The Cursed Kingdom

by Peter Darman

  The brother of Itti Egibi, Nabu, was a recent widower who was very different from his abstemious brother. Nabu was corpulent and believed the gods had granted his family great wealth and power so it could be used. He had fathered two sons like his brother, so the family line was safe for another generation. Having done his duty to the Egibi family and having reached the age of sixty, he was determined to enjoy his remaining years to the full. He had no intention of marrying again but the prospect of sharing his bed with an eighteen-year-old Armenian girl from a prestigious family aroused his attention, among other things. The marriage was encouraged by Itti who believed the union would allow the Egibi to expand its business interests.

  ‘Have you seen him?’ exclaimed Lusin. ‘He is older than father.’

  Ctesiphon had suddenly become a gilded cage for her after her father and Ashleen had introduced the grotesque Nabu to her in the palace gardens. If first impressions were very important it was an unfortunate venue to choose because the heat caused Nabu to sweat, despite a slave holding a large parasol over his head. And when he held Lusin’s hand to kiss it, his hand was hot and wet. She recoiled in horror from his touch and nearly threw up when her father and the chief of court informed her she was to be Nabu Egibi’s wife.

  ‘He is from a very wealthy family,’ offered her mother by way of compensation.

  ‘You are lucky that any man wants to marry you after your abduction,’ snapped her father harshly. ‘The king is in favour of the match.’

  Lusin, tears in her eyes, looked at her parents. ‘Do I not have a say in this?’

  ‘Don’t be absurd,’ replied Geghard, ‘you will do as you are told. It may have escaped your notice but our circumstances are greatly reduced. Only with the assistance of King of Kings Phraates can we return to Armenia. The alternative is too dreadful to contemplate.’

  ‘You will be treated like a queen, Lusin,’ said her mother. ‘Your husband-to-be is from the wealthiest family in Babylon, which I have heard is a very rich city.’

  Her father stood before her, tall, imposing and unyielding.

  ‘You will do your duty for the sake of your family and Armenia.’

  The intimate meal the chief of court had arranged that night was designed to facilitate the ‘happy’ couple getting to know each other more fully. A musician played a lyre to soften the mood and scented candles filled the room with pleasing aromas. Ashleen sat with Lusin and her mother and father, their son Vahan absent due to him visiting to the garrison of Seleucia. The overweight Nabu sat opposite Geghard, stuffing his face with barbel cooked in butter. He paid scant attention to the lord’s wife Katar and none to Lusin, who normally would have relished such a delicacy but had no appetite.

  ‘Is she a virgin?’ asked Nabu bluntly, emptying a gold rhyton filled with wine.

  Geghard clenched a fist under the table. How he wanted to punch the fat oaf.

  ‘Of course, lord,’ answered Ashleen.

  Nabu belched. ‘I heard she was captured by King Spartacus and his Sarmatian barbarians. I have heard terrible things about Gordyene.’

  ‘King Spartacus treated me with the utmost respect,’ stated Lusin, earning a rebuking glare from her father.

  Nabu turned his bloated face to his intended. She was pretty enough with her heart-shaped face, slender frame and chestnut curls, but he detected a feisty, rebellious nature. He would soon beat that out of her. Women should be subservient and eager to please.

  ‘You paid Spartacus your daughter’s weight in gold to get her back, lord?’ he asked Geghard.

  ‘I did.’

  Nabu clicked his fingers to indicate his rhyton should be refilled.

  ‘I will give you double her weight in gold by way of thanks for gifting me your daughter.’

  Geghard nodded. ‘That is most generous.’

  A slave filled Nabu’s drinking vessel.

  ‘Nonsense, we will soon be family and families must look after each other.’

  ‘What date did you have in mind for the wedding, lord?’ Ashleen asked Geghard.

  ‘In truth, I had not given it much thought.’

  ‘As soon as possible, I think,’ leered Nabu. ‘Fruit is at its most ripe when it is picked early.’

  Lusin shuddered as she realised she was nothing but an object to be bartered, no better than the slaves with blank expressions who stood around the table.

  But the months she had spent as a novice at the Temple of Anahit paid dividends and the goddess smiled on her. The next day Ashleen presented himself at the quarters of Lord Geghard and his wife to announce that Phraates had decided Lusin and Nabu should be married in the royal palace at Artaxata once it had been liberated from the Romans. The high king thought it would mark the beginning of good relations between Parthia and Armenia. Geghard was annoyed his gift of gold would be delayed, Nabu went back to his drinking and whoring and Lusin felt like a condemned prisoner who had just been reprieved on the gallows.

  *****

  The Romans quit their camp at dawn and commenced their march north, skirting the city of Irbil bathed in an orange glow as the sun rose in the east. Quintus Dellius sat on his horse and watched the line of marching legionaries, carts, mules and horsemen making its way across the green plain. He saw the figure of Antony riding towards him, flanked by Gallic horsemen. The triumvir had spent his fiftieth birthday as guests of King Darius and the charming Queen Parisa, plus the not so charming Queen Mother Aliyeh. The latter had been enraged when the triumvir had informed her that he and his army were leaving Media to re-establish control in Armenia. Reports had reached Irbil of large groups of bandits attacking Roman garrisons and supply lines. Antony’s trusted general, Publius Canadius Crassus, had begged his commander to abandon Media to consolidate his control over Armenia, otherwise it would be lost. Antony had also received reports from Alexandria concerning Octavian’s advanced preparations for a campaign against him and Cleopatra. Media had suddenly become an insignificant sideshow.

  Antony pulled up his horse and nodded to his friend. As ever he looked splendid in a white tunic with narrow purple stripes denoting his social status, a large scarlet cloak pinned at the right shoulder and a beautiful muscled bronze cuirass embossed with silver that shone in the sunlight. He removed his polished helmet with its huge red crest.

  ‘Our Median allies are conspicuous by their absence,’ noted Quintus.

  ‘The king and queen said their goodbyes last night.’

  ‘And the queen mother?’ asked Quintus.

  Antony smiled. ‘Perhaps I should leave the army behind and take her north with me.’

  ‘The men you are leaving behind will never leave this place.’

  To soften the blow of leaving Media, Antony had agreed to leave behind one legion – four thousand men – plus two hundred Cappadocian slingers and a thousand Pontic foot javelinists to bolster Darius’ army.

  ‘The queen mother’s diplomacy has deprived Phraates of the services of the armies of Hatra and Dura and their allies, and the high king’s military talents leave a lot to be desired,’ replied Antony.

  Quintus looked around at the lush plain and the citadel of Irbil rising above the sprawling city.

  ‘Do you think we will return?’

  ‘Once Octavian has been defeated I will return with a large army and my son and his queen will sit on golden thrones at Ctesiphon.’

  Quintus grinned and Antony replaced his helmet on his head. But neither of them would see Parthia again.

  *****

  The Pambak Valley was beautiful in the spring, full of flowers, the rivers and streams foaming with ice-cold water. The mountains were still capped with snow but the lower regions were beginning the feel the warmth of the sun, though in Gordyene the heat never reached the heights of the deserts to the south. It was for this reason that Prince Pacorus found the journey along the Pambak so pleasant. Attired as he was in helmet, scale armour cuirass, his limbs wrapped in tubular steel armour, he would normally be drenched in sweat leading Hatr
a’s Royal Bodyguard in the sandy wastes around his father’s capital. But here in the north the cool spring air of the Pambak made the ride comfortable. Less comfortable would be the meeting with his brother. His father and mother had said little during the journey, their faces wearing permanent frowns and worry lines.

  The prince pulled up his horse and raised his hand to signal a halt when he first caught sight of the brooding city of Vanadzor, because between it and the column of horses and camels behind him was an army. There was a host of red banners fluttering in the breeze, all showing a silver lion, and the ten thousand Immortals standing in their ranks ironically resembled Roman legionaries in their red tunics and leather armour. The medium horsemen also wore red tunics, their lance points glinting in the sun. Equipped and attired in a similar manner but standing apart were the five hundred horsemen of the King’s Guard, each man carrying an ukku blade in a red scabbard. Beside them were Rasha’s five hundred Vipers, also uniformed in red and black.

  The thousands of horse archers grouped around their lords presented a shoddier sight in comparison. They wore a mixture of green, brown and blue tunics, had no armour and only soft pointed hats for headwear. Among their ranks were women, the inhabitants of the hill villages of Gordyene making no distinction between the sexes when it came to shooting a bow to kill game or an enemy. A similar ragtag bunch was the Aorsi and their leader Prince Spadines, though they did have armour – all of it plundered from defeated Romans and Armenians. Prince Pacorus frowned at their appearance but noted there were a great many of them. Clearly Spartacus had not assembled such an army just to honour the arrival of his parents.

  The king and queen of Gordyene, accompanied by their children and a party of Vipers, rode to greet the prince as Hatra’s Royal Bodyguard deployed into a line and every rider dipped his kontus in salute. Spartacus raised his hand in acknowledgement but paid scant attention to the strutting peacocks in their gleaming armour and plumed helmets. He knew most of the officers in the bodyguard, though without affection. As boys they had mocked him for his low birth and barbarian ways and now they were commanders in one of the empire’s élite formations. The smile of his brother erased the memory. He halted his horse alongside that of Pacorus, reached over and gave him a hug, or at least he hugged his armour. Pacorus, ever the knight, bowed his head and kissed Rasha’s hand when the queen drew her horse level with his.

  ‘It is good to see you, my brother,’ smiled Pacorus. ‘Your boys are growing up fast.’

  Rasha turned to smile at her sons, Haytham and Castus attired in leather cuirasses and Akmon in scale armour. Haytham was now ten and already proficient in the use of a bow, though he looked slightly ridiculous in his armour.

  ‘Would you care to inspect our father’s bodyguard?’ asked Pacorus.

  ‘Not really,’ was the terse reply.

  ‘We are eager to see our parents,’ said Rasha hastily, giving her husband a disapproving frown.

  Spartacus dug his knees into his horse and ordered it to move, the beast cantering straight through the line of Hatrans, who were fortunately in open order so there was space to allow it to pass through their ranks. A somewhat discomfited Prince Pacorus wheeled his horse around and followed, as did Rasha and her children, the Vipers diplomatically going around the long line of cataphracts.

  Gafarn looked at Diana and shook his head after seeing Spartacus ride through the horsemen to head towards them.

  ‘I have the feeling this visit is going to be a torturous one.’

  ‘Try not to goad him,’ pleaded Diana.

  But whatever Spartacus may have thought of the arrogant nobles of Hatra, he loved his parents, the couple who had raised him and especially the woman who had carried him out of the Silarus Valley as an infant in the aftermath of the death of his blood father. He jumped from his horse and went down on one knee in front of them, bowing his head to the rulers of Hatra.

  ‘Welcome to Gordyene, mother and father, my army awaits your inspection.’

  He was justly proud of the force he had assembled before his city, especially the ten thousand Immortals who stood in immaculate uniforms and perfect order. But Gafarn knew his son had not raised, trained and equipped such a force just to stand on parade before the walls of his city, and that evening, after he and his wife had rested and changed their clothes, he came straight to the point.

  ‘We do not wish you to march against Media.’

  Spartacus drained his cup of wine and calmly placed it on the table. He had arranged a great feast to celebrate his parents’ arrival but they had requested a private meal with him, his wife and Prince Pacorus.

  ‘I have been summoned by the high king,’ said Spartacus, ‘and I will not disobey him.’

  ‘You might if you knew the truth,’ stated Diana.

  ‘What truth?’ asked Spartacus.

  They told him and Rasha about the violation and humiliation of Aliyeh, which had forced her son to seek the friendship of Mark Antony. Rasha was appalled and there were tears in her eyes after the tale had been told, Prince Pacorus sitting in silence with his head down. Spartacus listened impassively and when his parents had finished he told them his story.

  ‘When Media and Ctesiphon were friends, eastern Gordyene was subject to raids organised by Irbil. They were bad enough but tame in comparison to the recent Roman incursion into my kingdom. We had to eject the Romans by force, by which time they had crucified dozens of villagers and carried off dozens more women and children to sell in their accursed slave markets.

  ‘You talk of violation but the abuse of a vicious, evil woman for an evening is as nothing when compared to the slaughter and abduction meted out by the new friends of Media in my kingdom. Such excesses cannot go unanswered.’

  ‘Perhaps these excesses were punishment for your own wrongdoings, my son,’ suggested Gafarn.

  Spartacus’ eyes narrowed. ‘Wrongdoings?’

  Gafarn began counting on one hand.

  ‘Let’s see. Violating a temple to steal its gold, gold gifted to the gods by worshippers. Abducting one of the novices and subsequently ransoming her back to her father. Invading Armenia to install your Sarmatian ally as the Prince of Van, a ridiculous title for a loathsome individual. Finally, hiring more Sarmatian bandits to spread terror in Armenia. Tell me, what is the difference between a poor Armenian villager and his family being murdered by your allies and your own villagers being killed by Romans?’

  ‘I do not need to explain myself to anyone,’ grunted Spartacus.

  ‘Armenia is not your plaything, Spartacus,’ said an exasperated Gafarn.

  ‘Hatra is not subject to Armenian raids,’ his son shot back. ‘I have to protect my kingdom.’

  ‘Protect or expand?’ posed his father.

  Spartacus shrugged. ‘I do not know what you mean.’

  ‘Have it your own way, but you seek to take advantage of Phraates and that will end badly. He is untrustworthy.’

  ‘That much we can agree on,’ laughed Spartacus.

  ‘You may not march your army through Hatran territory,’ said Gafarn.

  His son was surprised. ‘What?’

  ‘It is for your own good, son,’ said Diana.

  ‘As we have done, inform Phraates that due to familial ties you cannot in all honour march against Media,’ proposed Gafarn.

  Prince Pacorus spoke in support of his parents. ‘Byrd in Palmyra sent word to Dura that Mark Antony has left Irbil to prepare for a great battle between his own and Queen Cleopatra’s forces and those of Octavian. King of Kings Phraates should be able to muster more than enough men to deter any further Media aggression against Ctesiphon.’

  ‘It all points to an accommodation between King Darius and Phraates,’ said Gafarn, ‘which would be far more beneficial to the empire than more war.’

  Spartacus thought for a moment. ‘Perhaps you are right, father. Perhaps some sort of agreement can be resolved between the two parties.’

  Gafarn and Diane left Vanadzor a happy coupl
e, seen off by a Spartacus who seemed remarkably relaxed. After he had ridden in the company of his parents and brother for a distance of twenty miles, he returned to his palace and immediately summoned General Hovik.

  ‘King Gafarn, my father, has prohibited my army from entering his territory during the march to Ctesiphon.’

  Hovik looked at the hide map on the wall of the king’s office and scratched his thinning hair.

  ‘That presents a problem, majesty. We could request permission from King Aschek to march through his kingdom, though that would mean marching north into Armenia, then east before heading south.’

  Spartacus leaned back in his chair and extended his arm to his general.

  ‘Take a seat.’

  He waited until Hovik had done so before pouring him some wine.

  ‘Some men look for signs from the gods in their lives, Hovik. They see the work of the immortals in oddly shaped flocks of birds in the air or cattle behaving strangely in the fields, or interpret an unexpected visit from a neighbour or relative as a sign, of what I have no idea. But I believe the visit of my parents might just be the gods telling me something.’

  ‘Which is what, majesty?’

  ‘That I waste my time joining with others when I can accomplish the task myself.’

  Hovik was perplexed. ‘I do not understand, majesty.’

  ‘We will march directly south into the belly of the beast. I will meet Darius and his Roman allies in battle, defeat him and take Irbil, afterwards informing Phraates the army of Gordyene has saved his throne.’

  Hovik said nothing as he tried to think of a suitable reply. The king was straight-faced so it was unlikely he was making merry, and in any case King Spartacus was not one to tell jokes. This could only mean he was serious, prompting Hovik to wonder if he was going insane.