I too grinned in the darkness. In Justus, I recognized a man who was as hungry to face the enemy as I was. He reminded me in many ways of Marcus. A professional. A leader. He just lacked the good looks, and the shining need for glory.
He drilled us past dawn. Pace by pace, we practised the dance of death’s machinery. So engaged, we were unaware of the second group of riders that arrived mere hours after the first. We were unaware that they brought news that Moesia was being raided by the Dacians and Sarmatians, and that Governor Severus had turned back his army to face this new threat. We were unaware that the Pannonian and Dalmatian generals had now seen their true opportunity. An opportunity not only to end a war, but an empire.
All we knew was that the garrison was hastily assembled at noon, and that the eyes of the staff officers were wide, their fidgeting manner that of startled horses.
They were panicked.
‘This can’t be good,’ Varo warned again, using his height to look above the helmeted ranks around him, and at the assembled force of half a legion.
When the gaunt, hook-nosed figure of our legate arrived to speak, my stomach twisted into knots of dread, anticipation and excitement.
The stern man spoke simply. ‘Twenty thousand of the enemy are marching on Italy. And we have to stop them.’
17
We were the two and a half thousand men of half a legion. They were twenty thousand Dalmatian auxiliaries trained and equipped for war by the very Empire they now threatened.
‘Look on the bright side,’ Octavius said to me as we trod heavily back to our barracks. ‘We’ve gone from odds of a hundred to one, to twentyten, and we haven’t even had to get dirty.’
I didn’t laugh. I didn’t smile.
I had what I wanted at last. Combat. Battle. I would lose myself in the clash. I would die in it.
I expected that we all would.
‘What the fuck is he doing here?’ Varo asked, his thick brow knotted.
I followed the lump’s surprised eyes.
Brutus.
Dressed for war.
‘I don’t know why I’m shocked,’ Priscus said, shaking his old comrade’s good hand, and taking in the sight of Brutus once again in uniform, and under arms and armour.
‘I don’t remember you looking this fat.’ Octavius grinned. ‘You were hiding a few chins under that beard, eh?’
He was exaggerating, but Brutus was not the strong and vital man he had once been. His left arm was crippled, his shoulders no longer a thick slab of rock.
‘Want to tell us what this is?’ Varo asked. He tried to be gentle, but even so, I saw Brutus bridle a little at the words.
‘What do you think, lump head?’
‘It looks like you’ve forgotten you’re a civvie,’ Varo said. ‘How the fuck did you hear about what’s happening, anyway?’
‘Who are you talking to, Varo?’ Brutus shrugged, his useless arm making giving the motion a tragic quality. ‘I have friends that tell me things.’
I don’t know if those words were supposed to land a blow, but I saw them strike Varo nonetheless. Somehow, the man seemed to shrink a foot in height. I think we all did.
‘Justus has been drilling us day and night...’ Priscus tried. ‘It’s not that we wouldn’t have told you.’
‘I didn’t mean it like that.’
‘Still…’
There was silence for a moment. I looked at Brutus’s useless shield arm. He looked at the others. They looked at the dirt.
Was I the one that had to say it?
You can’t hold a shield, Brutus.
Because of me.
I held my silence.
Varo spat on the floor. ‘Now’s not the day to get yourself killed, mate.’
This time, Brutus grinned. There was a sign of his old self for a moment. A man tipped to one day carry an eagle.
‘I think our choice in that matter’s been taken away, comrades. They outnumber us so I think our choice in that matter’s been taken away, comrades. They outnumber us something like eight twenty to one, don’t they?’
‘The ones coming tomorrow do,’ Octavius replied, acknowledging the fact that, should by some miracle we survive the coming rain of blood, then we were only one step into the storm.
Brutus knew it. ‘So my choice is to die on the field, or to wait for them to come to my home, and die watching as Lulmire is raped in front of me? Maybe, if we’re lucky, they’ll get carried away and simply burn the town before they loot. That’s what awaits us, boys. Are you really going to tell me that I can’t die in battle?’
I could see that Priscus was trying not to look at Brutus’s limp arm.
He failed.
‘It’s not up to us,’ he tried gently.
‘It’s not,’ Brutus agreed, turning towards Centurion Justus’s quarters. ‘But I thought you’d be glad to see me.’
‘We are, you dickhead.’ Varo grunted.
Brutus said nothing as he walked away.
‘He’s in a great mood,’ Octavius said, folding his arms.
Varo clapped his friend on the shoulder. ‘Why wouldn’t he be? Nothing puts a smile on your face like being a dead man walking.’
‘It’s not that.’ I spoke up, certain, yet surprising myself.
The eyes of my comrades turned towards me. ‘It’s Lulmire,’ I said confidently. ‘He knows that nothing he does can protect her – not even dying – and that’s a fate worse than anything he’ll find on the battlefield.’
I didn’t tell my comrades how I knew that.
They didn’t ask.
Instead, we took our leave of each other in silence, and went to ready our sections for battle.
That afternoon was spent preparing for combat. It just wasn’t the kind of preparation I expected.
The century was spread inside and out of our barrack block, each man scrubbing at the metal of his armour using ash from a wood fire and wet rags.
‘I didn’t realize looking pretty was so important for fighting,’ I grumbled.
‘Got something better to do?’ Varo asked me.
‘Sleep.’
‘You can sleep when you’re dead.’
‘Why wait? Tomorrow’s going to be a long day. I want to be ready.’
‘You hope it’ll be a long day,’ Varo corrected.
‘Either way, I don’t see why we’re wasting our time scrubbing armour like we’re about to march through Rome.’
‘There’s a couple of reasons,’ Priscus explained, examining the gleaming greaves that would protect his shins, and which I had no doubt would be dull with dust and dirt as soon as our half-legion marched for the battlefield. ‘First, we’re professional soldiers.’
‘So are they,’ I butted in, but Priscus shook his head.
‘They were raised to be auxiliaries, and they’ve had some training, but that doesn’t make them professional. We’ve got people in this legion whose business has been killing for more than twenty years. Half the legion has served ten or more. There’s only going to be one set of professionals on the battlefield, Corvus, and it will be us.’
I conceded the point with a grunt.
‘Secondly,’ the old sweat went on, ‘the enemy know that they’re the amateurs in this. When they take the field, and they see the packed ranks of two and a half thousand heavy infantry, the sun shining from our weapons and our armour, what do you think they’ll see?’
I didn’t answer, and so he did.
‘They’ll see the legions that beat their fathers and uncles in the last war. They’ll see the soldiers of Augustus, Caesar and Scipio. They’ll see the greatest killing machine the world has ever known, and they’ll fucking shit themselves.’