These men were older, and since myback was to the fire, they were fully illuminated, and I saw themilky white eye and partially missing nose of the warrior to myleft, but it was the man next to him I paid attention to because,for the first time to this point, he was not only wearing mailarmor, he was wielding a gladius, marking him as a high-ranking man ofthe Brigantes tribe. This seemed to be confirmed when he snappedsomething, and his comrade immediately began shuffling to my left,separating himself and placing me in more danger. Their slowerapproach did give me an opportunity to perform a quick scan of thispart of the town at the southeastern corner of Petuar, and I wasdismayed to see that not only had the Brigantes effected a breach,enough of them had poured through to push Ivomagus and some of themen back out of sight around the corner of the last building at thesoutheastern corner. Besides Tincommius and me, I counted about adozen Parisii who were the only thing keeping the Brigantes stillon the eastern street from rushing north towards the river to fallon the flank of the men defending the eastern gate.
When the first warrior moved, it wasnot the man to my left as I had anticipated, my assumption beingthat this nobleman would want the glory of killing the largebarbarian who was so arrogant he was not even wearing any armor, byhaving his lower-ranking comrade launch a diversion first, but itwas the nobleman who began. Fortunately, however, his attack wasessentially the same as that of every barbarian of every tribe Ihad encountered when using their version of the gladius: a high, overhead attack where theattacker brings their blade down in an attempt to split their foedown the middle. For a man in the ranks of the Legions, this is oneof the simplest attacks to counter by simply raising the shield sothat it is parallel with the blade in order to spread the forceevenly. For a Centurion, it is more difficult, but for a Centurionwhose only protection is his tunic, and using a weapon that he hasnot handled in some time? If I was forced to wager on the outcome,I would not have bet on the Centurion. This time, I did exactlywhat I should have done with my first opponent, except that I threwmyself to my right, which put my spatha out of range, but if I had gone in theopposite direction, I was certain I would have taken a spearthrough the side from the warrior to my left. My foe did reactquickly, and he managed to stop his downward stroke before itstruck the ground, while keeping his shield up in position, pulledin tightly against his body, but I had no intention of attackingyet.
When I dodged to the right, I simplykept going, essentially circling the nobleman in an attempt tothrow him off balance as he was forced to pivot. I could not makeeven a half revolution because it would place me with my back tothe thin line of Parisii struggling with those Brigantes who hadnot pushed Ivomagus down the southern street, and if one of themfell during my fight, I was likely to get a spear through the back.The nobleman spun about on one foot, taking advantage of both thelength of his blade and the fact that he had managed to arrest itsdownward movement at about waist level, changing the direction ofhis attack with an impressive speed. I leaned back at the waistjust enough, though I felt a tug around my waist as his blade sweptpast me, giving me less than an eyeblink of an advantage, becausethere was an instant where his own blade was between his shield andme. My response was to violate the rule about keeping at least onefoot planted on the ground at all times, but it was for a goodreason, and I suppose that it might have looked like I was leapingacross a ditch, so that my left foot hit the ground at least twopaces from where I had been standing. Most importantly, it placedmy torso about even with the nobleman’s gladius hand so that, even if he had respondedin time with a backhand slash, no part of his blade would havetouched me. I did not only use my legs, because as I made thisjump, I brought my spatha upand across my body, which is not a position that is taught in theLegions, then reversed the movement and brought it down and backwith all of my strength, aiming for the junction of his neck andshoulder, just above the chain mail. I was trying to decapitatehim, and I will insist with my last breath that, if I had had abetter quality blade, his head would have gone tumbling into theair; instead, it almost got me killed when it struck the bones ofhis neck and became lodged there, so that when he fell back away,his blood spurting straight up into the air before falling back ina warm, sticky shower on my face, his body weight pulled mesomewhat off balance, causing me to stumble slightly.
Perhaps the only positive thing wasthat I was facing in the right direction to see the spear-wieldingwarrior, his mustachioed face twisted in a savage grin of hatefultriumph as he drew his spear back, the point aimed directly at myface. He was well within reach, and despite the fact I saw itcoming, there was no way I could have dodged this time because ofthe awkward position I was in. Oh, perhaps I could have twisted mybody so the wound would not be immediately mortal, but it wouldhave been damaging enough to make it an
