Triumph

CHAPTER EIGHT

Morale naturally plummeted following such a reverse and the only method by which Flavius could counter that was by a return to his previous stratagem, that of a controlled sortie and then retire. This enjoyed only limited success, due to the higher spirits of the Goths and the way they had learnt to counter his tactics. The fact that preyed on his mind was not the nature of his own failure – in war such things had to be accepted – but the way it had nearly turned into disaster.

If the Goths had put in a final charge it was possible, with the gates of the city shut against him, he would have lost his entire army and the image of those Roman citizens lining the walls in silent contemplation of such an outcome caused a near apoplexy, just as much as the indiscipline of their levies on the Plains of Nero had multiplied his own difficulties on the east bank of the Tiber.

The need to know how such a set of circumstances had come about was a task for Procopius. He agreed with his master that the Roman mob were not capable of such behaviour on some collective natural instinct. Yes, the common people could riot as could any mass of citizens; Flavius had seen that very thing in Constantinople in the so-called Nika riots against Justinian and Theodora, an uprising that had ended in the massacre of thirty thousand citizens in the Hippodrome.

There had been furtive leadership then seeking power for themselves and many had paid the price for mere suspicion of involvement; something of the same must exist in Rome and future security demanded that whoever was responsible be unmasked, a demand easier made than satisfied, as Procopius sadly reported. He lacked the sources among the Romans that he enjoyed within the army.

‘It’s like walking the sewers, leaving me wading in filth but with no clarity. Hint to one senator that there has been treachery is to invite him to name with certainty his chief rivals and they are just as keen to condemn the source.’

‘So it could be any of them?’ Flavius asked.

‘Or all!’ Procopius snapped, before modifying that. ‘Not all, but who the culprit might be, I am at a loss to say.’

‘Silverius?’ Flavius asked. ‘He was quick to betray Witigis, perhaps he will be just as swift to do the same to us. I daresay he hoped that with us in possession the Goths would leave Rome be.’

That received a jaundiced look, which obviated the need for Procopius to state the obvious: when it came to wading through ordure the denizens of the Church were worse by a wide margin than their lay brethren. They lied with a facility that flew in the face of their stated occupational godliness. Having seen that look Flavius went to his desk and fetched a scroll, which he handed to his secretary.

‘Read this.’ His secretary complied, not once, but judging by the cant of his head, twice and both times so slowly as to make his employer impatient. ‘Well?’

‘It is damning enough, Magister, but is it true?’

‘You have reason to doubt it?’

‘There’s a certain crudity to the accusation, it seems too explicit, too lacking in uncertainty. Silverius could very well be engaged in treachery but he would not be such a fool as to leave himself so open to discovery, and I cannot be certain, but I would say this draft of a letter is not in his hand.’

‘He will not write his own words any more than I do.’

‘No man in his right mind would dictate a missive in which he openly alludes to secret dealings with Witigis. At the very least he would employ a simple code. Added to that, whoever brought you this claims to have read the final missive. Can that too be accurate?’

‘You know Theodora has demanded I remove him?’

That gave them both pause; one of the matters that had plagued the empire over several decades had been a dispute on dogma between those who adhered to the creed of Monophysitism. This went against the agreed decision reached by the Synod of Bishops at Chalcedon, all based on an interpretation of scripture. Could Jesus be both man and God? Was there a Holy Trinity of equals? Chalcedon decided yes but many refused to accept the agreed conclusion.

Theodora was strong for the Monophysites while Silverius, who occupied the senior office in their shared religion, was openly opposed to that position. She wanted him removed and replaced with a deacon called Vigilius, who was clearly her creature. So far Flavius had not acted upon the demand, his excuse for delay being that his orders came from the Emperor not his consort, however powerful she thought herself to be.

It was a dangerous game and had his wife been present in Rome it would have been doubly so, for she would have acted not only as an advocate for Theodora but as her partisan, even if he fundamentally disagreed, a fact which was wounding in the extreme. Yet even without her presence, prevarication could only last so long; here was an excuse to act that met with his needs as well as those of Theodora.

‘Silverius could be our perpetrator, could he not? Someone – perhaps more than one – gave orders that those gates be kept closed against us and was prepared to see us destroyed. Only Witigis did not finish us off and I still have no idea why, excepting divine intercession.’

‘But you must guard against a repeat for we may not be so lucky in future?’

‘To the point, Procopius, as always. Send a party of my bodyguards to arrest Silverius-’

‘To do with him what?’

‘We’ll send him to Constantinople. Let the man who rules, not I, decide to please or displease his wife.’

‘And Vigilius?’

‘He is here in the city, is he not?’ Procopius nodded. ‘Then he shall become the Bishop of Rome until Justinian says otherwise.’

‘Which leaves the senators, Magister, and Silverius might be innocent.’

‘I doubt he is wholly that, none of them are.’ Flavius paused for some time, to think. ‘The senators are to be expelled from the city. Let them reside in the country where they can plot to their heart’s content, but uselessly.’

At the next meeting of the military council, if that action met with universal approval it was clear that the reputation of the man in command had taken a dent. It was an undercurrent rather than manifest, a feeling not a fact that Flavius’s generals had lost a degree of belief in him, the most obvious evidence being in the more forthright way that his second in command felt he had the right to hold forth and act as if he was equal. Not that he proposed any other course than his superior had intended to put forward himself.

Much as Flavius wanted to check his presumption he let Constantinus have his moment; the last thing needed was an open dispute between the two senior commanders, and if disagreements were allowed to break out into the open between the top men, it would lead to the taking of sides, which would be fatal to the enterprise: a divided army could only hope for complete defeat. So it was with a high degree of diplomacy and a frustrating touch of humility that Flavius gave him full agreement.

‘We cannot sit idle, so we must do as Constantinus suggests and keep up our raiding. To his claim to take the command of such operations I can only say I fully support it and thank him.’

As ever, when the conference broke up Flavius was left with his secretary, who had on his long, thin face one of those enigmatic smiles that left anyone observing it to wonder if they were caused by amusement or mental superiority.

‘Constantinus suggests?’

‘He wants to take responsibility for the tactics we have no choice but to employ.’

‘And if they begin to work, he can claim the credit-’

‘Which,’ Flavius interrupted, ‘he will further use to undermine my authority.’

‘Wise, Magister?’

‘Necessary,’ was the snapped reply.

Being clearly in search of a degree of personal popularity drove Constantinus to seek outright success, but that was not granted to him; if he employed the right commanders and the right troops, some of whom just happened to come from the Belisarian bucellarii, he was successful. When he employed other formations and thus avoided the opprobrium heaped on his commanding general for perceived favouritism, the results were less rewarding and sometimes risked being disastrous.

Flavius allowed him to have his head; let the army find out for themselves that only one man knew the right way to fight. It became clear that such pressure told on his second in command. The day came when Constantinus declined to give the task of mounting a raid to another; he proposed to lead it personally, yet he did so at the head of the only other troops who could be said to be fit for the purpose.

No one admired the Hun way of fighting more than Flavius Belisarius; indeed, when creating his own heavy units under Justinian he had modelled much of their mode of fighting on that race. They were the people who had first evolved a way of making war on horseback as mounted archers, albeit on swift and agile ponies instead of heavy steeds and that had given them a fearsome fighting reputation.

There was thus no ill feeling in the breast of Flavius as he watched them exit the western gates and head for the Plains of Nero. His prayers were for success and if he found the behaviour of Constantinus an irritation it was a minor one: the man was ambitious but so he should be. God aid him if he led inferiors who lacked belief in their own abilities.

The Goths came out from their camp to oppose Constantinus, who immediately deployed his Huns to face them. The chosen battlefield was too far off for the whole action to be in plain view, though the general outlines were visible. At first, matters proceeded as they should, the Huns doing that at which they were superbly proficient, riding forward in fast and loose groupings to engage and thin the enemy ranks with arrows.

It was Photius, with his young eyes, who first spotted that matters might not be panning out as well as they should; the twin forces seemed to be getting closer to each other, a concern quickly laid to rest by his stepfather.

‘Constantinus knows when to break off, Photius. He saw what happened in the recent battle and will not allow the Goths to get too close to his lines.’

‘They are doing that very thing, slowly but successfully.’

‘You’re sure?’

‘I can only relate what my own eyes tell me.’

A cold feeling gripped Flavius then; for all the mixed fortunes of recent forays the balance had been towards success and not failure. When his men had got into difficulties and had been forced to flee it was for gates now under Byzantine control. If they had incurred losses, they had not been serious and as a result the dented morale of his army had begun to repair. Right of this moment the last thing he needed was a major reverse.

The sound of the distant horns did nothing to relieve that feeling, especially as the masses of men began to move and their composition became easier to observe and comprehend. Constantinus had broken off the engagement but it was clear even through the dust that he and his Huns were not headed towards the city gates, while the advancing Goths were hard on their heels, which meant Photius was right.

He looked along the parapet to observe the faces of his other senior commanders and was not reassured; Valentinus was clearly praying, Bessas staring, his expression one of concern, Martinus and Valerian the same. Ennes, now leader of his bodyguard, was looking at him in a way that presaged doom, doubly evidenced by a quick break off from eye contact.

‘I cannot support him,’ Flavius murmured. ‘I dare not.’

Such words were pointless anyway. In order to reinforce Constantinus he would require his own bucellarii to be ready to act at once, they being the only troops he could rely upon to effect a good outcome. Having ceded tactical control to his second in command that was far from the case; neither they nor their horses were armed, saddled and ready.

Photius now reported that Constantinus had swung away to the west and he and his Huns were making for an abandoned suburb, then that they had got in amongst the buildings and he could no longer see them. This being a place Flavius had reconnoitred, he knew to call them buildings was overstating their condition. Like every suburb of Rome outside the walls it had been subjected to Goth savagery. Most of the houses that made up what was a farming community had been torched and in many cases their walls had collapsed in on themselves.

‘That might give us time,’ Flavius cried. ‘Ennes, get our men mounted.’

‘The light, General,’ came the concerned reply. ‘By the time they are ready it will be near to dark.’

Ennes had made a calculation that took into account the time it would take to close with Constantinus and in that he was correct. It would be under moon and starlight by the time Flavius and his bucellarii would be in a position to fight and that was a bad notion. The feeling that he had to do something faded for the very good reason it would only be to show others he was not being passive in the face of the possible massacre of his Hun mercenaries and their general. Ennes got a nod of agreement, which served to rescind the previous instruction.

The light did fade and in the distance there was a mass of torches, with no one having any clear indication of their locality. Were they in that village or without? Finally they faded to leave only the silver light of the moon and stars as well as anxiety, for the lack of those torches could have two meanings and one was total annihilation.

It was near dawn when Constantinus, at the head of his troops, asked to be allowed to re-enter the city. He and his Huns, covered in dust and exhausted, looked a sorry lot in the light of the torches by which they made their way down the roads that led to their encampment. Constantinus did not accompany them; he was required to report to his commander.

‘They crept forward, Flavius Belisarius. It was not an obvious movement, given it was so slow, but by the time we wanted to break off they were too close.’

The temptation to reply ‘You should have seen it, fool’ had to remain unsaid but the spoken reply was hardly less damning. ‘It is a tactic by which we lost in our one major battle. I think we agreed it was one we must guard against in any future engagement.’

‘Which I would have done, but the dust the Huns created obscured my view, making it difficult to see what the Goths were about.’

There was some truth in that: horsemen in constant motion, riding forward to sting and then retire on dry ground would have created a murkiness hard to see through. Yet it was still an excuse and a glance round the faces of the others present told Flavius they took it as such as Constantinus continued.

‘Those abandoned buildings seemed to provide the only chance of safety and once within them I had my men dismount.’

‘Which clearly worked, given the numbers with which you finally returned.’

‘The lanes were narrow and the spaces between strewn with rubble, too dangerous for the Goth to seek to fight in. Whoever led them declined to risk that, though he had his men circling the settlement hoping to force us out with nothing but insults.’

Eventually the Goths had retired and would, no doubt and quite rightly, claim a victory; had they not driven their enemies from the field, a defeat which if it had been low on casualties was demoralising? By his actions, Constantinus had allowed a pendulum swinging towards Byzantium to be sent quite markedly the other way.

‘You did well to survive, Constantinus.’ There was a sting in that remark and the man did not miss it as Flavius added, ‘Now I think you must yearn for the baths and some food.’

What followed was a sharp drop of the head from the handsome but dust-covered patrician, an acknowledgement, albeit a reluctant one, that any dent to the authority of Flavius Belisarius was now repaired. It would be he who would now order future sorties and those he chose to lead his men would have to show more in light of today’s events.

Witigis was forever probing for weakness and knew that which was the most potent was still aiming to starve out Rome, given the city yet had a huge number of souls within its walls. In order to disrupt the supplies coming from Antium through Ostia he built and heavily manned a fort at Portus that dominated the route, effectively cutting the city off from its main source of food.

Soon there were major shortages and that acted on the mood of the citizenry, who, even under less elevated leadership, demanded that he take them out again to fight and defeat the Goths before they expired of hunger, a request brought to Flavius by the present Bishop of Rome.

‘I have been bitten once, Pope Vigilius, I will not be so again. I require you to calm this furore.’

The newly appointed pontiff replied with studied calm. ‘With what, my son?’

‘Tell them there are reinforcements on the way in numbers to drive Witigis from their walls.’

‘I am bound to ask, Flavius Belisarius, if that is wishful thinking or the truth?’

Flavius had to bite his tongue. His own faith was strong but from his earliest years he had observed the kind of men who officiated within the Christian faith and only rarely had he been impressed. The first bishop ever encountered had been a thoroughly evil man, a thief to his flock as well as an aggressive pederast.

If he had since encountered good and honest men they had been rare and not elevated. No one, as far as he could discern, rose high within the ecclesiastical hierarchy without leaving their soul somewhere on the slippery pole by which they had ascended to prominence. He had no reason to think Vigilius any different.

‘You are the Bishop of Rome and they are fearful for their souls. If you say it is so they will believe you and as of this moment that is what is required. I need time to find a way to best the latest moves Witigis has made and get food into the city.’

Flavius was irritated by the amused look on the face of Procopius, who knew only too well what this exchange implied. He too had a low opinion of churchmen and the notion that the one before him was seeking to avoid, not so much a lie as a touch of exaggeration, clearly tickled him.

‘You wish me to use my authority to calm the fears of my flock even if I cannot be sure that what I say to them will come to pass? Would that not imperil my soul?’

Such a bald statement rendered Flavius uncomfortable; Vigilius was driving home that if he complied it would be done as a favour. Thankfully, before he was obliged to respond in a positive manner the cleric turned to another subject entirely.

‘By the by, the last convoy of supplies brought a message from Constantinople.’

‘It brought several.’

‘The one to myself and the church was to inform us that Silverius is to be returned to Rome. Justinian wishes that the claims made against him be investigated, which can only mean he is unsure of their veracity.’

Slightly stunned by that news, Flavius could imagine the hoops Justinian must have been obliged to jump through with his wife, who was not one to be easily swayed from any course she had decided to adopt, which probably explained why Vigilius knew of the return before he had been informed. The man before him was her appointee and that position would obviously be under some threat; if Silverius was found to be free of guilt he had the right to reassume his papal office.

The disenfranchisement of Silverius must have caused uproar in Constantinople, a deeply religious city in which imperial interference in church matters was always risky, putting Justinian under so much pressure he felt he had to defy Theodora. The amount of venomous abuse that had exposed him to could only be guessed at. If the thought had its amusing side it also presented to Flavius a difficulty; his emperor was landing the problem right back in his lap and he did not want it.

‘That being the case, Magister,’ Vigilius added, in a silky tone, ‘I ask that Silverius be judged for any perceived crimes by those that are qualified to do so. He is a priest and should be examined by the bishops of the Roman Diocese.’

‘You feel that will serve?’

‘It is not fitting that a lay person should question one who so recently held my office.’

It was a grateful Flavius Belisarius who agreed to that, it being, he felt and for numerous reasons, too hot a stone for him to handle. He only realised that he had done the required favour when Vigilius was quick to hand him his reward, an assurance that he would do his best to calm the passions of the citizens who looked to him for guidance.

‘What are you grinning at?’ Flavius barked, at a still smiling Procopius, once Vigilius had departed.

‘He’s a wily bird, General, he must be to have impressed the Empress.’

‘So?’

‘Beware of what games he might play.’

‘That is of little account,’ came the snapped reply. ‘I must get as many troops from the southern provinces as can be released and you are the only person I can spare to undertake such a task. We need to strip the garrisons and get them where they will be of use. And while you are in the south find out, for the sake of the Lord, if Justinian has sent me any more soldiers, or am I to beat Witigis with defrocked popes!’