The creases of Hasdrubal's brow fixed in a way that Silenus found uncomfortable just to look at. He bit one corner of his lips, chewed on it, gnawed like a mongrel at a scrap of sinew. “He knew of my message,” he said. “He knew the number of men and where I sent them. His speech was accented with the tongue of the Theveste.”
“There are numberless means of deceit,” Noba said. “Can he not be made to prove himself? What thing could we ask him—”
“No,” Hasdrubal snapped. “If he's been coached in how to lie to us, how can we prove it for sure? Do we torture him? If he tells the truth, then he can only tell the truth. If he lies, he can only keep on lying, because he'll know the worth of his life if he confesses. I cannot see my way clear of this. Why is nothing straightforward? Not one thing happens as it should. Not one thing . . .”
He bit off his words, bit his lip again, turned, and fixed the scribe in his glare. “Silenus, what does your heart tell you?”
The Greek raised his hands, palm upward, and groaned at being brought into the discussion. He looked between the frame created by his hands and shook his head. “These things are not for me—”
“What does your heart tell you? Just say it!”
“I believe the man,” Silenus said.
“Noba?”
The Ethiopian said, “We must be cautious. Send scouts—”
“The same question I asked the Greek! Answer it.”
“If I must . . . The spy is true. I believe him.”
“I do, as well,” Hasdrubal said. “So we withdraw. Noba, send your scouts to prove or deny the man's story, but unless they do so conclusively we withdraw this very night. That's my decision.”
At the first call to march, the guides slunk away into the dimness, never to be heard from again. Hasdrubal damned them, but then said it did not matter. They would follow the Metaurus River through the night, then chart a better course in the light of the next day and ascend into the Apennines to find cover in the rougher terrain. But from its first moments the retreat went foul. Even in the full light of day the river's course would have been difficult to follow. The channel cut a deep meandering confusion of a trench through the plain; the ground was thickly wooded, with sloping banks, with stones tilted at strange angles and roots that looped up from the earth and grabbed men's feet. In the pitch dark the forest came alive with malicious intent. Men could barely take a step without stumbling under the packs, spilling food and weapons around them, cursing. The river became a giant serpent, flexing and squirming, never where it should be. Groups lost their way and shouted to one another, but the uneven landscape played tricks with their voices and led them into greater confusion.
The Gauls did not fear the woods as much as the Africans did, but they grew frustrated and lit torches to see by. Others yelled for them to douse the lights, complaining that the patches of wavering brilliance just made the dark more frightening, distorting the land even more, casting shapes about so that some yelled that the Romans were upon them. Then someone dropped a torch and failed to pick it up fast enough. The flame scorched through the pine needles, to the dry bark of several trees, and up them as quickly as a squirrel fleeing. Within moments the forest was afire above their heads. Horses went wild with fear beneath them. Cattle yanked free of the tenders and searched out dark places and then grew frightened there and ran back toward the light.
For much of the night, Silenus walked slowly, paused often, held his hands either out in front of him to ward off branches or to his temples to calm himself. This was all wrong. They should have kept to the open ground, away from the river. Even if they had marched without direction they would have made better time than they were now. He knew this, and he knew that Hasdrubal must know it. That was why the general worked so hard. His voice rang through the trees, pulling lost men in, redirecting their course. Several times he rode splashing through the river itself, urging men on, keeping sanity with the power of his voice alone.
Hasdrubal did not sleep at all that night. He should have been exhausted, drained, senseless from the continuous labor. But the next morning he shone with vigor Silenus had never seen in him. He seemed to feed on the direness of the situation they found themselves in and showed no sign of the melancholy that had plagued him through the winter. When Silenus commented lightly on this, Hasdrubal answered seriously. He said, “I suffer. I wish Rome to suffer with me.”
In the first light of the new day, Hasdrubal explained to all the men just what was going to happen. The Romans were upon them. They would fight that day. If they did not, they would be slaughtered as they ran, and he had no desire to run anymore. He led them away from the river and onto the clearer, undulating ground upon which the day would be decided. As soon as they were out of the trees they could see the waiting mass of the joined Roman forces. The great numbers testified to the truth of the spy's information. They were already in position, drawing up into battle formation.
Hasdrubal called for his forces to do the same. Before long he strode before the front ranks with his sword unsheathed. He seemed taller than ever he had, hardened from his normal physical perfection into something still more statuesque. He wore no leg or shoulder armor, but walked with his chiseled arms and legs bare; they flexed and quivered and jerked with energy. Even the muscles of his neck snapped into and out of view as he lifted his chin and called out his instructions over the masses. He ordered a narrower front line than usual, as the terrain would hamper the wings.
Hasdrubal's gaze met Silenus', but before the Greek could acknowledge him with a gesture the general turned away and the battle commenced. Silenus stood some distance behind Hasdrubal's command position, but the view he got of things to come was much the same. The two forces collided as if each were nothing but a barbarian horde. The Romans hurled their mighty timed volleys, but Hasdrubal had his men rush through these opening maneuvers and draw in to close quarters quickly. Order broke from the early moments and there was nothing of art in the combat. Nothing resembling finesse or strategy. Nothing except for the pure slashing panic of men trying to kill before they were killed. The Gauls bellowed their war cries and blew their animal-headed horns and swung with such force that their braids snapped about them like whips. The Libyans worked with their spears, thrusting overhand like the quiet killers they were, piercing a face here and a shoulder there, twisting the prongs as they withdrew so that Roman flesh tore free of the tendons and bones that held it. The Iberians worked with their double-bladed swords, cutting arms and legs to the bone, and then through the bone, slitting unprotected bellies, spilling loops of guts about the ground. To all of this, the Romans gave as good as they received.
And so it might have carried on until one side gradually tipped the balance in its favor. But Nero, Silenus saw, played one move that changed the balance in an instant. He must have realized that the troops of his right wing, nearer to the river, were tangled in the broken ground there and could find no one to fight. Nor could they progress and keep formation. He had several of these cohorts withdraw, turn, and march behind the bulk of the army to the far end. They then turned again, moved forward, and fell upon the opposite Carthaginian side. In a few moments they caused so much mayhem that the whole battlefield shimmied away from them, rocked by a wave of confusion that must have meant little to those fighting in the center. The move, it was clear, had decided the battle. The Romans seemed to recognize that the advantage was theirs, and they fought the harder for it.
Silenus drew his eyes in nearer and searched out Hasdrubal. For some time he could not see him, but then he saw his standard and picked out his form and that of Noba beside him, both rushing to join the melee. His throat tightened so much that he could barely breathe. For the first time in his life, Silenus called upon the gods to intervene. He asked them to prove themselves just this once, to save Hasdrubal Barca from that pack of wolves. He wanted to look away. He wanted to avert his gaze so that the gods might work their magic with subtlety. And also he wanted to grasp up what he could of his scrolls and records and run with them clutched to his chest and put all the distance his bowed legs could between him and this scene.
But he did not. He could not move except with his eyes, which followed that lion standard and Hasdrubal's helmet so near it. He saw him join the thick of the fighting and saw how quickly he became the center of the battle. The Romans must have recognized him for who he was. They swarmed toward him. Silenus saw him fall, engulfed in a mass of enemy soldiers. Ten and then twenty and then more of them surrounded the spot into which he had disappeared, all of them stabbing, thrusting, shoulders and elbows popping into and out of view, reaching over each other to pierce Barca flesh over and over, as if they so feared that he would rise again that they could not stop.
Hanno had visited Cirta, the Libyan capital, as a child. Now, as his quinquereme rowed into its harbor, the city seemed smaller than it had back then. It sat low on the horizon, not so imposing as Carthage, nor as breathtaking in its situation as many of the Iberian fortresses. It was the same dull color as the soil around it, with few embellishments other than inlaid shells outlining certain portions of the walls, and bright red and orange tapestries
