Invasion (Tales of the Empire Book 5) Read online

  Cantex shook his head. ‘Respectfully, sir, we cannot say for certain that they will not move to become more aggressive, and their fort effectively controls this ford – a ford that our poorly-defended supply lines will have to use. It is the height of folly to leave them in a strong position and risk our supplies.’

  ‘I have a captain with his own force back there protecting the supplies,’ the general snapped. ‘Yes, it is a small force by imperial standards, but given the mettle this tribe have showed, they should be more than adequate to defend the wagons against a native attack.’

  ‘Sir…’

  General Quietus gestured to Cantex and strode away towards the tree beneath which the tribune had been resting earlier. Once they were as alone as it was possible to be, the nearest troops respectfully pulling away to give them privacy, the general fixed the tribune with his inflexible stony expression.

  ‘It is poor military etiquette to argue with your superior in front of the men, Cantex. The ordinary rank and file were there listening to you undermining my authority. That means they are now wondering about the validity of my strategy. The knock-on effects of that can be dreadful for discipline and morale, so I will politely and kindly ask you to keep your arguments to yourself and your trap shut when you are in earshot of the soldiery. If you wish to oppose my viewpoint and put forward alternate plans, that is your right, and indeed your duty, but you should confine yourself to doing so in staff meetings within the privacy of the command tent.’

  Cantex nodded. ‘I understand, sir. And I do apologise for the nature and location of my argument, but there will be no command meeting before we move, and I felt – I still feel – strongly that to move on with tired, soaked men, leaving a potential enemy behind us to wreck supplies, is folly. I know you to be an excellent strategist and commander, general, and so the reason for such rashness is all the more baffling to me.’

  Quietus’ brow furrowed.

  ‘Why the speed, sir?’ prompted Cantex. ‘Help me to understand, General. If I know what we are attempting to achieve, perhaps I can better support you and perhaps tailor my advice.’

  The general drummed his fingers on his folded arms and finally nodded, glancing around to make sure they were effectively alone. ‘Very well, Cantex. I shall confide in you. Given your assignment, you will understand that I have been reluctant to fully explain my every move. You are most likely an agent of the imperial court, and greater men than I have fallen far because of the reports of imperial spies.’

  As Cantex shook his head and opened his mouth to deny the accusation, the general held up a hand to quieten him. ‘To my mind, that fact at least makes it extremely unlikely that you are working for Crito or Volentius, and I am happier with court interference than the potential troubles my idiotic, deranged peers could cause me.’

  Cantex chuckled. ‘I fear they will find any attempt at interference somewhat hampered with my friends in their commands, General.’

  ‘I hope so, Cantex. No man in his right mind would trust either of my peers. They are both more twisted than a thousand-year old olive tree. Very well. You ask why we march north at such speed? Two decades ago, when we were first here, Volentius, Crito and I came across a fortress in the north, controlled by a tribe called the Albantes. They are the true power on this island, and that fortress is the key to their power. Take that fortress, break that tribe and their king and queen, and Alba is laid bare before you.’

  Cantex’s brows raised in surprised appreciation. Perhaps the general had thought it all through after all?

  ‘We failed to take the fortress twenty years ago because neither Crito nor Volentius was willing to surrender the primacy of their position to anyone. In my youthful arrogance, perhaps I was no better. We fought and wrangled over who would lead our forces for so long that in the end the enemy pulled together a massive force from all over their territory and fell upon us while we were unprepared. We were beaten resoundingly and forced south. We resolved to apply to General Anicius Rufus to grant us a fresh force to take the Albante capital, but while we were being ravaged in the north, he was being beaten in the south-west. The campaign was deemed a failure and we were all withdrawn. The fortress remains powerful in the north, and it remains, along with the resident royals, the key to Alba. We march north to take it, and then consolidate. All else that happens here is frippery. That fortress has to be our singular goal.’

  Cantex nodded. ‘I understand, General. And I can see why the three of you would feel aggrieved over what happened. But is it not still folly to march to the attack without the other legions? Even if you do not trust their commanders, surely they would not allow history to repeat itself, and three legions would be far more effective than one.’

  The general sighed. ‘You have no idea what it is to live with such failure, Tribune. It has soured my life for two decades. Anicius Rufus has suffered the ignominy to such an extent that he even tried to persuade the emperor against this invasion, lest we succeed and show him up for an even worse failure than currently believed. But the shame of our failure has twisted and broken Volentius and Crito. They were never the most stable of men in the first place, but now? I would not trust them to run a mile, let alone a campaign. They are probably even now attempting to work out how to turn all this to their personal advantage. They will be scheming. That, Tribune, is why they went east and west and not north. They have plans and plots abounding.’

  Quietus’ stony face took on an odd hint of pride.

  ‘But as good military men, we are above all that. I will not concern myself with my peers. I shall achieve with able officers and a stout legion what the three of us failed to do twenty years ago. We shall defeat the Albantes and control Alba before Crito and Volentius manage to achieve whatever underhand machinations they have in motion. So now you understand. Now you know what we must do and why I cannot rely on the support of my peers. We alone have the chance to complete this campaign successfully and honourably. Now go and organise the men as they cross. I want to be ten miles north by sundown.’

  Without waiting for a reply, Quietus strode away across the turf, leaving Cantex standing beneath the tree, musing. Somehow, from what he’d seen of the other two generals during the muster time on the other side of the sea, he could picture Crito and Volentius just as Quietus had painted them, which left him with more than a little worry for his friends.

  It did ease his soul a little, though, to discover that his own commander held to his honour and at least had carefully thought through his plans. Yet despite that, Cantex could not quite silence the voice of concern in the back of his mind. How big was this combined army the generals had lost to the Albantes twenty years ago? Did the general really think one legion, even a strong, veteran one like this with high morale, could take the most powerful fortress of the most powerful tribe on the island?

  The tribune sighed. He would just have to trust in the general. Quietus had a keen military mind, a little like Bellacon’s, and was obviously no fool on campaign. Despite one blunder so long ago, the rest of his career, while lower-profile, had been highly successful. Likely the man had plans and tricks up his sleeve that he had not yet revealed. Most importantly, Cantex found that he trusted Quietus.

  He would support the general, and pray that everything worked out.

  Chapter 13

  The Hawk Legion breathed a nocturnal sigh of relief. Ten days of slogging north had drained the enthusiasm of every man in the army, along with his strength and his sense of humour. Ten days of hardship, struggle and discomfort, and even the eternally optimistic Cantex was beginning to feel despondent.

  He had, he felt, experienced everything this island could throw at them, as well as everything a military campaign could raise to trouble a legion. The weather had veered this way and that as though the gods were rolling dice and laughing every morning as they consulted some divine chart. The clear, blue sky at the ford had given way the next day to torrential rain without a hint of blue or sun in the sky.
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br />   The rain had continued to hammer them day and night until it morphed into sleet the next morning, which hardened in the afternoon to head-drumming hail. The next day, the sun suddenly appeared from nowhere, roasting the landscape and creating a fog thick enough to hide an elephant at arm’s length. The thick, white Alban shroud lasted two days and then gave way to blue sky once more with blistering heat.

  Then, unbelievably, two days ago it had tried to start snowing. Fortunately the howling gales that came along and repeatedly tried to knock men from their feet blew away all those hints of snow and now left a frost that turned the ground white each morning and left the world muddy slush in the afternoon.

  The natives had not tried to attack the column on its journey north, but the scouts repeatedly found those ever-present hill forts, and everyone was aware of the regular appearances of locals on horseback, shadowing the marching army on distant hills, keeping pace with the legion as they monitored its progress.

  None of this was enough of a threat to make the general halt his advance, but it was enough of a constant risk to keep the men tense and uncomfortable.

  The terrain seemed as undecided as anything, too. North of the river, they had skirted the fenlands where, by then, Crito and his Raven Legion were probably living high on the hog. Then they had reached low hills, then lush fields, flat land, thick forest, wide vales, then high moors. Finally, they had struck a huge broad valley between two ranges of lofty hills along which to march. From the river at its heart there had been a good twenty miles on either side to the hills.

  And the legion had suffered maladies, too. The dreadful, peculiar weather had brought on a wide range of fascinating illnesses, infections and conditions that kept the medics on their toes and, often, baffled. For the past four days the men had been on half rations due to the lack of supplies – the wagons were days behind them now – and it looked extremely likely that those reduced rations would be further halved in the coming days.

  General Quietus seemed not to worry. He claimed that the legion was now close to Albantes territory, and their objective would be no more than three more days further north. The men, he felt, could cope with a few more days’ hardship in order to be the victors in this war, and the supplies would catch up with them in due course.

  The scouts were now thin on the ground, as no more than a third of them were performing scouting duties at any given time, the others combining with the few mounted cavalry to act as foragers, seeking out fodder wherever it could be found. The horses and other beasts were also on reduced rations and the level of reduction now depended upon how successful the foragers were. The ranks had been allowed to send out their own hunters and foragers as they marched, and Cantex felt certain this entire island would be empty of deer, rabbits, fish and birds by the time they reached this great fortress.

  Now, at the end of the tenth day, they had camped on a wide stretch of flat ground beside a small, shallow river that wavered murmuring through the gentle countryside. Through the beneficence of nature herself, the camp site was bounded entirely either by that river – which though small was wide and deep enough to deter any but the most rabid enemy – or by a low escarpment which would at least cripple descending horses, if not men.

  Cantex had felt more secure than in most of their camps on this journey, which had been almost entirely open and vulnerable every night. With no real defences here other than the landscape, the army had wearily set out pickets around the entire circuit, and the scouts had agreed once more to ride out once an hour and check the surrounding landscape for trouble, sleeping in shifts.

  This close to the Albantes, no one was under any illusion as to potential danger.

  But as soon as the men had eaten their meagre evening meal, talked, laughed, drunk, belched and farted, and their heads hit the sleeping roll, they had slumped into a grateful sleep. Three more days, Cantex sighed as blessed slumber claimed him. Just three more days. Then the real hardship would begin.

  His dreams were peculiar, filled with lumbering monsters, snowstorms, poisoned bread, rivers that talked and the like, so when one of the odd creatures with a horn on its forehead and six eyes opened its mouth and issued a long keening cry extremely reminiscent of a call for the legion to stand to, he’d not been at all surprised. When it repeatedly did so, he tried in the dream to batter the strange green, hoofed beast to shut it up.

  The fifth time it cried the legion’s call, Cantex’s eyes shot open.

  By the time the horn had blared out the signal the sixth time, he was out of his cot, scurrying around the tent, grabbing his uniform and trying in the dark to locate his arms and armour. There was a clamour now, distant but clear, of shouting voices. The tribune was no novice at dressing in a hurry on campaign and was grateful as ever that he wore a bronze cuirass that comprised a front and back plate, hinged beneath shoulder pieces and fastened at the sides with straps and buckles. The standard armour types of the legion generally required two men to help one another into.

  Officers were not, of course, required to dress themselves, as they had lackeys to do so, but in this kind of emergency it paid to have armour one could slip into alone.

  The seventh call blared out as Cantex emerged from his tent, lacking socks in his boots or a scarf at his neck, and with his tunic skewwhiff beneath the armour, but with sword in hand and purposeful expression riveted to his face. Even as he took in the scene, that seventh call faded into a gurgle as the musician met some grizzly ending.

  The Hawk Legion had been attacked, and seemingly with little or no warning. Even without defences, that should not be possible, given the number of pickets and scouts out there. If a rat farted out in the woods the entire camp should know about it within moments. It was hard to determine what was going on at the edge of the camp, since the ground was so flat and vision obscured by the rows of white tents, but the noise was all coming from the east, where the site was bounded by that escarpment rather than the river.

  No other officers seemed to be in evidence, and soldiers were emerging from their tents in varying states of readiness. Gathering the better prepared men as he went, Cantex ran through the camp, heading for the din. Rounding the corner of a tent row, he caught his first glimpse of the trouble. Natives were leaping down the low escarpment, howling and attacking. Tents were being demolished at the edge of the camp and men hacked to bits as the legion, taken by surprise, struggled to put up an adequate defence.

  Cantex caught sight of a captain standing by a stack of javelins, gesturing wildly, giving out orders in a constant litany to the confused lessers around him, sending men to the worst-hit areas and trying to stem the influx of the enemy. With now a dozen or so men at his back, the tribune hurried over to the captain.

  ‘How did this happen?’ he asked.

  The captain snapped irritably at him: ‘No time for chat,’ then addressed an expectant soldier. ‘Take four others to tent row seven and try and secure the gulley behind it.’ He then turned and, realising he’d snapped at the army’s second-in-command, paled. ‘Apologies, sir.’

  ‘No,’ Cantex waved it aside. ‘You were quite right. What of scouts and pickets?’

  ‘No sign, sir.’ The captain turned at a call from another lesser, and issued a string of orders before returning his attention to the tribune. ‘Frankly, sir, it was damn lucky I was over here when they appeared. They must have neutralised our entire defensive circuit, ’cause there was not a murmur of warning.’

  Cantex waited while the man issued another series of commands, and sent his own men to the periphery to join in. ‘Is that likely?’ he asked the captain, once they had a moment again. ‘Surely at least one man would have shouted? We’ve three times as many guards out as is standard.’

  ‘Never heard of anything like it, sir. And these bastards are hardly subtle or quiet, neither.’

  Something very peculiar was clearly going on.

  ‘Breach at tent row thirty-one, sir!’ bellowed a voice from some way along the road, and Can
tex could see a man that way waving his arms.

  ‘Shit,’ the captain said, with feeling.

  Cantex turned at fresh shouting to see another captain hurrying along the main track from the camp’s centre with several hundred armoured men behind him. ‘Thirty-one,’ bellowed the tribune, pointing towards the trouble. The captain nodded, sending his men off to the side towards that problem, while he himself came on.

  ‘Begging your pardon, sir, but there’s trouble at the river now, too. General Quietus is heading that way and is calling for his senior officers.’

  Cantex nodded, though inside he felt the irritation rise. He had little time to wait upon the general now. There was too much to do. Even as he clicked his tongue angrily, half a dozen yelling natives suddenly emerged from a tent doorway right next to him, deep behind the lines of the defenders, one carrying a horrified looking severed head by the hair, another one examining the imperial blade he’d purloined.

  The captain leapt between them and Cantex, taking that same blade in the gut before he could even draw his own. Cantex let the poor, heroic officer fall away and immediately slammed his own blade into the neck of the offending native. He might have fallen then to a blow from another man to his right, had that organisational officer not suddenly been next to him, hacking at the native. Then there were three of them, then four, as passing soldiers ran to the tribune’s aid. The barbarians fell in a welter of blows, blood spraying the leather tent wall behind them, their screams lost in the din of battle.

  As the last barbarian fell, Cantex took a deep preparatory breath and, sword at the ready, ducked inside the tent. The rear of the shelter had been cut away for entry, and three bodies lay butchered among the bedrolls in varying states of dress. He emerged into the night air once more.