The Seven Hills (7 page)

And now: a flying machine. It made his head whirl.

He walked down a broad corridor where artisans were still busy painting the walls and inlaying the mosaic floor with scenes from the life of Alexander and the early
Ptolemies. He was still uncomfortable in the spectacular parade uniform Selene had had made for him and insisted that
he wear, even when not engaged in military duties. The muscle-sculpted cuirass was overlaid with gold and silver leaf, its leatherwork studded with amber and coral. His helmet was embossed on the temples with curling ram's horns, the significance of which he could not guess. He knew he'd be laughed out of Rome should he ever show up there in such a rig, but the Alexandrians lacked all restraint when it came to display.

Thought of Rome darkened his mood. He knew that he had many enemies there. His family protected him, but to
some his actions of late smacked of treason. If only he could
make them understand that he held the key to Rome's fu
ture greatness! Romans were for the most part conservatives
and traditionalists. The scions of the great old families like his own wanted only to reestablish Rome as it had been in the time of their ancestors. He knew this to be folly. The world was very different than it had been in the day of Fabius Cunctator.

Besides, he thought, their vaunted traditions and system hadn't done them much good when it came to dealing with Hannibal, had it? This new world would call for new methods and new ideas, as much as that might pain the ancestor worshippers of the Senate.

He went into a huge courtyard where men were erecting,
employing or tearing down structures of wood and metal.

Some were catapults, some scaling devices and some objects of no function he could guess at. Once in a while a timber or
rope would break under too much stress and there were shouts or laughter or the screams of injured men. Never before had Marcus seen men so frantically employed, yet seeming exhilarated at the task, strenuous, frustrating and dangerous though it might be. These "active philosophers," as someone had dubbed them, were a new breed of men.

He went to an especially strange structure that consisted of a platform between uprights, the platform suspended by
a complicated armature of ropes, pulleys, gears and what ap
peared to be large boxes full of metal bars. "What might this be?" he asked the sweating supervisor.

"We aren't sure yet what to call it," said Chilo. He was the head of the Archimedean school, but he was as dusty
and ill kempt as the slaves who assisted with the work. "The
new falling-weight catapults got us thinking about the possibilities of falling weights. It seems such a simple thing, something we all tend to take for granted, yet there is a
whole unknown field of study here: the dynamics of falling
weights."

" 'Dynamics'?" Marcus said.

"It's an old word we've revived. It means the study of
how matter moves. Remember when you first came here and
I told you that we seek out fundamental principles? Well, this is one of them. Matter does not move about, at random
and free from obedience to natural law. There are rules, and
we intend to discover them. Watch this."

At Chilo's direction, a dozen slaves crowded onto the platform. A single slave seized a rope and began to haul
back on it. There was a clacking of gear wheels and the platform began to rise, a few inches with each pull. At the same
time, the boxes of metal bars descended at the same rate.

"You see?" Chilo said. "The strength of a single man is sufficient to raise many men. This can be used to raise soldiers above an enemy rampart, but more important to us is
the demonstration of the properties of the counterweight."

He looked around and indicated a man who sat on the edge of a fountain, staring at the machine. "You see that sour-
faced fellow observing over there?"

Marcus looked at him. "Isn't that the mathematician who just arrived from Crete? Nikolaus, is it?"

"The very one. He seeks to penetrate to the very essence
of this question: the principle of
why
objects fall as they do."

"Why?" Marcus said. "Self-evident, isn't it? Things have
always fallen."

"That's just it. It isn't self-evident at all. We just take it for granted. Why doesn't smoke fall? What holds clouds up? They may not have much mass, but they have some.
Some of us think that Archimedes' principle of buoyancy is
involved, but Nikolaus thinks that there is a fundamental, universal force involved and he wants to understand it."

"Too deep for me," Marcus admitted. "But I like this machine. It could have all sorts of uses. Can you make one high
enough to take people all the way to the top of the lighthouse?" The lighthouse of Pharos, tallest structure in the world, stood only about a mile from them.

"It would require a lot of rope and wood," Chilo said, "but the principle will work no matter how tall the machine might be."

Marcus left him pondering.

An hour later he found Queen Selene in her council chamber. Technically she was not a true queen, merely the consort of the boy-king, her brother Ptolemy. In reality she
was unquestioned queen and this position she owed to Mar
cus. Her immature husband now sulked in a wing of the palace, enduring education from formidable teachers instead of his previous indulgent and scheming eunuchs, courtiers and advisors.

The queen was seated at a delicate table and she looked up
as he entered. "Your friends have disappeared," she said in
her usual, abrupt fashion. She favored the Stoic philosophers and had little use for court formality or artificial manners.

"Which friends?" he asked, tossing his helmet to a
nearby slave. The adroit functionary caught it without dam
aging the delicate plumes.

"Norbanus, of course. And his four legions." She was studying a map, and a weathered man stood behind her, pointing out something with an ivory wand.

"Rather a large body of men to simply disappear," Marcus answered, knowing where this was leading.

"This is Achates, an officer of the Sinai Scouts," she said,
indicating the man behind her. His features were a mixture of Macedonian and Bedouin, not an uncommon combination in that part of the world. He spread the fingers of one
hand upon his breast and bowed in the Eastern fashion. "He
says that, instead of hugging the coast as expected, they plunged straight off into the desert, more or less in the direction of Judea."

"Are your men following them?" he asked the desert soldier.

"They will shadow the army as closely as possible,"
Achates said, "but you must understand the special difficul
ties posed by the great desert. There will be very little food or water in front of that army. There will be none at all left where it passes. My scouts may have to turn back."

"Norbanus continues to amaze me," Marcus said. "I always thought he was a smooth-tongued Forum politician
and no soldier at all. But he takes to the life as if he was born
to it. Men follow him willingly, too. The gods have touched
him somehow."

"Will his men continue to follow him as they turn to dried meat in that awful desert?" Selene asked.

The question had been sarcastic, but he treated it seriously. "That's to be seen. Soldiers are an odd lot. They'll
turn on one officer for assigning an extra watch, and worship
another who treats them like dogs. Alexander's men endured unbelievable hardships for him. Norbanus may have that touch with men."

"Or they may all die out there," she said, shrugging.
"They certainly made extensive preparations. They denuded
a whole district of forage to take along and they must have commandeered every water bag to be had. Still, it is a ruthless desert, and with so many men and animals to feed and water, they may leave their bones out there."

"They'll make it," Marcus asserted. "I won't bore you yet again with a description of my people's excellence, but rest
assured that they will make it where they are going. The question js: Where is Norbanus leading them? I wouldn't put it past him to have a go at conquering India."

She smiled wryly. "He'd have to pass through a few nations before reaching there. I think he's headed for Judea, thence up the coast. He's going to Greece. From there it's just a short passage to Italy."

"That's the most likely course," Marcus agreed. "Is there anything in his path likely to stop him?"

"Judea is in a constant state of civil war," she said. "For some time the land has been ruled by the Hasmonean family, but they have split up into factions, so there are usually
rival claimants. Religious differences come into it as well."

"Religious differences?" Marcus said. "I thought those were the people with only a single god."

"They differ on how that god should be worshipped," she
said. "I cannot claim to understand the details."

"Norbanus will do well there," he murmured. Norbanus,
he was certain, would select the weaker party, offer his ser
vices and put that claimant on the throne, and Rome would acquire a new client state. It was an old story.

"What did you say?"

"Nothing. Don't the Seleucids of Syria claim Judea?"

"They claim a great deal of territory they no longer con
trol. Until a few months ago they were planning a campaign
to retake everything east of the Delta, hoping we would be too distracted with Hamilcar's aggression to do anything about it. Now it looks as if they are facing a new assault from Parthia."

"The Parthians sound like an interesting people," Marcus
said.

"Too interesting for my liking," she agreed. She turned
to Achates. "Leave us now. Come to me immediately when you know something of importance." Then, back to Marcus:
"They are a soldierly people, very like you Romans. A
very—how shall I put it? A very
masculine
people. But also
very different."

"Different how?" Marcus asked, intrigued. He was always interested in warlike people, especially those Rome was likely to have to face someday.

"You are an agricultural people, tied to the soil. They are
pastoralists, or were until a few generations ago. The ruling
caste are descended from the Scythians. They are horsemen and archers of great repute. The common rabble are Medes. For foot soldiers they buy slaves or levy young men as trib
ute from their subjects."

"Slaves as soldiers? That makes no sense. Slaves don't fight. They have nothing worth fighting for."

"Perhaps the Roman system isn't the only one that works," she commented. "The Parthians seem to have done well with theirs. Apparently they take the boys when they are very young and train them hard in special camps. They
know no other life and by all accounts are as brave and loyal
as other soldiers."

"I find it hard to believe. Besides, we've made little use of
cavalry or arehers. We like to get close and settle matters with javelin and sword."

"In those northern forests of yours that is hardly surpris
ing. You'll find the eastern plains a different matter entirely.
The horse and the bow are supreme there."

"And how did these centaurs come to be so powerful?" he
asked.

"The usual. They took advantage of their enemies' weak
nesses. When the successors of Alexander fell out and warred on each other, Parthia attacked whoever was most weakened by the fighting."

Marcus nodded. "We Romans are old hands at that game. Norbanus may have his hands full if he runs afoul of them.
People who are both warlike and astute may be difficult to deal with. The Germans and Gauls we've done so much fighting with are just warlike."

"Welcome to civilization," she said.

Marcus gave her a report on the progress made by the
Archimedean school, then retrieved his helmet and took his
leave, pleading a multitude of duties. He strode out amid a swirl of Roman
virtus.

Selene sighed. Dealing with Marcus was like wrestling
with one of those absurd machines he was so fond of. He was
ever full of plans and schemes, pumping for information, drafting and dispatching his everlasting reports to the Senate, inspecting and correcting and, above all, taking charge.

He had no gift for relaxing, for sitting back and enjoying
the fruits of victory. She owed him much, including her life,
but she found him exasperating.

The Romans were a disturbing lot and she harbored no illusions about them. They were bent upon reconquering the territory taken from them by Carthage, and they took a decided interest in the rest of the world. She was the de
scendant of many kings and she knew how power worked in the world. The Romans dreamed of revenge upon Carthage,
but that was only the beginning. With Carthage destroyed, they would control all the territory now owned by Carthage. That meant everything west of Egypt, everything
west of Italy, to the Pillars of Hercules. They would control
half the world, and they were not the sort of people who would be content with half of anything.