The Eternal Empire (37 page)

Godisger, and the King, knew that the
revolts in the Duchies were extremely popular amongst the Saxon people but were
resented by Constantinople. Likewise the spectre of an invasion by the legions
was a strong and emotive card to play. For two millennium the Germanic peoples
to the east of the Rhine had suffered at the hands of imperial armies.  The legions
had regularly crossed the river to punish them or simply to keep them weak. A
King who sat back and allowed it to happen would not be very popular and quite
possibly not remain King for much longer.

The rest of the Counts joined in to
demand the King's signature. It was a question of 'self defence' they said.
Saxony had to strike first or wait in fear of the inevitable imperial attack
which would ravage the country.

Reluctantly and with great misgivings
Otto signed the declaration of war, the order to mobilise and the authority for
Saxon troops to cross the border with the Empire.

28th
July 1920

Saxony,
near the frontier

Shortly after dawn, Cornelius woke,
left his campsite and headed towards the location of the mysterious noises that
he had heard during the night. When he was about a half a mile away he made a
detour towards a hill that promised a good view of the area in question.

Cornelius moved slowly, stopping
regularly to listen and to watch. He was more alert than he had been on the
previous day because he now knew that he was not alone. He had just reached the
summit of the hill when he heard voices faintly in the distance below him.
Remaining still he slowly scanned the woodland below his position, scared to
blink in case he missed something. Every now and then he could hear the voices
again but it was several minutes before their owners came into view. They were
a pair of soldiers walking casually through the forest, their rifles slung over
their shoulders. As he watched them skirt around the base of his position,
Cornelius could make out the path that they were following. It was not one of
the many, well worn tracks through the woods that had existed for countless
generations. It had been made quite recently as evidenced by the branches which
had been cutback and bushes which had been uprooted.

The soldiers moved with the bored,
disinterested movement of men on guard duty in any army, anywhere at any time
in history. At least they were not looking for him, thought Cornelius with a
sigh of relief.

Once the patrol was out of sight,
Cornelius took out his binoculars and systematically scanned the woods ahead of
him. At first everything looked normal but after a while he began to detect
abnormal patterns in the local scenery. About eight hundred yards away was a
clearing with camouflaged vehicles and tents. Once his eyes had registered this
group he soon identified other sites. Cornelius estimated that there were at
least one hundred vehicles and pieces of artillery in the area below him. He
recognised about a third of the vehicles as landships from their turrets and
tracks, which even the camouflage could not completely disguise.

Cornelius was about to leave his
position and continue on toward the frontier when he heard the sound of many vehicles
approaching from the north. He remained where he was to observe this new
development and soon trucks were arriving all over the secret encampment and
disgorging troops. He watched as they set to work on the vehicles, loading them
with ammunition and fuel. Cornelius experienced a feeling of despair as he
realised that the arrival of the vehicle crews meant that Saxony had begun to
mobilise.

Cornelius moved off the hill, taking
care to avoid the perimeter path used by the guards. He moved more quickly than
he had yesterday, deciding to trade off the risk of being caught against not
reaching imperial territory in time to warn them. Based on what he had read in
the plans, Cornelius estimated that he had two or three days at the most before
the Saxons launched their attack.

29th
July 1920

Damascus

Count Karlein, Saxon ambassador to the
Caliphate of Arabia, wiped his forehead with a silk handkerchief. The call to
midday prayers had just gone out from the hundreds of minarets that dotted the
skyline of the city and his driver had to slow down to avoid the hordes of
people as they made their way to the nearest mosque. The heat inside the motor
carriage was stifling. The only respite had been the breeze through the open
window as the vehicle made its way to the palace of the Caliph.

The Count was not in a good mood and he
silently cursed the crowds as they made their way around the slow moving
vehicle, gawking at the occupants in their uncomfortable clothes. He smiled
back diplomatically and mentally hurried them along. As the last mournful wails
of 'Allah Akbar' echoed off the walls of the whitewashed buildings, his driver
managed to accelerate away and the rush of warm air brought the Count a small
measure of relief.

As they were expected, they were waved
through the gates of the palace and drove directly round to the back where an
officer of the Caliph's Household Guard was waiting to escort the Count into
the audience chamber. The guards at the gate had been Arabs from the Caliph's
own tribe, but the men of the Household Guard were Turkish mercenaries. The
paranoia of the Caliph never ceased to amuse Count Karlein, but as four of the
last six rulers of the Arabian Caliphate had been murdered by ambitious
relatives he had to admit that it had a basis in fact.

The officer showed him into a large
room strewn with cushions and containing a number of low tables. He was
directed to sit down and slaves came in and offered him coffee and dates.
Taking one of the small delicate cups he sipped the hot, dark liquid appreciatively.
Although he disliked many aspects of his current posting, he had acquired a
taste for the strong, bitter coffee served on any and every occasion in the
Middle East.

He sat quietly sipping from his cup and
helping himself to the dates. He expected to have to wait for up to an hour
before the Caliph was prepared to see him.

Eventually the curtains at one end of
the room opened and the Caliph entered preceded by two of his Turkish guards.
With him was his Grand Vizier and his eldest son, Mohammed Bin Rashid, newly
appointed commander of the army.

The Count rose and went forward to meet
the Caliph, giving him a beaming smile.

"As-salaam alaykum, - peace be
upon you" the Caliph greeted him formally.

"Wa alakum e-salaam, - and upon
you" replied the Count and shook hands with all three.

Count Karlein spoke fluent Arabic,
having spent most of his childhood in Baghdad where his father had been the
Saxon trade counsel. It was the bane of his life that as one of the few Arabic
speaking Saxon diplomats his entire career would probably be spent in the hot
environment of the Middle East.

They sat down on the cushions and
coffee was served again. They exchanged some polite conversation before the
Grand Vizier broached the reason for this meeting.

"The note that you sent this
morning," he began, "indicated that the 'matter' we have been
discussing over the past month has become rather urgent."

Count Karlein nodded his head.
"Yes, I'm afraid that we have not been able to settle our dispute with the
Empire over trade and the situation is very tense. I'm sorry to have to tell
you that war between Saxony and the Empire may only be a few days away."

The Vizier nodded thoughtfully whilst
the Caliph and his son watched the Count.

"The Empires trade laws have been
a source of concern to us as well," the Vizier said. "Like you, our
negotiations have been fruitless."

"It is sad that such disputes
cannot be settled peacefully," replied the Count sadly, "but it
appears that the Empire grows arrogant and overbearing. They must realise that
they cannot treat the rest of the world like their colonies, to be ordered
around at their whim."

The Caliph's son spoke for the first
time. "You speak the truth," he said with some passion. "The
oppression of our Moslem brothers in Egypt is intolerable. The new military
governor has closed all the Islamic schools accusing them of plotting a revolt.
They show no respect for the true faith!"

The Caliph and the Vizier looked
slightly uncomfortable at this outburst but said nothing. Karlein smiled
sympathetically. Until recently Mohammed Bin Rashid had been the governor of
Arabia. He had built up support amongst the fanatical Wahhabi tribes and
Karlein suspected that was the reason he had been brought back to Damascus. The
Caliph did not like to see anyone too strong, even his own son.

"Respect for other people, their
beliefs and heritage is something that the Empire has lost sight of," he
said solemnly.

The Arabs nodded their heads in
agreement, and the Count felt confident that they would provide the support
that Saxony had asked for. However, he knew there would be a price and it would
be higher now that time was of the essence.

"What we spoke of earlier,"
broke in the Caliph entering the conversation, "I'm sure that we could be
of assistance, however it is rather short notice and the money to pay for the
mobilisation of our army takes time to find."

Karlein gave the Caliph a smile of
understanding. Now the haggling begins he thought.

Two hours later when the Count left,
the Saxon treasury was considerably poorer although Karlein believed that he
had struck a good deal. He had even persuaded them to act immediately with the
forces that they had available on the Egyptian border. It was only later that
he found out that the Caliph had been under considerable pressure to act over
the treatment of the Moslem minority in Egypt, and that he had already given
permission for his son to take action against the Empire. The crisis on the
Rhine simply meant that now the Caliph would be able to get Saxony to help foot
the bill for something he was going to do anyway.

30th
July 1920

Egyptian
Frontier

The Egypt-Sinai frontier between the
Empire and the Caliphate was marked by piles of whitewashed stones and the
occasional length of barbed wire. Ten miles beyond the border on the imperial
side in Egypt there was a string of fortifications manned by the men of the
legio II Trajana. Farms and villages were scattered between the frontier and
these fortifications. Patrols went out from the border forts into this area
regularly and it was one of these patrols that fired the first shot in the war.

Tribune John Bryennius had been with
the second Trajana for just over nine months, long enough to feel confident in
command but too short to ignore the advice of his centurion. It was his fourth
patrol along the border and as the previous three had been without incident he
expected this one to be just as boring.

He commanded seventy three legionaries
from the 1st century of the 2nd cohort with sixteen troopers from the third
Cyrenian auxiliary cavalry attached for scouting. Bryennius had been up ahead
with some of the cavalry when a message arrived from his centurion urgently
requesting his presence. The patrol was scattered over an area half a mile long
by a quarter of a mile wide. The mounted auxiliaries were on the flanks with
half of the legionaries in the centre and the rest in groups of three or four
in between. The centurion was with the main group of legionaries who had halted
and had formed a skirmish line facing the low hills to the east.

Bryennius dismounted, handed the reins
of his horse to one of the legionaries and walked over to the centurion. They
exchanged salutes and the centurion pointed towards the east.

"One of the scouts on that flank
has failed to report in sir," he said, "and another sent to find him
has not returned."

The tribune looked towards the hills
with his binoculars. All he could see were some of his own men making their way
through the barren terrain below the hills.

"How long ago?" he asked the
centurion.

"Ten minutes since we sent
somebody to look for the scout."

Bryennius looked around at his
position. His men were scattered over a wide area with very little in the way
of cover. "I don't like it," he said, "what do you think?"

The centurion was in his late thirties
and had spent all his life in Egypt. He did not like it either, and it was not
just the missing horsemen that made him uncomfortable. For the past three miles
he had not seen anybody, no traders or people from the settlements, not even a
herd of goats.

"I think that we should
consolidate the patrol and move towards that village," he said pointing
south west to a group of low buildings dominated by a single, plain church bell
tower.

"Agreed," said Bryennius
without hesitation. "Give the order."

The centurion called the bucina player
and told him to blow the rally. He watched the tribune mount and thought how
glad he was that Bryennius was in command. Some junior tribunes were a right
pain in the arse - arrogant, overbearing pampered brats from Constantinople.
Bryennius treated the men well, listened to advice and did not shirk his
duties. ‘Yes’, the centurion muttered to himself as he watched the tribune
oversee the withdrawal of the men nearest the hills, ‘Bryennius is all right - 
even if he is an officer’.