Fortune's stroke

Chapter 7

Persia

Spring, 532 A.D.

"You're right, Maurice," said Belisarius, lowering his telescope. "They're not going to make a frontal assault."

Maurice grunted. The sound combined satisfaction with regret. Satisfaction, that his assessment had proven correct. Regret, because he wished it were otherwise.

The chiliarch examined the fieldworks below them. From the rise where he and Belisarius were standing, the Roman entrenchments were completely bare to the eye. But from the slope below, where the Rajput cavalry was massed, they would have been almost invisible.

Almost, but not quite. Again, he grunted. This time, the noise conveyed nothing but regret. "Beautiful defenses," he growled. "Damn near perfect. Pure killing ground, once they got into it." His gaze scanned the mountainous terrain around them. "Doesn't look like too bad a slope, not from below. And this is the only decent pass within miles."

Belisarius' eyes followed those of Maurice. This stretch of the Zagros range was not high, measured in sheer altitude, but it was exceptionally rugged. There was little vegetation on the slopes, and those slopes themselves, for all their rocky nature, were slick and muddy from the spring runoff. Little rills and streams could be seen everywhere.

Impossible terrain, for cavalry-except for the one pass in which Belisarius had positioned his army. He had designed his defenses carefully, making sure that their real strength was not visible from the plateau below.

The temptation, for an enemy commander, would be almost overwhelming. A powerful, surging charge-clear the pass-the road to Mesopotamia and its riches would lie wide open. The only alternative would be to continue the grueling series of marches and countermarches which had occupied both the Roman and the Malwa armies for the past several weeks.

Almost overwhelming-for any but the best commanders. Like the ones who, unfortunately, commanded the Malwa forces ranged against them.

"You were right," Belisarius pronounced again. He cocked an eye at his chief subordinate, and smiled his crooked smile. "Think I've gotten sloppy, do you, from dealing with those Malwa thickheads in Mesopotamia?"

Maurice scowled. "I wasn't criticizing, General. It was a good plan. Worth a try. But I didn't think Sanga would fall for it. Lord Damodara might have, on his own. Maybe. But it's been obvious enough, the past month, that he listens to Sanga."

Belisarius nodded. For a moment, his eyes were drawn to a pavilion on the plateau below. The structure was visible to the naked eye. But, even through a telescope, it wasn't much to see.

For two days now, while the Malwa army gathered its forces below the pass, Belisarius had scrutinized that pavilion through his telescope. The distance was too great to discern individual features, but Belisarius had spotted Sanga almost immediately. The Rajput king was one of the tallest men Belisarius had ever met, and he had no doubt of the identity of the towering figure that regularly came and went from the pavilion. Nor of the identity of the short, pudgy man who often emerged from it in Sanga's company.

That would be Lord Damodara, the top commander of the Malwa army in the plateau. One of the anvaya-prapta sachivya, as the Malwa called the hereditary caste that dominated their empire. Blood kin to Emperor Skandagupta himself.

From the moment Belisarius had first seen that pavilion, he had been struck by it. It was nothing fancy, nothing elaborate, and, by Malwa standards, positively austere. The structure was completely unlike the grotesque cotton-and-silk palace which Emperor Skandagupta had erected at the siege of Ranapur. And Belisarius was quite certain that Lord Venandakatra, the anvaya-prapta sachivya whom the Roman general knew best, would have disdained to use it for anything other than a latrine.

Beyond the nature of the pavilion itself, Belisarius had been just as struck-more so, perhaps-by the use to which it was put. In his past experience, Malwa headquarters were the scenes of great pomp and ceremony. Such pavilions-or palaces, or luxury barges-were invariably surrounded by a host of elite bodyguards. Visitors who arrived were accompanied by their own resplendent entourages, and with great fanfare.

Great fanfare. Kettledrums, heralds, banners-even trained animals, prancing their way before the mighty Lords and Ladies of Malwa.

Not Damodara's pavilion. There had been a steady stream of visitors to that utilitarian structure, true enough. But they were obviously officers-Rajputs, in the main, with the occasional Ye-tai or kshatriya-and they invariably arrived either alone or in small groups. Not a bodyguard to be seen, except for the handful posted before the pavilion itself. And those-for a moment, Belisarius was tempted to use his telescope again, to study the soldiers standing guard before Damodara's pavilion. But there would be no point. He would simply see the same thing he had seen for the past two days. The thing which had impressed him most about that pavilion.

Rajput guards-always. Never Ye-tai. That single, simple fact had told him more than anything else.

The Ye-tai were barbarians. Half a century earlier, they had erupted into the plains of north India and begun conquering the region, as they had already done with the Kushan territories to the northwest. But when they came up against the newly rising Malwa realm, an offshoot of the collapsing Gupta Empire, their advance was brought to a halt. Already, Belisarius now knew, the being from the future called Link had armed the Malwa with gunpowder technology. With their rockets, cannons, and grenades, the Malwa had defeated the Ye-tai. But then, instead of simply subjugating the barbarians, the Malwa had incorporated them into their own power structure. Had, in fact, given them a prized and prestigious place-just below that of the anvaya-prapta sachivya themselves. Ye-tai clan chiefs had even been allowed to marry into the elite castes.

The move was extraordinarily shrewd, commented Aide, and quite beyond the capacity of normal Hindu rulers to even envision. The instructions must have come from Link itself. The Ye-tai are not part of the caste-and-class structure of Hindu society-what Indians themselves call the varna system. By giving such heathen barbarians a place in the elite, Link has provided a powerful and reliable Praetorian guard for the Malwa dynasty which is its creature.

Mentally, Belisarius nodded his agreement. That was how the Malwa invariably used their Ye-tai forces. The barbarians were ferocious warriors in their own right. But the Malwa, instead of using them as spearhead troops, used them as security and control battalions.

Except-for Damodara.

Again, Belisarius made that mental nod. Damodara had placed his Ye-tai contingents with his fighting forces, and relied solely on Rajputs for his own protection. The Rajputs were treasured by the Malwa for their military skills, just as was true of their Kushan vassals. But they were not trusted.

Except by Damodara, Aide, just as you say. The Rajputs form the bulk of his army, and he's obviously decided to weld them to himself by giving them his final trust.

Belisarius sighed, faintly. All of which tells me a great deal. None of which I'm happy to know.

This had been Belisarius' first opportunity to study his opponent at close hand. Roman and Malwa contingents had clashed several times in the weeks which had elapsed since his narrow escape from the ambush at the oasis, but the forces involved had been small. For the most part, the Romans and the Malwa had kept their distance, as each army tried to outmaneuver the other through the labyrinth of the Zagros range.

The Romans had had the best of it, in a narrow sense. Belisarius was simply trying to block the Malwa from passing through the Zagros onto the open plain of Mesopotamia. He had succeeded in doing so, true. But Damodara and Sanga handled their own forces extremely well. They had not dislodged the Romans blocking their way, but they had, slowly, succeeded in forcing them back.

The Zagros was a wide range, but it was not inexhaustible. Sooner or later, Belisarius would run out of room to maneuver. So he had decided to fight a battle on his own chosen terrain. If he could badly bloody the Malwa, he would gain more time-possibly even regain some lost ground.

Against the normal run of Malwa commanders, his plan would have worked. Against Damodara, and his Rajputs, it had failed. Just as Maurice had predicted.

Belisarius raised his telescope and studied Damodara's pavilion, trying to discern anything inside the dark interior. It was a vain enterprise, more born from habit than anything else.

But, suddenly and surprisingly, Aide spoke urgent words. There's a telescope in there! I can just barely make it out.

Belisarius focused his own eyesight, but even with Aide's help he could not see the telescope which was apparently hidden within the pavilion. He was not surprised, however. Aide could often detect things through Belisarius' eyes which the general himself could not.

Big, clumsy damned thing, came Aide's mental sniff.

Still-nothing. Belisarius knew that Aide was using his own crystalline version of what the "jewel" called computer image enhancement.

Is this important? asked Aide.

In and of itself-not especially. If that telescope's as big and awkward as you say, it's not going to be much of a help on the battlefield. But the fact that Damodara has one is interesting, nonetheless. It's a reminder to us not to underestimate the Malwa.

Belisarius folded up his telescope. As so often before, in doing so, he was struck by the clever design of John of Rhodes' device. But, for all that, his motion was sharp and decisive.

"That's it, then," he announced, turning away. "Pass the word, Maurice. We'll leave a unit here on guard, but get the army ready for another march." He gestured with his head toward the enemy below. "They'll be moving out themselves, sometime tonight. Make sure Abbu and his scouts are close enough to see which route they take."

"Won't be very close," replied Maurice grimly. "Not with Rajput flankers."

Belisarius began striding toward his own tent, some fifty yards down the trail. Over his shoulder, he said, "I'm well aware of that. Just close enough, Maurice, that's all. Just close enough. If that army ever breaks contact with us, we'll be in a sea of trouble."

A few steps away, hearing the exchange, Valentinian scowled.

"I was afraid this was going to happen. God, I'm sick of marching." He cast a half-hoping, half-skeptical eye at the Malwa army on the plateau below. "You think if I tried taunting them again-?"

Next to him, Anastasius snorted sarcastically. "And just what do you think that'll accomplish? Besides making you look like an idiot? Again."

Two miles away, at the entrance to his pavilion, Lord Damodara straightened up from his own telescope. Then, feeling the usual ache, the Malwa general grimaced. "Wish I had one of his telescopes," he grumbled.

Standing next to him, Rana Sanga cast a glance at the optical device in question. The Malwa telescope, quite unlike the slender, handheld artifact which he had seen in Belisarius' hands, was an ungainly thing. As in many areas-steelmaking was one outstanding exception-Indian craftsmanship was not the equal of Greek. The Malwa approach to optics was much like their approach to shipbuilding: Since we can't make it elegant, we'll make it big and sturdy.

Big and sturdy the Malwa telescope certainly was. So big, unfortunately, that it had to be supported on a rigid framework which could only be adjusted with great difficulty. The end result was that anyone who used the thing was forced to stoop in an awkward posture which, after a period of time, invariably resulted in back pain.

For a moment, Sanga was tempted to point out that Damodara, as short as he was, suffered less from the problem than did Sanga himself. But he restrained the impulse. Lord Damodara maintained an easy and informal bearing around his top subordinates, but he was anvaya-prapta sachivya. There were limits.

Instead, he opted for the bright side. "It's a better telescope than he has," he pointed out. "At least as far as its strength goes."

Judging from his snort, Damodara was not mollified.

"And so what?" he demanded. He gestured through the open flap of the pavilion. "So I can discern his features, where he can't mine. On the rare occasions when he happens to wander into my field of view, that is. While he, for his part, can look anywhere he wants. Without breaking his spine in the process."

Damodara rubbed his back, still grimacing. "I'd trade with him in a minute! And so would you, Rana Sanga-so stop trying to cheer me up."

Sanga said nothing. After a few seconds, Damodara stopped scowling. The young Malwa lord's innate good humor returned.

"There's this much," Damodara said cheerfully. "I'm quite sure he doesn't know we have a telescope. We didn't have them when he was in India, and I'm positive he hasn't spotted mine." He glanced around his headquarters. The telescope was positioned ten feet inside the entrance, well within the gloom of his pavilion's interior. Damodara had kept it there at all times, despite the limited field of view which the position provided, precisely in order to keep Belisarius from spotting the device.

For an instant, the scowl returned. "I'm not sure that makes any difference, of course. But-" He shrugged. "With Belisarius, I'll take any advantage I can get."

Damodara turned away from the telescope and moved toward the large table located at the very center of the pavilion. Sanga, without being asked, immediately followed.

At the edge of the table, Damodara planted his pudgy hands and leaned over, intently examining the huge vellum map which covered most of it. His gaze, now, was one of satisfaction rather than disgruntlement. Whatever they lacked in optical craftsmanship, no one could fault the skill of Malwa mapmakers. He was especially pleased with the topographical information which his chief cartographer managed to include.

Damodara peered into a corner of the dimly lit pavilion. As always, his cartographer was waiting patiently, seated on a small cushion. Narses was also in the corner, available in case Damodara needed his advice. The eunuch, following Roman custom, sat in a chair.

"It is up to date, Lord Damodara," said the mapmaker. "Just this morning, I incorporated the latest information brought in by the Pathans."

Damodara nodded, and turned back to the map. For a time, he was silent, examining the terrain shown thereon. At his side, Rana Sanga did the same. Then, Lord Damodara reached out and placed his finger on a location some fifteen miles to the south.

"There, perhaps?" he asked. "Judging from the map, it seems like an obscure pass. Very narrow, but it might be enough."

Sanga studied the pass in question for a moment, before shaking his head. The gesture was more one of slow consideration, however, than firm judgement. "I don't think so, Lord." He hesitated, tugging at his rich beard. "I am not sure of this, you understand, but it seems to me that Belisarius has been especially keen to thwart us from making any headway to the south. I suspect that he already has scouts watching the approaches to that pass."

Damodara looked up, his eyes widening. He seemed slightly startled.

"To the south-especially? I hadn't-" He frowned, thinking; then, chuckled ruefully. "It seemed more to me that he was thwarting us anywhere we went."

Sanga's shoulders lifted in a small shrug. "That is true, Lord. But I still think that he has been quickest of all to prevent us from going south."

Damodara spread his hands on the table, staring at the map. It was obvious to Sanga, watching the movement of his eyes, that Damodara was retracing every step of the past month's maneuvers.

"I think you're right," he murmured, after a minute or two. Damodara straightened up, staring now at the bare leather of the pavilion wall across from him.

"Why is that, do you think?" he mused thoughtfully. His gaze turned to Sanga. "It doesn't make any sense. What difference does it make, whether we bypass him to the north or the south? So long as he can keep us from making westward progress, he keeps us out of Mesopotamia. Tied up here, in these miserable mountains."

Damodara's eyes returned to the map. "If anything," he added slowly, "I would think he'd prefer to maneuver us south. That way he can keep us following the Zagros range-all the way to the Gulf." He pointed to the southern reaches of the mountains shown on the map. "In the end, we might find ourselves emerging into Mesopotamia down at the delta. Near Charax."

He laughed sarcastically. "Where he already has our main army bottled up! With Emperor Khusrau and his lancers to keep the cork in the bottle."

Sanga's beard-tugging grew more vigorous. "There is one possible explanation. Especially dealing with Belisarius."

Lord Damodara cocked his head, peering up at the tall Rajput next him. "A trap," he stated. Sanga nodded.

Damodara began pacing back and forth slowly. His hands, in one of the Malwa lord's characteristic gestures, were clasped in front of him as if he were in prayer. But the short, jabbing, back-and-forth motion of the hands conveyed concentration rather than piety.

"You could be right," he mused. A sudden bark-half-humorous, half-exasperated. "Subtle bait! But that is the way the man thinks."

Damodara suddenly stopped his pacing and turned to face Sanga squarely. "What do you advise?" he demanded.

Sanga stopped his beard-tugging, and took a deep breath.

"Go north," he said firmly. "It may be a trap, Lord Damodara. He may be laying an ambush for us. But traps can be turned against the trapper. A trap designed for a wolf will not necessarily hold a tiger. Our troops are excellent, and our army outnumbers his by two to one."

Damodara nodded. "Closer to three to one, I think." The Malwa lord's eyes grew a bit vacant. Again, his hands were clasped before him in the gesture of prayer. But there was no emphatic jabbing, this time. The hands were still, except for a slight flexing of the fingers.

Sanga, recognizing the signs, waited. As usual, Damodara did not take long to make his decision.

"I agree," the Lord said firmly. "We will go north." He barked another laugh. "With our eyes wide open! And-"

There was a sudden commotion at the entrance to the pavilion. Damodara and Sanga turned. They saw that two of the Lord's Rajput guards were barring the way of a Ye-tai who, for his part, was expressing his anger in no uncertain terms.

It was General Mihirakula, the commander of Damodara's Ye-tai troops.

"Let him in!" called out Damodara. The guards stepped aside, and Mihirakula stormed into the pavilion. He cast an angry glance at Rana Sanga before coming to a halt in front of Lord Damodara.

"What is this nonsense I hear?" demanded Mihirakula. "I was just informed by one of your"-another angry glance at Sanga-"Rajput dispatch riders that we are to make preparations for a march. Is this true?"

The question was obviously rhetorical. Mihirakula did not wait for an answer before gesturing angrily at the mountains visible through the open flap of the pavilion.

"Why are we not charging the stinking Romans?" he demanded. "We will brush them aside like flies!" Again, Mihirakula glared at Sanga. "If the Rajputs are too fearful, then my Ye-tai will lead the way!"

The Ye-tai general was a big man, heavy in the shoulders and thick in the chest, but Sanga was as much taller than he as Mihirakula was than Damodara. The Rajput drew himself up to his full towering height. His hands were clasped tightly behind his back, but it was obvious from the tension in Sanga's powerful arms that he was barely controlling his anger.

Damodara intervened quickly. He placed a slight, restraining hand on Sanga. To the Ye-tai general, he stated firmly: "The orders were mine, General Mihirakula." Damodara made his own gesture toward the mountains. "The Roman fieldworks here are too powerful. But," he added, overriding the Ye-tai's gathering splutter of protest, "my scouts tell me that we may find a way to the north."

Again, he overrode Mihirakula's protest. This time, saying with a cheerful smile: "The scouts think there will be opposition, of course. So I was thinking of using you and your men as my vanguard element in the next march."

The smile Damodara was bestowing on Mihirakula was positively a beam, now. "To clear the way for us, of course. So that we can finally be done with these damned mountains."

Mihirakula relaxed, a bit. He glanced at Sanga, once again, before replying to Damodara. But the glance had more of satisfaction in it than anger.

"Soon, do you think? My men are very restless."

Damodara shrugged. "Soon enough. Within a week, I imagine." He made a little, apologetic grimace. "Marching through these mountains, as you know, is not a quick business."

All apology and goodwill vanished. Damodara's next words were spoken in a tone of steel: "And now, General Mihirakula, you will carry out my commands. At once."

The Ye-tai commander knew that tone. For all his barbarous nature, Mihirakula was not a fool. He bowed his head, stiffly, and departed from the pavilion.

After he was gone, Sanga let out a short, angry grunt. "My Rajputs can lead-" he began, but Damodara waved him silent.

"I am well aware of that, Sanga. But the Ye-tai are getting restless." He gave Sanga a shrewd glance. "So are your Rajputs, for that matter, even if they control their impatience better."

Damodara pointed at the map. His finger made little wandering gestures, as if retracing the tortuous route of the past weeks. "Good soldiers grow impatient with this kind of endless maneuvering. Sooner or later, they will demand action. You know that as well as I do."

Grudgingly, Sanga nodded.

Damodara spread his hands. "So let the Ye-tai lead the way, for now. If there is a trap, they will spring it. To be frank, I'd rather see them bloodied than you."

It was plain enough, from the look on his face, that Sanga found his commander's cold-bloodedness distasteful. But Damodara took no offense. He simply chuckled.

"I am Malwa, Rana Sanga, not Rajput. Practical."

Two days later, Belisarius was studying a map spread across a table in his own field headquarters. All of his top commanders were joining him in the enterprise. Those included, in addition to Maurice and Vasudeva: Cyril, who had succeeded Agathius in command of the Greek cataphracts after Agathius had been crippled at the Battle of the Nehar Malka; and Bouzes and Coutzes, the two young Thracian brothers who commanded the Syrian contingents in Belisarius' army.

Abbu entered, pushing his way through the leather flaps which served as an entrance. The chief of Belisarius' Arab scouts did not wait for an invitation to speak before advancing to the center of the tent and giving his report.

The old bedouin did not give the map so much as a glance. Abbu was a stern traditionalist. Despite his deep (if unspoken) admiration for Belisarius, the Arab considered the map an alarming omen-either of the Roman general's early senility, or of his rapid descent into modern decadence.

"The Malwa are heading north," he announced, "toward that saddle pass I told you about. It is obvious they are expecting an ambush. They have their Ye-tai contingents leading the way." Abbu grunted approvingly. "He's no fool, that Malwa commander. He'll feed the barbarians into the fire-good riddance-before following through with his Rajputs."

"Before trying to follow through," said Cyril.

Abbu shook his head. The bedouin's countenance, always dour, grew positively gloomy. "They will succeed. The pass is too wide, and the slopes on either side not steep enough. The north slope is especially shallow. They will be able to use their numbers against us. It won't be easy, but they'll force their way through."

Cyril began to bridle at the Arab's easy assumption of defeat, but Belisarius intervened.

"That's just as well," he stated forcefully. "I want to steer them north. So we'll put up a stiff resistance at the pass itself, but withdraw before our men get mangled." He bent over, studying the map; then pointed with his finger.

"If this is accurate, once they get through the pass their easiest route will be to follow this small river to the northwest." He cocked an eye at Abbu. The Arab scowled fiercely, but said nothing-which was his way of admitting that the newfangled absurdity could not be faulted.

Belisarius kept his eye on Abbu. "And if I'm reading this map correctly," he added, "when we fall back and set our positions southwest of the pass, our fieldworks will be too strong for the Malwa to take any other direction."

Abbu's scowl deepened. But, again, he said nothing.

"If you don't want to hold the pass, general," asked Bouzes, frowning, "then why even put up a fight at all? Seems like a waste of good soldiers." The young Thracian did not bother to add: which is not your usual style. Like all of the men in that tent, he had become very familiar with Belisarius' tactical methods. One of those methods-a very important one-was to be sparing with his men's lives, whenever possible.

Belisarius shook his head. "I don't have any choice, Bouzes. I can't afford to make it too easy, not for commanders like Damodara and Sanga. If we fight like lions whenever they move south, but stand aside when they move north, they'll start to wonder why. Doesn't make sense. Strict military logic would be the other way around-I should be more than happy to steer them down the Zagros, toward Pars." He winced. "I do not want Sanga and Damodara spending much time contemplating my bad logic."

Maurice interrupted. His own expression did not exude any great happiness. "They're probably already doing that," he growled.

Belisarius heaved a sigh. "Yes, I'm sure they are. But as long as they don't think too much about the qanats, and don't know about the Kushans, I think we'll be all right."

He cast a quick glance at the helmet which Vasudeva had placed upon the table. As always, the Kushan had removed the detested monstrosity as soon as he entered the tent and was safe from spying eyes. Belisarius' expression resumed its usual calm serenity. He even managed a crooked smile.

"My plan is, after all," he said cheerfully, "a bit on the crazed side."

That announcement did not seem to bring any great cheer to the other men in the tent. But they did not protest-not, at least, beyond thinking private dark thoughts. Those men were all very familiar with Belisarius' tactical principles and methods. Many of those methods struck them as bizarre, but not the one which-always-stood at the very center.

Win the war. That's all that matters.