Field of Mars (The Complete Novel) (5 page)

Abgar, the Arab chieftain who had offered his services to Crassus as a translator and guide, made a sound that implied disbelief. “And who told you this?”

“We caught two of his cataphracts harassing the Seventh.”

“And you tortured them,” said Abgar, smiling.

Publius drank from a wineskin offered by a young tribune and wiped his mouth. “And you’d have offered them a villa on the cliffs of Capua?”

Abgar’s grin broadened. “One always gets the answers one wants when one separates a man from his testicles.”

Publius refused further eye contact with Abgar, whom he distrusted and detested. “If your intention is to admonish me for gathering knowledge, spare me your wisdom, Arab. The other man who watched on, fearful of receiving the same treatment, confirmed the information yielded by the one whose arm we skinned. I think we can be assured of its accuracy.”

“Which is?” asked the proconsul.

“That Abgar here has led us into this godless place to soften us up for the enemy.”

“They told you this specifically?” Crassus asked.

“Father, we cook in this cauldron solely
because
of this man’s treachery.” He jabbed a finger at Abgar. “We should have come down through Armenia, protected against the enemy’s arrows by the mountains and forests, as King Artavastes advocated. And then we should have followed the Euphrates, keeping it at our backs as Legate Cassius Longinus recommended. In so doing we could have avoided the risk of being surrounded and used the river as a supply road. Instead we trust
his
assurances that this is the best and fastest way to victory!”

“Are we surrounded now?” Abgar inquired, gesturing at the empty desert beside them.

Publius ignored him. “You agreed to these more favorable options, Father, but each time this Arab here brought you around to a lesser alternative. So now we’re in this land shunned by gods and men, out in the open, far from water and resupply and a ready target for the enemy’s arrows.”

Abgar shook his head theatrically. “You would have us march by the Euphrates and lose all surprise?”

Publius sneered. “We lost that long ago, Arab.”

“So I take it your answer is no, Publius,” said Crassus, losing patience. “No specific mentions of Abgar.”

Publius’s frustration was evident. “Where do you go, Arab – you and your countrymen? Where do you go when you ride off into the desert with no Roman escort?”

“We forage, Publius, just like your Celts.”

“And what do you forage for? Sand?”

“Just so that you know, Publius,” Crassus interrupted, “the decision to take a more direct route to the capital of the Parthians was not Abgar’s, but mine.”

“Based on his advice and assurances.” The prefect lifted his chin at the Arab.

Crassus’s impatience was growing. “Publius, what’s done is done and I stick by it. I had reasons for taking this route, chief among them to reabsorb into my army the garrisons left behind during last year’s campaigning.” Crassus gave a glance to Appias Cominius Maro, his own historian, to make a note of that. “And I command a
Roman
army, not a collection of country squires seeking the delights of Campania. The King of Armenia has never led an army of such stature as the one that marches at my bidding. And, as for this desert, I would say that to conquer the world, one must first conquer hardship.”

The prefect shook his head, his ammunition spent.

“Now, Publius, this Surenas … Do we know how many men he commands?”

“Ten thousand, Father. His personal guard.”

Crassus leaned forward in the saddle to take the stiffness out of his back, but he was pleased enough to chuckle. “Ten thousand against our forty thousand? It will be a slaughter.”

“There is King Orodes’s army somewhere out there too,” Publius warned him. “A much bigger army, and we don’t know where it is. Also, I have just come from a minor skirmish. It took around thirty legionaries and twenty of our cavalry to repel just two Parthian cataphracts and a handful of mounted archers. We lost half a dozen legionaries in the exchange. You can believe it when I say these desert horsemen are worthy adversaries. They are not the rabble we defeated last year.”

“And once you have dispatched this worthy adversary,” said Abgar, “the way will be clear for you to capture, sack or spare all the great cities of the land of two rivers, as the mood takes you.”

Crassus nodded, savoring Abgar’s summary as if it were something already come to pass.

Legate Cassius Longinus, the general charged with direct command of Crassus’s legions, brushed the flies out of his face. “Publius, what of the terrain ahead?” he asked.

“Perhaps I can answer that,” Abgar offered. “There is a river a day’s march from here, the Balikh. It feeds the Euphrates.”

“And you’re sure there’s water?” Cassius Longinus asked him.

“A whole river of it, General,” Abgar assured him playfully and with the broad smile of his that infuriated Publius.

“And
my
answer would be that all we can truly be sure of, Legate, is that there’s a lot more desert between the army and any water,” said Publius.

“A Roman army can march a long way in a day,” Abgar shrugged.

“I think I know better than you, Arab, what a Roman army can do.”

“Enough!” Crassus snapped, grown tired of the bickering. “Publius, how are the men?”

“My Celts are straining to be unleased, Father. As for the legions, the heat is extreme and the dust clogs their throats. Also, rumors are rife about the enemy. The Parthians are now believed to be ten feet tall and invincible.”

“Last year, this same army beat the Parthians from one end of Mesopotamia to the other,” Crassus said with impatience.

“Not
this
army … Proconsul, their fear is born of fatigue. I would rest them for a day, perhaps two, before offering battle to Surenas.”

Crassus’s simmering scowl told Publius none of this was what his father wanted to hear.

“I concur with Publius, Proconsul,” said Cassius Longinus, continuing the theme fearlessly. “The centurions are reporting much unrest in the ranks.”

“Where is the problem?” Abgar wondered. “I fail to see it. Surenas is heavily outnumbered, is he not? March for the river with all haste. The men will then have all the water they need. Let them rest a while there.”

Crassus turned to Appias Cominius Maro. “How about you, historian? What would your Ptolemy do? Join battle as soon as possible? Or hide behind trenches and palisades?”

“What survives of Ptolemy’s campaigns do not cover his journeys in as much detail, Proconsul,” the historian replied, eager not to be held to account by either father or son.

The exchanges had done nothing to alleviate Publius’s concern. “Father, a word, if it suits you.”

Crassus took a moment to think about it before giving his son a nod, and then followed Publius to the upwind side of the column where the air was clear of dust. The two men rode along together, their horses ambling. “Excuse my impertinence, Father,” said Publius, “if that’s what it seems.”

“No, I need the Conqueror of Aquitania to speak his mind.”

“In that case, allow me to say that I believe you put too much faith in the Arab’s counsel. Abgar knows you want this campaign concluded as soon as possible. My concern is that his advice is putting the whip to your horse. We both know he’s Pompey’s close friend and supporter. That alone is warning enough for me. Would it be beyond Pompey to have given the Arab certain instructions?”

“You’re seeing conspiracy where there is none,” said Crassus.

“Pompey would love to see you fail, we both know that.”

“I pay Abgar handsomely, with a bonus in gold to come at the successful conclusion of hostilities.”

“Pompey has gold
and
the man’s friendship,” Publius reminded him.

“Even if you’re right and Abgar lives in Pompey’s purse, Surenas is a fly blowing around our ass.”

“And we’ll come upon this fly in his own land, a land he knows well.”

“As you came upon the tribes of Aquitania in their land and subdued them.”

“Father, it’s not the same. In Gallia we had plentiful corn, meat and water and the sun was not our enemy as it is here.” Publius was reluctant to add that in the conquest of Gallia he also had Gaius Julius Caesar’s leadership to rely on, which had proved to be tactically unimpeachable. “We’ve been marching for a considerable distance in this kiln, and fought several battles already and something just doesn’t … It doesn’t
feel
right.”

“It feels fine to me,” Crassus replied.

“What’s another day, Father? Rest the men tomorrow. Once we’re refreshed we can do battle with Surenas on our terms, not his.”

“You’re wrong about Abgar. Also, the summer is yet to come upon the desert fully. These conditions are only going to deteriorate and I don’t want a day wasted.”

Publius decided on retreat. He had tried to convince his father and failed. “Yes, Proconsul. As you say.” It wasn’t as if their situation was dire, was it? The momentum of the campaign was Rome’s and numbers were on their side. There would be more important battles with Crassus to come, Publius considered. Better to lose this skirmish today in order to win tomorrow. As for Abgar, he would keep his eye on the man. And, he reminded himself, accidents happen on the battlefield.

*

Watched on by the old priests of Mithra and Ahura Mazda, Rustaham Surenas-Pahlav sat motionless and allowed the servants to finish braiding his beard while he considered possible maneuvers. The desert air flapped through the folds of the tent, keeping the direct sun off his person. On the plain around him, Surenas’s personal guard of a thousand cataphracts stood at rest, their steel armor polished so that it glittered like a sea of silver fish. Beyond them, 9,000 mounted archers and light cavalry went about the business of feeding and grooming their horses, the air alive with activity. The mood among the men was good, their confidence brimming, their eagerness to fight and win glory palpable.

“The men are in high spirits, Lord,” observed the most senior priest.

“They are,” agreed Surenas. From his slightly elevated position, the general saw a tight knot of riders gallop out of a distant dry creek bed and thunder toward the camp. “Ah,” he said aloud as if expecting them.

The men quickly closed the distance and dismounted expertly while their horses were still on the move. They ran to Surenas and kneeled on the rug spread across the dirt at his feet. Their leader, Volodates, Captain of Horse, opened his mouth to speak but the spāhbed silenced him with a raised hand.

“The Romans are where I said they would be,” Surenas said. “They continue to march into the heart of the desert.”

“Yes, Spāhbed Surenas,” answered Volodates, clearly surprised by the general’s vision. Perhaps Surenas could read the wind. The captain admired his lord and general, a man who smelled of lotus flowers in a world of horseflesh, steel and blood. How the women of his harem must fight over him, Volodates thought. The spāhbed was brimming with the vitality of a man in his prime, his skin clean and smooth, the kohl accentuating the healthy whites of his eyes.

“Have the skirmishers pull back, but keep your men in touch with the foreigners’ movement,” Surenas ordered. “I don’t expect the Romans will turn away but it’s always best to be sure.”

“Yes, Spāhbed,” the captain repeated.

“How many days’ water and food do we have?” Surenas inquired.

“Three days, Lord,” came the answer.

“Wounded?”

“Less than a hundred. All horse archers and all due to accidents. None have been wounded by the invaders.”

“Deaths?”

“Six, Lord. One accidental and five from battle wounds. Five men are missing in action.”

“Captain Volodates, what do you think of the Romans? Tell me honestly. I trust in your bravery not to tell me what you think I might want to hear.”

Ordinarily, such a speech from someone of Surenas’s rank would have put the captain on his guard, but
this
spāhbed was different. “Their infantry is fearsome, Lord. And their cavalry are skilled horsemen. They could cause us some damage; but their weapons are inferior, their armor minimal, and their arrows don’t fly as far as ours.”

Surenas considered this as a polished silver plate was held in front of him so that he could examine the handiwork on his beard. “Then we shall have to stay beyond the infantry’s swords and deal with the cavalry.” He seemed satisfied with the gleaming curls and turned back to Volodates. “How many arrows are stored?”

“Around a hundred thousand, Lord.”

“Every archer is to have two hundred arrows at his disposal.”

“Yes, Lord.” Volodates frowned, not at the spāhbed but at the problem thus presented. The captain of horse performed the calculation in his head. An archer couldn’t carry anywhere near 200 arrows into battle. And where would they find the material for the many hundreds of thousands of additional arrows now required, the iron for the arrowheads and the feathers for each arrow’s flight?

Surenas had an idea – that much was obvious to Volodates. Was it possible he knew what the Romans would do before the Romans themselves knew? The captain wished he could anticipate the actions of men as his lord and general did. And then, perhaps, just like Rustaham Surenas, he too would have the ear of King Orodes.

Surenas stood and walked among his men, admiring them. “Captain Volodates. Assemble the captains and the signalers an hour before sunset. We must discuss strategy for the battle to come.”

With the sun still high above the endless horizon, relief spread through the army once the walls of the night’s marching camp came into view. Ahead lay the promise of a secure night’s rest, food, and water, as well as relief from the choking dust. All of this lightened their feet. Century after century, hundreds of them marched through the lines of men hard at work. Fellow legionaries had been drafted from each of the centuries and sent ahead with the engineers to build the camp, their steel picks digging trenches into the hard baked ground while others piled the sand and rocks into wicker baskets and stacked them into ramparts.

As Rufinius and his century passed through the gate, walls were still going up and artillery crews were toiling to get their catapults into place behind them. The air was alive with the sound of men’s voices competing with the strike of metal on stone, the smell of horse and human sweat pungent in the air. In more hospitable climes, the camp for the night would have been largely made from local wood and completed by the time the army proper arrived, but the desert made everything so much more difficult.

The Fourth Syrian Legion, Tenth Cohort, Sixth Century – Rufinius’s century – continued its march to the area it always occupied in camp, the same area no matter where that camp happened to be pitched. This was the practice with every century that made up the army. It was only once they reached their designated area that the men broke step and each contubernium went about staking out the areas their tents would occupy, scratching lines of ownership in the hard dirt and unpacking their baggage poles. A pile of palisade stakes soon accumulated, each legionary adding to it with the three he carried. In an army of 40,000 that was a lot of palisade stakes. They would all be used in the defense of the camp, either jammed into the top of the stone walls, or lashed together to form tripod obstacles, or grouped into hedgehog barriers to break up cavalry attacks beyond the walls. Alongside the stakes stood a stack of wicker baskets that would be filled and formed into ramparts and other barricades.

Figulus, the legionary with the rank of decanus elected by the contubernium to be its sergeant, motioned at the stakes and baskets. “Albas, Libo, take those to the gate.”

Albas crouched, giving his leg muscles a rest. He stood with a groan. “What I wouldn’t give for a nice soft pile of hay to lie in,” he said.

“What I wouldn’t give for a nice soft whore to lie
on
,” Libo countered, bundling up stakes and baskets in his enormous arms. “And while last I looked there was no spare hay in the baggage train, there were luscious tits aplenty.”

“I heard we picked up some Armenian whores that came along with their cavalry,” ventured Carbo, stretching his back.

“Yeah,” said Gracchus. “There’s a red-head pleasure whore who’s pretty special, though she’s not Armenian. Trained in the arts of love and from the far distant isle of Britannia, I’ve heard told. Hands off that one – you’ll know her when you see her. You’d think her hair was on fire. When we clear this desert, I’m gonna see if she likes the look of my sestertii.” He grinned.

“You and a thousand other cunni,” observed Libo, pausing with his load. “Tonight I’m going for something more practical; get myself some bedding with plenty of fat and oversize mammaries to put between me and this hard ground. I’m gonna get me a good night’s sleep even if it kills her.”

Libo walked off, Albas trailing behind him carrying a towering stack of baskets. “Forget Aristotle, Libo. You are truly wise.”

“Who’s Aristotle?” Rufinius heard Libo say before the camp noise swallowed their conversation.

The optio took a handful of water from his wineskin and used it to wash the caked dirt away from around his pale blue eyes, then drank what remained in the skin. The whole century was running dry. He scanned the area for a water donkey among the thousands of men preparing their own coming needs from their kit, but as usual couldn’t see one. There were rumors of a river. Where was it? He hadn’t sighted it as they marched up the slight rise into camp. Perhaps the walls of the camp enclosed a well or a spring …

Tesserarius Paleo came over to have a word. “Not such a great place to make camp, primor. No food to forage.”

“Food isn’t the problem.” He motioned to Figulus that he wanted a word and the decanus came over and joined them. “Have Dentianus scrounge some water for us.”

“Dentianus!” Figulus snapped. “Why are you lolling around like Bacchus after an orgy with a phalanx of nymphomaniacs? Sharpen those light fingers of yours and go find us a water donkey.”

Dentianus rolled onto his hands and knees and reluctantly rose to his feet. Rufinius allowed himself a smile at Figulus’s friendly abuse. While in Perugia, the merchant employing Dentianus had chased the Italian out of the country and ultimately into the legions. He’d paid some toughs to murder Dentianus for stealing from him, the legionary having earned a reputation as a thief. But on this particular occasion it happened to be the man’s wife who was doing the stealing, all so that she could pay Dentianus to sleep with her. According to Dentianus, when the merchant learned the truth he was more worried about his disappearing coin than he was about being cuckolded.

“Well, what are you waiting for?” snapped Figulus.

Dentianus shook his head and began to walk off.

“Take your gladius, legionary,” said Rufinius. “You know the rules. Enemy territory.”

“Yes, primor.” Dentianus grumbled under his breath some more as he backtracked several steps to get his sword and slip it over his shoulder.

“Have you noticed, Optio, that no one is particularly happy to be here,” observed Paleo, stating the obvious.

Rufinius grunted. Legionnaires were only happy to be on campaign once the enemy was vanquished and the spoils divided.

“You know about the bad omens before we left?” Paleo continued. “Publius stumbling at the gate of the treasury at the Temple of Atargatis, Crassus then tripping over him … Then there were all those ships Crassus lost sailing from Brundisium with his conscripts. And don’t forget the proconsul’s own standard picked up by a sudden breeze and carried into the Euphrates.”

Rufinius was aware of these portents of disaster doing the rounds among the men, but currently he was more concerned with the immediate practical realities facing the century: sunburn, heat stress, and insufficient supplies of potable water.

“The gods don’t want us here. They made that plain,” Paleo continued. “But we ignored them and so they’re making it difficult for us.”

“Uh-huh.”

“Well, that’s what I think, primor, and I’m not alone.”

“You won’t fan the flames, though, will you,” Rufinius warned Paleo. “I don’t want our men presenting their backs to the enemy because they think that would make the gods happier. Don’t forget we have a commander who is not averse to decimation.”

Paleo nodded. Marcus Licinius Crassus’s reputation had preceded him.

All this talk prompted Rufinius not to ignore the gods. He should make an offering to Atargatis, the chief deity of his new home in Hieraopolis, northern Syria; and Bellona, the Roman god of foreign wars. He would remind both gods that he had sacrificed a bull to each before departing on the second year of this campaign, to guarantee victory and an injury-free homecoming with a full purse.

“Ah,” said Paleo, looking over Rufinius’s shoulder. “They’re here.”

Rufinius turned and saw familiar faces: their slaves leading the mule and oxen that carted the contubernium’s mountain of essential supplies.

“At last! Where have you pig’s genitalia been?” said Carbo, glancing up as he alternated between pissing on a scorpion scuttling across the sand and his blister-covered feet.

“Eating your dust, vagina breath,” said Mena, the one-eyed, middle-aged Syrian hag owned by Rufinius. The lid covering the scar tissue that was once her eye had been tattooed with a startling blue eyeball to frighten away bad spirits. She unstrapped the contubernium’s leather tent and pulled it down from the mule’s back, assisted by Popixia, an older Carthaginian man of indeterminate age, owned by Tesserarius Paleo. The slave wore a wooden peg on the end of his leg, strapped on with leather, his left foot having been hacked off as a boy by a former owner for the crime of trying to run away. Rufinius and Paleo shared their slaves with the contubernium, its own slaves and mule having perished on the march.

“Set the tent there,” Figulus directed them, pointing to the lines marked in the sand.

Rufinius surveyed the bustling camp. On the highest point was the proconsul’s praetorium, his headquarters, identified by a banner hanging limp in the airless afternoon heat. The large square standard bore Crassus’s name and the knot of Hercules, the proconsul’s personal motif.

Through the press of activity and the cacophony that came with it, Rufinius caught sight of his commanding officer, Centurion Marius Pontius, making his way through the legionaries, the men taking a break from their duties to salute him. Pontius, a burly centurion of the lower ranks, was made entirely of scar tissue and hard gristle. He was a man with more than thirty years of campaigning under the aquilas, a fine soldier with a legendary reputation for bravery and swordsmanship, having twice won the Silver Cup for killing and stripping an enemy in single combat, the Torque and Amulae for bravery, and the Civic Crown, awarded for being the first man to scale an enemy wall. Unfortunately, however, Pontius’s prowess on the field was eclipsed by the sharpness of his tongue off of it, lashing at least one tribune too many for ineptitude. This had resulted in him being passed over continuously for promotion to more senior positions.

Rufinius caught Marius Pontius’s attention and then picked his way toward him through slaves, mules, partly erected tents, and heat-exhausted men lying on the bare earth or wearily unpacking their baggage poles.

“Centurion,” said Rufinius, saluting.

“Kill the formalities, Rufinius. Too stinking hot,” Marius Pontius said to his lieutenant, looking around him. “What’s your take on the men?”

Morale was on the low side. “They’ll be fine once the fighting starts.”

“I don’t know whose genius idea it was to march straight through the deserts of Mesopotamia. Here’s hoping it didn’t come from the man who’ll be making the army’s dispositions when the enemy finally shows itself in force.”

Rufinius agreed. Marching 40,000 men across the desert was either pure hubris or someone was in a blind hurry. Perhaps it was both.

“How you doing for water?” the centurion inquired.

“Running low. Is there a spring?”

“Not as far as I know,” Pontius said, his bald head caked with a paste of desert dust and sweat. He rubbed his hand over it then wiped it on a rag pulled from the side of his cuirass. “There’s talk of a river half a day’s march from here. Apparently, we’re nearly through the worst of this desert, but that hasn’t been verified by any speculatores as far as I know.”

“And the enemy?”

“We’re taking a few arrows and there’s some harassment of the column’s tail. Aside from that, they’re laying low from all reports. Even a demoralized Roman army commands respect.”

Further down the lines of contubernia, a couple of legionaries kicked a donkey found to have empty water barrels and it squealed and bucked several times as it ran into the empty desert, the handler in pursuit.

“Do what you can to secure additional water supplies for our men,” the centurion continued, returning to the legion’s most pressing concern, “though anyone not doing exactly that is a fool, so I don’t like your chances. Might be an idea to keep the men’s whoring to a minimum, assuming they’ve any stamina left for it. At the very least tomorrow will be a copy of today.” The centurion flashed his optio a grin that was missing several teeth, and placed a grimy hand on his shoulder. “Keep the men’s spirits up and their swords sharp, Tullus Bassius Rufinius. It’s not all bad. There’s gold in our future, I can feel it.”

Rufinius returned the grin. “I like the sound of that, primor.”

“Now … the legate has seen fit to move our century forward in the ranks. I will command the cohort.”

“That’s good news, primor,” said Rufinius, thinking as much for his own fortune as for his centurion’s. Leading the cohort was a prestigious and conspicuous place to fight.

“I suspect I have your fame with the gladius to thank for it.”

“Primor?”

“You’re soon to be promoted, centurion. You’re at the top of the list if anyone should fall over.”

The optio was surprised.

“You deserve it, Rufinius. Along with your reputation, ours is probably the legion’s best-drilled century – that’s all you. You’ve been noticed. Congratulations.”

“Thank you, primor.”

“If I hear anything more of interest, I’ll let you know.” Pontius turned away and continued his casual inspection of the men. Rufinius took a moment to watch him go while he considered the prospects of promotion. Of course, it was something he wanted – it would mean more pay and more responsibility – but a centurion like Pontius would have to die before he could wear a galea bearing the transverse crest, so it was a sword with two edges.

The optio took the long way to return to his contubernium, stopping now and then to convey Marius Pontius’s advice about laying in supplies of water to the legionaries. Arriving back where he started in the closing minutes of daylight, Rufinius found the junior officers’ tent he would share with Paleo and the century’s cornicen erected alongside the contubernium’s larger tent, as was normal practice. The air swirled with the competing smells of baking bread and smoldering animal dung – collected by the muleteers, compressed into cakes and sold at exorbitant prices – to fuel the ovens.

Mena produced a small wooden stool for Rufinius to sit on and handed him a wineskin. He took a long grateful draft of the watered wine, felt the magic spread through his body, and joined the men watching on in hungry silence as Popixius pulled the lid off the oven with a dirty cloth and lifted out two loaves of bread. Mena cut up the loaves and two thick slices each were handed around, first to Rufinius, followed by Paleo, then Figulus, and then the rest of the men, along with a plate for each containing olives, strips of dried fish, and a dollop of thick, sweet honey. The ration was meager and Rufinius was intensely aware of his hunger, having eaten only a couple of slices of salted bread all day, but he ate slowly, savoring it.