Sands of Egypt

by S. J. A. Turney

  The army spread out in the valley below, filling it from slope to slope and stretching back into the heat haze with the baggage train still invisible. His gaze rose east to the pass and the hills beyond. Some three days march that way, if reports were to be believed, Pharnaces waited with an army twice the size of theirs. Caesar was brimming with confidence, and it was honest confidence too, not a show of bravado for the likes of Calvinus and Deiotarus. Fronto had known the man long enough to tell the difference. Fronto was less full of confidence, and disinclined towards shows of bravado. Pharnaces’ men might be inferior, but the odds were still stacked in his favour, and this was his land. Fronto had learned time and again that an army imperils itself if it faces an enemy on their home ground. Any general knew that.

  ‘We shall overnight here,’ Caesar said, sitting astride his white mare on the peak at the valley side facing the city, officers gathered around him. He turned to Deiotarus. ‘It is acceptable that the army encamps in the valley? This will not impede your citizens?’

  The king smiled. Geared for war, he now looked totally different to the poor supplicant who had met them on their arrival. Like some Macedonian conqueror of old, yet with nods to his Gaulish origin, he gestured towards the city.

  ‘Taouion relies little upon fertile land, Caesar, for there is so little of it. Goats and hill beasts are their diet, and the rest comes in trade for the minerals mined all about. Indeed, if your officers allow it, the people of the city will be grateful for the opportunity to trade with the soldiers.’

  Caesar nodded and turned to Cassius. ‘See to it that orders are distributed. The locals are permitted to approach and to set up their stalls and trade with the men. The usual warnings against fights and drunkenness, mind.’

  Cassius saluted and walked his horse off down the slope towards the massing army.

  ‘You know Pharnaces?’ Caesar said, peering off into the distance.

  Deiotarus shrugged. ‘We have crossed paths, not just on the field of battle.’

  ‘What is he like. As a man, I mean. Not as a ruler.’

  ‘Arrogant. Headstrong and arrogant. Indeed, if it were Pharnaces himself leading his army, I would say that we have little to worry about, Consul. He could easily be goaded, and might act with dangerous rashness. Unfortunately he is also no fool, and his army is commanded by competent men. Still, there is in the Bosporan character a certain impetus to immediacy that might work against them.’

  ‘Is he wily? Will he attempt to gain through deviousness as well as through war?’

  The king pursed his lips. ‘I would not put it past the man, certainly. After all, Rome has had hegemony in the east for many years and no ambitious man dared push for personal gain for fear of incurring the enmity of the republic. Pharnaces is no different than any other in that. Yet the civil war pulled from the region the strong rulers and their veteran legions. The moment Pompey fell, his allies gathered far away in Africa, and you were besieged and trapped in Aegyptus, suddenly Pharnaces takes advantage of Roman weakness to begin his conquests. His timing speaks of a man of wheedling deviousness. In men, I find that such guile is usually at dangerous odds with arrogance, but a man who can tame both such sides of his nature and make them work in concord? Well, he could be a dangerous man.’

  Caesar nodded absently.

  ‘I feel that the rogue king of Pontus might just be about to attempt to lull and court us, even as his forces prepare. Your intelligence on his army?’

  Deiotarus sat back in his saddle. His lands abutting those of Pharnaces, his scouts were Rome’s primary source of information. ‘Our intelligence places his army in the region of Zela, some seventy to eighty miles east, along the mineral trade route.’

  ‘Apart from one small group,’ Caesar murmured and lifted a finger, pointing along the valley.

  The others followed his gesture. A small force was making its way down the eastern slope in the late afternoon sun, which filled the valley with golden light from behind the Roman force. Fronto squinted. Maybe two hundred riders, many in bronze, which shone even at this distance. ‘Can’t be a danger to us,’ he noted. ‘Even the most headstrong man wouldn’t send such a small group against his enemy’s legions. And they’re not scouts. Not armoured like that.’

  Caesar nodded. ‘An embassy. Duplicity hangs in the air like a miasma.’ He turned to the king. ‘I see your enemy’s dual nature at work, Majesty. I see his arrogance settled with his army in the peaks, daring us to challenge him, but I see his guile riding towards us this very eve, bedecked in bronze.’

  ‘Do not allow them to approach, Caesar,’ Salvius Cursor said quietly, gesturing to his officers to draw up the rest of the praetorians who were lagging further back down the slope.

  ‘You think we need fear them?’ Caesar smiled. ‘I do not. I have no intention of showing fear or weakness. This is no true deputation, but an intelligence gathering mission and delay tactic by the Bosporan invader. Let his embassy return with news of a confident and powerful enemy. By all means, Salvius, have the praetorians form up and on hand, but I will meet personally with this embassy, and his honour guard will be permitted close.’

  Salvius Cursor’s face radiated disapproval, but he saluted and began to order his men into the best possible position to move at speed and take down an enemy, should he make a single false move.

  ‘Send a rider to guide them in,’ Caesar told him.

  They sat and watched, wondering what to expect, as Salvius’ rider reached the approaching party, and escorted it along the line of the army as they prepared to camp for the night. Fronto smiled. He knew centurions, and knew damn well that at the first sniff of a foreign deputation, every man they passed would be perfectly kitted out and defiant. The strongest men would be on show. What the emissaries of Pharnaces would encounter were the ideal legionaries – the best of the best – and it was these men whose description would be carried back to the enemy.

  Gradually, the group became clearer as they approached. Amid an honour guard encased in helms and cuirasses of bronze, with laminated arm plates, skirts of white pteruges and horses clad in coats of bronze scales, came the emissaries of Pharnaces. Dressed in rich robes, their hair oiled and elaborately curled, even their horses displayed wealth in gold accoutrements. Fronto felt disdain rising at the sight. As they approached, they slowed. The honour guard dropped slightly back, though Salvius’ hand still went to his sword hilt at the closeness of so many heavily armoured men.

  There was a stoic silence and a stony-faced look to the soldiers, though Fronto had seen such men as the emissaries often enough to recognise a veneer of bravado over a sea of nerves, so thin and brittle that it might snap and peel away at any moment.

  ‘Greetings, Roman,’ the head man said in thick Greek, raising a hand.

  Caesar sat still. ‘I am Gaius Julius Caesar, consul of Rome and representative of the republic in all matters. Say your piece, men of Bosporus.’

  The emissary narrowed his eyes at the flat response. He leaned back, placing one hand over the other on his reins.

  ‘His great Majesty, Pharnaces the second, scion of the house of the Mithridati, King of the Bosporus, King of Pontus and Cappadocia…’

  ‘Invader of Pontus and Cappadocia,’ Caesar corrected him, butting in.

  The man’s lip twitched and he paused, glaring at the consul.

  ‘His Majesty entreats you to lead your forces no further into his lands.’

  He paused, clearly waiting for Caesar to correct him once more. That the consul did not seemed to irritate the ambassador even more. He straightened. ‘In return for you standing down from a war footing and leading away your forces, his Majesty will agree to terms beneficial to Rome and vows to stand by them. He sends you this as a gift appropriate for a royal friend and victor of such wars as the consul can claim.’

  His shaky hand held a purple linen wrap, which he unfolded to display a golden crown in the form of a laurel wreath.

  ‘Your master’s vow is as solid as m
orning mist, and almost as long-lasting,’ Caesar said pointedly, ignoring the rich gift.

  The ambassador’s twitch returned as he lowered the crown. ‘I am instructed to remind mighty Caesar that his Majesty had staunchly, for years, refused support to Pompey in his war against you. More than once, the general sent requests for troops and supplies as he fought your forces. From his Majesty, Pompey received not one man. Not one loaf of bread.’

  ‘And in return he believes we will sit back in gratitude and watch him carve an empire out of our territory?’ Caesar said, his tone becoming dark.

  The twitch heightened. The man was close to losing his temper, Fronto noted. ‘Might I remind mighty Caesar,’ the man spat, ‘that the would-be hegemon sitting on the horse beside him not only supplied Pompey with the tools to help destroy Caesar, but even took the field against him personally.’

  Caesar glanced at Deiotarus, who simply nodded, then resumed.

  ‘The king of Galatia and I have agreed amicable terms. Such is easier to do with a man who does not claim swathes of Roman land for his own. A man who might have fought a Roman general, but did so in the service of another such Roman general.’ As the ambassador wound up for another tirade, Caesar held up an assuaging hand. ‘Very well, man of Bosporus. I will say this to you, which you may carry back to your master.’

  He walked his horse two paces forwards so that he was uncomfortably close to the ambassador, at which point the differences between the two men escaped nobody. The Bosporan with his rich tunic, oiled curls and copious golden jewellery, sat before the consul in his armour, with sword at side, hair severe and grey, eyes like a hawk. Put the two men in an arena, Fronto smiled, and Caesar would wipe the floor with the ambassador, despite the thirty year gap in their ages in favour of the Bosporan.

  ‘I am a fair man, and known for it,’ Caesar said. ‘I am as renowned for my clemency as for my military victories. In fact, nothing gives me greater pleasure than granting mercy when it is humbly and reasonably sought. As such, I recognise the strength in the man beside me who may have been my enemy but sought amends and peace like a true leader. All this, I might add, while your own master displays not one iota of humility as he invades Roman lands.’

  His hand shot out, a finger levelled at the ambassador, and he was now so close that the pointing finger almost put the man’s eye out. The Bosporan leaned back in shock.

  ‘Do not,’ Caesar snapped, ‘dare to take a moral high ground with me. Not when spouting such obfuscating bilge.’

  He leaned back and watched the man struggle upright in his saddle.

  ‘In point of fact,' the consul went on, ‘I see your master seeking to use such acts of loyalty as an excuse to save him from war, while my own victories I do not seek for vainglory, and are granted by the gods for the betterment of the republic.’

  He stepped his horse back once. ‘As for the great and serious outrages perpetrated against Roman citizens in Pontus, since it is not in my power to set them to rights, I accordingly forgive Pharnaces.’

  Fronto frowned. This he had not expected. In fact, disapproval emanated from the rest of the Roman officers too. Caesar glanced round and they kept silent at the look in his eye.

  ‘I cannot, in fact,’ he resumed, glaring at the ambassador, ‘restore to murdered men the life they have lost, nor to the mutilated their manhood; and such indeed is the punishment, worse than death, that Roman citizens have undergone in your master’s stolen realm.’

  He left the accusation of torture hanging in the air like a foul smell, and the ambassador, unable to deny it, for it had become common knowledge, lowered his face for a moment.

  ‘Here are my demands,’ Caesar said loudly. ‘Pharnaces must immediately withdraw from Pontus and Cappadocia. He must release all slaves he has taken in his campaign of conquest, and make appropriate restitution to all those who have lost or suffered as a consequence of his actions. Once this is done, and not before then, he may send tribute and gifts to us, as appropriate for friendly rulers in the arms of the republic.’

  With this last, he pointed at the crown. The ambassador dropped it as though it had suddenly become hot, the rich bauble clattering into the dirt by his horse’s hooves. Fronto tried not to see the victor’s laurels ground into the dirt as an omen. He failed.

  ‘This is your last word on the subject?’ the ambassador hissed.

  ‘It is.’

  ‘Then I shall take your proposal to the king. Farewell, consul of Rome.’

  Turning his horse and gathering his party about him, the ambassador began to ride away, his honour guard close by. The Romans watched them go, and Fronto cleared his throat.

  ‘You don’t expect him to actually leave, of course.’

  Caesar shook his head. ‘He is playing with us. Possibly buying time to prepare against us in some manner. Certainly, after committing to this conquest as he has, he is not going to relinquish all his gains and return to obscurity. No, but I would be willing to wager that he will string out the debate. Perhaps he hopes that we will weaken through lack of supplies. Perhaps he believes that King Deiotarus here will abandon our cause. Whatever the case, he speaks through one face and leads his army with the other.’

  He turned, scanning the crowd of officers, and singled out Galronus.

  ‘Take five of your best riders. Follow the ambassador discreetly. Find their camp and watch what happens, then report back as swiftly as you can. It would be greatly advantageous to us if you were not seen by their own scouts.’

  Galronus nodded and wheeled his horse to go find his best riders.

  Caesar squinted off into the distance. ‘I wonder what his plan is. Why is he trying to buy himself time?’

  ‘We’ll know soon enough,’ Fronto muttered.

  * * *

  It was early morning two days later, the kalends of the month, that the next encounter came. The army marched at speed along the valleys of Cappadocia, bearing down on this Zela, where Pharnaces was said to have gathered his force. As the legions stomped along the valleys, raising dust with their thousands of tramping feet, the deputation once more appeared ahead in a saddle between hills.

  Caesar brought his officers out to the side and climbed to a spur of land that overlooked the valley, Salvius Cursor gathering the praetorians around them. There, they waited patiently as the two hundred strong, gleaming deputation of King Pharnaces closed. It was no accident that Caesar had chosen this position, for the enemy were forced to climb a steep slope to meet them, the going difficult. When they finally came to a halt in front of the Roman officers, the horses were clearly exhausted, and it took long moments for even the unarmoured ambassador to recover. Finally, he held up his hand in greeting.

  ‘Good day, Consul of Rome.’

  ‘That remains to be seen,’ Caesar said quietly. ‘You have my reply from Pharnaces?’

  The man nodded. ‘His Majesty sends greetings to the representative of the mighty Roman republic. He acknowledges that perhaps a certain over-zealousness had overcome him, and that he had occupied more territory than he had originally intended. His Majesty agrees to Caesar’s terms. Even now his army begins to disperse to home garrisons. However, he begs Caesar’s indulgence.’

  ‘Oh?’

  ‘The consul is a career military man, and must be aware of the sluggish nature of such a great undertaking. The consul, he believes, cannot expect the entirety of half a year’s campaign to be undone in a matter of hours. He begs that Caesar grant him a month to complete his withdrawal from Roman-claimed territory.’

  Caesar narrowed his eyes.

  Fronto glanced sideways at his commander. He had been watching the ambassador carefully, and there was something about his manner. Everything here was façade. There was nothing genuine at all, and the consul had to be aware of that.

  Caesar was as inscrutable as ever, though. The consul straightened.

  ‘The king is most reasonable,’ he said. ‘Though we shall, of course, require a sign of complicity and good fait
h. I will grant until the calends of next month for his Majesty to complete his withdrawal from all occupied lands and the release of prisoners. The appropriate restitution may draw out beyond this, of course. But as a gesture I shall expect the army of the king to have withdrawn from this region and dispersed within a matter of days. That should be more than possible for any army, no matter how poorly-disciplined.’

  This last jibe seemed to stab the ambassador like a knife, and his lip twitched in irritation. However, he bowed his head. ‘The king will accede to the consul’s demands, of course, though I would remind Rome of her own promises to withdraw and to advance no further.’

  Caesar smiled, and Fronto now knew something was going on, for he knew that smile well and knew that it masked other intent. The consul turned to find Cassius. ‘Have the signals given to halt the column.’

  Cassius looked extremely disgruntled at the command, but saluted and rode off to carry out his orders. The ambassador looked satisfied for the first time in two meetings. Straightening, he pulled out of his repertoire the most oily smile imaginable, which stretched its fake line so far from ear to ear that it looked as though his head might fall in half.

  ‘It is a matter of great joy that accords such as these might be met between Rome and Pontus,’ the ambassador said.

  ‘Would you care to stay for a while?’ Caesar asked in a pleasant voice. ‘To celebrate such great accords, we should feast.’

  The ambassador slipped into his most contrite expression. ‘Would that were possible, Consul. However, the process of withdrawal is a complex one, and the king requires our presence. Perhaps when all is settled, we can celebrate further with a true meeting of equals.’

  Caesar bowed his head. ‘Far be it from me to stand in the way of the king carrying out his withdrawal. Rome extends its gratitude for such easily-agreed concord.’

  The ambassador continued to smile that horrible smile as he turned and rode away, the other nobles falling in with him as his honour guard shifted into protective lines. Caesar and the officers sat silent as they watched the group descend the hill, and then begin the long journey east up the valley. Once they were some distance away, Caesar sat back in his saddle and raised his voice.