Fortress of Spears

by Anthony Riches

  Calgus led the Venicone warriors silently round to the Petriana camp’s southern side, keeping to the darkest shadows and moving with a slow, cautious stealth calculated to avoid their being detected by any listening patrols the Romans might have out in the scrubland that surrounded their turf walls. When he judged that they had reached the optimum spot for their purposes, less than fifty paces from the patrolling sentry closest to them, he halted the group wordlessly and indicated that they were to spread out a few paces and take cover. Taking a silver pendant from his neck, he swiftly tied its leather cord to a tree branch, and silently stripped away any vegetation that would obstruct its line of sight to the men patrolling the camp’s walls. He outlined his plan to the Venicones in a harsh whisper.

  ‘When one of them comes to take this trinket, we will wait until he is in the act of removing it from the branch, then hit him from all sides. You,’ he pointed to the warrior Maon, whose blow had flattened him during the Roman attack on his camp, ‘you knock him senseless and put him over your shoulder, and then you all follow me away from here. We should be well away by the time they even notice that there’s anyone missing, and by then it’ll be far too late.’

  Maon frowned.

  ‘What if more than one of them comes for your bait?’

  Calgus simply shrugged, tapping the hilt of his sword.

  ‘Take whichever of them goes for the pendant, and put anyone else to your iron. We only need one.’

  He reached up and spun the silver disc on its cord until the leather had a dozen or more turns to unwind, feeling the tension fighting his fingers.

  ‘Ready?’

  The men around him all nodded somberly, realising that they were about to lure a dangerous prey to them, and Calgus released the disc and allowed it to spin freely, the polished metal flickering as the moon’s pale light reflected from its whirring surfaces. Sliding into the cover of a bush, he stared through its foliage at the Roman he could see standing guard on the camp’s western entry, willing him to look up and see the disc’s silver twinkle in the darkness that surrounded them.

  Cyrus strode from the tent with his face set stone hard, seething inwardly at the tribune’s words and fearful of the potential consequences of his own failure to confess the prize that he still hoped would be his, despite the urge to tell his superior officer the full story. That fool Octavius had no idea of what he was capable of doing, or he would never have allowed him within a hundred miles of the deal, whether he was short of ready coin or not. Ignoring the sentry standing solitary guard on the camp’s western gate, he pulled off his helmet and its felt liner in order to allow the night’s cold air to take the itch from his sweat-sodden hair. No, he would find whatever idiot soldier was willing to sell the torc to the stores officer for a pittance and double the offer Octavius had made him, cutting the halfwit storeman out of the deal at a stroke. There would be no intermediaries between the frontier and Rome, just a two-year wait for his discharge and then a leisurely journey to the heart of the empire. He would have plenty of time to find the right man to broker the sale of the Venicone king’s badge of authority to a wealthy collector on his behalf, and his presence and the story that he was the man who had hacked the barbarian king’s head from his shoulders would help to ensure that the price paid would be a steep one. He could comfortably expect a hundred thousand from the sale, he estimated, enough money to … He snapped out of his reverie as the flicker of something shiny in the bushes to his right caught his eye and turned back to the sentry, ignoring the fact that the man looked half asleep.

  ‘Stay here, keep your mouth shut and keep your fucking eyes peeled. There’s something in the undergrowth and I’m going for a look.’

  Pulling his helmet back on, he strode towards the spot where he’d seen the momentary flash of light, drawing his sword and scanning the ground around him suspiciously before returning his gaze to whatever it was that was hanging from the tree, now less than ten paces from where he paused to look around and sniff the air. He could see it now, a disc of metal hanging from a low branch.

  ‘Must have snagged when the bastards came through, or been left as a marker and got forgotten. Their loss …’

  The decurion sidled forward with his sword ready to strike and his other hand outstretched to take the object from its resting place, his attention fixed on the trinket. He didn’t see the massive Venicone warrior who rose silently from the ground to his rear, an axe handle gripped in one huge fist, or even suspect the trap until the last second, with the rush of air as the stave’s heavy shaft swept round in a vicious arc that ended with a thunderous impact with his helmet, smashing him to the ground despite the protection of its iron plate. Scrabbling disjointedly at the ground beneath him, shakily attempting to get back to his feet in defiance of his reeling senses, he felt another pulverising impact land on the helmet, and then knew nothing more.

  6

  The next morning was bright and cold, a harsh wind from the east making the Selgovae tribesmen occupying the Alauna fort huddle deeper into their thick woollen cloaks. They had gorged themselves on the fort’s stores the previous evening, and taken their pleasure of the vicus’s remaining inhabitants in an orgy of alcohol and rape, and many of the warriors were still the worse for wear by the middle of the next morning. A handful of corpses were scattered across the fort’s cobbles like bloodied rags, left where they had been butchered by drunken tribesmen, and a faint echo of the stench of blood was carried by the biting wind. The faint cries of distress from those of the vicus’s inhabitants that still lived bore witness that not all of the tribesmen had yet drunk themselves to the point of insensibility.

  The tribal band’s leader sat in the detritus of the former commander’s residence, chewing on a piece of salted meat and basking in a quiet feeling of satisfaction. After their escape from the destruction of Calgus’s forest camp his men had run long and hard to evade the inevitable pursuit, and to have found such ready shelter and food was little less than divine intervention. His warriors could recoup their strength over the next day or two, and the fort’s intact walls and gate would protect them from any Roman units that happened across their hiding place. As he sat grinding the near-indigestible meat between his teeth, one of his men burst into the room, his sword drawn and a wild look in his bloodshot eyes.

  ‘Harn, there are Romans advancing from the south! Looks like a legion!’

  From the elevated vantage point offered by the fort’s walls, Harn could see a long column of infantry approaching from the south, moving with a deliberate speed rather than hurrying to the attack as he would have expected. Straining his eyes, he could see that the leading soldiers were indeed legionaries, their detachment standard fluttering gaily in the wind, the stylised representation of a bull immediately identifying them as belonging to the hated 6th Legion.

  He stared bleakly over the fort’s stone rampart, looking across the empty landscape to the north and reckoning the odds. ‘It would be them. At least there’s no cavalry to be seen, and none of their stone throwers either. We could hold this place for weeks, given the amount of food they left behind, or we could make a run to the north without fear of being ridden down. It’s a pity there’s no way to know if they’ll bottle us up in here, or just pass by and head north.’

  As if in answer, the advancing cohorts’ trumpets blew again, and the column split into three, one body of men deploying to the east and another to the west, while the foremost cohort spread across the southern arc. Within minutes the whole southern horizon was lined with troops apparently awaiting the order to advance to encircle the fort. Harn frowned out at them, looking again to the north.

  ‘Looking to wrap us up, are they? If I could be sure there was no cavalry out there …’

  A horseman rode forward from the advancing column with a dozen soldiers trotting alongside him, his armour and weapons shining in the morning light, and reined in his horse at the edge of any possibility of bowshot from the fort’s walls. A warrior close to Harn
put an arrow to his bow, ready to chance his skill at the distant target, but the Selgovae leader tapped him on the arm and shook his head.

  ‘Let’s hear what the bastard has to say before you start trying to put an iron head into his guts. Signal him to approach!’

  The Roman officer dismounted, and approached the captured fort’s walls with an escort of six men with shields held ready to protect him. At fifty paces from the wall he halted, bellowing out his challenge loud enough for every man gathered on the walls to hear it clearly.

  ‘Selgovae warriors! I am Scaurus, the tribune commanding this detachment, and the man with your fates held firmly in my hand! You have been lucky enough to find a fort not yet burned out, and now you line its walls wondering whether to wait us out behind them or run for the north. I cannot make that decision for you, but I can provide you with a small clue as to the treatment you can expect when we break in and put an end to your pathetic remnant. I have with me a cohort from the imperial Sixth Legion, and these are men who want little more than a chance to take their swords to you. These soldiers are not the raw recruits that were shipped in from Germania, after the act of betrayal that destroyed six cohorts of their comrades. These are men who actually witnessed what you did to their comrades at the battle of Lost Eagle, and they are desperate to take prisoners rather than heads in this coming battle. Any of you that survive will find your last few hours more painful than anything you could ever have imagined. Anyone that lives through this day will be skinned, crucified and left for the birds to feed on their raw flesh!’

  Harn leaned forward over the fort’s wall, shouting back his defiance.

  ‘Why are you telling us this, Roman?! Do you want us to run before you, and save you the grief of having to come and fight for these walls?!’

  The tribune’s reply was swift and purposeful, and sent a chill down the spine of any man listening with the learning to understand him.

  ‘No, Harn! All I want is for my sworn oath to Mithras, for retribution on you and your tribe, to be honoured! And for that to come to pass, I need you to stay right where you are, and wait for us to break in and start killing you!’

  Harn spoke out of the side of his mouth, not taking his eyes off the Roman.

  ‘Shoot him.’

  The archer raised his bow, pulling back the arrow until its iron head was level with the weapon’s wooden frame, but before he could loose the missile at the Roman officer, and with a sudden scurry of movement, a group of twenty or so warriors threw open the fort’s main gate directly below them. While they ran down the vicus’s main street, heading for the road to the north, one of the running men, a big man at once strangely familiar and yet hard to place, turned as he ran and shouted back at the men lining the fort’s walls.

  ‘Run while you can! The goddess is angry with us, and she has called on these Romans to deliver her justice!’

  Harn stared at them in amazement for a moment before turning to look down into the street below him at the cluster of warriors gathering around the gate. More than one of their staring faces was pale with fear, and, as he drew breath to put some iron in their backs with a swift series of barked orders, one of them bolted through the gate and down the road in the wake of the running men. An arrow from the waiting archer, loosed at Harn’s terse command, left the man face down and writhing in the road’s mud, but the damage was already irretrievably done. In the next few seconds half a dozen others followed, hurdling their fallen comrade without a second glance, and the trickle quickly turned into a flood as panic spread across the fort at the sight of more and more men running for their lives. Harn cursed loudly and bounded down the steps in pursuit of his fleeing warriors, his shouts of rage lost in the chaos of the warband’s flight.

  Scaurus watched and waited as the warriors streamed out of the fort, letting the rearmost men clear the vicus before signalling the legionnaires forward at the double march to occupy the fort, and secure it against any attempt by the Selgovae to return to the sanctuary of its walls. He watched for a moment longer, waiting until the running warriors were well clear of the fort, then turned to his trumpeter.

  ‘It seems that the barbarian’s ruse has succeeded. Give the signal.’

  The trumpeter blew his horn, sending three long peals echoing across the empty landscape, and on the hill to the left of the fleeing barbarians a long line of horsemen crested the ridge to stare down pitilessly at their prey. Their upright spears glittered in the morning sun’s cold light as Decurion Felix rode out in front of his command, his normally urbane voice raised in a stern tone of command.

  ‘Spears!’

  As one, the riders swung their spears down from the vertical to point down at the straggling line of barbarians fleeing to the north along the road’s long dark stripe, five hundred paces down the hill’s slope. Felix looked up and down the line of his men, while his mount Hades snorted and twitched beneath him, eager to run at the enemy warriors. Raising his voice to be sure he was heard along the line’s length, the decurion issued his last instructions.

  ‘No sword-work today, gentlemen, there are too many of them for us to stop and duel! Pick a target, and whether you hit or miss, ride through them and turn back for another go! Don’t go spearing our barbarians, they’re the ones at the front with the rags round their arms and their hands in the air! And listen for the horn signal; we need live prisoners as well as dead barbarians! Advance!’

  He turned Hades through a prancing half-circle and led the detachment down the gentle slope, raising his good left hand in the command for the riders to keep pace with him while allowing Hades to lengthen his stride to a canter, controlling the stallion effortlessly with his knees as the hill’s slope eased towards level ground. In the line of horsemen behind him Marcus clung tightly to the big grey’s flanks with his thighs, pulling at the reins to lift the beast’s head, physically holding him back from charging at the enemy prematurely. Looking to either side, he saw Arminius to his left, clinging to his mount with a look that combined exhilaration and terror, while to his right Qadir’s face was alive with the joy of the moment as the chestnut mare increased her pace to match the animals to either side. The line of horsemen cantered steadily across the open space between hill and road, quickly closing the gap between them and the barbarians, who, rooted by the horsemen’s thundering approach, had drawn their weapons and were readying themselves to meet the attack. When the horsemen were a hundred paces from the barbarians Felix lowered his hand to point at the enemy, his command delivered in an almost incoherent bellow.

  ‘Charge! Petrianaaa!’

  Ignoring the bit’s hard grip on his mouth, Marcus’s mount responded to the command the way he had been trained, putting his ears back and gathering himself for a split second before he sprang forward to rip across the turf in a furious gallop that took the pair out in front of the surging line of horsemen. Horse and rider seemed to float across the ground, such was the animal’s speed and purpose, and he barely had time to pick a target from among the mass of screaming warriors before they were upon the quavering barbarians. Putting his spear through the man’s throat more by luck than judgement, Marcus dragged the blade free as the horse, disdaining any show of fear at the warriors’ screams of pain and anger, burst through the enemy line in a scatter of bodies. He pulled the big grey back round for another pass through the enemy just in time to see disaster strike. As Arminius’s mount Colossus crossed the road’s slippery surface the animal lost balance, sending barbarians flying as he slid into them in a flurry of skittering hoofs before crashing unceremoniously to the ground with the German trapped under his struggling mass. The horse fought his way back on to his feet in an ungainly lunge, and a stray hoof clipped his helpless rider’s head, stunning Arminius and sending him headlong across the road’s hard surface. The warriors around him, momentarily scattered by the horse’s flailing limbs, raised their weapons in anticipation of an easy kill, ignoring the chaos around them.

  Marcus instinctively dropped his shiel
d and pulled the grey up sharply, releasing his mount’s reins and lifting his left leg to slide over the horse’s side to the damp turf, dropping momentarily to one knee before springing back to his feet. Two hundred paces to the north Martos and his chosen warriors, having managed to outpace the fleeing Selgovae, had slowed to a walk while they watched the Roman cavalry tear into their sworn enemies. Lugos, standing among them and yet still in no way accepted as one of them, saw Arminius fall unconscious to the ground and reacted swiftly, drawing his long sword and sprinting back towards the embattled Selgovae with a roar of challenge. The leading Selgovae warriors turned to meet him but were already too late, one man falling with his stomach torn open while another reeled back with his nose spouting blood, smashed by the giant’s massive fist.

  Running towards his friend’s prostrate and unmoving body, Marcus calculated fast as several barbarians moved in for an easy kill, their swords poised to stab into the unconscious German. Drawing back his spear as he ran, he slung the weapon at the man closest to Arminius and missed by inches, sending the weapon’s wickedly sharp blade clean through the huddle of warriors without drawing blood, but scattering them in surprise and giving him the precious few seconds he needed to close the distance between them. Drawing his swords and screaming his rage at the warriors gathered around his friend, he confronted the half-dozen men poised for the kill. In the split second before the fight began, as the warriors took stock of the lone soldier confronting them, a rider clattered past the group, expertly spearing one of the barbarians in the back, dropping the man twitching across Arminius’s body. With that, Marcus was among them with his swords blurred arcs of polished iron. Hamstringing the closest man with his spatha, he ducked under a wild swing to gut his attacker with the gladius’s short blade, sending him tottering back with the stinking, slippery rope of his torn guts hanging from his body. Another warrior stepped in quickly, his powerful sword-thrust skating along the Roman’s hastily raised gladius and slicing open Marcus’s arm. Grimacing with the pain, the Roman arced his spatha through a full turn to hack the Briton’s arm off at the elbow before he could pull back, then reeled away from the fight as another of the warriors caught his helmet a glancing blow with his sword, lucky in that the blade skidded across the iron plate rather than chopping through it and into his skull, but still seeing stars from the blow. As he staggered backwards, momentarily unable to defend Arminius from the men around him, Lugos burst into their midst, having run the length of the stricken warband at risk of being taken for a Selgovae and speared by the Petriana’s riders, now roaming the battlefield at will.