Legion of Videssos

by Harry Turtledove

“The poor Vaspurakaner is too much for you, and I too little, eh?” the tribune snapped back, angry in return. Styppes unfailingly found a way to grate on him. “What good are you, then?”

  “Ask your Roman,” the healer-priest retorted. “If your cursed scratches mortify, I’ll see to them. Otherwise leave me be; it wears me no less to heal small hurts than great.”

  “Oh,” Scaurus said in a small voice. He had not known that. There was, he realized, a lot he did not know about the healer-priests’ art. Styppes and his kind could work cures that had left Gorgidas in envious despair, but it seemed the Greek also had skills they lacked.

  Thinking back to Gaius Philippus’ remark of a little while before, the tribune wondered what sort of bargain Styppes was.

  * * *

  That evening Helvis did not appear. Marcus waited inside his tent until the legionary camp slept around him, hoping she would come. At last, knowing she would not, he blew out the lamp and tried to sleep himself. It was not easy. When Helvis and he were first partnered, sharing the sleeping-mat with her had made it hard for him to doze off. Now, alone, he missed her warm presence beside him.

  All what you’re used to, he thought. He tossed irritably. What he was getting used to was not sleeping.

  Videssos’ coastal plain was as flat a land as any, but to the tribune the next day’s march was all uphill. There was a brief flurry of excitement late in the afternoon when a couple of Namdalener scouts emerged from a clump of woods to take a long look at the imperial army, but neither the Khatrishers’ yells as they gave chase nor Gaius Philippus’ lurid oaths after Drax’ men escaped succeeded in rousing Scaurus from his torpor.

  Munching absently on a husk-filled chunk of journeybread, he walked down the via principalis as dusk fell. As always, his own tent was midway between the two entrances on the camp’s main street, with the surveyors’ white flag just in front of it. He was about to lift the canvas tent flap when the sound of a familiar voice made him spin on his heel.

  Yelling, “Papa! Papa!” Malric swarmed down the via principalis toward him. Because the Roman camp was always built to the same simple formula, even a five-year-old could find his way in it with confidence.

  “I missed you, Papa,” Malric said as Marcus bent to hug his stepson. “Where were you? Mama said you were in the fighting yesterday. Were you very brave?”

  “I missed you, too,” Marcus said, adding, “and your mother,” as Helvis, carrying both Dosti and her traveling chest, came up to him. Seeing the tribune, Dosti wriggled in her arms until she set the toddler down. He staggered over to Scaurus; his legs grew steadier under him every day. The tribune gathered his son in.

  “Papa,” Dosti announced importantly.

  “So I am.” Marcus stood up; Dosti started undoing the leather straps of one of his caligae, reached up to bat at his scabbarded sword.

  “You might say hello to me as well,” Helvis said.

  “Hello,” he said cautiously, but she tilted her face up to be kissed as if nothing was wrong. A knot came undone in his chest; he had not known how tight it was till it loosened. Risking a smile, he raised the tent flap. Malric darted in, shouting, “Come on, slowcoach!” to Dosti, who followed as best he could. Helvis stooped to enter. Marcus went in after her.

  The talk was deliberately ordinary for a long time: bits of gossip Helvis had picked up among the women, the tribune’s account of the storming of the castle. At last he asked it straight out: “Why did you come back?”

  She looked at him sidelong. “It’s not enough I did? Must you always dig down under everything?”

  “Habit,” he said, waving at the camp all around them. “I have to.”

  “The plague take your habits,” Helvis flared, “aye, and your senseless love for creaking Videssos, too.” Marcus waited for the fire to grow hotter, but instead she laughed, more at herself than to him. “Why did I come back? If it was once, it was five thousand times from Malric: ‘Where’s Papa? When is he coming back? Well, why don’t you know?’ And Dosti fussed and cried and wouldn’t stop.” Even in the flickering lamplight, she looked worn.

  “Is that all?”

  “What do you want me to say? That I missed you? That I wanted to come back because I cared about you?”

  “If that’s so, I want very much for you to say it,” he answered quietly.

  “What does it matter to you, with your precious Empire to care about?” she said, but her face softened. “It is so. Oh, this is hard. There you were fighting against my people—my kinsmen even, for all I know—and what was I doing? Praying to Phos you’d come through safe. I thought I didn’t care—until you went into danger. A heart’s easy to harden with nothing at stake, but—damn it anyway!” she finished, caught between conflicting feelings.

  “Thank you,” he said. He went on, “When I was sixteen I was sure everything was simple. Here I am twenty years later and, by the gods, twenty times more confused.” Helvis smiled and frowned at the same time, not quite pleased by his automatic translation of the Latin oath. Even there, he thought, I have to be careful. Still … “We stumble on somehow, don’t we?”

  “So far,” she said. “So far.”

  There were more of Drax’ men the next day, not scouts but a good fifty hard-looking horsemen who rode, lances couched, not far out of bowshot on the army’s flank. They shouted something at Utprand’s Namdaleni, but distance blurred their voices so no words were clear. “Bold-faced sods, aren’t they?” Gaius Philippus said.

  Zigabenos thought so, too. He sent off the Khatrishers to drive the rebel mercenaries away. Drax’ men pulled back to forest cover in good order. Laon Pakhymer did not order his archers into the woods after them, unwilling to sacrifice the mobility that was their chief advantage. After a while his men rode off to catch up to the rest of the imperials. Drax’ troopers emerged and took up their dogging post once more.

  When evening came the rebels did not camp near Zigabenos’ army, but trotted purposefully southwest. Watching them go, Gaius Philippus scratched at the scar on his cheek. “We’re for it tomorrow, I expect. That troop’s not on their own; they’re a detachment off a big bunch and act like it.”

  He pulled out his sword, tested the edge with his middle finger. “Have to do, I suppose. I don’t like fighting these bloody islanders. They’re big as Gauls and twice as smart.”

  After full darkness Marcus saw a faint orange glow on the southwestern horizon. He did not remember any good-sized town just ahead of them, which left only Drax’ men. His mouth tightened. If they were so close, it would indeed be battle tomorrow.

  A messenger came to the Roman camp with orders from Mertikes Zigabenos: “We’ll march in extended line tomorrow, not in column.” The Videssian general expected it, too, then. His aide continued: “You foot soldiers will be on the left, with the Khatrishers covering you. My lord will take the center, with Utprand’s Namdaleni on the right.”

  “Thanks, spatharios,” the tribune said. “Care for a mug of wine?”

  “Kind of you, sir,” the Videssian said with a grin, looking years younger as his official duty fell away. He took a pull, screwed up his face in surprise. “Rather dry, isn’t it?” His second sip was more cautious.

  “As dry as we could find,” Marcus answered; almost all Videssian wine was too sugary for the Romans’ taste. Making conversation, he asked, “Why are the islanders on the right?” If Zigabenos was wary of them, better to put them in the center, where they could be watched—and checked—from either wing.

  But the spatharios had an answer that showed his commander had also been thinking, though not along Scaurus’ lines: “The right’s their place of honor, sir.” The tribune nodded thoughtfully; with proud Utprand, an appeal to honor was never wasted. The Videssian finished his wine and hurried away to pass the word to Laon Pakhymer.

  Marcus wished the battle had developed sooner; as it was, Helvis and most of the other legionaries’ women were here, instead of in a camp of their own farther from the upcoming figh
t. When he said as much to Gaius Philippus, the senior centurion answered, “They’re likely safer here, sir. The imperials take no pains with their fieldworks.”

  “That’s so,” the tribune said, consoled. “Still, we’ll leave half a maniple behind when we move out tomorrow. Under Minucius, I think.”

  “Minucius? He’ll feel shamed at being left out of the fighting, sir. He’s young.” The senior centurion spoke as though the word covered a host of faults.

  “It’s an important job nonetheless, and he’s a sensible lad.” Marcus’ eyes grew crafty. “When you give him the order, explain to him how he’ll be protecting his Erene.”

  Gaius Philippus whistled in admiration. “The very thing. He dotes on the wench.” Was that derision or envy in his voice? Scaurus could not tell.

  The morning dawned clear and surprisingly cool, with a brisk sea breeze blowing the humidity away. “A fine day,” Marcus heard one of the Romans say as they broke camp.

  “A fine day to be hamstrung on, beef-head, if you don’t tighten that strap on your greave,” Gaius Philippus snarled. The soldier checked it; it was quite tight enough. The senior centurion was already rasping away at someone else.

  Khamorth irregulars came galloping, waving their fur caps over their heads and shouting, “Big horses! Lots of big horses!” A ripple of excitement ran through the imperial army. Soon, now.

  They topped a slight rise and came down into the almost flat valley of the Sangarios, one of the Arandos’ minor tributaries. A wooden bridge spanned the muddy little stream. The rebels’ camp was visible on the far side of the river, but their commander had chosen to draw them up in front of the bridge.

  “Drax! Drax! The great count Drax!” the Namdaleni shouted as their foes came into sight. The call was deep and steady as the beat of a drum.

  “Utprand!” “Videssos!” “Gavras!” The answering battle cries were various but loud.

  “I credited this precious Drax with more sense,” Gaius Philippus said. “Aye, the land doesn’t slope enough to matter, but if we once push them back they’ll go into the river, and that’ll be the end of ’em.”

  Marcus remembered something Nephon Khoumnos used to say: “If ifs and buts were candied nuts, then everyone would be fat.” If that was an omen, he misliked it; the dour Videssian general was long dead, slain by Avshar’s wizardry.

  Zigabenos, who had once been Khoumnos’ aide, knew better than to exhaust his troops by charging too soon. He kept them well in hand as they advanced. The Namdaleni moved slowly forward to meet them. Drax’ men wore sea-green surcoats and had green streamers fluttering from their lances.

  Where was Drax’ banner? If the right was the islanders’ place of honor, Scaurus had expected to see it bearing down on him. But it was nowhere to be found—until the tribune spied it at the opposite end of the Namdalener line. Suspicion flared in him. What was Drax scheming?

  Like an armored thunderbolt, Utprand hurled himself at that taunting banner, breaking the steady line the imperial army had maintained. By squads and platoons his men followed, until half a thousand knights bore down on the rebel count.

  “Traitor! Robber!” Their war cries rang over the pounding of their horses’ hooves.

  “Drax! Drax! The great count Drax!” Shouting, too, Drax’ horsemen swung lances down and dug spurs into their mounts to meet them. They had another cry as well, and a premonitory shiver went down Scaurus’ spine: “Namdalen! Namdalen! Namdalen!”

  “Go on! Go on! Back him, you milk-livered, cheese-faced dogturds!” That was Gaius Philippus shouting, profanely praying for some miracle to take his voice across the field and make Soteric’s men, and Clozart’s, and Turgot’s, join Utprand and his loyal retainers in their charge.

  A few did, but a trickle, ones, twos, and fives. Most sat their horses, waiting. If Utprand could cast Drax down, perhaps they would advance … but Utprand and his followers were alone on the field, and Drax had more than half a thousand knights to throw against them.

  Lances shattered. Horses fell, screaming worse than men. Riders flew from saddles to be trampled under iron-shod hooves. The sun sparkled off steel as swords were bared. Utprand’s wedge of men, fighting all the more grimly for knowing themselves betrayed, still surged toward their enemy’s standard.

  Scaurus cheered them on, but not for long, for Drax’ right bore down on him, every lance, it seemed, aimed straight at his chest. The Khatrishers were still skirmishing with the onrushing Namdaleni, peppering them with arrows. A knight here, another there, sagged in their saddles as they were hit. But the light horse in front of them could not really stop their charge. One Khatrisher, bolder than his friends, rode in close to slash at an islander with his saber. The Namdalener swerved his horse so it struck his foe’s pony shoulder to shoulder. The smaller mount stumbled and went down. An islander speared its rider as if he were a chunk of meat to be impaled on a belt-knife. The sea-green wave rolled over the corpse.

  “Stand firm now, you hastati! The horses don’t want to spear themselves,” Gaius Philippus was shouting.

  “Pila at the ready …” Marcus called. He waited, dry-mouthed, as Drax’ men neared with frightening speed. “At the ready … loose!” He swung his arm down; the buccinators’ horns echoed his command.

  Hundreds of javelins darted forth as one, followed by another volley and another. Horses and riders went sprawling, killed or wounded; knights behind lost their footing in turn. Some of the horsemen reacted quickly enough to catch the pila on their shields—which were shaped, Scaurus thought in one of those strange, clear moments he knew he would remember forever, like the kites Videssian boys flew. It did them less good than they might have hoped. The long, soft-iron shanks of the pila bent on impact, making them doubly useless: not only did they foul the shields, but the Namdaleni could not throw them back.

  But Drax’ men were already fearfully close when the rain of javelins began. Their charge was blunted, slowed. It could not be stopped. A few of their horses drew up rather than running onto the hastae; more, spurred on by their riders, crashed through the line of heavy spears. “Drax! Drax! The great count Drax!” Their shout never faltered.

  Had it not been for the flexibility of the Romans’ maniples, the system that let them fight in small units and shift eight-man squads to meet trouble wherever it occurred, the Namdalener charge would have smashed them to ruin in minutes. Scaurus, Gaius Philippus, Junius Blaesus, Bagratouni—all of them screamed orders, directing legionaries to where they were needed most.

  A lancehead, its steel discolored with rust but still deadly, jabbed past the tribune’s shoulder. Behind him a Roman grunted, more in surprise than pain. The lance, now dipped in red, ripped free. The legionary’s scream drowned in up-bubbling blood.

  A hurled stone smashed off the nasal of the lancer’s conical helm. He swore in island patois, shook his head groggily. Marcus sprang forward. Sudden fear on his face, the Namdalener tried to beat his thrust aside with the shaft of his lance. The tool was too clumsy, the man too slow. Scaurus’ point punched through his chain gorget and into his neck. The lance slipped from his hand. He would have fallen, but in the press he could not for some minutes.

  Another Namdalener, also on horseback, slashed down at the tribune, who caught the blow on his shield. The knight grunted and cut, again and again, his sword striking sparks from the bronze facing of Marcus’ scutum. He was a clever warrior; each cut came from a different, newly dangerous angle. The Roman’s shield arm started to ache.

  He pivoted on his left foot, thrusting at the rider’s jack-booted leg. With a veteran’s instinct, the Namdalener twitched it out of the way, but for a horseman that was not enough. His mount took the stab in the barrel. Its eyes wide with pain it could not understand, it reared and then foundered, pinning the islander beneath it before he could kick free of the stirrups. His cry of pain was cut short as another horse trampled him.

  Someone pounded the tribune’s shoulder. His head whipped round; it was Senpat Sviodo, who
waved a scolding finger under his nose. “That was not sporting,” the Vaspurakaner said.

  “Too bloody bad,” Marcus growled, for all the world like Gaius Philippus.

  Senpat’s mobile features curdled into a frown. “The Romans are a very serious people,” he declared, and winked at the tribune.

  “To the crows with you,” Scaurus said, laughing. And one worry, at least, he thought, had come to nothing at all, for Gagik Bagratouni’s band of refugee Vaspurakaners was fighting as fiercely as any of Scaurus’ troops. The thick-shouldered nakharar himself dragged a Namdalener from the saddle, to be finished by his men. Mesrop Anhoghin outdueled another; the Roman thrusting-stroke he had learned let him use his long arms to best advantage.

  “This Drax is no great shakes as a general,” Senpat yelled in Marcus’ ear. “He should have learned from last year’s battle that his knights can’t break our line. They pay the price for trying, too.” That was so. With their charge stalled, the Namdaleni grew vulnerable not only to the legionaries but also to the Khatrishers, who plied them with arrows and began to stretch wide to turn their flank.

  But if Drax’ tactical skills left something to be desired, the great count was a clever, insightful strategist. Sudden commotion broke out on the imperials’ right wing. Scaurus glanced in that direction, but saw nothing—too many horses and riders in the way. He grimaced in annoyance; in most fights his inches gave him a good view of the field, but not today.

  All too soon, he had no need to see; the rising tide of battlecries from the right told him all he had to know: “Namdalen! Namdalen! Namdalen!” The shout swelled and swelled, far beyond the noise Drax’ men alone could make. Cries of fury and fear came from the Videssian center; the island mercenaries had turned their coats.

  There was a lull in the assault on the legionaries. The commander of Drax’ right wing, a snub-nosed Namdalener who had to be older than he looked, held up his shield on his lance. It was not painted white, but Marcus guessed he meant it as a sign of truce. “What do you want?” he called to the officer.