Marius' Mules Page 9

  He was just considering pushing some kind of offensive, sending a couple of centuries out across the ford to try and relieve some of the pressure, when one of the legionaries nearby called out and pointed across the river. Following his direction, Petreius twitched with excitement.

  Longinus and his skirmish cavalry had arrived. Not only that, but they had come through light forest and fallen upon the rear ranks of the Helvetii before the barbarians even knew they were there. In an instant the barbarians turned from fierce pride to panic and fear. Petreius ordered a concerted volley of javelins and arrows from the wall, and the Helvetii, trapped between the cavalry and the wall, fell like wheat before the scythe. Those that could escape east or west along the bank of the river did so, fleeing with no sense of order. The rest would never make it back to their comrades. Petreius turned to face the tired and beleaguered men of the Eighth Legion, a mad grin on his face.

  “This is it lads. Open the gate and let’s get onto those fords and draw some serious blood.”

  He turned once more to glance across the river. In the flickering light, Longinus and his cavalrymen moved like birds in flight, their blades raising and swooping, red and gleaming.

  Velius and the primus pilus of the Eleventh surveyed the scene in front of them from the top of the wall. A senior centurion of the Eighth stood a couple of yards away.

  There had been no sign of Tetricus when he’d arrived and, when Velius had questioned the leading centurion, he’d been told that no one had seen the tribune for over an hour.

  The initial flurry of missiles from the opposite shore had been astounding. Like a swarm of hornets, the arrows and spears filled the sky, black against the dark blue curtain of night. A fair number of soldiers had fallen foul of the barrage and had continued to do so, even though the strength of the volleys had begun to wane. A defensive force three or four times the size of that the Helvetii expected waited patiently and quietly beneath the walls, shields interlocked above their heads. Waiting for the attack.

  The eyes of the Eleventh’s leading centurion kept straying to the blood-soaked bandage around Velius’ arm and chest. He seemed to be fascinated.

  “What’s the matter, centurion?”

  The man jolted and met the eyes of the Tenth’s training officer. Despite the fact that he officially outranked Velius, he had been nothing but polite and deferential since they had arrived.

  “I’ve been in plenty of battles in my time, and I’ve seen wounds like that put a man out of action for a month. Yet here you are, hours later and still on your feet directing the men. I’m just impressed is all.”

  Velius sneered, though without real feeling.

  “I haven’t got time to be wounded. Got to show the men that you’re impregnable. Only way they’ll ever follow you into the lion’s mouth.”

  Velius ducked his head very slightly for another volley; then another; and finally, as a hail of arrows punched their way into the palisade, a mass of barbarian shapes plunged out of the scrub and into the river. There were so many that they bore a resemblance to ants from the top of the wall. Velius was wondering what they hoped to achieve when he saw the ropes. A large number of warriors were swimming the river, but they held ropes that trailed off up the opposite bank and out of site in the bushes.

  Finally, the other ends of the ropes appeared, four of them hauling an entire tree trunk. A battering ram, as Velius immediately realised. The rest pulled smaller branches and roughly-hewn planks. He turned to the primus pilus.

  “They’re going to fill in the ditch with wood and try to barge a hole in the palisade. What are your orders, sir?”

  The primus pilus of the Eleventh, newly raised from the centurionate of the Seventh looked up in surprise. “What do you think we need to do? You’re the man who trained this lot. What can we do?”

  Velius grabbed the primus pilus by the scarf beneath his chin and hauled him up until their noses almost touched.

  “The tribune’s vanished and you’re the senior centurion. That means you’re in charge of this bloody legion. You’re supposed to be a leader. Now lead!” he growled.

  The primus pilus raised his voice, trying to cover the slight tremble in it.

  “All missiles on the wall pick off those swimmers.”

  Velius’ eyes rolled skywards.

  “Alright. Here’s what you do. Form everyone who’s not on the wall into three units, and make sure they’re armed to the teeth and carry full body shields. Keep them ready and out of sight. As soon as you know where they’re going to cross the ditch and punch through the wall, let them. As soon as they have a gap, they’ll come through, and you can box them in with three units of heavy infantry. The phrase is ‘rats in a trap’. It’s just about over.”

  The primus pilus grinned. “You see? That’s thinking. We must talk, Velius, when this is over.” Velius looked up to see the centurion from the Eighth smiling over at him, and that was the last thing Velius saw before everything went black, and the waking world slid away from him.

  Chapter 4

  (On the western road from Geneva)

  “Furca: T-shaped pole carried by legionaries which held all their standard travelling kit.”

  “Scorpion, Ballista & Onager: Siege engines. The Scorpion was a large crossbow on a stand, the Ballista a giant missile throwing crossbow, and the Onager a stone hurling catapult.”

  The road was dusty and dry. Despite a late start to the spring, the weather had been kind. The storms of March had given way to rain and then gentle showers during early April. These had now abated and the last week had been dry, the sun gradually growing in heat and strength. Since the legions had foiled the advance of the Helvetii and the barbarians had been forced to find another route, the three legions had marched for the last week and a half, out of the Alps, and down toward the lower lands nearer the mouth of the Rhone. Then, one morning, the scouts had reported back that the Seventh, Ninth and Tenth Legions were less than three miles away and marching on a path of convergence. North of the Rhone, they had met and the six legions had turned, a fearsome army, to march west toward the Saone and the crossings into Gaul. The heavy drum of footsteps in perfect time, stretching simultaneously over nearly four miles of road with close to forty thousand men had become a constant drone, and the choking clouds of dust and grit thrown up by the marching feet had formed a steady haze through which the army moved.

  There was another fight coming their way, and everyone knew it. To begin with, Caesar and the senior officers had tried to keep the situation confined to planning sessions and strategy meetings but by now even the common soldiery could not be kept blind to the groups of tribesmen moving among the hills and keeping pace with the army. Three of the local tribes had allied with the Helvetii who, by ingratiating flattery and by use of familial connections, had gained passage through the narrow pass in the mountains.

  For the last four days, the legions had been ordered to march in tighter formation with full equipment and the artillery and support wagons for each legion following up directly. Every night now the army spent two hours creating a well-defended and neatly organised marching camp.

  Fronto made a point of travelling at the head of the Tenth, close to Priscus who, as primus pilus, marched at the front of the legion. Fronto couldn’t help but smile. There was a fight coming, but this time he would be back with the Tenth, and it would be the Roman way. Open ground, fully manoeuvrable legions in proper formation. No skulking behind walls and hiding from archers. Any battles the army engaged in on this journey would be ten to one in favour of Rome; five to one at worst. With Longinus leading mounted scouts out and about within five miles of the army, there was no likelihood of the army being taken by surprise. They would have at a minimum thirty minutes warning of an enemy attack. May Fortune help any barbarian force brave enough to challenge them.

  His mind wandering, he thought of the night after the battle at Geneva and smiled. While the Eighth celebrated, Fronto had spent his time rushing around, occu
pied with many tasks.

  He had visited the doctors at the Eighth’s hospital to check on Velius. The centurion was unconscious, but stable. The arrow had finally been removed and rebound, but a missile had split his skull not far above the ear. Luckily it had whistled on past and not become embedded, which would have spelled certain death. Fronto smiled. Velius was indestructible. Not even a ballista could stop him. The doctors were concerned as to any damage done to his brain. They wouldn’t know how severe the wounding was until or unless he awoke, but they were hopeful.

  It had been three days before the centurion had finally surfaced. Fronto and the primus pilus of both the Eleventh and Twelfth had been present as he awoke. His first words were directed at the three of them.

  “It’s only blood. Haven’t you got anything more important to do?”

  He had then been to visit Caesar at the headquarters. The General was relaxed and happy and admitted Fronto with a wide grin.

  “Marcus. What can I do for you this evening?”

  Fronto sagged against the wall, exhaustion beginning to settle in.

  “Caesar, without Velius in active condition the Eleventh and Twelfth are in a bit of a dithering state. The primus pilus of the Eleventh keeps trying to find a superior for advice. Have you decided on who is taking command of the legions?”

  Caesar smiled.

  “Yes. I’ve appointed Aulus Crispus to the Eleventh and Servius Galba to the Twelfth.”

  “I don’t think I know either of them.”

  “You’ll have seen them around at the staff meetings. They should serve quite nicely. They’re both involved with preparation at the moment, so would you mind kindly looking after the Eleventh and Twelfth until they’re ready to take command?”

  Fronto sighed.

  “Alright. I’ve already got them repairing and replacing weapons and armour. You can probably see the smoke from all the temporary forges if you look out of the window. I’ll go and issue orders for the day.”

  He bowed and turned to leave, stopping momentarily by the door.

  “I don’t suppose there’s been any word of Tetricus yet?”

  Caesar shook his head.

  “Nothing yet, but the battlefield is still being cleared. Unless he deserted or he was captured, we’ll find him.”

  Fronto nodded sadly and left the headquarters, making for the south gate of the Eleventh’s temporary camp.

  Spotting two centurions talking by the standards, he turned straight for them.

  “You two.”

  The men straightened instantly.

  “Get every able bodied man from both of your centuries and meet me at the redoubt by the lake. They don’t need to be armoured and they can leave their furca behind. Now hurry.”

  As the two centurions ran off, Fronto had wandered down to the lake, past the Eighth Legion, who appeared to be having some kind of party. Every time he walked past a small group of seated soldiers and they saw a superior officer, they sprang to their feet and saluted and, by the time he reached the redoubt, he was rather sick of saluting. He surveyed the damage done to both Helvetian and Roman armies from the vantage point and shook his head. He was still reflecting on the attrition rate of siege warfare when he became aware of the thump of booted feet not far away. The two centurions approached with over a hundred men. Fronto turned to face them, a determined look on his face.

  “Alright gentlemen, we’re going to head from here down to where the first units of the Eleventh were stationed. From there we’re going to split into three groups. One lot will search on our side of the stockade. One will cover the stockade to the river. The other will search across the river. We’ll search as long as the light lasts until we find a sign of what happened to tribune Tetricus.”

  There was an equally determined look of the faces of the men as they set off at a fast march to the first position of the Eleventh.

  It was, in fact only an hour or so into the search when a legionary gave a shout.

  “I think it’s him sir!”

  Fronto ran up to the stockade and hauled himself to the top, where he could see a small knot of soldiers and one of the centurions huddled close to the water’s edge. In the centre, he could just make out a small pile of bodies with spears sticking out of them, resembling some sort of hedgehog.

  Fronto carefully clambered over the parapet and dropped the bone-jarring distance at the other side. He rushed towards them as they carefully hauled the extraneous bodies from the tribune, the soldiers making way for him as he arrived.

  “Is he dead?”

  One of the legionaries, presumably a capsarius, was kneeling, examining the body closely. A spear rose from the man’s stomach, pointing accusingly at the sky. Tetricus looked remarkably white and a pool of very dark congealed blood had collected near his stomach.

  “He’s breathing sir, but won’t be for long. I’m going to need three people’s help here, and the rest of you need to clear out and give us space. We might be able to help him, but he might already have lost too much blood.”

  Fronto unfastened his armour and let it drop into the water. One of the centurions and one of the legionaries stayed, while the others joined the steadily growing ranks of observers by the shore.

  “What can we do?”

  The capsarius looked up at him doubtfully as he tore a long strip from his tunic hem.

  “I need two of you to hold that spear very steady, and one of you to take this cloth and hold it very gently but very steady around the entry point. Do NOT press down under any circumstances. While you all do that, I will very carefully cut through the spear.”

  It took a gruelling five minutes to remove the bulk of the spear without rupturing any more of the tribune’s insides. Even so, far too much more dark blood welled up around the shaft for Fronto’s liking.

  “Alright.” The capsarius threw the spear out into the river, where it bobbed away with the current in the cool, clear water, and pointed at the man with the cloth.

  “Now you’re going to keep that cloth over the wound, but with only very slight pressure. You two are going to very slowly and gently lift him from the ground, while I look underneath. Alright? Now go.”

  As Fronto and the centurion gingerly lifted Tetricus as gently as they could, the capsarius put his head level with the ground and, as soon as the body was slightly clear, he reached underneath.

  “The point was still in the ground, so the shaft went right through. The point’s diamond-shaped and quite narrow, so it shouldn’t have done too much internal damage. I don’t want to draw it out though. We should get him to a medicus as soon as possible now.”

  He looked over at the group on the bank.

  “Make yourselves useful. Put together a makeshift stretcher. It needs to have a hole in the centre of the fabric so we don’t drive the spear any further in. Once that’s done, get him as fast as possible to the chief medicus of the Eighth, but carry him gently. Any more blood loss and he’s gone for sure.”

  The capsarius washed his hands in the water.

  Fronto leaned down toward him.

  “If you ever want to transfer unit, you’d be an asset to the Tenth.”

  And now, two weeks later, Velius was back in his accustomed place, though still with a tender shoulder and a broken cranium. He would be unable to lift anything with that arm or to wear headgear for several weeks yet. Despite his injuries, he seemed to have picked up exactly where he left off and ignored any discomfort he felt. Tetricus had lived through the first four days and was hopefully still alive now, but had been far too delicate to travel. He had not woken during all that time, and had remained in the camp at Geneva, with a medicus to look after him. If he regained his strength and healed, he would take charge of the local auxiliary force.

  All in all, things had worked out better that they’d initially seemed. Regardless, he’d been happy to see Priscus and the Tenth. It was like reuniting with a family. The three reserve legions had reached a prearranged point just north of the
river a day ahead of the force moving from Geneva and had made camp over night. Just before lunchtime the next day, Caesar and the command unit had crested the hill and come down to find Crassus in overall command of the three legions. Crassus had bowed to Caesar and formally greeted him, while the lesser ranks’ reunions were considerably less formal. Following Fronto and Balbus’ advice, Caesar had agreed to spend one day camped to allow the legions to unite properly before they moved on.

  Priscus had clasped hands with Fronto and then walked with him.

  “Why were we kept there, Marcus? The Helvetii have gone past toward Gaul days ago on this side of the river, while we were all too far south to do anything about it. Level with me.”

  Fronto sighed and looked around to make sure they were alone.

  “Gnaeus, we’re heading deep into Gaul. You’re absolutely right. We couldn’t spring a trap and stop the Helvetii, or we’d have no excuse to chase them into new and fresh territory. We have to prepare for a long campaign. Which reminds me,..”

  Walking over to the small pen set aside for the animals, Fronto scanned the beasts.

  “Priscus!” he shouted. “Where’s my horse?”

  Priscus turned to look at him and shrugged. “I put it to work helping carry the wooden frame for the mess.”

  Fronto stared. “You did what? That’s a thoroughbred mare that I’ve had with me for years. And it’s an officer’s steed, not a bloody carthorse.”