David Durham - Pride of Carthage

Hannibal had looked up long enough to study his brother, to inventory his body parts and verify his health. Then he lowered his gaze and watched the fire. Bostar answered Mago's unfinished question. They had suffered badly, he explained. Four hundred dead among the Libyans, for example. If they had not placed their best infantrymen to their rear the army might have been wholly lost. They had faced about at a moment's notice and fought with a resolution that would have impressed even Spartans. Bomilcar asked Mago his news and he confirmed what they had already been told. The army was cut in half, spread thin, its entire length overseen by hostiles who held all the high ground. This information given, the council fell silent, awaiting the direction of their commander.

When Hannibal spoke his voice betrayed a melancholy unusual to him. He did not look at Mago directly, but it was clear he was answering his brother's unasked questions about the Gaul. “Just before it started I had been talking to him of his people's customs and of his family. Do you know that he is the father of two children, twins? Two girls? I had, for a moment, convinced myself that he was being true with me. That his people were to be true to their word.”

“They nearly destroyed us, Hannibal,” Bomilcar said. His deep voice made the statement hard to refute.

“I know. I know. It was my sword that slit his belly. It does confound me, though, that men should be so foolish. This Gaul need not be walking in his underworld right now. Nor should my men have suffered so.”

Bomilcar spoke louder, as if his commander's hearing was in question. “Had they destroyed us they would be the richest tribe in these accursed mountains. That's all the reason they needed.”

Hannibal studied the fire a moment longer. “Quite so,” he eventually said. “Mago, just before you arrived I realized something. When the first rocks rolled down and the cries of alarm went up, this Gaul jumped back as if to draw his weapon. I beat him to it and sank my own into his belly. Such was the bargain his father traded him into. But what seemed odd to me then was the look of astonishment he fixed on me. It was an honest look, the face of a man just realizing he'd been deceived. Do you know what I am saying?”

Mago thought that he did. “Visotrex had not told him of the planned ambush. His own son . . .”

“What kind of man would do that? It is right for a father to die for the sake of his son, but not the other way around. Not like this. What is the honorable means of burial for these Gauls?”

They all looked to Bostar. He shrugged at first, but then offered, “I believe they make elevated platforms, wrap the body tight in skins, and post mourners to keep away the wild beasts.”

Hannibal nodded. “Let that be done. I will not see his body defiled more than it already has been by his father's avarice. Who will carry out this rite?”

The group was silent. And the one who answered did so without speaking. Monomachus grunted a reproach to his fellows, strode forward, and grasped the Gaul around one thick ankle. He dragged him away by it, like a laborer resignedly accepting one last chore for the day.

When the sound of the body scraping across the ground faded and only the crackling of the fire could be heard, Hannibal said, “I can feel already the strains on my humanity.” He inhaled, drew himself up, and retrieved his commander's voice. “Now, we've much to do tonight. Sit down with us, Mago. Remember that half of our army is separated from us. We've had no word as to how they manage. We must devise a method to unite with them. The way must be opened.”

The younger Barca thought about this. “It can be. I will tell you how,” he said.

Later that night under the cover of cloudy darkness, Mago led a small force out. They gained some height by shimmying behind a flake of granite that led to a hidden chamber, which provided access to a zigzagging route up a nearly sheer stone face. Several times Mago doubted he could find a route that would bring them up as high as the protrusion from which the Allobroges coordinated their attack. But his whispered prayers seemed to help them onward. They were in place a couple of hours before dawn. Mago, from hiding, studied on the Gauls' fires, caught occasional breaths of their conversation. For a time he heard the sonorous rhythm of someone's snoring, so loud he sent a few scouts to investigate it. But the offender could not be found near at hand.

At the first light of dawn they sprang. The Gauls, unprepared, were slaughtered over their morning meal. Another rain of spears fell, but this time it was the Gauls pinned to the ground beneath them. The way was opened. The two arms of the Carthaginian force joined again. Though the army could not command all the heights of the ambush gorge, they did march through, suffering still more men dead, climbing over bodies, following in the swath of fear the elephants cut through the barbarians. When the gorge widened they gained some relief. They halted in a section of the valley open to the blameless sky that did not toss down boulders or trees or darts.

The ground was flat and easily defended, snow-dusted, with an enormous rock at one end, upon which lookouts were posted. If the Allobroges were to attack here, they would have to fight as a massed army. Fatigued and injured though they were, many among Hannibal's troops welcomed such an encounter for the opportunity to pay back the wrongs done to them. But there was no sign that the enemy cared to pursue them further, except in small bands that attacked stragglers. Mago figured that the work of scavenging from the dead in the gorge was enough to keep the Allobroges occupied for a week. The army spent two uneventful days nursing wounds, numbering the dead and the missing, taking stock of the injured animals and lost supplies, welcoming the stray soldiers and camp followers who trickled into camp, a testament to human resilience, to the dumb, animal instinct for survival.

It seemed no time had passed at all when Hannibal had the horns sounded early on the third morning. They were to march on. The soldiers rose damp from their slumber, pulled their clothing tight against the chill. They looked for the sun, but the sky hung low and heavy with cloud. As they rose the roof of the world descended to meet them. Snow. It began in mid-morning, first one giant flake and then another. Many of the men had never seen the likes of it before. The Tartesians pulled red ribbons from their bags and wrapped them tight around their heads with ceremonial import. The Libyans tried vainly to avoid the flakes, lest they be weapons of Gallic magic. They dodged and wove, so serious in their alarm that the northern Iberians fell to the ground in fits of laughter. Tribesmen from the center of Iberia simply stopped, dropped their loads, and stared about them, gape-mouthed and indignant. The Numidians watched this all with disdainful eyes. They murmured to each other from horseback and tried to appear calm, although few could help but swat the gathering flakes from their arms and shoulders, quick gestures as one might use to dislodge scorpions.

Mago himself felt a growing sense of dread, but before it could take hold of him completely Hannibal acted. The commander dismounted at a central spot among the men and chided them for fearing puffs of white less substantial than pigeon feathers. He tilted his head up and caught the flakes on his tongue, encouraging others to do the same. His beard had grown thick over the last few weeks, but there was no disguising the smile of mirth hidden beneath it. He scooped up snow in his hands, shaped it into a ball and hurled it at his brother. Mago stared in bewilderment, unmoving, as the ball exploded on his chest. A moment later Hannibal repeated the maneuver, this time splattering a Numidian's upraised arm. Soon the men caught on and balls of snow cut through the air in all directions, men shouting and laughing. In a matter of moments, the soldiers remembered themselves. They often looked spear and arrows in the eye—what had they to fear from snow? The light mood changed, however, when Balearics began to fling ice balls from their slings. The impact of these on their targets was too much like actual warfare. With effort, Hannibal reined the men in and ordered the march to proceed.