Aelia Capitolina, The Roman Province of Judea
It was cold on the hilltop, making every breath a cloud of frost. Odenathus squinted at the eastern horizon, urging the sun to rise and bring him warmth. A steep-sided, boulder-strewn valley separated him from the city of Aelia Capitolina. Lights gleamed on the walls, illuminating guardposts and fortified towers.
Odenathus had been sent forward with the scouts to observe the lay of the land. The Palmyrene snorted to himself. Jalal had sent him. This had caused vigorous discussion between the burly Tanukh soldier and the whippet-thin Lord Uri, who vied with Jalal for command. Each man was sure that Lord Mohammed had placed him in charge of the expedition. Even sending scouts forward required a vehement and prolonged discussion of the options. For reasons best known to himself, Lord Uri was dead set on being the captor of this hilltown.
Mohammed may be infallible when the voice from the clear air speaks through him, Odenathus thought, cold hands stuffed into his armpits, but he is still just a man when he speaks with his own voice. The Palmyrene youth was pretty sure that Mohammed had intended for the two men to work together. They certainly behaved themselves when he was about. Odenathus shook his head in dismay and wonder. Like two boys with only one toy between them!
Rock clicked on rock and Odenathus turned, seeing that one of the Sahaba was clambering across the cracked and weatherworn boulders.
"Sir? We've checked the hill and the nearest huts. Everything seems empty. No Romans about, anyway."
Odenathus raised an eyebrow at the boy and received a shrug in return. "Not even a goat or a watch goose?"
The boy, his face mostly shrouded by the dark cloth of his kaffiyeh, shook his head.
"They must know we are coming, then. Send a rider back to the camp and tell our… commanders that there won't be any surprise attack for this place."
In the wake of the victory at Yarmuk, the Arab army had split in two. The main body, with two-thirds or more of the men, under the direct command of Mohammed, had pressed on to the coast, aiming to capture the great port of Caesarea Maritima. At the same time, a second effort had been sent south, towards the town that controlled the highlands of Judea. Odenathus had been attached to this expedition as their sorcerous support, even though that meant breaking up the team that he and Zoe made.
Somehow, Odenathus thought with a smile, Mohammed will make up that lack.
The Palmyrene didn't know how the Arab chieftain had attracted the attention of a "power" but it was clear beyond doubt that he had. Looking upon him in the hidden world was almost impossible. He shone like a cloth hung over the sun. Conversations with the Mekkans in the army revealed that the man had never received any kind of training in the arts. Something had found him, though, and entered the world through him. Odenathus shivered, but not from the cold. There were things in the universe that were vaster than the human mind could imagine.
Odenathus had been taught, both by his tutors as a youth, then later in the Legion, that these "powers" were hostile to man. They were beyond the pale, weak gods with human faces that the people worshiped. They were more than the tiny spirits and servitors a man could call up and control. These things, unnamed by any sane man, were to Odenathus as he was to the least of the insects. Trafficking with them meant madness and annihilation.
I pray that Lord Mohammed has not been found by one of the Ancient Ones. If he had, Odenathus knew, then it was very likely the world in which he walked, breathing the chill air of a summer night finally breaking into dawn, would be destroyed. An elephant brushes against an anthill with one ponderous foot, smashing it into the ground. The ants, milling about, rushing here and there, are reduced to a stain. The elephant, continuing on its own business, fails to notice.
The sun at last rose, washing the olive trees on the mountain with golden light. Odenathus held his hands up in the air, greeting the sun. Around him, the Sahaba were kneeling, making their prayers. Soon the heat of the day would build and it would be blindingly hot. He turned, watching the rosy light slowly paint the tops of the walls and the roofs of the buildings in the city. It seemed quiet and still. Soon the cocks would be crowing and the priests ringing the summoning bar. It seemed clear that the city was held by the Romans, by a garrison, and they knew the Sahaba were coming.
Today, if Jalal and Uri could quit arguing about who was in command of the expedition and the order of march, they would lay siege to the place.
– |"Um… Nicholas?"
Three men were crouched in the shadow of a gate postern. The gate was a deep-set opening in the eastern wall of the praetorium of Aelia Capitolina. It was the main gate from the city-a crowded, ramshackle affair of tiny streets, overhanging roofs, close-set tenements and shops-into the fortress maintained by the Roman government to administer the province of Judea. The praetorium was built on the foundations of an older citadel that had once been partially demolished to make way for an extensive palace that had lined the western wall of the city. As a result, it rose up on an artificial hill of debris, looking down over the rooftops of the city. Too, Aelia Capitolina was built on three hills with a streambed between them. The praetorium rose on a spur of the southwestern hill, while to the northeast, on a broad, flat platform, there was a massive temple complex.
Like most things in the city, the original structures on the temple mount had been torn down by the Romans and rebuilt. Between the fortress and the temple lay the body of the city, creased by the streambed, which had long ago vanished under pavement and buildings and centuries of rubble.
"Yes, Vladimir? You're having some second thoughts?"
Due to the confined nature of the city and the fact that the southwestern wall faced directly onto a rather steep slope which was unsuitable for building, the plaza before the gate of the Praetorium was far smaller than the Roman city planners had desired. There was barely thirty feet between the brooding overhang of the gate tower and the nearest building. Too, the narrow alleyways that snaked between the buildings, twisting and turning, plunging down flights of steps or climbing steeply, were very dark. In some places, even the noon sun did not illuminate the courtyards. The Roman planners, particularly the engineers attached to the old Tenth Legion, had expressed some reservations about the security of the praetorium, given that it would be easy for a hostile force to hide in the alleys, only a short sprint from the gate.
"Second thoughts? No, my friend, nothing like that. I just wonder…"
As it happened, the alleys fronting on the plaza were crowded with Roman engineers. Though not technically hostile, their presence would have caused some consternation amongst the inhabitants of the praetorium. These men, armored in the overlapping plates of their lorica segmentata, dark red cloaks bundled around them, spears and short, stabbing swords at the ready, helmets tied securely under their chins, were waiting for the gate to open.
The three men in the shadow of the gate overhang were their commander and two close companions.
"Wonder what?" Nicholas whispered crossly. The last three days of frenzied activity had not been without some discussion amongst Nicholas and his staff. If the Walach had concerns, he should have brought them up. The barbarian, his thick black hair clouding his face, scratched the back of his head. Nicholas turned slightly, so that he could see Vladimir's eyes.
"Well… we're about to seize the residence of the civil governor of the province with Imperial troops. This is the same governor, appointed by the Emperor, who has struck a deal with the largest clan in these parts to see that order is maintained and the taxes are collected. If this Albanian is thrown in the jug, they'll be pissed."
Nicholas nodded, mauve eyes in shadow. Though the sky was brightening, it was still quite dark down in the brick and plaster ravines of the city.
"That's so," he said in a whisper.
"Doesn't it strike you as reckless to pick a fight with half the province and the governor when we received news not more than three days ago that the Great Prince Theodore has been routed by a rabble of desert bandits and unhappy farmers? Isn't it a little unwise to do this when the city may be under siege within days?"
Spreading his hands, Nicholas shrugged.
"Sometimes, Vlad, you've got to take the bull by the horns and leap. This pustule of an Albanian is a thief and corrupt as a Persian clerk. He's driven the other half of the province to the edge of revolt with his tax policy, and I do not trust him to hold the city against these raiders. If we make him disappear, then I think the rest of the citizens will fight. If he stays…"
The third member of the little group stirred, putting a finger to his lips.
"Quiet," breathed the young man, his red hair tied up behind his head. "I feel someone coming."
Nicholas froze and Vladimir became so still that he seemed to fade into the bricks behind him. The young Hibernian settled back behind the heavy bulk of the Walach, whose shoulders dwarfed his. Nicholas, his face settled and calm, slowly drew his blade from its sheath. The metal gleamed in the poor light, showing a rippled, watery surface. The sword was of the hand-and-a-half style favored by the northern barbarians, with hilts wrapped in grooved leather and wire. Nicholas brushed lank brown hair out of his face and took the blade in both hands, tensing for action.
Brunhilde quivered in his grip, smelling blood.
Beyond the heavy pine door, bound with iron bands and held by a pair of bolts sunk into the rock of the tower on either side, there was a rattling sound. The voices of men came, muffled by the thick wood. Metal squealed, sliding along a stone groove. Then the door opened, pushed by two of the governor's guardsmen.
For an instant, Nicholas looked upon them, seeing a pair of Illyrians with stubbled faces and corselets of round iron rings. Their swords were slung over their shoulders in wooden scabbards held up by a leather strap. Neither was wearing a helmet, though one man had a pointed spangenhelm hung from his waist belt. Both were grunting, their strength matched against the rust and grime in the hinges that kept the door from swinging freely.
Nicholas' jaw clenched and he moved, Brunhilde whipping past at shoulder level as he drove her with the full power of his upper body. The Scandian blade sunk into the first man's unprotected neck, parting the skin and muscle like soft bread. Blood spurted, fouling the clean length of the blade, and Nicholas stepped into the doorway, wrenching the sword free. The first man was falling, unable to make a sound with his throat torn away, as Nicholas reversed direction with Brunhilde's wedge-shaped point and ran it through the open mouth of the second man. The soldier's eyes bulged and droplets of blood from his cheek spattered his face. Bone ground and popped, then Brunhilde was on guard again. Nicholas, letting the blade keen softly, strode over the bodies. He was in the courtyard.
Behind him, Vladimir sidled into the chamber of the tower, crouching low. An odd light burned in his eyes as he loped past the two bodies, still twitching on the cobblestones. In the gateway, Dwyrin raised his hand and whistled sharply.
The Roman engineers darted across the plaza, their rectangular shields held up at an angle. No one expected the garrison of the praetorium to be awake and armed at this hour, but it never hurt anyone to be thorough. The engineers that Nicholas commanded believed that more than most, since lax attention to detail on their part could kill hundreds. They reached the gateway without incident and poured through.
Dwyrin watched them go. When the last of the men had filed inside, taking up their positions at the gate to prevent any disturbance, he entered the gatehouse himself. There was little place for him in the swift, bloody business that Nicholas intended, so he climbed the long flight of stairs to the observation deck on the top of the main building of the fortress. He went quickly, being young and limber. Two years of service in the Thaumaturgic Corps of the Eastern Empire had cut the fat from his teenage body, leaving wiry muscle. His hair, long and red, trailed behind his head in a thicket of braids. Despite his obvious outlander appearance, he wore the red cloak, strapped boots and tunic of a Roman soldier.
The sun was full over the horizon when he reached the top of the stairs and he stepped out into bright golden sunlight. He squinted, shading his face with a hand. Life in the desert suited him, even when he had been in the wizards' school in Egypt. That was surprising, considering how green, foggy and wet Hibernia was, but his memories of his homeland were growing fainter with each day. After three months in the Judean capital, the barren hills and dusty olive groves on the mountains seemed homey and familiar.
Yawning a little, he leaned against a battlement. Like the rest of the city, the citadel was built of quarried limestone blocks fitted with cement. It made everything a yellowish-white color, matching the mountains and valleys. From a distance, if the sun did not strike on the gilded roofs of the Temple of Jupiter on the other hill, it could be hard to distinguish the city from the hill. The local tribesmen tended to wear pale white, tan and cream robes, too, which made them match the ground. It always seemed dusty, even when it was not.
Dwyrin stared off to the east, worrying. Two years ago, when he had been sent by the school to satisfy the Imperial levy, he had been drafted into a thaumaturgic manus, or "five," with three other youths. During the war with Persia, Eric had died, drowning in frigid waters before the gate of a besieged city. Last year the other two, Zoe and Odenathus, had left Imperial service after they had learned that the Eastern Emperor had betrayed their home city, Palmyra. That rich and glorious city had been destroyed. Dwyrin had parted from them amid bitter anger and hatred. He had stayed with the Legions, while they had vanished into the desert.
Sometimes couriers came to the city bringing news from other Roman outposts. When they did, Dwyrin stayed close to Nicholas' office, hoping that he might hear some rumor or news of his friends. He hoped that they had not been killed or captured by slavers. The provinces across the Jordan River, to the east, had risen up in revolt. War engulfed the whole region.
Dwyrin straightened suddenly, disturbed from his thoughts by the wink of sunlight on metal. There, on the height of the mountain that rose on the eastern side of the city, something was shining. He squinted, trying to make it out, then laughed aloud. He had learned more than a few tricks while training in the Legion.
Time to earn my pay, he thought as he raised his hands.
Entering the hidden world was easy now; hardly a moment's concentration and thought was required to see the solid surfaces and forms of the world of physicality melt away. He turned aside from the abyss of full sight, letting his mind discern the patterns of the city and the hills amid the fury and chaos of the true world. A sorcerer could lose himself in the vast depths that opened before him. Some apprentices entered the hidden world and never returned, their bodies withering as the mind failed and the heart ceased. There were depths in the sky that did not bear investigation.
The Hibernian turned his attention to the swiftest of the motes that flooded the space around him, letting his thoughts bring into focus the tiny photons that made up the wash of light that fell over him, warming his face and lighting the stones. It was difficult, for the training he had received told him to ignore the minute, flickering ether that filled the sky. But now he needed to gather them, folding them towards his eyes, letting a transparent disk form before him. His raised hands marked its edge, letting the disk de-form and flex, making a convex surface.
Turning towards the distant hill, he let the disk expand and capture the photons that had reflected from the shining metal there and touched his eye. They flooded against his face, making it slightly warmer. Dwyrin, trying not to squint, let his mind restore regular vision and sight.
The far hilltop sprang into view, seemingly as through he stood only yards away, floating in the air, looking up at the men clustered there amid the olive trees. One of them turned, his head coming up, dark eyes narrowing in suspicion.
"Ay!" Dwyrin jumped back and the invisible disk spun out of control and fragmented, scattering light across the white stones of the tower roof. The Hibernian youth was sweating, his face hot and burning. He blinked furiously, almost blinded.
Despite this, he staggered towards the top of the stairs, letting his hands find the way along the battlement.
– |Nicholas, armored arms crossed over his heavy scale breastplate, squinted at the Armenian.
"You don't have a problem, then, serving under my banner?"
The Armenian, a long-mustached rascal named Nezam, grinned and made a weighing motion with his right hand. Nicholas nodded, not surprised. As long as the highland mercenaries that Nezam commanded were paid, in coin of a full weight, they would be loyal. Luckily for Nicholas, who had not come with any great store of gold, the lock rooms under the citadel held part of the tax revenue that the governor had been collecting. A troop of stonemasons from the engineers' cohort was guarding them right now, with Vladimir along as insurance.
"I no care who sits in praetor's chair," said the Armenian, his musical accent making the Greek sing. "We will fight or watch, no matter to us."
"Good," said Nicholas in his equally poor Greek. "Divide your men into groups of five. They will go with the engineers to secure the town and the gates."
Turning to the other two men in the room, Nicholas raised an eyebrow.
"Sextus, Frontius-see that your men and these barbarians are at each gate in the city. No one comes in or goes out until I've talked with the city senate and the other ne'er-do-wells that thrive in this place."
The lead surveyor and the master draftsman nodded. Each looked a little uncomfortable in their armor, but it was clean and it fit. Their role in the Legions might not be to fight on the front line, shields interlocked, but they were Roman soldiers. Nicholas sighed to himself, wishing he had the cohort of Eastern veterans he had been promised when he arrived in Judea.
But that is bootless, he reminded himself. The troops he had expected had gone off on some bandit-chasing expedition in the north, leaving him with a stranded Western Empire siege and road-building cohort. At least they had tools and equipment and some idea of what to do with a sword. The late governor, who had fallen down a flight of stairs when Nicholas and Vladimir had dragged him out of a rubbish shaft for questioning, had not done much with the local militia or the city garrison. Most of those billets were empty, the presumed soldiers having been cashiered out or died. Of course, the records of the garrison still showed them on the rolls. It was an old trick.
The problem was, Nicholas needed those men even to police the city, much less hold four miles of double-ramparted wall against whatever army had thrashed Prince Theodore and eight legions of Eastern troops. Which led him back here, to this cramped office in the citadel, where he was buying off the five hundred Armenians that the late, lamented governor had imported for his own protection. There was no doubt that the Armenians could fight-they were professionals-but what if the gold ran out, what then?
"Sir, what about our survey?" Neither Frontius nor Sextus had left the room.
Nicholas took a deep breath and put his hands on the tabletop. "The survey… will have to wait until the city is secured."
Neither man moved, staring at Nicholas with sad eyes. Frontius, with his permanent squint, looked particularly disturbing.
Gods! They're worse than a pair of Locrian hounds!
When Nicholas and his troops had entered the city, there had been an argument between Sextus and the local magistrate about the aqueducts. The Western officer, long accustomed to the massive public works of Rome, had held forth over a flagon of weak wheat beer that the Judean provinces were sorely lacking in proper waterworks. The magistrate, an Illyrian emigre who had lived in Aelia Capitolina for thirty years, disagreed with some heated words. Luckily, the dispute had not been resolved by fisticuffs but rather by a trip into the basement of the tavern.
There in the ancient stone floor was a round stone lid with a heavy iron ring. With the help of those engineers that could still stand up, a great deal of rope and a pulley, Sextus was suspended head-first over the hole and then, with a racket of shouted commands and laughter, lowered into the mysterious chamber. Nicholas had been watching from the top of the stairs, trying to keep his hair from catching fire in the lantern. A grain passed, then another, then there was some more shouting and the engineer was pulled up, choking and coughing from the smoke of the lantern he had in his hand.
"It's incredible!" The engineer had that look, like a boy really seeing a girl for the first time. He was dripping water and looking like a half-drowned rat but he was smiling. "It's enormous!"
Apparently the tavern stood atop a vast underground cistern. The ancient builders of the city, plagued by war and raids from neighboring tribes, had built their water system underground. The hilltop was riddled with caverns and tunnels and buried springs. The soft limestone was easy to cut, allowing the stonemasons of old to quarry out great vaulted chambers and pools. This discovery had transported Frontius and Sextus into a veritable frenzy of excitement. With them, bound in a waxed leather cover, was a thick book of parchment. It was a matter of cohort pride that they possessed a copy of Vitruvius' De Architectura. It rode in one of the special wagons in a locked iron box.
Like their ancient idol, the two engineers were working on a survey of all modern waterworks, siegecraft, buildings and construction materials. The thought of adding the expertise of the ancient Judeans-consolidated and revised, of course, by these two stalwarts-quite distracted them from the tasks that Nicholas had set them.
The centurion had then suffered at length as the engineers had pressed him to let them conduct a full survey of everything in the city, above and below ground. Nicholas had refused, and was still refusing. The gates, the walls, the ramparts-everything was in disrepair after years of neglect. He had work teams supplemented with local workers out from sunrise to sunset, shoring up walls, repairing gates, clearing the old ditch that ran along the exposed northern wall. Nicholas guessed that perhaps only half of the work that needed to be done to restore the defenses of the city was done.
"But, sir! We could do it on off hours."
Nicholas raised his hand sharply and was about to bark some severe words when there was a rattling of boots in the corridor outside.
Dwyrin was at the door, panting, his face sunburned. "They're here!"
"Who?" snapped Nicholas, but he could guess as well as the two engineers.
"The Arabs-I just saw their advance party on the mountain to the east."
Sextus and Frontius were gone, their armor banging off the jamb of the door. Nezam, having stood well aside while the two Romans dashed out, followed more sedately, hand on the pommel of his sword. Nicholas was about to follow them when he caught the look on the boy's face. He pulled up hard and caught Dwyrin's eye.
"What is it?"
"Nothing, sir-"
Nicholas grimaced and seized the young sorcerer by the throat, jamming him up against the wall. Breath oofed out of Dwyrin's lungs and his eyes bulged.
"I've no time to dally about," snarled Nicholas, his face close to Dwyrin's. "Tell me what you saw."
He released his fist and the Hibernian slumped down, gasping for breath. While he recovered, Nicholas' face, which had grown quite grim, softened a little.
"Sorry, lad," he said, setting the boy upright. "Everything counts now, though."
Dwyrin nodded, his face red with shame. Withholding information from your commanding officer in time of war was an offense punishable by running the gauntlet. The Hibernian had seen men dragged from the end of that corridor of fists and staves, their faces ruined masses of blood and broken bone. The Legion had great hopes that all of its soldiers would live to reach their twenty-six-year retirement and collect the honesta misso. Nothing in that hope kept the Legion officers from enforcing a brutal and strict discipline on their troops.
"I saw a man with the scouts on the mountain; I know him. He was my five-mate in the Persian campaign. His name is Odenathus, a Palmyrene noble. He and his cousin Zoe left us at Antioch, when the auxillia mustered out."
Nicholas' eyes narrowed. The boy had told him a little of what had happened in Antioch when his comrades had taken their discharge from the Legion. "A sorcerer? Like you? How strong is he?"
Dwyrin started to speak, then stopped. A pensive, thoughtful look came over him. The thought of who in the manus was better or worse had seemed very simple when they were fighting as one. Dwyrin was the youngest and the least experienced, therefore Odenathus must be far stronger than he. But was that still true? Dwyrin had grown in the past months, freed from the strictures of having to fight in the battle-meld with the two others. He lacked many skills, but this was a siege. His fire-calling talent, which now hovered ever-eager for release, might be the difference between victory and death.
"He's not like me, centurion. He made a solid second for our manus and he's good at deception and defense, but he can't call fire or lightning well. I can master him if we come to blows… I think."
The Scandian nodded, his mind turning the situation over, viewing it from more than one angle. There was something disturbing here, but what was it? Ah.
"Take yourself to the northern wall, lad. Find cover near the main gate, but don't show yourself. These fellows may be rash and try and rush us. If they do, I want you to surprise them."
Dwyrin nodded, still rubbing his throat, and jogged off. Nicholas, alone in the governor's office, brooded.
The Palmyrenes are with these bandits. Theirs was a rich city, with many ships and warehouses and great trade. Their agents and factors were in every city on the Levantine coast, even here. This is no rabble that comes against us…
Then he laughed, bits and pieces of rumor and fragmentary news falling into place. It was not a laugh of pleasure or joy, but rather of the knowledgeable man who sees what others have not.
Prince Theodore had been soundly defeated in the north, on the Syrian heights, on the road between the port of Caesarea Maritima and Damascus. Such success at arms had not been achieved by rabble. It was well known from merchants and travelers fleeing along the roads from the east that the Greek cities of the Decapolis-Bostra, Jerash and so on-had risen in revolt. Now the Palmyrenes and these Arab bandits were involved. A rebel army was here, well south of the line between Damascus and the port. This was no longer a provincial dispute over taxes. This was a war between the Empire and a new pan-Levantine state.
That collection of events meant that the entire Imperial frontier from Damascus to Aelana had collapsed. It was likely that any survivors of Theodore's army would fall back to the north, towards Tyre, or to the sea. Worse, at the center of the Decapolis was the massive Legion camp of Lejjun, which he could only assume had fallen into the hands of the rebels. That meant they had gained arms, armor, siege equipment, supplies, wagons. It meant his position, cut off here in this vile little town on a poky hill, was completely untenable.
Cursing, Nicholas strode out of the room. He would not wait to discuss matters with the town senate, he would root them out of their homes right now while there was still a little time.
– |"Look, the walls are empty. Do you see any watchmen? No."
Uri, Lord of the Sarid clan of Mekkah, pointed with his riding staff at the crumbling yellow walls of the city. He was astride a spirited bronze-colored gelding, his left hand wrapped in the reins. His kaffiyeh was cinched around his high forehead with a twisted cord threaded with the colors of his tribe. Like all of the Sahaba, he had a flash of green in his headdress.
Jalal, riding just ahead of Odenathus in the van of the army, grunted. The old soldier's eyes were watching the wall very carefully. His bow, sweeping horn and bone with a half-bent top arm, was laid across his saddle with a flight arrow set to the string. The Tanukh had spent thirty years wandering the fringes of the Roman and Persian empires, taking his pay from any lord needing a strong bow and a stout arm in the line of battle. He had never commanded before Lord Mohammed had placed him over the left wing of the army of the Sahaba. Now he knew why all generals were such bastards! Still, he would not trade the command of the maimanah for anything.
"What is this?" Uri was continued to berate the Tanukh captain, his voice sharp. "Why-a scaffold where someone is trying to repair the gate! I think, my friend, that you worry too much about this place. It is old and decrepit, barely worth your time."
Odenathus, who had been aware of a quiet watching sensation since the lead elements of the Sahaba had come up onto the ridge that ran down from the city walls and off to the west, nudged his mare with a knee. She ambled out of the line of march, letting him have a clear view of the gate and the walls. It was true they were in poor shape. Some of the embrasures on the battlements were missing, leaving gaps. The gate itself was closed, but scaffolds and piles of cut stone littered the area around it. Odenathus smiled a little, imagining the panic that must have set in among the workers when the first Sahaba lancers had ridden into view.
There was no one on the walls, though, and he had a good idea of what that meant.
"You'd put your head in the noose on a lark?" Jalal's voice was deep and rolled like rocks falling down a hillside. Somehow it fit here, in this desolate country. "You've a hankering to take your men over the wall first, do you?"
Odenathus squinted at the wall. He was sure the defenders were crouched down behind the stone teeth, waiting for the Sahaba to come into range of their bows and slings. He was listening to Jalal and Uri with only half an ear. They had been bickering for so long that it had become part of the background noise. Rubbing his face, he began to concentrate, letting his mind slip through the entrance of Hermes and into the whirling void waiting beyond.
"You think the Ben-Sarid have no stomach for a little blood? Shall we have a wager, then?"
Odenathus let his sight expand, seeing the hidden cracks and shifted foundations under the gate. The land had settled a little, tilting the stones and splintering the plaster off the old Roman brickwork. It would not take much to bring down the whole structure. He put forth a subtle pressure, letting his will infiltrate the stone courses.
Distantly, Jalal barked in laughter, waving for the Sahaba to stop. A cornicen shrilled and the wings of the army began to fold out into the rocky plain before the city. Men and horses moved at an easy trot, kicking up a flat cloud of dust. Off to the left, the ground fell away towards a valley under a hill covered with olive orchards and the humped shapes of tombs. To the right, the ground rose a bit, irregular and cut by walls of piled fieldstone. Small gardens crouched between them. Odenathus concentrated, negotiating the ancient wards and spells that had once protected the gate.
They were very old and fallen into disrepair. Centuries ago they had been violently broken and only poorly repaired. In them, the Palmyrene could suddenly feel a little of the history of the city-a long struggle of capture and recapture, of repeated destruction and slow, painful rebuilding. Blood soaked the stone and brick, but there was dust too and the taste of long neglect.
At the fringe of his vision in the waking world, a troop of the Sarid galloped forward, their lances glittering in the midday sun. Despite his bold words, Uri was not leading them. He looked on, still sitting at Jalal's shoulder, still arguing. They had moved into the shade afforded by an old Roman triumphal gateway that stood, alone, a few hundred yards from the gate of the city.
Odenathus felt something in the air, a change in pressure, a sharp spike in the gradient of power in the land around him. Reflexively his hand ran through the mnemonic to call a pattern into waking memory. In the hidden world, the glittering blue sphere of the Shield of Athena sprang up, surrounding himself and the two arguing captains.
The earth shook, booming like a drum slammed by a heavy hand. The Sarid lancers, who had just come within a spear's throw of the gate, vanished in an eruption of sand, blazing limestone dust and red-orange flame. Burning horses catapulted through the air, their riders enveloped in white fire. Odenathus' mare reared, screaming. The two captains shouted in fear, their arms raised to shield their faces. Within seconds steaming ash, burning skulls and scorched limbs rained out of the air from a spreading black cloud. It drifted away from the gate.
Odenathus tried to rise. The mare had run away, her reins trailing on the dusty ground. The shield remained intact, though it was wavering in time with the thudding of his heart. Both Jalal and Shadin had managed to remain mounted and they were hiding behind the ancient gateway.
"Get away," Odenathus shouted. "It might be trapped."
It seemed the defenders had prepared a hidden ward under the ground, waiting for the Arabs to ride up the road to the gate. His brow furrowed with effort, he put forth his strength again, sending his will forth, probing for the enemy. In the ether the blast area flickered and gleamed with violence, making the patterns around it shimmer and twist like light in a rising pillar of heat.
There was a figure on the rampart, Odenathus could feel him, almost see him like a burning brand. The enemy was strong. Gritting his teeth, for he had never tried to strike at an enemy without Zoe at his side, their minds and powers amplified by the battle-meld, he chopped his hand at the distant wall. The air around him chilled and the nearest statuary on the triumphal gate splintered and cracked. Power leached from the dead ground and the sky and the roiling motion of atoms in the air. A cyan burst flared against the gate.
The enemy sorcerer's shield rippled as the blow struck, radiating heat and light like a rainbow. Odenathus swayed to his feet.
The enemy flexed his strength and Odenathus' shield fractured like a pane of glass struck by a hammer. Crying out, he was blown fifty feet down the road by the shock of contact. The air where he had been standing boiled and burned with a fierce blue-white light. The triumphal gate, licked by the roaring flame, cracked and shattered. Black smoke billowed out of the sandstone. Then half of it crumbled, in a roar of tormented stone and wood, to the ground. Bits of brick and facing pattered down around Odenathus in the sand.
The Arab army streamed away from the city at a full gallop, men shouting in anger and dismay.
The Palmyrene raised his head, feeling the world spin around him. His cloak was on fire, sending up a curl of bitter white smoke. At the last moment, he had managed to invoke a second shield. This had saved him. The enemy was very, very strong. Weakly, Odenathus threw off the smoldering cloth. His face and hands stung from the light.
"Oh," he gasped. "You've grown mighty, old friend."
The fire signature was far too clear, for Odenathus had seen it before, in the training camps and practice fields of the Legion.
Jalal jogged past, on foot, shouting something at the youth lying in the dirt. The burly soldier had Uri slung over one shoulder like a side of beef. The horses were disappearing in a cloud of dust. Odenathus' ears were still ringing and he couldn't hear.