by R. W. Peake
Unsure of where Caesar was headed, he still nodded his head, agreeing cautiously, “I did, yes.”
“Well,” Caesar said with a smile, “I’m going to give you the chance to prove that it wasn’t just a boast.”
His name was Darius. The fact that he represented, along with Valash before he capitulated, the last and only hope for the Parthian cause would have sent Phraates and most of the members of the Parthian nobility into paroxysms of despair, as well as a fair amount of rage. The reason was straightforward; Darius wasn’t a member of the nobility. At least, not legitimately, although his father had been none other than Gobryas, a fact about which the dead satrap was never aware, since Darius’ mother wasn’t even a concubine. She had been the daughter of an elder of one of the villages in Gobryas’ satrapy, and when the young future satrap had come on behalf of his father to collect the annual levy of tribute in the form of grain and horses, Darius’ mother had caught his eye. She was, after all, a true beauty, and it wasn’t without a certain amount of logic that Darius’ grandfather had sent his only daughter to the bedchamber of Gobryas the night of his visit. Alas, the only tangible result for Darius’ grandfather had been another mouth to feed, in Darius himself, while ruining the marriage prospects for his daughter in the process. That was how Darius found himself growing up in the house of his mother’s father, but as was the habit of men, not just Parthian men, but all men of those times, his grandfather had blamed his mother for being “unchaste,” so he couldn’t say it was a particularly happy childhood. For his mother’s part, she refused to say an ill word against her father or Gobryas, simply accepting what had happened as the will of their gods. Perhaps the one positive in this, for Darius anyway, was that his mother never expressed anything but love and kindness to her only son, and the only child she would ever have, since no self-respecting Parthian man would take her as wife. Yet, despite these humble beginnings, it quickly became apparent that Darius was gifted in many ways. From his earliest days, he was the swiftest runner among boys his age; when it came time to begin riding horses, he proved remarkably, even alarmingly adept at it, so it was a natural progression that he be handed a composite bow. By the time he was fifteen, he was a full-fledged member of the drafshi of his village, and he had accompanied his father when Gobryas had assembled the eastern spad that answered the call of Orodes, before the disastrous fight on the ridge. And, as Caesar and the Romans would discover to their chagrin, he had been one of the many men captured when Susa fell who, because of their lowly status, had been allowed to go home. When Darius did so, it was with a burning, passionate hatred, not for Rome, but for the man who, through the Parthian version of the army grapevine that meant every Legionary knew what was coming before orders were ever issued, he had learned had murdered his father.
The fact that Gobryas had never acknowledged that Darius was his son, something that was undeniable to anyone who had seen them both, didn’t matter all that much to Darius, because, over the years, he had constructed an elaborate, and frankly, implausible story to everyone but himself, that the only reason Gobryas had not claimed him as son was because his grandfather had hidden the truth from the satrap. This idea, which by the time Susa fell, had become so ingrained in Darius’ mind that, even if he had been confronted with the truth, he wouldn’t have accepted it, began when, after becoming satrap, Gobryas returned to this village, as part of the grand tour that was customary for every new satrap. And, it was true, Darius’ grandfather had insisted that the boy, who was then eight years old, be hidden from view, his grandfather going as far as sending Darius away with one of his uncles, into the hills overlooking the village. This had happened three more times, and every time, Darius grew more and more suspicious of his grandfather’s claim that it was for his own protection. Yes, Darius would admit to himself, he had heard the stories about how his father, supposedly afraid that one of his bastards might prove to become a threat to his reign, had them killed whenever he found them, but the boy convinced himself that, even if this wasn’t just a story concocted by his grandfather, that when Gobryas laid eyes on Darius, he would have no thought of striking his son down. After all, he reasoned, as a child would, his father would immediately see what everyone in his village said, that he was the mirror image of the satrap, but it was more than that. Darius was special; it was something he knew and felt down to his very marrow, destined by his gods for greatness, and his father would see that for himself the instant he laid eyes on him. His grandfather was just jealous, he was certain; that his mother shared her father’s fear was understandable, and he didn’t hold her at fault. She, after all, was a woman, and a mother, and mothers always worried about their children. Therefore, when he was released, along with a couple thousand other men who had been part of the contingent of mounted archers drafted to become part of the garrison defending Susa, Darius had immediately set out for his village outside Istakhr, along with the hundred other survivors of his drafsh. Before they did so, however, Darius did make one attempt to get close to the traitorous dog Bodroges, who he had learned had been the man who slit Gobryas’ throat, but to no avail.
Realizing that his chances were next to nothing acting on his own, Darius had ridden out of Susa with his companions, his mind already working on a plan that would give him the opportunity he needed to avenge the father who never knew he existed. For Darius, this was his cause, his only cause; he gave no more thought to the idea of Parthia than he was forced to, since he quickly realized that, for many of his comrades, they still believed that it was their duty to try and stop these Romans from completely subjugating their country. But, when Darius pressed them, which he did as a pretext of simply passing time during the long watches walking on foot, asking them to explain why they felt compelled, it quickly became obvious to them that their position was based on what they were supposed to do. That was how Darius had begun, by chipping away at the mindset brought on by countless generations of conditioned servitude, so that by the time he and his comrades had arrived in their home village, they were receptive to the next phase of his plan. Essentially, Darius intended to use the chaos and turmoil brought on by the invasion and conquest of the Parthian Kingdom to his advantage, elevating himself into a position of power that would erase the stain of his low birth, while at the same time, living up to and surpassing the father that he had created in his mind, the one who would be proud to call Darius a son. He had begun almost immediately after returning, and had done so in a manner that was destined to leave an impression on others, in Istakhr.
Using his striking likeness to the satrap, Darius had gained entry to Gobryas’ personal residence, essentially a fortified palace on a scale slightly smaller than the summer palace at Sostrate. The commander of the skeleton staff of bodyguards and servants, a man who had faithfully served the same family for a half-century, had been so affected at the sight of what, to his seventy-year-old eyes was his satrap as he had appeared twenty years earlier, had made no attempt whatsoever to stop Darius when he pushed his way past the man standing in the gate. Within a matter of moments, Darius and his comrades had secured the residence and cut down the only two men of the bodyguard who resisted. From there, he had worked rapidly; summoning Gobryas’ wives, all of whom had been left behind by their husband, and what were in essence Darius’ half-brothers and half-sisters, of which there were seven in number. The oldest, a boy of nine, was the only one of the children who showed no fear, regarding Darius, now sitting in the large chair their father had used as a quasi-throne with a coolness that marked him to Darius as a potential problem to his future plans. That, however, was a challenge for the future, and his grasp on power was extremely tenuous, Darius well knew. Although every one of Gobryas’ subordinate satraps had answered the summons as part of the eastern spad, with those who had sons of age bringing them along, Darius had learned from the other men who were from different parts of Gobryas’ satrapy, that didn’t mean there weren’t any members of the Parthian nobility left who outranked him; socially, at least. Not, Da
rius was certain, militarily, because Darius hadn’t just been listening to his comrades on their journey, he had been talking as well, and he had been extremely persuasive. It wasn’t all that difficult; he had immediately sensed the level of inner turmoil, doubt, and most importantly, dissatisfaction with the fate that had befallen the Parthian Empire. And, as he had been certain was the case, the discontent of his companions was based in a simple question: What now? Darius had been quick to supply the answer to that, and as he had instantly discerned, it was one that was pleasing to the ears of his fellow Parthians, the men of the lowest orders of their world. This, he had convinced them, was their chance to reverse their fortunes.
It had taken Darius two months to consolidate his power, and in doing so, he demonstrated a level of cunning, skill, and ruthlessness that, setting aside what it meant for his legitimate issue, Gobryas would have recognized, and in all likelihood, approved. That Darius was completely untutored, not just in politics as practiced by the members of the Eastern nobility, but in his letters, made his ascent even more remarkable. Not every move he made was done with whispers and promises to his growing number of followers; a month after his arrival in Istakhr, one of the sons of a satrap who was left behind to attend to their satrapy rode in to the city. He only had fifty men under his command, but ten of them were cataphractoi, and he haughtily demanded that Darius surrender control of the city and all its affairs. In answer, Darius challenged the young lord, who appeared to be a bit younger than Darius’ nineteen, to single combat, something that under normal circumstances would have been strictly forbidden between members of different classes. There were two factors that worked in Darius’ favor, the most obvious being that the circumstances were anything but normal, and the second was that the young lord, taking in Darius’ attire of loose trousers and tunic, the tunic bound by a sash, was certain that he would win. The ensuing duel, if it could even be called as such, was over almost before it began, when Darius, eschewing wearing any kind of armor, moved so rapidly that the heavily encumbered Parthian couldn’t pivot in time to avoid Darius’ quick thrust to the neck, killing the young lord instantly. A tense span of heartbeats passed, as the ten bodyguards appeared intent on making an issue of it, but from the surrounding rooftops, when several dozen archers suddenly appeared, arrows nocked and ready to fly at the first signal from Darius, very quickly their nominal commander knelt and swore his fealty to Darius.
That had marked the real beginning of what quickly became the formation of something that, while certainly not a full Parthian spad, but was well more than a drafsh, and the extension of Darius’ influence in a rapidly growing circle around Istakhr. There had been more challenges, certainly, not least of which that he was treading a very fine line about divulging his real intentions. Not surprisingly, those retainers who were essentially noble themselves by virtue of their positions were skeptical of Darius’ claim that he intended to do everything in his power to stop the Romans. What did surprise Darius were the feelings of those men of his own class, who had very little interest in Rome, aside from how much of a disruption this invasion would cause in what they considered to be their real jobs, and that was in tilling the soil and gathering their crops, or tending their herds. It served as a powerful reminder to Darius about how different the perspectives were between the class of men to which he belonged and the class to which he aspired. With the men of the nobility, what few remained in the region, word of Darius’ slaying of one of their own reached their ears very quickly, and there was one other attempt by one of the nobles to remove Darius. This was by ambush; at least, that was the intention, but the nobleman, this being a fourth son who was left behind by his sire because he was simply too incompetent to contribute to the Parthian cause, confirmed his father’s assessment when he made it known to those peasants under his control not just his intentions, but enough details of when, how, and where he planned to do it that, when he arrived at the site of the ambush, Darius was there to meet him. This wasn’t even a duel; using his own bow, Darius placed three arrows in the man’s chest before he toppled from his saddle, eyes wide with the disbelief in his own demise that is common to the slain. Only two men of the noble’s contingent put up a fight, and they were killed almost as quickly as their lord.
After this, the half-dozen men who, by lineage, might have laid claim to Darius’ position, independently reached the same conclusion, and albeit at different times, all rode to Istakhr, whereupon they bent their knee to Darius and swore fealty. Not, it should be said, that Darius trusted these men; not yet. He knew very well that he needed to prove himself worthy of leading his men in some sort of action, which quickly became his most pressing problem. His gods provided him the opportunity when a band of men from Elymais were spotted approaching Istakhr. Darius knew as well as any member of the nobility that, while the Elymais were a vassal state of the Parthians, they were reluctant vassals, so when Darius made the argument that it was likely these men, numbering a bit more than five hundred, were coming to Istakhr not as supplicants to the Parthian cause, but as jackals slinking up to take advantage of the chaos and weakness of loyal Parthians, he had a receptive audience. That the truth was that this was Kamnaskires’ younger brother Oronastes who, in his own bid for power, was coming to the last Parthian-held city in the region to fight for whoever was in charge, Darius would never know, not that it would have mattered.
Leading his force out from the city, composed almost entirely of mounted archers, with less than a hundred cataphractoi, Darius used his superior knowledge of the terrain to effect an ambush that, within a matter of moments, annihilated the Elymais, whose own reaction was slowed by the shock of being treated as hostile when they were coming to fight for Parthia. Several of them, including Kamnaskires’ brother, tried to shout their peaceful intentions, that they posed no harm to their attackers, but they were roundly ignored, mainly because Darius shouted back that this was clearly a ruse. The few survivors of the initial onslaught were quickly dispatched by men who were loyal to Darius, before they could complicate matters by telling those who Darius didn’t trust their real intentions. It was short and bloody for the Elymais, and decisive; it was the perfect action to cement Darius’ leadership, posing the last time he was ever seriously threatened for supremacy. It couldn’t have come at a better time either, because word soon came that the massive Roman army was on the march, heading for where they, for understandable reasons, believed the last bit of Parthian resistance were waiting. Darius, recognizing that he had absolutely no hope to defeat Rome, gave orders to leave the city. What surprised a proportion of his newly formed army was his refusal to take the family members of the men fighting for him, but when he was pressed by some of them to explain, none of them were prepared to hear his explanation.
“Our people have nothing to fear from the Romans,” Darius told the small delegation who came to see him at Gobryas’ residence, which was now acknowledged to be his own.
This was met with disbelief, but very quickly, several of the other men who had been with Darius at Susa added their own voices to this, each of them relating something they had witnessed during the short period of time while they waited to learn their fate as captives, but it was Darius’ words that mattered.
“Our people will be treated better by the Romans than we were ever treated by my father.” He said this more than once, and it was calculated on more than one level. “And, by leaving them behind, they won’t be connected to us when we take action. If we take them with us,” he argued, “and we are defeated, they will be found in our camp, which would indicate to the Romans that they were with us by choice. Then…” He didn’t finish, because there was no need, every man instantly understanding his meaning.
Privately, Darius didn’t believe that, even if the families of his men were found with his army, Caesar would exact any kind of reprisals against them. As it had been with Bodroges, his short exposure to how the Romans did things had quite an impact on Darius, and while he had far-reaching ambi
tions, they were only partially formed at this moment, so he hadn’t made the connection to Caesar himself yet, but saying as much at this moment didn’t suit his purposes. Putting it in simple terms, Darius’ men could move more rapidly without the encumbrance of women and children; he had been debating with himself the idea of leaving behind the men who couldn’t afford their own horses, consigning them to the infantry, because he knew that his best asset, and at this moment his only one, was his mobility of movement. While they had waited at Susa for the arrival of the Romans, the talk among the men of the Parthian ranks was mainly about how, despite the vast majority of his army being on foot, Caesar and his men moved with astonishing rapidity. While there was no way for him to accurately judge whether this was true, what he had seen with his own eyes was how quickly the Romans worked in enveloping Susa. He and his comrades spent time on the rampart of Susa every two days, with little else to do but watch the Romans at work, and it was the primary topic of conversation every night because every time they ascended the stone stairs up to the rampart, the amount of progress was simply something none of them had ever seen before.
“I haven’t seen one man flogged yet,” one of Darius’ comrades had remarked one day, “but they all work like dogs anyway.” He had turned to Darius, and it was a moment Darius remembered because of the expression on the man’s face, one that denoted a growing feeling that, perhaps, these Romans were simply unbeatable, a conclusion that Darius had already drawn on his own. “Why would they do that? Why work so hard if you don’t have to worry about feeling the lash?”
While Darius was largely in agreement, he had felt it politic to point down at a scene that was taking place right then, where a Roman wearing a crest that ran transversely across his helmet was using what appeared to be some sort of stick, applying it across the back of another Roman, saying mildly, “See? They do feel the lash.”
