‘The mouth goes dry, your tongue becomes like leather. You think of the need to drink more often than the need to stay alive.’

‘Get the water out,’ she had shouted, before grabbing several servants and pushing and cajoling them into obedience. ‘See if there are any spears in the wagons, or swords, axes, anything that will serve as a weapon.’

Time had seemed to stand still, the whole effect of her words played in a slower motion that reality and she heard rather than saw the first probing attack by a detached band of Celt-Iberian tribesmen; the clash of swords on shields and metal, the hiss of spears and arrows as they sped through the air, the screams of unidentified victims as they were wounded or killed mingled with the triumphant cries of those who had delivered the blow. Claudia had been too busy to follow the course of the contest, supervising the unloading of the water butts, too occupied with buckets and ladles, organising a line of supply to the fighting men that would ensure that they had water to drink. Every sharp tool in the baggage train had been put in the hands of a person who could use it, practically doubling the number of fighters Metullus had at his disposal. And to all she had repeated the same thing.

‘We need not hold for long. My husband is at this very moment on his way to rescue us.’

It had been a while before the truth dawned. Through the dust kicked up by the tribesmen seeking to break into the circle of wagons, it was just possible to observe that the Roman legions had formed up in a hedgehog defence, shields up to the front, the rest over their heads to protect against arrows, the whole forward-moving assembly bristling with protruding spears. What they had not seen was the hastari, Aulus’s best troops, moving past the baggage train, not towards it, going to the rescue of the allied legions. Claudia could not know that on receipt of her message, her husband had had no choice but to save his army before he could think of saving her.