The Conqueror

by Bryan Litfin

  But despite the great victory, the emperor allowed himself no time to rest. That night, as the field camp rang with the songs of his celebrating men, an aide arrived at the commander’s tent to announce a visitor. “There’s a centurion here who says you’ll want to meet with him, sir.”

  “Can’t you see I’m busy? I’m writing up terms of surrender for Mediolanum. Once they hear about today, they’re going to fold, no question.”

  “I know, sir. I’m sorry to be a bother. He insists on seeing you. He’s a defector from the other side, but he knows all the right watchwords.”

  “Who is it?”

  “He says his name is Aratus.”

  “Ah! My Roman spy! Send him right in.”

  Moments later, the tent flap opened again. The battle-hardened Greek speculator looked just as tough as the day he was commissioned. With him were the two Germanic spies, Rex and Geta, now shorn of their long barbarian locks. According to Aratus, the fourth man, Hierax, had been injured and could not complete the mission.

  “What news of my enemy?” Constantine asked.

  “Maxentius has remained in Rome and seems prepared to withstand a siege like he did twice before. The northern campaign is being waged by Ruricius Pompeianus. He’s well entrenched in Verona and Aquileia, with a large body of troops in both places. He has some new Italian levies and the African legions, along with the Second Parthica, the Praetorians, and the Emperor’s Personal Cavalry.” Aratus pointed to his two protégés. “These men have won appointments into the imperial horse guard, so they have learned much about its tactics.”

  “Well done! That is important information. Some people say the old Batavi are weaklings nowadays, but I know better.”

  “They’re good fighters, my lord,” said the speculator named Rex, “but I know you can take them.”

  “We shall see,” Constantine mused. “I suppose you’ve deserted from their ranks to come here?”

  “It wasn’t hard. When the Maxentian lines broke today, the three of us bolted for the woods. After we met up at a rendezvous point, we came straight to your camp and hailed the sentries with the passwords.”

  “Very good work, men.” Constantine rose from his field chair and pulled an amphora from a cabinet. “Take this wine as an expression of my gratitude and go celebrate. Centurion Aratus, I’ll want a full intelligence report from you within three days. Then stay near me at all times in case I need to consult you.”

  Aratus put his fist to his shoulder and bowed. “I’ll have the report delivered to you in two days, sir! And what of Rex and Geta?”

  Constantine approached the two men. Though still young—perhaps not even into their twenties yet—they were tall, handsome, and self-assured. He put out his hand and gripped Rex’s upper arm. The feel of it was not like flesh, but marble. Constantine was impressed.

  “You know about the so-called oven men?” he asked.

  Rex nodded right away. “Of course, Your Highness. Fully armored heavy riders. Their horses are clad in scale and chamfrons. They carry no shields. Their weapon is the two-handed lance. Devastating against infantry, and always disruptive against cavalry.”

  “Can you fight like that?”

  Rex and Geta exchanged excited glances. “Definitely, sir,” Rex replied, unable to suppress a smile.

  “Good. I need some oven men of my own. Strip the dead of their armor and find suits that fit you both. You’re back in the service of the true Augustus of the West.”

  “We never left it, my lord,” Geta said with a bow.

  “Are we headed straight to Rome?”

  Constantine grinned at Rex’s question. “One thing at a time, my eager young speculator. You have two tasks to accomplish beforehand.”

  “What are they, sir?” Rex asked.

  “The first is to enjoy that amphora of wine. You earned it through some excellent Roman espionage.”

  “We will. And the second?”

  Constantine turned and snatched a clay pitcher from a stand. He smashed it against the wooden edge in a spray of water and shards, then held up the broken handle before his three startled men.

  “We’re headed to Verona,” he declared with a stern gaze, “and there we shall shatter the army of Ruricius Pompeianus.”

  JUNE 312

  With Segusio and Taurinorum defeated, Mediolanum capitulated just as Emperor Constantine had predicted. Though the negotiations took several weeks, the delay presented no strategic problem, for it gave the men ample time to rest and resupply. Yet Rex couldn’t help but feel impatient, for he didn’t need to relax. Unlike the rest of the army, he hadn’t marched down from the German frontier, nor crossed the Alps, nor fought in any battles. As time wore on, he grew more anxious for some action.

  Yet at least it wasn’t all boring: he and Geta were occasionally sent on scouting forays toward Verona. A few times they encountered detachments of Pompeianus’s troops from a distance, though they always managed to stay back and avoid capture. Now Rex believed he had a good feel for the terrain around that formidable city. It was locked up tight, and Pompeianus was lodged inside like a bear sleeping in his den.

  Of course, the fact that Pompeianus was in Verona meant the pressure on Flavia in Rome would be eased. Was that an answer to her Christian prayers? Rex had to admit, it was remarkably coincidental. The same day that she and Bishop Miltiades prayed for relief from Pompeianus, Emperor Maxentius received some kind of divine omen telling him to stay put in the city. Therefore he decided to send his favorite general to defend northern Italy from invasion. For the time being, Flavia was safe from Pompeianus’s murderous intent, since the prefect had his hands full preparing Verona for a siege. Maybe Jesus was a more powerful god than Rex first thought.

  It was the Ides of June when the army finally moved out from Mediolanum. They took the Gallican Highway to Brixia, where they ran into a cavalry contingent that quickly fled at the first charge. Rex was somewhat disappointed not to see action in that engagement. Though Constantine was grateful for the advance warning about the nearby troops, Rex had wanted to do battle against an enemy. But for now, all they would do was run away.

  The city of Verona lay at the end of the Gallican Highway where it joined the Postumian Way. It was strategically located in a large bend of the Athesis River, so only its western side could be approached by land. Constantine drew up his army there, effectively sealing off this western entry point. In every other direction, however, the swift, rocky, and deep Athesis protected the city from invasion.

  A bridge carried the Postumian Way across the river toward the east, and beside it was a second span of white stone called the Marble Bridge. The twin bridges were guarded by a strong surrounding wall at their far ends, as well as a natural hill at that spot. Until Constantine had total control of Verona, the eastern side of the river and all its connecting roads belonged to Pompeianus. That meant resupply of the city and armed reinforcements could easily come from that direction. The first order of business, then, was to traverse the Athesis and set an army across those eastern roads, creating a complete encirclement—but the only nearby bridges were the two inside the city’s fortifications. Another crossing point would have to be found for the troops.

  While the regulars helped the engineers set up the siegeworks, Aratus gathered a squad of scouts in a tent at the edge of camp. A map on the table displayed the full length of the Athesis. “I want those of you going downstream to be on the lookout for a pair of matching docks,” he said. “If the locals have a good spot for a ferry, we might be able to get an army across on rafts.” He turned to Rex and Geta. “You two take your men upstream into the mountains. The river might narrow or get shallow for a time. I doubt there’s a ford we can wade, but our boys can swim their horses across if the flow isn’t too swift for too long.”

  The next morning, a party of ten scouts with Geta in the lead followed the Athesis upstream into a long, narrow valley with mountains on either side. The main highway between Verona and the Alps, the Vi
a Claudia Augusta, was visible on the far bank—tantalizingly close, if only a decent crossing could be found.

  “What about that gravel spit up there?” Rex asked as he reined up next to Geta. “It sticks halfway into the river. We’d only be submerged a few moments.”

  “There are rapids beside it. They would be tough to negotiate.”

  “Yeah, but look closely. Those rapids are mostly caused by that one boulder and all the brush that’s snagged against it.”

  “You think we could clear it?”

  “We should at least try.”

  In short order, the men roped their horses to the larger logs that had created the snag. It only took a few pulls to make a big difference. Then, once the branches were cleared, the horses dislodged the boulder with a tree-trunk pry bar, enough to sink it. The whitewater at the surface immediately dissipated.

  “You think it’s swimmable now?” Geta asked.

  Rex grinned. “Let’s find out.”

  The two men prompted their horses into the swift Athesis. Their strong Celtic ponies walked into the current as far as they could. As soon as their hooves left the bottom, Rex and Geta slid into the water on the upstream side. They clung to the mane with one hand and guided their mounts with the other. Once the horses touched the gravel bottom again, the riders were back astride. They came up out of the Athesis like fierce hippocampi, secure in the saddle and ready for war.

  Geta whooped as he emerged onto the far bank. “I’m ready to take on Pompeianus myself!” he exclaimed.

  Rex pointed south on the wide, smooth surface of the Via Claudia Augusta. “Good, because he’s just a few miles that way. But first let’s go back and give our emperor the news. He probably ought to send a few more troops with us before we take on Verona.”

  Over the next week, twenty thousand soldiers forded the stream, each carrying enough supplies and rations to sustain him for a month. The troops proceeded down the highway and promptly encircled the twin bridgeheads that lay behind Verona’s walls. Now the city was invested on all sides.

  With this development, the two armies fell into a pattern of watching and waiting. Not even taunts were exchanged, much less arrows or stones—just a kind of dreadful silence and brooding anticipation.

  Then, three days before the Kalends of July, around sunset, the eastern gate burst open and a sortie exploded onto the Postumian Way. The besiegers were caught unaware as they cooked their evening meal. The clash was brief, consisting mostly of javelins and arrows rather than swords or lances. Since the Constantinian forces were clustered so densely around the gate, the attackers were forced back inside by the hail of missiles. But just when the sortie seemed to be rebuffed, a smaller group made another attempt under heavy cover from archers on the walls. Rex killed one of them, but in return he caught an arrow in his chainmail sleeve that left a gash on his left bicep. Unfortunately, most of the sally got away in the chaos.

  “No matter,” Geta said after things had settled again. “It was what? A hundred? That’s a hundred fewer to defend the walls.”

  “Our guys are saying that Pompeianus was among those who broke through.”

  “Hmm. That’s not good. If he returns with the legions from Aquileia,

  we’ll have to abandon the siege on this side of the river to face them.”

  Rex puffed his cheeks and blew out a breath. “I hope not,” he muttered with a little shake of his head. “The garrison would empty from Verona too, and we’d be under attack before and behind.”

  “Yeah. Squeezed like a pair of pliers. Certain death.”

  “Nothing is certain in war.”

  Another week of boredom passed. The men ate their porridge and kept watch on Verona’s silent walls. But at dawn on the eighth day after the breakout, a scout galloped into the eastern camp with urgent news. He rode straight to the emperor’s tent, and within an hour everyone was preparing for battle. Pompeianus was approaching across the Venetian plains at the head of a mighty column. It was rumored to be thirty thousand strong. The Aquileian legions had been summoned to break the siege of Verona.

  By late afternoon, the rumble of countless hooves could be heard reverberating through the earth itself. Rex and Geta had donned the oven-man armor they had scavenged at Taurinorum. In addition to his chainmail shirt, Rex’s arms and legs were now protected with overlapping bands of iron that flexed as he moved. Even his warhorse, a gray Andalusian stallion, wore armor: a coat of scale hung below its abdomen, and a bronze chamfron left only its eyes and nostrils exposed. Rex could see how such an array would give the heavy cavalry a feeling of invincibility.

  The only thing he was unsure about was his helmet. He had chosen one that covered his face with a steel plate adorned with a scary expression. All the oven men similarly armored themselves from head to toe, for it was part of their strategy to charge into a hail of missiles without concern. But Rex was unaccustomed to wearing a helmet that gave him sight through two small eyeholes and breath only through the faceplate’s downturned scowl. It felt limiting and constrictive. And he quickly discovered that the nickname for such troopers was exactly right: it really was as hot as an oven inside this thing. Nevertheless, if Constantine wanted Rex to be an oven man, that is exactly what he would be.

  Pompeianus arrayed his soldiers on the far side of a grassy meadow east of Verona. A sunset glow cast a red sheen across a battlefield that was about to grow even redder with the blood of fallen men. As General Vitruvius formed up his own lines, he put Rex and the other oven men in the center. Unfortunately, Rex could see right away that the enemy’s front was longer. Constantine must have seen it too, for he rode up to Vitruvius, accompanied by the standard bearer who carried the labarum. “Stretch us out so they don’t outflank us,” he ordered. “We’ll have to sacrifice depth for length.”

  “We could lift the siege and use those troops to lengthen the line,” Vitruvius suggested.

  “No! That would leave us vulnerable to a rear attack from the city. We’ve got to divide our forces. I understand it thins us out, but I believe even one rank of our brave men can turn back a charge.”

  “It’s hard for a single line to withstand a direct assault by heavy cavalry,” Vitruvius observed. “The textbooks consider that foolhardy.”

  “Our boys can do it! They’re rested and well fed. The enemy has been on quick march for several days. It’s late in the day now, so no doubt they’re tired and thirsty. And the sun will be in their eyes. If we engage them tonight, our lines will hold no matter how thin they may be. This is the day we break Pompeianus.”

  “Are you sure, Your Majesty?”

  Constantine pointed to the labarum fluttering in the breeze above him. “Yes. The Rider on a White Horse goes before us. Prepare your men.”

  Vitruvius saluted, then turned and gave the order to redeploy into a single line with the oven men still in the center. Rex tightened his helmet with the faceplate, wishing the armorer had designed it with bigger eyeholes and a wider scowl. But nothing could be done about that now. It was time to fight or die. He reached out and knocked his lance against Geta’s. “Brothers always,” he said.

  “To the death!” came the muffled reply, then the cavalry started to move.

  The troopers trotted across the meadow at first, but when they reached the quarter mark, the oven men rose to a canter, and the ends of the line sped up to stay in formation. From across the field, the enemy battle cry was now a monstrous roar, echoed by the angry shouts from the long, thin line of Constantinian riders. The high-pitched whistle of flying slingstones added their deadly whine to the din. Arrows sliced the air alongside the stones, and even a few javelins arced across the field. But the body armor did its job, and the cavalry moved up to a gallop.

  Hooves pounded the earth and churned up clods of dirt. The low sun at Rex’s back bronzed the faces of the oncoming troops. He could see them now, snarling and gnashing in their furious bloodlust. And then, like two wolves leaping at each other’s throats, the lines engaged.
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  The colossal impact nearly knocked Rex from his horse. The sound of it was like a thousand blacksmiths hammering their anvils at once. Only by squeezing his thighs in a fierce grip against the flanks of his mount did he keep his place in the saddle.

  Yet as the cavalry surged ahead, Rex found that his two-handed lance, impelled by the speed of his charge and the sheer weight of horse and iron, couldn’t be stopped by the pitiful armor of his foes. He was mighty, invincible—a god! Not by human hands did he fight, but by the divine strength of Hercules Victorious. The Constantinian line ripped into the three-deep enemy front and came hurtling out the other side. Rex’s spear had impaled two men at once. He cast it aside with its skewered corpses and drew his spatha as footmen ran to engage him.

  The maelstrom where the two armies clashed now became a monstrous snake pit of roiling, writhing, death-dealing fiends. Here the real world disappeared; only violence existed. Every sound faded but the clang of murderous arms and the screams of anguished souls leaving the body. Rex hacked and chopped at the men who attacked him right and left. Their blades glanced off his plated legs, and in return he shoved his steel down their throats. When enemies rose up in front, he spurred ahead and mowed them down under the sharp hooves of his Andalusian steed. Many soldiers fell beneath his onslaught.

  A trumpet call rang out across the battlefield, the signal to rally at the imperial standard. Rex had managed to break free from the melee, so he was able to wheel his horse toward the banner. At first he couldn’t believe what he saw; yet there it was, unmistakable even in the twilight. Constantine had entered the fight, resplendent in his golden armor as he fought beneath the labarum. And a horde of enemy troops was converging upon him.

  Somehow Rex’s exhausted horse found the strength to gallop toward the emperor. All the cavalrymen were hurrying to protect their lord. Yet the enemy was growing thick around him too, attracted like moths to a torch. A hail of leaden darts rained down on Constantine’s defenders as the Maxentians sought to end the battle by slaying the opposing commander. He was no doubt a great warrior. Even so, it was a foolish choice on Constantine’s part to join the fray; for without his charismatic personality and confident leadership, his troops would be utterly demoralized.