Rise of the Spears

by J Glenn Bauer

  A movement beside the path caused the lead pony to lean back on its haunches. The three watchers held their breath as an arm snaked out of the foliage and into view. A pause, and then a helmet appeared. The enemy wore cloth on their heads, but this was not Tascux’ helmet they saw. Instead, as the man turned to look up the track, they saw an unfamiliar hairless face. The man pulled himself onto the path, head swinging from the enemy below to the skittish ponies. He slowly rose to his knees and then his feet, one hand outstretched to the mounts.

  “Who is he?” Audoti whispered.

  “Not Bastetani, but perhaps not of the enemy either.” Lyda observed, then her eyes widened as the unknown warrior laid a hand on the muzzle of the closest pony. Moments later, he was at its neck and then he had a hand in the horse’s ragged mane. Slowly he turned it uphill and began to climb.

  “He has the ear of the horses.” Audoti sighed with respect.

  “There are more with him.” Lyda noticed several more helmets shifting through the chest high summer grass and thorn.

  The trio watched as the warrior led the pony up the path. The two remaining ponies turned and followed. Behind them slunk the handful of hidden warriors.

  Lyda was crouched, spear ready at the head of the steep goat track when the warrior stepped off the path and onto the flat ground at the summit of the hill, hand still buried in the mount’s mane.

  Before she could rise, he silenced her with a gesture. “Move back. Move back. I have her, but she is still jumpy from the storm.”

  Lyda started at his speech. Audoti noticed and pulled her back without any sudden motions. Eppa too, stepped back, her spear levelled.

  The warrior noticed and smiled, teeth white against his dark skin. “You can put your spears away, Bastetani. We are no enemies of yours.”

  The two remaining ponies appeared, paused to scent the strangers and nickered softly before following their leader.

  “There we go.” The warrior released the mount and tossed a handful of nuts towards the Bastetani horses. The ponies followed, scrubbing them up from the mud as they went.

  More warriors emerged from the trail, slinking over the rim and congregating out of sight of the enemy below.

  “Greetings, Bastetani. I am Chalcon from Sucro.”

  Lyda’s jaw dropped, astonishment writ large in her eyes. “From Sucro?”

  Chalcon grinned and nodded. “Yes. As you see from my daring and courage, everything you have heard of the warriors of Sucro is true.” His grin turned cheeky.

  There was a heartbeat of silence and then Audoti gave a bark of amused laughter. The others smiled and laughed too, all except Lyda.

  “I too was once from Sucro.” She said softly.

  Chalcon’s eyebrows rose to meet the rim of his helmet. “Truly! Then the gods have had a hand in our meeting here today.” He stepped forward and before Lyda could react, enfolded her in his wiry arms. “Greetings, sister of Sucro.” He released her and smiled. “I may know your family.”

  Lyda’s lips parted and then closed, her face growing cool. Instead, she pointed down the goat track. “One of our warriors lays untended down there. We do not know if he lives or if his shade has flown. Did you chance upon him?”

  Chalcon’s expression turned from confusion to concern. “Not I.” He looked at the warriors with him who shook their heads.

  Audoti grunted and Lyda’s shoulders drooped with disappointment. “We must wait until the enemy leave or night falls then.”

  They gathered in a wary circle, the Bastetani warriors and the warriors of Sucro. Drawing their cloaks tighter as the wind whistled through the rocks and lifted their hair. The rain ceased as the thunderstorm drifted south on the cold north wind. The season of warmth was fleeing and soon winter’s cold grip would close on the land.

  “It will be a cold night.” Chalcon moaned. Then he grinned. “Meeting a warrior from Sucro is a good remedy though. Tell me what brings you to the Oretani lands? Raiding?” His eyes were on Lyda.

  Cenos, who had joined the circle along with the Herb Queen, spat. “Blood debts! Many of them!”

  Chalcon eyed the dour warrior. “Oh? Then you will need to wait your turn I fear.”

  Lyda frowned. “You are here to collect blood debts?”

  Chalcon chuckled. “Not I, Sister. Them.” He gestured sharply over his shoulder towards the track below. “The Thunderbolt of Carthage. Hamilcar. He seeks to shackle the Oretani.”

  “We know this and our fight is not with the Oretani, but with this Thunderbolt.” Lyda’s voice was as hard and cold as the rocks they crouched on. “He sacked my home village and levied the strongest to fight in his masses. We would free them.”

  The warriors with Chalcon shifted and his eyes narrowed. “The Bastetani are at war with Hamilcar Barca? This is good news!”

  “How so? What is our war to you from far away Sucro?” Audoti snapped.

  Chalcon waved an arm to the east. “Not so far away. We mistrust this Carthaginian. He has taken the south lands of the Turdetani and Turdeli. His greed for the silver mined from their hills has grown. In Sucro, we fear that he will not stop until he has driven us all into the Inland Sea.”

  “This is why you are here? You do not take Barca’s silver to wield his spears?” Lyda’s voice grew hopeful.

  “My companions and I wished to see this Hamilcar and gauge how strong the resolve is among the people of Iberia to resist him.” He paused and grimaced. “My apologies. I was thoughtless of your own suffering.” His eyes locked on Lyda’s. “The people Hamilcar killed and took, they were kin?”

  The Bastetani remained silent, their faces sombre. Chalcon shook his head. “As I feared. I travel far and wide and have met Bastetani of the western hills. Perhaps even those that have been taken?”

  “My son.” Lyda’s voice cracked even as she fought to keep it steady. “Dubgetious.”

  Chalcon’s expression clouded for just a fleeting moment, but Lyda noticed and her jaws tightened, muscles bunching in her shoulders.

  “You know this name?” She whispered.

  Chalcon glanced at her as though he had forgotten her presence and then shrugged noncommittally. “The name is unusual. I thought I had heard it said before, but…” He snapped his fingers. “Too much wine I fear.”

  Lyda gazed at him sceptically. “Just so.” She looked west towards the sun settling on those dark hills there. “It is almost nightfall. Herb Queen, prepare to tend Tascux.”

  The Herb Queen lifted her face and nodded to Lyda. “I have thought of the injuries he most likely suffers and am prepared.”

  Chalcon’s eyes were drawn to her face and all could see his recognition of her.

  “You know our Herb Queen! Then you know my son?” Lyda’s voice was sharp.

  Chalcon appeared flustered. “I must do. I cannot recall the boy, but your Herb Queen tended my hand after I burned it.” He nodded at her and lifted his right hand, palm out so all could see the white and pink of wrinkled scars.

  The Herb Queen smiled. “Too much wine.”

  Chalcon laughed. “Indeed!

  Audoti growled and edged to the lip of ground overlooking the trail below. A moment later he signalled to Lyda. The others joined him.

  “The enemy are gone. There is still time to search for Tuscox before nightfall.” Lyda stood. “Bring your medicines and bandages, Herb Queen.”

  She scrambled down the slope, wary of the treacherous footing. The others followed her, all making for the place they had seen Tuscox fall.

  Chalcon caught up with Lyda in a few paces, uncaring of the slippery mud, springing from rock to boulder lithely.

  “How will you find your people among the enemy hordes?” He asked her.

  She gave him an irritated look. “The gods will offer me an answer at the right time.”

  Chalcon knelt beside a clump of crushed bush and ran his hands over the cold body of a rider, removing a pouch from under the dead man’s tunic. He hefted it and made a face.

&nbs
p; “Before Hamilcar can march to Castulo, he must take a settlement a day’s ride north and its walls are formidable.” He slid the pouch under his tunic. “This will offer you a chance to find your people.”

  “How do you know this?” Lyda eyed the second fallen rider. Tascux had done well.

  Audoti and Cenos pushed down the slope, passing her. The sun was merging into the dark hills to the west and the light was fading fast, but Lyda held Chalcon’s eye.

  The warrior from Sucro grinned. “Hamilcar killed many Oretani in a battle just days ago, but many more have filled this settlement I speak of. Would you leave so many enemy at your back?”

  Lyda grunted, his argument sound. “And you? Are you returning to Sucro?”

  Chalcon shook his head. “I must convince Orissus to raise his Spears and bring all his warriors to the fight.” He spat. “His Spears would have doubled the Oretani numbers in the last battle, but at the last he refused to march.”

  “Yet you still hope to persuade him to fight? What is the point? Hamilcar is sure to take the fight to him.”

  A cry from the gloom below them drew their attention. Chalcon left her and went slipping on hands and feet like a scuttling beetle down the slope. The Herb Queen caught Lyda’s arm before she too could follow the sound of the cry.

  “Is he the father of your son?” The Herb Queen’s eyes were wary, but there was a deeper pulse there of something akin to sympathy.

  Lyda pursed her lips, fighting down her anger. “Have you always known?”

  “That Venza was not Dubgetious’ true father? For some few seasons.” She hoisted her bag of herbs. “He knows who the father is though?”

  Lyda considered. “He is that man’s brother. I expect he knows.”

  Chapter 9

  The call of a jay echoing in his ears, Dubgetious groaned. He lay face down in the leaves and dirt, a stone pressing coldly into his cheek. The jay called again and he came awake, noticing at once the usual noise of the army was absent. Sitting up, he stifled a curse at the ache in his legs, his eyes widening as he remembered where he was and the message he was to deliver. He darted a hand under his tunic and felt the familiar shape of the message pouch. He rose to his knees, his cloak falling from his body, and his heart stuttered. The Masulians were gone as were the mounts. All three horses.

  Standing, he turned slowly. There was no sign of the scouts or the horses. He was in a thick forest on a hill far from home with no idea how to find the army of Eshmun. Returning to Berut without having delivered the message to Eshmun was inconceivable.

  He bellowed angrily into the boughs of the trees swaying unconcerned over his head. The echoes of his despair faded and bird calls filled the silence followed by the alarmed bark of a deer. Dubgetious lifted his cloak and spear. His waterskin was empty, but he recalled there was a good stream nearby. He would find Eshmun and deliver the message. This might be a test set by Berut or the Masulians may just have decided to leave him behind. He could not say, but he would show them how resourceful a Bastetani could be.

  At the stream, he drank and then filled his waterskin. The water was icy and the forms of fish lurking at the bottom of the pools could be seen. He tried to spear them, but gave up after overbalancing on a slick rock and almost falling in.

  Using the sun and resuming the journey in the direction they had travelled the previous day, Dubgetious followed the trail beside the stream until it veered sharply north. He scrambled up a hillside from which he could see a great distance north. He searched in vain for any telltale signs of a village or encampment. There were none, but he spotted what appeared to be a wider trail to the west. It might lead to the village he sought. If not, it was possible he would meet travellers who could direct him. There was also the chance he would encounter warriors keen to gut anyone in Hamilcar’s army.

  Before he reached the trail, he began to feel the weight of eyes on his neck. He slipped between trees and kept to the shadows as he stared back the way he had come. There was no sign of watchers. He was sweating freely, his legs tingling as he pushed his pace. The leather of his sturdy new sandals was beginning to bite at the skin around his ankles and his stomach protested the lack of food. He rounded a thick stand of thorn bush and paused to tighten his belt and squash the hunger pangs. The way ahead was too steep to walk and he turned to find a better path over the hill. He had taken just two steps back when he saw the glint of sunlight reflected from a blade. The dazzling brightness was gone in a heartbeat. Dubgetious sank to his knees, his body tight against the shadowy side of a wide tree trunk. Breathing quietly, he took his time to examine the clusters of bush and deeper shadows beneath the trees. For long moments, he watched. If not for the reflection he had seen, he would have turned away. Instead, he began to use his eyes like the old hunters had spoken of and concentrated on what he saw from the sides of his vision. It was difficult and his eyes soon ached. Then, about to resume his journey, he spotted a figure. Looking directly at the figure beyond a thicket, Dubgetious could make out little, but when looking from the corner of his eye, he saw the unmistakable shape of a head and shoulder. He saw two others soon after. They were watching the ground above the thorn thicket he had stepped behind earlier, expecting him to appear there. Hunting him.

  Dubgetious shuddered. These were hill warriors. The men and women who lived in the wild lands between tribes. They owned little and moved often, hunting their meals where they could and stealing and killing when the opportunity arose. Such people were often deformed and carried puss filled sores. It was said that the shades of people cursed by the gods would fill these people so they might have more than one shade within them. Dubgetious had seen two a season earlier when his father’s spears had hunted them down. They had attacked a young couple just beyond the town walls, killing them gruesomely. When cornered they had fought like Saur’s dogs, snarling and mad with bloodlust.

  Dubgetious sank lower and edged deeper into the trees, his face averted lest they spy the sheen of sweat on his brow and cheeks. Crawling out of their sight, he shuddered and then ran, cushioning his footfalls on pine needles, slowing when he had to pass through low bush and stopping to skirt two crows fighting over the remains of a lynx kill.

  He ran harder once beyond that hillside, stretching his stride to eat the ground. He kept to the shade where he could and until he saw an open expanse of ground before the trees began again. To reach the trail, he would need to cross it in full view of any watchers on the hill behind him. If they saw him from the hill, they would have a long distance to make up and he was not planning on taking a rest before he was at the gates of the village and kneeling at the feet of the Carthaginian, Eshmun.

  He lowered his head and ran hard, breaking out of the tree line and parting the tall dry grass like a scythe. Ten strides into the field, he heard an exclamation of surprise and then the bone chilling sound of a bowstring released.

  An arrow whipped past his head close enough that he could follow the fletching as it flew. He began to dodge from side to side like a hare before the hounds. Arms pumping, he thrust out his chest and sprinted. Whistles and claps sounded in his wake. There seemed to be many more pursuers than just the three he had spotted.

  Fear lent him speed and he was well past the middle of the field when the next arrow whistled past him, followed by a third that fell from above him. He knew then that they were at the very limit of their range. If he could maintain that distance, he knew he could outrun them. Gritting his teeth, he pressed on, quickly reaching the trees and leaping a gully to land on the hard-pressed dirt of a wide track. Choosing to follow it north, he began running in a measured stride that would lap up long distances without exhausting him. His heart leaped as he recognised the deep ruts in the track. Wagons had passed this way. Very likely the road would lead to the village he sought.

  A new sound reached him and a cold sweat that had nothing to do with his exertions bathed him. The rapid drumming of horses riding hard resonated up the hill. The hill warriors rarely had m
ounts; they tended to ride them too hard with no care and so ended up eating them once they were injured beyond use. He increased his pace, fixing his eyes on the crest of the hill and the tall trees that shadowed the track there. He had run perhaps a quarter of the distance when he sensed the horse riders come into sight of him. Unable to restrain the urge, he glanced over his shoulder and at once lost his footing on the rutted ground. He thrust his spear away from his body as he tumbled forward to avoid gutting himself and then he hit the ground, slamming into it with a knee and elbow. Pain bloomed and his breath expelled in a grunt. He was rolling to his feet the moment he fell, ignoring the scraped and bruised limbs, lifting his spear before him to point back at the riders. For one surprised heartbeat he dared to hope he was saved. The riders were the pair of Masulian scouts.

  Their expressions were hidden, but their eyes were deep wells of cold unfeeling. Staring into those merciless eyes, he knew for a certainty that Berut wanted him dead. His courage began to buckle.

  They slowed their mounts and lifted throwing spears to shoulder height. Dubgetious had no shield and was on his haunches in the middle of the track. Lips dry and tongue thick in his throat, he fought the urge to turn and flee. He was Bastetani and he would face his death like a champion. He heard Beratza’s laughter and felt her breath on his neck. The weight of his father’s eyes on him from across the bowed heads of his people. His mother and her long seasons of hidden sadness. These all came unbidden to his mind as the Masulians drew back their throwing arms.

  Dubgetious sprang forward although the Masulians were twenty paces from him. He would not die huddled like a child. With a shrilled war cry emulating his father’s, he threw his whole strength into casting the heavy spear.

  Chapter 10

  The sun cast no shadows nor was there a breeze. About him all the land turned still and shrunk from his vision. All except the Masulian at which he had aimed. The throw was good. The spear flew neatly from his hand, the bright gleam of the spearhead trailed by its spinning shaft lifted a head above the Masulian’s face.