The far bank of the Rhine was a different world. The Roman order of Gaul vanished, replaced by a deep, tangled wilderness. Vast, dark forests drank the sunlight, and the army's path was often choked by swampland that seemed to deaden all sound. The air grew heavy, thick with the smell of wet earth and rot. Constantine saw the caution in his men. The legionaries' discipline held, but he saw the tension in the way they scanned the oppressive woods, their grips white-knuckled on their shields. They saw a hostile, unknown land. He saw something else.
The scout reports, which others might dismiss as simple accounts of plunder, formed a different kind of map in his mind, one that showed the enemy's patterns and routines. They strike here, but draw supplies from there, he thought, piecing together the fragments. They favor ambushes in narrow valleys, which means their main encampment must be in a more open, defensible position nearby. He was not interested in chasing scattered warbands. He was hunting the heart of the tribe. He split his forces, sending Crocus and his swift cavalry on a wide flanking maneuver, while he led the main body of the legions on a direct but cautious advance, intending to pin the Franks against the banks of the river Lippe.
They found the enemy sooner than expected. The Bructeri, emboldened by their earlier successes, had gathered their warriors for another raid. The meeting was a sudden, brutal affair in a marshy clearing. The guttural war cries of the Franks erupted from the trees as thousands of warriors, clad in leather and iron, their faces painted with fearsome designs, charged forward in a great, undisciplined wave.
"Form line!" the centurions roared, their commands echoing through the clearing. The Roman legions, drilled to perfection, reacted instantly. Heavy shields locked together, creating an immovable wall of steel and wood, the tips of their spears a glittering hedge of death. The first wave of Franks crashed against this shield wall and broke upon it, their wild ferocity no match for disciplined Roman formations.
Constantine sat on his horse behind the main line, his face a cold, impassive mask, Valerius and his Protectores around him. From his position, Constantine tracked the shifting points of pressure in the battle, his eyes constantly moving. He saw a weak point on his left flank where the marshy ground was causing his cohorts to lose cohesion. He saw the Bructeri chieftains, massive, bearded men, trying to rally their warriors for another charge.
"Metellus!" Constantine's voice cut through the din. "Take the reserve cohorts, swing left. Reinforce that line before it buckles. I want no gaps." He was so focused on the tactical situation, on the grand geometry of the battle, that he failed to notice a smaller group of Frankish warriors, berserkers perhaps, who had slipped through the swamps on his right flank, ignoring the main battle line in a desperate bid to slay the enemy commander.
They burst from the treeline with savage howls, Valerius and the household guards reacting instantly to form a protective ring. But one of the warriors was faster, stronger than the rest, his two-handed axe a blur of motion. He smashed through the guard of a Protector, his wild eyes locking onto the figure of Constantine on his horse, the clear leader.
Constantine's inherited instincts screamed danger. He drew the gladius at his side, his movements swift, but the sheer ferocity of the charge was overwhelming. He deflected the first swing of the massive axe, the impact jarring his entire arm, but the warrior's follow-through was immediate. The sharpened back-spike of the axe head, designed for punching through helmets, whipped around.
Time seemed to slow. Constantine saw the spike coming. He tried to turn his head, to pull away. He was too slow.
A roaring fire of pain erupted in his head, a force so potent it threatened to overwhelm his senses and drag him down into blackness. But another part of his mind, a core of unyielding, cold reason, refused to be broken. Incapacitation now means rout, the thought cut through the agony. Rout means annihilation. That singular, cold fact became an anchor. He forced himself to move, staggering to his feet and shoving away the hands that reached to help him. The right side of his face was a mask of blood, his sight a dizzying, one-eyed perspective. But his will was a shard of ice.
His men, seeing him fall, had wavered. Seeing him rise again, a terrifying, blood-drenched figure, they roared. At that moment, the horns of Crocus's Alemanni sounded from the enemy's rear. The trap was sprung. "Advance!" Constantine roared, his voice a raw, shredded sound. "Advance and destroy them! No quarter! No prisoners!"
His words, combined with his horrifying appearance and the arrival of Crocus's cavalry, shattered the last of the Frankish resolve. The battle turned into a rout, the rout into a merciless slaughter. The Roman legions pushed forward, their spears rising and falling, while the Alemanni rode down the fleeing warriors in the woods.
By dusk, the victory was absolute. The Bructeri were broken. Their principal kings, Ascarius and Merogaisus, were captured alive. Constantine sat in his command tent, a physician carefully stitching the ruined socket of his right eye. The pain was a constant, throbbing fire, but his mind was utterly, terribly clear. He had been tested by fire and steel, and he had not been found wanting. He had paid a price, a permanent alteration to his physical self, but he had won.
Valerius entered. "Augustus, the victory is complete. The Frankish kings await your judgment." Constantine looked up, his remaining left eye glinting in the lamplight, cold and hard as a shard of obsidian. "They wished for a spectacle of Roman weakness," he said, his voice flat. "They shall, instead, become a spectacle of Roman strength. Send them to Trier in chains. The arena has been quiet for too long."