Masters of Rome

CHAPTER IIII

Vespasian brought his mount to a violent halt next to Cogidubnus, who was waiting with the young tribunes, Marcius and Vibius; behind them stood the Britannic auxiliaries with the Gallic cavalry and the now rallied remnants of the legionary cavalry, fewer than eighty troopers in total. Blassius arrived moments later.

‘I left the other Gallic auxiliaries with Valens and the second cohort as you ordered, sir,’ the tribune reported, shouting against the din of combat along the third of a mile front. ‘The Batavians were just arriving with him as I left. He said that there was no one in the fort.’

‘I know there was no one in the fort,’ Vespasian replied, trying to keep his voice level but failing. ‘What about a flank attack? Were the Britons trying to force a way around behind the fort?’

‘No, sir, not by the time I left. Valens had begun to move around the hill; he reckoned that, provided he doesn’t encounter opposition, it would take a quarter of an hour before he would be in position for a flank attack.’

Vespasian ran a hand through his hair, his face taut. ‘Yes, that’s what I thought.’ He glanced up the Roman line; the reinforced centre had pushed back but the Britons’ assault showed no signs of abating. ‘We need to break them before they wear us down. Are your men ready to be blooded, Cogidubnus?’

The King held his look. ‘They will prove their loyalty to Rome and reap their revenge on Caratacus for his years of subjugation of the Atrebates and the Regni.’

‘I’m sure they will. Have some men collect the ladders left up by the gate and then take your lads down into the outermost ditch. I’ll meet you there; we can use it to work our way behind the Britons’ line.’

‘The rebel tribes’ line,’ Cogidubnus corrected.

‘Indeed, the rebels’ line.’ Vespasian turned back to Blassius. ‘Go up to the Hamians …’ Vespasian faltered, looking over the tribune’s shoulder; there were no archers lining the fort’s palisade silhouetted by the fires within. ‘The Hamians! Where in Hades are they?’

Cogidubnus pointed south; the rear of the eastern archers’ column could just be seen, a few hundred paces away, disappearing into the night. ‘They turned around and marched off south soon after you left.’

‘I gave no such order.’

‘I saw a legionary cavalry messenger ride up to them and then they turned and left. I assumed that he must have come from you.’

‘That’s the second false message.’ He paused, suddenly realising what was happening. ‘Alienus! It must be him. Which way did he go?’

‘I didn’t notice.’

Blassius frowned with recollection. ‘One passed me just now heading around the fort towards Valens’ position.’

‘Gods below! Blassius, take a half turma of the Gauls and get after him; capture him before he stops Valens with another false message. I want him alive.’

Blassius saluted and hurried off, and Vespasian turned his attention to Marcius and Vibius. ‘Marcius, take another half turma of the Gauls and get those Hamians back to the fort as fast as they can run; and I mean run. I want them on the palisade shooting down into the flank of that hairy horde now! Vibius, we’re going to force a gap between the ditch and the left flank of the line; when we do, take the rest of the cavalry through and take the long-hairs in the rear.’

The young man saluted, determination written on his face but with anxiety in his eyes. Vespasian prayed that the former would overcome the latter as he turned back to Cogidubnus. ‘Let’s get this done; we don’t have much time.’

‘It looks like we’ll have to get out of that ditch without archer support,’ Cogidubnus observed.

‘I’m afraid so, my friend.’

‘Then it’s just as well that a quarter of my lads have slings.’

‘What are you doing here?’ Vespasian asked, seeing Magnus walking down from the fort’s gates; behind him a party of Britannic auxiliaries collected up the discarded ladders used in the abortive assault while the rest of the cohort clambered down into the outermost defensive ditch just behind the first cohort’s line.

‘Ah! Watching the shambles I think is the nicest way I can put it. What the fuck’s going on?’

‘Alienus has been riding around the field posing as my messenger, giving false orders; but despite that, we’ve just managed to hold off a surprise night attack for the last quarter of an hour in what I would describe as a desperate scramble to stay alive, not a shambles. Now if you’ve got nothing better to do than criticise then I would suggest that you piss off back to bed and wait to see whether you wake up in the morning with a Briton’s spear up your arse or not.’

Magnus looked out over the battle raging below. ‘No, I’ll stay. What made you guess they were coming?’

Vespasian turned towards the ditch. ‘There’s no time for that now.’

‘Where’re you going?’

‘Down into that ditch with a whole load of Britons who promise me that they would rather kill other Britons than Romans.’

‘Then I’d better come along and make sure that they keep that promise.’

The cacophony of ringing metallic clashes and human cries of pain, encouragement, fear and despair grew deafening as Vespasian weaved his way through the sharpened stakes embedded in the bottom of the ditch; the Britannic auxiliaries followed behind. They were level with the line of combat but the rampart on the front lip of the ditch hid them from the combatants’ sight.

Vespasian raised an arm, halting the auxiliaries. He looked up to his left; the silhouetted palisade was still devoid of archers. ‘Shit!’ he hissed under his breath, turning to Cogidubnus next to him. ‘We can’t afford to wait. We’ll have to do this with your slingers; how many have you got?’

‘The front rank of each century, so two hundred.’

‘They’ll be spread out along the column; how do we sort them out to send them forward first?’

‘I’ve already done it; they’re all at the front. I’ll take them forward with five of the ladders to about fifty paces behind the rebels’ line and get them into position. As soon as we’re there I’ll give a signal of a repeated short note on the cornu and we’ll start shooting into their rear.’

Vespasian waited until the slingers were clear before ordering the cohort’s primus pilus to lean the remaining ten ladders at intervals along the side of the ditch with the remains of the centuries, each headed by its centurion, waiting in readiness at the bottom. He took his place at the foot of the first.

As he watched the cohort get into position in the gloom of the ditch, Vespasian caught his breath and tried to steady himself after the frenetic race to save the legion. It had been less than half an hour since he had stepped out of the first cohort’s formation realising that there was an unseen danger approaching from the north; his pulse quickened again as he contemplated what would have happened had he not made the connection in time. He looked at Magnus next to him. ‘If it hadn’t been for Hormus we could well be dead by now.’

‘So even the humblest of slaves can save a legion.’

‘Indirectly, yes. I realised what I had overlooked: the significance of Cogidubnus’ scouts in the north not sending any message: they were all dead. Then I put together two things that we’d talked about the other night and realised that we had been drawn into a trap. Caratacus put himself up as bait and sacrificed those people in the last hill-fort to draw me here; he’d arranged to meet up with all those horsemen after he’d escaped to make his tracks obvious. He wanted me to know where he was going. But to make absolutely sure I followed, Alienus gave his name to the auxiliary prefect knowing that I would have found out by now that it was he who had betrayed Sabinus — and to find Sabinus I need Alienus; so I had to come.’

‘I suppose when you look at it that way it was all too neat.’

‘Exactly; and then when there was no alarm raised in the fort and I remembered those condemned men shouting so urgently I knew that there was no one in there; it was a trap and we’d been goaded into a night attack.’

‘And the savages were just waiting out there to the north and they very nearly got us.’

‘They still might.’

Magnus felt the weight of his gladius, contemplating the honed blade. ‘Not if I have any say in the matter.’

Vespasian looked along the ditch; the centuries were in position. ‘Come on, Cogidubnus, what’s keeping you?’

After a few more thumped heartbeats that added to the tension racking his body, Vespasian heard the low call of a cornu from behind the Britons’ line. With a nod to the primus pilus he pushed the ladder upright so that its head appeared over the top of the rampart and scaled its twenty-foot height with a speed that reflected the desperation of the situation. Propelling himself onto the top of the rampart he found himself level with the third rank of the Roman defence, who were struggling to keep their footing on the steep slope, hunched down behind their shields as they pushed them into the backs of the men in front in a desperate attempt to hold back the horde that had pressed them for so long. Unlike the Romans, the Britons were not tightly packed but rather in loose formation to best utilise their long slashing-swords; they flowed back and forth hacking and cutting at the rectangular semi-cylindrical shields and iron helmets of the rigid front rank of the II Augusta’s élite cohort, braving the blood-dripping blades that punched out from between the gaps in the shields.

With a quick glance to his right to assure himself that Vibius had brought the cavalry into position, Vespasian swept his sword from its scabbard and pelted along the crown of the earthwork, Magnus and the primus pilus following, as slingshots cannoned into the exposed backs of the rearmost Britannic warriors, felling many and causing consternation to spread through their haphazard, loose ranks. Taken by surprise, the Britons looked up to see Roman soldiers, with long hair flowing from beneath their helms and drooping moustaches framing their bellowing mouths, appearing above them; for many the lapse in concentration meant that it was the last thing they saw.

‘Second Augusta! Second Augusta!’ Vespasian roared in warning to the legionaries below, hurling himself into the midst of their foes, punching his shield boss into the upturned face of a startled warrior and taking him crashing to the ground underneath him as all around the unblooded auxiliaries of Cogidubnus’ cohort leapt down onto their fellow countrymen in the name of Rome.

Raising himself to his knees, Vespasian jabbed his sword tip under the ribs of the concussed man beneath him whilst raising his shield over his head, deflecting a downward cut from his left. Bellowing obscenities, Magnus barrelled past, body-checking the perpetrator as behind them more and more auxiliaries piled down from the earthworks, crashing into the Britons’ flank, using their downhill momentum to great advantage. Without order in their attack they had no formation but careered on regardless of lack of support to either side, creating a melee of individual combats as they inveigled their way deep into the Britons’ fracturing flank. The aim of the slingers adjusted with the auxiliaries’ progress, thinning out the rearmost warriors so that the push through them was becoming oblique. But then came the sound that Vespasian had been hoping for: the wet hollow thuds of arrows thumping into chests close by.

Punching his sword into the temple of a kneeling wounded warrior, Vespasian pulled back from the front rank of the advance and shouted at the auxiliary primus pilus, ‘Get some order into your lads, close them up!’ The officer acknowledged and drove forward roaring at his men to form up on him. Vespasian stood, breathing deeply, allowing the rest of the cohort to stream past, their rate of progress gradually increasing in line with the panic spreading along the Britons’ line.

But Vespasian knew that it was far from over. Looking behind him he saw that they had cleared about twenty paces of the first cohorts’ frontage; it was enough. ‘Pull your men back from the rampart, Livianus!’ he ordered, picking out the centurion from amongst the bloodied, exhausted front-rank legionaries by the transverse horsehair plume on his helmet. ‘Make a gap for the cavalry.’

Livianus nodded his understanding and immediately began shouting at his battle-weary men as Vespasian ran back to the rampart and scrambled up it. Looking down along the battle’s front from his high position on the hill his heart faltered: it was concave and the two cohorts that he had left in reserve with Maximus had been deployed; there were no reinforcements left. But worse still: there was now fire in the II Augusta’s camp; he could do nothing but pray that Caepio, with the last two Gallic cohorts, could deal with the incursion. ‘Valens, where are you?’ he muttered to himself as the gap between the first cohort and the ramparts finally opened. Vibius’ arrival at the head of the cavalry was as prompt as Vespasian could have wished for. The young tribune stopped by Vespasian to return his horse; Vespasian mounted and spoke to Vibius privately. ‘Our centre could break very soon if it’s not supported. Cause as much carnage to them there as you can, buy us time with your lives or we’re all dead; understand?’

Vibius swallowed hard and sucked in a lungful of air through his nose as he realised what was being asked of him and his men. ‘Yes, legate, I understand; trust me to do my duty.’

Vespasian reached over and grasped the young man’s shoulder. ‘Thank you. Now go.’

Vibius kicked his mount forward, looking dead ahead with blank eyes; the Gallic and legionary cavalry streamed through the gap behind him unaware of what their legate was expecting of them.

‘You look like you’ve just been told of a death in the family,’ Magnus said, walking over to Vespasian as the last of the cavalry sped out into the open; his forearms, chest and face were smeared with blood.

‘Not me,’ Vespasian replied, his face grim as he watched the troopers ride down the hill into the distance. ‘But I’ve just demanded that perhaps five hundred other families will get that news.’

‘Well, sir, it’s a lot better than eight thousand families.’

‘I know that, so I had no choice.’ Vespasian shook himself. He felt sick to his very core but he knew that there had been no alternative if he was to preserve the main body of his command, and also his career, intact. He forced himself to watch as Vibius and his cavalry thundered into the Britons’ centre, just grey silhouettes at that distance but each silhouette was a man whom, in all likelihood, he had sent to die.

Where was Valens?

Cogidubnus’ auxiliaries had cleared the Britons from the hill; the first cohort was now unopposed and the Hamians up on the palisade were too distant to be able to shoot with any effectiveness into the enemy. Still with no sign of Valens’ flanking move, Aulus Plautius’ advice came to Vespasian’s mind: In war you should never wish for what you don’t have, it takes your mind from using what you do have to its best effect. ‘Magnus, run up to the fort and tell Marcius to bring the Hamians down here. I want them to follow up the advance, just behind Cogidubnus’ left flank to ensure that none of the hairy bastards slip round.’

‘Oh, so I’m a messenger-boy still, am I?’

Vespasian looked over his shoulder as he urged his horse away down the slope. ‘Just do it!’ Galloping along the body-strewn frontage of the first cohort he came to Tatius’ position on its extreme right abutting the Gallic auxiliaries whose timely charge had plugged the gap in the Roman line, less than half an hour before. ‘I’m glad to see you still with us, primus pilus.’

‘A good few of my lads aren’t.’ Tatius looked down at the tangled corpses, both Briton and Roman, and spat a blood-tinged gobbet of saliva into the face of a gutted warrior at his feet; a slight twitch indicated that there was still life within. ‘They were fucking relentless; we only managed to rotate the ranks once.’ Tatius slammed his foot onto the man’s throat, crushing his windpipe.

‘Take your cohort and double round to the centre. Maximus is in command there and he needs help.’

Despite his exhaustion, Tatius gave a sharp, veteran’s salute. ‘We’ll be there.’

Fighting off the fatigue he shared with Tatius, Vespasian moved on to find the prefect of the Gallic cohort, now half clear of the fighting as Cogidubnus’ auxiliaries, finally in proper military formation, shoulder to shoulder, swept their countrymen before them; on their flank the slingers maintained a continuous barrage to ease their path through the dead.

Although the screams of battle rose up to the heavens in a multi-octave dissonance and the pounding of metal and leather-clad wood pulsated in manic accompaniment, Vespasian was now inured to all sound; all except one: the sound that he had prayed for. It came from over his left shoulder, faint but to Vespasian plainly audible: the shrill blare of a lituus. He turned in his saddle; the Batavians appeared from behind the hill, flecked with firelight from the inferno above them. Behind them doubled two cohorts, one legionary and one auxiliary; Valens had arrived. Now was the time to take the initiative.

‘Prefect!’ Vespasian called, finally spotting the Gallic cohort’s commander. ‘Pull your men in behind Cogidubnus’ lads; I’ll order him to move aside so that you can take his place and create a broader front. One more effort from you and we’ll be safe.’

The prefect nodded grimly and turned to his primus pilus to sort out the details of the manoeuvre as Vespasian kicked on towards Cogidubnus, his heart feeling lighter than at any time since he had woken to find his lamp mysteriously burning, two nights ago. With the first cohort to reinforce it, the centre could withstand for a while yet and now that Valens had arrived he could take the fight to the Britons rather than just scrambling a defence. They would win through.

As his horse pounded past manoeuvring auxiliaries, Vespasian felt, for the first time in his life, a real closeness to his guardian god, Mars, who had warned him of his oversight. Mars, the god to whom his father had dedicated him at his naming ceremony, nine days after his birth, at which the portents, Vespasian knew from an overheard conversation of his parents, had predicted a destiny, preordained. Yet what that destiny was, he did not know; his mother had sworn all those present to secrecy and no one had ever spoken of it to him. However, now he had witnessed the power of the god, he could believe that, whatever his destiny, Mars truly held his hands over him and would guide him to it.

The lituus blared again as Vespasian drew up next to Cogidubnus and quickly gave him his orders. He looked up; the Batavians had galloped ahead of Valens’ main force; now, perhaps, he could relieve Vibius — if the young lad still lived. With a nod to Cogidubnus, he set out to intercept the Batavians, just two hundred paces away; Ansigar rode at their head with Blassius next to him. Vespasian cursed under his breath: Alienus must have avoided capture.

The gap quickly closed between Vespasian and the oncoming cavalry; to his left the Hamians could be seen jogging down the hill. He swerved his mount around and joined the head of the column next to Blassius. ‘Alienus?’

Blassius shook his head. ‘He just disappeared; we caught sight of him as we went around the hill but he saw us. When we reached Valens there was no sign of him and no one could remember seeing him.’

‘Shit! Well, I’ll worry about him later; get back to Valens and tell him that as soon as he is level with Cogidubnus they’re to swing round and crush the Britons against the legion; Cogidubnus is ready for it but Valens must hurry before the Britons see the trap coming.’

Blassius pulled his horse away and galloped back to the oncoming infantry. Vespasian felt his heart quicken but this time it was not with fear or anxiety, but the scent of victory: victory that just under an hour ago had seemed an impossibility in the face of the horror that had sprung out of the night. Smiling to himself, thinking of how Magnus would have spat and held his thumb to avert the evil-eye if he had shared such premature thoughts with him, he turned to Ansigar, the bearded, senior decurion of the Germanic Batavian cavalry. ‘We head over there.’ He pointed to where Vibius’ depleted command could be seen rallying, making ready for another charge at the deeply packed Britannic centre that had now been forced to fight both to the front and rear.

‘And after they break?’

‘Ride down as many as you can; I want them to remember the Second Augusta.’

‘What about her Batavian auxiliaries?’

‘I want the Britons who come into contact with you to remember nothing — ever again.’

Ansigar grinned beneath his full, blond beard. ‘I pray that your wish will be granted.’ He shouted in his guttural language to the liticen behind him as he swung to the right aiming for the centre of the battle. With a blare of the instrument, his finely trained troopers started to fan out and without losing pace the column began to manoeuvre into a line, four deep.

But then shouts from within the ala disrupted the move. Vespasian turned to his left to see a lone trooper veering away to the north; in the dim light he could see that he was not wearing trousers like the rest of the Batavians, but was dressed in the uniform of the legionary cavalry. ‘Alienus!’ Vespasian pulled his horse left, pointing at a couple of troopers in the front rank. ‘You two with me! Ansigar, you ride on.’ He sped after the fleeing spy, the two Batavians following him, out into the darkness beyond the reach of the twin fires now blazing on the hill and in the camp. He trusted the animal sense of his horse not to stumble but kept as close to Alienus’ track as possible; he would be able to risk more speed than Alienus who would be riding blind. He could just see him and judged that he was about fifty paces ahead. Glancing at his two companions, he counted at least half a dozen javelins in their holsters. ‘We’ve got to bring him down, understand?’

The Batavians growled their affirmation, reaching back for a javelin each whilst controlling the mounts with prodigious skill as they thundered over the ever-darkening ground.

‘Pass me one,’ Vespasian shouted, stretching out his hand whilst keeping his eyes fixed upon his quarry; he sensed that they were gaining. He felt a javelin pressed into his palm; he fiddled with it, getting his forefinger through the looped thong midway down its shaft. They rode on, the barrel chests of their mounts heaving. Despite the darkness, Alienus was becoming clearer; they were gaining.

‘We’ll try a shot!’ Vespasian called, clenching his calves tight around his horse’s sweating flanks to gain purchase. The Batavians did the same, throwing back their right arms. With colossal effort all three raised themselves from their saddles as they thrust their arms forward, hurling the missiles away into the darkness. Alienus remained mounted but suddenly skewed to the left and then just as quickly veered back again to the right.

Vespasian thrust out his hand again. ‘Another!’ A javelin was quickly passed over as Alienus continued to swerve, shortening the distance between them. Again Vespasian braced himself against his mount, judging the diminished distance and the rate of Alienus’ deviations. With another huge effort he and his companions hurled their sleek weapons, but this time at a lower trajectory. Alienus’ mount again changed direction abruptly and then veered back with equal force but not smoothly; it let out a shrill neigh that rose in pitch, bucking to try and remove the javelin embedded deep in its rump. Vespasian slowed his horse as the stricken animal kicked out again with its back legs, this time with such violence that it dislodged its rider. Jumping from his saddle, Vespasian sprinted forward, whipping his sword from its scabbard as the unhorsed man crunched down onto his back. He rolled over and got to his knees as Vespasian brought the flat of his sword slamming round onto the side of his head, sending him rolling to the ground, unconscious. Vespasian kicked the body over and looked down at the man who had betrayed Sabinus, his brother.