The Seven Hills

CHAPTER ELEVEN

Queen Teuta's face twisted, making the tattoos writhe. Her breath wheezed between teeth clenched in a rictus of near-grotesque intensity. Her unbound hair flew wildly, her breasts swung, her hips churned and every part of her body was in abandoned motion. Then she shuddered, stopped as if suddenly stunned and cried out hoarsely as her fingers dug into his shoulders, before she collapsed upon Hamilcar in a sweaty heap.

The shofet, drained by his own, less demonstrative release, stroked her back as his thundering heartbeat slowly returned to normal. He knew that this passionate woman might well be the death of him, but no one else had ever made him feel more kingly. She seemed perfectly unconcerned about possible impregnation, and he gathered that she believed the two of them were above such petty considerations. That, too, gave him satisfaction.

Of course, she had some annoying peculiarities. For instance, she insisted on riding him, holding that as a queen of matchless horsemen, this was her right. He longed to mount her as a lion mounts a lioness, but this she had so far refused to permit. He resolved to enjoy her this way before consenting to a royal marriage. The woman would have to learn to make concessions.

At last she arose from the bed and called for her serving women. As they attended to their mistress with damp cloths and warm towels, he admired her superb body with its covering of tattoos. He had learned that, indeed, not a square inch of her flesh had been spared the needle save her eyelids and lips. A lifetime in Carthage made one a connoisseur of the bizarre, and this was as outré as anything he had ever seen. What made it even more stirring was that the woman was a queen.

Later, dressed and seated on a terrace in the light of a full moon, they spoke of their plans. From the distance they could hear the constant work of hammers and saws. The building of new ships went on day and night now, as Carthage sought to make up the losses from the tremendous fire. The work went swiftly, but harder to replace were the cargoes that had turned to ashes and smoke. The shofet had sent out to his provinces and to neighbor kings for the supplies his armies would need so desperately. He had called in favors going back many years, spending royal capital with abandon. No matter. With the success of this war he would be master of them all.

"Syracuse has fallen," Teuta said in her customarily blunt fashion. "When do we begin?"

"Begin? You mean counterattack?"

"What else could I mean?" she said impatiently. "So far, Rome has had all the advantage in aggression. Let them win any more, and they will think themselves invincible."

"They already think themselves invincible," he pointed out.

"So did the Spartans. Then came the battle of Leuctra. Epimanondas and the Thebans smashed the Spartans and never again did the Spartans or anyone else believe that they were invincible. Once a myth is broken it is never again recovered." She took a generous swallow of unwatered Chian wine.

The woman was a constant amazement. She ate and drank like a Gallic mercenary and could be as crude as a clay pot, but she displayed a fine knowledge of history and was an astute judge of men as individuals and in their masses and nations. But she was trying to rush him and he could not allow her to think she was in charge.

"When the time is right, I shall destroy Rome and its myth together. But one should never go to war without the fullest preparation. Grain and oil, nails, tents, lumber and a thousand other things are as important to a campaign as fighting men, horses and weapons."

"It is possible to be too cautious. Sometimes it is better to hit hard and fast with what you have, than to wait until you have everything you think you must have. Many campaigns have failed because a king has always needed just one more allied contingent, one more wing of cavalry, one more ship. They are usually struck by someone more aggressive and less concerned with preparation. I am not saying that you should go off foolishly unprepared, just that these Romans don't seem to hesitate to attack and you must hit back quickly. Deal them a major setback and they will stop to figure out what went wrong. Then you will have leisure to assemble your fullest force down to the last tent peg in order to fight a war of annihilation."

This was tempting. "I see. You are not, then, suggesting that I send my main army?"

"No."

Hamilcar clapped his hands and a slave stepped forward from the shadows. "Bring my war map and more lamps."

In the light of the new lamps they studied the large parchment. Upon it were drawn all the lands bordering the Middle Sea. Carthaginian possessions were gilt, and fortifications marked, with their garrisons enumerated. Ports and their naval facilities and fleets were likewise depicted. Hamilcar stabbed a finger at a spur jutting from the southern coast of Spain.

"New Carthage. I've assembled an army there, mostly Iberian allies and mercenaries. I had intended to send them into northern Italy as a feint, to distract the Romans and draw away some of their power while I launched the main blow at Sicily and southern Italy."

"Very good," Teuta said. "But why wait until the main invasion? The Romans will know enough to concentrate on the main thrust and leave your Spanish army for a later action. Launch them now. The main Roman force is now engaged in Sicily and they've lost the four legions they left in Egypt. They'll send a minor force northward, thinking they are dealing with a minor incursion. Smash that Roman army and the effect will be demoralizing."

"Just what I was thinking," Hamilcar said, believing indeed that it had been his idea. "They will pass through the southern edge of Gaul, where we have old allies. And they can pick up the garrison of Massilia as they pass."

"Excellent! And why not send some of the mercenaries you have lying around here eating up your substance while doing no fighting? The naval fleet is untouched. Some of your warships can transport the mercenaries and then support the Spanish army on its campaign, and be back in plenty of time to take part in the real invasion."

Hamilcar smiled. "I like this. If they take fearful losses, what of that? I can.always hire more mercenaries and levy more troops from the subject cities. But I won't try to emulate my ancestor's feat and send them across the Alps. It's already been done, so there is no glory in it, and it isn't necessary, anyway. Roman power is weak in the North; they have no allies there to give my army any trouble. They can simply march along the coast, gathering strength as they go and supported by the fleet, which will leave them and return home as soon as they reach Italy." He sighed. "This is so attractive that I'm tempted to take personal command."

"No!" she said. "You must command only the main thrust, not a sideshow like this. But do entrust it to a capable general."

"I'll send Mastanabal with the reinforcements."

"Wonderful!" She poured wine for both of them and they drank to the new project. "Now that you are committed to real action," she went on, "it is time you took some action at home. Your sister is a traitor. If you don't want to kill her, let me."

But this time Hamilcar refused to be pushed. "If only it were so easy."

"You must kill her, my princess," Echaz said.

"The foreign queen? That overdecorated Illyrian?"

"The same. She has become our shofet's closest advisor. More than close-intimate. She has his ear in bed."

"As well as other parts. What of it? He may have every woman in Carthage save me, for all I care. It is his right."

"Highness," he went on patiently, "he is listening to her, though she is a woman and a foreigner."

"So you think she misleads him with bad advice?"

"Worse. She may be giving him good advice."

The princess lay on a huge cushion stuffed with rare, aromatic herbs. She was exhausted after a lengthy, demanding ritual in the Temple of Tanit, and now she rolled over onto her stomach, propping her weary head on her fists. "This could be bad. I knew my brother wanted the woman for a plaything. She certainly is colorful. It did not occur to me that she might be intelligent."

"A mistake many of us make," Echaz said, sighing. "Those Romans seemed comically uncouth, yet they proved to be shrewd."

"She won't be easy to kill," Zarabel said. "She has her own men, who are very savage, and then there are my brother's own guards. It would be easier for me to kill him, but I dare not do that."

Zarabel hated and feared her brother, but she had little to gain by his death. A woman could not inherit the throne and she had no son to elevate and then manipulate. If Hamilcar died, the head of one of the great families would assume the crown and, most probably, put her away and give the high priestesshood to a female relative. She wanted Hamilcar weak, not dead.

"We will find a way," Echaz assured her.

Mastanabal was a tall, lean man with the clas-sic Carthaginian looks: swarthy complexion, dark brows beetling above a beaklike nose, curly black hair and beard. His deep-lined, weathered face showed every day of his twenty years of hard campaigning. Even when Carthage was not at war, there had always been bandits and pirates to suppress and insurrections to put down.

Ten days before he had arrived by ship and taken over command of the army gathered for the incursion into northern Italy. "The Divine Shofet Hamilcar, descendant of Hannibal the Great, has ordered that the invasion of Italy is to commence forthwith," he had announced. "I want every man I am to command assembled for my inspection immediately. We shall perform the sacrifices and take the omens and we shall march upon the first day pleasing to the gods of Carthage."

He did not tell them that this would not be a part of the main attack on Rome, which would not come for a few months, at least. There was no need for them to know such things. Their task was to obey the shofet's commands. Nor was he dismayed by the task before him. He had seen the Romans in action in Egypt, and he had been impressed. But for all their skill and professionalism, they were but men, and men could be beaten and killed.

He knew further that the four legions of the Egyptian campaign were lost somewhere in the East, and the Romans were massively committed to the conquest of Sicily and must even now be massing that army for an attack on Africa, on Carthage itself. He had an excellent chance of meeting an inferior force of green troops in northern Italy, and smashing them. The Romans were raising legions so fast that surely they could not all be trained and equipped to the highest standards.

Now he rode along the massed ranks of his army, and as he passed each unit, the men raised their arms and cheered. The hand of Carthage lay lightly upon Spain, for it was an invaluable resource far beyond its value as a source of horses, cattle and metal ore. For centuries, Spain had provided Carthage with mercenaries. Its many tribes produced a profusion of warriors, their skills honed by constant intertribal warfare. Many of them had no trade save that of war. Most were a mixture of Celt and native Iberian, now merged.

They were a dark people for the most part, their black hair dressed in long plaits hanging from the temples, the hair at back flowing free or gathered into a net.

Most wore white tunics with colorful borders, but the Callaici, Astures, Cantabri and Vascones wore black. From the northeast and the central plateau came the Arevaci, the Pelendones, the Berones, the Caretani and others. From the west came Lusitani and Turdetani. From the foot of the Pyrenees came the Ilergetes and Auretani. Some were horsemen, wonderfully skilled with lance and javelin.

Most were light infantry. Many carried a small, round buckler called a caetra, though some retained the long, oval shield of their Celtic ancestors. Their favored weapon was the falcata: a peculiar sword with a downcurving blade, sharpened along its inner edge, its spine thick to add weight to the blow. It was a slashing weapon and could sever a man's leg with ease. Many also carried the short, straight sword the Romans called the gladius hispaniensis, which they had adopted for their own legions. Each Spanish swordsman carried a number of javelins, and these slender weapons were often forged entirely of steel. Some wore helmets but few bothered with armor.

From the Greek colonies of the coast came hoplites: men with large, old-fashioned round shields; helmets, cuirasses and greaves of polished, bronze; armed with long spears and short swords. They would be his heavy infantry and hold the center of the battle line. Greece had long fallen from its military preeminence, but Greek soldiers fought all over the lands of the Middle Sea. Unlike the brave but disorganized tribal peoples, the Greeks understood discipline and the importance of maintaining formation.

The rest were a rabble of Libyans, Gauls, islanders and others; slingers from the Belearics, Cretan archers, even a few hundred black spearmen, barbarously painted, their hair plastered with mud and bearing shields of zebra hide. Sadly, Hamilcar had allowed him no elephants.

At the head of the formation Hasdrubal's command staff awaited him: Carthaginian nobles, Greek professionals and some Spanish chieftains. They watched him expectantly, their eyes bright, eager for the war to come.

"Let's go to Italy," said Mastanabal.

Off they set, an army massive by the standards of most kings, but a trifling force by Carthaginian standards. And as it progressed, it grew larger. Their trek along the coast, shadowed by the Carthaginian fleet, took them through territory occupied by Carthaginian tributaries, and from each they levied troops. From Spain they passed into southern Gaul, and here many Gallic warriors, eager for action and loot, joined them. At Massilia, the principal port, they collected more Greek troops and the Carthaginian garrison. A few days march past Massilia they entered Cisalpine Gaul, the Gallic territory of northern Italy. They were now in the area called Liguria, once owned by Rome. They had as yet seen no trace of Roman occupation. This was as Mastanabal had anticipated. The Romans were not worried about attack from the north, despite their disastrous experience with Hannibal. He would teach them their error.

Near Genua the coast turned southward and they entered the peninsula of Italy proper. At each town Mastanabal's officers questioned locals. Yes, the Romans had come through, surveying and taking a census, but they had seen no Romans for months. There was said to be a garrison at Pisae, on the Arnus River.

The coastal road was wretched, little more than a goat track, so progress was not swift. His light cavalry rode ahead of the army, intercepting and killing any mounted man they saw, to prevent word of the advancing army from preceding it. Thus they arrived unannounced upon the plain east of the delta of the Arnus, near the minor town of Pisae, where a Roman army lay encamped.

Decimus Aemilius, propraetor for northwestern Italy, awoke to a pleasant morning in one of the most pleasant parts of the peninsula. The land was wonderfully fertile and occupied by diligent peasants. He had decided that, when the present war concluded, he would petition the Senate for lands here. He belonged to a minor branch of the great Aemilian gens, and the ancestral Aemilian lands to the south had already been reclaimed by the more prestigious members of the family. No matter, he thought. From what he had seen, he liked this district better than the central and southern peninsula.

He was not flawlessly happy. It grated that he had not been given a more important army and a part in the Sicilian campaign. Not much chance of that, he thought. Not with the great consular families fighting tooth and nail for every commission. Still, he knew he had little cause to complain. There would be campaigning for the rest of his lifetime, and glittering opportunities would fall his way. Even as he had the thought, something fell his way.

He became aware of a growing clamor outside his praetorium and was about to investigate when his legate, Servius Aelius Buteo, burst in. "There's a Carthaginian army on the field to the north!"

"What! How did they get here?"

"At a guess I'd say they walked," Buteo told him. "And they didn't come alone. A scout just rode in and reported a fleet off Pisae."

Aemilius shouted for his orderly, and scrambled into his field armor. With his helmet beneath his arm, he strode from the tent, Buteo walking beside him. His orderly, his trumpeter and his secretary followed behind.

"Hamilcar couldn't counterattack so fast. And why here?" Aemilius said.

"Maybe the report of the fire at Carthage was exaggerated," Buteo said. "Maybe he's invading anyway, on two fronts."

"Not that it matters," Aemilius said. "If they're out there, we have to stop them. If they get through us, they'll go all the way to Rome, and except for what we have here, all our legions are down in the South. Rome is unprotected."

They came to the camp wall and ascended the tower flanking the gate called the porta praetoria. From its top platform they surveyed the spectacle to the north, aghast. A huge host stood there, arranged in three great blocks, with flanking cavalry. They were ominously silent. Roman soldiers along the wall were jabbering at one another, some of them forgetting their Latin and speaking their native Celtic and German dialects.

"Professionals or at least well-drilled militia in the center," Aemilius said, his voiced schooled to calm despite the sick feeling in his stomach. "Those great mobs on the flanks are barbarians. How many do you make them?"

Buteo spat over the front rail. "Thirty thousand if there's a buggering one of them. And they've ten times our strength in cavalry."

And what do I have? Aemilius thought. Two legions plus auxiliaries, and not full strength at that, not even fifteen thousand total strength. The odds would not have dismayed him had the legions been veteran, but they were newly raised troops just down from Noricum, only their senior centurions men of long experience. They had been drilled long and hard, but even the best training was not combat. Roman commanders considered soldiers fully reliable only after they had ten campaigns behind them.

"Well," Aemilius said. "Here's where we find out if we're really as good as we say we are." He turned to his trumpeter. "Sound battle formation." As the call rang out, he turned to his secretary, who stood by with a wooden tablet open in one hand, a pointed bronze stylus in the other, ready to inscribe his general's message on the wax that lined the inner surface of the tablet.

"Date and hour," Aemilius said. "To the noble Senate. Greeting from Decimus Aemilius, propraetor for northwestern Italy. This hour a Carthaginian army of some thirty thousand men appeared two miles north of the Arnus River near the town of Pisae, accompanied by a fleet of unknown strength. I go now to engage the land force. Long live Rome."

Amid a rustling of armor and a shuffling of hobnailed caligae, the legionaries exited the fortified camp and formed up their cohorts between the camp and the approaching enemy. They formed into their cohorts, with the two legions of heavy infantry in the center, the auxilia on the flanks and the tiny cavalry force, too small to be divided, concentrated on the left flank. The forming up was done with commendable swiftness and efficiency. Drill was a Roman specialty.

"It's not good," Buteo said, "fighting this near the camp, with our backs to a river."

Aemilius knew what he meant. Outnumbered as they were, should the Romans be hard-pressed, with nowhere else to flee except the river, the fortified camp would be a temptation. Men whose nerve failed under the strain of battle would break formation and run for the camp. It could quickly turn into a rout. Had there been time, Aemilius would have demolished the camp before offering battle. That was standard procedure. Romans were realists about warfare, and recognized that to ensure steadfastness in battle, it was best to remove all possibility of safety in flight.

"Speaking of which," Aemilius said, "we'd best get out there ourselves. Can't have the men thinking we're lurking back here in safety."

Buteo snorted. "Safety!"

They went below and mounted their horses. Just behind the legions, in the center, carpenters were assembling the command tower. It was not high, just a platform about twelve feet above the ground, from which the commander could survey his army and the battlefield. Aemilius ordered all his mounted messengers to assemble by the tower, for he intended to send continuous reports to the Senate as the battle progressed.

With his staff officers, he rode through the gaps between the cohorts and emerged before the center of the battle line. A hundred paces before the center of the first rank, they drew up and awaited the Carthaginian negotiators. Every battle began with a parley: demands, refusals, conditions, agreements and so forth. It was expected. In due time, a party of horsemen rode out from the Carthaginian lines. Their harness was ornate, their arms shining or colorfully painted. Their standard, the triangle-and-crescent of Tanit, was draped with white ribbons in token of truce. In the forefront was a hard-faced Greek. Aemilius read him for a Spartan mercenary. That state had long since fallen from any claim to power, but it still produced professional soldiers who were in demand wherever there was fighting.

"Romans!" the Greek said without preamble. "My general, Mastanabal, servant of the Shofet Hamilcar, bids you surrender your arms and your persons to him. Lay down your arms, pass beneath his yoke and you will live. The alternative is extermination."

The Roman party laughed, though without much amusement. The Carthaginian party stared. There was something extremely unsettling about that Roman laugh.

"Well, that's blunt enough," Aemilius said when he had breath. "Why did your general not come to deliver his ultimatum? Why is he lurking behind his army?"

"A nobleman of Carthage does not treat with foreign peasants!" the Greek said scornfully.

"Is that so?" Aemilius said. "Tell your general that before this day is over, this peasant will flay his princely hide from his body and make saddlebags from it. I need a new set."

The Greek seemed not to understand. "That is all you have to say? No counterterms? No offers?"

"If your general wishes to surrender to us, he may," Aemilius said. "Same terms: Lay down your arms and pass beneath our yoke. Or if he wishes to go back to Spain, where I presume this expedition originated, he may. We shall not molest him. But tell him that he has come as close to Rome as he is going to get."

"You are mad!" the Greek said. "None of you will live to see the sun go down."

"Are we keeping you here, hireling?" Aemilius asked. "Don't you have pressing business elsewhere?"

"Your blood is on your own heads!" the Greek said. He wheeled his horse and pelted back to the Carthaginian lines, followed by the rest of his party.

"Fine, arrogant words," Buteo commented. "Think we can live up to them?"

Aemilius shrugged. "In a situation like this, you might as well speak arrogantly. It-doesn't cost anything and may give them something to think about. While I speak to the men, the rest of you join your units or go to the command tower. Send your horses to the rear. From here on, only the cavalry and the messengers are to be mounted."

As customary as the parley was the harangue. Every army expected to be given a rousing, inspirational speech by its general. But how to inspire on an occasion like this, when the odds were worse than two to one and most of the soldiers had never seen battle before? Aemilius prayed to Mars and the Muses to gild his tongue and inspire him to say the right thing. He reined up before his men and used the Forum speaker's voice that could be heard from one end of the line to the other.

"Soldiers of Rome! Until today, we have been stationed here, complaining that the other legions were winning all the glory and wealth in Sicily, and in the East. But now, today, it falls to you to win glory far beyond the lot of any other legions. Today you must save Rome of the Seven Hills! Except for us, Rome lies defenseless, all her temples and tombs naked to the desecration of the barbarians! Over there," he swept an arm around, pointing to the host opposite, "are those who would destroy Rome. But they are barbarians, and barbarians cannot outfight Roman soldiers. Crush them, and the names of your legions will live forever, and you will have undying glory for yourselves and for your descendants. As long as Romans speak of the glories of their ancestors, they will speak of the men who stopped the barbarians here, on the River Arnus!"

The men raised a deafening shout, beating the insides of their shields with spear butts. Aemilius rode back to his command tower, dismounted and slapped his horse on the rump before climbing to his post.

"No time for the sacrifices," he commented.

"Pretty soon," Buteo said, "there'll be all the blood spilled that any god could want."

"Still," Aemilius said, "it's always best to make the sacrifices and take the omens. Oh, well, I suppose Jupiter will understand."

"Is there any reason to wait?" Buteo asked.

"None at all. Sound the advance."

The cornus brayed and the standard-bearers, draped with wolfskins, stepped out toward the enemy. There would be no maneuver, no subtle play of tactical advantage and deception. There was no time for planning and preparation. This would be a simple clash of two armies in an open field, a test of strength and courage. Aemilius knew all too well that in such a fight, numbers could be decisive. It was too late to worry about it.

As the trumpets conveyed their general's orders, the cohorts transformed from a series of blocks in checkered formation to a solid battle line, with four cohorts of each legion in reserve, keeping open order so that they were free to maneuver to defend a flank or strengthen a weak spot in the line should there be danger of a breakthrough.

"I think we should extend the line," Buteo said.

"I'll send the reserves to the flanks if it looks like they're going to outflank us," Aemilius said.

The Carthaginian army advanced at a slow, deliberate pace. Officers advanced along the whole front, but walking backward, facing their own men. They barked orders to speed up or slow down, close right or left, as they saw disorder in their lines. The watching Romans could only approve. This was the sort of professionalism they understood.

"This is going to be different from fighting a pack of howling Germans, isn't it?" Aemilius commented. Buteo didn't bother to answer. On the field across from them, a large number of lightly armed men ran out past the flanks and arranged themselves in double lines.

"Here come the arrows," Aemilius said. The trumpets

sounded, and all along the Roman lines shields were lifted.

Except for the front line, each man raised his shield and held

it over the head of the man in front of him. In seconds, the

whole army looked as if it had grown a tile roof. The

Carthaginian flankers drew their bows and soon arrows

came down like rain on the Roman force. Very few got

through, but here and there a shaft slipped beneath an unsteadily held shield and the Romans took the first casualties of the battle.

"First blood to the enemy," Buteo said.

Aemilius's look was bleak, but he was a Roman. "It's last blood that counts."

When the Carthaginian front line was within fifty paces of the legions, the arrow storm let up. Aemilius spoke to his trumpeter, and the signal to advance and close with the enemy brayed out, to be echoed by the trumpeters who accompanied the individual standards. As one man, the first two lines stepped out toward the Carthaginian center.

Soon the Carthaginian light troops began to pelt the Romans with light javelins. Since the light infantry was concentrated on the flanks, the center of the Roman lines took no casualties. When the opposing lines were fifty feet apart, a trumpet barked and the Roman advance stopped abruptly. As if controlled by a single nervous system, the right arms of the Romans rocked back, poised a moment, then shot forward. The heavy, murderous javelin called the pilum was a mainstay of the Roman arsenal. The front line hurled theirs directly at the men a few paces before them. The second line launched theirs over the heads of the men in front. These fell into the ranks of the enemy behind the battle line.

Instantly, hundreds of men went down, their shields and bodies pierced by the deadliest close-quarters missile ever invented. Hundreds more found their shields rendered useless by the massive spears impaling them. The small, barbed heads could not be easily withdrawn, nor the long, iron necks and thick, wooden shafts easily cut through.

With a move as precise as the spear hurling, the Romans drew their short, razor-edged swords. They advanced at the double, striking the Carthaginian center along its length. Behind the protection of their large, body-covering shields, they brushed the enemy's long spears aside or lifted them overhead. Where a pilum protruded from an enemy shield, it was kicked aside or trodden down, exposing the man behind the shield for execution. These front-rankers wore excellent armor, so the short swords lanced into throats, into the lower abdomen below the rim of the breastplate, directly into the face between the cheekplates of the helmet. While it was intended primarily for thrusting, the broad, heavy blade of the gladius also cut extremely well, and wielded in short, vicious chops it exposed the user no more than did a swift thrust. An exposed arm could be severed completely, and an incautiously advanced thigh could be laid open to the bone on its inner side, severing the great artery and dumping out all of a man's blood in a few seconds.

In this stage of the battle the Romans took very few casualties, though the footing grew treacherous with bodies, blood and fallen weapons. This was the sort of fighting at which Romans excelled above all others. The legion thus employed was a vast killing machine. After a few minutes, before the men could tire too much, Aemilius gave another order and the trumpets roared out. The fighting men disengaged arid stepped back as the next two ranks of the legions marched forward. The men who had been fighting fell back through gaps between the advancing soldiers. The enemy, surprised at this maneuver, were still reeling when the second volley of heavy javelins fell among them and the killing recommenced.

The Romans who had been fighting went to the rear to get new pila and have their wounds dressed. Long ago, the Romans had realized that only a small part of the army could be fighting at any one time, so they devised this system to keep fresh men at the front at all times. In the army opposite, the rear ranks were in a close-packed mass, shouting, waving their arms in excitement and getting tired without contributing at all to the fighting strength.

In the center, this battle belonged to the Romans. The flanks were another matter. The great masses of Mastanabal's light-armed troops were pressing against the Roman flanks and their cavalry rushed in, hurling light javelins with great accuracy, riding back before the Romans could come to grips with them. The Iberians, insanely brave and aggressive, charged against the iron-clad Romans with great ferocity. In this sort of fighting, the falcata was as effective as the gladius. The downcurved, wide-bladed sword was not versatile; it was a pure slasher, but swung down by the arm of a strong man, it could shear through helmet and armor, and only quick shield work could save the target. If the unarmored Spaniard missed his blow, he was dead, dispatched by the lightning thrust of the gladius.

The Roman right flank suffered especially, for these attacks fell upon their unshielded sides. If they were to defend themselves, they had to face right, disordering the Roman lines. Seeing this, Aemilius sent his reserve cohorts to reinforce the flanks. This left him with nothing to commit in case of an emergency or an opportunity, but he had no choice, not when he was this badly outnumbered.

The sun rose higher, and the battle wore on. The Carthaginian cavalry made several attempts to encircle the Romans, but the rear ranks faced about and drove them off with volleys of pila, killing some riders and many horses. Mastanabal called his horsemen back. They would be better employed in pursuing the enemy when they broke ranks and fled, speared in their backs as they ran. In most battles, the great bulk of the killing took place in the rout, when helpless, terrified men were slaughtered by the thousands.

One of the Greek professionals who sat his horse next to the Carthaginian general remarked, "These Romans are taking their time about panicking."

"Well, we've heard they were tough," said a man with a Spartan accent.

"They cannot last much longer," the Carthaginian commander said. "They are better than I anticipated; they fight well and hold their ranks. But these men are not the equal of the legions I saw fighting in Egypt. Their commander is not inspired, like Titus Norbanus." In truth, Mastanabal had no doubt that he would be victorious, but at what cost? His army was taking fearful casualties. He cared nothing for the men, who were just foreigners and many of them savages, but every man who fell would mean a weaker army to proceed against Rome.

In another campaign, he would levy troops from the subject cities he passed, but Carthage had demilitarized Italy after Hannibal's conquest. There were no soldiers on the whole peninsula, except for the Romans. If he lost too many, he would have to fall back into Gaul to rebuild his strength. When he returned, he knew he would find far more than two green legions in his way. He had to bring this battle to a successful conclusion, and soon.

His center was being chewed away by the Roman swords and spears, but he resisted the temptation to reinforce it. The center would not collapse any time soon. Both his long schooling and his many years of experience in war told Mastanabal not to waste his resources in attacking the enemy's greatest strength. Concentrate instead on his weakest spots.

"I want all the archers and slingers on the Roman right flank," he ordered. "I want them to pour missiles into that flank until they run out of ammunition."

His officers rode off to do his bidding. Soon the lightly armed troops were on that flank, standing just beyond range of the Roman javelins. The arrows and sling-bullets began to rain into the legion's flank, and this time the disorder in their lines did not allow an effective shield roof to form. Arrows found their marks and the sling-bullets-egg-shaped slugs of lead the size of a boy's fist-wrought terrible damage, smashing exposed faces and necks, sometimes denting a helmet deeply enough to crack the skull beneath. Romans began to fall by the score, then by the hundred.

Aemilius turned to his secretary. "To the noble Senate of Rome. We will need more and better and cavalry. Also, we must find great numbers of missile troops. The enemy is very strong in these arms, and they are very annoying. Our men cannot close with them without breaking ranks, and their effects wear us down." This was the fifth such message he had dictated since the outset of the battle. "Append my seal and send it off."

The messenger galloped off toward the bridge across the Avernus. Aemilius had one tablet and one messenger left. This he would hold until the last minute, to announce either his victory or his defeat. He heard renewed shouting and looked to see its source. The missile troops, emboldened by their success, were creeping forward, raising their trajectories to rain arrows and bullets almost into the center of theRoman lines. A few were transfixed by javelins, but the Romans were running out of spears to throw.

"Buteo," he said, "before our center gets totally disordered, we have to do something about those archers and slingers. I want the rear lines to about-face as they did when the cavalry tried to encircle us. Then I want them to step out, pivoting on their left flank like a big door swinging shut. If they carry it out briskly, they can encircle and kill all those half-naked foreigners."

"That's a parade-ground maneuver," Buteo said, sounding like his throat was very dry. "Do you think these boys are up to it?"

"If you have any better ideas, I'll listen."

Buteo turned to the trumpeter and spoke very urgently, at length. The man nodded and began to sound a very complex series of calls, which were picked up and echoed throughput the now badly depleted Roman army. The rear ranks turned about and began the maneuver. The pivot man at what was now their left flank marched in place while those nearer the center walked and those on the right flank trotted, to keep the wheeling line straight.

From his command prominence, Mastanabal watched with wonder, understanding instantly what his opposite intended. It was a marvel to behold, but it further weakened the Roman forces and he saw exactly how to take advantage of it.

"They are out of those damned spears," he said to his officers. "I want the entire cavalry to go around their left flank and charge into the back of that pivoting line, then turn inward against the Roman rear. Now!"

Moments later the horsemen thundered toward the Romans as if they were attacking the center, then they wheeled right and swept around the Roman flank. Moments later they crashed into the line advancing against the missile troops, spearing them from behind, annihilating them before turning against the Roman rear. As before, the rear ranks faced about, but this time they had no pila to hurl, only short swords with which to face mounted men, and they were tired, slow to get their shields up as the lancers thrust and the Libyans threw their own short javelins with deadly accuracy. The Romans did not die easily, but they died anyway.

Aemilius turned to his secretary for the last time. "To the noble Senate. The battle of the River Arnus is lost. I die here on the field with my legions. Long live Rome." He watched as the messenger pelted away, saw him almost overtaken by enemy horsemen; then he was clear and riding for the bridge.

Then he and Buteo watched, helpless, as his proud legions broke up into isolated groups, fighting shield-to-shield, and then there were just pairs of men back-to-back, all of them struggling until they fell.

"Not one of them fled for the camp or the bridge," Aemilius said.

"They're Romans," Buteo said, "even if some of their fathers came from Germania. Will you fall on your sword?"

"No, I'll make some of those bastards fall on mine. Will you join me?"

"Might as well," Buteo said. The little group of men on the platform drew their swords and descended to the bloody field below. Only the secretary stayed. He was a slave and noncombatant.

Within an hour the field was a vast expanse of fallen men and horses, shattered shields, weapons and standards. Of the fallen, many were still alive but maimed. Soldiers went among the wounded Romans, killing them with swift stabs of sword or spear. Already, ravens hopped among the dead, pecking at eyes and spilled viscera.

"So they aren't unbeatable," said the Spartan officer.

"No, they are not," Mastanabal concurred. But his satisfaction was severely tempered. The dead of his own army far outnumbered the Roman dead. His clerks had brought him a preliminary casualty list: more than twenty thousand dead and many others severely wounded. The Romans had sold their lives dearly. And this had not been a first-rate Roman army. What would it be like to face the cream of the legions?

A man rode up holding, in his hand something that dripped blood. He halted before his general and raised his trophy. It was a human head. "This is the Roman commander, general. A captive.slave identified him."

Mastanabal looked into the rolled-back eyes of his late adversary. This had been a second-rate commander of inexperienced soldiers and he had almost ruined a splendid Carthaginian army almost twice the size of his own. Mastanabal reached out, bloodied his fingers on the severed neck and drew three red lines across his forehead to protect himself from the vengeful spirits of the dead.

"Do we march on Rome, General?" asked the Spartan.

Mastanabal surveyed the field once more. "With this cut-up remnant?" he snarled. "No! We return to Gaul. We have to rebuild our strength before we engage these people again." He wondered how he was going to explain this to the shofet.