While Rusticanus had overall charge of the operation in lieu of the Commander (whose bodyguard would not protect him from fire), the Tenth Cohort’s senior centurion had been delegated tasks involving the assault proper. That meant building a gangway of solid timbers and organizing teams of men to slide it into position when required.
Which was now. Without the gangway, Vibulenus’ party and their mobile gallery could not have climbed down the fascine-bulging front of their own siege works. As it was, the descent would be a steep one for men so awkwardly burdened.
The cohort leader gave another muffled command, and the guardwalk shook with the pace of over a hundred men. The gangway was of four-inch planks, planed smooth on their upper surface so that no one would stumble in the quickmarch down from the siegeworks. The stringers were halved logs; and the whole contrivance, carried upside down, weighed the better part of a ton.
The important responses by the defenders were hidden thus far behind the tower’s crenellations, but a storm of crossbow bolts was as obvious as it was expected. The siegeworks themselves could not cover the teams moving the gangway; even the light breastwork which shielded the guardwalk had to be thrown down so that the gangway could pivot into position.
Instead, other legionaries attempted to cover their fellows with a tortoise of shields locked overhead and to the sides. Between that formation and the gangway itself which acted as a roof, the legionaries were as safe as reason expected in the heat of battle.
The defenders snapped their volleys down as quickly as they could work the levers of their bows. Each time an archer pulled his cocking handle, a claw drew back the bowstring and the wedge which retained bolts in the magazine slid out far enough to drop the lowest missile. A sear released the string automatically when the bow reached its full draw — and the archer pumped his lever to repeat the cycle.
Bolts that hit the gangway pattered. Those which struck shields thudded on plywood or rang peevishly if they glanced from a metal boss. A scream pierced the confusion of shouts and shuffling hobnails, but the advance did not pause for one casualty running to the rear with a bolt in his shoulder and the pain of poison blazing in his imagination.
“Down front!” ordered Rusticanus in a voice like a scythe. The log surface of the rampart quivered on its base of earth and wicker as soldiers butted the forward end of the gangway in the pits provided for that purpose.
“Now push, curse you!” the centurion shouted. There was a lull in the volleys of missiles from the top and arrow slits farther down the tower face: most of the defending archers had exhausted their magazines and were ripping open fresh bundles of quarrels to shake into the feed lips of their weapons. Through the snap and patter of the occasional shot came a mechanical screech and the collective wheeze of scores of men as they lifted the far end of the gangway against the fulcrum provided by its stringers bedded at the edge of the rampart.
As the gangway lifted, legionaries waiting with stout poles ran up to continue the momentum of the end which hands could no longer reach unaided. The arrow storm broke again with a viciousness that equaled its first intensity. The gangway lifted to its zenith like a wall, but it was too narrow to provide full protection. Bolts clicked against armor, and less fortunate soldiers cursed or bawled according to their temperament as points gouged their flesh.
But the gangway continued to swing upward until it paused trembling, just short of vertical. “Push!” roared Rusticanus. He reached over the back of a legionary to add the thrust of one hand while his other braced a shield studded with half a dozen quarrels already.
The unlubricated stringers rotating in adze-cut pits shrieked louder than the triumphant legionaries as the gangway crashed over the edge of the siege ramp.
Released from duty at the same instant as their major protection toppled away, soldiers ran to the rear in a diminishing shower of bolts as archers emptied their magazines again.