Адриан Голдсуорти - Brigantia

Halfway through the morning of the fourth day since Ferox had joined the column, Brocchus with the advance guard sent a rider back to say that there was an army waiting to meet them. The prefect estimated that the enemy numbered at least twelve thousand men, and when Ferox was sent to join him he judged the number about right. This time Arviragus had not blocked the road, and instead his army stood on hills to the west. It was a decent position, the left flank strengthened by the grassy walls of a long-abandoned fort and the right with good, gently rolling ground ideal for cavalry and beyond that thick woodland. Any attempt to outflank would be seen long before it posed a threat, and in any case would mean attacking up even steeper and more difficult slopes. Ferox saw men at work in front of the main line, finishing off a turf rampart that would cover much of the slope.

‘Bit of a cheek,’ Brocchus said, for the wall was being raised using the army’s routine technique. Ferox could see that most of the men doing the work were the royal guard.

Neratius Marcellus did not hurry. He let the column arrive at its own pace and when the leading auxiliary infantry arrived he formed them into a line facing west, and a good half-mile from the enemy. One of the cohorts of XX Valeria Victrix soon joined them, and then after that he set the remaining legionaries to digging the camp, which had already been marked out on the ground with flags showing where everything was to go.

The legate sat on his horse alongside Ferox, Brocchus and other officers and scanned the enemy line.

‘Will they attack, sir?’ the tribune in charge of the vexillation from Legio XX asked. The enemy had made no move so far, and most of the warriors sat or wandered around, while the guardsmen toiled away to make their rampart. Arviragus was riding a grey, and was clearly visible supervising the work and watching the Romans just as they watched him.

‘Oh, I should not think so. After all the trouble they have gone to, making their little wall, they must be desperate to make use of it.’ The prince’s plan was obvious. He wanted the Romans to attack him. The rampart would not only make that attack harder, but it would help restrain the enthusiasm of his own warriors. Let the Romans come up the hill and be killed. In the meantime his cavalry, whose numbers looked far larger than the Romans’, would hold the right of their line, until the attack was spent or beaten back and then they and any warriors he had held back could sweep round and through the Roman left, rolling up the whole line.

Ferox wondered whether to speak, and was prevented when Neratius Marcellus proceeded to give an almost identical summary to the narrow-stripe tribune. ‘Let him sleep thinking he has us beaten,’ the legate concluded, ‘and worrying that we will try a night attack. We will attack an hour after dawn.’

‘Is it worth considering the night assault, my lord?’ The tribune must have commanded an auxiliary cohort before he was given his post, but may well have seen little service. He was a pale man, with narrow lips, and darting eyes, with the air of someone trying not to be noticed.

Neratius Marcellus smiled. ‘I could be Alexander and tell you that I will not steal a victory in that way! Or just say that I am getting old and need a good night’s sleep. The truth is that a December night is too long and too cold. The men need rest and food, and I do not want everyone blundering about in the dark. Let us do things in what passes for sunlight here in the north, and make sure that we do everything to perfection.’

The legate expanded on the theme in his consilium that night, as he issued orders to all the senior officers and commanders of cohorts and alae in the army. There were only seventeen men all told, including Ferox and the two cornicularii who struggled to keep pace with the governor’s rapid dictation. Each officer would then take written orders and pass them on to his subordinates. The whole army would be armed and in formation in the road behind the ramparts an hour before dawn. That was normal practice, but they were to form so that they could march out and easily take up their allotted place in the battle lines.

The night was clear and cold, the grass crunching underfoot as it froze. Men were glad whenever they could stand or sit near a fire, and listening to the low conversations Ferox felt their confidence. They wanted the campaign over so that they could get back to warm barracks and a quiet winter. No one seemed to doubt that they would win, or if they did, like good soldiers they kept it to themselves. They moaned about the food, and the cold, and bastards from the other units who did not know how to use a latrine, and all the usual things legionaries and auxiliaries liked to complain about. At the third hour of the night Ferox went to visit the picket outside the main gate. The duty fell to the Batavians that night, and he found Cerialis there. They had lit fires thirty paces beyond the picket, which meant that they would get a bit of warning of any attack. A lot of units did this, although Ferox thought it was wrong because it made it impossible to see anything beyond the fires.

‘Tomorrow we kill you!’ a voice yelled from the darkness.

‘He’s back,’ muttered one of the soldiers.

‘We’re going to cut off your pricks!’ This came in a deeper voice than the first.

‘He must have found a friend,’ one of the older soldiers said. ‘In this cold he’ll be lucky to find anything.’

‘Speak for yourself,’ another of the Batavians replied, and then raised his voice. ‘Piss off, you daft buggers!’

‘You are all traitors!’ Ferox thought he saw a pale shape moving in the dark and knew the voice of Arviragus. ‘Trajan is dead, and your legate a traitor who will die along with all his supporters.’

‘That’s nice!’ a soldier shouted back.

‘Tell your officers to give up,’ the prince continued.

Cerialis took a couple of paces forward and cupped his hands to shout louder. ‘Lord prince, you are the traitor and rebel. Trajan lives and we all serve him, true to the oath you have broken. You must all lay down your arms and trust to his mercy!’

Arviragus’ laughter was loud. ‘Will you give a message to Flavius Ferox?’

Cerialis glanced back, wondering whether the centurion wanted to declare himself, and then nodded in understanding. ‘I will give it.’

‘Tell him that bitch, my sister, is dead. Tell him that. As high king I ordered her death and that of all those with her. They are all dead. Tell him that.’

A grey horse shone as it bounded forward, the prince whirling something bulky around in his hand before he flung it forward. It bounced on the grass and rolled a little before it stopped. One of the Batavians flung a javelin, but it fell several paces short and the prince had wheeled his horse and galloped away.

Ferox ran forward, trying to fight down his fears. He could see that the prince had thrown a head, but when he came close he saw it was large and must be a man’s. For a moment he worried that it was Gannascus, until he picked it up and saw that the hair was short and the chin clean shaven.

‘I do not know him,’ he said.

‘I do.’ Cerialis was alongside. ‘It is the prefect in command at Cataractonium.’

‘It is rarely wise to be too clever.’ Neratius Marcellus repeated what he had said in the consilium the night before. ‘He expects us to attack him and so we shall. But in our own time and way.’

An hour after dawn and everyone was in place. On the left, both alae formed up, each in two lines of turmae. Ala Petriana was furthest forward, with the other ala behind and to its left. They would let the enemy horsemen come to them, rather than driving too deeply forward. The Gauls stood between the cavalry and the main force of infantry. A cohort of Legio XX was on the left, formed in two lines, each six deep. Two hundred paces to their right was the first cohort of Legio II Augusta, in a matching formation, with the eagle shining in the middle of the reserve line surrounded by five signa from the centuries of the first cohort and the vexillum flag of the detachment. The gap between the legionaries was filled by ten scorpions, light artillery, firing heavy bolts with tremendous force and uncanny accuracy and some of the archers in open order. The rest of the archers formed an extra rank at the back of the leading lines of legionaries. Behind them all, the other cohort of Legio XX acted as an immediate reserve.