“Enoughl” The Caesar of the East shut his nephew up before he could say more. “You know Tribune Constantinus belongs to the Imperial Guard and you heard him say the Emperor sent him to reinforce us. Who are we to say he has not carried out his orders?” Then his eyes narrowed. “How far are the Persians behind you?”
“We lured those who were following your army into splitting their forces and destroyed more than half of them,” Constantine explained. “I think the rest decided they were too far west for comfort.”
“I am in your debt, Tribune.” The words obviously caused Galerius considerable effort.
“You would have done as much for me, sir,” Constantine said quietly. “Have I leave to billet my men and their mounts? We have come a long way.”
Galerius looked at him for a moment, and to Constantine it seemed that his shoulders drooped a little, as if the burden of ignominy put upon them by this defeat was proving very heavy indeed. Then he straightened, like the veteran soldier he was.
“You have my leave, Tribune,” he said, then added almost as if he were speaking to himself, “You have come a long way, a very long way indeed!”
Roman army
When two days passed without any evidence that the Persians intended to attack the shattered remnants of the Roman army, which had marched so boldly eastward from Antioch hardly a month earlier, Galerius decided to return to the Syrian capital and report to Diocletian, who had recently arrived there by ship from Alexandria. Resplendent in polished silver armor and wearing the purple cloak of a Caesar, he rode at the head of the troops who had not been left behind to hold a hastily erected line of fortifications at Beroea.
Just behind Galerius rode Maximin Daia, who, as Caesar’s nephew, was already regarded as the heir to his position in the East. In the next rank were Flavius Valerius Severus, who had commanded the Imperial Guard while Constantine was a cadet, Licinius Licinianus and, over his objections, King Tiridates of Armenia. Constantine had not expected an invitation to ride with the leaders and received none. Instead he rode at the head of the column of his own cavalry, well back in the line of march.
The sun was shining brightly as the long column approached Antioch from the east and turned into the broad colonnaded street the Via Caesarea bisecting the city. It was Constantine’s first visit to the Syrian capital and, as they rode along, he looked about him with interest at this ancient crossroads of the eastern world which with its seaport city of Seleucia about an hour’s ride away along the banks of the mighty Orontes River that divided Antioch in half was one of the richest and most important cities of the Roman world.
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