Read Online To Crown a Caesar (The Praetorian Series: Book II) by Edward Crichton - Free Book Online Page B
Authors: Edward Crichton
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the birth of Christ and has since been called home by the Legio XIII Gemina , and if history was at all accurate, the Legio XXI Rapax should have just moved in. Along with Galba’s Legio XV Primigenia and Vespasian’s Legio II Augusta , that accounted for four of the six legions meant to embark on the campaign.
It would be a difficult nut to crack as all that firepower would make sneaking in a challenge. Santino’s UAV would have been helpful for advanced recon, but it was no longer available so we’d have to reconnoiter the camp the old fashioned way.
Like all legion forts, it had been constructed far from the tree line, a defensive strategy that ensured an attacking force would have to abandon the natural cover provided by a tree line to enter missile fire range.
General George Washington, before he was a general and when he was still a Redcoat, had made the mistake of not clearing out the tree line around Ft. Necessity before a battle during the Seven Year’s War. The blunder had left much of his force dead, and he and his remaining men were just barely able to hold the line.
No insult to George Washington, but Romans would never make that mistake. Their camps were so efficient and practical that no matter how many legionnaires were present, the fort would always be built around the same basic principles, just scaled up.
Camps worth keeping around, like this one, generally had far la rger walls around its perimeter and were built with stone instead of wood. The higher walls would make our infiltration route more difficult, but once inside we’d instantly know our way around. The only possible snag was that we didn’t know exactly where Galba’s tent would be. Vespasian, as the overall commander of the entire army, would be staying in the praetorium this time, not him.
But the praetorium was always situated directly in the middle of the camp, set halfway along the via principalis , and it didn’t take a huge leap in logic to assume Galba would be nearby. As one of Vespasian’s legates, he was only one step below Vespasian in the chain of command, and the army’s generals would be posted near each other. All it would take is a legionnaire who valued his life more than his pride to tell us where Galba was.
Simple.
We set up our own camp about two miles inside the tree line and camouflaged our tents as well as we could. We buried them beneath a rock outcropping that jutted out over the landscape, creating a nice little space for our tents beneath. We secured large bushes around the perimeter and draped a camouflage net over everything. The site was practically invisible, and I was confident a scouting party would never spot it.
Once our hideaway was concealed, we spent a few hours resting before using the cover of night to scout the Roman camp from the trees. Using a mixture of infrared and night vision optics, we were able to identify and chart the movement of guards upon the walls. We timed their patrol route and noted in which direction they paid attention to at all points along their patrol.
At daybreak, Helena used a camera with a telephoto lens the size of a soda pop bottle to take panoramic shots of the camp and its surrounding. While she was taking her pictures, I retrieved my small journal from a cargo pocket and took some time to sketch the landscape with a few pencils. While using both sketches and photographs may seem redundant, utilizing them together was a practice indoctrinated in snipers, recon marines, and other units for decades.
We returned to camp in the early evening , having shifted our recon position a handful of times, arriving to a freshly cooked dinner delivered by Santino. He had shot, cleaned, and cooked a deer while Helena and I were away, and by the time we joined him, he was already packing leftovers in salt, preserving it for a lifetime.
We poured over the images taken earlier as we ate, quickly remembering that we were no longer dealing
It would be a difficult nut to crack as all that firepower would make sneaking in a challenge. Santino’s UAV would have been helpful for advanced recon, but it was no longer available so we’d have to reconnoiter the camp the old fashioned way.
Like all legion forts, it had been constructed far from the tree line, a defensive strategy that ensured an attacking force would have to abandon the natural cover provided by a tree line to enter missile fire range.
General George Washington, before he was a general and when he was still a Redcoat, had made the mistake of not clearing out the tree line around Ft. Necessity before a battle during the Seven Year’s War. The blunder had left much of his force dead, and he and his remaining men were just barely able to hold the line.
No insult to George Washington, but Romans would never make that mistake. Their camps were so efficient and practical that no matter how many legionnaires were present, the fort would always be built around the same basic principles, just scaled up.
Camps worth keeping around, like this one, generally had far la rger walls around its perimeter and were built with stone instead of wood. The higher walls would make our infiltration route more difficult, but once inside we’d instantly know our way around. The only possible snag was that we didn’t know exactly where Galba’s tent would be. Vespasian, as the overall commander of the entire army, would be staying in the praetorium this time, not him.
But the praetorium was always situated directly in the middle of the camp, set halfway along the via principalis , and it didn’t take a huge leap in logic to assume Galba would be nearby. As one of Vespasian’s legates, he was only one step below Vespasian in the chain of command, and the army’s generals would be posted near each other. All it would take is a legionnaire who valued his life more than his pride to tell us where Galba was.
Simple.
We set up our own camp about two miles inside the tree line and camouflaged our tents as well as we could. We buried them beneath a rock outcropping that jutted out over the landscape, creating a nice little space for our tents beneath. We secured large bushes around the perimeter and draped a camouflage net over everything. The site was practically invisible, and I was confident a scouting party would never spot it.
Once our hideaway was concealed, we spent a few hours resting before using the cover of night to scout the Roman camp from the trees. Using a mixture of infrared and night vision optics, we were able to identify and chart the movement of guards upon the walls. We timed their patrol route and noted in which direction they paid attention to at all points along their patrol.
At daybreak, Helena used a camera with a telephoto lens the size of a soda pop bottle to take panoramic shots of the camp and its surrounding. While she was taking her pictures, I retrieved my small journal from a cargo pocket and took some time to sketch the landscape with a few pencils. While using both sketches and photographs may seem redundant, utilizing them together was a practice indoctrinated in snipers, recon marines, and other units for decades.
We returned to camp in the early evening , having shifted our recon position a handful of times, arriving to a freshly cooked dinner delivered by Santino. He had shot, cleaned, and cooked a deer while Helena and I were away, and by the time we joined him, he was already packing leftovers in salt, preserving it for a lifetime.
We poured over the images taken earlier as we ate, quickly remembering that we were no longer dealing
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