Chapter Three
You have power over your mind—not outside events. Realize this, and you will find strength.
—Marcus Aurelius, Meditations
Northwest Germania, September 10, 762 AUC
First the ground had shaken and erupted upward, almost like a volcanic eruption, but without the spewing of pumice or the flow of lava. And then it got infinitely worse.
Gaius Pompeius had never imagined that lightning could be so bright, so large, and so loud. The brightness blinded him even as the enormous bang deafened him. Then he found himself falling, before slamming chest down onto what seemed to be solid ground. His head hurt like a thousand of the worst hangovers ever known to mankind.
I am dead, thought Gaius Pompeius. The gods themselves have struck me down. I will never see home, never see my family or sweetheart again. I am dead. So now I join the roots of my family tree.
Though Gaius couldn’t hear it, all around him thousands of men of the Roman Army—Romans, Germans, Gauls, Rhodians, Thracians, Palmyrenes, and some numbers of Greeks and at least one Jew with the medical staff—screamed for all they were worth. Each, like Gaius, was certain he was dead. It didn’t help that, blinded, they couldn’t see anyone and, deafened, couldn’t hear anyone. Each man was all alone.
Even some of the centurions screamed in terror, though if asked they’d have lied shamelessly about it. Some of the horses landed well. Some, though, broke legs on the sudden arrival below. These, too, screamed, though in pain more than fear.
Gradually, outstretched on the ground, terrorized beyond reason and with the breath knocked out of him, Gaius began slowly to realize, My ass is wet. Hell, my whole body is wet. How does someone who is dead feel that he has a wet ass? Or a wet body? How does someone who’s dead have the wind knocked out of him? How does he feel the contours of his muscle cuirass digging into the flesh of his chest. Or the grass on his face?
“I am alive,” he finally concluded, though even he could not hear the words, so viciously had the thunder pounded his ear drums. “Whether this is a good thing…”
Slowly, very slowly, Gaius’ eyes accustomed themselves to the surrounding darkness. Blinking, and though his vision was slightly blurred, he realized that he could see much better now than he had been able to in the rain-pouring, foggy German forest. He looked up and saw a very large, very bright moon overhead, with the edges a bit fuzzy. The stars and constellations of stars, fainter, gradually made themselves known.
“No, no man who is dead can see the Septentrio, nor Virgo, Leo, and the Gemini. I must conclude, therefore, that I am not dead. Yet.”
His ears still rang and his head still pounded him mercilessly. Even so, the young tribune was made of pretty stout stuff. It was this, plus a profound sense of duty, a Roman sense of duty, that made him force himself to his feet, unsteadily, and look around to get his bearings.
The first thing he saw was that the forest had changed. There were still trees, but they had been uprooted and fallen over. Still, there weren’t many of them and they were mostly not too close to the troops. From what he could see by the light of a nearly full moon, none appeared to have fallen on the troops though some of the troops had plainly fallen on the trees. Even with somewhat blurry vision he could see them draped over the now not quite horizontal trunks. The elevation that made them not quite came from the fully exposed root systems, now all aboveground, and their branches.
The hangover he felt—Sooo unfair for a man to have a hangover without even getting drunk—abated rapidly. His vision began to clear more, too. He noticed that, while still soaking wet, he was fairly warm. He remained deaf.
Centurion Silvanus trotted up, not all that steadily. Rather than taking a knee next to Gaius Pompeius, he plopped himself down on the shockingly dry ground next to him.
“Sir,” he asked, “what the fuck just happened?”
The tribune looked at him without comprehension. Silvanus shouted the same question.
Whether Gaius’ shaking head meant “I don’t know” or “I can’t hear you,” none but he could have said.
* * *
Marcus Caelius managed to land his body next to a large rock. His head, on the other hand, managed to land on the rock. Short version, he was stunned silly and very lucky not to have broken his neck. Not far away, Agilulf lay dead with a broken neck.
At that, he was in better shape than Appius Calvus, the haruspex who, though physically unharmed, had drawn up into a fetal position, apparently catatonic.
The Gallic cavalrymen were not in bad shape, but some fifty-nine of their horses had managed to break legs in the unexpected ten-to-twelve-foot fall. The cohort had a couple of veterinaries on hand, and the legion had several more in the medical group, but how many of those horses could be saved was a matter for speculation. Probably they would all die. Meanwhile, the horses cried out piteously for an end to their pain. Some of the horseman, who, by and large, loved their horses, though deaf for the time, could still recognize equine agony when they saw it, even if by moonlight. Some of those couldn’t take it anymore and cut the poor beasts’ throats, then wept like babies over their cooling corpses.
The commander of the Gallic cavalry, Atrixtos, son of Cotilus, was one of those who had felt he had to put his horse out of its misery. He was also one of those who wept over the corpse afterward.
Sextus Albinus, of Second Cohort, had a broken arm. Gnaeus Gallus, from Seventh, was fine other than the deafness.
Gratianus Claudius Taurinus, the aquilifer, had saved his eagle but at the cost of landing in a very awkward way. He’d broken several ribs on Marcus Caelius’ rock.
Along with the horses, a fair number of legionary mules, donkeys, and oxen had likewise been hurt. And every wagon and cart the legion owned had broken its axles.
* * *
Stunning Marcus Caelius was no mean feat. Keeping him stunned for very long was nigh unto impossible. Walking still a bit unsteadily, he wandered the legion telling each senior centurion from each cohort, along with the praefecti of the auxilia, to start building a camp. “No, I don’t give a shit that’s it’s dark. No, I don’t care that you’re tired. Build!”
All this was done with hand gestures and standard hand and arm signals. Mimicking using a shovel and making a gesture of pounding in stakes was common. For the cavalry, he pointed around three hundred and sixty degrees and held one hand over his eyes, as if shielding them from the daytime sun. Thus the light troops and horse were sent out to screen. With Agilulf dead, command had fallen to a more Romanized German, one Thancrat, something of a world traveler, who spoke fair Latin, albeit with an accent. The first cohort stayed in armor and spread out to guard the men building the camp. The medics…
By the time Caelius reached the medics and the sick and injured in the center, he’d gotten back some of his hearing. So had they. He was pleased to see that the medical detachment had gotten their tents up, though the fracturing of the wagons and the injuries and deaths to the oxen were troubling.
Where are we going to get more? We don’t even know where we are, except that it’s not that damned German forest. He looked upward, thinking, Not that I’m complaining, whichever one of you is responsible for this. If you exist.
“How are your patients?” he shouted at the senior doctor, an unusually tall Jew who had studied medicine in Alexandria, Samuel Josephus. Unlike many Jews his age, Josephus had a full head of hair that he kept close-cropped. The doctor shook his head, not from despair but from wonder. He made a respectful hand motion for the first spear to follow him into one of the tents.
He pointed at one of the patients, lying atop the ruins of a collapsible cot. “This one was a goner,” Josephus shouted. “No doubt about it. Nothing I or anyone could have done about it. He took a deep slash across the belly, sliced his intestines all to hell. Shit leaking out everywhere. And with that, infection and a miserable, lingering death. But look at this.”
Josephus moved aside the cloths covering the man. There was a red line marking where his belly had been slashed open, but no sign of an actual cut.
“He was burning up with fever already, before that…that event, I suppose we can call it for now…took us. Now?” Here Josephus put a hand to the man’s head and once again shook his head with wonder.
“I have ninety-three more or less like that—all very badly injured, all were going to die; all suddenly healed.”
Marcus Caelius nodded soberly, then planted a solid kick in the prone man’s side, below the ribs. “Get up, you fucking malingerer. Get your weapons and armor and rejoin your century. There’s digging to be done and we need every hale man.”
The legionary sprang upright and stood at attention. “Yes, First Spear. As you command, First Spear.”
“And you, Medicus, get those other ninety-two slackers back to duty.”
By the time Marcus Caelius returned to where he’d been dropped on a rock, his hearing had pretty much returned—and apparently so had everyone else’s—to the point he could hear digging, stakes being pounded, and shouted orders and groans as the legionary corps of centurions applied their vine staves to slackers.
As it should be.
He found Calvus, the haruspex, still in his fetal position—upright, arms around bent legs, rocking back and forth and keening piteously. A quick examination showed no wounds. Even so, Caelius called for medical orderlies to bring Calvus to the medics. Maybe he just needs some time.
Tents were going up, too, even the legate’s big tent, the Praetorium. Marcus hadn’t looked but was as certain as he was of anything that Privatus and Thiaminus would have found the cart carrying his limited baggage and tent and would have already unloaded it and gotten to work setting the tent up. Tent, cot, little chest with personal items, including his corona civica, leather valise with spare clothing and a spare pair of caligae—these were all the baggage Caelius permitted himself. His greater comfort, a family, was back near Castra Vetera, on the west bank of the Rhine. He’d left a will naming his brother, Publius, also a centurion, as executor, and leaving everything to his girl, Dubnia, a tall, fiery—in all ways—Gallic slave, a dozen years his junior, whom he’d freed and married.
I hope to hell Flavus gets through to warn them. I can also hope, but really doubt, that Nineteenth Legion managed to cut their way out. Sorry, friends, but it wasn’t our fault we abandoned you.
Gaius Pompeius, having determined for himself that, on the one hand, Agilulf was most sincerely dead and, on the other, that his replacement spoke reasonably good Latin, the tribune showed up half an hour later, going immediately to his own tent at one side of the large one called the Praetorium. Marcus Caelius intercepted him, en route, saying, “No, sir, you go to the commander’s tent.”
“But I’m just a junior trib—”
“Yes, and you look the part, too,” said the first spear. “But, no, sir. You are the senior officer present. You are the commander and, as such, you must take your place.
“Sir,” the first spear continued, “the men have been through a lot. We were three legions and close to six thousand auxilia. We’re down to one somewhat understrength legion, two legionary ad hoc cohorts, and maybe a couple of thousand auxilia. We were surrounded by German barbarians in a dense, dank forest, full of rough terrain. We appear to be alone now, and on some kind of grassy plain. We had a chance to fight our way free, but it was never more than a chance and maybe a slimmer one than I let on to the men. We are now, at least for the time being, safe. But even being safe, when you expect not to be, is a kind of stress. And so, once again, the men have had just about enough. So you, sir, will take over the command tent and you, sir, will play the part of a commander to the best of your ability. And, yes, sir, I and the other centurions will help you and cover for you to the best of our ability while you learn the job. Is that clear, sir?”
Almost Gaius Pompeius stood himself to attention while answering, “Yes, Top.”
Almost letting an unaccustomed smile peek through, Marcus Caelius said, “Sir, we don’t need officers for the routine things—assuming battle formation, setting up camp, marching hither and yon. All those things the centurions can do perfectly well and routinely. We need officers for the things that are not routine. That, and to provide absolute integrity to a business given to corruption. This means you.
“Now get a little rest. I’ll wake you before first light and you and I will inspect the camp’s defenses. Watch my face. If I frown, you go ‘tsk’ and say, ‘Not quite up to snuff, is it, First Spear?’ I will then castigate the cohort responsible for ‘embarrassing me in front of the commander.’ If I do not frown you will smile, very slightly, and say, ‘I suppose it will do. For now.’”
“Got it, Top. I’m a quick learner; my tutors always said so.”
“Very good, sir.” Caelius stood to attention for a short time, less than a minute, before tilting his head and saying, “Sir, you need to tell me I am dismissed. Loudly, so some of the men can hear and pass the word.”
“Oh. Right. Dis…missed.”
Caelius saluted and prepared to turn about, then remembered one more thing. “And, sir, you are no longer the tribune. Until further notice you are the legate. Wear his tunics with the purple stripe and look through his goods for a spare belt. Best start thinking about your assumption-of-command speech.”
* * *
The legate’s tent, the Praetorium, which Gaius now occupied by order of the first spear, was a lot more luxurious than any other tent in the camp—indeed, it was large enough to hold an oversized bed, a collapsible desk, a terrain model board with folding legs, and enough space for the legate, his six tribunes, the praefectus castrorum, and the first spear and other first order centurions all to attend orders, meetings, and war counsels at the two-and-a-half-foot-high table, which itself was large enough to seat ten on stools arranged around it. In addition, there were three small tables, much lower, and nine collapsible couches, called lecti, arranged around them, for when the legate invited his staff to dine.
Overhead, hanging from a hook in the wooden central ridge of the tent was a bronze eleven-wick lucerne, or oil lamp. Other lamps sat in various other spots, with two five-wick terra cotta jobs at the main table and one three-wick lantern at each of the short dining tables.
I hope the legate had enough oil in the impedimenta to keep all those lamps going.
Gaius didn’t sleep, though he lay down on the thick bed of furs some of the men—and he supposed some of the actual legate’s slaves—had set up for him.
I am so fucked. The first spear was right that it’s my responsibility to take command as senior officer present, but, damnation, I was just getting the hang of morning reports, running the duty roster, and inspecting the guards. I don’t know how to prepare and give an order. I don’t know anything about gathering and analyzing intelligence and scout reports. I am clueless about the quartermaster functions of an army; Ceionius took care of all that. Speaking of which, I wonder where Ceionius is? I suppose the Germans must have gotten him.
And where am I going to find replacements for the other five tribunes and the camp prefect? I could promote Marcus Caelius to camp prefect, I suppose, but he’d probably turn it down for now, on the theory that a first spear, under our circumstances, is more important than a glorified clerk and tent-peg counter. And he’d probably be right.
Hmmm…I am pretty sure that, somewhere in the six thousand or so citizens with the legion and the refugee cohorts, there are probably at least half a dozen from the equestrian order, gentlemen rankers, whom I could promote up to tribune. But would anybody take orders from them?
Or maybe I could make eight of the centurions—have to find those who would know what they’re doing—to include Marcus Caelius, the de facto heads of the various staff functions, and give them each a ranker from the equestrian order to assist, which is to say to do the actual work.
Yes, got to give anybody like that a capable and literate assistant. I mean, take the first spear for an example. He is, all at the same time, the commander of the First Century of the First Cohort and the First Maniple of the First Cohort. He is also the commander of the entire First Cohort. He is also the senior centurion of the legion and, as such, rides herd on all of the fifty-eight other centurions. If I gave him one more thing to worry about, I don’t know that even he could cope.
The legate’s thoughts were interrupted by a knock on the tentpole by the entrance and the sound of someone clearing his throat.
“Yes?” Gaius said.
A tall and skinny form, bearded and swarthy, slipped in through the tent flap. He wore a simple tunic of linen, somewhat dirtied now, and carried a stylus and tabula cerata, or wax writing tablet, in his left hand. The tabula cerata was often called a cera for short. The skinny form looked over Gaius Pompeius and, though he kept his face carefully blank, he thought, So young.
“Dominus, I am Gisco, freedman and secretary of the presumptively late legate and supervisor of his slaves. They’ve prepared some food and poured some wine if the legate would care to eat.”
Gaius was taken aback. While he’d seen the man about fairly often, he’d never known his position. He suspected that was because Gisco simply kept a very low profile. He also realized he was famished. Even so, he asked, “What food and what kind of wine?”
Tucking his cera under his left arm and placing the stylus behind his right ear, Gisco clasped his hands together and made continuous short, rocking bows as he spoke. “The food is mainly a roast rabbit, with a gravy suitable for dipping the bucellatum in. The bucellatum is fresh, so not so hard to chew. There are some lovely olives as well as some sharp cheese from Gaul. For meat, a rabbit was all we could find, until the veterinarian decides which animals are hopeless from the fall, and we kill and butcher them. The wine is a well-aged Alban, dry in this case, and I ordered it mixed, of course.”
“You know, Gisco, that sounds pretty good.”
“We aim to please, Trib…err…Legate. My apologies, Legate.”
“It’s all right,” Gaius Pompeius said. “It’s not as if I am used to the change yet, either.”
Gisco reached one hand out and snapped his fingers. A slave entered, followed by another. Between them they bore the meal and the wine on trays, the wine with a pitcher of water, a small amphora holding the wine, and a filled cup. Soundlessly, with deep bows, they left.
“Sir,” began Gisco, resuming his clasped hands rocking motion, “do we have any idea what happened, and where we are?”
“Not a clue, Gisco,” replied the legate. “But one thing I am pretty sure of: Wherever we are, it’s not surrounded by bloodthirsty barbarians, in the middle of a nearly impenetrable forest, shivering, while being rained on, in Germany.”
“Very good point, Dominus.”
“Tell me, Gisco, what services did you provide for the legate?”
“Well, Dominus, as mentioned I supervised his slaves on campaign.”
“How many of those are there?”
“There were twelve, including two girls for the legate’s sexual use. Now there are seven, and none of those are the girls. Pity, wonderful and lovely creatures they were; they brightened up every place they went. But they were in the middle of the column, with Seventeenth Legion and the heavier baggage. Hopefully the Germans will appreciate them for their beauty and not just slaughter them out of hand.
“I also handled all his personal correspondence in any of a number of languages: Latin, Greek, and Aramaic, but also Phoenician and Egyptian in Demotic. Also, I have some very limited Parthian, or Farsi, in their own tongue, though I cannot read or write that. I have a smattering of German and Gallic, but cannot claim fluency.
“I reviewed and compiled the daily reports, prepared the daily orders—”
“Wait! You prepared the orders?”
“Yes, Dominus. Also prepared the notes for battle orders.”
“So you know what goes into them?”
“Yes, Dominus. It’s not that complex. I have noticed, over the years serving the legate—the former legate—that everything in the army is very simple, but all the simple things are very hard. I also—”
“Can you make me a list of everything you did and could do?”
“Yes, Dominus. Give me a couple of hours and I’ll have it for you.”
* * *
By now the ditch, the fossa, was dug, the wall, or agger, was raised, and the rampart of stakes, the palisade of sudes, was emplaced. All tents were up, not just the legate’s, tribunes’, and centurions’. Most of the troops not on guard had repaired to their own tents with severe headaches, still. Marcus Caelius could sympathize; his own head still ached, though it was going away.
One century per cohort stood guard on the walls.
While ostensibly watching over latrines being dug under the closer eye of the medical detachment, Marcus Caelius worried over how the legion was going to make good its losses. And these were not especially light.
He wasn’t especially concerned with the loss of the troops—a few hundred, more or less, made little difference to the effectiveness of the legion. But at least nine centurions had fallen or been left behind by whatever gods had sent them here. And those were going to be very hard to replace.
Then there was Ceionius. I don’t think I had much choice. Even so, I wish the surly bastard were here now to do the quartermaster work. Where am I going to find another quartermaster? I know that I don’t want the job.
Ceionius. Ceionius…No, if I hadn’t offed the son of a bitch, the legion would have fallen apart where we were. I can’t regret preventing that, at whatever the cost.
I also know Ceionius’ assistant and staff—competent for routine matters but not an ounce of initiative among the lot.
And then there’s the legate…the very new and inexperienced legate. He desperately needs a staff, but they were all killed either with the old legate, alongside Varus, or in the Germans’ first attack, when the barbarians sought them out especially.
Well, actually, our boy was junior, only got here three months ago, so if one of them had survived they’d be the new legate.
All right, first things first. I’ll move the centurions around but no more than necessary to make sure there are at least five per cohort. Then I’ll look into the optios, and find the best one per cohort, then have the legate promote them up to hastatus posterior. After consulting with the senior centurions of that cohort, of course. As for the legate’s new staff…
All right, suppose I find a dozen or two rankers of equestrian rank. I pick the seven who seem most promising, and we make them optios. No need to rotate them through the various staff functions; we can afford to specialize. Then I assign one first-order centurion, each, to watch over them and give orders that the rest will obey. Meanwhile, without giving up my position as first spear, one of those equestrians can do the quartermaster job under my occasional supervision. For now.
Gonna be a busy day.
Oh, and, note to self, there’s no reason for those optios to have their own tents as if they were real tribunes, they can crowd into one tribune’s tent and like it. The other five of those tents? Well, despite the healing of some men who should have died in any sane world, we still have hundreds of injured, far too many for the tents of the medici. So they can take over the extra tribunal tents.
The first spear turned his attention back to the latrines. No flowing water so no sewer system to carry off the waste. I’ve got both the legionary cavalry, the Palmyrene horse archers, and the Gauls out scouting the area. Hopefully they’ll stumble upon a decent-sized stream. In the interim, I need to put the engineers to digging some wells, well away from the latrines. Can’t know how many until we see what the wells can produce.
If not, if the scouts find no water, we know it takes about nine days, minimum, for maggots to turn into flies, so every week we’ll drop a layer of dirt about a foot thick atop the shit. That should keep the flies down.
I suppose I ought to have the troops start depositing their wood ash at a central location to be turned into lye by wetting and evaporation. Helps with the stench.
And then we’d better see to salting and smoking the meat from the dead and soon-to-be dead animals. Then there’s the…
* * *
Atrixtos, the prefect of the Gallic cavalry to which the survivors of the legion’s own cavalry had been attached, had separated his not quite four hundred and sixty remaining men—less the ninety-three for whom no horses remained—into four groups, which he thought of as north, south, east, and west, and sent them out in those directions with orders to go out ten miles, then turn to their right for five, then return to camp. Tomorrow they’d do the same thing, only oriented northeast, et cetera.
In addition to the Gauls, there were some five hundred and twenty-three Palmyrene mounted sagittarii, or horse archers. A larger percentage of their horses had survived unharmed, being a lighter and more nimble breed, carrying lighter men.
He, himself, had gone out with the eastern group toward the mountains that loomed in that direction. Ten miles hadn’t brought them to those mountains, not nearly, but it had brought them to a stream, one good enough to keep the legion and its attachments in water, after a move, if the other detachments, or tomorrow’s patrols, found none better.
The grass was quite tall, about to the riders’ calves.
Like many ethnically non-Roman Gallic aristocrats—at least among those who had survived Julius Caesar’s conquest of Gaul—Atrixtos’ family had been given Roman citizenship a couple of generations prior, for services rendered.
“Beats being starved at Alesia before being murdered or sold as a slave,” his old grandfather used to say. “And Gaul would still have been conquered no matter what other choice my father might have made.”
His Roman name was Attius Julianus. His mother still called him “Atrixtos.” So did everyone else except the late Varus, who set massive store by Roman citizenship and culture. In keeping with his Roman name, Atrixtos had had a classical education, at home, first, with tutors bought or hired by his father. Later on, he’d been given a better education at Colonia Copia Felix Munatia, later to be known as Lugdunum, and still later as Lyons. He’d never been to Rome and, from the descriptions, never wanted to.
Sometime after the detachment had turned right, Atrixtos’ second-in-command, Taurou, cantered up next to him and said, “We’re being tracked. Men on foot, I think, though they may have horses they left behind for stealth. Or are walking.”
“I know. Spotted them just after we made the turn. Less than half a dozen, I think.”
“I counted five. Could’ve missed one.”
“Here’s what I want you to do,” Atrixtos said. “Take twenty—no, make it at least twenty-five men. Trot ahead and once we’re out of your sight find a good ambush position to either side of our route. Hide yourselves in that position. Send the extra five on, raising as much dust as they’re able. We’ll march through some distance, then spread out and turn round to make a net of men and horses. Our trackers will follow. Capture—and I cannot overemphasize that I mean capture—them. We don’t want to make enemies we don’t need to.”
With a curt nod, Taurou trotted to about midway back in the column and ordered one section of about twenty-seven to follow him. He made sure to include a cornu man in the groups.
* * *
After the detachment had passed and the trackers showed up, Taurou could see they had been six in number, after all. They were small men, those trackers, and a bit dark or even yellowish. They weren’t bald, he saw, though they seemed to have shaved their heads, all but for a black topknot. If they had a weapon amongst them beyond knives and what looked to be light hunting bows, Taurou couldn’t see one. Contrary to his expectation, though, they did have horses, just very short and shaggy ones.
Ponies? I’ve never seen a horse that short, thought the Gaul, standing just high enough to see over the grass, and with tufts of grass hastily tied to his head for camouflage. He watched until the trackers broke into a small stream, where he could get a better look at them. But if their legs are short, they look strong. We shouldn’t assume they’re not as fast as ours, at least on the long haul. So we cannot give them the chance for a long-distance race.
Taurou and the other Gallic riders had their horses—and pretty well-trained horses they were—prone in various depressions on either side of where the main body had been expected to pass and had.
Taurou let the strangers pass and continue on for a couple of hundred yards, then told the cornicen, “Blow charge.”
The brass call blared out. In an instant, the twenty riders Taurou had kept with him burst from cover. Almost as quickly, their wide-eyed, shocked, yellowish prey mounted their short, shaggy ponies and goaded them to a gallop. Their gallop, however, was a good deal slower than that of Taurou’s men and their mounts.
As any pursued rabbit might, the locals tried to bolt left. When they did, they could see a thick knot of the strangers’ huge horsemen charging for them. Looking behind, they saw even more coming for them. To what was now their left charged the group that had originally set them to flight. And there was nothing more open on their right.
* * *
The leader—leader, for the nonce, though he was not especially senior in the tribe—of the half dozen scouts, for that was what they were, was Bat-Erdene. He was known merely as Erdene to his friends.
He was leader because he had the best eyes of any young man in the tribe. His name meant something like “strong gem,” though this was given as a baby before his eyes’ abilities became known. Bat-Erdene looked desperately for some kind of opening.
There was, Bat-Erdene saw, a small chance, a small weakness, in these strange people’s cordon. This was just to the left of the group now to his front, between them and the group that had first charged them after breaking from ambush.
Pointing with his right arm, he twisted his head and torso about, shouting, “That way! That way! It’s our only chance!”
From there it was a race between the maneuverable and strong ponies of the locals, and the monstrously large and powerful looking mounts of the strangers. It was a race that Bat-Erdene and his handful were doomed to lose, however; the strangers’ horses were not just big, they were at least thirty percent faster.
One of the strangers to the front, like his horse, huge compared to Bat-Erdene, had shocking red hair, something the young local had never seen before. That distraction was partly to blame for his not swerving in time to avoid having his pony hit sideways by the stranger’s big horse. This knocked the pony over, sending Erdene flying. He hit hard and rolled.
Before the local could rise to his feet, one of the big redheaded strangers was atop him, stripping away his small utility knife and pinioning his arms. Another bound his hands behind him. When the strangers hoisted Erdene to his feet, he saw that four of his five companions were likewise taken, while their ponies were being joined into a coffle. He did not see Ankhbatar in their number, so had some hope his friend had managed to escape.
Bat-Erdene thought, Maybe Father or the chief can come up with some kind of bribe to get these fearsome folk to let us go. Bribery was their only hope; fighting was just not his people’s way.
Someone who seemed to be chief of these strange men said something to Bat-Erdene is an inquisitorial tone. The words meant nothing. The captive gave an eloquent shrug, which the foreign leader seemed to understand.
* * *
Atrixtos looked over the captives. Short men, they were, and stout. And, though they carried no hand weapons beyond the couple of knives of which they’d been relieved, plus bows, they seemed to be fairly strong. They wore vests of animal hide, fur side in, and trousers of leather. On their feet were short boots with upturned toes. Each man’s head sported a fur cap, which seemed a bit much for the weather.
Their bodies were not the only thing that was strong about them, Atrixtos noticed. “Gods, do these people stink. How can they live like that? No matter, get them ready to move.”
The captives were mounted on their coffled ponies, then the strangers formed up and began to ride in the direction of the setting sun.
* * *
Marcus Caelius brought the captives, with Atrixtos, to the legate’s tent. There were also present the new legate, the senior decurions of the legionary cavalry, and the Palmyrenes, as well as the most senior decurions of the rest of the Gallic cavalry.
As Atrixtos entered the tent, he heard the Palmyrene leader, Tadmor, describing the river and campsite his men had found.
“That sounds better than what we found,” he interrupted. “On the other hand, we do have some captives. Five of them, one got away.”
Holding a palm up to temporarily silence the Palmyrene, Gaius Pompeius asked the Gaul, “What language do they speak?”
“Not a clue, Trib…er…Legate. Sounds like nothing I’ve ever heard. They’re seated outside the tent.”
“Gisco,” called the legate.
Instantly, the secretary was there, cera under one arm, hands clasped, making his usual short, rocking bows. “Yes, sir?” One of the old legate’s slaves stood at Gisco’s elbow.
“There are five captured locals seated outside. Make friends with them. Give them food and wine or water or both, mixed, whichever they prefer. You speak more languages than anyone else in the legion; either learn their language, enough to get by, or teach them ours.”
With a deeper bow, the Phoenician disappeared.
“Now, Tadmor,” the legate continued, “tell me about this stream. Is there a ford nearby? How far from the hill? And the hill, gentle slopes or steep sided…?”
He is, indeed, a pretty quick learner, thought Marcus Caelius, not without some measure of personal pride.
* * *
Make friends first, thought Gisco. And no better way to make friends than over food and wine. I wish they didn’t stink so.
“Quickly,” he told his trailing slave, “bring water, wine, and six cups, immediately, then have the cook produce something decent to eat.”
Half a dozen of the Gallic cavalry stood around the bound men, standing guard. As soon as Gisco saw that the captives were bound he ordered that the ropes be struck off.
As the captives were unbound, the secretary made gentle little motions with his hands that they should remain seated. Afraid of the towering Gauls, none of the captives attempted to rise. They did look around at the camp’s guarded ramparts and the sheer mass of soldiery everywhere on display.
Gauging their chances of an escape, thought Gisco, and judging those chances poor. Intelligent enough, even if disgustingly filthy.
The wine came, accompanied by cups and a jug of water. Gisco poured himself, water first, then just enough wine to be sociable.
He passed the cups out to the captives who, he noticed, refused to take a sip until he had.
After the—no, not the “captives,” our guests—had had their first sip of the watered wine and seemed pleased with it. Gisco began the lesson by pointing at his own chest and saying, “Gisco.”
The captive, who was clearly bright but a little misoriented, likewise pointed as his own chest and repeated, “Gisco.”
“Well, this is going to be tougher than I’d hoped,” muttered Gisco. “Hmmm…I know: let’s try different body parts.”
He held up one hand and pointed to it, saying, “Hand.” Then, lest the guests make the all too easy mistake of thinking that the word for pointing was “hand,” stopped pointing while still keeping that hand up, he repeated, “Hand.” He then did the same with his other hand.
A sudden light seemed to dawn in one of the captive’s eyes. Holding up his own hand, he answered in something completely unpronounceable, then repeated the Latin for hand without too much distortion.
“Right,” Gisco said, “teach you boys Latin, it is. To the extent possible, though, let’s just stick to first and second declension, and first conjugation.”
To clear up the previous confusion, Gisco made a circle around his own chest, then did the same for the bright guest, followed by each of the others. Again, that light came on in the bright guest’s eyes. He pointed at his own chest and repeated the Latin word.
Gisco then made gestures encompassing his entire body and said, “Gisco.” Rather than repeat “Gisco,” the bright one pointed to himself and gave his name, “Bat-Erdene,” then, again, in what Gisco took to be a short form, “Erdene.”
Bat-Erdene had a surprisingly intelligent face, with the thinnest, wispiest bit of facial hair Gisco had ever seen. Like the others, he was short and stocky. His topknot hair was so black it was almost blue, and very straight and wiry.
To make sure he got that part right, Gisco then pointed to the other four, in turn, and adopted a quizzical look. One by one they said something that was, in the first place, not “Bat-Erdene,” and, in the second place, different in each case. He poured them all some more water and wine, then went through the names a dozen times each until he was fairly confident that he could remember all five.
Food arrived in the form of fresh biscuits and some stew with chunks of beef in it. Again, as with the wine, none of the guests would touch theirs until Gisco had first. The Phoenician decided that, since they had no way of telling if the bowls had been poisoned, rather than the food, this was probably a matter of politeness. While they ate he went through the words for cup, wine, water, jug, bowl, spoon, and stew, then the verbs for eat, drink, and finally, to go, as in to go about the camp. The guards accompanied the group.
“Tent,” said Gisco, then, sweeping his hand around to cover an area of tentage, he gave the plural.
“Tabernaculum, tabernacula,” all five captives repeated.
Gisco then pointed out one legionary and said, “Romanus.” He pointed out several more labeling each as Roman. Then he pointed at a group and said, “Romani.” He then pointed to several other groups saying the same thing. Finally he swept his hands around, as if to take in the entire camp and repeated, “Romani.” Finally, when he thought he had that message across, he held out both arms to encompass the group of captives.
As one they said, “Argippaeans.”
* * *
“Argippaeans?” said the Legate, that evening. “Herodotus mentioned them. Supposed to live somewhere north—well north—of Persia, I think. Doesn’t help with the language lessons, I suppose.”
“Five hundred words,” Gisco told Gaius Pompeius and Marcus Caelius. “Five hundred words and you can more or less get by in any language. I’m not saying they’ll know the difference between first declension singular vocative and third declension neuter plural, or why Romanes eunt domus is wrong and Romani ite domum is right. But with five hundred words we’ll be able to talk. Should take about ten days.”
“And, if not,” said Marcus Caelius, with deadpan seriousness, “we can always cut their balls off.”
* * *
Though a new campsite had been settled on, the one found by the Palmyrenes, moving wasn’t going to be that easy. Little by little, the century of artificers and fabricators was turning trees into wheels to replace the ones broken in the fall that had brought them here. It would have been slow work in the best of circumstances; given the sheer volume of wheels needed, hundreds, as it turned out, it was excruciatingly slow.
“And there’s nothing we can do to speed things up,” the centurion in charge of the artificers told Marcus Caelius. “Worse, none of this wood is seasoned. Worse still, we’ve only got so many wheelwrights. The others are all handy with tools, of course, but I’m stretching the wheelwrights parchment-thin with supervising. On the plus side, at least the hubs and most of the axles are all right, and we’ve lost none of the ironwork, though a lot of it needs repair. But that’s more than balanced out by the wagon bodies that broke.”
“Let me tell you what worries me,” said Marcus Caelius. “We are running out of food. If it weren’t for the meat the cavalry are bringing back, and the flesh of the dead horses, mules, and oxen, we’d be starting to get hungry in under a week. We’ve got to find a source of grain and buy or take it, then haul it in.”
“Well, that’s another thing, Top: do we need to fix all the wagons when we’ve lost so many draft animals?”
“We do,” answered Caelius. “We can take some of the cavalry horses and put them in harness to supplement what we’ve lost. But we cannot make from scratch everything we might have to leave behind if we don’t have drayage.”
“I’ll keep them to it, then. We’ll fix everything that can be fixed.”