the others who were going into battle for the first time. Giving them bits of advice that just might save their lives. The young ones listened carefully. Lucky charms and fetishes were brought out, amulets of all kinds. ThoughAhura-mazda was the supreme deity of Persia, several men made offers to different gods. It couldn't hurt, could it? Wine was spilled on the earth to honor Zeus. A crippled horse was slaughtered for food and dedicated to Ares. These gods were holdovers from centuries of Greek rule and people did not lightly rid themselves of their gods or fears. It was always best to play it safe and there was safety in numbers.
Casca had no gods. He was not given even that small comfort. Though he still used their names in speech, from long practice, he didn't believe that Jupiter or Zeus were real any more thanAhura-mazda was, or the evil one of the Persian gods, Ahriram.
About Jesus, he was unsure. The Jew had possessed powers, that was clear, but was he truly the Son of God? And if so, what God? Or, was Jesus some kind of evil spirit? Casca did believe that there was a force beyond his comprehension but exactly what it was he was sure he'd never know, even though he'd lived a dozen centuries or more. He did believe in the soul, the thing that lived on after the body was no more than an empty husk. Perhaps, as he'd heard from some devotees of different gods, the spirit lived on, waiting to be reborn again in a different body. Perhaps that was the way Jesus would return. He would have to keep his ears open. One day they would meet again, of that he had no doubt.
He put these thoughts behind, trying to concentrate on the battle ahead. But it was no use planning now, he needed more intelligence. That, he would have in the morning when his scouts returned with the disposition of the Huns and their movements. Until then, he would do better to get what little sleep he could. Rolling himself up in his saddle blanket, he slept under the clear, open sky. There would be no tent for him tonight. They were too close now and events could change things in a matter of seconds.
TEN
Jugotai looked out over the ramparts at the circling Huns, riding beneath their standards of yak tails and human skulls. They hadn't been strong enough to break into the city or mount its thirty-foot walls. But neither had the Kushanite forces the strength to drive them off. The time was near when a decision would be made either way.
He knew what the Huns were doing at all times. Reports of their activities came to him from his spies and scouts that slipped over the walls at night, returning the same way to inform him of their movements. A lot of them never returned from their nightly missions, but the Huns made it a practice to toss their heads back over the walls to let those inside know of their failure.
But a few were successful and had brought news to him of their coming disaster. The Huns were rounding up every villager, man, woman, and child, that could be taken alive, and were herding them into pens to use later. From what Jugotai had learned, they now had over forty thousand of his people in those pens out of sight over the nearest hill. Out of sight, yes. But not out of sound. Hecould hear them. God, could he hear them. Starving people have a sound all their own and it can shrivel the heart of the strongest warrior when he hears it multiplied a thousand times.
There was food enough in the walled city of Kushan to feed the people inside for another three weeks. Then, if relief did not come, either from their armies to the south, or from their Persian allies, he would have no choice but to go out and do battle and hope for the best. That hope, he knew, was slim, for they were outnumbered three to one. Even that was a lesser fear right now than the one the Huns had in store for them. They intended to drive the starving villagers to the walls of the city, give them ladders, and set them free to scale the walls.
Jugotai's problem was simple. If he allowed them to enter, they, in their vast numbers, would consume the food and supplies on hand so fast that their end would come in three days instead of three weeks. His other choice was to kill them. He shook his graying head, looking older than his fifty-two years. It was hard to consider killing your own people when all they wanted was bread for their children and water for themselves. He was also aware that if he ordered them shot down, he'd run short of spears and arrows to do the job, and again deplete his supply needed so badly against the Huns later. The Huns would come, he knew, when the starving thousands were swarming up the walls. Surely they would use that time to mount an attack of their own. Jugotai could not spread his men out to where they could handle forty thousand starving people and still beat the Huns back. No, his was aproblem that had no answer. Perhaps it would be better to open the gates and have the entire city march out to die, at least it would be over with quickly.
A hand at his shoulder brought him around quickly. The handsome face of his warrior son, Shuvar, the pride of his life, stood beside him, bow in hand. He knew what terrible thoughts were plaguing his father and it hurt him to know that he could only offer the touch of his hand in consolation. But his father knew that it was Shuvar's way of telling him he was ready to do whatever his father said, trusting that it was the best they could do, even if it meant killing their own people. Yes, command was a lonely thing, but he was glad his son was back.
Shuvar had returned from Chin after an absence of two years. His mission to secure an alliance with the peoples behind the Great Wall had failed. His pleas had fallen on deaf ears. The nations of Chin were involved in a great struggle for power among themselves. One nation, one brother fighting another. They had no time, Shuvar had learned, for anything other than their own problems. Though they listened to him courteously, neither of the three kings would spare the men or equipment to mount a campaign to reduce the growing threat of the Huns. Each had told him to return when the wars were over and they would listen again.
Shuvar hadn't thought at the time that he'd live to return to them, and even if he did, he thought it would most likely be too late to do any good. The Huns had added tens of thousands of their standards in the last few years. They'd absorbed onetribe after another, turning them into partners. He'd returned to Kushan, sadly telling his father that they'd refused to listen. Jugotai had anticipated it and consoled him, praising his efforts.
Shuvar and his father, who still clung to the old style hair-dress of the warriors of his tribe, the Yueh-chih, the scalp lock reaching almost to mid-back, now gray with years, went silently down the stairs of stone that led to the streets of the city below. He knew they would, as was Jugotai's nightly custom, visit different quarters of the city. In every house, the inhabitants were doing what they could to aid the fighters on the ramparts. Arrows were being made. Bronze, copper, and iron were being gathered to take to the smelters to be turned into spear and arrow heads.
Every able-bodied man and stripling in the city took their turn on the wall. But still, it was not enough. Normally there would have been about twenty thousand living inside the walls of Kushan, now there were about thirty thousand. Refugees that had entered to escape the wrath of the Huns outside had swollen their numbers, but nearly all of these were women and children that would be of little use in battle. They only served to deplete their stock of food a little faster. There were not even dogs, cats, or rats to be seen on the streets; all had gone into the cooking pots.
Jugotai had fought against the wishes of some of the other commanders to have the horses slaughtered. True, they would help to feed the city for a few more days, but would leave them without mounts if they had to go out and fight, or go to the assistance of their rescuers, if they ever came. No, the horses were not to be slain, but he'd ordered all sick, lame, and old animals to be given to the people. The fighting animals were to be well looked after.
They passed the reclining figures of Buddha, the small smile on the lips of each patient, gentle effigy with all the time of stone on its side. Time to be patient with the follies of man.
Jugotai's old body held a touch of rheumatism from the years he'd spent in the saddle riding from one war to another. But his back was straight and no flab dangled from beneath his upper arms, as was common of men his age. They were still strong arms of sinew that could draw back a bow to the ear, sending its deadly shaft through an iron helmet and into the brain of an enemy warrior.
Jugotai was a warrior of a race of warriors, and he was determined to die as one. These problems of state and politics he wished he could leave to someone else, someone wiser than he. Jugotai was a man who enjoyed taking orders. Issue them and he would obey. But there were none here to rule. Kidara, the King, suffered from the dropping sickness, and his mind grew weaker and feebler by the day. His son, who should be making the decisions, was leading the armies to the south.
Shuvar interrupted his thoughts.
