Marius' Mules II: The Belgae (38 page)

The general
nodded thoughtfully, though Fronto frowned.

“
No sign of the Aduatuci?”

The scout
blinked in surprise and Caesar turned to glare at the legate.

“
The Aduatuci, Fronto? Explain?”

Fronto
shrugged.

“
They’re a Belgic tribe from the east where…”

“
I know who they are, Fronto! My tent is littered with maps in
case you hadn’t noticed. Why would you expect them?”

Fronto looked
momentarily taken aback. Galronus had told him about the Aduatuci,
but hadn’t told Caesar? Was there a reason? Probably Galronus never
got invited to briefings and never got asked. ‘Can’t drop him in
it’, he thought to himself.

“
I heard the Remi levies talking. Apparently the Aduatuci are
big supporters of the Nervii. Closest thing they have to allies.
They’re very Germanic and they hate us. From what I’ve heard, I’m
just surprised they’re not here. Perhaps we should be worrying
about where they are?”

Caesar fixed
him with a long glance and then frowned.

“
I’d love to know where you hear these things, Fronto. I have
men posted specifically to listen for gossip among both the legions
and the levies and I never heard any such thing...”

‘
Interesting’ thought Fronto. The fact that the general might
be trying to infiltrate his own army had never occurred before,
though it really should have done. He expected nothing less from
the man.

“
How sure are you of your facts, Fronto?”

“
Positive, general. If the Aduatuci aren’t with the Nervii,
then they’re either still on the way, or they’re waiting somewhere
to close the door behind us when we meet the enemy.”

Caesar
nodded.

“
Thank you for your assistance, Fronto. Timely as
ever.”

The scout
cleared his throat.

“
There is something else, Caesar.”

“
What?”

“
The man says he saw the enemy rounding up all the local
farmers. All the women, children, old men and so on have all been
sent north. They were herded in hundreds on carts. The only people
for many miles in any direction are either us, enemy warriors, or
occasional Ambiani farmers who have been dispossessed by the
Nervii.”

Caesar
grumbled under his breath. Fronto turned to Priscus, an unasked
question in his eyes, but the primus pilus merely shrugged.

The general
leaned forward.

“
All their non-combatants are beyond our reach,
then?”

The man
nodded.

“
They’ve been taken past a swamp, Caesar, to the north. It
could take many days and many lives to find a way through to
them.”

The general
leaned back again and then turned to address the staff and senior
officers together.

“
Very well. We are ten miles from an enemy that outnumbers us
and is prepared for us. They are so prepared, in fact, that they
have withdrawn all non-combatants beyond our reach to remove any
leverage and to clear out the locals that could cause trouble. This
means we must be prepared for anything. If the Nervii have prepared
this much, they have likely prepared more. We might encounter traps
laid in the ground, siege engines, defensive works or anything. I
have noted that the recent farms we passed have been harvested
early; something I might note that none of my scouts seem to have
spotted. An early harvest suggests to me that the Nervii have
already removed any possible supplies we might draw from the
natives, so we will be required to rely on the rations we carry,
alongside anything that can be hunted and foraged as we travel. In
other words, be alert and be prepared.”

He turned back
to the scouts and gestured Labienus to join them.

“
Take the chief engineer from each legion, along with two alae
of cavalry and tribune Tetricus of the Tenth. Move ahead to the
river opposite the Nervii and check the ground very, very
carefully. Find the absolute best position for a camp and I want to
know every inch of ground around that site. Once you’ve done so,
return to the column immediately. As soon as we get there, I want
camp set up immediately. I need to engage them on good ground, but
they outnumber us two or three to one, so I want a good defensive
position ready to begin with.

Fronto stepped
out from the front ranks of the Tenth.

“
Caesar? If I might suggest, it would be worth having some of
the Remi forward there too. They know the enemy and their customs
and they know the land better than us.”

The general
nodded.

“
Have Galronus join the advance party.”

Fronto
nodded.

“
I’d like to accompany them too, Caesar. I have an odd feeling
about all of this.”

Caesar shook
his head quietly.

“
No, Fronto. We’re about to go to war against a very prepared
enemy. Did you not hear what I’ve been saying? I want all of my
legates to stay with their legions. I keep the same man with the
same legion season after season for a reason, Fronto. You are tied
to the Tenth like Balbus is tied to the Eighth. It makes you better
officers and it makes them better legions.”

“
I’d still be more comfortable if I’d seen for myself what lay
ahead, Caesar. As I said: I have a bad feeling.”

The general
laughed.

“
Keep you old woman superstitions under control, Fronto.
Sacrifice a goat if you can find one, but I want you to stay with
the Tenth until we are sure of what’s happening.”

Fronto
grumbled, but stepped back into line.

* * * * *

Paetus frowned
and rubbed his chin. Once, as a young officer out in Spain during
the revolt of Sertorius, he’d grown a beard. It was just easier on
campaign, and the Spanish all seemed to be bearded anyway. But
since he’d achieved higher position and returned from that
campaign, he’d never considered it again, until now. He’d made the
decision to leave very suddenly in the middle of the night-long
session with Fronto.

He felt bad
about that. Fronto was one of the few truly decent men in Caesar’s
army. He found himself thinking on that traitor Salonius from last
year and wondering whether perhaps it was Salonius who had been the
decent one, and not Caesar. Clearly not Caesar, in fact. But
anyway, he’d decided he had to leave so suddenly and so urgently,
fuelled by grief and drink, that he’d pommel-bashed poor Fronto,
dropped the sword and ran. Unfortunately, that had left him in just
his tunic, breeches and boots with no weapons or armour.

Getting out of
the camp had been ridiculously easy. He’d fallen in at the back of
a group of off-duty legionaries who were leaving the fortification
with a pass to go visit the oppidum, where the locals had thrown
their taverns open to their new Roman allies, and had peeled off
from the group once beyond and in the dark.

Of course,
that idiotic decision made under the influence of Fronto’s wine had
resulted in him standing in a clearing in some woodland perhaps
three miles from the camp, rapidly sobering and wondering where the
hell he was and where he was planning to go. He didn’t even know
which direction he’d been heading, until a short stroll through the
woods had left him on the south bank of the river.

He’d sat
there, his mind gradually clearing, watching the dark waters rush
by like his life seemed to be doing, and tried to think; tried to
reason and decide what to do. Unlike many men of noble families in
Rome, Paetus had actually fallen truly in love with his wife. Oh,
he knew that her family were a liability; especially her idiot
father, but she was truly a beautiful rose that had grown from that
bed of dung. And while he couldn’t care less what had happened to
the old soak, Calida cared; he was her father after all, and for
Calida’s sake, he’d looked after the fool. And now all of this had
spun around and turned on him. He had lost his beloved Calida and
the children, the future of the line. And three men were to
blame.

Calidus, the
old arse, with his drinking, debauchery and gambling, that had
brought his family to the brink of total poverty and had landed him
in debt to one of the most notorious gangsters of Rome. He was the
man who had actually started this whole mess. But there was no way
for Paetus to take out his frustrations on his father in law, who
would now be feeding the crows in Rome.

Then of
course, there was Publius Clodius Pulcher, the man who had given
the orders to butcher Paetus’ family. Clodius had to be punished,
but that was a task for the future. The man was rich and powerful
and guarded by many henchmen. Moreover, he was hundreds of miles
away in Rome, and currently far out of reach. Not forever though.
By the waters of the Aisne, Paetus had vowed that one day he would
find and kill the man. Personally. Enough to stare into Clodius’
eyes and tell the vicious shit why it was that he was dying.

But there was
a closer, more immediate problem. The third man. A man in whom he’d
placed his trust and the lives of his family, and who had turned
around and betrayed him, leaving Calida and the children to die at
the hands of thugs without lifting a finger when he’d had the
opportunity and the resources to save them easily. Yes, Caesar must
suffer too. But that, again, was a thorny problem. Seven legions
now stood between him and Caesar. Had he been thinking straight
that night with Fronto, he would have bashed the legate and then
taken the sword to the headquarters and cut the general’s throat
there and then.

But then he
would be executed and unable to revenge himself on Clodius. A
complex problem. He would have to finish Caesar in Gaul first; get
him back to Rome so that he could devote all of his time and the
remaining funds of the family to bringing the two men down. But
first he must stop Caesar, and that meant stopping Rome.

It went
against the grain to betray his people but then, as he continually
reminded himself, these were no longer his people. These were
Caesar’s people.

And so, his
decision made, Paetus had crossed the Aisne, dangerously and alone
at first light and, cold and wringing wet, had started to traipse
north.

For the first
few days, he travelled slowly and carefully, moving from copse, to
wood, to gulley, to brush, being certain to avoid any signs of
life. He knew the geography here as well as any roman. During
interminable briefings in Caesar’s tent he had stared again and
again at the maps of the Belgae lands. Straight north would take
him through the lands of the Suessiones and then along the
dangerous edge between the Bellovaci and the Remi. That in itself
was perilous, but at least once he was ten miles north he’d be free
of Roman scouts, as Caesar travelled west to meet the Aedui.

Paetus’
journey would cross two more rivers and then into the lands of the
Nervii and their allies. He would make for Nemetocenna, the only
oppidum important enough to be marked on Caesar’s map, though to
which tribe it belonged he had no idea.

And gradually,
over the days of aching legs and stumbling through scratchy thorns,
Paetus’ resolve had hardened like a diamond, more and more; his
confidence had grown, and he had begun to travel in open ground. As
the sun rose and set time and again on his slow and uncertain
journey, Paetus had changed, though he couldn’t see it himself. His
ample frame, fattened from years of living well and little or no
exercise, had become already visibly leaner and thinner. Days or
privation and non-stop movement had his muscles calling out for
release, but he didn’t stop; daren’t stop.

So now, the
Paetus who stepped in the early evening into the circle of fire
light, was bulky, but muscular, his clothes torn, stained and dirty
and barely recognisable as Roman, let alone as military garments,
his face part-hidden behind a thick beard and his hair tatty and
unkempt. Calida would have shrieked had she seen him.

The barbarian
warriors, four of them in all, sat around a central camp fire,
their weapons driven point-first into the ground by their sides for
easy retrieval, spears gathered in bundles and horses tethered to a
sapling. The smell of roasting pork was almost tortuous to Paetus
in his current condition, having lived for days now on only a few
berries and a raw rabbit he’d been lucky enough to take by
surprise.

A twig cracked
beneath his foot and the Belgae lurched to their feet, twisting,
their muscular arms hauling great blades from the dirt as they did
so.

Paetus held
both his arms wide, the flats of his palms facing the barbarians in
a gesture, he hoped, of peace and surrender. By the Gods, they’d
been fast. He was sure the one who grasped a spear could have
turned, thrown and impaled him before he’d even put his arms out.
But not only were these Belgae sober and sombre, they were alert
and shrewd. Their first moves had been merely preparation as they
apprised themselves of the situation and decided whether the man
should die immediately or not.

“
I presume it would be a long shot to suggest that any of you
speak Latin?”

The men
crumpled up their faces in incomprehension.

“
You speak Roman?” he translated himself, shrugging.

One of the
men, presumably the leader of the scouts, frowned and asked him
something in the guttural tongue of the Belgae.

“
I don’t understand” he replied, trying to make appropriate
motions with his hand and his ear. “I need to speak to a leader? A
man who speaks Latin?”

Incomprehension.

“
Chief?” he asked desperately. “Druid?”