Throne of the Caesars 01 - Iron and Rust (8 page)

The landscape was like nothing Gordian had seen. The cliffs to the right were steep and jumbled, their stratifications tipped and fanned. In the main they were bare slopes. Some of the heights were ringed with darker, vertical rocks like cyclopean crenellations. A harsh place, but not that out of the ordinary. There were pockets of green in the dips and hollows. Now and then a flash of white or black movement betrayed the presence of a flock of goats.

To the left, there was no remission to the harshness. A great flatness stretched as far as the eye could see. Its surface was banded like agate; brown, tan and white. There were pools of standing water and dusky lines coiled between them. There was no telling if they were tracks, animal or human, or now dry channels carved by last winter’s rain. In the high sun mirages shifted; water, trees, buildings. Once, Gordian thought he saw a boat. Nothing else moved in all that vastness. Nothing real.

This was the Lake of Triton, the dreadful, great salt lake. Once it had been a real lake, if not an inlet of the sea. The
Argo
had sailed its waters. But even then it had been an evil place. Two of the Argonauts had been killed here; Mopsus by a snake, and Canthus by a local herdsman. For the rest to escape had needed an appearance by Triton himself.

Mauricius had told Gordian the local legends. At night men saw torches moving far out in the desert. They heard the music of pipes and cymbals. Some said they had seen the satyrs and nymphs gambolling. There were stories of buried treasure: a huge tripod from Delphi, solid gold. Those who searched never found it, and many never came back. Once, a caravan of a thousand animals had ventured off one of the two safe paths. Nothing was seen of them again. There had been no epiphany for them.

Looking hard, Gordian saw there were patches where the crust was broken, and a dark sludge exposed.

‘Ad Palmam.’

There – two or three miles ahead – was a line of green, utterly incongruous in the waste.

They rode on without speaking, every man trying to hide his trepidation.

Two hundred yards short, Gordian called a halt. Time was against them, but he did not know by how much.

Gordian dismounted, to ease his horse. Most of the others did the same. They watched the oasis. Nothing much moved. A couple of chickens scratched in the shade of some outlying trees. Once, further in, a flight of doves clattered into the air.

‘Well, we can not stay here for ever,’ the legate Sabinianus said. ‘I had better go and take a look.’

Gordian felt a rush of affection at the calm courage of the man.

‘Of course,’ Sabinianus continued, ‘if Arrian were here, I would recommend you send him. He is far more expendable, and I would sacrifice him happily to ensure my safety.’

Men smiled. Sabinianus and Arrian were the closest of friends, always laughing at each other, and at everything else.

‘Actually,’ Sabinianus said, ‘I would sacrifice anyone at all. I want you all to remember that.’

Gordian gave Sabinianus a leg up into the saddle. He wanted to say something, but the words would not come. The wry look on Sabinianus’ face, the turned-down mouth, was more pronounced than usual. With his knees, the legate moved his horse into a walk down to the settlement.

It had all happened with a dislocating suddenness. Just fourteen days before, all had been normal. As far as Gordian and his father, the Proconsul, had known, the province had slumbered under the North African sun in a state of profound peace. They had passed February in Thysdrus for the olive season; a round of local festivals and outdoor meals in the shade of the evening. As ever, the presence of the Proconsul had drawn intellectuals from all over the province, and abroad. There had been literary recitals and plays. The old man had formed a strong fondness for the town. He had bought two estates nearby, and had commissioned a new amphitheatre at vast, possibly ruinous personal expense. Gordian Senior had lingered there until the
nones
of March, when he had felt compelled to give orders to begin to prepare the journey north to the town of Hadrumetum, where he had to fulfil his duty as a judge on his assize circuit. There was much to organize in the entourage of a Proconsul. The representative of the majesty of Rome could not arrive like a beggar. When, finally, they took to the road, the gubernatorial carriage and its cavalcade went by easy stages. Gordian’s father was a septuagenarian; things should not be rushed. Ten miles a day was enough. Hadrumetum was in sight, but still some miles distant, on the
ides
, when the messenger drove his sweat-lathered horse up to them. The beast stood, head down, trembling, as he told them the bad news. Gordian found it difficult to accept. His mind kept shifting to the horse; the way it was standing, it might be permanently broken down.

The nomads had come up out of the desert to the west of the Lake of Triton. There had been no warning. They had rampaged through the oases – Castellum Neptitana, Thusuros, Ad Palmam, Thiges; each was left a scene of desolation. Not yet sated, the barbarians were riding north. Soon they would reach Capsa. Their numbers were immense; like nothing seen before. Their leader was Nuffuzi, a chief of the Cinithii. His prestige was such that warriors from other tribes of the Gaetuli had joined him, some from as far south as Phazania.

Gordian’s father might be nearing his eightieth year, but he had a long career behind him. He had governed many provinces, armed and unarmed. He had not survived, and usually prospered, by giving way to panic. ‘If you left the barbarians on the road to Capsa, and we are outside Hadrumetum, we have time to finish our journey, go to the baths, and then take counsel over dinner.’

The defence of Africa Proconsularis was overseen by Capelianus, the governor of Numidia, the province adjacent to the west. Between Gordian Senior and Capelianus there was a personal disagreement of very long standing. It was a delicate subject, best not mentioned in front of either man. The governing elite of the empire had long memories for any slight, let alone anything worse. Duty, or at least fear of imperial displeasure, would make Capelianus act eventually, but habitual animosity would not encourage the governor to rush to the aid of his neighbour.

The governor of Africa had few troops at his disposal. There was an Urban Cohort in Carthage and two auxiliary cohorts in the west, one at Utica and the other at Ammaedara. They were there to prevent riots in the towns, and the latter to suppress banditry in the countryside. Strung out along the borders to the south-west was a cohort of legionaries from 3rd Augustan and an irregular unit of mounted scouts, and to the east three cohorts of auxiliaries in Tripolitana. Although within the province of Africa, all the troops along the borders were notionally under the command of the governor of Numidia. For his father’s security, and greater dignity, Gordian had sought volunteers throughout the province from the regular units and from the various small groups of soldiers on detached duties. With these, and some veterans who found life outside the army less than they had expected, he had raised a mounted bodyguard one-hundred-strong for the Proconsul. This unit of Equites Singulares Consularis had been the sole military force with them in Hadrumetum.

The plan which the younger Gordian advanced over dinner was bold and did not meet with universal approval. Menophilus, the Quaestor in the province, and Mauricius, the local landowner, saw its merits. One of the Proconsul’s legates, Valerian, had been talked around, but the other two, the inseparable Arrian and Sabinianus, remained deeply sceptical. ‘Putting your hand in a rat’s nest,’ said Arrian. ‘You are not Alexander, and I am not Parmenion,’ said Sabinianus. You should abandon this desire for military glory. It does not fit the type of philosophical life you profess. You should take the sort of cautious advice the Macedonian King rejected from the old general.

Nevertheless, Gordian had persevered.

The nomads had come to pillage, not to conquer. It was too late to head them off – the worst damage was done – so they should be caught as they returned. Whether they took Capsa or not, it was unlikely they would venture deeper into Roman territory. They would know troops from Numidia would be mobilized to chase them. Almost certainly, the raiders would seek to leave the province by the same route they had entered. Ad Palmam was the key. At that oasis the land narrowed between the Lake of Triton and the smaller salt lake to the west. One of the two safe paths through the great waste ran off south-east from there. It intersected the other somewhere out in the wilderness. A force at Ad Palmam dominated both escape routes.

Gordian, guided by Mauricius and accompanied by Sabinianus and Valerian, would lead eighty men of the mounted bodyguard as a flying column. They would go via Thysdrus and Taparura. When they reached the hills, Mauricius could take them south by unfrequented ways to avoid running into the nomads.

Arrian was by far the best horseman among them. He would ride ahead, take spare horses on a lead rein. At the high country he would bear west for Thiges. He could take a couple of troopers with him, but, if he came across the nomads, he would have to rely on his mount and his skill.

‘I might try praying as well,’ Arrian had said, ‘although I know some think it useless.’

After Arrian reached the frontier wall, it was not far to the Mirror Fort. At their headquarters, he would take command of the five hundred scouts and then force march them back to join Gordian and the others at Ad Palmam.

Meanwhile, Menophilus would have ridden west from Hadrumetum, through the Sufes Pass, and collected 15th Cohort Emesenorum from Ammaedara. He would bring them down from the north through Capsa.

The raiders would be burdened with their plunder. They were barbarians, and had no discipline. They would straggle all over the country. Their retreat would be slow. Gordian and Arrian, if they acted with alacrity, could be waiting at the oasis long before the nomads appeared. Between them, the Romans would dispose some six hundred cavalry. More than enough to delay the enemy until Menophilus appeared with five hundred infantry in their rear – like a hammer on to an anvil.

‘You are proposing to surround a much greater number with about a thousand men,’ Sabinianus had said.

Gordian had agreed. ‘But we are not trying to massacre or capture them all. Merely retake their loot, kill some of them and teach the rest a lesson. Make them think twice before crossing the border again. Show weakness, and they will be back before the end of the year. There will be more of them. Garamantes, Nasamones, Baquates … tribesmen from far away will flock to the banners of this Nuffuzi. You all know the nature of barbarians: success breeds arrogance.’

No one at the dinner had an answer to that, not even Arrian or Sabinianus. He was self-evidently right: that was how barbarians were. Gordian Senior was predisposed to be won over. He had no desire to be rescued by Capelianus. The thing had been clinched by Mauricius. Could he join the expedition? The local magnate had twenty-five mounted, armed retainers with him. He was sure other nearby estate owners would contribute more. If there had been time, he himself could have produced perhaps nearly a hundred from his own lands.

The Proconsul had approved the plan. He told his son to take all the
equites
. The younger Gordian would not hear of it; nor would the others. Together they urged the governor to have a ship prepared in the harbour to take him and his household to safety, if things should go very badly wrong and the nomads threatened Hadrumetum. Gordian Senior had replied that he had never run from his enemies, and he was too old to start now.

Menophilus and Arrian had ridden their separate ways the next morning. Three days had passed getting ready the men, weapons, supplies, and animals of the flying column. When finally Gordian led them out, he was at the head of eighty troopers and a similar number of armed locals. He had waved to his father, blown kisses to Parthenope and Chione, his two mistresses, and wondered if he was doing the right thing.

When they had ridden through Thysdrus, they had got the news that Capsa had fallen. The barbarians appeared to be taking their time over their looting. The estimates of their numbers remained unreliable, hopefully vastly inflated. They had received no further word on the journey.

Gordian shaded his eyes, and watched. Another flock of doves got up as Sabinianus disappeared into the oasis. Perhaps his friend was right – perhaps he was doing this for the wrong motives. Still, it was all too late to worry now.

The doves circled and swooped back into the treetops. The chickens had vanished. It was quiet – dreadfully quiet – and very still. Now and then Gordian thought he half saw movement deep in the shade. If something happened to Sabinianus … Odysseus must have felt this apprehension when he sent Eurylochus to scout the smoke drifting up over the Aeaean island. Eurylochus had returned from the halls of Circe. It would be all right.
We won’t go down to the House of Death, not yet, not until our day arrives.
But Eurylochus had not come back from Sicily.
All ways of dying are hateful to us
poor mortals.
If he had sent Sabinianus to his death … Gordian pushed the verses from his mind. No point in entertaining such thoughts; not until necessary.

‘There!’

Sabinianus had emerged from the tree line. He was still mounted. His horse was ringed by children. He beckoned.

‘Mount up.’

It was dark under the high fronds. Sabinianus led them through the oasis towards the settlement. There were conduits everywhere. Of all sizes, they crossed and recrossed each other, elaborately regulated by dams and aqueducts of palm-stems. Where the sun penetrated, the water was jade; elsewhere, a cool brown. The hooves of their mounts rattled over narrow wooden bridges. Sheltered by the date palms, there were fig trees and a profusion of shorter fruit trees: lemon, pomegranate, plum and peach. Below, almost every inch was set out in gardens for grain or vegetables. With the arrival of the other riders, the children had withdrawn to a distance. Gordian caught glimpses of them, and of adults through the trunks of the trees.