by James Mace
“No!” the guardsmen protested, suddenly horrified at the prospect of losing their emperor. The six weeks since he had claimed the mantle of Caesar from the hated Galba had been a welcome respite to the Praetorian Guard. And as most of them had taken part in helping him seize the throne, they loathed the thought of letting another take it from him.
“Forgive us, Caesar!” one man shouted from the ranks. This was followed by even greater pleas from the praetorians.
All the while, Otho continued to pace in front of them. Finally, he held his hands up, silencing them.
“If we are to go on together,” he said, “if we are to put this matter behind us and stand as one against the fat usurper and his band of Germanic savages from the Rhine, then order and discipline must be restored, and absolute. There will be no more threats made to members of the senate, for it is they alone who are intrinsically bound to the very fabric of Rome’s great history. And it is they who legally conferred upon me the title of emperor. If ours is to be the noble cause, with Vitellius the corpulent renegade, then respect for Rome’s most august senate must be maintained.”
The abrupt and rather enthusiastic change in the men’s demeanor told Otho his speech had had its intended effect. Of course, it would take more than a few flowering words and a handful of coins to maintain strict order within the Guard. And those who perpetrated the mutiny would still have to face the consequences of their actions.
“What I must now do pains me deeply,” he continued. “For I know that the violent and misguided actions were done out of love for your emperor. But that does not excuse the shameful conduct, the disobedience of orders, and the murder of Tribune Crispinus and his men. Bring forward all involved in this shameful disorder.”
Fifty men were forcibly grabbed by their companions and dragged to the front of the formation. Prefect Firmus stepped up and whispered into the emperor’s ear, pointing at two of the men.
“Step forward,” Otho said to the guardsmen, who hesitantly did as they were told. “You are accused by your prefect of not only murdering Tribune Crispinus, but of inciting the mutiny against your officers, which has brought shame upon the Praetorian Guard. What say you?”
“Forgive us, Caesar,” one of the men said, hanging his head low.
The other praetorian was more defiant in his response. “I answer to my emperor, not to these vulgar retches!”
“Then you are a fool,” Otho replied. He addressed the assembled mass. “Disloyalty to the emperor’s duly appointed officers is disloyalty to the emperor himself. But know that your emperor is both pragmatic and, above all, just. The vile usurper, Galba, sought to restore discipline through the archaic and ineffective punishment of decimation. But I do not believe in punishing the innocent, while risking allowing the guilty to go free. Therefore, only those responsible for this crime will pay the price.” He nodded toward the two ringleaders. “You are both hereby sentenced to death by bludgeoning at the hands of your very comrades, whose lives have inexcusably been placed in danger. As for the rest, you are each sentenced to flogging, with the number of lashes to be determined by your officers. You will also forfeit a month’s wages.”
Otho turned about and walked back towards the gathered officers. Prefect Firmus quickly stepped forward and addressed the Guard.
“Alright, you lot!” he barked. “Take these bastards away and lock them up until their punishment can be exacted.” He glared at the two condemned men, who were shaking in fear. “As for these two, their sentence will be carried out immediately. Now move!”
The praetorians, once more eager to demonstrate their professed loyalty to the emperor, set about following their prefect’s orders with a frenzy of motivation. Those sentenced to be flogged and docked wages were glumly escorted to the small prison along the back wall of the barracks, while those given the death penalty were dragged away screaming, towards the parade field. Their shattered corpses would later be disposed of in the Tiber. And while glad to have restored order once more, the meting out of such brutal punishments brought Otho no joy. He only hoped that by doing so, he managed to save face with those members of the senate who had been threatened and harassed by the misguided fools whose screams of pain echoed throughout the complex, as their bodies were broken by the clubs of their comrades.
The suppression of the praetorian mutiny did little to restore calm within either the city or the senate. In fact, many within the senate were now leery of Otho, despite his flattering words to the praetorians about the majesty and unbridled prestige of the Fathers of Rome. Prior to a meeting of the senate, one of the last which Otho would call before his journey north, Senator Italicus sought out General Paulinus to vent his concerns.
“Roaming bands of praetorians may not be preying upon the populace,” he said, “but they are still creating discord and unrest. Individual guardsmen have been forcing their way into people’s homes, equites and senators mostly, and interrogating them while terrorizing the men’s families.”
“There are rumors of Vitellian spies infiltrating the capital,” Paulinus replied. “Otho hasn’t even been Caesar for two months, and yet he is already embroiled in the first real civil war since the rise of Augustus. Subtlety is not a luxury he has at the moment.”
“Easy for you to say, they’re not breaking into your house!” the senator retorted.
“And they’ve been to yours, I take it?”
“They have,” Italicus confirmed. “A rather brutish fellow barged in just the other evening. I was right in the middle of entertaining guests. An embarrassing distraction that was, me being accused of acting as a Vitellian spy!”
“I sympathize with you,” Paulinus said, although his inflexion betrayed his utter indifference to the senator’s plight. “But what would you have me do about it?”
“Compel Otho to call off his attack dogs,” Italicus pleaded. “With the pending conflict with Vitellius, you are one of the few he will listen to. The incident with their little mutiny, as well as the shameful assailing of the emperor’s guests at the palace, has left most of our colleagues a little paranoid. Otho may not have yet turned into the vicious tyrant that Nero and Galba were, but after these incidents involving his guardsmen, I do hope he will take measures to regain the senate’s trust.”
“The senate is always on edge when we end up in conflict with each other,” the general reasoned. “When Otho gives his speech today, everyone will have to be measured and careful in their responses.”
“That is true,” Italicus concurred. He gave a twisted smirk. “After all, supposing Otho loses this war, what then? We cannot sit here and pretend this isn’t a possibility, especially if the rumors prove true regarding the size of the Vitellian army. Few in the senate want another pretender to seize the throne, least of all an uninspired glutton like Vitellius. However, should anyone get too vocal in their disparagement, it could bode ill for them. That is, if Vitellius does emerge victorious.”
“Then it will be up to me and the other legates, to ensure he doesn’t.”
Having to listen to the fearful doubts from so many of his senatorial colleagues had been extremely aggravating for Paulinus. Granted, he could scarcely blame the senate for being rather fearful of Vitellius’ army. And while he may have won the greatest victory against overwhelming odds in a generation, even the great General Suetonius Paulinus would need more than a scratch legion of raw recruits and a few praetorian cohorts, if he was going to have any chance of defeating the Army of the Rhine.
Three thousand miles to the east, Aula Cursia Vale made ready for her departure from Caesarea. Gaius Artorius was still assigned as an army staff clerk, though General Trajan had stated he would send him back to his cohort before the renewed campaign against the zealots commenced. Aula had rather enjoyed the past few days as Vespasian’s guest, but now she donned the red tunic once more, with her leather pouch carrying a pair of thick scrolls and a few other messages.
“Dispatches for the senate, I take it?” Gaius asked, ste
pping into her room and leaning against the side table.
“Mostly for Sabinus,” Aula corrected. “He has an official report for the senate, along with assurances of the eastern armies’ loyalty to Emperor Otho. And, of course, there’s a few pieces of personal correspondence, a letter to Antonia, as well as another to Domitian.”
“But why do you look so vexed?” the optio asked. “After all, you’re returning to civilization.”
Aula set her bag down and sat upon the bed, her gaze fixed on the far wall. Her expression betrayed her thoughts, she wondered whether she should tell Gaius what she foresaw coming.
“Vespasian intends to overthrow Vitellius should he succeed in usurping the throne,” she finally said. “He didn’t say it in those exact words, but I could tell by the way in which he spoke about Vitellius, and the war in general.”
“You really think so?” Gaius, like most of the eastern army, had a huge amount of respect for his commander-in-chief, yet the thought of him becoming emperor bordered on the realms of pure fantasy.
“I also sensed it from each of his generals,” Aula explained. “I don’t know whether or not they put any credibility in the predictions of eastern mystics who’ve predicted Vespasian’s rise. What I do know is none of them feel the people will stand behind another usurper.”
“Something else troubles you?” the optio asked, when Aula’s gaze fell upon the floor.
“There is something I want to know,” the young woman replied, gazing at him. “Supposing Vespasian should declare war, regardless of who wins this wretched conflict, who would you fight for? Where would your loyalties lie?”
“That is a question I think every soldier within the empire will have to answer for himself,” Gaius remarked. “Before, it was always so simple. Our loyalties were to Rome, to the emperor, and the senate. Loyalty to one meant loyalty to the others. But now, we must decide for ourselves who, among the potential claimants to the mantle of Caesar, is best for Rome. Vitellius seeks power for its own sake, not to act as a servant to the empire...at least that is the way I understand it. I am certain the issue is far more complex than that. However, with our forces being thousands of miles from Rome and none of us knowing the first thing about Vitellius, or Otho for that matter, we can only go by what our leaders tell us.”
“I personally witnessed Galba’s cruelty,” Aula said, with a shudder. “Strangely, I don’t think it was done out of malice, but rather out of complete indifference. The lives of individual persons meant nothing to him, and so he could order people to their deaths almost on a whim, like one would send a cow or a goat to be slaughtered.”
“So you approved of Otho’s overthrowing him?” Gaius asked.
“No, at least not the way he went about it. A lot of people died, horribly, when his soldiers murdered Galba in the Forum.”
“Still, better that he be the one to take on the pretender,” the optio reasoned.
“True,” Aula acknowledged. “I honestly don’t think the army would have stayed loyal to Galba had he been the one to face Vitellius. Otho, at least, has a chance. Of the three who’ve claimed to be ‘Caesar’ after Nero’s downfall, I would venture to say he is probably the most worthy, even if his methods were underhanded.”
“They always have been,” Gaius observed, with a dark laugh. “Augustus’ rise to become Rome’s first emperor was not exactly peaceful and bloodless. Roman killed Roman at Actium, even though historians have tried to depict that struggle as a conflict between Rome and Egypt. I only hope when all of this is over, we at last have an emperor worth serving under.”
“You know, my father served under both Tiberius and Claudius,” Aula recalled. “Though he temporarily went into retirement during the mercifully short reign of Gaius Caligula. I used to ask him all the time about his service to the Julio-Claudian emperors. He was always a soldier first, much to my mother’s dismay. Yet, I think his greatest service to the people came during his tenure as Plebian Tribune. It was during that time that he came to know Tiberius quite well. And he considered Claudius a friend long before he ever came to the throne.” She scrunched her brow in thought, trying to recall the many things her father had told her, regarding the two emperors.
“An enviable position he was in,” Gaius noted. “I remember some of the stories he used to tell as well, although I always gathered that he left out a lot of the sordid details.”
“He respected the institution, if not always the man,” Aula added. “Before I came to Rome, we used to go horseback riding almost every day. He told me far more than he’d ever let on before. He once loved and respected Tiberius, both as a soldier and as a statesman. But after the death of his son, Tiberius fell into a deep gloom, which he never recovered from.”
“Yes, and his retribution towards his son’s murderers was quite severe,” Gaius recalled. “Of course it did not help that one of the conspirators was his closest friend and praetorian prefect.”
“Father never really knew if Sejanus intended to seize the throne for himself,” Aula said. “And what most never talk about, is that my father actually played a role in Sejanus’ downfall.”
“Those were dark times,” Gaius stated. “Thankfully that was another era, long before we were born.”
“Watching Tiberius unleash his vengeance became too much for Father,” Aula continued. “The rape and execution of Sejanus’ young daughter, along with the strangulation of his underage son, shattered the love Father had for Tiberius. It sickened him greatly, and made him feel that the man who he’d served loyally for so many years was not the same who had ordered the public slaying of the innocents. Mother later told me that broke him for a long time. It was only ten years later, during the reign of Claudius, that he finally found Rome worth serving. Yet even Emperor Claudius, who Father was immensely loyal to, was not without blood on his hands.”
Gaius simply nodded. While no one would ever consider Claudius a tyrant, it was common knowledge that there were still those who unjustly lost their lives during his thirteen-year reign.
“And all of that simply verifies what I said,” Gaius remarked. “Every man who has ever become Caesar has left a trail of death in his wake.”
“Which is why I do not fault Otho for usurping Galba. I know almost nothing about Vitellius, other than what Sabinus told me. He’s apparently a fat, gormlessly-minded aristocrat, who was given a governorship in Germania simply because he was a political nonentity. It surprised Sabinus greatly that Vitellius decided to declare himself emperor and march on Rome. And because Vitellius is such a weak leader, I suspect that, should he succeed, this war will not be over, but only just begun.”
Chapter XXX: A Diversionary Brawl
Albium Intimilium, Maritime Alpes
11 March 69 A.D.
***
It took Marius’ fastest rider three days to reach the army of Fabius Valens. The Vitellian division was a hundred and fifty miles from Nicaea and currently encamped near the town of Lucus Augusti, which meant ‘Grove of Augustus’. It was less than midway between the coast and Lugdunum, and the rider was relieved Valens had made it this far south. Sentries manning the southern gate stopped the rider and relieved him of his weapon, before having him escorted to Valens.
“General,” the messenger said. “I bring grave news from Marius Maturus, governor of Maritime Alpes.”
Valens read through the rather brief and hastily scrawled message, letting out a sigh of mild frustration. “A few praetorian and urban cohorts raid a loyalist province, yet they are too few in number to lay an effective siege anywhere,” he observed. “What in Hades is Otho playing at?”
“Trying to delay us, most likely,” said his auxilia corps commander, a tribune named Julius Classicus. A chieftain among the Treveri peoples in Belgica, Classicus was a master horseman and had, thus far, proven himself to be an impeccable auxiliary officer.
“Well, of course, that’s what he’s trying to do,” Valens said with irritation. “Yet, what does he hope to accomplish
with only two thousand infantry, none of whom appear to be legionaries? He has no cavalry and is completely lacking in any sort of siege equipment.”
“He hopes to delay, or at least divert, some of our forces away from the main thrust of our advance,” a legate spoke up. “He knows we cannot ignore the atrocities being committed, even if it is in a miniscule province like Maritime Alpes.”
“It’s true, sir,” Classicus agreed. “If a pitiful force like this rampages through our territories and we do nothing, it will undermine all we’ve fought for in the Gallic provinces.”
Valens stared at his map and traced a finger along the proposed route from Lucus Augusti into northern Italia.
“Five hundred miles,” he stated. “We still have five hundred miles to cover, almost half of it over mountainous terrain. The winter has been mild, but that does not mean all of the mountain passes are open. I have to get this army to Cremona in a month or risk Caecina’s division engaging Otho’s forces by themselves.”
The general’s trepidation was two-fold. Firstly, there was the very real risk that Otho would be able to rally sufficient reinforcements and defeat Caecina. If that happened, it would spell disaster for the entire campaign. Support for Vitellius would wane and more forces, both legionary and auxilia, would flock to support Otho.