The Slave King

by Peter Darman

  ‘It might be best if you stayed in camp today,’ I told him.

  ‘Best for whom?’ he asked. ‘Not for the wounded who will not be treated if I am not near them to do administer said treatment. Have you devised a novel way to fight battles that does not result in casualties?’

  ‘I could order you to remain in camp,’ I told him, in no mood for his levity and sarcasm.

  ‘You could, and I could choose to ignore you. I will see you after the battle, the gods willing. Take care of yourself, Gallia.’

  With that he strolled away, leaving me fuming.

  ‘Sometimes, I wonder why I tolerate him.’

  ‘You tolerate him because he is an old and loyal friend,’ said Gallia. ‘Something troubles you. What is it?’

  ‘Nothing.’

  But she knew me too well and as trumpets blared and the sound of thousands of hobnailed sandals treading the earth filled the air, she stared in silence at me, waiting for me to crumble.

  ‘The other night, Marduk showed himself and warned me about the two eagles. The banner of Artaxias is emblazoned with two eagles.’

  ‘The gods speak in riddles, Pacorus, and they tease us. Perhaps it means nothing.’

  ‘And perhaps he foretells our death.’

  She smiled. ‘Death roams freely on the battlefield. If we want to protect our friends and family, then order a retreat back through the gorge. The Durans and Exiles can form a rearguard to allow the rest of the army to conduct an orderly withdrawal. Do you want that?’

  ‘No.’

  She adjusted her new cuirass. ‘Then concentrate on the task in hand. You wish to save lives? Keep a clear head and put aside your emotions.’

  It was mid-morning by the time the army was fully deployed on the plain, the twenty cohorts of the Durans and Exiles forming the full extent of our battle line. A cohort in battle array consists of six centuries in line abreast, each one made up of eight ranks, ten legionaries in each rank. The frontage of a century in close order is approximately ten yards, that of a cohort seventy yards, give or take. By the time Chrestus and his officers had organised their cohorts into a continuous, spear-straight line, nearly ten thousand soldiers stood shoulder-to-shoulder over a distance of just over three-quarters of a mile. And attached to every century was a scorpion bolt thrower – one hundred and twenty of the machines ready to unleash death upon the enemy now massing on the other side of no-man’s-land.

  To the rear of each century stood medical orderlies, a stack of bolts for the scorpions and full water bottles. Further back stood two groups of soldiers, each one numbering two hundred legionaries. They were the colour parties: hand-picked men whose sole task was to protect the religious icons of the Durans and Exiles, the golden griffin and silver lion respectively. They were the army’s bravest and most experienced soldiers, veterans of many battles and campaigns, and it was perhaps ironic that on the battlefield they spent all their time away from the action defending the revered totems.

  I sat on Horns beside Akmon, behind us Joro and his cataphracts, all sporting blue plumes in their helmets. On my other side was Gallia and behind her Zenobia and the Amazons. On the right and well back from the cohorts of the Exiles that made up the right-centre and right wing of the army, stood Soter and Orobaz with the horse archers of Media and Hatra, six thousand riders in all. Also with Soter was a thousand mounted spearmen raised from the retainers who worked his estates. Media’s professional soldiers wore blue tunics and grey leggings but these horsemen wore a variety of colours and though many wore scale-armour cuirasses, others had only a shield and helmet for protection. The shields were round wooden affairs faced with hide painted black and sporting a white dragon emblem. All the horse archers of both Media and Hatra wore tunics and leggings only, with nothing on their heads and only the officers being armed with swords.

  The enemy began to mass to our front, Talib and his scouts riding up and down the line to gather as much information as possible about specific formations. But as the morning wore on two things became apparent without the aid of scouts. First, the enemy had more foot soldiers than we did because the foe’s line overlapped our own by perhaps half a mile. Second, the enemy horsemen on both flanks extended each wing for a further half-mile at least. It was an impressive spectacle, reinforced by the multi-coloured flags flying among the Armenian horse and foot, and the din of kettledrums, trumpets and foot drummers. Then, as if the enemy’s drumming was not bad enough, the sound of kettledrums came from behind.

  I turned in the saddle and rolled my eyes when I saw a row of the infernal mounted drummers in the front rank of Soter’s mounted spearmen. Gallia saw my annoyance and beamed with delight.

  ‘Perhaps Dura should have a corps of kettledrummers, Pacorus.’

  ‘They fortify the men’s courage,’ said Akmon, trying to be helpful.

  ‘Over my dead body,’ I grumbled.

  Chrestus, on foot carrying a shield, walked up as we waited for Talib to report to us.

  ‘The enemy are marshalling archers and slingers in front of their foot soldiers, majesty,’ he told me. ‘They have chased away our scouts.’

  This was confirmed by Talib who arrived moments later, bowing his head and pointing at the enemy.

  ‘The centre of the enemy line is made up of heavily armed foot soldiers, some with long spears, others with shorter ones.’

  ‘The ones with long spears are Armenians,’ Akmon told us, ‘they fight in a phalanx, like the Greeks of old.’

  ‘Flanking them are lightly armed troops,’ said Talib, ‘thousands of them, armed with a mixture of spears and axes.’

  ‘What about their horsemen?’ I asked.

  ‘A mixture of well-armed and armoured mounted spearmen and horse archers, majesty.’

  ‘No cataphracts?’ I enquired.

  ‘None that we have seen,’ he told me.

  Akmon pointed directly ahead, to a stand of red banners in the distance, behind the enemy’s foot soldiers.

  ‘If they are anywhere they will be with Artaxias.’

  How I wanted to turn and see Azad at the head of his dragon of Duran cataphracts, and how I resented Phraates at that moment for creating the situation we found ourselves in. No point in dwelling on that now.

  Focus.

  ‘Begin shooting with the scorpions,’ I told Chrestus.

  He saluted, turned and ran back to his cohorts, speaking to one of his officers and moments later a cacophony of trumpets sounding along our battle line. The war cries and taunts of the foe drowned out the sharp snaps of one hundred and twenty bolt throwers shooting at the enemy, but after two or three minutes, parties of enemy foot soldiers on the flanks of the more professional troops deployed in the middle of the opposition’s line began to dart forward. The scorpion crews would be shooting two bolts a minute: one hundred and twenty bolts hitting the foe every thirty seconds.

  ‘Come on, come on,’ I said to myself.

  Two more minutes passed and a further four hundred and eighty bolts struck the enemy line, each one finding a target in the densely packed ranks of the enemy. The arrows and pellets of the enemy archers and slingers deployed in front of the foe’s battle line began shooting back, their missiles striking mostly Duran shields, though some would invariably hit flesh and bone. But the scorpions continued to shoot, until there was a mighty cry on the enemy’s right flank and thousands of men sprinted forward.

  By the speed of their advance it was apparent they were lightly armed soldiers. They resembled a surging mob, which pointed to their lack of discipline. I could not determine their numbers but they were many and they ran at the line of cohorts like a huge wave approaching a harbour wall. For the men standing in the front ranks of the Durans it must have been a terrifying sight. That they did not turn tail and run was down to their training, their morale and an unshakeable faith in their tactics.

  Before the wild tide hit them, there were whistle blasts and the first four ranks of each century stepped forward and hurled their jav
elins, followed seconds later by the subsequent four ranks – each century hurling eighty javelins to create a thick iron rain, which the foremost enemy troops ran into. This did not halt the momentum of those following but it did create an instant barrier of bodies, over which they had to scramble to get at the Durans. The latter, shields locked and swords drawn, began stabbing their blades at those enemy soldiers, disorientated and bleeding, that had survived the javelin storm, only to be mutilated by the swift blows of the Durans.

  If the enemy troops had been disciplined professionals they would not have attempted to bludgeon their way through the ranks of the legionaries in front of them, but would rather have attempted to sweep around the end of the line of cohorts. But they were a mixture of the blood-crazed without reason or the terrified who stumbled forward blindly in their confusion.

  ‘Their left flank is attacking,’ exclaimed Akmon.

  It was the left wing of the enemy’s foot soldiers, not the horsemen on the extreme left of their line. I nodded in approval as once more a mass of lightly armed and armoured soldiers raced forward to get to grips with the Exiles on the right of our battle line. The scorpions had done their job to goad the foe and once more the enemy horde ran into a hail of javelins that took the sting out of their charge, the clatter, screams and shouts of men locked in a bloody mêlée filling the air moments later. Another sound suddenly drowned out the din of battle: multiple trumpet blasts signalling the advance of the enemy’s heavy foot soldiers.

  These troops did not rush, run or break ranks. Instead, slingers and archers in the van provided missile support to silence the accursed scorpions that had tormented them. They maintained their formation and discipline and buckled the centre of our line when the Pontic legionaries hurled their javelins moments before drawing their swords and running forward to fight Chrestus’ cohorts.

  I turned to Akmon. ‘Get your horse archers forward to support our centre.’

  Gallia had pre-empted what would happen and had led the Amazons forward to begin shooting over our centre cohorts into the ranks of the enemy. But they were only ninety women and the foe numbered thousands of heavy foot soldiers, against which our outnumbered centuries would struggle to contain. Fortunately, Akmon had also realised the danger and ordered his professional archers to support the Amazons forthwith, and within minutes nearly three hundred and fifty archers were shooting arrows into the enemy ranks.

  Those ranks comprised Armenian heavy foot, each man wearing a helmet, either mail or scale armour, carrying a round shield, and armed with a short sword and long spear. They jabbed the latter forward while protecting their torsos with their shields, which meant they out-ranged our legionaries armed with a gladius. But their phalanx formation meant there was very little room for individual spearmen to manoeuvre and thus it was relatively easy for my men to use their shields to either brush aside a spear point or use a scutum to force it down. Then a Duran or Exile could dash forward to attack an opponent with the point of his sword. My men were winning a host of small victories, but the enemy had replacements that could be fed into the mêlée whereas Chrestus had no reserves.

  ‘Enemy horsemen.’

  I turned my eyes away from the desperate battle to the front to see Akmon pointing to the right, to where a large group of riders was sweeping around our right flank.

  ‘Atrax’s rebels,’ he shouted, bitterness in his voice.

  I turned to Soter and Orobaz. ‘Now is your time, my lords.’

  They needed no second prompting, digging their knees into their horses to gallop over to their waiting men, then leading them forward into the assault. Dragon banners and those showing the white horse’s head of Hatra fluttered in the breeze as a thousand mounted spearmen and six thousand horse archers cantered forward to assault the riders who also carried dragon standards. But Soter and Orobaz did not lead their men straight at the enemy horsemen but rather broke into a gallop to head further to the right before wheeling left to ride forward and then swing around the enemy riders. Or at least they would have done had not the enemy wheeled about to withdraw, in turn luring Soter and Orobaz towards them to entice them into a trap. The move and counter-move, akin to a game of feint and counter-feint, resulted in both wings disappearing from both armies.

  A lull descended over the battlefield and the sound of combat petered out as men drew breath and pulled back all along the line. The sun was high in the sky, the breeze had dropped substantially and the temperature had risen markedly. Battle stretches every nerve and drains the reserves of muscles and limbs that had previously been feather-light. Shields, spears and swords suddenly became lead weights when battle lust wears off. Medical orderlies behind the centuries distributed water bottles to ease raging thirsts, centurions ordered those in the rear ranks to replace those in the front ranks who had been engaged in hand-to-hand fighting, and everyone steeled themselves for a renewal of hostilities.

  The Amazons and Akmon’s horse archers had also ceased shooting, Gallia riding to me to report on the situation.

  ‘We are down to one full quiver each,’ she told me, ‘we need more ammunition.’

  I gestured to Talib to attend me. He cantered up and bowed his head.

  ‘Majesty?’

  ‘You and some of your men go and find the horsemen of Media and Hatra. Pass on my compliments and inform them they are needed here, now. Go.’

  He galloped off.

  ‘That’s what happens when we don’t have disciplined troops,’ spat Gallia. ‘I curse Phraates.’

  I smiled, which vanished instantly when a new threat appeared on the left.

  Dura’s lord and their retainers, standing in a large, widely spaced group, began to move forward without my instruction or indeed that of Kalet who was sitting on his horse near me and Akmon. But he had been on too many battlefields to realise that the horsemen massing in a long line on the left were not a serious threat. He kicked his horse forward and galloped to join his friends and comrades who were now cantering towards the Armenian horsemen.

  I looked at Gallia and saw concern etched on her face, not only because Eszter was somewhere within the lightly armed riders heading directly at the enemy, but also because like me she realised the two sides were unevenly matched. Kalet and his men and indeed women were armed with recurve bows, spears, swords, axes and a few maces, though no rider carried a full complement of these weapons. None wore body armour or helmets, a few carried small black shields as used by the Agraci, and their horses were similarly unprotected.

  The enemy horsemen, in comparison, were superbly equipped. The multi-coloured banners among their ranks showed symbols dear to the Armenian people: the tree of life, the wheel of eternity and the six-pointed star. The standard showing two gold eagles flanking a gold star was the banner of the Artaxiad dynasty, but these were more ancient, revered emblems and a host of them was now bearing down on Kalet and his lords.

  ‘They will never hold them,’ remarked Joro matter-of-factly.

  I rounded on him. ‘Get your cataphracts ready.’

  The general smarted at my tone and looked at Akmon, his liege lord. The king nodded, Joro turned his horse and rode to the line of eighty cataphracts waiting patiently in the sun. He turned his head when a continuous chopping sound filled the air, signalling Kalet and his men had collided with the Armenians.

  Whatever his faults, and he had many, Kalet did not want for courage and neither did his followers. They would have seen the well-dressed ranks of the enemy, noticed the helmets, body armour, shields and lances of the thousands of horsemen charging at them, but they did not falter. Their opponents were Armenia’s lords, their sons, cousins and retainers, each one attired in scale-armour cuirasses and helmets, carrying round wooden shields faced with hide and armed with lances and swords. The wild frontier men of Dura screamed their war cries and crashed into the enemy, the initial clash unhorsing dozens of them as they were skewered on Armenian lances. Curiously, there was no exchange of arrows before the two bodies of hors
emen collided, the Armenian commander probably believing his lancers could easy swat aside the rough-looking riders who looked more like a mounted body of vagrants than soldiers. Thus began a swirling mêlée on the left flank, in the midst of which was our daughter and son-in-law.

  A blast of trumpets wrenched my attention away from the mêlée to the centre where the enemy, reorganised and refreshed, again attacked Chrestus’ tired cohorts. On the flanks of the line the hordes of Cilician war bands and light spearmen, forced once more to scramble over mounds of their own dead, were held by the disciplined centuries, which could fend off uncoordinated and wild attacks, cutting down unarmoured warriors to create yet more obstacles for those following to clamber over before they could get to grips with the Durans and Exiles.

  But in the centre it was a different manner.

  I saw the figure of Titus Tullus on a horse, a large yellow crest in his helmet, riding up and down behind his Pontic legionaries, sword in hand and urging them on. In response to his exhortations they were doing just that, fresh bodies grinding forward slowly but inexorably, tired and bloody legionaries giving ground slowly, reluctantly, but at least retaining their cohesion as they did so. The battle line in front of me was being bent inwards to resemble a concave shape. The Armenian heavy spearmen on the flanks of the Pontic legionaries were faring less well, but they too were fresh men who had replaced their battered and bested comrades who had suffered in the initial clash with the Durans and Exiles, and for this reason alone they too were able to inch forward. Slowly but surely, we were losing the battle.

  Zenobia sent a rider back to Gallia to report the Amazons had expended nearly all their ammunition, and judging by the desultory volleys coming from the ranks of the Median horse archers, so had Akmon’s men. I yelled at Horns to move and rode to the colour party guarding the Durans’ gold griffin – two hundred men standing rooted to the spot around a hundred paces from the rear of the buckling cohorts. Their commander stepped from the square and saluted. I pointed at the rear of our battle line.