But it wouldn’t be the same. Everyone would always know who Julius Caesar and Augustus were. People would always tell stories about them. The stories wouldn’t shrink in the telling, either. Stories never did. If a man two hundred years from now wanted to learn the name of the man who conquered Germany, though . . .
So many books were written and then forgotten, never recopied after the author put in the labor of composing them in the first place. Still, these were important times, and would surely attract an important historian, one whose works would be reproduced often enough to last . . . somewhere.
The library at Alexandria was supposed to keep at least one copy of every work in Greek and Latin. It had been damaged in the fighting in Caesar’s day, but say it did what it was supposed to do. That would give the future scholar a chance to discover the name of Publius Quinctilius Varus - if he could find the scroll he needed among the thousands in the library . . . and if he could afford to go to Alexandria to do his research in the first place.
Immortality, then. But a shadowy immortality, rather like the one Homer gave the spirits of the dead in the Odyssey. Better than nothing, less than enough.
“Something wrong, your Excellency?” Eggius asked. “You look a little peaked, like.”
“No, no, no.” Varus denied it not only to the soldier but also to himself. “Just thinking about what Germany will be like when it’s been Roman for a couple of hundred years, that’s all.” That wasn’t exactly what he’d been thinking, but it came close enough to let him bring the lie out smoothly.
Lucius Eggius made a face. “It’ll still be the back woods, you ask me. The Gauls, now, the Gauls are picking things up pretty quick. But these gods-cursed Germans? They’re stubborn bastards, no two ways about it. I wouldn’t be surprised if they were still mumbling to themselves in their own language, even after all that time.”
Struck by an odd thought, Varus asked, “Have you learned any of it?”
“Me?” Eggius laughed. “Just a tiny bit, sir, so I can talk a little with the German girls I bed. They like that, you know? You can tell ‘em what you want ‘em to do, and they can let you know what feels good to them.”
“I suppose so.” Varus had slept with some German women, too. What else was he going to do, when Claudia Pulchra’d stayed down in Rome? But he’d made sure his bedwarmers understood enough Latin to get by. The other approach hadn’t even occurred to him.
Eggius chuckled again. “Hate to talk business instead of pussy, sir, but when do you aim to cross the Rhine again?”
“How soon can the men be ready?” Varus asked.
“An hour from now, if they have to be.” Professional pride rang in Eggius’ voice. “If you’re not in a hurry, though, a few days to get organized won’t hurt.”
“All right. Do that, then. I don’t think there’s any great rush,” Varus said.
“Right you are, sir.” Lucius Eggius nodded. Then he raised a curious eyebrow. “You sure this Arminius fellow isn’t as much trouble as people say he is?”
“I’m not losing any sleep over him,” Varus answered. “I don’t think anybody else needs to, either.”
The Romans had cut back the woods on the right bank of the Rhine opposite Vetera far enough to make it impossible to bushwhack them when they crossed their bridge into Germany. That didn’t mean Arminius couldn’t watch them cross without being seen himself.
This wasn’t the first Roman army on the march he’d seen, of course. He’d fought alongside the legions in Pannonia, and, before that, he’d fought against them here in Germany. He didn’t think the Romans knew about that. They wouldn’t have granted him citizenship if they did. Back in those days, he’d been nothing to them but another shouting barbarus with a spear and a sword and a shield.
Barbarus. His mouth twisted. It didn’t just mean someone who wasn’t a Roman, the way he’d once thought. It meant somebody who couldn’t talk like a human being, someone who made bar-bar-bar noises instead.
He’d learned Latin. He spoke it pretty well - not perfectly, but pretty well. He’d never yet met a Roman who came close to speaking the Germans’ tongue anywhere near so well.
Romans had an almost perfect contempt for anyone from beyond their borders. He often wondered why, feeling the way they did, they wanted to rule other folk at all. He supposed perfect greed outweighed almost perfect contempt.
No denying they made a brave show, though. Cavalrymen crossed the Rhine first. He envied them their big horses. Germans, big men, rode ponies so small they often jumped off them to fight. Mounts from the Roman side of the Rhine were great prizes. There weren’t many horsemen here: enough to smoke out an ambush and hold it off till the foot soldiers deployed.
Behind the cavalry came one of the legions the Romans were using to try to hold down Germany. As a fighting man, Arminius had nothing but respect for the soldiers tramping forward into his country. They were tough. They were brave. In a fight in the open field, they could beat more than their number of Germans. Arminius didn’t like that, but he’d seen it was true. The Romans worked together so much better than his own folk did. . . .
He muttered something guttural under his breath. If the Germans were ever going to beat the legionaries, they would have to do it on a battlefield where the Romans couldn’t deploy to advantage. The Germans would have to spring a trap, in other words.
Still, the Romans weren’t stupid. They sent scouts ahead of their force and out to either flank. They were more careful than Germans, too. Arminius did some more muttering.
Camp surveyors and engineers followed the first legions. Then came Varus’ baggage and that of the leading Roman officers, with plenty of horsemen to protect it. Arminius chuckled. The Roman governor wasn’t about to let anything happen to what belonged to him.
Varus and his slaves and flunkies came next. The warm breeze fluttered the soldiers’ scarlet capes. The slaves, in plain white tunics, were easy to distinguish from their masters.
The horsemen who weren’t in the vanguard followed the commanders. Even with their fine mounts, the Romans got less from their cavalry than they might have. Their foot soldiers were so good, they hardly seemed to care about their riders.
More wagons rattled and creaked after the cavalry. Seeing them made Arminius scowl. They carried catapults that could hurl immense arrows or stone balls or pots full of burning oil farther than a bowshot. He’d seen what they were worth in Pannonia. The rebels there couldn’t match them. Neither could his own folk. Being struck by weapons to which you couldn’t hope to reply naturally spread fear. And the catapults could easily flatten the stockade that warded even the strongest German village.
Arminius had talked about casting the Romans out of his land. Talking was easy. Seeing a Roman army on the march reminded him that actually doing it would be anything but.
Behind the engines marched the other two legions. The aquilifer who had the honor of carrying each legion’s eagle marched in front of it, surrounded by the lesser standard bearers and the buccinatores with their gleaming brazen horns. The aqulifers’ mailshirts were likewise gilded, and blazed under the bright spring sun.
Camp followers -loose women, sutlers, ragtag and bobtail - made up a disorderly train that straggled along behind the legionaries. There, at least, Arminius felt superior and virtuous. Germans did without such folderol. They also probably would have done without a rear guard. Again, though, the Romans didn’t believe in taking chances.
The legionaries brayed out a bawdy marching song. Arminius smiled before he quite knew he was doing it. He’d sung that one himself, tramping through Pannonia.