Alexander

by H A CULLEY

  He thrust his spear into the chest of a large tribesman and then just managed to draw his sword in time to knock an enemy spear out of the way. He felt a thump on his shield and then he was through the line of warriors. He rode clear so that he wouldn’t be in the way of the Thracians’ charge and, just as he was about to rally his men, a young boy ran at him armed with just a dagger. It was totally unexpected and Iphitos hesitated, which was disastrous. The boy slid fearlessly under the rearing horse’s front hooves and stabbed upwards into its belly. The horse screamed in agony and tried to stomp on the boy, but he was too quick and rolled out of the way. The horse was fatally wounded and collapsed onto its knees, giving its rider the chance to leap clear. He stumbled as he landed and, feeling himself losing his balance, he rolled on his left shoulder and landed on his feet.

  Before he had re-orientated himself the boy ran at him screaming in rage and he jabbed his dagger into Iphitos’ chest. Luckily the boy weighed very little and there was no real power behind the thrust. The point stuck in the glued strips of linen and didn’t penetrate. Not wanting to kill a boy who couldn’t have been more than eight or nine, Iphitos knocked him aside with his shield and the boy ended up sprawled in the dirt, his small dagger flying out of his hand to end up out of reach.

  Just at that moment several of the Pathfinders rode up and one of them was about to ride over the boy, smashing his small body into a crimson mess, but Iphitos grabbed the man’s reins and pulled the horse to a halt just in time. The taxiarch scooped up the winded boy and thrust him at the soldier who had been just about to kill him.

  ‘Take care of him, he’s got more pluck than any boy of his age that I’ve ever known; but watch out – he’s a real firebrand. Do you think you can do that without harming him?’

  The boy had recovered and was starting to squirm and wriggle, trying to bite the man who held him fast. The man grinned and brought his sword hilt down on the boy’s head, knocking him out cold.

  ‘No problem, kyrios,’ he said grinning.

  Iphitos later found out that few of the Agriani had taken their weapons with them when they stumbled, blinded by the smoke and coughing, towards the river. It was more like a massacre than a battle and two hours later it was all over. Some of the Autarati had managed to get away but most lay dead or were captives.

  Iphitos was sickened by the games that the victorious Agriani played with their captives. He expected the more attractive women to be raped but he hadn’t anticipated the joy they derived by watching helpless young men and even boys being killed by flaying them alive whilst Langarus and his men shouted encouragement, got drunk and stuffed their faces with food.

  He made sure that the young boy he had captured was kept well away from view but he did show him what was happening to the others of his tribe. The boy suddenly vomited, heaving until his stomach was empty, and then nodded his understanding.

  ‘I know that you have rescued me from suffering a gruesome and ignoble death, kyrios,’ he stuttered in broken Greek. ‘I don’t understand why, but I am grateful and I will be good.’

  Iphitos nodded. He had saved the young Agriani’s life but he had no idea what to do with him. Then he had an idea; Weylin was proving to be an excellent skeuphorus and, in the absence of an aide, he had started to use him in that capacity. However, he had more important things to think about and he tucked his half-formed idea at the back of his mind for now.

  The next morning he took his leave and headed westwards to find Alexander, sick at heart by what he had witnessed. He had been born an Illyrian and although he had been serving Macedon for over half his life, he still found it difficult to rejoice in the humiliation of what had been his people. He wondered if Parmenion had felt the same when King Philip had attacked Amphipolis, the strategos’ birthplace.

  -X-

  Alexander watched the Dardanians approach from his vantage point astride Bucephalus. Unlike the hot-headed Taulanti, Cleitus had sent his peltasts forward first to soften up the hoplites. Unfortunately for him he hadn’t seen the Macedonian position on the far bank of the river. The right flank of his peltasts were out of range but bolts from the katapeltikons and then the gastraphetes tore into them as they prepared to launch their first volley.

  Instead of concentrating on the hoplites, the Dardanian peltasts reacted with fury and turned their attention onto the Macedonian artillery. They soon realised that they were out of range as more and more bolts continued to tear into them. With a roar all of them, even those on the right flank, plunged into the river to attack their persecutors. When they emerged the artillery continued to mow them down but now the Macedonian peltasts joined in. Soon half the Dardanian peltasts were dead and they started to flee. This was the moment that the light spearmen guarding the peltasts had been waiting for and they leaped over the hastily constructed walls and ran after the enemy peltasts. Very few made it back across the river.

  Cleitus had watched the destruction of two thousand of his men impotently. He had more sense than to waste more men on trying to rescue the situation and he decided to concentrate on breaking the phalanx. After all, he had he had over fifty thousand men against Alexander’s thirty five thousand, and half of the latter were engaged fighting in the Taulanti.

  The Dardanian king tried to see what was happening on the other side of the battlefield but dust obscured it. All he could hear was the sound of fierce fighting. Then a sudden gust of wind down the gorge blew the dust away for a minute and he clearly saw the fight on the other side of the river. He had difficulty in believing what he had glimpsed. Instead of engaging the rear of the Macedonian phalanx, it appeared that most of the Taulanti were either across, or were in the process of crossing, the river. That meant that the phalanx would only be fighting on one front – his.

  Lysis watched the tribesmen swarming across the river and his heart sank. His artillery and his peltasts kept shooting into the mass of Taulanti warriors but, although they kept killing hundreds of them, there were several thousand who were climbing the bank ready to charge his position. He glanced up the hill, hoping that the light infantry stationed up there to hold the heights had seen his plight. Then he gave a sigh of relief. They had, and they were now slithering and sliding swiftly down the scree slope towards the Taulanti.

  When they crashed with tremendous momentum into the nearest tribesmen, throwing them back into their fellows, the Taulanti advance was checked. Missiles continued to strike the enemy rear ranks and more and more of them fell. A few minutes later the tide turned and they started to flee back across the river. As they scrambled up the far bank they kept going. The Taulanti had broken. Glaucias and his bodyguards tried to halt them, but it was useless and eventually he joined them in their flight back to their own lands on the Adriatic coast.

  -X-

  Alexander saw his men abandon their positions on the upper slopes above the valley and, not knowing of his artillery’s plight, cursed them, swearing to have the heads of their commanders. When he had calmed down, he realised that they didn’t appear to have been driven off the heights, so he assumed that they had gone to Lysis’ aid. When he saw them making their way slowly back up again he guessed what had happened. When he saw the dust cloud thrown up by the routed Taulanti he breathed a sigh of relief and turned his attention back to the Dardanians.

  He gave the order for the rear ranks of the phalanx to turn round and face the Dardanians and a keras blared out the discordant signal. Now the hoplites could use all sixteen ranks to rotate with those fighting in the front five rows. The Dardanians kept attacking but they were losing far, far more men than the phalanx was. The enemy also had several thousand hoplites but they were all equipped with the shorter twelve foot spear, which was no match for the sarissa.

  It was then that Ptolomy appeared at the rear of the Dardanians leading four thousand cavalrymen. The Dardanians also had cavalry, but only eight hundred of them, and they were at the rear of their army being held in reserve. They bravely turned and charged the Macedon
ians, but they stood no chance and were quickly defeated. Ptolomy saw the Dardanian king ahead of him with his escort and, giving a whoop of joy, he called to those soldiers nearest to him and galloped towards Cleitus.

  Unfortunately most of his men were busy either chasing the few enemy horsemen who had escaped or charging into the rear of the mass of tribesmen who were on foot. If Cleitus had stood his ground Ptolemy would have been in real trouble as Cleitus’ bodyguard numbered about eighty and Ptolomy only had twenty five men with him. Luckily Cleitus had decided that the battle was lost and was more interested in saving his own skin than he was in killing Ptolemy. He turned and his men fought their way through the melee to escape into the hills. Seeing him flee, his men lost heart and either surrendered or fled.

  -X-

  Iphitos had decided to make for Pelium after leaving Langarus’ camp. Without the Agriani scouts he realised that he had no idea which way to go. It was then that he thanked Zeus and Apollo that he had spared his diminutive captive.

  ‘What’s your name?’

  ‘Ondrej, what’s yours?’

  Iphitos had to restrain himself from bursting out laughing, both at the boy’s impudence and at his name, which meant virile or manly.

  ‘Well Ondrej,’ he replied when he had control over himself again, ‘I’m called Iphitos, and I’m a taxiarch in the Macedonian army although, like you, I was born in Illyria and, like you I was a captive at one time. So it would be appropriate for you to call me kyrios.’

  The boy nodded. ‘I understand, kyrios. Will I be able to become an officer like you?’

  The lad was nothing if not bold.

  ‘Perhaps, although I was the son of a noble, so that helped.’

  ‘So am I.’ The boy drew himself up proudly on the back of the small mare he had been given to ride. ‘My father was the brother of our king. I saw both him and my father fall,’ he added sadly. ‘That was why I was so mad and attacked you; I was foolish.’

  ‘Yes, you were, Ondrej, but you were also very brave. Now I have two people I would like you to meet.’

  He beckoned Theon and Enyo over to join him and he introduced Ondrej to them.

  ‘Ondrej, Enyo is my daughter and Theon her husband. I want you to help them by finding a safe way for us through these hills to Pelium on the River Apsos. Do you know where that is?’

  To his relief the little boy nodded.

  ‘I don’t know where Pelium is, but I know my way from here to the Apsos. I’ve been to a trading post on the river with my father twice to sell some of our produce. He made me memorise the route.’

  At the mention of his dead father the boy’s face crumpled but he squared his shoulders and blinked back the incipient tears.

  True to his word, Ondrej took them straight to the river and then they followed it to the fortress. When they got there Iphitos found Alexander’s army laying siege to it.

  ‘Iphitos, what are you doing here?’ Parmenion asked him when he rode into camp with his men.

  ‘I couldn’t stand being with that savage Langarus a moment longer but, don’t worry, the Auterati have been virtually destroyed. When I left those savages were flaying alive those who had been captured. Doubtless they’ll tire of their unpleasant sport after a while and sell the rest into slavery.’

  ‘Well, that’s excellent news. Be careful how you report it to Alexander though. He thinks a lot of Langarus and it wouldn’t do you any good to criticize him. He might remember that you’re an Illyrian too, so tread carefully. He seems to have taken against Kleandros because he’s an Illyrian.’

  ‘Thank you for the warning, Parmenion. Why is he like a bear with a sore head though?’

  ‘He blames himself for our losses defeating the Dardanians and the Taulanti. I warned him he was walking into an ambush but he wouldn’t listen. He called me a cautious old woman.’

  In fact Alexander seemed buoyed up by the news of the elimination of the Auterati as a fighting force. His elation didn’t last long though. Two days later a messenger arrived from Pella with devastating news. Thebes had risen in revolt, expelled the Macedonian garrison and Athens were on the brink of joining them.

  As if that wasn’t bad enough, it had been Olympias who had sent the messenger, not Antipater, who he had left as regent. He began to wonder about Antipater’s loyalty.

  -X-

  Desmosthenes of Athens had sparked off the revolt. He had agents in Illyria with Cleitus and, when they reported back to him that Alexander was marching into a trap, he announced in the Athenian Assembly that Alexander had been killed and that Macedon was about erupt into civil war between the claimants for the vacant throne, Antipater being one of them .

  It was, of course, completely false and the Athenians demanded proof before they acted; not so Thebes. They had never forgiven Alexander for his destruction of the Sacred Band and the citizens immediately attacked the acropolis. The Macedonian chiliarch was a coward and sued for a truce. He was allowed to depart with his mixed force of Macedonian and Thessalian hoplites, but without their weapons and armour. Thebes immediately began to mobilise for war.

  Alexander threw a fit when he heard the news.

  ‘Am I never to be rid of these traitors so that I can lead Greece against Persia, our real enemy? Must Hellenes always fight against fellow Hellenes?’

  He brooded for some time, pacing up and down in his rage until eventually he mastered it.

  ‘We can’t stay here. Hector, go and fetch Lysis.’

  When his master of artillery arrived, Alexander clapped him over the shoulder. It was a gesture of friendliness he had never displayed towards him in the past and which made Lysis a trifle nervous.

  ‘We need to settle matters here in a hurry, Lysis, so that I can go and deal with Thebes. I’ve therefore decided to destroy Pelium instead of trying to recapture it. It shouldn’t be too difficult as it’s built of wood. I want you to prepare to rain fire down on it and burn it to the ground. Can you do that?’

  ‘Well, we have quite a lot of amphorae of olive oil and I’m told that there is a marsh not far from here that seems to have tar bubbling out of the ground. We could collect that in jars. If we hurl them into the fortress so that the buildings are doused in oil and tar, fire arrows can ignite it. That should do the trick.’

  ‘Good! Excellent in fact. You have four days to prepare; will that suffice.’

  ‘I’ll do my best basileus. Perhaps I could borrow Iphitos? He has more experience than I do with fire.’

  ‘I was going to send him down through Thessaly to find out whether the Gates of Fire have fallen to the Thebans, but I can send Philomedes with Theon and Enyo. Very well. Don’t stand there looking gormless, get on with it.’

  ‘Yes basileus; straight away.’

  Iphitos wasn’t happy at first. Philomedes was still quite young to be given command of such an important reconnaissance mission; besides he had only just recovered from his wounds. He would have liked to have gone himself, instead of holding Lysis’ hand.

  In the end it was a simple enough matter, if a very mucky one, to collect the tar in clay pots and then shoot them over the wall along with most of the amphorae of oil. This was done at night by the light of a full moon so as to cause the maximum panic inside the fortress.

  When the fire arrows arced over the wall the buildings caught light instantly and the fire spread throughout the fortress. The wind from the north fanned the flames and it wasn’t long before the inhabitants, military and civilian, gave up trying to put the fires out and filed out of the gates, dejected and covered in soot, before being rounded up.

  A week later two parties left Pelium; the smaller one escorting the captives to the slave markets and the other, Alexander’s army of thirty thousand, making their way to Thessaly and thence to Boeotia and its primary city of Thebes. Iphitos went with Alexander, once more his chief engineer and master of artillery. Kleandros was left behind with a thousand light spearmen and peltasts to build a new fortress, this time out of stone, to gua
rd the route from Illyria down into Macedon. Lysis retained his post in charge of the artillery, but under Iphitos.

  Chapter Seventeen – Theban Sunset

  December 335 BC

  Philomedes sat tall in the saddle, Enyo on one side of him with Theon and the diminutive Ondrej on the other. Since the trek through the Illyrian hills to Pelium Ondrej seemed to have attached himself to them as a third member of the team. Both of them had become fond of him and found him to be both clever and useful, and not just as their willing servant. He had a keen pair of eyes and his smaller form, even when mounted on his mare, was more unobtrusive.

  Thanks largely to Myrto’s care of him, Philomedes was now fully recovered with just a slight tightness in the muscles on one side of his torso and a livid scar to remind him of his near brush with death. He was inordinately proud of commanding not only his Pathfinders but also a tetrachium of Thracian light cavalry to act as his scouts.

  The mission was straightforward enough. He was to find out if the Hot Gates and the route in Boeotia were still controlled by the Macedonian chiliarch who had been left in command of the fort controlling the narrow track between the mountains and the sea or not. If not, Alexander faced a long and laborious trek up the goat tracks through the mountains guided by Philomedes, Enyo and her brother Georgios. This would take time in which news that he was still very much alive and on his way would filter through to Thebes. He was anxious that this didn’t happen; he wanted to surprise that treacherous city, and that meant speed was of the essence.

  The problem he faced was discovering who now controlled the fort without giving away the fact that Alexander’s scouts were in the area.

  ‘I suggest we climb above the fort on the goat tracks and spy on it from there,’ Enyo suggested.

  ‘That won’t tell us who commands the soldiers in the fort though, not unless they are clearly dressed like Thebans, and that might be difficult to spot at a distance. Or they might be Thessalians who have thrown in their lot with Thebes; it’s happened before.’