by Wilbur Smith
Tanus wanted to draw our main forces back from the frontier and to set up a series of deep defences along the river. At the same time, he intended sending forward scouting and reconnaissance parties to assess and study the nature of the mysterious enemy. We had spies in all of the northern cities, but for some unknown reason no reports from them had as yet been received. Tanus wanted to gather these in and study them, before he deployed his main force to battle.
‘Until we know what we are facing, we cannot devise the correct strategy to meet it,’ he told the council.
Nembet and his faction countered any of Tanus’ suggestions. The old admiral had never forgiven Tanus for his humiliation on the day he saved the royal barge from destruction. His opposition to Tanus was based on principle rather than on reason or logic.
‘We will not yield a cubit of our sacred soil. To suggest it is cowardice. We will meet the enemy and destroy him wherever we find him. We will not dance and flirt with him like a gaggle of village maidens.’
‘My lord!’ roared Tanus, incensed by the suggestion of cowardice. ‘Only a fool, and an old fool at that, will make a decision before he knows the facts. We have no scrap of intelligence to act upon—’
It was in vain. The seniority of the three generals above Tanus on the army lists prevailed in the end.
Tanus was ordered north immediately, to steady and rally the retreating army. He was to hold the frontier, and make his stand on the boundary stones. He was forbidden to make a strategic withdrawal to the line of hills before Asyut, which was the natural defensive line, and from which the city walls provided a second line of defence. He would have the fleet and the northern army corps under his direct command, with three hundred warships to provide the transport, and to command the river.
In the meantime, Nembet would bring in the rest of the army, even those regiments on the southern border with Cush. The black threat from the African interior must be ignored now in the face of this more pressing danger. As soon as they were assembled, Nembet would rush these reinforcements northwards to join up with Tanus. Within a month, there would be an invincible army of sixty thousand men and four hundred galleys lying before Asyut. In the meantime, Tanus must hold the frontier at all costs.
Nembet ended with a strict injunction. ‘Lord Harrab is further ordered to hold all his forces on the border. He is not to indulge in raids or scouting forays to the north.’
‘My Lord Nembet, these orders blindfold me, and bind my sword-arm. You are denying me the means of conducting this campaign in a prudent and efficient manner,’ Tanus protested in vain. Nembet sneered with the satisfaction of having forced his authority upon his young rival, and in having gained a measure of retribution. On such petty human emotions pivots the destiny of nations.
Pharaoh himself announced his intention of taking his rightful place at the head of his army. For a thousand years the pharaoh had been present on the field whenever the decisive battles of history had been fought out. Although I had to admire the king’s courage, I wished he had not chosen this moment to demonstrate it. Pharaoh Mamose was no warrior, and his presence would do little to enhance our chances of victory. There might be some bolstering of morale when the troops saw him in the van, but on balance he and his train would be a greater hindrance than assistance to Lord Tanus.
The king would not travel northwards to the battle-front alone. His entire court would attend him, including his senior wife and his son. The queen must have her retinue and Prince Memnon his tutors, and so I would be going north to Asyut and the battle-front.
Nobody knew nor understood this enemy. I felt that my mistress and the prince were being placed in unnecessary danger. On the other hand, the safety of a slave was of no account, except to the slave himself. I slept little the night before we sailed northwards on the flood of the river for Asyut and the battle-front.
* * *
The farther north we sailed, the more numerous and troublesome were the rumours and reports coming down from the front to feed upon our contentment and confidence, like locusts upon the standing crops. Often during the voyage, Tanus came aboard our vessel, ostensibly to discuss these with me. However, on each visit he spent some time with the prince and his mother.
I have never held with the custom of women following the army into battle. In times of peace or war, they are a marvellous distraction—even a warrior of Tanus’ calibre could be diverted from his main purpose. All his mind should have been on the task ahead, but when I told him so, he laughed and clapped my shoulder.
‘They give me a reason to fight. Don’t worry, old friend, I shall be a lion defending his cub.’
Soon we encountered the first elements of the retreating army, straggling groups of deserters who were looting the villages as they fled southwards along the banks of the river. With very little ceremony and no hesitation at all, Tanus beheaded several hundred of them and had their heads spiked on spears and planted along the bank as an example and a warning. Then he gathered up the others and regrouped them under reliable officers. There were no further desertions and the troops stood to the colours with a new spirit.
Our flotilla came to the walled city of Asyut, overlooking the river. In defiance of his orders from Nembet, Tanus left a small strategic reserve of five thousand men here under the command of Remrem. Then we sailed on northwards to take up our positions on the border, there to await the approach of the mysterious Shepherd King.
The fleet lay at anchor across the river in its battle formations, but the vessels were under skeleton crews. The fighting men were disembarked with the main body of infantry and deployed upon the east bank of the river.
I prevailed upon Pharaoh to allow my mistress and the prince to remain on board the large and comfortable barge that had brought them here. It was cooler and healthier out on the water, and their escape would be swifter if our army met with any reverse of arms.
The king went ashore with the army, and set up his camp on the higher ground above the inundated fields. There was a deserted village here; years ago the peasants had fled from this disputed border with the false pharaoh. There were always foraging troops and bloody little skirmishes hereabouts, and the farmers had given up any attempts to work these fertile but dangerous fields. The name of the derelict village was Abnub.
The flood of the Nile had begun to subside some weeks prior to our arrival at Abnub, and although the irrigation canals were still running strongly, and the fields were morasses of black mud, the main waters had retreated back between the permanent banks of the Nile.
Within the restrictions placed upon him by Nembet, Tanus set about preparing to meet the threat. The regiments encamped in their order of battle. Astes commanded the fleet on the river, Tanus himself had the centre with his left flank anchored on the Nile, while Kratas had the right wing.
The desert stretched to the eastern horizon, dun and forbidding. No army could survive out in that burning, waterless waste. It was our right flank, secure and impregnable.
All that we knew of the Hyksos was that he had come overland, and that he possessed no fleet of his own. Tanus expected to meet him on land, and to fight an infantry engagement. Tanus knew that he could prevent the Hyksos from crossing the river, and so he should be able to bring him to battle on the field of his own choice. Ideally, this would not have been at Abnub, but Nembet had made that decision for him.
The village of Abnub stood on a low ridge with open untended fields around it. At least it commanded a good view, and the enemy would be under our observation long before it could engage and drive in our pickets.
Tanus had thirty thousand of the finest troops in Egypt under his command. I had never seen such a large force. Indeed, I doubt that an army of this size had ever before been assembled in the valley of the Nile. Soon Nembet would arrive with another thirty thousand. Then it would be the greatest army in history.
I went with Tanus to inspect them, and the troops’ morale had soared since he had taken command in person. Perhaps the
presence of Pharaoh in the camp had also helped to steady them. They cheered Tanus as he strode along their massed ranks, and I felt much encouraged and relieved at the multitudes of their host, and the spirit in them.
I could not imagine an enemy powerful enough to overwhelm us. There were twelve thousand archers with polished leather helmets and padded leather breastplates that would stop an arrow, except if it were fired at very short range. There were eight thousand heavy spearmen, with long shields of hippo-skin as tough and hard as bronze. The ten thousand swordsmen in leopard-skin caps were also armed with sling-shots, the stones from which could split a skull at fifty paces.
I felt more confident with each day that passed, as I watched Tanus exercising these huge masses of armed men. Yet it worried me that we still knew so little about the Hyksos and the forces that he commanded. I pointed out to Tanus that the war council had forbidden him to send land forces forward to reconnoitre, but had said nothing of vessels being used for this purpose.
‘You should have been a law scribe,’ Tanus laughed, ‘you can make words dance to any tune you play.’ But he ordered Hui to take a single squadron of fast galleys northwards as far as Minieh, or until he encountered the enemy. This was the same Hui whom we had captured at Gallala, and who had been one of Basti’s Shrikes. Under Tanus’ favour, that young rogue had advanced swiftly, and now commanded a squadron of galleys.
Hui had strict orders to avoid action and to report back within four days. Dutifully, he returned on the fourth day. He had reached Minieh without seeing another ship or encountering any resistance. The villages along the river were all deserted, and the town of Minieh itself had been sacked and was in flames.
Hui had, however, captured a handful of deserters from the false pharaoh’s shattered army. These were the first persons we had questioned who were actual eye-witnesses of the Hyksos invasion. However, none of them had ever stood to engage and actually fight the Shepherd King. They had all fled at his first approach. Their reports were therefore so far-fetched and garbled as to be completely incredible.
How could we believe in the existence of an army that sailed across the open desert on ships that were as swift as the wind? According to our informants, the dust-clouds that hung over this strange fleet were so tall as to obscure their numbers and to strike terror into any army that watched their advance.
‘These are not men,’ the prisoners reported, ‘they are fiends from the underworld, and they ride on the devil winds out of the desert.’
Having questioned the prisoners carefully, and finding that even hot coals on their heads could not make them alter their stories, Tanus ordered their summary execution. He did not want these wild tales circulating and spreading despondency amongst our forces who had only recently regained their courage.
* * *
On the tenth day of waiting at Abnub, we received word that Nembet was at last on his way with reinforcements, and that he expected to reach Asyut within the next two weeks. The effect on the men was marvellous to behold. They were transformed at a stroke from sparrows to eagles. Tanus issued an extra ration of beer and meat to celebrate the news, and the cooking-fires were a field of stars upon the plain before Abnub. The luscious odour of burning mutton fat filled the night, and the sound of laughter and singing only died away in the final watches.
I had left my mistress on board the barge with her son, and had come ashore in response to a summons from Tanus. He wanted me to attend the final war council with his regimental commanders. ‘You are always a well of ideas and wisdom, you old rascal. Perhaps you can tell us how to sink a fleet of ships that comes sailing over dry land?’
Our deliberations went on until after midnight, and for once I was able to contribute very little of value. It was too late to return to the ship that night, so Tanus gave me a straw mattress in the corner of his tent. I awoke before dawn, as was my habit, but Tanus was gone from his bed, and beyond the coarse linen wall of the tent, the camp was already astir. I felt guilty of indolence, and hastened out to watch the dawn breaking over the desert.
I climbed the hill behind the camp. From there I looked first towards the river. The blue smoke from the cooking-fires was smeared out across the surface, mingling with the streamers of river mist. The riding lamps on board the ships were reflected in the dark waters. It was still too dark and far to pick out the vessel upon which my mistress lay.
I turned then towards the east and saw the light bloom over the desert with the nacreous glow of pearly oyster-shells. The light hardened and the desert was soft and lovely, the hillocks and dunes shaded with mauve and soft purple. In the limpid air the horizons seemed close enough to touch with an outstretched hand.
Then I saw the cloud suspended on the horizon beneath the unblemished aquamarine sheen of the sky. It was no larger than the end of my thumb, and my gaze wandered past it and then drifted back to it. I felt no initial alarm, for I had to stare at it for a while before I realized that it was moving.
‘How strange,’ I murmured aloud. ‘The beginning of the khamsin, perhaps.’ But it was out of season, and there had been no charging of the air with those malevolent forces which herald the desert storms. The morning was cool and balmy.
Even as I pondered it, the distant cloud spread and grew taller. The base of the cloud was upon the earth, not suspended above it, and yet it was too swift and wide to be of any earthly origin. A flock of birds might move that fast, locusts may rise that thickly to the skies, but this was neither of these things.
The cloud was ochre-yellow, but at first I could not believe it was dust. I have watched herds of scimitar-horned oryx galloping through the dunes in their hundreds upon their annual migrations, but they had never raised a dust-cloud such as this. It might have been the smoke from a fire, but there was nothing out there in the desert to burn. It had to be dust, and yet I still could not wholly believe it. Swiftly it grew, and drew ever closer, while I stared in wonder and in awe.
Suddenly I saw reflected light twinkle at the base of the towering cloud. Instantly I was transported back to the vision of the Mazes of Ammon-Ra. This was the same scene. The first had been fantasy, but this was reality. I knew that those beams of light were shot from war armour and from blades of polished bronze. I started to my feet, and alone upon the hilltop I shouted to the wind a warning that nobody heard.
Then I heard the war trumpets sounding in the camp below me. The pickets on the heights had at last seen the approaching dust-cloud and sounded the alarm. The sound of the trumpets was a part of my vision. Their urgent warning shrilled in my ears and threatened to split my skull, it thrilled my blood and chilled my heart. I knew from my vision that on this fateful day a dynasty would fall and the locusts from the East would devour the substance of this very Egypt. I was filled with dread, and with terror for my mistress and the child that was part of the dynasty.
The camp below me was a tumult of men running to arms. Their armour glinted and their spear-heads sparkled as they brandished them on high. They were bees from the overturned hive, massing and swarming in disarray. The shouts of the sergeants and the rallying cries of the captains were almost drowned by the braying horns.
I saw Pharaoh carried from his tent in the centre of a knot of armed men. They hustled him up the slope of the hill to where his throne was set amongst the rocks, overlooking the plain and the wide sweep of the river. They lifted him to the throne and placed the crook and the flail in his hands and the tall double crown upon his head. Pharaoh sat like a marble statue with an ash-white face, while below him his regiments fell into their battle formations. Tanus had trained and exercised them well, and out of the confusion of the first alarm, order swiftly emerged.
I ran down the hill to be near the king, and so rapid was the response of Lord Tanus’ divisions that by the time I reached the foot of his throne, his army lay upon the plain like a coiled serpent to meet the menace of that boiling yellow dust-cloud that swept down upon it.
Kratas stood with his division on
the right flank. I could recognize his tall figure on the first slope of the hill. His regimental officers were grouped around him, their plumes nodding and waving in the light morning breeze from the river. Tanus and his staff were directly below me, close enough for me to overhear their conversation. They discussed the advance of the enemy in cool, academic tones, as though this were a sandbox problem at an officers’ training course.
Tanus had disposed his force in the classical formations. His heavy spearmen formed the front ranks. Their shields were interlocked and the spears’ butts grounded. The bronze spear-heads sparkled in the early sunlight, and the men’s demeanour was calm and grave. Drawn up behind them were the archers. Their bows were strung and ready. Behind each man stood his quiver boy with bundles of spare arrows. During the battle they would gather up the expended arrows of the enemy to replenish their own bundles. The swordsmen were in reserve, light and quick troops that could rush in to stop a breach or to exploit a weak point in the enemy formations.
The moves of any battle were like those of the bao board. There were classic openings with set defences that had been developed over the centuries. I had studied these and written three of the definitive scrolls on military tactics that were the prescribed reading of officers training in Thebes.
Now, reviewing Tanus’ dispositions, I could find no fault in them, and my confidence soared. How could an enemy prevail against this mighty host of trained and battle-hardened veterans, and their brilliant young general, who had never lost a battle?
Then I looked once more beyond our ranks at that ominous, rolling yellow cloud, and my confidence wavered. This was something beyond military tradition, beyond the experience of any general in all our long, proud history. Were these mortal men that we were facing, or, as rumour suggested, were they fiends?
When I stared into the swirling clouds, they were now so close that I could make out dark shapes in the dun and gloomy veils of dust. My skin crawled with a kind of religious horror as I recognized the shiplike shapes that our prisoners had warned us of. But these were smaller and swifter than any vessel that had ever been launched on water, swifter even than any creature that had ever moved upon the surface of the earth.