Ballista smiled. ‘I thought you looked familiar.’
Jucundus smiled ruefully. ‘Castricius – a long time ago he was my contubernalis – has been appointed to replace Rutilus as Prefect of Cavalry. Not done badly, old Castricius, for a man who was once in the mines.’
Ballista also smiled. ‘He is a resourceful man.’
‘That is one word for him. I remember that night at Caeciliana – gods below, the two of you were drunk – when you burned that patrician officer’s baggage. The boys and me could hardly stand for laughing. It was magnificent.’
Ballista dropped his voice. ‘Jucundus, has my freedman Maximus been arrested?’
Jucundus shook his head. ‘Not that I have heard.’
Ballista sighed. ‘That is something at least.’
‘I will see you tomorrow.’ Jucundus snapped a salute, incongruous in the degraded surroundings.
Jucundus turned back. His eyes took in the small cell. ‘Your wife and children too … Dominus, I am so very sorry.’
The dead lived well in Palmyra. Maximus rode through the Valley of the Tombs; everywhere, the tall, well-built rectangular homes of the dead. Maximus had been this way before, six years previously, on his way to Arete. One of a company then, he had not really looked at the tombs. Alone now, he gazed at them. They spoke of wealth and power. And, to his mind, there was something more. Halfway up the steep slope on one side, three, four storeys tall, their masonry so well squared off, doors and windows so neatly cut, the ring of towers spoke of permanence. They were like a smoother version of the jagged rocks poking through the sand at the summit; grown out of nature, but shaped by man. Like the living rocks, they intended to be here for ever.
Looked at in a certain way, they seemed to be the walls, the natural rocks the city; the dead men guarding the living rocks. Gods below, any more of this drivel and you would think I had been educated in Athens, thought Maximus. He had been out in the sun a long time. It had been a long, tough journey since the killings in the mere. Over the terrible hard mountains – Ballista’s bloody hills – then monotonous days of dun-coloured, sun-blasted, rocky desert. But at last he was here: Palmyra, Tadmor to the locals, the oasis city of Odenathus, the Lion of the Sun.
There was a crowd at the gate jostling to get in. Most were farmers from the villages to the north-west, their donkeys, camels and wives laden with wheat, wine and fodder, olive oil, animal fat and pine cones. There were fewer traders from the west than there had been the last time Maximus had been here. But there were a couple. War or not, profits can drive a man from home. One of these hardy souls traded in Italian wool, the other in salt fish. It was very hot, and tempers were short. Men shouted and donkeys brayed; the camels spat.
Maximus sat on one of his two horses and looked at the city walls. He remembered his old drinking companion Mamurra sneering at them the last time they were here. The Hibernian checked the thought – as if that square-headed bastard Mamurra would ever be going anywhere again, buried as the poor bugger was in a collapsed siege tunnel under the walls of Arete. He was never the quickest man in the world, old Mamurra, but in time he had got things right. The low mud-brick walls of Palmyra would be as much use in a siege as a one-legged man in an arse-kicking competition. It was a good job the Palmyrenes were on the attack. They had better pray the tables were never turned.
Eventually, Maximus reached the customs post in the gate.
‘What do you have to declare?’ The telones spoke without looking up.
Maximus did not reply.
With a tut of irritation, the telones took his eyes from his tally. He took in the mail coat; the worn leather grip of the sword; the missing tip of the nose; the two horses and the dust engrained thick in everything that told of a long journey at speed. ‘Carry on,’ he said. ‘Next.’
Inside the gate, Maximus threw a street child a coin and said he wanted the house of Haddudad. He followed the lively bundle of rags and brown limbs up one fine, bustling colonnaded street, down another, through a monument of sixteen columns of swirling black and gold, passed a full agora and an empty theatre. The strong but not unpleasant smell of spices, horses and humanity, all with a slight edge of camel, was familiar. Maximus recognized the route to the palace of Odenathus. Three houses beyond it, his guide stopped, pointed at the marble entrance to a huge townhouse and jabbered excitedly in whatever language he or she spoke. Haddudad the mercenary had come up in the world.
Maximus showed the child – on balance, probably a girl – a quite high-denomination coin, mimed holding the horses and put the coin back in his wallet. Laughing, the child took the reins.
The porter created no fuss. It was as if armed, violent-looking men covered in dirt arrived at the door every day. Given that his kyrios was an ex-mercenary and his kyria the daughter of a caravan protector, quite possibly, they did. He showed Maximus to a small room and asked him to wait. He expressed no surprise when the visitor declined his offer to look after his weapons.
Maximus sat down and stretched out his legs. He assumed he was being watched. He looked around, unconcerned. The walls were painted and depicted some Greek myth. Large, near-naked and hairy men were running about on an improbable range of mountains. They were throwing huge boulders down at anchored warships. Most of the ships had been hit, and some were already beyond salvation. Their crews stretched their hands to the heavens in appeal or reproach. A shifty-looking man on the last vessel had the right idea. He was cutting the mooring rope. The galley was so far unscathed but, given the hairy boys’ skills with a rock, Maximus did not fancy its chances.
Two armed men entered the room. Hands on their hilts, they hard-eyed Maximus. After them came a woman in eastern costume, fully veiled, only her eyes visible.
Maximus politely stood up. The guards tensed.
The woman passed the guards, came close. With her left hand, she reached up and across and undid her veil. Gods below, but Bathshiba was still attractive.
‘It has been a long time,’ she said in Greek. Her voice was as he remembered; the sort of thing that could take a man’s wits.
‘Five years.’
‘I would kiss you, but you are filthy.’ She smiled, stepped back.
Ballista, my old friend, thought Maximus, you were a fool not to fuck her when you had the chance. If it had been me she set her cap at in Arete, her bed would have been no place of solitude and quiet contemplation.
‘As you can see, I am in my best demure-wife clothes. We are entertaining – just the one guest. You will join us; no need to bath or change.’ She came close again, closer than before. He could smell her, beneath her perfume. Ballista, you were such a fool. She leant closer still and, her breath in his ear, whispered, ‘Be very careful what you say in front of Nicostratus. No mention of coming from the army of Quietus. No mention of Ballista.’
The dining room was light and shady at the same time. For a Syrian afternoon in high summer, it was cool. A water feature played somewhere.
Haddudad rose from his couch. Prosperity suited him. His hair was longer, flat on top, curled at the sides, very artful. From behind his full, curled and perfumed beard, he grinned.
‘Maximus,’ Haddudad said. Although his clothes were yet more gorgeous and ornate than those of his wife, he hugged the Hibernian to him. They pounded each other on the back. Clouds of dun-coloured dust drifted up through the shafts of sunlight.
Haddudad gestured at the occupied couch. ‘Maximus, this is the renowned historian Nicostratus of Trapezus.’ Haddudad gestured back again. ‘Nicostratus, this is an old systratiotes of mine from the siege of Arete, Marcus Aurelius Maximus.’
The man of letters got to his feet. There was no overt show of reluctance, but Maximus had the impression that Nicostratus of Trapezus did not often shake the hand of mercenaries, old companion of his host or not.
Servants brought in a third couch. Haddudad guided Maximus over to it. All three men reclined. Bathshiba sat on an upright chair behind and at the foot of her husband�
��s couch. Maximus felt like laughing. He remembered the wild Amazonian girl from Arete: dressed like a man, fighting alongside her father’s men, quite probably – much to his fury – saving Ballista’s life.
First they brought him a bowl and ewer to wash his hands. Then a servant positioned a small table at Maximus’s right hand. Another placed a selection of small dishes of pastries, olives and cheese and an empty wine cup on the table. A third poured the mixed wine. Maximus made a libation and drank the health of his host.
Haddudad and Nicostratus resumed a conversation they had obviously been having before Maximus arrived. It was about a historian called Herodian. Nicostratus tried to include Maximus. The Hibernian said he was usually paid to kill men not read books. Nicostratus did not try again.
Maximus drank his wine. He was impressed by Haddudad. The ex-mercenary had taken to this life as if born to it. His fine, embroidered tunic, trousers and boots – all dusty now – hung easily on him. He lounged elegantly and was more than holding his own in bookish discussion: ‘So would you agree, my dear Nicostratus, that Herodian sacrifices certain trivial details in order to bring out more clearly what he regards as deeper and more profound levels of historical truth?’ The false nomen he had given Maximus was clever. Since the emperor Caracalla – about fifty years earlier – had given Roman citizenship to all the free inhabitants of the imperium who did not already have it, almost every other person carried the Caracalla’s praenomen and nomen: Marcus Aurelius.
A servant came and refilled Maximus’s wine cup. That was another creditable thing about Haddudad – not just that he kept the drink flowing but that he had followed Bathshiba’s father’s way of employing fighting men at table. Much more use than some pretty boys or naked girls in the event of trouble.
Bathshiba leant forward and spoke to her husband. Haddudad inclined his head, smiling. She got up. At her sign, a servant placed another upright chair by Maximus’s couch.
‘Historiography not your strong point?’ Bathshiba’s voice was pitched low, so as not to carry. She did not wait for an answer. ‘Nicostratus is a pompous bore – failings not unknown among men of his calling. Zenobia summoned him here to Tadmor. She has commissioned him to write a history from the reign of Philip the Arab to the glorious victories of Odenathus. It will be ghastly – no chance of it standing the test of time.’
Maximus studied the reclining Greek historian. He had thin, pursed lips in a self-satisfied face. He did not appear a man much troubled by curiosity. Under his Greek himation, a pair of oriental embroidered trousers and finely tooled soft leather boots peeped out. This standard bearer of Hellenic culture had gone half native already. Not that Maximus cared.
‘Odenathus’s second wife is not the beautiful but submissive young girl we were all expecting. Zenobia is deeply ambitious. More ambitious even than Odenathus himself. And she is warlike.’
Maximus glanced sharply at Bathshiba, who ignored it.
‘It frustrates her. Odenathus has a grown son, Haeranes, from his first marriage. The young man is a natural warrior. In Zabda and Zabbai, Odenathus has two generals he trusts. Now there is my husband. No need for a twenty-year-old girl in the councils of war of the Lion of the Sun.’
Bathshiba stopped as a servant replaced the empty dishes with ones of fruit, nuts and sweet things.
‘So,’ she continued, ‘Zenobia has set herself up as the great patroness of culture. From all over the east, philosophers and sophists, historians and poets, flock to the court. These men of paideia infest the palace. Every one of them is more greedy and ambitious than the last. But every one of them owes his position to Zenobia. And that is why Nicostratus is here, and why poor Haddudad is putting himself out to be so charming.’
Bathshiba smiled charmingly as Nicostratus looked around.
‘Not that Zenobia does not get to ride with the army.’ Bathshiba’s eyes sparkled with her old mischief. ‘They say she will not let Odenathus have what a husband needs unless he lets her have her way.’
The last tack of her conversation sent Maximus’s thoughts wandering. Under all these eastern fabrics, was Bathshiba still the nicely rounded armful she had been? She had been one of the likeliest-looking bits of tumble you could imagine. Lucky old Haddudad.
‘Ow.’ She had prodded him with a fruit knife. Maximus quickly smiled blandly over at the others.
‘That is better. My face is up here.’ Bathshiba’s teeth were very white when she laughed. ‘And I said, what are you doing here?’
‘Ballista wants Haddudad to arrange for me to see Odenathus in secret.’ There was no point in beating around the bush.
‘Why?’
‘To give him a letter.’
‘Saying what?’
‘I have no idea.’
‘Really?’
Maximus looked at Bathshiba. Surely she was not being so unsubtle as to push her shoulders back to accentuate her breasts. How shallow did she think he was? ‘All I know is I have to make sure Odenathus knows which is the Tower of Desolation at Emesa.’
‘The tall, thin one at the extreme south-east of the walls.’ Bathshiba spoke, but her thoughts were elsewhere. ‘Of course Haddudad will do it. But …’ She paused. ‘I am not sure what sort of a reception you will get. Your friend is a leading general of Odenathus’s enemy. Obviously, much depends on the contents of the letter. But it is far easier to read Herodian’s History than the Lord of Tadmor. He is unpredictable. It is part of what has made him so powerful. He is like a capricious elemental force. The Lion of the Sun may shower you with gold and make you his drinking companion – or he may kill you like a dog.’
Maximus shrugged. ‘Sure, life would be terrible dull if we knew all the outcomes. Is there any chance of a bath?’
‘Of course. Would you like some company?’ At Maximus’s grin, she quickly added, ‘No, not me, you fool. One of the maids.’
‘Well, that would be better than either your husband or the historian. I don’t suppose there would be two of your maids at a loose end?’
Before she made the arrangements, Bathshiba spoke seriously one more time. ‘It is lucky you have come now. You are nearly too late. The Lion of the Sun marches on Emesa in three days.’
It may have been the best cell to be found in the gaol under the palace of Emesa, but it was still dark, airless and insufferably hot. And familiarity did not stop the stink of it catching in Ballista’s throat.
Ballista knew he had failed. Everything he had done during these years in the east had been to protect his family, and he had failed. He did not know why, but they were in gaol with him.
True to his word, Jucundus, or one of his men, had come every day to check that things were no worse than they had to be. This may have gone some way to explaining why the behaviour of the gaoler and his assistants had shifted from its customary and ingrained cruelty to a grudging near-politeness. The open-handedness of the prisoners with money and an unexpressed and incoherent fear of the mutability of fortune probably also came into play.
Under the supervision of Calgacus, servants delivered fresh food and drink. Every morning, maids dressed the hair and did the make-up of the domina. Other girls produced newly cut flowers. The women swept and cleaned, strategically arranged the flowers, lit scented lamps and liberally dispensed scented oils. Yet, no matter how many aromatics were deployed, still the prison stench seeped up from the lower cells, where those lacking in fortune and influence lay in their own filth, devoid of hope.
The children were doing surprisingly well. Admittedly, they had no fresh air, nowhere near enough space to run, and sometimes their own noise crashing back from the walls seemed momentarily to stun even them. But they had the rarity of near-undivided attention from their parents, all their favourite playthings, and were largely being fed things of their own choice. To all these benefactions, Isangrim added the absence of his schoolmaster.
If the boys were bearing up well, the same could not be said of Julia. Her usual disposition towards order had been
elevated almost to the level of mania. She was always moving, tutting and complaining under her breath as she put things back in their right place after her husband or children had moved them. It was, thought Ballista, rather like being locked up with a better-looking version of Calgacus, but with his irony gone.
Ballista himself, as far as he could in the din of the confined space, retreated into reading. The second day, he had Calgacus bring him Arrian’s Discourses of Epictetus. It was hard to think of a circumstance where some hard-line Stoic philosophy should not be more appropriate or sustaining. On the third morning, as instructed, the Caledonian arrived with a novel, The Aithiopika of Heliodorus of Emesa. Ballista wondered if he might learn some interesting things about the mentality of the town in which he was a prisoner. He did not. But it was a diverting enough series of picaresque stories within stories. After another day, he asked Calgacus to bring him some of Plutarch’s Parallel Lives. They were far more like it – examples of men bearing changes in fortune set in exciting stories; philosophy in action for those like Ballista who could not quite stomach the unalloyed thing. He started with the lives of Demetrius and Antony:
Antony turned back to Rome. He disguised himself as a slave, made out he was carrying a letter to Fulvia from Antony and was admitted to her presence with his face all muffled. Fulvia was distracted and, before taking the letter, asked him whether Antony was alive. He handed it to her in silence, and no sooner had she opened it and begun to read it than he flung his arms around her and kissed her.
‘Dominus.’ Jucundus stood in the doorway. ‘I am ordered to convey you to the sacred presence of our emperor. Your wife and sons are to remain here.’
There was only time for hurried farewells. Julia looked openly terrified, and her fear transferred itself to the boys – Isangrim cried, Dernhelm howled. An inauspicious way to leave.
Warrior of Rome III Page 28