Caesar Triumphant

by Peake, R. W.

  "My Primus Pilus is dead," Porcinus replied softly, trying to keep his tone even and lower lip from trembling in an unseemly display in front of this foreigner, Centurion or not.

  "Balbinus is dead?" Pacorus asked sharply, for such was the legend of Titus Pullus that it didn't occur to him that it might be the Primus Pilus of the 10th.

  Porcinus shook his head in answer, not saying anything in response, as his vision suddenly began swimming at the sheer enormity of what he was imparting to the Pilus Prior. For a moment, Pacorus stood there, not understanding the import of the other man's mute answer. Then his face lost its color as his jaw dropped in astonishment, and the fleeting thought passed through Porcinus' mind that suddenly Pacorus didn't look so much like a Parthian.

  "Titus Pullus is dead?" Pacorus gasped, but again, Porcinus could only answer with a simple nod of his head.

  Unbidden, Pacorus' lips formed the prayer said for the dead to the gods of his people, for Titus Pullus' reputation demanded no less.

  "I'm very sorry to hear that, Centurion," Pacorus finally managed to say. "But if that's as you say, then surely the need of the men in the forum is greater?"

  "If we can't stop these cunni from getting over the wall, then it might not matter," Porcinus replied.

  And that was something Pacorus couldn't argue. In fact, if he didn't offer up aid to this Centurion, whose name he hadn't asked, then his own Cohort may be faced with the sudden appearance of an enemy in their rear. It might not tip the balance back in the barbarians' favor, but it wasn't a good idea to put him and his men in a position to test that idea.

  "Very well, but I can only spare you one Century."

  Porcinus opened his mouth to argue, but seeing the look on the Parthian's face, shut it again, understanding that he was lucky to get that much.

  "Thank you Centurion," Porcinus said instead.

  While this exchange had been taking place, the men of Pacorus' Cohort had continued running past the two men, and, as luck or the gods would have it, the last Century was just approaching. Waving his hand at the Centurion at their head, Pacorus signaled him to stop his Century. The panting man ran up to Pacorus, and, like Porcinus had, rendered his salute.

  "Take your Century and go with this Centurion," Pacorus directed. "You're under his command and he'll tell you what he needs."

  The Centurion didn't hesitate; this had been a day of surprises and firsts, he reasoned. One more was to be expected. Porcinus thanked Pacorus again and turned to go, but then Pacorus stopped him with a question.

  "Centurion, in case this all works out, who should I say helped save this day?"

  "I'm Decimus Hastatus Posterior Gaius Porcinus, of the 10th Legion, Pilus Prior," Porcinus answered, prompting a frown from Pacorus.

  "If I recall, Primus Pilus Pullus had a nephew by that name," Pacorus commented.

  At the mention of his uncle in the past tense, Porcinus felt a stab of pain even greater than he had experienced in the moments after his recognition that his uncle was dead.

  "He still does, Pilus Prior," Porcinus answered, his tone stiff with hurt and rebuke. "And he always will."

  Without another word or waiting to be dismissed, Porcinus turned and began trotting away, beckoning Pacorus' Centurion to his side as he did. Pacorus watched for only a matter of a couple of heartbeats, understanding the younger man completely. Then he turned back and began running to where the five Centuries of his Cohort were arraying in a line, prepared to pounce on the barbarian rear.

  It was over, the Wa general now recognized. He still wasn't sure how it had happened, but he was now sure that at the very least his attempt to breach the wall had failed, and the taste of that was bitter ash in his mouth. Now the only thing he could do was to leave those of his men who had managed to get up the ladder and over the wall and were even now fighting to their fate, and pull the rest of the men gathered at the ladders to join their comrades in the fight against this new force. At this point in the battle, if the general had been Roman, Greek, or even Han, his goal would have been to fight his way out of this predicament to preserve what remained of his force to fight another day. But this was not the Wa way. To be defeated was so shaming that no Wa with any self-respect would dare to show his face back at the capital, and no man in the rank and file would do so, either. No, what remained was only to die with as much glory as could be salvaged and to take as many of these grubworms as possible. To that end, the general now began pushing his way to the front, no longer needing to direct matters. He was determined that he would wet his sword to the hilt, and that his gods would be so impressed with the number of his kills that they would forgive him for not bringing victory to his people. It helped that he was sure that the battle itself was won; it didn't occur to him that the force assaulting the camp holding the grubworm general would fail. So, even if the strategic aim of this prong of the attack was foiled, the loss of this camp would undoubtedly send the barbarians skulking back to their ships. And no matter what happened, they had crippled the invasion force to the point where it would be impossible for them to continue.

  What this Wa forgot—which could be forgiven under the circumstances—was that this attack had been an all-or-nothing proposition and that the only troops left at the capital were the personal bodyguards of the emperor and men who were too sick to fight or still recovering from wounds received from the other engagements with these grubworms. In fact, the only hope of the Wa at this point was that the mauling the Romans had received was so savage that it removed from them any thought of continuing their thrust towards the capital. To help ensure this end, the Wa general made his way to the front, standing just behind the front line, where his warriors were still slashing and thrusting at the shields of the grubworms, who, in contrast to his own men, still stood in ordered lines several men deep. As much as he despised these pale creatures, he was nevertheless admiring of the discipline and order they brought to a battle, and it was a pity that he wouldn't survive to try to adopt some of their practices for his own army. Seeing one of the grubworms with a device on his helmet that went crossways over the top—unlike that of all the rest of the barbarians, whose plumes looked like horsehair and simply hung straight down—the general drew his sword and headed directly for him, determined that this would be the first of what would be many deaths that he would bring.

  It was only because of the shouted warning of one of his men that Felix turned in time to see one of the barbarians, this one wearing a helmet mounted with the wings of some white bird, come lunging at him with a screaming shout and upraised sword. Barely able to get his shield up in time, Felix just managed to block the massive blow that shook him all the way down to the soles of his caligae. Before he could answer, the barbarian had recovered his blade and, in seemingly one single fluid motion changed the direction and angle of his thrust, going from a high overhand downward thrust to a vicious, upward-traveling slicing swing that originated from a point beneath Felix's shield. Somehow, Felix managed to deflect the Wa's blade with his own, so that the barbarian’s blade went flashing by diagonally, across the Roman's body. This put the Wa in a vulnerable position, and again showing why the Legions of Rome valued the shield for both its defensive and offensive capabilities, Felix made a hard horizontal thrust with his left arm. The shield, its metal boss leading the way, punched out at the barbarian general, and this time it was the Wa's turn for a desperate movement, twisting his body backward, so that, while the boss struck him on his right shoulder, by his giving way, the impact was lessened. Still, it was a painful blow, and Felix was rewarded with a hissing sound exploding from the barbarian's lips, but he had no time to savor the moment, because again his enemy's blade came flashing at him, this time with the point aimed directly for his eyes. Felix performed a slight turn and dip of his head, causing the point of the Wa's blade to strike only a glancing blow high on his helmet, but it was enough to cause lights to explode behind Felix's eyes. Fighting the surge of panic at his momentary sightlessness, Felix,
in turn, made an overhand thrust at the spot where he had last seen the barbarian, just before the Wa landed his blow. While it missed, having the point of a sharp blade jabbed right at you is enough to disturb even the most disciplined man, so the Wa's recoiling backward jump gave Felix enough time for his sight to clear. Just in time to move his shield to block yet another strike from his opponent, he caught the barbarian’s point with the boss, making a clanging sound and striking sparks as the blade bounced harmlessly off. In much the same way that the Wa had recognized the strengths and advantages of his opponent's style of fighting, a part of Felix was no less appreciative that these yellow-skinned barbarians were exceptionally skilled, able to move with a rapidity and fluid grace that Felix wished he, and the rest of his men for that matter, possessed. Where a Roman would strike with his sword one time, in that same span of time, these barbarians seemed to be able to strike at least twice as often, if not more times; while Felix had no idea how they did it, each blow still managed to carry the same amount of force as that of the average Legionary. Only men like Titus Pullus and a handful of others could match these men in pure skill, Felix realized, but they lacked the discipline and teamwork of the Legions. He didn't even want to think of how formidable the barbarians would be if these two strengths were combined, and the detached part of Felix's mind hoped that if they survived this day, Caesar would figure out a way to train his Legions to take advantage of what the yellow bastards could do with a sword. Both men had paused to catch their breath, the Wa general glaring at his opponent, who stared at him from above the rim of his shield, eyes narrowed in concentration.

  "I will gut you like a fisherman guts a fish," the Wa general taunted, completely forgetting that this grubworm wasn't civilized enough to understand language.

  Felix, while he didn't understand the words, clearly comprehended the meaning, and, in answer, made a motioning gesture with his sword, inviting the barbarian to do his worst.

  "You sound like a pig grunting," Felix taunted, eliciting the exact same response from the Wa.

  Not understanding the words but needing no translator, the general leaped into the air with a grace that gave witness to the hundreds of watches he spent practicing maneuvers like this. The sudden movement caused Felix to react, the point of his sword suddenly striking out like a snake, but in the delay between what his eyes saw, his brain commanded, and his arm obeyed, the spot where he aimed his thrust was now empty. His right arm was now fully extended, and anticipating that this would be Felix's move, the general had already begun his downward swing, the blade of his sword arcing in what could only be described as a beautifully precise semicircle, when, in yet another one of those accidents of battle that the beneficiaries usually attribute to an act of the gods, the warrior next to the general had just taken a thrust from a Roman sword to the throat and staggered sideways, bumping into the general just as the sword was perhaps halfway in its arc of travel. While it would have made a slightly diagonal strike across Felix's forearm, severing the Pilus Prior's sword arm and probably leading to his death, instead, the general's body was jarred hard enough so that the blade turned and missed Felix's arm by no more than a hand span.

  But what this also did was upset the general's stance and throw him off balance, so that in the very instant after his sword missed its target, and before he could recover himself, the Wa general was vulnerable. And Felix didn't waste the opportunity provided him. Bringing his already extended sword up in a straight line, he brought the edge of his blade up and directly into the Wa general's throat, the point tearing into the soft flesh directly underneath his chin. Although there wasn't a lot of force behind it, since his arm was already extended, it was nevertheless a damaging blow, the Wa's head snapping back in a spray of blood and exposing his throat. Felix made a leaping step forward, his arm still extended out before him, so that the point of the blade entered the Wa's body right above his Adam's apple, the Centurion stopping only when he felt the grate of the bone that supported the man's head. When he felt that resistance, he immediately moved his arm sideways, slicing through the carotid artery and most of the muscles of the neck, causing the Wa's head, weighted down by the helmet as it was, to suddenly tilt grotesquely to one side.

  For a couple of heartbeats, the barbarian stood there, blood spraying in a bright arc, as his heart continued beating, his eyes registering the same shock that almost every man experiences at his own sudden death, before collapsing in a heap. There was a moment's pause, then the Romans around Felix erupted in a roar of fierce joy, knowing that their Pilus Prior had slain an important man. Immediately around the Wa general, his own men let out howls of despair, but continued their fight with even more fury than before. Unlike their leader, they hadn't thought about the larger situation; all they knew was their job, which was to obey and to die, should their commander order it. And now that their leader was down, all that was left for them to do was to continue killing, even though it meant their own certain death.

  Chapter 10

  The sun, which almost every man of Caesar's army would have sworn would never, ever set, was now just barely above the low horizon, and for the first time that day, the prevailing sound was silence. At least, it was silent when compared to the sound and fury of a battle that had begun not that long after dawn. In the northern camp, there was not much left, other than smoke, ruin, and a level of carnage that nobody in Caesar's army, not even those veterans of Gaul who had been at Alesia, had ever witnessed before. If one stood in the middle of the camp and just listened, he would have sworn that he heard the keening of a relentless, lonely wind. But the breeze was almost nonexistent; taking its place was the sound of thousands of wounded, on both sides, each of them speaking a universal language of suffering and pain.

  Sextus Scribonius stood, as he had been standing for some time, too weary to move, or to give any orders, for that matter. He was afraid to sit down, sure that if he did, he would never be able to stand again, so instead he just...stood there. His mind was almost as empty as the rest of his body, barely able to register the sights, sounds, and smells around him. All he knew for sure was that somehow—he had no idea how—the camp hadn't fallen. Anything more complex than that, even for someone as brilliant as Scribonius, was beyond him. Everywhere around him, men were shuffling as if they were sleepwalking, most of them doing nothing more strenuous or involved than checking on fallen comrades to see if they still lived. If they found one alive, they would raise a hand and try to call for the attention of a medicus to come and aid the wounded man. Even this taxed them, as they shambled from one pile of bodies to another, bending over and pulling aside the barbarian bodies, using their dagger on any Wa who showed any sign of life. Scribonius watched all of this, with a detached interest that was the best effort he could muster, observing mutely as men went about their grisly business. Then, a medicus, his tunic completely black from all of the blood in which he had been forced to wade this day, approached him with an expression Scribonius couldn't readily interpret.

  "Pilus Prior, can you come with me?" the medicus' accent betrayed a Pandyan heritage, if his dark skin hadn't already proclaimed it.

  Scribonius found it difficult to summon interest in what this man was saying, but he forced himself to respond.

  "Why? Surely you don't need me to tell you if someone's alive or dead."

  The medicus hesitated, and something in his manner triggered a slight flicker of interest in the Pilus Prior.

  "It concerns the Primus Pilus," the medicus replied.

  "Ah," Scribonius' curiosity faded, not willing to deal with this detail, despite knowing that it was inevitable. Couldn't these bastards allow a man to grieve for his best friend for just a few moments, he wondered? "Well, I'm sure there are other men who need your help more than he does."

  The medicus’ reaction confused Scribonius, because the man hesitated again, as if there was something more than the routine requirement of deciding what to do with his friend's body.

  "I doubt that,
" the other man replied. "He's alive, so he needs us just as much as anyone. More, probably," he added.

  Scribonius stared in disbelief; he was so sure that his last conversation with Pullus would be the final time he would ever speak to his friend, his tired mind was unable to comprehend fully what it was hearing.

  "He's...alive?" Scribonius gasped.

  The medicus nodded, but his expression was grim.

  "Yes, he is. I don't know how, and I don't know for how much longer, but yes, right now he's still alive. And he's asking for you."

  In Caesar's camp, the general was in much the same state as his Secundus Pilus Prior of the 10th, but he had the luxury of being attended by the handful of his slaves and staff who had somehow survived. Statianus' attack, with his four Cohorts had shattered the Wa assault, although it had been at a grievous cost. Even so, these four Cohorts, along with a scratch force that Caesar had thrown together of what remained of his forces defending the barricade, numbering about a full Cohort, were pursuing the barbarians. However, Caesar had given strict orders for the pursuit not to go more than halfway down the slope, because, as shattered as this Wa force was, until he knew what the situation was in the other camps, his army was still in great danger. As exhausted as he was, Caesar's mind was still hard at work, not just directing the care for his wounded and tallying his losses, but already putting men to work at cleaning away any debris that might hinder a defense, if there was to be another assault. Most of the camp was a smoking ruin, especially the half of the camp between the western wall, where the assault had come from, and the forum. After thinking about it for a moment, Caesar had ordered that the makeshift barricade not only stay in place, but be improved. The wall was being repaired, as well, although the ditches were still filled with the bodies of the Wa who had served the same purpose as the fascines, the bundles of sticks Roman armies piled on top of each other to fill a ditch. Unfortunately, he couldn't spare the men or the time to toss the bodies out of the ditch, so that this would enable the Wa to cross again with no impediment, but it couldn't be helped.