Fire From Heaven 17 страница

'This, then was the order of battle.., '

A workmanlike summary followed. Philip muttered through it, forgetting to recite aloud to Parmenion, who craned forward to hear. Lured out, rolled up, and thrown into confusion, the Maidoi had duly struggled off through the river, into the iron trap of the gorge. Alexander had returned to Amphipolis most of its borrowed garrison, in charge of his many prisoners.

'Next day I pressed on up river beyond the pass; a number of the Maidoi had crossed the mountains by other ways, and I did not want to give them leisure to re-form. So I came to the country of the Agrianoi. Here Lambaros, my guest-friend, met me with a troop of horse, his friends and kinsmen. He had asked leave of his father to ride to war with us, in fulfilment of a vow. They showed us the easiest passes; later they did very well in battle. '

'Teres saw which way the cat was jumping, ' said Philip. 'Yet the boy didn't wait. Why? A child when he was at Pella, I can't even remember what he looked like. '

He muttered his way through the breakneck mountain campaign that followed. Guided by his allies to the enemy's craggy nest, Alexander had attacked its main approach, while his mountaineers crept up the sheer side left unguarded.

'The men of the valley, wanting to revenge their wrongs, were about to kill everyone they found; but I ordered them to spare the women and the children, who had injured no one. These I sent to Amphipolis; do with them as you think best. '

'Sensible lad, ' said Parmenion. 'Those strong hill-women always fetch good prices; work better than the men. "

Philip skimmed on, through rounding-up operations and commendations (Hephaistion son of Amyntor, of Pella, fought with great distinction) his voice fading to the murmur of routine business. Suddenly, making Parmenion jump, he shouted, 'What? '

'Well, what, then? ' asked Parmenion presently.

Philip, looking up from the roll, said in a measured voice, 'He has stayed on there to found a city. '

'It must be the clerk's writing. '

'The clerk writes like a book. The Maidoi had some good grazing-lands, and the footslopes will grow vines. So he is refounding their city, in counsel with Lambaros, his guest-friend. I reckon they can notch up thirty-three years between them. ' 'If as much, ' Parmenion grunted. 'He has considered suitable colonists. Agrianoi of course; loyal Paionians; some landless Macedonians he knows of, and…Yes, wait. An afterthought, this. Have I any good men I would like to reward with a gift of land? He thinks he could take twenty. '

Parmenion, deciding that only a fool would open his mouth, cleared the back of his throat to fill the pause.

'Of course he has named the city. Alexandropolis. '

He stared down at the parchment. Parmenion looked at the shrewd, scarred, ageing face, the grizzled black brows and beard; the old bull snuffing the new spring air, tilting his battle-frayed old horns. I'm getting on too, Parmenion thought. They had shared the Thracian winters, stood together through the Illyrian battle-rush; they had shared muddy water in drought, wine after the battle; they had shared a woman, when they were young; she had never known for sure which had fathered her child; they had shared the joke. Parmenion cleared the back of his throat again.

'The boy's for ever saying, ' he brought out brusquely, 'that you'll leave him nothing to do, to make his name on. He's taking what chance he can. '

Philip brought down his fist on the table. 'I'm proud of him, ' he said decisively. 'Proud of him. ' He pulled a blank tablet towards him, and with deep quick strokes sketched the battle. 'That's a pretty plan, nice dispositions. But let them get out of touch; let a gap open, now, say, here, and where would he have been then, eh? Or if the cavalry pressed on out of hand? But no, he kept his hand on everything, there in the front line. And when they broke the wrong way, he changed his movement like that. ' He snapped his fingers. 'We shall see things, Parmenion, with this boy of mine. I'll find him those twenty settlers for his Alexandropolis, by God I will. '

'I'll ask about, then. Why don't we drink to it? ' 'Why not? ' He called for wine, and began rolling up the letter. 'What's this, wait, what's this? I never finished it. '

'Since I have been in the north, I hear everywhere of the Triballoi who live on the heights of Haimon, how they are unruly and warlike and a threat to the settled lands. It seems to me that while I am at Alexandropolis, I could carry the war up there, and bring them into order. I would like to ask your leave before drawing the troops I would need from Macedon. I propose... '

The wine came and was poured. Parmenion took a great gulp, forgetting to wait for the King, who forgot to notice it. 'The Triballoi! What does the boy want, does he want to push on up to the Ister? '

Philip, skipping the requisitions, read, 'These barbarians might annoy us, if they come on our rear when we cross to Asia; and if they were subdued, we could push our frontiers as far north as the Ister, which is a natural defence wall; being, as men say, the greatest river on earth after the Nile and the Encircling Ocean. '

The two weathered men searched one another's faces, as if consulting omens. Philip broke the pause, throwing back his head in a great laugh full of broken teeth, and slapping his knee. Parmenion joined in with the loudness of relief.

'Simmias! ’ called the King at length. 'Look after the Prince's courier. A fresh horse tomorrow. ' He threw back his wine. 'I must get off his recall at once, before he starts to mobilize; I don't want to disappoint the lad. Ah, I know. I'll propose he consults with Aristotle over the constitution of his city. What a boy, eh? What a boy! '

'What a boy! ' echoed Parmenion. He gazed into his cup, seeing his own image in the dark face of the wine.

The long train of men marched south, by phalanxes and squadrons, along the Strymon plain. Alexander led, at the head of his personal squadron. Hephaistion rode beside him.

The air was loud with sound; thin harsh crying and keening, deep creaks as of strained wood. It was the call of kites, hovering and stooping and fighting for choice shreds, mixed with the croak of ravens.

The settlers had buried their dead, the soldiers burned theirs on ceremonial pyres. At the rear of the column, behind the straw-bedded hospital wagons, a cart trundled along with straw-packed urns of local pottery, each painted with a name.

Losses had been light, for victory had come quickly. The soldiers talked of it as they marched, gazing at the enemy's scattered thousands, lying where they had fallen to receive the rites of nature. By night the wolves and jackals had gorged on them; with daylight the village pi-dogs, and the birds which clustered in a moving pall. When the column passed near, they rose in a screaming cloud and hovered angrily over their meal; only then could one see the raw bones, and the rags torn by wolves in haste to reach the entrails. The stench, like the noise, shifted with the breeze.

In a few days they would be picked clean. Whoever owned the land, the worst of the work done for him, would burn the bones in a heap, or shovel them into a pit.

Over a dead horse danced vultures, bouncing up and down with half-opened wings, scrawking at one another. Oxhead gave a smothered squeal, and shied away. Alexander signed to the column to proceed, dismounted, and led the horse gently towards the mound of reeking flesh; stroking his muzzle, going ahead to scare off the vultures, and, when they scolded and flapped, returning with soothing words. Oxhead stamped and blew, disgusted but reassured. When they had stood there a few moments, Alexander mounted and cantered back to his place. 'Xenophon says, ' he told Hephaistion, 'one should always do that with whatever scares a horse. '

'I didn't know there were so many kites in Thrace. What do they live on when there's no war? ' Hephaistion, who felt sick, was talking to keep his mind off it.

'There's never no war in Thrace. But we'll ask Aristotle. '

'Are you still sorry, ' said Hephaistion dropping his voice, 'that we didn't fight the Triballoi? '

'Why, of course, ' said Alexander, surprised. 'We were halfway there. They'll have to be dealt with in the end; and we'd have seen the Ister. '

A small cavalry detail on the flank cantered ahead at his signal; there were some bodies blocking the road. They were raked into a hunting-net, and dragged out of the way.

'Ride on ahead, ' Alexander ordered, 'and see it's clear.... Yes, I'm sorry still, of course; but I'm not angry. It's true, as he says, his forces are stretched just now. He sent me a very handsome letter; I read it too quickly, when I saw it was a recall. '

'Alexander, ' said Hephaistion, 'I think that man there's alive. '

A council of vultures was considering something out of sight; bouncing forward, then recoiling as if offended or shocked. There came into view a feebly flailing arm.

'So long? ' said Alexander wondering.

'It rained, ' Hephaistion said.

Alexander turned and beckoned the first rider whose eye he met. The man cantered up smartly, and gazed at the wonderful boy with fervent affection.

'Polemon. If that man's not past help, have him picked up. They fought well, hereabouts. Or else finish him quickly. '

'Yes, Alexander, ' said the man adoringly. Alexander gave him a slight approving smile; he went radiant off on his mission. Presently he remounted; the vultures, with satisfied croaks, closed in together.

Far on ahead of them shone the blue sea; soon, thought Hephaistion with relief, they would be past the battlefield. Alexander's eyes wandered over the bird-haunted plain, and beyond it skywards. He said:

'Many brave men's souls it flung down to the house of Hades,

While their flesh made a feast for dogs, and all the birds of the

air.

And the will of Zeus was fulfilled. '

The rhythm of the hexameters matched itself smoothly to Oxhead's pacing. Hephaistion gazed at him silent. He rode on, at peace, with his unseen companion.

The Seal of Macedon stayed some time with Antipatros. Alexander had been met by a second courier, bidding him come to his father's siege-lines, to be commended. He turned east to Propontis, taking his companions with him.

In the King's lodging before Perinthos, a well-lived-in home by now, father and son would sit at the pinewood trestle, over a tray of sea-sand and stones; heaping up mountains, digging out defiles with their fingers, drawing with writing-sticks the disposition of cavalry, skirmishers, phalanxes and archers. Here no one disturbed their game, except sometimes the enemy. Philip's handsome young squires were decorous; bearded Pausanias with his ruined beauty, now promoted to Somatophylax, Commander of the Guard, watched impassively, never interrupting except for an alarm. Then they would buckle on their armour, Philip with veteran curses, Alexander eagerly. The troops whose section he joined would raise a cheer. Since his campaign he had a nickname: Basiliskos, the Little King.

His legend had run before him. Leading a scouting party against the Maidoi, he had walked round a crag straight into two of them, and dispatched them both while the men behind him were still catching their breath; neither had had time to shout a warning. He had kept a twelve-year-old Thracian girl in his tent all night, because she had run to him when the men were after her; had never laid a finger on her, and had given her a marriage dower. He had run between four big Macedonians brawling with their swords already out, and shoved them apart with his bare hands. In a mountain storm which had rained thunderbolts, so that it seemed the gods had resolved to destroy them all, he had read luck into it, kept them moving, made them laugh. Someone had had his wound stanched with the Basiliskos' own cloak, and been told his blood was a dye more honourable than purple; someone had died in his arms. Someone else, who had thought him raw enough to try old soldiers' tricks on, was sorry and sore. You would need to watch out, if he took against you. But put a fair case to him straight, he would see you right.

So, when in the light of the falling fires they saw him running towards the ladders, burnished like a dragonfly, greeting them as if they had all been bidden to a feast, they would call to him, and race for places near him. It was well to keep your eye on him; he would think quicker than you.

For all this, the siege went badly. Making an example of Olynthos had cut two ways; the Perinthians had decided that at the pinch they would rather die. And the pinch was still far off. The defenders, well supplied by sea, met assaults in strength and often went over to attack. They were setting their own example. From the Chersonesos, just south of the Great East Road, word came that the subject cities were taking heart. The Athenians had long urged revolt on them; but they would not take in Athenian troops, who were seldom paid and forced to live off the. country. Now the cities had been emboldened. Macedonian outposts had been seized, and strongpoints threatened. War had begun.

'I swept one side of the road for you, Father, ' Alexander said as soon as the news arrived. 'Now let me sweep the other. '

'So I will, as soon as the new troops come. I'll use them here; you'll need men who know the country. '

He was planning a surprise assault upon Byzantion, to stop their aid to Perinthos; as well deal with them now as later. He was committed, more deeply than he liked, to this costly war, and had needed to hire more mercenaries. They were coming up from Argos and Arkadia, states friendly to his power because for generations they had lived under the threat of Sparta; they did not share the anger and dread of Athens. But they cost money; which had been swallowed by the siege like water poured in sand.

At length they came, square stocky men of Philip's own build; his Argive descent still showed in him, bridging the generations. He reviewed them and conferred with their officers, from whom for better or worse hired troops would never be divided; it made a weak link in the chain of command. However, they were trained men who would earn their pay. Alexander and his troops marched west; already the men who had served with him in Thrace were patronizing the others.

His campaign was rapid. Revolt was still in the bud; several towns took fright, exiled their rash insurgents and pledged their loyalty. Those already committed, however, rejoiced to hear that Philip, the gods having sent him mad, had trusted his forces to a boy of sixteen years. They sent defiances, Alexander rode to their citadels, sat down before them one by one, looked for the flaws in their defences, or, if there were none, created them with saps or ramps or breaches. He had learned his lessons at Perinthos, and improved on some of them. Resistance soon died out; the remaining towns opened their gates on his terms.

Riding out from Akanthos he viewed Xerxes' Ditch, the ship canal through the isthmus neck of Athos, cut for the Persian fleet to bypass its mountain storms. Its great snowy peak reared up from its shaggy buttresses. The army turned north, along the curve of a pleasant bay. Perched on the foot-slopes below the wooded hills stood a long-ruined town. Brambles grew on its fallen walls; the terracing of its vineyards was collapsing from the winter rains; its weed-grown olive groves were forsaken, but for a herd of goats nibbling the bark, and some naked little boys tearing off low branches. Alexander asked, 'What place was this? '

A trooper rode to ask, and, when all the boys fled yelling at the sight of him, grabbed up the slowest, who struggled like a netted lynx. Dragged before the general, and finding him no older than his own brother, he was struck dumb. When the portent let him know that all they wanted of him was the name of the spot they stood on, he answered, 'Stagira. '

The column rode on. Alexander said to Hephaistion, 'I must speak to Father. It's time for the old man to have his fee. '

Hephaistion nodded. He had seen that schooldays were over.

When the treaties had been signed, the hostages delivered, the strongpoints manned, Alexander went back to Philip, still sitting before Perinthos.

The King had waited for him, before moving against Byzantion; he had needed to know that all was well. He was marching himself, leaving Parmenion here; for Byzantion would be tougher than Perinthos, three sides protected by Propontis and Golden Horn, the land side by massive walls. He set his hopes upon surprise.

They milled over the campaign together, over the pinewood trestle. Often Philip would forget it was not a grown man he was talking to, till some careless bluntness would set up the boy's back. It was rarer now; rough, wary, touchy, their contact was warmed by a secret, mutual pride in one another's acceptance.

'How are the Argives shaping? ' asked Alexander not long after, over a midday meal.

'I shall leave them here. Parmenion must cope with them. They came here I suppose to swagger about before half-trained citizen levies, as they can in the southern cities. Our men think them raw hands, and let them know it. But what are they, soldiers or bridesmaids? Fair pay, good rations, good quarters; yet nothing's right for them. They sulk at drill; they don't like the sarissa; all they mean is they're clumsy still and our own men laugh. Well, they can stay here and use the short spear, for this work it's well enough. When I've marched with my people, and they're cocks of the walk, they'll pick up, their officers tell me. '

Alexander, scooping up fish sauce with his bread, said, 'Listen. '

His first question had been prompted by half-heard sounds of discord. They were getting louder.

'Hades take them, ' said the King. 'What now? '

Shouted insults, in Greek and Macedonian, could now be heard.

'Anything looses it off, when they're at odds like this. ' Philip pushed back his chair, wiping-off his fingers on his bare thigh. 'A cockfight, a squabble over a boy…Parmenion's on reconnaissance. ' The noise was growing; each side was being reinforced. 'Nothing for it, I shall have to sort them myself. ' He walked with his stolid limp towards the doorway.

'Father. They sound ugly. Why not get armed? '

'What? No, that would make too much of it. They'll give over when they see me. They won't heed one another's officers, there's the mischief. '

‘I’ll come too. If the officers can't quieten them... '

'No, no; I don't need you. Finish your food. Simmias, keep mine hot. '

He went out as he was, unarmed but for the sword he always wore. Alexander got up and looked after him from the door.

Between the town, and the straggling village of the siege-lines, was a wide space through which slit trenches ran out to the siege-towers, and fortified guard-posts stood. Here between men on duty or changing guard the brawl must have begun, visible all along the lines, so that the factions had gathered quickly. There were already some hundreds; Greeks, who had been nearer, outnumbered Macedonians. Racial taunts were flying. Above the din, voices that sounded like officers' were exchanging recriminations, and threatening each other with the King. Philip stumped forward a few paces, looked again; then shouted to a trooper who had been riding towards the crowd. The man dismounted and gave him a leg up. Provided now with a living rostrum, he cantered purposefully forward, and shouted for silence.

He chose seldom to be formidable. Silence fell; the crowd divided to let him in. As it closed again, Alexander saw that the horse was restive.

The squires who had waited at table were talking in excited undertones. Alexander gave them a look; they should have been waiting for orders. The next hut was the lodging of all the body-squires; the doorway was full of heads. He called out, 'Get armed. Be quick. '

Philip was wrestling with the horse. His voice, which had carried power, now sounded angry. The horse reared; there was a roar of abuse and cursing; it must have struck a man with its forefeet. Suddenly it gave a great scream, stood almost upright, and sank down, the King still doggedly clinging. Horse and man vanished into a threshing, shouting vortex.

Alexander ran to the armour-pegs on the wall, snatched his shield and helmet - the corselet would take too long - and called to the squires, 'They've killed his horse under him. Come. ' Soon outdistancing all the others, he ran without looking back. The Macedonians were pouring out of barracks. It was the next moments that counted.

At first he simply shoved at the mob, and it let him through. These were sightseers, or mere accretions, easily shifted by anyone who knew his own mind. 'Let me pass. Let me through to the King. ' He could hear the squeals of the dying horse, weakening to groans; no sound from his father. 'Back, get back, let me pass. Make way, I want the King. '

'He wants his dad. ' The first defiance; a square-shouldered, square-bearded Argive stood grinning in his way. 'Look, here's the cockalorum. ' The last word choked off. His eyes and mouth gaped, a retch came up from his throat. Alexander with an expert jerk freed his sword.

A gap appeared; he could see the still twitching horse, on its side, his father lying with one leg under it, unmoving; over him stood an Argive with a lifted spear, irresolute, waiting for encouragement. Alexander ran him through.

The crowd heaved and swayed, as the Macedonians flung themselves at its edges. Alexander bestrode his father's body, one leg braced against the horse which had stiffened in death; he yelled, 'The King! ' to guide the rescuers. All round him, uncertain men were urging each other to strike. For anyone behind him, he was a gift.

'This is the King. I will kill the first man who touches him. ' Some were scared; he fixed his eyes on the man they had been looking at for guidance. He stuck out his jaw and mumbled, but his eyes were flickering. 'Get back all of you. Are you mad? Do you think if you kill him or me, you can get out of Thrace alive? ' Someone said they had got out of worse places; but no one moved. 'Our men are either side of you, and the enemy has the harbour. Are you tired of life? '

Some warning, a gift of Herakles, made him whip round. He hardly saw the face of the man whose spear was lifted, only the exposed throat. His stab severed the windpipe; the man reeled back, bloody fingers clawing at the hissing wound. He swung round to confront the others; in this instant the scene had changed, he saw instead the backs of the royal squires, shields locked, heaving off the Argives. Hephaistion came breasting through like a swimmer through surf, and stood to shield his back. It was over, in about as long as it would have taken him to finish his half-eaten fish.

He looked round. He had not a scratch, he had been a stroke ahead each time. Hephaistion spoke to him and he answered smiling. He was shining and calm at the centre of his mystery, the godlike freedom of killing fear. Fear lay dead at his feet.

Loud voices, expert in command, cleft the confusion; the Argive general, and Parmenion's deputy, roared at their troops in familiar tones. Hangers-on turned swiftly to spectators; the centre fell apart revealing a scatter of dead and wounded; all the men near the fallen King were arrested and led away. The horse was dragged aside. The riot was over. When shouts began again, they came from those on the outskirts who could not see, spreading rumours or asking news.

'Alexander! Where's our boy? Have those whores' sons killed him? ' Then, running the other way in a deep bass counterpoint, The King, they killed the King! The King is dead! ' and higher, as if in answer, 'Alexander! '

He stood, a point of stillness in all the clamour, looking beyond it into the blue dazzling sky.

There were other voices, down by his knees. 'Sir, sir, how are you? ' they were saying. 'Sir? ' He blinked a moment, as if awaking from sleep; then knelt down with the others and touched the body, saying, 'Father? Father? '

He could feel at once that the King was breathing.

There was blood in his hair. His sword was half-out; he must have felt for it as he was struck, perhaps with a pommel by someone whose nerve had failed him to use the edge. His eyes were closed, and he came limply with their lifting hands. Alexander, remembering a lesson of Aristotle's, pulled back the lid of his good eye. It closed again with a twitch.

'A shield, ' Alexander said. 'Roll him gently. I'll take his head. '

The Argives had been marched off; the Macedonians crowded round, asking if the King was alive or dead. 'He is stunned, ' said Alexander. 'He will be better presently. He has no other wound. Moschion! The herald is to give that out. Sippas! Order the catapults to fire a volley. Look at the enemy gaping on the wall; I want the fun knocked out of them. Leonnatus, I'll be with my father till he's himself again. Bring anything to me. '

They laid the King on his bed. Alexander drew a blood-stained hand from holding his head, to settle it on the pillow. Philip groaned, and opened his eyes.

The senior officers, who had felt entitled to crowd in, assured him all was well, all the men in hand. Alexander standing by the bed-head said to one of the squires, 'Bring me water, and a sponge. '

'It was your son, King, ' said someone, 'your son saved you. ' Philip turned his head and said weakly, 'So? Good boy. '

'Father, did you see which of them struck you? '

'No, ' said Philip, his voice strengthening. 'He took me from behind. '

'Well, I hope I killed him. I killed one there. ' His grey eyes dwelt deeply on his father's face.

Philip blinked dimly, and sighed. 'Good boy. I remember nothing; nothing till I woke up here. '

The squire came up with the water-bowl and held it out. Alexander took the sponge, and washed his hand clean of blood, going over it carefully, two or three times. He turned away; the squire paused with the bowl, at a loss, then went round to sponge the King's hair and brow. He had supposed that this was what the Prince had meant it for.

By evening, though sick and giddy if he moved, Philip could give orders. The Argives were marched off on exchange to Kypsela. Alexander was cheered wherever he was seen; men touched him for luck, or for his virtue to rub off on them, or merely for the sake of touching him. The besieged, encouraged by these disorders, came out on the wall at dusk and attacked a siege tower. Alexander led out a party and beat them off. The doctor announced that the King was mending. One of the squires sat up with him. It was midnight before Alexander got to bed. Though he ate with his father, he had his own lodging. He was a general now.

There was a scratch on the door, in a familiar rhythm. He folded back the blanket, and moved over. Hephaistion had known, when this tryst was made, that what Alexander wanted was to talk. He could always tell.

They milled over the fight, talking softly into the pillow. Presently they fell quiet; in the pause they could hear the sounds of the camp, and, from the distant ramparts of Perinthos, the night watch passing the bell along from man to man, the proof of wakefulness. 'What is it? ' Hephaistion whispered.

In the dim glimmer of the window, he saw the shine of Alexander's eyes coming close to his. 'He says he remembers nothing. He'd already come to himself when we picked him up. '

Hephaistion, who had once been hit by a stone from a Thracian wall said, 'He'll have forgotten. '

'No. He was shamming dead. '

'Was he? Well, who can blame him? One can't even sit up, everything spins round. He hoped they'd be scared at what they'd done, and go away. '

'I opened his eye, and I know he saw me. But he gave me no sign, though he knew it was over then. '

'Very likely he just went off again. '

'I watched him, he was awake. But he won't say he remembers. '

'Well, he's the King. ' Hephaistion had a secret kindness for Philip, who had always treated him with courtesy, even with tact; with whom, too, he shared an enemy. 'People might misunderstand, you know how tales get twisted. '

'To me he could have said it. ' Alexander's eyes, glittering in the near-darkness, fastened upon his. 'He won't own that he was lying there, knowing he owed his life to me. He didn't want to admit it, he doesn't want to remember. '

Who knows? thought Hephaistion. Or ever will? But he knows, and nothing will ever shift it. His bare shoulder, crossed by Hephaistion's arm, had a faint sheen like darkened bronze. 'Supposing he has his pride? You ought to know what that is. '

'Yes, I do. But in his place I'd still have spoken. '

'What need? ' He slid his hand up the bronze shoulder into the tousled hair; Alexander pushed against it, like a powerful animal consenting to be stroked. Hephaistion remembered his childishness in the beginning; sometimes it seemed like yesterday, sometimes half a lifetime. 'Everyone knows. He does; so do you. Nothing can take it away. '

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