Alexander (Vol. 3) (Alexander Trilogy)

by Valerio Massimo Manfredi

  ‘Why do you wish to pass through Gedrosia?’ Craterus asked him. ‘They say it’s a frightful place, a desert burned by the sun throughout the year, completely lacking in vegetation – no grass, no trees.’

  ‘The southern frontier of the Empire is the only one we do not know. We must move in that direction.’

  They ate and drank in moderation because the King was still occasionally feeling the after effects of his wounds, and they went to sleep relatively early. At dawn the entire assembled army lined up to salute Craterus’s contingent, which was just leaving. Alexander embraced him tightly and said, ‘You are one of my dearest friends. I’ll miss you.’

  ‘I will miss you too, Alexandre. Take good care of yourself, I beg you. Thus far you have tempted fate too much. May the gods smile upon you.’

  ‘And may they smile upon you too, my friend.’

  Craterus leaped astride his horse and raised his hand as the signal for the long column to set off amidst trumpet blasts and shouts of salutation from the Companions who were staying with Alexander. As soon as the last division of the rearguard had disappeared into the stepped expanse that led to the desert, Alexander had his men embark and start off. They sailed southwards and each time they stopped they received the submission and the homage of the local princes until they came to Pattala, the great city that stood at the very end of the Indus. It was heavily populated and rich, involved in all sorts of trade with ships arriving from everywhere, many from a gigantic island to the east called Taprobane, which was said to be as big as all India.

  From there the fleet moved on to the last stretch before the estuary. The river at that point was immense, so wide it was almost impossible to see from one bank across to the other and Onesicritus calculated that it must be some fifty stadia wide.

  The evening of the last day of navigation found them at the mouth of the river and Nearchus decided he would anchor the ships at a point where the current was so slow-moving it was almost imperceptible. Indeed, he was afraid that if they were to venture out on to the open sea they would find no shelter in case of any sudden storms breaking out. What happened instead was a disaster no less terrible than a storm – during the night the level of the water descended to the point where the ships were stuck on the seabed and many of them capsized. Nearchus ordered everyone to stay at their stations and to wait until the waters started flowing once more. Then, considerably worried, he went to Alexander.

  ‘I had no way of foreseeing this phenomenon, even although I have heard tale of a mariner from Massalia, a certain Pytheas, who described a point in the northern Ocean where a great hole swallows up the waters and then regurgitates them, uncovering and covering great swathes of the coast, but few people give him credit and this is not the northern Ocean. How could I ever have imagined such a thing might happen? It’s a disaster . . . a disaster!’

  ‘You have achieved the most extraordinary things,’ replied Alexander. ‘You must not torment yourself. I know that we will emerge victorious from this battle with the river and the sea – my ancestor Achilles fought against the Scamander and won. I will win as well. Let us wait for the night to pass. The light of day will change many things.’

  There was a new moon that night and the darkness added to the panic and the confusion. Nearchus had the alarm trumpets sounded and ordered the heralds to spread the word from one ship to another, instructing them all not to move for any reason, but many sailors, terrorized by this phenomenon and by the rumours they had heard in the ports and the taverns of their home cities, sought to escape under cover of darkness, seeking safety on dry land. They all died, swallowed up by the mud and the quicksand, and those who first tried to help their marooned companions were also swallowed up; their shouting and desperate cries for help rang through the night air, filling their companions who had stayed on board with anguish and terror – there was nothing they could do to help. Then the shouting died down and one by one the voices fell silent, and all that could be heard were the cries of the nocturnal birds and the far off roar of a tiger roaming through the woods in search of prey.

  Out on the flagship Roxane clung to Alexander, trembling with fear, terrified by the hostile, inhuman nature all around them, so terribly different from the natural world of her native mountains and their clear sky. Nearchus and his mariners stood motionless and silent, whispering now and then of their sailing experiences. Shortly before dawn there came a new, far off noise and the King turned his ear towards it.

  ‘Did you hear that?’ he asked.

  Nearchus was already running towards the bow and when he got there he leaned out, trying to see what it was making the noise that was growing now with every instant. Suddenly he saw a sort of whitish band appear in the distance, moving towards them quickly in the pale light of dawn. It was a band of boiling, menacing foam, and the noise was the galloping of the white horses as they raced towards the helpless, motionless fleet marooned on the mudflats.

  ‘Trumpets!’ shouted the admiral. ‘Sound the alarm! Sound the alarm! The waters are coming back! To your oars, men! The oars, quickly! Helmsmen, to your rudders!’ and while the trumpet blasts rent the grey morning sky, he threw a rope to the King so that he could tie himself to the mast with Roxane and he himself rushed to the helm to help out, getting ready for the impact with the wave.

  All the other crews heard the alarm and sounded their own trumpets and the great swampy expanse resounded with agitated shouting and crying.

  The impact of the great wave was frightful – some ships were lifted and thrown backwards like twigs, while those that were firmly stuck in the mud were smashed to pieces, and yet others, whose sides were exposed to the wave, were overturned and crushed by the enormous mass of water.

  Onesicritus, pilot of the royal quinquereme, was hanging on to the rudder and shouting to the men to row with all their might to keep the vessel upright as he himself put his shoulder to the bar to fight against the force of the eddies that the flood-tide generated on the surface of the waters.

  The great wave finally calmed, its thrust balancing out with the flow of the Indus, and Nearchus was able to look around and gauge the extent of the disaster. Hundreds of boats had been destroyed, many others damaged, and the surface of the water was littered with wreckage and with men frantically treading water, clutching at beams or planking as they floated by.

  The whole day was spent recovering the shipwrecked survivors and Alexander himself did all he could to save his men, on occasions actually diving into the water to help those who were about to succumb to the fatigue of their ordeal.

  That evening the ships dropped anchor just beyond the estuary, on the sandy shores of the Ocean, and the division commanders made the roll call: more than one thousand five hundred men had drowned. All the bodies they could manage to recover were placed on a pyre before the assembled army and the soldiers shouted the names of their dead companions to the wind and the waves so that their memory would not be lost for ever.

  For all those whose bodies could not be found, the King officiated over a funeral rite and had a cenotaph built on the shore so that their souls would find peace in Hades, but he thanked the gods from the depths of his heart that none of his friends had perished in the disaster and that he had been able to embrace them all. He also read an encomium for Nearchus and Onesicritus – it was only thanks to their courage and their skill that the disaster had not become a catastrophe.

  The army remained camped on the shore for twenty days, to give time to everyone who had survived to join up with their divisions and to make sure all the damaged vessels were repaired.

  They found a sheltered area not far off, surrounded by fertile fields and located at the border with the desert region inhabited by the wild Oritian tribes. Alexander founded a city there and had all those whose poor health meant they would not be able to face the long journey across the Gedrosian desert settled in it. He built a pier and a sheltered harbour and consecrated a closed area for the temples of the gods. He was then ready
to make a decision regarding the day of their departure, both for the fleet and the army.

  Nearchus was waiting for him on the newly completed pier and Alexander embraced him affectionately, just as he had embraced Craterus at the moment of his departure.

  ‘It would have been wonderful if this river, as some maintained, had actually been the upper course of the Nile. We would have travelled together, all the way to Egypt.’

  ‘Unfortunately it isn’t so,’ replied Nearchus. ‘It takes more than dark-skinned men and crocodiles to make a Nile.’

  ‘Indeed,’ replied the King, ‘but keep the coast and the army in sight all the time, and when you can, land wherever you see our fires: this will make it easier for us to supply you with food and water.’

  ‘I will do so if it is possible, Alexandre, but I must make the most of this constant wind that blows westwards to save the energies of my sailors and I know not if you will manage to keep up with us. In any case, we will see each other at Hormuz. My vice-admiral Onesicritus would like to have the honour of bidding you farewell. He is an excellent sailor and deserves your esteem.’

  As Onesicritus stepped forward and shook his hand, Alexander said, ‘May the gods be with you and may Poseidon smile upon you. I made a sacrifice to the Ocean this morning, together with Aristander, and we invoked the clemency and the favour of the winds. The price we have already paid for this expedition is far too high.’

  Nearchus and Onesicritus went to their ships and gave the order to release the moorings. The fleet moved off from the pier under power from its oarsmen, but immediately afterwards they hoisted the sails which filled with the brisk wind. In no time the mighty ships were as small as children’s boats and Alexander went down to the sea and planted a lance there on the shore to indicate that he had taken possession of this remote region. Then he turned to his companions and shouted, ‘It is now time for us to leave as well – give the signal!’

  Everyone mounted their horses – Hephaestion, Leonnatus, Ptolemy, Seleucus, Lysimachus, Perdiccas, and they took up position at the head of their divisions. The King too mounted his steed, his banner flying before him, and then the long column moved off amidst trumpet blasts and the rolling of drums, its many flags and standards fluttering in the wind.

  59

  THE WOODED STRIP that ran along the banks of the Indus soon gave way to a sort of marshy prairie on which great buffalo with curved horns grazed, together with antelope and deer; in the distance small groups of lions could be made out, similar to the animals that were hunted in Macedonia. The trees were tall and full of all kinds of birds, including many brightly coloured parrots. Then the wetland prairie became a steppe with occasional bushes and small herds of oxen and sheep, led by wild, primitive-looking shepherds.

  ‘Oritians,’ explained the Indian guide. ‘These are from the coastal tribe, but further on we will meet those from the steppes and the desert – truly savage and ferocious. They can be very dangerous, hiding in the sands like scorpions and jumping out suddenly to attack’

  ‘Pass the word on to everyone,’ ordered Alexander, who then continued to move forward, gazing southwards. Indeed, they had moved away from the coast to follow the track and the Ocean was now completely out of view.

  On the fourth day of marching the army came to the edge of the desert and the men looked in astonishment at the great expanse of burning sand that spread out before them. This was hell – not even a blade of grass, no shelter whatsoever, baked through all the seasons by the relentless rays of the sun.

  The Indian guides turned back now and Alexander had to rely upon the experience of some Persian officers who had taken part in King Darius’s expeditions to Drangiana and Arachosia.

  Marching under those dreadful conditions soon proved to be a terrible ordeal, almost hopeless. The officers immediately sequestered the water supplies and kept them under constant surveillance so that they could be rationed, but this measure proved to be somewhat limited in its effectiveness – supplies ran out quickly anyway and they had to search out wells, which were few and far between, along the track through the sands. The food lasted longer because the plan to provide supplies to Nearchus’s fleet proved to be impossible – the ships were no longer to be seen, the eastern wind having blown strong and hard to send them much further ahead.

  At a certain point the Scythian guides saw prints near the track and reported this to their officers and the King. There was danger now of an ambush – in such arid terrain an invading army became legitimate prey because of the supplies it carried, together with the great number of pack animals and horses.

  ‘Double the guards,’ ordered Alexander, ‘and keep fires burning if you can.’ But wood was hard to come by – only a few skeletal trunks left by the tide on the seashore.

  They attacked suddenly, one moonless night, and they began with Leonnatus’s contingent, which was functioning as rearguard, marching some stadia behind the others. The precision of the ambush was deadly – like ghosts they appeared from the rocks, leaping like hellish furies on the warriors who were already seriously weakened by thirst and the long march; the result was a massacre. Leonnatus fought valiantly and when his trumpeter’s throat was cut by an enemy who emerged suddenly from the sand, he himself picked up the trumpet and sent out long alarm blasts, calling for help from Alexander.

  The King set off at a gallop with two squadrons and managed to break through the circle, freeing his friend, exhausted and wounded, just when he was being surrounded by a group of the enemy. When the sun rose, more than five hundred soldiers lay lifeless on the ground, many of them clinging on to their adversaries in the last spasm of their death throes.

  They buried them all in the sand with their weapons because there was no wood for funeral pyres and their hearts were heavy with sadness as they moved on, knowing perfectly well that those hurried graves would soon be violated by the voracious savages.

  One day a group of scouts returned from a reconnaissance mission and reported they had discovered a group of villages near the coast, near the mouth of a small stream that brought a meagre flow of water to the sea. They decided to attack that very night. There was a full moon that lit up the chalky whiteness of the desert as if it were day.

  Leonnatus hung his axe on its bracket, picked up his bronze shield, some sixteen minae in weight, and leaped astride his stallion, but Alexander put out his arm to stop him. ‘Your wound is still fresh. Stay here and let us deal with it.’

  ‘Not even if you tie me up,’ growled his friend. ‘I’ll make them pay for each soldier they killed, butchered in the darkness without even being able to defend themselves.’

  The King, his Companions and the men selected to accompany them – some two hundred in total – had chosen black horses and wore black cloaks so as to blend in with the night shadows. Alexander gave the signal and all the steeds set off at full gallop, shoulder to shoulder, head to head across the deserted plain: demons born out of Hades.

  It was too late when the Oritians spotted them, but they ran nevertheless to defend their villages, their children and their wives. They stood no chance at all with the first wave of attack, cut down like lambs at slaughter, while the Macedonians set about sacking and looting and Leonnatus let fly with his axe. The fleeing enemy fell like grain in the field; he massacred so many of them that at one point he felt his heart bursting in his breast and then he heard Alexander’s voice shouting, ‘That’s enough, Leonnatus!’

  Only then did he stop, dripping sweat and blood from his panting body.

  A second squadron of light cavalry arrived soon after, bringing with them the pack animals and the water bottles and the carts for gathering provisions, but all they found were flocks of sheep and goats enclosed in stone corrals. The thick layer of dry dung in the enclosures showed that they were taken out to pasture very rarely.

  ‘I wonder what they feed them with,’ said Eumenes, who had arrived with the supplies convoy.

  ‘It looks like they use this stuff,’ replied
Seleucus, pointing to sacks made of dried seaweed fibre, full of a sort of whitish powder.

  ‘It stinks of fish,’ said Lysimachus.

  ‘It is fish,’ confirmed Eumenes, picking up a handful and bringing it to his nose. ‘Dried fish ground into meal.’

  They returned to camp with the water they had been able to collect and the flocks of sheep they had stolen, but when they slaughtered the animals the taste of the meat proved to be revolting, like putrefied fish. There was nothing else to eat, however, and so they had to make do with what they had scavenged.

  For days they moved forward under the relentless sun, tormented by the heat and their thirst. At times the desert suddenly changed colour, becoming blinding white, and the army found itself having to march over a crust of salt deposited by the ancient marine lakes that corroded the horses’ shoes and the infantrymen’s footwear, penetrating their skin and causing first deep cracks and then extremely painful sores. Many pack animals and horses died of thirst or hunger and then the men started falling as well.

  They had neither the time nor the strength to bury them or give them any type of funeral. There came a stage when the soldiers rarely took any notice when a companion collapsed, and even when they did notice there was no help they could offer and the bodies were abandoned, prey for the jackals and the vultures – groups of the birds now circled continuously above the column as it marched. Not only did the King have to bear the pain of this ordeal, but he had to witness his young bride suffering such privations and difficulties, all of this combined with the anguish of not knowing what had become of the fleet; they had had no news of Nearchus since the day he left from Pattala.

  In the midst of this terrible ordeal, while bearing all that suffering, only Kalanos seemed not to feel any pain or hardship: he walked barefoot across the burning sands, dressed scantily with a piece of cloth, and in the evening, when the darkness brought the cool air, he could be seen sitting alongside the King, teaching him his philosophy and the art of controlling the passions and the needs of one’s own body. Roxane as well, despite being so young, behaved in an exemplary fashion, with incredible pride and strength of spirit. She was often to be seen riding alongside her husband, wearing the jerkin of the Sogdian horsemen, and more than once she was even seen hunting for passing birds with bow and arrow.