We parted, with my mind full of theimplications of what I had learned, and an ache to talk toScribonius about it, or even Balbus, for that matter. All I hadleft was Diocles, and I would not unburden myself at his expense,knowing that if things were to go horribly wrong and it was somehowdiscovered that I had divulged what I knew to my slave, he wouldpay a gruesome price. I trusted Macrinus well enough, and I wasbeginning to trust Flaminius, but neither man was as politicallyastute as Scribonius, or Diocles for that matter, so I was stuckwith this secret eating away at me and trying to determine what itmeant. What I had learned about myself over the years was thatwhile I am smart enough, I don’t have a naturally devious turn ofmind that would enable me to peel away the layers of this problemto examine them, one by one.
My brooding was interrupted by the return ofthe first of the scouting parties and, immediately upon the restarriving, I held another meeting, holding this in the fortresssince the camp was broken down by this point. Each small groupprovided its report on what had been found, and what quickly becameapparent was that while there were many spots where the men couldgather in the immediate vicinity, there were none that met all therequirements. The first need was that it be close enough to thefortress so a signal could be heard, but the position also had tobe concealed enough to hide the bulk of two Legions andauxiliaries. Granted, there would be no baggage train, and we weresending the Legion mules along as well. Still, that was a largenumber of men, taking a fair amount of space. Any spot large enoughwas within plain sight, without sufficient concealment, meaning thefirst requirement that it would be within the sound of Caldus’cornu signal was out of the question, since the only spotthat met the first requirement did not meet the second. On theopposite side of the peak of the large mountain where the fortresswas located, there was a large bowl-shaped depression at the base.As the crow flies, it was less than a mile from the fortress;however, the men would have to travel more than two miles aroundthe shoulder of the mountain, and this over a narrow, rugged track.It was Flavianus who had found this spot, making me feel bettersince he at least had a good eye for ground and could provide anaccurate estimate of the time it would take to cover thedistance.
“If the men were pushed, and pushed hard,they could make it to the fortress within athird of a watch,” hesaid. “But even on horseback, it would take a fair amount of timeto get from the fortress to let them know it was time to move.”
The crux of the problem was that we wantedto be in place, inside the fortress, ready to attack the men sentfrom Serdica to reoccupy the fortress, before they arrived. I wassure that the Serdi would have this force standing at the gate,ready to move immediately, if they did not in fact move out of thecity to a short distance away, just out of range of a possibleambush, and simply wait out in the open. However, given the lossesthey had taken when they had attempted to relieve the garrison,when they had been caught out on the road, my feeling was that theThracian commander would be cautious, suspecting a trap of somekind. Our job was to convince him that there was no such trapwaiting, and part of that was moving the men as quickly as possiblewithout being detected. It seemed that this was now in seriousjeopardy. After hearing everyone’s report, I decided I needed to bealone to think. I was giving serious consideration to calling thiswhole plan off, since there did not seem to be any way to alert thearmy to move into place and get them there in time. I climbed up tothe rampart and leaned on a crenellation, brooding about what todo, staring up at the bulk of the mountain. My eye was caught bysomething out of place, another straight line, this one a whitishline angling across the mountain face, its high point terminatingjust behind a clump of rocks just above the fortress. The lowerpoint of the line disappeared around the curve of the mountain somedistance away, and I recognized that it was a trail of some sort. Ifelt a surge of excitement, and went to find Flavianus. Bringinghim back up, I pointed to what I had found.
“Can that clump of rocks be seen from thespot you found?”
My hopes vanished with the shake of hishead.
“Farther down that trail, yes. But not fromthat spot you just showed me.”
I thought for a moment before making mydecision.
“Then that will have to do.”
That trail I had seen turned out to be notmade by man and was some sort of game trail, except I had seen nowild animals bounding about on the crags above. It was very narrow,too narrow even for a horse, meaning that men had to be found whohad experience traversing such terrain. We ended up picking fourmen who would work in pairs, one moving to a spot behind the clumpof rocks out of sight, but within hearing of the fortress. WhenCaldus sounded the signal, they would wave a red pennant that weused for signaling to the second pair, who would do the same to uswaiting below. This would be our signal to start toward thefortress and, from that point on, it would be a race to see who gotinto position first.
The army slept out in the open that nightthen, before dawn, the bucina sounded the call to begin thefinal preparations for leaving so that we began marchingimmediately after the sun rose. I sat aboard Ocelus, watching themen march by, seeming from all appearances to be giving up andleaving. The prisoners were
