She beat her wings a few times and Hattu could tell she and her new partner were eager to fly again, so he pulled out a strip of dried pork and fed her a piece, tossing the other part to the male falcon. While they devoured the meal at frightening speed, he took the opportunity to draw from his purse the small animal bracelet he had won in a wrestling bet at the end of that heady evening in the arzana house – a bet that had resulted in an over-confident Sargis being turned nearly inside-out by the champion wrestler. The trinket wasn’t a fine piece like the things Muwa often brought Atiya, but it meant just as much. ‘Take this to her,’ he said as he tied it to Arrow’s leg and flicked his wrist, sending her skywards again – the male bird quickly taking flight in pursuit. He took a mouthful of icy water from his drinking skin, then climbed down from the outcrop and set off at a jog for the edge of the fells. As he descended the slope – the same slope that had nearly bested him the previous summer – he saw the Fields of Bronze down at the foot, veiled in white. He heard a guttural grunting from down there and saw a lone figure in the snowy training ground, loping up a small, artificial dirt hill. Up, then down, then back up again, over and over, the lone silver braid jostling.
Now try it with six buckets of water, Hattu chuckled. He had come to admire Kurunta One-eye – much in the way a runner might appreciate the calluses on his heels and toes. One night, in the depths of winter while thunder crackled above the academy and a blizzard howled, he had heard the so-called ‘breaker of men’ crooning. Soft, gentle tones: first, it was a sonnet of love, of his fondness for his wife; next he sang a quiet dirge – one that had Hattu rapt.
Tarhunda weeps and the rain pours,
His lightning blinds, his thunder roars,
Our fallen sing his ageless song,
And in our hearts they’re never gone…
He smiled at the memory, then set off at a jog for the downhill track that would take him back to the academy. But something wasn’t right. Something in the corner of his eye was not still. Something in the frozen, deserted countryside had moved. A grim shiver crept over him as he turned to see a figure loping along a high, snowy track. For just a moment, the horrors of the Kaskan raid came to him like a nightmare. But this was no Kaskan, he realised. Nor was it a raider. He fell to his haunches and peered at the stranger. A man, loping, wearing rags, his feet bare, leaving red blotches on the snow behind him. He cupped a hand to his ear and heard the fellow’s distant, ragged breaths. This man was no threat, he realised. Within a moment he was up and running towards the poor wretch.
The man saw him, gawped at him with wide, bloodshot eyes, then fell to his knees, weeping. The fellow’s hair was matted and his chin thick with stubble, his fingernails broken and packed with dirt. ‘Who are you?’ Hattu asked.
‘A fallen man,’ he wailed, sobbing deeply again. ‘I have failed my family, my people.’
Hattu crouched by the man, pulling his water skin out and offering it. ‘Where did you come from?’ he asked, looking out across the man’s red-tinged footprints in the snow – coming from the northwest. The countryside beyond had been blocked with snowdrifts for months.
‘From the lands of Pala,’ he gasped after nearly draining the skin. ‘A land that now lies in ruin. Our cities had no walls, we could not hold them back,’ he wept. ‘They slaughtered everyone… everyone. And on they went, razing neighbouring Tummanna to the ground too. I ran from them… like a coward. I ran and I have been running all winter, through the white wastes, wading through the blocked valleys. I hid in caves, ate grubs and roots.’
Pala, Tummanna. Hattu thought of the northwestern vassals. Loyal, vital states. ‘Who? Who did this?’
The man looked up, his eyes wet. ‘Pitagga,’ he wailed. ‘The Lord of the Mountains has reduced my homeland to ashes. He roves in my lands, waving the head of Prince Sarpa on the end of his spear.’
***
Many in Hattusa looked on with wide eyes as a stablehand from the academy ushered the bleeding stranger up the main way, to the acropolis. They gossiped and whispered of troubles in nearby allied lands. But their curiosity vanished when the first burst of spring rain came just a few days later. The snow was washed away and the city exploded with song and colour as the Festival of the Earth began. A month of joyous praise to the Gods for the coming of the New Year.
By the eighth day of the downpour, the rains had grown tepid, falling in sheets. The swollen Ambar River was thick with people – children playing, pregnant women waist-deep, mouthing words of worship to the sky. Silvery-haired Wise Women stood midriver, pouring droplets of honey into the current, lips moving in muttered incantations as they launched hand-sized ‘prayer boats’ of kindling. The main way was even more crowded, the silvery cascade of rain drumming and leaping from its flagstones. People lined the broad avenue. Their robes were drenched as they cheered and chanted at dancers weaving down the road in a snaking line. The lead pair of dancers held up a fierce, fanged clay serpent’s head with a lolling, forked tongue while those behind carried a patchwork trail of feathered yellow and orange linen. This was the feared Illuyanka, the demon serpent, nemesis of the Storm God. Warriors play-fought against the serpent as the dancers twisted around them, much to the crowd’s delight.
Atiya clapped and sang as the procession wound past her. Her heart skipped to the rhythm and she felt wonderfully free of responsibilities and troubles – soaked to her skin and blithe. Women and men bumped into her as they passed but she didn’t care, laughing like they were. Another fellow bumped into her and she turned her bright grin upon him. Suddenly, she was seized with surprise.
The handsome, amber-haired man smiled, his freckled cheeks lifting. ‘My apologies, Priestess,’ he said, bowing to her. Since that first time she had seen him, over a year ago, she had been unable to stop meeting his eye – at the market, by the banks of the Ambar, around the outskirts of the Storm Temple. Whatever wares or business brought him to Hattusa, they certainly brought him here often. ‘The wagons are ready – for the Tapikka pilgrimage?’ he said, looking past her shoulder down to the Storm Temple’s gates.
Atiya looked there too: a collection of ox-wagons were lined up. These would see the silver statue of Tarhunda taken from the innermost sanctuary of the Storm Temple and towed to the fort-city of Tapikka, to bring it before the city’s High Altar where the supreme god could commune with the sky. Again, she had been overlooked and would not be part of the temple party that would ride with it. But next year, the Elder Priestess had told her that morning, she would be included. A shiver of pride ran through her. ‘They are,’ she said, ‘the silver effigy needs only to be anointed and blessed and then the journey can begin.’
‘A hard road though, is it not?’ the fellow mused.
‘The high road is hard but swift, but there is a low road too – lengthy but gentle,’ she answered, echoing what the Elder Priestess had told her.
‘I see,’ the fellow nodded.
A man and a woman, drunk and giggling, barged between them. When they passed through, she returned her eyes to the spot the amber-haired man had been. But he was gone. She looked around for a moment, before returning her attentions to the procession, letting out a whoop and clapping.
Prince Muwa, his thick dark mane drenched and plastered to his face, could not relax. The festival had to be held lest the Gods be angered. But much more serious affairs were afoot. He looked beyond the Earth Festival celebrations and uphill: on the Noon Spur, regiments were already being drilled by the Great Barracks, readied to form the campaign army. The Kaskan invasion of Pala and Tummanna had to be countered. Sarpa’s shame had to be ended. Soon, they would march and he would be gone from this place until autumn. He swirled his cup then took a swig of wine, casting his eye downhill a little, where the play-serpent was now approaching the banks of the River Ambar.
He saw her there, in the crowds by the stonemason’s yard, her headscarf and robe wet through and locks of soaked hair spiralling across her cheeks. Every time she cheered and laughe
d his heart ached. Then he saw her talking with the amber-haired man. A spike of jealousy ran through him, until he laughed it off and the sadness returned. They were drifting apart, he realised. No, she was drifting away from him, no matter how frantically he paddled to stay with her. During last winter and this, the precious time he had planned to spend with her, she had been distant. Why? I can give you everything.
He eyed the tiny vial of petal oils. It wasn’t quite as opulent as gifts he had given her before, but it would remind her how much he cared for her, and that was what mattered. He took a last swig from the cup of wine, then clasped the vial in his fist and made his way through the crowds to reach her. He stole up behind her and grabbed her by the waist with a playful ‘raarrr!’
She squealed and swung round in his embrace. ‘Muwa!’ she cried, beating a light hand across his chest.
‘You look sweet as honey when you are happy,’ he said, unable to stop the thought tumbling from his lips.
She looked away, embarrassed. ‘Who could not be joyous, on a day like this?’
Muwa thought of battles past and the struggle for the beset northwestern lands that was to come. Cleaved bodies. Screaming men. Blood. Vultures. A frenzy of flies. He blinked the thoughts away, trying to keep his face bright and his eyes on the serpent procession. ‘Aye, it is a fine spectacle, is it not?’
‘The Elder Priestess and I wove the tail section,’ she pointed out proudly. ‘It took us a month, but it was worth it. The textile trader was asking for fortunes to buy a length, so instead we bought flax and-’
‘I’ll be leaving soon, Atiya,’ he said, cutting her off.
Her smile fell a little. ‘I know.’ She glanced up at the acropolis. ‘You will look after your father, won’t you?’
‘Aye,’ Muwa replied. ‘His ailments are worsening, but his generals know this. He can still march and ride.’
‘I will miss you,’ she said, tilting her head a little.
He saw her full lips and the look of expectation on her face. He cupped a hand to her chin and made to kiss her. But she turned her head a little to the side, the kiss landing on her cheek, she kissing his.
Rejection, again. Another weight pulled at his heart. ‘Atiya I, I will miss you terribly.’ He gave her the petal oils, but she pushed it back into his palm.
‘I should not take gifts from you, Muwa,’ she said.
‘Why not? Do you not see how much I delight in giving you things?’
‘But it’s not right,’ she insisted.
‘Of course it is. Why would-’
‘Because there is another,’ she interrupted. ‘I think I am in love with… someone else.’
The words raked his heart. He felt like a fool, holding her like this. He let her go, stepping back. He noticed how she had on one wrist a cheap animal trinket – something from the trade wagons that passed the Fields of Bronze, he reckoned. She was toying with this as she stood there before him in unease. ‘I’m sorry,’ she said, turning to run off into the crowd.
Muwa’s heart ached as if a smith’s anvil hung there now.
***
‘Muwa?’ King Mursili called. His shout echoed through the corridors of the palace. ‘Muwa,’ he called out again. Silence. Angered and unsure why, Mursili slammed the leather bags down on the hearth room floor and stuck his head out of the door in search of a palace slave. None were nearby. ‘Muw-’ he started then fell silent with a stifled croak, clutching a hand to his left armpit. His whole arm stung with invisible needles. He felt his chest tighten as if an unseen armourer was buckling a willow-thin man’s bronze cuirass around his trunk. The pain seemed set to crush him. It was stronger than ever before. But, as always, it passed after a few moments.
‘My Sun,’ a voice said, startling him. He swung round to see a horned apparition approaching him: Volca had entered the hearth room via the other door. He stalked across towards the king, silent in his bare feet, the red cloak that had once been Zida’s floating in his wake. ‘You need help?’
‘Aye, Prince Muwa was supposed to be helping me choose what things we might need for the campaign. My arm, you see,’ he said, wincing as he tried to lift one of the bags, ‘it grows weaker.’ He felt ashamed that he was even out of breath from that speck of effort.
‘Sit, My Sun,’ Volca gestured to the wooden chair by the circular hearth. He tapped the silver hawk cloakpin Mursili had given him earlier that moon. ‘I am your Gal Mesedi now. That means I must protect you from others… and from yourself.’
Mursili was about to protest, but the fight left him and, with a sigh, he slumped onto the chair, rubbing his palms on the armrests and resting his head on the back. ‘But damn, when I was twenty, I could have sworn I was a lion. Tall, proud, lean and brimming with energy. When I was thirty, I felt sluggish, a little slow thanks to the lack of daily drills with the army,’ he clasped a pouch of loose skin near his waist as he said this. ‘At forty, it was as if someone had taken out all my muscles and replaced them with straw – and then there are the aches and pains in the cold season: all those bumps and cuts from my younger days now haunt me when the winter comes. But now, approaching my forty-fourth summer, I feel a hundred times worse than that. I have never known frailty like it. The pains in my chest, the weakness of my limbs, the quickness with which I tire and the ease with which my mind wanders is… terrifying.’
‘There was an old king on the Island of the Sherden who suffered a similar ailment to yours… ’ Volca said, then added swiftly: ‘not that you are old.’
‘Not as old as I’ll be tomorrow,’ Mursili said, managing a weak chuckle. It still amused him how much Volca’s jagged accent had softened and how well he had mastered the Hittite tongue. ‘Tell me about him – this king.’
Volca crouched by the fire at the king’s side. Mursili noticed how his pale blue eyes grew distant, the reflected flames dancing in them. ‘He was a kind man. A good ruler. Every day he would invite families to dine with him: highborn, farmers, beggars, even. He did not keep vaults of silver for himself; indeed, he saw little value in shiny metals and gems.’
‘And his illness, did… did it kill him?’
Volca shook his head ever so slowly. ‘No. A young guard of his did. The old king was too trusting, you see. This young guardsman and a band of co-conspirators dragged him from his bed one night and up onto the keep roof. They slit open his belly, pulled out his gut ropes and tied him there, alive, and let crows and vultures descend to tear him apart from the inside. He lived for two days like that, tormented.’
Mursili recoiled in disgust. ‘Why? Had they put a knife through his heart or tossed him from the roof they would have achieved their end all the same. Why the grim torture?’
‘Some said the young guardsman enjoyed it.’
Mursili felt glad of the heat from the hearth. ‘But why anyway? The king, as you say, stored no wealth – what had they to gain?’
Volca shrugged. ‘The throne. The power to horde the wealth that the old king chose not to. Respect.’
‘Respect?’ Mursili said, arching one eyebrow. ‘Respect is won by example.’
Volca nodded slowly. ‘And that was the mistake the usurpers made: for all the Sherden people heard the old king’s cries. They knew what had happened. They rejected the young guard.’
‘Rejected him? Put him to death, surely?’ Mursili laughed dryly.
A log snapped and hissed, then settled in the fire.
‘They put him to an equally cruel torture,’ Volca said. He turned his gaze to Mursili. ‘Now can you see why I left such a place behind, My Sun?’
Mursili felt an odd chill for a moment, but put it down to the dying fire. ‘Yes, yes I can. A brutal land.’
Volca sighed and smiled sadly, then rose. ‘Let me carry the bags to the stables and the carriage. You rest here. And shall I bring you a cup of the root brew?’
Mursili’s mood brightened. The tangy drink was pleasant – nothing like the vile muck the asu healer had been trying to ply him with. ‘Aye,
that would be good.’
As Volca made to leave, Mursili added: ‘Tell me, Volca – and I have been itching to ask – why do you insist on wearing that brutish helm at all times?’
‘I have my reasons,’ Volca smiled, halting in the doorway.
‘Very well,’ Mursili shrugged. Every man has his secrets. ‘But the horns – are they not a bane in battle? They merely give your foe something to grab hold of, do they not?’
Volca chuckled. ‘They do, true enough.’ Then he smiled, his pale face half-obscured in shadow. ‘But don’t they make me look damned terrifying?’
***
Volca made his way to the palace scullery: the place was empty and a picture of cleanliness and organisation: a spotless stone floor, ovens, rows of hanging, pristine white aprons and shelves stacked with pots and cooking implements. He came to a wooden bench lining the walls and selected a cup from the row of gleaming copper vessels resting upside down on a shelf there. He poured priest-anointed water from a vase to fill the cup halfway, then brought a small wooden box from his purse. It was no bigger than his hand. Opening it released a waft of decay. He took a knife from a trough of implements and scooped out just a speck of the green-brown purée within the wooden box. The mixture – sweet clover petals putrefied with fragments of funghi – was known only to him. He tapped the knife on the edge of the cup so the mixture dropped into the water, then stirred it in. The odour of decay was still strong, so he lifted a small clay pot of honey, popping the wooden lid off and tipping in a copious measure of the thick, sweet, nectar. That was why the root brew tasted so good, he smiled, the flavour of decay masked.
It reminded him of the venison he had once hung in his stony barn on the Isle of the Sherden. Some of the nobles had wanted to devour it on the day the deer had been caught, but he had dissuaded them, convinced them to let the meat rest over a period of two days. When they had protested, he had convinced them to wait by describing the process of ‘controlled rot’, to age the meat.
Son of Ishtar Page 19
