(Caesar’s camp on the coast of Britannia)
Fronto stood on the rampart and peered out into the torrential rain as the winds battered him, threatening to knock him from the parapet and driving the downpour at an almost horizontal angle. The soldiers on the walls had taken to moving considerably slower than usual due to the extremely slippery nature of the timber walkway, which had already caused a number of minor accidents. Back down in the camp, what had begun as puddles a day and a half ago were now small lakes that reached up above men’s ankles and the grass across much of the site had now become a thick, cloying mud.
“There’s going to be too many of them. You know that?”
Caesar, standing beside him, tapped his chin thoughtfully with a finger. “How many was the estimate?”
“The scouts came up with various figures, but I’d safely average it out to about twenty thousand.”
“And we have less than ten thousand.”
“Precisely. And those men are undernourished, cold, tired and have the lowest morale I’ve seen in years. When the Tenth start to mutter and complain you know there’s something wrong.”
“Indeed, Marcus. But this could be our moment. We came here to chastise the Britons for their interference in Gallic campaigns and to make them think twice about doing so again. If we can smash their force here, we could perhaps break their spirit and consider our task complete. Then we could return to Gaul and think about wintering the troops.”
The legate of the Tenth nodded with little enthusiasm. “That’s reliant upon us actually winning, though, and I’d be dubious about wagering money even on a one-to-one basis right now, with the legions in the condition they’re in. Certainly two-to-one worries me.”
“We could still leave” Cicero muttered on the other side of Fronto, quietly enough that only his fellow legate could hear before the wind whipped the words away. Fronto ignored him, despite the sense he spoke. The two men had shared a strained relationship ever since the aftermath of the beach assault.
“We need an edge. We need to pull something out of our helmets to even the odds.”
Caesar nodded and tapped his foot irritably. “If we had the cavalry we could harry them from behind. That would make all the difference.”
“No use pondering on the ‘could-haves’, Caesar. Unless…”
A smile crept across Fronto’s face.
“What?”
“Maybe we could use their tactics against them?”
“What do you mean?” Cicero asked interestedly, leaning closer.
“These Britons are the same as the Germanic tribes we fought, and the Belgae and so on. All these Celtic peoples favour ambushes. The worst battles we’ve fought are the ones where they’ve fallen on us from the woods. Remember the Nervii at the SabisRiver? They very nearly put an end to your whole Gallic campaign. And only days ago the locals came out of the trees and surrounded a vexillation of the Seventh. But they feel safe attacking us, because word gets around. Everyone knows that Romans fight in the open ground. We like an empty field.”
“Go on” Caesar said thoughtfully.
“Horns of the bull. We array most of the army in the open before the camp, exactly as the Britons will be expecting. But they won’t notice two cohorts missing. Cicero can take his veteran first cohort out to the south, through the trees, and I’ll take mine north. We’ll get ourselves lined up in the cover of the woods to either side of the open fields and as soon as they engage your force, we’ll come out of the woods and fall on their flanks. We can do them so much damage it might even the odds for us.”
Cicero shrugged. “Why not two cohorts each? Why not come right round behind them and seal them in? After all, we need to stop them escaping like they have every time.”
“No” Fronto shook his head. “More than two cohorts makes enough of a difference in the army’s size that they might notice and suspect a trick. On top of that, on the off-chance we run into trouble in the woods, we only lose Caesar two cohorts and he can still make a try for victory with the remaining eighteen. If we risk four cohorts we risk leaving too few to succeed.”
Caesar nodded. “And while I would love nothing more than to stop them fleeing the field, it’s stupifyingly risky to trap a force twice your size with no means of egress. They are then forced to fight to the death and that makes any army twice as dangerous. If we wish to survive it ourselves, we have to leave them a way out when they break.”
He glanced around Fronto at the legate of the Seventh.
“Are your men up to it? The Seventh have had a difficult time of it so far. Perhaps Brutus can take Fronto’s second cohort?”
Cicero opened his mouth, a look of sheer disbelief on his face being quickly overcome by one of anger, but Fronto stepped forward to block the view between them and addressed the general.
“Caesar, Cicero is an able commander and his first cohort fought like lions the other day. They have a number of good veteran centurions. This is the way we need to move. We’ll be taking the primus pilus of each legion with us, so Brutus will need to take charge of the Seventh, on the assumption that you will command the Tenth, Caesar?”
He stepped back and allowed the air to crackle between the other two officers for a moment. Caesar seemed to be weighing up the situation in his head and finally nodded.
“Very well. Good luck to you both. You had best move now, before they arrive. They must be close.”
With a quick salute, Fronto gestured to Cicero and the pair slipped and clambered down the logs that formed the stairs to the ramparts, leaving Caesar to watch the tree line pensively.
“The old bastard goads me deliberately” Cicero snarled as the two legates strode through the siling rain and sloshed through the muddy pools. It was the first time he’d spoken to Fronto in many days without issuing a threat, an accusation or a curse of some kind. Perhaps it was time to bury the hatchet. If Fabius and Furius could do it for him, surely he could do it for Cicero. The army needed to pull closer together; not to continue fragmenting.
“You have to understand a certain level of uncertainty, though” Fronto said with a sigh. “Your brother is the general’s most outspoken opponent. He denounces Caesar at every turn of the wheel. The general’s bound to level a certain amount of mistrust at you.”
“I have been his loyal legate throughout the campaign!”
“And one of the most forthright in opposition to his decisions” Fronto declared, biting down on a reminder that this ‘loyal legate’ refused Caesar’s orders at the beach. “You do yourself no favours.”
Cicero looked around to discern just how alone they might be, but every man in camp was busy making preparations, waiting for the call, or huddling beneath their cloaks against the driving rain. None were paying any attention to the small talk of senior officers.
“Marcus, you have no idea. I am Caesar’s loyal man; always have been. But because I will not distance myself from my brother, and because I advocate a path of calm and sense, I am tarred with the brush of a traitor. And I’m not alone, either. Labienus cannot fall much further from favour without having to look up at the turf! Remember that you are not that far behind us, either.”
Fronto turned, ready to proclaim himself Caesar’s man, but a plethora of thoughts battered at him in that fraction of a second. Just how much was he Caesar’s man? Certainly his allegiance to his general had waned throughout the campaign. And given the vehemence of Cicero’s statement, it was more than possible that his fellow legate had, at a deep level, a more solid and anchored support for Caesar than he himself. Quailing at even the thought, he swallowed and broached a new subject — almost new, anyway.
“What of Menenius and Hortius? Why are they not in the Seventh with you if Caesar’s lumping all his potential dissidents in one legion?” It was blunt. Much blunter than he intended, but the conversation had taken a difficult turn that had hit him unexpectedly, and he felt ill-equipped to attempt subtlety.
“I’m sorry, Marcus?”
“The two tribunes from the Fourteenth. Make no mistake: whether they’re tied to you and Labienus or not — or whether they’re tied to your brother or even Pompey, I will deal with them for what they’ve done. But how did they escape the policy of ‘all Caesar’s opposition in one legion’?”
Cicero actually stopped walking for a moment in surprise, standing in a muddy puddle and apparently not even noticing as his boots started to saturate.
“Tied to me? What are you talking about, Fronto? What have they done?”
“They’ve been undermining the general, removing those with close links to him. I can appreciate a bit of opposition, such as you and Labienus — that’s healthy and keeps the general grounded, but taking action and killing officers is tantamount to treason and murder and I won’t have it — especially not with my friends.”
Cicero frowned as he started walking again. “I thought you landed that blame squarely with my centurions. Hell, you only started speaking to me civilly again since we found out we were in danger.”
“Fabius and Furius are innocent — martinets, but innocent. It’s the two tribunes, Menenius and Hortius.”
“You’re mistaken, Fronto.”
The legate of the Tenth glared at his counterpart.
“Don’t protect them, Cicero. I will have my time with them.”
“I’m not protecting them, you idiot.” Cicero grasped Fronto by the shoulders. “I’ve avoided every contact with those two. They’re Caesar’s pets.”
“Oh, please…”
“They are, Marcus. I’ve seen them in the general’s tent late at night when most of the army is asleep. They creep around and fawn to the general. I don’t know what they’re up to, but they’re certainly not killing Caesar’s favourites.” He lowered his tone, despite the fact that no one was remotely interested. “Menenius is so far into Caesar’s purse he would clean the general’s arse with his tongue if he asked. The Menenii were once Consuls but they’ve fallen so far, and now they’re living on farms in Illyricum. They’re but a spit from being plebs these days, Marcus, and Caesar’s the only thing upholding their ancient noble name. And as for Hortius — well the man may play a noble fop but his mother served in a brothel on the Esquiline and his father was… let’s say a regular visitor with solid mercantile wealth. He owes his current high position to the general.”
Fronto shook his head. “It’s them. I know it’s them.”
“I fear you’re mistaken, Marcus. The men would return to relative obscurity without Caesar. They’re his creatures. It’s why they’re assigned to the Fourteenth that’s always on supply train duty and safely out of the danger of combat. Speaking of which…”
Cicero gestured to Carbo, who stood beside Fronto’s neat little room at the end of a timber building. In the wide space beyond, his men were formed up ready for action.
The legate of the Tenth came to a stop. Cicero paused on his way to the Seventh and clasped hands with him. “Now is not the time for such talk or thoughts — we go to fight. Forget about your conspiracies, Fronto, and concentrate on the Britons.”
Fronto nodded and clasped the other legate’s hand. “Mars be your strength and Fortuna your protector. Come back safe, Cicero.”
“You too. I’ll meet you half way through the Celt army.”
Turning from his fellow legate, Fronto found the somewhat serious face of Carbo grimacing at him, pink and somewhat unhappy as the torrents poured down his face and soaked his tunic and armour.
“I know that look, sir. What sort of cockeyed insane plan have you cooked up now? With respect, the boys are near breaking point.”
Fronto nodded to him and strode on past to where the legion was assembled.
“Men of the Tenth” he shouted in his most inspiring voice, loud enough to be heard over the incessant roar of the rain battering on armour and helmets. “In order to give us an unfair advantage over the enemy, I am forced to split our legion.”
There was a groan from the men, though from no easily identifiable individual source.
“I and Carbo will be taking the first cohort into the woods to pounce on the enemy’s flanks. Cicero and his legion are pulling the same manoeuvre on the other side of the field. The rest of you… “he grinned. “The rest of you will create an impregnable wall. You’ll be serving under the direct command of the general.” He paused to let the fact sink in, during which there was silence, though whether a happy or a troubled one, he couldn’t tell.
“The general will allow the looting of the tribesmen when the battle is over and all the local settlements will be ours to pick over.” He grinned wickedly. “And despite your Roman origins, I know you’ve all grown quite fond of the native beers of Gaul. Well, guess what? These Celts brew the same stuff, though this beer is apparently strong enough to make the hairs on your chest stand up straight. And it’ll be ours for the taking when we finish. Just make sure you hold the line and stay alive long enough to enjoy it.”
A roar of approval greeted the statement.
“Now let’s get ready to kick them so hard they don’t wake up ‘til three weeks after they’re dead.”
“Shit shit shit shit shit!” Fronto hissed as he collapsed in an awkward heap, trying to remain as quiet as possible despite the agony that tore through his knee, having entangled his foot in a think gnarled tree root and twisted his leg on the way down.
“You alright sir?”
“Fine!” he snapped at Carbo. “Don’t worry about me.”
The primus pilus gave him a look that hovered somewhere between concern and disapproval and wiped the rain from his face. Here in the depths of the woodland, the rain was no longer a hail of watery shards, but a constant battering of heavy, bulbous droplets that formed on leaves and deposited themselves unerringly down the necks of the men.
“You sure you know where we are?” Fronto barked at his senior centurion.
“With respect, legate, finding north in a forest is a very easy task. We’ve already turned back south and we’re heading towards the field.”
“I hope you’re right” Fronto grumbled, using the rough surface of the tree to haul himself to his feet. “I’m remembering now why no famous general has ever led a campaign in a forest.” He glanced around to see the four hundred and twenty seven men who currently comprised the slightly under-strength first cohort, spread out in the woods, glinting in the sunlight between the trees, unable to hold to a formation. “If they anticipate this and come at us in…”
“Shh!” Fronto blinked as Carbo stopped dead and put the finger to his lips. Behind Fronto, the entire cohort came to a halt, the noise of the battering raindrops once more taking the place of the steady movement of soldiers.
“What?” He hissed.
In reply, and frowning at Fronto’s volume, Carbo cupped a hand around his ear. Fronto fell silent, trying to hear over his own laboured breathing and the downpour. As the thumping of his pulse and the wheezing of his lungs died down, he could now just make out the sounds of fighting.
“They’re already engaged!” Fronto hissed in surprise. Carbo nodded and Fronto shook his head in disbelief. The cohort had been ready to move by the time Fronto and Cicero had returned from their wall meeting with Caesar and they had been heading out of camp toward the forest’s edge before the encamped legions had even put out the call for assembly. How long had they been in this damned dripping sylvan nightmare?
“Fully engaged, too” whispered Carbo. “That’s not the opening roar of two lines; that’s the sound of ongoing fighting. We’d best move.”
Fronto nodded as his centurion made several hand gestures that began the cohort moving again, as quietly as they could through the woods, trying not to spook wildlife or snap large twigs. Inevitably, the noise level was louder than any officer would wish it — and certainly a different matter entirely to the surprisingly stealthy Celts — but with the din of battle growing louder with every cautious step and the background roar of the rain, there was little chance of the cohort being heard on the battlefield.
Carefully, slowly, Fronto approached the growing white-green ribbon of light that heralded the tree line and the field of battle. It would be overestimating their contribution to things to say that everything rode on their little manoeuvre, but certainly it would make a vast difference to the way the fight went, and might mean the saving of — or the death of — a great many men. Fronto found himself seething that they hadn’t thought of this earlier. He could have been moving through the forest with his men as soon as the scouts had even finished estimating their numbers. Then they’d have been ready. Now…
The whole plan had been based on the notion that both his and Cicero’s cohorts would be in position at the forest’s edge and ready to pounce when the Britons arrived. Now they were playing ‘catch-up’ and had to commit as soon as they were reasonably able. Would Cicero be there? Had he already arrived and committed his men, cursing Fronto for his absence? Was he still wandering around these cursed Britannic forests getting wet and angry and unaware that the fight was already on? Or was he too creeping through the undergrowth worrying about what might happen?
Finally, he began to see the movement of a vast seething army of men, largely naked or dressed in those curious long trousers such as the Gauls wore, painted and adorned with bronze or even gold where their status warranted. Every man seemed to be armed with a different weapon, like an unruly mob hastily dragged from their beds to save their land. Even in the haze of the downpour it was hard not to be chilled at the number of them.
They would be no match for a Roman legion in top fighting condition, even at two-to-one odds. But at the moment it was at best touch-and-go as to which side would gain the advantage and Fronto knew as well as any experienced commander that morale was half the battle. The army that thirsted for blood would push all the harder and an army that broke was lost in that instant. It was sadly a little too obvious which force had all the morale on that field.
The Roman lines, invisible somewhere behind the mass of warriors, were making only the noises of a group of men fighting for their life: grunting, yelling, screaming, occasional horn calls or bellowed commands. There was no roar of defiance; of the might of Rome, nor the silence that was sometimes called by a commander to frighten the enemy — a totally noiseless armoured advance was a disturbing sight for anyone.
The Britons, on the other hand, were in full spirit, bellowing their war cries and howling their blood lust, exhorting their strange Gods to help them drive these hated invaders from their island, heedless of the rain battering their oft-naked skin. Likely the inhabitants of this accursed island viewed heavy rain as the normal weather for any time of the year. Fronto found himself wondering whether there were druids among them. It seemed that any Celtic force gained a dangerous amount of heart when they knew they were in the presence, and had the support, of that bunch of weird blood-drinking goat-humpers.
Closer now they crept, passing the boles of trees only ten or twelve yards from the edge. The field was becoming clearer all the time, the denser foliage at the periphery returning the roar of driving rain on green leaf.
Fronto felt a slow smile creep across his face as he took in the situation. The Britons had held nothing back in this, their apparently last ditch attempt to drive Rome from their shores. The bulk of the men — nobles and warriors alike — pushed and struggled to get to the Roman lines, formed in a mass. Their cavalry had apparently charged en masse on this flank at the north side of the field, expecting to break the Roman ranks. Whether it had been Caesar’s decision or that of the senior centurion among the Tenth’s ranks there, the Roman lines had pulled the age-old ‘fake flight’ manoeuvre, apparently breaking under the cavalry’s charge, but then consolidating again to slow their advance and enveloping them, wrapping them in a circle of steel. A small reserve cavalry force remained at the rear, on the far — southern — edge of the fight, but not enough to swing the battle. The nobles had all joined the throng, leaving their chariots in the hands of the drivers who, unaware of the approaching danger, had brought them toward the forest’s edge to watch the battle progress and wait for the call from their masters.
There was a chance, then. As long as the centre, a joint command of the Tenth and the Seventh, could hold against the much greater numbers of their enemy, there was a chance.
Glancing across at Carbo, Fronto tried to use his hands to mime the shape of a chariot, drew a line across his throat, pointed to himself and held up two fingers. Carbo nodded his understanding and turned, gesturing for the centurion of the second century to follow their legate. Like a flowing river of shining steel through the forest, the cohort separated, nine centuries forming on Carbo near the forest’s edge. The remaining century moved to Fronto’s location, where he repeated his mime until they all nodded.
With a last motion to Carbo, urging him to wait, Fronto gestured to his century and they spread out along the line of the trees in their eight-man contubernia, each group opposite one of the waiting chariots. As soon as he could look along the line and see that they were in place and all movement appeared to have ceased, he made the motion to attack.
The chariot drivers were oblivious; all their attention locked on the battle before them, they were hopelessly unprepared for a sudden attack from behind. By the time Fronto and his eight man unit reached the nearest chariot, the man was only just turning in alarm at the sound of jingling metal above the driving rain. His yell of panicked warning was cut short and became the gurgle of a man with an opened throat as a particularly energetic legionary bounded up onto the yoke, his shield hardly inconveniencing him as he plunged his gladius into the Briton’s neck, wrenched it free, and dropped down the far side without pause into a puddle of mud churned up by the vehicle’s wheels and horses’ hooves. For good measure, a second legionary put his blade in the driver’s ribs just to be sure, dragging him down from the traces to die on the sodden turf.
Two more men from the contubernium hurriedly cut the horses free of the vehicle and smacked them on the rump, sending them running from the field in panic. This last was, strictly speaking, unnecessary, the chariots having been rendered ineffective with the loss of the driver, but the wanton destruction emboldened the legionaries and gave them much needed heart.
A quick glance left and right told much the same story all along the forest’s edge. Of the ten parties that had sortied from the trees, only two had been forced to make a fight of it, their targets more alert than the others, and three of the contubernia had already moved on to take other chariots out. One or two of the vehicles that stood to the western edge of the field were making a run for it, and Fronto briefly considered ordering that they be chased down, but reminded himself that this was about a quick win, not a thorough trouncing — let them go.
Now, Carbo’s men were moving out of the tree line, filtering between the useless chariots and forming up into shield walls one century at a time, twenty men wide and four deep. Already Fronto’s contubernium was moving on to a chariot that was busy wheeling and making to leave, but which had neither the time nor the space to evade the onslaught.
Glancing around, Fronto tried to see what was happening elsewhere. The enemy’s reserve cavalry had apparently noticed the sudden danger from the wing and were forming up to come and meet them but behind them he could see the shapes of armoured legionaries emerging from the forest to the south: Cicero had arrived.
Calls were now going up among the horde of Britons, warning of the danger from the flanks. The warriors began to turn at the edge of the mass and form a front against this new threat. The reserve cavalry, preparing to charge Fronto’s cohort, was suddenly warned of the newly-arrived force behind them and dissolved into chaos, some of the riders turning to attack this fresh army, while others kicked their steeds into life and continued their original charge.
Such it always was with a disorganised army. The reserve cavalry had still been a strong enough force to punch through either new cohort, but having become divided and without the advantage of a system of officers and signallers, the force had neatly split into two groups, neither of which would have the strength to break a Roman advance.
With a wave at the centurion of the second century, Fronto signalled him to pull the men back into formation, but the well-trained soldiers were already finishing off the last of the chariots within reach and moving towards their standard, the glinting silver decorated with sprigs of greenery from its difficult passage through the woodland.
Cornu blasts and the cries of officers from the far side of the field revealed that Cicero’s cohort were moving against the far flank at a run. Carbo, ever the long-sighted officer, had slowed his own men so that all the advancing centuries could fall into step, allowing time for Fronto and his men to catch up and join them and, above all, letting their comrades beyond the enemy horde know that they had arrived.
Even as Fronto listened, he could hear the rhythmic battering of gladius on shield from all along his cohort’s line. There would be no surprise to this attack; the enemy had had sufficient warning from the chariots’ destruction to turn and face them, and so Carbo was sending a strong signal to the beleaguered centre of the Roman lines that help had arrived.
Sure enough, even as Fronto and his century began to form up and move at a jog to plug the gap Carbo had left them, an answering roar arose from the Roman force as they fought with renewed vigour, aware that they were no longer on the defensive.
The tone in the enemy also changed, though not enough. There were cries of dismay, but as many cries of defiance as the mass of warriors turned almost inside out to present three faces, leaving a clear way only to the west.
Fronto met up with the line only ten yards from the waiting Britons and shuffled along to find a spot between his century and the next where he wasn’t ruining a centurion’s formation.
“Respectfully, sir” an optio called from behind his men, where he was busy using his stick to prod them into a straighter line, “but you need to fall in at the rear, sir.”
Fronto stared at the junior officer in disbelief.
“You what, soldier?”
The optio didn’t even bend under the malice of Fronto’s gaze.
“Orders of the primus pilus, sir. On account of your knee, sir.”
The legate’s glare simply hardened as he struggled to come up with a spiteful enough reply, but already the line had closed in front of him. Fronto was closer to his legion than most legates, but he was still a world apart, while their primus pilus might as well be Mars himself wielding a thunderbolt and no legionary would be about to defy the man.
Fronto realised he was standing glaring at a man who had already moved his attention back to his own men, and determined to have this out with Carbo the moment they were in private. His thoughts were interrupted a moment later by the tremendous crash of two armies meeting in a line of bloody violence.
Galronus, chieftain among the Remi tribe and commander of an entire wing of Caesar’s auxiliary cavalry force rubbed his hair to rid it of the excess water as his horse danced impatiently. “How far?”
“Not far” his best scout shrugged the rain from his shoulders as his horse came to a halt and it took Galronus a moment in the torrential downpour to see the grin on the man’s face.
“What?”
“You don’t recognise the ground, sir?”
“Don’t try my patience, Senocondos. I am tired, saddle sore, and now I find we’re on the trail of a damned war band!”
It had been two and a half days since he and the small cavalry command had left the lands of the Atrebates, riding as fast as they dared for the south east coastline. The local chieftain had taken some persuading and the promise of very heavy future concessions, but had not been averse to dealing with Roman commanders. Now, four hundred horsemen travelled with eight hundred mounts, changing beasts regularly to see them arrive fresh and capable for action.
Better than that, the Atrebate nobles’ sons who led the contingent under his command knew the land well enough that their return journey had been a lot shorter and more comfortable than the horrible ride into the unknown west over a week ago.
And only half an hour ago, weary and becoming aggravated with the incessant bad weather, the riders had happened upon the unmistakable trail of a large force that had recently passed by in the direction of the Roman landing site.
“Apologies, lord. This is land we scouted when first we landed. Caesar’s camp is less than half a mile distant. We can follow the trail and it will lead us there.”
Galronus’ jaw hardened. The freshness of the trail suggested that any meeting between this force and the Roman expeditionary legions was likely still in progress. If it was already over, then it would have to have been a massacre one way or the other. Those possibilities didn’t bear thinking about.
“Keep to your tired mounts!” he called to the men gathered around him. “As soon as we are close enough to hear the battle, change mounts and set the worn horses to graze. Then we muster and charge.”
One of the young Atrebate nobles shook his head. “If we do not tether the horses, they may bolt. These are strong, noble and costly beasts.”
“And your fathers and their chieftain have donated their services to our cause. You will follow my orders, or you will dishonour the lord of the Atrebates in your defiance.”
Satisfied with the look of sullen and grudging acceptance in the young man’s features, Galronus squared his shoulders and sat straighter.
“Quickly now. To the coast and battle!”
Fronto stormed along the line of fighting men. Despite having apparently issued the order to his men to make sure their legate stayed safely out of trouble, Carbo was inaccessible, fighting somewhere in the front line where Fronto could hear his bellowed commands even though he couldn’t see him.
The men of the cohort might have effectively locked him out of their fight, but there would come a point where the line of legionaries came to an end, where the way had been left for the Britons to escape the field.
For a few minutes, Fronto had wondered whether that would truly be likely. The enemy had fought them with unending vigour and seemed undaunted by this ‘boxing in’ of their army. But in the last minute the atmosphere had changed subtly. That breaking point had almost been reached. He could feel it crackling in the air like the promise of lightning.
Sure enough, there, a few yards ahead, the last century in the cohort had been fielded at double the density and only half the width, providing extra protection for their own flank — it was not unknown for a surrounded enemy to outflank their own attackers. Had the Britons worked it out, it could have been easy enough for them to send out a large enough force to break around the edge of the Roman line and start smashing them to pieces.
Fortunately, a combination of two elements kept the flank safe. Firstly: the enemy’s chaotic nature where, rather than thinking on the grand scale of how to win a battle, the Britons were simply falling over each other to get at the nearest Roman, while their cavalry flittered uselessly amongst them and around the edge — scattered and ineffective. Secondly: years of drilling and practising under first Priscus and then Carbo had kept the Tenth not only strong and disciplined, but also adaptable and able to think for themselves when required. On the very flank, the primus pilus had placed his most trusted veterans, interspaced with his biggest and strongest men. Behind them, in the subsequent rows were fast men capable of responding to threats speedily and efficiently. Every time the enemy tried to break the end of the Roman line through brute force they encountered only the mean and brutal response of Carbo’s bear-like veterans. Every time a small group attempted to move around them to turn the flank, a highly mobile force of legionaries appeared as if from nowhere to deal with them.
It was working.
It was also where Fronto would be able to join the fight without being pushed out.
“Cavalry!”
Even as he’d started to pick up the pace to reach a fighting position, nearing the end of the line, Fronto looked up at the shout from a nearby legionary and saw a force of hundreds of Celtic horse bearing down on them from the woodlands. It appeared the Britons were not alone.
“Hold the line. Don’t worry about that cavalry” Fronto bellowed. “Just hold the line!”
Yet despite his command, the legate was no longer sure about making a fight of it at the line’s end. If that cavalry came in at a charge and chose to hit this particular position, he’d be trampled before he even had a chance to bloody his blade.
Tucking his gladius under his shield arm and stepping back away from the fight, Fronto reached up to the amulet supposedly representing Fortuna and gave it a little caress for luck as his eyes roved this way and that, trying to take it all in. A groan was rising from the Roman ranks as they realised that Celtic reinforcements meant it was almost certainly over, though the officers back at the main legion force were still pushing their men as the buccina and cornu blasts confirmed.
And then the strangest thing happened.
Even as the Roman force began to sag with the dire expectation of death, a bellow of something unintelligible arose from somewhere in the crowd of Britons and was echoed back and forth until it became a moan of despair. The few horsemen who were still free at the periphery of the fight made to escape, running not for the relief force, but obliquely, into the woods.
Fronto stared as the mass of footmen broke in an instant and began to flee as best they could. His eyes followed them and paused for a moment on the newly-arrived cavalry. Blinking, he focused on the force once more. No, his eyes had not deceived him: that was a Roman banner among them.
Galronus!
Even as the allied cavalry slammed into the fleeing Britons driving them into a frenzy of fear, Fronto straightened with a grin — the tables had just turned unexpectedly.
Determinedly, he collected his sword from beneath his armpit once more and took a step forward. Was he being stupid? Though Galronus’ cavalry had almost sealed in the enemy within a neat box, there were still gaps where the Britons leaked out making for safety as best they could like water bursting from holes in a dam, and he’d made his way to a position directly between them and their objective.
Most of the Britons, however, were now purely intent on escape, fleeing past him, heedless of this lone Roman officer and flowing around him like a stream around a rock as he kept his shield forward to ward off any stray blades while he slashed and struck at the figures running to either side of him.
A blow struck his back and he wondered for a moment whether it would be mortal. It would be a truly awful fate to die and be buried in this wet, forbidding, sickening land.
“Watch your back, sir.”
Blinking, he realised that the blow had not been an enemy weapon, but rather a legionary falling in at his side, protecting him. Even as he nodded at the man, a similar thump announced the presence of a soldier at his other side, effectively forming a small shield wall on his position. Did Carbo’s interference know no bounds? Now men were being sent from the cohort to protect him? Somewhere deep in his soul, Fronto started to seethe.
Safer than he had any intention of being, the legate moved his shield slightly to gain a better idea of what was going on amid the chaos of fleeing Britons, hefting it sharply back into position just in time to take the blow of the sword he’d fleetingly seen coming. The point of the long, Celtic sword slammed through the layered boards and leather of the shield, stopping alarmingly close to his sternum and then ripping back out, tearing pieces of shield with it.
Concerned, Fronto risked rising momentarily to peer over the very top of the shield.
He blinked in shock.
The man before him was a druid!
There could be no doubting it. The grey-white robe and the feathers and bones braided into his hair and long beard that tapered to twin forks spoke volumes about the man’s status. What surprised Fronto more, though, was the martial aspect of this druid. While he’d seen their kin in Gaul bearing swords, he’d never imagined them as true warriors. This one, though, looked thoroughly at home with his heavy sword as he drew it back with a muscular arm for another blow. His other hand held no shield, but a short stabbing spear, which he was raising for a thrust over the top of Fronto’s shield. The big man’s hair was held back by that appeared to be a plain iron crown.
Like all druids, he was arrogant and sure of himself. Like all Celts, he fought as though attack was all. Like all their kind, he overextended and opened himself up to quick attack by a trained soldier of Rome. Fronto raised his shield and angled it slightly to ward off the spear thrust as he lunged with his gladius. The tip tore through the dirty robe of the druid but to Fronto’s surprise met the unyielding metal of a finely-forged mail shirt beneath, striking sparks as it skittered across and past the man’s ribs, becoming lost in the voluminous folds of the man’s robe.
Almost in a panic, Fronto felt himself overbalanced and falling forward with the momentum. Just as surprised, the druid tried to step back to allow this Roman room to fall gracelessly forward where he could easily deliver the killing blow, but the press of his fleeing countrymen around him prevented the move. Desperately, Fronto toppled like a falling tree — his soft, useless boots unable to find purchase in the soaking mud — and was suddenly jerked straight as some unseen hand grasped the back of his cuirass and hauled him upright.
The druid had already recovered and had both spear and sword raised and pulled back ready to strike. That bubbling seething feeling in the pit of Fronto’s stomach began to boil. Anger coursed through him, vying with embarrassment.
He had been effectively babysat by his own legion, prevented from getting himself into trouble and, determined to do his part like a spoiled child — something he was beginning to recognise in himself, much to his irritation, he had found a way to involve himself in the fight only to seriously underestimate his opposition and have to have his arse hauled out of the fire by the same damn babysitters, proving them, beyond a shadow of a doubt, right!
Furious at himself, his men, this damn druid and his irritating people, this drizzly, wet and hopeless island, the endless bickering, backstabbing and uncertainty of Caesar’s army, his own limitations and even his apparent abandonment by Fortuna, Fronto snarled, his ire and anger forging a white hot spear in his brain.
He snapped.
Two hours later, lying propped up on a raised bench with a relatively soft pallet beneath him as the medical staff worked on him, he talked to Atenos, who, it turned out, was the man who had grabbed him and hauled him back up.
The huge man shook his head with a disbelieving grin.
“I’ve never seen anything quite like it!”
“What happened? I seem to remember punching that druid a few times.”
Atenos laughed out loud as the medicus stitched the cut on Fronto’s shoulder. “You really don’t remember? I honestly thought you might take them all on yourself!”
Fronto could feel himself flushing and knew he should be angry, but somehow there was not enough anger left in him. He just felt exhausted.
“It was like the great berserk rages of the heroes of our legends. You actually threw your shield at him.”
“You should have stopped me then. That’s stupid enough in itself. If a legionary did that, you’d have him beaten for his negligence.”
“I did try to stop you, legate. How d’you think I got this black eye? A Briton?”
Again, Fronto flushed.
“By the time I’d recovered,” the centurion grinned “so had the druid. You’d confused him a bit, I think, when you threw your shield at him, but that was nothing to his expression when you kicked him between the legs.”
“I did what?”
“Went down like a sack of grain, he did. I swear his eyes even crossed. I think you beat him about half a mile past the point of death. He looked more like a lamb stew than a man by the time you’d finished with him. All we could do was put a shield wall around you and stop you getting trampled as they fled.”
“Oh for the love of Juno!”
“Legionary Palentius tried to haul you off him. The other medicus is looking at him now to see if you broke his jaw.”
Fronto rubbed his head in a mix of embarrassment and tiredness.
“Anything else I need to know?”
“Not really, sir. After that you just sort of started laying about you among the fleeing Britons. I hate to think how many of them you sent to Elysium this afternoon. They only got you four times, and none of them bad — miraculous, really. Of course the men were around you as best they could manage, but it wasn’t easy. You were like a damned hedge-pig with that sword.”
“I honestly remember very little. I think I saw Galronus, but the first thing I really recall with any clarity was when you hauled me up off the floor. I think the enemy had gone.”
“It was over. I think you’d blacked out.”
Fronto leaned close to the huge Gallic centurion. “I’d take it as a personal favour if you tried to stamp on this before it becomes common knowledge?”
Atenos grinned. “I’ll do my best, legate, but you were in the middle of the army, and a bit of a sight. I suspect the story’s already spreading round the campfires.”
Fronto leaned back and winced as the suture the medicus was tying off pulled tight.
“Sit up, legate.”
Fronto looked across at the surgeon. “I’m trying. So tired. Sorry. Atenos, I think I’ll stay in the hospital for the night. You know… just in case.”
The big centurion nodded sympathetically.
“I’ll leave you in peace, sir. Get some sleep.”
Fronto was unconscious before the centurion had reached the door.