All War Is One

It is bitter to be recalled to war when the fruits of peace are sweet, but an Emperor will not be denied, much less this new Hadrian.  Taking up my old sword, I kissed my brave wife and left the villa, accompanied by the wails of sobbing slaves.

I was to meet a detachment of veterans at Durovigtum, then north, to join with our new governor Falco, rebellious Picts to crush. It’s an old road that stretches on to the ruins of Camulodunum, where a British queen once slaughtered our Ninth Legion. The weather honoured that massacre by raining continuously, rather than episodically, as is the climate of this island.

Once my cloak became sodden, I sheltered under a rowan tree and rehearsed lines of Virgil’s poetry, as is my pleasure. Out of the murk marched a line of armoured legionaries. Veterans, no doubt answering the summons to war, so I called to them and joined their ranks.

“Where is your Decurion?” I asked, for no officer greeted me.

They replied not, but trudged on through the churning mud. I noticed how grim were their expressions and how their eyes burned with unblinking passion. We pressed on in silence.

“Let’s hope for a warm hearth in Durovigtum,” I told them, “for the North holds few civilised comforts.”

One turned his head to me and I recoiled, for on his brow was a wound that would be mortal to any man. Grey was his face and bloodless his lips, yet his eyes were bright and unkind.

“We go to Camulodunum,” he said, in a voice as hollow as a cracked bell, “to fight the Rebel Queen.”

I looked around and saw how broken was their armour, how tattered the pennant of the Ninth Legion, and each man pallid and blood-badged.

More silent marching, until the walls of Durovigtum emerged from the rain clouds.

“We must part,” I told my silent comrades, “you to your war and I to mine.”

The legionary turned to me and said, “Unica belli. All war is one.”

With that, they marched on, and the rain hid them from sight.

I reported to my unit but I did not seek a warm hearth. Instead, I hired a Greek to write a new will, providing for my wife and freeing my slaves, whose master left for war on a spring morning, but will surely not return.

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In AD 60, the British queen Boudicca (Boadicea) rebelled against Roman rule and her army of Celts sacked the city of Camulodunum (Colchester). A detachment of the Ninth Legion marched to save the city but was routed and massacred.

This story is set 50 years later, in 117, at the start of the Emperor Hadrian's reign, when a rising in Scotland was put down by the Governor, Falco. Veterans like our narrator would have been called out of comfortable retirement for this campaign. Durovigtum is near modern Huntingdon, a mustering site for Roman forces and a town I once lived in.