The silence was unbearable as we watched, unable to take our eyes off the black demons approaching with the intent of sending us into the next life. There were a lot of them that much was certain, for they were kicking up a large dust cloud.
‘They are Agraci.’
All three of us turned to stare at the legionary behind us whose eyes were obviously keener than ours. In his relief and joy he momentarily forgot that he was speaking to his king and general as he smiled at me and said the words again.
‘They are Agraci. It is Prince Malik.’
We snapped our heads back to the front once more to see with our own eyes the miracle that was unfolding. Ahead, swathed in black robes and riding a black horse, was the son of King Haytham, my friend and Dura’s ally. But he was not alone. Beside him, galloping towards me on her faithful mare, rode Gallia, her face covered by the cheekguards of her helmet. Behind her came Vagharsh carrying my griffin banner and behind him rode the Amazons, while on Gallia’s other side was Orodes.
As the low rumble of horses’ hooves filled the air the ranks behind me were silent. Then they erupted into wild cheering, the sound reverberating along each side of the square as the word was passed that our salvation had arrived. Domitus slapped me hard on the arm and Kronos locked me in an iron bear hug. With difficulty I fought back the tears as I fell to my knees and bowed my head in thanks to Shamash, who had surely woven this miracle.
Domitus helped me to my feet as Malik, Gallia and Orodes pulled up their horses in front of us and my wife leapt from her saddle and wrapped herself around me. Both of us sprawled in the dirt. This brought whistles and hoots from the men behind as Gallia stood up, untied the straps on her helmet and threw it on the ground. I hauled myself onto my feet once more and she grabbed my face and kissed me long on the lips.
‘I came as fast as I could,’ she said, running a finger tenderly down the scar on my left cheek. ‘I would ride into hell if need be to save you.’
My eyes misted as I looked at her flawless face and blue eyes.
‘Orodes must have ridden like the wind to reach Dura in so short a time.’
She reached down to hold both my hands. ‘No, my love. We left Dura before Orodes had time to reach the city.’
She smiled her most beautiful smile as Orodes came up and embraced me. He stood back seeing my haggard appearance, my torn and filthy tunic, my battered cuirass and unshaven face.
‘You look terrible.’
He, as ever, looked immaculate in his scale armour cuirass, well-groomed hair and clean-shaven face.
‘I have been entertaining Mithridates and Narses these past few days. Alas, I have had no time to wash and change.’
Malik, face adorned with the black tattoos that were the hallmark of Agraci men folk, embraced me warmly.
‘It is good to see you, my friend,’ he beamed.
‘You too, Malik. Never has a Parthian king been so glad to see an Agraci prince.’
There followed a series of happy reunions as Malik’s warriors, who must have numbered over a thousand, flanked the square and rode south and east to ensure that we were not surprised by a returning foe.
‘There is little chance of that,’ said Orodes as we all retired to my command tent that had been hastily assembled in the centre of the square. ‘Their scouts will have reported that a great number of horsemen are riding to your relief.’
I was surprised. ‘Really?’
‘Of course,’ added Gallia. ‘Your father brings the army of Hatra to your aid.’
‘Your horsemen are accompanying your father, Pacorus,’ said Orodes.
‘And with him rides my father and ten thousand of his warriors,’ added Malik.
‘King Haytham?’ I could scarcely believe it.
‘Of course,’ continued Malik. ‘When Queen Gallia issues a summons, men obey.’
This was most excellent news and I had difficulty in maintaining my composure. I embraced Gallia once more and then Orodes. But then I noticed that someone was missing.
‘Where is Surena?’
‘I sent him east with a thousand horse archers,’ replied Gallia.
I stared at her, unsure whether my hearing had been damaged during the fighting. I smiled.
‘Very droll. I assume he is with the rest of my horsemen.’
‘It is true, Pacorus,’ said Orodes. ‘He was sent to the Tigris with a thousand riders and ordered to ride south.’
I looked at him and then Gallia.
‘What madness is this?’
‘No madness,’ replied Gallia. ‘Dobbai told me that Surena would reap a rich harvest east of the Tigris so that’s where he is heading.’
I was so relieved and tired in equal measure that I asked no more questions about Surena. But I felt certain that he and a thousand of my horse archers were riding to their deaths.
Chapter 6
My father, his red banner with its white horse motif carried behind him, arrived two hours later with Gafarn in tow. He was accompanied by his five-hundred-strong bodyguard, a thousand other armoured riders, five thousand horse archers, three thousand squires in full war gear leading the same number of camels and a further thousand camels carrying spare arrows, tents, food and waterskins. My two legions had been drawn up in battle order to salute their arrival.
The army of Hatra was a sight to behold. Each cataphract was encased in scale armour, legs and arms in steel circular armour similar to that worn by my own heavy horsemen. White plumes were fixed to the top of every helmet and white pennants fluttered from every kontus. The horses wore armour from head to thigh, their eyes covered by metal grills to protect them from sword and spear thrusts and missiles.
My father’s bodyguard, recruited from the sons of the kingdom’s nobles, were the finest of all, each man wearing scale armour of overlapping polished steel plates riveted onto the thick hide undercoat. The sun glinted off their armour and whetted kontus points. For additional armament each man carried a sword, mace, axe and dagger – they were truly fearsome killing machines.
Only Hatran nobility could serve in the ranks of the royal bodyguard, a notion that I scoffed at. But I had to admit as they halted behind my father and Vistaspa they presented a magnificent sight.
The same could not be said for the horse archers brought by Dura’s lords: men in varying shades of brown, yellow and white shirts and leggings, wearing no armour and riding horses of different colours. Every horse in my father’s bodyguard was a pure white to complement each rider’s white shirt and leggings. But to amass such a contingent took time and a great deal of wealth, attributes that Hatra had in abundance. Dura’s lords, though men of some wealth in their own right, did not have the means to raise and equip such immaculately attired soldiers. But my lords had carved out their lands with blood and hard graft, often fighting the Agraci in the process before the time of peace between our two peoples. The farmers who worked their lands were also hardy individuals who knew how to fight their way out of a tight spot if need be. Gallia had brought twenty thousand of them. The lords had elected Spandarat to be their commander for the duration of the campaign. One-eyed, brusque and having the appearance of a shabby carpet salesman, he had been the one who had escorted the queen back to Dura when she had been pregnant with Claudia when I had marched to fight King Porus of Sakastan and his elephants. How long ago that seemed now!
Trumpets and horns blasted as the legions stood to attention and I walked to greet my father from where Gallia, Orodes, Malik, Domitus and Kronos were standing beyond the front rank of legionaries. Vistaspa held the reins of his horse as he dismounted and paced towards me, Gafarn next to him. We embraced and he stepped back to examine me. He wore a sleeveless leather cuirass overlaid with silver scales and a gold crown atop his silver-inlaid helmet. His spotless long-sleeved white shirt contrasted sharply with my own filthy shirt and leggings. Gafarn was similarly dressed but wore no crown on his helmet.
‘It would appear that we have arrived just in time, my son.’
<
br /> ‘It would appear so, father.’
He looked at the lines of filthy, tired men drawn up behind me.
‘Your soldiers look as though they have taken a battering. It is fortunate for you that you have allies to come to your aid, for otherwise the buzzards would have been picking at your bones by now.’
‘There are worse ways to die,’ I replied casually.
His brow furrowed. ‘Are there?’
‘Better not to die at all,’ suggested Gafarn. ‘You and Mithridates didn’t kiss and make up then?’
‘Grovelling to snakes has little appeal, brother,’ I said.
My father was going to say more but at that moment a great rumbling noise heralded the arrival of more reinforcements – Haytham’s warriors. Like a great cloud of locusts the black-clad Agraci warriors filled the horizon, and my father kept his council as Haytham and his desert lords rode up to where we stood. I smiled as the Agraci king dismounted from his shining black stallion and strode over to me. He nodded curtly at my father who nodded back but said nothing. I bowed my head to Haytham.
‘Welcome, lord,’ I said. ‘I am in your debt.’
My father folded his arms and glanced at the long line of Agraci warriors who now waited on their horses and camels on the right flank of Hatra’s army – a stark contrast to the white-uniformed Parthian riders.
‘I had no say in the matter,’ replied Haytham, his black eyes studying my father. ‘Your queen sent for me and told me to bring my warriors.’
This was nonsense, of course, but Haytham was obviously at ease and enjoying himself. No wonder, for no Agraci king had ever crossed the Euphrates to venture into the empire. I could see that my father was most uncomfortable by the presence of both him and his warriors. But I gave thanks to Shamash that they had come for it signalled that Haytham valued our alliance and my friendship.
The awkwardness was shattered by the appearance of Spandarat, who walked over to us. He bowed to my father and Haytham, muttering ‘majesty’ as he did so, then slapped me on the arm.
‘Nearly got your arse kicked, then? I reckon that sorceress of yours must have been working flat-out weaving spells to protect you.’
My father was appalled at his behaviour but I had never insisted on a strict adherence to protocol at Dura, preferring loyalty and honesty to sycophancy and faithlessness.
‘Perhaps we should make camp,’ said my father brusquely, ‘then we can discuss matters more fully and Pacorus can change his clothes to look more like a Parthian king.’
He nodded stiffly to Haytham and then went back to his bodyguard.
Gafarn smiled and bowed his head to Haytham. ‘Until later, lord king. Diana sends her love, Pacorus.’
He walked back to his officers assembled on their horses before Dura’s horse archers. It was appropriate that Gafarn, one of the finest bowmen in the Parthian Empire, commanded some of the empire’s finest horse archers.
Malik came forward to speak to his father while Gallia told Spandarat to distribute the extra full waterskins that had been brought by each of his riders. At least the legionaries would be thirsty no more.
Domitus stood the men down as a multitude of tents sprang up around the hastily erected royal tent of my father. Domitus ordered that the legions dig a ditch and rampart to surround their camp, in which the lords would also shelter. The men grumbled but to no avail. We may have lost our wooden stakes and most of our tents but Domitus was determined to maintain proper procedures.
‘The enemy might come back,’ he growled as hundreds of men sweated and cursed as they wielded entrenching tools to dig the ditch and erect the rampart.
When they had finished both legions were allowed to rest for the night, security provided by a screen of horse archers five miles away in all directions from the camps of the allied armies. Malik threw parties of Agraci scouts out even further. In the late afternoon he himself rode east with a large group towards the Tigris. My father camped his army to the north of our own tents and east of Haytham’s warriors. As dusk was enveloping the land he sent a rider to my tent inviting me to dine with him. But I sent a message back that I was too exhausted to be good company and if I did attend him would probably fall asleep at his table. No doubt my absence fuelled his ill ease further. Domitus and Kronos were also listless as they sat down with me at the table in my tent. Orodes and Gallia tried in vain to engage us in conversation. After we had eaten a meal of salted Hatran mutton and dried biscuit washed down with tepid water, Orodes, Domitus and Kronos made their excuses and left to get some sleep. Fortunately we had managed to save the blankets in our flight from Mithridates, and in the darkness row upon row of legionaries lay on the ground wrapped in them as they slept like the dead, the Amazons and the lords’ horse archers standing guard over them.
In my sleeping quarters I lay next to Gallia, her head on my chest, her hand caressing my scalp. It was sheer heaven. Her voice was soft and soothing.
‘Soon after you left Dura Dobbai had a dream in which she saw a griffin with one of its wings pinned to the ground. It was all alone and squealing in agony and she knew that you were in danger. So I mustered the lords and sent a message to Haytham, asking for his help.’
‘So Orodes never made it back to Dura.’
‘No, we met him and his horsemen on the east bank of the Euphrates.’
‘And my father?’ I asked, finding it difficult to stay awake.
‘I sent a message to Hatra at the same time as the request to Haytham, saying that you faced defeat if your father did not bring his army south.’
‘Perhaps you should command the army and I will stay at Dura to raise our daughters.’ I never heard her answer as I drifted off into a deep sleep, my beloved wife beside me.
The morning came soon enough. When I awoke I found Gallia gone. I dressed and donned my cuirass and left my bedchamber, buckling my sword belt as I walked into the tent’s main area to find Byrd pacing up and down while Domitus and Orodes were seated at the table.
‘Ah, the sleeping hero comes at last,’ remarked Domitus sarcastically.
I ignored him. ‘Byrd, you are a sight for sore eyes.’
He stopped pacing and nodded at me. ‘I ride in earlier. Vardan comes with his horsemen.’
I picked up the jug of water on the table and poured myself a cup.
‘That is excellent news. We may yet bring this campaign to a happy end.’
‘Vardan also sent a message to Nergal at Uruk to let him know situation,’ continued Byrd.
‘It will take him a few days to get to us,’ said Orodes.
He was right about that. Uruk was over a hundred miles south of Babylon and Babylon lay eighty miles at least south of where we were camped. Still, I knew that if Nergal learned that we were in peril he would also bring his army to support me. Except that we were no longer in peril.
When Vardan and his horsemen arrived two hours later a council of kings was held in my father’s camp. Gallia returned from her early morning ride with her Amazons as did Malik and his men, and she and Orodes joined me as I journeyed to the tent of my father in the middle of the Hatran army’s camp. Gallia had brought Remus back with her and it was good to be in the saddle again, albeit only for a short time as I rode with them through my father’s camp to his pavilion. As is the Parthian custom the king’s marquee was located in the centre of the camp, with the king’s horse and those of his bodyguard stabled immediately behind it. The tents of the royal bodyguard’s officers were pitched around the royal pavilion, the smaller tents of the rest of the royal bodyguard positioned beyond them in an outer circle. Further out still were the tents of the horse archers, with stable areas for their horses dotted among the tents. The camel park was usually located anywhere as long as it was downwind and far away from the royal pavilion. The banners of Dura and Susiana fluttered in the light breeze behind us as we rode. At my father’s tent our horses were taken from us and we were escorted inside.
Already the legions were marching west to the
Euphrates. I had told Domitus that he was to take them to the river and then north back to Dura. They would be of no further use here and it was imperative that the wounded were taken back to the city where they could be properly cared for. In the fighting with the enemy we had lost only one hundred and fifty killed but over four hundred more had been wounded, mostly by arrows. Of those fifty were expected to die before they reached Dura. We had also lost four Companions killed.
Before the meeting with my father Haytham and Malik had ridden over to my tent to tell me that the King of the Agraci was going back to his lands.
‘My presence within the Parthian Empire is not welcome, I think,’ King Haytham explained.
‘Your presence is very welcome, lord,’ I reassured him.
‘To you, perhaps. But you are different from other Parthian kings. I will accompany your foot soldiers back to Dura.’
‘I am in your debt, lord.’
He smiled. ‘When I am in danger, then perhaps you will bring your army to assist me.’
‘You have only to ask,’ I said.
He walked over to Gallia who bowed her head to him. He then leant forward and kissed her on the cheek.
‘Do not leave it too long before you visit Palmyra, Gallia.’
She dazzled him with her smile. ‘Tell Rasha I will see her soon.’
Malik embraced us both and then we all followed Haytham outside where a score of his mounted warriors waited for him.
When he was in the saddle he raised his hand to us and then departed.
‘He is a good man,’ I said.
‘Yes he is,’ agreed Gallia. She turned to look at me. ‘You may find that your father is not as agreeable.’
Parthian Vengeance (The Parthian Chronicles) Page 18
