Джерейнт Джонс - Siege

The ranks were silent now. There was time only for panted breaths, and no need for words of harsh encouragement from the officers – we all knew what the penalty would be for failing to cover a backbreaking distance. Dawn would expose us on the wrong side of the German army, and then we would die.

Even making it to the west of the enemy was no guarantee that we’d see out the daylight. At best we could hope to have a few miles between us and the forces we had slipped past, but they would be fresh, and fierce. Cavalry would harass and slow our advance. Eventually, bands of spearmen would crash into our exhausted ranks. There would be no drawn-out battle. It would be over in a blood-soaked hour.

Unless.

Unless the runners that Caedicius had dispatched to the Rhine had prepared the legions for our attempt. Unless they were ready to cross the bridges and come to our aid. I had no sure knowledge that this was the message the prefect had sent with the men, but what else was there to say? What else was there to beg for? Without their help, we would be dead by noon.

Sixteen hours of life. Best then to savour the savagery of the storm. Best then to embrace the burning in my muscles, and the throbbing ache of my knees. The alternative was thought, and I had no wish to spend my dying hours cursing myself for the mistakes I had made when life had been an open road ahead of me.

Hour past hour. The storm held. So did the pace. It was steady, short of panic, and still I wondered how many civilians would have fallen by the wayside. How many would be making their own paths in the darkness, hoping that the fat target of a beaten garrison would distract the enemy from their own escape?

Enough of that. Concentrate on one foot in front of the other. Concentrate on the dull steel of the helmet in front of you. Concentrate on keeping your shoulders loose for when the time comes to draw your blade.

I told myself this. Over and over. Did I listen? Of course not. Instead I tortured myself. Relived my life, mistake by mistake, death by death. Perhaps this was my way of preparing for the end. So deep was my anger, so overwhelming my distress, that I would almost have welcomed an enemy blade in my guts.

Almost.

Stumps. Titus. Brando. Micon. H. Linza.

Six reasons I would parry that blade, and shove my own into the enemy’s chest.

Things had changed, I acknowledged. They’d changed in the forest, and now they’d changed in the fort. The hope of my future wavered between the dream of what could be in Britain, and the company that I was within.

Maybe we would make it, I dared to think.

Hour past hour. The storm held. So did the pace.

The civilians did not.

Panicked calls began to echo in the night. They were shrill with fear, shouted in Latin.

Titus spoke up, his voice like the rumble of thunder in the storm. ‘They must be losing the vanguard.’

‘They’ll be losing more than that if they don’t keep up,’ Stumps hissed. ‘How far you reckon we’ve covered, Felix?’

‘Eight miles? Nine?’

‘Fuck,’ Stumps swore, realizing what that meant.

We were on the wrong side of the enemy army, and the cries of the terrified civilians were cutting through the din of the storm, their harried voices like the bleat of frightened goats with the scent of wolf in their nostrils.

‘Fuck!’ Stumps cursed again, this time loudly, because now there were more voices in the darkness. Commanding voices, loud and angry.

‘That’s not Latin,’ Titus growled.

And then the wolf attacked.

Wind carried death’s symphony to our ears: the clash of blade on blade; the cry of orders; the screams of pain.

Stumps grimaced. ‘Vanguard’s getting it.’

The panicked cries in Latin were louder now. Moments later, we began to see the fleeting figures of fugitives streaming by our century, the lashing rain doing nothing to hide their terror.

‘They’re running back to the camp?’ Brando guessed.

‘They’ll die if they do,’ Titus grunted. No one pointed out that they could well die here – the sound of crashing shields spoke well enough to that.

‘You see that?’ Stumps shouted. ‘One of those civvies was running with half a villa in his arms!’

Peering into the darkness, I saw more figures escaping towards the false comfort of the fort. Many carried burdens, some even chests. With such loads, there was no way the untrained civilians could have kept pace with the vanguard of soldiers.

‘Fell behind and woke the goat-fuckers with their singing,’ Stumps sneered. ‘Fucking civvies. Should have left them in the fort. Linza excluded,’ he added quickly. ‘We’ll all get it, now.’

Was I worried for Linza? Of course I fucking was. I was worried for her, and for all of us. That’s why I looked to our flanks as we continued to push onwards. So far the noise of battle remained distant, but that would not hold for long, I was certain, and I braced myself for the rush of spear and shield I was certain was coming.

‘Form square!’ Albus called from ahead, his crest lost to me in the darkness.

‘Form square!’ section commanders repeated above the winds.

Hindered by the elements and a few figures of fleeing civilians, the century’s movements were sloppy, and Albus and his optio screamed oaths at anyone who threatened the tiny formation’s integrity. Our section found itself on the left flank, which meant that when we moved, we would be taking side steps to our right, our eyes always forward to the formation’s flank, and away from our direction of travel. It was a disorientating way to move, but gave us the all-round protection we needed.

‘Slow march!’ Albus ordered, finally satisfied, and the formation began to creep in the direction of the fighting ahead. After the forced pace of our march, the slow step was agony on minds now fuelled with fear.

We were the rearguard, and I knew what the slow march and square formation meant: Caedicius was using us as a lizard does its tail. We would occupy the attacker as the body made its escape.

‘Keep your shields up,’ Titus warned. ‘Be ready.’

‘Shields up,’ Livius echoed the veteran’s words. His voice had climbed an octave since battle had been joined ahead.

‘First time?’ Stumps asked, hearing the same.

‘I was on the raid,’ Livius offered.

‘So it’s your first time,’ Stumps told him, and I could imagine his playful grin. ‘You’ll be all right.’

As we crabbed towards the Rhine, still agonizingly distant, I took in the comrades by my side. Stumps was on my left shoulder, his face twisted into a mad man’s grin. I felt good that he was there, knowing that I could trust him with my blind side. He would die for me, I knew with no doubt, and I hoped that Micon to my right knew the same of me. His head was made of clay, but I was certain his heart understood that he was beloved of his comrades.

Titus’s bulk was a blur to the right of Micon, but beyond that I could make out nothing but vague shapes of shield and armour. Behind my back was the second file of the section, men I neither knew, nor, in all honesty, cared about more than any other soldier, or man. They were unknown to me, Livius the only one I knew by name. If we survived this battle, then likely I would know them as well as family. War created brothers with far greater speed than a mother’s womb.

Silence had fallen in the ranks. The sound of our steps, and of the bump of our weapons against shield, was lost to the wind and the cries it carried.

I stared on into the darkness.

There were orders being shouted in the black.

The sideswipe of my right foot hit something hard, and I glanced quickly down at the obstruction. It was dark, but it appeared to be a child’s toy: a whittled horse.