Enemy of Rome

XVI

It was a horse race and in its initial stages it seemed there could only be one winner. The Thracian mounts had been ridden twelve miles, taken part in a full cavalry charge and found themselves at the centre of an intense, fear-crazed, blood-scented battle. Serpentius looked back over his shoulder as they galloped over the open fields, leaping the occasional ditch, the causeway to their left. ‘They’re gaining,’ he grunted breathlessly. ‘But not as much as I thought. Maybe they’re scared of us.’

Valerius shook his head. ‘Their horses are almost as blown as ours.’ He saw the puzzlement in the Spaniard’s eyes. ‘The two cohorts Varus attacked would have been attached to the garrison at Cremona. The cavalry who are chasing us now must have come from their main force at Hostilia.’

‘That means the legions won’t be far behind them.’

‘I don’t think we need worry about that for the moment.’ Valerius glanced back. ‘Because they may not be gaining fast, but they are gaining.’

They concentrated on getting the most from their mounts, the grass flashing beneath the flying hooves. By now, the retreating squadrons of Varus’s Second Thracum Augusta were spread out over the length and breadth of two cavalry parade grounds. Small pockets of riders formed round the wounded who reeled in the saddle leaking blood, but as their pursuers closed the maimed were reluctantly abandoned to fend for themselves. Survival was all that mattered.

In the centre of the retreating Thracians, Valerius saw Varus away to their right. Beside him rode his standard-bearer and Felicio, whom the cavalry commander had demanded as a replacement for his dead signaller. At first it seemed all was well. Men grinned at each other, congratulating themselves on their escape or their prowess. Yet the thunder of hooves from the rear increased with every length and in a heartbeat the euphoria of survival turned to panic. Suddenly men who had been encouraging each other to safety cursed and fought for the swiftest course. Comrades competed for gaps in the field boundaries and priority at the easiest crossing points of streams and ditches. Their hard-ridden mounts sensed the fear of their riders and snapped at their neighbours, breath snorting from their nostrils and the foam thick on their flanks. Soon the first screams announced the moment the weakest became prey for their pursuers’ spears.

Valerius looked up to see a shadow across the fields and the causeway. A surge of relief washed through him. Primus had withdrawn to the legions, but he’d left his cavalry to act as rearguard. Ahead waited three thousand hardened fighters, more than enough to give the enemy pause and save the bulk of Varus’s fleeing men. Whoever commanded them had disposed his troops to create a gap fifty paces wide in the centre. It was a risky formation for the defenders, but one that made sense with hundreds of cavalrymen galloping to seek refuge in their midst. Better to leave a gap in the line that would allow a route to safety and could be closed at need, than hundreds of men and horses trying to claw their way through the tight-packed formations.

Valerius risked another glance towards Varus’s banner and was puzzled to see the cavalry commander without his trumpeter. He searched for Felicio in the group around the prefect and began to edge in their direction. A surge of panicked men blocked his progress, but a sharp cry alerted him and he groaned as he realized what had happened. The young signaller’s horse had snapped a foreleg and now it was limping along as the rearguard of the Second Thracum thundered past. Felicio looked round in despair towards the massed ranks bearing down on him.

‘We can’t …’ Serpentius began. But Valerius had already turned his mount and the Spaniard followed with a curse and a prayer. They swerved their way through troopers blinded by fear and past riderless horses wide-eyed with terror, trailing flecks of foam from their sweat-slick sides. Felicio was still three hundred paces away, diagonally across the enemy’s front. Valerius dug his heels into his horse’s ribs, desperately trying to ignore the fast-approaching wall of steel-tipped death. The young signaller raised his head and Valerius saw hope flare briefly in his eyes before the crippled horse collapsed, pitching him from the saddle.

‘Run,’ Valerius screamed. ‘Run.’

They were so close now that Felicio heard the cry and looked up. He hauled himself to his feet and began to fly across the rough ground to meet his rescuers. With less than fifty paces separating them the Roman saw the boy’s face relax as he raised his hands ready to be plucked to safety. In the same instant a dark shadow appeared at the edge of Valerius’s vision and with almost supernatural swiftness the trumpeter was gone, swept away in a welter of shattered bone and exposed viscera by the sword of a Vitellian cavalrymen.

With a cry of despair Valerius turned to follow the killer, but Serpentius drove his horse across his friend’s path. ‘That won’t help,’ the Spaniard snarled. ‘If you want to avenge him, do it without getting yourself butchered.’

With a last glance at the remains of the young signaller, Valerius reluctantly followed Serpentius through the chaos of retreating men. The vanguard of the Vitellian auxiliaries tore at the fleeing Thracians like wolves in a sheep pen, whooping their war cries with every kill. Valerius and Serpentius found shelter with a more or less organized group and Valerius found himself riding at the shoulder of Tiberius Simplex. The decurion’s face was a mask of defeat, but he acknowledged their arrival with a weary salute. Valerius pointed ahead. ‘Gather what men you can, form column and ride for the gap.’ Simplex looked up and his eyes came alive as he saw the breach in the cavalry line and the possibility of survival. His jaw hardened and he galloped ahead shouting instructions to his men.

Barely two hundred paces to Valerius’s right, Varus rode in a fog of confusion. He could see his standard-bearer’s mouth opening and closing, but the words made no sense. Orders? How could he give orders when his signaller had abandoned him? This was no fault of his. He was certain he had done everything he could. Now it was up to every man to save himself. The trooper was screaming something about a gap, but Arrius Varus’s whirlpool of a mind recognized no gap. All he could see was a long line of cavalry squadrons waiting to provide sanctuary. Narrow avenues showed between the individual units that might give access to two or three riders. He shut out the terrible sounds around him and set his mount for the closest break in the line.

A galloping horse will take less than a minute to cover half a mile. Already the bulk of Varus’s men were bearing down on the sanctuary of the Flavian cavalry line. Most had maintained their discipline; a few, like their commander, were consumed by panic. The one thing they had in common was a determination to survive. Behind and among them rode the great mass of enemy cavalry who had chased them from the field. Savage thrusts of their spear points pierced chain armour, rib and spine to the accompaniment of the shrill death cries of their victims. Their blood was up and they barely noticed the static line of mounted men ahead.

Valerius had seen it before. Panic is like the disease that spreads through a camp on swampy airs, carrying rashes and lung rot and showing no mercy or discrimination for rank or quality. A wave breaking on a beach inundating every shell and grain of sand until its energy is spent. Now it leapt from the Thracian riders to those they had elected their saviours.

‘Stay together!’ Valerius roared the order at Simplex. ‘Whatever happens aim for the gap and stay together.’

Three hundred paces. Ahead, the long line of cavalry seemed to ripple as they realized what was approaching. They could see the enemy’s standards mixed with their own in the confused mass rushing towards them, and beyond, the solid formations of the trailing Vitellian cohorts. They’d been told to expect an orderly retreat and disciplined columns who would take advantage of the gap in their centre. Instead, they faced a tidal wave of terrified men and horses that would break their carefully prepared defence lines and wreak havoc with sword and spear. When the first man turned his horse his decurion tried to push him back into line. By then it was too late. He was followed by first one then another of his comrades, and within a dozen heartbeats the whole line began to disintegrate.

Valerius watched it happen with a sinking heart, but his course never deviated from the gap in the line where the officers still exerted some semblance of discipline. Stern, determined faces flashed past to right and left and he was through and safe. The men Tiberius Simplex had gathered remained with him and he knew their first instinct would be to lower their guard, but he couldn’t allow that to happen. He roared above the thunder of hooves, ‘Stay together. Stay in formation.’

Serpentius had never left his side and he heard the Spaniard curse. ‘Mars’ sacred arse, what a fucking shambles.’

Valerius looked about him and was reminded of the mountain avalanche that had almost killed him the previous year. It had roared down the slope absorbing everything in its path, be it rock or snow, or tree — or man. The Flavian defensive line had absorbed the fleeing cavalry and taken on its momentum, careering blindly back towards Bedriacum. Thousands of men and horses thundering east in a confused rabble without form or discipline: a commander’s worst nightmare.

Marcus Antonius Primus had overseen the formation of his legions and was returning to join his cavalry when he saw the disorganized horde sweeping down the Via Postumia. For an instant the same panic that drove them threatened to overwhelm him. Yet the fear he felt was nothing to the realization of the humiliation he would suffer if he was defeated. Better to die on this field than see his name a laughing stock.

Twenty paces ahead a narrow stream with steep banks cut across the line of the road, spanned by a wooden bridge. He turned to the prefect in charge of his personal guard. ‘Tear it down and form a line on this side of the stream. This is where we make our stand. Not one step backwards.’

The men set to work and as more officers arrived from Bedriacum he ordered them to extend the holding line along the eastern bank of the stream. ‘Kill the leaders if you must,’ he instructed, ‘but stop the rout at all costs. They will be slowed by the gully. Stop them and turn them round to face the enemy.’

Then he waited.

The first fugitives were those who had fled fastest, their horses foaming and close to spent, but they ignored their general’s entreaties to stop and fight and galloped on. In desperation, Primus seized a spear from the closest of his escorts. The next man to cross the stream and top the bank was a standard-bearer, still clutching the red banner with his unit’s symbol of a rearing horse. His eyes were glazed with fear and he didn’t even hear his commander’s order to halt. Primus thrust forward and the impact almost broke his wrists as the spear took the man square in the breast and pitched him out of the saddle. An aide swiftly stepped forward to pick up the banner and set it on the bank of the stream.

Primus dismounted to heave the spear free from the dead man’s still twitching flesh. A shadow loomed threateningly over him, a tall, mounted figure silhouetted against the sun, and he turned with the point ready.

‘Well,’ he said savagely. ‘Will you fight or do I have to kill you too?’

Gaius Valerius Verrens rapped his wooden fist against his chest in salute. ‘One tribune and a hundred and fifty men at your service and ready to fight, general.’

‘This is not a defeat.’ Marcus Antonius Primus spat the word as if it was poison on his tongue. ‘It is a setback, and a setback that we will turn into a victory. Do you understand? There will be no turning back. We will fight here and we will die here, if necessary.’

‘Your orders?’ Valerius asked.

For a moment Primus looked slightly bemused, as if, despite his fiery words, he hadn’t expected to be able to do anything tangible to stem the tide. He shook his head to clear it and the orders flowed as a plan took shape. ‘Form your men into five squadrons and place them to the south of the road about a hundred paces out. That will be the centre of our line and this stream and the men behind it will be our only defence. Spread your junior officers on either flank to help gather everyone who can fight and order them to kill anyone who refuses. They will collect them into squadrons and add them to the line.’

‘And the road?’

‘I will hold the road. You must hold the rest.’

It felt like the end of something, but it was only the beginning.

The makeshift line of cavalry behind the gully firmed up thanks to Valerius’s decurions and optiones and their willingness to use a blade when required. Their efforts slowed the flow of fleeing men and created a dam of Thracians on the far bank of the stream. Those on the fringes of the cowering mob suffered terribly from the swords and spears of the pursuing Vitellians, but as Primus said: ‘If they hadn’t run they wouldn’t be dying now.’

Eventually, the flow of friendly troops slowed to a trickle of wounded and shocked survivors and the leading enemy formations became visible, strong and unbloodied. If they’d followed up their advantage they might have broken through, but their horses were winded and the men felt they’d already won a victory. That was enough for now. Besides, in the far distance towards Bedriacum, they could see the banners of Primus’s legions marching to reinforce the battered and demoralized cavalry units. The sound of trumpets echoed across the flat, churned-up fields and Valerius watched as they wheeled about and trotted unhurriedly back to Cremona.

When the Vitellian units had vanished into the distant haze, Primus rode along the line of the stream calling encouragement and taking stock of his exhausted cavalry. They were still nervous, but the fact that they had fought off the Vitellians, however belatedly, had raised their spirits. Valerius was glad their commander showed enough wisdom not to reverse that situation.

‘We will have words about this,’ Primus promised his officers. ‘But at the right time. When the legions come up we will camp on this side of the stream and maintain strict vigilance until morning. For now, we will rest.’

But there was to be no rest.