Marius' Mules VII: The Great Revolt (68 page)

Finally, after what felt like an age of plunging through ordered chaos, accompanied by the carnyxes and war cries of enemy forces seemingly all around, the six horsemen crossed one of the temporary plank bridges that carried the fortifications across the Osa River and left the flat of the plain, climbing the very lowest slopes of Mons Rea.

Already the other end of the camp - to the north and at the higher elevation - was clearly under serious attack and Fronto was surprised, as he looked up at the southern gate of the camp, to see a full complement of legionaries strung out along the rampart and above the gate. As the six of them approached and gave the day’s watchword, the gate swinging open to admit them, Fronto ground his teeth at the idiocy of it. The north wall of the camp was under attack by probably a third of the entire Gallic reserve army, and yet the camp’s garrison had spread their forces across all the walls evenly.

Angrily, Fronto rode inside and looked around until he spotted a centurion among the men behind the gate, overseeing the distribution of supplies and equipment along the walls and into carts for the plains sector. Leaving his friends to enter behind him, Fronto walked the impatient, snorting Bucephalus over to the officer. ‘What in the name of Juno’s greasy shit is going on?’

The centurion saluted with a confused frown. ‘Sir?’

‘Your northern wall is hard pressed, man, yet you’re concentrating men on every front. Explain?’

‘The signals, sir.
Maintain positions and hold
. Legate Caninius had told us that the general gave the order to hold and not redeploy, and all the legions are signalling that order.’

Fronto stared at the man. ‘The signals were to stop the redoubts and camps around the circumvallation sending their needed men to the plains sector, not to keep every man rigidly in position no matter what was happening around them. Use your damn common sense, man.’

‘Sir?’

Fronto resisted the urge to give the man a slap. ‘You’re wearing half a dozen decorations, so you should know better than this. Unless you have a serious fear that you’re about to come under attack from your sister legions, get these men up to the north wall and try not to let thousands of Gauls walk across it.’

‘Sir… respectfully, you command the Tenth. I can’t give that kind of order against the commands of my own legate.’

Eyes narrowed, Fronto scanned the other men nearby. Behind the centurion’s right shoulder stood a veteran legionary with a scarred face, holding the tablet and stylus that contained the watchwords. The Tessarius - the third in command of a century. The man was trying very hard to conceal an expression of mixed contempt and disbelief at his officer.

‘You. What’s your name?’

‘Statilius, sir. Tessarius. Second cohort, Third century.’

‘Congratulations, Statilius. This is a field promotion. You’re now an acting centurion. I’ll clear it with your legate when we’re not under attack and hip deep in the shit. Now take command of this shambles and get these men to the north wall.’

The veteran legionary saluted in a business-like manner and turned, immediately issuing the required orders, taking two men in every three and sending them up the slope towards the distant sounds of combat. Fronto looked at the centurion whose face was rapidly purpling, but who had finally found the sense not to explode in front of a legionary legate.

‘You can argue this out with your own legate when - if - we make it through this almighty cock up. For now, command your nice safe south wall.’ With a malicious smile, he kicked his horse and rode off towards the east gate, his singulares in tow, leaving the centurion on the verge of eruption, his face a marbled puce colour.

‘I wonder how many others are having similar problems with the calls and the orders,’ Masgava mused as he trotted alongside.

‘I don’t know, but blind obedience is only useful if you temper it with a bit of common sense. Look!’

The situation was clearly the same at the eastern rampart, though at least here there seemed to be an excuse. The incline upon which the camp sat gave the riders a good view across the defences down towards the no-man’s-land between here and the oppidum, and a small enemy force was rushing for the camp’s wall. Not many - perhaps four hundred, maybe four fifty - they were essentially the extreme right flank of the trapped rebel force that had sallied forth along the entire length of the walls.

Fronto looked across at the centurion commanding the gate guard and rode towards him, sliding from the saddle and clambering up the slope to the gate top. ‘Tell me you’re not going to keep a full complement of men here against a few hundred while many thousands attack the north wall.’

The centurion turned an embarrassed look on the legate. ‘Orders, sir, though I can’t say as I like it.’

‘Good. As a senior officer of Caesar’s staff, I am giving you a direct order. Take half your forces, including the reserve century, and reinforce the north.’

An expression of profound relief crossed the centurion’s face and he saluted and ran off, shouting for his signifer and musician. Mere heartbeats passed before the calls went up and every other man stepped back from the palisade, hurrying down the slope to form up on the standard.

Fronto looked along the line, having to lean past the bulk of Masgava who had taken the centurion’s place at his side. Another centurion, clearly of a lesser century, stood a dozen paces further down the rampart.

‘I am Marcus Falerius Fronto, legate of the Tenth Equestris, and I’m taking command of this wall’s defence.’ The centurion saluted and Fronto nodded his satisfaction. Better officers than at the south wall, then. Their shields bore the bull emblem of Caesar as well as the XV of Reginus’ Fifteenth legion. He looked down at the defences. While the double circumvallation consisted of a towered fence atop a rampart protected by sharpened branches, twin ditches, lilia pits, metal spikes, caltrops and pointed stakes, this was a standard camp. A timber palisade protected by a rampart and single ditch. If ever there was a weak spot begging to be attacked…

‘Hold the wall top, Centurion. There aren’t many of them, so you should have no difficulty. Use your discretion. If you manage to thin out the enemy enough to be sure they pose no further threat then send more men to the north. I leave that decision to you.’

‘And where will you be, legate?’

‘The gate. It’s potentially a weak point. There’s an unprotected crossing of the ditches there, so you can be sure a few of them will try for it.’

The centurion nodded and gestured to two of his men. ‘Calatorius? Nilus? Take your contubernia down below and support the legate at the gate.’

The men saluted and sixteen legionaries stepped back and descended, the soldiers at the rampart shuffling along to fill in the gaps they left. Fronto smiled again in recognition of the efficiency of the men around him. He had no qualms about leaving the upper rampart in this centurion’s hands, though as he approached the gate he was concerned to note that it was formed of only a single thickness of oak slats, bound and hinged with rope and barred with only a single light beam.

‘Whoever was in charge of this construction should be beaten with his own gate!’ he grumbled as he stepped close. ‘This wouldn’t hold long against a breathless old woman.’ The four men who were already here had the grace to look at the floor at the comment. ‘Apologies, sir. Not our construction, though.’

Fronto nodded. ‘Nothing we can do now. We’ll just have to hold it.’ He looked around at the force he commanded. Twenty legionaries, five singulares and himself. Twenty six men. A double-leaved gate some eight feet in width. He turned to look inside the camp and rubbed his purpled cheek.

‘We can’t keep this gate shut against them. It just won’t hold. So all we can do is form an inner redoubt. See those three carts?’ He gestured to the two contubernia who’d joined him from the walls. ‘Get them over here and form a ‘U’ around the inside of the gate with them. Tip them on their sides and form a rampart. Use any barrels, crates, sacks and ropes you can find to strengthen it.’ He looked at the four men who had been on guard here. ‘You four go get as many pila as you can. If any of you can use a bow, requisition one. Get the stuff and get back here before I have time for a long fart. Got it?’

The four men nodded, saluted, and scurried off towards the nearest supply dump. He turned to his singulares. ‘We’ll stand ready in case they break through the gate while the other lads are still working, but I think we have a short while yet.’

Leaving Masgava distributing the men in a semi-circle, Fronto jogged forward and put an eye to a crack in the gate. The enemy force were spreading out, only a few dozen paces away, but perhaps a hundred of them were making for the causeway that would lead them to the flimsy gate. A command above sent a flurry of pila out against them, dropping a score of running men at distance. Fronto blinked as a familiar figure pushed his way from the throng to the fore of the attack, his face a bleak and tragic mask.

‘Bollocks!’

* * * * *

Back along the inner rampart, as the artillery continued to thud and crunch and twang their deadly rain on the attacking Gauls, Vercingetorix stood tall amid the death, his winged helmet marking him as easily to his men as the red-robed figure on the white horse he could occasionally see behind the Roman defences did to his legionaries. Caesar was constantly on the move, encouraging and cajoling his men. Vercingetorix nodded in respect for his enemy, wishing there was some way he could magically transport himself to the old general’s side to face him in honourable combat.

‘We’re being thrashed,’ an old, cracked voice said from close by, and the Arvernian king turned to see the blood-spattered, aged figure of Teutomarus of the Nitiobriges, rubbing his sore back and standing with a slight stoop, leaning on his sword.

‘We are taking heavy losses, but so are the Romans, and we are but one hammer of three that pound them.’

‘If we keep this up for another hour or two there will be few of us left to boast of our glory,’ Teutomarus groaned and tried to straighten. Vercingetorix looked his ally up and down. The man was too old and weary really to be fighting. He should be at home, leaving this to his sons. But who was the king of the Arverni to deny a chieftain his right to glory. Instead he nodded.

‘We do what we must. Look to the hill,’ he pointed at Mons Rea and Teutomarus followed his finger. ‘See how my cousin has found their weakness. Vergasillaunus presses home an attack on the Roman camp there. That is where this battle will be won or lost. Like those on the plain outside, we do what we must to keep the Romans from sending reinforcements there.’

Teutomarus nodded and lifted his sword in a tired arm. ‘Then let us hope your cousin knows what he’s doing, my young Arvernian king. And we will go and kill some more Romans.’

The old man lurched off, staggering, towards the ramparts and Vercingetorix lingered for just a moment, looking up at the brutal fight going on at Mons Rea. As soon as he saw that north wall fall, he would pull his men in that direction and make for the camp to combine forces. Victory was almost in his grasp; so close he could almost taste it.

Chapter 23

Vergasillaunus of the Arverni exulted. Commius would writhe in humiliation when he realised how precisely the plan had fit its intention. His scouts had been absolutely correct: when viewed from the crest of Mons Rea, the Roman defensive lines had looped up the slope from the plain, encircling two of the smaller redoubts, but descended again to converge on the Roman camp, as had the twin lines at the far side. The camp itself, no more difficult a proposal than any Roman temporary installation, presented the only obstacle separating him from the trapped rebel force.

Moreover it was clearly under-manned, with much of its personnel engaged on the plain against the other attacking forces. Oh, he’d heard the desperate calls of the Roman horns as his thirty thousand hand-picked warriors descended towards the rampart. He could hardly identify one Roman call from another, but their tone and speed suggested more than a little urgency, and he knew them for a desperate command to reinforce the camp against this new threat.

They would be too late and too few to do anything much about it.

As his army flooded towards the camp’s north wall, the ground continued its gentle descent, giving the men an easy charge with no real danger of stumbling or falling, adding to their momentum and to their sense of triumph.

But the reason for the senior chieftain’s confidence was not based on numbers or surprise or terrain, though all three played their part. It was largely down to the fact that his men had been far too agitated to sleep since they had arrived in position during the dark of night, and instead of resting and eating throughout the morning, knowing that they were out of both sight and hearing of the Roman lines, they had practiced manoeuvres repeatedly.

Vercingetorix had reasoned time and again that if they were to succeed, they should be learning from their deadly adversaries; adopting whatever tactics they could make work. It had been uphill work much of the time with the unruly leaders and their fractious tribes.

But
these
were the best the army had to offer, and he had been careful to bring only those chieftains and nobles in command who were open to his ideas and who he could trust to carry them out without argument. The morning had been an eye-opener as to what the tribes were capable of if they only put aside their arguments and committed to an act.

And so, rather than a rag-tag mass of howling warriors running down the hill, aiming for their own individual glory-hunting duels, the army of Vergasillaunus descended on the Roman ramparts in a more disciplined formation than even many Romans might manage, slamming blades on shields in a rhythmic beat.

Eighteen thousand of his men moved in eight blocks, four-wide and two-deep, each in ordered lines, with the best-armed and -armoured men at the front, presenting a solid shield-wall, heads lowered to protect the face. Behind the shield wall, the next two rows held spears out ready, while two of the rear blocks were constituted entirely of archers and slingers. And following the blocks of infantry and missile troops, some forty paces to the rear, came the reserve force of nine thousand men, ready to take the place of the dead, the wounded, and the exhausted in the ranks as required. The remaining three thousand moved between the army and the reserves with their burdens, ready to tip the balance in this assault.