Marius' Mules: Prelude to War

by Turney, S. J. A.

  There was nothing he could do about it, though, and moments later he’d lost sight of the unfortunate merchant amid the flow of howling warriors. A lucky labourer managed to slip the grasp of one of the lead Gauls and ran onto the bridge, yelling for help. From somewhere behind, a cobble sailed through the air and hit him square in the back - between the shoulder-blades - throwing him forwards onto the timbers of the bridge.

  Desperately, crying out in pain, the young labourer tried to rise, but now the enemy was on the bridge and the mob’s advance was momentarily blocked as two more men beat the fallen worker, smashing bones and rending flesh. Cita took a deep, steadying breath and his gaze fell on the ships.

  For a heartbeat he wondered whether perhaps Brocchus had been right and he wrong after all. One of the barges began to move away from the quay, trying to use a combination of desperate physical strength and the fast current to move into the centre of the river, where they would be able to safely clear Cenabum and make for the coast.

  But, no. He’d been correct after all. They’d had no time. The barge barely made it two paces from the quay when half a dozen Carnute warriors leapt aboard, one misjudging the jump and plunging into the freezing waters of the Liger, where he floundered for a while, before swimming back to the bank. The remaining five howled with glee, a man in expensive armour and gold adornment among them.

  The barge was a simple affair with a single square sail that was as-yet still furled, unoccupied oar spaces to each side, and a wide, flat deck with a no shelter, providing plenty of storage room for goods.

  Perhaps ten Romans had made it aboard the barge, including one of the merchants, who was now shouting for his men to repulse the invaders and unfurl the sail. None of his men were soldiers, though; none of them were armed, beyond a few knives or timber belaying pins.

  Cita watched in silent helplessness as the Carnute warriors dispatched the sailors, closing on the merchant at the steering oar, who was screaming desperate offers of coin and treasure for his safe passage. The man’s last scream remained locked in a silent ‘O’ as the head was brutally hacked from the body, one of his killer’s hands gripping his hair and tearing the grisly orb away from the neck to which it was still attached by tendrils of flesh. Laughing, the warrior - probably a chief or noble from his attire - thrust the Roman head in the air and stared bellowing something in his native tongue to his compatriots on the shore.

  The slogan that he finished upon was picked up by the rest of the warriors, who fell into a rhythmic chant as they worked their way through the moored vessels in their violent harvest. Behind the chieftain, the rest of the crew’s heads were taken as prizes.

  Shaking his head at such waste and at the stupidity of those who’d sought safety on the water, Cita turned to find his native assistant, Bennacos, standing patiently beside him.

  ‘What do they shout?’

  ‘It’s a little difficult to translate, sir. Essentially: Gaul, not Rome. Or not a province of Rome. Something like that.’

  ‘You might be safer joining them, Bennacos.’

  The native frowned as though Cita suggested he spread his arms and fly away. ‘I am Boii, sir, with an oath given to the general!’

  Cita smiled. ‘Good man. Let’s get in the depot then, and shut the gate before we’re overrun.’

  The last of the fleeing sailors passed them, with the front men of the Carnute horde not far behind. Cita turned his ample frame and pounded along the bridge, with Bennacos at his side, across the short stretch of churned mud and through the stockade gate, which was hastily slammed shut behind him.

  Cita paused in the open ground, where the civilians milled about aimlessly, panic infusing their voices. Leaning over with his hands on his knees, he heaved in a few deep breaths to recover from the run and then straightened, his gaze playing across the rudimentary defences of the depot. All bar two of the soldiers were already at the stockade, pila and shields in hand, swords at their side, armoured and prepared. The other two he could hear, along with the optio over by the barracks. As the crowd parted, he saw the two remaining legionaries, bearing the heavy timber weight of a scorpion bolt thrower as they carried it to the defences. Behind them, one of the sailors who’d managed to fight down his panic and had been suborned by the optio was carrying a case of ammunition for the weapon.

  Good. Not that the scorpion would do them much good. They were still horribly outnumbered and these defences would not hold for long. But at least it gave them a little heart and something to do as they waited to be overrun. And it was something the civilians were focusing on too, helping them to overcome their own panic.

  ‘Crow’s feet!’ bellowed the optio, and the legionaries around the stockade began to reach down into the bags at their sides and haul out the excruciating weapons, casting them over the top of the defences and onto the turf beyond. The tribuli, or ‘crow’s feet’, were tetrahedral caltrops a few inches across, which when thrown to the ground always presented a single point on the upper side.

  Cita nodded his approval. The devices had been manufactured in Narbonensis and sent here down the Liger, where they had been stockpiled in preparation for distribution to the army. Tomorrow afternoon they’d have been on their way to Agedincum and Samarobriva. Here, they were more useful.

  Even as the legionaries cast the last few tribuli over the top, mining the ground beyond the defences with painful obstacles, half a dozen labourers who had been singled out by the optio were bringing a second bag to each man. There was no doubt whatsoever in Cita’s mind as to the inevitable outcome of the next hour or so, but he would damn well make the Carnutes pay for every foot of ground.

  Bennacos appeared again as if from nowhere, carrying Cita’s helmet and sword, which he delivered heavily before running off to find his own mail shirt and arms.

  ‘Optio!’

  The officer looked up, saw Cita and nodded a professional greeting as he sent two more men into the lean-to for something. ‘Sir?’

  ‘Have weapons and armour dished out to every living soul here. I don’t care whether they’re Roman or Gaul, sailor, servant or merchant… every last one’s a soldier now!’

  The optio threw him a quick salute and then sent two more workers inside to begin sorting the shields and weapons. ‘We’ve another scorpion, but no one else trained to use it. Hundreds of bolts and stones for it, though, sir.’

  Cita frowned and threaded his way through the remaining panicking civilians, though there were considerably fewer now that the optio had put some of them to work. One of the merchants - a man with three chins that wobbled hypnotically as he talked, grabbed Cita on the way past.

  ‘Why aren’t they attacking?’ he asked desperately, a strained hope adding an odd inflection to his voice.

  ‘They are. They’re falling into position, spreading out to surround us and still bringing the bulk of their force across the bridge. Juno knows why they’re bothering, given that they could overrun us with a tenth of that number.’

  ‘Why wait? Why surround us so thoroughly?’ begged one of the sailors.

  ‘They’ll want to seal this place tighter than a Vestal’s underwear. I doubt they want anyone to escape. If word of this reaches the legions… well you can guess what’ll happen. So they’re moving into place to completely cut us off before they attack, making sure they don’t drive anyone through a gap and off to freedom.’

  The merchant and his sailor both sagged, their hope extinguished by Cita’s flat explanation. For a moment he felt he should say something positive - something hopeful, uplifting - but he had nothing. If it had been Caesar here, or even Fronto, they’d have had the civilians roaring with venom and the naked hunger for battle. They both had the charisma of a true commander. Cita had a good understanding of the mechanics of command, and a lot of experience of war despite not being much of a fighter himself, but he’d devoted his long career to the logistics of the military. He was no real leader of men. Even the optio was motivating the men better than he could. Perh
aps it was for the best, then that he could find no helpful words. Any hope he could give them would be a hollow thing, after all.

  However, what he could not give them as a leader, he could give as an organiser. Striding with purpose across the compound, he stopped next to the optio. ‘Strongest building here, optio? Defensively, I mean.’

  ‘Main store room, sir. Stone walls with small slit-windows for air circulation - roof’s a weak point, but not worth panicking over. The whole pissing place is one big weak point. Shame we pinned the lean-tos on either side, but it’s still the strongest place. After that it’s the barracks, then the guest quarters.’

  ‘Agreed. The main store will be our fall-back position when the outer stockade falls.’

  The optio’s eyes swung back and forth at the civilians who were listening in. ‘If the outer stockade falls, sir.’

  Cita took his meaning and nodded. ‘If they fall, yes.’ He took a deep breath. ‘I can hear them moving off to the south already. We’ve got less than a quarter of an hour before they begin the push - probably a lot less. They’ll come slow at first because of the crow’s feet, and we can make them a little more hesitant with pila. We should have plenty of those in store, eh?’

  ‘At least a dozen a man, sir,’ the optio smiled.

  ‘Then get every last one distributed. Three to each civilian and the rest stacked up evenly next to the legionaries. Let’s give ‘em hell when they move. Any bows in there?’

  ‘No sir.’

  ‘Fair enough. Doubt we’ve anyone who could use one anyway.’ He turned and glanced at the gate, where the artillery piece was being set up on the fighting platform. ‘Get the other scorpion up onto the roof of the barracks. I wish the store had a flat roof, but the barracks will have to do. Have the two men on the gate scorpion split up, one with each weapon, and put one of the less panicked civilians with each as an assistant.’

  ‘He’ll be as exposed as a whore’s arse up there, sir.’

  ‘We’ve got an entire lean-to full of grain sacks, if I remember rightly. They were taken from the granaries in town this morning, but the grain barge hasn’t arrived yet. Have them hauled up to the roof and make a small ring defence. In fact let’s have the rest of them as a fall-back redoubt in front of the stores. Simple work for the civilians and as soon as it’s done they’ll be needed at these buildings.’

  The optio nodded and began to point out men among the crowd. ‘You: go get Servilius from the scorpion by the gate and send him to me, then stay there and ask how you load and aim the thing.’

  As the optio turned to the next men, assigning grain sack removal, Cita spotted Bennacos rushing from the barrack building, his mail shirt flapping heavy and loose about his thighs, spear in hand and sword at his side, hexagonal shield painted with bright native designs. He had foregone a helm, his braided hair framing his serious face and moustaches twitching with anticipation.

  ‘Bennacos? I’ve got the civilians building a redoubt of grain sacks outside the store entrance. I want you in charge of defending it until - and possibly after - we pull back there.’

  One of the Roman merchants near his elbow, struggling with a sack, paused, frowning. ‘But he’s a Gaul!’

  ‘And one of the few men I trust to do the job.’ Paying the merchant no further heed, but flashing a raised-eyes incredulous look at the Boii auxiliary, Cita began to scrabble his bulk up onto one of the barrels stacked against the barracks and grasped the flat roof, hauling himself up and onto the top. Already one of the workers was there, waiting for grain sacks to be heaved up to him.

  ‘I don’t think we’ve time to do this, sir.’

  Cita rose and looked around. ‘I see what you mean, but we’ve no choice. Try not to get killed. My staff records are already a mess.’

  The man smiled, and Cita frowned. Perhaps he’d inadvertently issued a joke? Shrugging, he ignored the man and took in the situation. Time to offer up a few heartfelt prayers and make sure everyone had coins to put under the tongues of the dead. He’d hate to be refused by the boatman and be doomed to wander this shithole for the rest of time.

  They were evenly-spaced now - a ring of vengeance, righteous fury and death around the supply depot, dozens deep. He wouldn’t bother counting - didn’t have time - but there would be over a thousand of them and even now the carnyxes were blarting out their ‘deflating bull’ noises as they called the horde to attack.

  With mere moments to spare, Cita turned and peered down at his command. The first sacks were being hauled onto the barracks roof, and the scorpion was on its way up. If they were lucky it might even get a chance to loose a few shots before it was overrun. The other artillery piece was swinging back and forth, trained on the approaching mass, selecting a target. The legionaries each hefted a pilum, with a stack of others waiting. More civilians stood between the soldiers at the stockade, each with a couple of pila, bolstering the defences. A small group ferried sacks from the store while another distributed them to either the barrack roof or the storehouse redoubt. The optio was on the way to the gate where he would stride the perimeter, offering advice and encouragement - the latter with the business-end of his staff of office as was the wont of his breed. Bennacos was directing the construction of the redoubt.

  At a headcount, in all Cita commanded maybe fifty men, though more than half of those were civilians who’d never held a blade. It didn’t take a master mathematician to do the arithmetic. It would all be over soon enough. But at least Cita would give the rebellious bastards a taste of what was to come if they continued to revolt. Six legions waited less than a hundred miles away and the general, when the news of this mess finally reached him, would be pitiless in his chastisement.

  ‘Here they come!’

  As the horde of Carnute warriors swept towards the defences on all sides, the optio roared out his commands and the men at the stockade drew back their throwing arms, pila steadied and angled for the cast. The civilians matched the legionaries with varying degrees of success, and the optio paused as he stomped around the perimeter, knocking a sagging pilum shaft back up into position with his staff.

  ‘Keep your arm up and steady, lad. This ain’t the games… this is serious business.’ He turned and looked up at Cita, who held up his hand showing two fingers with his thumb across his palm in the lookout’s standard sign for ‘two hundred paces’.

  ‘At thirty paces, lads,’ the optio announced. ‘Then at twenty, and then at will. Let’s give ‘em something to listen to, eh? Volcatius, you’ve a voice like a lark… give us a tune.’

  The legionary he gestured at grinned and cleared his throat.

  ‘Wine is better than women,’ he sang in a lilting but loud tone. ‘Oh wine is better they say. I’ve had a whore in every door, but the beer never made me pay!’

  The soldiers among the defenders joined in with the ditty and Cita, who’d heard enough marching, digging and fighting songs in his time of service, turned his attention instead to his immediate locale. Sacks of grain were now coming up and a second man had arrived and was stacking them in a half-circle to protect a small area from missiles. As he turned, Cita saw the tip of the scorpion arrive over the lip of the roof and rushed over to help the artillerist and his civilian assistant haul the thing up and then move it into position.

  As the engineer shuffled the machine into a good firing situation and began to turn the windlass, Cita helped the assistant bring up the box of ammunition. It would be touch and go whether it would be of any real use. The enemy were almost at the stockade.

  Leaving them to it, Cita moved to the edge of the roof and slid down to the ground. The soldiers had finished their bawdy song and at the instigation of the optio begun chanting ‘Minerva, Minerva, Minerva,’ in a menacing tone. At the sixth repeat, the optio dropped his raised hand and pila arced up around the defences, coming down with varied success, most of the legionaries hitting their chosen targets and even one or two of the civilians actually reaching the mass of the enemy and scoring a blow. />
  Cita strode across to the redoubt of grain sacks that was already three feet high and stepped on an upturned bucket to give himself a clearer view across the scant defenders and the low stockade. The legionaries at the perimeter had a height advantage over their enemy, since the defences had been designed with a slight embankment of turf behind the stockade. The rise allowed the defenders to strike over the top with their swords, the timbers protecting them from the chest down, while the ground beyond the palisade was some two feet lower, meaning the Carnutes would have to stretch and leap to strike over the top.

  It was small advantage, given the odds, but at this point Cita would take every edge the Gods granted him. Another three repeats of ‘Minerva’ and the second volley of pila launched from the defences.

  Cita’s slight height advantage on the bucket allowed him a reasonable view of the attack to the south, where no buildings existed to aid defence, and where the beleaguered Romans were reliant upon a simple stockade alone. The enemy, as he’d hoped, had faltered as they reached the scattered caltrops, the iron spikes gouging holes in feet, heedless of any booted protection, disabling and crippling the front runners who fell to the dirt in agony, only to find themselves speared in other places by more of the nightmare mines and then trampled to the ground by the tribesmen following.

  Cita watched as the front men collapsed in a screaming heap all around the defences, then a second wave from behind fell afoul of the same weapons, howling and falling only to be trampled by their fellows. The wave came on but at a slower pace, men regularly collapsing with wounded feet. The command had now been given for free throws and the legionaries cast their remaining stack of pila in a continual stream while the civilians each took their remaining pilum and steadied it to defend themselves against the first men to make it to the stockade.