Battle For Empire

Prologue

3103 BC, the Palace in the city of Akkad, in the Land Between the Rivers. .

“Tell me a story, Grandmother.”

The childish words caught Trella by surprise. She rose from her seat at the window to find Escander standing a few steps behind her. The words and intonation might be those of a little boy, but the youth facing her had already entered his manhood.

“And who let you into my rooms unannounced?” She frowned at him and shook her head, annoyed only at herself for not hearing his approach.

“You did, Grandmother, else your guards would have stopped me.” His voice now held all the confidence of a young man. “So you must still want to see your favorite grandson.”

“I’ll speak to the guards about their carelessness later. No doubt they’ve been sleeping at their post again.”

Escander smiled at her jest.

The hard-eyed and well-trained bodyguards from the Hawk Clan remained ever alert outside Lady Trella’s quarters. They had a very short list of those allowed entry to her chambers unannounced. King Sargon, her eldest son, as well as her two other children, Zakita and Melkorak. Escander’s name came next.

After that, except for a handful of trusted servants and close companions who had served Trella through the years, everyone else, including her other grandchildren, had to seek an audience or wait for approval to enter Trella’s wing of the Palace. Even now, the King’s Mother had many enemies, and not all of them dwelt outside the royal residence.

Her frown faded. Trella held out her arms and let Escander embrace his grandmother, her forehead resting easily on his shoulder. His body felt warm and reassuring, strong and full of life against her.

Trella remembered how often she’d held the boy as a child. He needed her touch then, even more than her own children. Tell me a story, Grandmother. Escander was always pleading and cajoling her while growing up, using the same words and plaintive voice she’d found difficult to refuse.

Escander occupied a special place in her affections. Sargon had carried his son Escander to Trella when he was little more than two years old, the boy sobbing, his face buried in his father’s shoulder. The poor child had just learned of his mother’s death, and Sargon, his own grief scarcely under control, handed the frightened and bewildered boy to Trella.

“Please care for him, Mother.” Sargon touched the boy’s cheek and brushed away a tear. “He means so much. . there’s no one else I trust with him.” Sargon, too, had tears in his eyes. He’d loved only two women in his life, and both had died in childbirth.

From that day, Trella raised Escander as her own child, though she never let the boy forget the memory of his real mother, a good woman who cared deeply for both Sargon and their son.

Trella brought her thoughts back to the present. She separated herself from her grandson’s embrace. “And what brings you to me now? It’s after midday. I know you returned to the Palace last night. Were you too busy to visit your grandmother?”

Almost a month ago, Escander had ridden north, traveling with his uncle Melkorak to inspect the border villages and their garrisons. They had returned to Akkad yesterday.

“The night was late when we arrived, Grandmother, and I didn’t want to disturb you. I planned to come this morning, but Father summoned me. We spoke for some time. He said. .”

Escander met her eyes. “He’s sending me to the steppes, to visit our allies and learn from them. But before I leave, he wanted me to speak with you. . to ask for your help.”

Trella studied her grandson carefully. Midway into his fifteenth season, Escander appeared taller than she remembered, more man than the boy who’d ridden out with his uncle only a month ago. Escander’s shoulders had grown broader, his arms thick with muscle, much like his grandfather, Eskkar.

The young man’s light brown hair would have swirled around his gray eyes but an unadorned strip of black leather kept his long hair away from his face and off his neck. A broad forehead gave his face a rugged look. His keen wits and quick tongue nearly matched her own.

It was his mouth that intrigued Trella the most. Escander had the same mouth and jutting chin as his grandfather. When Escander smiled, Trella saw the stamp of her husband’s face on the boy, Eskkar’s blood flowing through their grandson’s veins.

The youth had indeed grown into a man, Trella reminded herself. Already he knew the ways of power, and the many secrets of Akkad’s rulers. Now the time had come for Escander to prove not only his manhood, but his readiness to take the crown of Akkad someday.

For that to happen, he needed to travel to the steppes, to earn the respect of their allies and learn the grim ways of warfare, where lessons came only through battle and at the risk of his life. Sargon’s firstborn son had died there. Now Escander would follow the same path, and possibly meet the same tragic end.

“Do you approve of what you see, Grandmother?” He smiled.

Again Trella saw Eskkar’s features reflected in her grandson’s face. This time a pang of loneliness swept through her. “Don’t question your elders.”

She’d been gazing at him for some time. “You come to see me with no warning, asking silly questions.”

“My father said there were many things I should know before I leave.” Escander met her eyes, his expression serious.

“And what could an old woman tell you that the King could not?”

“You’re not so old, Grandmother.” Escander reached out and touched her cheek. “You’ve scarcely changed since I was a child.”

“Which, as I recall,” Trella said, unable to conceal a smile, “wasn’t that many years ago.”

She pushed his hand away. In one more year, she would reach her sixtieth season, and her hair had long since turned to gray. Nevertheless, she thanked the gods that her wits remained sharp, even if her body had thickened somewhat with age and the burden of birthing three children.

At least she still stood upright, and retained some of the grace that had marked her girlhood. And men yet looked at her with favor, and while she might smile back, she had never taken a lover.

“I don’t think your father sent you here to talk about your childhood.” Trella linked her arm within Escander’s and guided him to the wide table that butted against the window overlooking the garden below. Two chairs, each with a thick russet cushion, added a touch of luxury to the otherwise spare furnishings. “Now, tell me exactly what King Sargon said.”

“That you should tell me about my grandfather, that it would help me in the north.” Escander settled into the chair beside her. “And about Father’s own journey there. All about it. The good and the bad.”

“Oh, Sargon said that, did he?” Trella leaned back in her chair. “Is my son now afraid to speak to his son? Perhaps I should talk with him, not you.”

Escander reached across the table and took her hand. “Be serious, Grandmother. Everyone knows there are secrets only you know and understand, about the dangers in the steppes, and what happened to my half-brother there. Father knows, but he can’t. . won’t talk about it.”

“It’s too painful for him.” Trella squeezed Escander’s hand for a moment.

Her thoughts went back to those days of danger, of pain, and of sorrow. And of happiness. Those feelings, too, had faded away, replaced with a sense of serenity as she drew closer to her end of days.

She raised her eyes, looking over the boy’s shoulder and beyond the window, at the green and brown hilltop less than half a mile away. Lately Trella spent more and more of her time staring at the sight. Her husband Eskkar was buried there, near the crest of the hill. The unmarked grave dove deep into the earth.

Obeying Eskkar’s final wishes, Trella had washed and dressed the King’s body in his warrior’s garb by herself. Then she placed the great sword on his breast and folded his hands around it. No gold or jewelry adorned the body, only his favorite cloak with the Hawk Clan emblem draped over the burial shroud.

For many years, two elderly women lived nearby, watching the site for Trella, lest any foolish grave robbers seek to loot the grave. But by now no one showed any interest in the spot, its location almost forgotten.

“Tell me a story, Grandmother.” Escander still held her hand.

He’d followed her gaze, and knew where her thoughts had taken her. Once again she heard the child speaking, but the earnest eyes that met her own looked anything but childlike.

“You’ve heard all the stories, Escander. There’s nothing more to tell.”

“I’ve heard all the tales of the mighty Eskkar and his brave son Sargon, who fought together to save Akkad. Now it’s time for me to learn the truth, so that I will know what dangers to expect. The secrets only you and Father know.”

“The truth,” Trella mused, “after all these years, the truth is hard to remember. . even harder to tell.”

“No one speaks of the time when my father went to the north. Is the truth so difficult to reveal? Is that why he asks you to do it?”

“The good and the bad, that’s what he asked?”

“The good and the bad,” the young man repeated, his voice serious. “Tell me the truth, not a story, Grandmother.”

“It would take hours, even days, to tell you everything.” Trella leaned back in her chair. “When are you leaving?”

“My father the King agrees that it might take some time for you to instruct me. He said the Hawk Clan could enjoy a few more days guzzling wine and chasing women before my journey begins.”

“My son becomes even more presumptuous as he grows older.”

“Everyone knows, Grandmother, that you’re the only one he listens to. At least, since my mother died.”

“If only that were true.” Trella’s eyes softened the words. Sargon did still come to her for advice and counsel, and when he didn’t seek her out, she had other ways of getting her ideas and thoughts into his mind.

Power, she reminded herself, comes in many ways, and Trella still retained much of the authority that had once been hers alone. “Everything? He said to tell you everything?”

“Yes, everything.” The boy settled back in his chair and made himself comfortable, now that he saw her acquiesce.

She gazed into his gray eyes, and realized that the boy she’d raised from a child had truly gone, replaced by the calm young man with the emanation of strength before her. Eskkar, she remembered, had much the same aura, a powerful presence that men deferred to almost without thinking. “You know what your journey to the steppes means, Escander? What it really means?”

“It means that I will be king someday, if I pass the test, and if one of my half-brothers or sisters doesn’t have me killed first. Or I’m being sent to my death, like my older brother before me.”

Trella nodded in understanding. After Sargon’s first wife died, he took a second wife, Escander’s mother. Two years after Escander’s birth, she also died attempting to give life to a still-born daughter.

In his grief, Sargon had taken to his bed chamber a long string of willing women, who produced a multitude of sons and daughters. Trella had tried to restrain Sargon’s passion, warning him about what might happen in the future, but in this, her son had refused her advice.

Now every one of those sons and daughters, encouraged and guided by their scheming mothers, could make some claim to the throne. The danger that Trella had foreseen had come to fruition. The only suitable heir to the Kingdom of Akkad stood in the way of his jealous kindred, each of them eager to rule. The thrust of a knife or a drop of poison hung over his head. Escander did indeed have many enemies.

“You must always beware of your siblings,” she said. “But I will keep watch over the most troublesome.”

Escander shrugged, in just that certain way Eskkar used to do. For a moment, Trella almost lost control of her emotions. She’d loved Escander’s grandfather since their first night, and now as her life drew to a close, her heart went out to this boy.

“Whatever happens here will happen.” Escander dismissed any concerns with a shrug. “I know the ways of the Palace and its intrigues. But what I will face in the northern lands is still hidden. That’s why I must hear the truth now, and not from the steppes barbarians. Besides, if I ever do come to rule, I’ll need to look every man in the eye and read their thoughts, the way only you can, Grandmother.”

They both knew what this journey to the steppes meant. Trella had often wanted to warn Escander, to tell him what he needed to know and what dangers lurked in his path, but it remained her son’s place to tell him these secrets. The Palace intrigue, she knew, unraveled nearly every hidden thought and desire.

Escander would be on his way before anyone learned of his departure, but tongues would whisper about his destination, and the plotting would begin. Even so, she felt satisfied that at last King Sargon had grasped what had to be done, even if he couldn’t do it himself.

She stood up and went to the door and called out to a servant. “Ask En-hedu to join me.”

Trella waited by the door until En-hedu arrived from her rooms down the corridor, then the two women whispered together for a few moments. Trella returned to the table and settled herself comfortably in the chair. “En-hedu will watch the door, to make sure no one hears our talk.”

“What if En-hedu listens?”

“En-hedu doesn’t have to listen, she knows the truth. She was there for much of it.” Trella poured water for herself, and a half cup for her grandson. She gestured to the pitcher of wine, but the boy shook his head. Trella had spoken to him often about the dangers of too much wine, and at least he had learned that lesson well.

“Where should I begin?”

“Start with when you first met King Eskkar.”

“No, you’ve heard those stories before. And even if they seem like tales to impress children, what you’ve heard is mostly true. Your grandfather was indeed a great man.”

She took a sip from her cup. “Your story, what concerns you, began long after the building of Akkad’s great wall, the wall that saved us from the barbarians.” Trella closed her eyes for a moment, to count the time. “Twenty-seven years ago, when Sargon was a year younger than you, that’s when your story begins.”

“So long ago,” Escander said in surprise. “How can it matter now?”

“The very young and the very foolish,” Trella said firmly, “think that everything starts with them, and that only their days are important. But to rule wisely, a king has to think many years into the future, and must always remember the failures of the past. Eskkar learned that lesson well. A good leader plans for six months ahead; a great leader plans six years into the future. The events from long ago can affect you today, Escander, but if you’re not interested, you can leave and let an old woman return to her rest.”

“No, no, I’ll keep silent, I swear it. Not another word.”

“When you have questions, good questions, ask them,” Trella said. “Otherwise, how can you learn anything? Do you want to plod along like your half-brothers?”

“You know the answer to that, Grandmother. That’s why you’ve favored me all these years, though you tried hard not to show it.”

“Let me see, then.” Trella drummed her fingers on the table. “In that time, the lands under Akkad’s control stretched ever further south, ever closer to those of Sumeria. As the Sumerian cities expanded their influence northward, the border disputes began. The age of mighty cities had arrived, and it was inevitable that Akkad would clash with the growing power of Sumeria. In those days, the southern cities grew even faster than Akkad, since they had the trade on the Great Sea as well as the Two Rivers.”

“Then came the war with Sumer,” Escander said. “That’s when my grandfather proved once and for all his greatness as a leader. His tactics in that war are still talked about among the soldiers.”

Trella shook her head. “The only thing good about that war was that the actual fighting ended quickly. Eskkar gambled his life and the existence of Akkad in one battle, and only his skill as a leader saved them both.”

“The cities of Sumeria still defer to our leadership.” Escander’s tone implied that it would always be so. “We can take care of the Sumerians if need be.”

“Ah, the arrogance of youth, who thinks that what is, will always be. I hoped you would know better. Yes, they still respect our power. Just as they wait for Akkad to make the slightest mistake, so they can attempt to overthrow our rule once again.”

Trella had spent most of her life in that struggle, determined to ensure that the city of Akkad never made that mistake, never lost its power. Still, it remained a natural conflict of interests that would likely never end.

He nodded, accepting her rebuke. “I take nothing for granted, Grandmother. I lay down each night to sleep wondering if I will awake in the morning.”

“A wise thought to keep in your head.” Trella let her mind return to the past. “Where was I? Oh, yes. After the Sumerian War, we overcame other minor battles and skirmishes, raids and marauders, good crop years and bad. Despite all these difficulties, the city grew greater and stronger each day. Akkad spread to both sides of the Tigris, and Eskkar built this palace for us on the west bank.”

She paused for a moment, remembering those happy days. “But after many years of peace, we were caught by surprise when the new threat of war came from the east. Eskkar looked to his son to assist him. But Sargon, your father, had grown into a rebellious and lazy young man. A great disappointment to us both. He sorely tried your grandfather’s temper, which Eskkar could never quite control.”

“I’ve heard that King Eskkar could bellow and roar like a lion, though never at you, Grandmother.” Escander squeezed her hand again. “But my father, a disappointment? I’ve never heard anything about that.”

“Few remember those days,” Trella said, “and even fewer want to speak about them. So while Akkad basked in prosperity, a new war loomed. Meanwhile, your father, the heir to the kingdom, wasted his time drinking, gambling, and whoring with friends as shiftless as himself, despite our strictest commands. That’s when a stranger arrived from Sumeria, and brought with him the first stirrings of the Great War to come.”

“Ah, the mysterious stranger, whose name no one knows.”

Trella smiled. “In truth, at that time no one in Akkad knew his name or face, save Eskkar.”

“But now. . after so many years? Why is his name kept secret?”

“Because if he still lives, he might yet be of help to Akkad in the future. The bond between him and Eskkar proved stronger than time or distance. And even if he has passed beyond the veil, he will have whispered his secrets to his heirs, and his sons may yet honor the bond that exists between our families. So to this day, only Sargon and I know his name. Now I will share that secret with you. The man’s name was Bracca, and he was a companion of Eskkar’s during much of his youthful wanderings. They shared so many dangers that each owed the other his life.”

“I’ve never heard that name. And after this Bracca came, King Eskkar went north once again, to the barbarian lands, to seek allies.”

“No, that’s not the way it happened. You must learn patience. Always you want to jump ahead in the story, just as you did as a child. At that time, Eskkar’s focus remained on Akkad’s old enemy, the barbarian clan from the steppes, the Alur Meriki.” She shifted in her chair. “Even in the steppes you will find enemies.”

“Enemies? But I’ve offended no one outside the Palace, let alone in the north.”

“Eskkar had many enemies throughout the land, even among the clans of the steppes, and some of them may still be alive. Those who’ve died may have passed their hatred of your grandfather to their children. Blood feuds can span generations. Your name will bring danger from many sides, and you will have few friends to stand by you. That is why the test worries your father so much.”

“But if I survive. . if I return?”

“You will survive. I see Eskkar’s spirit in you, and that gives me hope. He always managed to outwit his foes.”

“He had you to help him, Grandmother. And the luck of the gods. I’ve heard those stories, how he often gambled his life in some desperate battle, trusting to chance to see him through. But my luck remains to be tested.”

“Don’t believe all those tales about your grandfather’s luck, Child. Eskkar succeeded because he always managed to anticipate and outwit his enemies. Every one of his foes underestimated both his courage and his wits. Now, try to keep silent for a few moments.”

“Yes, Grandmother.”

“Where was I? Oh, yes, the stranger came to our house — we still lived in the Compound across the river then — to speak to Eskkar. The Great War had already begun, though Eskkar and I didn’t realize we were at war. By the time we found out what had happened, it was nearly too late. Our enemy had already plotted our downfall, and sent the first of his minions into our midst, to spy on Akkad and its allies.”

“But everyone said how strong and powerful Akkad was.”

“You said you wanted to hear the truth, all the secrets. Now pay attention, and listen to the truth about your father, Sargon. And learn about the cunning of the Great King of the Elamite Empire. What you hear might just save your life.”

She sighed. “I remember the night it all started, the night the stranger arrived to see your grandfather and brought with him the news, both good and bad, of what was to come.”