Chapter 49 Coming up with a Plan of Action

After the incident on the borders of Italia, and the village that was slaughtered, Marcellus heavily reprimanded the Foederati for their actions, seizing their plunder for himself. However, that was the most that he could do to punish them. The truth of the matter was he needed them to win his war with Honorius, and to repel Alaric from the Empire’s borders after he had crowned himself emperor.

Without the support of the Foederati, Marcellus had an abysmal army, and could not compete with the many threats that faced Rome. However, by stealing their plunder, the foederati grew disgruntled, with only Sarus keeping their loyalties in check. Sarus himself was not bothered by the slaughter of the village, however, he had sworn his loyalty to Marcellus for the time being, and truthfully, he was slightly intimidated by the man.

Marcellus had promised the Gothic Foederati money, land, and, more importantly, vengeance. To Sarus, those things mattered far more than the paltry sum they had gained from one small town. Thus, he had used every tactic he could think of to prevent his warriors from deserting in the time following the border fiasco.

Since then Marcellus and his army had marched into Italia unopposed, forcing every village they came across to pay tribute in the form of food and other supplies. There was not much of a Roman Army left at this point, at least not under Honorius’ control. The remaining Roman forces were all in the hands of Constantine, and he was too busy with an uprising in Hispania to bother threatening the Italian Peninsula at this point.

Honorius and what little forces he had were holed up in Ravenna, believing they could outlast Marcellus and his army, and force the man to surrender by threatening his mother. However, little did Honorius know that would not work on the man.

Marcellus was smart enough to realize that his mother was already dead. Even if he surrendered himself to the mercy of the Emperor, she would not be spared. Honorius would kill the woman in front of him just to make him suffer in his last moments. Thus, all he could do was to a march on the capital and avenge the woman. He did not know that Placidia was in the middle of figuring out how to break Aeliana out from her cell.

—

Placidia sat within a room, with several guards watching over her. Since her brief spat with her brother, she had been confined to her room for most of the day. Only making appearances at meal time. This was a response to Honorius’ paranoia, who now believed his own sister had turned against him. He would not allow her to cripple his operations, and had thus kept her under house arrest in Ravenna.

As a result, she had nothing to do but spend her hours thinking of the best way on how to escape, with Aeliana in tow. The longer the woman stayed in the cold, damp, and dark dungeons, the worse she would be. She had already lost the will to live and was wasting away. Because of this, Placidia knew she had to act quickly if she were to save the woman’s life.

Little did Placidia know that the guards who were assigned to watch over her were paranoid in their own right. Word that both Alaric and the Gothic Foederati had joined forces with Marcellus, and that the man was leading a large army to Ravenna.

This was only half true, but the fear that such a massive force of Goths was being commanded by the man who was now widely recognized as Western Rome’s greatest general had caused many in the city to go mad with fear. The men were conversing by themselves on the best course of action, unaware that the girl they were guarding was eavesdropping.

“I’m telling you, we should take anything of value from the palace and flee the city. If an army of sixty thousand goths march on Ravenna, led by the infamous Goth-Slayer, we will not be enough to defend the city. They will sack us, and then they will brutally execute anyone who still works for Honorius!”

However, another man in the group was a bit more level-headed and immediately countered this claim with some solid logic and reasoning.