by R. W. Peake
The man next to him started to move towards him to drag him to safety, now that the rear had taken another step or two backward, but the Pilus Prior’s voice cut through all of us like a dagger as he roared, “You take one step towards him I'll cut you down myself. He’s a dead man! Leave him to his fate!”
I was appalled and from the look of it so were Vibius and Plautius who both muttered curses under their breath.
“Silete!”
This came like the crack of a whip from Calienus, adding to our shock and confusion. Meanwhile, once the man on the ground, who was in the fifth section of the Second Century and one of the new men like us, was left behind far enough out of range that we could not protect him with either sword or javelin, the Lusitani descended on him. While I could not see, I could plainly hear their cries of triumph as they surrounded him the way a pack of wolves do when they close for the kill, and I said a silent prayer to the gods that he was still unconscious. Unfortunately, the gods were not listening because I was not even finished when I heard him shriek with the kind of pain that comes from the most agonizing of mortal wounds. Despite my attempts to shut it out of my mind, I began speculating on exactly what they were doing to him, his screams continuing for a few moments before, as abruptly as they began, they stopped just as suddenly. We moved just a few more paces when there was a flurry of activity in the surrounding hordes, and after a moment it became clear that one or a group of them was doing something that aroused the rage and frustration of both Centuries, as behind us we could hear the others cursing the Lusitani with a venom missing to that point. I got my answer why when a Lusitani came sprinting within our line of sight, out of range of a javelin but certainly close enough to see and hear him. He was brandishing a spear, on the point of which sat the head of the man they had just slain, and I felt my stomach roil as I fought the urge to unman myself by vomiting at the sight, the blood still dripping from the severed neck, the source of his agony made apparent by the clear visual evidence that he was not decapitated in one clean blow, but in three or four. Still wearing the look of shock and horror that I imagined was his last, his eyes were open, staring at us. They had even left on his helmet and this barbaric display was met with roars of approval from the surrounding Lusitani. Finding myself joining in the cursing, I hurled every vile imprecation I could think of, and as I was doing so, I locked eyes with one of them. This Lusitani was a medium-sized man a few years older than I, with long hair pulled into the knot that was their custom, bare-chested and armed with a long spear and a small shield made of painted wood. Looking me in the eyes, he grinned and with his spear made a gesture across his throat, then pointed and laughed at me. Staring grimly at him, I marked him as a man for whom I would be on the lookout if I was given the opportunity.
Just a hundred paces short of the hill, it was only then that our front rank took a casualty. It was the man behind Plautius, and he was hit by a rock that skipped off the ground to smash into his shin, shattering the bone, forcing him to fall to the ground clutching his leg. As we marched past him he reached out, grabbing Calienus by the leg, forcing him to alter his stride.
“Don’t leave me,” he begged, “for the sake of all the gods, don’t leave me with those savages!”
Calienus refused to answer, but the wounded man would not relinquish his grasp, and now Calienus was falling behind in a way that endangered the line, which in turn endangered the Century. From the corner of my eye I saw a flash of silver; Calienus dispatched the man with a quick and merciful thrust, saying loudly for all of us to hear, “If we break ranks we’ll all die. I’ll do the same to you, and I expect you to do the same to me if it’s needed.”
I did not need any more encouragement to keep my place, trying to shut out what I had just seen. Despite knowing it had to be done to ensure the survival of all of us, seeing Calienus kill one of our own was hard to take. Finally, we made it to the base of the hill, even as the cloud of dust had grown closer, and it now looked like there was a sizable force of Lusitani no more than two miles away. The punishment was not all one way; as we made our way up the hill, the warriors opposite us were now walking backwards up the hill when one of them lunged at us to try striking at what he thought was a weak spot in our line with his long sword, but the blow was deflected easily. As he backed up, however, he tripped over his own feet just a couple of paces away from us but before he could regain his feet he was done in with a quick thrust, his death met with a howl of outrage from the Lusitani. Reaching the top of the hill, we underwent a brief struggle with a few of the more stubborn warriors who realized the advantage we would have if allowed to stay on the crest. My chest was heaving from the effort and I recognized this as a good sign; the hill was much steeper than it looked, and any advantage we could wreak from the situation helped. Even so, things looked bleak until the gods smiled on us, in the form of the Lusitani themselves.
Once it was clear that we would make the crest, the warriors that had steadily harassed us now withdrew to the base of the hill, seemingly content to watch us while they waited for reinforcements. The Pilus Prior did not waste any time; since we were out on a patrol that included destroying crops and chopping down vines and trees, we had a semi-complete set of tools with us, lacking only a turf cutter. Crastinus ordered our Century to dig a defensive ditch, using the spoil for a makeshift rampart, while the other Century remained on guard. We were told to keep our armor and helmet on while leaning our shield and javelins close to hand as we worked, so if I thought I was hot and sweating profusely before, I was mistaken. As I dug, I watched the water pouring off the end of my nose in a steady stream whenever I bent over, and I wondered dully how long it would be before I ran out. There was no time to even drink, let alone rest, so that before long I was desperately thirsty. Meanwhile, the Lusitani leaders huddled up in a discussion once they saw what we were doing, with a lot of arguing back and forth, men gesturing first to us and then to the dust cloud, which seemed to remain stationary, although we knew that was impossible. Very quickly the reason for the debate became fairly clear; there was a sizable contingent in the group that considered it vital to attack us immediately to keep us from erecting a defense, no matter how flimsy. This discussion quickly became an argument that grew increasingly heated, a fact that was not lost on us.
“Maybe they’ll kill each other first,” I heard someone on guard say and I thought, one can only hope. However, while they bickered we kept digging, and I at least was thankful for the delay. Crastinus kept exhorting us, calling out so that we could all hear, “Keep it up boys. The digger you deep, the safer we’ll be.”
The trick was to dig a ditch wide enough where they could not leap across it and deep enough so that they could not just simply step down into it without slowing down. Additionally, the deeper and wider the ditch, the higher the rampart, which half our tent section was erecting as the other half dug. For once, even Didius was not shirking, clearly seeing the danger we were in as much as the rest of us. I was digging, while Vibius was packing the spoil to form a rampart and it was brutal work, the hardest I had performed at that point during my short time in the Legions. Our shovels and pickaxes were flying as we worked frantically, yet the gods were smiling on us because the Lusitani debate quickly degenerated into a physical confrontation, with warriors clearly dividing into two camps, both sides shaking their fists and doing a lot of yelling at each other. Then, someone pushed someone else and all of us, despite our predicament, stopped to watch as a brawl developed among our enemies, so astounding was the sight.
Even the Pilus Prior stood there, mouth open in amazement for a moment, before snapping out of it and snarling at us, “All right, that’s enough of the show. Put your backs into it you cunni or I’ll stripe you good.”
We immediately turned to again, smiling in spite of the threat.
By the time their reinforcements arrived, assessed the situation, then arrayed themselves to attack us, it was late in the afternoon and I had never been as tired as I was at th
at moment. Even with the tension and imminent danger, I was fighting a losing battle against falling asleep on my feet. More than once I would feel myself pitching forward, only opening my eyes and averting an unforgivable lapse of discipline less than a heartbeat before I reached the point of no return and fell flat on my face. No matter what I told myself, how horribly I cursed my weakness, I could feel the tendrils of sleep curling around my brain. I was struck by the thought that perhaps dying in one’s sleep would not be such a bad way to go, and looking at my comrades, I saw they were much in the same condition. Having finished what preparations we could make, we were now standing behind a parapet that stood chest high for most of the men yet was only just above my waist. The only saving grace, at least as far as I was concerned, was that it was fairly thick and despite being low for our tastes, we could still kneel down and be covered from most missile weapons, especially if we set our shields on top of the parapet. Not for the first time we thanked the gods that the Lusitani did not use the bow very often, and we could see there were only a few scattered in the mass of men who surrounded us now. Calienus, being the most experienced, estimated that the new arrivals numbered between 400 and 500 armed men, adding to the 300 or so that ambushed us, although we had whittled that last group down by 50 or thereabouts. Regardless, they were long odds, of which we were all too keenly aware. Lusitani were milling about at the base of the hill, flowing around it like a flood encircling us, and once again beginning their pre-battle rituals, the sound rolling up to us, steadily growing as they worked themselves into a frenzy. Speaking for myself and I imagine a lot, if not all of the other newer men, I was almost beside myself with fright. Looking around to see that we were completely surrounded by a vastly larger force, I could not see any way to get out of this alive, and I was positive our Centuries were about to be wiped out to the last man. Then, I heard someone laugh.
Turning to see Optio Rufio and Calienus walking towards us, I saw that it was Calienus laughing. He and the other section leaders had been called over by the Pilus Prior to be given their orders, and he was returning to relay to us what we were supposed to do. Yet here they were, acting like they were back in camp, strolling along and having a good laugh, just moments or at the most a matter of a couple watches before their death. It astonished me, and I could not even begin to fathom how one could be so lighthearted knowing they were about to perish.
Calienus came to us, with Rufio going to talk to another group, and our Sergeant called us closer, but before he could speak I blurted out, “What in the name of the gods could be so funny at a time like this?”
Calienus looked at me, eyebrow raised in surprise. “Time like this? What do you mean?”
Then, waving towards the Lusitani, he laughed again. “Oh, you mean this bunch? Do you really think we’re in that much danger, Pullus?”
Feeling my face flush, I knew that I was being ridiculed for some reason, but I was not about to just roll over. “We’re outnumbered five or six to one, Calienus. Are you saying that’s not cause for worry?”
Nodding, he replied, “You’re right Pullus. We are outnumbered, but numbers don’t tell the tale.” Without being obvious, he indicated the men below us encircling the hillside with a nod of his head. “Do you notice anything Pullus?”
I was still not seeing what he was, and told him so. “What I see are a lot of men down there who want to kill us.”
“Yes, but look carefully. They’ve encircled us, correct?”
Biting back a sharp retort, instead I merely nodded.
“You want to know why I’m not worried? Because they have us surrounded.” Thankfully, I could see that I was not the only one who was puzzled. Sighing, he squatted down, indicating that we were to follow suit. Continuing, he explained, “Now, if they were in one big bunch, I'd be very, very worried. See, I know that each one of us can handle five or six of those bastards each, right? I mean, how many kills did you have on the attack on the town Pullus?”
“More than that,” I admitted grudgingly.
“See, their problem is that they’re thinking like warriors, not like an army. I promise you that each one of them has picked one of us out that he's sworn to his gods he's going to kill personally.”
This made sense and I was beginning to get a glimmer of where he might be going.
“And like I said, each of us can handle a half-dozen of these bastards. Now,” he shook his head and smiled, “what would scare me out of my wits is if they were down there, in a formation like we use, and focusing their attack on just one part of the defenses. And if they had a leader half as smart as the Pilus Prior, that’s exactly what they'd be doing right now, so thank the gods that they don’t. Because if they hit one area, they'd take a lot of casualties, but it'd be a matter of moments before they'd overwhelm that point in the defenses, and that’s when our lack of numbers would really show. No,” he finished, “this isn't going to be all that difficult to handle.”
Calienus started to rise, then Scribonius asked him quietly, “But how long are we going to have to hold this hill? I see that you’re right about the way they're going to attack, but I have to believe that it’s a good chance that there'll be other Lusitani showing up before too long.”
Calienus nodded. “You’re right, and I forgot, that’s what I was supposed to tell you before I got off course patting Pullus' ass for him,” this brought a round of laughter, and despite being the butt of the joke I found myself joining in. “The Pilus Prior wanted us to pass the word that we’ll probably have to hold this hill through the night and the first couple of watches tomorrow, but since we weren’t sent on an overnight patrol, Caesar will know that we’re in trouble. The command group also knows where we were assigned, so they’ll immediately send aid, probably the rest of the Cohort.”
This cheered us up immensely; at least having some sort of finite time where we could expect help was a tremendous boost to our morale. Once Calienus was done, we stood and took our places, ready to face the Lusitani.
Pilus Prior Crastinus had ordered us to construct our defense tightly enough that roughly only half of us stood at the parapet at any one time. Although this lowered the number of swords we could bring to bear, it meant that we were able to be relieved, and would have someone else to step in should we fall. Provided that we did not lose more men than we could replace, I remember thinking. In the center of the ring we piled all of our excess equipment, forming a last-ditch set of breastworks in the event the parapet was breached and became untenable. Naturally, we were forced to lose the cattle and forage when we marched to the hill, but that just gave us one less thing to worry about as far as we were concerned; their numbers could always be made up. Our breastworks were not much, yet perhaps they would serve, but I prayed that we would not have to find out. Once again, I had chosen to be next to Vibius, who gazed out over the waving, threatening mob with an expressionless face.