by Peter Tonkin
‘Well,’ answered Voadicia, frowning, ‘I think Septem and Felix can tell you if my observations are of any use, but Hecate and I both remarked on the new palisade. The one Cassius put up after you tried to steal his corn.’
‘What about it?’ demanded Antony, bridling once again as that sensitive nerve was touched.
‘Well, we have both seen their main palisade from outside and your palisade from inside our camp,’ Voadicia explained. ‘The trench, the earth wall, the palisade on top of it, the watch-towers, the walkway between them so that legionaries can move easily from place to place during an assault.’
‘Yes. So?’
‘There is really nothing like that in the new palisade. No trench to speak of, nothing much in the way of an earth bank to support the tree-trunks that form the palisade wall. There is a watch-tower, but that is at the corner of Cassius’ original defences – there’s nothing new. And although there’s a walkway towards the top of the new palisade, it seems quite hard to get to. Cassius’ soldiers have to come out of his main camp and run along the side-wall before they get to the ladders that take them up there.’
‘I see what you mean,’ said Antony. ‘With the right preparation and a careful bit of timing, that palisade could well be Cassius’ Achilles’ heel.’ He looked around the assembled faces with a wolfish grin. ‘What say we give him a birthday that he’ll never forget?’
XIV - Gaius Cassius’ Birthday
i
It was a cold grey autumn dawn that did not bode well for the coming day. Antony was up early, moving through his troops as they ate their meagre breakfast. ‘It is Divus Julius’ breakfast,’ he assured them. ‘Bread and vinegar water – true soldiers’ fare.’
Artemidorus, Quintus, Ferrata and Furius caught up with him as he visited the Fourth at the northern end of his lines. He was accompanied by Agrippa, just as he had been accompanied by Saxa, Norbanus, Bassus, Asinius, Maecenas, Rufus and the rest while he talked quietly with each of the other legions. ‘Young Caesar is too unwell to speak to you himself,’ the General explained. ‘But his spirit and Divus Julius’ good luck are both with you. Fortuna smiles on you. Venus Victrix, founder of the Julii, stands at your shoulders and holds her hands over you. Remember, the watch word is Hercules.’
‘Of course it is,’ whispered Artemidorus to Quintus. ‘It always is. Just as Brutus and Cassius always use the watch word Liberty. They are both dangerously predictable, but the generals fear that their legions might forget anything more complicated and not be able to tell friend from foe in the heat of battle when generals, legates, tribunes, eagles and standards are out of sight.’
‘Especially in battles like this,’ nodded Quintus, ‘when legion is fighting legion, Roman fighting Roman, brother fighting brother. It’s Pharsalus all over again – and what a mess that turned out to be!’
‘You have each been given five drachmas to sacrifice,’ Antony continued. ‘You may sacrifice to Venus or any other deity. I have personally overseen the sacrifice of a bull dedicated to Mars, Jupiter Optimus Maximus and Hercules on behalf of us all, and of course a fat pig in the ceremony of Lustration. The predictions revealed in the bull’s liver could not have been better. And I am an augur, remember. When I looked at the sky above Cassius’ camp yesterday I saw two eagles flying westward towards us – a certain sign of victory. And if you yourselves look, you will see a great column of birds beside his southern fortifications. Scavengers of all sorts preparing to feast on his dead soldiers – another sure sign…’
He turned away and went on towards the Spartans who held the northernmost part of the line. His bodyguard went with him, of course, as did his secretaries, his messengers, the soldiers carrying his standard and the great curved horns that passed his orders around the troops, all surrounded by the Praetorians in their suits of shining mail.
As the sun struggled to show itself through the overcast, Antony’s army lined up in battle-order as they had done every day for the last week. Once again, some of the legionaries were replaced by slaves and servants because the men who had built Antony’s causeway were now detailed to garrison it and prepare to meet anyone coming towards them from Cassius’ causeway. With an unsettling sense of foreboding, Artemidorus had seen Felix, Hecate, and Voadicia off alongside these troops. Their mission was to act as guides and ensure Antony’s legionaries could move swiftly, surely and safely through the maze of the marshland. Hercules, Notus and Kyros joined the Seventh as supernumeraries and messengers.
There was no doubt in anybody’s mind that Antony was going to join the battle today, come hades or high water.
*
Cassius and Brutus seemed to sense something in the wind as well. Whereas Antony’s men had made their preparations and sacrifices in their camp. The Libertores went on full parade, armour silvered and gilded; each man receiving a heavy bag of money; and not to be used as a sacrifice either. As Artemidorus had observed to Felix at the impressive Donative ceremony they had watched – the troops had so much more to fight for now that their armour and their purses were worth a fortune. In front of each legion, a white bull was led to a sacrificial altar, followed by a white ram and a sizeable pig to be ritually slain in the full Lustration ceremony so that the gods would look kindly on the Libertore legions today. And victory was something that the priests loudly predicted after examining the sacrifices’ steaming livers, their words coming and going amid the cheers of the legions they served. The carcasses were butchered and roasted. A sight easterly breeze carried the odour to Antony’s legions, whose mouths watered with hunger and whose eyes ran with tears of anger and frustration as the Libertore legions were fed a feast for breakfast.
The whole process lasted until near noon when the sun broke through the clouds and Antony, who had positioned himself in front of the troops facing Cassius’ lines, suddenly announced, ‘I’ve had enough of this! Let’s go!’ He slung his shield over his shoulder to sit snugly on his back, pulled out the spatha he preferred as a cavalry commander – even though he was on foot now – and he charged for Cassius’ ranks.
As Antony hurled himself forward with all his attendants except his secretaries around him, Artemidorus, Quintus, Ferrata and Furius slung their own shields over their shoulders and joined the lines immediately behind him – the Sixth and Seventh legions. His standard bearers and aquilifers had already joined in. His aenators paused, sucked in breath and then blew on their cornicines which blared out the order Advance! To the entire army. Logic and strategy demanded that Antony lead his men straight up the hill towards Cassius’ Thirty First and Thirty Third legions who were ranged five lines deep along the front of his main palisade. They stood between the gate into his camp and the last watch-tower overlooking the marsh. Wide-eyed with surprise, they tensed themselves to meet the unexpected onslaught. Their front line raised their shields and pushed them together, edge to edge. They deployed their pilae javelins. They braced themselves for impact. The second line got ready to throw their pilae at the oncoming troops then lean in to support the front row. The third row, the deadly triarii, prepared to chop to pieces anyone getting past rows one and two. Archers and slingers behind the triarii got ready to shoot.
But just at the last moment, Antony turned right. Forewarned, his legions swung in behind him, pounding down that strange southward slope which Artemidorus had discovered on his first visit to the then unguarded section between Cassius’ camp and the marsh. Without pause, they ran full-tilt down the slope towards the shallows of the Gangites which flowed so close to Cassius’ new wall. As Hecate and Voadicia had confirmed, the recently-erected palisade was lightly guarded. There was certainly no room for rank upon rank of legionaries to form up in front of it - as there was up the slope to the north – unless they were prepared to stand in the river itself.
ii
Under the unbelieving eyes of Cassius’ serried ranks, Antony led his men in front of their regimented lines, charging wildly across them, heading for the swamp. As he neared the newl
y-built palisade, beginning to come under serious fire from the defenders in the watch tower and along the main wall, so another group of legionaries, led by Norbanus himself, came pounding past the wall of reeds that had concealed the building of the causeway, sprinting up from the dry river valley where the causeway began. They were carrying scaling ladders. They were leading horses in teams of four pulling wagons full of earth and rocks, moving forward at a gallop which tested the vehicles to the limit.
Antony, Artemidorus and the rest splashed through the shallows, crossing the Gangites, arriving at the newly built palisade at the same time as Norbanus and his men. Because they were so close to the new wall now, the hail of arrows, slingshot and spears lacked force and accuracy. Disregarding it altogether, Antony leaped across the narrow ditch with Artemidorus at his side, moving so quickly that he left even his bodyguard behind. They paused to sheathe their swords, but no sooner had they done so than the first scaling ladders slammed into place. The general and the centurion, two soldiers side by side, gripped by the rage of battle, swung onto the stout rungs and ran upward as fast as they could, aware that more ladders were smashing into place beside them and the bodyguard, the Praetorians and the first team of legionaries from the Sixth and Seventh were only a heartbeat behind.
There was almost no-one on the walkway at the top of the palisade when they heaved themselves over. The men stationed there seemed frozen with something between shock and horror. Antony pulled out his cavalryman’s spatha, once more, swung his shield into position and charged towards the tower, chopping Cassius’ guards out of his way as he ran. He was focused on reaching the top of the inner ladder and stopping any reinforcements from climbing onto the walkway before the next stage of the stratagem began. Artemidorus went the opposite way, with the same mission to close the ladder at the marsh-end of the palisade. The unrelenting hail of slingshots and arrows made him all too well aware that he and the general were in equally dangerous positions. One was charging into a field of fire with a shield in front of him, while the other was more distant and moving away – but presenting his back to it. At least the spy had the good sense to leave his shield where it was for the time being, the layered, leather-covered wood and the segmented armour beneath it keeping him safe from the steel-tipped shafts slamming into it.
There were half a dozen men in front of Artemidorus, all torn between facing his charge, avoiding the friendly fire that followed him, and trying to stop the wave of enemies running up the ladders at them. Artemidorus pulled out his pugio with his left hand and went at them with his shaft-spined shield on his back and a blade in each fist. None of his foes was carrying a shield – a dangerous encumbrance on a narrow walkway, especially one generally believed to be immune from attack. The first solder raised his gladius half-heartedly. Artemidorus’ dagger went straight under his armpit and the centurion smashed him bodily off the narrow ledge as he charged at the second, who was staggering back with a look of simple horror on his face. He had dispatched the second man as well before the third turned more purposefully to make a fight of it – only to receive a gladius blade through his throat as Quintus arrived on the scene. Blood boiled out of the dying soldier and Artemidorus only just managed to turn his face away from the blinding fountain in time. The dead man staggered sideways and toppled off the wall. Then, with Quintus just behind his shoulder, Artemidorus pushed on until he reached the top of the second ladder. He stopped, chest heaving. Looked down. There was no-one down there at all.
*
Moments later, with the walkway clear of Cassius’ troops, Antony’s men controlled the two ladders designed to give access to it from the camp. The next wave of invaders arrived. Fire from the tower dwindled as it became the next target for Antony’s men. While archers and slingers crowded the inner end of the walkway, pouring shafts and shots into the tower, Norbanus’ scaling ladders were pulled up and slammed into place down the inner wall and Antony led the first wave down onto the mud-bank scarred by his wagon wheels beside the pile of corn sacks. As they formed a solid shield-wall across the mud-floored corridor and began to move forward, a scanty second wave arrived at the top of the wall behind them and the next stage of the plan began to unfold. The new arrivals turned, catching lines and loops of rope thrown up from below, fastening them round the tops of the columns which formed the palisade. The sounds of horses being urged forward were lost in the general cacophony, but the truth of the matter was revealed a few moments later when the entire palisade crashed down and out to form a solid bridge across the shallow trench, opening a breach in Cassius’ defences as wide as the Appian Way.
The hard men of the Sixth and Seventh charged forward to form a second line behind Antony and Artemidorus – and not a moment too soon. Legionaries Cassius had obviously stationed out on his causeway came boiling back again, summoned by the unmistakable sounds of battle. But they were ill–organised and surprised to find themselves confronted by Antony’s shield wall. Their numbers far outweighed the invaders’ to begin with but that was very little use because Antony’s bodyguard, Praetorians and legionaries filled the gap between the side-wall and the swamp. There was no way around them, only over them or through them - neither of which was much of an option.
With Antony himself at one shoulder and Quintus at the other, Artemidorus drove his shield forward ruthlessly, supported by the weight of the second and third rows behind him. He stabbed his gladius past the edge of his shield ruthlessly and relentlessly as the new arrivals, who had run across the fallen palisade, slid their pilae past his protected cheeks and into the faces of the men he was fighting.
‘Desisto!’ called Antony and the line stopped on his command. Artemidorus risked a glance to one side and understood the general’s order. They were coming to the end of the side-wall running back from the fallen palisade. At any moment now, reinforcements would come streaming out of Cassius’ camp as the legionaries of the camp guard contingent joined the men from Cassius’ causeway.
They waited, heartbeats speeded by almost unbearable tension.
But nobody came.
iii
It suddenly occurred to Artemidorus that Cassius must have been so confident in the strength of his defences, double-walled as they were, that he left his camp effectively unguarded. He had been just too keen to send every available soldier not ranged in front of his main wall up the causeway and into the swamp with orders to destroy Antony’s men there. But the boot was on the other foot now. As Antony started to move forward again and the interlinked shields moved past the end of the camp wall, it was his legionaries from the Sixth and Seventh who came charging round the end of the shield wall to drive Cassius’ men back onto their causeway – and then along the narrow way as they pushed them into the swamp where yet more of Antony’s legionaries were waiting for them in their well-manned stone-walled redoubts.
As far as Artemidorus was concerned, this section of the battle moved two ways – and then three. Antony sent a further century of the Seventh down the causeway to make sure Cassius’ troops were impelled onto the swords of his legions waiting on his own causeway and a sizeable element of the fighting moved into the swamp. No sooner had he done so than the General himself led the rest of his soldiers into Cassius’ unguarded camp. It was laid out in the same pattern as every other legionary camp they had ever visited, except that it centred on two hills, one larger and higher than the other. Antony paid no regard to the outlying parts of the encampment, preferring to head straight for the command centre which was pitched on top of the higher hill.
He paused in Cassius’ tent and gave a series of staccato orders to Norbanus. ‘I’m leaving two more centuries of the Sixth with you. Taking the rest of the Sixth and the Seventh with me. You secure Cassius’ war-chest. I’ll keep that. The men may take what they want from this camp. I’d suggest food and drink as much as gold or money. There’ll be plenty of that on the corpses of Cassius’ troops. We’ll collect it all together and share it out later. But discipline must be mainta
ined. Discipline is crucial. Use the wagons if you have to but hold everything here until we’re certain what’s happening outside. I’ll go and find out then get word back. Septem, you and your crypteia with me.
Antony marched swiftly through the camp, followed by his guards, Praetorians, those of the Seventh not clearing the causeway and those of the Sixth not staying with Norbanus. When they reached the camp gate leading out through the main fortification, they paused to form up and prepare themselves for battle. Battle that would begin immediately they went out of Cassius’ camp and back into the war-zone. They had a lively expectation, after all, that they would run straight into the rearmost line of the Libertore army, ranged five lines deep at the top of the slope looking down on Antony’s camp. Then the gate was thrown wide and Antony led the charge out onto the battlefield, surrounded by his guards and Praetorians, with Artemidorus and his men immediately behind, units of the Sixth and Seventh close behind them.
The first thing that struck the spy was how little he could see. There was a fearsome battle taking place all around but the hobnailed caligae of the thousands of combatants had torn the dead grass to shreds and released huge, choking clouds of dust. It was as though they were fighting in one of the terrible fogs the centurion remembered from Divus Julius’ invasion of Albion. At least Voadicia would be feeling right at home, he chuckled grimly.
*
It was difficult to see what was going on, but by no means impossible. Artemidorus charged forward with the rest of Antony’s command. The first thing that he realised was that there were no coherent battle-lines in front of him as he had expected there to be. He guessed that Cassius must be at the head of his troops, further down the hill, between the two camps and the two armies, trying to rally his men. The Libertore Thirty First and Thirty Third legions were undermanned and not very experienced; they had clearly moved away from their original positions; perhaps they had even broken and run already. Had the Sixth and Seventh been at full strength and permitted to go straight for them instead of going for the palisade, they would have made short work of it. But Antony’s plan had come at the price of lengthening the battle out here. Or it had done so until now. After a wild dash downhill, Antony and his troops finally hit Cassius’ lines from behind. It was difficult to overestimate the shock and confusion spread by an attack from the one place where security should have been absolute – the legions’ own camp.
