by Peter Tonkin
As he looked, silently trying to assess the full importance of what he was seeing, a second element was revealed as the near-full moon shone down on the plain behind the doubly-fortified camp. There was a road there, reaching straight as an arrow back to the Via which in turn led down to Neapolis; this end of the new road coming across the trench at the foot of the palisade on a wide, wooden bridge. Clumps of bushes and stands of trees rearing sporadically along its length could not disguise the breadth of the track, nor its points of departure or arrival. There was no doubt in Artemidorus’ mind that this road had been designed by this camp’s engineers to bring supplies in directly, from the most convenient junction obviating the need to keep going back and forth to the Via itself at the main gate – which must be, by his rough estimation, nearly three miles to the north of here.
His interest piqued, Artemidorus led the others to the trench. He discovered with some relief that it was only five feet deep – less even than Voadicia’s height and an easy scramble to get down into it. In single file, he led them along the trench at the foot of the castrum wall until they reached the point where the new road rode on the bridge to the camp’s south-facing entrance. This was a much less massive affair than the huge gateway that closed the Via or the one he guessed must open westwards from here onto the plain and Antony’s camp. But in spite of the shallow trench, there was still a low embankment topped with a stubby palisade – and it boasted two short watch-towers and diminutive wooden gates. These were closed and guarded by legionaries stationed up in the watch-towers – neither of which was a surprise. But the guards in the nearest tower were bored and inattentive.
Unlike the men on the inner and outer watch-towers looking down across the plain towards Amphipolis, these sentries had no enemy camp to watch, no frisson of danger arising from the possibility of a night attack. All they had to do was watch the new-made road, the eastern edge of the swamp, the plain beyond it, the Via heading for Neapolis and the rugged hillsides. They were just a couple of bored legionaries by the sound of things, without even an optio to keep them focussed on their duties. They were standing together in the watch-tower, looking away down the empty road and gossiping. As with everything – every one – the spies had come across so far, they were overconfident. Sure of their position, they saw no need whatsoever to lower their voices because it simply didn’t occur to them that they might be overheard by enemy spies.
‘You think they’re going to attack any time soon?’ said the first one. ‘I hear the watch in the towers on the front wall counted thirteen legions to our seventeen.’
‘Antony’s mad enough,’ said the second guard. ‘I mean, look at how he vanished over the Alps after Mutina only to reappear after everyone thought he was dead, grab power and start slaughtering his enemies – starting with Cicero.’
‘And look how close to us he’s pitched his camp now. I don’t know what Brutus thinks in his castrum up there near Philippi but Cassius is obviously getting ready for something down this end. And General Cassius really does know what he’s doing.’
‘The supplies, you mean?’
‘Not just the supplies, the way he wants them brought in, wagon after wagon, day or night. I’d lay good odds that there’ll be wagons full of grain rolling in tomorrow as though he’s getting ready for some kind of a siege.’
‘Just so long as I’m doing nothing more than opening the gate, closing the gate and guarding the gate. I don’t mind eating the bread they make out of it but by all the gods I hate humping grain. I joined the legions in the first place to get away from that kind of thing.’
iv
‘Right,’ said Antony as he consumed his breakfast of bread and watered vinegar at dawn next day. ‘Let me get this straight. They’ve built this bloody great wall more than five miles long that reaches from the hills to the swamp but it’s still too short.’
‘In that it’s possible to get around the end of it, yes, General. There’s a section of firm ground in the swamp right beside it that must be as wide as the Appian Way.’
‘But you reckon that they’re probably not too worried in any case because there are fully-palisaded, properly constructed castra hidden behind this massive outer wall.’
‘That’s right, General. Cassius has his south of the Via, nearest the swamp and Brutus has his to the north of it nearest the hills and Philippi.’
‘And how far apart does that put them do you think?’
‘I can’t be absolutely certain until I’ve looked down from the hills themselves, but I’d say the camps are at least two miles apart.’
‘By Hercules’ hairy backside that’s sheer insanity! They must hate each other even more than we suspected! The main wall makes them appear to be united and ready for battle when in reality they’re nothing of the sort! What kind of command structure is going to be effective across that distance when it comes to guts and gladii?’
‘They don’t want it to come to thet, General,’ said Artemidorus confident that what he had seen last night made their earlier suspicions as solid as concrete. ‘Even though they have a well-stocked supply-base on Thasos and a convenient entrepot in Neapolis, Cassius – at least – is stocking his personal castrum with grain just as though he’s expecting to face a siege.’
‘So it is as we guessed - he’s just going to sit there and watch us starve.’
‘That has to be the plan General; it’s the only explanation. You know they know what a challenge it will be for you to feed and supply your legions for any length of time – and things will just get more difficult after young Caesar arrives with six more legions unless he’s also loaded with extra supplies.’
‘And he won’t be – so it’s a good plan,’ grumbled Antony. ‘Especially if Murcus and Ahenobarbus have managed to close the sea-lanes between Brundisium and Dyrrachium behind me again. I can see that sort of cowardly trick appealing to Brutus especially. But it’s a waste of a well-chosen site all the same. If I were in a position half as strong as theirs, I’d be down here in a heartbeat kicking backsides and cutting throats.’ Antony sat brooding for a while. Then he brightened. ‘But you say there’s a way round the south end of the main wall do you?’
‘Yes, General.’
‘And you managed to get as far as this new supply-road Cassius has had made to join his castrum with the Via?’
‘We did, sir, yes.’
‘And they’re expecting some pretty hefty loads of grain within the next few days and nights?’
‘That’s what the sentries were discussing, General, yes.’
‘So, why don’t we go sneaking round the wall one night and let Cassius give us some of the supplies he is trying to stop us getting from home? A wagonload of grain or two would make my legionary bakers very happy indeed and irritate the stercore out of his men into the bargain. That’s the sort of plan that could kill a whole fornicating flock of birds with just one stone!’
*
It seemed to Artemidorus that Antony latched onto the idea of stealing Cassius’ grain shipment with unusual tenacity, displaying the single mindedness he usually applied to the pursuit of reluctant virgins or vintners with stocks of rare wine. Although the secret agent spent as much of the day as possible catching up with some sleep in company with his exhausted team, his waking hours were peppered with summonses from the general to discuss various elements of what was, actually, a very simple plan. Made restless by Antony’s slightly disturbing enthusiasm, Artemidorus began to draw some plans of his own. First, he detailed the hard core of his unit as the team that would accompany Antony and himself on the planned raid. Then he detailed the rest of them to prepare a back-up plan in case anything went wrong with Antony’s deceptively simple one. As Quintus drily observed, ‘Every plan works perfectly – up to the first time the enemy slips his sword into your guts.’
As the sun set, Antony and his brother Lucius emerged from Antony’s tent, tonsured, bathed, oiled, massaged and fed; armed, armoured and as excited as a couple of boys about the
ir first visit to a brothel. With their glowing skin and gleaming hair they reminded the Spartan-born Artemidorus of King Leonidas preparing to lead his Three Hundred into the pass at Thermopylae. And that, of course, heroic though it was, had not turned out well. The brothers led Felix, Artemidorus and the chosen section of his crypteia into the thickening shadows. They headed towards the swamp-end of Cassius’ wall at a flat run which only eased as they reached the river and the need for silence overcame Antony’s desire for speed. As with the previous night, Hercules waded across the Gangites first with Antony and Lucius close behind. Quintus, Ferrata and Furius watched their backs, Felix and Artemidorus brought up the rear. In the absence of Hecate and Voadicia, it was Felix who carried a dark lantern, flint and the steel.
Although they paused at the western corner of the outer wall, Antony was too good a soldier to get side-tracked into confirming the width of the firm ground between the wall and the swamp. He led them instead in single file and silence along the palisade that reached eastward. They were armoured this time and no-one was covered in black ashes, so stealth was vitally important. Artemidorus even controlled his breathing as the General led them past the end of the wall and turned left to slide down into the shallow trench and creep along the foot of the inner castrum wall towards the gate, the bridge and the roadway. The night was clear again and chillier than yesterday. The stars were out and the moon on the rise. As Artemidorus had observed on his previous visit, the road between here and the Via was lined with bushes and trees, but the nearest outcrop was at least a stade away, every foot of the distance bright enough to reveal movement, not even counting the steely glitter of armour, or the flash of pallid, well-oiled flesh. They gathered at the foot of the watch-tower immediately beside the gate in the shadow of the bridge, therefore, and strained their eyes, looking along the road in the hope that a grain wagon or two might be on the way.
Inevitably, when a wagon did approach, the guards high in the tower saw it in the distance first. ‘Here comes another one,’ said one of them, breaking the mounting tension on the ground. ‘Looks fully laden. If we let it in I hope some other poor buggers will be unloading it!’
‘I know! You and humping grain sacks…’
‘Ever since I was tall enough. My family worked on one of those bloody great latifundia outside Rome. Tenant farmers. They’re probably still at it – if they haven’t been forced to sell my sisters into slavery to make ends meet. At least, with the problems in Egypt and Sextus Pompey pirating anything that comes near Sicily, the price of grain should have gone up – though the price of ugly girls was never very high. Still, when I get to retire if I make it that far I’ll know what to do with whatever land I end up being granted.’
‘And the chances are you’ll end up with an ugly wife as well. Unless you’re luckier in love than you are with soldiering.’
‘Fortuna smile on that wish. Come on, it’s our turn to open the gate and let the wagon in. Gods! It’s like living in Rome, isn’t it? No wagons allowed on the streets by daylight. One of bloody Caesar’s edicts if I remember correctly. Good thing the General, Brutus and their friends got rid of the power-grabbing bastard before that fundamentum arsehole Antony had him crowned king.’
v
The conversation ended there to be followed by the sounds of footsteps crossing the watch-tower’s floorboards, then the creaking of rungs as the guards climbed down the ladder one after the other. By the time the pair of them had made it to the ground, the general, his brother and the others were out of the ditch and flat against the palisade on either side of the bridge, the road and the gate it led to. The wagon was approaching slowly from the near distance and just as the bolts on the gates slid back, it vanished into the final stand of trees. The gates creaked open. Antony and his brother vanished through the widening gap. The movement of the gates hesitated, the creaking covering the muffled sounds of two throats being cut and two bodies being lowered to the ground as quietly as possible. ‘I hope that was the one who called me a fundamentum,’ said Antony rolling the corpse out of sight behind the gate.
Artemidorus led his men in past the two commanders and the corpses at their feet, then on up the ladder to the second watch-tower. He was careful to check as they went in case there was a team of slaves or soldiers here already, waiting to unload the sacks of grain. But it appeared that task happened away in the centre of the camp, he thought with some relief. For he was by no means convinced that Antony or Lucius had thought to look.
There were two guards up in the second tower as well, but they were relaxed and sleepy, knowing it would be a while before it would be their turn to open the gates to another load of grain. The expressions of shock and surprise on their faces showed they never really recognised that the men who appeared so unexpectedly were neither their companions from the other tower nor their watch replacements arriving early. They died as quickly and quietly as the two on the ground.
Feeling a little like his demigod Achilleus, hero of Troy in the moments after he emerged from Ulysses’ wooden horse into the unsuspecting city, Artemidorus lowered his victim, still twitching, to the floor, feeling the lifeblood from his severed throat beginning to cool on his hands and forearms. He crossed to the front of the tower and looked down the road. The wagon-load of grain was just pulling out of the trees’ shadows. It would be at the gate in a matter of minutes. He scanned the roadway. The wagon had two drivers and a small four-man cavalry escort followed it. None of the six men seemed to be alert – they all might have been driving or riding in their sleep as far as he could see. Six unsuspecting enemies faced by seven ruthless robbers, he calculated. They wouldn’t stand a chance.
Artemidorus led Hercules, Quintus, Ferrata and Furius back down to the ground. Antony and Lucius had opened the gate just wide enough to admit the wagon and its escort. The General and his brother stood back, as though waiting to welcome the wagon. Artemidorus gestured Hercules to join them – he would hold the horses’ heads while the two senior officers took care of the driver and his mate. The rest of the crypteia remounted the first few rungs of the ladders – two each side - ready to take the escort riding close behind.
More used to this kind of thing than the General and his brother, Hercules walked backwards as the wagon entered the gate, gesturing welcomingly, making sure the escort came in as well before he took the horses’ head straps and brought it all to a halt. At precisely the same moment, as though they had rehearsed this time after time, three men on each side leaped into action. The general and his brother dragged the startled driver and his mate from their seats and onto the blades of their daggers as Artemidorus, Quintus, Ferrata and Furius leaped off their ladders and onto the four-man escort. The surprise was absolute and the slaughter ruthless. There was little chance of silence, however. The wagon’s horses stirred and nickered as their masters died but Hercules quietened them at once. The four cavalrymen died quietly enough – choking and whimpering before their blood came hissing out. But they crashed noisily to the ground and their horses whinnied and tried to bolt, disturbed by the violence and the stench of steaming blood.
There was no time to pause or worry, however. The brothers understood that. Antony and Lucius leaped onto the wagon and into the seats still warmed by the men they had just killed. Antony took the reins and pulled, even as Hercules led the horses round in a tight half-circle before heaving himself aboard onto the sacks piled high behind them. By the time the wagon was pointed at the gate, Artemidorus and his three companions were in the saddle and the hijacked wagon with its enemy escort was ready to head for Antony’s lines and safety.
*
Antony used the reins to whip the rumps of the cart-horses pulling the wagon, prompting them out of their placid amble towards something like a trot.
‘Thinks he’s driving a chariot for the greens,’ observed Quintus.
‘He’ll need to move faster than that, driving for the greens or not,’ observed Ferrata. ‘Especially if anyone raises the alarm.’
‘Be fair,’ said Furius, ‘this isn’t the Circus Maxims…’
The terse conversation was enough to take the wagon and its escort out through the gate and over the bridge. Antony hauled on the reins, swinging the horses round, off the road and onto the firm earth beside the wall that now led towards the Gangites.
Quintus and Artemidorus, as acutely aware as Antony of the need for speed, pulled their mounts in beside the cart-horses’ hindquarters, leaning in and adding to the effect of Antony’s lashing reins with the flats of their swords. The cart-horses attained a canter, moving themselves and the wagon faster than ever before - but still not fast enough.
Behind them, on the far side of the palisade, there was a sudden outburst of shouting. It was too indistinct for any of them to hear individual words and phrases over the thudding of hooves, the jingling of tack, the bellows breathing of the horses and the creaking groan of the wagon, but there was no mistaking the meaning.
‘If they come out of the gate behind us, we might have a chance,’ said Antony, forgetting to quieten his voice in his excitement. ‘But if they come out of the front gate we’re in trouble.’
‘That’s always been where he likes to be best,’ said Quintus, quietly. ‘In trouble.’
The horses seemed to understand the urgency of the situation. They took their canter up towards a gallop as though they were indeed pulling a chariot for the Greens in the Circus Maximus. But they weren’t: they were pulling an elderly cart laden with a heavy load. They had just attained their fastest speed at the very top of the gentle slope leading down to the Gangites when the left wheel shattered, its ancient spokes giving way to forces far beyond anything they had ever experienced. The wagon fell sideways at once. The ageing leatherwork surrendered allowing the horses to gallop free. The cart slewed onto its side, spilling its contents, human and grain, onto the rushy mud of the bank-side as its forward motion stopped abruptly. The grain bags burst, spreading their contents as though Jupiter himself was sewing the stuff broadcast.