Dawn of a New Rome
Chapter 47: The Hard Pursuit

Chapter 47: The Hard Pursuit

Dawn after the battle of Cibalae broke not with the promise of glory, but with the stench of death. The pale morning light revealed the true cost of Constantine’s victory. The plain was a ghastly, sprawling tapestry of twisted bodies and broken wargear. Thousands of men, from his own Western legions and from Licinius’s Danubian army, lay still upon the churned, blood-soaked earth. The air was thick with the groans of the wounded, a sound that no cheer of victory could entirely drown out.

Constantine walked through the makeshift medical tents, his face a granite mask. Physicians and their orderlies moved through a nightmare of suffering, setting bones, stitching gaping wounds, and offering wine to those whose journey was clearly at its end. He saw men who had followed him from Britannia, their faces pale with shock and pain. He saw Gallic legionaries and Alemanni warriors, all of whom had bled for his ambition on this Pannonian field. He acknowledged their salutes with a curt nod, his single eye taking in the sheer scale of the butchery. This was nothing like the swift, decisive victories against Maxentius. This was a war against a true peer, and the price was terrifyingly high.

Metellus brought him the casualty reports. The numbers were grim. Nearly a quarter of his army was dead or too grievously wounded to fight again. "We paid for every foot of ground in blood, Augustus," the tribune said, his voice heavy with fatigue. "Licinius’s men are as tough as old iron." "Iron can be broken," Constantine replied, though the elation of the previous day’s victory had been replaced by a cold, pragmatic anger. He had won, but Licinius had made him pay dearly for it.

In the ensuing council of war, the mood was sober. "We hold the field. We have won a great victory," Metellus argued, his pragmatism evident. "Let us consolidate our gains. We can claim all of Pannonia. We should rest the army, refit the legions, and secure our position. Licinius is hurt badly; he will not trouble us again for some time."

Crocus, restless and eager, disagreed vehemently. "A wounded wolf must be hunted to its lair and finished!" the Alemannic king insisted. "If you let him lick his wounds, he will only return with sharper fangs. We have him on the run! We must not stop!"

Constantine listened to both arguments, his gaze fixed on the map. Metellus’s counsel was sensible, the safe, conventional path. But Constantine knew that his greatest weapon was momentum, the belief in his own invincibility that now burned in the hearts of his soldiers. To stop now would be to relinquish that advantage. It would give Licinius time to rally his forces, to gather new legions from his vast eastern territories. "We pursue," Constantine stated, his voice quiet but absolute, cutting off all further debate. "Crocus is right. A wounded enemy is the most dangerous if given time to recover. We will give Licinius no rest, no sanctuary. We will hound him until his army collapses or he is forced to turn and fight again. Prepare the men. We march within the hour."

The pursuit became a grim testament to Licinius’s skill as a commander. Each day, the army would come upon another obstacle left in his wake. One day it was a stone bridge over a deep ravine, its central arch expertly demolished, forcing Constantine’s engineers to spend precious hours constructing a pontoon replacement. The next, they would march into a village to find the granary a smoking ruin and the local well fouled with carrion. Metellus rode up to Constantine as they surveyed one such desolate town. "He bleeds us with every step, Augustus. Our supplies dwindle." Constantine stared at the scorched earth, his face unmoved by the desolation. "Then we will march faster," he replied, his voice flat. "Order the men forward. No rest until we reach the next river crossing."

Days into the hard chase, as they made camp near the Thracian border, a small party approached under a flag of truce. It was an envoy from Licinius. The man, a high-ranking court official named Mestrianus, was brought before Constantine. He offered a message of peace. "The Augustus Licinius acknowledges your valor and the fortune of the day at Cibalae," Mestrianus began, his tone respectful. "He sees no need for further Roman blood to be spilled by Romans. To secure peace, he is prepared to cede to you all the provinces of Pannonia and Illyricum. He asks only to retain Thrace, and his domains in Asia and Egypt, and for this destructive war to end."

It was a staggering offer. Licinius was willing to surrender nearly all of his European territory in exchange for peace. Metellus shot Constantine a look that clearly urged him to accept. Constantine listened to the entire proposal without a word, his face unreadable. When the envoy finished, he was silent for a long moment. "Your master offers me what I have already taken by force of arms," Constantine said at last, his voice dripping with cold contempt. "He offers me provinces his legions could not hold, and asks to keep the wealthiest parts of the Empire for himself. This is not an offer of peace. It is the plea of a defeated man hoping to salvage his pride."

He stood and walked to his map. "Here is my counter-proposal. Tell your master this. He will cede to me all his European provinces, without exception. He will confine himself to Asia. Furthermore," Constantine added, his voice dropping, "he elevated a man named Valerius Valens to the rank of Caesar to legitimize his own position after the battle. I do not recognize this appointment. Licinius will depose and execute this Valens as a sign of his good faith."

The envoy stared, horrified. The demand was not for peace, but for utter capitulation. "My army will continue its march while your master considers my terms," Constantine said, dismissing the man with a wave of his hand. He had thrown the offer back in Licinius’s face, demanding terms that were all but impossible to accept. He did not want a negotiated peace. He wanted total victory, and he was willing to gamble the lives of thousands more of his men to achieve it. The pursuit continued.