Shadow of Ararat

The courier put spur to horse and pelted off down the hill, dust swirling behind him.

“You, you and you… get down there into that mess and send the infantry forward and the knights to the wings. I don’t care how, just get the road cleared. More men are coming and half of the regiments I see down there are standing around wondering where they’re supposed to go.”

More men galloped away from the hilltop, ba

“Lord Rhazames, take your household troops and form up in the center of that mob of infantry. One of your men for each five of those peasants. Spread them out and get them facing forward. Any man who has lost his spear, sword or axe, back a rank. They can pick up fallen weap ons.

The young man bowed in the saddle and then was gone in a cloud of clods and dust. His ba

He turned and began, “You…” then he stopped, surprised beyond measure. “Salabalgus! What in the Corrupted World are you doing here?”

The stocky man smiled back at him, most of his face covered by the iron plates of his helmet. He wore a deep-green cloak over a battered shirt of ring mail. A bronze boar’s head was pi

Baraz stared down through the brush and saw, to his horror, that he knew nearly every one of the young men clustered there in their motley armor, antique weapons, and earnest expressions.

“Oh, Lord of Light,” Baraz breathed, turning to his uncle in dismay. “Is there anyone left at home?” Salabalgus shook his head silently.

Baraz ran nervous fingers through his beard and twisted a curl around his thumb. Nine years ago he had left his highland estates in Bactria with a troop of two thousand men, answering the summons of his King. There were, when last he had counted them, a few hundred left, all officers or sergeants in his Immortals. Behind them, he had been careful to leave a smattering of veterans and all of the youngsters. Someone had to guard the herds and farmland from raiders. Now Salabalgus was here, not at home, and all of those youngsters, grown up, were at the bottom of the hill.

He looked out across the vast host of men on the field and those still coming up the road. They were all too young or too old. He felt a chill. How many of us has Chrosoes killed in this war? Then he pushed a flurry of seditious thoughts aside. Battle was at hand.

Zoe‘ ran forward through the short grass, her brown legs flashing in laced-up leather boots. Dwyrin and Odenathus ran right behind her, flanking her on either side. Armenians with bows and quivers of arrows ran before them. The grass was burning ahead of them and to the right, sending trails of white smoke across the plain. Arrows whickered overhead in both directions. The Persian lines were only a hundred paces ahead. Zoe stopped, going down on one knee. Dwyrin ran up behind her and halted as well, his breathing heavy with the effort of dashing the two hundred paces from their own ranks. He did not feel tired, only exhilarated.

“Loose!” the leader of the Armenians cried. The archers stopped in a ragged line and let fly with their stout bows. Their arrows arched high and then fell, flashing, into the tightly packed ranks of the Persian spear men in front of them. There were cries of pain and a wave of angry shouting. The Armenians reached back over their shoulders for fresh arrows.

“Loose!” Zoe shouted, her forehead creased in concentration. Dwyrin had already shed the prison of flesh. He clenched his fist and whipped it through the air in front of him. Power built in it, leached from the sky and the hot stones under his feet. Pale-blue flames danced around his fist, and he flung them in a whirling ball at the spearmen. The sphere leapt from his hand like a sling bullet and shrieked across the intervening distance. Persian axemen scrambled to get out of the way, but they were pressed too tightly together. The flames were searingly bright when the sphere smashed into the chest of one of the spearmen.

The man vanished in a white-hot burst of flame. His companions screamed horribly as their flesh caught fire and the green flames leapt from man to man. Lightning danced from Zoe’s hands a moment later and lashed across the front rank like a terrible whip. More men died, their flesh crisped black and their leather armor burning merrily. Odenathus’ hand chopped down and the earth shook, toppling their ranks. Spears wavered, tangling with those behind them. Somewhere a horse screamed in pain.

Dwyrin grimaced for a moment, seeing the wailing men die, falling to the ground. He felt an odd detachment. Here, at a distance, they did not matter to him. If he had seen Eric die again, he would have felt sick, disgusted, filled with revulsion. Instead, a thrill crept along his skin as his power smashed at them again and again.

More arrows flew, turning the sky dark. The Armenians emptied their quivers into the Persian lines, then ran back toward the Roman army. Dwyrin sent one last bolt of brilliant orange flame cutting into the Persians, then he too trotted off after Zoe. A vast, angry roar rose from behind them. He looked over his shoulder and saw that the surviving ranks of Persians were begi

Galen swayed in his saddle as the horse cantered along the length of the Roman lines. He had deployed his legio

Galen completed his circuit and surveyed the field. The Persian army had filled the far side of the plain with a solid mass of men and was begi

Armenian skirmishers and the thaumaturges he had sent forward had finished retiring behind the stolid lines of legio

He looked to the west and saw that two huge wedges of Eastern knights had fa

Trumpets blared in the Roman ranks, and bucinas shrilled. The Legions advanced at walk, their great rectangular shields angled in front of them, each man carrying a javelin at the ready in his hand. The Western Emperor rode through the ranks, angling for the block of red cloaks that marked his bodyguard and the hulking shapes of the Varangians. As he passed, the men raised a cheer and he smiled and picked up the pace, his right arm thrust out in salute. Eight thousand voices rose up around him, a great booming shout: