by Andrew James
The Great Chief folded his arms across his chest and tilted back his head. ‘No.’
‘But my ransom is paid!’
‘Not in full. I have only twelve talents. I need thirty-six.’
‘You swore that any man who paid his share could leave.’
A hooded look clouded the Great Chief’s eyes. ‘Since then many babies have been born, many men have died. The world is not the same. My messengers report you have two great palaces with vast flocks and herds. You must pay the full amount.’
Vinda swore a shocking oath in Persian. When he looked at the Great Chief, there were daggers in his eyes.
The Ammonian king was unmoved. ‘You will remain here until the gold arrives. In the meantime, your two friends will die.’ He signalled to his guards and pointed at Darius and Dadarshi.
Darius’s heart began racing madly as he watched them coming, spears in hand, bare feet silent on the sand of the courtyard. The battle heat was spreading inside him, but he held himself in check as four of them seized Dadarshi and the Armenian began to struggle. Darius forced his muscles to relax and stood utterly still as another four guards surrounded him. Two seized his arms, the others hefted their spears.
Si-Ammon stepped forward and pushed the spears away. ‘No, that’s too easy. Bring honey.’ He turned to the Great Chief. ‘The ants, Father. You promised.’
The Great Chief looked fondly at his firstborn son. ‘Yes, my boy. The ants.’
Standing near the spot where Mithrayazna had died, Dadarshi’s eyes grew round with terror. Darius also remembered the massive insects with their huge jaws, the thousands of tiny red swellings on Mithrayazna’s skin, the horror and pain as he was eaten alive. Sick at the thought of what was coming, Darius knew it would be better dying on an Ammonian spear. He ached to take Si-Ammon and the Great Chief with him. It was the only victory left.
There was a sudden scuffing of sandals as Vinda stooped down, lifted two handfuls of sand, ran a few steps and barged into the side of the guards holding Darius. Shouting angrily, they turned just as Vinda flung the sand in their faces. Their mouths flew open, their hands went up to the stinging in their eyes.
In an explosive movement, Darius wrenched his arms outwards and threw the guards off. He seized a spear and grunted as he drove it into the side of the nearest Ammonian, who gasped and staggered back, blood dripping onto the sand. Scuffling feet raised a cloud of dust as Vinda seized another spear. Darius turned his weapon sideways and used it like a stave to push the three half-blinded guards away, the heavy wood thumping into their ribs. Dadarshi butted one of his guards in the face with a desperate-sounding crunch, while Vinda speared a second and Darius charged at the Great Chief, his lungs bursting as he yelled a piercing Persian war cry, his spear levelled before him. Stunned by the speed of events, the Great Chief froze, shock on his face, but drawing a short sword Si-Ammon stepped into Darius’s path. The spear point pierced the prince’s shoulder, he screamed and dropped the sword. Seizing him by the neck, Darius dropped the spear, picked up the sword, spun Si-Ammon round and held the blade to his throat.
Vinda cried out as he was overpowered. Dadarshi roared as three guards charged into him. With a great backhand swipe he swept one aside but the other two punched him repeatedly in the stomach then kicked him to the ground, the thump of the blows stark in the nearly empty courtyard.
Jerking Si-Ammon’s neck back with the blade glinting beneath it, Darius shouted at the Great Chief. ‘Let them go!’
The Great Chief looked at Darius full of malice, but he spoke quickly in Siwi and the guards pulled back. Vinda and Dadarshi staggered to Darius’s side, faces bloody. Darius’s chest was heaving but his head was extremely clear as he flicked his eyes around the courtyard, again noting the positions of the guards and gates.
The Great Chief started to speak. ‘Let him live and I swear I’ll free you all …’
‘Shut up!’ Darius nicked Si-Ammon’s cheek with the sword. Blood trickled down the blade. Holding the prince in front of his body, Darius started backing towards the only unguarded exit, which led into the palace. Vinda and Dadarshi followed, picking up fallen spears on the way. The Great Chief and a band of guards followed at a distance. Darius shouted: ‘Stay back!’ The Ammonians carried on advancing. Darius put the blade to Si-Ammon’s right hand, chopped down savagely and severed his thumb. The prince howled and struggled. Darius held him easily and threw the thumb at the Great Chief’s feet. ‘Next time it’s his hand. Then his arm. Stay back!’
The Great Chief looked down at the severed flesh, then up into Darius’s eyes. Barely containing his hatred he motioned to his guards to let the prisoners go. The fugitives backed into the palace and Vinda slammed the heavy door shut. ‘Bolt it,’ cried Darius, and the crossbar dropped into place. Darius twisted Si-Ammon’s arms high behind his back, tore off his woollen sash and bound them tightly. He groaned, bleeding profusely from his face, more blood pumping from the severed thumb. Darius dragged him through the long hall, into the throne room down to the far end, into the narrow service corridor for the palace slaves, then out the back of the palace through the slave’s entrance. The western wall of the temple blocked their path.
Dismayed, Darius stared at it. It was very tall and built of stone. Quickly he turned left, but another stone wall blocked his way, this time part of the chamber adjoining the Sanctuary. He turned left again and this time he came to an open space, the palace on the left, the inner wall of the citadel to the right. If they followed the wall round, Darius knew they would come out at the western gate of the palace; beyond that would be the gatehouse which led out to the citadel. But by now both would be swarming with the Great Chief’s men. The citadel wall was too tall to scale and even if they managed it there was a sheer drop on the other side.
They were trapped.
Shouting was getting closer, and the thump of iron on wood as the Ammonians took axes to the door. With a crash, the wood splintered. Soon the guards would break it down. Fighting the panic inside, Darius turned and ran back the way he had come, calling the others to follow. The axes stopped, replaced by shouts and sounds of pursuit from inside the palace. Si-Ammon began struggling again. Darius hit him in the head and he went limp. Dadarshi helped drag him back towards the temple, his feet leaving scrapes in the sand as they trailed on the ground. Darius paused for breath, but warriors suddenly burst around the corner he had just turned, coming from the direction of the gatehouse. They had circled the palace and were coming at the prisoners from behind. More men appeared from the front of the temple, from the direction of the well. They had run down the steps, into the dank well chamber, up the terraced steps and were now approaching Darius from in front.
Vinda and Dadarshi looked at Darius helplessly. Darius turned from one group of running warriors to the other. The temple blocked his path to the right, the palace to the left. There was nowhere left to run.
He knew they couldn’t stay here; in a few moments the guards would be on them. Darius backed against the temple wall and found a door set into it, heavy wood with bronze studs. He tried it. It rattled. It was locked. He looked up at the wall of the temple and its neatly cut blocks of smooth white stone, fifteen or twenty cubits high, impossible to climb. The palace wall was rougher, but still too tall. Dadarshi ran at the temple door and barged it with his shoulder. It didn’t budge. Vinda went to help him. They beat on it hard with the spear butts, trying to break it down, but it was solid. They gave up and stood by Darius, their faces grim with the look of men who knew they were going to die, but were glad it would be bravely, with weapons in their hands.
The echo of pounding feet rang in Darius’s ears as the two groups of warriors converged, the Persians trapped in the middle. Chieftains shouted orders and their men came on at a trot, some brandishing spears, others stringing bows. They stopped twenty paces away, hemming the Persians in. Darius stood with his back to the door, clutching Si-Ammon before his chest. A squad of archers trained their bows on him. He pulled
Si-Ammon closer, using him as a shield.
The Ammonians walked slowly forward, their eyes hard. A few looked back at the Great Chief, waiting for his signal. A calmness came over Darius. Aware of every sound and movement around him, he put the blade to Si-Ammon’s throat. When they charged he would kill the prince, just as the prince had tried to kill Darius.
Then he would die.
26
From behind Darius came a faint click, the creak of a hinge. Gripping the prince tightly in front of him Darius half turned, thrust his blade forward, and found himself staring into eyes of the clearest, most piercing green. Eyes that were well-cut emeralds, or the deep pools beneath the trees of an oasis on a sunlit day. They belonged to a woman of spectacular plainness, with grey hair and wrinkled skin. She stood by the open door dressed in a white robe with a belt of silver links, and the tip of Darius’s sword at her throat. She didn’t flinch. ‘Put it aside, Darius,’ she said softly in fluent Persian.
Astonished, Darius lowered the blade. Aware that warriors were running behind him he turned to see the paths solid with armed men, more arriving every moment. Shouts came as the Great Chief and his counsellors appeared around the corner. There was a faint cheer and the warriors parted to let them through.
When the line of sight between the old woman and the king was clear, Sutekh-Irdis suddenly stopped. He stared maliciously at the woman. The warriors fell silent.
Her face expressionless, the old woman addressed him briskly in Greek. ‘You have camels taken from the Persians. Bring me two, and another for a guide.’ She pointed at Darius with a gnarled finger. ‘And this man’s weapons and armour. He is to leave.’
The Great Chief spoke angrily. ‘He is a Persian! He came here to kill you, Prophetess, and destroy the oasis!’
The Prophetess’s voice became icy cold. ‘For eight months I have communed with the gods, divining this man’s fate. I know precisely who and what he is. I have a purpose for him. He will leave.’
An excited buzz swept through the crowd of soldiers.
Darius shook his head. ‘I will not leave without the others.’
The Prophetess gave a resigned nod. ‘Bring six camels, not two. They will all go.’
The Great Chief drew his heavy brows tight, stamped his right foot and thrust his spear into the ground. ‘They are my prisoners! They do not concern the temple.’
‘Everything concerns the temple! When their army came I stood on the Temple Mount and cursed them. The Lord of the Winds called down a storm and the army died. Your puny force of drunken mercenaries did not capture these men, Ammon did. Now in His name I command you to set them free. I have my reasons. If you are wise you will not interfere.’
At the invocation of Ammon’s name the soldiers knelt, facing the temple, turning their backs on their king. The Great Chief breathed out heavily, regarding the mass of kneeling men with barely concealed disgust. He shook his head and began walking away, shouting over his shoulder, ‘The camels are at the Western Lake. They will be brought.’
Still barely able to grasp that he was safe, Darius stepped through the door into the temple. He immediately recognized the chamber as the first hall he had seen on his earlier visit, musty and ancient, with the image of the god with vile eyes.
Given that over a hundred men outside had been trying to kill them, Vinda and Dadarshi followed with surprising reluctance. Once inside, they looked around suspiciously at the strange, eerie place while the old woman took some lamps and wicks from a shelf. With a hiss of sizzling olive oil they flared alight, transforming the chamber into a glittering treasure house. Darius gazed in wonder. Shelves and tables of rare woods were filled with ornaments of silver and gold, some brightly polished, others coated in a thick patina of dust as though undisturbed for centuries. In one corner stood a casket of jewels, beside it a sacrificial basin of gold. Despite such splendour and the tense standoff outside, the grey-haired woman seemed perfectly relaxed. Setting herself down on a straight-backed chair – the only one – she apologized for the need to sit. ‘Unfortunately, even Ammon’s servants sometimes suffer from ailments of the knees. Would any of you gentlemen care for some refreshments? A little wine, perhaps?’
She poured it herself into crystal goblets, first cutting it with water, Greek-style, in a gold mixing bowl. Darius tasted it. It was excellent.
The men drank in silence, overawed by the outlandish surroundings. The woman sat with a faint smile on her lips. ‘What will happen now?’ Dadarshi asked at last, addressing the woman but staring nervously at the image of Ammon on the wall.
‘Oh, very little really,’ she replied, in her strong, understated voice. ‘Sutekh-Irdis dare not cross me. The camels will come, I will give you a guide to take you as far as the Two Lakes, and directions from there. On the far side of the desert you will come to the Northern Oasis, from where you can easily reach the Nile. Travelling light, the whole journey shouldn’t take much more than a month.’
‘Is the desert crossing not perilous?’ Vinda asked, cradling his goblet and staring longingly at a huge ram-headed rhyton fashioned from electrum and gold.
‘Oh yes! Very much so. But you are strong men with camels and water. You will come to no harm. My advice is to get yourselves back to Memphis as quickly as you can. You will find things there in some disarray.’ She spoke of events in the city, of a beleaguered Persian garrison beset by riots.
‘Strange,’ she said, musing, ‘I have been to Thebes many times – we have frequent contact with Ammon’s temple there – but in all my years I have never visited Memphis.’ Her eyes twinkled with amusement. ‘Yet I felt no inclination to take up Cambyses’ invitation when he summoned me. Still, I should like to go there one day before I die. Perhaps the next King of Kings will be more amenable.’ She looked at Darius and smiled.
‘You are not from Egypt?’ Darius asked, returning her smile.
She laughed out loud, sounding much younger than she looked. ‘My green eyes give me away? No, I am from … somewhere far distant. Perhaps it is because I am an outsider that Sutekh-Irdis has always been implacably hostile. He is a foolish man, always scheming. Not that it does him any good. The people obey him because he is their chief; but it is Ammon and His Prophetess that they honour. We are their true sword and shield.’ She shook her head indulgently as though the Great Chief were a wayward child. ‘Sadly, Sutekh-Irdis has gone too far this time, incurring the wrath of Persia.’
‘Prophetess,’ Darius said delicately, ‘was it not your prophecy that did that?’
She seemed surprised. ‘My prophecy was true! It has come to pass. It is Sutekh-Irdis’s faithlessness that will bring about his downfall. If he had sent the survivors back to Persia, matters would have been at an end. But no, he had to massacre them, which means before long a new Persian army will cross the desert seeking revenge.’
Vinda turned away from the rhyton in astonishment. ‘It will?’
‘Of course! Ammon will ensure it. Sutekh-Irdis has broken his solemn oath. He must be punished.’ She gave a sigh. ‘That is the trouble with these tribesmen. Most of the time they act like children, the rest like animals. Even after three centuries they are half civilized at best. They still do not understand the power of words. To them a promise is something you make one day, and discard the next.’ Beneath the geniality, Darius saw the iron in her. She reminded him of Cyrus, who had also worn his power lightly. Taking Darius by surprise, she leant forward and fixed him with her eyes. ‘Darius!’ she hissed, with such fierceness that he was alarmed. ‘In return for your life I want your promise that, when the Persian army comes, I and my temple will be left in peace!’
His heart sank. ‘I would gladly give it, if it were in my power. But the King of Kings is set on revenge. I doubt he would listen to me.’
The fierceness left her. She smiled faintly to herself. In her eyes was a faraway look. ‘I am not concerned with that broken reed Cambyses. It is your word that I seek. Darius, son of Hystaspes, of the royal house of Pers
ia.’
Vinda spoke to Darius in Elamite, the ancient tongue of the Persian court that few men except Persian nobles understood. ‘A slip of the tongue,’ he drawled. ‘You would think a woman of such obvious learning would know the difference between the “royal house of Persia”, which is an empire, and the “royal house of Parsa”, which, with all respect to you, Darius, is but a small part of that empire.’
The old woman’s eyes were alive with mischief. ‘What makes you think it was a slip of the tongue, Vindafrana?’ she asked, also in Elamite, astonishing both men. ‘When you reach Memphis, you will find much has changed. The army that marched south has been destroyed by the Ammon-worshipping Kushites. The Empire is in turmoil. Ammon has cursed Cambyses with madness, and his days are numbered. Persia will soon need a new king.’ She looked at Darius sternly. ‘One who has the sense to leave other men’s gods well alone.’
‘Bardiya?’ Vinda asked, missing the hint.
‘Sadly, Bardiya settled in his grave long ago.’
‘By all the daevas, he did? I heard he’d disappeared, but …’ Vinda looked at Darius for confirmation.
‘Parmys told me Cambyses had sent an assassin to murder him. But the face was mutilated, and no one was certain what had happened.’
‘Sadly the princess is right; Cambyses had his brother murdered,’ the old woman said. She did not say how she knew. Later Darius wished he had asked.
Vinda didn’t notice the absence of an explanation either. The courtier in him was already calculating. ‘But Cambyses has no acknowledged sons. If Bardiya is truly dead, Cyrus’s male line is at an end. If anything happens to Cambyses … the Empire would be there for the taking! Anyone with the gold to buy support …’ Perhaps revealing too much of his thoughts, he fell suddenly silent.
