Sword of Rome(96)

Valerius followed his gaze and saw nothing in the broken countryside, but the Spaniard was certain. ‘Victor has split his forces,’ Valerius thought aloud. ‘He’s sent an advance guard of his best horsemen to either pin us in place or make us turn and fight.’

‘Then here is as good as anywhere.’ It was Metto. The big centurion’s voice sounded weary and his words received muttered support from his men, who were arse-sore and exhausted after days and nights of struggling to stay in the saddle. ‘We can ambush the bastards among the trees.’

‘There aren’t enough of us,’ Valerius pointed out. ‘Would you fight them on horseback?’

Metto shrugged, but it was clear that a mounted battle with veteran cavalrymen could only have one winner.

‘And we can’t fight them from the ground, because they’ll cut us to pieces.’

‘So what do we do?’ the centurion demanded.

‘There may be a way.’ Valerius took Serpentius aside. ‘I want you to ride ahead and find a place. Remember the Cepha gap. Somewhere we can’t be outflanked.’

The Spaniard’s eyes lit up with understanding. ‘I know. If such a place exists, I will find it.’

An hour later, Serpentius met them where the road turned sharply from the river valley at the edge of a green meadow. The meadow was almost a mile deep, disappearing into heavy forest at the far end, bounded on one side by a scrubby hillside impassable to a horse, and on the other by the thick trees and bushes that lined the river bank.

Valerius shot a puzzled glance at the Spaniard.

‘You’ll see,’ Serpentius said. ‘We ride halfway across the meadow at the trot. When we get there you’ll see a branch I’ve pushed into the turf. That’s when you dismount and lead your horse. Go gently and stick close together on the line I’ve marked.’

The men did as they were ordered, and as he walked his horse through the branches Serpentius had placed Valerius realized the genius of the plan. ‘Will it work?’

The Spaniard shrugged. ‘It’s the best I can do. It depends on how determined they are to get you and how blown their horses are. If it doesn’t, we take our chances among the trees.’

When they reached a point about three-quarters of the way across the green sward, Valerius halted the men.

‘Now we wait. Metto?’ The centurion nodded. ‘When they come into view we’ll be arguing. You want to go back. I want to go on. Lots of arm waving. The others will mill about looking demoralized and beaten. You hear that, you bastards? They’ve beaten you. Those sons of dogs have ridden you into the ground and now you’re ripe for their spears.’

A pent-up growl of frustration went up from the legionaries, but Valerius silenced it with a snarl. ‘Save your anger for the Batavians. If they win, you’ll find yourself with a stake up your arse and a flaying knife tickling your foreskin. They believe they’re going to win because they outnumber us two to one. But Serpentius thinks we can beat them and Serpentius survived a hundred fights in the arena so he knows what he’s talking about.’ The men glared at the Spaniard, hating him for bringing them to this place and their potential doom. Each of them was armed with the pair of legionary pila they had stolen from the armoury at Moguntiacum. ‘When the time comes, you slaughter them.’ Valerius’s voice rose to a shout. ‘You slaughter every last one of the bastards.’

The thunder of hooves heralded the arrival of the enemy. Valerius prayed to Mars and Jupiter for Claudius Victor to be leading the men, but one glance told him the glacier-eyed Batavian had stayed with his main force. Metto was red-faced and roaring obscenities, waving his sword back to the road, and Valerius had a feeling it wasn’t entirely an act. His men were doing their best to look defeated.

Valerius recognized the moment the auxiliary leader saw the small group trapped in the middle of a broad field. He knew what his adversary would be thinking: a perfect target, half his strength and ripe for the slaughter. The man swerved off the road and led his troopers at the gallop across the meadow towards the confused fugitives. Of course, he would be suspicious. One part of him would be thinking it was too easy, but he’d have the scent of blood in his nostrils and his commander’s warning of the consequences of failure in his ears. It was obvious they’d ridden at a killing pace to get here. The horses were pop-eyed with exhaustion, their coats foam-flecked and silver-bright with sweat, but they still had one last charge in them and against so few their commander would be gambling that one would be enough.

Valerius watched them come, following the innocent hoof pattern. Saw the moment the commander registered the change and lost his certainty. But before the auxiliary’s mind could assess the implications of what he was seeing, his mount had covered another four strides. To disaster.