Stealing Fire (23 page)

“Yes,” I said, and a chill ran down my back, as though someone had put a cold hand on me. “And yet was it not worth it, if all the hearths in the world are kindled from that stolen fire?”

Alexander nodded slowly, his eyes on mine, gray and rimmed with black, eyes to see eternity with. “It was indeed worth it.”

I laid my heart on the earth, like a libation, though it thundered in my breast. “My Lord, will you accept my oath?”

“Yes,” he said gravely as I knelt.

The crushed stone of the path was rough beneath my knees and above the careless stars turned on in their wheeling dance. “I, Lydias of Miletus, do give my word to you, Alexander, to be your true man waking and sleeping, in all things great and small, to obey you and die at your command, for all time.”

“All time is too long,” he said. “Say rather while life and breath lasts, as otherwise there may come a time when you regret these words.”

“Then I will regret,” I said, and raised my eyes to his.

Alexander searched my face, and I did not know what he sought and found there. “Rise, Lydias, true Companion, and know that I understand the full worth of your gift.” His hand when he touched me burned with fever.

“You should go and lie down, my Lord,” I said. “Or perhaps return to the pool if it eases you.”

“I will,” he said, turning, then stopped with one hand on the bathhouse door, his eyes bright. “I will see you again, Lydias,” he said.

“Of course, my Lord,” I said. Of course he would see me often, in the natural order of things.

Instead, he died four days later.

THE BATTLE OF
CAMEL'S FORT

W
e heard the battle before we saw it. There is no sound like it—the rumble of so many hooves and feet, the shouts of thousands of men, the crash and scream of arms. It was midafternoon, and the sun had slipped westward from its zenith.

Awkwardly, I wrapped the reins around my left hand, passing them between thumb and fingers, and drew sword with my right. “Forward!”

I held my horse to a walk as the two Iles formed up, the first with Glaukos on the point, myself in the rear between the Companion Cavalry and the fifty horse archers. I would follow the charge, not lead it. I swept the sword point forward, my voice carrying over the din. “Ptolemy and Egypt!”

And let it go.

We came in like a loosed arrow, straight into their flank.

On the other side of the ford, our fort still held, but that was about all one could say for it. The wooden palisades Artashir had repaired were torn and gaping, huge gaps between trampled sections. Perdiccas had let the elephants at them, and the results were unmistakable.

Half of his men were across the river, scaling ladders raised to the walls, a full phalanx of infantry about the base of the ladders, shields raised above their heads to ward off the Egyptian archers on the wall above. The other half of his men were either midstream or still on our bank, horse archers held in reserve and some others. Twenty men or so were struggling with a massive elephant, its eyes streaming blood and gore. Our defenders on the wall had blinded the lead elephant, and in its pain it rampaged through their lines while its handlers tried to calm it. Another elephant stood some distance away on the opposite shore, its flanks heaving. The platform on its back was smashed to splinters and its driver dangled head down, dead, from its neck, still held on by the straps of his harness.

As the first Ile of our cavalry plunged like a knife into the flank of the men on our side of the river, I saw something I could not have seen had I been in the front of the charge. To our right Perdiccas’ camp lay open.

Artashir and the horse archers were still behind me. They were not meant for the shock of a charge against heavy infantry.

“Artashir!” I shouted. “The camp!”

He could see where I pointed—the elaborate tents with their gilded posts that must surely belong to Perdiccas. To Perdiccas, or to the boy king and his mother.

Artashir met my eyes, and there was no need for further words. “I'll get the child,” he said, and with a shout his men formed up around him, riding hard for the camp and Alexander's son.

I followed the charge instead. We were pressing deep into the side of Perdiccas’ reserve phalanx, and had come down on them so fast that they hadn't had time to change facing. A sarissa is twice a man's height in length, and as the phalanx advances the ranks are staggered, so that each sarissa goes between the men of the rank ahead of it. In order to turn the entire formation, each man must be able to lift his sarissa free and rotate ninety degrees, maintaining proper distance and dress between ranks, and then lower his sarissa again between the men now before him. This is a maneuver practiced over and over on the drill field, because it is difficult to do without someone fouling up and blocking others. It is doubly difficult to do on the battlefield, especially with cavalry crowding into the front ranks, swords in hand.

They had not managed to do it, and as always happens in these situations, some men had dropped their sarissas and drawn sword as our horsemen got in too close. Which meant those sarissas now fouled other men, lying across theirs at wrong angles and preventing them from turning to the new facing, or just released without being put properly down. This was the right chaos. This was good chaos. And it benefited us.

I raised my sword again. “Ptolemy and Egypt! Press it home!” We were giving a lot better than we were taking, but a seasoned phalanx wouldn't break easily.

My horse screamed and shied, and I fought to stay with her, the reins still wound around my left hand. I hadn't the strength in the hand. I couldn't hold her as she fought. Their horse archers had engaged, and an arrow had burned along her side, lodging nearly spent in the fleshy part of her rump. It was far from a mortal wound, but she struggled and panicked.

I got the rein loose and slid down her off side, trying to get clear of her before she threw me entirely, my feet skidding in the dust. I made a better target for their horse archers than our men, who were now hopelessly tangled up with their phalanx.

I saw his shadow move along the ground rather than saw him, and without even thinking turned, my sword in guard. The infantryman who had come at me was one of the Silver Shields, his beard threaded with gray. I saw his eyes flicker to my left hand as our blades connected. He saw I had a bad hand. Would that translate to a bad side?

He feinted to my left, testing me, but I had seen his eyes and blocked to the right instead, catching the return strongly. And then it was cut and thrust, guard and block, the deadly dance. I was younger than he, but I had been up all night. Thrust and block, neither with the advantage, sweat running down my brow.

I do not know how it would have ended if not for the horns and shouting. Perdiccas was ordering the recall. Still horsed and able to see somewhat above the fray, he must have seen Artashir sprinting for the camp. Now he shouted the recall, that all the infantry on this side of the river must rally immediately to prevent losing the prize.

My opponent hesitated for half a second, then turned and charged off toward the camp. I did not pursue. My chest heaved with my breath. Too many months on leave, I thought, if one combat should wear me out!

I looked about for my horse, but she was nowhere to be seen. “Fuck,” I said under my breath. Dismounted I couldn't tell what was going on, nor could I give orders. One of my troopers was some little distance away, but I could not make him hear me in the din. I had always thought that squires and bodyservants were an affectation in battle, but now I could see the use of them. A general who can't see what's going on is useless.

There was a thunder of hooves, and a dozen horse archers thundered down on me. It took a moment to distinguish that these were ours, not theirs, since all were clad alike.

“I need a horse!” I shouted in Persian, and one of them pulled up and extended a hand to me.

I came up behind him. “Many thanks!” I shouted in his ear. “Where is Artashir?”

“Right behind,” he yelled back. “We did not get through to the tent because the heavy infantry got back before we were done with the guards. Artashir said to disengage.”

I looked about, but in the dust and chaos I could see nothing, certainly not Artashir.

“Make for the river,” I shouted. “We need to get back across to the fort.” If we got stuck on the wrong side of the river with their superior numbers of both cavalry and horse archers, we'd get crushed.

By now, the flow of troops was in reverse, Perdiccas’ men breaking off the attack and returning to their camp, and our men going the other way. Fortunately, at this point the ford was quite shallow, hardly up to the horses’ bellies. We floundered across at the southernmost end.

By the time we were on the opposite shore a few of my own men had joined us, and I traded for the horse of a trooper who had been wounded. He was a youngish stallion and he had been spooked quite a bit, so it took my good hand to hold him in and get him to bear a new rider. Really, I thought, as I walked him in a circle where we were forming up, he was too green for this, but we had run through the remounts quickly. We were going to need more horses, good Nisean blooded horses that had the size for a man in steel. The little horses the archers used were not large enough. I doubted there was a Nisean broodmare in all Egypt. Another problem for another day.

“Form up!” I yelled. Our men were still crossing over, and even though ours and theirs were passing in midstream everyone looked too exhausted to trade blows.

They formed up in a ragged line halfway up the bank, three ranks of them, some of them nursing wounds but still horsed. Six of Artashir's men. Seventy-seven of my own.

Not good at all, I thought grimly, scanning the battlefield. Not good at all.

The sun was behind the fort, and I heard at last the gate opening when none of Perdiccas’ men remained on this side of the river.

“Wounded to the rear!” I ordered. “Everyone else, stay mounted and guard the ford.” The last thing we needed was a late sortie when we had the gates open. We paced down the bank a little way, until the first rank stood with their ankles in the water, a barrier across the ford.

Behind us were the terrible sounds of the wounded. The cries for help were not so bad. Men who have both wits and strength to cry for help may live to see another day. It was the groans and the rasping breaths, the choking cries like children that were dreadful. I did not have to look. I stood with my men, our backs to them, guarding the ford while our servants and doctors came down.

A few more of our men straggled across in ones and twos, all cavalry and horse archers, though some were now dismounted. A big Nisean stallion, ten years old or more from the look of him, came trotting up with no rider, his saddle blanket drenched with blood though he looked fresh as rain. He came to me and I caught his bridle in my bad hand and he came and stood beside me without pulling or fussing. I thought that he looked relieved to be doing something that made sense, standing around with a bunch of other horses. If it hadn't been for the blood I would have changed horses then and there.

Fourteen horse archers. A hundred and forty-five of my men. The stragglers were coming in. That meant we were missing thirty-six archers and five hundred and five cavalrymen, the bulk of our force.

Surely we hadn't lost so many? I wouldn't have thought so. Sixty, seventy, even a hundred I would accept, but we could not have lost so many. What had happened when I could not see?

At last, when full night fell, I gave the order to dismount and walk the horses back to the fort.

Ptolemy was waiting for me in the courtyard, talking with one of the infantry officers, while the servants were laying out the wounded in the courtyard, the lightly wounded to the right, the dying to the left. The men in the middle were taken straight into the shed they were using for a surgery.

Ptolemy's breastplate was streaked with gore, and blood had dried stiff in his hair where he had run his hands through it with his reddened hands. “What have you got?”

“Fourteen archers and a hundred and forty-five cavalry,” I said wearily. “And I've lost Artashir and Glaukos. You?”

Ptolemy looked grave. “Not as bad as that. Eighty-one killed or wounded on the parapets. I'd guess four or five times that number for them. But we were about to get overwhelmed by the elephants when you showed up. That was a good plan. We needed them to break off exactly then.”

“I don't know how we lost so many,” I said, and I could hear my voice choking. “Ptolemy, I don't. I don't know what happened. I was unhorsed and I couldn't see, but I don't think it should be that bad.” To have lost almost my entire command…

He put his hand on my shoulder, dark circles of dried blood under his nails. “It's probably not. From the walls of the fort I could see the gambit going for the tent, and when they had to break off from that because Perdiccas turned, a bunch of men were on the wrong side. They couldn't get back to the river because Perdiccas’ horse archers were between them. I saw a bunch reel away into the trees to the east, those palm groves along the canal over there. Some of them were in breastplates, so it wasn't all Artashir's men.”

I took a breath. I must think. I must not despair. “If there weren't enough to break through, they did the right thing,” I said. “And there may have been some others who disengaged at the end but couldn't get back across the ford.”

“We've more tomorrow,” Ptolemy said grimly. He squeezed my shoulder. “You tell your men to stand down and get something to eat. I know they've not slept last night, so they're excused from the watch tonight. And you get some rest too. The infantry is in better shape, and we'll shore up the defenses.”

“Don't you need me awake?” I said. “I can—”

“Go to bed,” Ptolemy said. “I'll need you more tomorrow, and you've already been up a full night. I'll see you in the morning.”

I
LAY DOWN
on a rough straw-filled mattress in one of the upper rooms of the fortress, certain that I would not sleep while the bustle of the work and the moans of the wounded below continued. Of course I did. I was asleep almost before I stretched out, and did not open my eyes until one of the squires shook me.

“Sir? General Ptolemy sent me to get you. They're gone again.”

I hurried up to the walls, once again to be met with the sight of a deserted camp.

Ptolemy looked bemused. “We had the same master, Perdiccas and I. He knows better than to waste his men trying to take Camel's Fort when the real prize is Memphis. All he needs is a place to cross the river. It doesn't need to be this place.”

I blew out a breath. “Head for Bubastis?”