The Gibli camp not far from the border was a city in its own right, a city with guards and winding streets and with tents taking the place of houses. The mood inside the camp was confident. As someone past whom Sharur walked put it: “We’ve beaten the Imhursagut plenty of times before. What can be so hard about doing it again?”
Kimash the lugal advanced with his force against the Imhursagut the next day. Sharur shouted to see the men from Imhursag drawn up on Gibli soil in a ragged line of battle. Then he shouted again, on a different note, for there near the head of the Imhursaggi force appeared Enimhursag, angry and armored and ten times the size of a man.
9
“Enimhursag! Enimhursag!” the Imhursagut chanted as their god strode with them toward the Giblut. But Sharur saw what they, perhaps, did not: Enimhursag did not stride out in front of them to take new land away from Gibil. Where his men had not gone before him, he had no power.
Some few of the Gibli peasants, not realizing this, fled before his awesome apparition. Beside Sharur, Habbazu asked in a shaken voice, “Where is Engibil, to withstand the god of Imhursag?”
“Engibil does not withstand in his own person the god of Imhursag,” Sharur answered.
“Engibil has not withstood in his own person the god of Imhursag for many years,” Ereshguna added.
“Not even in the days of my youth did Engibil withstand in his own person the god of Imhursag,” Sharur’s grandfather’s ghost said, abruptly announcing his presence to his kin.
Habbazu could not hear the ghost not having been acquainted with Sharur’s grandfather in life, but what the living men said was enough—was more than enough—to dismay him. “Engibil will not withstand the enemy for his own city?” he cried. “Then truly you are lost! Truly all is lost!” He made as if to flee after the handful of Gibli peasants who had fled.
“No, all is not lost,” Tupsharru said as Sharur set a hand on the thief’s arm to steady him. “Gibil and Imhursag have fought many wars since Engibil last withstood in his own person Enimhursag. We Giblut have won almost all those wars.”
“This is so,” Habbazu said slowly, as if reminding himself. Panic drained from his face, to be replaced by puzzlement. “I know this is so, but I do not understand how it can be so. How can men stand alone against men and a god and win?”
“We do not stand alone,” Sharur said. “This is Engibil’s land. He has dwelt on it longer than we. He aids in its defense. But we are not his slaves, as the Imhursagut are Enimhursag’s slaves. We do not need him with us to go forward against the foe.”
“And now,” Ereshguna said, drawing his bronze sword with its gleaming edge, “it is time to talk no more. It is time to go forward against the foe.”
Forward against the foe they went, Habbazu dubious and rolling his eyes but no longer ready to turn and run. Men without corselets, men without helmets, men without shields gave way before them, urging them up to the forwardmost ranks, the ranks where the men with the best gear were concentrated. As Dimgalabzu had said, many of those who fought at the fore were smiths; Sharur saw friends and neighbors from the Street of Smiths.
Others in the first ranks—the armor over the softer body of the army as a whole—were prosperous merchants (also friends and sometimes rivals whom Sharur knew) and scribes. The scribes were not so prosperous, but were fitted out with armor at Kimash’s expense. Like the smiths, they were imbued with a certain resistance to Enimhursag’s might by the power inherent in their trade.
On came the Imhursagut, still shouting their god’s name. They, too, had wealthy men, armored men, in their front ranks. Enimhursag tramped among them, like a tower on parade. Off to either wing, archers in the donkey-drawn chariots exchanged arrows with one another and maneuvered to outflank the opposing army so they could disrupt it with their archery.
Enimhursag waved his sword and shouted abuse at the Giblut, as if he were a peasant woman in the market square spuming an offer for a bundle of radishes. “Have no fear, men of Gibil!” Kimash yelled in reply. His voice was small beside the gods, but large enough. “Do you see how his blade cannot go a digit’s length farther than his frontmost line of men? He has no power over us, save that which his warriors can give him. Let us beat those warriors. Let us drive them back over the canal, and their foolish, loudmouthed god with them. Forward the Giblut!”
“Forward the Giblut!” the men of Gibil cried, and stepped up the pace of their advance against the invaders.
Beside Sharur, Habbazu said, “You are all madmen, do you know that? When your line and the line of the Imhursagut collide, Enimhursag will be free to pick you like dates. The Imhursaggi god will be free to harvest you like barley.” He did not give way as he spoke, though, but kept trotting along with the rest of the Gibli army.
“We have fought wars against the Imhursagut before,” Sharur repeated. “We have won wars against the Imhursagut before. Remember that when our line and the line of the Imhursagut collide.”
Moments later, the two lines did collide. Sharur picked the Imhursaggi he would meet from among several on his front: a rawboned fellow with streaks of gray in his beard who bawled “Enimhursag!” like a lost calf bawling for its mother. He wore a helmet and corselet and carried a mace with a flanged bronze head.
“Forward the Giblut!” Sharur shouted again, and swung his sword at the Imhursaggi. The foe turned it on his shield, then brought down the mace like a smith bringing down his hammer. Had it struck Sharur, it would have dashed out his brains regardless of whether or not he wore a helm. It did not strike him, for he skipped to one side.
The momentum of the blow made his foe stagger slightly forward. Sharur dropped his own shield for a moment. He reached out, grabbed a bushy handful of the Imhursaggi’s grizzled beard, and yanked for all he was worth. The fellow cried out in pain and alarm. Sharur struck him in the side of the neck. Blood spurted. The Imhursaggi’s cries became bubbling, soggy shrieks. He toppled, clutching at himself.
When the two lines met, all semblance of order in either one disappeared. The warriors who could reach their enemies flailed away with whatever weapons they had. The peasant levies who made up the bulk of both armies emptied their quivers as fast as they could in the general direction of the foe.
Beside Sharur, someone yelled, “I see what you mean!” Sharur almost swung at the man before realizing it was Habbazu. The Zuabi thief pointed up and up, toward the enormous figure of Enimhursag. “What good does his huge whacking sword do him?”
“Not much,” Sharur answered. “He can mow down ten men at a stroke with it—but half of them, in this melee, will be his own men.”
“Ah,” Habbazu said. Then he added “God of my city, aid me!” because an arrow hissed past his face. And then, aplomb restored, he went on, “Yes, what good is he in this battle? Even if he stomps with his feet, he will trample his own men as well as the Giblut.”
“Even so,” Sharur answered, slashing at an Imhursaggi who stumbled back to escape the blade.
Despite Enimhursag’s raging, despite his shouted exhortations that filled the field with thunder, the Imhursagut fell back all along the line. The fury of the Gibhit matched theirs, while the men of Gibil had more corselets, more helmets, more bronze-faced shields, more bronze blades, more of the chariots that, though slow and awkward, were still faster and more maneuverable than men afoot, and allowed the Gibli archers in them to shoot at the Imhursagut from the flank.
“Forward the Giblut!” Kimash shouted, and the men of Gibil echoed the cry as they advanced: “Forward the Giblut!”