THE INVASION OF GAUL (5 page)

Velius, renowned for his crude and occasionally brutal humour and his heartless training techniques, and the only officer to have brought his vine staff into the baths, looked up at his commander.

“
Sir. What else? You’re not the sort of man to call a meeting in the middle of important work to give us orders you could have given in front of the men and in the morning. What’s the murderous bastard got planned for us?”

“
Velius,” Fronto replied through gritted teeth, “your mouth is going to be the death of you. Regardless of your opinions, that is no way to speak of the General, and I’ll caution you against doing it again.”

He sighed and looked around.

“
You are, on the other hand, entirely correct.”

“
This is on a strictly need-to-know basis, and I believe Caesar would not consider it necessary for you to know. You will not, under any circumstance, pass this information on to another living soul.”

The tension in the room was tangible.

“
I can’t say too much at this time, but prepare yourselves for a long and drawn-out campaign. I believe it is very unlikely indeed that we will return to Cremona in the near future, or even at all. Sell anything you can’t take tonight, and make sure the men aren’t carrying useless extras with them.”

“
We’ll be going on beyond the Helvetii then? Perhaps having a go at the Gauls?” Priscus was nearing the edge of his seat, anticipation clearly audible in his voice.

“
I’ll give you nothing further, but mark what I said. I don’t care if the other legions aren’t prepared and have to leave their accumulated goodies to rot in a camp they won’t be returning to, but the Tenth will be prepared for anything the General cares to throw us into.”

He turned his gaze to Velius.

“
You, however, have a different job. Your optio will be commanding your century on the march. I’m afraid your training talents have been brought to the General’s attention. He’s raising two new legions here within the week. You will be assigned both of them for training. They will each be given only a partial officer staff for the time being, so you’ll be effectively in charge. As soon as you’ve got them assembled, they’re to march on Geneva and meet up with the General’s forces there. You’ll have to train them on the move and in action, I’m afraid. They’ll only receive a senior command unit when they reach Geneva.”

Velius opened his mouth to object, his face already taking on a slightly purple colour. Fronto waved his hand at the centurion; a gesture for silence.

“
Now, gentlemen, I’m going to oil down and get clean, then have a refreshing cold bath. Would one of you like to be a bootlicker and get a strigil to help me?”

Chapter 2

(Around the city of Geneva and the fort of the 8
^th
Legion)

“
Honesta Missio: A soldier’s honourable discharge from the legions, with grants of land and money, after a term of service of varied length but rarely less than 5 years.”

“
Optio: A legionary centurion’s second in command.”

“
Decurion: 1) The civil council of a Roman town. 2) Lesser cavalry officer, serving under a cavalry Prefect, with command of 32 men.”

It had been a long and gruelling march to this outpost on the edge of the Empire. Fronto wandered around the ditch and among the defences outside the ramparts and stockade of the regular summer training camp of the Eighth. They were taking great care to make the camp secure, as the general belief among the common soldiery was that the legion might be staying here for some time. The Eighth, though based in Massilia, were the only legion assigned to Transalpine Gaul and, as such, they were required to make their presence felt along the entirety of the Rhone’s east bank, from the Mediterranean to the lake at Geneva. Their summer training quarters were occupied as regularly as their base in Massilia, and had all the facilities of a permanent installation.

He glanced over at the frightening form of Balventius, the scarred and partially blinded primus pilus of the Eighth, standing on a wagon and directing a unit of men deepening the defensive ditch. Behind him, the civilian settlement lay sprawled from the river up the slope of the valley, with the summer fort of the Eighth built up against the walls of the town. Glancing east, Fronto could see small detachments of the legion building a new temporary camp less than a mile distant and he knew, even though he couldn’t see them, that more soldiers were following suit on the other side of the town. Caesar had decided, quite rightly, that it would save a lot of training time for the two new legions if they arrived to find their camps already prepared. All in all, when the Eleventh and Twelfth turned up, the best part of fifteen thousand heavy infantry would lay in a line a mile and a half to either side of the town of Geneva.

It had been hard to ignore the droves of locals flooding the roads leading south out of Further Gaul, their worldly possessions crammed in carts or strapped to their backs. The legion had been in Geneva for only a few hours, after meeting up with the General’s party near Ocelum, but the atmosphere was already tight and nervous. Legions were at their best in open territory, with full scope for manoeuvre. Sieges rendered the heavy shock tactics of the Roman army impossible, and made the officers and the men equally uneasy.

Fronto glanced across the bridge and at the mountains beyond. Somewhere beyond sight, the entire Helvetii tribe was moving and, if Caesar and the fleeing locals were correct in their surmise, the tribe would be coming this way; to this very bridge. The sound of hoof beats behind startled him from his chain of thought.

Caesar reined his white charger in beside his officer and looked down.

“
Fronto, I’m going to need you at the Headquarters building within the next half an hour. Leave someone else in charge here.”

“
Sir.” Fronto nodded, tearing his eyes from the ongoing work.

As the General rode back toward the Headquarters building he had commandeered from the legate of the Eighth, Fronto wandered up to the cart.

“
Balventius, you’re in charge here unless your commander appears.”

Fronto turned his eyes to the bridge once more as he walked toward the fort’s west gate. He couldn’t shake off the feeling that the Helvetii were already there, watching him. He amused himself for a few minutes watching the engineers working on digging lilia by the gate. Unaware that there was an officer nearby, their language was crude and violent, and shovelfuls of mud and clods of earth flew in seemingly random arcs from the depths of the ditch. The Eighth had been raised almost sixty years ago for the protection of Cisalpine Gaul and the Northern provinces after the victories of Rome over the Allobroges and the founding of Geneva as a Roman city. With the civil wars earlier in the century and the frantic raising and disbanding of legions throughout this turbulent time, few legions could claim a heritage that long. The Seventh, Ninth and Tenth were of much the same age, and Fronto had seen a marked similarity between the men of the Ninth and Tenth between commands. There was such a similarity again between his own Tenth and this Eighth Legion. He had heard tales of the commander of the Eighth, an old career soldier who had managed to achieve a remarkably long period in command of one unit. The men around Fronto now could just has easily have been his men. He smiled. Despite having commanded the Tenth for little over a year, Fronto already felt very close to his men and, he thought with more than a little pride, his men seemed to feel a similar bond with their commander. A clod of earth landed on the toe of his boot.

Five minutes later, the commander of the Tenth arrived at the headquarters building at the centre of the Eighth Legion’s summer base. Standards, flags and pennants stood and hung outside. A staff officer Fronto didn’t know came to the door and waved them inside. Fronto removed his helmet, placing it in the crook of his arm and falling into step behind the unknown staff officer.

Caesar sat in his own campaign chair behind a desk littered with paperwork. Standing around him were various secretaries and officials of the city and, seated to one side were Longinus and Tetricus, along with Balbus, the legate of the Eighth. Although he and Fronto had never met, the Eighth were an experienced and decorated legion, and Balbus’ reputation preceded him. Fronto gave him a respectful nod, which was returned as Balbus stood to acknowledge their arrival. The other legion commander was a lot older than Fronto, with a receding hairline and a round face. He looked rather jolly to Fronto, as though he should really be sitting at the theatre in a toga, rather than here in a cuirass. Tetricus was middle-aged with a shock of dark hair above a pale and serious face. Longinus had the same disapproving expression he habitually wore.

Caesar was deeply involved with one of the secretaries and Fronto waited fully five minutes before the general closed his wax tablet and the attendants hurried from the room.

“
Ah Fronto, sorry about that. Would you take a seat, please?”

The officer made his way to one of the chairs around the large central table, while Caesar continued to put the papers away in order.

“
I’m very busy this morning, so this will have to be brief. I have sent a request out this morning to the decurions of Geneva and the surrounding settlements, asking them to furnish me with every available able-bodied man. I intend to raise a number of auxiliary units here, some of which will become attached to the Eleventh and Twelfth, who should be arriving in two days, according to my latest information. A legion will not be necessary to look after this area once the Helvetii leave. Therefore I intend to leave several auxiliary units here under the command of the decurions of Geneva once we move.”

Balbus nodded at the General thoughtfully.

“
Things are heating up here,” Caesar continued, “and they will only get worse. The Seventh, Eighth, Ninth and Tenth, along with the two new legions, have to be available to cover other areas of our northern border and to campaign wherever necessary, and so I must raise troops here as long as the manpower is available. I will, of course, need men from the Eighth to begin the training of the new units as soon as they are assembled. I would think we will have enough for two or three within the next week.”

Longinus sat silently, and Tetricus looked distinctly uncomfortable in the combined presence of so many superior officers. Fronto opened his mouth to speak, but Balbus pitched in before him.

“
Caesar, I appreciate that there has been no problem with the raising of your two legions at Aquileia, and that there may be no problem with raising auxiliary units here, but there are a couple of factors I would like to draw to your attention.”

Caesar nodded at him.

“
Go ahead Balbus.”

“
Firstly, it will cost us to raise any troops here. Geneva is not a wealthy city, so any funding of units and extra equipment they need will have to come from us. Also, we are expecting the Helvetii any time now. We will not have time to give the auxiliaries anything more than the most basic of training, and they will remain in that state when we leave, which is dangerous for the security of the frontier.”

Caesar frowned.

“
The funding will not be a problem. My retinue brought a chest of denarii with them, raised in Rome for the very purpose of support of my Governorship. This is to be used sparingly, as it has to last, but should certainly be enough to cover these units.”

Balbus nodded approvingly and the General continued.

“
I had not fully appreciated the problem of training time, this is true. However, I will find a way to delay them. Would two weeks extra be enough to get them through the basic drills do you think gentlemen?”

Fronto nodded. “Given the training manpower, three to four weeks in total should be enough to at least make them useful, if not competent. We would obviously have to devote their training specifically to the type of work and warfare we are expecting here. I think that gives us a little edge. I’ll confirm everything with Velius when he arrives.”

“
Good.” Caesar smiled at the Tenth’s legate.

As the General continued talking, he leaned down to the table and began to write furiously. “Fronto, I am hereby placing Velius in charge of the training of all new units we can furnish in Further Gaul while the he’s still in the Province. When he arrives, have him quarter the legions and then report to me.”

Caesar cast his eyes over the paperwork and then looked up once more, this time focusing on Tetricus.

“
Tribune, I want you to take charge of the engineering works here. Regardless of our defensive position behind the river, there are ways the Helvetii could outflank or otherwise outmanoeuvre us. The land between the lake and Mount Jura is unsecured, so I want a wall and ditch constructed between the two, close to the River’s south bank.”

Tetricus’ eyes widened. “Sir, that’s nearly twenty miles!”

“
Yes, but the army has embarked on more ambitious projects than that before and succeeded. I want you to take the best engineers from the Eighth, along with as many labourers as you need, and start surveying for the best sites. There’s plenty of time, but I want the initial construction to be underway by the end of tomorrow. I will leave it to the discretion of you two as to how many men you can reasonably take for the job. I just want it done as quickly as possible.”

Caesar’s eyes moved on to Fronto.