Four thousand surviving warriors were chained together and were even now passing over the horizon, the cries of their women still ringing in their ears. Ctesiphon burned. The Roman eagles were triumphant. Only a small detachment remained behind for mopping up operations and to occupy the capital for a while. What remained of Ctesiphon would serve as a forward base and headquarters. The bulk of the army was already on the march for the glory of its general.
While the city burned, another flame was born in the brain of its conqueror. Warmed with pleasure over the victory, Avidius Cassius considered his worth as a senator and leader of Rome. He reflected the true value of Roman honor; it seemed only natural that the thought would come: Ave Avidius, Imperator! The spark caught in his mind…Imperator!
There were no sparks in Casca's mind. He turned his eyes upon the forty-five thousand dead men littering the field of battle. Other battles, other dead. How many scenes like this had he lived through? How many more could he face? Dead men… their corpses littered the ground as far as the eye could see. Horses… they screamed like women, their shrieks rising in the stormy air until, one by one, a member of the mop-up squad would mercifully slice the beast's throat, letting its rich blood join that of its human master in feeding the hungry soil beneath. Scavenging soldiers… Romans walked over the field below him, looting the bodies of the vanquished enemy. Parthia was no more. Killing the wounded was the final act of this dreadful scenario. Forty-five thousand men… eyes wide and staring… accusing the gods and forces that drove them… their mouths black gaping holes filled with silent screams… hands frozen in the act of clawing to reach the heavens… or digging into the torn earth as if seeking comfort. Dead. Dead. Dead!
Dead… dead… all could kill, all could be killed-all but me! The thought came screaming into Casca's mind.
Enough!
Taking his torn and bloody armor from his chest, he raised his voice to the now-thundering skies above. The memory of another day and another storm washed over him… How long ago? Two hundred years? Fat drops of rain fell to the ground. Distant thunder rumbled its way closer.
Tears streaked Casca's face, and the years of his anguish rushed up into his throat and burst forth in a soul- ripping cry. Drawing his gladius from its scabbard, the blade notched and dull from the day's slaughter, he cried out:
'Yeshua! Jesus! Jew! God or devil!'
His own voice seemed to be one with the thunder. Raising himself erect and holding the sword to the heavens, he cried:
'In the name of pity, let me die! What I did to you those long years ago in Jerusalem was as nothing to what you have done to me. I have been punished a thousand times over. You are the one without pity or compassion. The love your followers preach is a lie. You are far more cruel than me or any man. You have died-let me do the same!'
With one final great inarticulate cry Casca turned the blade to his chest. His muscles straining, he doubled over and drove the two-foot blade straight through his heart, and a foot of the Roman short sword stuck out his back, the soldier's blade almost cutting his heart into two pieces within his chest. The pain screamed through his nerves.
He called for death to take him, to give him peace, and, as he felt his life force ebbing, draining from him, a sense of gratitude warmed his brain. 'Death,' he whispered through blood-flecked lips, 'welcome… welcome.'
The sword moved in his hand.
No!
No! came the panic-stricken thought, no!
The blade was being forced back out from his body and from his heart.
'No!' he screamed.
Silently, slowly, irresistibly, the blade was forced out of his body. He fought as he never had to keep the blade inside him, but he was losing the battle.
He was losing his death.
Now the blade was completely out of him. He could feel the torn heart already mending itself.
Casca stood, his face to the now-thundering skies, rain breaking over him in a torrent, and cried out, sobbing in grief:
'Let me die! Damn You, let me die! How long must I endure?'
A cold shock grabbed his brain. The voice of the Jew came from the thunder and struck his consciousness with the words:
'… until we meet again.'
TWENTY-SIX
Goldman opened his eyes, and the blur between dream and reality vanished. There was no mistaking where he was; the click of the air conditioning coming on and beginning its interminable throbbing was familiar enough proof he was sitting in a hard, government issue chair in the hospital room at Nha Trang, Vietnam. Yet, his clothes were soaked with sweat, and a chill went through him as the cold air moved in the room.
And there was another, more important, detail that was not right.
The hospital bunk was empty.
Casey-Casca-was gone…
A cold wash of fear ran over Goldman. Momentarily his mind filled again with the sights and sounds and smell of that last great battle on the Parthian plains.
Or was it the smell of blood coming from the hospital morgue next door? There were, of course, rational ways to rule out hallucinations. After all I am a doctor, forcing the emerging panic back to the dark where it came from. He made a controlled unhurried visual survey of the room. It was precisely as he had remembered it. Nothing whatever had changed except that Casey was no longer on the bed. And, considering where his chair was placed, no one could have rolled a stretcher into the room and taken the wounded man while he slept. He looked at the bed. Had the man never been there in the first place? No. There was the indentation a body would normally have made, and the top sheet was pushed aside much as it would have been if Casey had simply gotten up of his own accord and left the room.
Goldman bent over the bed and absently ran his fingers lightly over the surface. He felt a lingering trace of warmth. He looked back at the door. Closed. Feeling a little foolish, he bent down and looked under the bed. He could see all the way to the shadowed wall. Nothing. He made a careful search of the entire room. Empty of any human life other than his own.
Odd. Damned odd.
He snapped the fingers of his right hand. He could hear the sharp noise distinctly. He moved his hand against the light. No. He was in full command of his own senses, a rational human being.
Yet…
He opened the door and stepped out into the hall and found himself stumbling, his body functioning as though all the energy had been drained from it. The lethargy weighed down his limbs as he made his way down the long hallway to Colonel Landries's room. He felt a little as though he were drunk-but he had no memory of drinking. As he passed the mess hall, an outside door opened, and he saw that dawn had almost come. He checked his watch: 0430 hours. Solid reality. Inside the mess hall the cooks were cussing out the Vietnamese kitchen help. Normal. Familiar.
He beat on Landries's door.
'What the hell is it now?' came the grumbling sleep-filled response from inside.
Goldman pounded again.
'All right. All right! Knock off the noise. I'm coming.'
Landires opened the door. He was wearing only Bermuda shorts, and sweat trickled down the thin gray hairs on his chest.
'Goldman?' He saw something in his surgeon's eyes. 'It's Casey, isn't it? He's dead?'
