Glory of Rome: (Gaius Valerius Verrens 8)

by Douglas Jackson

  For now.

  ‘You did well,’ he said as the three riders returned. ‘Who …?’

  Shabolz met his gaze with solemn grey eyes. ‘Licco rides among the stars,’ the Pannonian said. ‘He is a soldier. A good death and a quick one was the best he could hope for and the gods gave him both.’

  Valerius nodded. To show emotion would be to cheapen Licco’s death, but he had to bite his lip to ensure he displayed none.

  He turned away and inspected each flank of the square in turn. They seemed stable enough, but the stream of casualties continued to increase. The bloody ground where the medici worked was littered with men awaiting treatment or bandaging their own wounds. He could hear the increasingly urgent requests of the centurions for replacements, or tiring men being ordered out of the front line. In camp a soldier might spend hours every day exercising with a heavy scutum, but no man could hold one shoulder high for ever. And there was something about battle that drained the strength more quickly than any training session. Time. Time was his enemy. The attackers too would tire, but there were so many more of them. When one collapsed or became sickened by the slaughter ten would fight to take his place. As long as the square held it would cause Owain’s men casualties, but it could never defeat them. Everything depended on Naso and Gaius Rufus, but Valerius doubted the one without the other would be strong enough. They must act in concert.

  Until they did, the men of the Ninth must survive. And endure.

  As time passed and the casualties continued to mount, the pressure on the square increased from all sides. The Celts still threw themselves at the Roman spears over a wall of dead and dying. Valerius’s legionaries fought with a quiet, deadly intent, their only sounds the grunt as they thrust the pilum point home into Ordovice flesh, or the cry as they took a wound. The Pannonian replacements had long since been used up, their place taken by exhausted legionaries who had been in and out of the front rank three or four times and who struggled to stay upright as they leaned panting on their shields or sucked greedily from water skins.

  Valerius was reluctant to move from the saddle where his men could see him, but the groans and cries of the wounded reminded him of another responsibility. Handing the reins to Felix he slipped to the ground and, accompanied by Hilario, walked stiff-legged to the area where the medici worked with silent concentration. As he approached, Julius Hellenicus, the chief medicus, looked up with a grimace of annoyance, his arms bloody to the elbow and his face spattered with gore.

  ‘No one considers the wounded when they plan these things,’ Hellenicus spat. ‘Look at them. If this square gets any smaller I’ll be stacking them on top of each other.’ Valerius looked around and saw that Hellenicus was right: the area the square encompassed seemed to have shrunk without his being aware of it. The ground he stood on was slick with the lifeblood of the men lying on it, churned to mud by the passage of hundreds of hobnailed boots and littered with nameless scraps of flesh. ‘Leave him,’ the medicus grunted at one of his men treating a legionary with a red pit where his right eye had been. ‘Can’t you see he’s dead?’ They were interrupted by a shriek and the stink of burning flesh as another medicus cauterized a spurting wound with the point of a white hot poker from one of the medical unit’s braziers. Hellenicus ignored the noise. ‘We’re down to a cup of water a man. And if this goes on much longer we’re going to run out of bandages.’

  ‘I’ll see what I can do.’

  ‘Water,’ the medicus repeated mechanically. ‘We can cut bandages from the tunics of the dead, but we need water.’

  ‘Anything else?’ Valerius asked.

  ‘It won’t help much,’ Hellenicus waved a weary hand at the lines of wounded men, ‘but you could speak to them.’

  Valerius eased past him and worked his way through the casualties. He spoke to those who seemed lucid enough to understand, assuring them he’d make sure they were looked after. Many were so locked away in their own agony they were somewhere between this world and the next. Others stared at the grey sky with eyes that would never see again. One man, spitting teeth where a slingshot had broken his jaw, ignored Valerius’s protests, got to his feet, and made his way back towards the ranks. Valerius watched him go, teeth clenched to still the emotions that filled him like the churning pool below a waterfall. He had brought them to this. He alone was responsible for every man dead and maimed. A face he recognized, twisted with pain, a bloody rag stuffed beneath his armpit where he’d been pinned by a spear, armour and tunic stained red. Valerius knelt beside the man.

  ‘Avidius?’

  The eyes flickered open, but it took a moment before the soldier focused on him.

  ‘Legate.’ Avidius’s voice emerged as the merest whisper, ragged with the agony of his suffering.

  ‘You fought well,’ Valerius assured him. ‘You and all your comrades of the Second cohort.’

  Avidius’s eyes closed again and he whispered something unintelligible that might be a prayer. ‘Antonius and Claudius are dead.’

  ‘I’m sorry.’

  The eyes opened. ‘We will beat them, sir?’

  It was half question and half statement, but Valerius chose to answer. ‘We’ll beat them.’ He rose to his feet.

  ‘That night …’

  ‘Yes?’ Valerius crouched again. ‘You’ve thought about it further? The night your legate died?’

  ‘I wish I’d killed him.’

  ‘I can understand that, Avidius, I truly can. But you didn’t. You were on guard. Is there something else you’ve remembered?’

  ‘Ask …’ The voice almost faded entirely and Valerius had to put his ear to the dying man’s mouth. ‘Ask the tribune who inspe …’

  ‘He’s gone, lord.’ Hilario reached past Valerius to close the fading eyes.

  Valerius looked to the skies and tried to still the contradictions whirring through his mind. He had no time for this. He must concentrate on the battle. He looked to the north-west. Where were the cavalry?

  ‘Sir, you should see this,’ Felix shouted.

  XLIII

  Gaius Quintus Naso looked to the hills to the north-west for the hundredth time and muttered a soft curse. Where were the cavalry?

  He’d witnessed the moment the mist cleared to show the men of the Ninth legion perched almost on the lion’s lip, within bowshot of the main Ordovice host, and their slow march to victory or death. His heart had stopped when the great wave of howling warriors fell from the flanks and he’d been certain Valerius’s three fragile lines must be swept away in a maelstrom of horror, with his own end not far behind.

  The speed of the transition from line to square astonished him. Even so, he’d been certain the six cohorts would be smashed to pieces or swamped in that great mass. Yet they’d held out, and they held out still. But for how much longer? He’d watched the square compress foot by relentless foot until, from less than a mile away, it appeared a man might launch a pilum from one side to the other. It must have been thirty minutes now and the men behind him knew what that meant. There would not be a man in the square whose strength wasn’t sapped. The growls and mutters had started long before, and the rap of the centurions’ vine sticks and demands for silence had done little to still it. Quintus Naso understood why. Out there, men – their comrades – were fighting and dying while they were forced to watch. But again there was that question: for how long?

  Valerius had planned for Naso to attack with his infantry cohorts when he saw the two cavalry wings breasting the northern rise. But he had left the final decision up to the camp prefect. Now there was no sign of the scout Rufus or the cavalry, and every military instinct told Naso that Valerius and the Ninth were on the brink of annihilation.

  He called an aide to his side. ‘Gather up every man in the fort and tell them to arm themselves with anything they can get hold of. Empty the armourer’s cart of everything with an edge.’

  ‘The baggage detail and the camp guard, prefect?’

  ‘Everybody,’ Naso snapped. ‘If we
can’t find a way to win there won’t be a camp and we won’t need the baggage. Personal slaves, too. They’ll be as dead as the rest of us, so they might as well get the chance to die fighting. That should give us a second line and a small reserve.’

  He waited impatiently while muster parties were organized to bring the non-combatants and camp followers forward. ‘Cohorts will form line,’ he told the senior centurion, ‘but no trumpets. They’ve ignored us so far so let’s keep it that way.’

  Eventually, the centurions bullied a mob of confused, frightened muleteers, labourers, baggage handlers and cattle herders into forming a second line of close to nine hundred men. Fewer than half of them had helmets or shields and he had no idea how many would fight, but they made his pathetic little force appear twice as strong as it was in reality and that might make a difference. If they’d been trained soldiers he would have considered attacking in a wedge formation and simply lancing his way through to reinforce Valerius, but all that would do was leave them trapped anyway.

  He rode out in front of the long lines of men. ‘Our comrades are fighting and dying less than half a mile away,’ he roared. ‘Your legion’s eagle is in danger of being lost. Help is on the way,’ he continued, knowing it was probably a lie. ‘We will march at double pace until we are halfway and at the trot on my order. If any kind of sizeable force attacks us, you know what to do. If they don’t we will attack them.’ He raised his sword and pointed it in the direction of the vast host of Ordovice warriors. ‘There is your enemy. Slaughter the bastards. Advance. Double pace.’

  Valerius remounted and rode to the centre of the square where Felix was pointing east. In the low ground towards the river two lines of legionaries were marching towards the battle. Two lines? Where did he get the men? That didn’t matter. What did was that Naso had felt the need to attack before the cavalry reached them. Or possibly, he reflected, because he knew they weren’t coming. Valerius understood why the praefectus castrorum had made the decision; he would probably have done it himself. Naso believed the square was about to be destroyed and he might be right. It was a square in name only, a crumpled misshapen thing that had been under relentless pressure for over forty minutes now from tens of thousands of Ordovice warriors. A mixture of discipline, pride and self-preservation was all that kept these men fighting with the last of their strength. He rode towards the battered eastern wall in an attempt to form a better impression of Naso’s intentions. From a point just behind the fourth rank he could see what should have been clear earlier: the ragged state of the second line. Now he understood where Naso had found his ‘troops’. He was mentally congratulating his deputy when a lead slingshot pellet smashed off the crown of his helmet leaving him reeling in the saddle with his ears ringing. Felix took the reins of his horse and dragged him back to the reserve position.

  ‘For all the gods’ sakes, lord, you’ll get yourself killed if you expose yourself like a raw recruit,’ the young decurion rebuked him.

  Valerius muttered an apology, but his mind was already working on the implications of Naso’s attack. They were still invisible to the Celts attacking the square from the east, but that couldn’t last. He must take advantage of it while he could.

  ‘Hilario, find a spare horse.’ He nodded towards the aquilifer’s party.

  The big cavalryman caught his meaning immediately. ‘He can have mine,’ he said, dropping from the saddle. ‘I’m not going anywhere.’

  Hilario led his horse close to where Honoratus stood at the centre of his axe men. The standard-bearer must have sensed his presence because his head turned and Valerius saw a momentary look of puzzlement on his blunt features. Slowly Honoratus realized the implications of Hilario’s presence and he shot a glance of pure hatred at Valerius. He must have given an order to his bodyguard because they moved forward as a unit close to the rear of the fighting line and planted the staff of the eagle deep in the bloody turf. The defiant gesture brought a weak cheer from the wounded lying nearby and Valerius called Hilario back.

  ‘We can wait,’ he said.

  But he’d made up his mind.

  ‘Felix,’ he said quietly to the escort commander. ‘When Naso’s cohorts begin their attack you will take Honoratus and the eagle and break out with the escort from the south-east corner.’

  Felix opened his mouth to protest, but he saw the look on Valerius’s face and shut it again like a trap. ‘Sir.’

  ‘I will not lose my eagle.’

  ‘No, sir, but you—’

  ‘A legate has a duty to stay with his men. Just save the eagle and my name, Cornelius.’

  Felix brought his fist to his chest in salute. Valerius nodded. They both knew he was sending most of the escort to their deaths. Naso’s attack might distract some of the Celts, but the cavalrymen would have to sacrifice themselves to clear a path for the eagle.

  He heard a roar from behind as the warriors on the east side at last saw the attacking formation. ‘Aquilifer Honoratus, to me,’ Valerius roared.

  Honoratus turned with a look of anguish. Valerius saw the temptation to ignore the order cross his face before the discipline of a lifetime overcame it. The eagle-bearer marched to Valerius at the centre of his eight-man bodyguard. Their faces mirrored their commander’s consternation and anger. Valerius steeled himself to meet their gaze. These men had given their oath to protect their eagle to their last breath and last drop of blood. They were the elite of the legion. The best of the best. What he was about to do would tarnish their honour, but he had no—

  The eagle party seemed to freeze in mid-step and an illusion of stillness filled the battlefield as thirty thousand ears picked up a rumble of thunder above the sounds of men fighting and killing and dying. Valerius looked to the sky, but all it promised was snow.

  ‘Lord.’ Felix pulled his arm. ‘Look.’

  A great wave of horsemen rolled over the crest to the north-west of the swarm of Ordovice attackers and flooded the hillside. Valerius experienced a flash of puzzlement at the number of standards he saw, but he had no time to dwell on it. Suddenly everything was happening at once. A cheer went up from those legionaries who could see the men riding to their salvation, taken up all along the Roman lines as word spread. An echoing cheer came from beyond the east flank as Naso saw his opportunity and launched his attack on warriors who still had formed no coherent defence.

  ‘Second and third ranks, launch spears,’ Valerius roared. Anything that would add to the Ordovice confusion. Felix rode off to pass on the order and he heard the echoing cries of ‘Throw’, ‘Throw’, ‘Throw’ from the surviving centurions and decurions before a pitifully weak shower of pila soared out to be absorbed by the seething mass of Ordovices.

  A helmetless figure with a bloody face ran up and Valerius recognized his primus pilus. ‘Orders, sir?’ Julius Ulpius Canalius brought his arm to his chest in salute.

  For the first time Valerius felt the true fire of battle swelling inside him. With men like these how could he ever have considered defeat? ‘First, second and third ranks hold firm. Fourth rank to form up with the reserve in column formation.’ He guessed it would give him something like eight hundred men. A mix of legionaries and auxiliaries, and all close to exhaustion, but that couldn’t be helped now. All that mattered was to take the fight to the enemy. A great howl in the middle distance and the hair on the back of his neck stood on end. The sound of cavalry charging home. ‘Column of eight.’ His weary mind dredged up the essential, but forgotten, detail. ‘The escort will lead, primus, but we’re going to need a way out.’

  ‘May I suggest the south-west angle, legate, in two minutes.’ The centurion returned his commander’s savage grin. ‘Still some steady lads there.’

  ‘Make it so, primus. Cornelius.’ He checked his helmet strap and his hand dropped to the hilt of his sword for the first time since the battle began. ‘We’re going to make room for the attack. Form fours and follow me.’

  ‘The legate will naturally be in the middle rank,’ Felix su
ggested with an exaggerated formality that almost made it an order.

  ‘Not this time, Cornelius.’ Valerius smiled. ‘I’ll join you in the front rank with Shabolz and Hilario.’

  The delay while the column formed gave him time to draw breath and a last chance to take stock of their situation. He looked up in time to see the great swarm of cavalry – his disbelieving mind counted at least four wings of auxiliaries – smash deep into the northern flank of a Celtic army that had supposed itself on the cusp of the greatest victory since Boudicca’s time. A victory that would make every warrior who fought in it the subject of song and story for a dozen generations. The shockwave of the impact rippled through the mass of the Ordovices like a summer storm whipping through a forest. Swords rose and fell on unprotected heads in the determined, relentless rhythm of men scything their way through a field of corn. From the rear of the cavalry formations the sky darkened as a vast shower of arrows rose, and rose, reached their limit, and fell to plummet into naked torsos packed so tight every one must have made its mark. A tremendous howl of consternation and pain accompanied their delivery.

  Canalius reappeared, gasping for breath. ‘Column formed and ready, sir. You’ll get your opening on the signal.’

  ‘Well done, primus. I leave the rest in your hands. If the pressure eases on the square push forward where you can. They’re confused and they’re frightened, ripe for defeat. All that matters is that we fight them where and when we can. Kill the bastards.’

  The centurion’s eyes lit up like twin fires. ‘For Rome, sir.’

  ‘For Rome,’ Valerius echoed the traditional mantra. ‘Signaller? Sound the charge.’