by Jay Penner
I could see the surprise in the bandits.
They must have realized then that we had tricked them. But committed too deep, like a giant ship on the seas, they could not turn and flee.
The decoys parted, and Arnobarbus saw what was in front. He would now experience what it meant to face a Macedonian phalanx. The bandits ground to an abrupt halt as the frightening mass of concentrated spikes, now pointed towards them, began to move forward rapidly.
And just as the surprised mass slowed down and waited for their chief's direction, they heard another blast of sounding horns and saw a wall of armored cavalry bear down on them from behind and the left. The horrified bandits abandoned all discipline and reacted as immature fighters do—some attempted to flee, others clustered in small groups waiting for the inevitable clash. The horses whinnied and galloped in all directions in terror.
As dust rose and obscured the landscape, I tried one desperate trick—I ran to the funerary temple, now unguarded, and entered the chamber through a maintenance ladder.
I could now hear the clashing of the armies, but in my heart, I had no doubt about the outcome.
The funerary temple’s chamber held the gold sarcophagus of Alexander. It was the first time I was so close to the body and the treasured contents. I felt grief, guilt, and excitement at the same time. I removed my helmet as a mark of respect, prayed, and moved behind the sarcophagus. There were three boxes as described. One was magnificently laid out with gold and gems, with intricate engravings on its top and sides. The side facing me showed a royal assembly, with the king at the center, and a host of officers seated around him. The top had the military symbols of Alexander—his cuirass, kopis, helmet and royal plume, signet ring, the royal diadem. I wanted to knock a few gemstones off their fitting using the back handle of my kopis but thought the better of it.
Behind this box was a smaller, less ostentatious box. It was plainer, made of iron, and had metal carvings of a scene—Zeus towering behind a teacher and pupils holding tablets. This was what I was looking for. The box was however under heavy lock, and I could not open it.
I needed a hammer.
I jumped out and attracted no special attention except a few curious ‘decoys’ for the ones assigned to guard were busy at slaughter.
I paused to watch the massacre. The bandits were pincered between an advancing wall of spikes and an explosive cavalry charge. The foot soldiers, now in a panic, turned and rushed headlong into the Phalanx, only to be impaled. As the infantry pushed them back, the cavalry butchered them from all directions. The battlefield resembled a closed slaughterhouse with helpless animals baying within.
Arnobarbus, the chief, was recognizable with his elaborate ornaments and flowing green dress, with its customary lions and patterns of lamps and flowers. His panicked bandits ignored his exhortations.
I found a heavy hammer from the baggage train, ran back, and climbed again into the funerary temple. I swiftly moved towards the box.
I raised the hammer and struck a hard blow on the lock. My shoulders felt a stinging pain due to the impact and the force traveling up my arms, but the lock did not break. And just when I was about to raise the hammer again, the curtains rustled and a tall Macedonian officer, a man I had seen in company of Arrhidaeus, stepped in.
“What are you doing?” he said, the menace was unmistakable.
“Why are you here?” I retorted, in the hope that displaying authority would cow the man.
“I am one of Arrhidaeus’ temple protectors, and I’m asking you again, what are you doing?”
His eyes went to the hammer in my hand, and his right hand slowly gripped the handle of his kopis. I knew I had to act quickly before this would escalate and endanger me and my mission.
“I came in to check that no one got in to steal. I asked your name, soldier.”
“That is none of your concern, sir. Why do you have a hammer in your hand if you were looking for thieves?” He smirked. I would be foolish to expect a trained officer to fall for weak lies. He moved slowly and cautiously, all the time rapidly surveying the space around me. Once again, a mark of a good soldier.
I waited until he was at an arm’s length. There was not much space to maneuver as the chamber wall was behind me, and the two heavy boxes were by my leg. I would not have the time to pull my kopis out and engage him in hand-to-hand combat.
“Do not do something stupid and attack your superior officer.”
He paused momentarily. “My only superior officers are Perdiccas and General Arrhidaeus, sir,” he said, as he inched forward.
“Think of the consequences—” I said, as I tracked his slow movement.
“General Arrhidaeus has complete confidence in me. You knew you were not supposed to be here alone.”
“And I told you why—”
“As I said, sir, you have a hammer in your hand, and I think we both know why." He stepped forward. He had enough of the talk, and it appeared he had made up his mind.
I dropped to my knees, taking him by surprise and forcing him to readjust his position in the narrow confines of the chamber. And before he could wield his blade, I brought down my hammer on his right foot with full force.
The heavy iron crushed his bones. His eyes widened, and he bellowed and staggered backward. He thrust his kopis wildly. I avoided the edge of the blade and pulverized his knee with another blow. Screaming, he fell to the floor and tried to push himself back to the edge.
I hopped over the boxes just outside the reach of his arms. He was trying to sit.
I moved behind him, and before he could twist his body to face me, I brought down the hammer on his head. While our helmets did a reasonable job in protecting our skulls from weak arrows, light sword glances, and slowing projectiles—they were incapable of protection against heavy weapons in close quarters.
He tried to ward off the blow with his kopis. Its edge slashed my elbow but did not stop the hammer which crashed into his helmet and cracked his skull open.
He slumped silently. His back arched, his arms and leg stiffened and straightened, and the body twitched for several moments before it went still. The acrid smell of loose bowels and urine enveloped room, and matter from his brain oozed from under the crushed helmet.
I heard noises outside.
I dropped the hammer, drew my kopis and inflicted a deep gash on his forearm. I then sat down holding my injured elbow as blood trickled between my fingers. Four soldiers, and thankfully one of them from the rear guard, stepped into the strange scene in front of them. News spread quickly, and Arrhidaeus’ soldiers appeared.
I knelt on the ground, and a physician tended to my elbow. Some soldiers removed the body from the chamber and lay it on the ground.
The battle which raged had begun to slow. Most of the raiders were dead, and our troops were still slashing at the remaining ones who had nowhere to escape.
Someone barked an order to fetch Arrhidaeus, and I asked a soldier to also convey a message to stop the massacre and let some of them go home to tell tales. There was always a fine balance between suppression and keeping the hostile population in check, versus annihilating them and incurring the wrath and continued hostility from their tribes.
It was difficult to perceive the surrounding through the dust and commotion, but before the sun inched further up in the sky, I heard the sounding horns announcing the end of the battle. Arrhidaeus appeared, looking weary and exhausted. They had Arnobarbus in chains, dragged by one of the soldiers.
Arrhidaeus did not come to me at once—instead preferring for one of his men to explain what had happened.
Once they refreshed and Arrhidaeus gave orders for his staff to examine the battleground, inventory the dead and the dying, he walked up to me with a stern look.
“What were you trying to steal?” he asked, his voice a low growl like a beast about to pounce on his prey.
I looked up at him, squinting in the harsh Sun obscured by dust, struggling to speak as the fine grains of sand dried m
y throat and tongue. My hands shook from exertion and weakness, and I balanced myself gingerly.
“It was I who prevented thievery!” I said, mustering as much indignation as I could. I then continued, “It appears your man was attempting to enrich himself when the opportunity presented.”
With no one to contradict what I said, Arrhidaeus found himself in a tricky situation. He could, of course, ask for eyewitness accounts on who went in first and who later, and that would weaken whatever I had to say. But doing so would bring out fractures and recriminations against unreliable eyewitnesses. I was confident that there would be no lengthy public trial or investigation.
I was close to Eumenes who would undoubtedly try to protect me if there were a trial, and Perdiccas would support him—and it was unlikely Perdiccas would go against Eumenes and side with Arrhidaeus. I knew his mind was working through the scenarios. He had no idea what I was looking for, but it was reasonable for him to think I was planning to steal some valuables when I had a chance.
“Explain to me what happened then, because we will have to answer to Perdiccas and the Royals.”
“That is assuming you want them to know, General, that one of your men tried to steal from the King’s sacred chamber.”
“Remember you report to me, Deon,” he growled.
I was not going to accept assumed authority. “No, General. I report to the Regent. You outrank me, but my commanders are Perdiccas and Eumenes.”
Arrhidaeus seemed miffed at my response, but he said nothing on that topic. “Why should I believe you?” he asked, instead.
“We both have been promised ample rewards and a pension. Why would I jeopardize it to steal jewelry from a box?”
He paused to consider my argument. Encouraged, I continued. “When the infantry began to advance, I was at the edge observing the entire battlefield keeping an eye for escapees or spies attempting to infiltrate us.
“From the corner of the eye, I noticed this man quietly and quickly climb up the temple, having separated himself from his group, and disappear into the chamber.
“As you know, we have strict instructions not to allow anyone enter the chamber alone. Puzzled, I left the side of the infantry, seeing that the battle was in a great commander’s control—"
Arrhidaeus’ chest expanded slightly at the praise from a fellow soldier. Sometimes even if the mind tells you that what you hear is a lie, the body behaves as if it were the truth. Many of my fellow men who were robbed of their possessions by Babylonian whores will attest to this.
I continued, “When I climbed in, I saw him behind one of the boxes, ready to strike a blow on one of the ornate, jewel-studded boxes with his hammer. There is absolutely no reason for a man to attempt to open a lock except to steal.”
Arrhidaeus seemed horrified by the implication. If this were true, it would bring great shame to his battalion. But for now, we were out of earshot from the others who stood quietly and deferentially.
“He seemed very surprised to see me, and when I asked him what he was doing here, he refused to answer. Instead, he raised his hammer and attacked me. There was no question that he was already of the unsound mind to even attempt something so sacrilegious, and then to try to kill me without even an attempt at dialog.” I hoped that my indignant voice, coupled with dramatic expressions were effective in seeding doubt in Arrhidaeus’ mind.
“I then slashed his arm, and when he lost his balance, I wrestled the hammer from his hand. And then I smashed his foot, knee, and finally his head.”
I ended my story. It is always safe to say little to avoid exposing oneself in a lie. He stared at me, and then looked around. He took a step closer and knelt by my side, and whispered, “I know you are lying, Deon. I do not know what you were trying to do but what you say is not the truth. But you are a clever man, are you not? I will keep an eye on you. And the gods will keep an eye on you.”
With that, he stood up, beckoned his men, and ordered them. “Take this man’s body and leave it on the ground. He does not deserve final rites for what he did.”
Arrhidaeus eyes bore into mine as he said that, and I looked away. He knew I knew he knew I was lying. We were prisoners of our own evil making.
We then turned our attention to Arnobarbus, the idiot chief of a gang of fools. The shackled, scared man no longer brave, tried in vain to reason with Arrhidaeus. The soldiers tied his hands with rope connected to the handle of a luggage cart.
That night, as we rested under the dark skies of Syria, I prayed to the gods to allow the dead soldier’s soul into Elysium and asked forgiveness for my actions which I believed to be right in the greater scheme of things.
In the morning, the procession continued onward.
Arnobarbus, dragged along, thirsty, and exhausted, fell to the ground. He had no strength to scream as his skin and flesh shredded over the rough ground, leaving pieces, flecks, and a trail of blood on dusty earth, and he was soon reduced to a pink stump. We detached his body and left it to rot on the desert ground, letting the scavengers perform the last rites.
Two days later we heard news of our next major destination. We would swing South from where we were and enter Damascus, Syria. And once there we would halt for a few days, replenish our rations, journey to Sidon, and then finally turn North on the way to Cappadocia.
Cappadocia, the region now under Eumenes’ command.
I was getting increasingly worried—what if I never managed to succeed in my mission and the procession crossed Cappadocia to the destination at Hellespont? I often wondered if that wily bastard would harm my family if I failed in my duties.
I prayed for the gods to intervene on my behalf.
MACEDON
❅
The relatively comfortable servant quarter was gone, most of its furnishings stripped away to be placed elsewhere in the house or sold. The token gifts of apparel once every half-year had stopped. They still received enough food to sustain—even if the bread was coarse, and the thin soup smelled of rotten vegetable. They had been joined by two women, both clearly from disreputable backgrounds and from their behavior and utterances, Apollonia guessed that Krokinos, apart from other things, ran a string of brothels. Apollonia kept her distance from them and shielded her daughter. When she tried to persuade Krokinos to let them have their own space, he had only laughed and called her no better than those women and maybe he could put her to work if she were not so miserable and thin. A horrified Apollonia had retreated and never brought up the subject again. But hopes of improvement faded as the tumult in the countryside increased, and the environment for traders and businessmen became hostile.
The berating made way to beating. Apollonia prayed for salvation as her frail body withstood the slaps and the occasional lashes. The curses hurt the mind, and the red welts took time to heal. The eyes lost their luster, and her skin began to show an unhealthy yellow pallor.
It was at this time that she noticed that Krokinos would sometimes linger too long around her and cast his amorous eyes. That she was weak and a shadow of what she once was mattered little to him, for she was just out of his reach for his desires and that made her all the more alluring.
Apollonia prayed every day, but there were no signs of freedom from the gods. There was no new news from her husband, only that he was now somewhere on the way back. The military mail system was no longer functioning reliably, and she had no idea if his messages had been lost.
One day, as ominous clouds gathered on the sky, four unsavory characters arrived at Krokinos’ home. There were whispers around the household—these were slave traders from lands far beyond, and here on business.
They stayed for many hours, whispering, eyeing the house servants and slaves, and Apollonia felt the knots tighten in her stomach, and a sense of dread grow in her.
PART II
DANGEROUS JOURNEYS
Circa 322 BC
“At his best, man is the noblest of all animals; separated from law and justice he is the worst.”—Aristotle
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MEMPHIS, EGYPT
❅
Ptolemy had settled down in Memphis after his departure from Babylon. While he predicted a devastating battle for the empire, he hoped the greedy generals would spare Egypt and let him rule his satrapy with little interference from either Macedon or Asia.
His fondest memories were in Egypt—the visit to the temple of Ammon, the laying of the foundation of Alexandria, and the sailing on the Great River. He loved this land. He loved the smell of the desert mixed with the pastures by the Great River, the glorious monuments of the past, and the adulation of the people. He also loved how prosperous Egypt was and recognized the advantage of being away from Europe and Asia. They would leave him alone.
The aftermath of Alexander’s death was tumultuous. While Alexander wished to be buried in Ammon, Ptolemy preferred that Alexander be buried in Memphis, bringing greater legitimacy to his rule in Egypt; but Perdiccas, deferring to Macedonian customs, wanted the King buried in Macedon. There was also the fear of the wrath of Alexander’s powerful mother if the greatest son of Macedon rested in the remote deserts of Egypt.
Soon after his arrival in Egypt, Ptolemy had certain urgent matters to take care of, and dealing with Cleomenes, previously finance minister of Egypt and now assigned by Perdiccas as Ptolemy’s adjutant, was one of the first.
Cleomenes was a scoundrel who routinely extorted the Egyptians by manipulating their grain prices, threatening their religious symbols, and threatening to kill the sacred crocodiles of the Great River on the pretext that one of them killed his slave. He often hoisted false charges on local administrators and was also known to cast his immoral eyes on the wives and daughters of the court officials.
But for Ptolemy, who had seen such corruption many times before, the one that angered him the most was how blatantly Cleomenes passed on information about him to Perdiccas. It was as if Cleomenes thought Ptolemy’s end was near and Perdiccas was the new Alexander.