Caesar

by Colleen McCullough

  The journey from Ravenna to Placentia wasn't too bad, for Caesar kept stopping to hold assizes in the main towns along the Via Aemilia: Bononia, Mutina, Regium Lepidum, Parma, Fidentia. But what an ordinary governor took a nundinum to hear, Caesar heard in one day; then it was on to the next town. Most of the cases were financial, usually civil in nature, and the need to impanel a jury was rare. Caesar listened intently, did the sums in his head, rapped the end of the ivory wand of his imperium on the table in front of him, and gave his judgement. Next case, please—move along, move along! No one ever seemed to argue with his decisions. Probably, thought Lucius Caesar in some amusement, more because Caesar's businesslike efficiency discouraged it than because of any justice involved. Justice was what the victor received; the loser never did.

  At least in Placentia the pause was going to be longer, for here Caesar had put the Fifteenth Legion into training camp for the duration of his stay in Illyricum and Italian Gaul, and he wanted to see for himself how the Fifteenth was faring. His orders had been specific: drill them until they drop, then drill them until they don't drop. He had sent for fifty training centurions from Capua, grizzled veterans who slavered at the prospect of making seventeen-year-old lives a studied combination of agony and misery, and told them that they were to concentrate on the Fifteenth's centurions in their hypothetical spare time. Now the moment had come to see what over three months of training in Placentia had produced; Caesar sent word that he would review the legions on the parade ground at dawn the following morning.

  "If they pass muster, Decimus, you can march them to Further Gaul along the coast road at once," he said over dinner in the midafternoon.

  Decimus Brutus, munching a local delicacy of mixed vegetables lightly fried in oil, nodded tranquilly. "I hear they're really terrific troops," he said, dabbling his hands in a bowl of water.

  "Who gave you that news?" asked Caesar, picking indifferently at a piece of pork roasted in sheep's milk until it was brown and crunchy and the milk was all gone.

  "A purveyor of foods to the army, as a matter of fact."

  "A purveyor of army supplies knows?"

  "Who better? The men of the Fifteenth have worked so hard they've eaten Placentia out of everything that quacks, oinks, bleats or clucks, and the local bakers are working two shifts a day. My dear Caesar, Placentia loves you."

  "A hit, Decimus!" said Caesar, laughing.

  "I understood that Mamurra and Ventidius were to meet us here," said Lucius Caesar, a better trencherman than his cousin, and thoroughly enjoying this less-spicy-than-pepper-mad-Rome, northern kind of cuisine.

  "They arrive the day after tomorrow, from Cremona."

  Hirtius, too busy to eat with them, came in. "Caesar, an urgent letter from Gaius Trebonius."

  Caesar sat up at once and swung his legs off the couch he shared with his cousin, one hand out for the scroll. He broke the seal, unrolled it and read it at a glance.

  "Plans have changed," he said then, voice level. "How did this come, Hirtius? How long has it been on the road?"

  "Six days only, Caesar, and those by the coast road too. I gather Fabius sent two legionaries who ride like the wind, loaded them with money and official pieces of paper. They did well."

  "They did indeed."

  A change had come over Caesar, a change Decimus Brutus and Hirtius knew of old, and Lucius Caesar not at all. The urbane consular was gone, replaced by a man as plain, as crisp and as focused as Gaius Marius.

  "I'll have to leave letters for Mamurra and Ventidius, so I'm off to write them—and others. Decimus, send word to the Fifteenth to be ready to march at dawn. Hirtius, see to the supply train. No ox-wagons, everything in mule-wagons or on mules. We won't find enough to eat in Liguria, so the baggage train will have to keep up. Food for ten days, though we're not going to be ten days between here and Nicaea. Ten days to Aquae Sextiae in the Province, less if the Fifteenth is half as good as the Tenth." Caesar turned to his cousin. "Lucius, I'm marching and I'm in a hurry. You can journey on at your leisure if you prefer. Otherwise it's dawn tomorrow for you too."

  "Dawn tomorrow," said Lucius Caesar, slipping into his shoes. "I don't intend to be cheated of this spectacle, Gaius."

  But Gaius had vanished. Lucius raised his brows at Hirtius and Decimus Brutus. "Doesn't he ever tell you what's going on?"

  "He will," said Decimus Brutus, strolling out.

  "We're told when we need to know," said Hirtius, linking his arm through Lucius Caesar's and steering him gently out of the dining room. "He never wastes time. Today he'll be flying to wade through everything he has to leave behind in perfect order, because it looks to me—and to him—as if we won't be back in Italian Gaul. Tomorrow night in camp he'll tell us."

  "How will his lictors cope with this march? I noticed he wore them out coming up the Via Aemilia, and that at least gave them a chance to rest every second day."

  "I've often thought we should put our lictors into training camp alongside the soldiers. When Caesar's moving quickly he dispenses with his lictors, constitutional or not. They'll follow at their own pace, and he'll leave word whereabouts headquarters are going to be. That's where they'll stay."

  "How will you ever find enough mules at such short notice?"

  Hirtius grinned. "Most of them are Marius's mules," he said, referring to the fact that Gaius Marius had loaded thirty pounds of gear on a legionary's back, and thus turned legionaries into mules. "That's another thing you'll find out about Caesar's army, Lucius. Every mule the Fifteenth should have will be there tomorrow morning, as fit and ready for action as the men. Caesar expects to be able to start a legion moving instantly. Therefore it has to be permanently ready in every aspect."

  The Fifteenth was drawn up in column at dawn the next morning when Caesar, Lucius Caesar, Aulus Hirtius and Decimus Brutus rode into camp. Whatever convulsions had wracked the Fifteenth between being informed it was marching and the actual commencement of the march didn't show; the First Cohort swung into place behind the General and his three legates with smooth precision, and the Tenth Cohort, at the tail, was moving almost as soon as the First.

  The legionaries marched eight abreast in their tent octets, the rising sun glancing off mail shirts polished for a parade that hadn't happened, each man, bareheaded, girt with sword and dagger and carrying his pilum in his right hand. He arranged his pack on a T- or Y-shaped rod canted over his left shoulder, his shield in its hide cover the outermost item suspended from this frame, his helmet like a blister on its top. In his pack he toted five days' ration of wheat, chickpea (or some other pulse) and bacon; a flask of oil, dish and cup, all made of bronze; his shaving gear; spare tunics, neckerchiefs and linen; the dyed horsehair crest for his helmet; his circular sagum (with a hole in its middle for his head to poke through) made of water-resistant, oily Ligurian wool; socks and furry skins to put inside his caligae in cold weather; a pair of woolen breeches for cold weather; his blanket; a shallow wicker basket for carrying away soil; and anything else he could not live without, such as a lucky charm or a lock of his darling's hair. Some necessities were shared out; one man would have the flint for fire making, another the octet's salt, yet another the precious little bit of leavening for their bread, or a collection of herbs, or a lamp, or a flask of oil for it, or a small bundle of twigs for kindling. Some sort of digging implement like a dolabra or spade and two pickets for the marching camp palisade were strapped to the rod of the frame supporting each man's pack, making it the right size for his hand to cup comfortably.

  On the octet's mule went a little mill for grinding grain, a small clay oven for baking bread, bronze cook-pots, spare pila, water skins and a compact, closely folded hide tent complete with guys and poles. The century's ten mules trotted behind the century, each octet's mule attended by the octet's two noncombatant servants, among whose duties on the march was the important one of keeping their octet supplied with water as they moved. Since there was no formal baggage train on this urgent march, each century's w
agon, drawn by six mules, followed the century, and held tools, nails, a certain amount of private gear, water barrels, a bigger millstone, extra food, and the centurion's tent and possessions; he was the only man in the century who marched unencumbered.

  Four thousand eight hundred soldiers, sixty centurions, three hundred artillerymen, a corps of one hundred engineers and artificers and sixteen hundred noncombatants made up the legion, which was fully up to strength. With it, drawn by mules, traveled the Fifteenth's thirty pieces of artillery: ten stone-hurling ballistae and twenty bolt-shooting catapultae of various sizes, together with the wagons into which were loaded spare parts and ammunition. The artillerymen escorted their beloved machines, oiling the axle sockets, fussing, caressing. They were very good at their job, the success of which did not depend on blind chance; they understood trajectories, and with a bolt from a catapulta they could pick off the enemy manning a ram or a siege tower with remarkable accuracy. Bolts were for human targets, stones or boulders for shelling equipment or creating terror among a mass of people.

  [Caesar 223.jpg]

  They look good, thought Caesar with satisfaction, and dropped behind to start doing what he had to do through sixty centuries: cheer the men on and tell them where they were going and what he expected of them. A mile and a half from the first rank of the First to the last rank of the Tenth Cohort, with the artillerymen and engineers in the middle. Only after he had completed this task would Caesar dismount and walk.

  "Give me forty miles a day and you can have two days at Nicaea!" he shouted, grinning widely. "Give me thirty miles a day and you can have shit duty for the rest of this war! It's two hundred miles from Placentia to Nicaea, and I have to be there in five days! That's all the food you're packing, and that's all the food you're going to get! The boys on the other side of the Alps need us, and we're going to be there before those cunni of Gauls know we've left! So stretch your legs, boys, and show Caesar what you're made of!"

  They showed Caesar what they were made of, and it was far more than it had been when the Sugambri had surprised them not so very many months ago. The road Marcus Aemilius Scaurus had built between Dertona and Genua on the Tuscan Sea was a masterpiece of engineering which hardly rose or fell as it crossed gorges on viaducts and curled round the flanks of towering mountains, and while the road which followed the coast from Genua to Nicaea was not nearly as good, it was considerably better than it had been when Gaius Marius had led his thirty thousand men along it. Once the rhythm was established and the troops became accustomed to the routines of a long march, Caesar got his forty miles a day despite the short winter hours. Feet had long since hardened in the training camp and there were knacks to coping with the fate of Marius's mules; the Fifteenth was very conscious of its poor record to date, and very determined to expunge it.

  In Nicaea the soldiers got their promised two days of rest, while Caesar and his legates wrestled with the consequences of the letter Gaius Trebonius had waiting there for him.

  We managed to get this information, Caesar, by abducting an Arvernian Druid and sending him to Labienus for interrogation. Why a Druid? you ask. Fabius, Sextius, Quintus Cicero and I talked it over and decided that a serf wouldn't know enough but that a warrior might deem it preferable to die than say anything worth hearing. Whereas the Druids are soft. If our tribunes of the plebs had half as much genuine inviolability as the most junior Druid enjoys, they'd be running Rome a great deal more ruthlessly than they do.

  Labienus was elected as interrogator because—well, I don't really have to say, do I? Though I imagine the Druid was babbling what he knew long before Labienus had his irons red-hot in the fire.

  Gaius Fufius Cita, his commissioners, the other Roman citizen civilians and a few Greek traders living in Cenabum were murdered at the beginning of February, though no one got through to tell us. The Carnutes shouted the news all the way to Gergovia on the same day the raid happened. Vercingetorix had been exiled from the oppidum, but the moment he heard about Cenabum he took over the Arvernian council and murdered Gobannitio. The next thing, he was calling himself a king. And every hothead among the Arverni was hailing him as king.

  Apparently he went immediately to Carnutum and had a conference there with Gutruatus of the Carnutes and your old friend the Chief Druid, Cathbad. Our informant couldn't say who else attended, except that he thought Lucterius, vergobret of the Cardurci, was there. And Commius! The call to arms went out after the conference ended.

  This war is no laughing matter, Caesar. The Gauls are uniting from the mouth of the Mosa to Aquitania, and right across the country from west to east. Convinced a united Gaul has the numbers to throw us out, Vercingetorix intends to unite Gaul. Under his leadership.

  They mustered outside Carnutum at the beginning of March for a winter campaign. Against us? you ask. No, against any tribes which refuse to join the cause.

  Lucterius and fifty thousand Cardurci, Pictones, Andes, Petrocorii and Santones started off to make war on the Ruteni and the Gabali. Once they're brought into the Gallic fold, Lucterius and his army will move on the Province, particularly at the Narbo and Tolosa end, to cut off our communications with the Spains. They're also to spread dissension among the Volcae and the Helvii.

  Vercingetorix himself is leading about eighty thousand men from the Senones, Carnutes, Arverni, Suessiones, Parisii and Mandubii against the Bituriges, who refused to have anything to do with the united Gaul idea. As the Bituriges own the iron mines, it's easy to understand why Vercingetorix has to persuade them they're wrong.

  As I write this, Vercingetorix and his army are on the move into the lands of the Bituriges. Our Druid informant said that Vercingetorix will move against us when spring comes. His strategy isn't bad. What he intends to do is to keep you isolated from us, on the theory that without you, we won't come out of our camps. Where he intends to besiege us.

  No doubt there is one question you're burning to know the answer to: how did we come to abduct an Arvernian Druid in the first place? Why weren't we sitting back enjoying winter inertia as Vercingetorix imagined we would? Blame Litaviccus of the Aedui, Caesar. He's visited me several times since the beginning of February, each time in the most casual way—dropping in after going to a wedding, that sort of pretext. I didn't think anything of it until he arrived after the big March muster near Carnutum, when he informed me that Vercingetorix was "ruling" in Gergovia. I taxed him with the word, and he retreated too hastily, too offhandedly. He thought he was being very funny when he amended it to "vergobret without a colleague." I split my sides laughing, escorted him off the premises, and sent that first letter to you.

  Caesar, I have absolutely no concrete evidence which might lead me to think that the Aedui are contemplating a part in Vercingetorix's united Gaul, but beware. My bones tell me they are in it. Or that the younger ones like Litaviccus are in it, even if the vergobrets are not. The Bituriges sent to the Aedui for help, the Aedui sent Litaviccus to inform me of this fact, and to ask if I'd mind their sending an army to help the Bituriges. If all that's involved is an internal squabble, I said, then go ahead, send an army.

  But the fate of that army has this moment come to my attention. It set out, very strong and well armed, to march for the lands of the Bituriges. But when this force reached the east bank of the Liger, it sat down and didn't cross. After waiting several days, it marched home again. Litaviccus has just left me after coming to explain why the Bituriges were left unassisted. Cathbad, he said, had sent a warning that it was all a plot between the Bituriges and the Arverni, that the moment the Aeduan army crossed the Liger, both the Bituriges and the Arverni would fall on it.

  All too pat, Caesar, though why I think this I don't know. My colleagues agree with me, especially Quintus Cicero, who seems to have a little warning voice about such things.

  You will decide what to do, and it may be that we won't know what you plan until we actually see you. For I refuse to believe that a pack of Gauls, with or without the Aedui, will keep you from
joining us when you're ready to join us. But be assured that we will be ready to leap into action at any moment from today until the summer. Pleading a suddenly unsanitary camp site, Fabius has picked himself and his two legions up and moved to a new camp site not far from Bibracte, on the Icauna near its sources, in case you need to know. The Aedui seemed pleased enough at this change, but who knows? I have become an Aeduan skeptic.

  If you send news or troops or come yourself to Agedincum, be advised that all of us here would rather you skirted the lands of the Aedui. Genava to Vesontio, thence through the lands of the Lingones to Agedincum. That's the way we've routed our messages. I am very glad we have Quintus Cicero. His experience with the Nervii has rendered him invaluable.

  Labienus sends word that he will hold himself and his two legions where he is until he hears from you. He too has moved, and is billeted outside the Remi oppidum of Bibrax. There doesn't seem to be any doubt that the main thrust of this insurrection will come from the Celtae of central Gaul, so we decided that we had best be situated within easy striking distance. The Belgae, Commius or no, have ceased to be a force to be reckoned with.

  There was silence in the room when Caesar finished reading this communication aloud. Some of it they knew from Trebonius's first letter, but this one provided definite information.