Total War Rome: Destroy Carthage

2

‘Scipio! It’s ready!’ The voice came from the corner of the room opposite Hippolyta, from a wide recess containing a fireplace. Fabius could just make out a figure in the gloom squatting over the brazier, a lighted tallow candle in one hand. He saw Scipio glance anxiously at the door where the centurion would arrive, and then look at the others. ‘All right. Ennius has something to show us. But at the first sound of the centurion coming down the corridor, everyone rushes back to their places around the table. You know what old Petraeus thinks of Ennius’ inventions. We’ll all be for it.’

They crowded around the recess, Hippolyta included. Polybius stood alongside Scipio, his hands behind his back, peering with interest over the others, looking much more a scholar than a soldier. Ennius’ experiments of the last few months owed much to Polybius, who had introduced him to the wonders of Greek science and fuelled his fascination with military engineering. Scipio nudged Polybius. ‘So what ancient magic have you revealed to him this time, my friend?’

Polybius shrugged. ‘We talked yesterday about Thucydides’ account of the siege of Delium.’

Gulussa was standing beside them, and looked keenly at Polybius. ‘In the year of the three hundred and fiftieth Olympiad, that is, a hundred and fifty-six years ago,’ he said, his Latin accented with the soft guttural sound of Numidian. ‘The action where the philosopher Socrates fought as a hoplite, when the Athenians were routed by the Boeotians. The first major battle in history to involve full-scale tactical planning, including the detailed coordination of cavalry and infantry.’

Polybius cocked an eye at him. ‘You listen to my lectures well, Gulussa. Full marks.’

Scipio peered into the recess. ‘So what is it? Some kind of engine of war?’

‘All I know is that after I told him about the siege he disappeared off to Ostia, where he has a friend in a back alley behind the harbour who supplies him with all manner of exotic substances, brought from all corners of the earth,’ Polybius replied.

‘That would be Polyarchos the Alexandrian,’ Scipio said resignedly. ‘Usually that means pyrotechnics, and usually you can’t get the smell out of your clothes for days.’

Ennius had his back towards them and was shaping something with his hands on the brazier, moulding it. ‘Just give me a moment,’ he said, his voice muffled in the recess. Fabius listened out for the centurion’s distinctive step, but only heard the swish of blades and the sound of scuffled feet in the arena below, and the occasional grunt. Brutus had left them during the study period, and was practising his swordplay again. Fabius turned back to the squatting figure in the gloom. Since Fabius had first met him as a boy, playing on the Palatine Hill with Scipio, Ennius had been intrigued by all manner of contraptions: bridges, boats, cranes for bringing stone columns and blocks into the city, the principles of architecture. The old centurion approved of that: when a legionary was not fighting, his proper job was to dig fortifications and build forts, presided over by centurions who prided themselves on their building skills almost as much as their fighting prowess.

But Ennius’ latest craze was a different matter altogether. With Polybius’ introduction to Greek science had come a fascination with fire. Ennius had even accompanied Ptolemy when he had sailed back to Egypt three months ago, after Ptolemy had been recalled from the academy to assume the throne of Egypt. Ostensibly Ennius had accompanied him for Ptolemy’s marriage ritual and to go crocodile-hunting, but mainly he had wanted to visit the university at Alexandria to see the work of Greek scientists at first hand, and he had returned only the week before, overflowing with enthusiasm. He had even suggested to Petraeus that the Roman army needed a specialised cohort of fabri, engineers, with himself as tribune, tasked to supervise and improve fortifications and also to develop new weapons of war. Scipio had never seen such a black cloud descend over the old centurion’s face. To suggest that specialists should do the traditional work of legionaries was an affront to their honour. To suggest that new weapons of war were needed was not only an affront to the legionaries, but also an insult to the centurion himself; Ennius was questioning his ability to kill with the time-honoured weapons of thrusting sword and javelin and bare hands. But even the week of punishment Ennius had endured mucking out the dung of the elephant stable had failed to diminish his ardour, and here he was again risking the wrath of the centurion to show them yet another miracle of science.

‘All right.’ Ennius shuffled back from the fireplace and swivelled round to face them, the object he had been shaping lying in his hands. It looked like a sphere of wet clay, only it glistened black. In front of the fireplace were pots filled with powders — one bright yellow, others red and brown. Ennius coughed, then stared at them, his expression brimming with excitement.

‘Well?’ Scipio said. ‘We haven’t got all day.’

Ennius picked up a waxed writing tablet and a metal stylus. ‘First, you need to understand the science.’

‘No.’ Scipio held up his hand. ‘No, we don’t. Just show us.’

Ennius looked briefly disappointed. He put down the tablet, and picked up the lit candle again. ‘What do you know about Greek fire?’

Scipio thought for a moment. ‘The Assyrians used it. They made it from black tar that boils up in the desert.’

‘I myself have seen the tar, when I visited the land of the Israelites, beside the briny inland sea,’ Metellus added. ‘The Greeks call it naphtha.’

‘They also call it water fire,’ Polybius murmured. ‘It’s not extinguished by water, and will even continue to burn if you throw it on the surface of the sea.’

‘Right,’ Ennius said, twitching with excitement. ‘Now watch this.’ He put the ball into a bed of kindling below the brazier and thrust the candle into it. The chips of wood ignited and flames enveloped the ball, the flames rising towards the chimney. Suddenly the ball crackled and erupted in a violent flame that roared up the chimney and disappeared, followed by a suck of wind and leaving nothing but embers in the brazier and an acrid smell in the air. Ennius tossed a pot of water on the flames, watched the smoke disappear up the chimney and turned to them again, a broad smile on his face. ‘Well?’ he said. ‘Impressed?’

Metellus was closest to the fire, and held his nose. ‘What did you put in that, Ennius? Elephant dung?’

‘Not far off.’ Ennius wiped his forehead, leaving a black smudge. ‘Nitre, made from ground-up bird droppings. An Egyptian priest showed me how to do it. But the smell is sulphur.’

‘What’s your point, Ennius?’ Scipio said, his ear cocked for any sound from the corridor.

‘Did you see how the rising heat from the fire drew the flames from the naphtha up the chimney? By the time it reached the roof, it would have erupted out in a jet of flame far higher even than the Capitoline Temple.’

‘Jupiter above, I hope the old centurion didn’t see that,’ Scipio muttered.

‘So you think this might be a weapon?’ Metellus said doubtfully.

Ennius looked up. ‘Polybius, tell them.’

Polybius cleared his throat. ‘At the siege of the Boeotian fortress of Delium, the Athenians set up metal tubes to throw fire at the enemy. Thucydides called them flamethrowers.’

‘You see?’ Ennius said. ‘Somebody had the idea almost three hundred years ago, but then it’s forgotten. It’s typical of our attitude to technology. Why? Look at our beloved centurion. Total inflexibility.’ He shook his head in frustration but then became animated again, gesticulating as he spoke. ‘You would need a tube of bronze about six feet high and a hand’s breadth in width, set at an angle facing the enemy. At the base would be a brazier with a fire to create the necessary draught up the tube. You drop a ball of naphtha down the tube, and then you have an arc of flame a hundred or more feet high.’

Scipio looked sceptical. ‘To operate such machines would take valuable men away from the front line, men who could kill more of the enemy with their bare hands than with this contraption.’

‘They wouldn’t be legionaries. They’d be recruits of the third or fourth class, unsuited to front-line action. They’d be a specialised maniple of fire-throwers.’

Scipio pursed his lips. ‘You might use it against the wooden palisades of the Celts, but it wouldn’t be much use against a stone wall. You’d have to get close enough to project the fire over the ramparts, and then you’d be within easy range of the defenders’ arrows and javelins. As a battlefield weapon the burning naphtha falling on men would cause terrible injury, I’d grant you that, but assault under interlocked shields, the testudo, would provide a barrier, and by advancing rapidly the attacking force would soon be in relative safety, under the arc of fire.’ Scipio put his hands on his hips, thinking. ‘I can see its use in naval warfare, providing the wind was in the right direction and you didn’t burn your own ships. But for land warfare, I’d be on the centurion’s side with this one. It would be little more than a spectacle. Come on, let’s get back to the table before he arrives.’

‘Wait a moment,’ Ennius said, agitated. ‘We’ve only been thinking about a crude version, and I’d agree with you. That’s precisely why it didn’t go anywhere three hundred years ago. But my idea is different. Suppose you seal up one end of the tube, leaving only a small hole at the base to introduce the flame. And supposing you then pack the naphtha down the tube, and drop a stone or lead ball down on top of it, of a width to fit snugly in the tube and keep the gases from blowing out around it. The Greek scientists in Alexandria showed me that volatile substances can burn more violently when they are compressed into a small space. With this tube, it would not be the fire that was the weapon, but the missile. A heavy ball projected out of the tube at sufficient velocity could damage wooden walls, even stone ones. Smaller projectiles could be used on the battlefield: spheres of lead or iron, weighing less than a pound each. Thrown at high speed such a ball could decapitate a man, or tear him in half. As individual weapons, the fire tubes might not make much difference to the outcome of a battle. But massed together, fired in volleys like arrows or javelins, they could unleash hell. Even armoured men could be knocked down and killed by the shock of impact.’

Scipio stared at him. ‘Well, have you tried it?’

Ennius looked down, suddenly dejected. ‘The ball only goes part-way up the tube. The force of the naphtha isn’t powerful enough. I need a mixture that would really explode.’

Fabius cocked his ear. Over the months he had become attuned to the distinctive step of the centurion and the bang of his staff. And there it was. Thump thump bang. Thump thump bang. Soon there would be the clank of armour, the rattle of decorations on the breastplate. ‘Quick,’ he whispered to Scipio. ‘The centurion!’

Scipio clapped his hands and everyone hurried back to assemble around the table, all of them peering intently at the battle diorama. Ennius brushed the soot off himself as best he could and threw a cloth over the pots by the fireplace, then joined them. Scipio touched the small bronze gorget hanging from his neck that was the insignia of authority over the others given to him by the centurion, and straightened his sword. Fabius sniffed the air cautiously, and his heart sank. The smell of rotten eggs from the sulphur was unmistakable. The centurion was bound to notice it, and Ennius would be down doing duty with Hannibal the elephant for the next month.

He thought about Ennius’ concoction. Suddenly he remembered Julia, the ceremony she was attending today with her mother. The lictors who led the Vestal Virgins to the temple would throw clouds of coal dust into the air, and then thrust burning tapers into it. The dust would ignite, crackling and sparkling in a rainbow of colours. He glanced at Ennius, but then thought again. The last thing he wanted was for Ennius to blow up the Gladiator School. And Ennius needed to learn his place; there was a reason why the centurion came down harshly on him. Before he carried his experiments further, Ennius would need to earn his credentials in blood on the battlefield like the rest of them. Then, and only then, would men like the centurion listen to him. Fabius put the thought from his mind, and turned back to the door, tensing and coming to attention as he saw the figure who was standing there. Now the day’s training would really begin.

Marcus Cornelius Petraeus, primipilus of the first legion on three campaigns, was the most decorated soldier in the Roman army. Standing in the doorway, he looked as old and hard as an ancient olive tree, his legs and arms knotted masses of muscles and veins, his face creased and bronzed. In his left hand he carried a gilded bronze helmet capped with the crista transversa, the crest of the centurion made up of eagle feathers, and in his right hand he bore the other insignia of a centurion, the vine staff. Over his short-cropped white hair he wore the grass wreath of the corona obsidionalis, the highest Roman military decoration, awarded to him in Macedonia for killing his own tribune after the man had faltered, and for then taking over his maniple to lead it to victory. On his muscled breastplate were other decorations, the embellishments of more than forty years of war. Every time Fabius saw him at that doorway it was as if he were confronting an apparition from their hallowed past, as if the war god Mars himself had walked into the classroom. His battle credentials were second to none: the centurion had fought alongside Fabius’ own father and Scipio’s adoptive grandfather against Hannibal at Zama in North Africa, the very battle they had been war-gaming on the table in front of them.

They all knew that the centurion had intended to question them on the order of battle. From the corner of his eye Fabius could see the young arrival Gaius Paullus nervously mouthing the formation names to himself, knowing that Scipio had briefed him to answer the first questions. But then Petraeus curled his lip, sniffing. ‘What’s that reek?’ he growled. His voice was hoarse, and his accent was the rough country dialect of the Alban Hills. He smelled the air again, crinkling his nose. Ennius coughed, and looked down. Fabius closed his eyes, expecting the worst. The centurion grunted, sniffing loudly again. ‘Did someone break wind?’ His eyes alighted on Gulussa. ‘You haven’t been eating raw camel again, have you, Gulussa? I well remember your father Masinissa feeding it to us the evening before the battle of Zama. Later that night our tent stank like a sulphur mine. If someone had lit a fire, the tent would have ignited and risen into the air like a Greek firework.’ He guffawed, and waved his arm at the diorama. ‘That’s what you don’t learn here. The blood and guts of war. The smell of victory.’

Fabius let his breath out slowly. Ennius was off the hook, but they all knew that the new arrival Gaius Paullus was about to have his day of reckoning. He had been standing rigidly to attention, staring at the centurion. When Petraeus was like this, nostalgic about past battles, his hand clenching his staff, he was like a man stoking himself up for an evening in the taverns; only it was not the prospect of wine that was making his eyes gleam, but the prospect of blood. Today was the day of the month when criminals due for capital punishment were paraded into the arena, and the boys were allowed to use weapons on live victims. Today, Gaius Paullus would become a killer, if he had the stomach for it. Scipio knew the centurion would be as ruthless with Gaius Paullus as he had been with each of the others when he had first made them push cold iron into the chest of a living man.

The centurion slammed his staff down, put his helmet on and grasped the pommel of his sword. He scanned the room, his breathing harsh and quick. ‘Now then,’ he snarled. ‘Are we ready to play?’

He snapped his fingers and pointed at the nearest of three slaves standing against the wall holding trays, a tautly muscled, brown-skinned young man who looked Assyrian, his hair dark and curly and the wispy beginnings of a beard on his chin. The slave paused for a moment, uncertain what to do, and the centurion beckoned him forward. ‘Put down the tray,’ he growled. ‘Come over here.’ The slave did as he was told, and then the centurion fingered Scipio and Fabius. ‘Hold his arms,’ he said. Fabius took the slave’s left wrist, feeling the sinewy muscle in the forearm, and twisted it behind his back as he had been taught to do with prisoners in the arena; Scipio did the same on the other side. He could feel the slave tensing, expecting a beating. It would not be the first time the old centurion had used slaves to demonstrate a wrestling hold or knockout blow, an occupational hazard for slaves who had the unlucky lot of working in the Gladiator School.

The centurion drew his sword. It was a gladius, but with a more elongated leaf-shaped end than the usual Roman form, a shape they knew the centurion had ordered copied from the Iberian blades he had encountered in campaigns against the Carthaginians in Spain, before Hannibal had crossed the Alps into Italy. He held it up and put his forefinger on the tip, drawing blood, and then held the flat of the blade down on the palm of his hand, aiming the point at the slave’s upper abdomen. ‘Not to the heart,’ he said. ‘I want him to live long enough for you to see how the muscles of the body react to a blade pushed deep into it. This is how you learn.’

The slave had gone wide-eyed with terror, his mouth open and drooling. He cried something Fabius did not understand, words in his native tongue, and gazed imploringly at them. The centurion grunted, looked around and then snatched a scroll Polybius had been holding and ripped off the papyrus, thrusting the wooden spool sideways into the slave’s mouth to act as a gag. The man made a terrible noise and then retched, bringing up a dribble of vomit that sent a distasteful odour through the room. His head lolled forward, and the centurion gestured for Fabius and Scipio to grasp each end of the spool with their other hands to hold the slave’s head up. His knees were shaking and buckling, and Fabius felt the weight of his body. He saw a streak of brown drip down the man’s inner leg and smelt it, turning away and swallowing hard.

Gaius Paullus stood at the front, shorter and slighter than the others, looking barely old enough to be there, rooted to the floor and staring at the slave. The centurion pointed at him. ‘You. New boy,’ he snarled. ‘Don’t think I don’t know who you are: Gaius Aemilius Paullus, nephew of Lucius Aemilius Paullus, father of Scipio and the greatest living Roman general. I served under your father when he was a tribune. He began as a scrawny little wimp just like you, but we soon toughened him up. Let’s see if you’ve got the same mettle.’

He walked over, grasped Gaius Paullus’ right hand and put the sword hilt in it. He stood back, and the boy held the blade forward, the tip wobbling. For a moment he stood still, and all Fabius could hear was the rasping breathing of the slave, then coughing as he retched again. Gaius Paullus looked away from the slave’s terrified eyes, and then the centurion strode over and ripped open the man’s tunic, revealing the tensed muscles of his abdomen. He turned back to Gaius Paullus, leaning close to him, his face red and contorted. ‘Come on, man,’ he bellowed. ‘What are you waiting for? Drive it right through to the spine. That’ll kill him in a few seconds, but not as quickly as the heart.’

Gaius Paullus aimed the blade, and stepped forward. The slave struggled, his breathing coming hoarse and fast, and Fabius and Scipio held him upright. The tip of the blade touched the abdomen just above the navel, but the boy’s arm was extended too far forward to give the blade a good thrust; he needed to step closer, but seemed unable to do so. Gaius Paullus looked at Fabius, and in that split second he saw everything: the boy and the man, the fear and the resolve. The centurion snorted with impatience, clasped his right hand over the boy’s hand and pushed him forward, and together they thrust the blade deep into the slave’s body. The man gave a terrible groan and retched again, spattering blood and bile over the spool in his mouth. Gaius Paullus kept his nerve, thrusting harder until the bloody tip emerged from the slave’s back below the ribcage. The man’s legs slumped but his torso and arms remained rigid, as if his body were making a last attempt to resist, a final hold on life that Fabius knew would give way in moments to the throes of death.

The centurion looked at the others. ‘You see there is no blood yet from the entry wound?’ He turned to the boy. ‘Try to get the sword out.’ Gaius Paullus pulled hard, but was barely able to budge it. The centurion grunted. ‘So far this month I have taught you killer blows, thrusts to the throat and heart that bring instant death. But a thrust to the abdomen where there are walls of muscle is different. The muscles contract around the blade. If you are in battle, you need to be able to get the blade out quickly or you will be killed. You need to twist it, to use your foot. Watch me closely.’

He pushed Gaius Paullus aside, raised his right foot against the man’s abdomen, grasped the hilt of the sword and twisted it hard, then pulled it out in one clean stroke. Blood gushed from the wound and the slave’s body went limp, his jaws releasing the spool and his head arching backwards, his mouth and eyes wide open. Fabius and Scipio let go and the body fell into the slick of blood and bile that had pooled on the floor, the head hitting the stone hard and cracking open. The centurion clicked his fingers at the two remaining slaves, indicating the body, then pointed at Ennius and Gulussa. ‘You two clean up the mess here. I want this floor spotless when I return. That one wasn’t just a slave. He was a prisoner of war, a former mercenary, and his life was forfeit. All of the new batch of slaves working in the Gladiator School are like that. If any of the rest of you want to practise on one before having a go with the condemned criminals, you don’t need to ask me.’ He wiped his sword blade on the torn piece of the man’s tunic, sheathed it and looked at them. ‘We meet here again an hour before sundown. The prisoners due for execution this month include two young initiates for the Vestal Virgins caught in flagrante delicto with a slave. Gaius Paullus can bring his own sword and show us that he’s learned today’s lesson.’ He stomped off out of the room and down the corridor, the bang of his centurion’s staff receding into the gloom as he headed off towards the arena.

Gaius Paullus stood stock-still, his face and tunic spattered with the man’s blood, staring at what he had done. Scipio brought a bucket of water from by the door and a wet towel, which he tossed to him. ‘Clean yourself up. You and I need to be presentable for a temple dedication by the gens Aemilii in the Forum in an hour. And, by the way, welcome to the academy.’