“Comrades, do not worry about your reputation for valor, it will remain as untarnished as always. The failure here is mine, not yours.”
If he thought that this would quell our importuning, he was mistaken. If anything, our protests became more vehement, all of us trying to make our voices heard. The din caused by our display reached back to the ranks, and I could see the men in formation becoming restive as they began talking openly to one another, speculating about the cause of this disturbance.
“Silete!”
I recognized the voice of Primus Pilus Favonius, and we did quiet down, although it took a few moments before it was quiet enough for him to be heard. Once we were still again, the Primus Pilus turned to Caesar, saying loudly enough for all to hear.
“Caesar, don't you realize that any damage to your dignitas is just as damaging to the men of your army who have followed you all these years?”
We roared our agreement with the statement of the Primus Pilus; once more, Caesar put his hand up for silence, and it did not take nearly as long for us to shut our mouths when Caesar demanded it.
“Primus Pilus, your words move me, they truly do. But as important as my dignitas may be to me, and I will not deny that it is, the lives of my soldiers, who are like sons to me, is of exceedingly more importance.”
There was really no response to this, and we were smart enough not to try to argue with him. As kind as Caesar could be, he had a nasty temper when provoked, no matter who it was trying his patience. Seeing that there would be no more argument, Caesar dismissed us to pass the word back to the rest of our comrades.
It was with some grumbling, but we turned back around quickly enough to march back to Avaricum, the sounds of the jeering from the enemy on the hill ringing in our ears not making the march back any more pleasant. What we were not aware of was that this bloodless victory actually caused Vercingetorix almost more problems than if we actually carried out the assault. Upon Vercingetorix’s return to his camp, he was confronted by members of his army who accused him of treason. Their reasoning was that his absence from the camp was because he planned on betraying his army to Caesar; why else would he be gone when Caesar and his army showed up? But Vercingetorix was a canny bastard, I have to give him that. While out foraging he captured some of our camp followers and put them on starvation rations, and now he dragged them out to perform for his accusers. They were prompted to say they were Legionaries who had deserted because they were starving, and that Caesar had informed the army that if the siege was not resolved within three days it would be lifted. Vercingetorix finished by pointing out that it was his tactics of attrition that was on the verge of achieving this result, just like it was his leadership that united the tribes. This show of unity had brought the Romans to the point that, should Caesar be forced to lift the siege, it would not be the end of his problems, since all the tribes in the region pledged to Vercingetorix that they would offer no aid to Caesar or his army. True to their fickle nature, those Gauls who were just clamoring for the head of Vercingetorix were so won over by his words that they now reaffirmed his status as commander in chief, proclaiming him to be the greatest general in their history. Another development from that meeting was the decision to try getting another 10,000 men into the town of Avaricum, although nothing ultimately came of that.
At the site of the siege, work was progressing, albeit with great difficulty. Because of the cut in our rations, we were ordered to abandon work on one of the ramps, instead concentrating all of our efforts on the remaining one. The Bituriges did everything in their power to stop us, so that as much of the work that we did in those final days was to repair the damage done in their counter-siege efforts as it was in advancing the siege itself. Compounding our misery, the weather turned nasty, forcing us to spend most of our time wet and cold which, when added to our hunger, made for the worst conditions we had faced to date during our time in Gaul. We looked and acted like we were already dead; stumbling around, our eyes hollow with hunger and fatigue, and as lean as we may have been starting the siege, we were now beginning to look like walking skeletons. The Bituriges showed a lot of ingenuity and energy in their attempts to destroy the ramp. Using their experience in mining, they tried to undermine it, forcing us to dig our own counter-mines to intercept them. The fights inside those close, dark spaces under the earth were by all accounts vicious, nasty affairs, taking place in almost total darkness. This was another time I was thankful for my size, although it was the first time I was glad because it kept me out of a fight. I have no love for enclosed spaces, finding it hard to breathe and to keep a calm head. Vibius was not so lucky, his diminutive size making him a perfect candidate to go down into the dark holes in the ground to kill other men. Every time he went down into the ground I was almost beside myself with worry until I saw him emerge, grimy and often spattered with blood, none of it his thank the gods. The efforts of the enemy were not confined to subterranean methods; it became commonplace for the gates to be thrown open, whereupon a band of men armed with torches and small flaming pots of pitch would come pouring out, heading for the ramp and tower to hurl the pots at anything they thought flammable. Their success was limited; nothing was damaged to the point where we had to start over, but they were certainly successful in delaying us. As the ramp raised in height, so would our towers where the artillery was stationed. To further combat our efforts, the enemy erected a series of turrets, similar in construction to our towers, covering them with green hides that made burning them almost impossible, and was where their missile troops were stationed. Whenever we raised our towers, they would correspondingly raise the level of their turrets, building another level on top of the original one. By this point in the siege, all of the usual interaction between the two sides; the Bituriges jeering down at us from their spot on the walls, our rejoinders to them which I believe most of us on both sides enjoyed and looked at as a diversion, had long since ceased. Between our weakness from hunger, the weather, and the actions of the Bituriges, all sources of levity were gone. Conversations were almost non-existent, being seen as useless expenditures of energy, so that all over the camp and the siegeworks a pall of grim silence hung in the air like the mist that greeted us every morning.
It was on the twenty-fifth day of the siege, or night more accurately, when the Bituriges made their final and most determined bid to destroy the ramp. We had reached the most difficult part; the bridging of the last section which, as I have mentioned before, is filled in with basically whatever we can get our hands on just before the assault. The mantlets that we used for this last part had to be of the strongest construction, because they would literally be directly beneath the walls, where the largest stones could simply be rolled off the parapet to fall onto their roofs. They also had to be fireproof, and usually the roofs were covered with either clay shingles or green hides. It was at the beginning of the third watch when the alarm was sounded and I rolled out of my cot, our Century just relieved perhaps a third of a watch before, grabbing my gear and running out to see what the problem was. Our camp was perhaps two furlongs from the beginning of the ramp, so in the gloom it was impossible to see what was happening, yet men were running past heading in that direction, calling out to each other as we all tried to determine what was going on. Finding the Pilus Prior, he grabbed Scaevola and was bellowing for the Century to rally on the standard, a call that I picked up so within a couple of moments, we were gathered and could begin trotting towards the wall.