Their sergeant approached the travellers. Two of his men pointed spears, while the others headed for the carts.
‘Take it easy,’ Qirum murmured in Trojan. ‘They’re just inspecting us. Don’t give them cause to get upset.’ His men scowled, but kept their hands away from their weapons.
The sergeant, a weary-looking veteran, called in clear Nesili, ‘Who leads you?’
‘I do.’ The Tawananna stepped forward.
The sergeant looked her up and down cautiously. ‘And you are?’
She smiled easily. ‘Do you not remember me? I was never very good at showing my face to the people. Always too busy with affairs of family and state. I am Kilushepa, Tawananna, aunt of Hattusili the Sixth — who I presume still occupies the throne?’
‘He does.’ The sergeant peered at her. ‘If you are the Tawananna, they said you were dead. And that before you were dead you were a traitor.’
‘Lies.’
‘You tried to poison the King.’
Kilushepa was utterly fearless. ‘Would I dare return if that was so? I was betrayed by my enemies at court, that much is true.’
‘If those enemies still live, why have you returned? For revenge?’
‘Not that. To help. For Hattusa, and all the Hatti realm, faces a terrible crisis. You must see that.’
‘It’s true, it’s true,’ he said grimly. ‘My own wife and kids — well. You don’t need to hear my little troubles.’
‘The question is,’ Kilushepa said, ‘will you let us pass?’
He looked uncertain. ‘I’m just a sergeant.’
Teel murmured to Milaqa, ‘And yet what he decides now will shape all of history to come. What an extraordinary scene to witness. But he’s not the first common soldier to be put in such a position, and he won’t be the last. Every time there is a palace coup the decision of a lowly bodyguard can shape the destiny of a trembling empire.’
‘You speak as if you’re not here,’ Milaqa whispered back. ‘As if you’re outside it all, looking in. Reading about it in some archive.’
‘Maybe it helps me control my fear.’
Kilushepa simply smiled at the sergeant. ‘What is your name?’
‘Hunda, madam.’
‘Hunda, then. Follow your heart.’
‘Hmm. Well, you’re impressive enough. And if it’s true your family betrayed you, they deserve what’s coming to them.’ Milaqa had learned that to the Hatti family loyalty was the strongest bond — and to betray family was a powerful taboo, which even a king dared not break. ‘On the other hand, if you’re lying, you’ll soon get what’s coming to you. You may pass. No — I’ll escort you the rest of the way. The country isn’t as safe as it used to be.’
So the Hatti soldiers formed up around the party, and they moved on, with the sergeant leading, and Kilushepa on her cart. The Hatti soldiers and Qirum’s hired Trojan thugs eyed each other with contempt and hostility. Tension crackled.
And soon they came over a final rise, and at last Hattusa was laid out before them.
A scribble of walls across the folded, mountainous landscape — that was Milaqa’s first impression.
The great city, capped by a fug of smoke from its endless fires, was ringed around by a circuit of walls, mud brick over stone, painted brilliant white and topped by arrowhead crenellations, walls that strode up hillsides and over summits and ridges and along cliff edges, punctuated by huge blocky towers. In one place there was a tremendous structure, a square base tapering up to a flat summit, the sloping sides combed by steps. The outer wall simply rose up and over even this vast obstacle, although it was broken by an enormous gate. And the walls were not restricted to the outer curtain but extended inward in loops and folds, enclosing whole districts within the city itself. It was extraordinary — ghastly — a place of exclusion and control, as you could see at a glance.
But Milaqa could see that this monstrous fort-city had fallen on hard times, for the great walls were scorched and scarred, and the familiar mud-brown tide of a shanty town had washed up against the outer curtain.
They set off down a slope, following the track, heading for a gate in the south-west corner of the wall curtain.
‘Of course we don’t have your growstone,’ Kilushepa said. ‘Perhaps that’s the next secret I should trade for, and we could build even higher. But even so, we’ve done rather well, haven’t we? It would take you the best part of a day just to walk around the circuit of the outer walls.’
Riban just stared. ‘I can’t believe that you have built all this, up here. Most great cities are built on the lowland. That’s what I’ve read. By the rivers, by the sea coast. Troy, Ur, Uruk, Memphis. They are placed for ease of access. Whereas Hattusa-’
‘Whereas Hattusa,’ Kilushepa said, ‘is a fortress. Set in a country that is itself a natural wall of granite. We are five days’ walk from the nearest river, much further from the sea. Most armies starve even before they get the chance to fall on Hattusa itself. And in the winter, when the snow comes, none can get through at all. Of course there are vulnerabilities. We have always depended on imports for almost every bit of food, every grain of wheat. But without our fortress capital, Northlander, we could never have won our wars against enemies within and without, never have established our dominion over the greatest empire the world has ever seen. All of which is utterly beyond your petty imagination.’
As they neared the wall they had to get through the shanty town. The people came rustling out of their shacks and lean-tos, as always, the children with cupped hands. The soldiers snarled to drive them back, but they came again, their hunger and need outweighing their fear. Kilushepa seemed perturbed by this, Milaqa thought, watching her. Not distressed at the plight of the children. Embarrassed by the spectacle they made.
Soon the wall towered over their heads, four or five times the height of Milaqa, and the gate was taller yet, wood with bronze panelling, guarded by two lions carved in stone. A huddle of soldiers at the gate, Kilushepa called them ‘Golden Spearmen’, had their own little shrine set up behind a sullen fire, with a small, crude statue of a god, dressed in Hatti warrior garb and carrying an axe and a spear that was jagged like lightning.
‘Teshub,’ Qirum murmured to Milaqa. ‘Their Storm God, although actually they borrowed him from the Hurrians. Like everything else about this empire their pantheon is a patchwork.’
‘Perhaps they’re asking for his mercy,’ Milaqa said. ‘To blow away the endless clouds.’
‘Then they need to ask harder.’
Their friendly sergeant was able to get them past the guards without any trouble. They had to abandon their carts, however. Qirum left a couple of his men to watch the carts, while the rest escorted the party through the gate.
Inside, the city was a warren of crowded alleys between tall, enclosing walls. Though the streets looked clean enough there was a lingering stink of sewage, and Milaqa wondered if all cities smelled this way. There were many men wearing uniforms like the sergeant’s; this was evidently an age when the military were to the fore. Near the gate the visitors passed through a district that appeared damaged, burned out, abandoned. Here there were beggars, and Milaqa glimpsed gangs — young men and women wearing garish colours, brightly dyed hair, staring from broken doorways. But then they walked on, just a short distance, to a more orderly area where well-dressed people hurried busily, both men and women, many carrying clay tablets; Milaqa imagined they must be clerks, scribes, palace and temple officials. This was a city with problems, but evidently still a functioning capital.
They came to a wide, straight track and followed it through a precinct crowded with temples, walls of white marble enclosing gods carved of some sea-green stone, dimly glimpsed. Officials hurried between the buildings, as did servants and slaves — cooks perhaps, cleaners, even these great houses of the gods must need the most basic kinds of maintenance. The track merged with others, evidently coming from other gates in the walls, and the crowd thickened. A baffling clamour of languag
es was spoken. Milaqa recognised fragments of Nesili, Trojan, Akkadian, Egyptian, Greek — even a few Northlander words here and there.
And now, to add to the confusion, a procession came down the great way, forcing people to stand aside. Around a cart which carried a roughly shaped monumental stone priests shouted blessings, musicians played drums and flutes and gongs, dancers whirled and acrobats and jugglers put on spectacular shows. People applauded, and formed up a loose spontaneous procession behind the cart. It was a display of energy, of vigour — of fun, Milaqa thought, surprising in what she sensed was a city of harsh discipline and fear.
But, bewildered by the rush, the noise, the crush, the looming walls, Milaqa felt turned around, lost. Even Troy had been nothing like this in scale. Hunda, sensing her disorientation, pointed out how you could always see the higher land within the city walls — a big outcrop to the north of the temple district, and an even stouter-looking fortress within a fortress, the citadel that contained the palace of the King, and the great Sphinx Gate to the south that overlooked the whole city. As long as you could see palace or temple or guardian sphinxes looming against the sky you could find your direction, anywhere in this great stone tomb of a city.
When the procession had passed they walked on, heading steadily north.
They came to a modest dwelling, one of a short row of blocky buildings constructed of mud brick and plaster.
The sergeant turned to Kilushepa apologetically. ‘This is my own home, queen. I can’t think where else to take you that would be safe, for now. There is a man I know at the palace, he was the chief of the chariot-warriors and I got to know him when he reviewed our training. His name is Nuwanza-’
‘I know him,’ Kilushepa snapped. ‘A second cousin of the King, and so a relative of mine.’ In the Hatti empire all the senior army officers were relatives of the King. ‘One of Hattusili’s more sane appointments.’
‘I will try to get a message to him. I’ll find somewhere for your warriors too. Please… It is much less than you are used to, I know-’
Kilushepa smiled. ‘I am very grateful to you, sergeant. Your loyalty and your wisdom will not go unrewarded.’
He seemed embarrassed. He pulled back the door curtain, and Kilushepa walked through into the little space within.
‘By the Storm God’s left nostril,’ Qirum murmured to Milaqa as they followed Kilushepa, ‘I suppose there have to be a few honest soldiers or the whole thing would break down. But Kilushepa’s been very lucky in happening on this fellow — very lucky indeed, and not for the first time in her life.’
The house’s single room was gloomy, the light a greyish glow from a window cut in the wall. A woman had been labouring at a grindstone. She stood nervously, wiping her hands. There was a low table, wooden shelves at the back of the room piled with clutter, a stack of cloth pallets and blankets. Children huddled over toys in a corner, staring wide-eyed at the strangers. The room was tiny, yet its floor of packed earth was clean, evidently recently swept.
Hunda spoke calmly to the woman, explaining who Kilushepa was. The woman, called Gassulawiya, evidently Hunda’s wife, only looked more nervous. Then Hunda disappeared, off to the palace.
Noli sat beside Kilushepa on the pile of pallets. Milaqa and Qirum settled on the floor. Riban helped Kurunta down, but he sat heavily, without hands unable to lower himself easily. The sergeant’s wife bustled around with a tray of cups of wine and water, slabs of bread. Qirum drained a single cup of wine, and waved away the rest. ‘Take sparingly,’ he said to the rest in his own tongue. ‘We should not eat up all that this poor woman has got.’
The woman took her tray to the children at the back of the room. The three of them chewed their bread, silent, staring at the newcomers.
Milaqa said in her clearest Hatti, ‘Your children are charming.’
Gassulawiya smiled, still nervous. ‘Not all mine.’ She tapped the older girl on the shoulder; she was no more than eight or nine. ‘Orphaned. A comrade of Hunda’s, fell on patrol. Bandits. His wife already dead of the plague.’
‘Ah,’ breathed Kurunta, turning his sightless head to the voices. ‘There are always lots of soldiers’ orphans in such times.’
‘And this one,’ Gassulawiya said, pulling forward the youngest child, a boy about five with his left arm behind his back, ‘not charming at all. Show the lady. Show her!’
The boy, holding his bread in his right hand, produced his left arm. The flesh was covered in weals, the result of a beating.
‘Stealing meat,’ said his mother. ‘If he was seven he’d have been put to death. Stupid, bad boy. Stupid!’ She cuffed the back of his head. The boy slumped back into the shadows.
‘That is how these Hatti are,’ Qirum murmured. ‘Laws! The severest penalties! Duty, discipline and sacrifice! You have seen their arid country. The farmers must work hard to feed the soldiers, who must fight hard to hold their sprawling empire together. Discipline is the only way to drive people to such unrelenting effort, and when times are hard they fall back on such barbarity.’
Kilushepa said quietly, ‘And if you don’t discipline that tongue of yours, Trojan, it will be sent back to your home city separately from the rest of you.’
They lapsed into silence, the tension palpable. Hunda seemed to be gone a long time. And until he returned, Milaqa thought, the day remained in the balance — and all their fates, not least Kilushepa’s.
When Hunda did return he brought with him, not a set of guards to haul Kilushepa away, but a prince.
That was how the newcomer looked to Milaqa, anyhow. He glanced around the room, his eyes evidently adjusting to the gloom. He wore a long white tunic, spotlessly clean; he was clean-shaven with his hair worn long and braided. Bronze amulets hung at his neck, in the shape of crescent moons, animals. His fingers were crusted with rings, his wrists with bracelets. Despite all that he looked like a soldier, for he had a deep scar gouged into one cheek. He might have been forty. Gassulawiya cowered back with her children, as if hoping not to be noticed.
When he saw Kilushepa, the Hatti crossed the room in a stride and knelt before her. ‘Tawananna.’
Kilushepa did not move a muscle. If she was relieved at this treatment, at obeisance rather than arrest, she did not show it in her face, not by the slightest twitch. ‘You know me,’ she said.
‘Not by sight. I heard descriptions — they did not do you justice.’ His accent was subtly different from Kilushepa’s, to Milaqa’s ears. ‘You have returned.’
‘Evidently. And who are you?’
‘I am the Chief of Bodyguards. My name is Muwa. I am an ally of your cousin Nuwanza-’
She snapped her fingers. ‘Muwa. I know that name. Your Kaskan accent gives it away — and I remember your description — that ugly chasm of a scar. You went rogue! You set yourself up as a warlord among the Kaskans, during their rebellion — oh, five years ago.’
‘No warlord,’ he murmured with an easy smile. ‘I acted in the interests of the empire in stabilising a difficult situation.’
‘By defying the King’s orders?’
‘I am Kaskan. They were my people. I knew how to manage them. These are challenging times, and we must all cope as best we can, and move on. Whoever I am, wherever I came from, I responded to your summons. I remember your work before your fall. You were competent.’
‘Thank you,’ she said drily.
‘The Storm God knows it’s competence we need now, and unless we get it Hattusa itself will fall, I am sure of it.’
Now she smiled. ‘You are right. That is precisely why the gods have brought me back. We must talk. But first, sit.’ There was only the earth floor; he sat down, good humoured. ‘And wine!’ Kilushepa called. Gassulawiya hurried forward with cups of wine for them both.
Muwa told the Tawananna the state of the Hatti empire.
‘It’s the drought,’ he said. ‘This endless, god-withering drought. The cold summer is only adding to our misery. It extends far from here, you know — beyond Assyr
ia, even, and to the north and east, the great plains of Asia. We’re suffering from huge movements of people, and raiding on land and sea. Then there’s the disruption of trade. The King can’t reward his subjects, he can’t send tribute to his allies abroad. Luckily for King Hattusili the Pharaoh seems to understand this, and he continues to send his grain shipments to Hattusa, but only a fraction of them get past the bandits. This is all court gossip, you understand. It’s said that it’s the same elsewhere — Assyria — Mycenae has burned, I hear, the once rich valleys around it abandoned.’
Qirum said drily, ‘That’s a terrible thing if you care about Greeks.’
‘You should care,’ Kilushepa admonished him. ‘For all the great states depend on each other, for precious goods, for foodstuffs, for mutual help against enemies. And if one state fails and dissolves into banditry and starvation, another may follow, and the system itself may collapse.’
‘But you believe you have a solution,’ Muwa said. He looked at the Tawananna with something like simple hope on his battered face.
‘We will discuss all that,’ Kilushepa said. ‘But first you must get me into the palace.’
‘Hmm. Frankly, the challenge is to ensure you don’t get struck down as soon as you set foot within the citadel walls, for you can be sure your enemies’ spies will already have reported you are back.’ He stood easily, lithe, strong. ‘A day, madam. Give me a day to set it up. Then I will come for you.’
‘Be warned, Chief of Bodyguards.’ Teel had spoken. He laid his arm over the sacks of seed. ‘Betray us, and the treasure we bring will be destroyed. And all of you will continue to starve.’
Muwa’s eyes narrowed. ‘Your threats are unnecessary. I am a man of honour.’
Teel nodded. ‘Then I look forward to seeing you tomorrow.’
With a bow to Kilushepa, Muwa left.
Kilushepa glared at Teel, shaking her head. Then she sat back on her pallet and closed her eyes. Suddenly she looked exhausted to Milaqa, all her strength gone. Her monumental bluff was evidently draining even her deep resources.
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