Legionary (46 page)

Valens finally broke the silence with a heavy sigh. ‘My worst fears have been realised.’

Pavo sensed the bishop and Tarquitius brace slightly in their chairs.

‘The Danubius frontier has been stripped bare. Without the XI Claudia there to patrol it, we were relying on the quick response time of the I Dacia to protect us until the Claudia returned, triumphant, from Bosporus,’ he snorted, his upper lip shrivelled in distaste. ‘Yet now I find that the expensively constructed I Dacia have betrayed the empire?’ Valens curled his fist into a ball and hammered it down on the map.

Another lengthy silence ensued. Pavo felt his brow dampen and his mouth dry out.
Every moment is precious
. Before he could check himself, he felt the words tumbling from his throat. ‘Emperor, we promised Gallus, we promised the legion. We must return to them.’

Valens screwed his eyes tight and burned his glare into Pavo’s skin. ‘Do not test me any more than you already have,
boy!
’ The candidati touched their scabbards in warning.

Pavo’s spirit sunk again.

Valens scoured the map one more time. ‘But our borders
are
wide open, by God.’ His eyes keened on the small diamond shaped peninsula of Bosporus. ‘If this force, these Huns, descend on us in our current state…God help us.’ He lifted his hands and clapped them twice.

An aide rushed through the door to be by his side. ‘Emperor?’

Valens eyed each of the four as he spoke. ‘Rouse Tribunus Vitus. It is time to utilise our insurance policy.’

‘Tribunus Vitus. Insurance?’ Evagrius spoke, his voice soft. He sounded every inch the harmless snow-white mopped old man. ‘Emperor, if we could discuss this terrible misunderstanding; we were informed that these two were assassins…’

‘Enough!’ Valens cut him short. ‘The comitatenses of Asia and Greece have been on standby for some time. They have been mobilised under Tribunus Vitus, and will be ready to embark for Bosporus before dawn.’

Evagrius leaned forward, his eyes now narrowed and his face creased. ‘When was this order given?’ The bishop snapped.

Valens turned to him slowly, allowing a moment of silence to pass before replying; ‘Your emperor should not be questioned.’ Two candidati moved a step forward. Valens lifted a hand to halt them. ‘Do you think me a fool, bishop? You will be accompanying the relief force.’ Valens’ ice-cold glare curled into a menacing sneer. ‘You will be on the front line, bishop, front and centre. You will be expected to inspire our legions to victory.’ The emperor was fixed on Evagrius with a dark glare.

The bishop dropped his gaze first and slumped back in his chair with a throaty rattle.

Valens then turned to Pavo and Sura, arching one eyebrow even higher; ‘You two, you came from the wilderness outside of the empire, across the sea, infiltrated my city, then broke into my home?’

Pavo gulped his heart back down as the candidati keenly gripped their sword hilts again. He opened his mouth to speak, but his voice was gone and his tongue as dry as a dead toad.

Valens’ glare remained, but his words softened. ‘I want to flay you and exalt you at once. You are a credit to your empire, soldiers. But time is short as you say. Head immediately for the docks where you can eat, wash and then take arms once more — you are to march with the relief force.’

A man-sized rock came hammering down on the front wall of the fort, renting a jagged fissure up the wall and sending the legionaries at the top flailing as the force knocked them back into the courtyard.

‘Artillery — damn them!’ Gallus spat, watching the five dark wooden hulks at the edge of the plateau. Before the orange of dawn had fully spread across the land, the Hun hordes had spilled once more over the lip of the hilltop. But upon seeing the huge rubble mounds hugging the sides of the fort spiked with caltrops, bent spears, ballista bolts and timber shards like a pair of massive porcupines — they had backed off, not taking the bait of the narrow front left open for attack. They now waited like baying, bloodthirsty hounds, tethered behind their artillery line while the I Dacia loaded the catapults one by one. The second device fired; another rock smashed into the base of the wall — just left of the first one, and the sturdy bulwark shifted inwards. ‘They’ll be in here before the sun’s fully up at this rate. That artillery needs taking down!’

‘We can’t get to them, sir,’ Avitus snarled, punching his fist into his palm. ‘We’d need our cats up on the walls to reach them. We only need a few more paces to come into range and I promise you, they’d be firewood in no time!’

‘We can’t open the gates to push the cats out, their cavalry would be on us in a heartbeat,’ Zosimus grumbled, pulling at the thick stubble carpeting his chin.

‘The speed of cavalry is your answer,’ a voice piped up from behind them. ‘Just as you suggest.’

Gallus turned to see Horsa; the Goth had cut a subdued figure since they had holed up in the fort. Spurned by his treacherous unit, he and one other rider were all that remained of the loyal foederati now. But his good eye sparkled with an inner fire and his face was firm with determination as he straightened his eyepatch.

‘We’ve got two healthy mounts; fast ones too. Get me close enough to that artillery and I can take it down.’

‘One man to take out five catapults?’ Gallus asked.

‘No, he’ll have a man on the wing,’ another voice added. Amalric strode over to stand beside Horsa.

Pavo leant over the prow of the imperial flagship as it cut its way, full sail, through the waters of the Pontus Euxinus. The salt spray stung his eyes, but he could not tear himself from this unblemished view of the northern horizon. Gallus had been right to send them to the emperor and the emperor alone.

Valens had proved to be a shrewd thinker. He had played along with the bishop’s plan for the Bosporus mission, but a seemingly costly insurance policy of having two legions on standby had proved a cheap premium given the turn of events. Before dawn had broken, the fleets had set sail; Pavo and his party along with the contingent of some two thousand men from the garrison of Constantinople itself had set off from the city docks. Then before sun up they had rendezvoused with the fleets of the I Italica and the XII Fulminata. Some seven thousand legionaries had been tasked with racing to the wilderness of Bosporus to slam the gates to the empire firmly shut. Yet they were still massively outnumbered, and time ticked against them.

‘You and Sura did a top job, Pavo,’ Felix said, resting on a crutch beside him. ‘Don’t punish yourself for what happens next. It’s a miracle we’ve made it this far.’

‘It all counts for nothing though, doesn’t it? If we get back there to find another pile of corpses and the Huns have gone, then what? They’ll fall upon our borders before long while we’re scratching our heads, hundreds of miles away.’

‘The papyrus-thin frontiers? Yep, I’m with you,’ the optio sighed. ‘But take heart, Centurion Gallus is no mug, and he trusts in us. So he’ll have held out…
will
be holding out till the very last.’ Felix rested a hand on his shoulder before hobbling off.

Pavo turned away from the spray at last, his eyes red and his nose running. The boat was packed with idle legionaries while the oars remained retracted and the crew scrambled up and down the rigging. His gaze fell on Spurius, sitting on the deck, throwing dice with the seven of the I Dacia contingent who had survived the mission to the emperor. Spurius had been quiet since his last-minute intervention at the palace gates, quiet but contented. Maybe this was the real Spurius, he mused?

‘Funny how things turn out, eh?’ Sura spoke quietly having sidled up next to him.

‘Makes you wonder who you can really trust in the end. Nothing is as it seems.’

‘Think you could be friends?’

‘I don’t think Spurius ever really has friends — he’s a loner. I think he tolerates people rather than likes them.’

‘Well I’m glad he tolerates us now — no more looking over our shoulders.’

‘When one problem is solved, Sura, I usually find another one pretty quickly,’ Pavo sighed. ‘And we’ve got a pretty big one to deal with when we land.’

‘Aye, and there’s another one,’ Sura nodded to the solitary white-cloaked figure of Bishop Evagrius, sentinel-like at the stern. ‘You think he’s really tangled in this?’

‘It stinks, Sura. But Valens knew what he was doing in sending him here. Either he’ll inspire the legions with divine inspiration, or he’ll destroy himself. You know the saying
give ‘em enough rope?
’

Tribunus Vitus of the XII Fulminata stalked towards them. ‘Not long now, lads,’ he mused, craning his neck at the sun overhead.

‘We’ll be there by mid-afternoon — if the gods are smiling upon us.’

Pavo shot another glance at the bishop and smirked wryly at the tribunus’ choice of words.

Gallus wheezed through the dust coating him and the men on the wall. Each gargantuan boulder now ground the shattered battlements into a spray of rubble, and crimson smears along its length told of those caught under a direct hit.

‘They’re prising us open like a shellfish!’ Gallus hissed as another rock crunched down. Barely any defensible battlement remained, and only a few more hits would surely rent open a clear path into the fort. Of the defiant two hundred who had filed up onto the battlements this morning, a further seventy had been slain, and morale had dropped like one of those rocks.

‘Horsa’s nearly at ‘em, sir!’ Quadratus yelled from the timber watchtower. ‘Amalric’s just a few strides behind.’

‘Ride like the gods,’ Gallus whispered under his breath. Horsa would he would be the decoy while Amalric, weaving behind him, would hope to slip in close enough to the catapults to spring his surprise attack. They had slipped out of the side gate of the fort and dropped into a dip running around the eastern edge of the plateau. From there they had rode around the dip, obscured from Hun eyes, taking them almost up to the flank of the Hun line on the north edge of the plateau. They would be bursting into the enemy line of sight in moments. The centurion gripped the cracked crenellation in front of him, willing them on.

‘Amalric’s nearly in behind ‘em, sir!’ Quadratus cried again.

The straggle of the XI Claudia roared in support all at once as Horsa burst up to be level with the enemy. Like a porcupine, the Hun line bristled in surprise. Horsa whooped, spun his sword over his head, and galloped across the Hun front. The Huns, seeing a single rider, visibly relaxed, a detachment being sent out to slay him while the rest turned back to the fort. Just as they dropped their guard, Amalric burst out onto the plateau behind their front line, strides from the artillery.

‘He’s there!’ Avitus yelled.

The I Dacia artillerymen scrambled back in shock, crying out to the Hun spearmen, standing oblivious only paces away. But Amalric thundered forward, bringing a glowing ball of flames spinning above his head in a sling. The blazing pitch sack roared until he released it to zip across the air like a comet towards the rightmost catapult. The sack exploded in a fury of flames against the timber device. The Hun cavalry pitched forward to meet the solitary threat, but not before Amalric had unleashed the second, third and fourth sacks onto the remaining catapults.

‘They’ve done it!’ Gallus roared as the fifth catapult exploded in orange. ‘Now get our artillery trained on those riders!’ he pointed at the wave of nearly a thousand haring after Horsa and Amalric like a swarm of wasps — now in range. ‘This is the last free shot we get at them, lads. Fire at will! Take ‘em down!’

The men roared as a stone zipped through the air and ploughed right through the flank of the swarm. Gallus joined them, roaring until his lungs were spent, smashing his sword against his shield.

The roar subsided, and then died. Horsa and Amalric weaved across the plateau only to be blocked as they approached the fort by a detachment of Hun riders. Gallus watched as they wheeled round and then slipped towards the northeastern edge of the plateau and out of sight, down the hillside.
Gods be with you
, he mouthed.

The rest of the Huns, realizing they now had only one option left — to crush the pathetic remnant of the XI Claudia under weight of numbers — rumbled forward towards the shattered fort. He turned to the thin smattering of filthy and exhausted men.

‘This is it, lads. This is it!’

The two
equites
heeled their mounts into a gallop back over the lush grassy ridge, waving the all clear vigorously. Pavo’s heart pounded with anticipation.

‘We’re almost there!’ Sura cried, slapping his friend across the back. ‘One more ridge and we’re there!’ He yelled to Tribunus Vitus.

‘Forward!’ Vitus yelled in turn over his shoulder, waving the thick, shimmering column forward. He jabbed a hand at the aquilifer, who waved the purple flag on the end of the silver standard of the XII Fulminata. The equites read it at once and wheeled round to join the legionary column.

‘Well, we’ve not encountered any of their scouts yet. You said they were wrapped around the hill?’ Vitus quizzed.

‘Well, they were two days ago,’ Pavo frowned.

‘Excellent,’ Vitus rubbed his hands together. ‘A nice narrow line to smash into the back of!’

Pavo thought better of reminding the tribunus over the Hun number. A narrow line it was most definitely not. Then something flashed on the horizon — his eyes locked onto it, something dancing just above the ridge top. A topknot, then an eyepatch.

‘Horsa!’ He yelled. ‘And Amalric?’ The prince bobbed into view, dust billowing behind them.

‘They’re in a bloody hurry?’ Vitus mused. Then his eyes widened. ‘Form up to repel a cavalry charge!’

The XII Fulminata, leading the relief column, rippled into a wall of shields and plumbatae. Pavo fell back in line, realisation dawning on him as he watched; Horsa and Amalric bounded from the ridge top, thumping down onto the grass as a dark wave of arrows arced over them. ‘Sir, send the cavalry out to the flanks — I know what’s going to happen here.’