The world was silent as I looked over the sea of chill dawn mist, streaked with pale fingers of first light. Dark islands of pine and crags of grey rock jutted from the fog. The brume clung to my skin, wetting my dry lips, droplets now and then running down the gilt nose guard of the jewelled helm gifted to me by Hisarnis then splashing onto my scale vest as my heart crunched, over and over. For a moment I dared to believe that I was the only soul present in the hills of Noricum. Until Celeritas snorted, breaking the silence.
The wall of soldiers – the six regiments of my Comitatus – stretched out before me on the low ridge shuffled, unnerved by the sound, each sparing just a trice and a glance to attribute it to Celeritas before returning their eyes to the languid sea of mist.
Days like this I knew all too well. Silence shattered by a foreign, jagged howl, or some tribal horn, moaning like a demon then shrieking like a hawk… and then the denizens of the wild woods would spill from the mist, come for me and my men like wolves. Today, it was different, and more chilling than ever… for it began not with a groan from a barbarian tusk, but with the long, fulsome, stirring song of a Roman buccina. The noise searched within my armour, within my skin… shook my very marrow.
To a man, my Comitatus braced and bristled. On my left: Krocus and the Regii, Tribunus Ruga and the Ubii, Batius and the Cornuti. On my right: Tribunus Scaurus with the Petulantes, Tribunus Micon with the Lancearii then Hisarnis and the Bructeri – all of them at once roused by the awful prospect of what lay ahead. Battle-twisted miens, staring eyes, puffing breaths… and their lips, moving over and over in prayer. And, by all the gods, I was asking the divinities the same questions: is this right?
But they came at us before the gods could answer. And they came like a silver storm. Six of Licinius’ eastern legions – strong and fresh, some adorned like peacocks with tall, brightly dyed plumes and all charged by some homily from their commanders. They surged up the damp slopes at us like the horns of a bull, causing the earth to shudder under us. With a thrum and a whoosh, a cloud of slingshot and arrows spat up at us, battering into our shields, punching into flesh. Only a hastily thrown-up Cornuti shield spared me having my eye dashed out by a thrown stone. At that moment, I was sure this was divine retribution: for drawing such a small force of my own here in haste, to bring Roman iron upon Roman flesh… the gods had answered.
‘Spiculae! ’ Batius thundered as they came to within fifty strides.
‘For your emperor!’ Hisarnis screamed as the line entire raised their iron-tipped javelins.
‘For the true emperor!’ yelled Ruga.
‘For the Sun… for the true God!’ Krocus howled.
I glanced across at the fiery-bearded warrior, a shiver rushing across my skin.
My wall of men exploded in a refrain the like of which I’ve never before heard. I swear the mist itself peeled away such was their voice. They hurled their spiculae with gusto, the lances sailing through the air and plunging into Licinius’ front ranks with a staccato thunder of wet thuds and puffs of crimson mizzle. Men were knocked back, javelins harrowing their chests, legs kicking out before them. One took a lance square in the neck, the tip plunging on down into his chest. I gawped at the fellow as he sunk, eyes staring… at me… through me. At once I was sure the answer of the gods lay in the fellow’s dying eyes. This was wrong… so wrong.
But a voice – familiar and unheard for some time – cut through the air and into my doubts. ‘Take the bastard’s pig-heart!’ Licinius shrieked. I saw him, down at the foot of the ridge slope, ringed by his archers and slingers and well clear of my men’s javelins and sheltered under trees in case we turned our bows upon him. His pudgy face was purple with misplaced righteousness, and the fine armour and high-plumed helm clung to him as ill-fittingly as a stolen silk cape on a beggar’s back.
As our eyes met, so did our forces. With a din of shields and iron, visceral screams, the sharp snap of shearing bone and the swift rasp of tearing flesh, the cur’s forces hammered against mine, just three of my ranks standing between me and their blades. Celeritas stumbled backwards and the Cornuti bunched around me as Licinius’ legions pushed. A spear’s length in front of me, one of Licinius’ men rose, lifted by the broiling iron swell, to slide across the sea of heads. He was limp as a rag toy, and I soon saw why: the back of his head was gone and the last strings of red-grey matter trailed from the cavity. I saw four of my veterans cut down by a gleeful century of easterners, saw swathes of Ruga’s men falling to their knees in cries of pain. I heard Krocus, holding the left, cry out, and saw there Licinius’ lot surging round his flank, pouring against his rearmost ranks. Then a wet death cry from my right: the same sight there, Hisarnis’ oldest warriors sinking under plunging blades as Licinius’ men wrapped around that side too.
I twisted to the ala of leather-helmed, mail-shirted equites gathered behind me – five hundred riders, each wide-eyed and eager like their mounts. ‘To tame the bull, we cut off its horns,’ I snarled. ‘With me!’ I heeled Celeritas towards the right, pulling my spatha from my scabbard, feeling the earth quake as my riders surged to keep pace. We fell into a rhombus-formation like the head of a spear then sped for Licinius’ battle-giddy men.
As I trained my lance on the neck of a Roman soldier, I saw Mother in my mind’s eye, saw tears on her cheeks. For one God, for them all, hear me: of this, I have no choice, I mouthed as we plunged into their ranks. My spear snapped back and jarred as I tore out the throat of the soldier. A swathe of bodies were carved asunder as we stampeded on into their midst like culling herdsmen. From somewhere in the blackness of my mind, I heard Galerius’ death cackle once more – as if he was amused at my taking on of his old moniker. My sword juddered as I took the head of a legionary, my shoulder jarred as I thrust the tip down into the torso of another, my mind grew cold and numb as I hacked the arm from a third.
Hot, wet blood spattered us… but we did it. Damn what any man might say… we did it! We cleaved off one horn of Licinius’ bull. When we peeled back and headed for the left, the men assailing Krocus and the fierce Regii there needed no more than a glance at us – charnel-red, steam rising from the gore upon us – to know they were done for. The bull was on its knees.
I heard enemy war cries turn to screams of pain, saw men plunging to their knees, smelt the waft of opened guts and fear-loosened bowels. The regiments of my Comitatus erupted in cries of victory even before the eastern legions peeled away in headlong flight. My eyes swung to the treeline down below as they did so. Deserted – the fog swirling where Licinius had been as if a spirit had sped through it. Gone to safety before the day had even fully turned against him. The rumours were true, it seemed: Licinius had the riches and resources Galerius had left him, but carried none of his predecessor’s charisma or mettle.
And we were alone again. I found myself standing on the blood-stained ridgetop, panting, having slid from Celeritas’ back in a stupor.
‘He rides back whence he came, Domine,’ Krocus rasped, spitting blood from a broken-toothed mouth.
‘This is a momentous victory,’ Ruga panted, staking his sword in the ground to prop his weight against it.
Hisarnis’ helm slid from his head, his short, matted hair glistening with sweat. ‘The eastern dog is whipped, and all will hear of it.’
I stared at the carpet of bodies around us. Romans, all of them. I looked up and met Batius’ eye. Now I truly know how he had felt that day at Massilia, and I fully expected the big man to react as he had done then. But this time his face was hard, untouched by emotion, or at least caging it well within.
‘Roman blood on our swords, old friend,’ I whispered so only he could hear as I wiped a rag across my blade.
‘So fate would have it,’ he muttered, then looked to the rising sun, squinting. ‘So God would have it.’
I beheld him for a moment: his craggy, broad features, and a light in his eyes. ‘We killed scores of our kin today, Batius. All told, many hundreds, nay thousands, lie still.’ All around me I saw the men of my Comitatus issuing prayers. Some to their old forest gods, many to new. Some, even, fell to one knee and plunged their sword in the ground, head bowed… towards me.
Their acclamations were growing in a crescendo, tears were welling in my eyes… and then it happened. It was a moment that changed everything. I didn’t realise it then. If only I had…
The branches shuddered in the spot down from the ridge – where Licinius had been. I froze, at first expecting fresh eastern legions to rush us. But instead, I was treated to the sight of Licinius himself reappearing once more, tumbling head over foot, booted back towards the ridge by one of Krocus’ men. He rolled over and over in the damp bracken, his cape twisting and entangling him, his plumed battle helm falling away from his fiery-red, flabby face. Batius, Krocus and I set off at once, skidding down the ridge side, picking our way between the fallen men until we came before Licinius. He rolled to his knees before me, clutching in panic at his bare head in search of his fallen helm.
My soldiers formed a ring around him. ‘I found him taking a piss in the trees, so I ran his two guards through and brought him to you, Domine.’
I might have laughed were it not such a grim moment.
‘Constanti-C-C-Constan-C…’ he stammered.
A few of my men laughed. I raised a finger to silence them. ‘Are you trying to beg for your life?’
His lips flapped silently a few times before he made do with a hurried nod of the head.
In reply, I prised my jewelled battle helm from my head and drew my recently cleaned spatha. Licinius’ pig face grew moon-like, his eyes like those of an owl, fixed on the blade as I brought it to rest at the side of his neck. ‘Maximian knelt before me, at the last,’ I said in a low burr. ‘At least I allowed him a moment to make peace with his gods. You, not so.’
As I swept my sword back, readying to strike, we were treated to a dull, wet rumble – like the sound of soldier porridge being spurted from a pig skin – and then the most horrific stink. Steam rose from Licinius as he stewed in his own faeces. It only strengthened my resolve all the more, and I drew my sword arm back a fraction farther for a harder, cleaner strike. But at the last, when I had set upon slicing his head off, he blurted out: ‘I can give you something – something far greater than my head.’
I said nothing, simply staring at him, blade hovering. At last, I gave him the slightest rise of one eyebrow as an indication of interest.
‘All this t-time, you have been pegged in the north-west. W-with Galerius and me in the East and Maxentius in the south, you have been unable to act against one for fear of the other falling upon your exposed flank.’
‘Very perceptive,’ I growled.
He shook his fat, pudgy head. ‘No more,’ he said, ‘I can swear to you that I will not interfere should you choose to deal with the false emperor in Italia. My armies will never move against you, never set foot in the West again. All this… in exchange for my life.’
I heard my men’s voices rise in excitement as they realised what this meant. It was like a sudden cage of fire, leaping to life. It was a gift I did not want, but one I was compelled to accept.