The Art of War

Chapter 4

Judaea, June, AD 69

Vespasian

The sun was up by then, not far enough to broil the day, just a cherried orb on the eastern horizon that stained the light in the tent to blood.

Not counting Demalion, who stood within the door flap, we were four who gathered around the table inside to talk treason, taking watered wine in our campaign mugs, eating brown olives, and small silvery fish, caught by their millions on the coast and dried on rocks in the sun.

I was the oldest, the greyest, the one who, seemingly, must carry the conscience for this treachery we planned.

The youngest, not yet thirty years old, was Titus, my elder son, the light of my life, my legacy to the world. I wouldn’t say that in his brother’s hearing, of course. Domitian knows, but he doesn’t need to hear it said aloud.

Unlike his younger brother, Titus has been gifted an honest, open face, an athlete’s never-ending grace, buoyant chestnut hair and a lively eye. If he is not beautiful — and let us be honest, he is too short to be beautiful, his face too round — he has the glorious vivacity of youth that sets lovers trailing after him by the score.

Already a legionary legate, commander of the XVth Apollinaris, with the path to senator and then consul laid wide before him, my son, Titus Flavius Vespasianus, had most to lose.

Mucianus, former consul and now governor of neighbouring Syria, might be a decade younger than I am — it’s hard to tell his age with any accuracy any more than one can tell his exact parentage — but he was one of the few competent generals left alive after Nero’s predations on the senate.

Unmarried, childless, he was quite evidently lost to Titus’ smile, though I would wager my entire estate that the boy had not lain with him, and never will: Titus is made for women to exactly the same degree that Mucianus is not.

Even so, lust and ambition make for a heady wine and they had combined to transform this lean, driven man from the rival he once was to the kingmaker he wanted to become.

He had commanded the three Syrian legions during the recent Judaean war: the IVth Scythians, the VIth, and the newly reformed XIIth. They loved him just as my legions loved me and would have marched into Hades if he’d asked it of them. Just then, Mucianus was minded to ask them to propel me to the throne in Rome if only I would stop being obstinate and accept his offer.

And then there was Pantera, who was playing the role of secretary, a fiction that was laughable. Pantera was the one who had first suggested this path, nearly two years ago. Pantera was the one who had induced the Hebrew prophet to hail me the inheritor of their Star Prophecy that said a man would arise in the east and become lord of the whole world.

But it was Pantera who was so carefully not speaking now, leaving Mucianus to make his points for him, which he was doing, I have to say, with the zeal of the newly converted.

‘Vitellius is an incompetent idiot who excels only at eating and drinking, usually at others’ expense. He wouldn’t be emperor if the Rhine legions hadn’t put him on the throne and even then they wanted Rufus first. He’s a profligate wastrel who makes Nero look restrained in his spending. He’ll bankrupt the empire, and reduce the senate to a bunch of drooling fools.’

‘There are those,’ said Titus idly, studying the tilted surface of his wine, ‘who will say Nero accomplished that many years ago.’

Mucianus stopped. He tapped his long finger to his lips. His thoughts were so clear, and so graphic, that I didn’t know whether to laugh aloud or drag him outside and flog him.

I could do neither, obviously. Addressing them both, I said, ‘I am the second son of a tax farmer. My brother was the first senator in our family and he makes it universally known that I only followed him into public service at our mother’s insistence. Since Octavian became Augustus, there has never yet been an emperor who was not of solid senatorial stock. Drooling idiots or not, the blue-blooded men of the senate won’t have me.’

‘If you’ll forgive my saying so,’ Pantera said, quietly, from the farthest end of the table, ‘there have been three emperors in the past twelve months and the premium on ancestry has fallen noticeably with each one. If we delay, it is not Vitellius we must fear — incompetent and indolent as he is — but his brother Lucius. He is twenty years younger, more ambitious, more intelligent and more ruthless than any of his recent predecessors. If Lucius gains open control, there’ll be more than two assassins sent against you; there will be dozens. With respect, you can’t afford that, and if you won’t fight on your own behalf, then do so for the people and the senate of Rome. They want — and deserve — a leader who can set the empire back on its feet, who will rule with compassion, not caprice or cruelty, and who can count higher than ten without having to take off his boots to number his toes.’

Delivered of this speech, Pantera looked me clear in the eye. ‘My lord, you have six legions here, and two more waiting under Julius Tiberius in Alexandria. He will have them swear their oath to you the day we give him the word. With all that help, you can be emperor. The question is, do you want to be?’

‘Do I have a choice?’

It was a genuine question; I still thought I might wriggle out of it.

Mucianus answered. ‘Not if you want to live, no. If those two are the only ones in your army in Lucius’ pay, I’ll eat my belt. We can hunt for traitors, but they won’t give themselves away easily, and all we can be sure of is that Lucius will know soon that his men have failed. He will send others, or Vitellius will send orders for you to fall on your sword. Either way, you will die. The only chance to live is to take the field against them both. The choice, such as exists, lies in how this may be done. There is a way without bloodshed. Or there is the havoc of civil war.’

‘Without bloodshed? Are you insane?’ I slammed both palms on the table, and to hell with who might be listening outside. ‘Vitellius may be an idiot, but his brother and his generals are not. They have four legions camped in Rome, eating at the city’s heart like so many locusts. You told me yourself that they have sixteen thousand newly made Praetorian Guards. They have the massed naval fleets at Ravenna and Misene with their men in dock over winter and nothing better to do than pick their noses and fuck the local whores. They’ll march when they’re called to and be glad of it, particularly if Vitellius offers to make them into full legions. On top of that, he has legions scattered through the Balkans and the Germanies, any or all of which could block our route to Rome and may well do so. How, exactly, do you plan to take them on without bloodshed?’

‘With minimal bloodshed, then.’ Mucianus gave a merchant’s shrug. ‘Vitellius will have to relocate some of his legions before winter. Rome can’t sustain those numbers for long: the people will revolt against feeding so many mouths.’

‘He won’t send them far.’

‘He won’t, but then we don’t want him to. If you go to Egypt, you can threaten to choke off the grain supply to Rome. Shortages would be blamed on Vitellius and there would be riots. That’ll maintain pressure on him, whatever else is going on. I, meanwhile, will march at the head of as many men as Judaea can spare — I think probably five legions — while your son Titus’ — Mucianus flicked his long lashes at the boy, who had the grace to smile — ‘Titus will remain here with command of those legions left behind. He will prevent a renewed insurgency and then complete the defeat of Jerusalem when you are safely made emperor. Thus you and he will be kept safe from harm and guilt while the war is prosecuted, and you can return to Rome bringing peace with you when the war has burned itself out.’

‘And Pantera?’ I asked. All eyes turned to the head of the table. The man was not a soldier, but none the less… ‘What will you do?’

Pantera laid down his unused quill. He stretched out, languid as a cat on a bough. Only his eyes betrayed him, for they were not languid at all.

‘I will come with you to Alexandria and introduce you there to those who can help your cause. The fellowship of Isis, I think, will support you, and others whose loyalty is unshakable. After that, I will travel to Rome and work towards your ascent to the throne. To that end, I will bring to you the services of Seneca’s spy network. We will need spies local to Rome; men and women who are so embedded in the fabric of society that their presence is taken for granted. We need freedmen, tradesmen, whores, taverners, ostlers, equestrians, senators and their women, all pulling in the same direction, all united by trust. Seneca created such a network and there is nothing in the empire to match it.’

I ran my tongue around my teeth, found a fragment of fish, and chewed on it until the salt burst on my tongue.

‘Seneca is dead,’ I said. ‘He set himself against Nero and paid with his life.’

‘His legacy lives on.’

‘Under your command?’

‘Under his successor, the new spymaster, known as the Poet. We have discussed your cause and the network will support it.’

‘Really? And you only thought to tell me now?’ I chose temporarily to forget that he had only arrived in the night, and had found himself in the middle of an assassination attempt.

I paced the floor; it helps me think. ‘Why? Why are you doing this? You’ve been pushing me towards outright treason since you first brought back the Eagle of the Twelfth. Why?’

‘Seneca’s final request, his order, if you like, to those of us who served him, was that we find a man worthy of the empire and set him on the throne. In our opinion, you are that man.’

‘The only worthwhile man in the entire empire?’ Disbelief must have shown on my face. ‘You can’t be that desperate!’

Pantera said nothing, only blinked in a way that, beyond all reason, reminded me of my dream, and so of Caenis.

I turned on my heel. ‘Come with me.’

Titus and Mucianus rose, but I waved them back, and poked Pantera with the heel of one hand. ‘Only you.’

I needed to be alone and we couldn’t go out the front; half the army was waiting there. So I pushed through the back flap of the tent into the small space outside where the night guards squatted to relieve themselves.

Pantera followed me and, with care, he and I negotiated a path to the centre, holding our breaths against the stink.

Above, a solitary hawk rode the winds, or perhaps it was a carrion bird, come to feed on the two dead men; at sixty, my sight is not what it once was.

I watched it a moment, seeking calm, and then looked again at the waiting spy. I had no idea, really, who this man was. I didn’t even know if he was a Roman citizen. But I knew what he could do. I learned a long time ago that men are best judged by their actions.

‘What did we lose?’ I asked. ‘What was the assassin about to reveal that was so dangerous to our enemies that Albinius had to expose himself to kill him? What did he say that made you heat the irons?’

‘He said, “They hate you. They will see everything you care for destroyed.”’

‘Everything you care for? You? Not me?’ That made the hair stand proud on my neck, I can tell you. I said, ‘I thought you were secret? I mean, obviously people know you exist, but I was given to understand that nobody outside a select few knew you were a spy.’

Pantera’s gaze was lost on some distant horizon. ‘It’s possible that Nero kept notes and they have been found.’

‘Nero?’ No one shed tears when that one died; maybe we should have done, seeing the mess it left us with. ‘What did he know?’

‘Too much. He was one of Seneca’s proteges; he always knew more than was safe. I’ll learn how much more when I get back to Rome.’

‘You still plan to return?’

‘If I stay away, Lucius and Vitellius have won before we start.’ Pantera’s smile was dry, no humour in it, no sudden vivacity. ‘With or without me, the legions will put you on the throne. You don’t need me, but I may be able to smooth the way. With your permission, I would like to try.’

He talked as if it were a given that we would launch this war. His eyes came to rest on my face, full of surmise.

I said, ‘I have one condition.’

‘Name it.’

I dragged the ring from my finger, the only one I ever wore. I have it back now. It looks cheap, it is cheap; gold and silver mixed, with the emblem of the oak branch on it. It looks like nothing, but everyone who knows me, knows it.

I held it out to him. ‘See my family safe. I cannot bring them out of Rome: to endeavour to do so would make them immediate targets. And in any case, they won’t leave.’

That was true. I have never had the authority over my family that I have over my men. Pantera knew that, I think.

‘So do this for me. Go straight to Rome and act in my stead to see them safe. Sabinus, my brother, is prefect of the city. We have never had an easy relationship; he’s a politician and I am a soldier and he will hate this, whatever he says, but he is my brother, and I would not have him hurt by my recklessness. Domitian, my second son, is only eighteen and a quiet boy, not made for war. He lives with Caenis, freedwoman of Antonia, and she is… if you know anything about me, you know what she is.’

Softly, ‘I know.’

‘Then know this: Lucius must not be allowed to kill these three out of hatred of me, for if I am emperor and any one of them has come to harm, all the power in the world will not repair their loss. Do you understand?’

He looked me squarely in the eye. ‘I do.’

‘Do you accept?’

‘I do. I will protect these three with my life. And I will make sure that Seneca’s network of local spies in Rome and its immediate provinces smooths your path to the-’

‘No! Listen to me! Do you know what it means to love?’

It was the dream that drove me, and the sense of things sliding out of control. I gripped Pantera’s arms, high, by the shoulders.

We were face to face, an arm’s length apart. I could see the detail in his face, lose myself in the turbulent oceans of his eyes.

The emperor Tiberius once famously said that taking rule of the empire was like grasping a wolf by its ears; dangerous beyond comprehension, but impossible safely to let go.

Here, now, in the foul latrine space behind my own command tent, I found that I had grasped a leopard by the shoulders and I was not at all sure of the consequences.

I waited, and in his face I saw a wall brought down, a closed door opened. Where had been a mirror was now a glass, and what I saw through it was my own fear made barren. I saw who I would be if Caenis were to die, or Domitian; if I were betrayed by those I loved. The vision left me colder than the assassin’s touch.

‘I had a wife once,’ Pantera said, and his voice was a husk. ‘And a daughter.’

Had. I didn’t want to ask, and must. ‘What happened?’

‘I killed them both, that the enemy who had defeated us might not take them as slaves. My daughter was three years old. I cut her throat while she lay in her mother’s arms. And then I killed the woman I loved.’

What could I say? I stood silent, and after a while Pantera took my two hands in his own and lowered them from his shoulders.

Formally, he said, ‘I have no brother, but know what it is to love a man as if he were that close. I might have killed my own daughter, but I have another still alive. I have never seen her, and she is raised as another man’s child, but even so, I understand some of what you mean when you say Caenis, Domitian and Sabinus are dear to you.

‘I swear to you now that I will protect the lives of these three with my own, or I will answer to you when you are emperor.’ He shifted a little, listening. ‘And now, my lord, I think you must dress, and go out to meet your legions.’

This once, he was late, for I had already heard it: the susurration of a thousand sandalled feet scuffing over sand, the hush of men trained in silent assault.

I was not under assault any more, but I had heard this sound so often in the pre-dawn dark of a raid on a village, or a town, or a cluster of caves in the desert, that it raised battle blood in my veins.

An unexpected flap of tent skin made me jump: Demalion was there, and Hades take him but the lad was smiling. Not broadly, not with Titus’ ripe humour or Pantera’s scarred irony, but the sweep of his mouth was unquestionably up instead of down, and it was this small miracle, with its promise of a flask of Falerian, that told me I had crossed my own Rubicon; that there was, in truth, no going back.

Demalion carried my tunic over his arm, and my armour pack, and my silvered greaves and the enamelled belt, worn through to the bronze beneath with three decades’ wear. With his help, I dressed as fast as I have ever done, and then I lifted the tent flap with my own hand.

I looked left and right, to Titus and Mucianus who had come to join me. Behind were Pantera and Demalion.

‘Shall we go to meet our destiny?’

Outside, the day felt newly minted; sharp, fresh, not yet too hot. My men were standing in parade order, line upon line, in their hundreds, their thousands, in their shining, dazzling tens of thousands: the IIIrd, the Xth, the XVth, that were my own, plus the IVth Scythians, the VIth Ferrata, and the ill-fated XIIth Fulminata commanded by Mucianus.

There was a moment’s lingering stillness as each man took a breath and the suck of it rippled soundlessly back from the front lines to the rearmost.

It held one last, long heartbeat, and then the morning split asunder, rent by a wall of sound as, with one voice, thirty thousand men hailed me in the word that made me their ruler.

‘ Imperator! ’