'Wait,' called Demetrius. 'Wait. Is there not anything else? Something you are not telling me?'
The old man turned at the entrance to the alley. 'Was the statue larger than life?'
'I am not sure. I… do not think it was.'
The old man laughed a horrible laugh. 'You had better hope that you are right, boy. If it was, it spells death for your beloved kyrios Ballista.'
Once again it was being brought home to Maximus that, natural fighter though he was, he would never make an officer. It was the boredom, the sheer grinding bloody boredom of it. The last two days had been bad enough. Watching the artillery shoot had been all right, if a bit repetitive. Undoubtedly it was more fun when there was someone on the receiving end. But looking at them making the missiles had been insufferable. And, as for the walls, if you've seen one big wall you've seen them all. Yet all that had been as nothing compared with this morning.
As every good Roman commander with something on his mind should, Ballista had summoned his consilium, his council. It consisted of just Mamurra, Acilius Glabrio and Turpio, with Demetrius and Maximus in attendance. In a way fitting to antique Roman virtue, they had met very early in the morning, at the first hour of daylight. Since then, they had been discussing the size of the population of Arete. At great length. At the last census there had been 40,000 men, women and children registered in the city and, of these, 10,000 were slaves. But could these figures be trusted? The census had been taken before the Sassanids seized the town and since then many would have died or fled. Some would have returned, and with the invasion next spring, many would flood in from the villages. Perhaps it all balanced out.
Just when Maximus thought he might scream, Ballista said they would have to assume this and use the figures as a guide. 'Now, the real question. How do we feed everyone from March to November when we are besieged? Let us start with existing food reserves.' He looked at Acilius Glabrio.
'Legio IIII has stockpiled grain and oil to last our thousand men twelve months.' The young aristocrat was careful not to look smug. There was no need.
'Things are far from so good with the nearly thousand men of Cohors XX,' said Turpio with a wry smile. 'There are dry supplies for three months and wet for just two.'
Ballista looked at Demetrius. The youth's eyes were unfocussed, his mind elsewhere. 'Demetrius, the figures for the municipal reserves and those of the three caravan protectors.'
'Sorry, Kyrios.' In his confusion, the boy lapsed momentarily into Greek, before continuing in Latin. 'Sorry, Dominus.' He consulted his notes. 'The caravan protectors all say the same, that they have enough supplies for their dependants, including their mercenaries, for twelve months. Incidentally, all three claim to have about three hundred mercenaries. The municipal reserves hold enough grain, oil and wine for the whole population for two months.'
'Obviously we have to make sure all our troops are supplied. And while the civilians must ultimately take responsibility for themselves, I think that we should try to provide a half ration to them throughout the siege,' said Ballista. Forestalling the expected objection from Acilius Glabrio, he continued, 'No law says we must feed them, but we will want volunteers to fight. We will press others into work gangs. Starving, desperate men are liable to turn traitor and open the gates. And of course there is basic humanity.'
'Could we not arrange for supplies to be shipped to us downriver?' Mamurra asked.
'A good point. Yes, we should try that. But that relies on others, and on the Persians neither getting any boats nor besieging the places upriver that would be sending us supplies. I would rather keep our fate in our own hands.' Everyone agreed. 'Anyway, let us think about it as we inspect the storehouses.'
At least they were close, just by the palace in the north-east corner of the city. Seen one Roman army granary, seen them all, thought Maximus. Raised on a farm, the Hibernian rather admired the practicality of the great, long buildings. The Romans had taken the risk of fire, the need to keep rain and damp away from the walls and the need for air to circulate into account in their design. But he had never understood why they always built granaries in pairs.
A contubernium of ten legionaries under the eye of a centurion was unloading a wagon at the adjacent loading bay. As Ballista and his consilium climbed the steps into the first granary, two of the legionaries quietly but perfectly audibly howled like wolves.
'Silence in the ranks,' yelled Acilius Glabrio. 'Centurion, put those men on a charge.' The young patrician gave Ballista an odd look. The northerner glowered back.
The cool, airy dark of one granary succeeded another and another, and Maximus drifted off into thoughts of the woman who had given birth to a monkey. It was still occupying his mind after they had left the army granaries and arrived at the great caravanserai near the Palmyrene Gate which housed the municipal supplies. It was unlikely to be any form of portent or warning from the gods, he thought. Either she had looked at a monkey, or possibly a picture of one, at the moment of conception, or she had actually fucked a monkey. The idea that she had given birth to a very hairy baby that happened to look a bit like a monkey never occurred to the Hibernian.
'Right,' said Ballista, 'here is what we are going to do. We commandeer this caravanserai and everything in it. We place guards both here and on the military granaries. We issue an edict of maximum prices for foodstuffs – Demetrius, can you find out a list of reasonable prices in this town? Anyone selling for more will be fined and what they are selling confiscated. We will announce that the Dux will buy foodstuffs at ten per cent over the fixed price. We keep on buying, using promissory notes if necessary, until we have enough to feed a full ration to our troops, plus however many militia we raise, and a half ration for the rest of the inhabitants for nine months.'
Ballista was livid, so furiously angry he found it hard to concentrate. That little bastard Acilius Glabrio had not wasted any time telling the story of the barbarian Dux's werewolf father. He had grabbed the opportunity to undermine Ballista in the legionaries' minds.
He forced his mind to focus on the matter of water supply. Almost every building with any pretensions to size in the city of Arete boasted a cistern into which the carefully collected rainwater was channelled. This was all very good as a reserve but, on its own, it would never hold out for more than a few weeks. High on its plateau, the town was way too far above the water table for wells of any sort. Its main supply of water had always arrived, and would always arrive, on the backs of donkeys and men, via the steep steps that led from the banks of the Euphrates to the Porta Aquaria or a series of winding passages and tunnels cut into the living rock. While the eastern walls were held, those that reached out into the Euphrates from the foot of the cliff, this supply could not be denied. These walls were short, each either side of a hundred paces. The approaches to them, along the floors of the ravines, were difficult and completely open to missiles from the main walls of the town. It should be safe enough, but it was to inspect it all that the angry northerner now set his feet.
Ballista climbed down the steps from the Porta Aquaria. He looked around the narrow plain between the cliffs and the water. He studied the entrances to the tunnels: two had gates and three were boarded up as unsafe. He considered the short walls and was reassured to note how each was dominated by a tower overhead on the circuit wall. Finally, he ran his eye over the wharves and those boats present. Back at the top, puffing slightly, he issued his orders.
No one was to draw water from a cistern without official authorization. All water used was to come up from the Euphrates. Guards were to be set on all the major cisterns in military buildings, and also on those in the caravanserai and the major temples. A century of Legio IIII was to be based in the Porta Aquaria. Among other duties to be assigned later, its men were to oversee the bringing up of water and the security of the tunnels. Those deemed unsafe were either to be repaired or securely sealed.