The Wolf's Gold: Empire V

by Anthony Riches

  ‘Waste of a good bolt, since I don’t suppose those legion pricks could hit a cow’s arse with a lute in the dark, but it lets the barbarians know we’ve not forgotten them, I suppose. I don’t understand this though, where’s the sense in having a wall without men behind it? An obstacle only works when it’s manned, surely this tribune in command must know that?’

  Marcus returned the shrug.

  ‘He must be quite sure they won’t attack tonight . . .’ He turned his head suddenly, tilting it slightly to listen better. ‘Did you hear that?’

  The Briton shook his head.

  ‘Hear what?’

  The Roman listened intently for a moment longer before casting a long, hard look across the white expanse between ditch and wall. He whispered again, still staring out across the open ground.

  ‘Nothing, obviously. I thought I heard a footfall. This snow deadens noises, but it makes every step sound like a creaking floorboard. Come on.’

  Turning right, he led the party along the wall, keeping low to stay in its shadow, until the bridge was in sight, then turned and signalled to Dubnus, who nodded and pulled at his men’s sleeves to indicate that they had reached their listening post. Carrying on down the wall’s line the Roman stopped at the very end of the turf rampart, gesturing for Qadir to take his men forward and into the cover of the defence’s renewed run on the far side. Waiting until the Hamians had slid noiselessly across the open ground, he gestured to his own men to hold their positions, easing around the wall’s corner and out onto the bridge with slow, stealthy footsteps.

  Stopping halfway across the span he crouched and listened again, still hearing nothing more than the gentle moan of the wind through the bridge’s timbers, a faint smell of pitch wrinkling his nose despite the freezing air’s bite. After a moment’s waiting he heard a sound from behind him, so faint as to be almost imperceptible, but nothing more reached his ears and he assumed that it was one of his own men changing position. Edging forward again he reached the bridge’s far end and paused once more to listen for a long moment. Still convinced that the patrol was alone in the night, he turned to look back down the bridge and found Scarface five paces behind him, a determined look on his face as he stared out across the snow-covered landscape and avoiding Marcus’s eye. Shaking his head in bemused irritation the Roman pointed to the bridge’s planks at his soldier’s feet and held out a hand with the palm forward in an unmistakeable command for the soldier to stay put before turning back to the open ground before them. He paced slowly forward, his booted feet sinking into the snow’s crisp surface in a succession of crunches that he was convinced could be heard from a hundred paces. Pausing a dozen steps from the bridge, he squatted down under the sheet’s camouflage and looked out across the landscape, the fallen snow dappled by faint shadows cast by the stars’ dim light shining through the scattered trees.

  In that moment of absolute silence something went click to his left, a tiny noise followed immediately by a scurry of movement that made Marcus crouch lower against the snow, pulling the white sheet over his head until only his eyes were left uncovered, waiting in absolute immobility. A wolf loped across his field of view from left to right, the animal’s grey coat merging almost perfectly with the snow across which it was scurrying, clearly disturbed by something. The animal hurried away into the shadows, leaving Marcus waiting beneath the shroud in patient immobility, conscious of the hoarse breathing of Scarface close behind him who had clearly disobeyed his instruction to remain on the bridge. At the end of a count to fifty, throughout which he willed himself to remain absolutely still despite the cold seeping up into his legs and threatening to set off a convulsive shiver, he eased the sheet down from his face, allowing a mist of steam to slide from his nostrils in a long, slow exhalation of relief. Tensing his reluctant calves to start moving again he froze anew as a flicker of motion caught the corner of his eye. A man had risen out of the snow’s white carpet to pace slowly but purposefully towards him, another following in his wake, and as Marcus watched, a third and fourth figure got to their feet and fell in behind.

  ‘Enemy scouts!’

  Incapable of remaining silent in the face of the enemy, Scarface was already on his feet and striding past Marcus with his sword drawn, ignoring the first arrow as it whipped by him with a whirr, while a chorus of answering shouts rang out. Before the Roman had any time to react a second arrow flicked out of the darkness and struck the soldier in the chest, rocking Scarface back on his heels. While Marcus was still struggling to realise what it was they faced, another arrow transfixed the reeling soldier’s throat with a wet impact, and the stricken Tungrian fell backwards into the snow. A shout went up, and the ground before Marcus was suddenly alive with men running awkwardly towards him through the snow, all camouflaged in the same way that the Roman patrol had sought to merge with the icy landscape. Turning, Marcus floundered back towards the bridge, bitterly calling to mind Tribune Leontius’s words when he had been briefed for thepatrol. ‘And in the event that you discover the blighters trying to capture that bridge under the cover of darkness, then make it look real, eh Centurion? We need you to draw in as many of them as possible before we show our hand.’

  He sprinted for the bridge as best he could in several inches of snow, hearing an arrow hiss past his head and another thud into the timbers beside him as he reached the wooden surface, running faster on the firmer footing. Looking back he could see dozens of Sarmatae foot soldiers, waving swords and spears, slogging through the snow behind him, and behind them what appeared to be a solid wall of men charging out of the darkness. Raising a hand to point at the enemy he shouted to Dubnus and Qadir.

  ‘These aren’t scouts, it’s a full-scale attack! Run for the gate!’

  Pulling his whistle from its place hanging round his neck beneath his tunic, Marcus blew three short blasts, gratefully realising that his brother officers and their men were closing on him from either side. Arminius and Martos were running with them, and the Roman realised what it was that he had heard behind them earlier.

  ‘They’ve got the bloody bridge!’

  Glancing back, Marcus could see the truth in Dubnus’s words, as the first of the Sarmatae warriors stormed across the span in pursuit of the fleeing scouts.

  In front of them the fort’s western gates opened ponderously, a solid column of soldiers pouring out to face the barbarian attack with spears and shields. Dubnus shook his head as they ran towards the Britons, his voice bitter with disgust at the scale of the disaster.

  ‘Too little and too late. By the time we’ve got a cohort out here and ready there’ll be five thousand men facing them. This is fucked . . .’

  Shouting the watchword, the small group straggled to a halt behind the advancing soldiers as they formed up into a disciplined line, each century starting the ritualised hammering of spears on shields as soon as they were set in place, while fresh troops were pouring through the gate’s twin openings with a speed that seemed to belie Dubnus’s words. As the Tungrians watched, a column of soldiers appeared around the fort’s north-western corner, and Dubnus spun to see the same thing happening at the other end of the fort’s western wall. He stared at the onrushing troops for a moment before turning to Marcus with a strange expression.

  ‘This is a trap, isn’t it? Every man in the fort must have been waiting behind those gates, kitted up and ready to fight for this lot to be deploying that quickly. Did you know about this?’

  Marcus shook his head.

  ‘Not as such. My orders were to go looking for trouble, and if I found it then to give the signal and run for the gate. Why would the tribunes tell us what they had in mind, when one captured man might reveal the plan? But I don’t think this can be all there is . . .’

  Arminius nodded in agreement.

  ‘The Sarmatae will send ten thousand warriors across that ditch if they are given enough time. There must be some way to stop them, or why allow them to capture the means of crossing?’

  Craning his
neck to look between the soldiers in front of them, Marcus realised that there were already a thousand men and more across the ditch, mostly holding their ground while their strength built with every man that crossed the bridge, while a few skirmishers ventured forward to send arrows thudding into the auxiliaries’ shields. Martos stepped to his side, making the same calculation.

  ‘Two infantry cohorts and the Thracians are all this prefect has to fight with, unless he brings our men into action. I would expect that if he has a trap to close on these men, then the time—’

  With a bellowed command from the walls above them, the bolt throwers on either corner of the wall flung their missiles at the bridge in unison, blazing fire bolts which flew to impact directly beneath the structure. The timbers took light in an instant, and a moment later the bridge’s length was a mass of flames, the fire’s greedy roar overlain by the harsh shouts and screams of the mass of men who had been fighting to cross the span and get to their enemies. Marcus looked at his comrades, nodding slowly.

  ‘I see. Pitch, probably painted all over the bridge timbers. I thought I could smell something odd when I was crossing. But that can’t be all there is to this, or what stops them from simply jumping down into the ditch and making a run for it?’

  As if to answer Martos’s musing, and as the warriors who had already crossed dithered in the face of the Roman line that was still strengthening with every moment, the fire raced away from the bridge and up the ditch in both directions, following a trail of pitch which had clearly been laid with this desired outcome in mind. The roaring flames quickly set light to the pine trees that had been felled and laid along the bottom of the trench, their branches already primed with more of the sticky sap. In a dozen heartbeats the length of the defence was ablaze, denying the Sarmatae who had already crossed any means of escaping to their own side of the ditch’s line. With a blare of horns the waiting lines of soldiers advanced to fight, their enemies silhouetted by the fire raging behind, and looking at his companions’ fire-lit faces Marcus realised that the advancing Romans would appear to be little less than the servants of a vengeful god, their armour flashing gold in the fire’s light. Panic swiftly overcame the last vestiges of discipline possessed by the Sarmatae trapped between the blazing ditch and the implacable soldiers, some men throwing themselves at the Romans in blind, mindless fury, whilst others hurled themselves at the flames, sprinting to leap into the teeth of the blaze in the hope of reaching the far side unscathed. A few men who had flung away their weapons and armour succeeded in the attempt, but many more fell short and dropped, screaming with terror, onto the burning trees. Their hair and clothing ignited instantly to leave them rolling in shrieking agony before oblivion took them. The remainder fought like wild men, caught between the two implacable threats of fire and foe, but to little avail; the Britons’ spears harvested them with the efficiency of corn threshers as the desperate barbarians flung themselves at the advancing line of shields.

  ‘It’s a small enough victory, given the force still arrayed on the other side of that ditch, but perhaps still enough to give Purta pause to wonder what other tricks we have up our sleeves. I see you’ve collected somewhat more men than you left our camp with?’

  Tribune Scaurus had walked through the gates behind the last of the Britons, raising an eyebrow at Arminius and Martos who both shrugged in response. Marcus saluted wearily, turning to make his way back to the Tungrian camp with a crestfallen expression.

  ‘Indeed Tribune, a victory. But bought at a cost I would have been loath to pay, had I known in advance what the nature of the bargain would be.’

  The Sarmatae attacked again at first light, their rage stoked by the sight of fifteen crosses raised behind the line of the now heavily defended ditch. Upon each cross writhed one of the small number of enemy horsemen captured on the ice the previous day. Tribune Leontius nodded grimly at the doomed prisoners, speaking in conversational tones to his colleagues.

  ‘This will provide the bolt-thrower crews with some target practice, I suspect.’

  As he predicted, enemy archers quickly ran forward into bowshot of the crucified men, each man braving the artillery’s long reach in the hope of putting an arrow into their helpless brothers and ending their torture. When half a dozen of the captives were slumped down lifelessly on their crosses for the death of a single incautious archer, who had chosen to string another arrow rather than move from the spot from which he had loosed his first shot only to have his spine torn out by a swiftly aimed bolt, Leontius ordered the crosses to be set alight. Greasy plumes of smoke rose into the air as the flames swiftly consumed their human offerings, and the archers withdrew in the same zigzag runs that had brought them close enough to shoot at the captives, earning a grudging note of respect in Scaurus’s voice as he spoke to Julius.

  ‘Worthy of our admiration, I’d say. I wouldn’t want to run at four of those monsters whether I had the freedom to dance about and put their aim off or not. And with that done, I’d expect Purta to land his next punch quickly now. He knows every moment he’s stuck on the wrong side of these walls brings the arrival of our legions that much closer.’ He rubbed the amulet tied to his right wrist reflexively. ‘Always presuming that Our Lord sees fit to ensure that Tribune Leontius’s message reaches them, of course . . .’

  Purta’s response to the previous night’s disaster came soon enough and to the dismay of Scaurus in particular. A ragged flood of slaves poured forward towards the ditch, goaded on by whips and spears and sheltered behind an arc of raised shields, staggering under the load of their buckets of soil and rocks. Their first task was to fill the stake-studded pits that waited to cripple the unwary, and as they laboured to follow their masters’ shouted commands the enemy archers came forward again in strength, showering arrows at any of the defenders who showed themselves above the ditch or fort walls. Forced to take shelter from the hail of missiles, the soldiers hid behind their defensive wall while the barbarians’ slaves completed their initial task of making the approach to the ditch safe before being driven to attack the defensive line itself. Pouring the contents of their buckets into the ditch, each of the slaves turned away to retrace their steps under the goading of their Sarmatae masters. With the Thracian bowmen unable to shoot at the Sarmatae workforce in the teeth of the overwhelming enemy archery it was left to the bolt throwers to deplete the toiling slaves, and the officers watched grimly as the pitiless bolts ploughed into their labouring ranks.

  ‘This day would seem to have been a long time in the planning, given that our enemy clearly came prepared for a siege, although I doubt he expected to face quite such a stubborn resistance. There will, of course, be Romans among those labourers . . .’

  In truth Leontius was only confirming what most men had already realised, recognising scraps of Roman garb amidst the mass of humanity toiling to build a now discernible ramp across the ditch and realising that there were captured men, women and even children among the slaves.

  ‘We can only console ourselves that each one we kill has been freed from a grim existence that will already have visited misery and degradation upon them, and which can only end badly one way or another. You there!’ he called out to the commander of the nearest bolt thrower in an admonishing tone. ‘Don’t shoot at the men around the ditch, aim further away to allow your bolts to spear two or three of them with one shot, rather than just pinning single men to the ground!’

  The centurion saluted briskly, bellowing fresh orders at the men labouring to wind the massive weapon back to its maximum power, and Marcus turned away, sick at heart at the scale of the slaughter being necessarily visited upon the helpless slaves. He spun back as a loud bang and a scream of agony told of some unexpected disaster, finding the bolt thrower’s crew in chaos and one of their number staggering drunkenly with a chunk of wood protruding from his shattered forehead. The soldier fell full length to the tower’s wooden floor and lay still, one foot twitching spasmodically.

  ‘One of the torsion bars b
roke. That poor sod is as good as dead.’

  Leontius nodded grimly at Julius’s words, pointing at the wrecked weapon.

  ‘So is my bloody bolt thrower, and I’ve no means of mending the damned thing unless I take a bar off one of the weapons on the rear wall to keep this one shooting.’

  He conferred briefly with Scaurus before ordering the repair, the two men agreeing that there was little option but to keep all four weapons on the western side in action. The Sarmatae slaves laboured on without rest, their loads of mud and rocks combining with the bodies of those of them that fell to the defenders’ missiles to slowly but surely send the ramp’s tongue poking forward into the ditch. Julius cast an expert eye across the scene soon after midday before pronouncing an opinion.

  ‘Clever stuff. See how they’re making it higher than the defences on the other side, even though that takes longer? That way when they come to launch an attack off it they’ll have the high ground.’ He shook his head with a worried frown. ‘They’ve made a good start, although every pace they advance gets harder as the ditch gets deeper beneath them. And they’ll slowly but surely grind the life out of those slaves if they keep working them at that rate.’ He looked down at the ramp again, wincing as a bolt thrower’s missile ploughed through the labouring workers in a chorus of tired screams from those around the bolt’s point of impact. ‘I’d give it a day, perhaps less, and then the barbarians will be at spear point with the men behind that wall, while archers on either side shoot arrows at them from close enough to make their shields useless. And there’s nothing to break or burn with an earth ramp. They’ll be over the wall and behind the ditch in strength soon enough after that, if they’ve the willpower to spend a few hundred warriors smashing their way over the wall.’