The Gods of War

CHAPTER EIGHT

Cholon rubbed his hands over his sweating brow, while outside, though no rain fell, the rumble of thunder filled the sky. The atmosphere was oppressive enough without the prospect of the impending meeting. He and Titus were expecting a delegation from the Equites, a group in constant battle with the Senate over the division of powers. It was really the lack of division that was the problem; the Senate hogged it all, denying the other classes the right to sit in judgement in the courts, and they were just as opposed to sharing the franchise of Roman citizenship with their allies. The peoples of Italy could provide troops to die for the empire, they could help to feed the increasing beast that was Rome, but they had few if any rights, and the man who had fought to keep it that way was the late Lucius Falerius Nerva. Now that he was gone, an opportunity arose, while his successors were weak, to seek redress.

‘I fear I am developing a talent for intrigue,’ he said.

Titus was aware, as was Cholon, that the Greek was merely the messenger, yet it took a man adept at the messenger’s art to play the game; to entice suspicious people to treat with those they thought were their enemies, and he had also provided his apartment for the purpose. Knights calling here would excite no comment; the only person who had had to take precautions to get in unseen was Titus himself, yet those they had arranged to meet arrived, seemingly determined to arouse suspicion. Instead of making a noisy approach, like men calling on an old friend, they crept towards Cholon’s apartment silently, whispering encouragement to each other. Even the way they knocked on the door smacked of conspiracy, a soft tap instead of a confident hammering. Cholon opened the door quickly and shepherded them in.

They were three very different men, as though they had set out to find a cross-section of their class. One, Cassius Laternus, was tall and thin; the second, Marcus Filator, was round in face and body, like a human ball. The third was the most important, though the least imposing in appearance. Frontus was small and thin, more like a child than a grown man, but you only had to look into the eyes to see the strength of his character. Chairs were arranged, wine poured and the general enquiries that preceded any meeting flowed, with questions about family friends, wives, children and the state of the finances of the Republic. They all knew each other well; Rome might be a teeming metropolis and sit at the centre of a huge empire, but the people who ran it were small in number, tended to live close to each other and, because of their incomes, shared similar taste in entertainment. There was not a man in the room that Titus had not had a bet with at some time or other, he backing one chariot team, while they backed another. Gambling was one thing, politics another.

‘I take it you have discussed my proposals?’ asked Titus, formally bringing the meeting around to its true purpose.

The other two looked to Frontus to speak. He, like a dwarf beside Titus, shook his head slowly. ‘Nothing is decided.’

Cholon cut in, for he had held the first meetings with these men, trying to encourage them to see reason. ‘Yet you saw what Titus Cornelius was driving at.’

‘It is hard for men who have nothing to accept that they can only ask for a little.’

That was a somewhat disingenuous statement; all three men were quite powerful, especially in the constituent assembly. They had all schemed at one time to increase that power, only to find themselves up against the prerogatives of the Senate — men who were richer by far, and determined to keep things that way.

‘You’ll get to sit in the court and judge senatorial behaviour.’

‘Without a clear majority?’

‘A wedge, Frontus,’ replied Cholon.

‘Yes, I know. You have used that expression before, but who is the wedge for?’ He turned to Titus, the question clear in his expression. ‘Some of us feel we are being used.’

‘Are you one of them?’ asked Titus, sharply.

Frontus was not alarmed, either by his height or his threatening manner. ‘I most certainly am.’

‘That is just as well,’ said Titus. ‘If you think I’m doing this for the love of the knights’ class, you’re wrong.’

Cholon’s pained expression spoke volumes, having carefully painted the picture of a noble senator, moved to act only by motives of pure altruism. ‘What Titus Cornelius means is…’

Frontus interrupted, his palm raised. ‘I know what he means.’

‘So what do you stand to gain?’ asked Marcus Filator, his fat head wobbling as he spoke.

‘Justice.’

Even Cholon, having heard his friend’s previous words, raised his eyebrows at that response. Titus had just used the most abused word in Rome; every charlatan in the Senate would stand on his hind legs and demand ‘justice’, when what he really meant was that he wished to be left in peace to continue his larceny.

‘I want Vegetius Flaminus brought to trial for what happened to my father. He deliberately abandoned him and his men at Thralaxas.’

‘Personal justice, or revenge?’ asked Laternus.

‘Call it revenge if you wish,’ replied Titus, ignoring Cholon’s shaking head. ‘I would also like to see the Senate more accountable to the people, but I have no reason to see why you should believe that. And I have a clear sense of my place in the world. The Cornelii are patricians. I’ve no desire, for instance, to be numbered amongst the populares.’

‘Agrarian reform?’ asked Filator.

‘Not possible and, to my mind, of questionable benefit.’

‘So you will not support a law that gives land to the poor?’

‘I might, if someone could guarantee to me that those with money wouldn’t buy it off them.’

Titus smiled to take the sting out of the words, but his message was blunt for all that. He was telling them to their face that if he was not prepared to indulge in hypocrisy, neither could they. There were plenty of Equites, including these three, with the financial resources to stand for the Senate. The censor might take some persuading to admit them to the roll, and insist that they disabuse themselves of some of their more lucrative operations, but if they wanted it badly enough it could be done. If they chose not to it could only be for one reason; they would rather be big fish in the knights’ pond than minnows in another. The power struggle was not about money; it was about which personalities held the reins of government.

The three knights exchanged worried glances. It was left to Frontus to speak. ‘My own view is that we should accept what you offer.’

‘Good!’ said Titus.

‘I haven’t finished. You quite rightly surmised that the time is right, with your brother away and Lucius Falerius newly dead. You are also correct when you say that we can easily produce senators prepared to propose and second these changes.’ Frontus paused for a bit, letting these words have their effect. ‘What you have failed to appreciate is just how close the vote would be.’

‘I was given to understand, by you, that we had arranged a majority,’ said Cholon, the newest member of the knights’ class.

‘What people say and what they do are often at odds. No vote is safe until it is cast.’

Titus looked Frontus in the eye. The little man smiled at him, which did little to take the sting out of his words. ‘But if, just before the debate closes, the most noble Titus Cornelius were to speak on behalf of the motion, some in the chamber would have the impression that it has your brother’s secret support.’

‘You’re asking me to commit political suicide,’ said Titus angrily. ‘Quintus will never forgive me.’

The little man’s eyes bored into his, and he had a wicked grin on his face. ‘Perhaps you could even add a late amendment, handing the appointment of all the jurors over to the knights, or at the very least giving us a majority. You must decide, Titus Cornelius, how much you want revenge for your father.’

For Quintus and his legions the rest of the march to Massila was uneventful. They boarded their transports, provided by the Greek city state that sat at the mouth of the Rhone, and sailed for the coast of Spain. Marcellus was blissfully happy, for he loved the sea; the clean smell, the fresh wind and the sound of the galley oars digging into the deep blue water. Fabius, when not required to take a turn at the oars, spent his time catching fish, which he would then offer, filleted and raw, to his seasick ‘uncle’, turning his countenance an even deeper shade of green.

Aquila had been ill from the very moment he had stepped aboard. Romantic allusions to the wine-dark sea brought forth nothing but feeble curses, and this when the weather was clement. He cursed Neptune and all his works, then recanted at the insistence of his fellow sufferers, who were afraid that the Water God might whip up a storm by way of revenge. Their fleet ploughed on, never out of sight of land, until they reached Emphorae, just south of the Pyrenees, which stood at the very tip of the first of the Roman provinces on the peninsula, Hispania Citerior, a slice of valuable land that ran all the way down the eastern seaboard.

Quintus, who could not assume his command without his troops, was in a hurry to get them ashore. Messengers were sent to Servius Caepio to tell him that he had now been superseded, and should prepare to hand over control of all his soldiers to the newly arrived commander. Neither could the new arrival afford to be too long away from Rome: yet another reason for haste; if he was going to make any money in Spain, and possibly grab some glory, he had little time to achieve anything, so he avoided a formal handover ceremony and gave orders to be ready to march away from the coast into the interior.

Servius was allowed one short interview, to bring Quintus up to date on the situation, before being bundled unceremoniously onto a ship for the journey home. Quintus then rode hard to catch up with his troops. The legion that had seen action on the frontier was marching the other way by a different route and Quintus did not intend that they should mix. Troops who had been in Spain for any time tended towards low morale; the country was difficult, the natives cunning and fierce, while the war seemed endless. He detached several tribunes, including Marcellus, and gave them the unenviable task of trying to turn these broken legions back into a reasonable fighting force. Having harboured a desire to cut Marcellus down to size, Quintus took great pleasure in telling him that he was being moved to a posting that would be far away from any chance of glory. His voice was positively silky with insincere concern.

‘Who else can I trust, for I know you to be as single-minded as your father. And never fear, you will get your chance to fight, Marcellus Falerius, just as soon as you’ve whipped these men back into shape.’

The young man was not alone in thinking that this was a lie, suspecting that Quintus would drain off any men he trained as reinforcements. He had promised that Marcellus would join him on his first consular command and that promise had been kept, but Quintus was in no hurry to furnish Marcellus with an opportunity to distinguish himself.

Quintus Cornelius was a good general, but like most of his contemporaries a greedy one and there was always the question of time, or the lack of it, to make his military dispositions seem like sound sense. Servius Caepio had told him all the latest information he had about Brennos, leaving the new governor in no doubt of the man’s influence on the frontier tribes. He was like a cancer at the heart of Celt-Iberian resistance, which would continue until it was cut out, but he was also far away, and in an impregnable position. The other, closer hill forts, like Pallentia, could be invested, but Quintus did not want a lengthy siege; he wanted gold, silver, slaves and enough dead bodies on the field, all in the space of his consular year, then he could return to Rome to take up the true struggle: to stamp his dominance on the floor of the Senate.

He made an immediate adjustment to the standard tactics; normally the Romans operated in large units, since this was the way their force was structured. The cavalry were used as a protective screen, tying their pace to that of the infantry. Of necessity, this impeded overall mobility, and since the tribes were careful never to be caught in numbers, a battle of any size was rare. The legions marched and counter-marched, their looming presence ensuring that no major incursions took place, their snail-like pace guaranteeing a steady rate of tribal attrition, but they could not subdue their opponents in any meaningful way.

Haste, allied to his ambition, forced Quintus into a radically different method. He marched his men away from the established bases and picked a site that stood at the apex of three valleys, all of which led into the interior. Having built a strong base camp, he split the legions up into four groups, keeping the auxiliary legions, four thousand men, plus the majority of the cavalry, under his personal command. The others formed three triple cohorts. Each legate commanded a striking force of a thousand men with orders to emulate their opponents where possible; to fight, burn, steal and withdraw. Client tribes, those on the frontier who had treaties with Rome, were coerced into revealing what they knew about their fellow Celts, providing the new governor with sound intelligence.

The natives fought back, adept at ambush, forever setting traps to draw in the Roman troops, then attacking in force to try to annihilate them. Quintus Cornelius at the head of his mobile reserve, and with a good system of communications to aid him, would then fall on their rear, killing hundreds and capturing thousands of men. The countryside could then be scoured for the women and children who would be shipped off, like their men, to the slave markets of the empire.

But eventually success meant that the available targets soon diminished. Quintus had to send his cohorts further and further afield. Aquila and Fabius marched and retreated, fought when required, and moaned incessantly like the true legionaries they had now become. And Tullius could at least congratulate himself on being right; Aquila, almost without effort, had assumed a position of authority with his men and he was vocal on their behalf, often saving him from making a decision at all, through offering sage advice on the best way to fight without loss.

And all the time, Quintus received good intelligence about his main opponent, the man whose efforts and subversion kept the war alive.

Brennos could barely contain his disappointment; yet another Roman governor had arrived and declined the opportunity to make an attempt on Numantia. He realised now that he had made his hill fort too strong; it had such a fearsome reputation that no Roman wanted to risk failure by trying to take it. Worse than that, their present tactics were producing results and some of the tribes he had relied on were, out of sheer exhaustion, going over to the Romans, to become clients, who could live in peace, grow fat on their crops and watch their children grow to manhood.

He did not understand the Romans, and there was no one with enough knowledge, allied to a strong personality, to tell him where he was going wrong. To a man with complete power, who made decisions on his own without consulting anyone, the fragmented way that his enemies went about the affairs of state baffled him. He could not comprehend that he was dealing with a hydra-headed monster, with tentacles that prospered by an uncompleted war, and saw no advantage in outright victory. To him, the solution was obvious; all the power of Rome should be used to subdue him. He could not comprehend that the ability to concentrate that power did not exist, there always being voices on the floor of the Forum to counsel caution. The safety of the empire was very rarely their primary motive; jealousy, the opportunity for personal profit, or even the prospect of future glory animated more breasts than good sense.

Being stubborn, Brennos stuck to his aim, with little alteration in the basic concept. Harass the Romans until they saw, without blinkers, that they had to destroy him and Numantia; lure them to a battle which, with all the tribes combining to fight them and far from their bases, they would lose, then use the victory to further his own ends.

One of the most corrupting things about power is that few dare tell the holder of such supremacy the truth. They flatter instead, so when Brennos expounded his plans, again and again, there was no one prepared to tell him he was getting too old, that experience should tell him he was wrong, and that his opponent, Quintus Cornelius, was slowly but surely, by his novel tactics, isolating one tribe after another and pacifying the border area.

He addressed the pertinent problem first, not by calling a tribal council but by sending for Costeti, the leader of a bellicose yet mobile tribe called the Averici. Though close to the land the Romans controlled, they, because of the broken nature of the terrain and their sturdy ponies, had the choice to raid without too much threat of retribution. But Costeti had another problem: satisfying his younger warriors who longed for a fight, egged on by Brennos appealing to their greed as much as their martial spirit.

Brennos knew he had to stop the haemorrhage of tribes making peace and the best way to achieve that was to show them one thing: that they stood in as much danger from a Rome that claimed friendship as they did from that state’s declared enmity. The plan he had evolved had the added bonus that it would, at the same time, inflict a resounding defeat on one of Quintus’s columns, which would be laid at his door, proving, once more, where the resolution of the conflict lay.