Iron Winter

Himuili grinned. ‘The game’s on. Good! Come on, soldier, let’s get back to our line before it blows away in the desert wind.’ And he flicked his horse’s reins and galloped away.

69

In the early morning of the very day of battle a courier came for Rina, sent by Barmocar. To her bewilderment she was summoned to join a party that would go into the field ahead of the Carthaginian army, to meet the Hatti leaders in a last-ditch negotiation. Her — a Northlander matron and outsider in this city, summoned to this most historic of events! But, she thought with a kind of grim pride, a Northlander should be marching with the Carthaginian army today. After all it was a Northlander weapon that might win the day for Carthage. And, short of beating out the iron carcass of an eruptor herself, in the days since her meeting with Barmocar and Carthalo she had used long-dormant skills of leadership to do as much as anybody to ensure that the project had been completed.

So she dressed quickly, donning a smart but sensible robe, and pulled a cloak over her shoulders. For walking on the rough ground outside the city, she dug out the stout boots she had worn for the journey from Northland. Here in the small town house given her by the suffetes, she had no servants to help her. She could not bear servants in her presence, not any more. Having checked her appearance in a brass mirror, she hurried out of her house and to the city gate.

The army pouring out of Carthage was an extraordinary sight. It was an army of scarecrows, Rina thought, after months of siege, all but the officers dressed in ragged uniforms and armed with rusty blades.

Fabius’ carriage was more extraordinary yet. He called it his ‘truce wagon’. The great vehicle, specially constructed, rolled on four pairs of mighty timber wheels, each hooped by iron and fixed to tremendous axles. The wagon was drawn by teams of Hatti prisoners, harnessed like oxen, but Fabius had promised them their freedom when the job was done, and so they pulled willingly. On the wagon’s bed sat a great chest, a huge wooden box nearly as tall as Rina, so long that the custom-made wagon barely fit it. The chest was covered in expensive cloths and tapestries bearing images of the city’s gods. But the most extraordinary aspect of the whole thing was what lay on top of that chest: human skulls, all lacking their lower jaws, a heap of them arranged in an orderly pyramid. You could see that most of the skulls were small, most of young children; the larger ones supported the smaller, until at the apex of the pyramid was fixed the smallest of all, tiny enough to have fit into Rina’s palm. It was the skull of a newborn, its little throat slit at the moment of its birth. This was a molk cart, and the city’s primitive sacrifice was horribly visible. And that, of course, was the point.

As the truce wagon rolled out of the gate, followed by the columns of troops, Fabius with his senior officers walked ahead. The great and the good of Carthage had been summoned to follow behind the general, and Rina hurried to join them. Here came Carthalo, following in the Roman’s wake, along with many others of the councils, even the Tribunal of One Hundred and Four whose constitutional function was to keep generals like Fabius in check. None dare resist him now. Some of Fabius’ soldiers walked beside the general, whether to protect him from Hatti or Carthaginians it was hard to say.

Barmocar, his expression dark, worked through the small crowd of dignitaries towards her. ‘So you came, madam.’

‘You summoned me. It was only courteous-’

‘Courteous? I brought you here to see what you have done, woman. The skulls, Rina — the skulls!’

She took a breath. ‘And Mago-’

He turned away from her, his face working. ‘His skull is here, on the carriage with the rest, not ten paces from where you stand. He did not die on the grisly altar of the temple, however. He died well, in combat, fighting off a Hatti raid. I hope that whatever you imagine I have done to you is now compensated.’ He leaned closer and whispered, ‘And if we live through this day I will make sure the rest of your life is blighted as mine is.’ He withdrew.

Alone, Rina walked on, trying to show no emotion.

Outside the city walls the Carthaginian army began drawing up in battle order, the men gathering in great blocks within which the men were all dressed and equipped similarly. These formations were called phalanxes, Rina had been told. The truce wagon rolled forward, accompanied by Fabius and the nobles, advancing beyond the lines. And now, Rina saw, a party of the Hatti came out to meet the Carthaginians. One man was mounted, and the rest walked under their own truce banner, of Jesus Sharruma with the crescent moon.

Rina was close enough to Fabius to hear one of his aides muttering advice to him. ‘The mounted man is Arnuwanda, their prince, chief of the armies, though it’s said it’s his aunt the Tawananna who makes the big decisions. The soldier at his side is Himuili, one of the smarter generals. The young priest — I don’t recognise him, I was expecting Angulli. .’

‘Mother?’

She whirled. She had not heard that voice in months. ‘Nelo?’

It was him, her son, a soldier in his tunic and mail and helmet, standing beside the Roman. He was armed with nothing more lethal than a crayon and his sketch paper. For a heartbeat they stared at each other, both disbelieving. Then they broke and ran to each other, regardless of the rest of the world, the two foreign armies before and behind them.

‘I didn’t know you were here,’ he stammered out at last.

‘Nor I you. I spent an awful lot of money paying for news of your progress.’ She laughed, but it was as much a sob. ‘I tried to save you, to get you out of there. It was part of the deal — I thought Barmocar had cheated me-’

Nelo glanced at Fabius. ‘His man came for me. I refused to leave. I could not leave him, Mother. The general. This is history.’

Fabius heard all this. He growled, ‘There won’t be much more history for you if you aren’t back by my side this instant, boy.’

Rina clung to him. ‘Forgive me,’ she said frantically. ‘For what happened in the beginning — it was Barmocar, again. We could not have survived here in Carthage if I had not let the army take you. Forgive me!’

Nelo shrugged. ‘I thought it had to be something like that. It wasn’t your job to protect me, I was old enough. If you’d just asked, I’d have gone anyway, to save you and Alxa.’

‘Oh, Nelo-’

He broke away. ‘Later, Mother.’

There was no more time. For now, in the middle of the field, the enemy commanders met.

The Hatti prince dismounted. With the general and the young priest, and trailed by aides and wary soldiers, he walked boldly towards Fabius.

‘Roman,’ Arnuwanda said. ‘We meet again.’

Fabius bowed. ‘I am honoured to be in your presence again, sir, My Sun, whose integrity is known to all the world.’

They both spoke Hatti and Carthaginian, and aides murmured translations.

Arnuwanda grunted. ‘I don’t deserve that title, and Crown Prince Uhhaziti won’t have it, not until this day is won. Why are we speaking? Why are we not fighting? And what is that grisly contraption? What are you going to do, pelt us with skulls?’ He was rewarded with a ripple of laughter from his own men.

Fabius waited patiently until they were quiet. ‘I am a Roman. But I work within the traditions of my adopted city. And these poor bones represent one of those traditions. It is the molk, the sacrifice. In this lore the gods’ favour is won by the sacrifice of children.’

Arnuwanda paced. ‘What barbarism is this?’

Some of his men were disturbed, and they muttered prayers, and made the symbol of Jesus Sharruma, the crossed arms over the chest. Every eye was fixed on the heap of skulls, which, Rina knew, was its true purpose, to distract.

‘Not barbarism, Prince,’ said Fabius evenly. ‘If I had a son myself I would have given him up willingly, to the gods of the city.’

‘Well, our gods will have something to say about how effectual that has been.