Carrhae (The Parthian Chronicles)

by Peter Darman

  Carrhae

  Peter Darman

  Copyright © 2013 Pete Darman

  All rights are reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means without written permission of the author.

  Formatted by Jo Harrison

  This book is a work of fiction. The names, characters, places, and incidents are products of the writer’s imagination or have been used fictiously and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to persons, living or dead, actual events, locales or organizations is entirely coincidental.

  Contents

  List of principal characters

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  An end to all things

  List of principal characters

  Those marked with an asterisk * are Companions – individuals who fought with Spartacus in Italy and who travelled back to Parthia with Pacorus.

  Those marked with a dagger † are known to history.

  The Kingdom of Dura

  *Alcaeus: Greek physician in the army of Dura

  *Byrd: Cappodocian scout in the army of Dura

  Dobbai: Scythian mystic, formerly the sorceress of King of Kings Sinatruces, now resident at Dura

  *Drenis: Thracian, former gladiator in Italy and now a senior officer in the army of Dura

  *Gallia: Gaul, Queen of Dura Europos

  Kronos: soldier from Pontus, commander of the Exiles in the army of Dura

  *Lucius Domitus: Roman soldier and former slave. Commander of the army of Dura

  Marcus Sutonius: Roman soldier captured by Pacorus, now the quartermaster general of Dura’s Army

  *Pacorus: Parthian King of Dura Europos

  Rsan: Parthian governor of Dura Europos

  Spandarat: Parthian lord in the Kingdom of Dura

  Surena: a native of the Ma’adan and the King of Gordyene

  *Thumelicus: German soldier in the army of Dura

  *Vagharsh: Parthian soldier who carries the banner of Pacorus in the army of Dura

  The Kingdom of Hatra

  Adeleh: Parthian princess, youngest sister of Pacorus and wife of Vata

  Aliyeh: Younger sister of Pacorus and Queen of Media

  †Apollonius: Governor of western Hatra

  Assur: High priest of the Great Temple at Hatra

  *Diana: former Roman slave, now the wife of Gafarn and Queen of Hatra

  *Gafarn: former Bedouin slave of Pacorus, now King of Hatra

  Herneus: Governor of eastern Hatra

  Kogan: Parthian soldier, commander of the garrison of Hatra

  Mihri: Parthian Queen of Hatra and mother of Pacorus

  Spartacus: Prince of Hatra

  Vata: boyhood friend of Pacorus, governor of northern Hatra

  Vistaspa: Parthian commander of Hatra’s Royal Bodyguard and general of Hatra’s army

  Other Parthians

  Aschek: King of Atropaiene

  Atrax: King of Media

  Axsen: Queen of Babylon

  †Mithridates: former king of kings, now an exile in Syria

  *Nergal: Hatran soldier and formerly commander of Dura’s horse archers, now the King of Mesene

  Nicetas: Prince of Persis, son of Narses

  †Orodes: King of Kings of the Parthian Empire

  Peroz: Prince of Carmania

  Phriapatius: King of Carmania

  *Praxima: Spaniard, former Roman slave and now the wife of Nergal and Queen of Mesene

  Silaces: soldier of the Kingdom of Elymais

  Non-Parthians

  †Alexander Maccabeus: Prince of Judea

  †Artavasdes: Prince of Armenia

  †Aulus Gabinius: Roman governor of Syria

  Haytham: King of the Agraci

  Malik: Agraci prince, son of Haytham

  †Marcus Licinius Crassus: Roman politician and Governor of Syria

  †Mark Antony: Roman cavalry commander

  Noora: Agraci wife of Byrd

  †Publius Licinius Crassus: Roman cavalry commander, son of Marcus Licinius Crassus

  Rasha: Agraci princess, daughter of Haytham

  †Sampsiceramus: King of Emesa

  Scarab: Nubian slave

  †Tigranes: King of Armenia

  Chapter 1

  ‘Miserable Armenian bastards.’

  I kicked at the ground in frustration, stubbing my toe painfully as I did so. Having just returned from a costly campaign the last thing the army needed was another war. I kicked at another flagstone.

  ‘Treacherous Armenian bastards.’

  Gallia, my wife, handed me back the letter from my brother King Gafarn, ruler of the Kingdom of Hatra, and raised an eyebrow at me while stable hands and the courier who had brought the bad news stared at me and then at each other.

  ‘Bastards!’

  For some reason that was the only word I could think of. I saw Dobbai descending the palace steps and begin to amble towards me. She was the old witch who had been the sorceress of King of Kings Sinatruces, ruler of the whole Parthian Empire. Dobbai now resided in the palace with my family. She was coming to gloat no doubt. Marvellous!

  ‘Are you going to stand there kicking the ground all day long?’ asked Gallia. ‘Gafarn is requesting your aid.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘Did you read the entire letter?’ I had not, so incensed had I been by the first few lines informing me that the Armenians had declared war on the Parthian Empire. I quickly read all the words.

  ‘Problems, son of Hatra?’ Dobbai stood in front of me, a knowing expression on her face.

  ‘The Armenians have declared war on Parthia,’ Gallia answered for me. ‘Hatra is in peril.’ Armenia, now a client state of Rome, lay to the northeast of Parthian territory and directly north of Hatra.

  Dobbai nodded as though this information was no surprise to her.

  ‘Why does this come as a shock to you? You are, after all, a warlord. Would you not seek to strike at your enemies when they were at their weakest?’

  We were certainly that. The recent Battle of Susa that had finally ended Parthia’s civil war had been a draining three-day affair resulting in Dura’s army suffering heavy casualties. That was bad enough, but the armies of the other kings of our great alliance had also suffered substantial losses in the battle, none more so than the Kingdom of Hatra. It had lost its king, my father. And now Hatra was in danger from an Armenian invasion.

  I looked at Dobbai, fixing her black eyes with my own. Sometimes I disliked intensely her ability to state the blindingly obvious.

  ‘You should have dealt with the Armenians two years ago when you had the chance,’ she continued. ‘Your failure to kill Tigranes now returns to haunt you.’

  ‘First of all,’ I said loudly enough for most people in the courtyard to hear me, ‘I did not fail to kill Tigranes. I was invited to support my father, may Shamash bless his memory, in his discussions with Tigranes. I was but one of the kings present that day.’

  ‘But it is common knowledge that you begged your father to launch an attack against the Armenians,’ she replied calmly. ‘You knew that not to fight them that day was merely postponing the inevitable. And so it is.’

  ‘Armen
ian bastards,’ I muttered.

  ‘I wish you would stop using such language, Pacorus,’ said Gallia. ‘Remember you are a king.’

  ‘What are you going to do?’ asked Dobbai.

  That was a very good question to which I had no immediate reply.

  ‘There will be a council meeting in one hour,’ I announced.

  As usual the meeting took place in the headquarters building standing opposite the palace inside the Citadel. This stronghold was perched on a high rock escarpment inside my capital city of Dura. On this occasion I had asked Strabo to attend in his capacity as quartermaster responsible for the army’s horses, camels and mules. He positioned himself in a chair opposite Gallia where he could spend the meeting leering at her lithe figure. I asked Rsan, the city’s governor, to start the proceedings. As usual he had brought two fresh-faced young clerks along to take notes of any decisions made. The offices of the building were stuffed full of parchments recording the details of every meeting since I had become King of Dura. To what end I never understood, aside from keeping the city’s parchment makers in business. Because the room was fuller than normal the air was stuffy and oppressive, made worse by the lack of any wind outside. Everyone drank copious amounts of water from the jugs on the table to quench their thirsts.

  Rsan cleared his throat.

  ‘The king has called this meeting due to the unexpected news we have received from Hatra concerning the Armenian decision to commence hostilities against the empire.’

  The two clerks scribbled furiously to write down Rsan’s exact words. Why did he have to have two sets of records? I smiled – no doubt to have a spare set in case one got destroyed!

  ‘King Tigranes is seeking to take advantage of the state of exhaustion the empire finds itself in following the toppling of Mithridates and Narses. He believes he has an excellent chance of seizing large chunks of the empire, specifically the Kingdoms of Hatra and Gordyene.’

  ‘I would say their chances of doing so are excellent,’ remarked Lucius Domitus, the army’s general.

  ‘We should have fought them when we had the chance,’ added Kronos, commander of the Exiles, one of the two legions of foot soldiers I had raised. Both legions, Exiles and Durans, were trained and equipped in the same way as their Roman equivalents. Dobbai smirked at his comment.

  ‘You are so right, Kronos,’ I agreed, frowning at Dobbai, ‘but we did not and nothing can alter the past. The Armenians will attack the Kingdoms of Hatra and Gordyene with the intention of conquering them. Gafarn has asked me for help and I expect Surena to do the same. The question is: can the army march north to reinforce and assist both Hatra and Gordyene?’

  ‘Not a chance in hell,’ remarked Domitus bluntly. ‘It will be at least three months before it is ready to march anywhere, and even then it will be under strength. We lost a thousand legionaries, a hundred cataphracts, six hundred horse archers and a hundred and fifty squires. All dead.’

  ‘And seventeen Amazons,’ added Gallia gravely.

  ‘Indeed,’ said Domitus, ‘and then there are the wounded.’

  I looked at Alcaeus, our Greek chief physician who headed the army’s medical corps. He frowned.

  ‘I’m afraid it is not good news. Over two thousand legionaries have been treated for wounds received at Susa. Of those, around half have injuries that will take two months or more to heal properly, broken arms and wrists mostly. As for the horsemen, two hundred cataphracts were wounded in the battle, and of those over fifty require bed rest for a further month at least. Six hundred horse archers were also injured and around a hundred will not be back in the saddle for a minimum of five or six weeks.’

  It was a most depressing summary and the only sound that filled the room after Alcaeus had finished speaking was the scribbling of the clerks as they noted everything down. The rest of us sat in silence, Domitus as ever toying with his dagger.

  It was Gallia who spoke first. ‘What will the Armenians do?’

  ‘They will try to take Gordyene back first, no doubt,’ I surmised, ‘followed by an invasion of Gafarn’s kingdom to seize the whole of northern Hatra, which means Vata at Nisibus will feel the full force of their wrath first.’

  The Kingdom of Gordyene had been lost to Parthia when the Armenians had occupied it. It had subsequently been repossessed by Surena, formerly my squire who had been tutored in the arts of war at Dura. He had matured into a fine commander and so I sent him into Gordyene with an expeditionary force to wage war against its Armenian occupiers. But his martial brilliance had resulted in the Armenians being expelled from the kingdom altogether, earning him Gordyene’s crown from a grateful King of Kings Orodes.

  ‘Why did they declare war?’ asked Kronos. ‘Why not just launch an offensive? Seems odd.’

  I thought of the Armenian King Tigranes, named ‘Great’ in some quarters, and his pompous son Prince Artavasdes.

  ‘I assume Tigranes is making a grand gesture to illustrate to the world how powerful Armenia is.’

  Dobbai let out a low cackle. ‘You are wrong, son of Hatra. The Armenians wish to attract all attention to themselves so the empire’s eyes are diverted from another source of danger.’

  ‘What danger?’ I asked.

  ‘I see the eagles spreading their wings,’ she replied casually.

  Rsan was both confused and alarmed. ‘Eagles? I do not understand.’

  Domitus pointed his dagger at Dobbai. ‘She means the Romans.’

  ‘We have no reports of movements in Syria,’ I replied.

  Dobbai looked at me with a self-satisfied expression. ‘You will. Like the Armenians they will have observed the empire tearing itself apart and will also conclude that it is the right time to strike, while it is weak.’

  ‘Crassus will not arrive in Syria for many more weeks,’ I assured her. ‘Byrd has kept us fully abreast of the situation in the Roman province.’

  Byrd, the army’s chief scout, was also a successful businessman who lived in the great tent city of Palmyra. His offices in Syria supplied him with intelligence regarding Roman plans. We all knew that Marcus Licinius Crassus, Rome’s richest man, was on his way from Italy with an army to assume the governorship of Syria but he was marching overland and the journey was long and arduous.

  She looked away to stare out of the window at the courtyard. ‘Have it your own way, son of Hatra.’

  ‘What are you going to do about Gafarn’s plea?’ asked Domitus.

  ‘Wait until I have heard from Orodes.’

  Gallia looked most surprised. ‘You will not aid your brother?’

  ‘The Armenians will try to capture Nisibus first, but the city has strong defences and in Vata the region has a very able commander. Hopefully that will give us time to organise a coordinated response. It is better to wait until Orodes forms an alliance that we can join.’

  ‘He’s right, Gallia,’ said Domitus. ‘Dura’s army would be more effective as part of a larger force that can march north to confront the Armenians.’

  ‘Time is what we need to create a force large enough to defeat the Armenians,’ I said. ‘Vata will buy us time, and let us not forget that Surena in Gordyene will also be in peril.’

  ‘I wouldn’t worry about him,’ said Domitus, ‘he liberated the kingdom and he’s more than capable of keeping hold of it.’

  ‘You have changed your tune about him,’ remarked Gallia. ‘It was not long ago that you were calling him a puppy.’

  Domitus nodded. ‘True enough. But the puppy has grown into a cunning dog with sharp fangs.’

  ‘Be that as it may,’ I replied, ‘he too will need assistance to battle a full-scale Armenian invasion, though I am sure Media and Atropaiene will send him help.’

  ‘We can always take the lords north with us,’ remarked Gallia. ‘They were most unhappy that they were left behind when we fought Narses and Mithridates.’

  Domitus and Kronos nodded in agreement and in truth the addition of twenty thousand horse archers would certainly stiffen the a
rmy. Unlike most Parthian kingdoms Dura had a standing army. But like every Parthian domain it had lords who in times of war could raise their own troops from those who worked on their lands. These were mostly horse archers.

  ‘In fact,’ continued Gallia, ‘with the lords and their men we would not need to wait for Orodes.’

  ‘Do not leave the kingdom undefended,’ said Dobbai with force, ‘unless you want the Romans to pluck it like a ripe fruit.’

  I frowned at her. ‘You keep going on about the Romans but as far as I know the border with Syria is quiet.’

  Dobbai rose unsteadily to her feet and shuffled towards the door. ‘Did I say anything about the Syrian border? The army must remain here if the city is to stay safe.’

  Domitus winked at Kronos and then tried to be clever. ‘I thought you said that as long as the stone griffin stood at the Palmyrene Gate Dura would never fall.’

  The Palmyrene Gate was the main entrance to the city and above it stood a stone griffin statue that Dobbai had commissioned to safeguard Dura.