Marius' Mules: Prelude to War (3 page)

However, what he could not give them as a leader, he could give as an organiser. Striding with purpose across the compound, he stopped next to the optio. ‘Strongest building here, optio? Defensively, I mean.’

‘Main store room, sir. Stone walls with small slit-windows for air circulation - roof’s a weak point, but not worth panicking over. The whole pissing place is one big weak point. Shame we pinned the lean-tos on either side, but it’s still the strongest place. After that it’s the barracks, then the guest quarters.’

‘Agreed. The main store will be our fall-back position when the outer stockade falls.’

The optio’s eyes swung back and forth at the civilians who were listening in. ‘
If
the outer stockade falls, sir.’

Cita took his meaning and nodded. ‘
If
they fall, yes.’ He took a deep breath. ‘I can hear them moving off to the south already. We’ve got less than a quarter of an hour before they begin the push - probably a
lot
less. They’ll come slow at first because of the crow’s feet, and we can make them a little more hesitant with pila. We should have plenty of those in store, eh?’

‘At least a dozen a man, sir,’ the optio smiled.

‘Then get every last one distributed. Three to each civilian and the rest stacked up evenly next to the legionaries. Let’s give ‘em hell when they move. Any bows in there?’

‘No sir.’

‘Fair enough. Doubt we’ve anyone who could use one anyway.’ He turned and glanced at the gate, where the artillery piece was being set up on the fighting platform. ‘Get the other scorpion up onto the roof of the barracks. I wish the store had a flat roof, but the barracks will have to do. Have the two men on the gate scorpion split up, one with each weapon, and put one of the less panicked civilians with each as an assistant.’

‘He’ll be as exposed as a whore’s arse up there, sir.’

‘We’ve got an entire lean-to full of grain sacks, if I remember rightly. They were taken from the granaries in town this morning, but the grain barge hasn’t arrived yet. Have them hauled up to the roof and make a small ring defence. In fact let’s have the rest of them as a fall-back redoubt in front of the stores. Simple work for the civilians and as soon as it’s done they’ll be needed at these buildings.’

The optio nodded and began to point out men among the crowd. ‘You: go get Servilius from the scorpion by the gate and send him to me, then stay there and ask how you load and aim the thing.’

As the optio turned to the next men, assigning grain sack removal, Cita spotted Bennacos rushing from the barrack building, his mail shirt flapping heavy and loose about his thighs, spear in hand and sword at his side, hexagonal shield painted with bright native designs. He had foregone a helm, his braided hair framing his serious face and moustaches twitching with anticipation.

‘Bennacos? I’ve got the civilians building a redoubt of grain sacks outside the store entrance. I want you in charge of defending it until - and possibly after - we pull back there.’

One of the Roman merchants near his elbow, struggling with a sack, paused, frowning. ‘But he’s a
Gaul
!’

‘And one of the few men I trust to do the job.’ Paying the merchant no further heed, but flashing a raised-eyes incredulous look at the Boii auxiliary, Cita began to scrabble his bulk up onto one of the barrels stacked against the barracks and grasped the flat roof, hauling himself up and onto the top. Already one of the workers was there, waiting for grain sacks to be heaved up to him.

‘I don’t think we’ve time to do this, sir.’

Cita rose and looked around. ‘I see what you mean, but we’ve no choice. Try not to get killed. My staff records are already a mess.’

The man smiled, and Cita frowned. Perhaps he’d inadvertently issued a joke? Shrugging, he ignored the man and took in the situation. Time to offer up a few heartfelt prayers and make sure everyone had coins to put under the tongues of the dead. He’d hate to be refused by the boatman and be doomed to wander
this
shithole for the rest of time.

They were evenly-spaced now - a ring of vengeance, righteous fury and death around the supply depot, dozens deep. He wouldn’t bother counting - didn’t have time - but there would be over a thousand of them and even now the carnyxes were blarting out their ‘deflating bull’ noises as they called the horde to attack.

With mere moments to spare, Cita turned and peered down at his command. The first sacks were being hauled onto the barracks roof, and the scorpion was on its way up. If they were lucky it might even get a chance to loose a few shots before it was overrun. The other artillery piece was swinging back and forth, trained on the approaching mass, selecting a target. The legionaries each hefted a pilum, with a stack of others waiting. More civilians stood between the soldiers at the stockade, each with a couple of pila, bolstering the defences. A small group ferried sacks from the store while another distributed them to either the barrack roof or the storehouse redoubt. The optio was on the way to the gate where he would stride the perimeter, offering advice and encouragement - the latter with the business-end of his staff of office as was the wont of his breed. Bennacos was directing the construction of the redoubt.

At a headcount, in all Cita commanded maybe fifty men, though more than half of those were civilians who’d never held a blade. It didn’t take a master mathematician to do the arithmetic. It would all be over soon enough. But at least Cita would give the rebellious bastards a taste of what was to come if they continued to revolt. Six legions waited less than a hundred miles away and the general, when the news of this mess finally reached him, would be pitiless in his chastisement.

‘Here they come!’

As the horde of Carnute warriors swept towards the defences on all sides, the optio roared out his commands and the men at the stockade drew back their throwing arms, pila steadied and angled for the cast. The civilians matched the legionaries with varying degrees of success, and the optio paused as he stomped around the perimeter, knocking a sagging pilum shaft back up into position with his staff.

‘Keep your arm up and steady, lad. This ain’t the games… this is
serious
business.’ He turned and looked up at Cita, who held up his hand showing two fingers with his thumb across his palm in the lookout’s standard sign for ‘two hundred paces’.

‘At thirty paces, lads,’ the optio announced. ‘Then at twenty, and then at will. Let’s give ‘em something to listen to, eh? Volcatius, you’ve a voice like a lark… give us a tune.’

The legionary he gestured at grinned and cleared his throat.

‘Wine is better than women,’ he sang in a lilting but loud tone. ‘Oh wine is better they say. I’ve had a whore in every door, but the beer never made me pay!’

The soldiers among the defenders joined in with the ditty and Cita, who’d heard enough marching, digging and fighting songs in his time of service, turned his attention instead to his immediate locale. Sacks of grain were now coming up and a second man had arrived and was stacking them in a half-circle to protect a small area from missiles. As he turned, Cita saw the tip of the scorpion arrive over the lip of the roof and rushed over to help the artillerist and his civilian assistant haul the thing up and then move it into position.

As the engineer shuffled the machine into a good firing situation and began to turn the windlass, Cita helped the assistant bring up the box of ammunition. It would be touch and go whether it would be of any real use. The enemy were almost at the stockade.

Leaving them to it, Cita moved to the edge of the roof and slid down to the ground. The soldiers had finished their bawdy song and at the instigation of the optio begun chanting ‘Minerva, Minerva, Minerva,’ in a menacing tone. At the sixth repeat, the optio dropped his raised hand and pila arced up around the defences, coming down with varied success, most of the legionaries hitting their chosen targets and even one or two of the civilians actually reaching the mass of the enemy and scoring a blow.

Cita strode across to the redoubt of grain sacks that was already three feet high and stepped on an upturned bucket to give himself a clearer view across the scant defenders and the low stockade. The legionaries at the perimeter had a height advantage over their enemy, since the defences had been designed with a slight embankment of turf behind the stockade. The rise allowed the defenders to strike over the top with their swords, the timbers protecting them from the chest down, while the ground beyond the palisade was some two feet lower, meaning the Carnutes would have to stretch and leap to strike over the top.

It was small advantage, given the odds, but at this point Cita would take every edge the Gods granted him. Another three repeats of ‘Minerva’ and the second volley of pila launched from the defences.

Cita’s slight height advantage on the bucket allowed him a reasonable view of the attack to the south, where no buildings existed to aid defence, and where the beleaguered Romans were reliant upon a simple stockade alone. The enemy, as he’d hoped, had faltered as they reached the scattered caltrops, the iron spikes gouging holes in feet, heedless of any booted protection, disabling and crippling the front runners who fell to the dirt in agony, only to find themselves speared in other places by more of the nightmare mines and then trampled to the ground by the tribesmen following.

Cita watched as the front men collapsed in a screaming heap all around the defences, then a second wave from behind fell afoul of the same weapons, howling and falling only to be trampled by their fellows. The wave came on but at a slower pace, men regularly collapsing with wounded feet. The command had now been given for free throws and the legionaries cast their remaining stack of pila in a continual stream while the civilians each took their remaining pilum and steadied it to defend themselves against the first men to make it to the stockade.

Cita felt for them, he really did. He was hardly a seasoned warrior himself, but at least he’d had the training and experience of battle. They were poor sods with no experience or training, put in a hopeless fight for their lives, which the officer knew plainly that they couldn’t win.

More than one of the civilians was standing in a small puddle of their own urine, their tunics sodden with fear. Many were shaking, their pilum points dancing with the involuntary movement.

‘Minerva!’ he yelled.

The optio glanced around at him and Cita gave him an encouraging nod, gesturing to the men at the stockade.

‘Minerva!’ he bellowed again, this time with the optio joining in. By the third shout a few legionaries had added their voices. Then more and more until every soldier in the compound was chanting the Goddess’ name. Even some of the civilians began to join in, the union of the chant diverting their mind a little from the fear that ravaged them, steadying their javelin points even as it steadied their voices.

‘Minerva!’

Cita reached into his own tunic and pulled out the small silver figurine of that same Goddess, who he personally revered above all, and kissed it before tucking it away, silently vowing the biggest altar his purse could afford if there was any hope of victory here; any hope of survival.

There wasn’t, of course, but it never hurt to ask the Gods anyway.

There was a crash, followed by a bellow of panic as the first of the Carnutes reached the stockade and a legionary had to break position slightly to help the nearest civilian drive the man back.

It had begun.

The scorpion at the gate had already been loading and releasing as fast as the operators could work it from the moment the enemy had come near range, but now the second machine on the barrack roof began to cough iron death, though the Carnutes must be almost at the wall beneath it already.

Time to deal with the buildings themselves, then. The stockade would hold for a short time, until the casualties thinned out the defences too much, but the barracks, the accommodation block and the stores were now potential weak points. If the enemy could scale a wall and reach their roof, they would have open access to the whole compound.

The redoubt was now four feet high, and the remaining grain sacks in the store numbered few. The ten civilians labouring to position the sacks under Bennacos’ steady eye were flagging, panting and slow. They would be precious little use at the stockade now, but the job he had for them - while equally vital - was less exerting.

‘Right, you lot. Form up! You, you and you get over to the merchants’ accommodation block. There are no external windows, and the walls are pretty smooth, but you can guarantee the enemy will manage to scale them. Get onto that roof with your pila and stick any living thing that appears over the eaves. Got that?’

‘What if they have archers?’ one of the men asked with panicked, dancing eyes.

‘They do. Stay low until the enemy start to appear over the edge. Then you can stand safely. They won’t be stupid enough to loose arrows at the roof when there’s three of you and dozens of them. The chances of them hitting their own would be too high.’

‘
Dozens
?’

‘Perhaps you’d prefer a position at the stockade?’

The three men exchanged nervous glances and suddenly Bennacos behind them smacked the butt of his spear on the ground. ‘
Move
!’

The civilians ran off, holding their javelins in the ungainly manner of the reluctant soldier. Cita nodded his thanks to the Boii auxiliary and pointed at more men.

‘You, you and you. Same task, but on the barracks roof. Make sure you don’t get in the way of the scorpion crew, but keep any climbers off the roof and don’t let them get to the artillery.’

The second team exchanged equally fearful looks, but kept their arguments to themselves at the sight of Bennacos’ humourless face. As they ran off, javelins wavering, towards the barracks, Cita nodded at the others.

‘You four are with me and Bennacos. We’ll take the stone building and the roof. You are in pairs, one in each lean-to. There are small cracks, holes and windows in the place. Be selective and careful. Stick your weapons through those holes into anything you can hit, but prioritise on those who look like they’re trying to climb. Bear in mind they’ll be doing the same to you, so keep alert; eyes open and watch every crack for a weapon coming at you. Good luck and Minerva go with you.’