The Gods of War

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

Marcellus got his first ship to sea in record time, thanks to the engineering skills of Regimus and the work-rate of the local shipwrights. The old sailor, now once more a decurion, was a real find. ‘Can’t be done’ was not an expression he understood. From bare ribs, the ships started to take rapid shape, and the old man was proud, in more ways than one, of what the shipwrights had achieved.

‘They build better than anyone else I’ve seen, which is just as well. The conditions here, beyond the Pillars of Hercules, are nothing like the Middle Sea.’

Marcellus had been interested in all things nautical since his first trip aboard a trireme, and sailors loved to talk, though some caution had to be exercised to avoid falling for their endemic exaggerations. He had heard about the tidal rise and fall from those he had questioned, but the stories about the outer sea could be hair-raising. Some of the trading captains had sailed so far north that ice islands, floating on the surface, had turned them back. These men traded in amber and other precious objects, like tin and silver. Wonderful woollen cloaks came from the Pretanic Islands, easy to reach since they were a mere twenty-five leagues from the shore of northern Gaul. They were hard to believe, these tales he had been told, of storms where the waves had risen above the height of the masts, of whales ten times the size of the ship who sang to each other, yet swam alongside and never harmed men; and he had disbelieved more than he should.

Now, at sea, he would readily admit to being wrong. Nothing had quite prepared him for the sheer volume of water and the way it behaved, once you got out beyond the narrow entrance to the Middle Sea, and that alone took some doing due to the current, a boat being forced to hug the northern shore, and that only possible with a good following wind. The waves could indeed be huge! White-capped, whipped onwards by a screaming wind, curling over themselves to form dark cavities, rushing at phenomenal speed, then crashing onto rocks that had been worn down over time into fantastic shapes. Other days would see the same water a huge and gentle swell with troughs deep enough to hide you from land. And the smell was different, with air that had travelled over an ocean that seemed to have no end, all the way from the very rim of the world, carrying with it magical elements that could make you dizzy.

‘It’s not magic, Marcellus. You’ll get used to it,’ said Regimus as he staggered out of the steady wind, and the old seafarer was right; he had.

Marcellus was amidships, one hand holding on to the mast, his hair whipping about in the breeze, nose up and his eyes gleaming with pleasure, while beneath his feet the oars dipped evenly into the water, carrying the first of his ships forward at a steady pace. He turned to shout to Regimus, who stood with his arms around the great sweep.

‘Used to it, man? I love it! I think Neptune must be somewhere in my bloodline. Standing here, I feel at one with the gods.’

They had sacrificed a bull before sailing, as well as listening carefully to the augurs, but the gods were fickle, inclined to smite foolish mortals. The augurs and their corn-fed chickens guaranteed nothing; it was a reading of the sky, the shape and direction of the clouds, the state of the sea, a careful watch on the behaviour of the seabirds, the smell of the spume by those who had sailed these waters before, that provided some feeling of security.

‘Put her before the wind, Regimus. Let’s get that sail up and see how she handles.’

The old man called the orders and most of the oars were lifted and shipped, only those needed to steady the ship and hold her head true remaining in the water. He leant on the heavy sweep bringing the quinquereme round so that the wind was dead astern. They rose on the swell and the coast lay clear ahead: rocky, with narrow sandy bays and the mountains rising into a blue haze behind. Men hauled on ropes and the boom holding the huge square sail rose up the mast, then they lashed it taut and it took the wind, bowing out as though it would tear. Water started to run white along the ship’s side and Marcellus ran forward, dodging round the corvus, to observe the sea cream under the bows.

He moved back to the stern, took the sweep from Regimus, edging it this way and that, trying to find out how far he could steer off true before the sail flapped uselessly and the ship lost speed. Finally satisfied, he took in the sail, ordered the men back to their oars and sent the head oarsman to beat his tattoo on the great block of wood that stood just before the well of the ship. It was nothing like a trireme, built to ram the enemy; the heavy quinquereme was built to carry soldiers into battle, but speed could still be a prerequisite of a successful manoeuvre, placing the Roman ship in an advantageous position when faced with the much lighter ships Marcellus would need to engage.

They raced through the water as the drumbeat increased. The land, so recently a strip on the horizon, was now close enough for each feature to be clear to the naked eye. The rowers bent and strained, bent and strained, the sweat running freely from their bodies. Marcellus could not see their faces, but he knew, from his own experience, that they would be screwed up in pain, fighting to fill their lungs with air. Mentally he willed them to greater efforts, watching carefully for the first sign of collapse. One oar, wrongly handled, could throw out the whole rhythm of a galley. The heaving noise of snatched breath was clear above the sound of wind and sea, so the legate gave the order and the oars were shipped again, this time with exhausted rowers collapsing over them, as if suddenly dead.

‘Excellent,’ said Marcellus. ‘Back to Portus Albus, Regimus, let us see how our other ships and crews are doing.’

Brennos knew they were coming long before the first legionary put a boot outside the camp gate. He felt it in his bones as he awoke from his dream; not pain, for it was like an ache lifted. He looked at Galina, asleep by his side, the one person who had kept faith with him out of love rather than fear, never doubting that his prediction would come true. Not that anyone had dared to say anything to his face, but Brennos could see into men’s minds, so he knew they thought him mad, obsessed with the defeat of Rome. He never tried to explain, since that first battle against Aulus Cornelius, that it was the triumph of the Celts he sought; that he would have fought Carthage, Rome’s predecessors in Iberia, with equal venom. His hand ran softly over Galina’s thigh and she murmured in her sleep, while his other hand took the gold eagle that he always wore round his neck, the personal talisman that he believed would decide his fate.

Gifted to him by his uncle, a senior Druid who had helped him to escape from the hole in the ground in which he had been placed, as well as death at the hands of those who hated and feared him in the Druid community, it had been with him ever since that day, only ever removed when washing. Taken by his namesake, Brennos, from the Temple of Delphi, hundreds of years before he had been told it had magical powers, though it had as yet failed to fulfil the prophesy which went with it; that one day he who wore it would stand triumphant in the Temple of Jupiter Maximus high on the Capitoline Hill in Rome, a man who had conquered the legions and the city.

Finally, after all these years of trying to tempt them, his enemies were coming to meet their nemesis. In his mind’s eye, he could see the fields around Numantia filled with the bleached bones of the Romans. Once they had been defeated here, once he had proved that he was the true heir to the first Brennos, the Celts, the most numerous of peoples fractured by tribal rivalries, would come together under his rule. He would create and lead the greatest army the Celts had ever put in the field, then do what his predecessor had not done. First, Brennos would take enough gold to retire from Rome; they would not bribe him, he would raze their city state to the ground, destroy its temples and enslave its people.

Yet there were doubts; not everything was certain, and not just because the gods were fickle; he should have achieved this already. He had fought Aulus Cornelius, he had even captured the man’s wife and become her lover, more at her bidding than his own. Celibacy was his duty, the Lady Claudia Cornelia had taken that from him. He recalled the day he had to tell her to leave, though he did not tell her it was because his revolt had failed, that her husband was winning his war of attrition. The tribes had been deserting him, making peace, and he could no longer protect her and the child she carried. Why had he not succeeded in fulfilling the prophecy? Would he do so now?

He leant over the girl, his movement waking her, and held the charm up to her half-open eyes. ‘I’m old, Galina, yet I believed once that I would conquer Rome. The man who wears this has that as his destiny. I cannot believe absolutely now that it will be me, so I must have a son. This will pass to him and even if he has to breed sons and pass it on, one day my bloodline will conquer.’

Brennos pushed Galina gently on to her back and the action of his hands brought a smile to her lips. He kept the gold charm in his hand, and he felt the power course through his loins, certain that for the first time in thirty years he could really feel the force in the charm, the same kind of power he had felt that dark night when it had been placed in his hand. Despite being a passionate creature, Galina had never conceived, perhaps because she feared he would do as he had to his other offspring and kill the child. But he knew, with absolute certainty, that she would now give him the son he needed, one he would cherish and raise to fulfil his destiny.

Brennos was in the central arena long before the sun came up, reciting, from memory, the sagas that he had learnt so many years before. He could feel the years slip away, making him strong again, as if his life had gone into reverse, and as the sun came up he watched for the moment at which it first touched the altar in the middle of the square. The gold light crept slowly down the walls of the surrounding buildings, and all the time he talked. People had gathered to listen, never having seen their chieftain like this. He seemed taller than ever, more imposing, and just before the sunlight touched the altar, it lit his silver hair, making it shine. It was as though the Great Earth God had blessed him and a huge shout sprang from his lips at the sacred moment, when the sunlight lit the altar, startling those watching. Then he spun round, looking at them with a fearsome gaze, and started to issue the commands that would make Numantia ready for the invaders.

They had expected the march to Numantia to be hard, but not even Aquila, with his dire warnings and elaborate precautions, was prepared for the tenacity with which the tribes tried to block their passage. Brennos wanted them weakened before they arrived and had bent all his persuasive power to the task of ensuring a rough passage for the Romans. Every hill had to be taken by assault, each narrow valley outflanked and every river bridged under a rain of spears and arrows. They cut a makeshift road through the huge forests — a straight Roman road, ignoring the terrain. If they succeeded, it would become permanent, opening up the interior of the land to Roman civilisation; if they failed, it would disappear, an overgrown testament to the demise of a whole army.

The new quaestor had known for years that the formation of the army, with its complicated baggage train, had previously militated against success, for, when fighting such an enemy, in such country, speed and mobility were paramount and he had been worried at the outset when Titus pushed his army hard, letting the tribes occupy the route to their rear. These legionaries had grown up with a method of fighting and it was common sense to Aquila that a sudden change of basic tactics, in a situation where battle is imminent, could lead to total disaster.

One asset was Titus himself. The men had, for once, a general who led from the front; in fact, he could not be kept away from a fight, despite continual pleading that the loss of his life could be fatal to the enterprise. Titus trusted the gods with his person and the men beneath him with his legions. Aquila noticed right away, that, given the responsibility to make their own decisions, few officers let their general down, since the only requirement the consul had of them was that they avoid being foolish. So the individual tribunes were encouraged to innovate.

Aquila himself had instituted a way of pushing the entire force of velites, as well as the Iberian auxiliaries, forward at a rapid pace. These skirmishers, gathered from all the legions, added to the fighters from the coastal plain, being numerous, forced the tribesmen to spring their ambushes too early, and, facing lightly armed Romans, they were drawn into pressing home their attacks, from which they found it difficult to swiftly disengage. The bulk of the army, without the usual baggage train and camp followers, was moving at a hitherto unprecedented pace, so, in the first few weeks of the march they caught their enemies engaged time and time again. But Brennos, if indeed it was he who was directing the tribal effort, soon learnt the lesson and, with a firm grasp of the properties afforded him by the rugged landscape, he eschewed ambush, instead setting up defensive positions that had to be taken by assault.

‘These are mere pinpricks, Fabius,’ said Aquila, as they formed up yet again to attack a steep ridge. ‘The real fighting is still to come.’

‘That’s one of the things that’s wrong about you. You can’t tell a pin from a knitting needle, and as for a prick…’

Aquila yelled out his commands and the skirmishers started forward, darting about before the enemy to draw their fire and reduce their stock of spears. Success would mean they would have less to cast at the following heavy infantry. Titus for once stayed back, as a general should, standing on a rock to observe the action, all his army spread out around him in battle array. Cholon sat beside him, a papyrus roll on his lap, his eyes darting from the battle taking place ahead, then down to the paper for a quick notation. The commotion from the rear took them both by surprise. A huge mass of mounted tribesmen had appeared across the road back to the coast, formed up and ready to attack. Too small a force to defeat the Romans, their presence was, nevertheless, demoralising. They were living proof to all the legionaries that they were cut off in enemy territory and any attack they delivered, even partially successful, would lead to casualties that Titus could ill afford.

The general was off his perch in a flash, mounting his horse to ride to the scene of the trouble. Publius and Gnaeus Calvinus, in command of the lightly armed rearguard, had calmly wheeled their men round, forming two lines, as the mounted tribesmen came rushing forward. They kept their voices steady, raising them only as much as was needed for their orders to be understood. Their first line knelt at the command, their shields angled over their heads and their spears dug into the ground, forming a frieze before them that would impale any mounted attacker. The second line immediately formed into threes, one behind the other. Titus hauled on his reins, watching the next line of legionaries, heavy infantry to the rear of the Calvinus twins, as they swung expertly into place, forming up into four lines, with the proper gap between each group. That would allow the Calvinus cohorts to withdraw in safety. It was a set-piece manoeuvre, carried out as if being executed on the Campus Martius.

For all the pride in Roman arms that Titus Cornelius had experienced as a soldier, nothing equalled this, because it was being carried out, not on a practice field, but in broken country. That iron discipline, the ability to manoeuvre under attack, plus sheer raw courage by officers and men alike, when properly employed, made Roman legions invincible. Cholon had joined him, abandoning his chair and his note-taking. Titus looked over his shoulder to check that Aquila’s attack was proceeding successfully, noting that the velites and auxiliaries had scaled the escarpment and were now engaged in hand-to-hand combat with the defenders.

‘Write this up, Cholon. This is the very best you’ll ever see. A Roman army attacking in two directions at once.’

‘But they’re not attacking,’ said Cholon, pointing to the men withdrawing under the orders of their officers. ‘They’re retreating.’

‘Watch!’

Publius and Gnaeus led their men safely back, one defensive line slipping through another, with the three men coming abreast immediately the last man escaped, never leaving the attacker anything but certain impalement to face. Finally, when they were close enough to the heavier infantry, they broke and ran to safety. The gaps closed immediately and the rear cohorts filled in. The orders were given, and the Celt-Iberian tribesmen found themselves facing an unbroken line of advancing troops. Having milled around uselessly, their horses were winded, so they broke at the first cast of the spears, leaving dead men and screaming animals pinned to the ground by Roman javelins.

A great shout rent the air and both Cholon and Titus turned in their saddles, just in time to see Aquila, at the head of the princeps of the 18th Legion, take the crest of the ridge, his enemies in full flight before him.

Their next battle was at a heavily contested river-crossing, the main problem being that there was no room on the opposite bank to deploy, since, apart from a narrow strip of land, the rock rose sheer for a hundred feet. Titus had searched the river up and down its length for an easier passage, but in his bones he knew there was nothing. The mere presence of his enemies, in such force, on the opposite hills was proof of that. But the one asset that the Roman legion had in this situation was that they could all swim; the other advantage lay in their discipline. A well-trained army could attack at night — something denied to wild hordes of barbarians. Titus rested his men throughout the day, with only the rearguard engaged in any meaningful way, and stood down his auxiliaries; this was no task for local troops.

Then, using the cover of cloud, interspersed with fitful moonlight, he threw a line of cavalry across the river, well downstream, each soldier and horse roped to the other. These men and their horses would stay there all night, set to catch anyone swept away by the force of the water. Then, in almost pitch darkness, the most experienced heavy infantrymen, with ropes tied round their middle and stakes lashed to their backs, followed the velites into the water, holding clear their great metal-topped hammers. Aquila was at their head, his red-gold hair with the white band lashed round it picking up what little light existed. He swam swiftly to the other bank, forming the skirmishers into a defensive screen that would allow their comrades to work. The first the defenders knew of the coming assault was the sound of those stakes being driven into the damp riverside earth. The ropes were lashed to the stakes and at a steady pace Titus pushed his infantry across.

Aquila had already led his skirmishers up the steep slope, so that the tribesmen found themselves engaged in battle before they were properly awake. Fighting in the dark is terrifying, never knowing where the enemy is; or if the ghostly shape in front of you is friend or foe. Such hand-to-hand combat required a steely determination that the defenders lacked. Titus had the horns sounded continuously, and out of tune, from the moment the first stake was driven into the earth. This cacophony bounced off the rocks, multiplying and, added to the screams of the attackers, making the defenders feel that they were under attack from some horrifying monster. Each of Aquila’s men had, like him, a white cloth tied round his head. The Romans, even in the dim light, could identify their enemies, and they extracted a heavy toll long before the heavier troops arrived to take over the assault.

Yet someone gathered them into a cohesive line, shouting commands that Aquila heard clearly. He sent a messenger back to warn Titus, well aware that the effect, initially, would be minimal. The Celts started to throw their javelins over the heads of the Romans on the cliff, aiming them in the general direction of the river. With such a mass of men in the water, struggling across the foaming torrent on dozens of ropes, many found a target. The screams of the wounded added to all the other noises of battle that echoed off the rock face, and, downstream, the line of cavalry found that they were indeed required, if only to stop the bodies of drowned men flowing all the way to the sea.

When they ran out of spears, a distinct horn sounded, and the defence evaporated, leaving the Romans no one to fight.