by Nhys Glover
So, one of these Syrians might have bred with an Alan, for instance, the closest tribe with lighter colouring, and produced a blue-eyed child.
But it was not just the eye colour that had drawn me. Even before I saw his eyes I had felt some magnetic force drawing my gaze to him. Recognition. It was recognition! Those blue eyes looked so much like Orion’s that the shocking sight of them had knocked the breath right out of me.
Could it be him? But the rest of his colouring was wrong.
Yet, could he not have found a way to disguise his appearance? A wig for instance. After all, I was uniquely placed to know about the existence and wearing of wigs. I had worn one as Ennia, after I had cut my hair short to become Cassius the slave boy assistant to our physician.
My heart lifted. What if it really was him? Would that mean the others were somewhere nearby too? Might they be about to rescue me? Gods, it would be a prayer come true.
I fought down the euphoria. For one thing, I might have been mistaken. Maybe I had seen what I wanted to see. Second, showing any sign of hope would alert my captors. If I was to be rescued, then the Parthians needed to continue their relaxed attitude toward me.
We entered the shadowed, stuffy taproom, and I wrinkled my nose as the odour of stale sweat assailed me. The leader sent one of the men to negotiate with a corpulent man in colourful garb, who was seated at one of the benched seats drinking some kind of fermented spirits.
Our guide for the last stage of our journey had favoured those spirits at night beside the fire. I’d hoped my captors would join him. But though eyes turned enviously in the spirits’ direction, the leader’s control was complete. He would not allow any blurring of their perception while they transported a precious cargo.
In a kind of numbed exuberance, I did what I was told, until I found myself alone in a tent made of hide on the outskirts of town. The small tent was surrounded on all sides by a sea of growling, coughing camels. For a moment, I enjoyed the utter luxury of being left by myself. My captors had been with me every moment of the day, except for the brief moments I managed to carve out to relieve myself.
Now I sat on a carpet on the sandy ground and sipped cool, brackish water in dazed anticipation. Had it been Orion? Was he really here to rescue me? Of course, if he was here, then that was why he was here. Yet how was it possible? The Wolf Pack had been so far from home when I was taken. How could they have known about my capture and come after me?
Had they run away from the ludus?
No, that was not possible. Pater must have found a way to get word to them and given them leave to travel.
If it was him...
A small, dark-skinned woman entered the tent and placed a wooden plate on the floor in front of me. Before I could say a word, she withdrew hurriedly. Disappointed, I made the most of the opportunity to try the meal prepared for me. Now escape had become a possibility, I needed to build up my strength. The last thing Orion needed was someone who held him back.
I had discovered that the meals favoured by these people were far different from what I was used to at home. It was largely served cold and often involved a pasty, garlic substance that was both bland and smelly. In this instance, the paste was smothered over a small, round serving of flat bread and was accompanied by figs. I ate the garlic-flavoured bread with a small bite of fig. The combination worked well enough to allow me to complete the meal and hopefully add a little to my strength.
The leader came in not long after I finished. He nodded approvingly at my empty plate.
“This will be our tent for the next ten days or so,” he snapped out, though his posture indicated he was more relaxed than I had ever seen him. “During the day you will walk with the women, and at night you will help to set up the tents and prepare the evening meal. One of us will have you in our sight at all times. If you try to tell anyone who you are, I will kill them. Most of the women do not speak Latin anyway, so it would be a wasted exercise to try to involve them in any escape attempt you might be considering.”
“What will you be doing while I am working?” I demanded petulantly.
He sniffed and lifted his nose. “I ride with my men as protectors of this caravan. We do men’s work.”
“Protectors? You mean you will be riding your horses while the rest of us walk? That is protecting?” I knew I was courting trouble, but days of exhausting travel and fear was making me a little crazy. Part of me wanted to yell and scream and spit in this arrogant bastard’s face. How dare he treat me like nothing? I was a noblewoman of the greatest empire in the world!
The sharp, painful backhanded slap sent me sprawling. I should have expected it. Yet the shock of it and the pain left my head spinning.
“Woman, you will learn respect!” he snarled down at me.
I wiped my mouth and saw blood on the back of my hand. My teeth must have cut my inner cheek. I could taste the coppery tang of blood on my tongue.
“Respect has to be earned. So far you have earned nothing,” I shot back as I tongued my cheek, feeling for the injury. I found it fast enough and winced.
For a moment I saw the promise of more pain in my captor’s dark eyes, but then he seemed to think better of it. He sniffed and stalked out of the small tent, slipping under the flap as if he had been doing it his whole life.
I let my rebellion fade, and with it went my strength. Collapsing back onto the carpet, I let the tears fall that had been threatening since the blow. In desperation and misery, I prayed for some sign that my pack was really here. That an end to this nightmare might finally be in sight.
At least, I argued in my mind, having something to hope for was better than the feeling of hopelessness that had been my constant companion all these long weeks. Even if it wasn’t him, wasn’t it better to imagine it was, than to talk myself out of my belief? What did it hurt?
The next days settled into a gruelling, monotonous pattern. We rose before dawn, when I would go to join the women. I was wordlessly assigned tasks that ranged from food preparations to dismantling the make-shift tents and packing them onto camels. Every daylight hour I would then walk beside a heavily packed camel until my sandaled feet were raw and bleeding. Around me thousands of men, women, horses and camels walked in a long, bedraggled line along an unmarked ‘road’ through the searing desert.
Each night we either camped beside a wadi filled for the winter with water or at some predetermined point in the seemingly unbroken sameness of the desert where no water was available. I would help unpack and erect tents and prepare meals. By bedtime I was so exhausted I simply collapsed wordlessly between the men in our tent and prayed my misery would soon end.
When my captors saw the state of my feet, they grudgingly arranged for the purchase of some soft slippers that seemed far more suited to the terrain. I had noticed many of the women wearing the same footwear.
Yet, even though the slippers were more comfortable, my wounded feet got no better. So, on the third day, I was hoisted onto a horse behind one of my captors and allowed to ride. It was only marginally more comfortable. My head ached from the unrelenting sun, my stomach threatened to rebel as if I was once more at sea, and every muscle in my body screamed its agony.
My hope was also waning, though I tried to keep it alive. But the persistent insidious thoughts seeped in, nevertheless: It must not have been Orion. My mind had conjured him out of desperation. He really could not have been in a small border town on the Silk Road miles from home.
When the cry went up late in the day, my captors looked toward a blurred outline on the flat, sun-rippled horizon. I had no idea what was happening. But my current captor turned to look over his shoulder at me and said one heavily accented word I could understand. “Palmyra.”
I knew that word. It was the name of the big caravan city we had been heading for. Maybe there would be a few days here for me to rest and find some medicines for my feet. If they remained untended putrefaction would set in. My sores needed cleaning and the poisons removed.
&nbs
p; Another cry went up. I thought it was someone noting the city for the first time. But the feeling around me was different this time. Before, the cry brought with it relief and excitement. This time, it brought terror.
I saw them then. Or at least I saw the dust rising in a long stream behind them. They were heading our way.
Bandits! Hundreds of them!
My captor reached around and grabbed me, dragging me from the horse and dropping me unceremoniously on my damaged feet. I looked around in confusion, not knowing what I was supposed to do now.
I saw the camels and wagons that carried the wealth from the west being herded into a group. The mounted men arranged themselves around them, while others with bows and arrows hid behind the island of camels and wagons ready to fire at the oncoming enemy.
The women seemed to be doing something different. They were shepherding the less important beasts some distance away and getting them to sit in groups of tight circles. In the middle of them the women huddled.
With no other idea than to do as the women were doing, I hobbled over to the nearest circle and pushed my way into the tight space between the beasts. The humps and the heavy loads made for fortress-like protection.
Though my heart beat hard against my chest and my head was dizzy with fear, I also felt relief to be sitting down on soft sand. My personal agony seemed to outweigh the threat from my environment. Though it was a thought I fought down as soon as it surfaced, part of me hoped for a swift arrow to end my misery.
What happened next was a blur. The women held their breaths and looked out at the approaching bandits. So many of them! Just so many! But they seemed to know exactly where they were going, and it wasn’t in our direction. They were after the wealth we carried. That was clear. And the men, including my captors, were going to keep them from getting it at all costs.
When the arrows began flying, like the loud whizzing of mosquitoes, I buried my head against the warm, furry side of the camel. It shivered beneath me, frightened. One of the other beasts tried to rise in its panic, but a couple of women hung off its head, keeping it in place.
As the fighting began in earnest, the dust caught up with the bandits. My eyes filled up with it, my throat was clogged with it. Hastily, I pulled up the flap of the dull headdress I wore and wound it as the other women did, over my nose, leaving only my eyes uncovered.
I heard my name called above the uproar.
“Accalia.”
I had a flash of memory. When had I heard someone call me by that name before? Only four people called me Accalia. Only four men. But it had to be my imagination. In this chaos, how could I hear someone calling that name?
But it came again, louder and more anxious this time. Heart in my throat, I lowered the fabric from my face and cried, “Here! I am here!”
Then I remembered. It was in Rome when I was buried alive with Talos. My hand had been the only part of me that I could get out. And I had called for help. The answering call was for Accalia.
It had been my pack. They had found us!
Was it possible they had found me again?
I cried out once more, “I am here!”
I shuffled in the direction I thought the call had come. A man’s face appeared between the neck and hump of the nearest camel. A dark, bearded man with blue eyes!
“Accalia! Come quickly!” he yelled.
Without faltering, I threw myself between the camels. On the far side away from the main centre of the fighting, I saw two horses shifting restlessly, the blue-eyed man standing beside them clung tightly to their reins.
He beckoned and I hobbled the few steps to him as quickly as my sore feet would allow. I saw what he had planned. But it was madness. Orion was a gifted charioteer, not a rider. If riding horses away from this battle was his plan, it could never work.
But I would go anywhere with him; risk anything to stay at his side now he had found me. If I died, then at least I would die taking action. I had never accepted the role of victim, even when the worst calamities occurred. I would not remain one now. This was my one hope of escape, and I would grab it with both hands!
Without a word, Orion hoisted me onto the back of one of the horses and then jumped up on the other. Everywhere men fought and died trying to either steal or protect the wealth of the caravan. All but Orion. He held the reins of my horse in his hand and drove his mount forward towards the distant city.
It was insanity! Surely we would be seen and picked off? But the focus of the battle must have been totally on the central section of the caravan, because no one seemed to even notice us leave.
Riding a horse was new to me. My only experience was behind one of my captors. But I wasn’t going to give in to my fears now. I clung on to the odd, leather saddle and tried to fit my body to the galloping gait of my horse. If I did not look down, I would not see how far away the ground was and the breakneck speed we travelled over it.
Orion kept looking back over his shoulder and, one time, I did the same. We must have been half way to the city by then. I could now see the outline of the walls clearly.
A dust trail not of our own making was rising some distance behind us. We were being followed!
For however long it took us to reach the walled city, I clung on and prayed. Orion kept driving the horses on like a madman.
Where were the others? Were they waiting for us in Palmyra? Or had they brought the bandits to the caravan to act as a distraction? But how would they have known I was part of this caravan? And how were we going to escape the threat of the men who were pursuing us now?
These questions buzzed like a swarm of bees in my head until I was driven mad by them. Finally though, the city gates came close enough for us to see. They were huge and obviously closed. They must have seen the bandits attacking the caravan.
What if they wouldn’t let us in? That was when I noticed a much smaller door high enough and wide enough to allow a single, burdened camel through it. This small door was open!
Orion flung himself from his mount and came to the heaving side of mine. I dropped gratefully down into his waiting arms. Then we rushed in through the small gate dragging the horses in behind us.
Guards accosted us immediately. They spoke what I thought was Aramaic. When Orion spoke to them in Greek the guard changed languages immediately.
There was a heated exchange that I could only partially make out. Something about cowards. Then Orion saying there was a child. A child? Then he was extracting an aureus from the folds of his robe and one of the guards was taking it covertly and waving us on.
Though my feet were raw agony, I ran alongside Orion into the city proper. He dropped the horses at the first stable we came across and then hustled me into the milling crowd in the marketplace. In moments we became invisible.
Chapter Six
February 65 CE Palmyra SYRIA
ORION
“We seek sanctuary in the city. Our caravan is under attack,” I had said to the guard at the gate, desperate to get past these gatekeepers so I could hide Accalia in the crowd.
“Why did you not stay and fight! Are you a coward?” the obnoxious one of the two guards challenged.
I looked back out the small gate as the small cloud of dust following us grew closer. There was only one reason for that cloud. The Parthians!
“My wife is with child. My first concern is her safety. I have money to pay my way,” I got out of my mouth as my fevered mind tried to convert my thoughts to Greek.
I felt inside my robe for the pouch I wore at my waist and extracted a gold aureus.
The gatekeeper’s demeanour changed dramatically. All belligerence disappeared as he held out his hand for the coin. He gestured us forward quickly and we complied.
Once we’d left the stolen horses at a stable, I led Accalia, limping badly, along the narrow streets crowded with noise, animals, produce and people. Never had the chaos of a city so appealed to me. No one seemed aware of, or cared about the attack going on not far from their gates.
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br /> I half carried her down an alley and through an open doorway into one of the inner courtyards so favoured by these people. A small fountain shot water into the air, and the extraordinary sight of it, out here in the middle of the dry desert had us both entranced for a few moments. The place was like a small oasis of cool greenery and water.
A challenge went up in the language spoken by the men who had brought me to Emisa. I hoped that whoever spoke knew Greek as well.
“I seek accommodation for my wife. She is with child and sick with it. Her feet bleed from our journey,” I said in Greek.
A wizened crone hobbled out from behind lush foliage on the far side of the fountain, eyeing us suspiciously.
“Does this look like an inn?” she snapped in perfect Greek.
“She cannot go another step farther. Can you not spare a small space for us? I have coin to pay our way.”
She hobbled closer, her beady gaze seeing more than I wanted her to. I lowered my head before she could see the colour of my eyes.
“You are Roman?” she asked in Latin.
Accalia sighed and relaxed a little. It was the wrong thing to do. We stood out as Romans here. The predators that followed us would describe Accalia that way.
But it was too late.
“Yes, we are,” I answered her in my own tongue. It was a relief to speak it again after what felt like forever. “My wife... my wife was kidnapped, and I have rescued her from her captors. They are looking for us.”
“You bring danger to my door? Get out!” she cried, brushing her hands in a shooing motion.
Beside me Accalia crumpled, tired tears trailing down her filthy, burned cheeks. Automatically, I pulled her to my side, taking all of her minimal weight. I had never seen her cry except when she was afraid for Talos’ life. I didn’t like it.
“There will be no danger if you tell anyone who comes here you have not seen us. If they come here at all. You are not an inn, after all. Why would they search every home in Palmyra?” I argued desperately, feeling my heart tighten sickeningly in my chest.