Empire of Dragons (17 page)

‘Not at all. In exchange for our services, he’ll give us food and pay until we reach our destination. A good deal, I’d say.’

‘Magnificent! Go ahead and rest. I’ll take care of organizing the shifts.’

Metellus made another round of the camp before retiring. The oasis was immersed in silence, the fires had been put out and even the animals were sleeping – the asses, mules, big Bactrian camels, slender dromedaries, all fettered, covered with saddlecloths adorned with red and blue tassels. The murmur of the water running through the canals made a counter-melody to the voice of the Khaboras and her majestic current. The moon roused a sparkle of silver from the canals and every now and then the shadow of a bird of prey would pass among the trunks of the century-old palms, their great wings as silent as nocturnal thoughts.

Metellus returned towards Daruma’s tent with the thought of stretching out on a bed of straw for a few hours of true rest, but as he was about to enter he heard snarling coming from the dog tied at the post.

He took a look around. Everything seemed calm. He knew that dogs were able to hear sounds that the human ear could not pick out, or so they said, and he gazed into the distance, beyond the expanse of palm trees to the chalky hills that crowned the oasis to the north. He thought he saw something, like a wisp of barely perceptible fog. But it couldn’t be fog . . .

‘Dust! Horses!’

The sudden awareness that a squad of horsemen was galloping towards the oasis froze the blood in his veins. Their dream was over, but at least they’d die like men, with their swords in their hands. He ran towards the tents and found Balbus on the alert.

‘There’s something wrong, Commander. Birds are taking flight, the animals are restless . . .’

‘Wake everyone, quickly, to arms! There’s a cavalry squad approaching.’

Awakened roughly by the centurion, the men sprang to their feet and gathered around their commander.

‘They’ve come to capture us,’ Metellus told them. ‘But I will not be taken alive; I will not return to that sewer. If you feel as I do, fetch your weapons and follow me.’

They were all beside him in an instant. The sound of galloping was just starting to be heard, off in the distance.

‘No one moves without an order from me. Stay hidden behind these palm trees, near the houses. It is the most sheltered spot. If they surround us, we’ll pull back into that alley between the two houses at our backs, and we’ll fight them off as long as we can. I have no other plan to propose. It’s a choice between quick death and long agony. We must be thankful that we have the chance to choose. All I want to tell you is that I’m proud of you. You are the best soldiers and the dearest friends I could desire. If destiny wants us to be dining together in Hades tomorrow, so be it! Let’s go!’

Each man took up his position behind a palm tree so he could see his commander and his comrades as well. Lucianus and Septimius tensed their bowstrings, Rufus brandished his javelin, Publius and Antoninus gripped their swords, and Severus and Martianus their daggers. The two centurions, Balbus and Quadratus, wielded both sword and dagger and glared at the darkness before them, anticipating the direction and the moment of assault.

All the men were dripping sweat as they waited for the fight to begin, the brief, furious fray that would lead to their deaths.

In that instant of spasmodic tension, Uxal’s voice sounded. ‘Wait. Something’s happening. Look over there!’ He pointed at a path that crossed the eastern part of the oasis, where they soon distinguished a solitary horseman wrapped in a black cloak galloping by like a fury.

‘What in Hades . . .’ muttered Metellus.

Before he could even finish the phrase, the cavalry squad stormed in from the north and crossed the oasis at nearly the same speed as the horseman who had just streaked by. In a few moments they had all disappeared from sight, heading south in a dense cloud of dust.

‘They weren’t looking for us,’ said Uxal.

‘I guess not,’ replied Metellus with a great sigh of relief.

‘It was that horseman they were after,’ observed Quadratus.

‘Did any of you get a good look at him?’ asked Metellus.

Publius stepped forward. ‘He passed so quickly, in the shade of the palm trees, but I could swear it was the same man that was following us, up until the other day.’

‘Don’t listen to him, Commander,’ broke in Rufus. ‘He’s obsessed with that horseman without even knowing who he is. He dreams about him at night. He sees him everywhere, even when he’s nowhere to be found.’

Metellus turned to Publius. ‘What makes you think it was him?’

‘That black cape, his slender build, the way he rides. I’m usually not wrong, Commander.’

Uxal interrupted them. ‘Whether it was him or someone else, it doesn’t matter to us. What does matter is that they’ve gone, and that they weren’t after us. For a moment there I thought it was all over.’

‘So did I,’ admitted Metellus.

‘What’s happening here?’ A voice rang out behind them.

Metellus turned and found Daruma in his nightclothes.

‘A squad of Persian horsemen just crossed the oasis. They seemed to be pursuing another man on horseback who raced through here just before they did.’

Daruma scowled. ‘A lone horseman, you say? Did you see him?’

‘I did,’ said Publius, and he described him as he had to Metellus.

Daruma wrinkled his forehead. ‘In what direction was he heading?’

‘That way,’ Publius said, pointing to a patch of vegetation that extended south along the river.

Daruma sighed and motioned for Metellus to follow him into the tent. ‘Sit down,’ he said as soon as they entered.

‘I prefer standing. I’m more comfortable.’

‘I’m worried . . .’ began the Indian.

‘Do you think it’s the person you were supposed to meet up with?’

‘It may have been him.’

An excited buzz came from outside, dogs barking, people calling out in any number of languages. The people of the caravans had been rudely awakened by that sudden raid, but no explanation could be found, further increasing the confusion.

Daruma retired briefly into a brooding silence, then said, ‘Useless to fret now. There’s nothing I can do. But we must depart immediately. Tomorrow. Have your men ready at dawn, dressed and armed. I’ve had new clothes brought to their tents. We’ll be marching day and night, without cease. We must get to the port on the Khaboras as soon as possible. Rest now, for we have a long journey ahead of us.’

Metellus left to give instructions to Balbus and then came back and lay down on the bedding that had been prepared for him. Before he closed his eyes, bone-tired, he realized that he was going from one adventure to another he knew nothing about.

They left at daybreak, as the cocks’ crows were just starting to sound through the still-dark oasis. They set out without breakfast; food and drink would be distributed on the road.

They marched on all day under a scorching sun. Daruma was perched on a huge camel, topped by a canopy that sheltered him from the sun; he often wet his brow with a moistened handkerchief. Despite his anxiety, he was not one to give up his comforts.

The Khaboras flowed at a short distance to their right, between shores verdant with palm trees, stands of sycamores and fig trees and profuse oleander bushes.

Metellus had drawn up his men to the right and left of the convoy while Uxal followed, riding one of the tamed asses. As they advanced, they began to see all kinds of craft afloat on the river: some were simply wicker vessels over which tanned ox hides had been stretched and coated with bitumen for watertightness, but others had true wooden hulls with wide trapeziumshaped sails and a double helm at the stern, and were sailing upstream. Sometimes the boats were so close to the shore that they could see the faces of the sailors, intent on their rigging. The calcareous bottom of the river bed was usually quite deep; only occasionally were there shallow banks that sloped down in the direction of the current.

When the banks were lower, they would find villages, the houses made of sun-dried mud bricks. Women with earthenware pots on their heads returned from the river, hips swaying gracefully under their load. Naked brown-skinned children played in the water, shouting and splashing. Those little communities seemed much like any other village on their own Internal Sea, or in Mesopotamia or Egypt. And yet the great imperial powers – here, just as on the shores of their own sea – took the young men from those peaceful communities and filled them with hate and aggression towards the enemy to be fought, whoever that might be, sending them off to war. Each of these powers felt they were in the right, each thought that their own world was the best possible and should be expanded and imposed wherever possible.

Metellus had had such thoughts before, and remembered them well. But he also remembered that the more he travelled and visited other countries, the more he became convinced that his own world was the only one worth living in. He had never, in any other place, encountered a concept and an idea of man that could be compared to what the civilizations of Athens and Rome had produced. His long, cruel imprisonment at the mercy of an enemy who had no respect for people’s rights, no respect for someone who had shown courage, valour and loyalty, had only confirmed this conviction.

He could understand how the others, the foreigners, could be sure they were in the right. But he could not forget that Valerian, his emperor, had lost his freedom and his life because he had trusted his adversary, because he had felt that any risk could be faced to attain and uphold peace in every corner of the known world, from the shores of the Atlantic to the mouth of the Indus.

Absorbed in these thoughts, he marched in silence under the burning sun.

T
HERE NO PARTICULAR
obstacles to set them back during their journey. Towards dusk a small group of armed men who may have been brigands appeared, but the sight of the impressive display of Roman weaponry dissuaded them from taking the offensive, had that been their intention. They rode off on their dromedaries, disappearing behind a rise in the terrain.

The port appeared the evening of the next day. It was a dusty city, tucked into a bend of the river, surrounded by palm trees of every kind and by thickets of red and white oleanders. A small wharf made of fired bricks sheltered the bend and allowed the mooring of a good number of vessels.

Daruma advised Metellus and his men to cover their faces with the cloth they wore swathed around their heads. He was almost sure that there would be Persian soldiers in the port, or spies lying in wait to snare their game.

‘Scatter,’ he said, ‘but don’t lose sight of one another.’ He showed them a green flag. ‘When you see this hanging from the yard of one of the boats, that means it’s ours. You can board it as soon as night falls, but get on a few at a time, not all at once. Keep your weapons hidden under your cloaks and don’t pick a quarrel with anyone. Don’t speak among yourselves, because if a spy hears half a word in Latin you’re dead. Communicate using gestures and only when you’re sure no one’s looking. Remember that this is the last obstacle standing between you and your freedom. If you get through today, your imprisonment will be a distant memory. If you make a false step, it could cost you everything you’ve accomplished until now. The last moments will be the most dangerous. The slightest thing could tip them off: a glance or an expression, a word that slips out at the wrong moment, or in the wrong place. Remember, if you are caught, I don’t know you. I’ve never seen you. Is that clear? And I’ll never be able to do anything for you, ever.’

‘You’ve already done so much, Daruma,’ replied Metellus, ‘and we don’t want you risking your life for us. We can take care of ourselves. I’ll instruct my men.’

‘Fine. We’ll separate now, then.’

Metellus and his men decided not to enter the taverns that lined the wharf and not even to buy food from the stalls so as not to attract attention. They ate stale bread and drank water from their flasks as they walked down the crowded streets of the little town with an indifferent air.

The merchants’ stands offered a great assortment of wares: dates, unleavened bread baked in brick ovens, dried salted fish as well as the day’s catch from the river. There were deliciouslooking peaches, along with squashes, melons and little wild pears that looked very hard. There were plenty of animal vendors as well, selling snakes, monkeys, brightly feathered birds of a kind they’d never seen before. The men were fascinated by that spectacle, by the odours of the roasted meats, the exotic condiments and the spices and even the perfumes contained in jars of coloured glass and alabaster.

It was difficult to understand the prices, but it was clear that the perfumes were only for the wealthy; merchants with purses full of silver haggled loudly in every language and then made their deals, buyer and seller both convinced they’d struck a good bargain.

It was the first time that Metellus was travelling as a free man outside the confines of the empire. He had thought many times of making such a journey, but the empire was so vast that by the time you were near the border, you realized it was time to turn back.

He felt out of place, but excited at the same time; the situation gave him a new sensation, a kind of dizziness brought on by the immensity of it all, the lack of confines and limits. He realized that Asia had dimensions that were immeasurable and that a virtual infinity of peoples inhabited it. He thought of those unvarying expanses they had traversed, the deserted plains, the unchanging white of the cloudless skies. He recalled stories of fabulous animals and peoples that he had read in the pages of Pliny and the
De Mirabilibus
and he realized that those monstrous forms of nature only existed in men’s imaginations. As exploration and knowledge achieved the upper hand over fantasy, the monsters had to be relegated to ever more remote regions. Or perhaps the ancient heroes – Hercules, Theseus, Odysseus – had already destroyed all the monsters long ago. Even Alexander must have been disappointed when he got to India and found neither hippogriffs nor chimeras nor mining ants that dug gold out of the bowels of the earth.