The Dark Lord

offered up, hot blood spilled in fair contest on the sand!'

Shirin's dark eyes widened, understanding dawning in her face. 'The arena! I watched you fight—your face was wild, mad, transported... is this the Roman way, to honor the dead with living men's blood, spilled in combat?'

Thyatis nodded, feeling suddenly weak, emptied again. Memories crowded around, thick as Nile mosquitoes, faces emerging from darkness, mouths wide in anger or fear. My men. Our children. Nikos. 'Yes, this is the Roman way.'

Shirin clasped her hand over Thyatis, enclosing the jewel. 'I would put a dog of a slave at my children's feet, my gift to lighten their burden in the world of shades. This is how things were done in my grandfather's time. Will you help me?'

The Roman woman shook herself, feeling a spark flare in her breast. 'Shi—you don't know how dangerous this—'

'Yes, I do.' The Khazar woman nodded, eyes glittering again, but now her fury was banked, glowing hot behind a shield of purpose. Hidden in their hands, the jewel gleamed with an inner fire. 'I swear I will kill this prince of Rome.'

—|—

Gape-mouthed horns blew mournfully, sending a long, ululating wail out across the fields before the city. Exhausted soldiers raised their heads at the sound, looking up from beside the raised highway, their faces painted with the ruddy, red light of a vast, smoke-bloated sun. Fires continued to burn among a long swathe of grass and drifts of fly-infested corpses. A bitter white haze drifted over the Roman wall, swirling around shattered towers and obscuring the forest of stakes sprouting from the disordered earth.

The horns winded again and men began to limp away from the fortifications, retreating by ones and twos across the fields. Night came winging out of the east, swallowing the land in a black throat and none of the Persians cared to remain among the dead after sunset. All along the wall, points of light began to flare as the legionaries cast pine torches down upon the slope.

The squat shapes of the two gate towers were lit from below by the smoking remains of the great ram, glowing coal-red from the fires that had consumed the wooden frame. The ancient sandstone blocks were burned dark by countless blows. The jagged, gappy parapet of one tower stood black against a sullen orange sky.

Shahr-Baraz, King of Kings, turned away from the doleful view. His army fell back, bloodied and beaten, from the Roman fortifications. On this depressingly flat plain he could not see the full sweep of the disaster, but what lay within sight was enough. A full day had passed in relentless, repeated assault. Four times, the pushtigbahn had stormed forward against the gate. Four times, the legionaries had thrown them back in disarray. Though other attacks had gained the rampart on more than one occasion, sharp Roman counterattacks had driven them back each time. His heart heavy, the Boar paced into the loose collection of tents forming his headquarters.

Bastard Romans... they've denied us even a roof over our heads. Despite the inconvenience, Shahr-Baraz was impressed. The enemy had not wasted any time in recovering from the disastrous retreat across the delta. The approaches to Alexandria had been stripped bare; every house, gyre, barn, temple and chicken coop had been demolished and hauled away. Stone and brick had gone into the massive wall, everything else into the bellies of the Roman soldiers or hidden in the vast city just out of sight. The Boar ducked into his tent, idly twisting the ends of his mustache to even sharper points. He sat in a canvas field chair, hearing the old walnut legs creak with his weight and sighed, rubbing his face with both hands.

A distinctive chill mist crept into the tent, flowing across the damp floor in eddying waves. Shahr-Baraz looked up, weary anger simmering in his eyes. The dark, angular shape of Prince Rustam appeared in the entrance, flanked by the gaunt shapes of his two apprentices.

'Come in, then.' Shahr-Baraz gestured to the cots and camp chairs his servants had dumped under the canvas. He tapped an oil lamp with a thick, scarred finger. The wick had dimmed to a pinpoint with the sorcerer's approach. Shahr-Baraz breathed softly, letting the flame catch again and spread a slow, yellow light across table and chairs.

Hiding a mirthless grin, the King of Kings cocked an eyebrow at the sorcerer. 'You look well.'

Rustam bared his teeth in response, dark lips wrinkling up from long, white incisors. A dry hiss issued from the creature as he sprawled in a canvas seat, but he hadn't the energy for anything more.

Shahr-Baraz nodded to the other two figures, tilting his head to indicate the other chairs.

Pale oval face drawn with fatigue, Zenobia limped stiffly to one of the cots, her jaw pinched as she lay down on the hard boards. The Queen's robes were caked with mud, her hands bruised and streaked with blood. She turned her face towards the King of Kings, brilliant eyes dulled to fractured jewels, barely able to move. Her hands folded on her breast, withered doves lost in the dark, ragged pleats of her gown. 'My lord,' she whispered, though even so much seemed to drain her.

The jackal-headed man said nothing, squatting on the ground inside the door, his iron mask scored and dented. One ear, never properly repaired after the conflagration at Pelusium, was now entirely torn away, leaving a gaping hole in the metal, showing matted black hair and a pale scalp covered with scars.

'Have we failed?' Rustam managed to lift his head enough to speak. The king observed him closely, seeing the usual glamour fading, leaving the mottled, reptilian skin of the creature exposed. Inwardly, Shahr-Baraz sighed in despair, seeing the truth of his ally laid bare by such great exhaustion. The familiar princely face was no more than a comforting shell around something dark and lean, all spidery muscle and long, tapering ears flat against an inhuman skull. Something abhorrent, which should be cut down and cast into cleansing fire. The Boar's lips twisted into disgust, then settled—driven by implacable will—into a tight, flat line. Khadames was right about our dear prince. But I've made my choice.

'No,' Shahr-Baraz said after a moment, 'but today was costly, very costly.'

He cleared his throat, realizing he was tremendously thirsty. 'Bring wine and food,' he called to the servants hiding in the darkness outside the tent. The rustling sound of running feet answered him and he turned his attention back to the sorcerer. 'What happened?'

Rustam stirred again, nictating membranes rippling back from dark eyes. His voice was thready and weak. 'We should not have kept attacking.'

'I know that.' Shahr-Baraz felt his temper stir. 'You assured me the 'ward' was frail and easily destroyed. Just once more, you declared, and the towers would crack, the rampart split and we would be within the city.'

A thin-fingered hand raised in protest, then fell wearily away again. 'The Romans... no, the Egyptians are clever. We should have taken more time... divined their purpose, examined their defenses! I would have seen what they prepared, with just a day...'

Shahr-Baraz snarled, waving away the protest. 'Useless words. We all agreed to strike with speed, to try and overwhelm them before they had more time to prepare. We were overconfident and have paid for our hubris! Tell me what happened today. Tell me what we can do to avoid such a debacle again!'

The sorcerer started to speak, then stopped and took a breath. He settled deeper in his chair and the Boar realized the creature was trying to muddle through his memories. The king leaned back for a moment himself. Despite his admonition to the others, his own thoughts turned unerringly to what he might have done, should have done...

The Persian army had rushed down the Nile with all speed, trying to catch the retreating Legions before they found shelter in Alexandria itself. Unfortunately, despite destroying nearly an entire Legion in a pitched battle at Hierakonpolis, they had failed to seize the crossing. Roman engineers had collapsed the causeway, blocking the river channel to Shahr-Baraz's flotilla. For their part, the bargemen brought in from Mesopotamia had reacted swiftly, building a pontoon bridge across the arm of the Nile. The king had thrown his army across, then raced down the highway into Alexandria's suburbs.

His wild lunge had fallen short. The surviving Roman Legions entered the city in time to occupy a freshly built ring of fortifications. Shahr-Baraz was impressed, again, at the speed and efficiency of the Romans in siege work. Very early this morning, he had felt a pang of regret as well—all that work, he thought, would soon be rendered useless—shattered by the power of the Lord of the Ten Serpents. Even with his army weary from the forced march down the Nile, Shahr-Baraz had elected to attempt an immediate, full-scale assault. Pressing hard had broken the Romans before, why not here too?