He turned on his heel and left.
I had three hours. I was taken back to my rooms, hardly able to walk at first but gradually rediscovering that lost art, and there I was fed and bathed by slave women I had never seem before—not my servants, but Esarhaddon’s. They did not speak. The solitude of my confinement was preserved, and it was better thus.
“Let him do his will,” I told myself. “Let him kill me if he likes, but he will never live down the shame of this day.” I took comfort in that, in believing that I had somehow won—that there was something yet to win.
And at the end of the allotted time I was clothed in the silver tunic of a prince and brought before the king in his great hall. He waited there, but not alone.
It was a noble place, the great hall. At its entrance stood the great winged bulls with the heads and beards of men, which are the protective genies of kings. On the walls were carved and painted panels, monuments to the glory of our father’s victories. I had seen the Lord Sennacherib here a thousand times, banqueting with his nobles, dispensing justice, receiving tribute from the rulers of lesser nations. All the might and power of Ashur’s land found its expression here, no less than in her armies, no less than in the temples of her gods. When foreigners came to this place, they trembled. When we came, we, prince and common folk, for whom the king’s voice was as Great Ashur’s own, we thrilled with pride.
And now Esarhaddon was here, surrounded by his nobles and the glory of kingship, blazing like the sacred sun in his robes of gold, holding the golden sword, his symbol of office. He stood apart, waiting, his face set and lifeless.
When I entered, all fell silent, turning their eyes to the king. I put my hand over my heart and bowed, for he was the king. I could not change it, and so I must bow to that.
He raised his arm, pointing the sword at my breast.
“This prince is my enemy,” he said, his voice filling the hall. “In his heart he honors no king—even in my father the Lord Sennacherib’s time he was rebellious. He would hide his rebellion, and yet from me he cannot. For I alone know the twistings of his mind, I, who have been his brother.”
He lowered the sword and. with his eyes only, looked about him, judging for himself how men heard his words.
Yet they were not his words, as I understood now, but Naq’ia’s. It was her voice I heard, and her wisdom. She had said how it would be—she had made all things between us plain. And thus I could pity Esarhaddon, for he seemed to know it not.
“Thus I banish him.”
There was a murmur of voices, many voices, speaking different words to mean the same thing. And while they buzzed like flies over carrion, my brother—he who had been my brother, who had pronounced himself no more my brother—he and I exchanged a silent glance that said all that was needed.
“Let him be gone from this city,” he went on, his eyes holding mine. “And let him pass forever out of the Land of Ashur, and all the lands where the might of Ashur’s king is felt. In five days I will send out horsemen, that my judgment may be proclaimed. After that, if he is found, let him perish. I will reward the man who brings me his head.”
Thus was I given those five days of grace, five days in which to stay ahead of my pursuers. Five days in which to find safety for my life.
“Let him hide himself in the dark lands beyond the sun. Let him fear to return, for his king hates him. Let him be taken from my sight! Go!”
I was led away. I hardly knew where, for my mind was full. Five days. Five days in which to quit the land of my birth. To wander in exile until death. Never would I see. . .
Esarhaddon, pointing with his sword, pointing to a wasteland where no man walked, speaking the one word: “Go!”
In his own time, the god had made all plain.
Thus began my days of wandering. I saw them stretching before me, filled with sorrow. I thought my life was over. The god, at last, was finished with me. Since the hour of my birth, on the night of the blood star, I had not lived yet five and twenty years.
EPILOGUE
My youngest grandson has a daughter named Deianira. She is four years old and has a great curiosity about writing, so now she sits on the bench beside me, watching as I scratch my narrative onto the goatskin parchment—I have grown rich in my exile and can afford this extravagance.
Since it is more cumbersome and, in any case, none hereabouts could read it, I have not used the daggerlike script in fifty years. I have not spoken my native Akkadian in nearly as long. I seem to have become almost wholly Greek, so as I form the letters I name them to little Deianira. Sometimes she climbs down from the bench, takes a stick, and draws them in the dust. She will have them all soon.
She is a clever child and a great pleasure to me. I like to think that she may live to be an old woman and will read this story to her own great grandchildren, and that she will remember with some small affection the old man who wrote it, will remember this moment when we sat together and I filled the parchment with letters, and that thus I will not wholly die. In such vanities do old men comfort themselves.
A man in his first youth asks everything of the gods—wealth, immortal glory, pleasure, love—demands them as a right. Growing old is a process of learning that the gods give but little heed to these petitions. The voice that answers in the wind speaks of other matters, of wisdom and patience, which come of their own with time. Wealth, immortal glory, pleasure—these things are empty. Only love is real. To be happy is to know this, and it is the gods’ one gift. When they wish to blind a man, or damn him, they give him the others. In their mercy, sometimes they take them away. They have left me in the shade of my vines teaching the alphabet to my grandson’s daughter, and I am not empty of gratitude.
Curious are the destinies of men. A child born in that bitter hour of my banishment would be old now, withered, as I am, ready for death. And I still live. They are all dead—Esarhaddon, Naq’ia, Esharhamat, all the rest. They are ghosts whom I have brought back to live once more in the pages of this my story, my story which is not ended yet. For I was in error—the god was still not finished with me.
I would know exile and obscurity, happiness and sorrow, and something of the hearts of men. And one day I would return to the Land of Ashur. I would learn the secrets which then were hidden, and the will of heaven would stand revealed. My life, which I thought over, was just beginning.
But an old man’s strength has its limits, and that story must wait for another day.
About the Author
NICHOLAS GUILD was born in 1944 in Belmont, California. He received a B.A. degree in English from Occidental College in Los Angeles and an M.A. in Comparative Literature and a Ph.D. in English from the University of California at Berkeley. Since then he has divided his time between teaching and writing. He is the author of critical articles on 17th Century poetry and 20th Century fiction, along with twelve novels, several of which have been international best sellers and which have been translated into German, Italian, Spanish, Japanese, Russian, Greek and Czech.
Presently he lives in Frederick, MD
Visit his website: http://www.nicholasguild.com/
Discover other titles by Nicholas Guild at Smashwords.com:
Angel
The Blood Star
The Summer Soldier
Old Acquaintance
The Favor
The President’s Man
Chain Reaction
The Berlin Warning
The Linz Tattoo
The Assyrian Page 70
