The pale light of dawn crept over the Pannonian plain, revealing the enemy. From the low hill where Constantine sat on his horse, the army of Licinius was a dark, sprawling beast, its lines of infantry held firm between the grey mist of a marsh on one side and the dark slopes of a mountain on the other. Tens of thousands of men, the veteran legions of the Danube, stood waiting. Their standards, topped with the eagles of old Rome, formed a forest of sharp, metallic points against the rising sun.
Facing them, Constantine's army of the West arrayed itself for battle, the strange Chi-Rho symbol on their shields a stark contrast to the traditional emblems of their opponents. In his command tent, the mood was tense. "He has chosen his ground perfectly, Augustus," Metellus said, gesturing to a hastily drawn map. "The marsh protects his right flank, the mountain his left. He forces us into a direct, frontal assault. He intends to bleed us white."
