The Last Temple (22 page)

“I’m tired of all this death.” Titus pinched the bridge of his nose between thumb and forefinger for a few seconds, but a pained expression remained on his face. “Last night, about two thousand women and children and old men were killed. It’s like their own God is punishing them in the worst way possible.”

Although Mount Olivet kept the camp in the shadow of the sun’s first rising, dawn’s early light spread fingers of pink clouds above them. Vitas stood at ease in front of Titus, as was usual each day, for Titus liked having a person he could trust for honest opinions.

“I am as tired of death as you are,” Vitas said. “The smell of it hangs over the city like a cloud. But if they won’t surrender, we can’t prevent them from killing themselves.”

“The two thousand did not die in the city,” Titus said. “Our own men—Arabians and Syrians—were responsible.”

Titus rubbed his face with both hands. He sighed. “You know I’ve made it a policy that any deserters who are not fighters may slip past our walls.”

Vitas nodded. Famine was sending them out in droves. They risked their lives to escape Jerusalem and flee through the open zone to the Roman walls that surrounded the city, for Jewish defenders would try to kill them for deserting.

Once through the Roman enclosure, they were provided food. Some of them, unable to restrain themselves, took in food so quickly that their near-starved bodies and tightened bellies did not survive.

“I’m told that some of the Syrians noticed an old woman digging through her own excrement,” Titus continued. “They realized she was looking for gold coins she had swallowed for safety before leaving Jerusalem.”

Vitas rubbed his own face. He could guess what happened next, and Titus confirmed it.

“Word immediately went through the other camps that every Jew was full of gold. The Syrians and Arabians have a natural enmity for the Jews, and they spent the entire night killing them and slitting their bellies open to search for more gold.”

Vitas groaned.

“Unfortunately, Rome will take the blame for this,” Titus said. “What I would like to do is surround those Syrians and Arabians with horses, then shoot them dead with arrows. But there are too many of them. We’d end up warring among ourselves, and at this point in the siege, that would do me more harm than good. I see no choice but to put practicality over justice.”

“By choosing practicality, you are also choosing a different justice,” Vitas said. “The longer the siege continues, the more women and children will die. The sooner you get through the walls and destroy the fighting force inside, the more women and children you will spare. Thus, you bring justice to those still alive. Anyone would understand that. Bernice included.”

“I do not make my decisions based on keeping her happy,” Titus snapped.

“Don’t fool yourself.” Vitas knew that Titus intended to return to Rome with Bernice and marry her. “You are also motivated by a promise to help her people where possible.”

“I am motivated by the realization that Rome functions by destroying enemies and helping allies. When this war is over, we still want taxes from Judea.”

“That rationalization will sound good in Rome when you return for a triumph.”

Titus suddenly grinned. “Trust me, that’s not what I tell Bernice.” The grin just as quickly disappeared. “But this problem is bigger than the slaughter of women and children. Right?”

“If you continue to let any segment of your army loot and plunder at will, you risk losing your authority.”

“Exactly.”

“Are you asking my advice?”

Titus nodded.

“I will answer you as a soldier, but keep in mind, I am also a brother to a man who may still be alive inside the city,” Vitas said. “So I have a personal stake here.”

Once again, Titus nodded.

“Call the auxiliary commanders together and tell them that Rome will not permit a foreign army to indulge in unauthorized looting,” Vitas said. “Warn them that anyone who does so again will be executed. Send our soldiers among the Syrians and Arabians to confiscate the gold. They will fight us to protect their lives, but they won’t risk death to protect gold, especially if they are promised a fair share in the gold from Jerusalem when it falls. You keep peace among all the armies here, and your authority is not compromised.”

“Wise words,” Titus said. “Thank you.”

“You won’t consider me wise when I make a request. I’d like permission to enter the city.”

“That’s not unreasonable,” Titus told him. “In a day or two, we’ll break through the first wall. I can give you an escort.”

“I don’t want to wait,” Vitas said. “I need to get in before your soldiers. If Damian is alive . . .”

“You have lost your sanity,” Titus said. “Every male over the age of fifteen in that city is armed and ready to kill any foreigners. Allowing you inside too early is like sending you to your death.”

Any other man would have decided not to argue. Titus, after all, was the son of the emperor. But they were friends first, soldiers second, and Vitas knew that Titus would not consider him insubordinate for arguing. “As you know, I am obligated to Ben-Aryeh for protecting Sophia. Ben-Aryeh’s wife is in the city. Ben-Aryeh wants my help to get inside. In return, he can keep me safe. He is a man of great influence among the Jews of Jerusalem.”

Titus shook his head. “No. I’m not going to give you permission.”

Vitas nodded. “Anything else to discuss?”

“No,” Titus said.

Vitas turned to walk out of the tent.

“Wait,” Titus said. Vitas stopped and looked at his friend. “You’ll go anyway, won’t you?”

“That would be insubordination.”

“That’s a truthful response, but it doesn’t answer my question.”

Vitas kept a level gaze on his friend.

“I’ve put you in the position of choosing between serving one obligation to me and another obligation to Ben-Aryeh,” Titus said. “Am I reading this correctly?”

“Yes.”

Titus repeated his earlier gesture of pinching the bridge of his nose between thumb and forefinger. He closed his eyes and did not open them as he spoke.

“Today, I make one final offer for surrender,” Titus said. “I’d like you to accompany me. I believe what the Jews hear will be enough to get them to accept surrender.”

“You’ve offered it before to no avail. Even with the city racked by famine.”

Titus opened his eyes. “What drives these people, Vitas? I’ll tell you. Worship of their God. And the most sacred object in the world to them is the Temple, where their God resides. Every one of them—soldier or not—will fight to the death to protect their Temple. Today, I will tell them what they want to hear. I expect by tomorrow we will have peace, and then you can move through the city freely, with an escort of soldiers.”

“If today’s offer fails?”

“Tomorrow is the day that I begin the final push to break through the Antonia’s wall. That should draw the bulk of Jerusalem’s fighters to the ramparts and provide enough of a distraction for you and Ben-Aryeh to get inside unnoticed. I will expect help from Ben-Aryeh later, in return.”

“Thank you.”

“That decision was made for my benefit,” Titus rejoined. There was no hint of a smile. “You and I have been through too much together. I don’t ever want to have to choose between duty to Rome and executing you.”

Vitas found Ben-Aryeh at the tent they now shared. Ben-Aryeh was on his knees, his head bowed in prayer.

Vitas retreated to give his friend privacy. Through worship and sacrifices, the Romans did their best to make their gods serve them. He’d learned from Sophia and Ben-Aryeh that for the Jews, it was the opposite: their worship was because their one and true God was worthy of it.

There were moments—many of them—when Vitas wanted to surrender himself to the same worship, to the same sense that an invisible and all-powerful God was in control not only of mankind’s destiny, but of each man’s destiny. He was too much a Roman to believe without sufficient evidence, however, and every time his heart came close to this surrender, his intellect demanded proof.

Vitas returned about ten minutes later to find Ben-Aryeh standing outside, staring sightlessly at the rocks atop Mount Olivet.

Tears streamed down the older man’s face.

Ben-Aryeh did not turn to Vitas as he spoke. “While you were gone, Ben-Matthias told me enough so that I truly understand how bad it has become for our people. I don’t want to believe what he relayed to me. A hundred and fifteen thousand?”

A week earlier, reports had come to Titus that this was the total of the dead carried through the gate. The dead bodies of the poor had been laid in heaps in large houses. Other bodies were simply thrown over the city walls into the valleys, in such numbers that in Titus’s rounds along the valleys, he had groaned and spread his hands skyward, calling to God to witness that this was not Titus’s doing. War and death Titus had seen in plentitude, but this was so tragic that even an experienced general like him felt anguish.

Vitas knelt and took some dust from the ground. He threw it upward and watched as the breeze took it away. The wind was coming from the west, over the city and toward the Mount of Olives.

“I have a vial of oil of myrrh,” Vitas said. This was common, and many soldiers used it as a salve on light wounds. “My advice is to rub some of it on a cloth and keep it nearby to hold over your face if the wind continues to blow in this direction.”

“A hundred and fifteen thousand?”

“You will be grateful for the myrrh,” Vitas said. “All of those dead and more. As the heat strikes the dead, the stench is almost unbearable.”

Later that morning, Vitas rode at a stately walk alongside Ben-Matthias and Titus, who’d had a black stallion saddled.

They were near the bottom of the valley and had to look upward at the walls of Jerusalem. The sun was high enough now that when Vitas turned his eyes toward the Temple, it seemed to burn. The outward facing of the Temple was covered with burnished plates of gold, and the fiery splendor glimmered like a mirage but was far too painful on the eyes for more than momentary admiration. Later, when the sun’s angle shifted, it would no longer be like staring directly into the sun, but still so breathtakingly beautiful that often a man looked away for fear of being hypnotized.

The soldiers had begun their day’s activities, and the sounds only served to remind Vitas of the fate of this beautiful city and the hundreds of thousands still behind the walls.

The methodical windings of the
ballistae
—the great catapults—prepared for the daily barrage of stones sometimes double the weight of a man’s body. The
doctores ballistarum
—the commanders of the weapons—would take pride in their ability to aim and pick off single defenders. The whirring sound of the stones struck terror into all who heard, each stone chiseled to make it as round as possible.

In the weeks earlier, the Roman soldiers had realized the brightness of the stones made them as obvious as hail. Watchmen in Jerusalem would see the stones against the sky and call warning. Now the stones were painted black and were devastatingly effective.

The monotonous thumping of the siege engines began to form the rhythm of a heartbeat, a sound that never failed to chill Vitas. Not only did the
arietes
—battering rams—break down walls, but morale. Roman law dictated that defenders could surrender and be given full rights, until the moment before the first ram touched the wall.

Each ram was protected by a
testudo
—tortoise—with a steeply angled roof so that any objects hurled upon it simply slid down the sides. It was covered with uncured hides, and fiery oil flung upon it would slide to the ground before the flames could get through. As for the beam beneath, it was drawn back by dozens of men, who then pushed it forward in unison, letting go just before the iron head made impact with the wall. Not once in Roman history had any wall survived repeated blows, and often, in Vitas’s experience, a thick stone wall would collapse at the first blow.

Here, Titus had needed to send tens of thousands of men to bring in dirt and stone from dozens of miles away, just to be able to fill the valleys with earthworks. At the same time, Titus had sent thousands more men to dig beneath the city walls. The tunnels were filled with wood and resin and sulfur, then lit so the fire would undermine the walls even further.

And behind all of these engines were the dreaded
scorpiones
, crossbow devices smaller than the ballistae, firing arrows capable of piercing any armor.

Day after day for weeks now, these tens of thousands of disciplined men had steadily applied pressure on Jerusalem.

What had once been the immovable object was finally about to give way to the irresistible force.