Free The Seven Hills by John Maddox Roberts Page A

gods, and the whole region had erupted in furious rebellion, led by a family called the Maccabees. The two con tending for rule at the moment were descendants of the Maccabees.
    "Why so much fighting over this little place?" Lentulus Niger wondered. "It's decent farmland but I've seen better. The natives are sullen and have an outlandish religion. I doubt they'd even make good slaves."
    "It must be the location," Cato said. They rode just behind Norbanus, ahead of the standard bearers. "To the east is just more of that desert. They live on this narrow coastal strip. That means that any army that wants to get to Egypt and Libya and northern Africa has to pass through here. Likewise, Egyptian or Carthaginian armies headed for Syria have to pass through here. There's no place else to go, except by sea."
    "It must make life interesting here every few years," Niger said.
    Late that day they came within sight of the city. Once it would have impressed them, but after the splendors of Carthage and Alexandria, it looked small and shabby. The acropolis pointed out to them as Temple Mount was the only feature that seemed comparable to. the greater cities.
    An army was drawn up between them and the city.
    "Battle order, Commander?" Niger said.
    "I estimate their numbers at less than six thousand," Norbanus said. "This is no more than a gesture—all that the local king could scrape together on short notice." He looked around at the countryside. Most of it was open fields, well cultivated. Like most towns in this part of the world, it owed its location to a reliable and abundant water source. "Find the nearest spring and pitch camp. I'll parley with the locals."
    "You're not going to leave the army and put yourself in the hands of foreigners, are you?" Niger said.
    "I'm not a fool. I'll take the cavalry with me and halt a good distance from them. Then they can come to me." He gestured to his mounted trumpeter and the man blew a suc cession of notes on his lituus: a straight horn with its funnel bent back sharply. It was so named for its resemblance to the crook-topped augur's staff, and it was used only by the cavalry. At the signal, the small cavalry force detached from its flanking duties and rode forward to attend the general.
    Norbanus looked them over before proceeding. Romans were notoriously poor cavalrymen. These were mostly wellborn young men, mainly of Gallic descent and some of them sons of allied chieftains who lacked Roman citizenship. Their equipment was more ornate than that of the legionar ies but resembled it in most details except for their flat, oval shields, their longer swords and the short mail capes reinforcing the shoulders of their armor. They carried lances instead of javelins.
    "Dust yourselves off and mount your plumes," Norbanus ordered. "We're going to call on a foreign king."
    The men did as ordered, chasing the road grime from their armor and taking the fragile feathers and the horsehair crests from the boxes tied behind their saddles. They were too delicate and valuable for everyday wear and were reserved for parade and battle, where the display was esteemed as intimidating to the enemy. When the commander deemed their glitter to be sufficient, they rode forward, toward the native force before the city.
    They halted well out of bowshot and waited. After a few minutes, a small delegation rode out from the army opposite. They were well turned out, their equipment mostly of Greek design, which was fashionable everywhere, it seemed. They reined up a hundred paces away and a man in splendid armor rode forward alone.
    "Who are you?" he said in Greek, "and what are your in tentions? You trespass outrageously on the domain of King Jonathan of Judea. I demand to speak with your com mander." His accent was very different from that of the local people when they spoke Greek. This one spoke like Greek was his native tongue. Norbanus read him for a Greek mer cenary. He had encountered many such since arriving in the