Legionary, page 28
‘It’ll be dark by the time we set off,’ Frugilo grumbled, peeling off his cap and mopping his scalp for the hundredth time. ‘What are we bloody well waiting for?’
‘Them,’ said Pavo.
He guided Frugilo’s attentions to the north. There was something in the air there. First, the heat haze rippled, in the way the surface of a calm pond changes when a handful of shingle is tossed into it. Next, a new and entirely different chorus of horns sounded – deeper, almost discordant, and rising to a shrill keen. Finally, the north spewed forth a broad and long train of armoured men.
‘Goths,’ Frugilo drawled. ‘The emperor decided to call them up after all?’
‘He had no choice,’ said Pavo. ‘We need the manpower.’ He squinted to identify the squadron of horsemen at the fore. Reiks Faustius led them, dressed in white and gold imperial armour, holding aloft a hand of greeting. His few hundred cavalrymen were – in contrast – more tribal in appearance, most clothed in leathers and furs, their powerful mounts caparisoned in bronze and black leather straps. Behind marched a long train of several thousand Gothic spearmen and chosen archers – a train of bobbing topknots and ancestral totems mounted on poles.
Frugilo squinted to examine the mass approaching. ‘How many?’
‘Four of the six Haims,’ answered Pavo. ‘Reiks Faustius, Garamond, Sigibert and Alaric. They’ll almost double our numbers. They say Maximus has built up his forces to over thirty-thousand strong? Well, this will give us nearly forty thousand.’
Yet as the mass of men neared, he saw no other groups following in their wake. Faustius’ army was alone, he realised. Six thousand or so men; a quarter of what was expected. Naturally, he looked to Stilicho. ‘This is it? We need more,’ he said quietly.
‘All is in hand,’ said the Protectores commander. ‘The three other Haims had some issues in their mustering. They are delayed, that is all. They will take the north road and rendezvous with us in Dacia. Together, we will march on into Pannonia.’
Pavo felt a deep discomfort – as he always did when plans were wrenched and twisted beyond his control. It was something he had learned to acknowledge and to let the feeling pass. It was a fool who thought he could carefully plan a war and its every turn. By its very nature, war was a game of change, a writhing beast.
‘But your point is sound, Pavo,’ Stilicho added. ‘We do need even more men still.’ A great crunch of sand and shale sounded from the south. ‘And here they are.’
Pavo – like most others in the forming column – twisted to look. There, two score transport liburnians ground onto the shore of the Propontis. Gangplanks were thrown down, and a multitude of armoured infantry and riders began to disembark, winding towards the waiting imperial column.
Not Romans, not Goths.
‘Iberians,’ Pavo said, recognising the swarm of darker skinned, bronze-clad spear infantry. They wore shaggy tufts on their helms, and on their shoulders.
A vast wing of pale-skinned horsemen cantered down from another boat. ‘Alani,’ said Frugilo. They sported flowing fair hair and copper rings dangling from their ears.
‘Aye,’ said Stilicho. ‘They were our auxiliaries out in the Armenian mountains. Now that the Persians have taken on the burden of policing most of that land, these fighters have been freed up – and so I had them and the others shipped across the Pontus Euxinus to join us.’
Pavo tried to estimate the size of the reinforcements. Another seven thousand troopers, all told, he guessed. Now the myths and rumours of Maximus and his colossal army did not seem so daunting. This could be done, he told himself – the West could be liberated. ‘Hold on,’ he said, spotting another swarm of riders – darker, different, streaming down from the boats too. ‘Is that…’
‘Oh fuck,’ Frugilo uttered.
‘Huns?’ Pavo finished, almost choking with surprise. His eyes swept across this band – seven hundred strong – of stocky, goatskin-clad horsemen. Wan and strangely-featured, with tribal scars on their faces, the Huns had a few times served the empire as mercenary bands like this. But, by far and away, Pavo’s experience of these lethal horsemen was very different. More often than not, when the Huns showed up, devastation quickly followed.
‘I encountered them in the Persian court, where they were serving the King of Kings as a personal guard unit. He granted them to me. They are loyal,’ Stilicho insisted, ‘and powerful. They fly like raptors! Maximus will have no answer for them on the battlefield.’
‘The numbers do indeed begin to tilt,’ said Lucius the Protector, nearby, his eyes narrowly regarding the influx of outland auxiliaries as they joined the huge Roman column.
The zing of a sword being ripped from its sheath rang out. All twisted to see Emperor Theodosius, blade aloft. ‘The time has come,’ he said, chopping his sword down and pointing it towards the horizon. ‘To the West, to topple the tyrant, Maximus. For God! For the Empire!’
Bishop Gregory and his monks and clerics repeated these words, and all across the long column of the Eastern army, the chaplains echoed this. The pagans amongst the ranks cried out more personal oaths: ‘For Mithras! May Mars walk with us.’ These shouts drew dirty looks from the Christians. Equally, when Reiks Faustius’ Goths began drumming their spears on their shields in a mighty tribal barritus, pagan and Christian eyes allied to turn sourly upon them. The Huns, Alani and Iberians simply competed to shout and hoot louder than all others. Despite the tensions, the zeal all began to mix into one great sonorous roar, the trumpets blared again… and the huge silvery snake of armed men moved out, as the East marched to make war with the West.
Peregrinus moved off with the column. It had been a wonderful start to the day, just as it had been a perfect month since he had thrown Pavo the Protector off the scent that night in the cistern.
But the unexpected arrival of these Huns, Alani and Iberians had spoiled his mood. The words of the other Protector, Lucius, rang over and over in his mind:
The numbers do indeed begin to tilt…
This would not do, he mused. Not at all…
Part IV
Chapter 21
June 388 AD
The Via Militaris
With a clatter of armour, the Eastern Army moved like a spear along the sun-washed Via Militaris, with the Huns and Alani screening one flank, and the Iberians on the other.
Every few days they passed major cities – Adrianople, Philippopolis, Sardica. These were special moments. Petals rained from the walls and triumphant paeans sailed from the rooftops as the people cheered the legions’ journey to war. Unlike at the capital, there was little discontent about taxes or religion in these parts – instead, the people were solely concerned about the threat of Maximus. News of his crimes in the West had spread, and the tales had somewhat grown wings and horns. Some said he had beheaded every child in Mediolanum. Others claimed he had burned down the Basilica of Paul the Apostle and the ancient Temple of Jupiter Capitolinus in Rome – offending pagan and Christian alike. Some of those who had spent too much time in the sun even claimed Maximus himself had sprouted wings and horns.
On the thirteenth day they passed the market city of Naissus. Civilians flooded out to cheer them on, to offer the soldiers fresh water, wine and bread, and all manner of other services.
Pavo, blowing droplets of sweat from the end of his nose, could not quite believe what he was hearing when a prostitute, keeping up with Frugilo’s marching step, offered the man something that sounded like a torture method. Frugilo seemed interested though, and set about haggling. When he had worn her down to forty percent of the original fee and still persisted in trying to get more of a discount, she gave up and dropped away from the column, crestfallen.
Tight as a bull’s arse in fly season, Pavo chuckled inwardly. It was good to see him more like himself again. He had seemed so irritable and cold this last while.
The march became dogged as that day wore on, the sun burning like a brand on their necks, the road intolerably dusty. When at last the horns blew to bring the day’s trek to an end, the troops exhaled in one great, exhausted sigh of relief.
The ground by the northern side of the marching road was good and flat, and the vanguard had already marked out the perimeter of the night’s marching camp with ropes and pegs. Pavo fell out, appraising the campaign army as he unbuckled his armour. These moments – on the road to combat – were always strange. A tension lurked in the air; ghosts of what was to come drifting amongst the living. Many of the legionaries dealt with this in the time-honoured way – by breaking into their wine rations and warming their blood.
Pavo was too thirsty for wine. Taking a water skin from one of the wagons, he thumbed the stopper out and drank half in one draught, then poured a splash on his face and neck. As he blinked the water from his eyes, he spotted a familiar face. Eriulf, striding towards his command tent. The pair hadn’t had a chance to speak since that day on the stairs just before the strategy meeting.
‘Eriulf,’ he called to him. ‘Eriulf!’
But the man seemed deaf, or in a trance, as he vanished inside his tent.
The cages of crows inside cawed and flared their wings as Eriulf unbuckled his armour and set aside his cloak and weapons. Sitting by a candle lit earlier by a slave, he looked around, breathing slowly, then blew it out.
The darkness was soothing. When he closed his eyes, it became complete. For years, he had spent entire evenings like this. For the dark opened the window to his soul, and to the past.
Deep in the realm of the mind’s eye, he saw Runa, cavorting through the woods back in the north, her skin smooth with youth and her childish laughter echoing as she went. As he ran after her, he could even smell the pine-scent and the woodsmoke, hear the buzz of the tribal pipers. The Feast of Wodin was always a special time – something crackled in the air throughout those days. He slowed, looking up through the lacelike canopy of branches.
‘Can you feel it, Runa… the magic… the greatness?’
When she did not reply, he looked ahead: she was gone. Sadness crept around him like a shroud, suffocating the precious memory, blotting out the colours of the trees and the sky, dampening the sounds and withdrawing the smells.
‘Runa?’ he called down the forest trail, forlorn. ‘Please come back to me. I need you. I need you to understand how I feel. Things are changing. I cannot do the thing I swore to you I would. I cannot-’
In one blinding sheet of light, he was ripped back to reality: the tent, the stink of sumpter mules and soldier latrines, the chatter and clatter of thousands outwith this bubble of goatskin. Bagulf the praepositus stood in the open tent flap with a dark crow on his wrist. A shiver danced up Eriulf’s back as he saw the look on the man’s face – furtive, edgy. This was Vesi business.
‘It flew in moments ago, Master,’ Bagulf said, stroking the crow’s wing. ‘From the north, beyond the lake.’
‘Then the three Haims are on the move,’ Eriulf said, recognising the crow’s colouring as he placed it in an empty cage.
‘Aye, Master. They are moving towards the rendezvous as planned. All that remains to be decided is what happens when they get there.’ He eyed the ground outside the tentflap to make sure nobody was lurking out there, then dropped his voice to a whisper. ‘We could send word back – tell them to make haste to the rendezvous and prepare a mighty ambush there. The Huns are restive. I think they would side with us if we were to speak with them. The Alani too. Your Thervingi legion, and many of Faustius’ men also,’ he stopped to chuckle. ‘Faustius is so blind that he does not even realise how few of his followers respect the peace as he does. This could be it, Master: the moment we have been waiting for – with the emperor and his army out here, a full day’s march from the nearest city. Let me send back a blood crow.’ He gestured to the cages and to a rust-coloured bird in particular. ‘Let it begin.’
Eriulf did not answer for an age. Instead, he thought again of the lost past in the wilds. In particular those final days, when the Claudians had lived with them for a spell, then helped bring them safely into imperial lands. Did it make him a fool, he wondered, to both hate the empire and to love it also? Particularly the small, scruffy band of legionaries who had put their lives in danger to save his kin? He looked to the tentflap, seeing Libo and Durio out there laughing and joking at their campfire. Pavo too, standing watch near the emperor’s tent with that odd corpse-faced man, Frugilo.
You know what to do, Brother… Runa whispered.
‘No!’ he snapped, a tear falling from his eye.
‘Master?’
‘Leave me, Bagulf.’
‘But Master, the crow.’
‘I said leave me! There will be no crow, no signal, no attack. The Haims will come and they will serve the emperor on this campaign.’
The crows flared and squawked in distress at their keeper’s fiery words.
‘Master, this is not our way. We live to see the Romans fall and-’
‘There will be no attack!’ Eriulf shouted him down. ‘Do you understand?’
Bagulf looked disgusted.
‘I said… do you understand?’
‘Yes… master.’ Bagulf backed out of the tent, bowing slightly, barely disguising a sneer of contempt.
Peregrinus smiled. He had always benefited from keen senses, particularly his acute hearing. Ever since that night at the river battle when he had realised that Eriulf was the Vesi Master, he had studied the Gothic officer furtively and often. Gradually, he had picked up the tribal meaning of the coloured messenger crows. A red-feathered ‘blood crow’ would bring the Haims smashing down upon the Roman column? How very interesting. That the Vesi Master – the man supposedly at the head of this staunchly anti-Roman sect – would not allow it was more interesting still.
He watched and waited until the hours of darkness. When, finally, Eriulf emerged and trudged towards the latrines, Peregrinus crept over and entered the tent, admiring the array of crows. His fingertips brushed against the thin bars of the red one’s cage. With a mere movement of a finger, he could open the cage… and bring disaster. His hand hovered there for a time.
If the three Gothic Haims on their way here attacked, they would certainly damage the campaign force… but there was no guarantee that they would win. Yet they almost certainly would guarantee that the campaign was abandoned and that Theodosius would retreat back to Constantinople to lick his wounds and repair the damage. That would not do, not at all. He had promised the Dark Eagle a great war, after all.
‘No, not you,’ he cooed to the creature at last, his hand moving to the next cage.
Eriulf tramped back to his tent, his head full of conflict, his heart heavy. By choosing to spare his Roman friends, he was betraying his Gothic people, his sister. If he were to appease his kith and kin, then men like Pavo and the Claudians would perish. It was a poisoned choice.
He swept the tentflap aside and entered. Inside, his crows cawed in angst.
‘Quieten down,’ he sighed in their direction. He had trained them as messengers, but in truth he was rather fond of them. He looked at the red bird that Bagulf had compelled him to set loose. The conflict within rose to new heights. It was only after a time that he noticed the cage adjacent was empty. His brow furrowed: the cage door was unlocked too. ‘White wing?’ he called, looking around the tent. ‘White wing?’
The other crows cawed in distress, as if trying to tell their master what had happened.
Days slipped past in a blur, and the ritual of it all grew hypnotic: Rising at dawn to strike camp; onto the Via Militaris with the rattle of boots and hooves and bursts of doggerel verse over the hours of daylight; then the weary construction of another camp as night fell once again.
One sunset, at the end of the nineteenth day on the march, Pavo scooped off his helm and unbuckled his dusty armour, stowing it by the Protectores’ tent. The hot sweat gluing his tunic to his skin mercifully evaporated in the early evening breeze. He walked to the water barrels and dunked his head into the gloriously cold water, streams of bubbles shooting across his face. He drank a bellyful of it then filled his drinking skin, looking around the camp as he did so. For the last six nights, he had been on active sentry duty, standing guard beside the emperor’s tent for a three hour shift. Tonight, he was off-duty. What to do?
He looked across to the Protectores’ tent – inside sat Lucius, filing his nails, and the two other off-duty guards in there ate in silence, ignoring one another. There was little in the way of camaraderie amongst the twelve Protectores. The “Emperor’s Shields” were competitive and cold, rarely engaging in conversation – very much the antithesis of the legion spirit he was used to. He glanced over to the Claudian area, seeing the dusk silhouettes of the lads preparing their evening meals. As much as he wanted to, he felt it would be wrong to join them. He had experienced retired commanders lurking around their old duties before – it was rarely helpful to the unit.
Thus, he sat by himself and kindled a small cooking fire, the owl-light fading to black around him. Every wave of laughter and chatter from the Claudian and other legionary areas made him ache for the days of the past. As the night air grew cool, he realised how very alone he felt. So, he began to rub his hands in front of the fire, thinking of home. It only made him feel sadder to imagine the farmhouse lying empty. And when he tried to think of Izodora and Marcus in Constantinople, he felt like bawling aloud.
As if to remind him of his lack of companionship, Pulcher’s voice boomed in song from over by the Claudian tents:
We shine and clatter like soldier kings,
With the wind of Mithras under our wings…
And then all of the legion joined him for a night-shaking chorus:
‘…for we are the watchmen of Thraaa-cia!’
Pavo smiled and sighed at the same time. It was going to be a long night.
‘Get your chops around that,’ said Frugilo, arriving from nowhere, tossing him a hunk of bread and spreading out a cloth to reveal a round of cheese.
