The Dragon of the Ishtar Gate
L. Sprague de Camp
I – The Chamber of the Wizard
Golden lamps, hung by chains from the sooty ceiling, smoked and flickered, sending forth an olivine odor. The little yellow flames burnt steadily for a time, then writhed and fluttered as though struck by a sudden draft. Yet no breeze could penetrate to this secluded chamber, whose only opening to the outer world was a doorway closed by a heavy, wooden, copper-studded door.
At one end of the cluttered room, a striped hyena paced to and fro in its cage. Its claws clicked on the stone and, as it turned at the end of its walk, its eyes shone green in the lamplight.
The time was before dawn on the morning of the third day of the month Nisanu, in the twentieth year of the reign of Xerxes—the Great King, the King of All Kings, the King of the Persians and the Medes, the King of the Wide World, the son of Darius, the chief of the Achaemenid clan. The place was a chamber of the west side of the small palace of Darius at Persepolis, in the rugged mountains of Parsa.
Two men, seated on stools, faced each other across a massive table, on which lay three dead mice.
One of these men was King Xerxes himself. The Great King was a tall, strong man, albeit somewhat stooped and paunchy. Instead of his purple robe of royalty he wore a white gown over crimson trousers and pointed saffron shoes. Instead of the towering royal tiara, his head bore only a blue polka-dotted fillet to confine his long, curled hair.
Beneath heavy black brows, his bloodshot eyes bulged slightly. Below the long, hooked Achaemenid nose, a firm, thin-lipped mouth was shadowed by a heavy mustache with sweeping ends waxed to spikes. A curled, graying beard fell to his breast.
The king's expression was morose, discontented, and weary. He looked older than his fifty-five years as he peered nearsightedly at the mice, then at the man across the table.
This man was taller, leaner, and older than Xerxes. A long white beard was tucked into the bosom of his dusty black robe, and from his head rose a conical black hat.
"Then," said the king, "you have failed again?"
The other spread his hands, smiling with raised eye-brows. "The Good God did not wish me to find my goal by this route, sire. Yet will your slave persevere, trying each—"
"Ahriman smite you!" roared Xerxes, striking the table with his fist, so that the corpses of the mice sprang into the air as if called back to life. "Promises, promises; of those you have a muchel. But when will you show me some results? Belike the touch of hot iron would speed your quest—"
"Oh, Great King!" cried the other in a broad Medic accent, bowing again and again like a puppet worked by strings. "I do my best, truly I do. Be it as you wish—but who can compel the gods to reveal hidden truths? This time, however, your slave is verily on the scent of success. Fry my guts if it come to nought, sire! I assure my lord and master—"
"There, there," said the king. "I meant not to frighten you, my good Ostanas. Never would I harm a faithful servant and friend. Am I forgiven?"
Ostanas drew a long breath. "Whatever the king does pleases his slave. As for my fright,"—he smiled slyly—"that, I ween, is but the normal hazard of being the king's gossip."
Xerxes said: "I would not drive away my one true friend, for loneliness is the lot of kings. But it roils my temper when day by day I feel my powers waning. Here am I, ruler of the civilized world, commanding riches beyond those of any king before me. Yet year by year my teeth decay, my hair falls out, my breath grows short, and my sight grows dim, as if I were the commonest clod."
"The God of the Aryans give you life, sire! No one would think my master a day over forty—"
"Save your flattery, good Ostanas; I can see the plaster on my pate as well as the next man. My hairdresser does his best, but I do not think he befools anybody with all his powders, paints, and hair dyes. My father—God welcome him—thought it a pretty conceit to keep three hundred and sixty-five royal concubines. But what good does that number do me? I could get along with a mere score and never summon the same one twice in a year. So what can all my wealth and power do to stay the march of time?"
A low laugh came from the end of the room, a mirthless ha-ha-ha-ha on a rising scale. The king whirled about on his stool. The hyena stared greenly at him and resumed its pacing.
"I wish you would get rid of that thing," said Xerxes. "I swear by the golden heels of Gandareva that he understands my words and mocks them. Besides, he stinks."
"Mighty medicines are made from the organs of the hyena," said Ostanas. "So my pet may some day have his uses. As I was about to—"
"Tell me," interrupted the king, "I reign by the grace of Auramazda—the one and only true God, all-seeing and omnipotent—-and I have tried to be a good king. Then why, by the Holy Ox Soul, am I so unhappy? I have flunkies and flatterers galore but no real friends save you. My sons—the legitimate ones—watch me like vultures watching a dying camel. And you know how it is with the queen and me. I sleep badly and, when I do snatch some slumber, he visits me in dreams, dripping black blood. And she—" The king covered his eyes and shuddered.
"If it please Your Majesty," said Ostanas, "your slave will tell you of his discovery, which, if true, will relieve your heartache and restore your youth."
"Speak, man."
"I have read crumbling scrolls of cured human hide, writ in blood in the ancient picture language of Egypt. I have communed by the light of gibbous moons with unseen presences in the ruins of ancient fanes. I have cast up the signs of the glittering stars according to the arcane rules of the wise Babylonians. I have sought the guidance of gods in sleep induced by dire drugs from Kush and Hind. I—"
"I know you have done portentous things," said the king, "but come to the point."
"At last my unworthy self has found the formula for the true elixir."
"Then why have you not made it?" Xerxes extended a hand, glowing with rings, towards the three dead mice.
"Because, sire, some of the ingredients are so rare and outlandish that I know not if they can be had. Ancient lore and modern science alike assert that these things must needs be obtained if the great work shall succeed. Moreover, a holy spirit has appeared to me in a dream and assured me that my plan is right."
"What are these ingredients?"
"My lord will not think that I mock him?"
"Have done with evasions, good Ostanas. If you tell me that you need a piece of the moon, then by the Mountain of Lapis Lazuli I swear I will send men to fetch it."
"Know then, Great King, that the elixir must be compounded of three rare ingredients, besides the commoner stuffs like powdered emerald. These three things are: first, die blood of a dragon; second, the ear of a king; and third, the heart of a hero."
Xerxes laughed heartily, showing stained and blackened teeth. "Perfay, but that is a fine bird to pluck! I thank the Lord of Light that you asked me not for milk of a virgin or fur of a fish. Rehearse me the details."
"The blood of a dragon is needed because the vital element of life is heat, and the blood of dragons contains the most ardent heat of any living—"
"What kind of dragon? One of the winged serpents of Araby?"
"That were too small. Nor would any common lizard or cockadrill suffice, sire. Know you the reptile that the Babylonians represent as the sacred beast of their false god Marduk?"
"And which they depict in glazed brick on the Great Gate of Ishtar? Aye; I have seen a live one."
"You have? When?"
"Or ever the Babylonians revolted in the fifth year of My Majesty's reign, I entered the temple of Marduk to pay my respects to the priests; for, even though we Aryans have received the true faith from the inspired Zoroaster, statecraft compels us to tolerate the false gods of foreign nations under our sway. Seeing this same monster, portrayed in enameled brick on the walls of the temple, I asked the priests about it.