Sword of Rome

XIV

Rhenus Frontier, November, AD 68

The wine tasted sweet on his lips, but there was a hint of fruit, too. A Nomentan, he guessed, but how could one be sure? Still, much better than the tanner’s piss they had served on the galley that brought him down the Rhenus. The journey from Italia had been pleasant enough, though long. He had found the air of the high Alpine passes oddly invigorating, but the food of the locals execrable. Who could live on cheese, no matter how many hundred ways it was presented? Things improved markedly when he joined the Classis Germanica ship at Basilia, where the Rhenus wound its way from the Alps into Germania Superior, and the rising waters had carried him swiftly and in no little comfort. The week-long delay at Moguntiacum, a hundred miles upstream from the palace at Colonia Agrippinensis, had been inevitable but worthwhile. Hordeoinius Flaccus, the legate who had just taken over from Verginius as governor of Germania Superior, had been keen to show off his troops and keener still to hear the latest news from Rome.

Aulus Vitellius selected another roast duck — his third — ripped off a leg and sighed with pleasure as he bit into the firm meat. And now he was here at last, with the tiresome ceremonies confirming his appointment behind him. When he had picked the bird clean a slave appeared with a bowl and he washed his grease-slick fingers before drying them on a fresh cloth. ‘Now remind me of our dispositions,’ he said to the man in the place of honour on the couch to his right.

Gaius Fabius Valens had barely touched the food, content to watch the unequal epicurean battle unfold as the new governor of Germania Inferior ate his way through enough rations for three or four men. Dark and intense, Valens was as thin as his host was fat, with an air of suppressed anger that made other men wary. It was said that he had personally removed the head of Vitellius’s predecessor, and, if he was being honest, the new governor admitted he found Valens a little frightening. When the general spoke, it was sparingly and through clenched teeth, as if he were unwilling to part with the words.

‘My own legion, First Germanica, is stationed at Castra Bonnensis, which you passed on the left bank of the river.’ Vitellius nodded. He remembered the large fort dominating the river bend five miles upstream. ‘Numisius Rufus commands Fourteenth Gallica at Castra Novaesium, the same distance to the south, and Fifteenth Primigenia and Fifth Alaudae, legates Lupercus and Fabullus, hold the swamp country further downstream at Vetera opposite the Frisii, who like our old foes the Chatii and the Cherusci have been suspiciously quiet this year.’

Vitellius called for more wine, using the delay to run the names and positions of his legions and the Germanic tribes they kept honest through his mind. ‘You believe I should be concerned?’

Valens shook his head. ‘The campaigning season is past and the tribes have withdrawn to their winter encampments. Our only concern would be if the river ice reaches a thickness that would allow them to cross, but it is more than twenty years since it last froze over completely.’

The governor shivered, not with fear, but at the thought of its becoming any colder than it already was. Colonia Agrippinensis was a surprisingly civilized place and not at all what he had expected. Most Roman settlements on the Rhenus frontier were like Castra Bonnensis, large forts built to hold a legion and its associated auxiliaries. Over the years a small town would grow up around the gateway to supply the wider needs of the seven or eight thousand men within: bars, brothels and bakers, tanners and tunic makers. Colonia was different. The city had originally been a settlement for the Ubii, a Germanic tribe forced from the eastern bank of the river by their more powerful neighbours. But nineteen years earlier the unfortunate Ubii had been displaced again, when Claudius had ordered the establishment of a colonia, a planned town, settled by retired legionaries. Which was why Colonia Agrippinensis was like a little piece of Italia dropped on to the damp, gloomy flatlands of Germania: a tidy grid of streets enclosed by a defensive wall, with plastered houses, a forum and, most important, the governor’s palace, a comfortable two-storey villa built round an open square. But there the similarity ended. The land around Colonia was a veritable swamp, the air damp enough to swim in and, in November, cold enough to shrivel a man’s extremities, even when he was wrapped in a voluminous woollen toga. The heated floor made it bearable, but even so the wind whistled through every gap. As the whole world knew, Aulus Vitellius was a man who liked his comforts. A full belly was all very well, but cold feet? Belatedly, he realized Valens was still speaking.

‘… Julius Civilis.’

Vitellius smiled. ‘Ah, and how is our Batavian Pompey?’

‘If you chain a wolf, I suppose you should not be surprised if he howls. Better that Nero should have executed him along with his brother. Better still if he had left them to rot in Britannia, and their savages with them. Fine soldiers the Batavians may be, but an auxiliary in his own land is a recipe for trouble. There’s bad feeling between the tribesmen and the legionaries who man our signal stations on the island. Bar brawls and the occasional stabbing.’

Vitellius frowned. A decision would have to be taken about Civilis, a prince of the Batavians, but also a Roman citizen. A year earlier he and his brother had been accused of treason. The brother had been executed, but for some reason Nero had spared Julius, and Galba had now sent him home in chains. It was a complication he didn’t need. ‘I am told to expect a delegation from Noviomagus in the next few days.’

Valens nodded. ‘They will ask you to release him as a signal of your trust and to make an auspicious start to your reign as governor.’

‘And you would advise what?’

‘A year ago …’ The other man hesitated and a shadow crossed his face that sent an even deeper chill through Vitellius. He had been a politician for more than thirty years and he recognized the signs that confirmed the hints that had been dropped in Moguntiacum.

‘Please continue,’ he said carefully.

‘A year ago I would have flayed his barbarian carcass and fed what was left to my catfish. The Batavians wouldn’t have liked it, but they would have accepted it because our strength and our resolve was not in doubt.’

‘And now?’

Valens, never a man to advertise his feelings, went as still as one of the statues of Vitellius’s predecessors that lined the walls. A leopard ready to make the final leap. ‘May I be frank, governor?’

Vitellius kept his face as impassive as his interlocuter’s, and the First Germanica’s general took it for assent to continue.

‘The situation has changed. This morning, you took the salute of the elite first cohorts of the four legions of Germania Inferior, as fine a body of men as ever carried a sword for the Empire. Most of them have soldiered on the Rhenus frontier for their entire service. It is a largely thankless duty; dull garrison work, extreme watchfulness, permanent readiness for war, and the occasional patrol beyond the river that is as likely to be ambushed as not. The opportunities for glory are slim. Likewise the opportunity for profit.’ Vitellius noted the change in tone that identified the importance of profit and nodded wisely. ‘Six months ago those same men marched into Gaul to put down the revolt of the traitor Gaius Julius Vindex. Many of them shed blood and lost friends, but they won a great victory; the traitor was dead and his army scattered. They were promised glory and plunder, and they believed they had won both. Yet soon they discovered that the traitor was no longer a traitor, but an ally of the new Emperor, Servius Sulpicius Galba. Their victory was for nothing.’ There was another subtle change in the voice as Valens continued, a hardening like ice forming on a pond. ‘Far from being glorious it brought them only ignominy and scorn. What booty they took had to be returned. Now they hear that the Emperor has lavished rewards on the Aedui, the Arverni and the Sequani, the very tribes they vanquished, while they have nothing to show but their wounds. As I am sure you have been told, the Rhenus legions are seldom happy with their lot, but I must tell you they have never been unhappier than they are now.’

As Valens continued, Vitellius carefully laid the cup he held on the table at his side and crossed his jewelled fingers to prevent the other man from seeing them shaking. The news of his troops’ unhappiness didn’t come as a surprise. Flaccus had suggested as much of his own legions, who resented the dismissal of their former commander, Verginius Rufus. Personally, Vitellius thought Verginius was fortunate to still have his head. The fact that he had turned his legions down when they tried to proclaim him Emperor only delayed the inevitable. Yet there was opportunity here as well as danger.

‘I will, of course, make suitable representations to the Emperor to ensure they receive the rewards they deserve,’ he said very deliberately. ‘My personal means do not allow me to make the gifts I would like to make, but I will do what I can. Arrange for me to visit each unit in turn, beginning with First Germanica, and make the occasion an awards ceremony. I’m sure some of your men were honoured for their actions at Vesontio, but it is the way of these things that exceptions are made and the deserving are missed. We will ensure that all who are worthy receive the promotions and phalerae they deserve.’ He smiled, thinking of his old friend Valerius Verrens. ‘Perhaps we might include at least one Gold Crown of Valour?’

‘An excellent suggestion. I will see that it is done.’

Vitellius nodded his dismissal and Valens rose to his feet. He bowed and was making his way to the door when he appeared to have an afterthought.

‘We agreed that I could be candid. You have a lineage as distinguished as any man in Rome. As governor of Germania Inferior, four legions are at your disposal; probably the most powerful unified command in the Empire. Those legions have no taste for our new Emperor and that is unlikely to change. The three legions of Germania Superior are of a similar mind. None of these legions have yet sworn an oath to Servius Sulpicius Galba. They are the keys to Rome for any man with the courage to grasp them.’

With a curt nod the legate marched from the room. Despite the chill air, Vitellius felt the sweat running from his hairline and down his cheeks. Candid, indeed, and no afterthought. Valens had thought through each and every word. He had sought no response, thank the gods. This was just a planting of a seed. What to do? Have one of his legates arrested within a week of arriving in Colonia? It was unthinkable that Valens would not have foreseen the possibility, and the man who had hacked the head from Fonteius Capito would have no hesitation in doing the same to Aulus Vitellius. On the other hand, Valens would not have made the approach unless he had the support, or at least the approval, of the other legates in Germania Inferior, and perhaps those at Moguntiacum.

Was it possible?

Galba was old and weak. Would his soldiers even fight for him? In any case, the legions of the Rhenus frontier outnumbered those in Italia by at least two to one. It was possible. But only if a man had the courage to take what was offered. He reached for the polished rosewood box that held Julius Caesar’s sword, but it was as if his hands refused to obey his mind. His fingers came within an inch of wood, but they would go no further.

A sign?

He took a step back and drew in a huge breath to calm his racing heart.

To accept was to risk everything. To refuse was unthinkable.

Very well. He would do what Aulus Vitellius did best.

He would do nothing.