Marius' Mules: Prelude to War Read Online Free PDF Page B

could count four soldiers and six civilians, though he might have missed the count by one or two, at speed and in the confusion.
    Off to his right the second scorpion suddenly fell from the roof, along with a couple of the defensive grain sacks, signalling the end of the barracks as a defensive position. The other scorpion had stopped firing before Cita left the building, its crew fleeing to the redoubt with the rest. It was one small blessing that the enemy were so charged with victorious energy that they had not considered turning the defenders’ high places into their own missile platforms, but really, with the numbers now so hopelessly uneven, it hardly mattered.
    Despite Cita’s original intentions, Bennacos could not command the redoubt - he was busy inside, trying to prevent the roof falling into enemy hands. With a resigned swallow, he knew he was in charge. He, and he alone. In charge of a doomed command with only a few short heartbeats of existence left.
    Even as he tried to think of something encouraging to shout, he turned at a crash to see that the outer wall of one of the timber lean-tos had collapsed under the pressure of the enemy. The remaining of the two men inside was almost instantly hacked to pieces by the Carnutes as they swarmed inside.
    That was it, then. The redoubt was already useless before its defence had begun. The enemy had gained access through the building. The depot had fallen and all that was left was to die like a soldier.
    ‘Everyone inside. We can limit the number that come at us through that door!’
    The pitiful remaining force pushed their way into the stone store house, the rear-most men clambering over the grain-sack wall and flopping down to the inside. Despite the example of the optio who had died at the back, chivvying on his men, Cita was somewhere in the middle, pushing into the building in order to preserve his life as long as possible.
    The last of the retreating men - the incredulous fat merchant with the hare-lip from the bridge, he noted - fell as he clambered over the redoubt, a Carnute long-sword slashing down and smashing into his back, splintering bones and carving meat. The man shrieked in pain and tried to claw his way on, but already the rest of the enemy were on him and the last Cita saw of him was the panic on the wounded civilian’s face as he was dragged back into the mass of warriors. A small knot of warriors paused at that position, their sword-arms rising and falling, as the tide of Gauls swept on past.
    Cita braced his feet and noticed that the few remaining legionaries took up similar positions nearby while the civilians retreated into the darkness in panic. He shouted an order for them to fall in with the defence but they reacted no more than he’d expected, hiding among the wooden racks for the most part. A quick glance up and he could see that Bennacos was in trouble too. The roof now bore large holes and much of the thatching had been hacked away so that the men above could get at the warrior busy sticking them with a spear from below.
    Time was up.
    ‘Minerva be with us. Sell your life dearly, lads.’
    With a last sigh of resignation he reached for the coin purse at his belt and withdrew a single dupondius.
    ‘There’s pitch in here, sir,’ one of the legionaries said quietly. ‘We could destroy the whole bloody place and take a load of them with us?’
    Cita shook his head. It was not the horrifying prospect of burning to death in this place that stopped him, though. After all, he could easily put his own bloodied blade through his chest before the flames licked his skin. It was the knowledge that if everything here burned then there was no hope of word getting out.
    ‘No burning. Just take as many of them with you as you can!’
    The doorway filled suddenly with the shapes of Carnute warriors as they ran in to take down the last Roman defenders. The legionaries presented the best shield wall they could, the shieldless Cita taking one end