Marius' Mules VII: The Great Revolt (28 page)

One of the other lesser chieftains cleared his throat. ‘Defences.’

‘Precisely. My scouts tell me that direction is heavily fortified, particularly against cavalry, for Caesar knows well our strength. And Caesar has eight legions and their auxiliary support, plus his few regular cavalry. Their numbers are, even at a minimum, the match of ours. Yes, they are starving, but they are also tightly secured behind strong defences. An attack by us would be throwing away men as though casting stones into a lake. If you wish to attack Caesar, I will not stop you, but you will not take the Arverni or our clients on your doomed escapade. The least tactician among you should be able to see the foolishness of such a course of action.’

‘Then we wait?’ the irritated noble snapped to hide the colour rising in his cheeks.

‘We wait for Caesar to break off his siege. Then we resupply from Avaricon, and then we can move against him if need be, though I am still inclined to wait upon the Aedui, for they are the key in this war. In the meantime, if you fear for your townsfolk, Gannascos, have a single man negotiate the swamp and take word to them. Tell them that if they wish to flee the city and they can manage the swamps, they are welcome at our camp.’

* * * * *

The gathering of Biturige warriors hefted their weapons and wrapped their goods into bags they could carry on their shoulders. Cavarinos sighed as he leaned on the rail in front of the house he had called home now for the weeks he had languished in Avaricon.

‘You truly intend to leave?’

‘This place is doomed. We go to join the army.’

The Arverni noble rolled his eyes. ‘Avaricon
will
be doomed if its fighting men sneak out in the last hour of the night to wade through swamps and leave its women and children to fight off the Romans.’

Next to him, Critognatos shook his head and winced at the pain from the tightly-bound wound in his shoulder where some unseen foe had stabbed him in the press on the ramp. ‘There are less than a hundred of them. They will make no great difference to the manning of the walls, but a hundred less mouths to feed will enable us to withstand the siege for longer.’

‘It just means that the Romans will find more grain waiting for them when they take Avaricon because we are short of men!’

‘Teutatus, Taranis and Anvallus preserve you,’ offered one of the warriors. ‘We must go now, while the dark still conceals our passage.’

‘Let them go,’ Critognatos grunted.

‘No.’ Both men turned to see a woman standing in the doorway of a house across the street. She was a commoner in ragged clothes and with tangled, matted hair, but the fire in her eyes and the strength in her voice gave her a strange nobility to Cavarinos’ mind.

‘What?’ snapped one of the warriors in the street.

‘You would flee like cowards and leave your womenfolk to fight? I say no.’

‘It is not your place to question us, hag!’

The woman folded her arms defiantly. ‘Then consider this: for you to leave, we have to unbar and unblock one of the gates. Without the bridges, you will have to use one of deer trails through the marsh. All it then takes is for one Roman scout to see you and then Caesar is aware of the trail. Then we are in twice the peril. I say no. A hundred cowards fleeing could cost us our chance of survival.’

Cavarinos blinked at the woman. There was no denying her logic, and he could see the same thought dancing around the expressions of the warriors gathered in the street. He looked at his brother, and even Critognatos was nodding at the sense of it.

‘She’s right,’ he said. ‘No one leaves.’

‘How will you stop us,
Arvernian
?’

‘
I
will stop you,’ the woman snapped. I, and the others. We will tell the Romans where you are, so that they can pick you off in the swamp. What is it to be, Eridubnos, son of Garo the fisherman?’

The warrior narrowed his eyes, his whole body trembling with anger, but he said nothing. Other men and women, both noble and commoner, young and old were appearing in doorways, and a knot of them had gathered blocking the street ahead with folded arms.

‘Drop your bags and get to the walls,’ Cavarinos said quietly but firmly. ‘Dawn is not far off, and the light will bring with it fresh hell.’

* * * * *

Fabius and Furius stood in the awning of the latter’s tent as they helped each other into cuirasses and baldrics, passed over helmets and swords. Between moments of labouring into uniform, the two tribunes from the Tenth legion peered out into the deep grey and the torrential rain that had begun with the rising of the sun and as yet showed no sign of letting up. Blown sheets of rain gusted across the hillside.

‘I will be glad to leave Gaul, whether we win the place or lose it,’ Fabius grumbled.

‘I’ve never known a place with such depressing spring weather,’ agreed his friend, and reached out from the shelter of the leather flap to allow the falling rain to blatter on his open palm. ‘It’s a wonder the whole bloody place doesn’t wash away into the sea.’

‘But in summer it can get damned hot,’ Fronto muttered as he stepped into view from the tent’s side, his cloak wrapped tight around him, his crest looking soggy and limp. His face bore that tell-tale expression of little sleep and regretful hangover.

‘I can’t believe he’s got soldiers working in this,’ Furius said quietly. ‘The men are already feeling restive and bleak after that debacle last night.’

The three men peered out into the downpour. A rumble of thunder rolled over the hills to the north, as if to highlight the misery. Avaricon was only barely visible through the grey sheets of water, a darker shape rising through the dismal air. Small detachments of men were just visible moving about on the ramp - four centuries had been committed and told to take it slowly and carefully. Their remit had been an attempt to repair the minor fire damage to the towers, straighten the vineae, replace the pulley ropes and fill in the sunken pits in the ramp with baskets of gravel. They were not to engage the enemy, and were to keep themselves safe, even if it meant slow work. After all, there would be no missiles from the walls in this weather.

‘Caesar is never a predictable man,’ Fronto reminded them. ‘And therein lies the reason for my visit. The senior officers of the Ninth, Tenth, Eleventh and Twelfth have been called into a meeting. The general wants to see us all as soon as. Due to my… circumstances… we’re already late.’

The two tribunes finished adjusting their armour, threw the heavy wool cloaks about them and nodded to their commander. Taking a preparatory breath, the three men stepped out into the battering rain and hurried across the gloopy mud to the general’s tent, where Aulus Ingenuus and two of his men gestured for them to enter without challenging them.

As well as the commanders and officers from the four named legions the rest of the staff were present, as well as the legates from the other legions. It came as no surprise to Fabius and Furius that they were the last to attend. Rare was the meeting for which Fronto was on time, and word was that he had spent three of the five hours the army had rested since the night’s chaos drinking with Antonius, which was always a recipe for disaster and usually ended up with Fronto in a bad mood.

‘Good. Now we’re
all
here,’ Caesar said pointedly, his eyes lingering on Fronto for a moment, ‘time to explain the morning’s plans.’

The officers shuffled slightly in the expectant silence. Every man present had assumed that the day would go on as it was, small units repairing the damage so that the army was in a position to re-build the ramp to the correct height when the storm finally passed. A crack of thunder slightly closer filled the silence.

‘I have given the Bituriges what they expect,’ Caesar announced. ‘Small repair work. Tired, unhappy men trying to put things right.’ He steepled his fingers. ‘Enemy numbers on the wall are somewhat thin this morning, having committed only enough watchers to keep an eye on the workers below, while the rest shelter from the storm in houses. Now, seemingly, is our time to strike.’

Antonius turned a frown upon the general. ‘Respectfully, Gaius, can you not hear the foul mood of Jove out there? The gods grumble and moan.’

‘I would suggest that the grumbling out there is aimed at the Gauls, Marcus. Do not forget that they worship Jove as Taranis. That noise is the gods telling the inhabitants of Avaricon that their time is come. And it is.’

The general ignored the doubt in his friend’s face and slapped his palms on the table. ‘We are faced with failure, gentlemen, but the gods have dropped a gift in our lap and we must accept it, lest we lose all. The engineers tell me that last night’s troubles set us back more than a week. Probably two. The ramp will have to be strengthened from the base up before it can be significantly raised. I am sure I need to point out to no one that in two weeks our army will have starved to death or deserted. The men are at their breaking point and, while I could instil fear in them and keep them in line for a few more days, I will not do that, for who can blame them? Starvation is a terrible thing and we are all desperately hungry. I hear mutters of withdrawal even from the officers.’

As the assembly looked at one another suspiciously, Caesar shrugged. ‘No blame. I sympathise with the sentiment… but I will
not
abandon Avaricon. We cannot. And we cannot afford to wait. So you see our position: we have to do something, and we have to do it now. And the gods have seen fit to give us a storm for cover.’

He stood, straightening, his stomach gurgling unhappily as if to support his words. From a bag on the table, he withdrew two military decorations and placed them upon the polished timber in front of everyone. The officers stared at the two mural crowns, glinting and shining, freshly made, apparently.

‘Corona muralis. Two of them. One for each side of the ramp. In half an hour, the strongest and best men of these four legions will filter into the vineae tunnels at either side and creep up the ramp. The rain and grey miasma will hide them, and if they are quiet, we can fill the tunnels with the best men in the army without alerting the Gauls. In the last hour I have had four new siege ladders manufactured, with the extra height to touch the wall tops. They will be transported under the vineae to the ramp top. At a signal, they will all be raised and the men will take the walls and the city. The first man from each line of vineae who can raise a standard in victory will have one of these prizes. And every man in the army will have free reign when the city falls. Permission to loot to their heart’s content, with the exception of food. All food will be gathered and then dispensed by the quartermasters. Tonight we will eat in Avaricon.’

Someone’s stomach filled the satisfied silence with a long, low rumble.

* * * * *

Fabius and Furius stood pressed in the ranks of the Tenth’s leading century. Just as every other legate of the four veteran legions, Fronto had immediately grabbed Atenos and Carbo and begun separating out those who were at less than total fitness, largely due to hunger, exhaustion and the illness endemic of the wet Gallic spring. Atenos then weeded out those he didn’t think capable of a swift climb or who were too noisy to move subtly into position. The result was near seven hundred men, all fit and strong, despite current conditions, and the other legions had put forth roughly similar numbers.

Every man present had had the prospect of the coveted mural crown dangled before him as extra incentive to end the siege in short order, and each man of each legion currently huddled in the shelter of the vineae lines was hungry not only for food, but for success - desperate to be the first man to raise the sign of Rome above the wall. The signifers stood a good chance, of course, for they would already be carrying the standards of the legions and would be easily spotted by the officers. However, in these situations it was rare for the standard bearers to live long enough to do so, and often the vexillum or standard was raised by the first man to have bloodied his blade enough to clear a space.

The two tribunes were effectively the highest ranking officers here. None of the legates were present. Fronto had argued, of course, but since his old knee had started to play up again on damp days despite his high level of fitness, there was a distinct possibility that his knee would give way as he climbed the ladder, imperilling everyone. And none of the other legions’ tribunes or legates would stoop low enough to join the ordinary soldiers in such an action. Not so: the pair from the Tenth.

Furius elbowed aside a man he considered to be standing too close. The entire press was tight, of course, keeping ready and out of sight of the Gauls on the walls above. Narrowing his eyes at the man, Furius noted the naked hunger in the man’s expression.

‘Keep your grubby hands off the standard. That corona’s
mine
.’

Fabius rolled his eyes. ‘The important thing is for Avaricon to fall,’ he reminded his friend.

‘Absolutely. And for me to be waving the flag above it when it happens.’ He pointed a warning finger at the legionary, who managed to look back at him both deferentially and defiantly at the same time, in an award-winning expression.

‘Leave the standard to me or spend a year digging shit-pits. Got me?’

‘Ignore him, soldier,’ put in Fabius with a grin, but Furius continued to wag his finger threateningly.

Somewhere back in the camp, a single cornu blared out a long, protracted ‘booooo’, which was quickly taken up by several other musicians.

‘That’s it,’ Fabius said loudly, as the siege ladders were passed over his shoulder to the men at the front, a couple of ranks ahead of the tribunes. Being at the front was the most dangerous place to be, while being too far back pretty much put you out of the running for the corona, and Furius, who had narrowly missed winning that very decoration at Jerusalem under Pompey a decade earlier, had positioned himself carefully, unwilling to pass up the same chance twice.

Moments later, the ladders were rising up against the wall and falling into place, the foot-long iron spikes protruding from the bottom jammed into the ground to prevent slippage. Even before the wooden tip had clattered against the stone of the wall the first legionary had his foot on the bottom rung, sword still sheathed so that he had a free hand to climb while the other held his shield up to protect him from falling missiles. As the men began to climb, the engineers at the very front, even ahead of the ladders, ran forward with their hammers and ringed iron pitons.