The Gods of War (35 page)

Marcellus had constructed his stockade further up the coast, where his ships could anchor in some safety in a horn-shaped bay, protected by two long spits of sand visible at low tide, the open shore being deadly when the weather turned foul. This was his base camp from which he emerged to engage in a war of skirmish and raid, using the marching ability of his men, in combination with the power and mobility of his ships, to outwit the Lusitani, his aim to use their country against them instead of the other way
round. Two things were paramount: he must never allow them to assemble against him in any strength, and he could never risk a defeat at sea. Fortunately, the Lusitani ships seemed disinclined to test out the heavier quinqueremes, especially in deep water.

The place he was now using as a base presented a strong fortified position: his stockade built with great ingenuity, the natural defensive nature of the shoreline being enhanced by two small strongholds at the head of the bay. With steep cliffs on both sides, he was safe from any outflanking manoeuvre, while the great bight of water narrowed to an entrance where the two sandbars kept out both the weather and anyone inclined to attack him from the sea. On the landward side, the shape of the steep-sided ravine, enhanced by earthworks, channelled the attackers into a narrow approach that nullified their numerical superiority; but that same defensive network hemmed him in too, forcing him to undertake a voyage every time he wanted to mount an attack.

It was the ships that allowed him to keep his enemies guessing. Regimus had charted the coast, sailed it with him, and now knew every bay and landing place for a hundred leagues, as well as every hazard they could possibly face, so the
Lusitani, never knowing where he might strike next, were forced to extend themselves to contain him. If Marcellus had a true worry, one that survived into the hours of daylight, it was that war was a matter of luck and one day his luck, which had held till now, could run out.

‘If the Roman soldier dreams of anything, it is this,’ said Marcellus. The flickering torch, catching the surfaces of gold and silver, and winking off the precious stones, seemed to increase the size of the hoard. Regimus, his nose tickled by the dust that had risen off the wrappings, sneezed loudly.

‘No wonder they stood and fought,’ he said, wiping his nose.

‘Guard it, Regimus!’

Marcellus turned and walked out of the hut to see that the bodies of the Lusitani warriors had been cleared away and that his men were now standing around, whispering excitedly, because they all knew that this camp that they had just taken was different.

‘Any sign of women and children?’ asked Marcellus.

All the replies were negative, which only confirmed his original suspicion that this was some kind of sacred place. It had a circle of large
upright stones, which stood like sentinels in the moonlight, surrounding a flat, raised rock, seven sided, that could only be an altar. Added to that, the huts were of a more solid construction than those normally found in Lusitani settlements, but that was as nothing to the hoard of gold and silver objects he had just been shown. Those on long wooden shafts were, no doubt, designed to stand upright in the holes which had been made in each corner of the altar, but there were many more objects, all with that intricate craftsmanship in precious metals for which the Celtic nations were famous. These stones formed some kind of temple and the treasure was for use in whatever rituals took place at this spot.

Was it his imagination, or did the night air seem colder here than elsewhere, as though the spirits of the dead were in residence? He was a Roman, and traditionally he respected the gods of others as much as his own, so the feel of the place affected him deeply. In peace, it would not be beyond his imagination to see himself worshipping here, sacrificing some animal as an offering to an alien deity, who, in truth, would be the same as a Roman god, only with a different name.

All his instincts told him to leave everything as it was and get back to his ships with all haste, for
he could not be certain that his men had killed all the guards, so some might have got away. The trouble with that idea was that his men knew about the find, since one of their number had been the first to discover it. He would have a revolt if he suggested they leave such a treasure behind, and what would they say in Rome when they heard that he had had a fortune at his fingertips, the possessions of an enemy of the Republic, and had just left them to be repossessed?

He would try in vain to find a satisfactory explanation, yet standing here it was obvious. He had fought his campaign in a deliberately low-key way, doing just enough to harass his enemy and keep him occupied without ever troubling the Lusitani enough to make his removal a matter of paramount tribal survival. That this strategy had been forced on him by his limited resources in no way altered anything, but if he despoiled this sacred site, that could all change. Nothing would enrage them more than that their sacred objects should fall into the hands of an enemy and they would muster all their forces to attack him, with the sole aim of getting them back. Yet to leave it be would send an even less palatable signal; it would imply that Rome was afraid of the power of the Lusitani gods; so afraid, that,
having killed the warriors left to guard it, the legions had been forced to flee without touching anything.

‘Ropes and shovels,’ he shouted. ‘At the double!’

The tall circle of stones was held in place by its own weight, which over the years had allowed them to sink into the ground, so he set half his men to digging at one side of the base, while the others formed a human pyramid, so that one of their number could get high enough to lash a rope around the very top. Regimus was given the task of laying out the treasure; the route back to the beach was too rough for carts so each man would be given so much to carry, though Marcellus suspected that he would never get back with the entire hoard. Some would be filched, but that was the price he would have to pay.

The diggers had finished their task, hacking away at the earth until they reached the base of the stones lying on the bedrock. One of them went over on its own, without warning, nearly crushing the diggers, and as the work continued many a prayer was offered, silently, to Roman gods, for this was seen as a manifestation of the wrath of Celtic ones. The rest were pulled over, until every stone lay untidily on the thick grass.

Then they lined up and filled their pouches
with booty. Some had knotted their cloaks and slung them over their shoulders. Marcellus watched, noticing, in the torchlight, the fine craftsmanship that had gone into the making of these objects. He also saw the naked greed in the eyes of his men and the thought occurred that, with such valuable objects about their person, some of them might try to desert.

‘Back to the beach and we stop for nothing. Anyone wounded is to be left.’

‘What about the stuff he’s carrying?’ asked a voice in the dark.

‘That will just have to be left with him. You might just have time to put him out of his misery and say a prayer for him. After what we’ve done tonight, I wouldn’t want anyone to fall into the hands of the men who know we despoiled their sacred temple. Whoever does will end up on that altar, wide awake, while they slowly cut out his heart.’

The sky was tinged with grey and the sun was about to rise, so they had stayed there far too long already, and it was long past the time to go, so they set off at a steady trot, the laden legionaries following in single file. Marcellus had stood to count his men, tallying them off as they ran past him, when he first saw the pursuit. The glint of the rising sun, flashing off metal spear tips caught
his eye, making him stare harder at the ridges on either side of the long broad valley. The movement of the tiny figures became apparent, riding at a steady pace on small ponies, easily overhauling his foot-slogging legionaries. He tried to calculate how far they had come, what the chances were of reaching the beach before these horsemen caught up with them; indeed, whether it would be better to stand and fight.

His mind was made up by what he saw next: Lusitani on foot, so numerous he could not count them, pouring over one of the ridges and running to catch them. They were a long way away, but those horsemen had been sent to cut them off from their escape route, so that together they could overwhelm his small force. Marcellus threw off most of the things he was carrying, keeping only his weapons and those precious objects that they hacked off their wooden poles. He ran up the line, ordering his men to do the same, to drink their water and cast aside what they could not consume, to throw away their sacks of polenta, salt and bread and to run, each man at his own pace. He kept looking back, sure that the tribesmen on foot were not gaining, but the horsemen were already abreast while they were still a long way from the beach and the safety of their ship.

Running alongside Regimus, he saw that the older man was puffing hard, his legs being more accustomed to the deck of a ship than this exertion on dry land, while in his mind he ran through various options. The horsemen would get ahead of him, he had no doubt of that, and they would have to break through or face a horrible death, quite possibly, as he had already said, strapped to that sacrificial altar. They could break into smaller groups and try to escape over the more broken ground of the rock-strewn hillsides, but then the other warriors behind them would have the advantage of level ground, which would bring them on much faster.

By the time these thoughts had crystallised, the horsemen were past them and he saw the lead riders on each side turn their ponies’ heads and descend from the ridges, followed in single file by the rest. From that vantage point they would have picked their spot to halt the Romans and they would assume, from their own experience, that the legionaries would form up in a defensive line to face cavalry, just as he knew that ultimately that would suit their purpose.

‘Phalanx!’ he shouted to Regimus.

The older man looked at him wild-eyed, as though he had no notion of what his leader was saying, till Marcellus grabbed his arm and slowed
him, holding up his other hand to halt the rest. It was quite possibly a mad idea, since Roman javelins were nothing like the fearsome spears of Alexander’s Macedonian infantry, but it had the single virtue as a tactic that the Lusitani would not expect it, and quite possibly confused, they would yield before a determined charge by a solid triangle of spears.

There was no time for neatness, no time even to attempt perfection, and he did his best to impart the theory of this strange manoeuvre to his men as he pushed them into place, telling them to cover their heads with their shields and point the spears out at the same angle to the man in front. Then, raising his voice to the loudest tone of command, he ordered them to move, taking the point of the triangle himself so as to regulate the pace. The horsemen were strung across the broad valley floor, more numerous in the middle than they were on the flanks. Marcellus, spear pointed straight forward, turned slightly to the right as they came within casting distance, away from the heaviest concentration of his foes.

Sweat was running in his eyes, making it hard to see properly, but he felt that his tactic had them confused. The men in the centre, seeing him turn a flank to them, did not wait to find out
what would happen next but charged at the array of spears. Marcellus turned again to face them, aiming for the dog-leg gap that had opened up between those who had charged and the others, on his right flank, who had held their ground. As the galloping horsemen swerved to engage, it was like the meeting of two irresistible forces, the Romans, to a man, knowing that they would all die if they even paused. The Lusitani horsemen at the front of the charge were pushed onto the Roman spears by those behind and there was a moment, brief but frightening, when Marcellus thought that their forward movement had been arrested.

But the legionaries, with the single order to close up to the soldier in front and to keep going at all costs, managed to maintain some momentum. In this they were aided by the Lusitani horses, which tended to shy away from the unbroken line of spears. Those on the flanks were now charging to close the gap, but before him he could just see the silver glint of the sea at the point where the valley met the beach. His ships, he hoped, were out of sight below the rise. If they had their
corvii
out and they could keep moving, his troops had a chance; if they had decided to stand off for safety’s sake, then he and his men were doomed.

The improvised phalanx was no triangle now, it was a knot of men jabbing and running at the same time, each one trying to fend off an attacking horseman. The Lusitani swung their great swords, lopping off arms with spears still in the hands, getting under the raised shields to decapitate those who had dropped their guard. Men stumbled and fell, bringing down the unwary to their rear, the heaps of bodies quickly surrounded, to be remorselessly speared by screaming tribesmen, but at the head of that mass they were through, though the earth beneath their feet worked against them as it turned to soft sand.

Marcellus, head down, sweat dripping from his forehead, watched as the mixture changed, losing the colour of burnt earth, until his feet, seemingly weighed down by heavy stones, rose and fell on the clinging fine sand of the golden beach. Lifting his eyes he saw his ships, bridges down, with the men who manned the oars rushing to their stations. Those marines left to guard the ships were armed and they rushed down the
corvus
and formed up in a defensive ‘V’ to receive their fleeing companions.

Marcellus, aware of his duty as much as he was of the knot of terror in his stomach, dashed to one side, hoarsely urging his men up the ramp.
He could scarcely breathe from the heat and the weight of his helmet, so he tore it off his head and threw it into the ship, immediately feeling the welcome wind on his sweaty face. His sword was out, whipping the back of his men if they showed the slightest intention of delaying.

The Lusitani horsemen, several with Roman heads impaled on their spears, had formed up to charge the puny line of marines. Marcellus yelled an order, fearing that his voice would not work and the instructions would not carry, but a marine beside him, wiser than his fellows, bellowed out the instructions in a fresh, full voice as the Lusitani charged. From the line on the beach to every man on the ships who could find the space, a wall of javelins hit the charging horsemen. Animals went over, riders thrown forward into the sand. Those behind fared little better, their forelegs taken by the horses in front, struggling to rise in the sucking, awkward ground.