Colleen McCullough - 6. The October Horse - A Novel of Caesar and Cleopatra

They proceeded to make a properly fortified camp, but in two separate halves. Cassius took the hill to the south side of the Via Egnatia for his camp, his exposed flank protected by miles of salt marsh, beyond which lay the sea. Brutus occupied the twin hill on the north side of the Via Egnatia, his exposed flank protected by cliffs and impassable defiles. They shared a main gate on the Via Egnatia itself, but once through that common entrance, two separate camps with separate fortifications existed; free access between them was impossible anywhere, which meant that troops couldn't be shuttled between north and south of the road. The distance between the summit of Cassius's hill and the summit of Brutus's hill was almost exactly one mile, so between these two rises they built a heavily fortified wall on the west side. This wall didn't travel in a straight line; it bent backward in the middle where it crossed the road at the main gate, giving it the shape of a great curved bow. Within that wall, each camp had its own inner lines of fortification, which then traveled down either side of the Via Egnatia to the commencement of the Sapaean Pass. "Our army is just too big to put into one camp," Cassius explained to his and Brutus's legates in council. "Two separate camps mean that if the enemy should penetrate one, it can't get inside the other. That gives us time to rally. The side road to Neapolis makes it easy for us to bring up supplies, and Patiscus is in charge of making sure we get those supplies. Yes, when all is said and done, in the highly unlikely event that we should be attacked, our dispositions will answer very well." No one present contradicted. What was preying on every mind at the council was the news that Mark Antony had reached Amphipolis with eight more legions and thousands of cavalry. Not only that, but Octavian was at Thessalonica and not stopping either, despite reports that he was so ill his conveyance was a litter.

Cassius gave the best of everything to Brutus. The best of the cavalry, the best legions of old Caesarean veterans, the best artillery. He didn't know how else to shore up this hesitant, timid, unmartial partner in the great enterprise. For Brutus was those things, no matter how many occasional tactical inspirations he might have. Sardis had shown Cassius that Brutus cared more for abstractions than he did for the practical necessities war brought in its train. It wasn't quite cowardice on Brutus's part, it was more that war and battles appalled him, that he couldn't flog up interest in military matters. When he should have been poring over maps and visiting his men to jolly them along, he was huddled with his three tame philosophers debating something or other, or else writing one of those chilling letters to a dead wife. Yet if he were taxed with his moods and chronic depression, he denied suffering them! Or else he started up about Cicero's murder, and how he had to bring the Triumvirs to justice, no matter how unsuited for the task he was. He had a kind of blind faith in rightness as he saw rightness, nor could he credit that evil men like Antonius and Octavianus stood a chance of winning. His stand was for the restoration of the old Republic and the liberties of free Roman noblemen, causes that couldn't possibly lose. Himself very different, Cassius shrugged his shoulders and simply did what he could to protect Brutus from his weaknesses. Let Brutus have the best of everything, and offer to Vediovis, god of doubts and disappointments, that they would be enough. Brutus never even noticed what Cassius had done.

Antony arrived on the Ganga River plain on the last day of September and pitched camp a scant mile from the western, bow-shaped wall of the Liberators. He was acutely aware how bad his position was. He had no burnable fuel and the nights were freezingly cold, the baggage train's better food was lagging behind by some days, and the wells he dug in search of more potable water turned out to be as foul and brackish as the river. The Liberators, he deduced, must have access to good springs in that rocky chain of hills behind them, so he sent parties to explore Mount Pangaeus, where he managed to find fresh water then had to transport it to his camp until his engineers, using troops as laborers, built a makeshift aqueduct. However, he proceeded to do what any competent Roman general would: protect and fortify his position with walls, breastworks, towers and ditches, then manned them with artillery. Unlike Brutus and Cassius, he built one camp for his and Octavian's foot soldiers, and tacked a smaller camp on either side of it for that fraction of his cavalry whose horses would drink the brackish water. Then he put his two worst legions in the seaward small camp, where his own quarters were located, and left sufficient room in the other small camp for two of Octavian's legions when they arrived. They would act as reserves. After studying the lie of the land, he decided that any battle hereabouts was going to be an infantry one, so secretly, at dead of night, he sent all but three thousand willing drinkers among his cavalry back to Amphipolis. In locating Octavian's personal headquarters as a mirror image of his own in the other small camp, it did not occur to him that Octavian's illness was affected by the proximity of horses; it simply filled him with fury that the legions thought no worse of the little coward for his girly complaint indeed, they seemed to think that he was interceding with Mars on their behalf! Still in a litter, Octavian drew up with his five legions early in October, and the baggage train a day later. When he saw where Antony had put him, he rolled his eyes despairingly at Agrippa, but had too much sense to protest to Antony. "He wouldn't understand anyway, his own health is too rude. We'll pitch my tent on the outer palisades at the very back, where I might get a sea wind across those marshes and I hope, I hope! blow the dust from trampling hooves away from me." "It will help," Agrippa agreed, amazed that Caesar had gotten this far. The will inside him, he thought, is truly more than mortal. He refuses to quit, let alone die if only because, should he do either, Antonius would be the chief beneficiary. "If the wind changes or the dust increases, Caesar," Agrippa added, "you can slip through that little gate there and make your way into the marshes themselves for relief."

Both sides had nineteen legions at Philippi and could marshal about a hundred thousand foot, but the Liberators had over twenty thousand horse, while Antony had reduced his thirteen thousand to a mere three. "Things have changed since Caesar's time in Gaul," he said to Octavian over a shared dinner. "He thought himself superbly well off if he had two thousand horse to pitch against half of Gaul and a few levies of Sugambri to boot. I don't think he ever fielded more than one horseman to the enemy's three or four." "I know you're milling your troopers around as if you still had thousands upon thousands of them, Antonius, but you don't," said Octavian, forcing down a piece of bread. "Yet our opponents have a vast cavalry camp up the valley, so Agrippa tells me. Why is that? Something to do with Caesar?" "I can't find forage," said Antony, wiping his chin, "so I'm betting that what cavalry I have will be enough. Just like Caesar. It's going to be a foot-slogger battle." "Do you think they'll fight?" "They don't want to, that I know. But eventually they'll have to, because we're not going away until they do."

Antony's abrupt arrival had shattered Brutus and Cassius, positive that he would skulk at Amphipolis until he realized that he was doing himself no good in Thrace. Yet here he was, it seemed spoiling for a battle. "He won't get one," said Cassius, frowning at the salt marshes. The very next day he started work on his exposed salt marsh flank, bent on extending his fortifications right out into their middle, thus rendering it impossible for the Triumvirs to get around behind his lines. At the same time the gate across the Via Egnatia began to put forth ditches, extra walls and palisades; previously Cassius had thought that the Ganga River, flowing right in front of their two hills, would provide sufficient protection, but every day its level visibly dropped in this cold, rainless autumn of a cold, rainless year. Men could not only cross it, they could now fight in it. Therefore, more defenses, more fortifications. "Why are they so busy?" Brutus asked Cassius as they stood atop Cassius's hill, his hand pointing to the Triumviral camp. "Because they're preparing for a major engagement." "Oh!" gasped Brutus, and gulped. "They won't get one," said Cassius, tones reassuring. "Is that why you've extended your defenses into the swamp?" "Yes, Brutus." "I wonder what they're thinking about all this in Philippi town when they look down on us?" Cassius blinked. "Does what Philippi town thinks matter?" "I suppose not," said Brutus, sighing. "I just wondered."