Free The Blood Star by Nicholas Guild Page A

bitterly.”
    “And what of it? Even a slave has a right to
grumble.”
    “Grumble was all you did—grumble and play at
dice with the soldiers. I never had a decent day’s work out of
you.”
    “And did I not always give you your fair
share of my winnings? Did I not through my labors make you a rich
man in the Land of Ashur? Are we not this moment making our escape
with the treasure that I and I alone was wise enough to lay aside
for such an emergency? And have I not, in my wisdom and care for
you, deposited great wealth with the merchants of Egypt, that your
life in exile will be such that even a prince would not disdain?
Have I not done all this? Besides, a slave’s life was not to my
taste. I was not born to it.”
    “Neither was I, so you need not upset
yourself thus. And cease complaining about the water.”
    “Oh, very well.”
    He sat watching me for a moment, like a
physician at the bedside of a child, stroking his beard as if it
were a cat’s back. Then he nodded, apparently satisfied with the
results of his meditations.
    “You are annoyed with more than my poor
self,” he said at last. “Has something happened this morning about
which I remain uninformed? You are the prey perhaps of unpleasant
reflections?”
    “I had an encounter with the worthy Hiram,
not an hour ago, down at the river. He knows all about us. He seems
almost to make a joke of it.”
    “He may guess much, but he knows
nothing.”
    “In the end he will sell us to
Esarhaddon.”
    “In the end, yes—if any of us are privileged
to reach the end. But first he will try to squeeze what he can from
me, and that gives us more than enough time to safeguard ourselves
against future troubles. Be at peace, Lord. Do not be apprehensive
over distant evils.”
    “I still believe it would be wisest to kill
him now.”
    “Would you so willingly pollute your soul
with murder?” He raised his eyebrows in astonishment. “Besides, as
I have pointed out before, at present the caravan master serves our
purposes as well as his own. We have nothing to fear from him until
we reach Babylon.”
    Babylon. We could see her walls, still broken
in places, even after all that time, three days before we reached
her gates, but distance lent no charm. She rose up from the flat
brown earth like a ruined mountain, the stronghold of some god long
since cast down from heaven. My guts clenched at the sight of
her.
    At night, the priests of Marduk were busy. In
the center of the city the fires atop the great ziggurat burned
with black-red flames, offering sacrifice of blood and fearful
pain. We saw them, camped three days’ ride away. Anyone with eyes
could see them.
    I could remember other flames. I had seen the
whole city burning. I had helped to set the fire in Marduk’s temple
and, not many months after, I had watched Mushezib-Marduk, once
lord of Babylon, a wicked king indeed and the author of much
suffering, boiled alive in a bronze jug, over a fire fueled by the
corpses of his queen and children. These things were done in time
of war, the works of war’s cruel passions, but those passions still
heated the blood, even after years of peace. The Babylonians had
not forgotten, and neither had I.
    Long after the cooking stones had grown cold
I sat wrapped in my cloak, watching the distant, pulsing glow of
that sacrificial fire, knowing the priests did their work at
Esarhaddon’s command, wondering what ghost within himself he hoped
to quiet with all this spectacle of pious terror.
    Esarhaddon was a born soldier. The man had
not yet opened his eyes who could frighten him. Cheerfully he would
pitch himself into the worst of the fighting, heedless of death,
but as soon as he lay down his sword demons began flapping their
silent wings over his head. He feared the gods, naming each of them
in turn as he quaked with horror. He feared the omens of their
wrath and saw them everywhere. He feared the ghosts of the unquiet
dead. He feared the spirits without number that claim