The Lost Ten

by Harry Sidebottom

  Suddenly the Heruli wheeled around, with no more warning than a school of fish. Valens sawed on his reins, dragged his mount around after them. Now the Heruli were cantering away from the Sassanids. All the while they plied their bows over their horses’ rumps. Busy keeping close to Naulobates, managing his horse, and avoiding the Persian shafts from behind and those of the Heruli ahead, Valens had yet to draw his bow.

  A nomad was transfixed by an arrow. Valens stared, fascinated by the bright feathers protruding from his back. The pony did not break stride, but the Herul slid from its back.

  The Sassanid heavy horse came after the division of Naulobates, still at a walk. Some men and animals in their front rank had several arrows lodged in their armour. The steel and leather and horn was hard for any nomad shaft to penetrate. Valens saw that more Heruli were falling than clibanarii. The Persians were winning this fight.

  A great roar came from both wings. The Sassanid horse archers had slung their bows over their shoulders, and unsheathed their swords. They spurred into an all-out charge. Outnumbering these savages by more than two to one, like their betters, they would settle this with cold steel.

  The yip-yipping on the nomad flanks faltered, then gave way to shouts of alarm. The divisions of both Artemidorus and Andonnoballus were fleeing. They raced away to the north with howls of distress, not even turning to shoot at the pursuers close on their heels.

  That was too much for the pride of the Sassanid nobles. The arrows had stopped coming from behind. Valens looked over his shoulder. The clibanarii had replaced their bows in their cases. Now they were unslinging the long lances from the loops over their shoulders.

  Unnoticed by Valens, the Rosomoni had slacked their pace. Now he found himself out in front of Naulobates, leading the retreat. He was happy enough to ride in this place of comparative safety. The clouds had covered the sun, and the first spits of rain pattered his face.

  The clibanarii were still walking, but now they gripped their lances two-handed, and brought them down. A wicked wall of sharp steel glittered for a moment, until the shadows swept over the Sassanid horsemen.

  A trumpet called, and the Persian nobility urged their warhorses to a trot.

  No more than thirty paces separated the fighters. Yet Naulobates kept to a sedate pace.

  The Sassanid trumpet sounded again, and the armoured knights moved to a canter.

  The ground shook with the thunder of their coming. The air itself seemed to tremble.

  Naulobates and his men nudged their ponies to keep just out of reach.

  Now the storm front hit. Curtains of rain streamed down from the north, flattening the grass, stinging Valens’s face.

  Through the murk, he saw that the pursuit on the two flanks was drawing away fast. The riders of neither Artemidorus or Andonnoballus were making for the camp. Instead both were angling away across the limitless Steppe. Soon they would be lost from sight.

  Squinting ahead through the driving rain, Valens was amazed to see how far they had come. The trees along the river were no more than a mile away. The day would be decided soon.

  Maddened by their quarry always remaining just out of reach, and goaded by the gadfly arrows of their elusive foe, the Persian nobility could take no more. With or without orders they charged at the gallop.

  Now the Heruli rode hard. The small shaggy ponies surged past Valens and his men. The thousands of horrible spear tips were almost at Valens’s back. He bent low over the neck of his horse, driving it forward with all his strength. Drawing his bow, he used it as a whip.

  As they pounded across the plain, the Sassanid ranks broke. The better mounted pulled ahead. They bellowed the names of their clans, riding for the honour of first striking down these cowardly barbarians. Gaps opened in their frontage. But still they came.

  Suddenly Naulobates and the riders in front of Valens vanished, as if swallowed by the earth.

  Terrified as he was of the Persian spears so close to his shoulder blades, Valens reined back. They were at the river. Thank all the gods, Naulobates had ridden down one of the draws. Leaning back in the saddle, Valens followed him down, his mount almost on its hocks.

  The Rosomoni to either side had to jump from the high bank. Valens saw one pony fall. But these nomads had been in the saddle before they could walk. Riding was more natural to them than walking. They and their ponies could negotiate almost anything.

  The track up from the riverbed was muddy from the rain, trampled by the hooves of those who had gone before. Valens’s mount slipped and staggered up the far side.

  Emerging at the top of the bank, he swung away to the right. His men were still with him.

  Somehow, like mountain goats, the ugly little Steppe ponies swarmed up the steep and treacherous slope, and reined in around the Romans.

  The Sassanids were blinkered by bloodlust, their vision limited by the narrow slits in the masks of their helmets. They did not see the drop until too late. The bravest set their mounts to make the leap. The fainter hearted yanked back on their reins. Those behind collided with them, sending the foremost over the edge, and themselves tumbling after. Even those who had jumped cleanly were often undone by the weight of their armour, their mounts crumpling on landing. In a heartbeat the riverbed was transformed into a welter of thrashing and struggling injured men and horses.

  Up on the north bank, the Heruli poured arrows into the chaos. Their bowstrings might be slackened by the rain, but at this range they found any exposed flesh, human or animal.

  The clibanarii, lucky enough to have reached the river at the track, urged their mounts up against the defenders. The first wave headed by the bear standard went for Naulobates and his three blood brothers. Those following came at Valens and the Romans.

  A razor-sharp lance thrust at Valens’s face, and almost lost him his seat as he ducked to one side. The big Sassanid charger went chest to chest with his mount. Driven back, Valens’s horse sat down on its haunches. Dropping his bow, Valens drew his sword. The Persian thrust again. Valens batted it aside with his blade. The impact knocked the hilt from his grip. Desperately, he grabbed the shaft of the lance with both hands. The two horses circled as their riders wrestled for the weapon, all writhing together like one hellish beast.

  A second Sassanid was looming on Valens’s left. Clemens got in the way. The two men traded blows. Beyond them, all principles cast aside, Narses was also fighting for his life against another Persian. Yet another Sassanid approached from the right, half behind Valens. Out of the corner of his eye, Valens saw the warrior ready himself to plant his lance in the unprotected target.

  Die like a man.

  The Sassanid reeled. His head jerked around. He looked stupidly at the blood spreading over his surcoat. Decimus hacked again. Not a clean strike, but enough to drive the warrior down to the ground under the trampling hooves.

  The Persian fighting Valens let go of the lance, went for his sword. Left in possession of the lance, Valens instinctively swung it like a staff. The wood clanged on metal as it hit the warrior’s helmet. Valens battered with it again and again. Stunned, the Sassanid ineffectually tried to fend off the blows with his sword.

  As he recovered the ungainly weapon, Valens saw Decimus fall. Unable to aid him, Valens concentrated on punching the tip of the lance through the armour that shielded his opponent’s chest. The first thrust skidded off. On the second the scales of metal snapped, and the point struck deep.

  Yip-yip-yip. The Heruli were exulting.

  The great bear standard of the Satrap of Hyrkania was down.

  There was a gasp of horror from the Sassanids.

  There, on the lip of the river, was Naulobates. Like some malformed god of war, the King of the Heruli held aloft his grizzly trophy. No one could doubt that Naulobates had fulfilled his prophesy. Here was the severed head of Gondofarr, the Satrap of Hyrkania.

  That was the end of the fight. But far from the end of the killing.

  The Sassanid clibanarii, all pride forgotten,
fought each other to escape from the riverbed. Yip-yipping, the Heruli massacred them.

  As the Persians fled away to the south, the nomads followed.

  The others in Valens’s command, even Narses, streamed after the rout.

  Suddenly Valens was alone except for the injured and the dead.

  Wearily, he dismounted. Decimus was lying a few paces away.

  ‘Rest easy, let me get at the wound.’

  Decimus’s handsome face was contorted with pain. ‘Leave it.’ His words were little above a whisper. ‘A gut wound, I am done for.’

  ‘Let me look.’

  ‘No point. Put a coin in my mouth for the ferryman.’ The horse master tried to smile. ‘But before that, some water would be good.’

  Valens went back to where his horse stood. All the others had run, either after the rout or off to the herds grazing to the north of the camp. There was a great gash on the horse’s near foreleg. In the heat of battle Valens had not noticed it take the wound. The beast would have to be put down.

  Valens took his water flask from the saddle, and went back to Decimus.

  The pursuit was receding away to the south. There would be much work for Charon at his ferry.

  Valens unstoppered the flask, lifted Decimus’s head, and tried to trickle the water between his lips.

  Decimus was dead.

  Valens was unsure how long he sat cradling the head of the dead man. Not long, because the rider had not reached the edge of the camp and the vicinity of their tents when Valens saw him.

  The man was mounted on a horse, not a pony, and he was riding west, heading purposefully along the riverbank.

  CHAPTER 35

  The Steppe

  THERE WAS NO GOOD REASON for a Roman to go to the tents. None of them was a coward. But one was a traitor.

  Valens looked around for his sword. It was lost somewhere in the debris of battle. He snatched up a discarded Sassanid blade. Only when he reached his mount did he remember that it was injured. All the others in sight were dead or also grievously hurt. He turned and started to run.

  Their tents were pitched away from the river at the north-west corner of the encampment, a little apart from those of the Heruli. Valens left the riverbank and cut into the heart of the camp.

  The nomads had laid out their shelters in neat, ordered streets. They were well spaced so there was no danger of tripping over guy ropes or other impediments. Valens ran as fast as his tired legs would carry him. By the time he turned into the last thoroughfare, he was bathed in sweat, and the breath was beginning to burn in his lungs.

  There were only serving women left in the camp. They stared, silent and round-eyed and wondering, as he raced past.

  The thick quilted jacket and sword belt were getting in the way, slowing him down. Not stopping, he peeled off the jacket, unbuckled the belt, and left them lying in the dirt.

  The Persian cavalry had been waiting when they came down from the Castle of Silence. Valens had been right. There was a traitor. He was after Prince Sasan. Why he wanted the boy, why he had betrayed his companions, Valens still could not imagine.

  The man’s horse was cropping the grass off to one side.

  The Greek slave girl was outside Sasan’s tent. Her throat had been cut. No attempt had been made to conceal her body. She had been cast aside as a thing of no importance.

  Without stopping to think, Valens pulled back the hangings and burst through.

  The interior of the tent was gloomy, wreathed in smoke.

  Sasan was cowering amidst the baggage by the back wall.

  Clemens was by the hearth in the centre of the tent. There was blood on his sword and his forearms.

  As Valens entered, Clemens half turned, keeping an eye on the boy.

  ‘You should not have come,’ Clemens said.

  ‘Why?’

  ‘I have no wish to kill you.’

  ‘And Severus and Quintus, did you not want to kill them?’

  ‘No. It was necessary.’

  ‘We swore an oath. Why have you broken your word?’

  ‘Orders.’ Clemens smiled mirthlessly. The deep furrows on his face were like lines incised in marble. ‘We will do what is ordered, and at every command we will be ready.’

  ‘Whose orders?’ The longer Valens could keep Clemens talking, the better chance he could take him off guard.

  ‘You do not need to know.’

  ‘Why the boy?’

  Clemens glanced at Sasan. ‘There are those in Rome who want a war with Persia, and there are those who do not. If this child lives, thousands will die: soldiers on the battlefield, women and other children in the sack of towns.’

  Before Valens could strike, Clemens looked back.

  ‘There has to be another way to save them,’ Valens said.

  Clemens made a small gesture with his sword, as if to dismiss all the horror and pity of war. ‘Not to save the ones I love.’

  ‘Your family?’

  ‘Yes, my family.’ Despite his age, and the bulk of the nomad jacket, Clemens was quick.

  A hand’s breadth from his face, Valens blocked the thrust. The force sent him staggering. Clemens thrust again, low to the stomach. Again Valens got his sword in the way, backing off around the wall of the tent.

  Clemens followed, feet close together, balanced, feinting and probing. The armourer was a master at arms: he knew his trade. There was nothing Valens could do but retreat, try and stay alive. The unfamiliar Sassanid blade felt awkward in his grip.

  Slowly they circled around the hearth. There were no sounds but the pad and stamp of their boots, their panting breath, and the sharp clangour of steel on steel. There was no one to hear. None but women in the camp. No one to intervene.

  The smoke was smarting Valens’s eyes. His arms and legs were beginning to tire. There was a tight band of pain around his chest. He had to end this soon, before the experience of the old swordsman wore him down. Stepping forward, Valens aimed a cut at Clemen’s head, but in mid-air he altered the angle down towards his thigh.

  As if he had long expected the move, Clemens stepped inside the blow, and chopped his sword into Valens’s right wrist. The long Sassanid blade dropped into the hearth, as agony lanced up Valens’s arm. Clemens’s elbow smashed into Valens’s face, sent him sprawling on his back, head almost out of the entrance.

  With calm assurance, Clemens placed his boots on either side of the prone and defenceless figure, readying his weapon.

  A flash of movement from the rear of the tent, something coming through the whirls of smoke.

  Clemens swung backhanded.

  The boy fell back in a spray of blood. The old eunuch’s little knife flew across the tent.

  With his left hand, Valens tugged the dagger from his right boot. Clemens started to turn back, shifting the hilt of his sword to a double-handed grip. He was going to put his weight behind it, and punch down, skewering his victim to the floor. Still on his back, Valens drove the dagger up into Clemens’s crotch.

  Clemens grunted, but did not go down. He raised his blade. If he had to die, he would take Valens with him to the darkness. Valens twisted the dagger, forcing it deeper. Now Clemens swayed. The sword clattered close by Valens’s head. Clemens’s knees buckled. Like a felled tree, he crashed on top of Valens.

  Trying to ignore the sickening pain from his wrist, Valens heaved the corpse of Clemens to one side. A wave of nausea forced him to lie still, left hand clamped to right wrist. He attempted to gather himself.

  He rolled on one side, drew himself to his knees. Hunched over, he forced himself to release his wrist and look at the injury. There was a deep cut, a lot of blood, but it was not severed. Tentatively, he flexed his fingers. A surge of pain, more blood, but they moved. If the wound was cleaned, it might not fester. He might yet not die.

  Valens might live, but the traitor had won. So many hard miles travelled, so much hardship, so many deaths, all to end in failure.

  A small sob dragged Valens out of his ma
ze of despair.

  Like a crab, he scuttled on all fours to the back of the tent.

  The boy was covered in blood, but he was alive. Valens found a pitcher of water and a cloth. He bathed the child’s face. There was a terrible gash across his forehead, a flap of skin hung down and would have to be stitched. But he was alive.

  ‘Don’t cry, you will be alright.’

  Holding the cloth to his wound, the boy sat up. ‘I thought you were dead. It was you I was mourning. My father did not lament his fate, and nor will I. You saved my life. A Prince of the House of Sasan does not forget.’

  CHAPTER 36

  Aquileia

  TOMORROW WOULD DECIDE THEIR FATE. They were in a bar down by the docks on the river. It was pleasant with the sunshine on the water. May was a kind month in northern Italy.

  ‘I should have suspected the bastard,’ Narses said. ‘Clemens was always trying to stir up dissension in the mission, attempting to cast doubt on the loyalty of those from the east.’

  ‘When he accused you,’ Valens said, ‘I should have realised.’

  ‘None of us are to blame.’ Iudex was eating melon, while the others ate steak. ‘His treachery was well hidden, even in the spirit-world.’

  Hairan laughed. ‘I am far too trusting for our line of work. I never suspected anything – in this world or another – just thought we were unlucky. And I still do not understand why he broke his oath.’

  ‘Do any of us?’ Valens shrugged. ‘At the end he spoke of following orders and saving his family. Although I was a little distracted, as he was trying to kill me.’

  They had talked about it for months without reaching a conclusion.

  The journey had been long. After the battle, and the death of Clemens, they had ridden through the winter, across the entire extent of the domain of Naulobates: around the northern shore of the Caspian, across the Volga, and down the Tanais; endless miles of windswept grassland. The Heruli had been generous hosts, if eccentric. The soldiers had become accustomed to a diet of meat and milk and kumis. From the town of Tanais they had taken passage on a ship across Lake Maeotis to the city of Panticapaeum, and from there across the Black Sea to the Bosporus. The regular sailing season had not opened, but the gods had been kind. At Byzantium the governor had issued diplomatic passes to requisition horses, food and lodgings. They had not hired a carriage. Sasan, as a Persian, preferred to go on horseback. Following the great military road through Serdica and Naissus and Mursa, they crossed the Balkans. At long last they had negotiated the Alpine passes, and descended to the north Italian plains.