Better than that, the Atrebate nobles’ sons who led the contingent under his command knew the land well enough that their return journey had been a lot shorter and more comfortable than the horrible ride into the unknown west over a week ago.
And only half an hour ago, weary and becoming aggravated with the incessant bad weather, the riders had happened upon the unmistakable trail of a large force that had recently passed by in the direction of the Roman landing site.
“Apologies, lord. This is land we scouted when first we landed. Caesar’s camp is less than half a mile distant. We can follow the trail and it will lead us there.”
Galronus’ jaw hardened. The freshness of the trail suggested that any meeting between this force and the Roman expeditionary legions was likely still in progress. If it was already over, then it would have to have been a massacre one way or the other. Those possibilities didn’t bear thinking about.
“Keep to your tired mounts!” he called to the men gathered around him. “As soon as we are close enough to hear the battle, change mounts and set the worn horses to graze. Then we muster and charge.”
One of the young Atrebate nobles shook his head. “If we do not tether the horses, they may bolt. These are strong, noble and costly beasts.”
“And your fathers and their chieftain have donated their services to our cause. You will follow my orders, or you will dishonour the lord of the Atrebates in your defiance.”
Satisfied with the look of sullen and grudging acceptance in the young man’s features, Galronus squared his shoulders and sat straighter.
“Quickly now. To the coast and battle!”
* * * * *
Fronto stormed along the line of fighting men. Despite having apparently issued the order to his men to make sure their legate stayed safely out of trouble, Carbo was inaccessible, fighting somewhere in the front line where Fronto could hear his bellowed commands even though he couldn’t see him.
The men of the cohort might have effectively locked him out of their fight, but there would come a point where the line of legionaries came to an end, where the way had been left for the Britons to escape the field.
For a few minutes, Fronto had wondered whether that would truly be likely. The enemy had fought them with unending vigour and seemed undaunted by this ‘boxing in’ of their army. But in the last minute the atmosphere had changed subtly. That breaking point had almost been reached. He could feel it crackling in the air like the promise of lightning.
Sure enough, there, a few yards ahead, the last century in the cohort had been fielded at double the density and only half the width, providing extra protection for their own flank – it was not unknown for a surrounded enemy to outflank their own attackers. Had the Britons worked it out, it could have been easy enough for them to send out a large enough force to break around the edge of the Roman line and start smashing them to pieces.
Fortunately, a combination of two elements kept the flank safe. Firstly: the enemy’s chaotic nature where, rather than thinking on the grand scale of how to win a battle, the Britons were simply falling over each other to get at the nearest Roman, while their cavalry flittered uselessly amongst them and around the edge – scattered and ineffective. Secondly: years of drilling and practising under first Priscus and then Carbo had kept the Tenth not only strong and disciplined, but also adaptable and able to think for themselves when required. On the very flank, the primus pilus had placed his most trusted veterans, interspaced with his biggest and strongest men. Behind them, in the subsequent rows were fast men capable of responding to threats speedily and efficiently. Every time the enemy tried to break the end of the Roman line through brute force they encountered only the mean and brutal response of Carbo’s bear-like veterans. Every time a small group attempted to move around them to turn the flank, a highly mobile force of legionaries appeared as if from nowhere to deal with them.
It was working.
It was also where Fronto would be able to join the fight without being pushed out.
“Cavalry!”
Even as he’d started to pick up the pace to reach a fighting position, nearing the end of the line, Fronto looked up at the shout from a nearby legionary and saw a force of hundreds of Celtic horse bearing down on them from the woodlands. It appeared the Britons were not alone.
“Hold the line. Don’t worry about that cavalry” Fronto bellowed. “Just hold the line!”
Yet despite his command, the legate was no longer sure about making a fight of it at the line’s end. If that cavalry came in at a charge and chose to hit this particular position, he’d be trampled before he even had a chance to bloody his blade.
Tucking his gladius under his shield arm and stepping back away from the fight, Fronto reached up to the amulet supposedly representing Fortuna and gave it a little caress for luck as his eyes roved this way and that, trying to take it all in. A groan was rising from the Roman ranks as they realised that Celtic reinforcements meant it was almost certainly over, though the officers back at the main legion force were still pushing their men as the buccina and cornu blasts confirmed.
And then the strangest thing happened.
Even as the Roman force began to sag with the dire expectation of death, a bellow of something unintelligible arose from somewhere in the crowd of Britons and was echoed back and forth until it became a moan of despair. The few horsemen who were still free at the periphery of the fight made to escape, running not for the relief force, but obliquely, into the woods.
Fronto stared as the mass of footmen broke in an instant and began to flee as best they could. His eyes followed them and paused for a moment on the newly-arrived cavalry. Blinking, he focused on the force once more. No, his eyes had not deceived him: that was a Roman banner among them.
Galronus!
Even as the allied cavalry slammed into the fleeing Britons driving them into a frenzy of fear, Fronto straightened with a grin – the tables had just turned unexpectedly.
Determinedly, he collected his sword from beneath his armpit once more and took a step forward. Was he being stupid? Though Galronus’ cavalry had almost sealed in the enemy within a neat box, there were still gaps where the Britons leaked out making for safety as best they could like water bursting from holes in a dam, and he’d made his way to a position directly between them and their objective.
Most of the Britons, however, were now purely intent on escape, fleeing past him, heedless of this lone Roman officer and flowing around him like a stream around a rock as he kept his shield forward to ward off any stray blades while he slashed and struck at the figures running to either side of him.
A blow struck his back and he wondered for a moment whether it would be mortal. It would be a truly awful fate to die and be buried in this wet, forbidding, sickening land.
“Watch your back, sir.”
Blinking, he realised that the blow had not been an enemy weapon, but rather a legionary falling in at his side, protecting him. Even as he nodded at the man, a similar thump announced the presence of a soldier at his other side, effectively forming a small shield wall on his position. Did Carbo’s interference know no bounds? Now men were being sent from the cohort to protect him? Somewhere deep in his soul, Fronto started to seethe.
Safer than he had any intention of being, the legate moved his shield slightly to gain a better idea of what was going on amid the chaos of fleeing Britons, hefting it sharply back into position just in time to take the blow of the sword he’d fleetingly seen coming. The point of the long, Celtic sword slammed through the layered boards and leather of the shield, stopping alarmingly close to his sternum and then ripping back out, tearing pieces of shield with it.
Concerned, Fronto risked rising momentarily to peer over the very top of the shield.
He blinked in shock.
The man before him was a druid!
There could be no doubting it. The grey-white robe and the feathers and bones braided into his hair and long beard that tapered to twin forks spok
e volumes about the man’s status. What surprised Fronto more, though, was the martial aspect of this druid. While he’d seen their kin in Gaul bearing swords, he’d never imagined them as true warriors. This one, though, looked thoroughly at home with his heavy sword as he drew it back with a muscular arm for another blow. His other hand held no shield, but a short stabbing spear, which he was raising for a thrust over the top of Fronto’s shield. The big man’s hair was held back by that appeared to be a plain iron crown.
Like all druids, he was arrogant and sure of himself. Like all Celts, he fought as though attack was all. Like all their kind, he overextended and opened himself up to quick attack by a trained soldier of Rome. Fronto raised his shield and angled it slightly to ward off the spear thrust as he lunged with his gladius. The tip tore through the dirty robe of the druid but to Fronto’s surprise met the unyielding metal of a finely-forged mail shirt beneath, striking sparks as it skittered across and past the man’s ribs, becoming lost in the voluminous folds of the man’s robe.
Almost in a panic, Fronto felt himself overbalanced and falling forward with the momentum. Just as surprised, the druid tried to step back to allow this Roman room to fall gracelessly forward where he could easily deliver the killing blow, but the press of his fleeing countrymen around him prevented the move. Desperately, Fronto toppled like a falling tree – his soft, useless boots unable to find purchase in the soaking mud – and was suddenly jerked straight as some unseen hand grasped the back of his cuirass and hauled him upright.
The druid had already recovered and had both spear and sword raised and pulled back ready to strike. That bubbling seething feeling in the pit of Fronto’s stomach began to boil. Anger coursed through him, vying with embarrassment.
He had been effectively babysat by his own legion, prevented from getting himself into trouble and, determined to do his part like a spoiled child – something he was beginning to recognise in himself, much to his irritation, he had found a way to involve himself in the fight only to seriously underestimate his opposition and have to have his arse hauled out of the fire by the same damn babysitters, proving them, beyond a shadow of a doubt, right!
Furious at himself, his men, this damn druid and his irritating people, this drizzly, wet and hopeless island, the endless bickering, backstabbing and uncertainty of Caesar’s army, his own limitations and even his apparent abandonment by Fortuna, Fronto snarled, his ire and anger forging a white hot spear in his brain.
He snapped.
* * * * *
Two hours later, lying propped up on a raised bench with a relatively soft pallet beneath him as the medical staff worked on him, he talked to Atenos, who, it turned out, was the man who had grabbed him and hauled him back up.
The huge man shook his head with a disbelieving grin.
“I’ve never seen anything quite like it!”
“What happened? I seem to remember punching that druid a few times.”
Atenos laughed out loud as the medicus stitched the cut on Fronto’s shoulder. “You really don’t remember? I honestly thought you might take them all on yourself!”
Fronto could feel himself flushing and knew he should be angry, but somehow there was not enough anger left in him. He just felt exhausted.
“It was like the great berserk rages of the heroes of our legends. You actually threw your shield at him.”
“You should have stopped me then. That’s stupid enough in itself. If a legionary did that, you’d have him beaten for his negligence.”
“I did try to stop you, legate. How d’you think I got this black eye? A Briton?”
Again, Fronto flushed.
“By the time I’d recovered,” the centurion grinned “so had the druid. You’d confused him a bit, I think, when you threw your shield at him, but that was nothing to his expression when you kicked him between the legs.”
“I did what?”
“Went down like a sack of grain, he did. I swear his eyes even crossed. I think you beat him about half a mile past the point of death. He looked more like a lamb stew than a man by the time you’d finished with him. All we could do was put a shield wall around you and stop you getting trampled as they fled.”
“Oh for the love of Juno!”
“Legionary Palentius tried to haul you off him. The other medicus is looking at him now to see if you broke his jaw.”
Fronto rubbed his head in a mix of embarrassment and tiredness.
“Anything else I need to know?”
“Not really, sir. After that you just sort of started laying about you among the fleeing Britons. I hate to think how many of them you sent to Elysium this afternoon. They only got you four times, and none of them bad – miraculous, really. Of course the men were around you as best they could manage, but it wasn’t easy. You were like a damned hedge-pig with that sword.”
“I honestly remember very little. I think I saw Galronus, but the first thing I really recall with any clarity was when you hauled me up off the floor. I think the enemy had gone.”
“It was over. I think you’d blacked out.”
Fronto leaned close to the huge Gallic centurion. “I’d take it as a personal favour if you tried to stamp on this before it becomes common knowledge?”
Atenos grinned. “I’ll do my best, legate, but you were in the middle of the army, and a bit of a sight. I suspect the story’s already spreading round the campfires.”
Fronto leaned back and winced as the suture the medicus was tying off pulled tight.
“Sit up, legate.”
Fronto looked across at the surgeon. “I’m trying. So tired. Sorry. Atenos, I think I’ll stay in the hospital for the night. You know… just in case.”
The big centurion nodded sympathetically.
“I’ll leave you in peace, sir. Get some sleep.”
Fronto was unconscious before the centurion had reached the door.
Chapter 19
(Beachhead on the coast of Britannia)
The ships looked distinctly unseaworthy to Fronto. He sat on a folding campaign stool on the beach under the shelter of a large leather awning watching the relentless driving rain batter the sea, the pebbles, the ships and everything in sight – which was not a great distance in these conditions. The sky was a leaden grey and the weather had not let up for more than an hour at a time in the three days since the battle had ended.
Kicking a pebble down the beach in irritation, he realised he was brooding on his actions in that conflict yet again, in spite of himself.
In the aftermath of the fight, Fronto’s reputation seemed quickly to have reached almost legendary status. Every time he heard the story of his frenzy the tale grew in magnificence and by rights he should probably be deified by now. Gradually, pieces of the struggle had returned to him, and the medicus had confirmed, much to his relief, that he’d received a blow to the head during the fight that was the most likely cause of his fragmentary memories of the attack rather than a simple complete loss of control and wit.
Still, despite Atenos and Carbo swearing to try and suppress the tale, it had exploded, and the legate had the sneaking, though unprovable, feeling that the two centurions may well be at the heart of its speedy spread.
By the end of that first day, he’d taken to closeting himself away, and by the afternoon of the second he’d been forced to go in search of new places to hide from people. If anyone had ever suggested that he might spend days hiding from people who wanted to buy him a drink, Fronto would have laughed in their face, but that time had somehow come.
In the end, this cold and blustery location was one of the few where he was almost guaranteed peace. Due to the value of the ships, the fortified beachhead was under constant guard, and only those with business here were allowed through the gate, meaning that the only soldiers the legate stood any chance of bumping into on the beach were sailors, engineers or other officers, all of whom had their own business to attend to.
It was not the most comfortable of places, though. The shelte
r had been erected days ago for the duty officer and his staff to oversee the repair and loading of the ships and, while it held off the rain from above, it did not keep the ground below dry or prevent the biting winds from along the beach or off the sea from whipping at him.
Irritably, he pulled the cloak tighter around him, shivering into the damp, cold wool.
Soon.
Soon, they would return to Gaul, and then the legions could be settled into winter quarters if Caesar meant to continue this madness, or settled if not.
Despite his earlier concerns, the legate would have to admit now that he was almost past caring about Caesar’s motivations and future plans. This constant search for a new war was fraying him round the edges, and every place the army moved seemed to be less inviting and less worthwhile than the one before. All he wanted to do now was get back to Rome and to Puteoli; to see Balbus, Faleria, Lucilia.
With a sigh and another sickened glance around at the rain falling like rods from a lead sky, he took a swig of the wine in his clay beaker and huddled tighter still.
“Wishing yourself thirty miles south, legate?”
Glancing up in surprise, Fronto was relieved to see the hard, bristly face of Fabius looking down at him from beneath the awning. Furius appeared at the other side. Without further comment or requesting permission, the two centurions unfolded camp stools and sat to either side. Fabius produced two cups from his sodden cloak and a small jar of watered wine, while Furius withdrew a bowl of steaming stew that he must have carried extremely carefully to avoid spilling it down his front.
“You need this. You’ve been on this beach for two hours now without warmth or food. If you’re trying to make yourself ill, you’re going about it the right way.”
Fronto eyed the bowl of warm, appetising food uncertainly for a moment and then accepted it with a nod and took a mouthful, blowing round the hot meat to cool his mouth. Strange how things turn out, he thought to himself. Never, since that journey from Ostia, could he have imagined himself actually grateful to see the two former Pompeian officers, let alone for them to be trying to look after him.
4.Conspiracy of Eagles Page 43