Eagle in the Snow: A Novel of General Maximus and Rome's Last Stand

Thirty minutes after dawn, two cohorts were drawn up in a hollow square on the parade ground. All the centurions and all the officers were present, and the sentries on the walls faced inwards. The girl was brought out under escort and tied to a stake driven into the ground. The stake faced a low platform, upon which stood the legion’s farrier and a number of military police. The officers wore plumes upon their helmets, and the aquilifer wore a black panther skin and held the Eagle, which was hooded to conceal the shame that we felt. When I came out in my full uniform, which I only wore on special occasions, it was bitterly cold and I could see the lances held upright, quivering as though with fear. It was very cold and very quiet and you could hear the jingle of the bit as Quintus’s horse tossed its head.

Then we heard the sound of nailed sandals, and they brought him into the square, walking quickly as a man does who is late for an appointment; and he wore nothing but a tunic and a kilt. His uniform stood in a pile upon the platform, together with his sword and his helmet. It was customary for the sword to be broken, but we were short of such weapons and, at the quartermaster’s request, had substituted an old sword with a flawed blade which had been marked for disposal. He mounted the platform, and he looked like a ghost. He kept on wetting his lips with his tongue—or trying to, and his eyes seemed to be bulged with fear. We could all see that he was terrified of dying and he kept on making small whimpering noises, though he did not actually try to speak. The camp praefectus read the punishment and sentence in a high voice that cracked with nervousness. The flawed sword was then broken, ceremonially, across the duty centurion’s knees.

The camp praefectus turned to me and I nodded to him to get on with the whole ghastly, stupid, futile ritual. Even Quintus did not guess how I hated it all. The prisoner was asked if he had anything to say. He shook his head, desperately. We could hear his teeth chattering, but this might have been due to the cold as much as to fear. At such a time, it is kinder to give any man the benefit of the doubt. A trumpet sounded, the farrier stepped forward and the boy was pushed down onto his knees. The trumpet sounded again, and sentence of death by decapitation was performed upon Marcus Severus, former tribune of the legion, for desertion, treason and cowardice. The girl, soaked with his blood, was left tied to the post, alone with the body of the man whom she had enticed to his death. After an hour, she was cut down and taken back to her hut. The body was buried on the road outside the town; the platform was dismantled, and life in the camp returned to normal. That night, Quintus went out fishing with some of the tribunes and then got horribly drunk, later, in his hut. I went down to the town and attended a cock-fight. I won a lot of money. My luck was in, and the day ended better than it had begun.

XIV

AS A PUNISHMENT I sent Fabianus back across the river. He hated it there; he was a man who liked comfortable living. A week later he sent me a signal to say that the movement of waggons out of the enemy camp had stopped. Instead, waggons and families were coming in; and it looked as if those who had left were returning. Of food convoys from the Burgundians, however, there was no sign.

I said to Quintus, “That means the man did not die. They know how many we are; they will stay and wait.”

“But they will surely starve if they wait till the spring?”

“Perhaps. These people can smell the weather like an animal. They will wait till midwinter. If the winter is a bad one, the Rhenus will freeze and give them their opportunity. If it does not, they will break camp and head for their own lands.”

He said urgently, “What about the bridge? Will you take the legion over now?”

I shook my head. “Not now. They know our strength. Besides, Marcomir is dead and his men scattered. The risk is too great.”

He took a deep breath. He said, “We should have made the bridge when he was alive; when it was suggested first.”

I held up my hands, palms outwards in a gesture of surrender. “Yes,” I said. “I missed the opportunity.”

“Don’t look like that, Maximus.”

“Quintus, it is true.”

“So. What do we do then?”

I looked at him and, for the first time in weeks, I smiled as I did so. “You and I will go to Treverorum. We could do with a change of scene and I need a rest as much as you. It will be the last chance we shall get this year. Aquila can command.”