by Tony Roberts
Back inside the priest had retreated cowering to a far corner and Casca went up to him. “Priest, there is to be no mercy here today,” he said in Persarmenian.
“You-you speak my language?” the priest, an elderly man with a long white beard, said in surprise. Blood coated one side of his face. “Please stop this!”
“I cannot,” Casca said without emotion. “And you know that. What mercy did I receive from your priests in Persia when I was on trial there? None. I was sentenced to death by burning, and if not for the actions of a friend, who knows what my fate would have been? Your priests condemned me and ordered my burning, so today I exact my vengeance. But, I have no quarrel with you. Go. Go before someone decides to cook you in this oversized oven.”
The priest collapsed sobbing and Casca passed him, picking up a box of cedar and carrying it outside. He looked at it for a moment, then tossed it down the stairs where it splintered, tumbled and then shattered into pieces. There was not a great deal of stuff left in the temple and Kalatios ordered them out. He used a broken piece of wood as a torch, lighting it on the ceremonial flames on the platform, before tossing it into the building where he’d piled up some curtains and drapes.
The priest hadn’t made any effort to leave and he lay where Casca had last seen him, pleading to Ahura-Mazda to strike down the foul desecrators of the temple. As the flames grew and spread, Casca turned and walked away, an unpleasant feeling in his gut; it reminded him too much of the time the Persians burned him. He didn’t want to be too close when the priest started screaming either.
He walked down the cluttered steps and past the broken remains of the former contents of the temple and stood with some of the other soldiers as they watched the Zoroastrian temple begin to burn. Casca tried to feel some kind of satisfaction, but there was none. This wasn’t his idea of soldiering. This was one big religious quarrel, and as such should be left to the priests to sort out. He hoped there was something better than this coming up soon; he needed action to help take his mind off Ayesha and the Brotherhood.
* * *
Ayesha sat at the table with the rest of the Brotherhood members who were there that day. Like them, she was now clothed in the brown homespun wool of the sect. Her old clothes had become soiled and too ripe to wear, and one morning the Elder had entered her cell with two other members, and without even a word the two others had taken hold of her and ripped her rotting clothes off her body.
She had fought, cursed and screamed, but to no avail. She had been held then, naked, and the Elder had run his eyes over her without so much as a word. Then she had been thrown roughly into a corner, her soiled clothes picked up, and one of the homespun wool robes thrown at her. They had gone, leaving her weeping alone in the corner, curled up. It was the way he had looked at her that had unnerved her so much; not with any lust or longing, but almost with repulsion.
Finally with no choice she had put the item on and soon after that had been taken to the dining chamber to eat. Nobody made any comment, nobody even spoke to her. She sat with head bowed, not wanting to make eye contact, feeling terribly alone.
That morning the Elder had sat watching her like a snake does to a victim, waiting. Finally when the others stood to go about their daily chores, she had been gently made to stay where she was. Wondering what was going to happen next, she watched as the Elder slowly made his way along the bench to her and stood over her. She shrank away but was blocked by the two men standing to either side.
“You have been with us long enough to start contributing to the daily routine of this place. Instead of resting in your cell, you are to help clean this House of Worship. I shall judge the standard of your cleaning; if you disappoint me, you will go without supper. If you please me, then you can dine with the rest of us.”
“Is that how you force people to bend to your will? Blackmail? You force Casca to go on that task by blackmail. You use hunger as a weapon against me. What else do you do to get people to do as you wish? Torture?”
The Elder laughed gently. “Oh, how naïve of you, child. People willingly follow my will; they willingly follow the word of the Blessed Lamb. These two brethren here would willingly die if I so wished it.”
“You lie; you are not a king, you cannot hold life or death over these people!”
The Elder smiled again. He looked at one of the two, a dark, thickset man with a bulbous nose. He nodded briefly. The man reached inside his robe, and pulled out a sword. It was short but bright and gleamed. It was a well looked after blade. Ayesha looked on aghast as the man knelt and placed the point against his stomach and looked up at the Elder.
The Elder nodded once again, smiling. Ayesha screamed and went to grab the man’s arm but she was too late. With a convulsive thrust, the man impaled himself and fell onto his side, a curious smile on his lips. Ayesha stood there, a hand to her mouth, her eyes wide in horror.
“So you see, child, not only do they obey me without question, but they are happy to do so. I have the power of life and death over my brethren, and it is the love of the Blessed Lamb that binds them so.” He looked down at the expiring man. “Truly will you sit with Jesus this day, brother.”
The dying man smiled again, then shuddered and went still.
“Mad,” Ayesha whispered. “You are mad!”
The Elder tutted and shook his head sadly. “You do not understand. We are God’s instruments, merely carrying out His wishes for mankind. Many do not yet see what we are trying to achieve, and we must make them see the error of their ways.”
“And what if they don’t wish to?” Ayesha said, looking away from the dead man, unable to look at him anymore.
“Then they must die,” the Elder said coldly. “Nothing and no one must stop us in our sacred mission. We alone can pave the way for His return, for if we fail then who else knows how to? And then the world and all mankind will fall to Satan and his agents. This is what we are battling against; Satan and his most dangerous ally, Longinus!”
“What are you saying? Casca is Satan’s agent? You are mad!”
“You will believe that what I say is true. It will take time but one day you will come to know the truth of my words and that of Izram, our founder.” The Elder flicked a lazy finger at the remaining guard. “Show her the cleaning implements and the floor she is to scrub. I shall inspect it myself in due course.”
“Yes, Keeper of the Holy Word,” the guard bowed before pulling Ayesha along with him.
The Elder returned to his seat and sat for a while, deep in thought. His mind whirled over the options open to him, then as if making his mind up, called to an acolyte to attend him. The junior member had been waiting in the shadows, his task merely to fetch and carry for the Elder, part of his initiate’s duties in his first year of membership.
“Bring me Pallos. You will find him on guard duty inside the front entrance.”
The initiate bowed and left. The Elder remained alone for a few minutes before footsteps heralded the arrival of Michael Pallos. The soldier stood before the Elder silently.
“Ah, Pallos. I trust you are ready to undertake another task on behalf of the Brotherhood?”
“Of course, Elder.”
“Then it is this. Thanks to our spies in the Persian court we have had a breakthrough.” The Elder outlined his plan to Pallos who smiled evilly at hearing the words. Anything to bring pain and suffering to Longinus was what he delighted in, and this plan suited him perfectly.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
The campaign went from town to town burning all traces of the Zoroastrian faith. Many unfortunate townsfolk were burned along with the temples and contents when they protested or were identified by good Christian people as heretics or apostates. Casca reckoned more than a few old scores were settled that autumn by resentful people, using the religious argument as a pretext for getting even.
There were no appeals. Once someone was accused they were tried by a quickly arranged hearing and nearly always found guilty. Then they were thrown into the
flames. Fanatical fervor was evident everywhere and Casca retreated further from the forefront of the groups. Demetros tried to explain to Casca that all they were doing was saving souls, but Casca was having none of it. “It seems Christianity has been twisted to serve the wishes of the fanatics,” he commented.
“We must be strong to defeat the forces of evil,” Demetros argued.
“Who is evil? Burning people because someone with a grudge towards someone else makes up stories about whoever is hardly the act of a faith founded on peace and goodness,” Casca countered, staring Demetros down. “Did anyone take the trouble to see if what they were accused of was true?”
He threw down his half eaten supper and walked off into the night. He was sick to death of the campaign. He wanted an end to it. He wanted to find the Spear and then get Ayesha away from those sick Brotherhood people.
“Longinus,” a voice came to him out of the darkness.
“Oh, no,” Casca groaned. “That’s all I need. Get lost, can’t you?”
“We have a job for you. We are dissatisfied that the fool Emperor is not seeking the holy relics. No matter, we know of someone who was responsible for taking them in the first place. He has been identified in the Persian army. He must be captured and – interrogated.” The voice was whispery, low, but clear. Casca guessed he was up on a rocky outcrop because the voice seemed to be coming from above.
“Why can’t you do it? You’ve got enough men haven’t you?”
“Not for a mission that needs your special skills. You are to go alone to the Persian camp at Martyropolis where this man is in command. He is general Murtzak, a well-known and feared soldier. You are to get from him the location of the Spear.”
Casca kicked a stone at his feet into the darkness. “Alone, into a Persian garrisoned city? I’m to find this general and then somehow get him out of the city and bring him to you?”
“I did not say bring him. I said you are to get the location of the Spear from him, that’s all. He is to die once that information is gained from him.”
“Your organization can do that,” Casca objected. “I’m not a spy or a killer. I’m willing to bet you have both within your ranks. No way, freak. Go tell that asshole Elder I’m not one of his mindless morons who’ll shit as soon as he clicks his fingers.”
The dark voice sighed. Casca guessed he was about twenty feet above him; too far to get at him. He jumped as a dark shape landed with a soft thump at his feet.
“Open it.”
Casca could see from the camp lights and the starlight that it was a leather bag tied with twine. He opened it and pulled out a mass of dark hair. He didn’t need to ask whose it was. He felt a surge of anger and frustration. “If you’ve hurt her in any way….”
“We’re not stupid, Killer of Christ. If you can kill the Blessed Lamb then a single general will be easy in comparison. We have a man inside Martyropolis who will contact you at the right time. Your entry into Martyropolis has already been planned and is foolproof.”
“How?” Casca demanded. “Anything can go wrong!”
“Not when you’re a prisoner and taken for interrogation to that city’s dungeons,” the Brotherhood voice said, a tinge of laughter in the background.
Casca’s heart turned a somersault. “What the hell have you got planned, you sick bastard?”
“Nothing – except to have delivered an important member of the accursed Romanoi army into the hands of Murtzak’s men!”
Casca swore and grabbed his sword hilt, but even as he did so a net came sailing down from above and landed on him, tangling him up. As he fought to pull out his sword to cut the net, footsteps came to him and dark shapes loomed out of the night. There came an exclamation in Farsi and hands grabbed him eagerly. “Here, just as we were told! One of the Christian swine trussed up like a hog! Careful, he has a sword!”
An arm swung and something hard and heavy connected with Casca’s skull and a thousand stars exploded through his mind, and then there was nothing but unconsciousness.
How long he was out cold he had no idea, but once again his pounding head greeted him on his return to the land of the living. He was bound hand and foot beneath a pole and was being carried by two stout men in Persian army uniform. His vision swung from side to side with the rhythm of the walking men and together with his upside down position and his headache, soon became too much for him. He threw up violently, vomit spewing up and out over his face, chest, arms and the rocky ground beneath him.
The men carrying him halted and exclamations of dismay came to Casca as he spat the acidic bile from his mouth, inhaled hard through his nose and spat out what came into his mouth from that. Casca was dumped unceremoniously onto the ground, his legs coming to rest in what he’d just ejected from his stomach.
The Persians started arguing amongst themselves. Casca lay there panting, trying to gather his wits. He couldn’t move, that was for sure, and the ground was hard and uncomfortable. He desperately needed to move his butt because a sharp edge of a rock was jutting up into his crack, but he was so trussed to the long pole that it proved impossible.
Some of the Persians were for slitting Casca’s throat; they wanted to return to their camp as soon as they could and carrying the prisoner was slowing them down. The officer in charge told them to shut up and pick him up again. Casca gathered they were some miles from the city, but it was the headquarters of the local defense forces in that part of the frontier. The general was based there and so was the administration.
He was hauled back up, the soldiers grumbling, and they resumed, Casca swinging uncomfortably from side to side. He gathered during the journey downhill to the valley below that they had been given orders to pick up a prisoner who knew of the enemy army movements and organization in the region. Who had given them this information was unclear; but the officer in charge was determined to take Casca to Martyropolis as it would most likely end with some reward, maybe even a promotion.
The soldiers couldn’t give a damn about Casca or the officer. They were peasants from the Tigris River valley area and had been conscripted into the army in the spring. They were due to return to their farms and homes in a few weeks and wanted away as soon as possible. One good thing about the escort detail, they agreed amongst themselves that evening as they sat around their fire while Casca sat tied to a tree on the edge of the camp, was that it would guarantee they wouldn’t have to go into battle.
Casca kept silent. He decided that it would be to his advantage not to let them know he spoke their language.
The officer had arranged horses and donkeys at the bottom of the valley for them. Casca was tied to the back of one of the donkeys and rode with his hands fixed to the primitive saddle, very uncomfortably. But at least it was better than hanging upside down on that damned log. The officer rode the best horse while the soldiers either walked or used one of the pack donkeys. A messenger had gone on ahead south to the city.
Casca gathered it was a week’s journey which was a long way to go, but somehow it had been decided he was too important for anyone less than General Murtzak himself to interrogate. Casca knew why. Murtzak was bucking for a promotion and if the General himself could elicit this ‘important’ information and present it to either the Shah, his representative in the frontier satrap, or one of the top army commanders such as Shahin, then Murtzak would gain prestige and maybe a move to a better province. Knowing how the Persians and their administration worked was a definite plus to Casca. Maybe it could help him. How, he had no idea. What he was supposed to know about the Imperial army he also didn’t know. He supposed the Persians would be disappointed, but only after a great deal of torture and personal pain and suffering on Casca’s part. He wasn’t looking forward to it.
Typical of the Brotherhood.
What awaited him at Martyropolis apart from pain and suffering he had no idea. The Brotherhood agent would clearly know when he got there and would be able to contact him. So he had to be someone within the administration there. He
didn’t know much about the place; the name meant ‘city of martyrs’ in Greek, and that in itself made him feel uneasy.
After a week on donkey back, a week in which he got sore buttocks and wrists and got rained on, spat on, cursed at, kicked, beaten and generally hurt, they came into view of the town. It sat along an east-west running valley, dominated to the north by a huge rock escarpment rising sheer from the valley floor. It must have been a thousand feet high in places.
The road ran along the valley floor, alongside a shallow watercourse that was ten feet wide in places yet almost fifty in others. Stones and boulders were scattered along its course. The valley was cultivated and sheep grazed higher up towards the mountains. Casca knew Amida was to the south-west; he’d been there before. He was surprised. Amida was a bigger city and he thought the Persians would have based themselves there. Maybe Amida had been damaged too badly in the recent war, or maybe it had been recaptured. This was close to the frontier. It had been close to the frontier before the war had started, but had been Byzantine.
A white stone gateway faced them as they approached, square towers to either side. The wall extended all the way around but it wasn’t a huge place. A couple of thousand souls lived there, Casca reckoned. The pale blue Sassanid flag hung from the ramparts and Casca scowled at it. He got a slap from one of his captors for showing such disrespect.
The officer bellowed at the guards on duty, announcing he had an important prisoner for the general. They were checked and the officer on duty showed himself, an almost identical copy of the man leading the escort detail. Beards seemed all the fashion, so Casca thought.
After much consultation and arguing a messenger was dispatched and Casca was hauled off the donkey – much to his relief – and seated on a hard bench and guarded by two stern-faced spear-toting men. The escort detail lounged in an untidy group by the gatehouse, happy to be in a place of civilization and off duty. Maybe they could spend their bezants here and buy food, supplies or sample one of the local girls. Their officer hovered close to Casca, unwilling to lose sight of him. Casca shot him a few dirty looks.