Sarmatian

by Peter Darman

  I signed my name and waited for the ink to dry, the hairs on the back of my neck standing up and my palms becoming sweaty. I heard nothing to indicate anything was awry, but my instincts screamed at me to act. In a blur I stood, pulled my spatha from its scabbard and spun around.

  To see a Scythian Sister standing before me.

  I recognised the thick, golden hair and in the pale-yellow light of the oil lamps could just about identify her emerald green eyes.

  ‘Saruke,’ I said in surprise.

  She was the mistress of poisons sent by Claudia to instruct Gallia’s Amazons in their nefarious arts; a tall, slender, beautiful practitioner of murder. She glanced at the sword point inches from her gracious neck.

  ‘Are you going to kill a servant of the gods?’

  I slid the blade back into its scabbard.

  ‘I did not realise you journeyed here with the army.’

  ‘I did not. I have just arrived.’

  I wondered how a lone woman was able to infiltrate a guarded camp, all the entrances to which were sealed during the night. And I assumed she was riding a horse. Perhaps she rode a griffin and flew over the ramparts.

  ‘I have a gift for you, majesty,’ she said, ‘may I sit?’

  I offered her my chair and pulled up another. She saw the letter to Phraates and smiled.

  ‘The high king has locked himself in his bedroom after he received news of the defeat of the army he sent to battle the Sarmatians. He is in the pit of despair.’

  ‘Claudia told you this?’

  She nodded. I poured wine into a cup and offered it to her. She looked around the tent.

  ‘Your quarters are sparse compared to the great pavilions favoured by the other kings of the empire, majesty.’

  ‘They suffice.’

  She took the cup and tipped it at me.

  ‘To Parthia.’

  She lifted the cup to her full lips and sipped at the liquid, her eyes not leaving mine.

  ‘What brings you here, lady?’

  She put down the cup.

  ‘You march to fight the invaders?’

  ‘Tomorrow.’

  ‘You cannot defeat them on your own.’

  She reached into her black robes and placed a thick gold ring on the table.

  ‘You will need this.’

  I lifted it from the table and examined it. The shank was wide, and it had a square head, in which had been engraved a strange beast: a winged monster with a lion’s head and an eagle’s body. It was obviously an expensive piece of jewellery and recently created judging by its pristine condition.

  ‘The engraving is that of Anzu, the winged servant of the sky god Enlil,’ she told me. ‘It is from the time when only the gods walked the earth and humans did not exist, when the riverbeds of the Euphrates and Tigris existed but were not yet filled with water.’

  I held up the ring. ‘This is centuries old?’

  ‘Millenia,’ she replied.

  I drank some more wine.

  ‘Anzu was so large that when he flapped his wings he caused huge storms. You will need his help to defeat the Sarmatians.’

  I turned the ring over in my fingers.

  ‘Put it on, majesty,’ she said.

  I did as she requested and braced myself for a surge of immortal energy to flow through my body, to rejuvenate me so I would feel young again. I inhaled deeply, anticipating the air to be charged with the power of the gods. I closed my eyes and waited for the spirit of Anzu to infuse my being. Nothing happened, and after a few moments my leg began to ache. I opened my eyes and saw Saruke looking at me with a bemused look on her face.

  ‘One more thing, majesty,’ she said. ‘The armour you were gifted by the gods. You gave it away?’

  ‘I did, to Kewab.’

  ‘It was not yours to gift to anyone. It was given to you and you alone. But have no fear, it will be returned to you.’

  ‘It will?’

  ‘All will be revealed.’

  She stood, bowed her head and walked towards the entrance.

  ‘Will you not stay here tonight? I will arrange quarters to be made available for you.’

  She sniffed the air. ‘Your camp reeks of soldiers, leather and sweat. I will find a place in Assur.’

  I stood. ‘Guard!’

  Seconds later two Exiles rushed in, one a centurion, swords drawn.

  ‘At ease. This lady is to be escorted to the camp’s entrance and thence to Assur.’

  ‘Begging your pardon, majesty,’ said the centurion, ‘the gates to the town will be closed.’

  ‘They will be open,’ insisted Saruke.

  Alerted by my raised voice, Klietas rushed in from his sleeping compartment, knife in hand.

  ‘It is fine, Klietas,’ I said.

  Saruke looked at him, studying his bear’s claw necklace.

  ‘Your wife and son are safe in Irbil.’

  ‘I, I have no son,’ he stammered.

  She walked from the tent. ‘You will, bear slayer.’

  The comment caused Klietas’ spirits to soar and he began pacing up and down with an idiotic grin on his face. I sighed and poured him a cup of wine.

  ‘Sit down, you will wear out the carpet.’

  He did so. I handed him the cup.

  ‘Do you think she tells the truth, majesty?’

  ‘I would swear by it.’

  He closed his eyes, a look of utter relief on his face. Touchingly, he was clutching the bear’s claw necklace.

  ‘I am pleased for you, Klietas, truly.’

  He opened his eyes and took a gulp of wine.

  ‘Thank you, majesty.’

  ‘You should get some sleep, dawn must be only a few hours away.’

  But I could tell he was too excited to think of sleep. I, on the other hand, was ready for bed. I stretched out my arms.

  ‘Well, I am a lot older than you and require sleep.’

  A guard entered the tent and saluted.

  ‘Satrap Kewab requests an audience, majesty.’

  At this hour? Was I the only one in need of sleep?

  ‘Show him in.’

  Klietas quickly drained his cup, fetched another and filled it as Kewab entered and bowed his head. Klietas retreated a few feet with the wine jug.

  ‘What brings you here at such a late hour?’ I asked the satrap, keen to emphasis the unsociable time.

  ‘Apologies, majesty, but I received your note and came as quickly as I could.’

  ‘My note?’

  He produced a papyrus sheet and placed it in front of me. I was most surprised to see a missive requesting Kewab to return the armour I had gifted him, not least because although it was indeed my handwriting on the parchment, I had not written it.

  ‘When was this delivered?’ I enquired.

  ‘About an hour ago, majesty.’

  He placed the armour on the table. It must have been Saruke who had forged the letter, but the mystery then deepened.

  ‘A most curious thing, majesty,’ said Kewab. ‘The armour no longer fits me.’

  I looked at the immaculate, shining silver armoured cuirass.

  ‘Oh?’

  ‘Strange as it sounds, it appears to have shrunk,’ said Kewab.

  I picked up the cuirass and examined the silver scales. It was as light as a feather. The scales were still perfectly flush horizontally, starting from the top the rows overlapping slightly the ones below to provide maximum protection. I told Kewab to sit. I told Klietas to take the armour to my sleeping quarters. He started whistling as he did so.

  ‘I wanted to thank you for being here,’ I told him. ‘I know you must be thinking of Egypt.’

  He looked serious. ‘I am thinking only of bringing this campaign to a successful conclusion, majesty.’

  Ever the professional.

  ‘Well, with your help, I am sure it will be a success, Kewab. You miss Egypt?’

  ‘My memories of Egypt are not happy ones, majesty, whereas those of Parthia are the opposite. But
…’

  He hesitated.

  ‘But your wife is eager to return.’

  He appeared embarrassed. ‘She is from an ancient family, majesty, who held great power and commanded great respect in Egypt. When I was fighting the Kushans, she had a taste of her former life. She wants to taste that life again.’

  ‘I do not blame her. She is ambitious for you.’

  How I dearly wanted to tell him he was to be king of Gordyene. But I did not want to tempt fate. If I told him, his life might be snatched away to spite me. So, I kept silent. He sighed.

  ‘Well, it is late. I will see you in the morning, majesty.’

  He took his leave and I was free to retreat to my bed. Gallia returned soon after Kewab had left, no longer in a prickly mood. In our sleeping quarters, she saw the armoured cuirass identical to her own hanging on a frame.

  ‘Kewab returned it to me,’ I told her.

  She spotted the ring on my finger.

  ‘What’s that?’

  I told her of the clandestine visit of Saruke, the forged note and the armour that no longer fitted Kewab.

  ‘Try it on. The armour, try it one,’ she said.

  I did so. It fitted like a second skin. A sharp stabbing sensation shot through my leg.

  The gods give and they take away.

  The army marched just after dawn, the camp remaining extant as just over thirty-three thousand soldiers tramped out of its entrance and crossed the pontoon bridge to rid the empire of the Sarmatian plague. Rodak was left in charge of the camp, which was garrisoned by five thousand squires and a detachment of Hatra’s foot soldiers, sent by Governor Aspad on the orders of his king. Also left behind were the slaves that attended Hatra’s Royal Bodyguard and the dozens of others who cooked meals, erected tents and field stables, dug latrine trenches and served their masters. For the young nobles of the Royal Bodyguard, not to be attended and squired was a novel and not particularly welcome experience. But needs must.

  The Durans and Exiles marched six abreast across the bridge, singing songs of glory, bawdy ballads about whores and girlfriends, and filling the air with obscene threats directed at the Sarmatians. Their morale was high and they were eager for battle, Chrestus having deliberately spread news of my mistreatment at the hands of Castus and Tasius to encourage the thirst for vengeance. I sat on Horns in my shining silver scale-armour cuirass and accepted their acclaim as they marched past, raising my sword in salute when the golden griffin of the Durans and the silver lion of the Exiles passed me by. Gallia, similarly attired, also saluted them, taking off her helmet and beaming with delight when they whooped and whistled. Behind her the Amazons sat impassively on their steeds, ignoring the invitations to dismount and wrap their lithe limbs around lusty legionnaires. ‘Tomorrow we might be dead’, ‘you are only young once,’ and ‘I’m hung bigger than the king’s stallion’ were popular calls.

  Dura provided the bulk of the army, Azad’s cataphracts marching in full armour, their visages covered by full-face helmets, each kontus flying a white pennant sporting a red griffin motif. How they must have envied Sporaces’ horse archers attired in only white tunics and tan leggings, but with the Sarmatians only two days’ ride away, I did not want Parthia’s last hope to be surprised.

  No one envied Kewab’s battle-hardened veteran horsemen in their sun-bleached tunics and leggings, leather armour and helmets. But in their case appearances were indeed deceptive, and his three thousand horsemen were worth twice that number on the battlefield, perhaps three times as many under their Egyptian commander. He saluted us as he passed at the head of his men.

  ‘When are you going to tell him he is to be King of Gordyene?’ asked Gallia after he had passed by.

  ‘Not until the campaign is over,’ I said. ‘I want his mind focused on the here and now. After all, what use is a crown if its wearer is dead?’

  The exiles from Mesene, the last link with Nergal and Praxima, had a special place in both our hearts. They numbered three thousand, all horse archers, but every one a professional soldier trained by my old friend the former King of Mesene. I ordered the Amazons to draw their swords and hold them aloft when the horsemen of Mesene rode by, the horse archers responding by raising their bows to us.

  Talib and his scouts, plus those of Hatra, had left camp before dawn to reconnoitre the route ahead, and we also had patrols of horse archers far and wide acting as a screen for the army. Nothing was going to be left to chance on this campaign. Hatra’s nobles were already bending the ear of their new king concerning my battle plan before we had barely left camp. The idea of hiding behind foot soldiers in a giant square was anathema to them, not least because in Hatra foot soldiers were regarded as only slightly better than slaves. Real soldiers fought on horseback, from a position where they were figuratively and literally head and shoulders above their social inferiors. They were also acutely aware that many of Dura’s foot soldiers were former slaves, and despite also knowing that Dura’s two legions had never been bested on the battlefield, the thought of allowing such men to be their guardians appalled them. In answer, I reminded them I was lord high general of the empire, appointed by King of Kings Phraates himself, and if they had any objections they should take up the matter with the high king himself. Once he had left the sanctuary of his bedroom, of course.

  We had left the scorpions and siege engines at Assur but still had hundreds of mules and three and half thousand camels that made up the ammunition trains of Dura and Hatra, which together with the need to erect a marching camp each night, slowed our rate of advance to twenty miles a day. This further infuriated Hatra’s Royal Bodyguard, which believed a rate of advance of at least twice that was more honourable. After two days of listening to their grievances transmitted to me via King Pacorus, it made me give thanks to Shamash that I was not King of Hatra.

  The days were hot and getting hotter, spring having given way to summer. Each day the sun beat down from a cloudless sky without interruption. As we headed west at least the terrain changed from one of hard-packed dirt to a grassier landscape, made possible by the freshwater springs and streams that the gods had blessed Media with. And which the Sarmatians coveted as it provided grazing for their tens of thousands of horses. But their invasion had resulted in a land denuded of people and their livestock. We marched by abandoned farms and villages and empty fields. Only the crump of thousands of marching foot soldiers, the trundling of wagons and the clops of horses’ hooves broke the ominous silence hanging over Akmon’s kingdom.

  I chose to ride near the vanguard, Gallia beside me, the Amazons behind us, the sun high in the sky and the air hot and dry. There was not a hint of wind and sweat was trickling down my neck. I absently turned the gold ring on my finger and kept glancing into the sky.

  ‘What are you searching for?’ asked Gallia.

  ‘Mmm? Nothing.’

  She rolled her eyes and turned to Klietas.

  ‘I was happy to hear your wife is safe in Irbil. I hear you will have a son.’

  ‘Yes, majesty,’ he beamed. ‘I will call him Pacorus, if the king has no objections.’

  ‘He has no objections,’ I said, looking up at the sky.

  ‘What are you searching for, majesty?’ he asked.

  ‘A giant bird,’ said Gallia, prompting Klietas to peer into the sky.

  But a giant of another kind was approaching, Talib galloping up to me to report that his scouts had detected the Sarmatians closing from the east.

  ‘How many?’ I asked him.

  ‘Enough to fill the whole horizon, majesty.’

  Chapter 16

  I peered to the east, to the yellow-hued Zagros Mountains in the distance, their snowy peaks glistening in the sun. I glanced at the gold ring on my finger and twisted it, hoping for… For what?

  ‘Pacorus.’

  Gallia’s voice was laced with irritation. I turned away from the Zagros to see Chrestus, Kewab and King Pacorus had also been alerted to the news the Sarmatians had been spotted and had rid
den over for a final briefing. I forgot about myths of giant lion-headed birds and the help of the gods.

  ‘We stick to the agreed plan,’ I said. ‘Discipline and determination with rid Parthia of this plague. Shamash be with you all.’

  They nodded and turned their horses, Talib walking his steed over to Minu to share an embrace before the clash of arms.

  ‘Pacorus,’ I called.

  He halted his pure white stallion. ‘Uncle?’

  ‘Please impress on the fine lords of your bodyguard the need for restraint.’

  He smarted at the implication. ‘They will obey their king.’

  In the time following, the still air was rent with trumpet blasts as over thirty thousand soldiers changed formation to adopt the great square that would be our formation to battle the army of Tasius. Much as Hatra’s nobles would have loved to lead the charge to scatter the dirty barbarians polluting the soil of Parthia, they were under strict orders to wait until the time was right. In the battle sequence, they were last in line.

  Our first line of defence was made up of the Exiles and Durans – ten thousand foot soldiers forming the four sides of our square. Each century was divided in half to number four ranks instead of eight, thus doubling its frontage but weakening its depth. In this way each cohort of split centuries had a width of just over one hundred and fifty paces – five cohorts side-by-side extended for three-quarters of mile. There were gaps between each cohort to allow horsemen to charge from the square. The same gaps would hopefully be inviting to the Sarmatians, who might be tempted to direct their armoured horsemen towards them. But if they did they would be shot to pieces by the horse archers taking up position behind the cohorts.

  On the grassy, almost flat terrain the great square took shape, each side made up of five cohorts, behind them companies of horse archers, and behind them, with the camels of the ammunition train, mules and carts, the cataphracts of Hatra and Dura.

  Gallia was watching the square take shape, ahead of us Sporaces’ horse archers deployed to ‘dance’ with the enemy if the Sarmatians got too close while we were organising our deployment.