by R. W. Peake
In the First Cohort, I promoted Balbus to Princeps Prior; once I learned the source of Torquatus’ animosity towards him, all doubts about his abilities and loyalties were put to rest. Next to Scribonius and Cyclops, I trusted Balbus the most, knowing that I could count on him to tell me things that neither Scribonius nor Cyclops was willing to tell me, no matter how much I may not have liked what he was saying. The new Princeps Prior was Marcus Laetus, up from the Fifth Cohort. The Princeps Posterior had been Servius Arrianus, but he was one of the men who had decided he had enough, and in his place was his former Optio, Gnaeus Celadus. The Fifth Century also had a former Optio, Gnaeus Asellio, though he had been Optio in another Cohort, I forget which one. Finally, the last Century was no longer commanded by Gaius Varus, who like Arrianus had decided to be a farmer, the new man one Titus Vistilia. These were the Centurions of the new 10th Legion, who I believed at the time would be marching beside me into battle with the Parthians, and while only time and contact with the enemy would tell if Caesar and my judgment had been sound, I was well satisfied.
~ ~ ~ ~
Training continued apace, and I was pleased to see the men with barely enough energy to chew their food as they sat by their fires while I made my rounds. I had learned from Crastinus that the most important time in solidifying one’s leadership over a group of men is in the quiet times in the evenings, aside from battle, of course. As Primus Pilus, I took on the role of the stern but loving father figure, letting my Centurions do the dirty work of instilling discipline. In the first weeks, I had been just as hard on the men as the rest of my officers, but now the time had come for me to soften things up a bit and in the evening, I showed my concern for their welfare. Because of my condition, I could only make an appearance at a few fires a night, yet I always tried to leave the men with a joke or word of encouragement. I knew that the men feared me by virtue of my rank, size, and reputation, but men follow best when the respect they have for a superior has some basis in affection as well. That I had learned from Caesar, and I found that I enjoyed the evenings immensely as I became acquainted with the men I would be leading. I admit that I also did not mind the looks of awe and admiration that the youngsters gave me as I talked to them. With the veterans among them, like Vellusius, I made a great show of camaraderie, sharing some story with their younger tentmates about the exploits of their older comrade, either during battle or during our off-duty time. I held my normal daily briefings with the Centurions, receiving their reports on the daily progress as what had been little better than a mob of men, was turning into a Legion worthy of marching for Rome. All in all, I was pleased with the progress, though there were one or two trouble spots, along with the inevitable number of troublemakers and malcontents that salt every Legion, the Didiuses and Atiliuses of this current crop. The latter would sort itself out in time, as the tentmates of the rotten apples would rapidly tire of the kind of attention their comrades brought on all of them, just as we had done with Didius. The former problems were what concerned me, and one area I paid attention to was the seeming lack of men skilled in other trades, because these men would become the immunes of the Legion, yet it appeared as if the recruiting officers had only signed up boys fresh off the farm, with very few apprentices or craftsmen in the bunch. Of particular concern was the lack of men with any skill at metalsmithing, because this is one of the most crucial jobs in the entire Legion, and at that point, we did not have nearly enough men to perform the kind of work needed to keep our weapons and armor in repair. We had more than enough strong backs by virtue of the farm boys, which would be useful when we had to build camps, roads and such, but without enough immunes it was not likely that we would even get to the point where we could march. We had been authorized by Caesar to bring all Centuries to the strength of 100 men again, like we were in the original dilectus of the 10th more than 16 years before, rather than the 80 of tradition. However, we had already culled more than five percent of that number, winnowing out the weaklings and men too dull to follow simple instructions, so I gave the order to bring the Legion back up to strength, but with skilled craftsmen instead of just any man who was otherwise qualified. To achieve this goal, I was faced with a choice, neither alternative being palatable, for different reasons. The first choice was to comb the countryside for qualified men and “persuade” them to join by force, if they were not willing to do so voluntarily. While I was not opposed to that in any moral sense, I knew from experience that men forced into service would be more likely to desert at the first opportunity, which meant that I had to explore the other alternative, and that was to offer enlisting men a bounty. The problem with that was that I did not have the authorization to take it out of Legion funds, and would have to go to General Pollio for permission, though that was only part of the issue. Money at that point was very tight, as Caesar had spent huge amounts of gold and silver in the pursuit of his aims, and now was determined to fix all the damage caused by years of civil war, as well as instituting his massive reforms. All of this took enormous amounts of money, and Caesar had taken pains to explain to me before he returned to Rome how important it was for me to make Legion funds stretch as far as possible.
I was now wealthier than I ever dreamed possible, and because I had been frugal, I had more money than I could ever spend in a lifetime, so I decided that I would use my own funds to provide a bounty of 1,000 sesterces for immunes of the second grade, and 2,000 for those of the first grade. Trades like tanning are considered second grade immunes, while smiths are of the first grade. While using my own money would solve the problem, it did not make me particularly happy, even with General Pollio’s assurances that I would be reimbursed. I cannot deny that Caesar’s tardiness in giving the men the bounties that he had promised was in the back of my mind, but ultimately the 10th needed these men badly, and fortunately, these actions solved that problem, as within two weeks we filled the empty spots with skilled men. The only problem was that my funds had been depleted by more than half, and despite Pollio’s promise, I knew there was no real guarantee that I would ever see that money again. Fortunately, I was not only reimbursed, but Pollio ensured that I was repaid at ten percent simple interest. While I would like to think it was simply because of the regard in which I was held by General Pollio, by the time there were funds available for such matters, men like me had become very, very important to men like Pollio. But that is for later.
~ ~ ~ ~
As the day approached where we were scheduled to begin the march to Rome, the pace of training picked up, the men beginning to look more like Legionaries of Rome every day. I was almost back to normal, though my endurance was still not where I wanted it to be, while the wound in my chest had tightened into a knot of scar tissue that restricted my movement a bit, causing a dull ache at the end of the day or after a bout of hard activity. I had resumed my practice of a third of a watch of weapons training every day, stripping to the waist as I worked so that the youngsters could see the scars that I had earned over the years. I was definitely rusty, but before long the habits formed over the 20 years I had been training, starting when Vibius and I were barely in our teens with Cyclops as our teacher, came back. I must admit that it was a somewhat strange feeling to command the man who had introduced me to what it meant to be a Legionary, but Cyclops and I had talked about it, and he assured me that he did not have any problems with the arrangement. The one topic we did not talk about was Vibius, who I was sure I would never see again now that he had left the army, particularly since I decided that I would not be returning home to visit my sister and Phocas, mainly to avoid the possibility of running into him. While my anger towards him had cooled, it was still there, forming a hard knot in my soul that I did not want to rupture by coming face to face with him. The remaining time we spent in uniform after our confrontation at Pharsalus, we had the buffer of our separate ranks and the regulations of the army keeping either of us from spilling blood, although it would have been suicide for Vibius even to draw a weapon on a superior.
If we were to come face to face now, neither of us would have that protection; I could easily imagine a situation similar to that time years before when Vibius and I had first come home on leave and we had taken our revenge on our childhood enemies Marcus and Aulus. It was Marcus and Aulus who had unwittingly introduced Vibius and me when we were boys and I came upon the two of them dumping Vibius headfirst into a bucket of cac. I had been a large boy, strong even for my size, so I thrashed the two of them easily, though Vibius had helped. After we had joined the Legions, we came home to visit for the first time, running into the two of them in the forum, where they had been up to their old tricks, except this time we were no longer boys; we were hardened soldiers. I still have some regrets about killing Marcus, and I believe the surprise at seeing the two of them contributed to my perhaps overwrought reaction. It was the memory of that day that was the basis of my decision not to go home before we began marching to Rome, although I was not about to give that as the reason when I wrote to my sister telling her that I would not be visiting. Instead, I fell back on the same excuses I had always used when I wrote to her, telling her that I would not be coming for a visit; that my job kept me much too busy. This time there was at least a grain of truth; breaking in a new Legion, especially one that was preparing to embark on a two-month march was a job that never stopped, as we were now little more than two weeks away from marching, although our destination had changed. Instead of marching to Rome, we would be marching to Narbo, where we would take ship to sail to Syria to meet Caesar and the rest of the army. The men had not been informed of this change, and I thanked the gods for the small blessing that the Legion was still too green to sniff out the news before we were ready to let them know. A long sea voyage is enough to make even veterans nervous, and we did not need to deal with a panicked bunch of youngsters while we were marching.
~ ~ ~ ~
There are moments that stay with a man, remaining as vivid as if whatever event being recalled happened just an instant before, no matter how many years and intervening memories have occurred in between. I was sitting at my desk, the Legion having arrived in Narbo, and was filling out ration reports the night before we were scheduled to board ships and start sailing, when Diocles entered my office, and he did not need to say a word for me to know that there was something terribly wrong.
“Master, you're summoned to General Pollio’s headquarters immediately,” his voice was choked with an emotion that I could not immediately identify, but the distress in it was plain to hear.
I looked at him in some alarm, my fingers tightening around my stylus as I tried to divine what was happening. “What is it?” I asked, more sharply than I should have, but his manner had triggered a sense of deep unease in me that was unsettling.
“I . . . I . . . can’t say for sure Master. I wasn't told anything specific, just that you needed to report immediately.”
I stood, signaling to him to bring me my armor, but he shook his head, saying, “The General’s messenger was very specific that you didn't need to worry about being in full uniform, that you just needed to get there as quickly as possible.”
My heart was hammering in my chest as I studied Diocles’ face for clues, yet he refused to meet my eyes, which alarmed me even further. “What do you know, Diocles? What have you heard?”
He shook his head, clearly miserable, then I saw a glint of tears in his eyes. “I don't know anything for sure, Master. I just . . . I just overheard something, but I don’t know what it means exactly.”
“Then tell me what you overheard, Diocles. I'm not going to punish you.”
He looked up at me then, and I saw what I thought was a hint of anger in his eyes, but his tone was as formal and correct as always. “That wasn't my fear, Master. It’s just that I don't want to repeat something that causes you distress that turns out to be untrue, because what I heard was too horrible to even contemplate.” Seeing that I was not going to let it go, he finished, “It concerns Caesar. Something has happened, but I don't know what exactly, just that it wasn't good. Now you really must go to see the General.”
His words rang in my ears as I hurried to the headquarters building, my mind buzzing with the possibilities. I was one of the few people who knew about Caesar’s falling sickness, having been in his office when it struck one time, yet somehow I knew that whatever had happened had nothing to do with any illness. By the time I arrived at the headquarters, my stomach was churning, my sense of unease only intensifying when I was waved immediately into the building, then into Pollio’s office as well. Pollio was seated at his desk, but his face was hidden from me, his head in his hands, his eyes looking down at a piece of paper. He did not look up when I reported to him, and now I was sure that I was going to vomit all over his desk, such was my agitation. If only I had known that this was the best I would feel for some time.
“Caesar has been murdered.”
I stood there, sure that I had misheard him, even though another part of me knew that I had not, as I waited for him to say more.
The room suddenly started to lurch about. I realized that it was now going to be a race between whether I threw up or fainted, so without asking permission, I staggered to a chair, sitting down heavily. “What exactly happened, sir?” I managed to ask.
He finally looked up. I could see his eyes were rimmed in red, and he looked suddenly old.
He was older than Caesar, though he had a vitality of a much younger man, but now all that life force seemed to have dissipated like smoke, and he spoke with a weariness that only comes when a man has lost all hope. “He was murdered,” Pollio repeated dully.
I waited for more, but he said nothing for several more moments. “Sir,” I prodded gently. “Can you tell me the details?”
Sighing, he indicated the letter in front of him. “He was assassinated in the Senate, the day before he was leaving for the Parthian expedition. He had some final details of business to go over with the Senate, and had called for a morning session. That was where his assassins struck.”
“Who did it?”
He looked down at the letter, reading off the names of those vile bastards, whose deeds mark them forever as the basest, most despicable men in the history of Rome, if not the world. “Publius Casca and his brother; Ligarius; Cimber; Decimus Brutus; Cinna; Gaius Cassius,” at this he looked up into my eyes, and through the pain and sadness I saw a great, burning anger, the same thing that I was sure was mirrored in my own expression, as he read the last name. “And Marcus Junius Brutus.”
I gasped. “Brutus? Brutus was one of them? Why everyone was sure that Caesar was his father!” I exclaimed. Without thinking, I blurted, “If I ever get the chance, I am going to kill that cocksucker.”
In theory, a man of my class had no business threatening violence against a patrician, but I was beyond caring, and besides, it elicited a ghost of a smile from Pollio. “You'll have to beat me to it, Pullus.”
“So what do we do now, sir?” I asked. Pollio sighed, then gave a shrug.
“I have no idea, Pullus. I have absolutely no idea.”
~ ~ ~ ~
I staggered out of the praetorium, not even noticing that the members of Pollio’s staff who were in the outer office looked much the same as I did. Pollio and I had discussed what we should do about the news, jointly deciding that I would break the news to the Centurions, since there was no way that this kind of thing would stay secret long enough to arrange for a more formal announcement. When I came back to my tent, Diocles was waiting, and one look at my face confirmed that what he had heard from the slaves was indeed true. He burst into tears, the sight of his anguish then triggering my own flood, so we sat there for several moments sobbing like babies.
Finally regaining a bit of composure, Diocles asked, “What does that mean, Master? What will happen to you?”
His question caught me completely by surprise, because I had not had time to consider anything other than trying to absorb this cataclysmic change. However, once the words hung in
the air, the implication of them threatened to crowd everything else out of my brain. What exactly did this mean, I wondered? I sat there pondering Diocles’ question, my mind whirling with all the various possibilities. It was no secret whatsoever that I was Caesar’s man, so depending on who stepped into the vacuum of power that could be a dangerous thing for me. On the other hand, as I thought about it, I recognized that as high as I might have risen from the circumstances of my birth, I was still a small fish when compared to men like Pollio, who had to be considered an even greater threat to the assassins, should they come to power. What made me dangerous was my position in the army, and the influence I held over my Legion. I would have been a fool not to recognize that, for that reason alone, I could be perceived as a threat. Voicing my thoughts to Diocles, he listened intently, then was silent as he thought about the problem. I had learned to value Diocles’ counsel at times like this; his devious Greek mind thought in ways that were foreign to me, but were nonetheless helpful.
Finally, his face creased into a frown as some idea formed in his mind, then he said, “Perhaps there's a way to turn this to your advantage.”
I looked at him in dull surprise; I was still reeling from the news, and truth be known, feeling sorry for myself. “How?” I asked, without much hope, or interest for that matter.
“You're in control of a Legion of Rome,” he said quietly.
That got my attention.
I sat up straight as I thought about what he said, then I shook my head, “General Pollio commands the Legion, not me. I'm Primus Pilus, but I'm outranked.”
“The General does command, but you control the Legion, Master,” Diocles replied carefully, and despite myself I glanced around to make sure that we were alone.
What Diocles was saying might have been true, but at that moment, it was incredibly dangerous, as I was suddenly reminded of all those men who had just disappeared from around the fires; some of them were Centurions like me. Now I was getting irritated, because like all members of that pesky race, Diocles always seemed to speak in riddles at times when plain speaking is most useful.
