pinch of hot ash in the baby’s mouth.’
Ballista considered this. ‘In the story, Medea was not treated well by her father, but no one thinks she was right to dismember her brother.’
‘So you think I am a new Medea.’ She smiled. ‘After you killed my husband, I was returned like an unwanted purchase to my father’s court. My father wanted to marry me off to the king of the lice-eaters. Saurmag promised me more. If he took the throne, he would find me a better match. He talked much of the king of the Bosphorus.’
‘So you helped him kill your brothers.’
Pythonissa did not reply.
‘Why did you turn against him?’
‘Like all men, Saurmag is only interested in fucking women or using them in other ways. He realized he could only rid himself of our father and Azo if he had help from outside Suania. He decided to summon the barbarian Alani. As an inducement, I was to be given to the Alani chief. I would have shared a tent with the nomad as his fourth wife.’
‘And you discovered this when hunting north of the mountains.’
‘No, I went there to make certain my suspicions were right.’
‘And on your return, you came to my bed.’
She smiled. ‘Do you regret it?’
‘And now you think I can rid you and Suania of Saurmag and the Alani, making your brother Azo grateful to you.’
‘As you say.’ She turned to look at him with her blue-grey eyes. ‘If you think I am a new Medea, remember what she did when Jason deserted her.’
The next day, they picked up the headwaters of the Alazonios river and followed them down out of the high country. They emerged on to a broad, grassy plain dotted with isolated Albanian farmsteads. It was the threshing season. Small boys stopped their work and regarded them from out of clouds of chaff. The river meandered beneath bald hills to the right. The greener foothills of the Caucasus were some miles away to the left. They rode by the trees that bordered the Alazonios. At night, they went down to the banks and camped. And Ballista worried about Calgacus and young Wulfstan and the others.
After four days by their side, the Alazonios turned south through the hills. Down there, the river was the border between Albania and Iberia. Wanting to keep well clear of Hamazasp, they kept on to the south-east, tracking a tributary upstream. For another three days they crossed more high country, fording fast streams where the waters surged dangerously around the animals’ bellies. The evening before the nones of August they reached an Albanian settlement called Chabala.
The headman of Chabala was welcoming. He told them what they wanted to know. Cosis, king of Albania, was on the Caspian coast, south of the big peninsula, in the territory of the Cadusii. His uncle, Zober the high-priest, was with him. They had gone to confer with Prince Narseh, the son of Shapur. Yes, Narseh had his troops with him – many myriads – for there were still those unpunished among the Cadusii. Yes, the headman thought the Roman Castricius was with Cosis.
They rested for a day in the headman’s house. When they left, he gave them gifts and food, provided two warriors who would act as guides. A day in the saddle brought them down to an immense lowland plain. It was hot down there. Yet not so hot they would put off their armour.
They rode hard for three days, but the news of their coming preceded them. No fewer than one hundred mounted Albanian warriors were waiting for them. They were large, handsome men, dressed much like Persians or Armenians. They were armed to the teeth: bows, javelins, swords, many daggers; wearing breastplates and curious helmets made from the skins of wild animals. The leader at least spoke Greek. He welcomed the kyria Pythonissa with all politeness – his basileus Cosis greatly looked forward to entertaining her. With Ballista he was more reserved – it was his duty to take him with all speed to Narseh, the glorious son of the house of Sasan. On the type of welcome Ballista might receive he would not be drawn.
To reach the sea, they crossed the strangest landscape Ballista had ever seen. The path ran through nothing but miles of crazed, cracked mud. In places it pushed up to resemble small hillocks or large anthills. From these eminences, hot, liquid mud flowed; darker than its solidified antecedents. There was no animal or plant life. The smell was repulsive, like naphtha. It was like riding back into primordial chaos, back before Prometheus had moulded man from the foul stuff around them.
Finally, there were clumps of coarse grass, patches of sand. The mud gave way to the shore. The sea breeze blew away most of the stench. And there on the silted coastline was the camp. The horselines stretched into the distance. To Ballista’s experienced eye, there were some ten thousand horsemen and a horde of others – infantry and camp followers, Persians and Albanians all indiscriminate.
The camp was dominated by two pavilions, both purple, one larger than the other. The men were led in front of them, told to dismount. Pythonissa and her eunuch were ushered straight inside the smaller of the tents. Ballista and Maximus were told to wait. The Albanian guards were replaced by Persians. Beyond the camp, the line of the sea was decorated with men impaled on poles. It could have been the wind coming off the sea, but one or two of them seemed still to be moving.
‘Did you know, the Caspian is a lake?’ Maximus asked.
‘No, it is not.’
‘Sure it is – sweet water and snakes. I know about snakes.’
‘Did you know that among the many poisonous snakes in Albania there is one whose bite causes men to die laughing?’
‘Fuck off.’
‘And another with venom that brings you to death weeping and mourning for your ancestors.’
‘What if you did not know who your father was?’
‘You would probably cry about that.’ Ballista inclined his head. ‘We are drawing a crowd.’
‘Well, you cannot blame them, it is not every day Nasu the daemon of death comes calling cap in hand.’ Maximus looked somewhere else. ‘Do you think we will be joining the boys on the shore?’
‘No, I would not have come if I thought that.’
‘You do not sound so sure now.’
‘No, I am not so sure now.’
A Sassanid noble walked out of the pavilion. He was tall, broad-shouldered with slim hips. The silk surcoat over his steel was heavily embroidered, predominantly light blue. His beard was dyed bright red, and his eyes were lined with kohl. Some years before, Ballista would have laughed. That was before he had seen such men fight.
The Persian greeted them suavely in Greek. He asked them to accompany him into the presence of Prince Narseh. Ballista knew that such civility was only to be expected in a man of such rank from the Orient. It signified nothing about their fate.
They passed through the outer chamber of the marquee, where petitioners waited in silence. They were not told to remove their weapons – that might be a good sign.
The inner sanctum was a slightly smaller version of that of the King of Kings Shapur himself: purple and gold opulence in everything. Ballista pushed away the memories. He had to keep his concentration. Everything might depend on it.
The son of Shapur sat on a throne at the far end. Ballista and Maximus advanced – not too close – and made full proskynesis. Face down on a Persian rug, Ballista accepted that this was not the time for an assertion of either Roman dignitas or Germanic freedom. Having blown the ritual kiss, they got to their knees, then their feet.
Prince Narseh was a good-looking young man, with an aquiline nose above a curly blue-black beard. He wore a tiara and an enormous pearl hanging from each ear. He was flanked on his right by officers, on his left by mobads. Ballista did not recognize any of them. A Zoroastrian fire altar burnt in front of the priests. Soldiers in armour lined the walls.
‘I know you well, Dernhelm son of Isangrim.’ Narseh spoke excellent old-fashioned Attic Greek. ‘The barbarian from the frozen north where lies the mouth of hell. Marcus Clodius Ballista, the man who would have been king of the Romans – if only for five days, in just one town in Syria.’
The courtiers laughed.
‘The man who tried to kill my father at Arete, who raped the favourite concubine of the King of Kings at Soli.
