Satisfied, Maximinus took the ladder up to the higher levels. Above the ground there were three floors. The first was where the second wave of assault troops would assemble. The front of the next comprised the boarding bridge, which would be let down to release the forlorn hope onto the wall. Few of those initial attackers would expect to survive. If they did, they would be rich for life. If not, their dependents would never want. The top level was open to the sky. This would be filled with archers, shooting down to clear the defenders from the wallwalk.
The upright timbers and the planking of the floors were fir and pine; lighter than the base, but still solid. All military precedents argued that the walls should have been constructed of the same materials. The shortage of wood – the willows that lined the Natiso were deemed unsuitable – and the pressure of time, had prompted the engineers into ingenuity. Apart from the bracing beams, the sides of the towers were wattles of reeds coated in wet clay from the river. On the outside were hung sacks of hide, stuffed with more reeds and grass. The latter had been soaked in vinegar and water to retard fire. The relatively flimsy walls did not perturb Maximinus. There were no stone-throwing engines inside Aquileia, and the lightness of the sides would allow the City Takers to advance faster than the normal glacial pace. It was a pity that some of the troops had had to give up their tents to make enough sacks, but the weather had improved, and serving under the standards had always been hard.
From the god-like height of the machine, Maximinus surveyed the field. The siege towers were aimed at the same places that the rams had attacked. The one on which Maximinus stood would advance down the road against the northern gate. To the left, beyond the aqueduct, the other two would make for the two sections of hastily repaired wall.
Time was of the essence. There was no reason for further delay.
‘To your positions,’ Maximinus called down over the side of the tower.
It amused him to see the imperial entourage have to move out of the way. The great officers and dignitaries – Flavius Vopiscus, Julius Capitolinus, Marius Perpetuus, Consul Ordinarius the previous year, even the unnaturally calm Praetorian Prefect Anullinus – all had to step sharp to avoid the legionaries rushing to their places under the gaze of their Emperor.
While some men would push directly against the axles and the base, more took up station behind the tower. Anchors had been thrown out in front, and great cables ran back through the structure to winches and pulleys at the rear. The soldiers operating them would be sheltered by mobile screens when the City Takers finally edged into bowshot of the walls.
‘Advance.’
A deep groan issued from the tower as the pressure built. A tremor ran through it, like a mild earthquake. For a moment Maximinus wondered if the entire thing would collapse. It would be a strange way to die. Like everything, it was in the lap of the gods.
Squealing and complaining, the tower shifted slightly. Of course it was sound.
Maximinus looked beyond the aqueduct at the other two towers. Surely nothing on earth could withstand such power. This sight would bring any rebel back to heel. Only an occasional messenger now reached the imperial headquarters, but what news had come from the provinces was not good. In the west, both Gallia Narbonnensis and Lugdunensis had renounced their allegiance. Across the Alps to the east, Dalmatia, Thrace, and Dacia had also turned traitor. They posed no significant military threat. Only Dacia contained any legions. Maximinus could order expeditions from the forces along the Rhine and Danube to crush them. Yet to do so would leave the frontiers dangerously exposed to barbarian incursions. Unconfirmed rumours claimed that the Goths had sacked Istria in Moesia Inferior. There lay the difference between Maximinus and those who opposed him. Unlike the insurgents, Maximinus would never countenance inviting a barbarian like Cniva into the empire. To act thus would be a betrayal of everything for which he fought. No true Emperor, no true Roman, would put personal advantage above the good of the Res Publica.
The provinces could be dealt with swiftly enough when Aquileia fell. It was four hundred paces to the walls. The towers would advance at some fifty paces a day. Eight days until the boarding bridges crashed down and the storming parties went in. If they were repulsed, the rams should breach the walls in another two or three days. Eleven days at most until the town was taken. With the fall of Aquileia, even the most stubborn revolutionary must realize that their cause had no hope. The rebellion would collapse.
The sun was warm on Maximinus’ face. Thank the gods the rain had stopped days ago. The ground had dried out, and now there was no danger that their wheels would sink into the earth under the weight of the towers. The only worry in Maximinus’ mind was the commissariat.
The ration of sour wine had been halved to one pint a day to provide enough vinegar to soak the coverings of the towers, and there had been no fresh bread or meat for days. Veterans did not mind hard tack and bacon, but they would have missed the wine. With grain unobtainable, now the amount of biscuit issued must be cut to just two pounds a day. The men would go hungry, but it would not be for long. Eleven days, and they could all feast on the plunder of Aquileia.
The supplies brought an unpleasant duty to mind. Maximinus climbed down, the rungs of the ladders creaking under his bulk. The tower had stopped moving. To avoid exhaustion, the men hauling on the ropes had to be relieved regularly.
‘Barbius.’
The young tribune saluted.
‘Double the night guard; twenty men at each siege tower. Have them keep a good watch on the walls of the town. There are only civilians in there, they would not dare try anything in daylight, but they might attempt a sally in the dark.’
‘We will do what is ordered, and at every command we will be ready.’
Against all the odds, Barbius had survived the failed attack on the docks. Maximinus thought that he might be favoured by the gods.
‘Is the punishment parade drawn up?’
Julius Capitolinus stepped forward. ‘Emperor, may I appeal to your clemency? In military law only desertion, mutiny, or insubordination make a soldier liable for the death penalty. Even then consideration is given to length of service, previous conduct, and conditions in the field. The soldier is guilty of theft, but he has been with the standards for ten years, and food is scarce. May I request that you commute the sentence to a flogging?’
Of course an officer should intercede for his men – the soldier was from Capitolinus’ 2nd Legion – but Maximinus did not care to be lectured on the ways of the army.
‘Times are hard, disciplina must not be compromised.’
‘Emperor, the man fought under you in Germania and out on the Steppe.’
Maximinus took his time – Paulina would have been proud – and considered what he knew of the commander of 2nd legion Parthica.
‘Capitolinus, is it true that you are writing my biography?’
The Prefect looked taken aback, but rallied quickly. ‘Emperor, that would be presumptuous, beyond my limited powers. It is true I have been collecting material for lives of the Caesars, but had thought it best to end with the reign of the divine Caracalla.’
Capitolinus was no fool; safer by far to stick to earlier reigns. Maximinus knew the Prefect was lying. Volo’s frumentarii provided thorough reports. Anyway, it mattered little what people would say after his death. Maximinus had always acted in the interests of Rome. The gods willing, posterity would judge him correctly.
‘Emperor, may I urge you to accede to the request of Julius Capitolinus? The troops may take it badly.’
Maximinus turned to Flavius Vopiscus. Had the Roman army degenerated into some sort of martial democracy? Before he could frame a reply, the Praetorian Prefect intervened.
‘The Emperor acts on my recommendation.’ Anullinus made no attempt to disguise the implicit threat. ‘Are you questioning an imperial order?’
‘Never. We will do what is ordered, and at every command we will be ready.’ Vopiscus’ hand went to where an amulet hung under his cuira
ss. ‘It is our duty to say what we believe is best for the Res Publica, and give our open and honest opinion to the Emperor. Not all of us have sunk into sycophancy.’
Evidently there was no love lost between Vopiscus and Anullinus. Some intervention was necessary to defuse the imminent confrontation.
‘No need for harsh words.’ The role of mediator did not come naturally to Maximinus. He searched for something to say. ‘For many years I served in the ranks. No Senator or equestrian could know the mood of the troops as I do.’
‘You are right, Emperor,’ Vopiscus said.
Anullinus saluted, but his baleful eyes remained fixed on Vopiscus.
Tiberius had been wrong. Being Emperor was not to hold a wolf by the ears, but to keep a pack of the beasts from each other’s throats. Maximinus thought of the wolf in Emona. One by one he had broken her legs, then cut her throat.
‘To the parade ground.’
Maximinus ascended the tribunal, and settled himself on one ivory throne. His son took the other. The senior commanders stood at their backs, the standards were arrayed above.
The prisoner was brought out into the square formed by the troops. His tunic was unbelted, and his feet bare. Yet he bore himself like a soldier.
Sometimes, Maximinus thought, an individual has to suffer for the good of all.
‘Behold a thief who would steal food from his brothers.’ The herald had a powerful voice. ‘Let no man think to do the same. By order of the most noble Imperator Gaius Iulius Verus Maximinus Augustus, and the most noble Caesar Gaius Iulius Verus Maximus, let the sentence be enacted.’
When the executioners seized him, the soldier’s resolution gave. He struggled as they dragged him to the cross, forced him down. When the nails were hammered through his flesh, he screamed.
Maximinus regarded the victim without emotion. Beside him, Verus Maximus was smiling. His son was developing a taste for executions.
The cross was raised, dropped into its base, made fast. The soldier was beyond making much noise.
Maximinus had been merciful. The executioners knew their craft. A man could survive for hours, or even days, on the cross. Maximinus had told them to place the nails so the end would not be too prolonged.
There was no interest in watching a man die.
Maximinus took a coin from the wallet on his belt. DIVA PAULINA. The hooked nose, the jutting chin; more and more looking at his dead wife was like looking at himself.
CHAPTER 28
Aquileia, Five Days after the Ides of May, AD238
‘You do not have to do this,’ Crispinus said.
‘It was my idea. It is my duty.’ All true enough, but Menophilus wished it was not.
‘May the gods hold their hands over you.’ Crispinus’ prayer was sincere.
Menophilus embraced Crispinus – for the last time? – and nodded for them to open the little postern gate that led down to the river.
Crispinus raised a hand in blessing or valediction.
Outside the night was horribly bright. There was cloud cover, but the moon was near full. It backlit the big, high clouds silver. When there was a gap, it cast a white light on the landscape, near as bright as day. There could be no postponement. By the time the moon was waning, the fate of Aquileia would be decided.
Menophilus led the men down to the water.
The bank of the Natiso was a little higher than a man, sloping at some thirty degrees. It was bare of trees, but provided a modicum of concealment.
There was no outcry.
Menophilus waited. The smell of the river was strong in his nostrils: mud, the mulch of last year’s fallen leaves, rubbish carried down from the northern camp of the enemy.
Soon the twelve men in the party were in position. They were all soldiers, every one a volunteer. Mindful of how soldiers talked, of the dangers of betrayal, Menophilus had not told them the nature of the hazardous duty until a few moments earlier. The 1st Cohort Ulpia Galatarum had a proud record. They had taken the news well. It was quite likely that none of them would return.
Six men, including Menophilus himself, carried nothing but their swords and a shuttered lantern. The other six had the amphorae in packs strapped to their backs. There was no doubt which group thought they had the more dangerous task. All had blackened their mailcoats, and wore dark clothes. They had tied black rags around their helmets and boots, and rubbed mud into their faces, forearms and hands. Menophilus had personally inspected that everyone had removed every ornament from their sword-belts.
The breeze was picking up. It soughed through the grass and reeds.
Menophilus peered north, up the river. Before the siege, he had had the poplars and willows cut down for almost two hundred paces to prevent the attackers using them as cover. The irony was not lost on him. His old tutor had insisted that a man with a philosophical education had an advantage over the majority of mankind. While the philosopher had considered all circumstances beforehand, everything came as a surprise to others. That might hold true in the lecture theatre, less so in a hard-pressed siege.
Menophilus touched the man behind him on the shoulder, and set off.
Lantern in his right hand, Menophilus used his left to grasp the vegetation and the roots and stumps of trees along the bank. His feet kept sliding in the mud. The muscle in his left calf was still tight; with luck it would last the night.
The gurgle and lap of the river, and the sigh of the wind, were overlaid by squelching, skidding footsteps, laboured breathing, and sudden grunts when a man’s boot slipped. Noise carried at night. It seemed enough to wake the dead.
No choice but to see this to the end.
A clatter of wings, right under Menophilus’ boots, as a duck took flight.
‘Steady.’ Menophilus just stopped himself speaking out loud.
The duck whirred away across the dark land.
Heart thumping in his chest, Menophilus slithered along the greasy incline.
The world narrowed; three paces of muddy bank, the black water, the silver clouds overhead. On and on, painfully slow, like the souls of the damned condemned to some punishment with no hope of release.
A clink of metal on metal.
Menophilus froze. The men behind bumped to a halt.
There it was again.
Menophilus held his breath.
The silhouette of a figure walking towards them down the opposite bank.
Who in Hades would be abroad in the dead of night?
Unhurriedly, looking neither left nor right, but at his feet, the man passed by downriver.
A man, a daemon, the unquiet soul of one of the unburied?
Whatever the nature of the nocturnal walker, he was gone.
Menophilus pulled himself together. Distances were hard to judge at night. Perhaps they were more than halfway to the inviting, if illusory, safety of the black tunnel where the willows still bent down over the stream. Again, he tapped the man next in line on the shoulder, and moved on.
He had gone no great distance when something snagged his foot. He stumbled, and half fell. Better spaced than before, the men behind came to a halt this time with no fuss. Putting down the lantern, Menophilus sought with both hands along the ground to find what had tripped him. A line, another, both tied to pegs, and leading off into the water: a fishing trap. That might explain the solitary figure walking the other bank.
Pulling the pegs out of the earth, he let the lines disappear into the water. He set off again, now even more slowly, trying to detect further obstructions.
Perhaps the scouring of the land before the besieging army arrived was paying dividends. If soldiers were reduced to fishing between the siege lines, it could be that Maximinus was running short of supplies. Whether that was the case or not, this was evidence of poor discipline. The river downstream of the camp was foul with the filth and excreta of several thousand men. It was no place to let men draw water or catch fish. Since Troy, disease had haunted armies camped for any time before the walls of a town.
It was gratifyingly dark under the hanging branches of the willows. In the enclosed space the quality of the sound changed: the river louder, their own passage quieter. Menophilus somehow felt safer, as if the deity of that sylvan place stood beside them.
By his earlier, careful calculations, they needed to creep another fifty paces upstream. Lips moving, but silent, he began to count: ten, twenty. His paces were shorter than walking on good going. Fifty, sixty.
At seventy, he raised his arm to halt the column.
Not a word had been spoken since they had left the town. The men were well briefed. Now they sank down, and arranged themselves in what cover was available. Like the duck downstream, you would almost have to tread on them before you knew they were there.
Paccius, the Optio, came up from the rear to join Menophilus. Together they wormed their way to the top of the bank, and parted the grass to take their bearings.
The clouds had thickened while they were under the trees. Perhaps the gods really were with them.
Off to the right, all too close across the darkling plain, stretched the low, black mass of Maximinus’ northern camp. There would be sentries on the rampart, but repeated nights of observation had revealed that they never carried torches.
Ahead, and a little to the left, the tall shapes of the two siege towers could be made out. The nearest was no more than a hundred paces. The third was obscured by the arches of the aqueduct. Here too no lights showed, but for the last three mornings, at the dawn changing of their guard, Menophilus had counted the twenty guards stationed to the front of each tower.
Away to the left moving halos of yellow light showed where the guards on the walls of Aquileia made their rounds. It was hard not to think of the men snug behind those defences. It had taken so long to get here; best not to dwell that safety lay a few moments’ hard running to the south.
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