Tim Leach - The Last King of Lydia

A heavy weight fell against his back and pinned him to the ground. He felt a warmth soaking through his tunic, then hot against his skin. He felt a shudder pass through him as another arrow struck, and the man on his back lay still. He watched as some of the soldiers broke and ran, and others charged into the woods, screaming war cries. He lay against the ground, shaking and weeping in fear. He had never wanted to live more than in that moment.

Croesus felt the weight lift off his back. He covered his face with his hands, but it was a Persian soldier who pulled him to his feet, and told him to run.

They ran together, half tripping with every step, barely able to see in the darkness. Behind and around him, Croesus heard the dull sound of arrows striking wood, the skipping rattle as they bounced and spun through the undergrowth. His chest burned, as though he had swallowed the fire of his dreams, and the strength went from his legs. ‘Don’t leave me,’ he said, but the Persian soldier ran on ahead, leaving him alone in the darkness.

Croesus leaned against the closest tree, his breath rasping like that of a dying man, his eyes tight shut, as though he could wish the waking nightmare away. He heard the sound again behind him, of arrows in the quiver. He forced himself to keep moving, waiting to feel the arrow bite into his back.

He broke out of the woods, stumbling in an exhausted half-run, and saw the lights of the camp ahead. Now would be the time, he thought. With sanctuary in sight, now was the time for the arrow to find him, but still it did not come.

Staggering now on aching feet, driven forward by empty lungs, he made it to the picket line. The Persian sentry yelled at him to stop, seeing only a bloody foreigner charging towards the camp, but Croesus ran on, sinking to the ground before the man who stood over him, spear raised.

‘Please,’ he said, clasping his shaking hands together around the man’s knees. ‘Please.’

Harpagus sat by torchlight. On the heavy table in front of him, parchments concealed a stained, yellowing map so that it could barely be seen at all. A fragment of Egypt, a scattering of Hellenic islands, were all that remained uncovered. He preferred it this way. Soldiers and servants speculated over the contents of the three deep chests that Harpagus kept closely guarded in his tent. They would have been disappointed to discover that they were filled only with paper.

His captains complained incessantly (behind his back, thinking that he did not know) about the reports they had to deliver almost every day. Exact inventories of weapons, food stocks, the condition of armour, state of morale, reports on praiseworthy soldiers and troublesome individuals. His spies were instructed to produce reports with the same precision. The exact height of walls, depth of wells, consistency of soil. Here in his tent, with the army itemized and inventoried, the next city reduced to a few sheets of parchment, he could create a world on paper. A world that he could conquer.

He heard footsteps approach, fast and hard. He expected a messenger or a scout, but when Croesus entered, unannounced and unescorted, he did not react. He took in the blood and dirt on Croesus’s clothes, the angry, fearful look in his eyes. He laid down on the desk the paper in his hand, and waited for the other man to speak.

‘I am here now, if you want me dead,’ Croesus said. He felt tears fill his eyes, and angrily blinked them away. When his vision cleared, Harpagus still gazed at him impassively.

‘Not that you will believe me,’ the general said, ‘but I really don’t understand.’

‘Who were the archers in the forest?’

‘Archers?’

‘They killed most of your men. They almost killed me.’

Harpagus paused. ‘Bandits,’ he said after a moment. ‘Or men from Pedasus, looking for revenge.’ He smiled thinly. ‘No doubt they saw you being escorted by the soldiers and mistook you for someone important.’

‘Stop treating me like a fool!’ Croesus shouted. The sound seemed to hang in the air like a living thing.

‘You have come close to death,’ the general said slowly. ‘You have forgotten yourself. I forgive you for it. Come back tomorrow. We will talk then.’

‘No. We will talk now.’

‘As you wish.’ Harpagus turned away and picked up a wineskin. With his back still to Croesus, he poured out a cup.

‘Here,’ he said, turning around and offering the cup. ‘Take some wine. It might calm you down.’

Croesus looked at the wine and hesitated. Harpagus’s smile widened, and he drank deeply. ‘I see,’ he said. ‘So you believe the stories.’

‘Shouldn’t I?’

Harpagus shrugged, and gestured to a chair by the table. ‘Sit down.’ Croesus didn’t move. ‘Come on, don’t be a fool. Sit.’

Croesus followed this command. They stared at each other in silence. A pair of flies wound in spirals through the air, trying to alight on Croesus’s bloody clothes. Each time he twitched them off with a shrug of his shoulders, like a beast in a field. He did not take his eyes from Harpagus.

‘Have you heard about how I came to serve Cyrus?’ the general said suddenly, breaking the silence.

‘What?’

‘Cyrus. How I came to serve him.’

‘I don’t see how-’

‘Just listen, will you, Croesus? You talk too much for a slave. The story may give you a little understanding.’

Croesus nodded slowly. ‘Very well.’

‘I served Astyages, when he was king of the Medes. Did you know that?’ Croesus shook his head. ‘Your brother-in-law trusted me more than any. One day he complained about a dream to me. The soothsayers and prophets were consulted, and they all agreed. His daughter’s child would take his kingdom from him. She was married to a Persian nobleman, and she had just given birth to a son. Astyages asked me to kill the child. I agreed, of course. I had no choice. The Spartans expose hundreds of children each year, I thought, those who are weak or malformed. I was sure that I could manage to let one child die for the good of the kingdom.’

‘Why didn’t you?’

‘I don’t know. I am not a sentimental man.’

‘I would not have guessed.’

‘Perhaps it wasn’t anything to do with the child. Perhaps I did it just for myself, to spite Astyages. He was a cruel man, you know. Ruthless and stupid.’

Croesus nodded. ‘Yes, I know. I always pitied my sister, having to marry him.’

‘And yet you went to war to recover his empire for him.’

‘I think we both know that isn’t why I went to war. Come on, finish your story.’

‘Well, in any case, I thought it over some more. In the end, I found that I didn’t want to murder a child because Astyages had overeaten at the dining table and given himself nightmares. I gave the boy to some shepherds to raise, and talked to the cooks about reducing the richness of the king’s diet. I tried to forget any of it ever happened.

‘Well, he found out, many years later, when Cyrus was a boy. It was obvious to anyone with eyes in his head that he was not a peasant’s son. He resembled his father a little too well.

‘Astyages summoned me and asked me if I really had let Cyrus die all those years before. I could see that he already knew the truth and so I confessed. I hoped that if I did so, he would at least spare my wife and son. I expected him to order my immediate execution, but he smiled at me, and told me that he was glad to hear it. That he had always regretted giving that order, and it had been preying on his mind for years. He clapped me on the shoulder and asked if I would come and have dinner with him.

‘I ate with him that night. I wondered if the meal would be poisoned. But after a time, when there was no apparent taste of poison on my lips, I began to think that he really had forgiven me. So I tried to enjoy the meal, which wasn’t hard. It was a good meal. But he didn’t touch any of it. Just sat there, drinking wine and talking and watching me. I asked him why he didn’t eat. He laughed, and reminded me that I had told him to be more careful about what he ate.’ Harpagus paused, remembering. ‘It was a rich stew.