Siege
Page 19
‘All right,’ I offered to the uncommon band of brothers. ‘Follow me.’
37
The dry leaves pushed against my face as I edged my way through the copse. Flickering light danced in the distance; the sound of German voices was clear in the still night.
My throat tightened. Nothing about this raid was aligning in our favour. Our last assault had been unexpected, cloaked by heavy rain and wind. Tonight the land was tranquil, the enemy alert. Malchus had reconnoitred the enemy camp, finding no soft underbelly. We were now in the trees because it offered the best chance at concealment, and perhaps a few seconds’ surprise. There had been no talk of abandoning the mission, and when the archers had been left in position to cover our extraction, the faces around me had been grim and sullen beneath the half-moonlight. It was not the place for words, but men clasped hands and squeezed their friends’ shoulders, the comradely gestures an acknowledgment that some of us would not live through the night.
I looked at my own section. They crept beside me through the foliage, lifting feet high to avoid rustling the leaves that had fallen with the approach of winter. Even amongst the trees I could make out their wide eyes in faces darkened by dirt. So familiar were we after hours of nocturnal duty that I could pick out each man by his silhouette. I noticed Brando and Folcher at the fore, the Batavians eager to strike and spill blood.
At our rear was Statius. This was to be his first real taste of combat. He seemed loath to meet it, but who could fault him for that? Likely he was the sanest soldier in the section.
I forced the thought away. Now was the time to think of nothing but the most basic of instincts, and stealth: the placement of sandalled and swathed feet; penetrating looks into darkness; filtering the sounds of danger from a backdrop of nature. Forests are a noisy place, if you stop and listen, but an expert ear would hear death approaching above the creaking of old branches and the taunting crackle of dying leaves.
A hand signal to halt passed down the line. Eventually, the loose formation of soldiers came to a halt. I went on to one knee, the bone pressing into dirt still wet from earlier rains. I swallowed fear, knowing that soon the earth would be enriched. I could only mutter an oath that my men would not be the ones to fertilize the German woodland.
I looked through the last few yards of trees, my vision blocked partly by the tangle of bushes. I swore to myself, knowing that these would hinder my progress when the command to attack came, and I would be forced to run the hundred yards to where the first tents of the enemy’s camp were pitched. Constant roving patrols of German tribesmen rendered stealth impossible once the trees were cleared, and so Malchus had issued orders that were as brutal and simple as his manner.
‘Stay in your sections and sprint to the tents. Put your blade into someone – man, woman or child. When you hear the whistle, move back to the rally point on the other side of the trees.’
Malchus was no coward, and for him to issue orders for killing with such economy, I knew that he feared the futility of this mission as much as I did. We were a tiny force attempting to assault an army of thousands. They were alert, and would fall on our attack like a landslide. Every inch of my experience told me that this was an act of stupidity, and lethal. It told Malchus the same. Maybe even dim-witted Micon could see it.
But what did it matter? We were soldiers, and the command had been given. We would not be the first to charge forward with doubt about our orders in our minds. We would not be the last.
‘Let’s go,’ I heard whispered from the darkness, then the wraith-like figures uncoiled from the forest floor.
‘Stay together,’ I urged my own men, hoping that I had suppressed the fear in my voice.
Within a moment I reached the bramble bushes at the forest’s edge, the barbs snagging and tugging at my tunic, ripping at my skin. I pushed through, hearing other men curse beneath their breath as the vines gripped their shins like attention-starved children.
‘Get through,’ I urged, my voice higher now that the adrenaline was coming. ‘Get through,’ I said again, clearing the last of the bushes and stepping out beyond the trees’ reach.
The German camp was clear ahead of me now, braziers throwing warm light against the canvas of dozens of tents. Glancing left and right, I saw the black figures of ghosts racing across the open ground, their footfalls padded, breaths rapid.
I looked over my shoulder. Enough of my section’s silhouettes had made it through the natural barricade. We were falling behind the others. It was time.
I ran. Like every other idiot in the raiding party, I pushed away my reservations and rational thought, and instead sprinted headlong at an enemy encampment where I knew that death awaited me.
Why did I do this?
For Rome, the city I had never seen? For the Emperor, a man who had wrested power and kept it through violence and civil war? For glory? What was that? Something celebrated by people who had never experienced the cost of buying it.
No. None of that. I sprinted towards the enemy and death because, if I did not reach it first, then one of my men might, and if they died I would be racked with shame, guilt and sorrow. I charged at the enemy because my comrades did. They charged at the enemy because I did. If one of us had pulled out, then perhaps we all would have done, but the army relies on pride and the bonds of brotherhood to drive soldiers into the jaws of death, and so we ran willingly towards our fate.
We were almost at the tents when the first cries of alarm rang out. There was no need for Brando and Folcher to translate the words, and I knew that the enemy would now be rousing and rallying to meet our attack with their own counter. Our lives were now measured in seconds. We had entered death’s domain, and to climb out we would need to kill.
‘Into the tents!’ I ordered my men, all need for stealth gone now as we finally crossed the open ground. I ran with Folcher and Brando to the closest canvas, Folcher stepping forward to pull back the flap so that we could charge inside and butcher the occupants. Instead, in a split second of spurting blood and a gargled cry of pain, Folcher stumbled back from the tent’s opening with a spear-point in his throat.
‘Folcher!’ Brando cried, reaching for his friend, all thoughts of attack forgotten as Folcher crashed on to his back.
Three Germans burst from their tent in the same moment. Half-dressed and unarmoured, the seconds of warning had been enough for them to pick up weapons and shields. Now, the trio of bearded warriors came at me as a howling pack.
If I had an advantage, it was that my muscles were already loose and my eyes adjusted to the darkness. An inch marks the divide between life and death in battle, and I was able to step out of the arc of a swinging blade, lunging to my right and driving my javelin into a thigh. The man went down but he took my weapon with him, and so I was still pulling my short sword free of its sheath when the other two came at me, roaring threats and murder.
Brando fell on to their exposed backs like a violent landslide. He held no weapon, instead grabbing fistfuls of hair as he bit at the men’s faces and plunged a thumb into a German eye. That warrior cried in agony as Brando pushed it in deeper and deeper, and the Batavian’s teeth sank into the flesh of a cheek. Brando’s rage had consumed him, and it was almost a look of relief that passed over the second German’s face as I drove my freed blade into his heart, and saved him the savage fate that had befallen his partner. By the time that Brando backed away, the dead German at his feet was as mauled as a bear’s victim in the arena.
I moved past my comrade, desperate to seek out the rest of the section. Free of my own immediate life-or-death struggle, I now became aware of the shouts and screams that were ringing out around us, and, above it all, a whistle.
‘We have to go!’ I told Brando, grabbing him.
Despite the gore on his face, the man’s eyes were sharp and focused. ‘Help me with Folcher,’ he told me.
I followed him to the dark shape of his friend. Instinctively, I knew that he had passed.
‘Help me
get him on my back,’ Brando urged me.
‘He’s dead, Brando.’
‘I know that he’s dead,’ the man told me with the calm that precedes a warrior’s grief. ‘But I’m not leaving him here. Help me.’
I did, pushing the body of our friend on to the Batavian’s wide shoulders. My hands came away warm, and wet.
‘Get to the rally point,’ I told him. ‘I need to find the others. Go.’
Brando broke off at a run, adrenaline compensating for the burden of his comrade’s body. The whine of the whistle still pierced the night, but it was moving now, towards the trees. The clash of blades had dropped, but the screams were growing. So too the German commands and challenges. Had the raid become a rout?
There was no way for me to tell: I was between the tents, and my world was confined to the few yards around me.
‘Seven Section!’ I shouted. ‘Seven Section!’
No voice returned my call. No figures appeared around me.
‘Seven Section!’ I tried again. This time, there was movement to my right.
Germans.
A pair of swordsmen. One carried a torch in his left hand, and by the glow of those flames I saw the excitement etched into their hungry faces. With a sudden sickening realization, I realized why.
My hands were empty.
They charged at me, eager to butcher such idiot prey. On instinct I turned, and ran.
I’m not sure which body tripped me, but I tasted blood and dirt as my face drove into the floor like a spade. The golden light and shadow cast by the torch told me that a blade was on its way into my back, and so I rolled sideways. It bought me a moment to push away, but the torchbearer saw my eyes on an escape, and broke from his partner so that they faced me from both sides.
I looked quickly from one man to the other, needing to know which would be the first to attack. Both were young, and grinning. Both were eager for the kill.
They came at me in the same moment. Trapped in the alleyway between tents, I was left with no other option. With all my strength, I threw myself against the tent’s canvas, and prayed that the tent pegs had not been driven so deeply into the wet soil that the lines would take my weight.
They didn’t, and the canvas buckled beneath me, rope snapping free of the dirt as the tent’s side collapsed. Already I was moving, needing to free myself before they recovered from the unexpected. I escaped a swipe of a blade by inches, coming off the canvas like a sprinter at the games. The Germans were on my heels, but my arms were empty, and I used them to power my steps, charging between the tents, knowing that if there were any Germans in my way I would have no other option but to try and run by them. I was under no illusion that such a tactic would leave me gutted from a sword’s swing, but what choice did I have?
And so I ran. I ran from the camp and into the open ground between the tents and trees. This space was now a hunting ground, tribesmen whooping with glee as they chased down the fugitives who had dared set foot in their camp a second time. The whistle was gone, replaced by screams and the drumming of hooves as a half-dozen horsemen whirred amidst the chaos, chopping blades into exposed backs and driving spears into heaving chests.
It was a nightmare and a blur. I ran with blinkers, my sight and focus on nothing but the blackness of trees that offered at least the smallest chance of survival. Why did I survive the massacre in the open ground where others did not? Why had I come through such things before, when many had fallen? I could not speak to that. Maybe the name that Arminius had given me was true. Maybe I was the lucky one. Whatever the reason, I plunged into the barbed bushes of the forest as if it were the most inviting Mediterranean waters.
Caught up in the easy slaughter of the open ground, the trees seemed empty of Germans. I took no chances and moved at a crouch towards the rally point that I was certain must be deserted.
Cries of pain and barked orders echoed through the branches as I quickly stalked my way to be clear of the carnage. I hoped that Brando had had the time to get clear before the enemy were fully roused, but what of the rest of my section? I hadn’t set eyes on them since I had turned to the first tent, and Folcher had moved to the flap.
Folcher. One moment he had been alive and vital, the next he was dead. I had seen his end, and yet I hadn’t. The memory was so vivid, and yet a blur.
I shook my head. Now wasn’t the time to mourn him. I was unarmed and with an enemy army at my back. So far as I knew I was the only survivor from the century. If I allowed myself to stop and to consider what that meant, then I would not live through the night. Despair would overcome me.
The sounds of battle – of massacre – died as the wall of trees grew behind me. Soon I reached the rally point. I forced out a breath, telling myself that it was only what I had expected. What I was accustomed to. I was alone, I thought.
But then I heard the sound behind me, the slightest scrape of steel.
There was someone in the trees.
I was being hunted.
38
I held my position, and trusted my instincts. I was being hunted, and I would let myself be caught.
‘How did you know?’ Malchus whispered, slipping through shadows to join me at my side.
‘I can smell soap on you, sir,’ I answered honestly.
‘I sent the rest of them back,’ Malchus explained.
From his tone, I took it that ‘the rest of them’ were pitifully few.
‘You can catch them up,’ he told me.
‘What are you doing, sir?’
‘I’ll take my chances here. More of the boys could be lying low.’
His tone betrayed his true feelings, but Malchus was an honourable officer. He was not about to abandon hope for his men.
‘Listen,’ he instructed me, and we lapsed into silence, attempting to distinguish the sounds of the forests from the noise of the enemy camp, now fully roused. A few cries of pain echoed in the night, but largely what we could hear was the mumble of raised voices.
The enemy would be organizing search parties, I was certain. I could only hope that they would wait for the dawn, cautious in case the attack had been a ruse to draw them on to the blades of a larger force.
After a while, Malchus spoke. ‘There. Listen.’
I heard it. Footsteps. They were timid and careful. Not the sound of a German warrior flushed with victory.
‘Wait here.’
The centurion returned soon. With him was a legionary. His silhouette was alien to me, and I knew that he was not of my own section. He was injured, his breathing shallow as he clutched at his shoulder.
I had questions that I burned to ask him, the need to know the fate of my comrades gnawing at my chest, but I held my tongue, placing our survival first. Malchus left again, and returned with another soldier. The third time that the centurion left my side, he returned alone.
‘I don’t think there’s anyone else,’ he announced quietly to straining ears. ‘Follow me.’
We turned our backs on the victorious chants of the Germans, and slid into the black undergrowth.
We followed the cover of trees for as long as we were able. When we broke into open ground, Malchus was blunt in his orders.
‘We’re not going to take the track. Whether they attack our boys or not, there’re going to be cavalry scouts out there. We’ll make best speed through the fields. That means we fucking run. If we’re out here when daylight breaks, then we’re dead.’
No one commented.
‘Dump your mail in that ditch. I’ll make sure the quartermaster doesn’t bill you for the equipment loss,’ Malchus joked darkly. ‘Let’s go.’
So began hours of burning legs, aching muscles and scorched throats. Running through the night was abject misery, but no man complained, for what was the choice? Instead, I tried to do what Linza had told me. I tried to think about life, and not death. I promised myself that if we made the fort, then I would not wait until murder struck to see her again. That I would meet her friendship with my own.
I had to marvel at our leader. After the bloodshed and despite the exertion, his tone was calm, his breath steady. Malchus was a born warrior and leader. Perhaps, if the three legions that had entered the forest had been commanded by this man, then the bodies of more than fifteen thousand would not have been picked over by crows. But what chance was there of that? Malchus was not a senator. He was a soldier who had fought his way up the ladder, each step a testament to his prowess as a killer. Rome’s borders held and grew due to men like him, and yet the warrior would be no more welcome in the senate than a dog. Malchus was a tool that fit a purpose, and though the upper classes would laud him and heap praise on his armoured shoulders, he would never be seen as anything but a pawn to the men who controlled Rome. And yet, I knew deep down, he would die for them and their city.
Why were we soldiers so blind and obedient?
‘The fort,’ Malchus announced, jolting me out of my mutinous thoughts. ‘Made it, lads.’
With salvation in sight, nervous bursts of laughter broke out amongst us. Despite the death that we had left behind, relief at having survived overtook us, and I saw the white of smiles in the darkness.
Malchus announced himself to the guards on the gatehouse, and confirmed the night’s watchword. ‘Where’s the raiding party?’ he then asked.
The confused reply left me sick.
‘It’s not you?’
There was a moment of heavy silence. I thought I heard Malchus’s teeth grate.
‘Get inside,’ he said to me. ‘Get these men seen by a surgeon. I’m going back to find the others.’