Blood of Eagles, A Novel of Ancient Rome: Book III of The Bow of Heaven by Andrew Levkoff

Author:Andrew Levkoff [Levkoff, Andrew]
Language: eng
Format: azw3
Publisher: Peacock Angel Publishing LLC
Published: 2014-12-05T16:00:00+00:00

Chapter XVI

53 BCE Martius, Ctesiphon

Year of the consulship of

Gnaeus Domitius Calvinus and Marcus Valerius Messalla Rufus

Two days later, the Surena and I sat alone at supper. Not even a selection of his wives were present for the repast. “We have been abandoned,” he said. Seated, wearing a green silk tunic and black sherwal, the colors of his house, he cut only a slightly less imposing figure than when stretched to his full, armored height. From somewhere out of sight, music struggled to find a melody from an instrument that sounded as if the musician were strangling it, not playing it.

“Where are the king and his sons? That was quite a commotion yesterday.”

“His majesty, Phraates and his favorite son, young Pacorus—I don’t think you’ve met the pretty one—have left for the north, taking the army with them. My army.” He looked keenly at me. “Was nothing said to you?”

“No.” I studied the halves of a freshly cut fig with scientific concentration. “Is there any particular reason there are only two places set for tonight’s meal?” When one deceives, and one is something of an amateur at the art, one will ascribe supernatural powers of perspicacity to the deceived. Surely the Surena could read in every pore of my face that I was withholding some portion, i.e. all, of the truth. I told myself I was not lying, for in fact, nothing had been said directly to me, but I was as certain as a brothel adjacent to a bath house is as certain of its profits that the Surena would find that excuse to be a flagrant case of splitting hairs worthy of splitting my skull. My behavior as a result—the quavering voice, the elevated pitch, the bead of perspiration—all conspired to make my obfuscation a self-fulfilling prophecy. Fortunately, the Parthian general was paying less attention to my discomfort than to the memory of his most recent meeting with his suspicious sovereign.

I literally jumped off my seat when he banged the table with his fist. His head shook slowly from side to side as his face reddened and the cords in his thick neck tightened. I leaned forward to catch his next words, but he was grinding them out in his own tongue. Two men carried a pitcher the size of a small child to the table. The Surena poured so much barley beer into a chalice it would have taken both my hands to lift it, then pushed the ram’s-head flagon to me. I moistened a lip, then gingerly passed it back. For an embarrassingly long time he held the goblet tipped at his lips, leaving me nothing to stare at but the stubbly knot on his throat as it jerked up and down.

When he was finished draining this small pond he said, “Reason with me, Alexandros.” He wiped a new mustache of foam off the original thicket with two swipes of his fist. Such a prominent growth of hair must have required frequent washing. More trouble than it was worth, I should have thought, but I suspected it was an emblem of Parthian virility.

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