Memnon (49 page)

“A Spartan, Uncle. Who he is, I do not know,” Pharnabazus said. “But, they both await you in Zeus’s temple.”

Memnon’s brow creased.
A Spartan?
“Take over here. Hold off on the incendiaries until I return.”

 

D
ESPITE THE TUMULT OF THE SIEGE A PALL OF SILENCE CLUNG TO THE TEMPLE
of Zeus Polias. Memnon paused on the threshold of the open doors and waited for his eyes to adjust, the clotted shadows providing a welcome respite from the searing heat of battle. Bronze braziers spewed sweet-smelling incense into the cool air; fluted columns lined the central hall, the
cella,
where the stern visage of Zeus looked down on worshipers from his marble throne. The Thunderer, Lord of Dark Clouds, clement in his own fashion but implacable when aroused, Memnon mouthed a silent prayer that the Lord of Olympus might grant them victory. No doubt Alexander had asked the same boon for his own people. When Greek fought Greek, whom would the gods love more?

From within, Memnon could hear voices—one familiar, the other clipped and raspy. The Rhodian moved to his left, passed between the columns, and spotted Patron and his guest at the rear of the temple, near a side door that opened on the peristyle ringing the building. Though still as lean as from his days piloting
Circe,
the passage of time had scarred Patron, adding deep creases to his face and gray to his hair and beard. His plain blue
chiton,
worn cinched at the waist with a belt of old leather, stood in marked contrast to the finery of his companion.

The Spartan at Patron’s side cut an impressive figure—tall and well muscled with a full beard and long, immaculately groomed hair, both chestnut-colored. He sported a cuirass of fine bronze, etched and silver-inlaid, and greaves embossed with the faces of Nymphs. In spite of the heat, he wore the scarlet cloak of a Peer, a member of that ever-dwindling class comprised of full Spartan citizens.

“You speak of superiority,” Patron was saying. “But under Spartan standards would Alexander not be the superior man by virtue of his being a king?”

“Superior to other Macedonians, perhaps, but not to Spartans. In the company of lions, does a king of mice crow about his exalted position?”

“Only if the mouse has the wherewithal to align himself with the eagles,” Memnon said.

The two men turned.

“Zeus Savior, lad!” Patron said, grinning. “You look like a man whose been scrapping in the dust with a pack of dogs!” The Spartan nodded approvingly.

Memnon glanced down at himself. A rime of dried blood, sweat, and dust caked his limbs and armor. He grinned back. “Not all of us get the plum missions, Patron. How
were
the whores of Crete?”

“They send their regards,” he replied. Patron gestured to the Spartan. “This is Callicratides, envoy of King Agis of Sparta.”

“Greetings, noble Callicratides.”

“Rhodian. Patron speaks highly of you. So much so that I felt compelled to meet you in person, to take your measure back to Agis.”

“Just so you know,” Memnon said, winking. “Phocaeans are inveterate liars, Callicratides, worse than Cretans. Still, what’s mine is yours, for the duration of your stay. Before you depart for home, though, I would like to draft a letter to King Agis, something that defines my position in the plainest possible terms. I ask from you the added burden of delivering it into his hands for me.”

“Of course,” Callicratides said.

Through the open side door came the distant echo of a
salpinx.
Memnon frowned, cocking his head to the side. “That sounds like the call to withdraw. Surely Alexander’s not had his fill for one day?”

“How goes the fight?” Patron asked.

“Well enough. For all Alexander’s faults, he is tenacious and he has an inventive streak in him. Though we’re enemies we must respect his ability to lead men, to inspire them. Already his Macedonians would march to the gates of Tartarus and spit in Cerberus’s eyes just to please their king.”

“Respect?” Callicratides snarled. “Faugh! The gods have marked the slayer well, and in the end the black Fates always destroy the lucky but too lawless man! Philip, at least, was a worthy adversary who knew his place!”

“You mangle Aeschylus’s words but at least you’re familiar with them, my good Spartan,” Memnon said, recognizing sentiments from that poet’s
Oresteia.
“It’s exactly because Alexander doesn’t know his place that he has the potential of being a far more terrifying adversary than Philip could have ever dreamed of being. There’s little need to fear the man who recognizes his boundaries, Callicratides. Myself, I fear the man who doesn’t.”

The Spartan pursed his lips, his eyes narrowing in thought. “I will relay your words to Agis. No doubt he will find interest in them.” Callicratides extended his hand. Memnon took it.

“Deeds speak louder than words,” the Rhodian said. “A favor, Patron? Tonight—say perhaps near midnight—bring noble Callicratides to the acropolis walls. Our talk has inspired me to undertake an experiment. I want to see if Alexander truly recognizes no boundaries.”

“How?” Patron asked.

Memnon smiled, devoid of humor. “With incendiaries.”

 

S
TARS GLITTERED IN THE NIGHT SKY OVER
H
ALICARNASSUS, THEIR SPLENDOR
rivaled by the fires burning in the Macedonian camp. Exhaustion gripped both armies; yet, movement could be discerned as pickets on the ground mirrored sentries walking their routes atop the walls. Music drifted up from the harbor, from a wine shop where the fleet’s
auletes
staged an impromptu Dionysia.

The sound of dueling flutes reached even to the Horn. Here, in blazing torchlight, Memnon’s men kept a close eye on the nearly filled section of the moat, insuring the Macedonians didn’t attempt to finish the job under cover of darkness. Alexander’s men, too, watched the Horn, alert for any sign that the Persians might disrupt their day’s progress.

Memnon crouched behind an embrasure some distance from the Horn, near where he had captured the would-be traitors two nights previous. Thymondas and Amyntas crouched with him. Bareheaded, their faces daubed with soot, all three men wore cuirasses of leather rather than bronze. Lampblack dulled the sheen of their weapons; strips of cloth muffled their sheaths and baldrics. Dozens of ropes creaked as similarly camouflaged men on both sides of them lowered ladders and woven baskets full of straw-packed clay jars to their comrades outside the wall. Another three hundred raiders waited on the parapet for the Rhodian’s signal.

“You’re clear about your orders?” Memnon asked the renegade Amyntas. The Macedonian nodded.

“My men and I will make a hole in their sentry line near the siege train. We’ll cover Thymondas and his lads while they put those jars to good use.”

“Thymondas?”

The son of Mentor leaned forward. “We get in, spread the bitumen around, and get out. Nothing fancy. Once my men are clear, I’ll give the order for it to be lit.” He spat thrice, a gesture to ward off evil.

“When Alexander sends soldiers to snuff the fires,” Memnon said, “we’ll strike from the shadows. Kill as many as you can, but when they begin fighting back—and they will—disengage and make for the Tripylon. Pharnabazus will be at the gate and he’ll sound the call to arms. His archers will cover our withdrawal.”

Amyntas grinned, white teeth glimmering against blackened skin. “Bastards won’t know their arse from a knot hole after we’ve finished with them.”

“Gloat when you’ve brought your men back safely, not before,” Memnon chided. He gestured to the ropes. “Let’s go.”

Amyntas wasted no time. He scampered down the knotted line like a seasoned mountaineer. Thymondas and Memnon followed. Behind them came waves of black-clad fighters, Cretan archers and javelin-wielding
kardakes,
Ionian peltasts and a score of Amyntas’s fellow renegades. They reached the ground and low-crawled to the dry moat, where they quickly vanished down the ladders. Even in the pitch-black bowels of the ditch each man knew his place, his rally-point. Thymondas’s soldiers formed up on the left flank, Memnon’s on the right. Amyntas’s squad of renegades kept to the center. Weapons clattered; Memnon hoped the muffled cursing from stubbed toes or gouged thighs would not give away their position, spoil their plan. He stood still, listening.

Silence. No cries of alarm carried on the still air; no horns or thudding hooves sounded. With an unseen nod, Memnon touched Amyntas’s shoulder. The Macedonian hissed an order; his renegades repositioned the ladders and ascended to the far bank of the moat, fading into the night in the direction of Alexander’s picket lines.

Memnon waited. Seconds stretched on, a lifetime encompassed in each pulsing heartbeat. Hearing nothing, he gave Thymondas a low whistle. One hundred twenty Ionians followed him up the ladders, every second man carrying a jug of bitumen in the crook of his arm—a quarter of their arsenal of incendiaries.

After giving the Ionians time to disperse for their targets, Memnon led the final one hundred sixty men, the Cretans and
kardakes,
up and out of the ditch. The Rhodian had studied this terrain for a month, incorporating its every rise and fold into the defense of the city. He guided his men straight ahead, to where a dry streambed between two low hills, both thick with lonely olive trees and shrubs of wild myrtle, served to mask their movements from prying eyes. Loose soil and scree crunched underfoot, each step an explosion of sound to Memnon’s attenuated hearing.

A half-mile from the walls, the whitish scar of the streambed curled around the shoulder of the hill. Memnon paused; using hand gestures, he deployed his men in a loose skirmish line, led them out of the streambed and to the crest of the slight rise. Vegetation provided added cover. Memnon could see the fires of Alexander’s camp. They were behind the siege engines, now, and even with the towers. He motioned for his men to halt.

Pickets guarded the perimeter of the siege works, but the Rhodian couldn’t discern if they were his men or Alexander’s.
Did I make a mistake in trusting Amyntas?
Then he saw it. Movement. Faster than he could credit, shadows rose behind the five nearest pickets, figures that grappled and bore them to the ground. As each soldier fell, another man emerged from the undergrowth and assumed the picket’s station, leaning on his spear with feigned nonchalance. Soon after, an owl hooted twice, paused, then twice more—Amyntas’s signal for all clear.

Memnon heard the rustle of cloth off to his right; he saw the dark shapes of Thymondas and his men making for the breach in the Macedonian picket line. The Ionians kept low, those with jars of bitumen ahead of those without. Wisely, Mentor’s son kept his raiders from rushing forward in a mass—that many men blundering about the siege train would surely have raised an alarm. Instead, he assigned himself and four others the task of spreading the flammable liquid, two jars at a time. The rest of the Ionians waited in the shadows, ready to exchange full jars for those their comrades emptied. Soon, the acrid stench of bitumen reached Memnon’s nostrils.

A half-hour passed before the deed was done. The Ionians vanished in the darkness, followed by Amyntas and his false pickets. A remaining soldier—surely Thymondas—used a torch snatched from one sentry post to light a trail of bitumen, and then he too disappeared.

Memnon watched as a rivulet of fire raced along the ground, spreading, igniting pools of oil. It reached one of the
katapeltes
first; tongues of flame licked the machine’s oil-soaked wooden chassis, gnawing at torsion cables made from twisted sinew and human hair. With a roar the fire blazed to life, consuming the engine like a corpse on a pyre. It spread to other siege machines, the conflagration following a river of bitumen from engine to ammunition cache, all the way to the base of the nearest siege tower.

From the picket line, a
salpinx
cut through the din of the rising inferno. The alarm spread to the Macedonian camp; Memnon could hear the shouts and cries of engineers roused from sleep. Seeing their beloved creations devoured by flames, they rushed out naked, bearing cloaks and water skins as tools to snuff out the blaze. An officer among them recognized the stench of burning oil.