by Peter Tonkin
Which was precisely what they were going to do now.
As Gretorex and his alae peeled away, Artemidorus led his command across the ditch, treading lightly but uneasily on the solidly packed bodies of the dead and dying. The roadway itself was crammed solid with soldiers. Two straight lines of legionaries stood shield to shield across it, fighting in the old style. As the Senate’s army pressed relentlessly forward – and Antony’s men slowly gave ground. Because of that measured retreat, the roadway was jammed. No one was going anywhere at any speed. The Senate’s legions were packed tight but effectively held almost still. And in the midst of them, hemmed in and with apparently nowhere to go, were the Praetorian horsemen whose primary duty was to protect Hirtius and Caesar Octavius. Whose standards waved beside the eagles of their legions.
The spies attacked from the side just behind the foremost line of Martia legionaries but ahead of the hard men of the triarii line. Here was where the generals and their senior officers could most often be found. Just behind the first lines, confident that their men would dull the edge of the opposing legions. Surrounded by their own Praetorian bodyguards. Backed up by the solid triarii. And yet up with the standards, cheek by jowl with the eagles. Where the glory was.
Artemidorus put his professional conscience away. He had to. It seemed to him that the surprised legionaries he slaughtered before they even had a chance to turn and face him were dying outside the rules of civilised combat he was being ordered to disregard. If the idea of civilised combat was something that had ever really existed – beyond the stories of his Spartan childhood. Which, oddly, had failed to say much about the cryptaia and their licence to kill. And yet, as ever, there was the larger picture. He understood all too well that if he failed here – if the contubernium failed here – then Antony’s plan might also fail. And the fate of the empire as he understood it would turn once again. Like a great gate on a hinge.
He felt some empathy for the men he was slaughtering in this almost underhand manner. And, in a strange way that he was never able to understand, he also felt a kind of sympathy for the horses. As though they too were enemy soldiers he was attacking unfairly. The Praetorians sat on them almost uselessly. They were grouped around their generals, but were otherwise trapped and held helpless by the press of legionaries around them on the via. They could not deploy themselves as Gretorex and his alae could – or Antony and his cavalry wing. There was no space for them to charge. Nor opportunity to do so. Nor surface safe enough to allow it.
Instead, as Artemidorus slashed the last legionary away and came up against the first Praetorian mount, he took immediate and fatal action. Shield raised in case the rider was quick thinking enough to slash down with his spada as Gretorex had just done to Aquila. Aware that it would be unlikely – he was coming in from the rider’s left – the shield side, not the sword side. Without pausing, just as he had done with the nameless centurion, he went low and stabbed inwards with his gladius. He had no idea of the names of the muscles or tendons he was severing in the horse’s foreleg – nor of the veins and arteries lying beneath them. But he knew that if he was fast enough and had a long enough reach he could extend his arm beneath the horse’s chest and sever the tendons and muscles of its far foreleg. The horse would collapse at once. Falling away from Artemidorus. Pitching its rider to the ground in the middle of a cavalry melee. And, as likely as not, knocking the rider off the horse beside it. Two men down at once – and with any luck, killed or crippled beneath the falling bodies and plunging hooves of their mounts. While, focused on their leader and quick thinking as ever, the rest of the contubernium were soon doing the same.
The first horse’s chest and belly swelled like a brown barrel above him as he drove inwards. The stench of blood was momentarily replaced by the warm scent of the stable. Then his gladius reached its target. Point first, but also relying on the sharpness of the edge, he drove the blade through the brown column of the horse’s far foreleg. Watching in something like horror as the gash exploded in a welter of blood and the thin line of the wound yawned the moment the muscles and tendons separated. The leg simply collapsed. And the horse toppled sideways away from him. Exactly as planned. And the five horses behind it did exactly the same as the rest of the contubernium struck.
As they realised what was going on, the Praetorians reacted. Not by turning their horses’ heads towards their attackers. Something they could not do in any case because of the wall of crippled, dying horseflesh between them. Instead, they turned their horses’ heads away and retreated as best they could across the road packed with legionaries and the corpse-filled ditch beyond it. Into the field where the battle beneath Forum Gallorum had been fought six days ago. But as they did this, the horsemen spread panic and confusion among the foot soldiers surrounding them. Regardless of rank or importance.
Running through the line of screaming, thrashing horses, dispatching as many of the animals and their fallen riders as they could on the way, Artemidorus’ contubernium fell upon the mayhem left in the wake of the fleeing cavalry like the Friendly Ones themselves. But almost immediately, Artemidorus raised his right hand, sword dripping and steaming in his fist. The five men and one woman behind him ceased their slaughter. Looked around at the chaos on the blood-slick roadway and wondered what was going on now.
vi
Artemidorus found himself confronted by a sight he had never even dreamed that he would see. The uncontrolled retreat of the mounted Praetorians had caused total chaos. There were legionaries of all sorts and ranks lying hurt and dying on the roadway. Who had been knocked aside by the armoured breasts of the fleeing horses. Who had slipped and been trampled as they tried to run out of the way. Who were endeavouring to pull themselves up on the red-running icy slickness even now.
A standard bearer lay on his side amid the corpses filling the farther ditch. Still alive and fighting to find his feet and raise his standard. Beside him, face-up on the roadway, staring at the sky with lifeless eyes, the owner of the standard. Consul and General Aulus Hirtius. Whether he had been thrown from a horse or trampled as he fought on foot, the spy would never know. Beside him, face-down with the back of his helmet crushed, the Aquila eagle bearer of the Martia legion.
As the stunned centurion began to register the utter havoc he and his command had caused, he saw a slight figure begin to pull itself out from among the dead men packed in the ditch between the Martia legion’s eagle and General Hirtius’ standard. Even as a kind of horrified recognition began to dawn, his attention was claimed by something else. A flash of movement. There, on the far side of the ditch full of dead men, stood Decimus Albinus himself. Frozen. Staring with a terrible intensity at the slender figure dragging itself erect. As though in the grip of utter drunkenness – like Antony on the night of Caesar’s murder when Cleopatra left for Alexandria – the slim, blood-covered figure reeled onto the roadway. When Artemidorus looked again, Decimus Albinus was gone. Leaving the lone legionary to his fate.
By the grace of the gods, the young soldier’s unsteady footsteps did not slip. He staggered to the fallen eagle and tried to pick it up. But the dead aquilifer had lashed the pole to his body. The slim figure pulled out his pugio and cut it free with a couple of deft slashes. Then, clutching both the pole and the dagger in his left hand, using the eagle’s pole as a crutch to steady himself, he limped over to Hirtius’ dead body. Stooped, reached down and took a grip on the top of the dead man’s breastplate. Clearly planning to pull the general out of the battle to some place where his corpse could be treated with the respect it deserved.
Seeing what was happening – and who was watching events narrow-eyed, smoking sword in hand, with five equally fearsome companions at his back – the nearest of Hirtius’ soldiers fell back, wide-eyed and silent. The soldier holding the eagle, unaware of the scrutiny, pulled at the dead general’s armour but slipped on the ice-slick road and fell to his knees once more.
Driven by motivation he did not understand. That he would never understa
nd. In the grip, perhaps, of the will of the gods themselves, Artemidorus moved forward at last, sheathing his gladius. He reached down and took Hirtius’ breastplate at the throat. Heaved the corpse into a half-sitting position so he could be moved more easily. Leaned it against the belly of a dead horse as he reached down once again. Took the free hand of the young man fighting to pull himself upright on the Martia’s eagle standard. Dragged him to his feet as he spoke.
‘Take care Caesar,’ he said, his voice carrying in a sudden, breathless silence. ‘With Hirtius dead and Pansa so badly wounded, you have the command of these eight legions in your grasp. You’re doing well for someone only nineteen summers old. But I’d advise you not to slip again.’
The battered, boyish face split into a weary grin. ‘Cicero says it. You do it, Septem. What did he declare? Laudandus, ornandus, tollendus. You’ve elevated me, congratulated me. What comes next? Exterminate me?’
Even had he wished to answer Caesar’s question, Artemidorus got no opportunity to do so. Agrippa and Rufus appeared with the re-formed Praetorians then, crowding into a threatening line of cavalry just beyond the ditch full of corpses.
‘It’s all right,’ called Caesar. ‘My friend Septem and I were just discussing jokes and gifts.’ He swung the eagle so that the dagger was clearly displayed, held in his grip against the standard’s pole. ‘Antony never sent me this pugio, did he? You did.’
‘That’s right, Caesar.’ The spy was too weary to lie. ‘I thought a conciliatory gesture would help you both come to an understanding.’
‘But it is the dagger Brutus used to kill my father Divus Julius?’
‘It is, Caesar. I swear it on my life.’
‘Even though Cicero says Brutus brought it dripping from the murder?’
‘Even so…’
‘Then we will all have a settling of debts. Brutus and I. Antony and I. You and I. But not today. Today I have other work to do. Other accounts to settle. Which, I must admit, you have managed to bring to my mind with your typically clear analysis of my position. There are some horses over there that you left uninjured. Take them and go.’
*
The six of them took three uninjured horses from the pandemonium they had created on the Via Aemilia and rode two-to-a-horse back the way they had come. Off the roadway, over the corpse-filled ditch and onto that part of the battlefield Gretorex and his men had guided them through.
It was quieter now. For the XXXVth, the Sabines and the Larks had vanished from the burning wreck of Antony’s camp. Leaving only dead and dying in their wake. Pansa’s legions and now Hirtius’ were leaderless, rudderless. Unopposed. With nowhere to go. Caesar’s legions hardly more focused or motivated, for the moment. Decimus Albinus’ starved soldiers had reached the end of their strength. Some of them, no doubt, looking at the dead horses. Their mouths watering. No one tried to stop three mounts carrying six assorted legionaries as they galloped south out of the battlefield, past the walking wounded and the deserters. Down to a grove of trees where six strong cavalry horses were waiting to carry them south to Arretium.
And, when they arrived there, they discovered not only the promised mounts but also Gretorex and his alae cavalry wing. ‘Ah, Septem, you have survived! And your cryptaia suicide squad into the bargain. All still alive. I am surprised but very pleased. Well done all of you!’ boomed the Gaulish decurion and legate to the general. ‘Antony asked us to look after you if you managed to make it this far. He’s worried you might have become tired out by your exertions today. So he wants us to take you south and make sure you get safely to General Publius Ventidius Bassus. And the three legions he has promised to take to Antony.’
XV
i
‘This is it,’ said Antony. ‘The end of the road.’
‘You can say that again,’ grated his brother Lucius.
And Enobarbus nodded his silent agreement.
Their horses whinnied softly, tossing their heads and shifting their hooves, as though overcome by their situation. And the enormity of what confronted them.
Behind them the Alaude legion, the Sabines, the XXXVth, what was left of the Gaulish cavalry with Gretorex away, Antony’s Praetorian Cohorts together with bits and pieces of the VIth and VIIth, all stretched in a line almost as far back as Castra Torinorum. The last camp on the Via Aemilia. Where they had overnighted. And finalised the plans that had brought them here to this desolate place. The end of the road indeed. Almost, it seemed, the edge of the empire. The end of the world.
Ahead of them reared the Alps. Green-grey and white capped. Like the fangs of some unimaginable wolf trying to tear the throat out of the stormy sky. A bitter wind whirled down off the peaks, cutting into them like cold steel. They sat astride their nervous horses at the mouth of a valley which wound into the mountains, vanishing out of sight all too swiftly between the sheer slopes of interlocking spurs. Which filled their vision almost as far as they could see on either hand. And even when looking up towards the low, scudding overcast. There was a river flowing out of the sheer-sided valley, steel grey, swollen by spring rains and early run-off from the lower ice fields. But there was no road. No path. Not even any track. Only the desolate slopes gathering into rocky scree and absolute precipice before them.
‘Are you sure about this, Antony?’ asked Lucius.
Antony gave his great, booming laugh. ‘Look, Lucius,’ he said, his voice echoing back from the mountains and carrying down the roadway to the men behind, borne on that bitter wind. Full of cheerful virility and utter self-confidence. ‘Haven’t you read your Polybius? This is where Hannibal crossed! If some Punic general could get over these mountains a couple of hundred years ago with a bunch of Carthaginians and thirty bloody great elephants, then I can do it with an army which is mostly composed of Larks!’
*
And, thought Enobarbus with a secret smile as they began to move forward into the jaws of the trackless valley, most of an alae cavalry wing composed almost entirely of Gauls – who know their way around these mountains pretty well. Who are also related to half the Alleborge barbari who still guarded the passes.
Last night’s meeting had made Antony’s plans and the reasoning behind them very clear. The death of Hirtius gave them a considerable breathing space. Even if Pansa was still alive. Which Antony maintained was unlikely. As he was certain he’d inflicted the fatal wound himself. The one remaining consul was in no condition to lead an army in pursuit. If he was dead, then the Senate would almost certainly order Caesar Octavius to hand over the consular legions to the command of Decimus Albinus. Who was, according to Cicero, an experienced and capable commander. On the assumption that Albinus would come after Antony like Nemesis.
‘I can’t see Caesar doing that,’ Enobarbus said. ‘I don’t know him as well as Septem does, but we’ve talked over his likely actions and reactions to a range of scenarios at briefings of our contubernium. The Senate has been made very nervous by the general’s actions as we know. As I have seen – and as Lucius Piso keeps reporting. Consequently Cicero has been pleading that they grant Imperium to Caesar Octavius as well as to Hirtius and Pansa. Because the old man is still certain he can control the young man like a puppet and get rid of him if he gets too big for them to manage easily. Maybe grant him a gold statue or something of the sort to keep him quiet in the meantime. Then when his usefulness is at an end, the Catiline approach – a bowstring round the throat one night. You heard the joke he made. Everyone has. “Adolescens laudandus, ornandus, tollendus – He’s a young man we can congratulate, elevate, exterminate.”
‘The Senate has done what Cicero advises on this assurance. But Cicero is wrong. They all are. Look at it from Caesar’s point of view. He’s been given powers no ordinary nineteen-year-old could ever dream of. He has four legions of his own – which will become eight now that Hirtius is dead. And probably twelve if Pansa goes too. Which will follow him to Hades if he asks. Not only for the pay he offers them but also because of his name – Caesar! The onl
y thing he lacks to take absolute power is a consulship. He’s not going to hand all that back.
‘No. Pansa will die if he’s not dead already. The Senate will tell Caesar Octavius to give his armies to Albinus so that Albinus can pursue us. He will refuse. He may come up with some excuse – he can’t control the legions any better than Pansa; they won’t work with one of Divus Julius’ assassins – some such. But he will refuse. Albinus will hesitate. The general will escape, and we will escape with him. Caesar Octavius will demand a consulship as the price of stopping us. Something he can afford to do. Because he will be the only imperator with a serious army left in Italy. Only when he gets that assurance will he think of joining Decimus Albinus and coming after us.’
‘There!’ said Antony. ‘That is the whole point of maintaining a contubernium of spies and secret agents – so that they can come up with an analysis that agrees precisely with what I want to hear! Well done, Tribune! Keep up the good work!’
Enobarbus smiled and allowed the gust of laughter to pass.
‘And, don’t forget, General, although they seem to have missed Caesar Octavius himself, Septem and his spies were, it is reported, intimately involved in the deaths of Hirtius and Pontius Aquila. And if anyone can get Ventidius Bassus with his three legions to you, it is Septem. Who, may I remind you brought you Trebonius’ head as ordered, and has sworn to bring you Decimus Albinus’ head as well.’
ii
Publius Ventidius Bassus was a hard man. A balding, square-faced, square-bodied soldier. With short, thick legs and the arms of a blacksmith. A down-to-earth no-nonsense leader. He had been one of Caesar’s closest associates, in spite of his unusual birth and background. A commoner who had been taken prisoner as a child and paraded in chains at a triumph; a slave who had sold mules to make a living before joining the army as a common legionary and working his way up by sheer merit. Who in time had become one of Caesar’s most able and reliable commanders. Campaigning with him in Gaul and Britain as well as against Pompey.