‘Under normal circumstances, Cousin, that would be a most expedient tactic to use with the usual mindless barbarians thrown at the empire by the Romans, but in this case …’
He paused, looking up at the figures standing on the hill’s crest.
‘In this case it seems that someone with a little more subtlety has been placed in command of their attempt to relieve our siege of Nisibis. With this one, I suspect that only irresistible force will serve.’
‘That’s faster than I expected.’
Julius raised his vine stick to point at the Parthian archers, watching as they turned and pulled back away from the arrow-swept strip of ground across which the bodies of so many of their comrades was scattered. Scaurus nodded.
‘It’s the decision I’d make in his place. All they can achieve by persevering is to get a lot more of those poor bastards killed, whereas pulling them back now leaves most of them fit to fight another day.’
‘So we’ve won?’
Scaurus turned to smile at Tribune Varus, who stood next to Marcus watching the battle.
‘Not really, Tribune. At the moment I think the best we could claim is a draw, given that we’re tied to this hill just as long as those archers are close enough to attack us on the march to the next one. If they were to catch us out in the open, I suspect that the balance would tip towards their side of the table. If I were the king of Media, I’d be considering sending for supplies and setting up camp to starve us out, although he probably suspects I’d make him regret the choice once the sun was down for the night. And he’s right.’
The killing ground before them was now deserted, more or less, although the plaintive cries and whinnies of agony from wounded men and horses alike were clearly audible at two hundred paces. Beyond the corpse-strewn wreckage of the archers’ attack, the enemy’s heavy cavalry was on the move, hundreds of the powerfully built steeds necessary to carry both an armoured rider and their own body protection being marshalled into formation.
‘They’ve going to attack us, aren’t they?’
Scaurus smiled at Varus again, realising that tribune was in the grip of a powerful emotion.
‘Yes, I suspect they are. They’re going to come up this slope as fast as horses carrying that much iron can move, and they’re going to try to tear a hole in our line one way or another, either by causing panic among our men or by using their lances to kill from outside the range of our spears. And then, Tribune, we’ll find out if all that drill we’ve been doing has been a waste of time, won’t we? Perhaps you young gentlemen had best go and join your cohorts? And remember, your ancestors are watching. Make them proud, gentlemen, show them that we still know what it is to be Roman.’
Marcus and Varus hurried down the hill towards the Fourth and Fifth Cohorts.
‘I’ll command both Tungrian cohorts to start with. They’re more used to fighting as one unit in any case. If I go down, then you have command.’
The younger man nodded at Marcus, watching as he put on his helmet and drew the shorter of his two swords.
‘And no heroics. If I do fall then these men will need you to command them. You’re no good to them dead. That reunion with your ancestors you’re planning will have to wait a while.’
Osroes watched with a wry smile as his cavalry commander arrayed the three kingdoms’ cataphracts into their formation, the veteran soldier shouting and cursing as he laboured to make order out of their ranks, trotting his horse to and fro to deliver his commands in person rather than depend on messengers.
‘I do believe that man won’t be happy until we’re as neatly paraded as those Romans up there. But, since we’re not Romans …’
Encouraging his horse forward with no more than a touch of his heels, he rode out in front of the heavy cavalrymen, nodding his respect to the soldier who, recognising an unspoken command when he saw one, bowed at the waist once more and backed his horse into the body of his kinsmen, a pack of brooding killers with a fierce reputation for their valour in battle.
‘Well now!’
The king’s voice rang out across the horsemen’s ranks, every man craning his neck to see and hear their king.
‘Shall we spare our horses’ strength while we talk?’
He dismounted, holding onto his mount’s reins and stroking its scale-armoured head affectionately, waiting while his men followed his example. When every man was standing alongside his mount, the king took a step forward, looking to either side at the solid wall of armoured men and beasts in front of him before raising his voice to address them.
‘Knights of Media! Honoured brothers of Adiabene! Desert warriors of Hatra! Our fight with the Romans has come down to one simple truth! We must dislodge them from that hillside, either that or we must retire from this place before nightfall, to avoid the risk of their attacking us in the darkness!’
He paused, silently revelling in the hard set of their faces.
‘In truth, I have been waiting for this moment! This is our destiny! This is the moment in which we show these usurpers that they can never stand against Parthian nobility!’
Stepping away from the horse he gestured to it with his free hand.
‘Those of you who are my kinsmen will know that when I first set eyes on this animal I knew I had to have the beast for my own.’
Men in the ranks before him were smiling, recalling the stories that were still told of the moment when Osroes had watched the horse as it had exercised under the command of a skilled rider. He recalled that moment when, despite his possession of a dozen such mounts, the animal’s sheer speed across ground, and the graceful fluidity of its movement seemingly impossible given the weight of armour and rider, its barely controlled savagery in close fighting exercises, was enough to make him cry out in astonishment.
‘You know that I was robbed like a blind man by this beast’s owner, and you know that I would have paid three times as much to own this creature …’
He paused, smiling wryly.
‘Although I would probably have flogged the man as the price of his impudence, if he hadn’t been sweating like a young man on his wedding night.’
Laughter rippled across the ranks of horsemen, the assembled cavalrymen grinning as they recalled the story of how the horse’s owner had walked a fine line between negotiating the sale of a treasured and valuable asset and the risk of incurring the wrath of the most powerful man in his world.
‘So you can imagine just how delighted I am at the prospect of taking this magnificent creature up this hill to confront that!’
He pointed up at the Roman line.
‘A single arrow could fell this, the best and most beloved of all the things I own. A bolt from one of their catapults could kill the noble creature in an instant – and if I am afraid for Storm Arrow here, how much more do I fear the loss of a single man from among you? No, my brothers, I do not wish to charge our enemy, up a slope and without the chance for our archers to reduce their numbers a little first!’
He paused for a moment, allowing the words to sink in.
‘But, reluctant or not, Storm Arrow and I, and all of you, must take up arms against these trespassers! We must take that righteous fury that burns fiercely in our hearts at the sight of their boots fouling our homeland, and use it to inspire us to their slaughter!’
He strode forward, raising a fist to challenge the men before him.
‘Ride with me, fellow knights, ride with me against these followers of false gods who sully our homelands! Ride with me, and we will have our revenge for their destruction of the King of Kings’ city of Ctesiphon, a deed to make our fathers proud again! Ride with me, and we will show these ants in iron what it means to face the hunar of the artestarih!’
The knights arrayed before him erupted in a cacophony of shouts, echoing his last words.