[Gaius Valerius Verrens 06] - Scourge of Rome (45 page)

Simon had stared at them for a long time, until they began to shift uncomfortably. The bones in the cheeks of a few showed they’d experienced hunger, but most still wore the fleshy look of the well fed. He thought of the thousands willingly fighting and dying to keep the Romans out of the city, the hundreds of thousands sleeping on the streets who sought only to survive, and felt nothing but contempt for these people. Simon bar Giora was a large man and his anger showed, making the men closest to him step back.

‘God dictates my actions as he does yours.’ He allowed fury to pervade his voice. ‘It is God’s will that we are here fighting for our children’s future, and that of their children. We will no longer be subject to Rome, or we will die as free men. I need food so my soldiers have the strength to fight. From now on, any man who does not fight does not eat. I know you all,’ he’d looked at them one by one, ‘and I know you keep hidden food stores in your warehouses and your shops. I know your wives eat well while others go hungry. I know every house of yours contains a secret hoard of wealth, for you are the kind of men who would not willingly be parted from it. Well, I have a bargain for you. You have two days to bring all your food and a third part of your gold to me. If I believe any one of you has cheated me, I will have every house searched and your families put to the question. Till now I have not had the men to do this and hold the walls, but you will have noticed that my kingdom has shrunk in recent days. Now, I can give you the attention you deserve.’ They stared back at him with loathing and he smiled. ‘You should be thankful it is God’s will there are no longer poor Jews and rich Jews in Jerusalem, only Jews fighting for survival. I have made it easier for you to reach heaven.’

John of Gischala also had a substantial hoard of food he believed Simon didn’t know about. Simon needed the merchants’ gold to purchase a share of it for his men. Since the attack on the Antonia fortress, John had moved into the temple complex and Simon was on his way there now. His route was complicated because the bridge connecting the temple to the palace district was sealed off. To reach the temple mount, he must go south to Herod’s Theatre, then descend into the Tyropoeon valley before turning north towards the temple’s main gate. On previous visits his only escort had been Zacharias, but today ten spearmen accompanied him. John of Gischala’s moods were always mercurial and unpredictable, but of late he’d become ever more erratic and deadly. Of course, if John decided to kill him ten men wouldn’t prevent him, but they might make him stop and think.

They turned a corner into a street of steep steps Simon found oddly familiar. This was where he’d met the woman Judith and her little family. Suddenly it became very important that they survived. The spearmen carried food to bribe any guards who decided to make life difficult. Simon decided he would give it to Judith if she still occupied the same position. His heart quickened as he recognized the little makeshift shelter, but one look confirmed his fears. A pair of bony legs protruded from the entrance, the angle of the feet a certain indication of their owner’s status.

He leaned against the wall and closed his eyes. No need to look, the situation was plain enough. But he wouldn’t continue without showing her this one last measure of respect. Suddenly, Judith represented all the hundreds of thousands of Passover refugees crammed into the city. He forced himself to pull back the cloth opening, careful not to touch the dead body. A single brush of the hand would require him to undergo ritual purification before entering the temple. A swarm of black flies greeted him and he closed his mouth because the stink was so thick he could almost taste it.

Judith lay on her back with a child in each twig-thin arm, but not the Judith he remembered. All dead, of course; starved, and difficult to know which died first. There’d been a baby but he saw no evidence of it. The flies had laid their eggs in dark eyes now transformed into squirming pits of maggots. A face that was mere bone overlaid by desiccated flesh. He felt the urge to vomit, but managed to curb it. What was it she had said?
The children of Israel will prevail
. Where is your faith now, lovely Judith of Ephraim? A tear ran down his cheek and his mind cried out for support. God aid me, I cannot go on without your help. Give me a sign that what I am doing is right, and not just a matter of foolish pride.

But of course there was no sign. He looked to where the gleaming roof of the temple was just visible in the afternoon sun. What if … No, he couldn’t afford to have doubts. If he was not strong, how could he expect others to be strong? He must believe. With a last look at what had been Judith he reversed out of the shelter.

He turned to the escort commander. ‘Have four men take these people and find somewhere to bury them, Isaac. We have no priest, but say what words you feel are right over them.’

‘Lord, I …’

‘Just do it.’ The Judaean leader’s voice held a fury that made the other man flinch. ‘And when we are done with John, remove every body from the streets and the houses. It shames us that our dead lie for all to see.’ He saw the doubt on Isaac’s face. ‘Round up every man who cannot or will not carry a sword. They too can make a contribution. I know …’ he shook his head, suddenly death weary, ‘I know we cannot bury them all. But we must do something. Is the gate to the ledge above Gehenna still open?’

‘The Romans kill anyone who tries to use it.’

‘Then do it at night. Do you understand?’

‘I understand that.’ Isaac met his gaze without flinching. ‘But not why you insist on meeting John of Gischala with only six guards. Are you so fond of death?’

Simon’s expression didn’t change. ‘What is death to Simon bar Giora, ruler of a city of the dead?’

No man could fail to be impressed by the Great Temple of Jerusalem. As he approached the Huldah Gates, Simon’s eyes were dazzled by the sun’s glare on the massive polished blocks of white sandstone. The beaten bronze covering the gates glowed like hot coals. Galilean warriors guarded the wide stairway, but word had been sent of his coming and they stepped aside. He passed upwards through the centremost of the triple gateways, overlooked by hundreds more of John’s men watching curiously from the walls above.

The stairway opened out on to a broad court ranging the length and breadth of the complex. Massive columns supported a covered walkway. Like every Judaean, Simon knew they numbered one hundred and sixty-two. The walkway’s ceiling was a wonder of carved woods – mahogany and walnut, cedar and olive – depicting figures from the Torah. In the past, men selling cattle, sheep and doves for sacrifice would have filled the precinct. Now hundreds of tents of cloth and leather covered the court, temporary shelters for John of Gischala’s men. Dark patches and piles of ashes from the warriors’ cooking fires stained the once pristine paving of the Court of the Gentiles. The raw stink of fresh excrement indicated that the simple number of men had overcome both the limited latrine facilities and, more tellingly, their reluctance to defile the sanctity of this sacred precinct.

Weary eyes followed his progress through the maze of shelters, but no man attempted to impede him.

Towards the temple.

Built a hundred years earlier on the instructions of the first Herod Agrippa, the sheer scale of the building inspired awe, as its creator intended. It was constructed of the same polished sandstone as the walls and stood on a raised platform in the centre of the court. As commanded by God, it faced east across the breadth of the complex, less a temple than a giant walled fortress with a great tower at its centre.

Steps climbed to three doors in the long wall that faced him, but Simon’s progress took him to the main, eastern entrance.
Ballistae
strikes from the Roman war machines on the Mount of Olives had pitted the frontage. He was thankful he’d chosen a moment when the legionaries were conserving their ammunition. Temple guards stopped him at the base of the steps and sent word inside to John of Gischala.

While they waited, Simon heard a regular sharp metallic clang and wondered what mischief his rival was up to. A few moments later a bearded officer appeared whom Simon recognized as the man who had explained John’s battle plans at their last meeting.

‘My commander begs your pardon, but he asks that you enter alone.’ The leader of Simon’s escort shook his head, but the Judaean raised a hand for patience. The soldier continued: ‘Naturally, he guarantees your safety and that of your men.’

‘Very well.’ Simon waved aside his guard’s protest. If he wanted to talk to John here it could only be on his terms. ‘I place my life in his hands.’

He followed the man up the steps and into a broad, open chamber. Smoke from a brazier swirled in the soft breeze to tickle his nostrils and the air was heavy with heat and the acrid scent of metalworking. The surroundings were a sharp contrast to the industrial scene that greeted him. Sumptuous hangings in vibrant blues, reds, golds and greens covered every wall, almost giving the impression of being in the centre of an enormous garden.

This was the inner precinct known as the Court of the Women, where wives and daughters could watch the ceremonies from the galleries above. It contained four equally open secondary chambers: the Chamber of the Nazerites, reserved for a priestly sect utterly devoted to the service of God, and the Chamber of Wood, the contents normally used to burn temple offerings, but currently feeding the blaze beneath a large cauldron in the Chamber of Lepers, which was also being helped along with measured helpings from the contents of the Chamber of Oils.

John of Gischala sat upon his throne in the centre of the room watching two of his men laboriously sawing a solid gold table apart. Two others worked to free gemstones from the fastenings that fixed them in position. Despite his impatience, Simon took a moment to study this astonishing work of art being destroyed before his eyes. It must have been three paces long and one and a half broad, with legs the length of a Roman
gladius
. The top had a raised border a hand’s breadth in height and formed from a single twisted rope of gold which made three continuous circuits of the surface. Cunningly worked into the inner and outer faces of the rope were layers of precious stones fixed by golden pins. More gems, fashioned into the shape of eggs, decorated the table top. Not content, the artists who created this wonder had made crowns containing ears of corn, and all kinds of fruits – pomegranates, dates, apples and grapes, all formed from jewels of the same colour as the fruits themselves – and fastened them with a band of gold to the lower part of the table. A second solid gold surface, equally elaborately decorated, served to strengthen the legs, worked in the form of lilies entwined with grapevines.

Simon winced as the teeth of the iron saw bit into the gold. It tore great rips in the soft metal and showered dust and shavings to be collected on a curtain spread below the table. Eventually the two men laid down the saw and twisted part of the upper surface free, carried it to the cauldron and placed it inside.

‘It is a gaudy thing, is it not?’ John of Gischala’s voice brought an end to Simon’s horrified inspection. The Galilean waved a hand to where another four men worked with hammer and die on circular moulds filled with gold to create coins by the hundred. ‘Better to use the gemstones to bribe the Roman guards and the coins to pay my soldiers. They fight for a noble cause, but a man still needs an incentive that provides hope for the future. I hear you’ve been stripping the Upper City and minting your own?’

John accompanied the words with a sly leer and tossed one of the coins so Simon had to catch it. Simon looked down at the shining circle in his hand and read the crude legend circling the rim.

‘What do you think?’ John seemed genuinely interested in his opinion.

‘Freedom of Zion? A fine sentiment.’

‘We also have them in silver and bronze denominations.’ John’s lips twitched into that peculiar mirthless smile. ‘But I so wanted a gold coin, and of course my supply is much more reliable than yours.’ The knowing look in his eyes confirmed his knowledge of Simon’s meeting with the priests. ‘They came bleating to me to stop your ravages, but I sent them away. Bleed them dry and kill them all for all I care. A merchant without wares or a priest without a temple is just another useless mouth to feed.’

Simon was curious. ‘Does it not concern you to destroy the treasures that have been in our keeping for ten generations?’

A dismissive shrug of the shoulders. ‘What good is treasure if it cannot help those who hold it in their time of need? But you did not come here to talk about gold, I think.’

‘I would discuss my assessment of our situation with you.’

‘Very well.’ John’s gaze drifted towards the sweating workers. ‘We will find more privacy inside.’ He led the way through a curtained door between the Chamber of Wood and the Chamber of Lepers and they passed through a narrow room – ‘the Court of the Israelites,’ John announced, as if he were showing Simon around his home. Beyond it lay a much larger space with a massive stone altar at the rear. The altar, along with a strange-looking bronze vessel the height of a man and equipped with twelve spigots, identified the room as the Court of the Priests. Priests would use water from the laver to sanctify themselves before the ritual of the daily sacrifice. The floor on all four sides sloped away from the altar to an open conduit carrying a stream of clear water – John must have managed to maintain his own supply. Blood from a recent sacrifice still dripped down the side of the altar and ran into the conduit where it drained away in a trail of smoky pink. On one of eight marble tables to one side lay the flayed carcass of a sheep.

John saw his look. ‘The priests accused me of defiling the temple and wanted to suspend their rituals, but I persuaded them that God’s help may tilt the balance in our favour. An assessment, you said? I was most impressed with your little trick. You almost had them when you lured them inside the second wall. If only you had made me a part of your plans, victory might already have been ours.’

Simon stared at him. Could he really be so naive as to think a minor setback and a few hundred casualties would drive Titus away? ‘We lost too many men and they did not lose enough to make a difference,’ he replied. ‘It won’t make them give up. Has the siege dyke caused you problems on this flank?’