The Assyrian

by Nicholas Guild

  So I have no story to tell of that day except my own, which I think is as close to the general truth as any. In other times, when I was myself a commander of armies, I would stand on a bluff overlooking the field and watch the battle unfold according to the plans I had hatched in my brain, and I believe my plans saved the lives of many soldiers on both sides, for a clear victory is always cheaper for everyone. But at Khalule that was not the way of it.

  In the dim gray light of morning the smoke from the cooking fires hugged the ground like mist. Men did not speak. There was no sound except the clink of weapons and the snorting of horses. Even the drums of the Elamites had stopped, for they too knew that time was short and everyone was too occupied with the practical business of shield straps and bowstrings for the luxury of some nameless dread.

  “Come, Prince. Let us see that the men are ready.”

  In his armor and helmet, Nargi Adad looked as round and impregnable as a stone, making me think that all we needed to do was to roll him toward the enemy lines and he would crash through as if they were a row of reeds. He put his thick, hairy hand on the muscle of my right arm and squeezed it.

  “Tabshar Sin tells me that you have a mighty skill with the javelin,” he said, grinning like a dragon. “He claims you can take the eye out of a mouse at a hundred paces. I pray it is not too much less than the truth, Prince.”

  My men were a company of archers and throwers, the backbone of any army. They fought in units of two men, one to wield the bow or the javelin and the other to protect them both behind a huge woven leather shield. We were to fight in the first line, arranging ourselves in an arrowhead pattern, and we would be opposed by cavalry, who would try to ride us down, to break up our formation and scatter us like chaff. But they had to reach us first, and they would be riding straight into the points of our weapons. If they did not reach us, or if we did not break after their first charge, then we would advance on the Elamite lines where, at last, it would be close fighting with sword and dagger. Of the great armored chariots, which could cut down men’s bodies like standing wheat, we tried not to think at all.

  I shall not soon forget my first sight of the Elamite lines. They, of course, had many allies among the small southern states—the men of Anzan and Lakabra, the Chaldeans, the tribes of Iazan and Harzunu, the Pasheru, peoples and races beyond counting—but the Elamites were in the center. Without them the others were no more than buzzing flies. We were of the quradu and thus formed the vanguard around the king’s own person. We would take the full force of the Elamite advance.

  As I stood on that dusty, windless plain, shaded from the morning sun by a leather shield, I could watch their war horses digging at the air with hoofs that would cut like daggers. The soldiers wore bronze armor and helmets with horns like a bull. Their shields were without number and their weapons flashed in the dim light like the glinting of water as they raised their spears and swords in taunting challenge. Their drums were silent now and they did not waste their breath on war cries. Their very silence was enough.

  “All right, men!” It was the voice of Nargi Adad, breaking the quiet air like a hammer. “Remember—it is the brave man who lives to fight again. Panic, and they will trample you down like grapes in a wine vat. The only way to keep them from killing you is to kill them, so have hearts of snow and aim true. We are the quradu, the strong ones, and we have the king’s life in our keeping. Remember that as well. And tonight we see how the beer tastes in Elam!”

  Every man’s voice rang with cheering, and mine not least. If ever I believed in the glory of war—if ever there was glory in it—it was in that moment.

  Suddenly, somehow, we were moving forward, one step at a time as we kept our formation, as we listened for the pounding of hoofs of the Elamite cavalry and readied our weapons. My bearer carried our shield on his left arm, and with his right he held in a leather sling perhaps five and twenty of my thin, copper-pointed javelins. Another was in my right hand, balanced and ready. I was even then looking for a mark.

  The javelin thrower must be quick, for his is the most dangerous of arts. The bowman may stay behind his leather shield, but the thrower needs more room and thus must step out and into plain sight to make his toss. He must take the time to be accurate or he risks his life for nothing, but he must be fast or an arrow will find his belly and he will not throw again. The Elamite cavalry were coming now—I could see the flash of their long curved swords. I waited for them to come near enough. At all but the closest range one aims for the horse, for a cavalryman will run like a rabbit as soon as he loses his mount, and the horse is bigger and carries less armor and can tear a formation to shreds even without its rider. I waited for the horse—it was my enemy, and the man whose knees clutched its shoulders was a mere shadow. I waited, for my arm trembled with eagerness and my javelin was thirsty for blood.

  At last—at last—the lead rider was close enough. I did not see him, only the horse, only a patch of brown. I stepped out from behind the shield, yanked back my arm, waited that fraction of an instant that allowed me to be sure, and threw. Everything, every fragment of my strength went into that throw. The javelin arched through the air like a bird of prey and I stood and watched it, bewitched, unable to move. Higher and higher it rose, and then it swooped down and buried itself in the base of the horse’s neck. The beast rolled straight over like a cartwheel, and its rider did a quick acrobat’s flip in the air and fell beneath his dead mount. He must have been either crippled or killed, because he did not even try to crawl away. It was a beautiful sight. I could not take my eyes from it.

  An arrow buried itself in the dust at my feet, and I remembered that I too was mortal and ducked behind the shield. Even as my hand reached out, my bearer thrust another javelin into it. I searched the field for another mark.

  Over and over again I threw. Sometimes I missed, but for the most part I found my target. I killed I know not how many men and horses, and the sight of their deaths filled me like the breath of the gods. Arrows dropped around me like hailstones, but I hardly noticed for they could do me no harm. Once, and once only, the point of one touched the edge of my thigh, but I could not be bothered to remark it—I did not even trouble to wipe the blood away. I was in ecstasy. Men who say that war is the greatest joy under the bright sun are not fools and only lie a little, for the pleasure of danger and death are great and wash the mind clean. I think I must have been a little mad.

  When the cavalry were almost upon us, we aimed for the riders. As my men died around me, dropping on their faces without a word, I could think only of the next throw, and the next. Once a man on horseback rushed directly upon me, and as he swung down with his sword to take my head off, my point went in under his corselet and lifted him straight back over his mounts tail and he hit the ground with a thud. I didn’t even glance at his face. I merely pulled the javelin free and looked about me for another target.

  They did not break our lines, and the cavalry are good for one charge only and then fall to looting the baggage train—their battle is a short one. When they had passed, the chariots came.

  We were lucky—we had but two venture our way, and we killed the horses of one of these before it reached us. The other, though, swept over a corner of our formation, crushing men under its wheels like dates. By then we had almost closed with the Elamite line, and the time for javelin and arrow was past. I drew my sword and my bearer threw down our shield, for now it was each man fighting his way through alone.

  I had come to myself by then, at least enough to know that these men meant to kill me and that my skin was not made of iron. I was afraid now, but the fear only made me feel more alive. It was almost a pleasure, a joy of the senses, to be afraid like that.

  There was noise all around me, shouting and the screams of the wounded and dying and the clash of weapons. Those of my men who still lived clustered together like bees swarming on a tree limb. We acted in a kind of concert but by instinct rather than plan. There was no discipline, only the will to live
and the knowledge that we needed each other. But the final truth was that each of us fought alone and for himself.

  I am blessed with long arms, so I had that advantage to compensate for my lack of experience, but I still collected two wounds that vexed and weakened me. Once a spear struck me above the elbow, almost causing me to drop my small round shield. The pain was great but only the matter of an instant and, in any case, not so great as the danger, for I nearly died a score of deaths before I could pause long enough to reach down and retrieve the shield.

  It was the great black Elamite with the scarred face who came closest to giving my body to the crows.

  The fighting, which had aimlessly wandered this way and that like an ant crawling over a stone, seemed to have moved away from me, and for the first time in what felt like hours I had a moment to stop and catch my breath. That moment almost cost me my life, for when I leaned forward, sucking a little air into my lungs as I rested my hands upon my knees, I suddenly felt something scrape against the side of my shield—I wasn’t even conscious of having raised it, but the soldier who lives fights by instinct and perhaps I had had a glimpse of what was coming. I looked down and was appalled. The leather was torn open like the belly of a butchered ox, and I had just time to dance out of the way as the sword that had done it swung around for a second try at finding my entrails. I hadn’t even noticed the man.

  It wasn’t very long before he forced himself upon me, though — all at once I was foot to foot with a black giant, the sweat streaming down his arms and his eyes rolling with that ecstasy of fury that marks the born warrior. His taut face gleamed, as if it might have been hacked out of obsidian with an ax, and he showed his teeth in a fierce grin. It was a face that had felt the stroke of more than one sword, for across the bridge of the nose and down the side of his jaw were two great scars, ridged and shining and thick as sandal cords. When he lunged at me again, his war cry alone, like the scream of some great bird of prey, almost unstrung my sinews. How it was he did not kill me in those first few seconds, I will never know.

  We seemed to be alone in that raging battle—there was no one to offer help, and this devil was bearing down on me as if he thought to trample me underfoot like standing barley. His was the initiative. Slashing wildly so that my blade made the air hiss like an adder, I was somehow able to keep him at sword’s length, but that was all. I could hardly breathe, and my heart beat within my breast as if it wanted out. Again and again my shield felt the impact of his thrust, until I was certain the next would tear through and find my bowels. Surely he would kill me, I thought. This is it, this is the moment of my death. Over and over his sword point darted at me, seeking my life, and each time I managed to fend it off, and each time it came closer. A thrust, and his blade slides by against mine, just missing my shoulder. Another, and his point scrapes against my leather corselet. The sound of sword rasping against sword filled my ears. I was the goat, almost ready for sacrifice, and the augur was sharpening his knife. The next lunge and he would kill me—the suspense itself was a torture.

  And then, at a distance, above the clamor of battle, I heard the voice of Nargi Adad.

  “Hey! You there, you bastard!”

  I did not turn to look, for to turn would have been inviting death, and I knew he was too far away to save me. The Elamite would have me spitted like a roasting duck—already I could see the muscles in his great neck tensing to deliver the mortal stroke. I was already a corpse in that instant.

  But he too had heard Nargi Adad’s shout and he must have thought to make short work of me before that great hairy millstone had a chance to roll over him. That is the only way I can explain how I survived, for the great black one pulled his stroke and somehow I was able this one last time to turn it aside.

  But not enough. It cut through my leather corselet and bounced over my ribs so that I thought the man had killed me. I was dead—I knew it.

  Yet the black one had stepped in just close enough that I had the chance to avenge myself. With what I thought might be my dying strength, I lunged. My sword entered just under his ribs, and I drove it home. He cried out—more with surprise than pain, I think—and then, as with a quick yank I pulled the sword free, he sank to his knees, his eyes holding mine the whole time, and fell over onto his face.

  And somehow I was not dead. The wound in my side stung like an adder bite—this was a good sign, really—and I was not dead. I reached inside my corselet, and my hand came away smeared with blood, but I was alive. I did not even feel weak, merely sore. I looked around for Nargi Adad, but he had already vanished into that chaos of fighting. Yes—I was all right. The Elamite was dead by my feet and I was alive. I lived and fought on. In a moment I had even forgotten that I was wounded and that was just as well, for the battle did not end with the death of one enemy.

  Time and again we threw ourselves against the Elamite line, but it would not break. Neither would we break, for to break was to invite death. And so the battle went on and on, without end or hope of it. Sometimes, as if by common consent, the two great masses of men would fall away from each other, for the moment too weary to go on. Then there would be a rush and a shout, and shields striking together would echo like cymbals. And each of us had eyes only for the men to the right and to the left and for the enemy in front. If a man died, be he friend or foe, we stepped over his corpse as if it were a rock, for there was neither time nor breath for anything more. Thus did the plain at Khalule grow clogged with dead bodies.

  At last the gods, who must hate men for their folly, took pity even on such as we and let the light of day fade from among us. We needed only this, it seemed, for the two great armies—slowly, and with many thrusts and some hesitation—drew apart from each other, each flowing back toward its own camp like the tide ebbing away from the sandy shore. No one had won or lost. It was simply that we could not fight on. Mere flesh would not stand it.

  At last we sat down on the ground to rest, and as I looked about me I grasped for the first time the true character of war. Men whose arms and faces were streaked with smoke, blood, and dust stared out at nothing through eyes that had grown old in the space of a single day. The smell of corpses hung thick in the air like fog. There was no heroic grandeur here, only an appalled horror at what they had done and seen and suffered. None of these men would ever again know the world in its innocence—life had changed for them, forever. That was what I saw. I expect they saw the same in me.

  “Where is Nargi Adad?” I asked finally, when I could find the breath.

  “Only the great gods know, Rab Kisir. Probably dead.”

  They watched me through their weary eyes, and suddenly I understood that they were waiting for me to issue orders. I was the rab kisir. It seemed time I remembered that.

  “Go back to your tents then. Eat and rest. The fighting is over for this day.”

  Slowly they pushed themselves to their feet. I counted them as they collected their armor and weapons—there were only two and thirty men left. Some of them might have run away or become separated somehow, but we had begun the day with a hundred men and now there were but two and thirty.

  “Are you coming, Rab Kisir?”

  “Not now—later.”

  I wanted to find Nargi Adad.

  The battlefield at Khalule had become a scene out of a nightmare. This had not been war but mutual slaughter—dead and dying men lay on the ground everywhere, their limbs tangled together like driftwood. Crippled horses screamed and thrashed about, trying to stand up again. Crows perched on the faces of corpses, picking out the eyes with their long beaks. Discarded weapons, dead men and animals, the cries of the wounded, the stink of carnage. The ground was slippery with blood. Everywhere, as far as sight could probe, it was the same. I have not words to describe it, but I will carry the vision of that place with me into the dark earth.

  But I found Nargi Adad, and he was alive, if not by much.

  He was lying on his side, alert enough but with pain glistening in his eyes, a great hol
e torn in his belly, which he tried to keep closed with his hairy fingers, and they had grown crusted with dried blood. He smiled when he saw me—I have never known a braver man.

  “You fought well today,” he said. “You fought like a raging devil. That great black one. . . And you killed him, did you? I wish I could live to tell Tabshar Sin how well you fought.”

  “You will tell him.” My face was wet with tears, for I knew there was no hope. “We will find a physician. . .”

  “No, Prince—you see, I can’t even feel my legs. I think the villain must have cut my spine before I spilled out his life. That’s him over there.”

  Almost at Nargi Adad’s feet lay the dead body of an Elainite, his eyes still open, the sword still in his hand. There would be no more wars for him either.

  “Does it hurt much?”

  “Yes, Prince. It hurts like a bellyful of nettles. What of the battle? Have they quit the field yet? There’s an overturned chariot yonder—climb up on that and have a look around for me.”

  I went and looked and came back.

  “They are crossing back over the river. The water is black with boats.”

  “Good. Then at least we’ve stopped them. And now be a good lad and kill me, would you?”

  “I couldn’t—I—”

  “Do it. Prince. As a favor.” He smiled still, but his eyes begged me. “It isn’t pleasant work, dying, and I don’t want to take all night over it. One quick thrust, and you’ll finish me. As a favor. Prince.”

  Before he had time to see the stroke, or I to lose my nerve, I drew the dagger from my belt and pierced his heart. He died without making a sound.

  I left him there, and wandered without direction. My mind was throbbing as if from too much wine, and there was nothing left inside me, no courage, no will. If an enemy soldier had come upon me and drawn his weapon, I would have fallen on my knees and begged for life like a woman. There is only so much any man can bear.