Ahead a dragon, red tongue lolling from gaping silver jaws, its scaled, green body twisting in the wind. Below it a chieftain, tattooed forearms protruding from gilded and chased armour. A well-equipped warrior holding the standard, others banded in front.
Roaring an invocation to the fierce deity of his native hills, Maximinus drove forward. The Rider God was with him. A flurry of blows, too fast to be accounted, and he was in their midst. Now other horses impeding his progress. Borysthenes was brought to a standstill. Maximinus shield was wrenched from his grasp. A clanging impact hit the back of his helmet. Vision blurred, he twisted this way and that, fending off the sharp, questing steel that would take his life. As if through a glass, he saw Javolenus and Julius Capitolinus trying to cut their way through to him. Too late, he was surrounded.
Death held no fear for him. Reunited with Paulina, he would ride the highland for eternity. But not yet. First the chieftain must die. Blocking a blow from his left, one from his right, Maximinus kicked Borysthenes on. The great-hearted beast shouldered through the tumult.
The chieftain swung at his head. Catching the sword on his own, the impact shuddered up Maximinus arm. With his left hand, he seized the Sarmatians wrist, dragged him off balance, then smashed the pommel of his own sword into the snarling face. Something struck from behind, hard enough to drive jagged, broken fragments of armour into his shoulder blade. Ignoring the pain, he brought the pommel down on the chieftains temple. The barbarian went down, his armour clattering.
Turning, seeking the next threat, Maximinus saw Javolenus hack down the standard bearer. The snarling dragon dipped, and toppled into the fouled, blood-stained slush.
They are running!
Julius Capitolenus words held no meaning.
Augustus, they are beaten.
Painfully fighting air into his chest, Maximinus took in the stricken field. The Iazyges were streaming away to the south. Those unhorsed and not too wounded to get to their feet were struggling to catch the bridle of a mount and follow. The rest the living and the dead were being butchered, mutilated and chopped into sides of meat.
Sabinus Modestus and the right? Maximinus was hoarse, his words a grating whisper.
Dead or chased off the field. But the auxiliary cohorts on the flank did not break. Maybe Sarmatian horses are scared of donkeys after all. The barbarians are fleeing there too.
Maximinus felt no elation, instead nothing but pain and a weary relief. His plans had worked. His delaying had made the barbarians over confident. Exulting, they had thought to ride down a demoralized rabble. Their long approach, and the fresh snow had tired their horses. The battle was won, but now the advantage had to be pressed.
Open the ranks. Maximinus found it an effort to talk. His left shoulder was burning. Have Volos light horse pursue them. They must be harried, not allowed to reform.
As shouts and trumpet calls relayed his orders, Maximinus son rode up.
I give you joy of our victory. Verus Maximus was immacu-late, his beautiful face radiant. It could not have been more evident that the Caesar had not fought.
Exhausted, blood-stained and wounded, Maximinus regarded him with disdain.
My sons will inherit, or no one, Vespasian had said. It was the attitude of all Emperors. Even Septimius Severus had let the treacherous Geta accede with his brother Caracalla. The Romans of old had been made of sterner stuff. When Brutus discovered his sons were trying to reintroduce monarchy, he had them dragged to the Forum, flogged, tied to a stake, and beheaded.
Maximinus looked away. High over the Steppe a pair of buzzards were circling, soaring on motionless wings. A man could disinherit his son. Those Emperors who had no son had adopted their heirs. Everyone told him, the will of the Emperor is law.
Chapter 5
Rome
The Senate House,
The Day before the Nones of March, AD238
Pupienus looked up and out of the window high on the opposite wall of the Curia. All the windows were open. The noise of the mob bore in like a spring tide. It buffeted among the gilded beams of the ceiling and broke on the heads of the hundred or so Senators brave or ambitious enough to attend. Kill them! Kill the enemies of the Roman people! Let them be dragged with the hook! To the Tiber with them! Pupienus knew too much about the plebs not to despise them. He was glad the doors were bolted.
It was the first thing the Consul had done. After the clerks, scribes and other public servants had left, he had ordered the doors closed and barred. The Lictors stood guard outside. The ceremonial attendants of the few magistrates present would have little chance if the mob determined to force an entrance, none at all if the soldiers intervened. But it was better than nothing.
The religious observances hurriedly completed, the Consul had declared the Senate in closed session, and required the Quaestor Menophilus read the letter from Africa.
In the shadows, Pupienus sat with his friends and relatives listening. He had forgotten how dark it was inside the Senate House with the doors shut. The gloom smelt of incense and spilt wine, of unwashed men and fear. Pupienus drew strength from those around him: from his two sons and his brother-in-law, and from his two particular amici, Rutilius Crispinus and Cuspidius Severus. One could never overestimate the importance of family and friends in Roman politics. All those close to him were ex-Consuls, the last two, like himself, new men, the first of their families to enter the Senate. A solid cohort of men, devoted to duty and the Res Publica, they radiated dignitas, that untranslatable mixture of propriety, achieved rank and nobility of soul. The Greeks had no such word. That was why they were subjects, and the Romans ruled the world.
Menophilus had been reading the letter from the elder Gordian aloud, and now was coming to the end of it.
Conscript Fathers: the young men, to whom was entrusted Africa to guard, have called on me against my will to rule. But having regard to you, I am glad to endure this necessity. It is yours to decide what you wish. For myself, I shall waver to and fro in uncertainty until the Senate has decided.
The elder Gordian had expressed the right sentiments in it. The throne had been thrust upon him. He had accepted not from ambition, but love of Rome. He had raised his son to share the purple from the same motive. He acknowledged the right of the Senate to give an Emperor his powers, to confer legitimacy. But, Pupienus reflected, was it all too weak? Should an Emperor waver to and fro, admit to indecision? Was not a certain measure of ambition laudable? And was there any chance the Gordiani, father and son, could prevail? Menophilus clever lie that Maximinus was already dead had bought them some time. It had summoned the plebs onto the streets, and sown indecision among the supporters of the Thracian. But now it was clear that Maximinus was alive, and what could stand against him and the might of the northern armies?
Before the Consul could proceed, the other envoy from Africa joined Menophilus on the floor of the house, and asked permission to speak. Up on the Consular tribunal, Fulvius Pius looked relieved the initiative had been taken from him, and he granted the request.
Valerian was a big man, in middle age. Clean shaven, short hair receding above a broad forehead, both his looks and his reputation proclaimed an open, trusting nature, not overburdened with insight. From a traditional Italian family of senatorial status, he had held the Consulship years before, and it had been considered to add prestige to Gordian the Elders term of office when Valerian had agreed to be one of the governors legates in Africa. Even so, Pupienus might have been reluctant to accompany him to this meeting to put himself and those he loved at such risk if Valerian had not arrived at his house with the Consul Fulvius Pius. In politics, as in everything else, one thing leads to another, like links in a chain.
Conscript Fathers, the two Gordiani, both ex-Consuls, the one your Pro-Consul, the other your legate, have been declared Emperors by a great assembly in Africa. Let us give thanks, then, to the young men of Thysdrus, and thanks also to the ever loyal people of Carthage. They have freed us from subservience to Maximinus, from that savage monster, from that wild beast, from that barbarian. The family of the Gordiani descend from the noblest Romans, from the house of the Gracchi and that of the divine Trajan.
So that was how it was to be, Pupienus thought. Valerian would launch ponderous invective against Maximinus and laud the Gordiani with obvious praise. But would it be enough to sway the frightened yet calculating Senators huddled in the close, dark chamber?
Drag them, drag them with the hook! The shouts of the mob rolled around the Senate House, filled the pauses in the speech. Most Senators hated Maximinus and his son, for the confiscations, for the executions of their families and friends, for his casual lack of respect, ultimately for not being one of them. They hated him as keenly as the plebs outside, but, unlike the latter, they lacked the comparative safety of anonymity.
Pupienus ran his gaze over where those openly committed to the Gordiani sat together. Valerian was supported by his brother-in-law Egnatius Marinianus, and a more distant relative by marriage, Egnatius Proculus, the Curator of the Roads and Prefect of the Poor Relief. With Menophilus were young Virius Lupus, a fellow Quaestor, and the latters elderly father Lucius Virius. One coeval each of the Elder and Younger Gordiani was seated with them, respectively Appius Claudius Julianus and Celsus Aelianus. That was the heart of the problem. Gordian the father was so old that all his closest allies were in retirement or dead. Gordian the son had spent so many years in the provinces most recently in Syria, Achaea and now Africa the only associates who remained in Rome were relics of his disreputable youth. Like him, the handful of his friends who had grown into some responsibility were serving the Res Publica abroad; Claudius Julianus governing Dalmatia, and Fidus had charge of Thrace. Pupienus had a good memory, and prided himself on knowing such things.