Julian (68 page)

"Procopius will bring supplies. Also, to get here, he will have to open up a line of communications from our province of Corduene. That's only three hundred miles away. We don't need to worry about supplies if Procopius comes."

"But if he does not?" Victor leaned forward, a hunting dog who has got the quafry's scent.

"Then we are where we are now. It seems agreed that we cannot return the way we came."

"Because the fleet was burned."

This was too much. I turned on Victor. "Count, you will not speak again until I give you leave." As if struck, Victor blinked and sat back.

I continued. "We can always take our chances in the desert to the north. But it will be a hard march to Corduene." I could see that Ormisda wanted to speak. I nodded.

"The Augustus should know that there are no maps of that territory. We shall have to rely on guides. They may not be reliable."

"Can't we follow the course of the Tigris?" Dagalaif fanned himself with the frond of a date palm.

"Not easily," said Ormisda. "There are many strong fortresses…"

"And we shall be a retreating army, not a conquering one. We would be unable to lay siege to the cities." I let this sink in. Until now no one has mentioned the possibility of our defeat. Mter all, we have broken the Great King's army; half Persia is ours. Yet now we must talk of retreat because we have been burned out by Persian zealots. It is tragedy. I should have anticipated it. But I did not. The fault is mine. It is hard to believe that without the loss of a single battle one can so swiftly cease to be a conqueror and become the chieftain of a band of frightened men who want only to go home as fast as possible. Is this the revenge of Ares for what I said to him during the sacrifice at Ctesiphon?

Arintheus took my challenge. "We're not retreating, Augustus. How could we be? Why, old Sapor will make a treaty with you tomorrow, giving you anything you want if only we go home." News of the Persian embassy has been in the air for a week Nothing is secret for long in an army. I suspect the Persians themselves of spreading the rumour, to create discord: why is your Emperor driving you so hard when we are willing to give you gold and territory and a safe passage home? The Persians are expert at this sort of thing.

"Victor seems to feel that we have been defeated," I said. "I don't. I think we must wait a few days longer for Procopius. If he does not come, we shall consider whether to go north to Corduene or keep on south to the Persian Gulf." I said this casually. It was the first time I have suggested such a thing to the generals. They were astonished.

"The Persian Gulf!" Victor momentarily forgot my ban of silence. He quickly muttered an apology.

Salutius spoke for what, I am afraid, is the majority. "It is too far, Augustus. We are only three hundred miles from Roman territory and it seems like three thousand miles. If we continue any deeper into Persia, we'll be swallowed up."

"The men won't go." Nevitta was abrupt. "They're already frightened. Order them to go south and you'll have a first-class mutiny on your hands."

"But the cities of the Gulf are rich and unprotected…"

"They won't go, General. Not now. But even if they would, what's to keep the Persians from burning everything in our path? They're crazy enough to. We'd starve to death before we ever saw the Gulf."

So I have abandoned this dream. For now, I dismissed the council.

I sit on my cot, writing this on my knees. Callistus is preparing the sacrificial robes. The deaf-mute plays the lute. In a few minutes Maximus joins me. In an hour I pray first to Zeus, then to the Great Mother. Where have I failed? Is this the revenge of Ares?

The omens are bad. The auguries inconclusive. They advise against returning home by way of Assyria, they also advise against going north to Corduene. One indicated that I should go south to the Gulf! But the troops would not obey. They are already close to mutiny. I must bring Victor to heel or face rebellion.

I have not slept for days. The heat at night is almost as bad as the heat by day. It is like having the fever. We all resemble driedup cadavers. I lose my temper with everyone. I struck Callistus when he fumbled with the fastening of my robes. I quarrelled with Salutius over a trivial matter, and he was in the right. Tonight Maximus was with me. We were alone together because Priscus is sick with dysentery and Anatolius nurses him. While I was having supper, Maximus tried to cheer me up. He achieved the opposite.

"But it's so simple. Give the order to march south. They must obey. You are the Emperor."

"I shall have been the Emperor. They'll kill me first."

"But Cybele herself has told us that you must complete your work. After all, you are Alexander."

I erupted at this. "No, I am not Alexander, who is dead. I am Julian, about to die in this forsaken place…"

"No. No! The gods…"

"… misled us! The gods laugh at us! They raise us up for sport, and throw us down again. There is no more gratitude in heaven than there is on earth."

"Julian…"

"You say I was born to do great things. Well, I have done them. I conquered the Persians. I conquered the Germans. I saved Gaul.

For what? To delay this world's end for a year or two? Certainly no longer."

"You were born to restore the worship of the true gods."

"Then why do they let me fail?"

"You are Emperor still!"

I seized a handful of charred earth from the tent's floor. "That is all that's left to me. Ashes."

"You will live…"

"I shall be as dead as Alexander soon enough, but when I go I take Rome with me. For nothing good will come after. The Goths and the Galileans will inherit the state, and like vultures and maggots they'll make clean bones of what is dead, until there is not even so much as the shadow of a god anywhere on earth."

Maximus hid his face in his hands while I raged on. But after a time I stopped, ashamed of having made a fool of myself. "It's no use," I said finally, "I am in Helios's hands, and we are both at the end of the day. So good night, Maximus, and pray for me that it will indeed be a good night."

But I can't believe it is over yet. Our army is intact. The Persian army is broken. We can still go north to Corduene. If Helios deserts me now, there will be no one to restore his worship. But this is madness! Why am I suddenly in such despair? Why should I die now, at the height of my reign, at the age of… I had to stop to count! I am thirty-two.

Afternoon. We are still encamped. Food is running low. No word from Procopius. Yesterday and again this morning, Persian cavalry attacked us. They strike at the outskirts of the camp. Then when we sound the call to arms, they vanish. This is the most demoralizing kind of warfare.

I must soon decide what to do. Meanwhile, I make daily sacrifice. The omens are not good. The auguries confused. I want to put Victor under arrest. Salutius thinks I should wait.

During this morning's staff meeting, there was a sudden racket outside my tent. I heard the tribune who commands my bodyguard shout, "Stand back! Stand back!"

I went outside. A thousand men, mostly Asiatics, surrounded the tent. They begged me to lead them home by way of Assyria. They had been well coached. They shouted and whined, wept and threatened. It took me some minutes to silence them. Then I said,

"We shall start for home only when our work is done." Several jeered at this. I pretended not to hear.

"When we do go home, it cannot be by the way we came. Your general Victor will tell you why." This was a pleasantly ironic move. Victor was now forced to placate the men he had himself incited. He did it very well, explaining why the Euphrates route was no longer open to us. He was plausible, and the men listened to him respectfully. When he had finished, I assured them that I was as eager as they to return to safety. At the proper time we would go; meanwhile, I asked them not to take seriously the Persianinspired rumours which I knew were going about the camp. They dispersed. I turned to Victor.

"This is not the way to force us," I said carefully.

"But, Augustus…"

I dismissed him. He has been warned.

Later, I spoke privately to each of the generals. Most are loyal. For instance, Jovian sat on a stool in my tent, his tunic wet with perspiration, his face flushed from wine as well as heat. "Whatever Augustus commands, I will obey." His voice is deep and somewhat hoarse, for he drinks those harsh German spirits which burn the throat.

"Even if I say go south to the Persian Gulf?"

Jovian squirmed uncomfortably. "That is far away. But if the Augustus orders us…"

"No, I shall not order you. Not now."

He was relieved. "Then that means we'll be going back soon, won't we?"

I said nothing.

"Because the longer we stay here, the more difficult it will be. What with the heat, the Persians…"

"The Persians are defeated."

"But the Great King still has a good many soldiers and this is their country, not ours."

"Half of it is ours, by right of conquest."

"Yes, Lord. But can we hold it? I'm for getting out. They say demons ride with the Persians, especially at night."

I almost laughed in his foolish face. But instead I proposed: "Pray to your man-god to make them go away."

"If demons haunt us, it is because Christ wills it," he said piously.

I smiled. "I prefer a god who protects those who worship him."

"I don't know about these things, Augustus, but I say let's make terms with the Persians and leave this place. Not that it's for me to decide."

"No, it is not for you to decide. But! shall bear in mind your advice." I dismissed Jovian, more depressed than ever. I make sacrifice in a few minutes.

Mastara sees great peril no matter what I do. I sacrificed yesterday and again this morning. There is still no sign. The gods are silent. I prayed more than an hour to Helios. I looked straight at him until I was blind. Nothing. I have offended. But how? I cannot believe that my anger at the war god would turn all heaven against me. Who else will do their work?

Nevitta brings me word that the Asiatic troops already speak of my successor "who will save them". But apparently there is no popular choice. They follow Victor hut do not love him. Arintheus? Emperor? No. Not even his boys would accept that. Salutius? He is loyal to me and yet… I grow suspicious. I am like Constantius now. I suspect treason on every side. For the first time I fear the knife in the dark. I make Callistus sleep on the ground beside my bed while the deaf-mute remains awake most of the night, watching for the assassin's shadow to fall across the door to my tent. I never believed that I would become like this. I have never feared death in battle, and I never thought that I feared murder. But I do. I find it hard to sleep. When I do, my dreams are of death, sudden, black, violent. What has gone wrong?

Beside my bed there is a hook by Aeschylus. Just now I picked it up and read this at random: "Take heart. Suffering when it climbs highest lasts but a little time." Well, I am near the peak. Will it be swift? or slow?

Priscus and Maximus spent most of the evening with me. We talked philosophy. No one mentioned our situation and for a time I was able to forget that the gods have abandoned me. Yet why do I think this? Merely because the Persians have burned the countryside? Or because of the treachery of Procopius, which does not come as a surprise? Although things are not so bad as I feel they are, the fact that I have this sense of foreboding is in itself a message from the gods.

Maximus wanted to stay behind after Priscus left. But I would not let him, pleading fatigue. I suspect even him. Why should he be in league with Victor? Everyone knows he has influence over me, and certainly anyone could buy him if they met his price. This is insane. Of course Maximus is loyal to me. He has to be. The Galileans would have his head if I were not here to protect him. I must stop this brooding or I shall become as mad as those emperors who feared the long night of death more than they loved the brief living day. I am still alive; still Augustus; still conqueror of Persia. Tomorrow we start for home. I gave the order at sundown. The men cheered me. They don't know what a long journey it is from here to Corduene. All they know is that we are leaving Persia. All I know is that the goddess Cybele revealed to me that I was Alexander born again, and I have failed both her and Alexander, who is once more a ghost, while I am nothing.

I should have agreed to Sapor's treaty. Now that we are withdrawing, we shall get worse terms.

Priscus
: As well as I knew Julian, I never suspected that he was in such despair. The exhausted man who scribbled the journal, and the proud laughing general Maximus and I used to dine with are two different creatures. Naturally, we knew that he was worried. But he never betrayed to us that morbid fear of assassination he writes about. He joked occasionally about the succession, saying that if Rome were to have a Christian emperor he hoped it would be Victor because in a year there would be a million converts to Hellenism. But that was all. He talked as he always talked: rapidly, enthusiastically, late into the night, reading aloud to us from the classics, quarrelling with me over Plato's meanings, teasing Maximus for his ignorance of literature. The great magician, having always been in such close communion with the gods, seldom condescended to read the reports of those who could only guess at the mysteries he knew.

On 15 June Julian gave the order to go north along the Tigris to Corduene and Armenia. The thing was finished. Even Ormisda now realized that he would never rule in Persia.

At dawn 16 June we broke camp. Julian asked me to ride with him. I did not realize until I read the journal what a good actor he was. That day he was the exuberant, legendary hero, hair and beard burned a dull gold by the sun, arms and legs dark, face as clear and untroubled as a child's; even the constant nose-peeling had finally stopped and his head looked as if it had been carved from African wood. We were all quite black except for the pale Gauls, who turn painfully red in the sun and stay that way. There was much sunstroke among them.