A steady shower of javelins rained down on the enemy packed in front of the inner wall and more and more bodies littered the ground as the shafts of javelins spiked up like thickets of reeds. And still the Judaeans came on, emerging from the thick dust as they scrambled into the fort, and added to the tightly packed target making it impossible for the Romans to miss. Cato felt sick as he watched the slaughter. Already the ground was almost covered with dead and injured, drenched in blood, and he had to fight the impulse to order his men to stop. The dreadful killing must continue if they were to shatter the enemy’s will to fight on.

For what seemed an age the Judaeans kept coming, and those caught in the trap began to cry out in panic, and shout in frustration and rage as they could neither press forward to engage the Romans nor move back, away from the terrible rain of javelins. The constant pressure from behind, from those as yet unaware of the massacre taking place inside the fort, continued to press on those at the front, forcing them to their deaths.

Then, at last, somehow, word spread back beyond the breach and the order was given to call off the attack. Still showered with javelins and shot at with arrows the Judaeans began to retreat, pressing back as they scrambled over rubble and the bodies of their comrades until they had gone, retreating into the fading purple light of dusk. Cato sheathed his sword and gazed upon a nightmare scene of tangled bodies, javelin shafts at every angle and dark blood splashed over it all.Yet there was still life amid the tide of human destruction. Here and there bodies writhed in agony or shifted feebly as the injured moaned and cried for help, or a merciful end. Cato turned away and jumped down from the fighting platform, striding round the base of the inner wall until he reached the ladder that led up to the main wall and climbed the rungs. From the height of the wall he could see across the ground towards the enemy camp. The Judaeans were streaming away from the fort, encouraged on their way by the arrows still flying after them from the walls. A few of the enemy, more resolute than their companions, were standing their ground and whirring slings overhead as they loosed slingshot back at the Romans.