David Durham - Pride of Carthage

A Massylii scout came galloping in from the rear and beckoned anxiously for Hamilcar's council. He said something in his own tongue that got the commander's complete attention. He pulled up and moved off to hear the scout. What the Massylii said was this: A mixed company of Iberian infantry and cavalry had dropped into the valley behind them, cutting them off from Ilici and trailing behind them. What number? The Numidian was not sure for the visibility was poor, but he estimated a thousand, perhaps half that again concealed by tree cover. He believed they had seen him and would be fast behind.

“What people?” Hamilcar asked.

The Numidian, without raising his gaze but using only his chin, indicated those he believed responsible.

Hamilcar snapped his gaze around at Orissus. Meeting his eyes was all the confirmation he needed. The Iberian recognized this. He yanked his horse into motion, followed at once by the rest of his company. Hamilcar barked an order. Monomachus and a small contingent of cavalry went off in pursuit. But before Hamilcar could speak another command—with divots of mud thrown high from horse hooves still falling around them—the ambushing army breached the far horizon.

It was not even a battle or a running skirmish but simply pure flight after that. There was no time to consult maps save the internal one that Hamilcar had etched inside his skull. They rode west at a dead run, vaulting over the bodies of Orissus and his men, not even pausing to comment on their betrayers. The opening of a valley to the north brought with it yet another band of attackers. The Carthaginians raced past and forded the river without a pause. They emerged on the other side under a barrage of arrows, some hitting their targets, most skittering across the stones. They were at this for the better portion of the winter afternoon.

By the time they reached the impassable river the horses were lathered beyond all health. Before them churned an unnamed river that would have been easily crossed in summer. But now it was in full spate, high enough to cover the base of trees and churn brown water through branches usually the home of birds and squirrels, not fish. His father gave a command then, the only one of his that Hasdrubal wished he had disobeyed.

“You two,” he said, “ride south with the Sacred Band. Go now, at all speed. Meet me in a week's time in Acra Leuce.”

With that, Hamilcar spun his horse and rode, yelling to the rest of the soldiers to follow him. Hasdrubal glanced at his brother and for a moment saw the same concern on his face. To go upriver was madness. With the Iberians fast behind him, Hamilcar would have no escape route, for the river in its higher sections would surely be a tumbling torrent. Hasdrubal wanted to cry out for his father to stop, to halt, to reach forward and grasp the great man by the hair and stop him. He wanted all this, but turning once more to his brother he found Hannibal's face had changed. The visage now directed at him was set in stone, unkind and pitiless.

“You heard,” Hannibal said. “Turn and ride as ordered. Wipe the questions from your face.”

And so he had. He could no more disobey his brother than he could his father.

It was in a warm chamber in Acra Leuce that Monomachus brought them the news. Hamilcar Barca was no more. Drowned in crossing the upper reaches of that mad river. He and his horse flung and battered until lifeless, pushed and shoved and tossed by the muscle of water around the bone of stone. His father died so that his sons might live, for surely Hamilcar had chosen his route in full awareness of the risks. He had led the pursuers on and thereby sacrificed his own life.

Hasdrubal refused to look at Hannibal, though they heard the news together. He felt a hot anger toward him like nothing he had felt before or since, but it lasted only until he felt his brother's hands on his shoulders, then his arms around him. With that the anger went unmasked and betrayed what it truly was, the shocked sorrow of one who is suddenly an incomplete link in a chain, an orphan not yet ready to lose his father because he has not yet become completely a man of his own. Neither a child nor a father but a brother still. For some reason it was this last realization that set him to tears.

These memories did not leave him until late in the morning, when the preparations for Hannibal's address to the mass of returning soldiers took precedence. Hasdrubal, attending his brother in the last moments before his speech, could hear the gathering crowd outside the city walls: the entire army, some ninety thousand strong, brought together to hear Hannibal's plan for the upcoming campaign. Certainly the men knew whom they were going to war with, and knew that they would take the battle to Rome, but only now, on this morning, would the commander reveal the entirety of the plans to them.

Hannibal dressed with more care than he usually allowed, more attention to luxurious detail. He even accepted suggestions from his vain younger brother. He wore a breastplate with an image of Elissa—Carthage's founder—at its center. The woman's face was beautiful and ferocious and vacant all at once. Beneath this, his tunic was pure white, sewn with red thread and embroidered along the shoulders in gold. Even his sandals were carefully chosen, fine leather tanned to near black, adorned with silver studs. Hasdrubal had never seen him look finer, but Hannibal's mind was on other things.

“At the end of that corridor I will look out across a vast and well-trained army,” Hannibal said. “But can I tell them what the future holds? No, because I do not have that power unless they give it to me. In fact, I'll propose a future, and they'll tell me if I've imagined correctly. And then over this, Fate will sit in judgment.”

“Brother, they would follow you anywhere,” Hasdrubal said.

“Perhaps. The Persian kings believed their troops to be nothing but instruments of their will, yet their numbers were no match for the anger of free men. No, when I step onto that platform I am posing a question. It is they who answer.”

Hasdrubal heard this in silence and nodded his eventual acceptance of it. Still watching the empty corridor, he asked, “May I ask you one last thing?”

“Of course.”

“I don't know whether it's been asked, and I would hear your answer. Is there no other course than war with the Romans? Some say that if we ignored them we could enjoy the empire we've built here. We could expand further, equals to the Romans and alongside them. I don't run from battle. You know that. I am your student in all things. I question you only because I would understand completely. Do we hate them so much?”

Hannibal watched his brother's downturned face. “Do you remember when, as boys, we used to chase the shadows of clouds across the land? Mounted, we would outrace the wind and smite whole legions of foes made of nothing but white vapor.”

Hasdrubal nodded. Hannibal smiled and left the thought; he did not pick it up again or explain its significance.

“You ask an honest question, and in answer to it I will speak of two points. Yes, I do hate them. I had the joy of spending more years with our father than any of his sons. He burned with a hatred for the Romans. They have robbed us of so much. They are treacherous and remorseless and cunning. I believe our father to have been among the wisest of men. He hated Rome; I do as well.”

Mago and Bostar appeared from the corridor leading to the landing. They indicated with nods that all was ready. The men were waiting. Hannibal nodded and motioned them back along the corridor.

“But I'm no fool,” Hannibal said. “Hatred is to harness, not to be harnessed by. I wouldn't attack Rome simply out of hate. The truth is we've no choice. The Romans have a hunger different from any the world has yet seen. I have many spies among them. They bring me the pieces of a puzzle I've been fitting together for some time now. I have enough of it clear before me to know that Rome will never let us be. Perhaps they'd allow us five years of peace, perhaps ten or fifteen, but soon they'd come for us again. They grow stronger yearly, Hasdrubal. If we don't fight them now, on our terms, we will fight them later, on theirs. Father knew this as well and schooled me in it while young. Nothing he said on this matter has proved mistaken. We all want power, yes. Riches, yes. Slaves to satisfy us. Carthage is no different. But in their secret hearts the Romans desire more than just these things. They dream of being masters of the entire world. Masters of something intangible, beyond mere power or riches. They'll settle for nothing less. In such a dream, you and I would be but slaves.”