“Set for passage-of-lines!”
King Donan’s plan was working! Though the Romans had gotten much further into Mai Dun than he’d anticipated, the end would still be the same. Despite the fierce bombardment from their unholy weapons that had killed scores, if not hundreds of his warriors, the legions were simply being worn down by the inevitable grind of trying to take the heights. The king grinned as he saw an enemy centurion fall, having taken a sword blow to the leg.
“Now we can show Caratacus how to defeat these invaders!” he scoffed, as he beat his sword against a legionary’s shield. He then turned about to see how far they were into the town when his eyes suddenly grew wide. “No! It cannot be!”
Before he could say anymore, a legionary gladius plunged into his back, driving into his lung as he fell to his knees. Whatever happened to the rest of his people, King Donan’s reign over the Durotriges confederation ended on the blade of a Roman soldier.
As Metellus and his soldiers advanced into the town, they saw that they were at an angle behind the Durotriges, who were heavily engaged with the First Cohort. As he looked to his right, he saw not just the remainder of his cohort, but numerous soldiers from the Second Legion who were running forward to join the fray. What Metellus did not know was that Master Centurion Lyto, upon reaching the top, had dispatched one of his cohorts to the far side in order to clear the southern rampart and allow the rest of the legion to assault the town. The young centurion was filled with relief, as well as a brief sense of déjà vu when he recalled the first time he and Artorius had fought together at Braduhenna, fifteen years before.
A cornicen’s horn sounded, announcing the charge both to the Twentieth Legion’s First Cohort, as well as their enemy. As the Durotriges turned and faced them, their eyes grew wide in fear and despair.
“Cohort…halt!” Artorius shouted as the ranks of the Second Legion swarmed in from both flanks and fell upon the hapless defenders. He knew their adversaries were finished, and he did not wish to risk the lives of any more of his exhausted legionaries.
“I told you my men would take the heights,” Vespasian said with a friendly smack to the shoulder. His cheerful demeanor contrasted sharply with the brutal scene playing out as the air was filled with a symphony of screaming terror and pain as legionaries from the Second unleashed a fury of steel and death. He set down the shield he’d used, wiped off his gladius before returning it to its scabbard, and then made his way over to find Master Centurion Lyto. Though a number of Durotriges had been killed during the initial attack by Vespasian’s soldiers, most of those who remained were quickly trying to surrender. The men of the Twentieth Legion took it all in as they leaned against their shields and caught their breath. Sweat and grime covered all of them, and they reeked of blood and death.
“What do you bet the Second Legion takes all the credit for this?” Optio Parthicus asked as he joined his master centurion.
“It doesn’t matter,” Artorius replied. “Rome won a victory today, and that is enough.”
“Sir!” a legionary said as he ran over to them. “Centurion Magnus is down.”
Chapter XXIV: Is this Glory?
The battle won, Vespasian allowed himself a moment’s reprieve. He looked down from the highest rampart at the corpse of the enemy king that had been unceremoniously dragged forward as he surveyed the carnage wrought by his men upon the fortress. Bodies lay strewn about, many of which had been smashed by catapult and ballistae shot; faces and bodies mangled as a result. One poor bastard was leaned over the rampart, his head split open with brains bursting through the shattered skull. There were still cries from within, as well as on the earthworks below, as legionaries finished off those among the enemy wounded who they deemed were too gravely wounded to try and save. In a morbid sense, this was an act of mercy, for all who had defied Rome from the heights of this great hill fort and survived would live out the remainder of their lives in slavery.
In truth, Vespasian respected the Durotriges for their stalwart tenacity. How could he not? They had fought to the last for what they believed in, and despite the losses inflicted upon his legionaries, the legate of Rome could not fault them for that.
“If the roles were reversed, we would have done the same,” he said quietly to himself. He looked back over the outside of the rampart, down the large hill with its earthworks and battlements where his men had battered their way up.
Onagers, scorpions, and ballistae were scattered about, their crews assisting with the recovery of the Roman wounded. Near the last line of fortifications they carried away a pair of badly injured Syrian archers from the allied detachment. They had received their fearful wounds while protecting their stricken leader, over whose body they openly mourned. The crewmen who assisted them did not realize that the men’s tears came not from the pain of their wounds, but from seeing she, who had led them so valiantly, lying brutally slain. Achillia’s eyes were now closed, her face smeared in blood that had spewed from her mouth. The large spearhead had cleaved through her mail shirt, plunging deep into her stomach where it embedded against her spine. That it severed a major artery was the only mercy, as it expedited what was an agonizing death.
It was past this scene of sorrow that an imperial messenger rode along the path that led into the fort. Vespasian spotted the rider and climbed down from the timber wall in order to meet the man near the smashed gates.
“By Thor’s fucking hammer, this hurts!” Magnus said through gritted teeth as he tried to stifle the pain.
Artorius clutched his hand as a legionary wrapped a loose rag around the Nordic centurion’s bleeding leg.
“I feel your pain, old friend,” Artorius replied, wincing as he recalled a similarly painful injury he had sustained during a raid on a captured estate. Though this had happened more than twenty years prior, his leg still throbbed at the memory.
“Damn it all, I’m bleeding like a stuck boar,” Magnus grunted as the legionary tied the rags tight.
The soldier then took the centurion’s helmet and propped his injured leg on top of it. “It’s pretty serious, sir, but at least it’s not dark crimson; meaning the artery’s not severed.”
“That’s a relief,” Magnus said, swallowing hard as his forehead broke out in a cold sweat. “Now if we can just stop a bloody infection from setting in. I’d rather like to keep my leg.”
“You’re too much of an ornery bastard to let something as undignified as an infected wound kill you,” Artorius said while trying to force a smile. It was difficult, especially given the scene of death and suffering that went on around them.
All of the prisoners were being corralled at the far side of the fort, many of them crying out in rage and sorrow as they watched Roman soldiers murder their more badly wounded friends and loved ones. As the Durotriges had attempted to safeguard as many of their people as possible within the fort, women and children were also found amongst the dead and wounded; many were struck down by errant catapult stones or cut down by rampaging legionaries during the assault.