A hand fell on his shoulder, causing him to jump slightly and he looked round to see Atenos smiling.
“The cavalry’s behind them now. It’s over, sir.”
Fronto tried to see across the crowd but, being more than a head shorter than the centurion, he could see little but a sea of milling legionaries.
“They’re cutting the ropes” Atenos said with satisfaction. “You can see the empty rafts drifting out into the water. Arms are getting raised too. Looks like they’re surrendering.”
As Fronto listened, he could hear the distinctive sound of hundreds, even thousands, of weapons being cast to the ground in defeat.
It seemed that it really was over. The invaders had been smashed and beaten, their army destroyed, their camp ravaged. Survivors who made it to safety would be few and far between and there would be a lot of slaves taken. It was not even midsummer and the legions had already achieved their season’s objectives.
Fronto smiled to himself, despite everything. The image of Lucilia and the memory of the warm waters of the bay below Puteoli sprang unbidden to his mind. Maybe, just maybe, he would be able to give her the marriage she sought this year after all.
Fronto took a deep breath and, rolling his aching shoulders and wincing at the pains he’d suffered in the fall, glanced left and right at the crimson vexillum flags bearing Caesar’s Taurus emblem in gold, and nodded at the two guards, who opened the flap.
“Legate Marcus Falerius Fronto” announced the cavalry bodyguard, ushering Fronto into the tent.
“Ah, Marcus. I’d been hoping you would deign this meeting worthy of your presence at some point.” Caesar’s expression suggested that there was little intended humour within the sarcasm.
“Apologies Caesar” he replied with as little apology in the tone as he could manage. “I have come straight from the medicus.”
“Your tribune?”
“Tetricus, yes. He’ll live. He may suffer restricted movement in his arm and leg, but that’s what we expect from Roman weapons: killing and wounding efficiency.” His sharp, almost accusatory words echoed throughout the quiet tent and he took a moment to cast his eye round the assembled officers, allowing it to linger on Cicero and his pet centurions. Neither Furius nor Fabius seemed fazed by the words.
“The matter should be investigated, Fronto” Caesar confirmed quietly, “but you must be prepared to accept that it may have been an accident. In the press of war, accidents are inevitable, as you’re well aware.”
Fronto harrumphed and fell into position in a sullen silence, glaring for long moments at the centurions before turning to Caesar.
“The figures appear to be more than acceptable so far” Caesar announced, running a finger down the tallies on the tablets before him. “Currently they stand at forty seven men of the legions, including two centurions, an optio and a tribune, with a little over a hundred being tended by the medical section and nine unaccounted for. The cavalry lost twenty eight men and fifty one horses, due to the barbarians’ unorthodox and effective anti-horse tactics. So, even assuming the worst, we lost less than a hundred men in total. I think we can all consider that a more than successful engagement.”
“And the enemy?” enquired Brutus.
“A little vague. Estimates range from thirty thousand to eighty thousand. Until the men have finished stripping the camp of anything valuable or useful and gathered the dead for disposal we won’t have better figures. We’ll never be able to be accurate, given that the number of tribesmen who were washed away in the currents of the Mosella and the Rhenus or sank without trace due to the weight of their armour will remain unknown. Suffice it to say there were a great deal more of them than us.”
“I see the men are already dipping into the funeral club coffers and building the pyres for the Roman dead” Fronto noted. “Late this afternoon, I suggest you check the wind direction and make sure you stay upwind. It’s likely to get a bit smoky. Didn’t see pyres or pits for the enemy, though?” he added suspiciously.
“They will be left in piles for the scavengers in the wild” Caesar said flatly. Expressions of surprise and consternation rose on the faces of a number of officers, but Caesar blithely ignored them. “Prefect Lentulus?”
A cavalry officer Fronto didn’t recognise stepped out of the circle of men.
“Tell us about the flight of the camp’s inhabitants.”
Labienus stepped out and stood next to Lentulus.
“I can tell you about that, Caesar. I rode out to give them the opportunity to surrender, but this ‘officer’ here refused to rein in his men and stop chasing them, so I couldn’t find a way to address them. In my opinion, this man was not ready for such a command and should be sent back to his ala.”
The prefect shot a sour glance at Labienus and took a step forward.
“As you are aware, general, the men under my command had their blood up. They were seeking revenge on the bastards who had ambushed them in the valley, and that was well known when we were assigned to the fight. Once they had the scent of the fleeing barbarians nothing short of chaining them to the floor was going to prevent the slaughter that occurred.”
Fronto frowned. A look had passed briefly between the prefect and the general; a look of recognition; understanding; possibly even approval.
“It was unnecessary and entirely avoidable!” snapped Labienus. Lentulus turned away from Caesar and fixed his glare on the seething senior commander. “Once Commander Varus’ cavalry had cut off their escape route, it was inevitable that my men would take the opportunity to exact revenge for their own defeat and losses. No man — not even you, commander — would have been able to stop them.”
He turned back to Caesar. “And, I will state for the record that, had I been able to prevent it, I would not have done, regardless. The scum got what was coming to them. And with it we’ve ended the presence of the invaders here and achieved what we set out to do.”
Labienus continued to glare coldly at the man, but Caesar clapped his hands and drew everyone’s attention.
“And that is the pertinent point. We have crushed the invasion. Now all that remains is to make sure that it never happens again. I will be organising further strategy meetings in good time but, for now, we should lick our wounds, such as they are, and tot up our successes.” He turned to Varus, who stood tall and steady, despite the sling that held his broken arm tight and the padding beneath his tunic where the hip wound was bound. “I would like you to arrange mounted patrols and scouts to range up to twenty miles each way along the banks of the Rhenus and twenty miles back along the Mosella; long-range scouts out to the south, as well. I want continual and up to date information on the location and movements of the enemy cavalry that we know are still out there. We cannot afford to be taken off guard.”
Varus, standing painfully, his arm tightly slung and leaning on a stick with his good hand, started to rattle off figures and facts and Fronto’s mind began to drift along to the drone of planning. As the conversation hummed slowly around him, his eyes fell on Lentulus, now stepping back into the line, a virtual crackle of angry electricity between him and Labienus. The more he ran his mind back over the statements and the shared looks between prefect and general, the more convinced he became that the man had been following Caesar’s direct orders to wipe out as many of the barbarians as they possibly could and prevent the possibility of surrender. It would, after all, hardly be unlike the general to do such a thing.
Once more, his gaze passed to Cicero and the two centurions. Could Furius or Fabius have been responsible? They both bore their pugio at their belt, but a replacement would hardly be difficult to obtain had they lost one on the battlefield. A centurion didn’t carry a pilum into battle but, again, it would hardly be difficult to lay hands on one, even at a moment’s notice, in the press of men.