Battle of Naissus
The Luna and a huge fire atop the Pharos of Alexandria illuminated the calm waters of the entrance of the Canopic branch, twenty miles from the city. It was the darkest part of the night, and the eerie, silent delta of the mighty river was barely disturbed by the faint sounds of twenty oars of two small boats quietly approaching the mouth of the Nilus.
Odokar touched the surface of the water again, testing the salinity and temperature. He was born and spent his entire life at the mouth of the Danapris River, sailing across Lake Maeotis and northern Pontus Euxinus. He knew well how to feel the change where the fresh water of the river and the salty seawater meet. He cursed the light from the lighthouse, but the decision to row to this very watery branch was the only choice, knowing that the other six channels were quite deserted and that only here did they have a chance of what he had in mind. He glanced at his small band of lightly armed soldiers. They were all strong men in their prime who had been rowing for quite some time without stopping, showing no sign of fatigue. He personally selected the strongest Gadrauht soldiers for this mission. They were loyal, both to him and to their homeland, and above all, he knew they would obey his orders no matter what.
When they sank their ship a few miles north and continued their journey in these small boats, Odokar, for a moment, felt a slight doubt about the success of the mission, but if the information proved correct, perhaps for the first time in several generations of all the Gothic nations, especially his Herulians, they would have a fighting chance against the mighty Roman legions. Both his and his men's lives are worth nothing compared to what would come from their success in the upcoming days and months.
As they slid into the fresh waters of the river, he instructed both helmsmen to stay on the starboard side of the river, which was nearly a thousand feet wide and even wider at many bends and straights. The first settlement appeared after five miles on the Alexandrian side, and they passed it quietly without any disturbance. Odokar was well prepared for what awaited them most of the way downstream. His informant had taught him all he needed to know, and he knew that this city was called Rashid and that they were about a hundred miles from the Babylonian fortification, which was the main Roman stronghold and the last major one in the great river delta.
The first rays of light, with dawn coming earlier and earlier each day since they had set out from Scythian territory, not far from the northern border of the Roman Empire, were approaching quickly, and he felt that they were rapidly losing time. He was deep in thought, trying to come up with a different plan in case their luck ran out, when his men saw the first glimmer of light coming from a campfire on the other side of the water. He signaled for them to start rowing toward it, and they soon found a place to tie up their boats beside two date palms with plenty of room to safely disembark between them.
"Edgar!" Odokar pointed to his most loyal Gadrauht and childhood friend, who was the leader of the other boat. "Take two of your men and come with me. The rest of you, stay here and prepare for the call."
The four of them cautiously approached the camp, and the first thing they saw was several camels lined up in a circle with dozens of people in the middle, most of them sleeping, and a few busy preparing food and repacking goods and supplies.
"Libyans." Odokar cursed and gestured for them to get back into the boats. As soon as they were aboard, they set off upstream again, this time rowing along the left bank of the river as close to shore as possible.
Dawn had already begun to change the eastern sky from pitch black to variations of gray and blue when their luck turned after two more scouting trips to the coast, sparked by campfires of two more Bedouin camps. Odokar and Edgar, huddled a hundred feet behind dense palm trees, finally caught sight of what they had been hoping for all along. Three contubernium units of Roman legionaries had set up camp for the night on their way north, probably to Alexandria, or downriver to Babylon.
Edgar quietly returned to the river and organized his men for the raid. One group joined Odokar a few moments later, while Edgar led ten others around the camp in a wide arc and took up position on the western side. Soon both sides were crawling towards the camp in perfect sync, stopping just ten feet from the nearest legionary. Odokar and two of his men took out their crossbows and, in perfect unison, shot dead three guards who were sitting around the fire, keeping it alive and chatting lazily, not expecting any danger from the direction of the river.
The massacre that followed lasted only a few moments, exactly the time it took for the Goths to tower over each sleeping legionary, killing them with a few stabs directly to the back of the head or by brutal strangulation if their sleeping position made it easier. It was obvious that they were careful not to pierce their tunics and the thick leather parts of their armor, the belts and girdles that held the metal components together.
Odokar did not participate in the bloody raid. It was not because his instincts or morals could not bear it. He had had his share of raids over the last decade or more, during many scouting missions in the Roman territories below the Danube. First as a young Gadrauht himself, and then as a leader deep into the Dacian and Thracian lands. The last scouting mission had taken place last year in the southern parts of Moesia Superior, where information was obtained on the size of Roman mining facilities and the routes of Roman cohorts.
His mother was Greek, and she met his father during a more or less peaceful coexistence with Roman legionaries in their neighboring provinces. During these periods, he was an experienced sailor and shipmaster of a captured Greek corbita. He undertook numerous trading expeditions in the western Pontus, as far south as Byzantium. The trade goods transported to Roman cities mainly included high-quality furs, amber, and meat. His corbita was medium-sized but large enough to trade horses and slaves. His mother was an important part of the Gothic trading community. Not only because of her obvious translation skills but also because of her crucial knowledge of Roman customs. She was directly involved in trade negotiations and the exchange of goods in Roman ports.
Unfortunately, several scouting missions failed for various reasons and did not return. Some of their people were captured, and the Romans managed to learn the routes of entry of the Goths, primarily via the Danubius, but also those who entered Roman territory by infiltrating merchant ships. One of the last trading voyages had occurred nearly twenty years earlier when the Roman legionaries had boarded their ships as soon as they had dropped anchors at the large port of Odessus in southern Moesia Inferior. His father's ship was the largest at the head of the small armada of merchant ships of the day.
Odokar was only 12 years old when he witnessed the cruelty of Roman soldiers from the command post of the Corbita after they discovered the Gadrauchts in the cargo hold. They brutally killed them all, as well as the entire crew, including his father, sparing only his mother and him and several other children and women from other ships. That same day they ended up in Roman dungeons as slaves. It took him five years to escape and get his head out alive and another two to find his way to Scythian territory. His mother was not so lucky. She died of an infectious disease while doing the hardest jobs for wealthy families.
The Romans had banned trade and imposed an annual tribute two decades earlier on main Gothic settlements, hoping it would stop looting and raiding. But it was irregular, miserable, and offensive, to say the least.
The time has come to put an end to it.
He snapped out of his thoughts and watched for a while as his men buried the dead in a pit they had quickly dug in the mud.
"Make sure everyone is clean and well-shaven!" He shouted to Edgar and went to the pile of Roman uniforms and armor to find some that were his size. Fortunately, one of the three decanus commanders of the contubernium units was his height and build, and he quickly donned the uniform.
The sun was quickly rising from the horizon behind the Canopus arm of the mighty Nilus. Odokar would have been happier if they were already on their way, but Gadrauchtus' transformation into legionaries took much longer than he had expected. It didn't matter. They were fortunate to carry out their plan under cover of darkness; otherwise, it would have been much more complicated if they had had to travel and hide during the day in search of a suitable unit of legionaries. His source had told him that contuberniums were common along the river line, but the river delta was still a hundred miles long, and he had some doubts at first.
But now it was all over. Odokar mounted his horse and joined Edgar at the head of the small military unit. Turning to his men, he said a short prayer to the god of war, "Teiws, we are in your mighty hands now. Accept our sacrifice in the name of our forefathers!"
A religious chant erupted, slowly at first, but as they repeated the hymns of praise to the close presence of the ancestral spirits, the words became louder and louder until the thunderous chorus melted into sand and water and became almost otherworldly. For the twenty Gadrauhts, this meant only one thing. A promise. That the end was only their new beginning. Theirs, but also the new beginning and final unity of all their peoples that they desperately needed.
When their prayers finally fell silent, they quietly set off south on a journey of nearly seven hundred miles. Perhaps even more.