Parthian Vengeance (The Parthian Chronicles)

by Darman, Peter

  Narses sighed loudly. ‘He is testing, I agree. But he should hear the terms.’

  Mithridates nodded and looked away from me.

  ‘King Pacorus,’ said Narses without emotion. ‘You are surrounded and far from home. You must know that your position is hopeless. No one is coming to your aid. Hatra is preoccupied to the north and King Gotarzes is besieged in his city.’

  ‘I am fully appraised of the current situation,’ I said.

  Narses continued. ‘If you lay down your arms now we will allow you to go back to your home unmolested.’

  ‘Back to Dura?’ I enquired.

  ‘Back to Hatra,’ snapped Mithridates. ‘Dura will be taken back into the empire, to be ruled directly from Ctesiphon. A loyal satrap will sit on its throne.’

  I glanced at Surena, who was looking at Mithridates with venom in his eyes. ‘And what of my army?’

  ‘They will becomes slaves in the service of King of Kings Mithridates,’ replied Narses. ‘You, and your wife, though, will be allowed to return to your father’s kingdom.’

  ‘All except the Roman,’ said Mithridates.

  ‘The Roman?’ I enquired. I knew he was talking about Domitus, but I thought I would let him talk some more. Anything to waste time.

  ‘Yes,’ leered Mithridates, ‘the one who insulted me at Esfahan and who has been responsible for the deaths of so many innocent Parthians.’

  Whether Mithridates had been responsible for more deaths was a moot point, but his words confirmed that he had an unending capacity for bearing grudges and hatred. He was referring to Domitus having placed his blade against the throat of one of Mithridates’ companions after I had had the misfortune of meeting him in the mausoleum to Arsaces, the first Parthian king, at Esfahan many years before.

  ‘He is the general of my army.’

  ‘He will not be allowed to live,’ said Mithridates, ‘but will be put to death in the Roman fashion. You see how merciful I am, to allow him to die according to his own customs.’

  ‘You really think I will agree to this?’ I answered with incredulity.

  ‘You might,’ remarked Narses casually, ‘if you knew that it would ensure that Gotarzes lives.’

  What trickery was this? ‘I do not understand.’

  Mithridates was relishing my uncertainty. ‘It is quite simple. Agree to the terms and Narses will withdraw the army from before the walls of Elymais and I will forgive Gotarzes his treachery.’

  How many soldiers did they have? I had destroyed one army, only to see another spring from the desert. And now there was a third still besieging Gotarzes.

  ‘You may yet still save your ally,’ said Narses.

  There followed a deafening silence as I weighed up what they offered. They knew that I would never agree to my army being disbanded and seeing its members go into slavery, much less sentence my friend and general to death. Or perhaps they thought that I was like them: calculating, ruthless and devoid of any notion of right and wrong.

  ‘I need time to think about your offer,’ was all I could say.

  ‘You have one hour,’ snapped Mithridates.

  The parley was over and we returned to camp.

  ‘Well, Surena,’ I said as we walked the horses back to the entrance, the sky still showing no signs of clearing, ‘what do you think of the king of kings and his lord high general?’

  ‘They are liars, lord,’ he spat with contempt. He looked at me, concern etched on his face.

  ‘You are not going to surrender the army, lord?’

  I smiled. ‘No, Surena, I am not.’

  Back in camp Orodes was also dismissive of his stepbrother’s offer.

  ‘He intends to starve Gotarzes into surrender anyway. There is nothing you can do.’

  ‘Most likely he is dead already,’ added Domitus, now dressed in his helmet, mail shirt and greaves.

  I was toying with the idea of offering battle instead of running. Perhaps we could still be victorious, march on Ctesiphon and relieve Gotarzes. I voiced my opinion to the others. Surena thought it an excellent idea, though Domitus, Marcus and even Orodes had grave misgivings.

  ‘Even if we beat them,’ said Domitus, ‘there is no guarantee that there isn’t another army waiting on the other side of the Tigris.’

  ‘You may offer battle,’ added Orodes, ‘but there is no guarantee that my stepbrother and Narses will accept. Most likely they will sacrifice their foot and fall back with their horse, but they could still harry us as we marched east.’

  ‘Another battle will use up most of our water supplies, sir,’ said Marcus.

  By now the enemy army had moved into its positions around the camp, the foot to the west, horse archers to the north and east and the cataphracts in the south with Mithridates and Narses. There were nearly forty thousand soldiers surrounding us now. I knew that my two legions were worth three of four times the number of the enemy’s foot, but I only had four thousand horsemen against nearly five times that number of enemy cavalry. I had over a thousand cataphracts and the enemy had around five thousand, to say nothing of outnumbering us five to one in horse archers.

  I looked at each of their faces. I knew that if I gave the command to deploy for battle they would obey without question, and no doubt would be dead by the end of the day. I could not have that on my conscience.

  ‘Very well,’ I said, ‘we stick to the plan. To your positions.’

  Surena, Marcus and Domitus scurried away back to their men, though I asked Orodes to stay behind. As ever before combat he looked very serious. He was not like Surena, who regarded battle as another opportunity to acquire more glory and viewed it like a game with a few risks. Orodes drew his sword reluctantly, though in the midst of battle he was as expert at killing the enemy as the rest of us. But he always ensured that his conduct was beyond reproach at all times, even in the cauldron of combat.

  ‘I would ask one more favour of you, my friend.’

  ‘Anything,’ he replied.

  ‘Keep an eye on Surena. Above all do not let him do anything rash. I want him to become a good commander rather than an heroic dead one.’

  ‘Very well,’ he said quietly.

  We embraced and then he went back to his men. Mithridates’ ‘generous’ offer of an hour to resign ourselves to our fate did at least give the horsemen the opportunity to finalise their arrangements. While Surena and I had been in his company, Orodes, Marcus and Domitus had drawn up the legions and the horsemen ready for the breakout. The plan was for the two legions to charge the enemy foot drawn up beyond the western entrance to the camp while I organised a diversion at the southern side. The latter was to deceive Narses and Mithridates into thinking that I was launching an attack upon their own persons and they would hopefully rally their forces to them. That was the theory at least.

  Orodes charged one of the best men in his bodyguard to take care of Remus, standing now with his scale armour covering his body, neck and head. Even his eyes had wire grills over them as protection against enemy arrows. I stroked him under his chin.

  ‘Orodes will take care of you, and when you get back to Dura Gallia will ensure your needs are met. May Shamash protect you my faithful friend.’

  I nodded to Orodes’ officer who bowed his head and led Remus away towards the camp’s western entrance. It was the first time that I would not ride him in battle.

  Though they had been deployed to the west of the camp yesterday, today Narses’ palace guard were drawn up around their king and Mithridates. This meant that the foot soldiers the legions would be attacking would not be élite troops. I thanked the gods for that.

  A hundred horse archers had volunteered to remain with the legions and it was they who accompanied me on foot as I ran from the southern entrance across the open ground towards where Narses, Mithridates and their soldiers were grouped. Their cataphracts were drawn up in a long line of two ranks either side of the two kings who stood with the best foot soldiers in Persis, their bronze-faced shields presenting a wall o
f metal in front of a forest of spears. As we ran in one rank towards the enemy, to my right I could hear trumpet blasts coming from the camp – Domitus was attacking. We rushed across the ground to within five hundred paces of the enemy, horns and kettledrums answering our trumpets.

  We halted, strung arrows in our bowstrings and released them, then kept on shooting at the enemy ranks. Our arrows arched high into the sky and then dropped onto the densely packed ranks of the enemy foot. We shot at least four volleys – sixteen hundred arrows – before groups of armoured riders from each flank on either side of the foot began trotting towards us.

  ‘Back to camp!’ I screamed. Then we were running as though all the demons in hell were snapping at our heels. Behind us the cataphracts broke into a canter and lowered their lances. Perhaps Narses himself was leading them. I saw the camp’s entrance ahead, my heart pounding in my chest. Don’t look back; keep moving; run faster! I heard the thunder of iron-shod hooves getting closer and the shouts of men on horseback closing on their quarry. We dropped our quivers as we neared the wide gap in the earth rampart and ran into the camp with only seconds to spare. As we did so groups of legionaries either side of us and on top of the rampart next to the entrance hurled caltrops into the gap. These comprised three stakes that were ordinarily used to construct the palisade around the camp lashed together with wire to form a three-headed stake. Where only half minute before there had been a gap wide enough for twelve men to march through abreast, there now stood a thick carpet of caltrops.

  The enemy’s horses panicked and either tried to veer aside or pull up sharply to avoid crashing into the caltrops. Those behind smashed into the front ranks as dozens of horses and their riders were caught up in a giant, tangled press. Some horses reared up on their hind legs and threw their riders to the ground, to be trampled by other animals behind. It was chaos and I wished that I had fresh archers to shoot arrows into the faces of the horsemen and the unarmoured bellies of horses as they reared up, but all I had was a hundred men who stood panting and slapping each other on the back at their escape from the clutches of the enemy. More legionaries ran onto the rampart and hurled their javelins at the disorganised mass of horsemen. Most glanced off scale armour harmlessly; a few found flesh. Finding their way barred, the enemy officers reasserted control and began to pull their men back. They retreated out of arrow and javelin range and re-dressed their ranks. There were few empty saddles but, more importantly, we had created a diversion and given the army at the camp’s western entrance time to carry out its attack unhindered.

  The Romans call it cuneus, meaning ‘wedge’, and as the attention of Mithridates, Narses and the cream of their horsemen was focused on what was happening immediately to their front, the Duran Legion and the Exiles were pouring out of the western entrance of the camp, straight into the enemy’s foot. Each legion charged at the enemy in one long column, each one made up of dozens of ranks of six men.

  Immediately before they charged at the enemy a barrage of missiles was unleashed by the ballista operated by Marcus and his men. These had been placed on the ramparts either side of the western entrance. The smaller ballista were essentially over-sized and over-powered bows fixed horizontally on wooden stands that shot bolts, stones and solid metal balls over great distances.

  The charge of the Durans and Exiles was a foregone conclusion, made quicker as the enemy actually advanced towards the camp and then stopped abruptly when ballista ammunition began tearing into their tightly packed ranks, some bolts and balls taking heads off and showering those around with bone and gore. Soon the ranks faltered and then fractured as some men attempted to turn around and run from the horror that was being visited upon them, while others tried to press on with their attack. And then they were hit by the legions.

  Two great columns of men resembling a pair of great armoured serpents slithered out of camp towards them, the front two ranks gripping their lethal short swords tight to their bodies while those behind held their javelins at the ready. The ballista stopped shooting as the head of each column reached the enemy’s battered front rank. And then the slaughter began.

  As the front ranks of the enemy stood transfixed by the snarling and screaming legionaries running at them, the sky was suddenly filled with other missiles as the men behind the front two ranks hurled their javelins forward. Ever since I had first encountered them in Italy I had been fascinated by the Roman javelin, a spear that bent upon impact, making it impossible for an enemy to throw it back. And now dozens of javelins embedded themselves in enemy flesh, felling dozens. And then the legionaries went to work with their swords, stabbing upwards into thighs and bellies and over the rims of their shields into faces.

  I was told later that the two columns went through the enemy like a gladius through a linen shirt. On the legionaries went and the enemy was glad to get out of their way, fleeing left and right before them. So the Durans and Exiles prised apart the enemy, herding them into two disorganised and dispirited blocks, one to the north and the other to the south. In the middle the two columns of legionaries pushed their way forward until they had broken clear through the enemy. And then they stopped. Trumpets blasted and the Durans and Exiles halted as one. Whereas the enemy foot was a mass of frightened and confused men, the Durans and Exiles retained their discipline and cohesion. Train hard, fight easy.

  The Duran Legion formed the northern column and the Exiles the southern one. The trumpeters of both formations now sounded again and as one the Durans faced right to present a wall of shields to the enemy that had been barged aside and herded in a northwards direction like a flock of sheep. At the same time the Exiles faced left to prepare to advance against the second mass of enemy soldiers. Different trumpet blasts signalled a general advance, followed by another hail of javelins as both legions once more hurled their missiles at the enemy, the squeals and cries announcing that the latter’s ranks had been culled once more. Then the legions advanced north and south respectively, literally herding the enemy before them and creating a wide corridor behind them. Then Orodes led his horsemen out of the camp.

  The corridor that had been created by the foot was wide enough to allow the Prince of Susiana to deploy his cataphracts in a great wedge formation, he and his bodyguard forming the point, the banners of Susiana and Dura fluttering behind him as he led the horsemen into the desert. Behind the cataphracts came the squires leading camels loaded with food, fodder, full water skins, spare arrows, weapons and clothing, plus the camels of the ammunition train. Either side of the squires, providing flank protection, rode two great columns of horse archers, each one riding parallel to the rear of the legions. As they did so they shot volleys of arrows over the legionaries into the ranks of the enemy foot soldiers, causing them to fall back further. Surena came last with the rear guard – a thousand horse archers following in the wake of the other riders.

  The enemy’s attention had been first focused on what was happening at the southern entrance to the camp, especially after I led a hundred archers to pepper the enemy with missiles. The great number of horse archers deployed to the east and north of the camp remained immobile when the legions attacked from the camp’s western entrance. Now, as I ran with the other archers and those legionaries that had been detailed to support us to join the departing legions, the enemy horse archers began to move. Those to the north of the camp, obviously alerted by couriers to what was happening to the west, endeavoured to assault the Duran Legion. Fortunately for the Durans the enemy foot soldiers that had been herded north acted as a barrier between them and the horse archers.

  By the time Narses had realised what was happening Orodes and the cavalry and camels were galloping west into the desert, leaving the legions to redeploy into a giant hollow square as it inched its way northwest, towards Hatran territory. I caught up with them as enemy horse archers forced their way into the empty camp via the eastern entrance. Everything had been packed into the wagons and on mules, which were now positioned around the inner sides of the hollow
square.

  The enemy cavalry had ridden out into the desert to try and catch Orodes, but had been recalled. The first part of the plan had worked – my horsemen had been saved. But then the grim realisation dawned on me that I plus thousands of others were now surrounded by around forty thousand enemy troops. Orodes may have escaped but our ordeal was only just beginning.

  Chapter 5

  I watched the great dust cloud thrown up by Orodes and his horsemen and camels grow smaller as they rapidly disappeared into the west. By contrast the pace of our great hollow square was painfully slow, literally inching its way to the northwest like an injured crab. I took up position on the southern side of the square, the men on all four sides having adopted what the Romans call a testudo formation. Derived from the Latin word for ‘tortoise’, it refers to the legionaries locking their oval shields together to the front and overhead as a protection against enemy missiles. So our massive tortoise crawled across the desert, five cohorts on each side of the square presenting a solid and impenetrable wall and roof of shields all the way round.

  I felt like an unwanted guest at a banquet. I had no shield, no gladius and no use as I walked behind a wagon of cooking utensils with the other archers. All the wagons had been arranged so they ‘hugged’ each side of the square, which meant that there was a massive empty space in the centre of the square. Already the pungent smell of mules and their dung filled the warm air. I looked up and saw that the sun was finally breaking through the clouds. It was now mid-morning and the temperature was rising. It was going to be a long day.

  Centurions and officers stalked around like hungry wolves, cajoling and encouraging their men. I saw Domitus strolling down the western side of the square, occasionally stopping and sharing a joke with some of the men and encouraging others. Alcaeus joined him as they made their way over to me. Thus far our progress had been relatively straightforward and unimpeded.

  ‘Orodes made good his escape, then,’ said Domitus.