The War God's Men

by David Ross Erickson

  “A Numidian cavalry corps?” Juba asked, at a loss.

  “I have seen your people in action. You may have personally killed some of my men.”

  “No! Not me,” Juba said, utterly confused now, frightened and alarmed. “I have never fought Syracusans.”

  Gelon waved his hand dismissively. “It is of no concern.” Then he added quickly, “You remember telling my guard that you were part of my army?”

  Juba shook his head.

  “Well, you are now part of my army,” Gelon said. “Can you show my men how to fight?”

  “Fight who?” Juba asked.

  Gelon regarded him curiously for a moment. Then, gradually, a smile began to spread across his face and he threw his head back, laughing.

  Juba smiled at what must have been a joke he did not understand. Nervously, he took another drink from the strange dish and swirled the wine around to get a better look at the picture of the man slaying the lion.

  After Juba had explained his history and how he ended up on the road outside Syracuse, Gelon was certain that his prayers had been answered. Excited by his good fortune, Gelon sat forward on the couch as he stared intently at Juba, telling of his army and of his own past.

  “I fought with King Pyrrhus at Eryx,” Gelon said in an offhand manner. “It was…well, a generation ago, I guess.” He looked at Juba thoughtfully. “I was younger than you at the time, and I thought King Pyrrhus was Heracles himself.”

  “My father was at Eryx!” Juba exclaimed excitedly. “With the Carthaginians. I’m afraid you were on the wrong side.”

  “I am on my own side,” Gelon said soberly. “At that time, however, I was on Pyrrhus’ side, for to me, as I mentioned, he was a god. The Carthaginians? Well, they wanted to protect their temple whores and treasure. We just wanted to kill Carthaginians.”

  “My father has told me the stories,” Juba said.

  “He no doubt told you then that Pyrrhus himself was first over the wall—”

  “Oh, of course,” Juba said.

  “—and was quickly cut down.”

  “No!” Juba said.

  “Oh, yes! A blow to the head. Not too different from yours, I shouldn’t think, only bloodier. Much bloodier. The king was feared dead and taken to the rear. The fighting stopped until the Carthaginian’s fiercest warrior came forward, a very large man in shining armor. An arrogant bastard, to be sure, but fearsome, at least to my young eyes. I saw the whole thing! The man challenges Pyrrhus himself, taunting him to come forward “If he still lives!” the man says.

  “Still within earshot, this angered Pyrrhus, even with the blood still pouring down his face. The Syracusans tried to hold him back for his own good, but in his fury, he broke free and made his way through the crowd of stunned soldiers. Oh, he was terrible to behold, the rage in his eyes and the blood besmearing even his armor. He stood before the Carthaginian’s giant and with one swing of his arm struck the barbarian on the head and sliced him cleanly so that the man fell to the ground in two pieces. All believed Pyrrhus to be more than a man that day. Amazed and confounded, the enemy could not hold the mountain and lost both their treasure and the temple whores to Pyrrhus.”

  Juba listened intently, enthralled. He felt his old enthusiasm coming back, a pang of intense emotion, as he became a boy, reveling in the stories of his father. By the gods, he could see the flashing blades again! But he caught himself on the precipice and shook his head in laughter.

  “It is not believable!” he said. “The stories are just not believable. I will admit, they are thrilling, but that is all — stories to make your pulse race…”

  “Ah, but they are true,” Gelon said. “I should know, for I was there. I saw with my own eyes. Pyrrhus is called “The Eagle King,” you know. You probably noticed my courtyard. The eagles are there in honor of the great man. And his exploits, which I witnessed with my own eyes.”

  Juba continued to laugh. “The eagles are indeed beautiful,” he said. “The most beautiful I have ever seen.”

  “With respect, I venture to say that you have not seen much,” Gelon remarked amiably. “But even the exploits of the great man were not enough to keep Syracuse by his side. We canceled our treaty with The Eagle King when he tried to widen the war. Having chased the Carthaginians from Eryx, he desired to attack them in their home, in Africa itself. We Syracusans declined. There is a lesson there for us today, I think, as the Romans widen this war beyond Messana and Acragas.”

  “But you are allied with Rome.”

  “Yes and the cost of the alliance grows continually. First, we pay the indemnity, then grain and now Rome demands troops for this year’s campaign. The Romans are arrogant. They treat their allies like slaves. Now that they have designs on Sicily, I’m afraid we will never be free of them.”

  “Then why do you fight with them?”

  “Because they are the winning side,” Gelon said. “Sicily is a battlefield, and we side with the winner.”

  “I have fought against the Roman cavalry,” Juba said. “They could never defeat us.”

  “I know. That is why you are here,” Gelon said, leaning forward again. “The Roman horse fears the Numidians. Now, I want all to fear the Syracusans!”

  “I will do my best,” Juba said, trying to conceal his uncertainty. He had led his troop of ten men into battle, but no more. True, he had trained all those men from nothing to fight in the Numidian manner and they were all now excellent warriors. If he could train ten, he could train a thousand…

  “What kind of men do you need?” Gelon asked.

  “First of all, they must be the best riders. Nimble men, not too big…But strong,” Juba added, his face reddening as he felt that he asked too much.

  But when he arrived on the training field at dawn the next morning, five hundred of Gelon’s Sacred Band cavalrymen were waiting for him. Gelon introduced Juba to them and when Gelon had gone Juba noticed a few skeptical smirks mixed in among the eager and earnest expressions of the troopers.

  Juba did not help ease their skepticism when the first thing he had them do was shed their armor. He emphasized to them the necessity for speed. Nevertheless, he held off having the men discard their saddles as well, as he had planned. He was almost relieved when, after riding his own mount for several days and observing the men on theirs’, he realized that the Syracusan horses would never surpass the Numidians’ in speed and agility anyway so he let the men keep their saddles. The armor had been shock enough.

  The shields were another matter. They were too heavy and unwieldy. He brought this up to Gelon and three days later had delivered to him five hundred lightweight, hide-covered wicker shields, expertly made. Each man turned in his shield for one of the new ones and each was given a bundle of javelins whose points had been removed for training purposes. Without armor and carrying the small round shields and javelins, the men were finally starting to look like light cavalrymen. When some of the men began to realize their newfound speed and increasing level of horsemanship, Juba noticed with satisfaction the first hint of pride begin to emerge in the unit.

  The hardest part was getting the men to adopt and maintain a loose formation.

  “We do not stand and fight,” Juba explained to them. He had set up a line of straw men, which the unit attacked twenty men at a time. The men’s instinct was to bunch up flank-to-flank and launch their javelins in volleys. “We must fly at the enemy…” Juba shouted as he demonstrated, his horse kicking up dust as he swept in on the straw men. “Like the wind…” He rose up and flung his pointless javelin with such force that the blunt shaft pierced the thing’s head. “Strike and fly away…” He came back to a skidding halt before the men.

  One of the troopers began to laugh sardonically. “It is a dishonorable way to fight,” he said. It was the tough young soldier named Alexandros. Juba had been keeping his eye on him, for he was one of the skeptical men on the first day. Juba had hoped to win all the men over. Some had come around quickly when they saw the effectivene
ss of Juba’s methods. Others’ attitudes were set in stone. Alexandros had a gang of perhaps ten other troopers who followed him. He looked around at his fellows. “I have agreed to shed my armor and carry this basket lid and throw these broomsticks at scarecrows, but this is more than I can bear! In the name of Zeus, we are the Sacred Band!”

  “Not any more, you’re not,” Juba snapped, his anger rising as he rode over to face the man. “You are an Eagle!” he cried, inventing the name for the unit in that instant, remembering Gelon’s mosaic. He turned from the disgruntled man and rode slowly along the front of the assembled unit. “You are all of you Eagles now, the Sacred Band no more!” He was gratified to see some troopers set their jaws firmly and stiffen with pride. He was getting there with them; he was forming a light cavalry corps. “I am training you, Eagles, to be as fearsome as my own unit back home, a unit which struck fear in the hearts of the Romans!”

  “If only we were fighting Romans, I wouldn’t be worried!” Alexandros cried out, to a chorus of unrestrained laughter.

  The next day, Juba sent Alexandros and his gang back to the Sacred Band.

  “I want fresh men to replace them,” he told Gelon. “From the infantry if you have to, but I want young, eager men, men worthy of my Eagles!”

  “Done, my friend!” Gelon said, clapping Juba on the back, joyful at the fire of his passion. “Young men with talons bared you shall have!”

  Juba immediately fell in the love with the eager young men Gelon had sent to replace Alexandros and his gang. Their unbounded enthusiasm reminded him of Gervas and his own group of Numidians. He quickly worked at getting them caught up with the rest of the Eagles. Not weighed down by years of training in Gelon’s Sacred Band, the concepts Juba espoused came easily and naturally to them. They only wished they would be given real javelins.

  “Be patient,” Juba told them. “Your time will come soon enough.”

  But the boys were still raw. One day as the new recruits awaited their turn at the back of a line at the edge of the training ground, Alexandros and his gang, once again with the armor and spear of the Sacred Band, spotted them and with smirking faces lined up for a charge. Juba saw the whole thing from a rise of ground, but was too far away to stop it. The Sacred Band galloped in a solid line toward the unsuspecting boys, spears poised menacingly. They heeled their horses to top speed and screamed their war cry as they approached. The boys turned in terror to see the charge coming right for them. Unable to react in time, the nearest recruit’s horse reared and threw its rider. The others bolted, while the Sacred Band riders turned at the last instant and galloped away, their laughter rising even above the sound of the thundering hooves.

  Juba rushed down and helped the young man back onto his horse. The next day, he gathered all the new recruits around him.

  “No straw men today, boys,” Juba announced. “Today we target the Sacred Band.”

  The new recruits glanced nervously at one another, for in their eyes the Sacred Band was an elite cavalry unit led by the greatest cavalry commander in the world, Gelon of Syracuse. The idea of openly challenging them was terrifying, all but unthinkable.

  “You are Eagles!” Juba reminded them, but he could tell by their expressions that he was going to have to let them taste victory for his words to have meaning.

  He found Alexandros among the Sacred Band and rode up to him, ignoring the snickering comments that trailed him as he made his way through the heavy cavalrymen.

  “Yesterday, you taught my boys a great lesson, Alexandros,” he began. “You showed us a great deficiency. We need to learn to stand up to the charge of an elite force such as the Sacred Band. I would ask you and your men to train with us today. I want to show my Eagles how to meet your charge.”

  “Your Eagles meeting our charge?” Alexandros uttered Eagles with such contempt he nearly spat. “That I would like to see! What say you, boys? Shall we go charge the Eagles?” Alexandros’ gang laughed and cheered in derision. Alexandros turned back to Juba. “Show us where to line up. But remember, we don’t hold back. If any of your Eagles get hurt, it is on your head, Numidian, not ours.”

  “We may frighten them to death,” one of the gang shouted to a renewed round of raucous laughter.

  Juba showed them where to line up and then lined up his own men one hundred yards away, facing them, ten men on each side.

  “Today we fight like Eagles,” he told his troop. He saw them stare grimly across at the line of the heavy horse facing them: determined, eager, nervous, fearful, proud—all at the same time. Juba would fight with them, the eleventh man.

  When both sides were set, the Sacred Band started forward, and on Juba’s signal, the Eagles trotted towards them.

  “Steady, boys,” Juba called. “Give Alexandros a big fat target. Let them start salivating. Remember, we are faster than they are. Do not hurry…”

  The Sacred Band began to pick up speed, the men raising their blunt training spears. When the lines were less than fifty yards apart, the Sacred Band broke into a gallop. The Eagles grit their teeth as the solid wall of armored horsemen bore down on them.

  “Now!” Juba cried, and the trotting Eagles broke into a gallop of their own. But instead of surging forward toward the charging enemy, they turned and galloped directly away, as if in panicked flight. To add to the illusion, Juba had instructed the men in the middle of the line to wave their arms, making a spectacle of their terror. The Sacred Band troopers dug their heels into their horses’ ribs, frantic to catch the fleeing Eagles and complete their humiliation. Juba looked back and could see Alexandros and his gang laughing and grinning and shouting taunts as they urged their chargers forward.

  Just then, the flanks of the Eagle’s line peeled off in either direction, wheeled around onto Alexandros’ flanks and hurled their blunt-end javelins. So intent had Alexandros’ men been on catching the Eagles, they had not even noticed the flanks wheeling back on them, thinking instead that they were scattering in rout. Now, they were caught in a crossfire. The target of their charge had dissipated like a puff of smoke, and they pulled up short in confusion. When they did, the Eagle’s center came wheeling back also, delivering their own javelins as they charged their attack home.

  Juba noticed that the Sacred Band troopers were not grinning anymore, as one of the Eagle’s unhorsed one of them with a javelin to the midsection. Juba saw Alexandros himself, whirling this way and that on his terror-stricken mount, and lined up a shot. With all the force of his strong right arm, he hurled his javelin. It flew straight and true and struck Alexandros squarely on the temple. He fell to the ground with a thud. Thus, two unhorsed cavalrymen were left behind to the whim of the victorious Eagles while the rest of the Sacred Band turned and raced away, flying javelins chasing them as they went. The Eagles cheered wildly in pursuit. Juba clenched his fist in victory. They had done it!

  “It was fortunate for Alexandros that he wore a helmet,” Gelon told Juba the next day. “He suffered a crack to the bone of his head. Without the helmet, that would have been a killing blow.”

  “I did not realize he wore a helmet,” Juba said. “Or I would have thrown harder.”

  “Needless to say, the boy will not be accompanying us on campaign.”

  “But the Eagles will!” Juba said.

  He glanced up the hill where his five-hundred continued to drill, throwing real javelins now.

  “And let me tell you this,” he added. “My Eagles are ready!”

  Chapter 18

  Hannibal Gisgo stood on the balcony of the palace at Lipara overlooking the harbor. Next to him stood the city magistrate, Kyros, and together they watched the long lines of crewmen and soldiers fill the ships of the Carthaginian war fleet.

  Hannibal had sailed from Panormus and had arrived the previous evening after a full day’s journey. The men re-provisioned and rested within the walls of the city and were now re-boarding the fifty quinqueremes docked in Lipara’s ample harbor in the pre-dawn gloom. This was Hannibal’s first tim
e back to the city since he had based his fleet there four years ago to monitor the progress of Syracuse in eastern Sicily. Since the Romans had arrived on the island, the Carthaginians now used Lipara, principal city of the Lipari Islands, as a staging base for their raids upon Italian soil. From Lipara, it was a mere eight-hour journey to Italy and Hannibal was eager to set sail.

  “You are taking half of my Carthaginian garrison?” Kyros asked.

  Hannibal looked at the small man out of the corner of his eye. “It is only for a couple of days, Kyros,” he said. “You will still have your own soldiers. But I need the garrison troops to guard my ships while my marines are ashore. I saw no reason to bring these troops from Panormus when I could just use yours.”

  Kyros fell silent. Hannibal felt the tension emanating from the little man by the set of his jaw and steely gaze. He had always found Kyros a difficult man to deal with. He would listen to his complaints because protocol demanded that of him, but he found it extremely tiresome. He would rather just arrive in the city, take what he needed, and leave again without the pointless trifle of Kyros’ many objections. He would get what he wanted in the end, anyway. So why the difficulty? He sighed and located his flagship, the King of Epirus, longing to be on it. Several of the ships had already raised their mainsails.

  “You will bring the wrath of Rome down on my head,” Kyros said, breaking his silence.

  “The wrath of Rome?” Hannibal snapped, incredulous. “What on earth are you talking about?”

  Kyros turned to face the general. “I tell you, the people of Lipara fear retaliation for these raids. We know the Romans. We have traded with them for years prior to the Carthaginians coming here. They will not simply let this pass.”

  “Are you blind, man? What do you see in the harbor before you?” Hannibal gestured expansively towards the busy harbor below. “Let the Romans come. We welcome it. Indeed, we desire it!”