I TELL STORIES

 I

October 312 CE

Urbs Roma, Capital of the Roman Empire

Four-legged and two-legged mules are as oil and water, much alike, yet quite different. A four-legged mule serves its master until death. A two-legged mule fights to the death for its master.

Four-legged mules have no cares in the world other than eating brush and tough grasses, drinking whatever water is available, dropping clods of manure without the slightest concern for where it is or what it is doing, and carrying half their weight in equipment for twenty miles a day.

The two-legged variety builds roads, aqueducts, fortifications, and defeats the enemies of Rome. He takes loving care of his four-legged kin.

Just north of Urb’s Via Nomentana Gate on a vacant field adjacent to the city’s massive Aurelian Wall, two-legged mules unloaded tents and equipment from their four-legged brethren. Centurions followed 450-year-old guidelines designating where streets and tents should be erected. After walking sixteen miles from Ostia in six hours, setting up a Polybius encampment in the sun was tedious but rewarding labor.

Lupis of Legio XV led all the mules. Strutting officers who bought their positions to enjoy prestige at banquets, delegated everyday strategy and tactics for five thousand men to him. Only he wore the combat commander’s tunic featuring three blue bands around the white linen fabric above his wrists.

Lupis’s two centurions were a few inches shorter than he and wore the same white linen long-sleeved officer tunic, but with two three-inch blue bands sewn around the lower sleeves. He rested his hands on their shoulders and said, “The men are in fine spirits.”

Caepio lifted arms to the sky. “We were just talking about how comfortable it is to feel the ground under our feet.”

Ancus added, “And a benefit we didn’t foresee when we got this miserable assignment is that it delays winter’s first shiver.”

Lupis grinned. “Yes, it’s good to close our eyes and have the sun’s lazy warmth without a ship’s constant movement or winter’s icy wind blowing in from the north.”

The thought kindled a curiosity, and he faced north to think. Legio XV was based near the Black Sea, in the Prefecture of the East under Emperor Daza’s command. Under the Roman Empire’s tetrarchy system of government, there were four governing bodies or prefectures, each ruled by an emperor. Rulers of the two western prefectures, Constantine of Britannia and Gaul, and Maxentius of Italia and Africa, were engaged in a bloody civil war. Daza’s orders were for Lupis to avoid the conflict.

Lupis turned to his centurions. “I do have concerns about the fighting north of Urbs.”

Ancus gave a sly grin. “Yes, the elephant in the room. Constantine was once stationed in our prefecture. He’s a brilliant tactician.”

Caepio wiped a hand over his short, black hair. “Lando at the stables told me Constantine’s army took Verona at summer’s end. Maxentius’s best commander died there.” His hands lifted with palms facing each other. “Constantine’s probably this close to the capital by now. Maxentius must be worried.”

Lupis glanced at the formidable Aurelian wall protecting Urbs. “Daza told me that sending Ekimmu to Maxentius is all the aid he’s willing to give. We’re to stay out of the fighting. As Africanus said, 96% of a good life is how we react to our surroundings. I want our men to enjoy the empire’s capital, not be sucked into a combat that’s not our affair.”

Caepio and Ancus nodded.

Across the Via was a broad, grassy strip extending from the city wall. It fronted the Castra Praetoria, a massive brick fortification protecting barracks for the Praetorian Guard, ten thousand highly trained soldiers who called it the Scorpions’ Den. They were Emperor Maxentius’s private legio, identified by shields emblazoned with scorpions and lightning bolts.

In front of the fort, a large group of scowling vendors was shuffling back and forth around their wheeled, linen-capped Plaustrums. They were encircled by two squads of Praetorians carrying spiculas and spathas, wearing immaculate, purple-edged white tunics. A collection of city shoppers was growing outside the Praetorians’ ring. Both groups punched their fists at the sky while spewing angry words at the Praetorians.