Chapter Four
As far as the country of these Scythians the whole land which has been described is level plain and has a deep soil; but after this point it is stony and rugged. Then when one has passed through a great extent of this rugged country, there dwell in the skirts of lofty mountains men who are said to be all bald-headed from their birth, male and female equally, and who have flat noses and large chins.…These are injured by no men, for they are said to be sacred, and they possess no weapon of war. These are they also who decide the disputes rising among their neighbours; and besides this, whatever fugitive takes refuge with them is injured by no one: and they are called Argippaians.
—Herodotus, The Histories, Book IV.23
(Macaulay Translation)
In camp, somewhere in the land of the Argippaeans, date unknown
While the other four Argippaean captives had not quite reached the five hundred words Gisco had given as a goal, Bat-Erdene had well exceeded it. He, uniquely, could converse fairly well in a sort of pidgin Latin, certainly more than well enough to make Marcus Caelius’ threat merely theoretical.
Gisco hadn’t tried to count them, but he thought that, while the captive’s Latin accent remained an atrocity, his vocabulary was something near three times the goal. Though he still didn’t get the Romanes eunt domus joke.
On the other hand, all five had been forcibly bathed by legionaries, been issued new clothing, and had seen their old clothing burnt as an offering to Pluto. Who deserved it. They were much more tolerable to be around now.
“So, amicus Gisco,” asked Bat-Erdene, “what to become us? We no object to how we treatment, so far, but families know, by now, that we captured by fierce and powerful strangers. They must be out of minds with worry and grief.”
“Well, nothing too very bad is going to happen, I think,” answered the Phoenician secretary. “But I can understand your concern. I’ll tell you what: let me go see the legate and ask that one of you be given his horse back and be let to go tell your people that you are well, and that we would like to parley with your chiefs.”
“Would you?”
“Of course, I shall. In fact, I’ll go wait in line to see the legate now.”
* * *
“Yes, Gisco,” said the legate, who seemed to be in the middle of rehearsing his assumption-of-command speech. “What is it?”
“It’s the…err…our ‘guests,’ sir. They’re concerned that their families—who certainly know they’ve been taken—will be deeply worried about them. I was thinking we could send one home on his own horse to set their minds at ease and to set our guests’ minds at ease, as well. We could invite a party of them, too, to parley. We may find some friends. We may even find some friends who can stop the first spear from continuously worrying about the food situation. And the draft-animal situation.”
Poor Marcus Caelius, thought Gaius Pompeius Proculus. Ended up, after all, with the duties of first spear and the duties of camp prefect.
“If they’re going to send their leaders to come see us, they’re going to want some kind of surety that they won’t also be turned into ‘guests,’ don’t you think, Gisco?”
“I agree, Legate, but I am not sure who we can or ought to send.”
“Go see the first spear and ask who he thinks would do. Remind him that they must be sober men, of great probity. Now leave me alone; I have to rehearse…”
“One other thing, sir.”
“Yes, what?” Gaius asked, impatiently.
“Well, beyond the men to serve as hostages, someone with a little diplomatic experience ought to go along, too. But the only one in camp with anything like that experience is, sad to say, me.”
“Right. You go, too.”
* * *
“Lucius Pullo and Titus Vorenus,” mused Marcus Caelius, pondering the newly promoted-to-centurion duo standing at attention before him. They looked almost to be brothers, about equally ruddy-faced, equally tall, and equally broad of shoulder. Blue-eyed and blond-haired was a given, given where they’d enlisted from. “I don’t suppose…”
“Yes, First Spear,” answered Vorenus. “They were our great-grandfathers. Took their discharges—no, Titus Pullo wasn’t killed at Pharsalus, but switched sides once again—anyway, took their discharges and set themselves up as gentleman farmers in Gaul, about half a day’s walk from Nemausus. You know Caesar was a great one for forgiving even the greatest wrongs from old friends and comrades. Plus Vorenus-that-was spoke up for Pullo to Caesar’s face.
“Next farm neighbors, they were. Married girls from the local aristocracy; citizens, they were. Then, what with being best friends and all, they exchanged sons and daughters for marriage. Became something of a tradition between the two clans. Though, since the numbers weren’t usually even, this let some more local blood in. Became something of a tradition between the two clans. At this point, it’s not clear which of us is more closely descended from Titus Pullo and which from Lucius Vorenus. Near as we can tell, from trying to figure out the genealogy from family records, we’re closer to half brothers than distant cousins. We’re also a bit more than half Gaul.”
“I suspect I’m about half Gaul, myself,” said Caelius. “From Cisalpine Gaul, you see. If, that is, the hair and the blue eyes didn’t already tell you that.”
“We figured, Top,” said Vorenus.
“Plus,” added in Lucius Pullo, “first names also get switched for the firstborn boy in every generation. And when my mum died giving birth to my little sister, Ultima, it was Titus’ mom who practically raised the lot of us. Naturally, we also followed the other family tradition and enlisted together. You would be amazed at how much land a couple of generations of senior and first spear centurions can acquire in Gaul off their discharge payments. Enlisted? Yes, we’re equestrians but tradition is tradition. And, since the Eighteenth was actively recruiting at the time…”
“I see,” said the first spear, continuing with: “Well, I have a job for the two of you. You’re going to become escorts for the emissary from the legion to whichever tribe of locals the Gallic cavalry took our captives from. And you’re going to stay behind as sureties if they elect to send their own emissaries to us.”
Both of the new junior centurions gulped.
“Do you know why I chose you two?” asked the first spear.
“No, Top,” they answered together.
Marcus Caelius gave the two an icy smile. “I chose you because you are among the only really expendable centurions in the legion.”
* * *
All the centurions but two were present for Gaius Pompeius’ assumption-of-command ceremony and speech. So were the prefects and senior decurions of the auxiliaries, plus the senior medical staff and some few others, to include the gentleman rankers pulled up to be staff. There wasn’t room inside the legate’s tent for them all, though food and drink—nothing fancy, just fare a bit superior to what was normal in camp—were laid out inside in buffet fashion. The aquilifer, Gratianus Claudius, stood by the entrance to the legate’s tent.
Marcus Caelius read off, “Attention to orders.” At this, all those present except the new legate stood to attention. Caelius continued: “Pursuant to the customs and traditions of the service, and under the authority of the emperor, the undersigned assumes command: Gaius Pompeius Proculus.”
That was Gaius’ signal to move to the lectern and order, “At ease.”
He took a small sip of watered wine from a cup resting on a shelf on the lectern, as much to cover his nervousness as to wet his throat.
“So far, so good,” he began. “Seriously. Odds were fair that we were all going to be killed in Germany. Oh, we had a chance, yes, but not necessarily a great one.
“Now we’re safe, properly encamped, and although our supply situation could be better, it could be a good deal worse, too.”
Marcus Caelius, when reviewing Gaius’ speech, had been adamant. No, sir, don’t explain yourself. Just confirm for them the situation, then tell them what we’re going to do and why.
“Let me give you the downsides, up front. One, we do not know where we are, though, from the constellations, we can be quite sure we haven’t been moved by the gods to some other realm. Now, you are very likely thinking that, if we are on a plain, and this kind of grassy plain doesn’t exist in Germania, Gaul, Hispania, or anyplace we’ve been told of in Africa, then we cannot be to the west and must be situated somewhere to the east, right?
“Not so fast. We’ve never explored the western ocean past the Canary Islands. Could be another continent out there. Could be several. Could be that if we marched west we’d eventually come to a place we couldn’t hope to cross without building ships. Could be we’d never find enough wood to build those ships. So for now we’re going to sit pat while trying to figure out where we are.”
Hmmm, hadn’t really considered that, thought Marcus Caelius.
“Well, almost sit pat; there’s a better campsite to the east so we will be moving there, most likely.
“Two, based on the physical appearance of the captives the Gauls took, who resemble nothing I’ve ever seen, we are not close to home. In any direction.
“Three, we’ve lost a lot of men and some of them were key.
“Four, every one—every single one—of our wagons and carts were wrecked.
“Five, we lost a lot of dray animals.
“Six, the food situation is not great.
“Seven, the wells the engineers dug are not producing enough water for all our needs, though we can cook and drink just about enough.
“Eight, we’ve still got a lot of sick and injured, though whichever god or gods sent us here healed at least some of our men whom we should have reasonably expected to die.
“Nine, no women at all. Ten, there’s almost no wood growing around here for cooking, long term.”
“Had enough doom and gloom yet?” Gaius asked, with a broad and well-rehearsed smile. “Here’s the good news and the plan for the immediate future.
“First, we’re going to get the wagons fixed. Whoever sent us here was kind enough to transport enough wood with us for that and for cooking…for now. Then we’re going to load up and move to that better campsite—it’s got a good hill and a broad river nearby—that the Palmyrene horse archers found for us.
“We can do a lot of hunting for meat, and the cavalry has been doing a fair job of stocking the larder. But we don’t have enough wheat for more than another week or ten days with some rationing. And we’re so short that we can’t afford to set some aside to plant, even if we could be sure it would grow well in the local soil. So we’re going to have to either trade for grain or find someone who has what we need and take it.
“Me, I’d prefer trade. Much safer.
“Along those lines, we’ve sent—rather, this morning are sending—an embassy to treat with the tribe the captives came from. My secretary, Gisco, who has been teaching them Latin with mixed success, says they do not grow much if any wheat but do grow barley—” This was met with a chorus of groans; barley was what the legions issued as punishment rations. “Yes, I’m no happier about it than you. Better than starvation, though, isn’t it?
“Hopefully, too, the local barbarians will be able to give us some idea of where we are. But don’t count on it; we may be lucky just to get a good idea of our surroundings. And maybe a source of wood for fuel. I say ‘maybe’ because the locals allegedly cook over dried dung. No, unsavory though it is, this isn’t unknown even within the Empire. Note: Start saving animal droppings, effective now.”
Gaius took another sip. This one was for a dry throat; he found that the more he spoke, the less nervous he became. He pointed at a little knot of men, generally young.
“That lot over there is going to go to making up some of our losses in key personnel. They’re all equestrian class and they’ve all been promoted to the rank of optio. Like other optios, they can read, write, and do some arithmetic. They’re also somewhat schooled in history and literature. Also logic. So they’re a little better qualified than most optios.
“That’s too junior for their responsibilities so they’ve each had a senior centurion assigned to watch over them. Unlike normal tribunes, they’re not going to rotate through the jobs. Instead, they’ll specialize in administration and law, scouting, interrogations, and intelligence, planning, engineering, and supply. One of them, too, is from the camp prefect’s section—and, no, whatever happened to Ceionius no one seems to know, probably killed by the Germans. He’s not here with us. In any case, that one will be working under the first spear to take care of quartermaster functions.
“The first spear is also splitting with me the duties of the tribune laticlavius. So don’t fucking waste his time. Or mine. We’re both going to be busier than a one-legged man at an ass-kicking competition.
“That also all means that you are not to be feeding shit to, nor fucking with, the staff just because they’re very junior; they are backed up by some serious rank.
“Now all of you and the troops really have one question I cannot answer, or not yet, anyway: how and when do we get home? No, I cannot tell you either when or how; be lying through my teeth if I did. I can only tell you that, beyond sheer survival, nothing is more important than getting this legion home and reporting to the emperor.”
Again, Gaius Pompeius sipped at his watered wine. “Now, some minor instructions. Senior centurions of the vexillations from Seventeenth and Nineteenth: we’re putting your names on the roster and payroll of the Eighteenth. No, don’t even think about bitching about it, you don’t have your eagles, and you need to be under an eagle. We’re going to muster most of you as the Eleventh and Twelfth Cohorts, Eighteenth Legion. By most of you, I mean that anyone from your old legions’ first cohort is going to be transferred to the appropriate century of the Eighteenth’s First Cohort, at least until it’s full strength. We also need you, if you haven’t already, to start to compile a list of personal equipment shortages. Speaking of that, Top, how’s the inventory coming along?”
Marcus Caelius answered, “Still in progress, sir. A quick sight inventory tells me we’ve got about half enough scuta and gladii to provide for the missing ones, but not nearly enough furcae, leather haversacks, pila, or cooking pots. I’ve got the fabricators working on tanning the hides of the dead animals and making new pila and furca with wood from the uprooted trees and the iron from the several thousand framea found about the camp. Might be enough. Centurions, have your optios escort your people with shortages to the prefectural tent to sign or mark statements of charges on the payroll roster.”
“One area where we are in very good shape,” said Gaius Pompeius, “even with the vexillations, we’ve lost enough men that the pay chests are unusually flush. They were flush even before this, but there’s more now. As such, and since the men ought to be paid in September, we’re going to start payday as soon as the charges on the pay rosters are annotated.
“Any questions?”
The lad’s done fairly well, thought Marcus Caelius. I suspect that it’s that proper Roman nose that makes him seem to the men worth listening to, despite his youth.
* * *
“So how do your people live?” asked Lucius Pullo.
Gisco, Bat-Erdene, Titus Vorenus, and Lucius Pullo, guarded by an understrength turma from the Palmyrene horse archers, covered the seemingly endless grassy plain on horseback. They had two spares with them, plus three more with the Palmyrenes, as well as half a dozen pack mules bearing gifts and trade samples, as well as firewood.
Bat-Erdene had been given back his own horse, along with his bow and quiver. He rode what appeared to be a well-made saddle, felt over wood over leather over inch-thick felt to protect the horse. It was very high, fore and aft, but lacked the leg-clenching horns of a Roman saddle. Short-tied broad stirrups helped him take what looked to be a very comfortable seat well up on the high felt and wood rear. A couple of balanced bags were tied off and hung to either side.
The horse, the Romans noticed, had a much steeper, triangular back than their mounts, so that the saddle sat much higher over the beast’s backbone.
“We have pattern,” Bat-Erdene replied. He glanced as Gisco and asked, “Pattern? Is right word?”
“Routine might be better,” the Phoenician replied.
“Routine, then,” he corrected. “We keep sheep, generally. And numbers of goats. Also these big things; don’t know the name because saw nothing like in camp. Have…” Here Bat-Erdene used his fingers to make horns on his head.
“Ohhhh, cows and bulls,” said Pullo.
“Okay, if say so. We call ‘ngek’; more than one ‘ngekud.’ Have to keep them from turning land to dust, them and sheep and goats. We move them in great circle, mostly marked by watering holes and rivers. Make circle three times a year; always end up in same place, what we call ‘winter camp.’ We’ll also plant barley and rye at each stop, so have something besides meat to eat. Also collect other things—wild apples, some flavorings like…mmm…wild garlic and chives. Honey, too.”
“And you live in…?” Pullo asked.
“We have tents on…ummm…wagons—is that the right word?” At Gisco’s nod, Bat-Erdene continued. “We call ‘gerud.’ Pretty cramped but, when late fall comes, and early spring, cramped and warm is welcome. Mostly, in good weather, we sleep outside rolled up in a blanket made from wool—that, or skins. At winter camp is more permanent lodges.”
“Are,” said Gisco.
“Are more permanent lodges.”
Vorenus glanced down at the odd arrangement for Bat-Erdene’s feet, hanging from his saddle. They seemed to allow him to ride securely, somewhat bent-legged, but without needing horns to grip his thighs. Pointing at them, he asked, “What do you call those?”
“Yobud,” Erdene responded, figuring that the Roman meant his stirrups because he would have zero interest in his feet.
“Hmmm. Where did they come from? Did your people invent them?”
“Nobody really know. Been using that as far back as anyone can remember.”
“Them, not that,” Gisco corrected.
“I don’t know that I’d care to change,” said Vorenus, slapping the horns of his own saddle. “Our kind grips the legs and provides a pretty solid platform for fighting from.”
“De gustibus non disputandum,” said Erdene, the use of which raised a solid round of laughter from everyone who could hear.
“You’ve taught your student well, Gisco,” said Pullo.
“He’s a very good student,” the Phoenician replied. The comment caused Bat-Erdene’s chest to swell with pride.
“When will we reach your tribe?” asked Pullo.
“Really good question,” Bat-Erdene replied. “I…mmm…‘offset’ is right word? Ah, good. I offset our route to the west to come close to where they ought to be. When we reach trail, we will know.”
“By the shit left behind?” asked Vorenus.
“No, no; pick all that up for cooking and heating. Set off and pile up to dry. Use on next pass around. No, we will know because almost all grass for miles eaten or trampled down, and soil chopped up by hooves.”
“Ah.”
“You people don’t make war, Gisco tells us,” said Pullo.
“No,” replied Bat-Erdene. “War most stupid thing I ever hear of. Nobody attack us. Forbidden by them’s own customs and laws. We too useful doing what we do. Even Scythians to south no attack, and they attack just about anybody.”
“Hmmm…wonder why,” mused the Roman.
“Legends say we made war once upon a time. Made whole peoples disappear. So horrible we swore it off. And nobody wants us to start thinking about it again.”
“That would seem to make a certain sense,” observed Gisco. And neither do we.
* * *
The party reached a large section, many miles across, that seemed almost completely denuded of grass nearly down to ground level. The area had a strong odor of sheep manure, though it looked like most of it had been picked up and moved.
Most, however, was not all. Spying a roughly oval pad of manure, Bat-Erdene dismounted next to it, then bent over and tested it with his fingers.
“Two day ahead,” he pronounced, wiping his fingers on the short grass remaining. “Not more than three.”
“How fast do they move?” asked Titus Vorenus.
“Speed of sheep and goats, not speed of horse,” replied Bat-Erdene.
Vorenus looked at Lucius Pullo, whose family kept sheep in fairly large numbers. The latter thought upon this before saying, “Different kind of grass and maybe different kind of sheep and goat, and we have no idea how many sheep and goats, but maybe ten to twenty miles ahead.”
“We can catch them,” said Gisco.
“Going to be a hard ride, though,” Pullo answered.
“Tell my ass about it,” said Vorenus.
“We can ride at night,” suggested Bat-Erdene.
Gisco asked, “But how will we know where we’re going?”
Bat-Erdene looked left at Vorenus, then to the right, at Pullo, before suggesting, “One you two want tell him?”
Vorenus took it up. “Why, by the smell, Gisco, by the soon to be insufferable smell of tons upon tons of sheep goat and cow shit.”
“Let’s ride in the daytime,” insisted Gisco.
“Wish we had some dogs with us for wolves,” pined Bat-Erdene.
“Ummm…wolves?”
“Sure, wolves. Follow herds. Almost only reason we have bows and arrows.”
* * *
“You not make camp in like other place?” Bat-Erdene asked.
“Like in or as in,” corrected Gisco. “‘As in’ is better.”
Lucius looked at Titus to provide an answer.
The latter nodded, and explained, “There are three levels of manning to produce a camp. A whole army of at least two legions and the auxiliaries normally attached can do it in a few hours. Plenty of time left to cook, maintain equipment and animals, and get enough sleep even with pulling guard on the walls.
“A single legion can do it, but it takes longer and so requires that either the march be shortened, or the pace increased, or the ditch and wall—especially the gap between tents and wall that keep the enemy from tossing torches or shooting fire arrows at the tents—be reduced. Or that sleep and maintenance be reduced. Less than a legion and it gets progressively less of a camp, until it’s just flat impossible without marching for an hour, building a half-assed camp, then tearing it down in the morning, marching for an hour…You get the idea.”
Bat-Erdene nodded as if he did get it, although he didn’t, not entirely.
“Sometimes, too, speed gives more security than entrenchments.
“Now we could set up the tent carried by one of the pack mules, but that would only insulate us from warning, not from danger. So we’ll stay out here, roll up in a blanket just like you, and keep one ear open for the sound of the horses getting frightened. Also, while we won’t be pulling guard, the Palmyrenes will keep up a few of men on guard at all times. And out of force of habit, when one of us wakes up, we’ll walk the perimeter and check the guards.”
“Understand,” said Bat-Erdene. Without another word he got up and walked to where the moon showed a short wall of stacked sheep droppings. Kneeling, he felt from top to bottom until he reached some that seemed dry enough to him. He took out a half dozen of them, gathering them up in his arms, and walked back to the little encampment.
Once there, he unceremoniously released the sheep droppings, then plucked a few of the clusters of grass his tribe’s sheep had missed. These he twisted and then braided loosely into a rope. Kneeling down on the ground, he coiled the twisted and braided grass rope into a fairly tight mass. Then, using his knife, he dug up three clods of dirt and then a circular ring around those, fairly deep and about a foot in width from the inside of the ring to its outside.
“Uncontrolled fire,” he announced, “is thing of dread here on steppe.”
Bat-Erdene then went to his own saddle, now resting on the ground, and took from one of the bags a piece each of flint and iron pyrite. “We most lucky have outcropping of these, together, along tribe’s route. Friends Pullo and Vorenus, do you have a grating and maybe a cookpot in with the mules?”
“Several cookpots,” answered Titus. “One for us and a few for gifts for your tribe’s chiefs. Only the one grill, though.”
“May I borrow?”
Wordlessly, Vorenus went to where the mule packs lay, selected one and rifled through it until he came up with the iron grill and cookpot. These he turned over to Bat-Erdene, then stood to watch procedures.
Bending low, Erdene stuck the pyrite against the flint, raising sparks with only some of the strikes. After more than one hundred tries, one spark, finally, caught on the loosely twisted grass rope. Blowing gently, he breathed life into that little spark, until the grass went from a smolder to a low blaze.
Around the blaze he broke off and placed chunks of dried sheep droppings, then blew those ablaze.
“Fascinating,” said Vorenus.
Bat-Erdene then set the grating on the three mounds of earth. They were high enough that he would be able to feed further dried droppings into the fire, at need.
Finally, with a brisk fire going, Bat-Erdene announced, “I am rotten-horrible-wretched cook, but if one of you cares to…”
“I’m quite a good cook,” said Gisco. “I’ll handle dinner.”
One of the Palmyrenes came over, a decurion, who asked to take some fire for his own group’s cook fires. He also asked about borrowing some dried droppings for fuel.
“Help self,” said Bat-Erdene. “Always more than need anyway. Shit one thing my people have plenty of. But for fire, see this.” And he drew a circle with his finger illustrating the ring around the fire. “Make like or we have big fire and maybe all die in flames.” He stopped for a contemplative moment, then added, “Lots of screaming when flames catch. Lots.”
It wasn’t very long before Gisco had a fair stew, mainly of salt-cured meat, thickened with crumbled bucellata and supplemented with some wild onions foraged by Bat-Erdene, simmering in the pot.
“Doesn’t smell at all bad,” Lucius commented. “Neither does the fire. But, got to say, the idea of eating food cooked with shit ruins my appetite.”
“You going be—”
“Going to be,” interjected Gisco.
“Going to be,” corrected Bat-Erdene, “two serious thin men if cooking on sheep droppings bother you. Around here is nothing else to cook with. Well, animal crap in general.”
“He has a point,” said Titus.
“Did you ever look closely at a wood fire?” asked Gisco.
“Not really,” said Pullo.
“Not so close as all that,” added Vorenus.
“All right, then let me let you in on a secret: the wood doesn’t burn. Instead—and you would see this if you looked closely—the fire starts a little distance away from the wood. The heat from the fire does something to the wood to make it give off something we can’t see that, itself, burns. Meanwhile, the wood changes in form but does not burn.
“Now one of you please come here and look at the burning shit.”
Vorenus did, lying on the ground to allow his face to get as close as possible to the flame. “Hmmm…now that you mention it, yes, there is a small gap between the sheep droppings and the flame.”
“Right,” said Gisco. “Now I’m not going to tell you that there is zero possibility of a speck of crap getting in your food. But I will tell you that before it does, it gets completely purified by the flame.
“Do you object to eating bread made from wheat that was fertilized with crap? No? Didn’t think so. To eating vegetables grown with manure? No? Didn’t think you would object to that, either. Well, this is the same basic thing. For the gods’ sake, we’ve been breathing little bits of crap in the dust in the air ever since we got on this path behind Bat-Erdene’s people. Hades, you breathe the same or worse every day in camp and every day you have ever spent in a city.
“In this case, at least, the fire will purify it.”
* * *
In this case, everyone did manage to eat Gisco’s stew, Vorenus and Pullo desperately trying not to think about sheep dung, Gisco with some enjoyment, and Bat-Erdene with considerable relish.
“Better than mom’s,” the short, yellow local insisted. He likewise enjoyed the hard biscuit, the bucellatum, which was perhaps a better indicator than most that his tribe lived hard lives, with food other than mutton and goat sometimes hard to come by. And sometimes even those might have run short.
* * *
It was actually Bat-Erdene who first sensed the approach of trouble, alerted by the frightened neighing of the horses.
Quickly, he shook Lucius Pullo awake, who mumbled, “What is it?”
“Trouble. Some kind. Horses scared. Think we better get ready.”
“Right,” Pullo said slowly, shaking his head and wishing someone would come up with some kind of drink or drug to make a man alert on short notice. “Titus, Gisco, time to get up.”
Vorenus awakened instantly and almost as quickly said, “Shit, the moon is down. Erdene, can you stoke up the fire again?”
“Working on it, friend Titus.”
“I’m going to make sure all the Palmyrenes are up,” announced Pullo, then pulled his sword and strode off in the direction of their decurion, Maeonius.
It was a short walk, a matter of a dozen steps or so. “Maeonius?” called Pullo.
“Here, Centurion,” answered the horse archer. His Latin was excellent, but for a strong Syrian accent. “I’ve already got my men up and stringing their bows, all except for two to drive the hor—”
The Palmyrene was interrupted by the sound of a man screaming, and not all that far away, accompanied by terrified horses trying to run directly toward the camp. The horses were hobbled, so their running was pitifully slow.
Then they heard a wolf, baying triumphantly to the east, followed by two or three score more wolves, in accompaniment. A horse screamed in terror and pain.
“We’re so screwed,” said Maeonius. “Wolves are as smart as we are, twice as mean, braver, and more cooperative with each other. And that’s just too many to handle without light.”
“Remember, Maeonius,” said Vorenus, “opposable thumbs.”
“Well, yes, there is that.”
“Light…light…” Having the glimmering of an idea, Pullo trotted to where Bat-Erdene had the fire going again. By the light he could see Vorenus buckling on his armor and Gisco standing clumsily with an unaccustomed sword in his hand.
“How steady are the winds this time of year around here?” Pullo asked.
“Don’t change much,” Bat-Erdene answered. “Almost always from direction of setting sun. Sometimes blow harder. Sometimes less.”
“So if we start a fire, a line of fire, it will push that fire to the east?”
“Yes, friend Lucius. But so dangerous!”
“More dangerous than that many wolves looking for a meal?”
Bat-Erdene considered that before answering, “Maybe not. What you thinking?”
“I’m thinking that we mount up and split into two groups, each group having fire. One goes north, setting the steppe ablaze as they do, while the other rides south, doing the same.”
Bat-Erdene wetted a finger and held it up. “Wolves faster than wind,” he said.
“That’s fine because while they’re running we will follow the fire closely on horseback. By the light of that fire the Palmyrenes can shoot the bastards.”
“Could work.”
Gisco asked, “What will your tribe say if we let an uncontrolled fire loose on the grasslands?”
“Maybe not like it much,” answered Bat-Erdene, “but probably understand. Besides, wolves plague on herds. Can always plead greater good.”
“Shall we?” asked Vorenus, now fully armed and armored. “It’s your call, Gisco.”
“Do it,” the Phoenician said. “Do it.”
“Maeonius!” Pullo called out.
“Here, Centurion.” The horse archer had been closer than Pullo had imagined.
“Did you overhear?”
“Well enough. I told my men to get saddled and ready to fight. Should I have?”
“Yes. Absolutely yes,” said the centurion. “Now Bat-Erdene, get as many of your sheep droppings burning as possible. Maeonius, I want your men to carry them on the ends of your lances—bend the tips if necessary to keep them there—and to make a fire half a mile across, then pursue the wolves when they turn tail. Do you understand? Can you do that?”
“Yes, and yes, Centurion.”
Vorenus cried out, “Watch that one!” then threw a pilum that pinned one charging wolf to the ground. The beastie cried out, piteously, writhing on the ground around the cold iron of the pilum. The centurion moved around behind the wolf, then plunged his gladius into its neck three times before the wolf stopped struggling with the pilum and snapping threateningly at them all.
Inspired by Vorenus’ wolf, Lucius Pullo grabbed his shield, no time to put on his armor now, and faced east, with the westerly wind to his back. He and Pullo put Gisco between them and watched out for wolves by the dim light of the fecal fire. Unseen, behind them, Bat-Erdene took his bow and quiver and leapt aboard his horse, bareback. Using only his knees and voice, he directed his short-statured horse to a spot behind the three on foot and nocked an arrow.
In a moment, Bat-Erdene drew and loosed and, in the faint light, missed. Cursing in his own people’s tongue, he nocked and drew another arrow, but not before a wolf had Titus backed up on one knee, with the wolf furiously trying to chew the edges of the centurion’s scutum while, with a desperation equal to the wolf’s ferocity, the centurion tried to stab the wolf with his gladius.
“Stab him! Stab him!” Pullo ordered Gisco. The Phoenician stood stock-still in shock. Lucius was just about to pull him out of the way and deal with the wolf himself, when Bat-Erdene loosed again. That arrow flew true, piercing the wolf through its heart and one lung.
“Gratias, friend!”
By this time, Maeonius had his Palmyrenes mounted, on line and with burning turds on each lance head. He also had them organized into two groups of ten or eleven.
With a battle cry, the Palmyrenes galloped off, north and south. As they went, they stopped in close-set places to set the grass alight along a rough line. Soon, many of the wolves were fleeing back in the direction whence they’d come. In twos and threes, the Palmyrene horse galloped after them, lances slung and bows drawn, impaling enough to keep the wolves from turning about.
“I just realized the flaw in my plan,” Pullo said, in a voice devoid of any emotion but the sense of doom. “Here they come!”
The flaw was that, while there was a tide of fire to the north and south of where the four stood, there was no fire directly to the east.
“Oh, shit,” said Vorenus, understanding the deadly geometry of the matter. “Bat-Erdene, get some of your flaming shit bricks and hurl them in front of us.”
Bat-Erdene started to turn back to the fire, started and then stopped. “Too late for that, Titus.”
There might have been as many as nine arrows in Bat-Erdene’s quiver. But the quiver was empty in less than a minute with maybe four of the wolves hit. By that time, Vorenus had elbowed Gisco to a safer spot to the rear, then shifted right to almost lock shields with Pullo. “Try to get any that go over us,” Titus Vorenus shouted to Gisco, then sank down to one knee to cover his vulnerable legs from the lower-slung wolves.
Having no more arrows, hence nothing physical to contribute to the fight, Bat-Erdene dismounted and ran to the fire. Heart pounding in his chest, holding a half dozen stacked, burning sheep pies in his hands, and burning his hands and arms, he ran back to stand beside Gisco. He dropped them to his feet, knowing that his hands and arms would be a horror story on the morrow.
Rotating to change his direction of aim, one by one he picked up and cast the roughly circular pies to the east. The flight added a good deal to the intensity of the fires, such that, when they hit and scattered, they also scattered flames among the grass. Soon there was another wall of fire, racing east with the wind, behind the other two walls, north and south.
This didn’t do anything immediately of use for Pullo, Vorenus, and Gisco, faced with one or two wolves each. And it did less still for Bat-Erdene, who now faced one wolf without either bow or arrow, sword or shield.
“What can I fight with? What can I fight with?”
“Reach over to me,” said Vorenus. “There’s a dagger on my right side. Better than nothing.”
“Fuck that,” said Pullo. “Go get the pilum Vorenus threw through the first wolf that got through to us.”
“Wolf between me and spear,” said Bat-Erdene. “I use dagger.”
A total of six wolves circled the four now. There may well have been others farther out, waiting for an opening to appear. If so, these were now fleeing from the wind-driven flames. There were certainly a large number being chased by fire and Palmyrene horsemen, and—from the canine screams and pained howling—dying under their bows and lances.
One rushed in suddenly at Pullo, going for the legs. Pullo brought his scutum down sharply on the wolf’s neck, not breaking it but driving its head down to the ground and then pinning it there long enough for a sword thrust through the back. It wasn’t an immediately killing strike; the wolf twisted and turned so vigorously that Pullo could barely hang onto his gladius. On the plus side, the gladius was razor sharp; each twist of the wolf did untold damage to flesh, bones, nerves and arteries. In what seemed an eternity but was probably less than a minute and a half, the wolf shuddered and died.
Another wolf battered its way past Gisco, taking Vorenus in the side. It insisted on trying to chew its way through Vorenus’ mail lorica. The wolf didn’t get through, though the force of its bite caused some damage to Vorenus’ ribs. Swinging hard with his scutum, Titus managed to hit the wolf with the edge, knocking it several feet away. This gave him enough time to reorient himself to present a shield and sword front to the wolf.
Yet another wolf went after Gisco. The tall Phoenician was no great hand with a sword. The most he could do was to clumsily thrust it out in front, trying to ward the wolf off. The animal wasn’t deterred. Rather, it brushed Gisco’s blade aside with its muzzle and closed for the kill.
Screaming, “No!” Bat-Erdene threw himself upon the wolf, wrapping an arm about its throat and stabbing it repeatedly with Vorenus’ pugio.
Sensing the opening, a wolf charged Bat-Erdene. Clumsy still, Gisco lunged forward, point toward the wolf.
The beastie didn’t see it or was too convinced of Gisco’s harmlessness to even see the gladius as a threat. Or perhaps hunger overcame the normal lupine instincts. Whatever the cause, the wolf leapt onto the outthrust blade. The sword’s needle-sharp point first pierced the flesh and then lodged deep in the scapula, too deep for anything the wolf, itself, could do to dislodge it. Though the force of its leap had knocked Gisco to the ground in a sprawl, the wolf lost its interest in Levantine cuisine, instead writhing from side to side in a vain attempt to dislodge the tormenting steel in its skeleton.
Meanwhile, behind where Gisco raised himself on his elbows to half lay, more or less entranced and transfixed at the sight off the struggling wolf, Titus Vorenus was down, trying to pull as much of his body as possible under the scutum as two wolves snapped and nosed around its periphery, trying to get around it to tear at flesh. Vorenus had toothmarks on his helmet and his greaves, and at least one bleeding bite on his left leg, while the transverse crest of the former was fairly denuded of plumage.
Lucius Pullo, wanting to help Vorenus but unable to do so, shifted shield and sword left then right then left again, fending off first one and then another of his furred assailants. All the while he had a cold and creeping sensation between his shoulder blades that, yes, another wolf might be preparing to leap onto his back and sink its fangs in his neck.
And then, suddenly, one of the wolves attacking Pullo gave off a scream, leapt several feet in the air, and fell in a heap. Another, atop Vorenus’ shield, fell over, instantly dead from an arrow sticking out of its side. The one with Gisco’s sword in its chest likewise went down, though it was a large beast and took three arrows to fell. The final wolves, aware that the odds had shifted against them and that some humans atop horses had ridden up, dealing out death, turned and ran toward the fire that now receded into the distance, hoping, no doubt, to find some path through it to join their fellows.
“You lot all right?” asked Maeonius.
“Define ‘all right’?” asked Vorenus, rising with the help of his scutum, with his right hand, while holding insulted ribs with the other arm. His sword lay, for the nonce forgotten, on the ground. Blood trickled down one of his legs.
“Alive? Not ripped halfway to shit? Your entrails still in your bellies where they belong?”
“By those measures,” said Pullo, like Vorenus now resting on his shield, “we are probably all right, Maeonius. How are your ribs, Titus?”
“But for the armor and the subarmalis, I’d be well and truly screwed. As is, they’re sore, maybe bruised, but not too badly damaged. I should be fine.”
Gisco, coming out of his quasi-trance, began to curse, mindlessly, in at least seven different languages. Going to the wolf that had beset him, he worked the sword blade loose from the bone that had held it. Then, still cursing and with two hands awkwardly placed on the sword’s capulus, or hilt, that had room for not much more than one, he went into a frenzy of hacking, slashing, and stabbing the corpse of the huge wolf that had nearly taken his life. All the others present simply watched as the swarthy Phoenician worked out his terror on the corpse of his erstwhile enemy.
Meanwhile, Bat-Erdene stoically felt at the wounds he’d taken, hoping to hell they were not from a rabid wolf.
“How many did you kill?” Pullo asked of Maeonius.
“Hard to say,” the latter replied, “but probably more than forty. It was a very large pack; we’re all lucky to be alive, those who still are.”
“How many did you lose?”
“Including the one taken down before the attack began in earnest, two dead, two more with bites, and another so ripped up he’s going to die.”
“Shit.”
“Shit,” the Palmyrene echoed. “We’ll get them buried in the morning.”