Legends of Garaaga

by Paul E. Cooley

  "Did anyone see your mark? Besides your friend? His wife perhaps? Or--"

  "A man at the market."

  Trianni halted and turned. Even in the dim, flickering torch light, Isin could see the fear in the man's eyes. "Describe him."

  "Purveyor of lapis necklaces. He saw the mark on my skin and--"

  "Yes," Trianni said. "Come. Follow me and be very quiet."

  The two men made their way down the steep steps. The world tried to spin on him. He wavered and put a hand on Trianni's shoulder to steady himself. The old man stiffened and stopped his progress. When Isin felt sure he could go on, he squeezed. Trianni started down the steps once more, Isin's hand loose on his shoulder.

  The torchlight had all but vanished once they reached the bottom of the steps. The moonless night was pitch black as were the shadows of the temple. "Lay down on the other side of the steps, little brother. No one will be able to see you there."

  "Where are you going?"

  "I will find your friend Hassani. He might be able to get you out of the city."

  Isin shook his head. "No," he whispered. "You must protect the tablets. The story. The legend."

  "But I--"

  "Listen, Trianni. I am dying anyway." Isin clapped a hand on the older man's shoulder. "Will they harm a priest?"

  "They should harm no one."

  "Will they harm a priest?"

  Trianni shrugged. "It is absolutely forbidden."

  Isin smiled. "Go back to the temple. Guard the tablets." He leaned forward and whispered into Trianni's ear. "You are all that's left of us. Keeper." He pointed back up the steps. "Go."

  The tupšarru hesitated. For a moment, Isin wasn't sure if the man would heed his command. Finally, Trianni turned and made his way up the steps.

  The cough that had threatened to break the silence of the last several minutes finally made its ways from his lungs. The sound was loud enough to make his ears ring. He gurgled on the bloody phlegm and finally managed to spit it out onto the ground.

  He stared at the stars. Without trees or clouds to mar the sky, they seemed endless in number. A sudden glow on the city wall told him he'd been found. Shadows danced as a torch grew closer. "With you, Hennar."

  "I'm sorry," Hassani's voice said from behind.

  Isin turned. Three men stood with Hassani. The old man from the market held a blade in his hands. The other two were swaddled in dark robes, their faces and forms indistinguishable from shadow.

  In the light cast by the old man's torch, Isin could see the bruises and cuts on Hassani's face. "Never meant for you to get hurt, my friend."

  Isin smiled. "For Hennar," he whispered to Hassani. He stared at the old man. "For Rashim!"

  At the mention of the name, the old man screamed and thrust the blade through Isin's chest. Isin's eyes rose to the top of the temple where a shadowy form stood watching. As the other men unsheathed their blades and hacked at his body, Isin stared up at the stars until long after his last breath.

  INTERLOPERS

  326 BCE

  Night had fallen and Nerutal stood first watch. The men had found a small clearing within the forest to camp. There had been no food that night, but none complained. It was as though the lack of a mission and purpose had drained them completely.

  Nerutal held the iron xiphos loosely in his gnarled left hand. His fingers slid across the metal hilt, feeling the scarred surface. How many battles had he fought alongside Alexander with that blade? How many times had his shield deflected an arrow or spear meant for the king? The young ruler had clapped him on the shoulder after one battle, promising him his own star in heaven for his efforts. That, of course, was before exile.

  He brushed away the mob of mosquitos that flitted across his face and watched as Ellistan turned over in his sleep, moaning from the fever. The soldier would no doubt be dead in a day or two. Once the fever began devouring the body, the soul followed soon after.

  In the morning, the soldier might or might not awaken. If he woke, he would slow them down. Nerutal wondered if it wouldn't be better to suffocate him before dawn while the others slept.

  "The king of the world, the king of the world, the boy marches, the world trembles from the king of the world," Nerutal whispered. The army had chanted the anthem between battles as they made their way across deserts, mountain passes, snow-filled fields, and through storms that threatened to drown them.

  The moon rose over the trees. Nerutal stared up at it through the thick cedar branches and sighed. His stomach growled once and then fell silent. With a full moon, game would be sheltered for the night. Ellistan cried out in his sleep.

  He cocked his head to one side, his unkempt bangs dripping across his forehead. He heard singing.

  A shiver crawled down his spine. The voice was beautiful, but tinged with remorse, loneliness. The words were in some tongue he'd never heard before.

  Nerutal opened his mouth to wake his men, and then stopped. He felt a pull in his loins. He stepped from the tree line and walked to the river bank. The song was louder.

  The moon's reflection rippled on the river's surface. He peered upstream, looking for the source of the sound. No one was there. He turned and stopped.

  A woman stood waist-deep in the water. Long black braids fell past her breasts. Her skin glowed in the moonlight. Her hands massaged her stomach, then slowly moved to wet her breasts. Her head was tilted to one side as she sung the indecipherable words to her song. After another verse, she slipped below the water.

  With her disappearance, Nerutal remembered to breathe. The river gurgled, the gentle current moving steadily. He watched the place where she had been, but she did not resurface. He blinked, rubbed at his eyes, and took a step forward.

  He raised his foot to take another step and then slowly lowered it. Naiades. His heart jumped and shook from an adrenaline surge. Not a woman, he thought. A water nymph. The spirit of the river.

  "Goatshit," he whispered and let out a soft laugh. Too many hours spent listening to Alexander and his teacher pour over the old legends. Only the Greeks could come up with a different god for everything in the world.

  He turned to return to the camp and then halted. A gentle breeze rattled the leaves in the trees. The insects had ceased their song, as if waiting their turn. For a second, he thought he heard the naiade's song again, but it was just in his mind.

  He slowly backed away from the river, his xiphos held before him out of habit. His foot caught on a tree root and he fell backwards onto the soft ground. Nerutal cursed. The vision of the woman had rattled him. The urge to turn around, to make sure there was nothing behind him, was insistent. He forced himself to rise, eyes still focused on the spot in the river where the woman had disappeared.

  "Sir?"

  Nerutal flinched but did not turn his head. The voice was gravelly with disuse and disease. "Yes, Sergeant?"

  Ellistan coughed. "Is everything all right? I thought I heard singing?"

  "I think everything is fine, my friend." Nerutal raised himself, sheathed his xiphos and turned to face the soldier. "Go back to sleep."

  "Did you hear singing, sir?"

  "I heard something." Nerutal placed his hand on Ellistan's shoulder. "Go back to your rest. That's an order."

  "Sir," Ellistan said and saluted. The man stumbled to his place by the fire and lay down.

  Nerutal turned back to the river. The moon's reflection rippled on its surface. The woman in the river didn't resurface. Perhaps she'd never been there at all.

  The rest of his watch was uneventful. He had leaned against his chosen tree, head bent, listening. The insect song and the occasional night-bird chirps were the only sounds in the forest. Ellistan's intermittent cough was the only human sound.

  When the moon was past the high point in the sky, he'd woken Acquila. Nerutal had stood a few feet away from the young soldier and called his name in a hissed whisper. As expected, Acquila's hand immediately touched the hilt of his xiphos and his eyes flew open. Nerutal had smile
d.

  Discipline. Over a year in the scouts and the young soldier had learned all the lessons Nerutal had taught--they were reflex now.

  When you hear your name, you will open your eyes, you will be ready for battle. You will be calm. You will listen for orders.

  Acquila's eyes met his and Nerutal smiled. He nodded to the scout. Without a word and almost silently, the young man gathered himself and stood. Acquila saluted. Nerutal smiled and raised his hand. He closed it into a fist twice. The scout nodded to him and walked to the watch tree.

  The night watches in the Indus were always silent affairs. When surrounded by the thick forests and unable to determine enemy forces, it was best to spend the nights as quietly as possible. The men in his command had to be trained to understand the difference between night watches in the Indus scouts versus those of the army.

  Alexander's battles rarely required stealth. They were fought in open fields where the blood of men stained and soaked muddy ground or tall grass. The sounds of cavalry horses trampling soldiers, steel on steel, the cries of the wounded and dying, and the battle screams of soldiers were the background to every battle. Even night watches were noisy events, as the servants and slaves cooked food, fixed broken blades and shields, mended clothing, and provided sexual solace to their masters.

  When Nerutal had been tasked with forming the scouts, he'd invented a series of hand signals to communicate with his men. When spying on their enemies, the scouts needed to know how many combatants were in front of them, where they were, and how they were armed. Nerutal had written down all the possible situations that might occur, eliminated the unlikely, and then created signs for the most common.

  When a scout left watch and passed the responsibility to the next soldier, the previous watch scout raised his hand and closed the fist once for uneventful, twice for undetermined activity, and three times for known combatants in the area. When on the march, another group of signals was used. Nerutal had made the men study and practice those signals before he and his scouts left the army and began their journey into the Indus. Acquila was one of the men that found the signs difficult to learn, but over time, he had committed them to memory like all the others.

  Nerutal lay down in the young man's spot. He unsheathed his xiphos and gently curled his right hand around the hilt. Rolling over on his side to face away from the fire, sword at hand and easily accessible, he closed his eyes.

  Sleep was a rough lover. After so many months of traveling, his forces dwindling until their ultimate exile to the wilderness, sleep had become his only solace. The laughter his soldiers had once shared had died along with their morale. Since exile, his remaining soldiers rarely said anything. When they did speak, their voices cracked from disuse. Even smiles were uncommon.

  Nerutal could still see the look on Alexander Zeus-Ammon's face when he growled the word "exile." After all the death and blood and war, the only emotion he'd felt at the cold stare in his king's face was...relief.

  He and his three men, the last of the Indus scouts, were banished from the king's eyes forever, and left to wander and find a home beyond Alexander's kingdom. Nerutal doubted Alexander would look for the scouts; the king would no doubt have other matters on his mind.

  They had stumbled into the camp after months of being on their own, living off the land, fighting the trembling natives only when forced, and dying from the elements and the diseases the foreign country had to offer. His Scouts had originally numbered thirty. Nerutal had hand-picked the thirty men from Alexander's vast army. He trained them. He beat them. He loved them like brothers, and each death had taken something from him.

  So when Nerutal, once the king's most trusted hypostiaea, walked into camp with Acquila, Darian, and Ellistan, his three surviving scouts, there was nothing left the king could rip from him.

  General Craterus ensured Nerutal and his men were well-stocked before they turned their backs forever. Now, weeks later, their tunics were torn and ravaged with grime. Ellistan was already fevered and on the verge of collapse. Nerutal knew they would soon be three. He wondered how long before the gods would give him peace and a place to rest.

  After Alexander finished conquering the Indus, would his army keep singing? Or would they finally mutiny, demanding to go home? Nerutal smiled in the darkness. Alexander may not have noticed the disgruntled expressions on his soldiers' faces, but Nerutal had. The king's army would not stay forever by his side. One day, they might even slay their beloved monarch, the man who thought himself a god.

  As Nerutal began to drift, he remembered the woman standing in the river. He remembered being aroused and afraid at the same time. He pushed the image from his mind. It was a dream, he told himself. Just a dream.

  Nerutal opened his eyes and stared into the cloudless, purple sky. Dawn glowed on the eastern horizon, but the sky above was still dark, the stars beginning to fade into nothing. The fire pit smoked, but no flames uttered from its ashen remains.

  He looked to his right and saw Acquila sleeping on his side, xiphos held loosely in his fingers. Nerutal smiled. The boy may have learned his lessons slowest of all the scouts, but he'd learned them better than Ellistan--the older soldier's sword was frequently far from his hand.

  He swung his head to the side to see if Ellistan had remembered this time. The man lay on his side, the xiphos two feet away from him. Nerutal shook his head. "Sickness," he whispered and rose to his feet.

  "Sir," Darian's voice whispered.

  Nerutal swiveled his head toward the watch tree. The gray-bearded soldier swatted an insect with his free hand. His bare chest was lined with deep red scars from Alexander's wars. The man should have died long ago, but somehow always found the strength to march to the next battle.

  "Report."

  "Nothing, sir. Acquila indicated you'd seen something on first watch."

  "Was a dream, I guess."

  Darian smiled. "Don't tell me you fell asleep, sir."

  "Not at all. At least not that I'd admit to you, soldier."

  Darian saluted. "Sir."

  Nerutal grinned. "Wake up the men, Sergeant. Let's get some breakfast."

  "Aye."

  He watched the old soldier walk to the fire pit and then turned to look through the forest. The trees were thick. At night, one might see the faces of gods or demons in them. "Or old friends," he whispered.

  Nerutal walked out of the tree line and to the river bank. The water was dull and lifeless without the sun shining down upon it. He looked east. The horizon glowed as the sun began its march into the sky. It would be another hot day. With luck, it would rain.

  He removed his clothes and tossed them in a pile near the bank. Bathing and fishing in the river was the only way to keep cool. Since their exile and leaving the mountains, the weather had grown warmer and warmer. The scouts were used to desert heat. Nerutal would have welcomed it. Instead, the air always felt as though it would rain, even when it didn't. Coupled with the harsh sun, it made the heat unbearable.

  As they followed the river west, wading into the water, cooling their burning feet and bodies was a three-times-a-day routine. Nerutal, unlike his scouts, always started his morning with a dip.

  Once in the river, his skin cooled. He walked forward into the deeper water, letting the current wash over him. He slowly lowered himself until the water was just beneath his nose. Downstream, a single boulder rose out of the water. Nerutal chuckled. No woman singing last night. Just a hallucination, moonlight bouncing off the gray and white rock.

  But the singing...

  Had he heard that song before? Perhaps as they had watched Indus villagers go about their day? Or was it something older, from childhood?

  Nerutal blew water from his nose and waded down toward the boulder. The current was slow, but moved him along just the same. Fish jumped and he smiled. There would be a good breakfast when Acquila shrugged off sleep and broached the river.

  As he neared the boulder, he frowned. Long scratches covered its surface. Nerutal reac
hed the rock and ran his hands across the narrow grooves. The sun had finally crawled over the horizon, casting enough light to make flecks of quartz sparkle in the marred rock.

  "Sir?"

  Nerutal turned back upstream. Acquila held a long stick with a sharp point. "Yes?"

  The young man smiled. "You're going to scare the fish."

  "My apologies to the fish."

  Acquila said nothing, but continued to smile.

  Nerutal heaved a sigh. "You're right, soldier."

  He climbed atop the boulder and waited. Acquila nodded to him.

  The young man had been taught by his father how to fish with spear and net, or so Acquila had claimed. Nerutal had never seen anyone fish with such success. "When father would take me to the river, we would stay until I speared enough for us to have dinner. If I didn't, we didn't eat."

  Nerutal didn't doubt the story. Acquila joined the army very young already covered in scars. The boy's father had been a brute, that much was clear, but Acquila was a good-natured man, if a bit serious. Nerutal wondered if he would treat his children the same way should he ever have any.

  Acquila stood knee-deep in the water, the make-shift spear held just above the river's surface. Nerutal watched the man's eyes scan across the water, searching for movement. Acquila's lip twitched once, twice, and then the spear moved with a speed Nerutal thought impossible. Acquila lifted the spear, smiling at the large gray and black speckled fish flopping from its end. He walked to the bank and pushed the fish off the spear and into the grass before wading back into the river.

  Nerutal leaned back on the boulder and stretched. He closed his eyes. The dawn sun warmed his face and skin. Before long, the sun would become a source of misery rather than comfort. The sound of the spear splashing the water caught his ears and he smiled. Acquila would make sure they had a good breakfast.

  If they could follow the tributaries to Lothal, they could get transport from the Indus to Ur. From there? Nerutal frowned. The king might not return from the Indus for months or even years. They could make their way to Babylon and decide their future course from the great city. But if Alexander's anger had turned to spite, the king might have sent messengers and informed the magistrate of their exile.