Lion of the Sun wor-3

by Harry Sidebottom

  'You have to stop this.' Maximus was speaking in his native Celtic tongue. Apart from Ballista, only Calgacus could understand.

  Another ten were being herded forward.

  Ballista looked over the edge. At the bottom, in the pile, one or two of the bodies were faintly moving. He could see an arm or a leg shifting in agony.

  The next batch was forced over the edge. Some way down the rock, Ballista saw a relief sculpture, a family group in Greek dress, the father and mother seated, the grown children standing. All held a hand to their chin in uniform thoughtfulness as the shrieking men fell past.

  'Trebellianus,' called Ballista, 'that Persian there.' He pointed. 'I need to question him.'

  Up on the tower, Trebellianus nodded.

  The Sassanid was hauled before Ballista. There were tigers or some other big cats embroidered on his torn tunic. Ballista had seen him before, more than once. Demetrius undoubtedly could have named him straightaway.

  'We were promised our lives if we surrendered.' Behind the dust-stained beard, the young man addressed Ballista in Persian, his face angry and desperate.

  'You were fools to trust these Cilicians,' Ballista replied in Persian. 'You have killed and raped their kin.'

  The Sassanid made a gesture of contempt. 'You are no better than them. The superstitious among my men think you are Nasu. But you are no daemon of death. I know you — from Arete, from your surrender outside Edessa. I saw you swear an oath in Carrhae. You are Ballista — the oath-breaker.'

  'I swore to return to the throne of Shapur. At Soli, I did.'

  'Just twisted words — you Romans lie and cheat as soon as you can crawl.'

  'And everyone knows Persians never lie. It is against your religion. Yet your priests flay men alive, pour boiling oil in their eyes.'

  The Sassanid spat. 'And your men here are far less cruel.'

  'I know you now,' said Ballista. 'You are Valash, son of the King of Kings, the joy of Shapur.'

  The Sassanid sneered. 'And like your kind, you see a way of making a profit. You think my father will pay a ransom for me.'

  'I am sure he would. But I am not going to ask him for one. Although you killed my friend Turpio, left his severed head on a pike, I am going to return you to your father for nothing. Pick six of your men. They can go with you.'

  The Persian looked horrified. 'How can I make such a choice?'

  'War is a harsh teacher. Make the choice, or they will all die.'

  Once it was explained to him, Trebellianus acceded to this turn of events with outward good grace, but the throng of Cilicians were not so politic. They were clearly unhappy.

  As the selected Persians were bundled towards them, Maximus again spoke softly in his native language. 'This is wrong. You cannot leave the other fuckers to this mob. I thought you were back to your old self.'

  'Maybe I am.' Ballista's face was set, impassive. 'But, as I told the Persian, war is a harsh teacher. These Cilicians outnumber us — twenty to one or more. They will follow Trebellianus, not me.'

  Maximus looked round then nodded reluctantly.

  'Anyway, even if we could save all the Persians, we do not have troops to guard them all. And there are another three thousand of the bastards still to fight to the west at Corycus.'

  About three miles down the coast west from Sebaste was the town of Corycus. The most notable thing about it was the island lying offshore. It shared a name with other islets: Crambusa, the dry or parched one. It was indeed waterless, small — no more than two hundred paces by one hundred — and the majority of its shore was rocky. But when the mainland was in enemy hands, its utility to a fleet was immense.

  Ballista's flotilla had sailed down from Sebaste the day before. Arriving, the ships had made a martial display close in to the walls of Corycus — nine triremes, ten liburnians and twenty transport vessels. The latter, to aid the bellicose impression, had been tricked out with military standards, and their decks had been covered with marines seconded from the warships. With luck, the Persians in the town would not realize the roundships were empty except for food and water but would think them packed with troops.

  Now, in full sight of the city, the ships were moored off Crambusa. The bare islet gave the rowers of the warships a chance to get away from their cramped benches, to stretch their legs, to cook, eat and sleep ashore. Admittedly, if a storm got up, the fleet would have to run for shelter, either east to Sebaste or west to the delta of the Calycadnus river. But the summer weather looked set fair.

  Indeed it was a beautiful night. High, benign clouds, backlit by the full moon. The sea was calm as a millpond, silvered by the moonlight. The ships, black silhouettes, rode easily at anchor.

  Ballista stood at the prow of the Lupa, the trireme that carried his standard. He gazed up at the sky. The clouds moving across the face of the moon made it look infinitely distant. In the face of such immensity, mankind seemed very small. It was the trick of most consolations to emphasize the so-called smallness of grief against the enormity of something else. Ballista thought with repugnance of Sulpicius Rufus's famous letter on the death of Cicero's daughter. Do not be profoundly affected by your private sorrow when men like us have lost everything we value: our honourable name, patria, dignitas, all our honours. Cicero had written back saying it had helped. How could even the narrow-minded leaders of a failing oligarchy have thought in such disgusting terms?

  Much better Plutarch's consolation to his wife. Despite the tiresome repetition of the necessity of self-control, despite peddling the evident untruth that giving way to grief was as bad as giving way to pleasure, between all the philosophic platitudes, there was the true grief of a father for his lost child: the most delightful thing in the world to embrace, to see, to hear.

  Time is a great healer. Every one of them said it. All the great minds — Plutarch, Seneca, all the rest — reduced to the soothing of a nursemaid: there, there, time will make it better. And the sad thing was, it was partly true.

  Ballista was beginning to feel a little better. Julia and his sons were no longer in his thoughts all the time. Now he woke with just an unfocused sense of something wrong, before the loss of his wife and boys filled his mind. Here and there in the day, he did not think of them at all. Then he remembered, and felt guilty of neglect.

  At least he was not raving any more. His thoughts were no longer a seething, incoherent riot of pain, revenge and Euripidean tragedy. At Sebaste, Ballista had shaved, bathed, had his hair cut. Old Plutarch had written something along the lines of looking after the externals helping the inner man. Ballista wondered if it was possible to feel any emotion that was not filtered through the thoughts of others. Did the things one had read or heard just give words to one's feelings, or did they shape them, twist them into different forms? Whatever, did it make the emotion less real?

  Behind Ballista came a stage cough. Calgacus had the Persian prince, Valash, with him. So far it could not be said that the King of King's son seemed over-grateful for having his life spared. Perhaps, Ballista thought uncharitably, it had also occurred to the joy of Shapur that being returned to his father, with or without ransom, might not prove to be all that easy. Or it could just be that he did not trust the man his troops — his troops who now lay massacred at the bottom of a chasm called the place of blood — had thought the daemon of death.

  'The Persians in Corycus are commanded by a framadar called Zik Zabrigan,' Ballista said in Persian. 'His position is untenable. In the morning we will go and talk to him.'

  Valash smiled in a superior way. 'Now I see why you were keen to save me. You think I will help you persuade Zik Zabrigan to surrender. I will not.'

  'You mistake me.' Ballista was not going to admit that he would have rescued all Valash's men if he had felt able. 'I do not give a fuck if you talk to him or not. And I do not give a fuck if his men lay down their arms or they all die.'

  Valash glowered silently.

  'But I thought,' Ballista continued, 'you might prefer them not to
fall into the hands of Trebellianus and his rough Cilicians.'

  Valash made the sign to avert the evil eye. 'You may not be Nasu, but you are a lover of the lie, a true follower of Drug. One day Mazda will deliver you again into the hands of the righteous.'

  Ballista was too tired, not physically but emotionally, to have the energy to be angry.

  Maximus stepped out of the shadows and did it for him. 'You owe him your life. If you have any honour, you should keep a civil tongue in your head.'

  The tall, thin figure swung round, reaching for the long sword that was not on his hip. The sons of the house of Sasan were not reminded of their honour by others, never by non-Aryans. Valash mastered himself. 'You are right.' He turned back to Ballista. 'Although I did not ask you, I owe you a debt.' With an innate grace he performed proskynesis: a small, elegant bow, fingers brushing his lips. 'But I will not seek to persuade framadar Zik Zabrigan to surrender. I know your transports contain no soldiers. I will not lie to him.'

  Ballista smiled. 'To ride, shoot the bow and avoid the lie.'

  Valash nodded gravely. 'Just so.' In the morning, there was a slight choppy swell running from the west, nothing bad, but enough to make the ships fret at their anchors. Ballista had them all move into the shelter of Crambusa, as far as that was possible. Orders were given that no more than one-third of the rowers from each ship, one bank of a trireme, were to be disembarked on the islet at any one time.

  Ballista and his comites spent the time looking over at the hills to the north-east of Corycus. Nothing moved on the scrub-covered slopes. The coast road was empty. A lone cormorant worked a patch of water. As he watched the long-necked bird, Ballista noticed the lack of gulls. Back home in the north, the air would have been thick with them, wheeling and screaming around the fleet.

  Back home. Now Julia and the boys were dead there was nothing to stop him returning to Germania. Except, of course, when it became known, a messenger would come from the imperium demanding his father hand him over. And his father, the good of his people always coming first, would have to agree. The cost of non-compliance would be too high — the end of subsidies, the strong likelihood of a Roman-sponsored revolt — failing that, even armed intervention by the legions.

  Anyway, what would Ballista find in the north? It was twenty-two years since he had left. Much would have changed. Would he still be welcome in the halls of the Angles? It was unlikely that his half-brother, Morcar, his father's heir, would be overjoyed to see him. And Ballista knew that he himself had changed. Twenty-two years in the imperium, five years of high command. He was now Marcus Clodius Ballista, Vir Ementissimus, Praetorian Prefect, no longer Dernhelm, son of Isangrim. Maybe the smoke in the halls, the parochial concerns, would stifle him. The imperium changed everything it touched.

  'There.' Maximus pointed.

  Around the headland, about three hundred paces from the town walls, were the standards. Below them, a line of legionaries. Castricius, dependable as ever, had come.

  'Time to go.'

  The Lupa won her anchor. Oars dipped as one, its ram sliced through the swell. Spray flicked back into Ballista's face.

  There was no artillery in Corycus. The trierarch had his orders to take them right into the western harbour. Beyond the mole, the water was nearly still. The great galley came to a halt about a stone's throw from the dock.

  A short wait, and a tall standard appeared: an abstract shape in red, a little like a sword, on a yellow cloth. Below it stood a man in steel and silk, with long black hair.

  'I am Marcus Clodius Ballista, Praetorian Prefect. Draw me a bath and prepare me a meal. I have come to offer terms of surrender to the framadar Zik Zabrigan.'

  'Fuck you, and your terms,' the Persian on the wall jeered. 'Oath-breaker. You will not wash or eat here, you arse-fucking cunt.'

  Things were thrown from the wall. Ballista and the men on the prow ducked behind their shields. The missiles fell short. Some splashed in the water; others exploded on the dock. Clouds of white powder puffed up: flour, or salt.

  'You have your answer,' Zik Zabrigan shouted.

  The Lupa backed water, turned and left.

  'Arse-fucking cunt,' said Maximus.

  'Anatomically interesting, but certainly inventive,' conceded Ballista.

  'Sure, but they were quick to reach a good judgement.'

  Calgacus ushered Valash forward.

  'Joy of Shapur,' said Ballista, 'we need your explanation.'

  Unlike the others, the Persian was not laughing. 'Vulgar abuse. Unseemly in the mouth of a framadar but to be expected at a siege.'

  'No, I meant the other thing — the bags of white powder.'

  Still Valash did not smile. 'Salt. They condemn you as a perjurer. Persians swear on salt.'

  'The oath I took to Shapur was in the Greek fashion.'

  'They are Persians. They will assume you took the oath in the form they know. As your Herodotus said: everywhere, custom is king.'

  'Just so,' said Ballista.

  As the sun arced up across the sky, they took to waiting again. This time, their attention was on the hills directly behind Corycus.

  Over his shoulder, Ballista heard Calgacus telling Maximus an unlikely story: 'When Archelaos of Cappadocia ruled Corycus, he had a beautiful daughter.'

  'Did she have big tits?'

  'Huge — anyway, there was a prophecy that she would be bitten by a snake and die. Now, worry almost drove the king out of his mind. So he built her a palace on this islet of Crambusa — not a snake in sight. Safe as you like.'

  'Sure, she must have been lonely — a hot-blooded girl, all alone, in need of company.'

  'Certainly. Now one of her admirers — a far better-looking, better-set-up man than you — sent her a present, a basket of fruit from the orchards below Mount Taurus. But hidden among the apricots was an asp.'

  'Fuck you, and your stories. I am not in the least scared of snakes. Never have been. And, anyway, we are not on the island.'

  The two men bickered on amiably.

  When the sun was at its zenith, the hills shimmered with heat, and the white, limestone walls of Corycus were almost painful to look at. When it was time to eat, Ballista gave an order for Hippothous the Cilician to join them.

  As they had left Sebaste, an insignificant fishing boat had smuggled Hippothous out to them. He had been desperate to avoid Trebellianus and, it seemed, with good reason. Hippothous, on his own account, was one of the leading men of the upland town of Dometiopolis. His story, if true, was alarming. When those Persians now in Corycus had ventured inland, he claimed, they had been guided by Lydius, one of Trebellianus's boys. They had passed by Germanicopolis, leaving Trebellianus's hometown untouched, and had fallen instead on Dometiopolis.

  Hippothous was sandy-haired, more refined than the average rough Cilician. Yet Ballista had no doubt he was cut from the same cloth as Trebellianus. All these men were trying to turn the calamity to their own advantage.

  'You have claimed that the Persians handed some of your fellow citizens over to Lydius,' said Ballista.

  A look of distaste passed over Hippothous's face. 'Handed them over, and then watched, laughing, as the Cilicians carried out their disgusting sacrifices. They hang the victims, men and beasts, in a tree. They cast javelins at them. If they hit, the god Ares accepts the sacrifice.'

  'And if they miss?'

  'They get a second throw.'

  'I take it you do not agree with your countrymen's religious practices.'

  'Oh no,' said Hippothous. 'I am not Cilician by birth. Mine has been a long and tragic path. I was born in Perinthus, the noble city close by Byzantium. My father was on the Boule. When I was young, I fell desperately in love. Hyperanthes was nearly my age. Stripped for wrestling in the gymnasium, he was like a god. And his eyes — no sidelong glances or fearsome looks, no trace of villainy or dissembling.'

  As they ate, Hippothous told them a tale of love, lust, subterfuge, murder, flight, shipwreck, loss and exile — a tale
worthy of a Greek romance.

  'Probably from a fucking Greek romance,' muttered Calgacus.

  'Do you think Trebellianus will come?' Ballista asked.

  'Oh yes,' said Hippothous. 'These Persians are witnesses to his treachery. He will want them dead.'

  An hour or so after lunch, the trierarch called them. From the prow of the Lupa, they looked at the hills. Through the heat haze, the thin woods above Corycus seemed to be moving. Trebellianus and his men had come.

  'Let us go and talk with Zik Zabrigan again.'

  This time, the framadar offered no physically implausible abuse. Totally cut off by land and sea, aware that the main Persian army was far away, defeated and in retreat, he had to accept the game was up. Although suspicious, his attitude, as they stood between their forces on the seaward end of the mole, was reasonable.

  'Lay down your arms, give up your booty and any prisoners, surrender yourselves into my hands and, despite your outrages, your lives will be spared.' Ballista sounded implacable.

  'Spared for what?'

  'I will give you better terms than are customary. The emperor Alexander Severus settled Persian prisoners as farmers in Phrygia. But your men do not strike me as suited for a bucolic life. If they will swear the sacramentum, they will be enrolled into the Roman army. They will be split up into different units, but I will give you my word they will not be called upon to fight against their own people.'

  Given Ballista's record, it was quite commendable of the framadar to accede with no hesitation. The salt was produced, hands clasped, the right words spoken.

  Up on the tower above the docks, the tension was getting to Ballista. So far, things had been reasonably smooth, but the handover was tricky. There were many things that could go wrong. Ordered to remain outside the town, Trebellianus had protested civilly enough, his men more truculently. At any moment they might swarm forward to get at the Persians, maybe even sack the town itself.

  Ballista had hurried Castricius's soldiers up on to the walls. The legionaries were under military discipline, but they had no love of the Persians and civilians were always a tempting target. Estate guards could turn brigand; in fact they often did.