Give Me Back My Legions(92)

Shouts rang out inside Mindenum. Arminius hid a smile. His father was probably doing the same thing as he murmured, “See how much they love you?”

“Nothing we didn’t already know,” Arminius said. He raised his voice again: “May we come in? I don’t want to harm my father’s health.” The Romans were like Germans in respecting their elders. And, once he and Sigimerus got into Mindenum, the legionaries would have a harder time throwing them out than they would excluding them in the first place.

But one of the sentries answered, “Let’s see what the governor’s got to say. If it were up to me . . .” He didn’t say what would happen then. Arminius drew his own conclusions.

Another sentry looked over his shoulder. “Here comes his Excellency now!” The legionaries stiffened to attention. They expected their auxiliaries to do the same thing. Arminius had never seen anything so ridiculous in his life, but he’d learned the silly pose. Going along was easier than arguing, especially for one lone man facing a ponderous military machine.

The Romans thought all of Germany would take the easy road, go along, and submit to their yoke. But the Germans were not one lone man. They outnumbered the invaders. They were more determined than the Romans, too. I’m more determined than the Romans are, Arminius thought. And I can kindle Germany. I can, and I will.

A stocky figure mounted to the top of the earthen rampart. The sun gleamed from the Roman’s bald scalp. Arminius smiled and waved. “Hail, your Excellency!” he called. If the smile never reached his eyes, Quinctilius Varus couldn’t hope to notice from that distance.

Sigimerus waved, too. If he didn’t smile so broadly, he was an older man, and carried himself with more dignity. Arminius hoped Varus would think so, anyhow.

And evidently Varus did. He was at least as old as Sigimerus, but he wore a smile wider than Arminius’. “Hail! Welcome!” he said. “I didn’t know if we’d be lucky enough to see the two of you back here this year.”

“Here we are, sir,” Arminius said. “May we come into Mindenum? Your men didn’t seem to want us to.”

“You know how soldiers are,” Varus said. And Arminius did: he was one himself. If the Roman governor wasn’t, or didn’t think of himself as one, why did he hold this position? Smiling still, he went on, “You certainly have my permission to come in. I’m sure I will want your advice again and again on how best to civilize this province.”

Sigimerus growled down deep in his throat. Arminius’ gaze flicked over to his father, but the older man’s expression didn’t change. And the Romans wouldn’t have heard him. Arminius wore his smile like a mask, hiding his fury. What Varus meant by civilizing Germany was taking away its character and its freedom.

“Always a pleasure to help,” Arminius lied.

“Spoken like a Roman citizen - like the member of the Equestrian Order you are,” Varus boomed. After a moment, Arminius realized the Roman governor wasn’t really speaking to him, or wasn’t speaking to him alone. Varus was reminding the legionaries that the man outside was a tame German, a good German. He didn’t say anything to or about Sigimerus. But if the soldiers accepted Arminius, they wouldn’t mind his father.

Arminius drew himself up straight and delivered a clenched-fist Roman salute. Yes, let the legionaries see I can ape their customs. Let them see that I’m a tame German, a good German. And, when the time comes, I’ll show them just how tame and good I am.

None of that showed on his face. He probably had more practice dissembling than any other German since the gods first created his folk. Among themselves, Germans were always altogether honest (unless, of course, they saw some pressing reason not to be, as Segestes had when he broke his pledge to Arminius and tried to give Thusnelda to Tudrus). What they thought of as their innate honesty put most of them at a disadvantage when they tried to deal with deceitful foreigners.

Arminius had been shocked to discover that the Romans reckoned his folk a pack of lying, thieving savages. How could they be so blind? He finally decided that, since the Romans were liars and thieves themselves, they thought other peoples shared their vices.

“Pass in, Arminius. Pass in, Sigimerus,” Quinctilius Varus said loudly. If the sentries tried to go against that now, they would be mutinying against the provincial governor - indirectly, against Augustus himself. The Romans had some fearsome penalties for anyone who dared such a thing.

Any folk that had such penalties was bound to need them - one more argument against Rome and all its ways.

Legionaries mostly held their faces straight as Arminius and Sigimerus walked into Mindenum. They probably wouldn’t have done that if they weren’t under Varus’ eye. Then again, they probably wouldn’t have let the two Cherusci into Mindenum if not for Varus’ orders.