Thunder of the Gods (45 page)

‘Really?’

‘Really. Far be it from a man of my status to discuss matters of the flesh with a barbarian such as yourself, but I can assure you that real Parthian women are very different from any experience you may have enjoyed before. And of course with you being … different … they’ll be all over you from the moment you step ashore. Women, eh?’

Tertius thought for a moment.

‘And they’re not going to want to take us to this city of theirs then?’

Gurgen laughed.

‘A handful of sailors? I’d have thought not. It will be the tribune here who has the opportunity to enjoy imperial hospitality, and possibly his escorts. The court does so enjoy being treated to the sight of men from far-off kingdoms. Especially men as … colourful … as these. You, I expect, will be required to wait for them to return, with nothing better to do than entertain a succession of curious females. I expect it will become boring eventually …’

‘I think we can take that chance.’

Tertius turned to his crew.

‘You heard the man. Get rowing!’

Marcus leaned closer to Gurgen.

‘Really? It all sounded a little unlikely to me.’

The Parthian grinned back at him.

‘Your crew needed motivation – I provided it. In truth, since the port of Idu is, I believe, the highest point on the river that is navigable to ships from the ocean to the south, it is already well populated by seafaring men from far more interesting places than Syria. I suspect your sailors will very quickly come to realise that when it comes to female company, they will be paying customers like every other man in the port. Let us hope they have heavy purses.’

If Marcus had expected any sort of reception, hostile or otherwise, he was swiftly disabused by the sight that greeted them as they rounded the river bend and came in sight of Idu.

The
Night Witch
’s crew stared open-mouthed at the port’s crowded wharves, both sides of the river solid with moored shipping from which bales, crates, bundles and casks were being loaded and unloaded by an army of toiling dock workers.

‘This is the last port on the navigable stretch of the river. Some of these ships have sailed here from ports too distant to be recorded on any map you Romans will ever have cause to use, bringing goods for shipment on to your empire that will make the merchants involved, and many men besides, rich.’

Gurgen pointed to a stretch of dock where several smaller vessels were being unloaded.

‘Put us in there.’

Tertius frowned.

‘But there’s no space.’

‘Get me close enough, and there soon will be.’

Once
Night Witch
was within hailing distance, he shouted a peremptory order at the closest of the supervisors, pointing at the recumbent Osroes. The man on the dockside visibly blanched, turning tail and running for the office where the cargoes were tallied and taxes levied. He returned a moment later with an official who was clearly his superior, and whose evident belief in that superiority, already tottering, was punctured equally swiftly by whatever it was that the Parthian noble said to him. As the crew watched with increasing amusement, a man wearing a sword strode down the dock and pushed his way through the gathering crowd, waving away their protests and directing the half-dozen soldiers following him to push them back out of the way. Turning to the river he called out a challenge in slow and heavily accented Greek, clearly still of the belief that the whole thing was a simple misunderstanding between the dock officials and a hapless trader.

‘State your business!’

Gurgen replied with equal pugnacity, his patience clearly at its end.

‘The man lying here is King Osroes of Media, beloved son of the King of Kings, may Ahura Mazda bless him with continued good health. If you do not clear a stretch of dock to enable me to bring him ashore immediately, then your master will be given the choice as to whether it is your head or his that adorns the gates of this city, when I finally find someone to speak to who is not an idiot. Perhaps this will help you to decide …’

He fished Osroes’ crown from the bag in which it had been carried from Nisibis, holding it aloft.

‘This is the crown of Media! And that man is the son of your emperor!’

‘Greetings. You are honoured guests of the King of Kings. I am Artapanes, and on the behalf of my chief priest Bagadates I am bidden to greet you to Ctesiphon, and to extend the hospitality of our city to you.’

The priest had appeared on the dockside moments after a century-sized unit of Parthian guardsmen, and after a brief and vigorous discussion had led Marcus and the two Britons away while the soldiers had lifted the semi-conscious Osroes from the
Night Witch
and closed ranks around the king. The friends were provided with transport, horses for Marcus and Martos and a cart for Lugos, then escorted from the port to the gates of the empire’s capital, Ctesiphon, where they were met by a party of the priest’s acolytes armed with staffs and knives. Leading the three men through the city, Artapanes delivered them to an unprepossessing building in the shadow of a magnificent walled fortress. Only in the apparent safety of what he had termed a guest house, was the priest willing to speak. Martos looked about him, taking in the opulent furnishings and wall hangings.

‘Your city is vast, a place of wonders for a northerner such as myself. May I walk the streets and enjoy the sights that are to be found?’

The priest who had met the party at the dockside shook his head with a small smile.

‘Regrettably not. My senior has ruled that your presence on the streets might present you with more risk than he deems acceptable to such important guests. Were anything to happen to you it is doubtful that Rome would consider the matter an accident. And as you know, our relationship with Rome is still more than a little … strained. The high priest has ruled that you are ambassadors of your respective nations.’

He looked up at Lugos, shaking his head.

‘Wherever they might be.’

Marcus stepped forward.

‘I am Marcus Tribulus Corvus, a representative of Rome, an ambassador if you prefer the term. I have come to Ctesiphon in order to return the King of Kings’ son to him, and to ask the king—’

‘In good time. That you are Roman is evident to all who see you, and your self-professed role is of no interest to the priesthood. And these two men?’

‘I am Martos, King of the Votadini people in the Roman province of Britannia, far to the north of here. And this is Lugos of the Selgovae, my friend and travelling companion.’

The priest looked at Martos for a moment.

‘King? Of how large a kingdom?’

The one-eyed Briton laughed.

‘Small enough, compared to your King of Kings’ empire. But enough to have given the Romans a bloody nose in battle, before my brother in arms here captured me.’

Artapanes shook his head again.

‘A tale the King of Kings will wish to hear, I expect. You will meet him soon enough, and when that time comes I will instruct you as to your behaviour in his presence. For now, you are under strict instructions to stay within the confines of this building, for your own safety. Not all of my people will be as understanding as my master, and many still remember the atrocities inflicted on the city by your legions only twenty years ago. You will be fed and refreshed, and any other needs you have will be looked after by the staff assigned to watch over you. I must leave now, and take information to my senior priest.’

He left the room, and when Martos looked out of the door he found a pair of burly and implacable guards blocking any attempt to follow him.

‘It looks as if we’re here for a while. Perhaps you could use that Greek language of yours and get them to bring us some food?’

Marcus nodded.

‘You realise we’re effectively within the Parthian royal court now? If they’ve decided to have us quietly disappear then poison would be a good way to do so.’

The Briton shrugged.

‘That may be true, but it’s also indisputable that we can’t go without sustenance. Get them to bring some wine as well. If we’re going to die we might as well go to meet our ancestors with some style.’

‘You called for me? I presume it’s important, given the messenger gabbled out the request like a man with his arse on f—’

Still breathing hard from the exertions of climbing up to the northern wall’s parapet, Scaurus followed his first spear’s pointing arm.

‘The enemy are breaking camp.’

The legatus took a long look across the expanse of plain before them. The Parthian infantry were parading in neat formations, while the camp slaves were rapidly striking their tents and packing them onto carts.

‘So they are.’

Petronius grinned at him triumphantly.

‘They’ve had enough! I knew they wouldn’t be able to outlast us! More than one enemy has camped out there to no purpose, and this one’s no different.’

His eyes narrowed at the expression on Scaurus’s face as the legatus looked over the enemy army.

‘Legatus?’

Scaurus looked down at the enemy army again, shaking his head as he realised what it was that was troubling him.

‘They’re not leaving. Look at them. Does that look like an army that’s getting ready to slink away with its tail between its legs? Their flags are unfurled, the infantry are armed and ready to fight.’

‘Why?’

Both men looked round at Julius, who was staring down at the enemy soldiers with a thoughtful expression.

‘Why now? They’ve no more chance of getting over these walls now than they did yesterday, or last week. I’d presume they were just rehearsing for an attack, if they weren’t striking their tents.’

Scaurus leaned over the parapet, looking around the wall’s sweep to the west.

‘But they’re only striking their tents across a quarter-mile front on this side of the city.’

As he spoke, the huge command tent that had been the source of so much amusement collapsed as its central poles were removed, the movement catching Scaurus’s eye as he turned and stared down at the Parthian army in puzzlement. The three men stood and watched as the structure’s white canvas roof sank slowly to the ground, hundreds of slaves converging on the expanses of canvas and dragging it away from the river with no apparent concern for any damage they might do.

‘And that doesn’t make any sense either. Why treat such a valuable piece of equipment with so little care?’

As the previously concealed riverbed was gradually revealed, Scaurus suddenly made the connection that had been nagging at his subconscious since the river had ceased flowing days before, confirming his suspicion that the Parthians had dammed it in the mountains to the north.

‘Gods below! Look at the riverbed!’

With the tent no longer obstructing their view, the reason for the construction of what they had taken for a palatial headquarters became suddenly, sickeningly clear. A ten-foot-deep trench the same width as the river’s bed had been dug from the point where the Mygdonius swung to the east in its bend around the city, the excavation running arrow-straight from the dry watercourse towards the city walls for a hundred paces, the last quarter of its length gradually becoming shallower until the ramp this formed merged with the sandy soil. The soil from its excavation had been dumped into the empty river bed to form a fresh dam at the point where trench and watercourse met, its purpose immediately clear to Scaurus.

‘They didn’t build a dam in the hills to run us out of water, they were building a weapon!’

Petronius stared at him in consternation.

‘They’re going to break the dam?’

‘Yes! And when they do, all the water they’ve got backed up in the hills is going to come down the river with more power than a hundred battering rams! That trench they’ve dug will point the flood straight at this section of the wall, and they’ve dammed the river to make sure the water has nowhere else to go. It will bring tonnes of soil and rock with it, which will shoot down that trench and hit this wall like a monstrous hammer.’

‘But if that much water breaks through the walls …’

Scaurus nodded grimly.

‘There’ll be chaos in the city.’

Julius tilted his head.

‘Listen!’

The distant sound of axes on wood turned Petronius’s face white. Scaurus turned to Julius, pointing at the perfectly straight streets beneath them.

‘If the water breaks this wall down it’ll be channelled through the streets and do the same on the other side. Get the southern wall evacuated!’

The first spear saluted and ran, and the legatus turned to the prefect.

‘I’ll deal with the wall here, you get as many of the streets between here and the southern wall as you can evacuated to the east and west!
Go!
’

Petronius dithered for an instant, then turned and ran for the nearest tower.

‘Centurion!’

The officer of the guard stepped forward and saluted smartly.

‘Have this section of the wall cleared immediately. We take anything that we can carry and we leave everything that’s too heavy to move. I want every man four towers away from this point and I want it doing
now
!
Move!
’

Clearly fighting the urge to question the command, the centurion turned away and started barking orders, sending men running to spread the order in both directions. Scaurus turned back to the scene below, nodding in reluctant admiration as the enemy troops on either side of the river started marching away.

‘Perfect timing …’

In the hills behind the Parthians the sound of axes had died away, and an unnatural silence descended on the field as the enemy soldiers halted their march, leaving a quarter-mile gap in their line with the river at its heart.

‘Legatus!’

Looking round, Scaurus realised that he was the subject of consternation from the men who had been cleared from the wall’s platform a hundred paces to his right. The centurion who had called his name beckoned with frantic gestures, and he started walking slowly towards them, his attention riveted to the plain below. A sudden, tearing crack echoed across the plain, and for a moment the silence descended again. Then the roar of the released waters reached them, initially distant, then rapidly swelling as the Mygdonius’s pent-up flow was unleashed down the valley, still invisible from the fortress’s walls. As he watched in fascination, the torrent burst into view from the end of the river’s gorge, a wall of furious white water speckled with tiny dots that the horrified legatus realised were boulders and uprooted trees, tossed effortlessly by the flood’s elemental power.