Paul Kearney - Kings of Morning

There were charcoal braziers lit on the terrace, and a few lamps. The three figures rose from their seats at the Great King’s approach and went to their knees. Ashurnan studied their faces. All three were Kefren of high caste. Two, he did not recognise, but the third was a familiar face.

‘Merach,’ he said. ‘It has been a while.’

The grey haired Kefre smiled and looked him in the eye. Merach had been his personal bodyguard. They had ridden side by side at Kunaksa. There were few people in the world Ashurnan trusted more, for Merach was utterly devoid of ambition. He was a soldier, simple and pure. But he was also an Archon of the western army.

‘Despatches?’

Merach looked at the ground, opened his palm and gestured to a leather-topped scroll-bucket on the table.

‘Enough to keep a man reading for a month, lord.’

Kouros was already breaking the seal on the bucket and rifling through the scrolls within, like a pig rooting for truffles. Rakhsar stood to one side, face in shadow.

‘Suppose you tell me yourself, Merach,’ the Great King said, though it was already written across the Kefre’s face, which was as grey as his hair.

Merach looked up. There was weariness carved bone-deep in his features, and the grease of a hungry man’s meal on his chin.

‘The Haneikos River was a disaster, Lord. He came at us through the water with his line and we held him on the bank. We had good ground, as good a position as I’ve ever seen men hold. But his cavalry broke the left. He has five thousand armoured horsemen — he calls them his Companions, and they are both Kefren and Macht. Lord, he has Kefren of our own caste fighting for him!’

Kouros looked up from his scroll. ‘Impossible! You are overwrought, Merach.’

‘Lord, I saw them myself. They destroyed our flank — ’ Here Merach’s voice sharpened. ‘We had Arakosan cavalry stationed there, but he blew through them like a gale.’

Kouros threw the scroll at the kneeling Kefre. ‘That’s a lie!’

Merach went silent, bowing his head. It was Rakhsar who retrieved the scroll, rolling it up on its spindle. ‘Brother, you might want to hear the fellow out before you begin throwing things at him,’ he said with a smile.

‘Go on,’ Ashurnan said. He fumbled for a chair, and it was Rakhsar who slid one behind him.

‘I bear the official despatches from satrap Darios himself — you can see his seal on the scrolls.’

‘Why send you as his messenger?’ Kouros demanded, undaunted. ‘You’re an Archon of the western army, not some despatch-rider.’

‘He hoped that my presence would give weight to what he had to tell,’ Merach retorted.

‘Mind your tone, general. I am a royal prince.’

Rakhsar poured himself some wine from the table, smelling it before sipping. ‘Father, despite my brother’s luminous presence, shall we let these men get up off their knees? The stones are hard on the bones.’

Ashurnan nodded. He looked at his younger son, and immediately Rakhsar gave him the winecup. ‘I shall be your taster,’ he said. ‘It’s not the best, but I’ve had worse.’

‘General Merach shall speak now, without interruption,’ Ashurnan said tiredly.

‘And with some wine to loosen his throat,’ Rakhsar said, handing the grey-haired Kefre another cup.

There was a quiet. The wind moved in the ivy, and there was the hoot of an owl off in the trees. Not another sound. They were in the midst of the greatest city in the world, but the ziggurat lifted them far above it, and the wind here was night-cool, as though they were in the foothills of the mountains. The scent of the honeysuckle which wound through the ivy came and went with the breeze, too sweet, too heavy for the charcoal-warmed dark.

Merach drained his cup. ‘Our left was destroyed, and in the centre he had us pinned. He lost a lot of men there. The bodies piled up so thick in the water they changed the river’s course, and the water ran red as a pomegranate crushed in your fist. His cavalry wheeled on our phalanx’s rear, and after that the thing fell apart, and it became a hunt. They chased us for pasangs across the plains south of the Haneikos. We took fifty thousand spears up to the river. I doubt a fifth of that made it back to Gansakos. We lost our baggage, our stores, the paychests, even the remounts. He has light infantry who work with javelin and what they call a drepana, a curved, slashing sword. They run as fast and far as horses.’

Merach placed his empty cup on the table with a click.

‘My lord, I am told you knew something of this defeat already — you have the meat, but Darios wanted me to bring you the raw bones. I have been two weeks on the road, killing three horses a day to stand before you. Darios bade me say that Gansakr is lost, and Askanon cannot hold. He is moving his quarters south to Ashdod, and if necessary will stand siege there.

‘My lord, we need another army. We need your presence on the battlefield to inspire our people, as you did at Kunaksa. We need the Honai. Without such a grand levy, the outer empire cannot hold. This is no mere adventurer we face. This man comes to conquer.’

‘We know the facts of these things, Merach,’ Kouros growled. ‘Every satrap west of the Magron has been forwarding rumours of your disgrace for weeks. Perhaps we do not need a grand levy — perhaps we only need generals with a little backbone.’

Merach lowered his gaze. His eyes were as bright as coins caught in the sun. He said nothing.

‘Bravely said, brother,’ Rakhsar drawled. ‘It’s quite a feat to insult a man who cannot answer back — you truly have the knack of it.’

‘Go back to the women’s quarters, Rakhsar. We talk of the real world here. If we want to hear harem gossip we will send for you.’

Rakhsar smiled, but only with his mouth. ‘I doubt you need my help for that, Kouros. There’s not a whisper comes out of there that your mother has not heard before anyone.’

Kouros drew himself up like an infuriated bear. ‘You bastard spawned little shit! You do not speak of my mother — she is Queen of the empire — yours is nothing but forgotten bones.’

‘Indeed — well, the Queen would know all about that, don’t you think, brother? When you visit her, do you drink her wine, or do you bring your own?’

Startled, Merach had to step back as the two brothers lunged at one another, Kouros a black bulk, Rakhsar a rapier-lean shadow. They bore no weapons, but seemed about to fly at each other’s throat nonetheless.

‘Stand still!’ Ashurnan shouted, his angry bellow clear as a cymbal in the night. His head swam, and it seemed that there were black flies circling in the light of the lamps.

The two princes froze, their eyes locked on one another, the hatred sizzling in the air between them.

Perhaps I should leave them to it, Ashurnan thought; get it over with here and now. But the part of him that had grown grey since Kunaksa, that had sat on a throne for four decades, was too disgusted.

‘You are princes of the empire, sons of the Great King, not brawlers in some hut in the Magron. Bel’s blood, do you think you can behave so in front of me? Is this how kings are made? I have seen traitors go to the spike who show more respect to the diadem than you. Get out of my sight — and do not speak a word to one another as you go. I will deal with you — both of you — later. Now go!’

Kouros glared at his father, and in that instant, Ashurnan saw the older man within him; the heavy jowls, the down-turned lines about the petulant mouth. Then he strode off, feet pounding into the ground as if each step set his seal upon it.

Rakhsar lingered a few seconds more. His face was one perpetual sneer — what would it take to wipe it off? Then he bowed to his father and sauntered away into the trees.