Marius' Mules V: Hades' Gate (9 page)

His intense concentration was suddenly shattered by the braying of what might charitably be called a musical instrument. The unpleasant, droning cacophony was joined only a moment later by other similar noises being played just enough off-key as to send a shudder along his spine. He had heard the sound of the Gauls' carnyx horns before and, while it was true that the noise put the wind up many of the men, it in equal parts annoyed and amused Priscus. It sounded like a menagerie of distressed animals being physically abused.

His amusement remained suppressed this time, however. Too much of a coincidence to have a Celtic nobleman - for that was surely what the horn heralded - approaching the column at the same time as the forest to the side filled with apparent attackers. He had been sure there could not be enough men there to pose a threat to the legions. The woods would hamper the attack too much to be any real danger. And yet it had all the hallmarks of an ambush.

"Carbo!"

The pink faced centurion, senior in the Tenth, stepped out from the column and strode across to the new legate's horse.

"Sir?"

"Pass the word down the line. I want every pilum in the Tenth unshouldered and in hand ready to use."

"Yes sir." Carbo was peering into the woods. "Treveri, sir?"

"Probably. It's their hallowed forest. Pass the word."

As Carbo stepped back into line, Priscus turned to Fabius. "Stay here and keep an eye on the woods. I'm going to see what the fuss is about."

Fabius nodded and pulled in closer to the column as Priscus kicked his own horse and rode ahead in the wake of Furius. The Tenth formed the first legion in the column, with only the small cavalry contingent between them and the officers of the vanguard. As soon as Priscus moved ahead enough to see past the dust cloud kicked up by the horses, he spotted the source of the impossibly atonal noise. A small group of Gauls, perhaps a score in total - three of them on horseback - were issuing from some unseen trail in the forest on a course to intercept the column.

Steady, Fabius. This could turn ugly any moment
.

As the small party approached, Caesar gave the order to halt the line, an order that was relayed in a heartbeat by the officers of the various units. As the legions and their cavalry escort came to an ordered stop, Priscus reined in alongside the officers. Furius was sitting close to the general and nodded to his legate.

"Ah Priscus," Caesar said, turning to him. "You've spotted an ambush I hear?"

"Perhaps, general. There are a number of men in the forest."

"Then perhaps this noble comes to offer us an ultimatum? More fool him if he thinks to threaten or bargain."

The less experienced of the officers in the van laughed dutifully, but Priscus simply squinted ahead, trying to make out the details of the approaching party. It was clearly a nobleman and his escort; his personal bodyguard. Priscus frowned. Why would the man put himself in such direct danger if he had a hidden army just waiting to pounce?

He continued to puzzle over the problem as the men approached and slowed. The leader was short and stocky, barrel chested and with the arms of a legionary blacksmith. His hair was a copper colour and braided, and his molten-bronze moustaches drooped past his chin, giving him a fatalistic, unhappy look. The ornamentation of his armour and helm and the high quality sword at his side spoke volumes about his rank. Here was a prince among the Gauls. For some reason he looked strangely familiar to Priscus. Caesar was wearing an expression of passing recognition too.

The Gaul must know that Caesar came to conquer; must know that Caesar was not a man to forgive or grant undue mercy. So why endanger himself when he could just send his men out?

Unless they were not his men…

"Shields!" Priscus bellowed to the column in general as he kicked his horse forwards, covering the gap between the two groups of men in four bounds.

Even as Caesar opened his mouth to demand of Priscus what in the name of Venus he thought he was doing, the first arrow struck the nobleman's horse in the shoulder. Before the next could strike, Priscus launched himself from the saddle, slamming into the alarmed nobleman, knocking him from the horse's back so that the pair hit the ground in a tangle and rolled as arrows whispered through the air where the stocky nobleman had been moments before.

Uproar suddenly bloomed along the column. The continual clatter or men turning and forming shieldwalls was dotted with the bellowed orders of centurions and optios, the panicked shouts of green commanders, guttural cries of the nobleman's escort and the screams of both his and Priscus' horse as half a dozen more arrows thudded into them.

Instantly, Aulus Ingenuus was next to Caesar with the skilled manoeuvring of a veteran cavalryman, followed swiftly by half a dozen of his Praetorians, their shields creating a wall that protected the general. The last thing Priscus heard before his head hit the ground hard and shook his senses was the order for the release of pilum - the Tenth were prepared in advance and quick to launch a counter offensive.

Trying to think through his ringing ears and whirling senses, Priscus forced himself up to his knees and unfastened his helmet with considerable trouble. Removing it he noted with great interest the deep groove where his head had struck the rock. Helmetless, he would likely have died. Turning the helm to look inside he could see a smear of blood on the ridge that corresponded.

Blinking and trying to get hold of his brain through the roaring in his ears and the sickening, stomach-churning dizziness, he suddenly found himself being hauled upwards. As his eyes swam into focus, he realised that it was the Gaulish noble with the copper hair who was pulling him upright.

"Thank you" the man said in a thick accent as half a dozen sling stones whizzed through the air above them.

"Afnghhhh" was all he could manage in reply. Strange how a bump on the head made the tongue huge and numb and almost entirely useless. Blinking his rolling eyes again, he felt another hand come round to hold him steady and recognised in his swimming vision the chiselled, bristly face of tribune Furius.

There was no other explanation, now with the head-wounds into the bargain: he
was
turning into Fronto!

* * * * *

By the time Priscus' vision had properly refocused and the nausea had abated enough to allow him reasonable movement, the 'ambush' was over. The Tenth had taken the initiative, given their readiness and their position close to the van, and had peppered the forest's edge with deadly pila. In a display of incredible forward thinking and adaptability from their new Primus Pilus, the Seventh had appeared at a run from further down the column, pausing only long enough to ready their own missiles before sending a second wave into the forest into the seething, screaming aftermath of the first.

Priscus tried to bellow out an order, but his voice still seemed to echo quietly from somewhere deep in his chest, unheard by all but himself. He cleared his throat, wincing at the taste of bile, and looked around.

The legions were ready, swords drawn and shields up, awaiting the command to attack, following up on their devastating missile cloud. Priscus opened his mouth to shout the command, but paused, tilting his head. Turning, he looked at the stocky Gaul and at Furius.

"Did I hear music or is my head still playing funny buggers?"

The Gallic noble nodded. "It is call for talking."

Priscus frowned at the man. "I know you from somewhere." But before the man could answer, a small party of natives emerged from the forest's edge: another group of around a score, mostly noblemen in rich, heavy wool cloaks, with a small warrior escort."

"Shooting before they talk? What are they: Parthians?"

The men of the Praetorian guard, along with their drawn, eight-fingered commander, manoeuvred their steeds into a protective circle around the senior officers, all but blocking the view of Priscus and his two companions, now afoot.

"What is the meaning of this?" demanded Caesar of the new arrival and then, down to the man Priscus stood beside: "out front!"

As the stocky Gaul moved forward, the Praetorian horsemen stepping their mounts aside to allow passage, Furius and Priscus followed at his shoulder.

The newly-arrived party fanned out, leaving one man at the centre, standing proud and tall in high-quality bronze helmet and a clearly-Roman mail shirt. Despite the profusion of nobles in the group, he was quite clearly the leader.

"Man enemy."

"That much is obvious" Caesar replied sharply. "But not necessarily
my
enemy. Identify yourself."

A man wearing a russet-coloured cloak stepped up beside him.

"This" he replied in good Latin with a faint Belgic accent "is Indutiomarus, chieftain of the Treveri."

Caesar shook his head and pointed at the dismounted Gaul with the two Roman officers at his shoulders nearby. "
This
man is Cingetorix, leader of the Treveri. He has commanded his tribal cavalry for me on several occasions over these past years, so I am familiar with his face."

The tall noble and the man in the russet cloak exchanged a look and a few brief words in their own language and then the cloaked man addressed the general once again.

"Cingetorix is no longer of the Treveri. He is a crazed dog to be put down."

Caesar glanced down at the Gaul close by and raised his brow questioningly.

"Indutiomarus is a usurping liar, Caesar. You know my loyalty."

The general straightened again. "I trust you understood those words, 'chieftain' of the Treveri? What say you to that?"

Again, the two men glanced at one another. "Your former ally conspired against you with the Germanic peoples across the river, Roman. He is no friend of yours."

"Indeed? And
you
are my friend?"

'Russet cloak' took a step forward. "We have no love of Rome, it is true, but give us Cingetorix and we will give our oath to stop his German friends crossing the Rhenus."

The man beside Priscus stepped out into the open, turning to Caesar. "This man lies, general. He already has allies from across the Rhenus along with a growing force of his people in the forest. If I cannot return to Tielo and raise my own, loyal, men then by summer time, this usurper will have brought enough thugs from across the Rhenus to flatten all of Gaul, not just the Romans within it."

Caesar sat back in his saddle.

"You put me in a difficult position. I have pressing business in the west, and I cannot tarry here long." He turned to look down at Priscus. "Take both these parties into custody and then have the Seventh and Ninth sweep the closest half mile of forest and round up anyone they find."

"Caesar," Cingetorix snapped, waving his hands, "if you do this, you will give the friends of this son-of-a-German-whore time to build an army in the sacred forest; an army that will depose me and defy you."

"I cannot set you free on your word alone, Cingetorix, regardless of your history of service. I will see that your enemy here is the first to be put to the hot irons to seek the truth of the matter, though, so you may yet walk free a friend of Rome."

Priscus, looking back and forth between the two would-be rulers of the Treveri, suddenly focussed on the group recently arrived from the forest.

"You!" he bellowed, pointing at the group. Caesar looked around and down in surprise at the interruption.

The entire crowd fell silent at the sharpness of Priscus' tone and the new legate stalked out half a dozen paces towards Indutiomarus, Furius bristling at his shoulder like a shadow with violent intent.

"You!" Priscus repeated. "The cloaked man behind the spokesman. Show yourself."

The rest of the crowd now peered at the group, focusing on the figure lurking among the Treveri nobles, wearing a long, grey cowled cloak.

"Come on!" he demanded.

A tense silence fell over the scene - a silence broken suddenly as the man in the cloak turned on his heel and made a break for the treeline. The world exploded into activity as though the man had been a trigger. Indutiomarus and his group of nobles burst apart like a kicked seeding dandelion, each man hurtling individually for the trees in the wake of the cloaked runner. At the same time, the Roman officers all began bellowing orders, with Caesar shouting over the top of them to take the nobles alive.

Priscus turned and gestured to Aulus Ingenuus, sitting in his saddle, impassively taking it all in, his primary duty the safety of the general.

"Ingenuus! Get your men to chase down that cloaked man and bring him back alive!"

The young prefect looked across at Caesar with an unspoken question. The general took a quick look at Priscus' face and then nodded. In response, Ingenuus gestured to two of his troopers and the three horsemen kicked their mounts into action, hurtling off at an impressive pace towards the woods and the running man.

Priscus watched the chase, ignoring what was happening with the rest. The Tenth and the Seventh were moving to the woods to round up anyone they could find and to prevent the escape of the party of nobles. But the cloaked man had distance on them all, having broken first. It was touch and go whether he would reach the woods before Ingenuus and his troopers but, if he did, he was as good as free. These men knew the forest of Arduenna as well as their own skin, and no horseman could penetrate it with any ease.

"Who is he?" Furius asked from close by. Priscus turned to him and saw Caesar leaning forward in his saddle behind the tribune, echoing the question with his own expression.

"I'm not one hundred per-cent sure, but I saw his face briefly and the fact that he ran tends to support my suspicion."

Ignoring the irritation of the general at his non-answer, he turned back to watch the pursuit.

The man would only just make it. As he neared the first boles, he ripped away the cloak to give him a little more freedom among the trees and brambles but, with his back to them and the increasing distance, the view was no clearer. Ingenuus and his men were flogging the life out of their beasts to catch him, but they would not quite make it. Priscus smacked his fist against his hip in irritation.