He rode past the contingent of II Augusta, Julius Tertullianus waving to him as he passed. The princeps posterior commanded his own cohort, the double-strength First, its numbers topped up to almost its regulation strength of eight hundred by volunteers from the rest of the legion. They carried the eagle, but since today it was their turn to take second place to the vexillation from Legio XX Valeria Victrix, the gilded bird was concealed behind a protective leather cover.
The Victrix supplied almost as many men in two cohorts, and both contingents had spent the last year in the north, drilling and training. The governor had gathered a major force to hold manoeuvres over the summer, ready for a campaign if necessary and for grand exercises if it was not. Now they had their campaign, and Ferox had to wonder whether the legate had had this possibility in mind all those months ago. Tertullianus and some of his men had fought against the pirates during the attack on the island in the far north so had a recent victory to feed their confidence. Some of the auxiliaries were even more experienced, having fought in several campaigns. Cerialis’ Batavians and Rufinus’ Vardulli each mustered six hundred infantrymen as well as turmae of cavalry. There were two hundred and fifty more from cohors IV Gallorum, and three hundred and fifty archers, lean Syrians from cohors I Hamiorum. Supporting these were just over a thousand cavalry, drawn mainly from ala Petriana and ala I Hispanorum Asturum and the cavalry of the cohorts. It was not simply that Neratius Marcellus had more men, they all marched with an assurance and ease that had been utterly lacking in most of Crassus’ force.
On the next day the outlying cavalry patrols saw bands of horsemen watching them. There were more of them the day after, and once or twice javelins were thrown on each side, with no more result than a horse taking a graze. Neratius Marcellus had his army march in agmen quadratus, the main force moving in a long rectangle, the baggage in the centre on the road and the fighting units ready to turn outwards and face an attack from any direction. Bands of tribesmen were visible from time to time, especially on the hills to the west, watching and waiting. The legate ordered his own cavalry never to push too far away from the main force, and not to be too aggressive unless they were pressed. The warriors did not press close, so that the two sides watched each other as the Romans trudged south.
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.