Justinius marched at the head of the legion, feeling strange in his new position. The sun shining down on them was cool, and a slight wind came from time to time, rustling their cloaks and refreshing them. The road under their feet was long and straight and passed easily under their sandaled paws.
He knew from personal experience that they would have to ford a river come evening if they made good progress. While they marched, Justinius’s mind kept wandering back to his dream the night before and his conversation with Aquila. His suspicions that Aquila was plotting something were growing, but he was not sure what. It kept bugging him, so much so that he didn’t pay any attention to anything else. Thoughts about what he might be up to and what his dream might mean kept swirling around and around, with the occasional thought that the dream might portend to something.
By midafternoon, one of the soldiers he had sent ahead returned, warning that he had seen rat tracks, and that trouble might lay ahead. Hoping it both wasn’t too serious, and that it would take his mind off of his thoughts, Justinius took the scout and a cohort, leaving the remainder of the legion under a mouse who was a trusted friend and respected officer.
They went on ahead of the legion at a pace that left Justinius almost breathless by the end. They passed the tracks, but didn’t see anything. He didn’t like it at all, and decided to go on further. They stopped when they came to the bridge was supposed to be.
It should have been there, but it wasn’t. The road still continued on the other side. Justinius approached the ruins of the bridge with a suspicion, and sure enough ,there were rat tracks all over the place, muddying up the ground on either side of the stone road.
A forest to their left gave shade from sun, its lengthening shadows stretching across the road, while to their right extended the plains as far as the eye could see till it stopped at the foot of mountains. Those mountains were cruel and harsh and cold year round. Justinius had once had to cross those mountains as the legions he had been serving under had been sent across them to invade a small nation which had escaped unnoticed for years.
“Did you hear anything about incursions this close to Rome?” Justinius asked the other officers. “I thought it was on the edge of our territories.” He trailed off while he tried to remember everything the emperor had said. The centurions said they had not heard of anything and were just as shocked as he was.
Justinius spun around. He thought he had heard something in some trees to their left. Sure enough, he thought he saw a large, brown tale. He pointed, but as he did, a barrage of arrows rained down on the unsuspecting cohort. Squeaks of dismay could be heard as some of the arrows found their targets—many were injured and several were killed.
They had all raised their shields as soon as their reflexes could allow, which was fast, but no sooner had they done so than a score and a half of large, brutish rats leapt out to attack, while more arrows flew over their heads. Fortunately, Justinius was able to keep his head cool in situations like this. He managed to get his men into formation and they soon slew the rats and gave chase to those in the trees.
Once the slaughter was over, Justinius walked through the carnage, inspecting the dying. Almost a score of his fine warriors had fallen, all to the initial barrage of arrows. The rats were large and ugly, and resembled the description given of the ones on the border.
Justinius was disturbed. Why were the rats so close to Rome? Why had no one done anything about them? For that matter, why didn’t anyone say anything or seem to know about them? Had the emperor lied to him, or did he truly not know? Either way it was concerning, the latter more so.
Just then another arrow hit the ground with a dull thud. Justinius sighed and looked across the river. More rats on the other side were farrow loosing at them. He gave the order to form a wall of shields. That done, he began to think of a way around this, but none came to mind. The bows of the rats were stronger than those the mice had, which meant although they were targets for the rats, they could not do anything to fight back, as all the rats had to do was stand farther than they could shoot.
It shouldn’t be too long until the rest of the legion got there. But that would not solve anything immediately. Yes they’d have thousand mice, but they could not fire arrows back at the rats effectively, nor could they easily cross the river. It was a problematic situation to say the least. Rafts would be the simplest way, but it would be time consuming. For the moment, he told the cohort to pull away from the riverbank while he thought.
“You there,” Justinius said to the scout from before, a mouse by the name of Augustus. “Do you know of any bridges or places near here where crossing is possible?”
“No sir, this is most narrow place in the river for miles in either direction, and that’s why it was chosen. There are other bridges, but it would be a long march.”
“How long?” Justinius demanded. Don’t know exactly how long, probably two or three days march at least, and that would be going as fast as possible alone.”
“That is too long,” Justinius said, “to justify the march if there is a possibility the bridges will be destroyed.”
“My thoughts sir,” Augustus agreed.
Justinius tried to think of a way out of it, but couldn’t think of a better idea than rafts. Finally giving up, he gave the order for ten legionaries to be posted behind them to wait for the legion, posted more on each side to spot any ambush before it happened, then ordered the rest to follow him into the woods. There they began to gather wood and to make rafts. With the number of mice at his disposal, building enough rafts to get enough of his soldiers over to crush the rats, then ferry the other across would not take too long.
The legion arrived an hour later. Upon their arrival, Justinius told the officers what the situation was. They were less than pleased, but agreed that crossing by raft was the best course of action. They soon had the legionaries working as swiftly as they could. A few hours later, when the sky was growing dark, enough rafts had been completed to send two and a half centuries over the river. Justinius decided to wait until it grew darker so the rats would have a harder time seeing their targets, and gave the order for the legion to get some rest and replace the sentries.
Nothing of not happened while they rested, and around midnight, under the light of a full moon and a clear sky, Justinius and those centuries he had picked began to cross the river. It had been a major set back, but he hoped to end it swiftly and without many casualties on their side. They slipped the rafts into the river and guided them as silently as they could to the other bank. The moon glinted off of their armor, which Justinius regretted, but it was better than torchlight or broad daylight.
Floating on the calm river Justinius marveled at the beauty around them. The moon was a silver orb in the sky that outshone the thousands of visible stars. The forest on either side of the river blotted out the sky, leaving a black mass on either horizon. The water was cool and he wished he could leap off the raft and bathe there, but knew with regret that that was simply not possible.
Halfway across the river there was a commotion on the other on the far bank as the rats found out what the mice were up do. Swearing oaths and cursing, the rats scrambled to repel the formidable legionaries. Squeaking in frustration—Justinius knew that it would have been impossible to get across undetected, but he had hoped—and ordered those at the front to keep their shields up as more arrows rained down. Whether some had not had their shields up or they were in a poor position, some of the arrows found their marks and mice cried out while some fell into the river.
Undeterred, the mice continued across the river with a grim determination, while spare hands helped those who had fallen onto the rafts, be they dead or still living—none were left behind. Justinius stood behind the shields and eagerly watched as the bank, and rats, drew closer. Even though the arrows were still having no effect, the rats continued to let them fly in a hopeless attempt to stop the oncoming mice. He ordered archers to return the fire once close enough to thin the rats’ numbers before they landed. He was proud of his archers. Though the rats might have the better bows, his archers were the better shot by far. By the time they reached the shore, the rats who by his count numbered around one hundred to one hundred and fifty, had lost thirty of their number.
Once they were close enough to leap off and wade to the shore, Justinius led a charge against the rats. The midnight battle was quick and brutal. And though the rats were larger in number than expected, they were soon routed soundly. Breathing hard, Justinius slew the last rat who had foolishly tried to kill him instead of running away.
Justinius walked around the rats’ campsite looking for any who were either too drunk to awake or too cowardly to fight. The rafts had been sent back to retrieve the rest of the legion as they had been fighting. They returned with more mice as Justinius and some of those who had come in the first wave searched outside the campsite. Seeing that it was unlikely to find more rats, Justinius had Octavius, who had once against preformed admirably—he would make a good officer—hold a torch for him as he went through the camp again, trying to find anything he could to explain why the rats were there.
He found nothing but foul-smelling clothes the rats had discarded as well as bones and uneaten food. Finally, he found a pouch, but it only contained coins, no note like he had been hoping, but it really was unlikely that the rats could read he admitted, few could. The coins were mostly Roman, but that was unsurprising as they were in Roman territory, and that was not any indication of who had given them. But it did make Justinius think in light of certain events.
Trying to make sense of what they had encountered that day and night, Justinius told the legion to camp for the remainder of the night, relieving those who were piloting the rafts with fresh mice as they made the trips to ferry the rest of the legion across the river. He had two remain on the other side to return to Rome and relay that the bridge had been destroyed and there had been rats this close to Rome.
Once the legion was across, Justinius went to sleep. Creeping thoughts of betrayal entered his mind before he fell asleep, and he wondered not for the first time if the roman coin had not been there by accident, and had been given to the rats by someone of Roman citizenship. It was a wild accusation, but one that could not be ignored.
The next morning, their objective was delayed once again, as a mouse stumbled into the encampment and declared that a nearby village was under attack and needed help before falling over unconscious. Justinius roused the legion immediately, and headed off in the direction of the village, not knowing whether it was rats or some other danger that awaited them.
The End for now . . . God bless
word count 2,057—total 3,808 read previous chapter here.