And, his army being now reinforced by the garrison of his own county town of Tarentum, under the command of brave Ragnaris, he surprised the superior force of the Byzantines, which was about to march upon Cumæ, and defeated them with great loss. He himself slew the Archon Armatus with his battle-axe, and at his side young Adalgoth ran Dorotheos through with his spear. The Byzantines were routed, and fled northwards to Terracina.
It was the last ray of sunshine cast by the God of Victory upon the blue banner of the Goths.
The next day King Teja entered Cumæ. Totila, upon his last fatal march from Rome, had decided, at the instance of Teja, and contrary to his custom, to take with him hostages from that city. No one knew what had become of them.
On the evening of his entry into Cumæ, King Teja ordered the walled-up garden of the Castle of Cumæ to be broken open. There were hidden the hostages from Rome: patricians and senators--among them Maximus, Cyprianus, Opilio, Rusticus, and Fidelius, the most distinguished men of the Senate--in all they numbered three hundred. All were members of the old league against the Goths.
Teja ordered the Goths who had lately escaped from Rome to tell these hostages how the Romans, persuaded by envoys sent by Narses, had one night risen in revolt, had murdered all the Goths upon whom they could lay hands, even the women and children, and had driven the rest into the Moles Hadriani.
The King fastened such a terrible look upon the trembling hostages, as they listened to this news, that two of them could not endure to wait till the end, but then and there killed themselves by dashing their heads against the stony walls which surrounded them.
When the Goths from Rome had sworn to the truth of their story, the King silently turned away and left the garden. An hour after, the heads of the three hundred hostages stared ghastly down from the summit of the walls.
"It was not alone to fulfil this terrible judgment that I came here," Teja said to Adalgoth: "I have also to reveal a sacred secret."
And he invited him and the other leaders of the troops to a solemn and joyless midnight banquet. When the sad feast was over, the King made a sign to old Hildebrand, who nodded, and took a dimly burning torch from the iron ring into which it was stuck on the centre column of the vaulted hall, saying:
"Follow me, children of these latter days, and take your shields with you."