Soldier of Rome: The Centurion (The Artorian Chronicles)

by James Mace

  The Centurion walked quickly over to the niche that held the large bust. It was made of a hollow ceramic; still highly ornate, though far more affordable than marble. It was also more fragile. Flavia held Gaia close as her husband raised his sword and pressed the point underneath the goddess’ chin. A wicked sneer then crossed his face, and with an unholy howl of rage he swung the sword, which smashed through the bust and shattered it with a loud crash. He then lunged towards the full-body statue of Victoria and with a backhand swing smashed it in two at the torso. The upper portion flew apart as it crashed onto the floor. Flavia released her daughter and fell to her knees, holding her hands up to her face as Justus committed one terrible sacrilege after another. The smashing of ceramic echoed throughout the hall, with Justus’ howls of anguish terrifying the household slaves.

  As he strode towards the final statue, one of Apollo, Gaia rushed forward and came between her father and the god. Though just nine years old and half Justus’ size, she managed to stay his hand with a simple touch on his wrist. He gasped and hyperventilated as he hung his head, sweat dripping from his brow. Gaia effortlessly took the gladius from his hand. At first Justus thought his daughter was shamed by his conduct, but then he saw the cold determination in her eyes. She dropped the sword, turned and picked up the statue, and with an affirmative nod from her father, she gave her own cry of rage and smashed it onto the tile floor. As she met his gaze, Gaia’s eyes flooded with tears as the pain of her brother’s death overcame her. Justus grabbed her and held her close as both of them let their grief overwhelm them, his deeply cut left hand smearing blood all over the back of her stola. Flavia stumbled to her feet and limped over to her husband and daughter. All three clung to each other as they collapsed onto the floor against the wall. Justus uttered blasphemies under his breath, damning the pantheon of gods who had taken his beloved son from him. It was then that he swore he would rather be damned to the fires of hell than pay tribute to such abominations.

  “I hate formalities,” Artorius grumbled as he passed some documents over to Metellus, “but at least this makes everything official. This one confirms that you are a citizen of Rome by adoption, and that your name is now Metellus Artorius Posthumous. I felt the cognomen appropriate as it still gives a sense of bonding to your biological father, my dear brother.” Artorius sighed deeply, looking away for a second.

  Metellus sat quietly, reading through the official-sounding certificate of adoption. There were two other documents that Artorius was quick to explain.

  “This one is your discharge from the auxilia. The other is your enlistment into the legions. You can either enlist or find yourself a job. Though the circumstances are quite unusual, Master Centurion Calvinus was able to get your auxiliary service credited towards your service obligation to the legions. He’s also waived the requirement for you to go through recruit training. His argument was that anyone awarded the Civic Crown had proven their valor and worth.”

  Metellus smiled in reply.

  “Where will I be assigned, sir?”

  “The Sixth Cohort. I know the Pilus Prior, Centurion Agricola, pretty well. He took command of the Sixth right before the Sacrovir Revolt. He was the one who alerted us to Sacrovir’s intent to encase his vanguard in plate armor, thereby allowing us to come up with a plan to counter the threat.”

  “I heard about that,” Metellus replied. “You used your entrenching pickaxes to burst through their armor.”

  “Well, theirs was not the best crafted armor; it was bulky and extremely heavy.”

  “Still, you thrashed them so soundly that not even a whisper of rebellion has been uttered in all of Gaul,” the legionary added.

  “For now,” Artorius conceded. “There will always be those who seek to undermine the Empire and would see all that we have worked for undone. Still, at least it ensures that our profession will never cease to be a necessity. To be honest, I felt kind of bad for the Gauls. All they really wanted was to be recognized as equals within the Empire. If the damned Senate had just allowed Gauls of equal status senatorial membership, the whole rebellion could have been avoided.”

  “No love for the Senate from you then,” Metellus mused.

  “Not when a number of them were friends of my predecessor and would love nothing more than to make a lethal example of me,” the Centurion agreed. “Besides, from what I’ve seen, most of the Senate is fucking useless. There are a few who have made excellent legion commanders, but they are a minute portion of the senatorial class. The rest cannot make up their minds about anything! Their egos lead to pointless wars and we have to clean up their mess!

  “I look back on one particular rebel whom I killed with my pickaxe. He was little more than a boy and of no threat to us. What was the point of his death? I blame the selfishness of the Senate as much as I blame Sacrovir. The reign of terror that the remnants of the rebellion wrought in Lugdunum stemmed from this. So many people died such violent deaths, and I cannot help but think that many of them did not have to.”

  “Not a pacifist are you, sir?” Metellus asked, causing Artorius to laugh.

  It must have seemed baffling that one of the most well-known Centurions within the Twentieth Legion was speaking out against war.

  “Not at all,” Artorius replied. “The wars against the Germanic Alliance were totally justified, and I regret nothing that we did. I took no pleasure in much of the killing, particularly that of their women and children. Much of it still haunts me; however, it was a brutal necessity. I believe in wars of conquest and of retribution. What I do not support are wars of convenience, started by fat aristocrats who avoid the fighting and dirty work. Of course, when we joined the legions we gave up our right to pick and choose where we fight. We don’t have to like it, but we have to show up and do our duty.”

  “Kind of like our war against the Frisians,” Metellus observed, bringing a hard glare from Artorius, which made the young legionary nervous. “My apologies, sir.”

  “No, you are right,” Artorius replied, shaking his head. “When we destroyed the rebellion of Sacrovir and Florus, our losses were minimal. No one questioned why they had rebelled, we just accepted that they had and our punishments were just. Against the Frisians we have paid a terrible price, and the Senate has betrayed the memories of those slain by dismissing the war as a simple misunderstanding. They only begrudgingly acknowledged Tribune Cursor’s awarding of the Grass Crown, yet they will grant him no further accolades or recognition. It’s as if what we went through never happened.”

  “That’s easy for them to believe,” Metellus growled, his own horrible memories of Braduhenna gnawing at him. “Those bastards did not see the carnage and pain.”

  The two years since becoming Procurator of Judea had been a challenge for Pontius Pilate. The Jews were by far the most fickle, difficult, and unpleasant people he had ever dealt with. How Herod Agrippa had maintained such a lifelong friendship with the Emperor baffled him. Still, it was this friendship that made Pilate’s life a misery at times, for Tiberius was fond of Herod, and therefore, sympathetic to the wills of Herod’s people. Anytime a dispute arose between Pilate and the Sanhedrin, the Jewish elders would threaten to go to the Emperor and make their grievances directly to him. The fact that they made good on this threat a few times already had soured Pilate’s relations with them.

  “The Emperor expects me to maintain the peace, and yet he bows to the Jews at every perceived offence,” he vented as he pored over edicts and protocols requiring his attention.

  “The Jews are offended if a Roman, or any non-Jew for that matter, dares to breathe the same air as them,” his freedman clerk observed.

  Pilate snorted in reply.

  “They are an arrogant people, no doubt about that. It is only because Tiberius allows them to worship their one God that they think themselves better than those who rule them. I’ve tried to be patient with them, but every act I do seems to offend them, even when they benefit from it!”

  “You are speaking o
f the aqueduct?” the freedman asked.

  Pilate nodded. “I am. They wanted an aqueduct, and the city has benefited from it. But who did they expect to pay for it? Themselves? Hardly! Their temple has mountains of gold that they get in offerings to their strange deity. Well, if God is supposed to be there for them, then why wouldn’t He want His temple funds used to give His people fresh and ample water supply? But no! The second I ordered the temple to pay for the aqueduct the Sanhedrin were up in arms as if I had raped their mothers!”

  “Perhaps we should, since they’re going to complain anyway.”

  The freedman’s attempt at humor only soured Pilate’s mood, though he pretended not to hear.

  “Those damned auxiliaries are of no help either,” he ranted. “I’ve begged the Syrian Legate to, at least, attach a cohort of legionaries to Judea. He swears they are all needed in Syria, which hasn’t had a real crisis in decades! Of course, he promises to ‘clean up my mess’ should things go to shit here.”

  “Samaritan auxiliaries don’t make the most disciplined soldiers,” the clerk conceded. “Mostly they just bully the people while enforcing taxation…whether taxes are due or not!”

  “They don’t make us many friends,” Pilate added. “Bastards can’t follow orders either. When the Jews rebelled about the aqueduct, I specifically told them to disperse the crowd with batons and avoid unnecessary bloodshed. What do they do? They use their swords and kill a bunch of citizens instead!” Pilate then walked over to the window that overlooked the city. He was thankful that he spent most of his time in the port of Caesarea, rather than that stink hole, Jerusalem. He could not fathom what was so special and holy about that infernal place to the Jews.

  Just then the door was opened, and he smiled for the first time all day as Claudia walked in. His wife sensed what vexed him, and she placed an arm around his shoulders and kissed him on the cheek. The clerk bowed and left the room.

  “I feel alone, Claudia,” Pilate said as he breathed in the sea air on a gentle breeze. “Sejanus told me this would be a difficult task, but that if I succeeded here, only the gods could know what honors await me. It wouldn’t be such a hellish burden if that bastard Lamia would just give me some support!”

  “Lamia is stuck in Rome,” Claudia observed, “so what good can he do you?”

  “He is still Governor of Syria,” Pilate sighed. “Yet Tiberius does not trust him and will not let him leave Rome, so he cannot even see firsthand what is happening here. He adamantly refuses to send me even a single cohort of legionaries to assist me.”

  “Do you have any friends who could help?” his wife asked as she gently ran her fingers up and down his back.

  Pilate nodded, though there was no optimism in his expression.

  “The one man who would be willing to help is, unfortunately, in no position to do so.”

  “You mean Artorius,” Claudia observed, after a seconds thought.

  Pilate turned and looked his wife in the eye.

  “You know what happened to him then?” he asked.

  Claudia glanced at the floor and gave a sad nod.

  “I received a letter from Diana,” she replied. “It came with the imperial post, which I suspect is how you heard.”

  “Only the official reports which were scant at best. Sejanus added a few words, mentioning Artorius by name. No doubt he did this as a courtesy to me. After all, what does the whole of the Empire care about a thousand dead legionaries, as long as they won the battle?” There was bitterness in his voice and the expression on Claudia’s face told him that she knew better than to pursue the issue further.

  “What about Justus?” she asked after a minute’s pause. “He’s your friend, too, and he is just over the border in Syria.”

  Pilate gave a sad smile and shook his head.

  “You forget his outburst at our prenuptial feast where he grossly insulted Sejanus,” he replied.

  Claudia furrowed her brow.

  “They had a spat,” she observed. “But they had both been drinking and it could not have been that bad.”

  “When one says ‘fuck you’ to the Emperor’s right hand, it is usually not a good omen,” Pilate responded. “Justus is lucky to still hold his position as a Centurion in the Sixth Legion. Sejanus would have ruined him were he not my friend. No, though Justus would doubtless jump at the chance to help restore some dignity and order to this gods forsaken place, he has been relegated to obscurity.”

  Claudia placed her head on her husband’s shoulder as they both gazed out the window and watched ships coming into the harbor in the distance.

  The leaves were full of color and falling from the trees as a breeze took hold of them. Though Artorius hated winter and the cold weather, he loved this time of year when it was not so hot and the trees colorful. He and Diana walked along the riverbank, her hand in his. His physical wounds had mostly healed, though he knew the emotional ones would leave even deeper scars. The men he had lost were slowly being replaced, but they could never be replaced where it mattered most. It was not just soldiers under his command who had died, but also close friends. Decimus and Carbo had been with him since he first joined the legions thirteen years before. And Vitruvius, his dear friend and mentor, was gone.

  Yet at the same time he felt revived, almost reborn now that he had a son. Agricola had taken the young legionary into his own First Century of the Sixth Cohort.

  “Agricola tells me that Metellus has so far been a model legionary,” Artorius said as Diana laid her head on his shoulder, “admired by his friends, as well as his superiors.”

  Metellus’ performance and conduct made Artorius especially proud, for he knew Agricola was a stickler for standards and at times a harsh disciplinarian. And far from showing any favors, Artorius knew the Pilus Prior would most likely expect Metellus to maintain an even higher standard of performance and conduct than his fellow legionaries.

  “I’m glad to hear that,” Diana replied with a smile. Though she had not raised him or even known him for long, there was already a strong bond between them. “You know, he calls me Mother, even though I told him it was not necessary.”

  This made Artorius smile in turn.

  “I know I can never replace Rowana, who gave him birth and raised him.”

  “And yet he still feels the same type of bond with you that he had with her,” Artorius replied. “I know this, because he told me.”

  Diana gave his hand a squeeze as they continued to walk. Their strolls together in the evenings brought him a sense of peace, in what was otherwise his chaotic life. Before her return, Artorius’ life had been chaotic at best; quite the paradox given the order and discipline in the life of a Centurion of Rome.

  Chapter XXVIII: Valeria’s Rebirth

  ***

  The month that followed his adoption of Metellus had been extremely hectic for Artorius. Another dozen of his men had reported back to the Century, though most would be on light duty for at least a month or so. Only a handful more were expected to return at all, the rest were still awaiting medical discharge. It broke the Centurion’s heart to see his men, who had fought with extreme valor, now cast aside since they were of no use to the legions anymore. Even when the last returned, that would only leave the Second Century with a total strength of forty-six men, to include Centurion Artorius and the Principal Officers; leaving them even more under strength than he had first envisioned. That left thirty-eight vacancies within the Century. Some of the barracks rooms were almost completely vacant. Two only had one soldier living in each of them. Artorius had filled all of the Decanus vacancies from within the ranks, but two of these men had no one to lead. He had gone ahead with the promotions, feeling that it made no sense to leave any leadership position vacant, and that even without a squad to lead, these soldiers who merited the promotion should at least be able to enjoy the extra pay and benefits.

  There had also been much in the way of transitions within the Legion’s hierarchy. What caused the greatest stirring was t
he announced retirement of Master Centurion Calvinus. Centurions Primus Ordo Aemilius and Draco had also submitted their requests for discharge and retirement. Privately, Diana’s cousin, Centurion Primus Ordo Proculus, had also expressed his desire to leave the legions within the next year or so. Artorius could not help but wonder if it was simply coincidence that all of these men were leaving, rather than attempting to replace Calvinus as the Legion’s Primus Pilus, or if there was something more to it. Certainly they were not young men anymore, and most of them had been wounded during the Battle of Braduhenna.

  It came as no surprise to anyone then, that during the Council of Centurions, Platorius Macro was selected by an almost unanimous vote to replace Calvinus as Master Centurion. Few of the cohort commanders even attempted to win the position. Most were now focused on attempting to win all of the Primus Ordo vacancies within the First Cohort. All Centurions were eligible for these positions, though Artorius knew he would not be considered. After all, it had taken a special dispensation that allowed him to be promoted to his current rank three years shy of the minimum age requirement. He had reached that age requirement in January, when he turned thirty, and he knew that his name would not even be mentioned in the consideration to fill the Primus Ordo vacancies. It suited him just fine. His heart was with the Second Century, and he knew there was much work to be done in order to heal the wounds of his men. In his mind, taking a promotion at this time would be tantamount to abandoning those who had fought by his side and given so much of themselves.