CHAPTER LV

THE VOICE OF THE CHARMER

It was not the custom of an a.s.syrian army to leave its work half done.

The day after the great battle of Ardesh, the Armenians were scattered to the four winds of heaven. Thorgon and his long swords indeed lay on the field in regular lines of rank and file, as they had fallen; but, though resisting bravely while his crest could be seen above the tumult, when their king went down, the remnant of the mountain men broke up and fled in confusion to their homes. The very stratagem that had, as it were, doubled his presence for their encouragement, served perhaps but to dishearten them the more, when they no longer beheld the royal form which had hitherto seemed ubiquitous in the fight. Every portion of his host was satisfied it had taken its orders directly from the monarch; and when at last those two mailed figures, each of which was believed to be Aryas himself, came together in the hottest of the conflict, men lay so thick about the spot, that few indeed were left to observe the fall of one and disappearance of the other warrior, either of whom might have been their king.

Through many a league of mountain pa.s.s and tangled brake, fording the torrent or scouring the wind-swept plain, fled broken bands of fugitives, panting, scared, disarmed, looking wildly over their shoulder for the fierce and terrible foe, who spared not where he conquered, and when he lifted sword or javelin, never failed to drive it home.

But there was one troop of hors.e.m.e.n, scanty in number, yet formidable in appearance, that although fighting on the side of victory had suffered considerable loss. Returning towards the south in fair and orderly retreat, it yet bore no symptoms of discomfiture or flight. The children of Anak presented rather the appearance of a.s.sailants proceeding on some promising expedition than of a solitary force wilfully deserting the cause it had espoused. They restrained their invincible little horses to a steady regulated pace, halting at frequent intervals to show a bold front in case of pursuit from friend or foe. Their arms were bright, and held in readiness; their bearing was haughty and full of confidence; even the wounded sat firm and upright in their saddles, and at any moment all seemed prepared to resume the fray.

In the centre rode their Veiled Queen, accompanied by one in Armenian armour, who seemed less a prisoner than a guest.

While the battle raged at its fiercest round the white stone which Semiramis had marked at its turning-point, Ishtar found herself carried on its tide against the very person of him whom she had come to seek. It needed but a wave of her arm to rally round her those champions who believed so simply in her supernatural attributes, with whom no hors.e.m.e.n in the world could counter stroke for stroke. Pressing in on their leader, they soon encircled Ishtar and Sarchedon, soon cut their way to the outskirts of the battle, and merging alike their compact with Semiramis and their own love of fighting in blind obedience to their queen, drew off in perfectly good order, to commence a steady retreat for their southern home.

The a.s.syrian had seen Aryas fall in fight, had noted the destruction of the long swords, the total rout of those hardy warriors who hoped in vain to make head against his countrymen. What was left him now, but to drift with the stream of fate in the arms of the woman he loved?

The Anakim soon recognised him as the companion of their leader, when first she appeared among their tents and they knew her not. This was enough to insure their protection and regard. At the first halt, there was even a question of receiving him as an adopted brother in the tribe; but he wanted more than a span of the necessary stature, and that project was unwillingly abandoned. Nevertheless, every man felt pledged to do him homage and defend his person to the death.

It seemed to Sarchedon that he was riding through some unreal paradise in a dream. He told Ishtar as much, while she related her trials, her sorrows, and her undeviating constancy since they parted in the desert after their flight from Ascalon. He feared to wake, he said, and find himself again in that Egyptian dungeon, from which escape seemed hopeless as from the tomb.

"Beloved," she answered, "the queen of heaven will not permit us to be tried yet farther. Behold! twice has she brought you deliverance through me her servant in your hour of greatest need. It is enough. We shall be parted no more. We will cast in our lot with these children of the wilderness: they are brave, generous, faithful; they will fence us from our enemies with a hedge of steel."

"Be it so," he answered, looking fondly in the dear face that was unveiled only to _him_. "Better a goats' hair tent with Ishtar in the desert than a painted chamber and an empty heart in the palace of a king. And yet," he added somewhat wistfully, "I would fain see the inside of great Babylon again before I die."

They were crossing a fair and level plain, the mountains above Ardesh were already sinking on the horizon, and the children of the desert welcomed that smooth unvaried surface, as reminding them of the boundless tract they called their home.

Presently the chief, riding warily in their rear, shouted to halt.

Forming towards the point of danger, they observed a column of dust rising in the distance, as of an armed party proceeding rapidly on their track.

To those observant eyes, prompt and reliable information was afforded by the lightest tokens of earth or sky. While Sarchedon could detect but a rolling yellow cloud, the sons of Anak told each other of ten score hors.e.m.e.n and a war-chariot travelling at speed.

They bore down, therefore, in the direction of the approaching party, forming carefully round Ishtar and her companion in case of conflict.

When within a furlong of each other, both troops somewhat slackened pace, and a chariot, driven furiously towards the Anakim, was stopped at a spear-length from their chief.

Standing in it, erect and fearless before drawn bows and levelled spears, with head bared, shield lowered in token of amity, a.s.sarac raised his unarmed hands, and cried in a loud voice, "Is it peace, O my brother?"

"Let there be peace, my brother, between thee and me," answered the chief of the Anakim; and the eunuch, getting down out of his chariot, proceeded to explain the reason of his coming and his absence in the hour of victory from the army of the Great Queen.

"Semiramis," he said, "had been grievously wounded at the very moment of triumph. If not hurt to the death, she was at least unable to retain command of the host, or even to provide for the government of her empire at home. Therefore must he hasten back to Babylon, that he might rule wisely and in accordance with the laws of Shinar, while the queen's authority was thus for a s.p.a.ce in abeyance. New times were coming--a new policy, perhaps a new dominion. Those who were so skilful to rein a steed and wield a sword must ever be welcome to a warlike government, such as could alone control the sons of Ashur. He had it in his power to offer the Anakim a tract of fertile country, a land of corn and wine and oil, in which to dwell at ease, ruled by their hereditary chief and subject to their fathers' laws. Would they not hold it of the Great Queen by service of bow and spear, each man sitting under his own vine and his own fig-tree, doing that which seemed good in his own eyes?"

The Anakim glanced doubtfully at each other; their chief pointed to the mare from which he had dismounted, and shook his head.

"I could not breathe Lotus-flower," said he, "in the confines of such a tract. Like the wild a.s.s, whose speed she laughs to scorn, her limbs would stiffen if she might not stretch them on a plain boundless as the sky that meets it on every side."

"There is rich spoil to share," urged the eunuch. "Herds of sheep, oxen, and camels, droves of captives--men, women, and children--wine, jewels, goodly raiment, and gold to be had for the asking."

The other stooped his tall person to bend his bow against the hollow of his foot and ease its string.

"All these," he answered, "I can have by the tightening of this weapon in my hand. What need I more than the inheritance of my fathers--the desert sun, the trackless sand, and the goods of every man whose spear is a span shorter than mine own? Go to, thou lordly son of Ashur! my portion is better than thine. I have spoken. Take a gift from thy servant, and depart in peace."

a.s.sarac would never have been in his present position had he admitted the impossibility of an enterprise because of its first failure.

"I will accept the gift of my brother," said he, receiving with exceeding courtesy a loaf of barley-bread and a handful of dried dates, offered by one of the Anakim at a signal from his chief. "May it be returned to him a hundredfold when he encamps without the gate of Babylon, and I, even I, a.s.sarac, governor of the city, bow my head at the door of his tent to do him honour! If we may not draw bow again side by side in battle, at least let there be peace between thy people and my people, so that a son of Ashur, meeting a child of Anak in the wilderness, shall cast his spear down before him and say, Is it well with thee, O my brother?"

Pausing to mark the effect of these friendly sentiments, and observing that they were well received by his listeners, the eunuch turned to Sarchedon, and continued in a lighter tone:

"There is indeed a new dominion in Babylon when those laws of the land of Shinar have been set aside which sentence to death that a.s.syrian-born who shall be found arrayed in war-harness against the banner of Ashur.

And therefore, Sarchedon, if thou art a prisoner among these my brethren, I will ransom thee at a royal price. If a friend, I will bid thee leave them for a s.p.a.ce, to their profit and thine own. If a captain and leader, I will promote thee to yet higher honour in the great army that has never known defeat."

Sarchedon, glancing doubtfully at Ishtar, noted the colour fade from her cheek ere she drew the veil over her face. Nevertheless, the tempter was skilled in his art; and the prospect of once more bearing arms with his countrymen was too welcome to be dismissed.

"I would fain return to the land of my fathers," said he, "and ride to battle with my brethren in burnished armour and costly raiment once more. But yet it is better to dwell in the desert with a whole skin than to writhe on a stake in the sun, even though it be over against the palace of a king. If I came in the light of the Great Queen's countenance, behold, she would consume me in her wrath. If Ninyas reigned in her stead, my death might peradventure be more merciful, but more speedy also, and no less sure."

a.s.sarac had a purpose to serve, and the lie glided smooth and facile from his lips.

"Semiramis," he answered--and even now, in this his hour of fierce revenge and mad disloyalty, he could not speak that name without a quiver of the lip, a tremble of the voice--"Semiramis sickens in her tent with a death-hurt. Ninyas her son, sunk in sloth and pleasure, lover of the garland, the wine-cup, and the couch, would soon weary of the sceptre as he wearied of the sword. The a.s.syrian ruler needs a wise brain and a long arm. The a.s.syrian people look for qualities in their kings that are the attributes of their G.o.ds. Ninus will never return to us from the stars; but Ninus was less powerful than Nimrod, even as Nimrod himself was weaker than Ashur, from whose loins he sprang. Why should we, his descendants, owe allegiance to any earthly power? Why should kings, queens, and princes come between Baal and the people of his choice?"

The audacious project of wresting from the line of Nimrod that dynasty it had held with so strong a hand, and subst.i.tuting a hierarchy of which he should himself be the head, had long appeared to a.s.sarac a feasible project enough--one worthy of his own tameless energy and insatiable ambition, although the temptation had been stifled hitherto by his loyalty, his devotion to the queen. Now, in the torture of a vexed heart and wounded spirit, he swore to cast aside every sentiment but revenge, at least till Semiramis was at the mercy of him whose fidelity she had used, and scorned, and outraged without remorse.

Therefore, it would be well, he thought, to strengthen his hands with all the weapons he could seize, to make such friends for himself on every side as should become willing tools, to ply at need, and cast away at will. When he met them by chance in the plain, it struck him that the Anakim would be no contemptible auxiliaries; when he found Ishtar and Sarchedon in their midst, he reflected that the former might still be made a bait, if necessary, for the allurement of Ninyas; the latter, according as events fell out, might form a snare, a bribe, or a punishment for the Great Queen. That she believed him to have been killed, and in her agony of sorrow thought to raise him from the dead, he knew by the evidence of his own senses, and although the Armenian habit, in which he now recognised Sarchedon, convinced him of her error, the bitterness of his anguish seemed rather enhanced than modified by this discovery that the object of her desire was not yet wholly out of reach.

It was scarcely jealousy he experienced, for jealousy implies possession, past, present, or prospective; it was rather that morbid recklessness of despair, which pulls down the whole edifice on its own head, if only the idol may be crushed and buried in the ruins of its shrine.

Could he have hated her as sincerely as he wished, he would, perhaps, have triumphed, and, favoured by circ.u.mstances, might have held the proud Semiramis in his power, if only for a day; but when did man ever succeed in any perilous enterprise who suffered his heart to paralyse his arm, the outcry of his affections to drown the promptings of his brain?

Nevertheless, it was his present object to gain over Sarchedon, and after a pause, as of deep consideration, he spoke out with a semblance of the utmost frankness:

"Hearken, my son. Let nothing be kept back between thee and me. Baal, though he lead a host in heaven, needs also an army here on earth. That army must have a captain. He who has set the battle in array for friend and foe, at home, in Egypt, here among the mountains of the north, is surely well fitted to command the warriors of the a.s.syrian G.o.d. When a.s.sarac declares his will from the altar before his temple at home, Sarchedon shall stand forth in shining raiment, chief and Tartan of the great a.s.syrian host. Said I well, my son? and wilt thou not follow me in all haste to Babylon?"

He had bought him, he thought, for a price, and, through him, that foolish girl, together with this formidable tribe of stalwart simple-minded warriors.

Again Sarchedon glanced at Ishtar; but her veil was down, and she made no sign.

"To lead the host!" he muttered thoughtfully. "To have the power of Ninus, and wield it wisely, as did Arbaces!"

"Ponder it well, my son," said the eunuch solemnly, "while I speed on to prepare the way. What art thou here?" he added, lowering his voice. "A hostage in a foeman's camp, at a woman's will. Behold, I can make thee the n.o.blest leader on earth, and she, this veiled queen of a handful of hors.e.m.e.n, shall sit on the throne of a province larger than the great northern land we went out to conquer. What Baal offers, do not thou despise. Go to! Stretch forth thy hand, and take it whilst thou canst.

To-morrow it may be too late. I have spoken."

Then, with a courteous farewell to the Anakim, he mounted into his chariot, and was gone, speeding, like some pestilent wind, towards the south on his mission of treachery, rebellion, and revenge.

CHAPTER LVI