Etruscan Blood

by AM Kirkby

  ***

  Servius swore as his foot was caught, looked down, kicked at the leg that lay across his way, and saw it flop back; balanced himself again, saw a gleam of light through the narrow eye-slit of an enemy helmet, pushed his shield forward to shove the man back, brought his arm up to stab with his long spear, saw the man fall, and pulled the spear back, and realised from the heavy softness under his feet that he'd trodden on a body, friend or enemy he couldn't tell; all this in a moment, and then he was moving again, as the line pushed forwards. He didn't know the soldier on his left – two men in that position had fallen, and the line had squeezed up – and on his right was the old veteran who'd questioned his decision to let the horsemen retreat before the footsoldiers. Out of the corner of his eyes he saw them shuffle forward, stab, shuffle forward; but in the phalanx it wasn't sight that counted; he could almost feel what the veteran was doing from the way their shields locked together, the way the sides grated as the men moved, and he could feel the man on his left pushing into him, as the line shifted – as a phalanx always did, no matter how well you trained – always towards the right, further and further right.

  It had been easy pickings at first, the strong Roman line against an enemy already depleted in numbers, and morale was on their side too, the Veientes already discouraged by seeing so many of their front line dead or disabled, and then by the Romans they had thought were running away turning back to fight. The challenge had been not to break the line, to keep that tight formation they'd practised over and over again.

  But now it was getting harder; the Veientes had had time to form up again, and it had come to push and shove, their shields pushing against their opponents', in a sort of deadly tug-of-war in reverse. Fallen enemies were more threat dead than alive, Servius thought sourly, as again he nearly tripped; bodies and abandoned armour littered the field, and the phalanx had to advance blind, each man feeling his way. More than once he found himself standing on a dead man's chest, for a moment – till the line passed on – head and shoulders above his neighbours. He could feel the shield of the man behind him pushing him on, and behind him, there was another man, and another; the whole phalanx a force unstoppable, merciless against its own men as it was against the enemy. A step forward, a step forward, check your neighbours are still with you, step forward again, keep pushing; always looking for that flash of flesh between helmet and shield, the one spot that was vulnerable in this close fighting, and if you saw it, you stabbed quickly, exposed for a moment while you lifted your spear, and got back behind your neighbour's shield, if you were lucky, before any of the enemy could take advantage of it. Another step forward. At least they were winning, they had the Veientes on the back foot; every time he pushed he could feel the opposing shield wall give.

  "There are still more of them coming out from Veii," his neighbour shouted.

  "I saw them."

  "We'll be buggered if they keep coming."

  "I'll remind you of that later," he said, and pushed forwards again.

  He was more worried by what he'd seen a few moments ago, as the dead man's rib cage raised him for a moment above the line, above the pushing mass of the enemy; chariots rushing out towards the right flank of the Roman phalanx. They must have pulled up the stakes by now, he thought; and knew, as they all did, that the weakness of the phalanx was the last man in the line, undefended by any neighbour's shield. If they could get round the edge of the phalanx...

  But they wouldn't, he thought. Not if the plan worked. Come on, Tarquin. Come on.

  He knew the risk he'd taken. He'd given his success into the hands of the boy who hated him; who, if Servius fell fighting in the phalanx, was King of Rome, and knew it. He'd thrown the dice, and he could only hope his luck was with him, and the throw would be Turan, not Vanth.

  But still the enemy were pressing them, and now he couldn't see further than the end of his spear, and his ears were full of the noise of battle. And even though the Romans were still pushing the Veientes back, step by step, the opposing line showed no sign of thinning out, and who knew how many lines back their men were ranked? The battle was still finely balanced, Servius knew; he needed Tarquin, and he needed him now.

  Still, the front line held, and as long as they stood together, they could not fall. (They said one of the Porsena had been killed in the first clash at the battle of Curtun, and the line had carried him all the way through the battle, wedged between the men on either side; it was only when Kukrina's phalanx broke and ran that the body fell.) The fight was getting tough now; each step was harder and harder, and brought less and less advantage. The veteran had lost his spear, stuck in an enemy's body, and was using his shield to bludgeon his way forward; his neighbour on the other side had given up trying to use his spear in the crush, and was stabbing with his short sword when he got a chance, or slashing down where he saw an unprotected leg or arm, or across at a man's face. Servius' legs were numb with tiredness, and the sweat was running into his eyes, and all he could do was blink it away, but still his eyes stung, and his head was beginning to ache. He wondered how the new recruits were coping, back in the third and fourth lines – how many had come forwards to fill dead men's spaces? - how much work the veterans had left in them; how long it would be till his legs wouldn't move any more, till he got slow, and made a mistake, and left himself open, or let the line drag him under. And all the time he was thinking this, he was pushing, stepping, pushing, trying to stay upright as the line swayed, as one of the enemy staggered into him and then fell, and the Roman phalanx moved over him, trying to stay behind the shelter of the shields. How much more of this could they take?

  Come on, Tarquin.

  He nearly missed the spear butt that aimed at his ankles, where the greaves ended and the shield didn't protect him. Saw it just in time, twisted and jumped, and stabbed quickly. Man down. Thank the gods. That was sneaky.

  Then at last, he heard the thunder of hooves like a storm across the mountains, that low rumble when a storm is still two valleys away and there's just enough time to scramble for shelter under the trees or in a shepherd's stone hut, and he hoped it was Tarquin, and not reinforcements from Veii.

  "What the fuck's that?" the man on his left shouted, and Servius grinned, feeling his skin cracking at the corners of his mouth, feeling his mouth horribly dry, tasting blood and not caring.