The Tortoise in Asia (10 page)

On the ground, the cataphract can't get off his back. He's like an overturned sheep heavy with fleece. As he wriggles in the dust, kicking in the air for leverage, Marcus finds a gap in his armour, just under his chin at the junction. He pulls out Owl's Head and rams it in; arterial blood spurts over the man's brightly polished breastplate. Marcus barely hears the hoarse gasp of death before he's off to try again, the fury of battle in his lungs. But suddenly the Parthians break off and retreat.

With the roar of thousands the Romans charge forward. Marcus is at the head of his cohort, sword in the air, shouting “
Ad victoriam, ad victoriam
”. Everyone takes up the cry, lusting for blood and triumph. But they only catch stragglers, the few who fail to get their horses moving fast enough. The rest disappear into the mystic wall. It shifts back, maintaining its distance from the charging Romans, gradually draining their energy. Marcus slows down. “It's useless. We'll never catch them. Stop. Get back into formation.”

An uneasy quiet descends while the Romans dress into the square. Despite the frustration, they're buoyed by their tactical victory. Once again the highly trained infantry has proved its mettle against cavalry. Gaius cries out “Come on you dung worms. Next time we'll pull twice as many off your horses.” The rest of the cohort joins in yelling insults at the enemy, highlighted with derisive laughter.

Surena pulls his cataphracts behind the shining wall. The attack was only a probe; it's time for his main strategy. He says to his second in command,

“Take down the sheets Vardanes. They won't be needed any more – done their job. Did you see how the Romans staggered around? I knew they'd never seen silk before, ha ha ha”.

He's right. The diaphanous cloth has travelled along the Road for years but never farther than Parthia. And its secret composition is still locked up far away in the East, past the great deserts and the mountain barrier. As the wall of light comes down, the kettle drums, silent during the lull in the battle, start up again in full throated roar. Suddenly Gaius says, “Marcus, look over there”. An undifferentiated mass, like a heap of debris, is rolling across the plain, blurred in a cloud of dust. In just a minute, the Romans recognise it as mounted men dressed in open-chested tunics and cloth trousers, forehead bands collecting their wild black hair. Recurved bows wave above their heads, arrow–stuffed quivers on their backs. The ground begins to rumble as they approach and the air fills with war cries in a strange language. The Romans are about to experience the huge torque of the composite bow. Layered with wood and bone it unleashes arrows with enormous penetrating power. It's a product of the East.

Suddenly they split in two and swarm past the square, shooting. Then they stop dividing and the remainder comes straight at Marcus' section, pulling their horses up to fire.

Passing the order from the High Command, Marcus says, “Form the Testudo”. Immediately the troops close ranks and interlock their shields, the front row holding them upright and those behind horizontally. Bronze clashes on bronze. The army is transformed into a Testudo, a tortoise, its soft tissues protected by scales which form a carapace. Capable of standing its ground in the midst of mayhem, it requires the discipline and training only Romans have.

A cloud of arrows rises in a wide black arc, casting shade onto the armies fighting in the sun. In the dim light the projectiles hurtle down like pelting hail, thick and furious. Feathers whoosh through the air, and barbed iron heads hit bronze in chaotic pings. Some of the archers ride close enough to shoot in a straight trajectory, more deadly still. Again and again they fire, in a barrage without end. Inevitably the missiles find junctions in the Testudo – even Romans can't keep the scales from moving, however slightly. Man after man slumps down.

It's as if killer bees, angry that their hive has been disturbed, are in murderous swarm, intent on punishment. They get in everywhere, never stopping. No place is free from them. They'll never be content until their infuriator is stung to death.

Marcus says “Hold firm with your shields. They'll run out of arrows. Barbarians always do. Once they do we'll fight hand to hand. That'll turn the tide.”

But the arrows keep coming. It's as if they're from a magical source that has no limit. They never stop. Casualties are mounting; even the tiniest gaps between the Testudo's scales are penetrated and blood flows freely on the ground. Unless something's done soon, the carnage will weaken the army to the tipping point.

In desperation, Marcus decides to charge. With shouts of “
ad victoriam
” he leads his men into the barrage, shield in front. Before they can reach the enemy however, the archers turn their horses and retreat, twisting their bodies around to continue shooting at the advancing troops. After the battle the Romans call it the Parthian shot.

The charge peters out, arrows creating even more effect. Marcus orders his cohort to pull back and re-form the Testudo. He tries again, once more leading an assault against the retreating swarm; but that fails too, and again a charge, but to no avail. The highly mobile horse archers avoid contact. Roman skills can't be used; they're as useless as grasping at puffs of mist.

As more and more men collapse, doubt, the subverter of courage, infects the army. Paralysis takes hold. No more orders come down the line from the High Command. How can anyone continue to fight a foe that won't engage but kills at a distance?

Doubt morphs into despair – Marcus hears that the cavalry charge of Publius, Crassus' courageous son, has failed. It was the last chance for a break out. Nothing remains now but steady attrition and inevitable collapse.

The arrows keep coming. Some men try to yank them out only to have nerves and veins, even intestines drawn by the barbs. One screams that an arrow has gone through his foot pinning him to the ground; Quintus has his hand stuck to his shield. The darts have more penetrating power than the Romans are used to but it's the never ending quantity that's causing the trouble.

The terrible day comes to an end in a crescendo of suffering. It's as if the troops are standing naked in prison, the jailer thrashing them with a barbed lash. He keeps at it hour after hour with no compassion, oblivious to their pain.

As the western sun splits into horizontal fragments and merciful dusk spreads over the plain, the cloud of arrows thins out, subsides into single shots and ceases altogether. The victors disappear, leaving everything calm except for the groans of the Roman wounded. Even they fold quietly into the dark as their pain is dulled with time and the mortally injured slip into the silence of death. Squadrons of birds fly over, mute as if in sympathy, black shapes against the dimming sky. They're in their nightly migration to the safety of their nests. But some of them spy a meal for the morning.

Marcus flops down, stunned among the dead, wounded and silent others. No one has energy to bury the fallen. Even the stalwart Gaius is sitting listless on the ground, head bowed. Quintus is on his back propped up by one elbow, his torn hand across his chest, head hanging to one side. The impossible has occurred. No experience has prepared them for this. It's beyond comprehension. Today's disgrace blots out the glory from even their greatest achievements.

Covered in dust and blood, some his own, some the enemy's, Marcus wants to say something positive to his comrades, if only to lessen his own depression, but can't think of anything. Defeat ties his tongue. Only something banal could come out and that would do more harm than good. No other words are possible. The shock is even beyond black humour or escape into the absurd. It overwhelms the natural tendency to rationalise failure.

It might have been possible to take comfort in the fact they're not prisoners; the Parthians won the battle but they left the field and are known never to fight at night. However, the beaten troops are beyond thinking, capable only of nightmarish sleep on the open ground. It's to escape, not refresh, for few are that physically tired. Active fighting was impossible after the first few encounters. Casualties are so high the army will never again threaten the enemy. The only course to take now is to retreat to Syria.

❧

Encamped across the plain, the Parthians erupt in exuberance as the horse archers return, one after the other, dismount and join the triumphal feast that has spontaneously started. Casualties are few. Camp fires light up the plain in hundreds of blazing eyes as the victors rejoice with food and wine in the cooling night. They've a right to celebrate; they've won the most important victory in Parthian history; they've saved their country from the power of the West. It was a feat that seemed impossible when they saw the size of the Roman army. Everyone feels a hero, even on par with the Empire's ancestors, the soldiers in the legendary army of Cyrus the Great.

Surena is in his command tent with the senior commanders. Wooden tables accommodate fifty, their black beards soaked in wine. Within easy reach of their greasy fingers are piles of barbequed lamb and duck, flat loaves of bread, and rice. Earthen jugs are in motion, brimming with the best vintage of Shiraz. Slaves move in the uncertain light of oil lamps, keeping the noisy party supplied.

A thousand happy thoughts swirl in his head and like thermal currents in a summer morning lift him off the ground higher and higher into the sky. He touches heaven and feels at home. His face flushed, he stands up unsteadily with a silver goblet in his hand, filled so full that the wine spills in a sheet-like splash over the edge and down his tunic.

“Here's to the greatest victory of all time. Today we've destroyed the pride of Rome, completely smashed it – and with a smaller force. I foresaw that getting them onto the flat ground was the key to victory. Wasting them with our arrows did the trick. The ammunition never ran out – putting it behind the front line speeded up reloading like it was supposed to. Everything worked according to my plan.

“Rome will never be the same again. Never again will those foreign devils invade our land. We've made our Empire safe, impervious to attack. The might of our army is the greatest in the world. Nothing else comes close. We saw that today. Tomorrow we'll finish the rest of the rats off. I look forward to it – my personal pleasure. I'll lead a killing spree myself – I'll wipe them off the face of the earth, ha ha ha.

“Sillaces, send a message to the Roman commander. I give him one night to mourn his son. Then he must decide whether to surrender and walk to the King or be carried there.”

Sillaces, a thick, rough-bearded man, almost as tall as Surena, but ugly and coarse, says,

“I'll see to it, my Lord. But to get Crassus alive we need to persuade him to negotiate; otherwise he may commit suicide. That's the Roman custom.”

“Obviously. You don't need to tell me that. He'll be our greatest prize. But tonight just have one of our men with a loud voice approach the Roman camp. Shout the message across. We'll follow up in the morning.”

A troupe of dancing girls from the Commander's harem, diaphanously erotic, weaves out in front of the revellers, accompanied by flutes. They're as gentle as the men are rough. A wave of silence overtakes the guests. They're entranced by the beauty and grace of the performers but each knows it's worth his life even to speak to one in private.

Music and the lithe movements transport the tipsy banqueters to a universe beyond the battle, a realm of inspiration. There, they sense with even greater clarity the brilliance of their victory, and more keenly enjoy the sweetness of its pleasure. Before the spectacle is finished though, Surena waves nonchalantly, impatient to get back to talking and boasting. The dancers glide off in an elegant curve like a rainbow fading in the distance. He says

“Ariamnes, as I told you, I would reward you if we won. Well we did, and I'm ready to give you a prize”.

He produces a bag of coins from under the table and holds it up. The Arab minces over with shining eyes and takes it with a bow, low and deep. A slight glistening appears on his nose. As he goes back to his seat he looks surreptitiously in the bag. But he sees silver, not gold. How could his grand service be so meagrely rewarded? Before he sits down he says,

“Thank you my Lord; I'm much obliged. But forgive me for saying, I was thinking of a somewhat more valuable reward. I don't wish to overstate my contribution to the great victory, but enticing the Romans onto the open ground, as you yourself said, was the determining factor. Would it be possible for your Lordship to consider something more, particularly since I'll have to share with my tribe, who, as you know, fought valiantly on your side?”

Surena stands up, ramrod straight, red with fury.

“You dog, you insult my generosity. I won't tolerate your insolence. Either you accept your reward with gratitude or you'll have your head cut off. Bring me my sword, Vardanes. I'll do it myself.”

His eyes show the eagerness of the thought. The tent is suddenly silent. Ariamnes' mouth flies open. He doubles over in supplication, shaking so hard he can hardly maintain his balance. His voice quivers and sweat bursts through his skin.

“My noble Lord, I humbly beg – forgiveness. My stupidity. Must've been the wine. Twisting my thoughts. What I said not what I meant. Deeply grateful for your generosity, heavenly generosity, heavenly, heavenly. Not even a king could be so generous. Will be grateful for all time. Never forget, never, never. Will extol your virtues among my tribe. Always be your loyal supporter – and ally. Always, always. Please, please, please forgive my awful transgression. I assure you, not meant. Not meant at all. Please.”