Marius' Mules Anthology Volume 1

by S. J. A. Turney

  ‘Belay that order’ he barked, and then, turning to Fronto: ‘They rile me now.’

  The legate nodded.

  ‘I suspect that’s what they’re trying to do. They’re goading you into foolish actions. Don’t fall for it. Just have the auxiliary archers posted to the front in case they try that again.’

  Caesar glared into the distance for a while and then growled.

  ‘Alright. Give me ideas, then.’

  Beside Fronto, Tetricus shrugged. ‘How long do we have, Caesar?’

  The general sighed, a harassed look crossing his face. He rubbed his forehead irritably and grumbled.

  ‘Sabinus? Have a rider sent to Nemetocenna. Tell Labienus to start without me and that we’ll be along in due course.’

  As the staff officer nodded and called over one of the clerks, the general turned to Tetricus.

  ‘Very well. If time and manpower are no object, what is your best proposal?’

  A gleam that Fronto knew very well came into the tribune’s eye. The legate smiled as the tribune began to talk, illustrating all of his points with waving arms and pointing fingers.

  ‘Firstly, circumvallation. I’d wall them in. The oppidum is in the ‘v’ shape between two rivers. We build a rampart and ditch that seals them off, and place redoubts at regular intervals along the far river banks to make sure they don’t cross and, though I think the Meuse will be too deep and fast for that anyway, it’s better to be safe than to be sorry.’

  Caesar blinked.

  ‘That’s a sizeable rampart?’

  Tetricus nodded.

  ‘I’d say for safety six miles from bank to bank. And around twelve miles of interspaced redoubts across the water.’

  Caesar frowned.

  ‘How long?’

  Tetricus shrugged.

  ‘Given the manpower and peace in which to work, general, a day; maybe two. We’ll need quiet and undisturbed time after that, protected by the rampart you see, while we build the tower.’

  ‘The tower?’

  ‘Yes, sir. See, there’s no way we’re getting through those walls up the slope, so the only other way is up the rocks. Can’t climb them, and there’s no good materials for a ramp unless we quarry a few miles away and bring it here, which will take weeks and involve working within missile range of the top. So it’s a job for a tower. We can build it out of range and then move it close.’

  Caesar frowned.

  ‘Those cliffs are well over a hundred feet high, even in the easiest places. You’re talking about building a hundred foot tower?’

  Tetricus shrugged.

  ‘It’s been done before.’

  ‘It has?’

  The tribune nodded.

  ‘The siege of Rhodes over two centuries ago. Their tower was one hundred and thirty feet in height. And that was built by Greeks. Engineering has come a long way since then. I would say our issue is not the height, but the other dimensions.’

  ‘What?’

  Fronto noted with a smile that Caesar’s face had taken on the same frustrated incomprehension that all officers seemed to acquire when talking to a passionate engineer.

  ‘Well’ Tetricus went on, ‘it will need to be massive in all other proportions, partially to maintain stability with the enormous height, but also because we need to be able to flood them with troops from the top of it, and not just a gentle trickle of men. Also, the bridge across at the top will have to be pretty immense on its own.’

  Caesar boggled for a moment and then sighed.

  ‘Do what you have to. Just get me in that city.’

  He turned to the rest of the officers.

  ‘Have the legions construct a camp, then. Looks like we’ll be here for a while.’

  * * * * *

  Fronto stared at Tetricus.

  ‘What the hell are you doing?’

  The tribune turned back to see his legate and smiled, the moonlight picking out details on his man’s frame, as he collected the massive, coiled rope from the ground beside him. Camp had been completed in mid afternoon and already the ditch and rampart had been begun, stretching half a mile with six feet of depth and height respectively. The finished product would be twice that.

  ‘Measuring the height of the tower.’

  ‘What?’

  Tetricus grinned.

  ‘We need to know the height of the cliffs so we can work out what dimensions the tower must be. I estimated earlier on, but we need a more accurate measurement.’

  Fronto laughed. Only an engineer…

  ‘So you’re out in the no-mans-land in the dark with a rope. You are a madman, you know that?’

  Tetricus shrugged.

  ‘Safer at night. This is actually a lot easier in bright sun, but the Aduatuci would probably drop things on me.’

  Fronto blinked.

  ‘You’re actually going to climb that in the dark and measure it?’

  ‘No, no, no. It’s very simple. I know I’m five and a third feet tall, yes?’

  ‘If you say so.’

  ‘And I’ve measured my shadow and cut a length of rope to fit.’

  ‘Err… alright’ Fronto agreed hesitantly.

  ‘So while the moon is at this height, that length of rope is equal to five and a third feet.’

  ‘Yes?’ the legate said uncertainly.

  ‘So now I just have to get to the base of the cliff and measure the shadow of the cliff, and I can work out how tall it is.’

  ‘If you say so.’

  Tetricus laughed.

  ‘You’re not a scientific man, are you, sir?’

  ‘You have no idea, my friend. Come on. I’ll be your bodyguard while you do your sums.’

  The two men strode off quickly and quietly into the moonlit night, leaving behind the lights and sounds of the camp. While they walked, Tetricus frowned as he regarded his superior officer.

  ‘Would you be offended if I asked you a couple of personal questions, sir?’

  Fronto laughed quietly.

  ‘Gaius, I think we’ve known one another long enough by now you can stop calling me sir when there are none of the junior ranks around.’

  ‘Force of habit. Would you mind?’

  ‘Go ahead.’

  The jagged rocks that formed the massive fortress of the Aduatuci loomed less than a quarter of a mile distant, and it occurred once again to Fronto that this could be a dangerous and even foolhardy little jaunt.

  ‘Your arm’s not getting any better, is it?’

  Fronto shook his head. He had been trying not to think too hard about that. A future as a one-armed man was not a pretty picture.

  ‘Perhaps not. I’m not sure. The medical staff say that since I can still feel the pain in it, then it’s still alive. They think the…’ he tried to think back to what he had been told. ‘Like in torsion artillery, where you wind ropes tight? Well that’s sort of how the arm works. The doc said that some of the most important points in the workings have been badly damaged. He said that if it’s still viable that it’ll slowly heal and I’ll start to get some movement back, though it’ll take a long time and a lot of exercise.’

  He sighed.

  ‘Or possibly there was too much damage, and it’s severed inside. Then basically I have a decorative limb. I’m sort of hoping that’s not the case.’

  Tetricus nodded.

  ‘You’re a very private person, I’ve noticed, legate? No one has dared ask you about your arm before now, I’ll bet.’

  Fronto nodded.

  ‘Stop looking into my mind… it’s irritating.’

  Tetricus smiled.

  ‘I think that a lot of people who think they know you don’t know you half as well as they think they do.’

  Fronto gave him a warning glance.

  ‘Anything else?’

  Tetricus took a deep breath.

  ‘The woman.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘That native woman you left in Noviodunum?’

  Fronto, unseen in the nigh
t, rolled his eyes.

  ‘What about her?’

  ‘Why look after her only to then leave her behind? You should by rights have thrown her in with the captives. She should be sold in Rome with the rest of them. Most officers would have done that… or killed her.’

  ‘I don’t like killing girls.’

  ‘But to protect her from everyone and then just discard her among the Belgae?’

  Fronto looked across at his companion. Tetricus was clearly weighing him up somehow.

  ‘Go on…’

  ‘Well.’ The tribune took a deep breath. ‘I hope you don’t take offence at this, but… well, I saw the way you looked at her.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘Like a hungry man staring at a cooked lamb. I know that look.’

  Fronto growled.

  ‘I think this conversation is over.’

  ‘Fair enough. Any time you want to talk, though, I’ll listen.’

  The tribune turned back to look at the looming cliff, missing the unpleasant glare that Fronto threw after him. Muttering things under his breath that he was not really sure even he believed, he hurried and caught up with the tribune, just as they passed into the shadow cast by the bright moon in the east.

  ‘Not far now.’

  Fronto nodded.

  ‘So what? We pin the rope and then walk back to camp?’

  Tetricus nodded.

  ‘I’ve got to…’ he trailed off. ‘Did you see that?’

  Fronto’s face took on a sudden serious cast.

  ‘What?’

  He frowned and follows Tetricus’ pointing finger.

  ‘Shit!’

  Shadowy shapes moved, silhouetted, across the ground between the oppidum and the partially-constructed siege works.

  ‘These bastards are tricky. We’d best go warn the legions. Obviously they’ve not been seen, or we’d have heard the call go up.’

  Tetricus grasped his wrist as he turned.

  ‘No point’ he hissed. ‘Watch them…’

  Fronto stopped and squinted into the moonlight at the black shapes. Tetricus was right; they were swarming back up the slope toward the oppidum’s gate.

  The tribune raised an eyebrow. Do we go check, or just back to camp?’

  ‘We check. I don’t like the look of this. The guards at the rampart should have raised the alarm. They must have seen them.’

  Tetricus dropped the length of rope and the two men jogged across the eerie moonlit landscape with its streaks of black, grey and white where poplars cast their shadows. They watched the last few shadowy shapes disappear among the defences on the slope as they came within clear view of the fortifications.

  The torches and braziers of the guards still burned, but there was no polished reflection of helm or spear in the silvery glare.

  ‘This is not good.’

  The two men skittered to a halt at the near end, where the ditch in front was only two feet deep, with the rampart of discarded earth the same height. Fronto strode purposefully across to the nearest brazier. Soldiers should have been sheltering over it, warming their hands in the night breeze, but no. No men here.

  Scanning the area, he noted shapes on the floor nearby. With a sigh, he strode over, already sure of the guards’ fate.

  Sure enough, only a few paces from the brazier, a contubernium of eight men lay piled atop each other. Reaching down, he rolled the top man aside. Tetricus crouched next to him and examined the man.

  ‘Strangled with a laqueus. From behind, clearly.’

  He examined the pile of men.

  ‘Same for them all. They must have come out of nowhere and overwhelmed all the guards before they could raise an alarm.’

  ‘Shit,’ Fronto said again with great feeling. ‘There were an entire century of men guarding this work. All gone without a sound, and not a sword drawn. These Aduatuci are nasty. And clever.’

  Tetricus nodded.

  ‘We’d best get back to camp and report this.’

  ‘What about your measurements?’

  ‘I’ll guess. Come on.’

  * * * * *

  Paetus clenched his teeth. The first day of their journey he had spent tense, expecting at any moment to be hauled aside by the guards and accused of treason against Rome. The prisoners had been roped together in four lines hundreds of men long. There may have been some sort of order based on the tribe of the captive, but Paetus could not tell one man from another; with one exception.

  That first day, as they had been roped together, he had noted that Boduognatus, chief of the Nervii, had been positioned through blind chance only three men ahead of him in the chain. The man had not cast a single glance at him throughout that long walk, but of all the barbarians in this motley collection, Boduognatus was the only one that definitely knew who and what Paetus was, and the only one who would likely turn him over to the Romans. Possibly he was keeping Paetus’ identity as a piece in the game, to play at the last moment and save himself, but that seemed unlikely. The man who had initially wanted to skin him alive for merely being Roman was not the sort of man to play those games.

  No. More likely the chieftain was waiting for an opportune moment during the night when the guards were not looking to quietly do away with him. The legionaries would not care too much. It would be a small financial loss for them in slave profits, but one barbarian was as good as the next to the average legionary. He probably would not even get buried, just thrown in a ditch when they moved on.

  And so from that first agonising hour of expecting trouble, he had decided on a course of action. Boduognatus must die first, before he got the opportunity for which he was waiting. He had briefly worked on a plan to take the chieftain at night, but the man never seemed to sleep and, since Boduognatus was already looking for a way to deal with him, would be alert during that time. But during the day, all the prisoners experienced was hour after hour of painful shuffling and their minds drifted and switched off, especially if, like Boduognatus, they had slept little during the night.

  So on the third morning, as the prisoners, bound by their wrists only during the night, were lined up for the rope to be passed along the rows, Paetus had positioned himself carefully. The chieftain may have noticed that Paetus was now in the line behind him but, if he cared, he showed no sign.

  The column had started to move at sunrise and continued without a break, churning the mud of the track and eating away at the miles until the watery sun behind the thin clouds with their intermittent drizzle was high overhead. As noon came upon them, a rest was called, and the legions were allowed to sit and recover, while the prisoners remained roped and standing. Half a dozen soldiers came down the lines with jugs and baskets, dropping a chunk of bread into their greedy hands and tipping a ladle of water into every thirsty mouth. And everyone drank desperately, and tore into their bread; all except Paetus. The former prefect drank his water without comment as always, but the bread was tucked into his tunic, the pinion around which his plan revolved.

  After perhaps three quarters of an hour's tense waiting, the column began to move off once again. Knowing your enemy and situation was important to a commander and Paetus was a planner by nature. Two more hours of interminable shuffling, as the rain began to fall heavier and heavier and the clouds became dark grey and pregnant with the promise of storms. Two more hours was Paetus’ target. More, and he risked Labienus calling another halt; less, and the prisoners would be too rested and alert. Two more hours into the march and they were at their most docile, numbed by boredom and soreness and routine.

  And now the time at last had come. His teeth clenched tightly, he fixed his eyes on the back of Boduognatus’ head in front and slyly, as subtly as was humanly possible, he reached into his tunic and withdrew the bread he had secreted there.

  Starving as he was, Paetus recognised the simple fact that the warriors around him were all equally hungry and desperate and would likely have less discipline than he.

  Holding his breath, he waited until the near
est guard had looked away at another section of the line, and threw the torn loaf over the heads of the men in front. The item came down among the starving prisoners six or seven men ahead. He had meant to throw it further than that, but the ropes that held him restricted his movement too much for a good throw.

  The effect was everything for which he had hoped. An explosion of activity followed, as half a dozen captives struggled and fought to obtain the precious food. The guards called the alarm and charged to intervene, but there were four roped lines of men and getting to the centre from the sides of the column was near impossible. As a soldier desperately jabbed lightly with a spear, trying to frighten them into submission, what was a small fracas expanded, almost turning into a somewhat restricted riot. The men nearest the soldier grasped his spear and tried to wrest it from him while, around the place the bread landed, men had now collapsed to the floor, fighting.

  The ropes keeping them bound together lurched forward as the men fell and Boduognatus stumbled in surprise. Paetus, prepared and lithe as a cat, was on him the moment he fell. Leaping forward with the rope that connected them formed into a loop, he dropped it over the Nervian chief’s head and had it round his throat before they hit the ground.

  There was no time to slowly strangle the man. The guards were already beginning to get the minor riot under control; besides, ligature marks on the man’s neck would be a give away and would bring Paetus to far too much attention.

  With a move for which he was largely untrained, yet had thought out over and over for the last two days, he placed his knee on the Nervian’s back between the shoulder blades and yanked hard on the rope. There was a clear snapping noise and the body beneath him went limp. Paetus grimaced as he loosed the rope and returned it to its correct position while he crouched there on the man. The entire attack had taken three heartbeats, as he was acutely aware. The guards had been too busy to see anything, and the prisoners around him were clearly more concerned with the bread and the fight than with this less interesting activity. The only possible problem would be the man behind him who, if he had been paying attention, would have likely seen what he had done. It was a risk he’d had to take.

  As the soldiers moved up and down the rows, bringing the prisoners back into line with the occasional well-placed smack of a spear-butt, two legionaries reached down and hauled up the victorious captive, still chewing the last of his prize. The man grinned at them and they rewarded him with a hammerlike blow to the stomach before attempting to stand him upright.