Rome’s Fallen Eagle (38 page)

‘Don’t bother, primus pilus,’ Vespasian called, riding up the slope as fast as his dignitas would allow. ‘I’ve just had a look at the ground between here and where we’ll put the bridge across, it’s flat grassland; it’ll be much quicker to unharness the oxen and manhandle the carts down to the river.’

‘If you say so, sir.’ Tatius turned back to his men, some of whom were already obeying the last order. ‘Put those bastard boats back where you found them! Why are you taking them off perfectly good carts on which we can roll them down to the river?’ The legionaries looked confused at their primus pilus, but knew better than to ask questions. ‘That’s better; now unharness these oxen and take them away; and don’t eat them, they’re army property and need to report back to their rightful commander.’

‘Are the officers gathered at the praetorium, Tatius?’

‘Yes, sir, I left them there to come and sort out these boats.’

Vespasian kicked his horse forward through the carefully choreographed industry of constructing a marching camp and on towards the centre with Tatius following, having left the pontoon detail in the hands of the centuries’ optiones.

All of his tribunes, prefects and centurions from the legion and the attached auxiliary cohorts were waiting for him as he dismounted at the camp’s heart and handed his horse to a waiting slave.

‘I’ll be brief, gentlemen, as we should be on the move in a little over half an hour. Tatius has united the fifth and sixth centuries from the tenth cohort, both trained in pontoon construction, with the boats.’ He looked at his prefect of the camp. ‘Are the planks here, Maximus?’

‘Yes, sir. The first century of the second cohort is being issued with hammers and nails as we speak.’

‘Excellent. I’ve just been down to the river; the tide is on its way out but it is still a good fifty paces across, that’s thirteen or fourteen boats to span it, so we have enough to make a double span.’ He picked out Paetus from the crowd. ‘As soon as we make our move, Paetus, I want your lads to get down to the river and swim it in double quick time.’

The young prefect grinned. ‘I’ve already had them empty their water-skins and issued them with ten javelins each.’

‘Good. Once you’re across you’re to delay anything that tries to come and stop us finishing the bridge.’

‘Yes, sir.’

‘The Hamians will give you archer support from this bank.’ Vespasian looked for the prefect of the I Cohort Hamiorum. ‘How many arrows have your lads been issued with?’

‘Fifty apiece and twice that many on the reserve carts.’

Vespasian nodded. ‘That should last the day. I want all the legion’s bolt-shooters attached to the Hamians, Maximus.’ The prefect of the camp nodded. ‘Once the bridge is down – and let us pray to Janus that we can do it in half an hour – then the first cohort will lead the way over the right-hand bridge with Tatius and myself in the front rank. You will all follow our example, gentlemen, and fight in the front ranks of your units, even the young gentlemen.’ Vespasian cast his eye over the five youthful faces of the thin-stripe military tribunes, their shining eyes and earnest faces betraying excitement and apprehension in equal measure, and prayed that none of them would succumb to the mindless battle-frenzy that used to plague him in his youth; there was no place for that in the disciplined ranks of the legions. ‘Once across, the first cohort will form up facing north with the river right on their flank. They will be followed by the second with Mucianus in its front rank and then other cohorts in order. We’ll form up in three lines with four cohorts in the second line. The left-hand bridge will be for the auxiliaries; I want the Gallic cavalry ala over first to seize the high ground on our left flank as quickly as possible and hold it until the five Gallic infantry
cohorts arrive. They should form up on the hill, maintaining contact with the legion’s left flank; the cavalry will then act as a deterrent for any attempt to outflank us up there. The legionary cavalry will be the last to cross and will act as a reserve. The Hamians and the artillery will stay on this bank and move forward with us, so the
carroballistae
should stay on their carts and shoot from them. However, today we will not move forward as our orders are to hold the bridgehead and wait for the Twentieth. Any advance we do make will be short and tactical and will be signalled by the first cohort; you will move to support it. Is that all clear, gentlemen?’

Murmurs of agreement from the assembled officers answered Vespasian’s question. ‘I very much doubt that we will be allowed to deploy unmolested but the quicker we do this thing the more chance we have of taking the Britons by surprise. But they will come for us, be assured of that, and they will try to push us back across the river.’ He looked out towards the horde of tribesmen on the hill opposite, less than a thousand paces away; they had given up their jeering and now seemed preoccupied with cooking their supper and drinking. Their voices were a constant background drone. ‘We mustn’t allow that to happen, so we will have to fight hard against odds of five or six, maybe even seven to one. Our objective is to secure a bridgehead by dusk; then the Twentieth will come over and join us, relieving our auxiliaries on the high ground. After that we will have a hard night of it, remaining in formation, sleeping briefly by rotation after what has already been a tiring day. In the morning we advance north and that, gentlemen, will be a bloody path.’

As the truth of his words was contemplated by his officers the timbre of the drone of the thousands of voices from across the river changed, gradually at first and then quickly, to become another roar of defiance.

Vespasian looked north and smiled grimly as he felt his pulse quicken and a churning in the pit of his stomach. ‘The Batavians have made it; so it begins, gentlemen. Return to your units, have them stop this pointless camp construction and form them up in column. I’ll give the order to move as soon as I think that the
Britons have their attention sufficiently engaged elsewhere; the Batavians, Hamians, artillery and the bridge party will go first. I’ll go with them, Mucianus; once we’ve reached the river, move the men out. Dismiss.’

With a jangling of equipment the officers saluted their legate, turned smartly and marched away to rejoin their commands. Vespasian gazed back across the river; the Britannic horde was starting to swarm north with an oddly fluid swirling motion.

‘Just like a flock of starlings changing direction,’ Magnus commented, coming up behind him.

‘I don’t think I’ve ever seen so many starlings flocking together.’ Vespasian turned and looked at his friend and started in surprise. ‘What are you doing dressed like that?’

‘Well, I’m wearing this chain mail tunic in order to make it harder for one of them savages to examine my entrails; as for the helmet, that’s quite good for preventing your head being split open, and the shield is a far more effective device for deflecting a sword blow than just your left arm, if you take my meaning?’

‘I do indeed; does that mean you’re determined to fight?’

‘I did contemplate making myself a nice little picnic supper and sitting up here on the grass to watch the whole affair but then I thought that I might get rather chilly, so it would be better to be tucked up nice and snug in the front rank next to you. Oh, and I brought this for you.’ Magnus handed Vespasian his shield.

‘Aren’t you getting a little old for this?’ Vespasian asked, taking the shield with a nod of thanks.

‘I’m fifty-one this year, plenty of fight and fuck left in me; besides, I ain’t never fought a Briton – should be interesting.’

Vespasian shook his head, knowing that he would be unable to talk Magnus out of a fight that, as a civilian, was not his. He realised that he did not want to either; he would feel much better with his friend at his side. He looked back across the river; the Britons were moving north en masse. As he watched the dark shadow of humanity cloud the grassy hillside, a limb of it suddenly split off and headed down towards the river; the XIIII were approaching the broken bridge. Vespasian offered a
silent prayer to Sabinus’ god Mithras to hold his hands over his brother as, half a mile to his right, the XX started to move north behind the XIIII in their feint to the Batavians’ crossing point.

‘That’s got them interested,’ Magnus observed as the volume of the Britons’ shouting rose appreciatively at the sight of a new threat on the move.

‘It has indeed, almost all of them are moving away from us; time to go.’ He looked at the duty bucinator waiting by the praetorium. ‘Sound the advance.’

The notes rang out, high and clear, and immediately the throaty rumbling of cornua boomed out. To his left the two bridging centuries began to push their carts down the hill with mounting speed as Paetus’ cavalry galloped away, followed by the Hamian archers at a jog and then the sixty mule carts carrying the legion’s bolt-shooters.

Vespasian took a deep breath and steeled himself for what he knew would be one of the most testing few hours of his life. ‘Let’s get this done, my friend.’

‘I was hoping you’d suggest that.’

Vespasian and Magnus began to walk down the hill in the wake of the carts as, all around, the cohorts of the II Augusta and its auxiliaries prepared for combat against an enemy that far outnumbered them. Vespasian knew that the struggles of that afternoon would seem as nothing compared with what awaited the II Augusta on the far bank of the Afon Cantiacii.

‘Don’t just look at them, float them!’ the centurion of the sixth century of the tenth cohort bawled at four of his men who were momentarily resting after the exertion of lifting a boat from its cart; behind him, men pounded sledgehammers down upon eight thick stakes, ramming them into the drier earth up the bank. The legionaries hurriedly tipped the boat over onto its bottom and manhandled it through the tall reeds on the riverbank and onto the mud beyond. With a real sense of urgency, enhanced by their centurion’s malevolent glare, they untied the two oars secured to the benches inside and then pushed it into
the river; all four of them jumped in, with muddied sandals, once it had achieved buoyancy.

Vespasian watched, occasionally glancing nervously north, past the artillery carts forming up in three ranks of twenty behind the Hamians and on to where the Britons were swirling towards their perceived threats; along the bank the unloading procedure was repeated until all the boats were bobbing in the slow-flowing river.

The pounding ceased when the optio in charge of that detail was satisfied that the eight stakes, four for each bridge, were secure enough to begin fastening the four long coils of rope waiting on the ground; beyond them, the boats of the second bridge waited in the water. Slightly further south, on the opposite bank, Vespasian could see the last of Paetus’ men scramble out of the river to join the ala, already forming up in four lines. So far there was no sign of the enemy moving against them.

‘We might just get away with this,’ Vespasian said, looking past Magnus, up the hill to where the II Augusta was doubling down towards them.

Magnus spat and clenched his thumb between his fingers and muttered a prayer, warding off the evil-eye.

‘Sorry.’

‘First boats!’ the centurion roared; his colleague on the second bridge bellowed the same order.

Five boats immediately started rowing into position, fanning out into the river. As the first boat came in line with the stakes two legionaries grabbed it, holding it steady, whilst a couple more passed the coils of rope, each secured to two stakes, to the men not rowing, one in the bow, the other in the stern. They quickly fed the rope through large metal eye-holes screwed into each end of the vessel and secured them before passing them onto their colleagues in the second boat as it came alongside. The oarsmen held the boats together as the ropes were threaded through, knotted and then passed onto the third boat, the outside oarsman always working his blade in the water keeping the line stable, withdrawing it only as the next boat came into position. Beyond them a mirror image of this operation was taking place with the second span.

Vespasian looked back to the hill in the north; a mass of chariots was speeding up the grassy slope towards the Batavians arrayed along its summit. A thin, dark cloud suddenly soared up from the auxiliaries and arced in the sky to descend into the chariots’ midst; any screams resulting from the volley were drowned out by the general background roar of tens of thousands of raised voices, but even at this distance he could make out scores of chariots immobilised on the slope with their ponies lying still before them.

‘Next five!’ the centurions called out as the last two boats were secured, drawing Vespasian back to the matter in hand.

Five more boats, on either side, headed out into the river; on the bank, a century equipped with hammers and nails jogged down past the stakes, followed by mule carts full of planking. Ousting the former occupants of the boats, the four lead legionaries made their way forward along the secured boats; a work-chain formed behind them relaying the two-foot-wide planks to them. As the planks arrived they were laid down across the boats’ thick, horizontal gunwales and secured into place with long nails hammered through into the wood below. Working from the centre out, a twelve-foot-wide wooden road began to take shape, and was soon extended back to the bank by more planks overlapping those already laid. By the time the final planks were secured the next five boats were in place, stretching two-thirds of the way across the river, and the whole process began again as the last of the boats headed out towards their positions. On the far bank Paetus’ ala advanced past the line of the bridge as two boats landed a contubernium of legionaries equipped with sledgehammers and stakes to secure the bridges to the western bank.

Camp Prefect Maximus crashed to attention next to Vespasian with a jangle of
phalerae
, his military decorations, and gave his crispest salute. ‘The Second Augusta and its auxiliaries are formed up in column ready to cross, legate!’

‘Thank you, prefect.’ Vespasian turned to see the ten thousand men under his command extending up the hill in two columns, each eight men abreast. The warm westering sun glowed on their
tired, grim faces and played on the burnished iron cladding them, front-lighting the standards that they would follow to death itself.