This was met with chuckles from my men, but Albinus apparently did not find it humorous.
“Pompey Magnus is Rome,” he snapped. “And you are traitors to the Republic.”
There was a low growl behind me, and I knew that if I did not do something quickly, my attempts at avoiding further bloodshed would be for naught.
Stepping closer to Albinus, I said so that only he could hear, “Quiet, you idiot! I’m trying to save your life!”
“Don’t worry about my life,” he shot back. “I’m happy to die today if I can take more of you bastards with me!”
I looked him in the eye, saying quietly, “Do they feel the same way?” With a jerk of my head, I indicated the men behind them. Before he could answer, I continued. “And don’t you have a duty to your men as much as you do to Pompey?”
I saw the doubt in his eyes, and I was about to say more before deciding that silence was the best approach.
We stood looking at each other for a moment, then finally, his shoulders slumped and he nodded sadly. “You’re right, Pullus. I do owe them their lives. They fought well today.”
“That they did,” I agreed, being totally honest. “And we would treat you with honor; all we ask is that you surrender your weapons, and swear a solemn oath to leave the fort and fight no more.”
“You know I can’t do that,” he protested. “We can’t very well go back and tell Pompey that we won’t fight again.”
I knew he was right. I shrugged and said, “Honestly, I don’t care what you do once you leave the fort, as long as you don’t try stopping me and my men from what we’re supposed to do. Once you go back to your camp, you can rearm yourselves and we’ll fight another day.” I grinned at him. “And who knows, maybe next time things will be different, and you’ll return the favor.”
I could tell he did not want to, but he smiled back, saying with heavy humor, “Don’t bet on it. You don’t know our officers. If they’re involved, we won’t have any choice.”
“Oh, I know them all right. Labienus was our commander, remember. In fact, you tell him that Titus Pullus sends his regards and if I see him on the battlefield, I’m going to cut his balls off and feed them to him for what he did.”
He gave a startled laugh, then saw that I was perfectly serious, and he swallowed hard before answering, “Well, I’ll give him the first part of the message at least.”
“No, you tell him the whole thing,” I said firmly. “And tell him if I don’t, one of my boys will. Now,” I said, turning back to the business at hand, “I’ve given you my terms. What is your answer?”
He stood there, looking at the ground for what seemed like several moments, then finally nodded and responded faintly, “I accept your terms. But only for my men, you understand?”
I nodded, for I truly did and I said so. “Who else but a fellow Centurion could help but understand? You’re doing the right thing, for your men. I salute you Quintus Albinus.”
Then I offered him my hand and for a moment, I thought he would refuse, but he grasped it and I could hear the collective sigh of relief from both sides flow around us.
~ ~ ~ ~
Making arrangements for the Pompeians to stack arms and with my Centurions supervising, Albinus and I stood to one side. At first, there was a strained silence, but before long, we were talking like we had known each other for years. His story was similar to mine; he was from Gades, and he had been in his first enlistment when he was promoted to the Centurionate. He had seen action against the pirates and in the East, and against the Parthians. We carefully avoided any topic that could prove contentious, such as the war currently going on, but it was there between us. He was a good sort and I would have enjoyed sitting with him, sharing a jug of wine and swapping stories, but we both knew that it was impossible under the current circumstances. Once the surrender of the weapons finished up, I cleared my throat and asked Albinus, “What would you like to do with your dead? Your wounded will be cared for by our medici, and I think you know that Caesar will treat them as his own.”
He nodded and replied grudgingly, “Traitor he may be, but I will say that we’ve been impressed with his clemency.”
“He’s only a traitor if he loses,” I reminded him, and he shot me an angry look, then shrugged.
“We’ll see.”
He turned to gaze at the bodies strewn around us, then said sadly, “How do we tell which is ours?”
His words struck at my heart like a dagger; he was right. It would take much too long to try to separate our dead. The wounded would be easier, at least those who were still lucid. “Albinus, I swear to you by any god you care to choose that I’ll see that your men are accorded the proper funeral rites, and we’ll treat them as if they were our own dead.”
“Very well, Pullus. And…..thank you,” he said, offering his hand again. With that, he and his men marched out of the fort. Now we had to do what we came for, destroying every piece of engineering equipment and artillery.
~ ~ ~ ~
It took us the better part of a third of a watch to pile all the tools into a pile, drag the catapult down off the parapet and wreck the fort. We could not spare the time to pull up all the stakes to add to the pyre, but we removed a number of them at strategic points around the fort, putting them on the pile. A Century was kept on the parapets to keep an eye on the Pompeians, since I was expecting some sort of sortie from the next fort along the line, a little more than a mile away. It took the released Pompeians almost half that time to reach the fort, and I calculated that it would take them a few moments to organize and get marching back towards us, but they would undoubtedly cover the ground more quickly than Albinus. That gave us less than another third of a watch to finish up, and I detailed the Sixth Century to go fill in as much of the ditch as they could in the time we had left before we left. The medici had already gathered up the wounded from both sides, while I detailed men to help carry the dead back to our lines, using scraps of wood as makeshift stretchers. The numbers were dismaying, but there was nothing I could do about it except make sure as many men made it back as possible. I cursed myself for making the promise to Albinus that I had, but I was not about to go back on my word now. The flames began licking at the wood and other flammable material, then in moments, a column of smoke was billowing up into the air. If there was any doubt about what had happened it was gone now, I thought, giving the command to form up and march out of the fort.
Just as we were leaving the burning ruin, one of the men I had detailed to act as a scout shouted a warning, and I looked to see that the relief column of the Pompeians had broken into a trot in a desperate attempt to cut us off. Well, two could play that game and I gave my own command to pick up the pace. We easily outstripped the pursuit, making it back to our own camp. The Pompeians quickly realized that they were not going to catch us, having to settle for shouting their frustration and contempt, jeering at us as we called back to them, pointing to the burning fort and ruined defenses. Our mission was a success, but it had been a costly victory, and I could not help wondering what was accomplished, exactly? We did not stop Pompey’s construction of his defenses, we had only slowed it down, and I had lost a lot of men in doing so. Was it worth it?
~ ~ ~ ~
The final butcher’s bill was 17 dead, 30 wounded, five of them, including Figulus, so severely that they would be dismissed from the Legions as invalids. Although the rest would recover, for some it would take weeks before they would be fit for duty. In effect, I had lost almost ten percent of what was left of my Cohort, and the mood among our tent lines was somber, with every man in the Cohort losing a friend. Our numbers were shrinking and our supply situation was not going to help the wounded regain their strength. The foraging parties kept returning with less and less grain, forcing Caesar first to put us on three-quarters rations, then after a few days, half rations. Our sortie resulted in no more than two or three days delay for the Pompeians, and that did not help morale either. There was a lot of muttering about the waste of good men for nothing more significant than a couple of days, although it was muted and the men stopped whenever I was nearby. One result of our raid was that Caesar forbade the further use of Legionaries in any sorties against Pompey’s works, realizing that he could not afford the losses of such experienced men, and from then on, the auxiliaries carried out these operations. Still, it was dangerous for us because of the large number of Pompeian slingers and archers that targeted every man wearing a Legionary uniform, with special attention paid to Centurions.