Rome 3: The Eagle of the Twelfth

by M C Scott

  ‘Most clear, lord.’

  I didn’t ask the terms of our surrender, and in truth I didn’t want to know any sooner than I must, but Vologases said, in dismissal, ‘Your General Corbulo gave me his solemn word that not a single Roman legionary would cross to the east of the Euphrates. In crossing the Murad Su, in camping on its northern bank, which faces eastward, your Paetus has broken the oath of a better man. He shall pay for it. His men, however, need not.’

  CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

  ‘LORD, THEY ARE taking everything, everything. We can’t let them do it.’

  So said Crescens of the IVth, first to speak after me in the commanders’ meeting that Paetus had called on my return to hear the Parthians’ demands.

  Paetus stared him down. ‘You misunderstand. They are not taking everything. We may keep the Eagles, and so retain the honour of the legions.’

  ‘Honour?’ Crescens’ voice cracked. ‘After a surrender! Lord, you cannot mean—’

  ‘Centurion Crescens, you forget yourself!’ Paetus seemed to have aged overnight. His shoulders fell round a concave chest; his hair, I swear, was whiter; his hands were skin and bone with no strength in the sinews. He held them together, blanching his knuckles, as if he they might betray him did he only let them go.

  ‘I mean that I am not prepared to see the men of my command crucified before my eyes when by my actions I can prevent it. Corbulo may arrive, but not in time to save the lives of First Centurion Cadus and his men. They are my priority.’

  He turned to me and I found his gaze surprisingly sharp. This was a man who had survived two Caesars, who had kept in good odour with Nero when so many others had fallen from grace and paid for it with their lives. He was not a soldier, but he was a politician. ‘As I understand it,’ he said, ‘we will be allowed to keep the standards. Is that true?’

  ‘Yes, lord; all of them. We must march away leaving everything else behind, the food, the wine, the armour, the weapons, the horses … But first we must build them a bridge, to replace the one that was destroyed.’

  ‘If we keep the standards, we have not fully surrendered.’ Paetus’ gaze had grown distant, seeing himself back in Rome, speaking to the emperor, setting the record straight, so that he, Paetus, came out of it shining.

  He dragged his grey eyes back to mine. ‘You destroyed the bridge?’

  ‘I did, lord. At your order.’

  ‘And with my help,’ Crescens said. For a man of the IVth, he was remarkably decent.

  Paetus’ smile was thin as a lizard’s. ‘Then by my order and with your help, he shall replace it as the Parthians have requested.’ He stepped in front of me. ‘Clearly you will have to ford the river once more in order to give our agreement to the terms of surrender. But I wish you to return here afterwards, unless it is impossible to do so.’

  Unless Vologases has had your head struck from your shoulders, is what he meant.

  I swam back across the river, aided by a rope that the Parthians had already strung across. I delivered our acceptance. My head was not struck off.

  As I was heading for the river again, the narrow-eyed general of the Parthians came up to me and caught my arm, turning me back to face him.

  He had laid his hand on his heart and stared into my eyes. ‘Amongst our people,’ he said, ‘that is, amongst the Parthian tribes from which comes the King of Kings, it is an unthinkable dishonour to take back a gift once it is given. His magnificence wishes you to remember that, in the time that is to come.’

  ‘I see.’ I thought of the bay mare and what she was worth and how far I was prepared to risk my life for her. Quite far, I thought, particularly if I had Vologases’ backing. ‘Thank you. I will not forget.’

  I bowed from the waist with my hands on my breast as I had seen Pantera do with the kings in Hyrcania and the old man returned it as if we were not mortal enemies who had lately spent a great deal of effort and other men’s blood trying to kill each other.

  Soon after, I swam back across and helped the work parties to rebuild the bridge. It was lucky that we had wood enough in the camp without having to cross the river to cut more. Or perhaps it was ill luck. Cutting wood would have taken time, and in time, perhaps, Corbulo might have come and relieved us.

  But under the Parthians’ hard gaze we could not dally overmuch, nor could we pretend that we didn’t have enough men, when the several centuries not working on the bridge were standing in clots around their tents, doing nothing.

  The bridge was built in less than a day. That same evening, we stood in lines as Vologases had demanded, to receive him and his army.

  He came in pomp, weighted in blue silk, carried on a litter at head height by men taller than any I had ever seen. His captains rode around him on black horses that sported silver and silk at their brows and tails.

  After him, on horseback, not in a litter, came Monobasus of Adiabene, as smugly triumphant as any man I have ever seen. I could have killed him; I might have done so, whatever the consequences, had he not been leading Cadus and Lupus at either stirrup with leather leashes tied to their necks.

  So, like the others, I swallowed my pride and my loathing and watched as Vologases and Paetus each approached the table that had been carried over and placed in the centre of the camp. There, the entirety of both armies heard read aloud by the Parthian herald the terms of our surrender. Vologases held out a quill pen and a block of ink and Paetus stepped up to put his name to the document.

  We were finished then; even if Corbulo had come, we were bound by Paetus’ word to leave without bloodshed, to abandon all of our goods, keeping only our Eagles.

  Paetus stepped back and saluted – he saluted an enemy king! We gaped in disbelief.

  There was a moment’s hiatus before Vologases lifted his hand in a sign that was both acknowledgement and order. At that, Monobasus released the leashes holding Cadus and Lupus and they were pushed ungently forward past Paetus to join us.

  I clasped Cadus by the arms, holding Lupus more gingerly, taking care for his fractures. A short while later, I saw Syrion lifted on a litter, and had the beginnings of hope that the day might not be as bad as I had thought, that Paetus had shown wisdom in not leaving these men to the worst of deaths, that we could walk out with our heads high and our Eagles to the fore and perhaps rescue something of our reputation.

  Then I saw a movement from the corner of my eye; Vologases had dropped his hand – and that was when the Parthian army fell on us like a cloud of locusts, and set about pillaging our camp as if it were empty.

  Cadus pushed me away. ‘See to your horse.’

  I ran fast, being light, with no armour. I saw my gladius taken, our tent ripped apart. My mail shirt was lifted, fingered, thrown from one laughing man to the next; the metal rings glimmered in the sick winter light.

  But these were random acts by men who ransacked for the sake of it because that was what war expected and what Vologases demanded. A tighter, more disciplined group had moved almost before the order and made straight for the horse lines that were set beneath the palisade on the northern edge of the camp. Every one of the men was marked by the blue tern of Adiabene.

  They went down the lines as my father used to, picking out the best mounts with a practised eye, tapping the tails as a signal that they were chosen, leaving their boys to squeeze in between the horses and free their halters from the tether bar.

  My mare was last of the line. I reached her just ahead of the bearded maniac who threatened to take her.

  ‘Stop! This mare was a gift from the King of Kings. If you take her, you dishonour him!’

  If I screamed, it was a pouring out of the whole camp’s anger, and my frustration that I had no blade and could not even strike him with my fist for fear of breaking the truce. I stood close, though, hoping to use my size and rage to overwhelm him.

  I failed.

  ‘Liar!’ A gobbet of spittle struck my cheek. A leering face pressed close to mine. ‘The King of Kings gifts no Romans. She is mine now.
You can kiss her goodbye.’

  Fury lifted me outside myself. I grasped the man by his clothing, pushing his shoulders back and back against the palisade behind. In a whisper, driving each word into his eyes, his nose, his ears, I said, ‘Vologases gave her to Pantera in Hyrcania, after the Leopard shot the usurper. If you choose not to believe otherwise, don’t blame me if the King of Kings has your skin stripped from your naked body this night, leaving you living to make your apologies in the morning.’

  I had never seen that, only heard of it fifth hand, but it was enough to give the man pause, and me time to hear hoofbeats behind, and turn my head just enough to catch a glimpse of the man behind me; not enough to be sure who it was, but enough to take a gamble and pray that I was right. ‘Or,’ I said, loudly, and dropped him, ‘you could ask your king, who stands behind me. He was present when the traitor died. He will confirm that Pantera made the fatal shot, and was richly rewarded for it.’

  I turned as I spoke. Monobasus was still the fox-faced, narrow-eyed, duplicitous schemer I had first seen. And if rumour was correct, he had helped his third cousin on to the throne of Hyrcania the summer after we had been there, and might have helped him rebel against the King of Kings, although clearly Vologases did not believe that, or he would not have honoured him so greatly at our surrender.

  He leaned on the pommel of his saddle. His beard reached halfway down his chest. His moustaches were half the length of his beard. Both were tending to greyness, salted through here and there with white. He smelled of garlic, and mustard, and wine.

  Perhaps I should have fallen to my knees, as his men did beside me, but I had lost almost everything that day and was not inclined to throw away what dignity I had left.

  I said, ‘Shall I describe for you the moment my lord Pantera shot two arrows at the charging boar, and then at the one who pretended to be king? His name, as I remember, was—’

  ‘It will not be necessary to name him.’ Monobasus smoothed his hand down his chin. Hate lit his eyes. I was beyond caring.

  I said, ‘Then you will remember how the King of Kings gave to Pantera the bay mare that had been the traitor’s mount. He gave her to me and she stands before you now. You may check her brands if you doubt me.’

  ‘I don’t doubt you. I placed those brands myself. I bred her.’

  ‘Then—’

  ‘She is yours.’ He wrenched his own horse round with a savagery that would have earned him a beating from my father for ruining its mouth.

  I called after him. ‘She has given me three sons. Would you take those? Or are they not also gifts of the King of Kings.’

  Monobasus did not pause. I looked at his man, who stood, uncertain. ‘They have the brand of the leopard’s paw,’ I said loudly. ‘If you take them, be prepared to answer for it to the King of Kings.’

  It wasn’t easy for a horse to move fast in the crowded wreckage of our camp; Monobasus was not so far away that he couldn’t hear, or answer.

  Leave them,’ he called back. ‘Leave them all.’

  All. Leave all the horses. The king had spoken and must be obeyed and so, slowly, as if working through mud, sullen men nodded at the sour-mouthed boys who in turn thrust their unwilling way back through the lines to retie the halters they had so lately untied.

  I stood a long while after they had gone, talking to my mare, stroking her, checking her limbs, her mouth, pulling imaginary tangles from her mane, and then doing the same for each of her sons, who were jittery from having been so roughly handled.

  Presently, I returned to Cadus and Lupus, who stood where I had left them, watching the chaos. A thin cloud had drawn across the sky, cloaking the sun that Helios might not be forced to view our indignity. It left the air thinner, paler, so that men seemed ill who had been only stoic before. Cadus and Lupus, particularly, looked as if the sky had fallen on their heads.

  ‘What?’ I asked as I reached them. ‘I saved your horses for you. We march out now, and meet Corbulo, and go back to Syria and start again. It’s bad, but we’re alive. It could be a lot worse.’

  ‘It is a lot worse,’ Lupus said. ‘We are to march out under the yoke. Us and the Eagles, both. You are to fetch your horn. It has been saved for you. The King of Kings requires that you sound the marching orders.’

  I wet my lips. I blew. A faint, ugly whimper squeezed from my horn, barely enough to reach the first rank. Never in my entire life have I failed to sound the horn, but never in my life have I been so disgraced as to march beneath the raised spears of the enemy: the sign of ultimate defeat.

  On the second effort, I managed a thin, stringy sound. It resembled the signal to march not at all, but the men behind, in their mercy, accepted it as such. I heard the centurions shout their orders, the clash of sandals that should have been matched by the clash of arms and armour, and was instead met by the odd, dull sound of three and a half thousand men coming to attention in only their linen tunics.

  Ahead of us, two lines of Parthians used my horn as their own signal and raised their spears, holding them up and out, angled steeply so that they met in the middle of the line, forming a roofed channel under which we must pass.

  The spears made long, knifing shadows that fell across us in spliced angles, like the bars of a gigantic cage. I stepped in, and in, and in, following Paetus, until I was completely within their shade, until I was surrounded by the laughter, by the jeers, by the spits and thrown stones.

  I marched with Cadus on one side and Lupus on the other and I swear to you now that not one of us flinched, however we were struck. But in our souls, we knew we would have been better dead.

  Two days later, we met Corbulo, who was of the same opinion. He sent us, the remnants of the IVth and the XIIth, to Syria with orders to rebuild our legions, while he took the ‘fighting arm’ of his army, the IIIrd, the VIth and the Xth, up to Cappadocia to overwinter in our beautiful camp at Melitene, there to meet Vologases in the spring, and bring him to heel. Tears and Horgias joined us again before the two forces split. It was the only bright light in our darkness.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

  THE WOUNDED DIED like flies on the march back south to Syria. To our continued shame, we left their bodies where they lay, for Paetus would not let us stop to build pyres for them. A centurion – often it seemed to be Lupus or Cadus – spoke the words of death that their spirits might go freely to the other life and we marched on by, hating ourselves more with each passing day.

  Antioch, first city of Syria, loomed like a death sentence at the end of our march. The seat of Corbulo’s power, it was acclaimed as the third great city of the empire, behind only Rome and Alexandria, and Corbulo had stamped his ordered, military mark on every part of it, from the pin-neat barracks to the governor’s Spartan mansion to the markets, where neither thieves nor beggars plied their trade and every sale was decent, and the whorehouses, where the boys, girls and women were licensed by the governor’s office.

  We reached the city walls half a month after we had left the camp at Rhandaea and it seemed our fame – our notoriety – had preceded us, for the people of the city shut their doors to us as we marched in and not a soul gave greeting until we halted outside the governor’s mansion.

  The steward could not pretend to be indisposed, but he took his time in opening the door and when he walked out on to the steps above us we saw that he had dressed himself in a torn tunic and thrown dust on both shoulders to show himself in mourning at our presence.

  He was a tall, lean man with a bald pate and a patrician nose and he had the power to summon men from the locked and shuttered buildings of Antioch.

  At his command, they gave us the barracks that had lately been occupied by the VIth; they gave us food and water for ourselves, our mules, and our mounts; they gave us weapons to replace the ones we had been forced to leave behind – second-rate weapons, that we would not have deigned to buy in the days when we had money – all of this they gave us at the governor’s express order.

  But Corbulo had not
demanded that the people of Antioch make us welcome, and the lack of a single smiling face threw into painful relief all the other towns and cities we had camped in or near in the days of our ascendance, where we had been cheered, garlanded, wined and dined as men who came with silver to spare, anxious to find new ways to be parted from it.

  Here, we of the IVth and XIIth found ourselves in echoing barracks, eight to a room and half of those rooms empty, so that the parade ground did not so much rock to our entrance as titter, and it was clear that at night we would be cold for lack of men around us.

  Only the sick bay was full. As soon as I had seen to the horses, I went in to sit with Syrion; beautiful, elegant Syrion who was thinner than a starving street cur and lay for ever in a fever with skin blotched irregularly red and white and beads of sour sweat growing fat on his forehead. On the route down we had stopped for the night near a village and I had bought some rags of the kind they used for swaddling children and had boiled them in citrus juice to get rid of the smell of goat that had infested everything in that place. Whenever I could thereafter, I had used them to wipe Syrion dry.

  I did it again now, leaning forward, stroking across his skin. Presently, he opened one yellowed eye in thanks and I lifted the beaker that stood in a dampened sand box at my side.

  ‘Would you like some water? It’s colder than snow. Well, almost.’

  ‘As cold as our welcome?’ His smile was a twitch at the corner of his mouth. ‘I saw it from the litter. The whole city hates us.’

  ‘The city doesn’t know us. But once we have money, the people will—’

  ‘Where are we going to get money from? We walked our Eagles under the enemy yoke. We’re all down to single pay.’ That was true; Corbulo himself had given the order: every man in the legion, whatever his rank, down to single pay. Paetus alone was exempt, but then Paetus was in Caesarea, desperately trying to find a boat that would take him back to Rome in winter seas so he could give his side of things to Nero before Corbulo’s messengers ruined his life.