Invictus

by Simon Scarrow

  ‘Yes, sir.’

  Once the two officers had climbed down from the wall Macro spoke in a muted tone. ‘Think that’s going to help much?’

  ‘Some. Anything that buys us time is welcome. If we can only hold out until Vitellius arrives . . .’

  The enemy wasted no time in preparing for the next phase of their attack, and it was clear to Cato that Iskerbeles was the complete master of the situation. He knew exactly what he was doing and had planned his final assault on the mine down to the last detail. The mantlet, a wooden-framed shelter covered in cattle hides and soaked in water, was positioned directly in line with the gate, a hundred paces away. As soon as it was in place the ram was carried in through the back of the mantlet and hung from the roof beam. The end projected six feet from the front of the mantlet and Cato could see that it was capped with iron plates. The gate on the second wall would not resist being battered by such a device for long. Once the gate was breached, the enemy would attack, assaulting the walls on either side as well as soon as the ditch had been filled with fascines. The final piece in the rebel leader’s plan became clear once the wooden frames were assembled. Iskerbeles had made the most of the skills of those he commanded. Some of whom must have learned engineering skills in the mines he had liberated.

  ‘Catapults . . .’ Macro observed. ‘That’s not good.’

  Shortly after midday the rebel preparations were complete. The crew assigned to the ram stood waiting outside the mantlet. Behind the six catapults trails of smoke rose into the air from small fires lit by the catapult crews. Iskerbeles himself came forward to give the signal to begin. At once the crews threw their weight against the levers and the ratchets clacked steadily as the weapons’ throwing arms were drawn back against the tension of the tightly coiled bundles of sinew that provided the torsion required to hurl heavy rocks and other missiles over long distances on the battlefield. When all the siege engines were ready the crews loaded jars into the slings. The neck of each jar was stuffed with cloth. Rebels took torches from the fires and lit the cloths. Iskerbeles drew his sword and raised it so that all the men on the catapults could see him.

  ‘Thank the Gods for what we are about to receive,’ Macro commented before he shouted a warning to the defenders. ‘Beware incendiaries!’

  Iskerbeles swept his sword down, the crews threw the levers that released the throwing arms and they slammed up and against the leather restrainers in a ragged chorus of loud cracks. The slings released their missiles and the jars sailed through the air in lazy arcs, marked by thin trails of smoke, reaching the apex before plunging down on the second wall, and the desperate Praetorians defending it.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO

  The first jar struck the wall just below the parapet. The contents burst on the uncut stone and the fire swept across the spilled pitch. Three more overshot by some distance in two flaming ellipses, while the last two struck home. One smashed the top of the parapet, splintering the timbers as it sprayed burning pitch over Cimber, who had not been watching the fall of shot and had not followed his comrades as they had leaped aside. As he was engulfed in a blazing torrent of flame the man screamed and staggered back a step, rolling down the rampart and then writhing in a frenzy before his comrades surrounded him and beat the flames out with their bare hands and neckcloths.

  But it was the last shot that did the most damage, bursting in the heart of the dressing station and setting light to the surgeon, two of his orderlies and the injured men whose wounds they had been dressing. All were burned horribly before they were dragged out of the flames and doused with buckets of water from one of the troughs once used to slake the thirst of the slaves. The rest of the Praetorians looked on in horror before they turned back to the enemy and heard the steady clank of ratchets as the catapult crews made ready to loose the next volley. Greasy smoke curled into the air from the impact points and a hush hung over the cohort as the men mouthed prayers to the Gods to be spared the fate of the surgeon and the others.

  ‘Get the other wounded out of range!’ Cato shouted the order to the surviving medical orderlies. ‘Quickly, damn you!’

  As they hurriedly picked up the wounded and dragged them to the rear Macro shook his head. ‘Unless we do something about those catapults, then we’re cooked.’

  Cato nodded, without replying, then steeled himself not to flinch as the first of the catapults to reload released its missile with a loud thwack. It appeared that Iskerbeles had eschewed volley fire in favour of allowing his crews to shoot at will. The bombardment would be intermittent and so wear down the Praetorians’ nerves more steadily than would be the case through regular volleys. More men were immolated and more fires were started along the wall, engulfing the parapet. Elsewhere, men dived out of the path of the incendiary jars and many had to be driven back into position under the blows of the canes wielded by their officers.

  ‘We can’t endure this for ever,’ Cato decided.

  ‘What choice have we got, sir? If we stay, we face fire, and there isn’t enough ready water to put the blazes out. If we charge out and try to wreck the catapults, we’ll be annihilated before we even get halfway to them. If we fall back to the mine camp, then we only put things off for a few hours.’

  Cato knew that his friend was right. ‘Getting those fires out is the priority. We have plenty of water in the tanks. We can send men up to bring it down if need be . . .’ Cato paused, and then he slapped a hand against his thigh in frustration. ‘What a fool I am!’

  He turned to Macro. ‘Take command here. Be ready to attack when the moment is right.’

  Cato began to stride away from the wall and Macro called after him, ‘What? What do you mean, sir?’

  Cato shot him a weary smile. ‘You’ll see.’

  Then he ran off, calling to Cristus and the survivors of the Second Century to follow him at the double. Macro watched him go, angry with his friend for leaving him without an adequate explanation. Then, as another catapult launched its fiery missile, Macro’s attention instantly returned to the imminent danger and followed the arc of the shot, feeling a wave of relief when he saw that it was not going to land on his section of the wall. Instead it smashed down beside the water trough and surrounded it with flames, driving back the men on fire-fighting duty.

  ‘That’s all we need,’ Macro growled.

  The steep incline of the track leading up to the mining camp took its toll on Cato who was already exhausted, and Cristus and his men had caught up with the prefect by the time he reached the gap in the half-completed wall across the top of the track.

  ‘What are your orders, sir?’ asked Cristus.

  Cato was too short of breath to explain and simply gestured them to follow him as he set off past the garrison blocks and through the slave quarters to the series of water tanks beyond. He climbed to the edge of the first, the same one that had leaked a few days earlier, and coughed the dust from his lungs before he explained his plan to Cristus and the others.

  ‘I want four men on the sluices of all the tanks. When I give the word I want the sluices opened smartly. All of them, except this one. Or we’ll give Macro and the others a shower along with the rebels and we wouldn’t want Centurion Macro coming up here taking out his wrath on us, eh, lads?’

  Some chuckled, others nodded with feeling, having grown familiar with the centurion’s liberal use of insults and threats.

  ‘As soon as the tanks are drained, close up the sluices and return to the second wall. Stop for nothing. With luck the tide of battle should have tipped in our favour by then. Questions? No? Then to your places. Quick as you can.’

  Cristus ran along the line of tanks, assigning men to each in turn. The sluice mechanism was simple enough. A spoked wheel stood on top of each tank, beside the sluice gate. As they made ready, Cato ran to the edge of the cliff. The spectacle of the attack on the second wall lay spread out before him, two hundre
d feet below. Smoke billowed up from several fires along the wall and the tiny, foreshortened figure of a blazing soldier stumbling out of a pool of flames caught Cato’s attention for an instant before he turned his gaze to the enemy. Seen from above he truly grasped the scale of the horde that dwarfed the Praetorian cohort. At least ten thousand men were massed behind the catapults, a sea of embittered and fanatical humanity impatient to wipe out every last Roman defending the mine. To Cato’s right lay the breached wall and further off a trail of slow-moving figures making for the rebel camp; the wounded from the earlier action. In the camp itself there were perhaps another two or three thousand of Iskerbeles’ followers, mainly women and children and those too old and infirm to fight.

  A series of cracks drew Cato’s attention back to the attack on the second wall as three more incendiary jars reached the top of their path through the air perhaps fifty feet beneath him so that he could clearly pick out the flare of the flames at the neck of each jar. They hung there briefly and then swept down onto the wall, two falling behind and scattering the men who saw it coming. The third struck the gate and engulfed it in flames, wreathing the tower above in smoke as the rebels let out a great cheer and brandished their weapons.

  Cato ran back to climb up onto the rim of the second tank and turned to Cristus and the others.

  ‘On my word . . .’

  The men took firm hold of the spoked wheels and braced themselves.

  ‘NOW!’

  The wheels turned with a creaking that was quickly drowned out by the rush of the water spraying out from under the rising gates. It flowed down the channels, racing towards the cliff edge; then, as the gates continued to rise above the customary operating height, the flow turned into a raging torrent that swirled up and over the sides of the channels and churned over the ground on either side, carrying away loose soil and rocks as the wild, foaming tide roared towards the edge of the cliff and down onto the enemy below.

  The front of the tower was scourged by the flames and choking smoke from the blaze consuming the gates below. Macro and the other men in the tower had been forced back and he had to use his arm to shield his face from the stinging heat.

  ‘Get out of here!’ he shouted to the others. ‘Abandon the tower. Go!’

  The Praetorians needed little encouragement and scampered down the ladder as quickly as they could and backed away from the swelling inferno. Macro was the last to quit the structure, his eyes almost closed as the heat seared his head and exposed flesh. As soon as he had dropped below the floor of the tower the structure sheltered him from the flames and a moment later he had withdrawn to a safe distance and watched the flames engulfing the gatehouse with some of the other Praetorians.

  ‘Now we’re truly fucked,’ said Pulcher. ‘When that dies down, there’ll be precious little for their ram to knock to pieces.’

  ‘That’s the spirit,’ Macro responded drily.

  Pulcher chewed his lip. ‘Perhaps it’s time to think about surrender.’

  ‘Surrender?’ Macro raised an eyebrow. ‘To that rabble out there? I think not. I doubt if they’d be interested in the notion . . . Anyway, I was under the impression that the Guard dies, it never surrenders.’

  Pulcher spat to one side. ‘That’s just shit, that is.’

  At that moment Macro became aware of a change in the noise of battle. The flames still roared but there was a new sound. A collective groan and a rushing rumble from beyond the wall. Frowning, he climbed the rampart to join the men behind the palisade, all of whom were staring fixedly up at the cliff to the right.

  At first Macro could not quite take in what he was seeing. Water was cascading down from several points along the ledge above, gushing down the cliff. Then the flow abruptly spread along almost the entire length of the cliff as if the sea itself had risen up to drown the mine. Huge chunks of soil and rock peeled away from the ledge and tumbled along with the raging torrent. Fountains of muddy water burst into spray as they struck the foot of the cliff and then swept on towards the ravine, rising up the legs of the rebels standing transfixed with shock, jaws agape at the spectacle of the catastrophe about to engulf them. The full force of the flood hit them before they could turn and attempt to flee, knocking many off their feet and sweeping them into others and carrying them away as well. Bodies tumbled end over end. Those at the fringes of the horde threw down their weapons and ran. Some made for the second wall, others for the wall they had taken earlier, while more tried to run ahead of the rising water, heading directly for the ravine, only to realise too late that that direction promised only certain death.

  Macro watched as the desperate rebels tried to stop at the ravine but were driven over the edge by those trying to escape the flood. Hundreds fell, their cries and screams audible even above the loud roar of water and the crackle of the flames still hungrily feeding on the gatehouse. Great chunks of the cliff were collapsing all the time, sloughing off the side of the mountain and rolling boulders along as if they were corks in a stream. The water reached the catapults, surrounded them, rising over the wooden frames, and then they too were caught in the flow, spinning lazily, crashing up against each other and crushing a handful of their crews caught up with them. Steam exploded briefly from the fires that had been used to light the wicks and then they too were gone.

  From the vantage point of his horse, Iskerbeles saw it all, and knew that his rebellion was doomed, crushed at a stroke, when he had been on the very cusp of a great victory. Macro saw it in the posture of his body, before he kicked his heels in and spurred his horse towards the second wall. He was halfway there when the wave reached his mount and suddenly the hoofs were kicking up sprays of water, until it rose up to the hocks and slowed the animal down. The rebel leader had almost reached the ditch when the water surged up the horse’s barrel and it lost its purchase on the ground and began to slip and move with the remorseless current with a terrified whinny. Throwing himself from the saddle, Iskerbeles struck out towards the ditch and got caught in the flow as it swept down the far side, tumbling him over. He was carried a short distance up the other side and grabbed at one of the stakes driven into the stone foundations of the wall. He held on grimly as his body was buffeted by the deluge. His horse careered above the water, mane flying and hoofs thrashing, and then it reached the ravine and was snatched from sight.

  All this Macro saw with a sense of awe and grim satisfaction and even pity. Pity for all those he had moments before regarded as an enemy he must destroy and die fighting against. Now they were humans, caught up in a terrible disaster on a scale that none of them could ever have imagined. Nor would be able to tell of, save the few who might survive. The main force of the flood was roaring towards the ravine, in a muddy tide of men, rocks and stunted vegetation. Nothing could stand in its path and Macro watched as those close to the edge of the ravine turned and stood helplessly until they were swallowed by the wave and were swept into the ravine to be dashed to pieces on the rocks below.

  Gradually the torrent pouring over the ruined cliff began to ease and the flow slowed to a thin curtain of reddish-brown water, then a series of small streams, running down cuttings in the slope. So much of the ledge had collapsed that Macro could see the edges of one of the tanks. Several figures were standing surveying the devastation they had wrought, and one wore the crested helmet of a prefect, Macro was relieved to see.

  Pulcher was standing close to Macro and shook his head in awe. ‘Sweet Jupiter . . .’

  Macro nodded and then gestured towards the tower. ‘And it put the fire out. Nice work, Cato.’

  Then he looked over the wall and saw that Iskerbeles was still there, clutching the stake. ‘First things first. Let’s get that bastard in chains.’

  Cato hurriedly assembled the men of the Second Century and led them back down from the camp to rejoin the rest of the cohort. As they marched, he glanced sidelong at Cristus. The tribune was still
smothered in dust, and bleeding from a dozen scratches and minor cuts. The stunned look on his face after the collapse of the first wall had gone, replaced by a grim expression of steely determination. He was no longer the playboy of the capital, but finally a soldier, tested in battle. While Cato was sure he would never find it in his heart to forgive the man for his affair with Julia, he had, surprisingly, discovered a measure of respect for Cristus. In time, he might make a decent officer after all. If he didn’t get himself killed in a brawl with a jealous husband first, Cato concluded.

  As soon as he returned to the second wall Cato gave orders for the remaining men of the cohort to form up and be ready to advance across the mine works to mop up the rebel survivors. Iskerbeles, soaked through, all his hopes shattered, sat in numbed silence, his hands clasped over his face. Four men were left behind to guard him as the cohort marched out of the charred gatehouse and crossed the ditch into a landscape wholly transformed since the sun had risen over it scant hours before. The cliff had gone, burying some of the tunnels and laying a few others bare. The ground in front of the mine was now a drenched landscape of shallow pools linked by small rivulets. Much of the edge of the ravine had been washed away as well and everywhere lay half-buried shields and weapons. There were bodies too, some still living, dragging themselves free of the mud and staggering around in a daze. Two, maybe three hundred had escaped the flood and reached the safety of the first wall. Leaderless and stunned, they stared at the Roman column issuing from the far gate, then turned and stumbled through the breaches and disappeared.

  For Cato the overwhelming feature of this nightmare scene was its quiet. The deafening din of the rebels’ cheering was no more. As was the roar of flames, and the crack of the catapults. Behind him the Praetorians’ boots splashed through the puddles and mud, but no man spoke above a murmur. Cato halted the column a hundred yards beyond the wall and issued orders to Petillius and Porcino to take their men and pursue the enemy back to their camp before retiring to the ruined wall and holding their position there. Pulcher and the rest of the men were to sweep the open ground for enemy survivors and march them up to the slave barracks. The Praetorians spread out in ones and twos as they carefully picked their way over the sea of mud and debris. Macro stood with Cato a moment before the prefect crossed over to the crumbling edge of the ravine.