My descriptions of Alexandria comedirectly from the research I did for Marching With Caesar-Civil War when Titus theElder serves with Caesar during his seven month interlude duringthe civil war, and is based on the same assumption that I made withBritannia, that not much changed in the half-century since Titusthe Elder was there. The PraefectusAugustalus was a real office created by Augustus, andGaius Gallerius was the officeholder in that period of time, andthe 22nd Legion had been inEgypt for decades at this point. Finally, the trip to theagora, and the tale told by thenameless merchant about kinnamon, which I kept in the Greek because I’msure my readers would recognize it, actually came from researchthat I have been doing for the CaesarAscending series, specifically from the bookThrough The Jade Gate-China to Rome,by John. E. Hill, which is a scholarly work about the famous SilkRoutes of the 1st and2nd Centuries C.E. I includedthis tale because, if anything, it should demonstrate that theconcept of marketing was alive and well and living in the times ofAncient Rome.
Long-time readers might also note thatthere’s not much description of terrain in this work, mainlybecause terrain doesn’t play much of a role on the ocean, and thearea around ancient Petuar is as flat as my hometown of Houston.The only real question about it is whether it was heavily forestedthen. Based on what little descriptive information I could get myhands on, it seemed that there weren’t that many forests, at leastwith trees of the type that could be used for a mast, in thevicinity. The one error I avoided was when I researched and learnedthat the only form of evergreen, Scots Pine, or as we Americanscall it Scotch Pine, is in…yes, Scotland, so I made the type oftree that was favored by ancient shipbuilders for genericmasts.
Table of Contents
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
Chapter One
When I boarded the transport, atrireme named theBrizo, along with the First andSecond Century for our return to Ubiorum, I cannot say that it waswithout a fair amount of trepidation. While I had spent severaldays on a boat, there is quite the difference between floating downthe Dubis and Rhenus, and sailing on the open sea. It was true thateveryone, from the ship master down to the lowest crewman, tookparticular pains to let us know that we would never be out of sightof the coastline, yet that certainly did not do much to ease mymind, and I did know that my Optio Saloninus had been sacrificingalmost nonstop to every maritime god he could find, both Roman andGallic. Despite the assurances of our master and crew, I could nothelp noticing how the wind got much stronger as we drifteddownriver on the Amisia; fortunately, I was so occupied withgetting the men settled in for what was only supposed to be avoyage lasting at most a week, that it was only a passing thought.There had been some discussion about how our wounded would betransported, and whether it was better for them to take the longeroverland journey or be put aboard ship. As I had learned, and themore experienced officers know as well, we inevitably lose woundedmen when they are put in a wagon that is not traveling over a goodRoman road; the constant jolting and bouncing causes sutures totear or mending bones to break again. Yes, transporting the woundedby sea can be hazardous as well because of rough seas, but it waswidely accepted that transporting them by ship would be easier onthem, and frankly, the fact that it was even a discussion is moreindicative of how we view traveling by sea.
Certainly, the Pili Priores hadharassed Primus Pilus Sacrovir, and I was right there with mycounterparts. We were even willing to offer up part of the bountythat we had been told we were going to be paid when we returned toUbiorum to bribe whoever in the praetorium was responsible for deciding whosailed and who marched. Finally, he had had enough, and it took anexplosion of his temper with us before some of my comrades acceptedthat persisting in their attempts to get the1st among the Legions whowould be marching back was a bad idea. It is not that I wasunsympathetic; I did not want to get on a ship any more than they,or our men, did, but I had recognized that it was not happening, ashad Macer, so neither of us participated in the last delegation tothe quarters of the Primus Pilus. However, there were logisticalissues concerning the transport of the wounded; specifically,whether they were going to be kept with their respective Centuriesor transported together along with the medici and Legion physicians distributed amongthem. The fact that it required nine ships for the two Legionsgoing by ship, our 1st and the21st, was a sobering reminderof the cost of what so far are the final battles against Arminius.And, despite what transpired, I still cannot fault the decision ofPrimus Pilus Sacrovir, which Germanicus approved, to put them alltogether, despite what happened. I suppose it was too much toexpect that the respective numbers of wounded meant that all of ourwounded in the 1st could bekept together, but twenty of them had to be loaded aboard the lastship of the complement belonging to the21st.
I cannot say I was surprised when Alexapproached me to ask, “Gnaeus, I’d like to be assigned to the shipthat have the wounded from our Cohort. I think I could help.”
I knew that he was right; while notquite a full medicus, Alexhad become quite skilled, something I had been told from theLegion’s chief medicushimself, but I still shook my head.
“No, I’m going to need
