by John Stack
Septimus’s brow furrowed at the mention of the consul’s name.
‘Scipio’s campaign against Lilybaeum has been a complete failure – on land, and now at sea. He is sure to be recalled to Rome to answer for that failure.’
‘He has already given the order,’ Atticus replied. ‘What’s left of the fleet sails for Rome on tomorrow’s tide.’
Septimus thought for a moment. ‘He wants to defend his defeat on his own terms,’ he said. ‘Why else would he face the Senate voluntarily?’
Atticus nodded, having already reached the same conclusion after receiving Scipio’s pre-emptive order to return to Rome. Septimus stood up and began to pace the cabin. He stopped and turned to Atticus. ‘You must look to your back,’ he said, and Atticus raised his eyebrows in question.
‘The attack on the siege towers …’ Septimus began.
‘I saw the fires from the bay,’ Atticus said, sitting straighter on the cot.
Septimus nodded. ‘But what you might not have heard is that the Carthaginians used Greek mercenaries for the attack.’
‘Greeks?’ Atticus said in shock.
Again Septimus nodded, and he told Atticus of the skirmish in detail; in particular how the II maniple had been wiped out to a man by the skilled Greek fighters. He then went on to describe the anger amongst the legionaries of the Ninth and how they had driven a Greek trader from the camp.
Anger coursed through Atticus as Septimus relayed the story, and he watched the centurion closely for any indication that he agreed with the actions of his fellow Romans. There was none, and Atticus suddenly felt ashamed for having thought so little of him.
‘You and I both know Scipio for the man he is,’ Septimus said. ‘He will not accept blame for his failure. He is sure to look elsewhere; as you were one of the commanders at Drepana, he might try to implicate you.’
Atticus nodded thoughtfully, and the two began to talk through the defeat at Drepana in detail, concluding at length that Atticus had nothing to answer for.
‘But just be wary,’ Septimus said finally. ‘Scipio will not concede without a fight.’
‘We’ve known worse odds,’ Atticus said with a wry smile, and again they settled into a protracted conversation, this time recalling the battles they had fought over the years, the enemies they had faced and vanquished together. The slivers of light entering the cabin slowly turned from white to red as they spoke, and it was near dark when Septimus rose once more.
‘I have to return to the encampment,’ he said, and he reached out with his hand and clasped Atticus’s uninjured shoulder, glad once more that he was not seriously wounded.
‘Will the legions continue the siege?’ Atticus asked.
‘Doubtful, given the blockade has been lifted. The land behind the city is putrid and already we have had men fall ill with soldier’s fever. I suspect we’ll pull back to higher ground.’
Atticus nodded, and again a silence descended, both men remembering when last they had spoken and the irresolvable fight that had prompted Septimus’s transfer to the Ninth. Atticus thought of how Septimus had come immediately to see him when he’d heard he was injured, of the battles and trials they had faced together in the past, and of the comradeship the centurion had shared with Gaius and Corin, with all the crew of the Orcus, and with Atticus himself.
He held out his hand and Septimus took it without hesitation, his grip firm. He nodded slightly to Atticus in silent acknowledgement before turning to leave the cabin.
Hamilcar felt the thrill of victory at hand surge through his veins as the Alissar rounded the headland, the drum beat hammering out attack speed, the flagship sailing at the head of a seventy-strong fleet. He shouted out the order to deploy, the signalmen relaying the command, the fleet responding swiftly and the flanks advanced to cover the width of the bay at Panormus, trapping the pitiful Roman force that was moored within.
He had captured ninety-three galleys the day before at Drepana, with only a few escaping south as the battle raged, but Hamilcar had been content to let them go, knowing their destination. After the battle he had moved quickly to secure the remnants of the Roman fleet before assembling a reduced fleet of galleys, drawing additional soldiers from the remainder of his ships at Drepana to supplement the crews of those chosen to sail, anxious to continue the fight, to maintain the momentum his victory had granted him. He had put to sea, taking two Roman captains from the captured enemy fleet at Drepana with him, and had steered his fleet north, rounding the northwestern tip of Sicily in the still hours of the night, confident that no landward warning would reach his destination before him.
That confidence had been well founded. As Hamilcar gazed across the width of the entire harbour he knew he had taken the Romans at Panormus by surprise, the ten Roman galleys sallying out to meet his fleet hopelessly outmatched and outmanoeuvred. He ordered his left flank to turn into the Roman defence and overwhelm it, leaving his centre and right flank free to advance to the shoreline beyond the walls of Panormus. Once there he would deploy his troops to besiege the town and his ships to blockade the port. He would release the two Roman captains and hand them over to the garrison, ensuring that news of Rome’s utter defeat at Drepana would be given first-hand to the defenders, knowing it would sap their resolve to resist.
The Alissar sped on as the left flank met the Roman defenders. Hamilcar watched the skirmish with a growing sense of justice. He had stayed awake during the night voyage, preferring the open aft-deck to the confines of his cabin, searching the stars for the constellations that signified the gods of Carthage. He had whispered a prayer of thanks to each in turn, believing he could sense their satisfaction at Carthage’s triumph over the Roman foe, that it was their hand that had given him such a flawless and complete victory, divine retribution for Rome’s arrogant dismissal of his proposal for peace.
The first galleys of Hamilcar’s fleet reached the shore and the soldiers began to disembark. Hamilcar watched them form orderly ranks, expecting he would be able to return to Drepana within two days, leaving the siege in the hands of one of his commanders. Some of the Roman fleet had escaped to Lilybaeum, and might already be sailing onwards to more secure Roman waters, but Hamilcar felt it was of little consequence. Whether the Roman fleet was there to be taken or already gone, they were too weak to be a threat, and so Lilybaeum was once more an open city and could be continually supplied from Drepana until Hamilcar had the means to attack the landward besiegers.
To that end, and to deliver the news of his victory in person to the One Hundred and Four and the Supreme Council, he would return to Carthage. The war in Sicily had taken a significant turn in his favour. Lilybaeum was saved, Panormus would soon be retaken, and the Roman fleet had been annihilated. Now was the time to finally retake Agrigentum and sweep the Romans from western Sicily.
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
The crowd surged forward, straining against the line of legionaries at the base of the steps, the soldiers holding their pila spears level to form a solid barrier, the centurions shouting for the people to draw back as a group of senators walked across the top of the steps, moving towards the entrance to the Curia. A roar went up from the crowd, a conflagration of abuse and anger.
The remnants of the fleet had arrived back in Ostia over a week before, bringing with them news that had thrown the city into lamentation, the defeat at Drepana coming so soon after the loss of so many to a storm. That grief had quickly turned to anger towards the Carthaginians who had wrought such carnage, but then a more insidious fury took hold of the people, towards the leaders of Rome who had allowed defeat to follow disaster. The Senate had sensed the mood of the people and, fearful of their wrath, they had acted: Scipio, the senior consul and commander of the fleet, would be tried for the crime of perduellio, treason.
It was a trial that drew thousands to the Forum at the foot of the Senate house and again a roar went up as more senators entered the chamber. The crowd was restless and angry. Rome did not suffer defeat; she did
not fail or lose heart in the face of an enemy. She was flawless. Only men were flawed, and one of them had brought Rome under the shadow of danger. For that, the people demanded justice and retribution. In the silence that followed their roar, a man came out from the Senate chamber, shouting a message to the crowd below that could be heard across the Forum. The trial had begun.
Scipio reached to the depths of his self-control to keep his expression impassive, the indignity of the trial surpassing the limits of shame. He had stood before the Senate less than a week before to announce the defeat at Drepana, his prepared speech never proceeding beyond that opening report as the entire Senate had turned on him in fury and shock. He had left the Senate chamber under a wave of shouted abuse, only to receive notice the following day that he was to be tried for the crime of perduellio, for ‘injuring the power of Rome’. So now he sat in a chair alone by the speaker’s podium, a central position that placed him under the baleful view of all three hundred senators.
To add insult to this charge, Aulus Atilius Caiatinus, the junior consul, had been temporarily granted Scipio’s power. He had appointed his patron, Duilius, as the lead prosecutor, pitting Scipio against his arch enemy. The ancients had put men convicted of treason to death, but Scipio, if found guilty, would face exile, a punishment of living-death that would end his every ambition and destroy his political life. The Senate was baying for blood, for retribution, and Scipio could trust no other to speak for him. He would defend himself, putting his faith in his oratorical skills, his stature as a member of an ancient line of patricians, and the one defence that might save him: the revelation of a traitor.
‘Senators of Rome,’ a voice called out, and Scipio turned to see Duilius walk out from his seat in the front row of senators.
‘Today I am tasked with a grave duty, one demanded of me by my consul,’ Duilius turned and nodded to Caiatinus, ‘and my city, whose power and safety has been irrevocably injured by one man, Gnaeus Cornelius Scipio Asina.’
A murmur of anger swept across the Senate and the speaker hammered his gavel to restore silence.
Duilius turned to Scipio, meeting his hostile stare, wary of him despite the overwhelming evidence. The importance of his prosecutorial task caused him to pause. Here was a chance to finally rid himself – and Rome – of a man who never saw beyond the limits of his own ambition, who forfeited the safety of Rome many times for his own ends, whose offences were so well hidden that even Duilius did not know of their full extent, much less of any evidence that he could ever expose. Only Scipio’s reckless attack at Drepana stood against him and, in prosecuting him for that crime, Duilius would expunge all the consul’s previous wrongs, wiping them forever from the heart of Rome.
Duilius first called the captain of the Poena to testify. He was a man who fearlessly commanded a flagship but he stammered through his testimony under the glare of the most powerful men in Rome. He spoke of Scipio’s desecration of the ancient ritual to confirm divine approval and many of the elder senators gasped in disbelief at Scipio’s blatant effrontery to the will of the gods, in itself a crime that demanded dire punishment.
Duilius then called other captains to speak of the decision to withdraw the southern flank and retreat to Lilybaeum as the battle raged, but Scipio neatly cross-examined them, forcing each to admit that the situation was beyond hopeless when he had issued the order. Duilius nodded to Scipio to concede the point, wanting to lull him slightly, and the consul smiled coldly at the gesture. Only then did Duilius call his last witness.
Atticus limped forward. He ignored the gazes and whispers of the entire chamber, keeping his eyes and attention locked on Scipio, knowing him to be the most dangerous viper in the nest. He vividly recalled their last encounter on this very floor, and how Scipio had bested him, and he glanced at Duilius out of the corner of his eye, taking strength from his presence. He and Duilius had prepared in detail, predicting every counter-argument that Scipio might make, every defence he might employ. All that was needed now was for Atticus to deliver the final, fatal strike, and he brushed his doubts aside as the Senate came to order.
Duilius began with a detailed account of Atticus’s career in the war against Carthage, his command of the flagship at Mylae, his promotion to prefect for his valour at Cape Ecnomus, his part in the victory at Cape Hermaeum. The senators listened in silence, many of them only sitting forward with attention as Duilius ended his introduction and began his questioning.
‘Prefect Perennis,’ Duilius said. ‘Can you recount your conversation with the consul on the evening before the battle?’
‘I warned him that the fleet was not yet ready for an open, offensive battle.’
‘Not ready?’ Duilius asked, raising his voice above the murmur of surprise.
‘With the loss of the corvus, the enemy holds the advantage over us in seamanship. Our only chance is to drill our sailing crews in how to ram and our legionaries in how to board.’
‘And our fleet is not yet trained in these tactics?’ Duilius asked, looking to Scipio, wondering why he was not interrupting to challenge Atticus’s view on fleet tactics, a view that was not universally held, and the only weak point in their attack.
‘No,’ Atticus responded evenly, also perplexed, his carefully prepared response to Scipio’s expected rebuttal no longer needed. ‘The fleet was not ready and I made this fact clear to the consul.’
‘Thank you, Prefect,’ Duilius said, and he turned to the senators, his gaze level in silent but obvious criticism of Scipio’s foolhardy dismissal of Atticus’s warning. Many of them nodded in agreement, looking to the consul with censorious expressions, their decision on Scipio’s guilt already made.
Scipio stood up amidst the growing sound of disorder and looked to the speaker. The older man hammered his gavel and silence descended once more, albeit with an undertone of whispered conversations as senators debated the evidence privately.
‘Prefect Perennis,’ Scipio began, his tone offhand, ‘who do you claim was present when you say you made this warning?’
As Duilius had advised him, Atticus ignored the sceptical subtext of Scipio’s question and he turned to the consul.
‘You and Prefect Ovidius,’ he replied.
‘And with Ovidius dead,’ Scipio said, ‘the Senate only has your word that you ever spoke such a warning to me.’
A number of angry voices were raised at Scipio’s accusation of perjury and Duilius stepped forward. ‘The prefect’s word is beyond question,’ he said.
Scipio smiled coldly. ‘Really …?’ he replied, and he turned his back on Atticus. ‘Where were you born, Perennis?’ he asked.
‘Locri.’
‘So your ancestors are not of Rome,’ Scipio said, his tone mildly accusatory.
‘They are Greek,’ Atticus said proudly, refusing to be baited by Scipio’s attempt to blacken his word, again perplexed by the insubstantiality of the consul’s attack.
Duilius stepped forward again. ‘The prefect’s loyalty to Rome is also beyond question, and I put to you, Senators, that the consul is engaged in a futile attempt to somehow besmirch the prefect’s honour in the hope it will lessen the impact of his damning testimony.’
The chamber rang with murmurs of agreement, but Scipio ignored them. He was ready to make his decisive strike, to call his own witnesses: two men whom he had questioned in depth since Drepana and who, by the grace of Fortuna, had revealed auspicious information that could yet save him.
‘You say the prefect’s loyalty is beyond question?’ he asked the Senate, before nodding towards the entrance to the chamber.
Calix and Baro entered and stood where all could see them. Scipio introduced Baro and then spoke of Calix, referring to him as the Rhodian, a mercenary in the paid service of Carthage at Lilybaeum, but a man who had also served Rome honourably in the past. Atticus looked only to Baro, his initial shock turning quickly to suspicion and then resentment that his second-in-command should stand before him.
‘Baro,’ Scipio
began, the entire Senate now poised to listen with interest. ‘Tell us how this man, the Rhodian, escaped the blockade at Lilybaeum.’
Baro described the event in detail, mentioning how the Rhodian had first slipped through the blockade and how they had expected his eventual attempt to escape. He spoke of the final chase, with the Orcus leading the Roman pursuit, the Rhodian’s galley only a ship-length ahead, before ending with a carefully scripted condemnation.
‘We were in full pursuit and were about to catch his ship when the prefect ordered us to break off,’ he concluded.
‘Because we could not pursue him through the shallows,’ Atticus protested angrily, never taking his eyes off Baro.
‘At least, that is what you told your crew at the time,’ Scipio interjected.
‘He’s standing here now,’ Duilius said, indicating the Rhodian, trying to avoid a trap he could not have foreseen. ‘We can ask him if Perennis was correct.’
‘I have only two questions to ask of this man,’ Scipio said, and he turned to Calix. ‘Who was on board your ship when you escaped?’
‘Hamilcar Barca,’ Calix replied. ‘The overall commander of the Carthaginians.’
‘And where did you take him?’
‘Drepana.’
There was an audible gasp from the Senate and Scipio quickly turned to address them. ‘And this not hours before our siege towers were attacked by a Greek force, causing many casualties amongst our valiant legionaries – moreover, a Greek force in the paid service of the Carthaginians.’
Many of the senators automatically looked to Atticus, the Greek in their midst.
‘Then the overall commander of the Carthaginians, the man who subsequently led their fleet at Drepana, slips through our blockade,’ Scipio continued. ‘His escape orchestrated with the help of other Greeks who had enemy gold in their hands. Perennis’s own second-in-command confirms that Hamilcar Barca could have been captured had Perennis pressed home his supposed pursuit.’