Legatus Legionis: Book Two in the Gaius Claudius Scaevola Trilogy (42 page)

"I can't throw that very far," Quintus shook his head.

"No need. It will fall quite adequately by itself, and if the man wants to leap back to dodge it, well and good. Unless you think you can hit someone on the track S-bends down below, let your targets get as close as you dare, that way you are more likely to hit them. Right, everybody else! You might as well gather rocks as well. Timothy, bring all the arrows we've got."

"Is there anything I can do?" Vipsania asked.

"Gather firewood, if you can find any up here," Gaius nodded. "If there's enough, light a fire that can be seen from the west."

"For Vespasian's men?"

"Yes," Gaius said. "It'll be dark in a couple of hours, and we'll get help a lot faster if they can guess where we are."

"Gaius?"

"Yes?"

"What did Quintus mean just then, about the corn, I mean?"

"Quintus wasn't siphoning corn off, but he was involved in siphoning money off for friends of your father."

"What?"

"My guess is, another plot to get rid of Claudius."

A look of horror passed over Vipsania's face, as she said, "Honestly, I didn't know anything . . ."

"I believe you totally," Gaius said, and he held her for a moment, then added with a wry smile, "I know I once promised I wouldn't ignore you again, but we're going to have to concentrate on surviving right now. I know there isn't much to burn up here, but see what you can find. That's one thing you can do."

"I'll do what I can," she said doubtfully, as she looked around the rather barren stony terrain.

Gaius walked over to the edge and looked down. The Celts were massing for what seemed to be a frontal attack. That was, perhaps, not surprising. There was always the chance the Romans could escape during the night, so now was the time for an attack. There was one obvious path up the hill, where they could walk while carrying weapons while the slope was steep enough everywhere else that they would need hands for climbing.

The attack began. The Celts began to advance up the track. One of the soldiers looked towards Gaius, but he shook his head. They should wait.

"What's this!" Quintus.

Gaius turned to see Quintus standing before the creature. "I thought your position was by that rock," Gaius growled.

"This thing's got a light turning on and off!"

Gaius stared at the creature and saw that Quintus was correct. There was a strange metal object about the creature's wrist, and on it a blue light was turning on and off. The creature at first had seemed to be at pains to hide this, but now simply stood there, and if Gaius was reading its mannerisms correctly, it was almost frightened.

"Quintus, you're correct to point that out," Gaius nodded. "However, I don't think it can do us any immediate harm, and the Celts can. Back to your post, please."

"It could be getting help!"

"That little light's going to be seen a long way off," one of the men scoffed.

"We don't know what our creature's up to and Quintus might be right," Gaius said in as conciliatory tone as he could, "but we do know what's coming up that hill."

"We should kill it while we can," Quintus growled.

"We protect it," Gaius ordered, and noticed that, as soon as he had said it, the creature visibly relaxed. He suddenly understood that the creature understood Latin quite well, and it had been playing dumb. Still, that was a problem for later. No need to let on that he knew. He turned to the creature and made hand gestures to the effect that it should stay put, and they would defend it. It nodded that it understood. Yes, it did, Gaius thought to himself, but only because it understood the conversation. His hand gestures could have been interpreted in many ways. Gaius walked back to the brow of the hill.

The Celts were three quarters of the way up the track, now in single file as the track had narrowed, and they began to break into a charge. Gaius gave the signal, and the party began to drop boulders onto the Celts. As weapons, these were quite effective. They hurt, but more importantly they dislodged.

There were fearful screams as bodies tumbled over the edge, and gathered pace. There was nothing to hold onto, and over a hundred meters to drop. Celts stopped, to stare up, to see more boulders. Some raised a shield, and occasionally a boulder could be deflected, but often the shear force of the boulder caused the shield bearer to lose balance. The small round Celtic shields were also rather useless, Gaius noted, because the user really had to watch the boulder all the way to the shield. The locked Roman shields, at the correct angle, would nullify this attack.

It was then the Celts began to retreat. Gaius ordered the soldiers to cease, and he watched the Celts retreat further. Then, about three quarters of the way to the bottom, they stopped, and began to cluster. Gaius looked across to Quintus, and saw him struggling to lever a huge rock.

"You two!" Gaius ordered two soldiers. "Help over there."

They took up positions behind the rock and began heaving. Gaius looked over the edge, and saw the huddle still there, right below Quintus. Then, with a final heave and a curse, the rock moved. It was over half way down before anyone below heard anything. One man looked up, and stared in disbelief for a fraction of a second. Then he let out a yell, but it was too late.

There were more fearful screams of pain as the rock crashed into them, then continued its path to the stream below. The Celts now began to flee to the safety of the flat ground below.

"Good work," Gaius nodded to Quintus.

"Now what?" Quintus asked. His tone was aggressive, Gaius noted. His anger was not to be diverted by praise.

"Now what indeed," Gaius said. "It will be dark soon, and we have two choices. We can stay here, or we can try to break out. Anyone wish to comment?"

"With respect, sir," a Centurion began.

"Go on!"

"A break-out in the dark will be very slow once we get to the bottom, because we won't be able to see where we're going. On the other hand, there'll be a moon tonight, and that'll be enough for any Celtic guard to see us clambering down the side of the hill. Then, even if we make it, they'll track us tomorrow, and we'll be exhausted and in the open."

"If they catch us!" Quintus countered. "If we stay here, they'll be up the side tomorrow. There's too many of them, and we'll all be killed."

Some of the soldiers gave a scowl at this last remark, but Gaius put up his hand. "Those two view points are the nub of the problem," he said. "There is no guarantee, either way," he added, "but we have to do something. In my opinion, there are two constraints. We can only defend this hill for so long, and how long depends on how skilful they are. Put yourselves in their shoes. If there were that many of you down there, and this few of them up here, how long would it take you?"

"It's hopeless staying here," Quintus grumbled.

"It is true that if they can work out a way of defending themselves against the rocks," the Centurion nodded, "they must reach the top."

"I tend to favour the break-out," Gaius nodded, "and the only point not in its favour is how long it will take men from the
Augusta
to find us. If we can defend long enough, we win. If the break-out doesn't work, we . . ."

"It won't work!" one of the soldiers called out. "The Celts are on the move. They're going to climb the hill in several places, on various sides of the hill, in open file."

"Interesting," Gaius nodded.

"The rocks will be useless!" Quintus moaned. The Centurion stared at him, and was almost going to strike him, but Gaius held him back.

"Widely spread out open file makes it difficult for us to hit them with rocks," he said slowly, "but it gives us a chance. Everybody, back to your positions. Once the Celts are halfway up the steep hillsides, try to keep them pinned down. Let those on the track get to where they did before, then kill as many as you can. Try to work out how many are left on the track."

"Score keeping?" Quintus said, with a sour, disapproving expression.

"No," Gaius remarked coldly. "We now have a third option. If we can pin enough on the hill-sides, and kill enough on the track, we can break out by charging down the track, fighting our way out, and then we steal their horses."

The soldiers nodded in approval. They knew that taking the initiative away from the enemy usually gave you the best chance, and they also knew their commander had been remarkably successful in the past. Spirits rose with a plan.

"It is important that those climbing on the hill get a little over half-way up and then are pinned down so that once the breakout starts, they become irrelevant," Gaius told each soldier quietly, "but equally we have to kill as many as we can on the track before we move. For the breakout to work, we have to get through the remaining Celts without any appreciable pause."

The soldiers nodded, and went back to their positions. Whether the plan worked or not would not be because of lack of effort on their part.

Gaius stared down the slope. A party was marching up the track, in groups of about five. Each group carried an improvised rock shield above their heads, made of long lengths of wood to which were tied horizontally a number of pickets about a hand's width apart. These were held on a steep angle; any rocks of any size would bounce of the shelter and roll harmlessly down the hill.

"I need help!" Quintus again. Gaius almost exploded with frustration, but when he looked, he suddenly realized what Quintus was trying to do and ordered two other soldiers to help. Quintus was struggling with yet another massive boulder. It was so massive that if it could be timed so that it struck the Celts on the S bend near the top of the track, their makeshift shield would offer no protection. Also, with a little luck, it would roll down the track for a short distance. That chaos would be the correct time to launch the breakout.

Vipsania wandered over to Gaius, and whispered, "I think your creature's sending messages."

"To whom?" Gaius shook his head in disbelief.

"Either that or he likes talking to his sleeve."

"I doubt it matters," Gaius shrugged. "We have more pressing problems than . . ."

"He seems very pleased with himself," Vipsania added.

"I've got a bad feeling about this," Lucilla added. "Look where it's looking!"

"Up at the moon?" Gaius laughed. "Whatever's there's hardly going to matter."

"The Celts are a third of the way up the track," the Centurion reported, "and the others are about a quarter of the way up the hill."

"There's nothing we can do until they get closer," Gaius said, "but make sure everyone's ready for a rapid charge. Timothy! You will be at the rear of the charge. Your job is to make sure the horses don't panic. Lucilla and Vipsania will help there." He turned towards the Centurion and added, "Make sure everyone's ready, and I want two soldiers to cover the rear."

"Yes sir!"

"Look!" Lucilla stood there, gasping, as she stared up to the sky. In the distance was a silvery object, moving slowly towards them.

"A comet!" one of the soldiers exclaimed. "That's bad luck!"

"Bad luck for the Celts!" the Centurion growled. Some laughed, but most of the soldiers now had their eyes fixed on this object, which was clearly not a comet, and was moving extremely rapidly. It was coming towards them, and the closer it came, the more obvious it was that it was made. There were a number of lights along its side.

Immediately Gaius thought about the weapon he had. He walked towards the horse carrying the sack of his most precious possessions, and slipped the weapon and the two magazines amongst his writings, then placed his metal fittings above those, then he tied the bag tightly. The creature had been staring at the incoming vessel and had not seen him do this.

Over the bank, the Celts stared at this apparition in the air, and immediately many of them began fleeing down the side of the hill as fast as they could. If they retreated to the horses, Gaius noted, that would wreck his planned breakout.

The silvery craft came closer, and the horses suddenly panicked. It was all that Gaius could do to grab his precious sacks as the horse bolted over the bank.

"It's coming here!" Lucilla muttered.

"You were correct," Gaius nodded to Vipsania. "It is going to rescue our creature."

"What do we do?" Vipsania frowned. "Do we let it go?"

"Yes, we do," Gaius shrugged. Slowly and carefully mouthing his words, he said, "It would be wrong to try to keep him. Much as I hate to admit it, he's won."

"We could try to bargain," Vipsania frowned. "I mean if that thing would fly over the Celts, they might flee, and that would let us get away."

"Feel free to try," Gaius shrugged. "Unfortunately, he doesn't seem to speak Latin," he added, knowing this to be at least partly untrue.

The creature, recognizing he was being discussed, and recognizing that he was to be let go, suddenly became more assured. It approached Gaius, and held out its hand, indicating it wanted something.

Gaius looked puzzled, then started to examine the creature's hands. If it wanted something, it should admit it knew Latin, and use it.

Instead the creature made hand gestures as if it were shooting something with the weapon Gaius had taken.

Gaius thought momentarily about playing dumb, but then decided that would be pointless so he nodded as if in defeat, and he reached in under his cloak. Then he paused, frowned, and pulled back the cloak and began feeling. He then began looking everywhere, but, as he knew would be the case, it was not there. He turned and looked sheepishly at the creature and made a gesture that it must have fallen and got lost. The creature seemed furious, but it eventually accepted that it had been lost. Vipsania gave Gaius that look which seemed to be saying, "Just what are you up to?"

The large silvery object, a sort of elongated disc, came to rest in an open space on the top of the hill. The soldiers had backed away. A door opened on the side, a small ladder came down, and the creature tried to go towards the craft. One of the soldiers stepped forward to stop it, but Gaius shook his head. "Let it go," he said.