Caesar Triumphant

by Peake, R. W.

  Using the din to cover their conversation, Caesar asked, "How far do you plan on taking this, Pullus? If there's fighting are you going to draw your sword? Are you even capable of running your Century, let alone your Cohort and your Legion?"

  "Caesar, I'm perfectly capable of directing this Legion," Pullus' tone was still calm, but Caesar knew Pullus well enough to detect the undercurrent of indignant anger that was just below the surface of his words. Then he surprised Caesar by finishing, "And I can draw my sword perfectly well. Using it?"

  Pullus answered his own question with a wry grin and a shrug of one shoulder, and now it was Caesar's turn to laugh. Knowing he was outflanked, the older man shook his head before he reined his horse about, calling over his shoulder, as he trotted away to the front of the formation, "I hope I see you after this is over!"

  "So do I," Pullus muttered under his breath.

  With Caesar gone, Pullus braced himself then performed a parade-ground about-face, looking at the front ranks of the 10th Legion. The moment he did so, the muted chatter of the men immediately stilled, as they waited for what was as much of a ritual as the banter between Caesar and Pullus: the inspection by the Primus Pilus, normally the last thing he did before they went into battle. With a monumental effort of will, Pullus did his best to keep his military bearing as he walked toward where the Third Century, First Cohort stood waiting. This was a slight variation in the routine; normally Pullus would have begun his inspection with the Third Century, Fourth Cohort, the last of the 10th Legion at the far left of the formation. But even as shrunken as the Legion was, he didn't want to take the risk of being unable to finish the ritual, knowing how important such superstitions were to soldiers. He was no less susceptible than any of the men in the ranks; like every other man, he had his own pre-battle ritual, performed in the same order, with the same tasks since his first battle in Hispania some 27 years before. As it was, he was acutely aware that he had been unable to go through this ritual the night and morning before this day, but only he knew how nervous it made him. Otherwise, his face wore the same hard expression of tough professionalism as always, even if his skin did carry a slight glaze from sweat that was uncalled for by the temperature of this morning. Stopping before the first man, the Legionary, a Parthian with slightly crossed eyes and a nose that took an abrupt turn about midway down the bridge, started to smile up at his Primus Pilus and was about to open his mouth to say something, although he didn't know what. The words never came, frozen in his throat by the expression on his Primus Pilus' face, who glared down at the man.

  "What are you smiling about, idiot?" Pullus growled, then held out his hand, palm up.

  Rattled as he was by this reception, the discipline instilled in him through his Centurion's vitus stood him in good stead as, without thinking, the Legionary reached down and drew his sword, then reversed it to hand it hilt-first to Pullus. The Parthian, somehow knowing that something much more important than a simple inspection was taking place, made sure his gaze stayed locked at a spot where the transverse crest and helmet met as Pullus ran a thumb along the edge, ignoring the quiet grunt of pain that escaped his commander's lips as he performed this simple movement. If he had dropped his gaze he would have seen that his Primus Pilus was holding the hilt of the sword at a much lower angle than was normal for him so that he didn't have to lift his left arm quite as high, but he maintained his discipline.

  Handing the sword back to the Parthian, Pullus' only comment was a muttered, "You couldn't even cut bread with this."

  Normally, a statement like this would be followed by some sort of punishment, but when nothing was forthcoming the Parthian dared to drop his gaze to Pullus' face, his own expression betraying his disappointment at failing his Primus Pilus. Pullus' own mien didn't change, his face still the hard mask; but just before he sidestepped to face the man to the Parthian's right, he gave him a wink. Moving on, Pullus didn't see the relief flooding over the Parthian's face, or the grin that spread over the swarthy man's features. Man by man, Pullus performed the oft-repeated ritual, until he reached the last man from the ranks of the First Century, First Cohort, the man who stood next to him in line of battle. The identity of that Legionary, up until the battle now almost a week before, had been a tall Spaniard named Numerius, but like so many of his comrades, he was missing from the ranks. In his place was the man who normally stood fourth man down, and this mute evidence of how ravaged the 10th was shook Pullus' composure more than anything had up to that moment. Through a tremendous effort of will, he managed to complete his inspection before sidestepping to stand in front of his best friend and acting Primus Pilus.

  "I hope you know what you're doing," Scribonius echoed Caesar, after rendering his salute, of course.

  "I do," Pullus assured his friend. "And I'll take it from here."

  For a moment Scribonius froze, sure he had misheard Pullus.

  "You mean, you plan on taking your place in the assault?" he finally gasped.

  "Well, I plan on leading the 10th, like I always have," Pullus responded, his mouth twisted into a grin. "Hopefully this will be a walk in the gardens, because only the gods know if I could fight off an angry Vestal Virgin at this point."

  There was no other man that Pullus would admit such weakness to but Scribonius, and his friend's face showed the concern he felt, understanding that if Pullus was willing to admit even this much, he must be very worried that collapsing was a real possibility.

  "What do you want me to do?" Scribonius asked him quietly. "Do you want me to march with the Second or with you?"

  Pullus considered, then said, very grudgingly, "You better stay here. Just in case."

  Scribonius longed to point out that if Pullus collapsed, he needed to do so before they were inside the fortifications of the capital, but he also knew how meaningless his warning would be.

  Instead he merely replied, "I'll be right here."

  "Good," Pullus and Scribonius exchanged a look that communicated Pullus' gratitude more than any of his words could, while Scribonius returned his own message of devotion to the man who had been his best friend for so many years.

  With nothing left to say, they both turned to face the front and waited for the blast of the cornu to sound the order to advance. A short time later, the deep, bass note sounded that was the signal to march, and with no hesitation, Caesar's army stepped forward.

  The palace official who raised the warning was on his knees, gagging from a type of exertion with which he was completely unfamiliar, or at least since the removal of his testicles as the prerequisite to join the emperor's household. His superior, on the other hand, barely noticed the other man's distress, as he snapped out a series of orders to the hastily gathered group of men. This included the sub-commander to the royal guard, who had been left in charge by his superior, the man who was responsible for the group of swordsmen known as The Chosen Ones. He had also been placed in command of the rest of the royal guard, and he listened now to the eunuch, although he hardly needed to be told where to go and what to do. Once he heard, between gasps, from the supine eunuch what was happening and from what directions the grubworms were coming, there was nothing more to be said. Yet, for some reason, the official seemed determined to emphasize the importance of protecting the emperor, as if the warrior needed to be told! Standing with his arms crossed, he drummed his fingers impatiently on one arm in a silent signal to the official that time was being wasted. Glaring at the warrior, the eunuch hurriedly finished what he was saying, and without waiting to be dismissed—an unforgivable lapse of protocol in normal times—the sub-commander trotted off, calling to the assembled warriors. Watching his retreating back, the official savored the idea of the ways in which he would take his revenge, before reluctantly turning his attention back to the other men. None of them were warriors, but these were men entrusted with what the official knew was going to be the most important task of all.

  "Is The Divinity ready to be moved?" he asked the eunuch he had appointed to
the task.

  Bowing his head, the other man replied, "Yes, he is prepared for his departure. However," the eunuch paused, as he tried to choose his words, "The Divinity has expressed his desire that He not be moved until the last possible moment. He says that He has been in communion with His celestial Father and Mother, and that He has asked Them to intercede on His behalf. He is expecting that the barbarians will very shortly be destroyed."

  The chief official froze, his mind racing with the import of what he had just been told. Not now, he thought! Of all the times for the emperor to actually believe in his own divinity, this was the worst moment, without a doubt. It was true that he and all those in service to the emperor—which technically meant every man, woman and child on these islands—accepted as fact that the emperor was a god sent to earth to rule his people, at least on the surface. And while the official had no doubt that the common people believed this with a certainty reserved for the uneducated, for more enlightened individuals like himself, particularly one who had watched The Divinity squatting and defecating, the level of belief wasn't quite as strong. And, if the truth were known—a truth that this man would never, ever utter aloud—The Divinity was something of an idiot, hardly a fitting state for a god. Now this dolt was actually trying to make a decision that could lead to real, earthly consequences. However, he was the emperor and his word was supreme law. But while before that word had always been carefully guided and controlled by this official, and others, he conceded, this was a decision that went directly counter to what all of his staff knew was the proper course. Nothing, absolutely nothing, could be allowed to happen to the emperor's person. Death would be horrible, but capture would be absolutely catastrophic, because it would expose what was in essence a great lie, for how could a god be captured by mortals? Especially by these...these grubworms? No, the emperor had no business tarrying here. The challenge, he understood, was how to get the emperor to change his mind, while thinking that it was his own idea. Without saying anything to the others awaiting orders, the chief official beckoned to the other eunuch to accompany him and strode in the direction of the imperial quarters.

  It was hard to tell, but the scout estimated that the royal guard commander was unconscious for what was the sixth part of a Roman watch. Finally the man moaned, then slowly opened his eyes, but the scout, who had never left his side, noticed that they were still unfocused. After several moments, the commander turned his head, staring dully at the scout peering down into his face.

  "Commander," the scout began, but before he could say another word the man suddenly rolled to his opposite side, retched a number of times, before finally vomiting.

  Only after that did he seem to have any awareness, but his manner was still lethargic, as he struggled to sit upright. Helping him to sit up, the scout waited for the commander to speak, but when he said nothing, he began to tell the man what had happened. At first the scout didn't think the commander was listening, or if he was, his wits were sufficiently scrambled that he didn't understand what was being said; but when the scout mentioned how the two of them had ridden down the road to the lake, only to find the barbarian army gone, the commander's expression changed. A look of alertness came over him, as he stared at the scout for a moment, as if trying to gather his thoughts, which in fact was exactly what he was doing.

  "They....weren't there," he said slowly, prompting an affirmation from the scout, who was still petrified, keenly aware of what had happened to the man whose mount the commander had appropriated.

  "They had moved south," the commander continued, putting the pieces together that had been jarred apart in his head from his fall. "And they were nowhere in sight, so they must have left their camp behind in the dark. That means......"

  His voice trailed off, and his eyes narrowed, as all that he had seen and deduced fell back into place.

  "The capital is under attack!"

  Holding out his hand to be helped up, when the scout pulled him to his feet, he took a step to steady himself, but ignored the crushing headache; there was simply too much to do.

  "On your feet! We must hurry back to the city!"

  Shouting this over and over, the commander ran up the length of the road in what had been, up until this moment, the site of an ambush that was going to inflict such damage on the grubworms that they wouldn't be able to do what the commander was terrified they were doing at that moment: attacking the capital. In short, he had been fooled, and now it was a race to see what could be salvaged from his error, if anything.

  Flaminius' men were thorough in their searches, but as Flaminius expected, no barbarians, warriors or civilian, were found within the tiny houses. Much to the disappointment and frustration of the men, precious little in the way of loot was found, and every one of them was struck by how barely furnished these huts were. They were uniformly neat, arranged in tidy rows, each with a plot of land on which the peasants who lived there grew a variety of edible plants, but all of the enclosures that normally held animals were empty. From what Flaminius had gathered, this neighborhood, while it was inhabited by barbarians of the peasant class, housed the artisans and skilled craftsmen of the capital and their families. In every other situation of a similar nature, in every other campaign, no matter in whose lands they were, this class of peasant was usually prosperous and could be counted on to have any manner of goods and valuables of a portable nature. Not here, it seemed: yet another example of how this entire campaign had seemed to be cursed by the gods. While Flaminius wasn't much for believing in such things, he wasn't deaf and he heard the muttered conversations around the fires at night suggesting that very thing: that the gods had turned their backs on Caesar and his men. The only bone of contention, as far as Flaminius could tell, was whether it was because they were angry at Caesar, and by extension his army, for invading these islands, or if in fact these islands themselves were cursed, or in some way were territory where not even the gods dared to interfere. Shoving these thoughts aside, Flaminius returned his attention to the sounds of the cornu that told him that the 14th Legion was beginning their final advance into the capital. Moving quickly from among the houses so he could see, Flaminius stood and watched as the front line of the 14th, led by its Primus Pilus Figulus, suddenly rushed forward in a roughly straight line, or at least as straight as hundreds of running men could maintain.

  "They didn't use their javelins," Flaminius heard a voice behind him and turned to see his Pilus Posterior, the second-highest ranking Centurion in the Legion and commander of the Second Cohort.

  From the angle where they were, it was impossible to see very far past the area enclosed by the fortifications, but Flaminius didn't see any bodies or any sign that there had been any type of defense put up around the unfinished ditch.

  "Probably didn't need to," Flaminius concluded. Moving to another subject, he asked, "Are the last of the buildings searched?"

  "Yes, that's what I was coming to tell you."

  "Good," Flaminius grunted. "Get the men back together. It's our turn to go in as soon as the 14th is finished."

  With nothing else to say, the Pilus Posterior returned to his Century, while Flaminius called to his cornicen, telling him to sound the appropriate notes for assembly.

  The partially excavated ditch and the shapeless pile of dirt behind it barely slowed the men of the 14th down as they went streaming through the gaping hole in the otherwise unbroken wall. They had been expecting at least some resistance, but the streets in both directions were deserted, the houses appearing as empty as those on the outside of the fortifications. For men who had whipped themselves into the controlled frenzy essential for combat, especially against this enemy, the lack of anything or anyone on which to focus that ferocity was extremely unsettling. Pushing several blocks in a northerly direction, Figulus finally called a halt, as much to allow the men to collect themselves as to catch their breath. Up ahead of where he was standing—on the street running parallel to the eastern wall, closest to the deserted dirt rampart—F
igulus could see that this neighborhood ended and that there was some sort of cleared area, perhaps a park or large garden of some sort. It was only there that he saw any movement, and what he saw were figures, most of them clad in black, flowing robes, running toward the northwest, to what would essentially be the far corner of the fortification. Otherwise, there was still no sign of resistance, but he nevertheless admonished the men of his own Century to remain alert, a superfluous order, given how nervous the men now arriving were. As was their custom, the Legionaries had been shouting their battle cry as they went charging into the interior of the capital's fortifications, the noise fueled and strengthened by their belief that this would be the final battle and their chance to exact vengeance. But now they had fallen silent, so that the only sound was the ragged panting of men trying to catch their breaths. The noise echoed between the houses, adding to the eerie atmosphere and contributing even further to the collective case of nerves. Behind the 14th, the 30th was entering the capital, but their orders were to move to the west from the entrance into the city, arranged in a formation perpendicular to the 14th's. Ever methodical, the Roman assault on the capital continued, and in just a few moments it was the turn of the 10th Legion to enter. Unfortunately, as small an impediment as the partially excavated ditch was to healthy men, for Pullus it was a supreme challenge; but the only concession he made was to have help down into the ditch, leaning heavily on Scribonius, instead of leaping across like everyone else. Even this was almost too much to bear, but as bad as Pullus thought it was being helped down into the ditch, it was even more agony to have to be hauled up and out of it, it taking both Scribonius and a man from the ranks to help him. As much as he tried, Pullus was unable to keep a groan from escaping from him, and he stood motionless for a moment, eyes closed and swaying, rivulets of sweat pouring down his face. Scribonius, even more alarmed at this sight, opened his mouth, then shut it, knowing that it would do no good. His friend had thrown his dice and he knew that he would be wasting his breath trying to convince Pullus he had done enough.