The Wald Read Online Free Page A

on a broad, level training ground that had been cleared to hold all the officers of two of Caesar’s legions.  The sun had risen hours ago and his fellow leaders assembled as instructed, standing in complete silence since then.  To make a noise would be to draw the ire of more senior men and perhaps a cane or leather thong whipped across the shoulders.  Septimus had to keep reminding himself that his recent promotion had brought him rank among the more senior officers.  It would not do to have one newly minted centurion to be flogged like a common legionary.
    Eventually, his belly told him that he needed a midday ration, but his discipline allowed him to stand without wavering.  Septimus was buried in the center of all the centurions , and so the day’s breeze never touched him. Sweat formed under his chain mail cuirass.  He waited for the commander of Rome’s northern legions to speak.
    Drusus must have been delayed in his meeting with Augustus.  Whatever the two men had planned it was of immense proportions to bring the emperor into the frontier filth of his realm from the comforts of Rome and her paved streets.  Of course, Augustus the Caesar had been a soldier in the field, but Septimus imagined that it was hard to remain sharp after so many years spent in the drudgery of administration.
    Not that Oppidum Ubiorum was all bad.  Since the Germanic uprising and invasion of Gaul three years earlier, what was once a stinking outpost for a few soldiers and their Germanic allies, the Ubians, was swiftly growing into a hub of Roman culture, with the massive architecture to prove it.   Septimus watched as distant artisans, imported from Rome, worked on the finishing touches of one of what would become many temples to the gods that would cluster around the city’s geometric center.  The centurion thought that one day this city, without any further military expeditions, may be enough for Drusus to turn the wild tribes from enemies into proper subjects.  Its mere presence, mere influence, mere commerce of breads, gold, pottery, steel, slaves, and women would be enough to tame the wretched Germanic beasts.  The thought made Septimus visibly cringe as forgoing conflict would mean weeks or years of tedium in the barracks.
    Septimus had fought under Drusus before , even seeing him ride past once while Septimus was supervising the digging of a new latrine.  He was there two years earlier when Drusus and his famously-silent older brother, Tiberius, founded Vindelicorum to secure the Alpine passes south of the Danuvius for the emperor.  Drusus had a solid reputation among the men despite everyone knowing that his position was not earned from valor, but rather patronage.  He was the adopted son of Caesar Augustus.  So was Tiberius for that matter.
    That day as he stood under the clear sky was to be Septimus’ first time to hear Drusus, the new governor of Gaul and commander-in-chief of its military forces, speak.  It would have been a lie to say he wasn’t nervous, but Septimus made certain to show no anxiety.
    A flash of movement returned his attention to the raised platform from which the governor would address the men.  A young man, perhaps twenty-five, strode to the center of the dais with all the confidence that comes with station.  Even if Septimus had never seen him before, he would have known his commander by his carriage, head held high, not a single wrinkle in his deep red cape, and muscled armor that had the sheen that comes from the toil of a slave’s scrubbing.
    The officers spontaneously cheered.  It was heartfelt, the kind that a leader earns from his decisions and actions, not the sort that comes from mere position.  Septimus joined in the clapping, genuinely glad that the orders given that afternoon would be divided and sliced until the century he commanded received its task list for some grand campaign, hopefully across the Rhenus to the heart of Germania and its tribes, the Sugambrians, the