People of the Tower (Ark Chronicles 4) Page 17

  The sound was deafening to Nimrod, the shouts and the banging shields. Spear points screeching across bronze bosses. He blocked a spear, turning it, and he thrust over an opposing shield, the man’s leather jerkin saving his foe. All along the line, similar events occurred. Yet here and there, points drew blood or a cunning jab nicked a forearm or an exposed neck, or some men didn’t have leather armor. Two more ranks followed Nimrod’s front. Assur’s mob milled six or seven deep. With dread, those in the back watched those in the front rank. They saw men cry out, wounded. Yet the back rankers were unable to relieve the tension welling within them by swinging weapons. They had to wait their turn, to endure the ever-increasing pressure.

  Nimrod bellowed, shoved with his shield, his thrust blocked by an enemy counter-thrust. He pushed harder, and then danced back as a cunning foe stabbed at his feet.

  The man dipped his shield in order to regain his balance, because the fighter behind him accidentally jostled him. Nimrod thrust at the opening. The man howled and then fell to his knees. With a wrench, Nimrod freed his bloody spear. He exuded in his victory. Yet for all his strength and training, he gasped for air, tiring fast in the heavy armor. He fought full out, with the draining, overhanging threat of permanent maiming or death. Drums pounded and raw throats roared all around him.

  “Keep at them, boys!” Nimrod bellowed. His loud voice was one of the few heard above the din. He had faith in his Mighty Men, and that gave him courage. Each of them had faced awful beasts together, inuring themselves to the tensions of fear. Friend fought beside friend today, just as they had while slaying a roaring lion or butchering snarling wolves.

  To the side of the fierce contest, Nimrod’s second chariot squadron swept away the slingers that opposed them. But unlike the first squad that had chased the enemy off the battlefield, cool-headed Thebes, grandson of Javan, sounded the ram’s horn. Around him wheeled six chariots, the drivers looking to him for orders. The other three chariots rattled away in bloodlust as they chased running slingers.

  Thebes pointed at Assur’s formation. He pointed at the men jumping up in the enemy rear ranks. They did that to get a look at what happened up front. Others in the rear ranks stood frozen in dread fascination, slack-jawed as they witnessed man’s brutality and savagery. Among them, huge Beor tried to shove his way to the front, peg-legging. He held a shield in one hand and a spear in the other.

  With a shout, the drivers shook their reins and followed Thebes. Their vehicle companions readied javelins. As Thebes’s chariots rushed past the rear of the mob, they threw. Darts burrowed into backs, dragging down the unwary. They hurled more missiles, while the drivers blew their horns.

  The mob flinched from the handful of charioteers. The surprised rear-rankers goggled at the chariots sweeping past them. They felt themselves surrounded and trapped. One, two, three more men went down. In seconds, terror destroyed the will to fight. The instinct to live overwhelmed all other senses. Several men dropped their shields and weapons. They bolted.

  Meanwhile, in the terrible cauldron of the front rank, in the no man’s zone of spear-length where men hid behind their shields, both sides clashed and fought. Warriors still stepped forward, bashing shields, although only the bravest continued to do so. Many men panted, exhausted and frazzled, wondering how long this could go on.

  “Kill them!” shouted Nimrod, his voice lashing his men.

  At that point, that frightful moment, Assur’s people heard the enemy horns behind them. Fear made them quail and glance back.

  “They’re attacking us from behind!” cried a man.

  Several men just behind the front rankers turned around. They saw the charioteers standing tall, hurling javelins, and they saw some of their men fleeing, streaming past the enemy vehicles.

  “They’re running away!”

  “Save yourselves!”

  Like lightning, panic swept through the Shemite mob as men realized their worst fear: the enemy was attacking from behind where they were indefensible. It demoralized them, sapped what was left of their fighting spirit. Once a man turned around, he never faced forward again. The impulse to flee, to get away from what seemed certain death overwhelmed all other logic, all other emotions. He must live. He must survive. Sobbing, the panic stole his manhood and turned him into a mob cipher.

  The panic infected the front rankers, the ones directly facing snarling foes with reeking breath and straining muscles. Many of the front rankers threw down their shields like those behind them. They turned and—spears stabbed them in the back.

  The wild thrill of victory, of defeating those who moments before had tried to kill you, it rushed like a drug through Nimrod’s men. They bellowed in glee, chasing the enemy, stabbing, slaying and indulging in one of man’s most foul joys.

  At that point, Beor reached the disintegrating front line. He gnashed his teeth and froth foamed from his lips. Wild battle frenzy gripped him. His eyes riveted onto Babel’s King in his golden armor.

  “Nimrod!” bellowed Beor.

  Shemites fled all around him, although one or two stood with him.

  Beor thrust his spear at Nimrod, parting the seven-layer shield and cutting the King’s forearm. “To me! To me!” roared Beor. He knocked aside Gilgamesh’s spear-thrust. Then he tore a heavy dagger from its scabbard.

  Nimrod threw away the massive shield in time to see Beor leaping upon him.

  “Nimrod!” shouted Beor.

  The big warrior crashed upon the king, grappling, stabbing. Bronze screeched on bronze, the king’s armor momentarily saving the Mighty Hunter’s life. Then spear butts hammered against Beor, thudding against his back and on his head. It gave Nimrod time to squirm free. Rage, pain and murder lust overwhelmed him. The king pried a stone loose, and he lifted it above his head.

  “Beor!” shouted Nimrod.

  The eldest son of Canaan was bloodied and cursing, with his arm before his face as he warded off blows. He locked eyes with Nimrod.

  “Fight me man to man!” bellowed Beor.

  “Die!” screamed Nimrod, dashing the rock against Beor’s face.

  Bones cracked. The big man flopped back. Nimrod ripped Gilgamesh’s lance from his hands. He pinned Beor to the dark earth, finally riding himself of his deadliest foe.

  22.

  The aftermath bewildered the defeated, a strategic design of the Mighty Hunter. Speed, novelty and generous terms kept the Shemites and remaining Japhethites off balance.

  First, Nimrod gathered the captured clan elders, among them a depressed and dispirited Shem and Assur. Nimrod spoke with each and found who hated him and who could live with the New Order. Those who yet breathed fire, he put among the hostages. From the elders who would remain, he took favorite sons or daughters, also putting them among the hostages. Two hundred people would return with him to Babel. He promised to treat them well, and even did so now. Odin and Hilda were among the few tied by the neck to a slave line and guarded in a tent away from everyone else.

  Second, he divided the defeated clans into four groups and placed selected elders over them. He splintered clans for a reason, mingling Japhethites with Shemites, and Assur clan members with Elam clan members and so forth. Over each group, he placed a band of Mighty Men. They weren’t enough to defeat them in battle, but enough to awe and keep the others in submission, or enough to make examples of hotheads.

  Third, he told each of them the city name and location where they must build: Nineveh, Rehoboth-Ir, Calah and Resen. Controlling a populace in a central area would be easier than if they were spread out over the countryside.

  “I will return in a year,” Nimrod said. “Sooner if there is rebellion. If you rebel, there will be rapes, butchery, weeping and the gnashing of teeth. Build your city and remain loyal to me and you will become full-fledged members of the empire.”

  “We will remain loyal,” Elam said, the chosen elder for Nineveh.

  “I know you will,” Nimrod said, smiling his most brilliant grin.

  Soon ther
eafter, he departed with his host and hostages, the wounded remaining behind. The battle had only cost him handfuls, lost during the savage push of pike. Too bad the chosen Hunters had found no trace of Grandfather Ham, although Grandmother Rahab had agreed to return to Babel. He’d wanted all three sons of Noah in Babel, adding splendor to his reign and also near keeping them where he could watch them. Perhaps Ham had died. Nimrod shrugged. He didn’t see how one drunken old man could harm him.

  “What if he goes to Noah?” asked Uruk, riding a chariot because of his wound.

  Nimrod didn’t like thinking about Noah.

  “Send dagger-men to kill Noah,” suggested Uruk.

  “Who would you send?”

  “Any Mighty Man will do,” Uruk said.

  Nimrod shook his head. “Only a hard man, an utterly loyal and clever warrior, would be able to slice that old bastard’s throat.”

  “Send Gilgamesh,” Uruk said.

  Nimrod eyed him. “I had thought to send you, War Chief.”

  Uruk paled.

  That confirmed Nimrod’s thoughts on Noah. If the old man stayed on Mount Ararat, he’d let him live. If not—Nimrod pursed his lips. To do a job right, one often had to do it himself. Let old Noah enter the empire at his peril.

  So Nimrod dismissed the failure to capture Ham and decided to wait on Noah. Instead, he planned the glorious jubilee he’d stage when the Tower was finally completed this winter.

  23.

  A month and a half later, Ham trembled as he gazed upon snowy Mount Ararat, or the blur of it in the distance. He slid off the weary donkey. On unsteady legs, he sank onto a fallen pine. Weeks of travel, forever glancing over his shoulder, wondering when he’d spy Hunters loping after him, had drained him.

  Years ago, more than a century now, the Ark had grounded onto Mount Ararat. It had grounded onto an empty world, with all the possibilities that promised. Ham shook his head. A thousand recriminations played repeatedly. From fleeing the lost battle, from teaching Kush boxing, from the day he parted ferns and witnessed the bathing beauty of Naamah. He sighed. Nothing could be changed. What had happened, happened.

  “Oh, Rahab,” he said. He should have slipped back and freed her. But he wasn’t a young man anymore. It wouldn’t have worked.

  The donkey swung its head at him.

  Ham smiled tiredly. These past weeks, the donkey and he had slipped past a pair of rutting bears, an angry auroch bull pawing loamy soil and a wolf pack sniffing their trail. Arrows and shouts had sometimes been the answer. Other times, stopping and facing the danger had won them safety. On only two occasions had precipitous flight been required.

  What would his father say to him? How could he tell Noah what happened? What could they do about it?

  Something…he hoped. So Ham willed himself to his feet, took the donkey’s bridle and led it along a familiar path.

  24.

  They sat outside the wooden house, on the veranda in rocking chairs, Noah and Ham, two old men, one seven centuries and the other still over a decade from one hundred and fifty. They stargazed, Noah relating the story of one of the constellations and Ham the next. It was a game from Ham’s childhood, and it brought back pleasant memories.

  After a time, they simply rocked, the chairs and the veranda floorboard creaking.

  “More lemonade?” Noah asked.

  “No thank you,” Ham said.

  Several hounds lay about, big brutes. They yawned, watched their master or perked up whenever a strange sound occurred.

  The donkey had gone to the barn with others of its kind. In the house slept two visiting grandsons who had missed the excitement of Nimrod’s conquest. Ham had told his father about the terrible calamity. Noah had stroked his white beard while listening and brooded thereafter. Ham didn’t understand his father’s calm or that he asked no questions or for clarifications. For once, Ham went with it. For once, his father’s ways didn’t upset him. He enjoyed the peace of sitting here. He knew his father would think of something.

  “What are your plans?” Noah asked.

  “I don’t have any,” Ham said.

  “Reaching me was your only goal, eh?”

  “I couldn’t very well have gone back to Babel.”

  “You want me to go with you, is that it?”

  Ham rubbed his jaw. There it was. That was his thought: You beat me, well now I’m bringing my father. You’ll see what will happen now. He told Noah, “You overawed him last time.”

  Noah stilled his rocking, poured himself more lemonade and sipped the sweet liquid. “I didn’t do a thing last time.”

  Ham considered that. “Are you saying Jehovah did?”

  Noah leaned over and patted him on the arm. “After all these years, you’re learning to think before answering.”

  “Maybe you didn’t do anything,” Ham said. “But Jehovah worked through you.”

  “He can work through you. It’s not the prophet who matters but the Maker.”

  “I’m unworthy.”

  Noah chuckled. “We’re all unworthy.”

  “Maybe, but some of us are more unworthy than others.”

  Later, a bat screeched. The biggest hound raised its blunt-shaped head. Then the hound licked himself and soon settled back down.

  “Will you come with me?” Ham asked.

  “To Babel?” Noah asked.

  “We’ve got to stop Nimrod.”

  “What if he slays us?” Noah asked.

  “He can’t slay you.”

  “Me most of all.”

  “Then you won’t go?”

  Noah took his time answering. “I’m afraid, my son. I’m afraid that if I go, nothing will ever be the same.”

  “It’s already different.”

  “No,” Noah said. “Humanity is bent, its way crooked. But if I go to Babel as you suggest…”

  “What does Jehovah say?”

  Noah nodded. “Finally, you ask the right question. He says that I’m to go with you to Babel.”

  “When?”

  “Soon.”

  The Angel of the Lord

  1.

  In a white gown, Hilda moved down the stairs of her Grandfather Canaan’s house. She had been summoned, had therefore bathed and allowed one of the Singer attendants to apply malachite eye shadow. She no longer wore braids, but let her blonde hair cascade down her back.

  Since Beor’s death and her capture by Nimrod, she had become soft-spoken and downcast. She ate less and had lost weight, causing her robust figure to become thin and her cheeks to turn gaunt. These changes heightened her beauty, or so everyone told her. Some said she pined for Odin, who had been thrown into a pit. Others said she feared Nimrod’s boast that soon he would call upon her. During his heady victory over Shem and Assur, Nimrod had been too busy consolidating his position to threaten it with the hard-earned right of rape. Once the opportune moment had passed, Hilda took up residence among Beor’s brothers, the sons of Canaan, gaining protection from wanton ravishment.

  The Singer, one of Semiramis’s creatures, rapped lightly on the door, peering in, indicating that she should enter.

  Hilda walked into a windowless room. It was painted with mythic animals, while candles flickered on stands. At a low table, her handsome, olive-skinned Grandfather Canaan sat cross-legged. He studied a clay tablet and wore a blue robe.

  He smiled. “You’re looking lovely, my dear. Please, sit.”

  Hilda curtsied and sat across the low table, folding her hands in her lap.

  Canaan spoke banalities, perhaps thinking them pleasantries. It didn’t relax her, if that was his intent. She waited: she liked to think with the patience of a huntress. They didn’t let her see Great-Grandmother Rahab. They also made sure Rahab never witnessed the Singers in their wilder debaucheries and lewdest dances.

  Hilda wished her Grandfather Canaan would get to the point.

  As if reading her thoughts—the idea frightened her—he leaned toward her. “Do you know why I’ve summoned you, my dear?”


  Hilda shook her head.

  “It concerns your future.”

  “Who I wed?”

  “On no, Hilda, for I know you love Odin. I would never try to encourage you to marry someone you didn’t love. You’ve suffered enough for one round of life.”

  Her perplexity must have showed.

  “Do you wonder at my phrase?” Canaan asked.

  Hilda glanced at the symbols on the walls, the painted mythic animals.

  He indicated his clay tablets. “I’ve been engaged in research, my dear, a truly fascinating study.” His voice lowered. “The gods are chary in what they reveal to us. In truth, I think, because they are frightened about what we’ll learn.”

  “There is only Jehovah.”

  Canaan tapped his chin. “Even after the crushing defeat, you still hold to that out-dated notion, to that easily refutable lie. I’ve seen sights that allowed me to view reality as it is, not as I’ve been told it must be. The gods rose long ago, and yet…” He indicated the tablets. “There is a secret locked here that unnerves me.” He studied her. “Can I trust you?”

  “I’m too bewildered to answer.”

  “Yes. At first, the truth shakes the very foundations of one’s sanity. I attest to that. Hilda, I’ve stumbled upon something that radically alters anyone’s view. Did you know that once the gods were like us?”

  “I don’t understand.”

  “Once, the gods were flesh and blood. But through a long series of reincarnations, they evolved into what they now are.”

  “Re-in what?” Hilda asked.

  “Reincarnation,” Canaan said. “The soul departs a body upon death and waits to reenter anew. Slowly, one ascends or descends into higher or lower forms.”