The Storm of Heaven (79 page)

"You lads! Take these three women out of their cells, put them in the First Sword's quarters!"

Narses stomped off, whistling to himself. Hamilcar had been getting used to such plush accommodations! The boy needed to remember who was the master here, and who the oath- and contract-bound slave. Of course, Hamilcar might be a little angry about losing his privileges, his better food, his private bath. But that didn't matter to Narses. The
lanista
smiled to himself, supremely happy, and made sure that the peony behind his ear was still there. Behind him, the slaves and guards stared after him in surprise. Then they shook their heads and went to unlock the cells. Stranger things had happened, though no one could say when.

When he got to his office, a thought occurred to him. He banged on the wall until one of the clerks in the outer room came in.

"Jordanes, send a boy over to Gaius Julius' office with a note to come by when he can."

"Yes, master!"

Hot water sluiced into the stone tub, steaming as it filled. Thyatis was already sitting in the basin, her knees up to her chin. She hissed, both in delight and at the heat as the water flooded over her toes. Two brawny slaves were pouring for her, hauling big ironbound buckets from the heating room down the hall. She ignored their stares with long practice. Men had seen her naked before. If they tried anything, she would kill them and her promise to Narses be damned! The old cripple wouldn't miss one or two slaves...

"Candace! Get in here!" Thyatis started scrubbing at her toes with a soapy brush. "Bring Agrippina."

The two condemned women came in after a moment, then stared at Thyatis, up to her neck in steaming water thick with foam. The two men left, empty buckets slung over well-muscled shoulders. Candace stared after them. Both slaves were wearing only short tunics, which left little to the imagination. After a moment, she shook her head as if waking from a pleasant dream and looked around in surprise.

"Come on, get in." Thyatis was still in a sour mood, but it was lifting, buoyed by the smell of lye soap and hot water. That had always meant cleanliness and home to her. Even with her black mood, it was a giddy sensation. "What? You like being filthy?"

"No, not me!" Agrippina said, shaking her head. The older woman stripped off her tunic and eased into the water. Thyatis raised an eyebrow, seeing a brutal network of scars on the woman's arms and thighs. Some of them had healed badly, leaving puckered welts. Beyond that, however, the woman had serious muscle under a layer of fat.

Agrippina submerged, then surfaced, her hair slicked back. She was had a broad plebian face, all stout angles and a short nose. Thyatis lifted her chin, indicating one of the scars that laced its way across her shoulder. "What did that?"

Agrippina looked down, frowning, then nodded soberly. "Meat axe."

"You're a butcher?" Thyatis started working on her back with the brush. It felt so good! Maybe she could convince one of the others to rub her down with salt afterwards. An expensive treatment, but she saw that the previous inhabitant of these rooms had not stinted on the luxuries. There were green and blue bottles of oil, an assortment of bronze strigils and various scrubbing brushes.

"Yeah. I was." Agrippina captured the bar of soap, which had slid down to the bottom of the tub, and began lathering her hair with it. "Twelve years."

"What happened?" Thyatis knew she shouldn't ask, but it might make a difference.

Agrippina stared back, her face blank. After a moment, her eyes blinked, slowly, like a crocodile emerging from the green waters of the Nile. "Killed a man. Cut him to bits with the treadle-saw, put them in the grist mill after, made him into feed for the sacred geese."

"Oh." Thyatis' forehead creased, furrowing. "How did they find out?"

Agrippina shrugged, her powerful shoulders rising out of the water, then disappearing again. "The gods were displeased, I suppose."

"Well, that's a puzzler. Candace?" Thyatis looked up at the Nubian woman, who was still standing beside the tub, looking disgusted. "Aren't you getting in?"

Candace made a face, staring at the water, which was now beginning to shimmer with oil amid clumps of dirt and hair. "No... I think it might just make me dirtier!"

Thyatis scowled, then splashed lukewarm water on the Nubian girl. Candace yelped and jumped back. "I'll go after you're done!"

"Fine. It'll be cold then." Thyatis stood up, letting the soapy water spill off her. The slaves had left three more buckets of hot water just for rinsing. It wasn't the luxe treatment at the Baths of Caracalla, but it would do for today. She turned the bucket over, slowly, letting it sluice down the firm curve of her body. Soap peeled away like a second skin, swirling gray into the rinsing basin. The last of the water was for her hair, which had managed to grow out enough to lie flat against her head. Grains of sand and other, less identifiable grime, rolled under her fingers.

Hmm,
she thought,
it might take another four or five baths to get really clean... oh well.

Agrippina was still scrubbing, so Thyatis sat on the side of the tub, checking herself for scratches or other wounds. There were fresh scars, but they seemed to have scabbed over. She let them be. Dying with cold steel in her gut didn't frighten her as much as rotting from gangrene. While she had waited in the cell, she had washed her wounds with urine, hoping to keep them clean. She wrinkled up her nose, that hadn't been one of her best days, but one of her instructors on the Island had sworn by it.

At the thought, she froze, besieged by memories. All of them brought some kind of pain, so she started to breathe, slowly and evenly, until they passed. Her mind started to go far away, into the gray haze, but a touch on her shoulder brought her back.

"Don't." It was Agrippina, leaning over her. The older woman had a bleak look on her face and her sausage-like fingers were digging into Thyatis' shoulder. "If you hide, it gets stronger."

"What do you mean?" Thyatis pushed the hand away and stood up.

"You know." Agrippina turned away, gathering up her tunic. "Not my business."

Thyatis scowled, but she rummaged in one of the cupboards and found a pair of clean tunics. She tossed one to the butcher, then pulled the other over her head. It was too small, but she managed to pull it down enough to avoid complete indecency. "Candace! Your turn."

Arrows fell like rain, some burning, streaking across the night. Men struggling on the shore screamed, dying under the iron hail. Shahr-Baraz, King of Kings, Lord of the Persians and the Medes, spurred his horse forward, hooves rumbling on the plank road. Around him, Persian spearmen surged forward, every third man carrying a torch. The night was a wild confusion of burning lights and darkness. Bonfires roared on the shore, throwing a ruddy, red light on the faces of the soldiers. The Boar cantered down off the bridge, his sword raised, catching the firelight. "Forward! Clear the road!"

A deep-throated roar answered him and spearmen and
diquans
in full armor poured down onto the beach. Roman soldiers fled before him, throwing down bundles of pitch-soaked brush and lanterns. The King reined in his horse, laughing—a huge booming sound that rolled and echoed across the battlefield—to see the Romans running like hares. More arrows fell amongst the fleeing men. Dark shapes ran between them, gore-streaked swords flashing. More men died. Shahr-Baraz sheathed his sword with a
ting
and raised the silver visor of his helmet. The metal plate was worked into the face of a man, with a nose and eyes, and inlaid with gold. Wearing a full suit made for hot work, but gave excellent protection.

"My lord?"

The
Shahanshah
looked down, tugging at his mustaches. "Yes, Lord Piruz?"

The Eastern
diquan
made a sharp bow, then pointed up the road. "The Romans are falling back along the road, too; should we pursue?"

"No." Shahr-Baraz's voice was firm. A troop of men with long axes and maces clattered past down the wooden ramp from the last of the ships. "Push down the road until you can only just make out the bonfires. Round up the guards and beat the bushes for more Romans and our own men. We'll begin sending the army across at first light. You had better have secured the area by then."

Piruz made another bow and then clanked off into the night. A score of men in full mail and swords followed him. Shahr-Baraz sighed. The Easterner had a black scarf knotted where his breastplate and shoulder armor joined. One of Purandokht's tokens. Some days, the King wondered which of his adopted daughters had more followers.
No matter!
he thought.
They are here, these hotheaded youths, and they fight for me. We can deal with the suitors later, after the war has culled them!

Shahr-Baraz nudged his horse and trotted back up the ramp. The surface swayed under the charger's heavy tread, but the Boar was not concerned. His engineers had built well on the foundation provided by the Arab fleet. Lines of men marched in the other direction as he let the horse trot along. The Boar knew them, passing in the night, by their standards and ornamented shields, by the make of their helms and the fletching of their arrows. Khorasanians, Medes, Daylami archers, Gaur mountaineers, lowlanders from Mesopotamia, the hill chiefs of Tabaristan. All the panoply and glory of Imperial Persia. He passed lanterns too, suspended on the stern posts of the ships making up his bridge.

Khadames had not believed such a thing could be built, even when Shahr-Baraz showed him the passage in one of the old books. A hero of ancient times had done this, crossing over the Hellespont. He had been fighting Greeks, too. Most of the Arab fleet did yeoman duty, lashed together with ropes, making a wooden bridge from one side of the Propontis to the other. A wide swath of buildings across Chalcedon had been looted for the timber to make a roadbed on the back of the fleet. Shields flanked the sides of the wooden road, giving men on the precarious bridge shelter from Roman attacks.

Shahr-Baraz grinned in the darkness, torchlight catching on his strong white teeth. An enormous weight was taken from him, knowing the Arab fleet prowled out in the darkness, watching the approaches to the city, keeping Roman boats from attacking this fragile lifeline between Europe and Asia. He raised a gauntleted hand in salute—the folly of Heraclius and the noble honor of Palmyra and Arabia made this possible.
Bless you, Emperor!

"King of Kings." The voice was flat, emotionless, without a hint of human warmth.

Shahr-Baraz gentled his horse, which was not used to the odd smell, and halted. He was on the third ship from the Asian shore, now confronted with two dark figures, cloaked and hooded, showing only the barest glint of iron scale at their hands. "You have news?"

"Yes. Our brothers say the Romans are all dead."

"Good." The Shanzdah had been set to watch and wait, while the guard at the western end of the bridge slept. A wise decision. Shahr-Baraz did not bother to ask how these figures knew what transpired a mile away, where their fellows hunted in the darkness. "Is there more?"

"Yes. You are wanted beyond the hill."

"Ah. Tell your master I will be there in a little while."

The King of Kings did not bother to wait for a response. He had not managed to get to the scene of the abortive raid in time to even swing a blade, but the dash across the water had roused his appetite. He would eat before he went down into the valley behind the hills. The black wagon could wait, having nowhere to go, save where he directed.

The sun had risen, wallowing up out of an eastern sky thick with clouds and haze, by the time Shahr-Baraz rode down into the dell hiding the wagon. Cold mist clung to the ground, coiling among dark-skinned trees and tombs. Slabs of cracked stone rose out of the ground, covered with thorns and vines. The path narrowed, passing between a pair of standing stones. The Boar was sure the locals had chosen this marshy hollow for their graveyard because no one wanted to live there anyway. Surely no land worth planting with wheat, grape, olive, flax or rye had been lost! Even at midday the damp ground under the trees seemed dark and close. A chill hung in the air. The charger snorted, shaking its head, but the King urged it on. Horse and man passed through an opening in a paling of iron poles driven into the ground.

Shahr-Baraz felt the cold eyes of hidden guardians watching him but showed no sign of fear. Tomb-houses loomed up out of the dim light, their doors cracked and splintered. Moss hung from carved lintels and oozed across dirty floors. It was very still, without the sound of bird or man. Only the
clop-clop
of the charger's iron hooves on the tilted stone road disturbed the heavy silence. He reached a particular tree and stopped, swinging down off the horse. The charger stared at him with wild eyes, but the Boar ignored its entreaty, tying it securely to a low-hanging branch.

"I'll feed you when I get back." His voice sounded hollow in the air.

Beyond the tree, he walked to the left, then right, then ahead, following a path marked by small lead cones placed on the ground. The wards were etched with tiny, spiky symbols. Shahr-Baraz felt their presence as a growing resistance in the air, tugging at his beard, the passage of cold, ghostly fingers over his face and hands. At last he climbed a flight of ancient, crumbling steps and into the ruins of a temple. Only the snag-teeth of columns remained, marking out a double rectangle among tumbled blocks of stone and carvings. The black wagon sat at the center of the platform, heavy and forbidding. Broken mossy slabs floored the temple. Lines and patterns were scratched into the stone. A figure squatted, hands on knees, before the wagon, facing Shahr-Baraz. The King paced forward, stepping carefully, and the resistance in the air suddenly lessened.

Darkness folded around the Boar and he stopped, planting his feet, thumbs hooked into his belt. Though he stood under an open sky, here there was only twilight. High overhead, the sun was reduced to a dim bloated red disk. Walls of slowly moving gray smoke bounded the temple, shutting out the sight of the leprous trees and oddly pale undergrowth among the tombs.