Blood of Kings

by Andrew James

  All was not lost, however. With the gold spear came promotion to the inner core of Cambyses’ guard. Along with Megabyzus and Gobryas, Darius was now one of the forty noble Pomegranate Bearers known as the ‘King’s Spearbearers’, who carried gold pomegranates on their spears and attended the King of Kings night and day. Six of those Spearbearers had died during the desperate struggle around the chariot and Darius was one of the replacements. Since he was now allowed to bear arms in the king’s presence, killing Cambyses would be easy. But it was no good killing him just to be run through by vengeful guards. It would all need to be carefully planned.

  Cambyses’ pavilion stood just beyond bowshot from the white walls of Memphis – or, as Darius had heard Egyptian prisoners call it, Mennefer. First capital of Egypt and seat of the earliest Pharaohs, Memphis was sited on the southern tip of the Nile’s delta, with the green, earthy waters of the river swirling noisily to its east. It was midsummer, the time of the inundation that brought chaos to Egypt each year. Darius had watched, amazed, as the rising Nile burst its banks, water flooding over the tops of the irrigation canals to turn the fringe of tall date groves and small, lush fields into sheets of sparkling light. Flocks of white egrets strutted through the waterlogged fields, their long beaks spearing fish and frogs. Where the irrigation ended, greenery abruptly gave way to buff desert.

  In the shade beneath a cluster of date palms stood Cambyses’ gold-decked chariot. In front of it stood the two fire altars of Ahura Mazda on their silver pedestals. Darius’s mouth went dry as he contemplated for the fifth or tenth time the gruesome scene further along the riverbank. It was a sharp reminder of his fate if he made an attempt on Cambyses’ life and failed. Just far away enough to avoid polluting the Holy Fire with their stink, the corpses of a man, woman and two children hung limp on crosses, the dense clouds of flies around them adding an incessant buzz to the background noise of the besieging army. They were the remains of Timotheus and his family. The Greek officer had been found weak but alive after Phanes’s cut to the groin in battle, and his wife and young daughters were dragged screaming from Pelusium and brought here to die. Before crucifying them, Phanes had personally cut off their ears and noses and put out their eyes as revenge for the deaths of his sons. Children first, then mother, then Timotheus himself. The last thing the hoplite commander saw before his eyes were gouged out were the bloodied, screaming faces of his daughters.

  Darius turned his gaze on the king. Cambyses was foolish to let such displays take place in his name. They corroded the army’s discipline, encouraged savagery rather than order. Persia stood for civilization against the backwardness of lesser nations. If Persians behaved like animals, what right did they have to rule?

  Darius had been angered by the wanton cruelty, but now it was over he began to worry about how little it had actually shocked him. Parmys swore he had an immortal soul. If so, Darius feared constant exposure to bloodshed and suffering was corrupting it. How many more years of fighting would it take before he turned into a monster like Phanes? He prayed it wouldn’t happen, even as part of him envied the Greek his lack of conscience. How much simpler life would be.

  He had never liked Phanes but when he looked at him now, striding casually back towards the pavilion having washed off the blood and changed his clothes, with the family’s screams still ringing in his ears, Darius found it hard to hide his disgust. He plainly wasn’t alone, for the moment Phanes appeared, Darius saw Otaneh’s face change. It was as though the spadapati had just swallowed something bitter. His mouth hardened, his eyes grew troubled and his forehead drew tight. Noticing Darius watching, he gave the slightest of nods. Darius responded, searching the general’s face intently, feeling Otaneh search his, and as they held each other’s gaze an understanding passed between them. Darius knew Otaneh was now actively plotting against Cambyses, and Otaneh knew Darius approved. No doubt he would share the details in his own time. Until then Darius would wait. His father and Otaneh had long been friends. From now on, united by a loathing of Cambyses and his Greek favourite, Darius and Otaneh would be allies.

  Even before Phanes’s arrival there had been no love for Greeks at court. Like most Persians, Darius found them a strange, boorish breed, all the more so after learning about them from Phanes. They drank their wine cut with water and spoke of moderation and stoicism; then got blind drunk and indulged in bursts of shocking and sadistic violence. They elected their officers and spoke of ‘freedom’, but persecuted their slaves and kept their own wives and mothers locked up in their houses, forbidden to walk openly in the streets. They called themselves enlightened and civilized, but worshipped lumps of gold and marble like the most backward savages. No wonder the other Persian generals were watching Phanes with loathing. Darius wondered how many of them Otaneh had taken into his confidence.

  Movement near the city walls drew Darius’s attention. Detachments of spearmen and archers had taken up positions around Memphis. All the approaches to the city had been sealed, and already he could hear sawing and banging from the Assyrian siege engineers as they reassembled the half-formed towers that had been dragged across the desert. The siege tower nearest Darius was taking shape, tiny men swinging on ropes from the top, nailing facing plates onto the wooden frame. Camel and ox hides were soaking in the river, to be stacked in glistening piles at the base of the tower then hung across the front to protect it from fire. It didn’t take much imagination for Darius to picture the finished tower being wheeled into place alongside the city wall. Staring up at the massive structure he visualized soldiers climbing to the top and throwing down the ramp, screaming war cries as they jumped onto the battlements, overwhelming the demoralized defenders. When that happened, Memphis would fall.

  Cambyses noticed Darius staring intently at Phanes, then exchanging glances with Otaneh. The king wondered if it was just an innocent glance, or something deeper. Perhaps Darius needed watching after all. His attention was distracted by a herald in a gown of yellow and red squares who dashed across the open ground that separated the king and his entourage from the Persian camp. The herald passed beneath the half-built siege tower, overtook Phanes and entered the shade of the pavilion. Approaching the throne he spread himself graciously on the ground and rose to one knee. Cambyses carried on consulting with his generals. When everyone had had their say, Cambyses looked down at the herald. ‘Tell them they have three days. I want both the city and Pharaoh.’

  Still kneeling, the herald bowed his head. He looked very young to Cambyses, but his expression was suitably grave and his appearance appropriate to a bearer of the King of Kings’ majesty and power, with a short, immaculately curled beard and large gold hoops swinging from his ears. In civilized lands heralds were untouchable, but Cambyses didn’t envy this one his job. While Timotheus and his family had screamed on their crosses, an angry crowd had gathered on the walls shouting threats. They were still there now, and their mood was ugly.

  ‘Three is too generous, Great King, if you will permit me to say so.’ Phanes stepped up onto the raised floor of the pavilion. Cambyses smiled in welcome, but noticed Otaneh glaring.

  ‘We must destroy Pharaoh’s power quickly,’ Phanes went on, pointedly pretending not to notice the hostile Persian general. Cambyses was amused by the way the Greek insulted the man without saying a word. ‘The longer we leave it, the more the priests will work on the people and convince them to raise a fresh army.’

  ‘Priests?’ Cambyses squinted at Phanes.

  ‘Yes, Great King. They are the ones who keep the people under Pharaoh’s thumb. They fill their heads from birth with superstition, telling them Pharaoh is a god walking on earth. Even now they will be concocting some story to explain the defeat. They will produce a murdered cat or a plucked hawk and tell the people it was their own wickedness that caused Pharaoh to desert them.’

  The king pursed his lips thoughtfully. There was much sense in the stratekos’s words. Cambyses wanted the siege over quickly and Pharaoh captured, so he could mo
ve on to pacify Egypt. Besides, the heat was already uncomfortable; as the second half of summer approached it would only get worse. He wanted a good stone palace between him and the Egyptian sun. ‘Tell them they have until sunset. If they have not complied by then, Memphis will be put to the sword.’

  Cambyses saw Otaneh look darkly at the other Persian generals, as if to say, ‘See! The Yauna’s influence is becoming unstoppable.’ He checked his impulses. For the moment he still needed his veteran spadapati, but if Otaneh thought he hadn’t noticed the growing hostility against both himself and Phanes, he was a fool. Once the campaign was over, he’d purge the court of the men spreading poison.

  The herald stood, bowed himself backwards from the pavilion and clambered down the bank of the Nile to a small Mytilenean trading vessel waiting among the reeds. It had eight oars, a single square sail and a canopy at the stern to shield passengers from the fierce sun. As the herald climbed aboard and sat under the canopy Cambyses thought he looked surprisingly relaxed, considering where he was going and the message he was about to deliver. The Greek oarsmen pulled against the Nile’s current, and the herald’s colourful gown shrank as the boat headed towards a jetty outside the city wall. High on that wall Cambyses saw the crowd of Egyptians growing agitated, waving arms and pointing as the boat floated towards the half-flooded riverbank. On the breeze he heard catcalls and jeers as a sailor splashed in shallow, reedy water and secured the vessel with a line. The jetty and riverbank were deserted but the number of Egyptians lining the walls was growing alarmingly, and even at this distance their anger was unmistakable. Phanes was right, as usual. Whatever the priests inside the city had been preaching, it did not sound like submission.

  The herald splashed ashore in the shallow water, looked at his waterlogged feet and reluctantly moved closer to the wall where the ground was dry. The Egyptians lining the wall above him sounded aggressive. When the herald tilted his head up to look at them, Cambyses thought he saw him flinch. The crowd fell quiet as he delivered the king’s harsh ultimatum.

  Having finished his address the herald stood waiting for a reply. His posture was defiant, refusing to be intimidated by the obvious hostility of the crowd. For a while nothing happened. Cambyses tapped an impatient finger against the pommel of his sword. Suddenly the city gates creaked open and a mob of Egyptians rushed out. Archers, spearmen, civilians with cloths veiling their faces and cudgels, axes or lumps of rock in their hands. The herald stepped back as the crowd advanced. There was shouting, too distant to make out the words. When they were twenty paces away something, Cambyses didn’t see what, made the herald turn suddenly and run. His yellow and crimson gown was bright in the sun, his soft court shoes with upturned toes pounded the ground, but the fastest Egyptians were close on his heels. He was almost at the boat when a leaping tackle brought him splashing full length in the shallow water. The noise rose to a frenzy as Egyptians surged forward, a mob tearing at him until he disappeared from view. A crimson stain spread in the water. Cambyses heard him shrieking wildly, sounding barely human, then silence.

  More Egyptians poured out of the gate towards the Mytilenean boat. As the mob approached, a panicked crewman jumped quickly onto the jetty to untie the line. An Egyptian raised a bow, the crewman fell with an arrow in his thigh and was engulfed by the mob as they surged aboard. Axe blows rang across the water as the boat was smashed apart. Four or five bodies – Cambyses couldn’t tell if they were dead or alive – were dragged into the city.

  Furious at the insult to his herald, Cambyses stamped his feet, clenched his fists and shouted angrily. Then he realized he should be giving orders. But Phanes had beaten him to it, turning to the signaller, snapping out commands. Trumpets sounded and asabari thundered towards the gatehouse, a hazara of spearmen in close order behind. As they raced over the flat ground the Persian horse archers guided their mounts with their knees and bent their bows, sending repeated flights of arrows smashing into the backs of the fleeing rabble. Terrified screams followed as the arrows cut a swathe through the crowd. The asabari caught the mob before it reached the gates and there were more screams as the big horses rode stragglers down. Scimitars rose and fell in slashing arcs.

  Egyptians trapped on the battered hulk of the ship retaliated by setting it ablaze. Smoke curled up from the burning boat and the Nile began carrying wreckage towards the pavilion. Slowed by the fringe of reeds near the bank, Cambyses saw something in the water. Beckoning a guard he took the man’s spear, prodded it, then dragged it to the edge. At a command the guard bent down on the muddy bank and lifted the loathsome thing out. Cambyses felt a surge of acid in his throat as he stared at the herald’s arm, ripped off at the shoulder, still clothed in bloody squares of crimson and yellow. ‘Get rid of it!’ he yelled, screwing up his face.

  Hearing fresh shouts, Cambyses looked up. The asabari had dispersed the survivors of the mob and were sweeping away the last panic-stricken defenders from the gatehouse. A horn blew as a quick-thinking satapatish sent his sata of spearmen running forward to hold the captured ground. He shouted an order and waved his spear, and ten men went probing beyond the open gateway. Moving in column, a second sata began advancing through the gateway at a trot. Once inside they spread out. Moments later Cambyses saw leaf-shaped Persian spears glinting atop the wall. The king began hopping excitedly from foot to foot as he realized there would be no need for siege towers. Memphis was about to fall.

  Infused with more energy than he had ever felt before, Cambyses rushed from the pavilion and mounted his chariot, shouting and waving his bow. ‘Pomegranate Bearers with me, now!’ Normally he was self-conscious about his shrill voice, but for once he didn’t care. Men were jumping to his commands, that was all that mattered. Instantly five hundred of the elite guards formed up in front, his forty Spearbearers came to flank his chariot, twenty each side, and the rest of the hazara deployed behind him. The chariot lurched forward, the bronze-rimmed wheels rattling on the hard-packed dirt beneath the gate. About to achieve something that would surely make him famous for all time, Cambyses’ chest heaved with anticipation. He could hardly believe it. Deep inside he knew that, to many Persians, he was merely the despised offspring of their so-called ‘great conqueror’. But it was Cambyses, not Cyrus, who was about to end the reign of the Pharaohs after thousands of years. He leant on the guardrail, babbling loudly to Phanes beside him. ‘The capture of Pharaoh is a deed even my father cannot match. I wish to see it with my own eyes.’

  As the chariot rolled into Memphis, Cambyses tilted back his head and looked up at the gatehouse towering above. Ahead, the streets were slick with blood where the Egyptian rabble had been cut down. Jabbing a fist, Phanes shouted crisp directions, driving the army quickly along the main avenue, past a deserted square to Pharaoh’s palace, where the massive pylon gates were closed. Running footsteps came up behind Cambyses, then a sata of archers rushed past his chariot to kneel in a line. Under cover of their bows ropes were attached to the gates, whips cracked and three hundred Persians heaved. With a terrible splintering the bolts snapped and the wooden gates swung wide. Cambyses waved his arm in a wide sweep and the leading contingent of Pomegranate Bearers ran through, one sata at a time, bent low with shields raised as a flight of arrows smashed into the painted mud brick of the pylons. A handful of men fell. A satapatish shouted orders and the rest fanned out across the vast courtyard.

  Cambyses forced himself to stay upright as more arrows rained down from the flat roof of the palace and rattled against brickwork nearby. But he could feel the churning starting in his gut, the panic rising in his throat. He knew that soon his resolve would break and he would have to take cover. A wave of gratitude came over him as Phanes guessed his fear and raised the King of Kings’ war shield over his head. Cambyses thanked him softly, then noticed Darius standing beside the chariot, face completely relaxed as he judged the angle of the incoming arrows, so certain of his judgement he didn’t even bother to raise his own shield. Cambyses frowned. He told himself the
man was just plain arrogant, but part of him admitted that he was simply jealous of Darius’s easy confidence. Despite having promoted Darius, Cambyses realized he still didn’t like him.

  Checked by the arrows, the Pomegranate Bearers’ advance had stopped. ‘Forward, cowards, forward!’ Cambyses screeched, waving the men on, but they didn’t seem to hear him, just huddled against the massive stone columns until Otaneh, mounted on a chestnut stallion alongside the chariot, shouted an order and more archers were brought up. Kneeling under cover of spara shields, the Persian bows sent two quick volleys winging up to the palace roof. An Egyptian archer fell, and the clatter of footsteps receding rapidly over wooden beams suggested the rest retreating.

  Blinking at the realization that he was poised on the brink of penetrating the age-old palace of the Pharaohs, Cambyses felt light-headed, as though he was dreaming. Everything seemed unreal: the towering pylons, the pictures of weird beast-gods, the forest of huge, bright painted stone columns. The renewed tramping of feet brought him back to his senses as, shields high, spears levelled, his Pomegranate Bearers advanced through the courtyard. At the far side he saw them slow as they reached a double doorway. Four men swung heavy axes that crashed through stout wooden doors. Yelling high-pitched cries, their swords low, the Persians charged in. Cambyses’ heart pounded anxiously at the intense, violent clamour of clashing swords and screams which followed. Then he relaxed as a satapatish shouted that the palace guards had been slaughtered and the courtyard was clear. Cambyses tapped his driver with a trembling hand and the chariot rolled through the gate, Spearbearers at its side. In each far corner of the courtyard stood larger-than-life stone statues of ancient Pharaohs. Otherwise it was deserted.