Siege of Rome (20 page)

   Bessas
flashed one of his crooked grins, as though there was something amusing about the situation.

  
“Regarding the tower on the Milvian Bridge,” he went on, “some of you may be wondering how the Goths came to capture it. Well, earlier this morning a few Isaurian deserters came crawling back into the city, pleading for the general’s forgiveness. They had been part of the garrison on the tower. Apparently they took fright at the size of the Gothic host and abandoned their posts during the night. The Goths forced the gates and seized the tower, just in time to ambush Belisarius when he sallied out of Rome.”

   “Will the general forgive them, sir?” asked one of my brother off
icers, “and the men on the Flaminian Gate who refused to admit us yesterday?”

   “They should all die,” commented another, to a general murmur of agreement, “
flogged through the streets, and beheaded as traitors.”

   Bessas shrugged. “
They will be punished, certainly, but not with death. We cannot afford to start reducing our own numbers with executions.”
   I disagreed. Mercy is a noble trait, but the presence of cowards and deserters within our ranks could only lower morale. My voice, however, was too faint to be heeded, so I kept quiet.

   The Goths were soon firmly entrenched around the city, though as I suspected they lacked the numbers to encircle us completely. Their light horsemen scoured the countryside, but the passage between
Rome and Campania was not completely cut off. If Justinian overcame his envious suspicions of Belisarius and saw fit to send enough reinforcements, they could still reach us from the south.

  
For the time being, we were stranded inside Rome, and could do nothing but watch helplessly as Vitiges took measures to starve us out. First he ordered his men to destroy the fourteen great aqueducts outside Rome, thinking to cut off our supply of water.

   The
se ancient brick archways were duly dismantled, but the attempt to deprive us of water failed. The waters of the Tiber, though turgid, and the many wells located inside the city, were more than enough to supply our needs.

   The destruction of the aqueducts did succeed in stemming the flow of water needed to turn the city mills. Without the mills, we could not grind corn for bread, and the supplies of Sicilian corn inside the granaries would soon be used up.

   Belisarius devised a brilliant solution, proving he was something of an engineer as well as a soldier. He noticed that the current of the river flowed strongest under the Bridge of Hadrian, which spanned the Tiber between the centre of Rome and Hadrian’s mausoleum.

   He consulted with his workmen, and they built facsimiles of the mills that no longer turned, small enough to be placed inside boats.
The boats were then moored under the arches of the bridge, where the current of the river was powerful enough to turn them.

  
Ingenious, you might think, but the Goths soon got wind of this innovation, thanks to some deserters who fled the city at night and gave Vitiges the information in exchange for being allowed to pass unmolested. Our army was rotten with such traitors, and I often wondered if Belisarius was ever reduced to despair. If so, he did well to hide it in public, for he always appeared cheerful and lively, as though victory was just around the corner.

  
The Goths threw the rotting bodies of our soldiers, killed in the recent battle outside the walls, into the Tiber, along with tree trunks and various bits of rubbish. The strong current carried all this detritus down the Tiber, and it broke through the ropes guarding the bridge and smashed our boats all to pieces.

   “
What, have they sunk our mills?” Belisarius said lightly when he was informed of the disaster, “then we shall build new ones, and guard them with more care.”
   Undaunted, he ordered more of the floating mills to be constructed, and this time had several thick lengths of iron chain thrown across the outer side of the bridge. When the Goths threw more rubbish into the water, it got caught in the chains, giving our men on the banks time to fish it out with long hooks. Thus the mills continued to turn, and the city was adequately supplied with bread for weeks afterwards.

  
I saw little of Procopius, thanks to my new duties, until one day he appeared as me and my men were helping to block up the Flaminian Gate with piles of rubble. Belisarius had chosen to render the gate inaccessible, judging it too close to the Gothic lines and vulnerable to assault.

   “
Tacitus remarked that the Britons make poor workmen,” I heard him say, “as lazy as they are rude and uncouth. I see now that his words had some merit.”

   I put down the heavy block I was carrying and slowly straightened up, wincing at the ache in my lower back.
It was good to hear his voice, laden with its usual sarcasm.

   “
Romans are poorly placed to criticise the work of others,” I said, turning, “since they never do any, but have to pay stronger races to do it for them.”

  
Procopius was sitting on an upturned piece of masonry. He looked worn-out and thinner than ever, with dark smudges under his eyes. His hands, I noticed, were spotted with ink.

   “
You look well,” he said, studying me with narrowed eyes, “save that bit of stained linen wrapped around your shoulder. Are you wounded?”

   “Spear-cut,” I replied, flexing the shoulder with a grimace, “it is healing, but still aches. Just a graze, really.”

   “Really. I’ve heard stronger men than you dismiss their wounds as nothing, and seen them buried a few days later. Let me look at it. I know something of medicine.”

   “You are a master of every art,” I said sourly, but allowed him to gen
tly unwrap the binding and poke his nose into the cut on my shoulder. It was scabbing over, but slower than I would have liked, and the pain was refusing to go away.

   “
No odour, thank God,” he said, straightening, “but it needs washing out. Come with me.”

  
I protested that I could not leave my duties, but Procopius’ authority was second only to his master’s, and the centenarian overseeing the work on the gate said nothing as he led me away.

  
He took me to the Pincian Hill, in the northeastern quarter of the city, where Belisarius had fixed his new headquarters. The hill offered an unrivalled view of the rest of the city, and the encampments of the Goths.

   “The walls here are in a poor state,” said Procopius, indicating the dilapidated and crumbling rampa
rts, “Belisarius has stationed himself here until they are repaired, to dissuade the Goths from trying an assault. He relies on the terror of his name to preserve Rome.”

  “Until when?” I said with asperity, “does he hope that Vitiges will simply give up and go away?”

  
“Something like that,” replied Procopius, “at least the Gothic king is willing to talk.”

   Now I saw his real reason for bringing m
e here. A group of Gothic envoys were clustered at the foot of the steps leading up to the fine colonnaded mansion Belisarius had chosen for his headquarters.

   The envoys
were large, well-formed men, proud and arrogant in their bearing, clad in polished mail and fur-lined cloaks, their wrists and throats adorned with golden torcs. They clearly regarded themselves as superior beings, and disdained to look at the short, swarthy Isaurian spearmen who had escorted them into the city.

  
After a time they were admitted to the house, escorted by a strong guard. Procopius and I followed the procession up the steps, into a large, echoing hall of white marble.

   Belisarius
sat waiting to receive the Goths, on a high chair flanked by twenty guardsmen. Antonina sat on a smaller chair to his left, lovely as ever. Photius stood behind her, rigid and upright, silver breastplate shining like a freshly minted coin, his plumed helmet tucked underarm.

  
I felt an irrational twinge of jealousy. It had once been my duty to guard the general, but he had chosen to set me aside. The sight of Antonina made me wonder if my dismissal from the Guards had been her doing. Perhaps she thought I was too close to her husband, and had to be removed in case I influenced him against her.

  
The hall rang to the chatter of the assembled senators and lesser dignitaries. Their voices died away when Belisarius raised his arm for silence.

  
“Come forward,” he said, beckoning the chief envoy, “and state your case. King Vitiges asked for this meeting to take place. We pray that he has sent you with reasonable terms to lay before us.”

   The envoy, also the tallest and most richly-dressed of the Goths, swaggered forward and gave the most perfunctory of bows.

   “My royal master sends greetings, Flavius Belisarius,” he boomed, “and congratulates you on the victories you have won so far. Your Emperor is wise and fortunate in his choice of generals.”

   Belisarius bowed his head to acknowledge the compliment.

   “No general, however skilled and favoured by God,” the Goth continued, “could hope to prevail against such overwhelming odds as are now stacked against you. Rome is invested from all sides. You have no hope of relief from Constantinople. My master charges you not to prolong the sufferings of the citizens of Rome, who for long have prospered under the beneficent rule of our kings.”

   He turned and spread his brawny arms t
o address the senators. “Have my people not made Rome great again?” he demanded, “have we not lifted her from the pit of shame and ruin she had fallen into, under the tyranny of your degenerate Emperors? Senators, the time of the Caesars is long past. The last Emperor of the West died in exile, and his regalia lies in a vault in Constantinople. Why, then, did you open your gates to receive Belisarius and his army of hirelings? Why do you choose the slavery that Justinian would subject you to, over the enlightened rule of the Goths?”

  
A white-bearded senator stepped forward to speak, but Belisarius waved him back.

  
“I speak for the people of Rome,” the general said in a voice that brooked no protest, “and I will tell you why the Romans admitted us. They know we are engaged in a national and rightful cause. Rome does not belong to your barbarian kings, no matter how wisely and well they might rule the city. Should we applaud a thief for spending the treasures he steals on worthy causes? He is still a thief. My master is the direct heir of Romulus Augustus, the last Emperor of the West, and has sent me to reclaim his inheritance.”

   The envoy clasped his hands together and gave a sorrowful little shake of his head. “King Vitiges
feared that would be your reply. If you are so bent on your own destruction, he begs you to think of the people of Rome, and not seek to hide any longer behind their walls. He challenges you, Belisarius, to march out with all your army and meet us in open battle. If, however, you prefer the path of reason, and agree to surrender, you and your men will be permitted to depart from Italy in peace.”

  
“Your king savours a victory he has not yet won,” Belisarius replied in a tone of amused contempt, “my system of warfare shall be guided, not by his judgment or yours, but by my own. Far from viewing my prospects with any gloomy forebodings, I tell you that the time will come, when, reduced to your last detachment, driven from your last camp, you shall seek and scarcely find a refuge in bushes and brambles. If any one of your soldiers thinks to enter Rome, without fighting for every foot of ground, and meeting with the most determined resistance, he shall find himself grievously mistaken. So long as Belisarius lives, expect no surrender.”

   It was a fine speech, and drew a smatterin
g of applause from the onlookers. Not for the first time, it struck me that Belisarius cut a regal figure, far more so than his master, and was fitter to rule an empire than serve one.

  
The envoy made no reply to this defiance, but turned and swept out at the head of his comrades, his bearded face suffused with rage.

   
“That’s it, then,” said Procopius, delicately stepping aside as the Goths barged past, “war to the knife, and may God have pity on the loser.”

16.

If
Belisarius’ defiant response was intended to drive the Goths into a fury, then it succeeded. Very soon after their envoys had returned to repeat the general’s word to Vitiges, they started making preparations for an all-out assault on the walls.

  
They worked, day and night, to construct siege engines. Four mighty wooden towers, each larger than the one that had guarded the Milvian Bridge, built on gigantic rollers. Dozens of scaling ladders, and great piles of faggots and reeds to fill up the ditch when they attacked, and four battering rams. These last were the most impressive, and the most terrifying.

   The rams were made of several tree trunks bound together and topped with a lump of iron crudely forged into the form of a ram’s head
, complete with curling horns. They were placed on timber carriages with four wheels, and pushed by no less than fifty men inside a covered compartment at the base.