The Ethiopian was growing more and more agitated. It was not just Garamantian country that was on the brink of insurrection. But the high politics of neither people interested Flaminius very little. He had his own priorities.
‘You say Amasis and the others will be taken to the temple today?’ he asked.
‘Indeed,’ the Ethiopian replied. Menander had agreed to aid his former comrades, his former master’s partners. ‘If we reach the well in time, you may be able to free them from their cell. But every delay will make it likely that we will have to attack the temple itself.’
‘I understand,’ said Flaminius.
‘Should you not return after two hours, my people are under orders to retreat,’ the Ethiopian added. ‘I will not risk their lives more than necessary.’
‘I understand that too,’ said Flaminius, ‘but won’t you show us the way? I know what the irrigation channels are like. But you have been in this one. You’ve given me some idea what it’s like, and how long it will take before we come under the city walls, but it would be better if you were to join us.’
Menander shook his head. ‘I am risking the lives of my people for you,’ he said. ‘This is the last war my people will fight in these lands. We will return to the valley and I shall take power back from my brother. Then we shall journey south, beyond the reach of the Garamantes…’
Before Menander could outline his plans any further, the scouts who had been despatched earlier were sighted in the distance. Once again Flaminius marvelled at their speed.
‘It looks like they have an urgent message,’ Menander remarked. ‘I will order my people to adopt defensive positions.’
They reached the cover of a small pyramid and the troglodytes arranged themselves in its lea while they awaited the scouts. Flaminius scrambled to the top and scanned the desert ahead for signs of trouble.
The sun beat down. It was far off noon and yet already the desert, that had been so icy by night, was like a furnace. The glare of the sun was blinding. He shaded his eyes with his hand. Flat sand stretched away to the horizon. The monotony was broken up only by pyramids like this one, and Flaminius was reminded of the Egyptian tombs near Heliopolis, though none were on the titanic scale of the Great Pyramid. A breath of wind whispered across the waste, stirring up vortices of sand that danced in the air like evil spirits. A larger dust plume, drawing closer, indicated the approaching scouts. Otherwise nothing moved in all that arid country.
But in the middle distance stood groves whose date palms must be irrigated by channels leading from the cliffs behind them. Flaminius had been unable to understand why the Garamantes needed such watercourses in Garama, since a blue lake was visible outside the city walls. But Menander explained that although it had once contained sweet water, attracting the Garamantes to settle at this site, in recent years the lake had become brackish and saline, and the people needed the irrigation channels to bring purer water from elsewhere. Life in the desert was marginal and precarious. Such land bred fatalism, and a hardy race. Given the chance, Flaminius could learn to respect such people who tamed the wilderness and made it fertile.
The farmland, palm groves, olive groves, and fields, grew in number the closer the eye was drawn to the city. By the time the walls and gates were visible, the country around was so fertile and well farmed it could be any land in the empire. Herds cropped grass in some fields, crops grew in others, and semi naked men and women were visible in all. All seemed busy and peaceful. But he knew that must be an illusion.
The desert proper lay on the far side of the city. Garama itself stood on an outcrop overlooking a desert that stretched into the dusty expanses beneath a silver sky so it was difficult to determine where sand ended and sky began. A haze hung over the endless desert, and all was without form or substance, as if it had descended into the chaos that sophists say existed before the beginning of the cosmos…
Or was it a haze? It seemed to be growing closer, swallowing up Flaminius’ view of the agricultural lands. It was like the sandstorm that had hit the caravan even before they reached this land.
He leapt down from the pyramid. Menander was conversing in clicks with the scouts who had just arrived. All around them the spear carrying troglodytes were alert, wary, nervous.
‘The Garamantes! In their chariots!’ Flaminius cried. ‘They’re coming!’
Menander whirled round. ‘The scouts saw the chariots gathering outside the city. But you’ve seen them?’
Flaminius seized a spear from where it lay and brandished it. ‘I’ve seen the dust from their wheels. They’re coming through the arable country towards us. If we’re to reach the well, we will have to fight out way through.’ He halted, ear cocked. Menander stared at him.
The rumble of many hundreds of chariot wheels could now be heard, growing closer and closer.
‘We must go out to meet them,’ Flaminius said. ‘We have to fight our way through their ranks.’
Menander issued orders. Soon the troglodytes were marching forwards, leaving the pyramids behind. This could not be a defensive war, and besides, they would need a position to retreat to. Flaminius marched with a picked squad of troglodytes, men he had got to know in the last day or two, who he was sure were good fighters. They would be coming with him into the tunnel and even into the city, if only they could negotiate their way through the oncoming chariots.
He remembered his first command. What an unruly gang of barbarians they had been! Frisians, in the northerly parts of Britain, the debatable lands beyond Eboracum. Fine fellows, of course. He had been so young. Good thing he had a few stolid decurions to keep them in line. His first command. Fine fellows…
He had not been entirely candid with Menander; the chances the troglodytes had against the Garamantes were low. Although he had spent a few days training them in modern Roman warfare, they had no cavalry. Infantry would not prevail for long against heavy horse or chariots without cavalry to assist them. And their training had been scanty. There had been so little time. And all he had been asked to do was train them as raiders. They were unprepared for a massed battle.
He remembered Amasis’ hero worship of Alexander the Great. The boy would be disappointed to know that he had missed out on their very own Gaugamela. But was he Alexander or Darius?
Flaminius’ companions were naked but for loincloths, carried flint tipped javelins and ostrich feather shields. They had no armour to speak of, barely any clothes even, and their splayed feet were bare. And yet in the faces of each warrior was a look of fierce exultation. For too long had they lived among the rocks, only able to launch hit and run raids on the charioteers who hunted them as if they were beasts. Now everything had changed. They were facing their foes on the field of battle. And if some were fated to die, at least it would be a glorious death.
In the distance, the rumble of wheels, of what must be every chariot in the city of Garama, grew louder and louder and louder. Now the rolling wall of dust blocked out all sight of the city or the arable country. The chariots themselves were hidden as if by the spell of some sorcerer. Only the shaking of the sandy ground betrayed their approach.
Sweat pooled on Flaminius’ skin. He had made a mistake, he knew it now, a fatal mistake: leading barbarian tribesmen against civilised—semi civilised—armies? He should have fled in the night, embarked on the long journey back to Alexandria and reported the mission a failure, leaving Amasis and Dido to their fate. Now all were doomed. They would die far from the empire.
He remembered the diviner’s words. Only one of them would survive? Maybe Amasis would return to Alexandria with stories of adventures in the desert. Or would it be Dido? She was a survivor, Flaminius knew that much. He couldn’t see her allowing herself to be killed by Garamantes. What did she have in mind? But he doubted Demetrius would be the last survivor…
Now the wall of dust towered over him. It was like the sandstorm, but with it came the drumming of hoofs and the thunder of chariot wheels. He brandished his spear. ‘Charge!’ he yelle
d. ‘Charge!’
The troglodytes squealed and shrieked their own eerie war cries. They ran into the choking dust.
The first chariots appeared from the fog, wheels turning, horses whinnying and panting for breath. Garamantes stood or crouched in the chariots, archers, javelin men, spearmen. Spears and arrows flashed in the dusty air, swooping down. Troglodytes fell before the spears, or were crushed under the hoofs of horses. Others flung their own javelins. Now Garamantian charioteers fell, to be caught up in the traces to be dragged behind their own vehicles like Hector behind the chariot of Achilles. Others leapt down, spear or assegai in hand to fight the troglodytes in the dust.
Flaminius found himself dodging chariots, sprinting at the head of his troglodyte strike force. He must seem so slow to his companions, and yet they were all running so fast they had passed through the first lines of chariots. Behind them was another line, stationary now as the first had engaged the enemy. Some rode round and round the edges of the fight, flinging javelins and darts, but visibility was limited. It was only this that gave Flaminius and his companions any hope.
They avoided fighting if they could. Flaminius bled from a scalp wound sustained in a brief skirmish, one of the troglodytes was wounded, and another had fallen with a Garamantian arrow in his back. The rest ran on. They had to make it to the grove containing the well Menander had spoken of. Flaminius had no idea where it was, particularly in this dust. But one of his men did—luckily, still living.
At last they burst out of the dust cloud. Ahead of them rose the distant city walls. They had reached the edge of the farmland. Flaminius felt relief. Relatively unscathed, they had got through the battle that still thundered and clanged and clashed behind them. But now came the hardest part.
His troglodyte companions led him in the direction of the palm trees, scampering like lizards in the hot air. Panting for painful breath, Flaminius hurried after them.
—27—
Garama, Phazania, 22nd December 124 AD
Amasis was dozing when the barred gates screeched peremptorily open and Garamantes shouldered their way in. They grabbed Osorkon and Dido, then came for the startled boy.
Demetrius’ corpse had lain in the corner since death, attracting flies. There had been no flies near the cell before, but now they seemed to come from all quarters of the world, attracted by Demetrius of Oxyrhynchus’ mortal remains. The very fact of his death had been distressing, but to be locked in a cell with his stinking corpse as flies swarmed in clouds, had been… there were no words that would do it justice. Horrifying and absurd at the same time.
Osorkon had shouted for the guards, but the guards had not come. Corpses rot quickly under such conditions, with the damp from the subterranean walls, and although the guards had been conscious by their absence, the flies had come in myriads. The cell hummed to their noise. All three prisoners had tried to swat the insects, lashing out at great amorphous clouds of black, buzzing evil, trying to defend Demetrius’ corpse from their endless assault. In the end, they had sat as far as they could from the stinking corpse, gagging and retching and swatting vainly at passing flies.
Osorkon had gone mad, kicking and banging at the barred gates for so long it almost disturbed the flies from their feast. Amasis, nauseous, cowered in the corner until Dido came and put her arms round him. Both stared numbly at the frenzied Garamantian, who seemed to have superhuman resources to draw upon. But his fight with the door was as futile as the struggle with the flies. At last, exhausted and ashamed, Osorkon slumped down in one corner, head bowed, hands loosely knotted between his knees, and seemed to fall asleep. Still the flies buzzed and crawled, buzzed and crawled, and the rank stench of necrotic flesh filled the air.
Amasis clung to Dido like a child to its mother. He thought that she and his uncle had been lovers, but he didn’t see her hulking, big breasted form in terms of desire, only comfort. Perhaps Dido herself derived some comfort from comforting him. From what he had heard of her life, she had no experience of motherhood, little experience of the soft, womanly life. How ironic that it should be in a stinking desert cell infested with flies, in close proximity to death, that she should find another aspect to her character.
After a while, she pushed him gently away, and went to speak with Osorkon. Amasis crawled away into the far corner from Demetrius’ corpse, wrapped himself up in his long arms, and tried to sleep.
That was when the guards came. Amasis heard Dido squawk something in Punic, a complaint—he guessed it was about Demetrius’ corpse and the flies—but they grabbed her and Osorkon, hauling them protesting to their feet while others came for Amasis. One stood over Demetrius’ corpse, face pale with disgust, swatting angrily at the flies with a quirt. Another barked an order at him, and he turned away from the corpse.
‘You can’t just leave him there!’ Amasis choked.
Osorkon said something, and Dido relayed it to Amasis. ‘They’ll have him taken away later and buried by slaves,’ she reassured him. ‘They don’t want his ghost to haunt them. Forget him,’ she added harshly. ‘He lived his life of virtue, now he’s crossed Death’s dark river to be received into his Elysium. Our own lives are what matter now.’
The guards urged them out into the passage.
‘Where are they taking us?’ Amasis wanted to know. Dido’s face was blank.
‘To the temple of Tanit,’ she said.
But as they came out into a daylight that was almost blinding after the darkness, the city was not jubilant with excitement at a popular spectacle in the offing. Amasis remembered Alexandria on execution days. There was a sense of euphoria, of expectation, of relief that it was another whose sins had found him out, of cruelty and joy.
He’d been to a few executions with other boys his own age, other layabouts and lazybones like himself. Everything had been joyous, with hucksters and traders cashing in, men drinking in the wine shops. The drama of spectacular death livened up many a day, although Amasis always went from such events silent and sobered. It was the build-up to the execution that had always been such fun. The execution itself had been too much for him.
As they were marched through the streets between the whitewashed, flat roofed houses so strangely reminiscent of the Egyptian quarter of Alexandria, there were none of the jeering crowds he had anticipated. A brooding anxiety hung over the city, as if a storm was building. As if even the prospect of an execution did not excite the people buying and selling cloth, or metalwork, or pottery. From time to time he thought he heard distant thunder. Dust clouds were visible outside the walls. Another unseasonable sandstorm?
‘What is it that makes them so miserable?’ Amasis asked Dido with a cracked laugh. ‘Shouldn’t they be happy that foreign spies are going to their deaths?’
Dido spoke with Osorkon, who walked before them, downcast, his eyes on the dung strewn paves, avoiding the gaze of the indifferent crowd. He looked up and around, as if noticing the anomaly for the first time. Then he questioned the chief guard, who replied curtly and aimed a blow at him.
Clutching his cheek, Osorkon spoke to Dido again.
Dido’s face flushed with excitement. ‘An army is at the gates! The king has decreed our execution in an attempt to put heart into the people. But it seems that his ploy isn’t working. Maybe he’ll postpone it… Listen!’
In the distance, from beyond the walls, Amasis heard the clash of blade on blade and embattled shouts. It wasn’t a sandstorm, it was a battle! Despite himself, he felt his blood stirred.
‘But who is attacking?’ he asked. ‘Rebels?’ Osorkon had friends among the warriors. Was this them, come to release him? To release them all?
‘No,’ Dido said after a short exchange with their companion. ‘That rebellion died when the escape attempt went awry. His friends betrayed him. That’s why he was brought back to the cell. No, the word is that the troglodytes have issued forth from their caves to attack the city.’
‘Troglodytes?’ Despite himself, despite the impending threat of executio
n, Amasis was fascinated.
The chief guard shouted something and the rest hustled them onwards. Some of the shopkeepers and artisans put down their tools or their merchandise and came to follow the procession, but the rest remained where they were, indifferent to the coming spectacle.
They turned a corner. Ahead of them stood a large building with a wide flight of steps that led up to a pillared colonnade. Gates, tall enough for a cyclops to walk comfortably through them, stood open. Robed priests and court officials and the richer citizens stood in rows, fear and uncertainty on their faces.
Amasis halted in his tracks. A guard had to prod him with his spear to get him moving again. Dido had also seen what had so transfigured him.
‘How did they get here?’ she muttered.
With the priests and courtiers, in apparent dignity and honour, stood the Egyptian merchant who they had met in the desert, Rhampsinitus. With him were some of his people including his son. They looked censoriously down at the captives, showing no sign of recognising them. But now the prisoners were mounting the steps, and the merchant and his followers were soon out of sight.
‘It seems they did a better job of getting here than we did,’ said Amasis.
‘This is good,’ said Dido to herself as they reached the top of the steps.
‘What’s good about it?’ Amasis hissed. ‘We’re going to die! Don’t you understand that?’
She flushed, surprised he had heard her words. ‘It’s good because there are barely any guards in the city,’ she said. ‘All the warriors are out fighting the attackers. It will make escape that little bit easier.’
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