Accept? Don’t accept? Castus could not make out the words.
But now Talorcagus was speaking again, stretching up from his horse and raising his finger. He was pointing straight at Castus.
‘He say: Also you must go. Centurio – he say you go to prisoner. Then prisoners live and all others Romani march to home.’
‘Don’t listen to him,’ Timotheus said. He seized Castus’s leg, his fingers tight on the muscle of his thigh.
