The Tortoise in Asia (31 page)

“They're a special breed that goes back centuries. They were bred to be chunky, with flat muzzles. It gives them trouble breathing sometimes. Emperors favour them because they have such appealing personalities-friendly and whimsical. And they're good watchdogs, totally fearless. Even though they're too small to survive in a fight with big animals they will attack anything. Here they're sold for the table.”

To be both a pet and a food seems a contradiction – a disturbing one.

“I'd like to buy one, but for a pet. I know we must keep going but could you arrange that for me somehow? I'll repay you when I get paid.”

“Yes, of course. We're marching slowly. Don't worry about repaying. It won't be much.”

Kang speaks to someone who disappears into the crowd and brings back a male – just past the puppy stage. He's animated, squirming around as he's being carried, trying to get down.

“What shall I call him? What's a good local name?”

“Well, Ting Ting might be all right. You'll have to carry him until we stop for the day. That'll be soon, when we're outside the town. Then he can travel in one of the wagons.”

Marcus says as he picks up the little dog. Ting Ting settles down in his arms, wagging his curly tail, and seems content – at least willing to be carried now. Within a few steps he feels a warm wetness spread over his bare arms.

❧

The Road leads the troops out of Kashi into the desert. Soon they come to a small oasis where they set up camp for the night. He keeps Ting Ting with him as the tents are pitched and gives him his first feed – raw sheep meat meant to be cooked for the army. It disappears in a few seconds. That night he sleeps in his new master's tent.

Next day he puts his little friend in the baggage train and joins the rest of the cohort. In a short time the Road comes to mountains striking due east. Wrinkled drainage channels give them a personality of benign old age. The Road continues parallel, keeping watch, perhaps in awe of their wisdom so much more ancient than its own.

Marcus' language is improving and he's now able to hold a conversation with Kang without too much Sogdian.

“Can you tell me about this place?”

“That range is the Heavenly Mountains. It'll be with us all the way to Gaochang, like a guardian. We're passing through the Taklamakan, the most dreaded desert in the world. Countless people have died in it. The name means “If you go in you never get out'. People say stone demons emerge out of it and eat caravans whole. The Emperor sent troops in once and the stone demons ate them all.

“Sand storms blow up without warning and cover everything. They completely change the landscape so you'll lose your bearings unless you're an expert. It's said there're hundreds of rich cities, full of gold and precious jewels buried out there. Treasure hunters have been searching for years. So far they haven't found any, but they keep trying.”

They continue to march together, discussing the wild terrain, so removed from the comforts of Rome and Chang-an. It's the remotest place he's ever been in and the strangest, far from any human presence whatsoever, a land entirely of itself, an entity with its own rules. On their left the Heavenly Mountains are their chaperone, stern and constant. Reddish bedding, with white patches and green inclusions lies in wavy layers across vertical wrinkles. Soft dust in the air covers them in a subtle gauze. During a lull in the conversation, he lets his vision slip out of focus, allowing faces to appear on the slopes, their eyes narrow and cheekbones high.

Further down the sides, outliers take on supernatural forms that come alive in the shifting haze as reference points disappear. At the base of one a giant dragon sleeps on the sand ready to devour any traveller who wakes it. He knows the Hsiung-nu worship the dragon; so do the Han. It's a creature of power and authority.

On the flat ground that stretches to the right as far as the eye can see, salt pans and isolated tufts of camel thorn form a ragged pattern on the stony sand. The Road is taking them into an otherworldly place, a retreat for ascetics. Its severity beckons the mind towards the sacred and liberates it from mundane distraction. Here it's possible to go through a portal into a state entirely divorced from conventional life. Perhaps it's the Road's spiritual home, a place where it takes travellers so they can begin to understand the meaning of its mission.

Kang points out that the Road is now passing across lands never fully subdued by the Han armies, lands where death and destruction can suddenly swirl around caravans like quixotic gusts of desert wind. It's no wonder that tales of sand demons and other magical figures have been animating the imagination of caravaners for years. Marcus is intrigued by something he's just noticed.

“What is that tall thin structure just off the Road to the left?”

“That's a beacon tower, made from rammed earth. It's part of an early warning system. We've built a chain of them from here to the borders of our Kingdom. They're the scariest buildings this side of the Great Mountains. When the smoke comes out of them, it means the Hsiung-nu are about to attack. Those devils are a constant threat to caravans, also settlements. They can come out of the haze at any time – leave no one alive, unless they're on a slaving raid. However, our army is too big to attack, so don't worry. They'll leave us alone”

“It looks impressive. We have nothing like this where I come from. How does the system work?”

“Whenever a threat breaks out, each tower signals to the next one – wood fires at night, black smoke from wolf dung in the day. The dung – it's quite a chore to collect it, produces a colour different from normal fires, so there's no confusion when that smoke is seen. It means danger pure and simple.”

The troops have to go over a subsidiary range striking outwards from the Heavenly Mountains. The Road winds through a pass down to a river and onto a wide plain. Its surface is sculpted in sand waves whipped up by the wind. Jagged shores edge it and sandstone cones rise up like islands. It looks like a vast inland sea enclosing random landforms. Not a scrap of vegetation intrudes on its lifeless form.

While the Road is crossing the sculpted plain, little puffs of dust begin to dart around like unruly smoke. Wind start to suck up particles and swirl them, first slowly, then faster, in a torque like a spinning top. Kang says

“We have to take cover. Wrap yourself in what ever you can find and stay close to the ground.”

The wind builds to a shriek and darkness descends over the desert; new waves form on its surface. They're in motion now but soon they'll stabilize and change the terrain once again. Visibility plunges to blizzard level. Dust particles so fine they invade the pores come in endless blasts. Marcus pulls his tunic over his head and lies down curled up in a ball. Though uncomfortable, flying dust stinging his exposed flesh like wasps, it's nothing like the tornado at Carrhae. Three hours and then slowly it subsides into a thin orange shield which the sun eventually pushes through. Brown lumps on the sand begin to stir and men emerge as from a chrysalis. Ting Ting is safe in the baggage train. Marcus feels guilty that he didn't go back to look after him, but there was no time. He does now and finds the poor little dog terrified but unharmed; fortunately someone had covered him during the storm. The locals call it a Black Hurricane.

❧

The march starts up again.

One by one, oases come and go, each struggling to survive in the grim Taklamakan. They're like knots unevenly tied in a long string. There would be no crossing without them. It's just as well that whoever is navigating knows which track to follow. The Road is in its mischievous mood, leaving false clues to lead the unwary to perdition. Since time before reckoning its heartless fraud has claimed many victims, desperate men walking into endless wastes, their hopes becoming more and more frantic until thirst overwhelms them and they lie down to die in the cruel sand. Spurious paths are not the only delusions. Shimmering blue sheets on the distant sand near the horizon beckon the visitors, promising life – giving water only to fade into nothing on approach.

Suddenly a frisson spreads through the troops like the stirring of poplar leaves. A black plume is rising from the beacon tower just ahead, straight as a pole. A halt is called and the leaders hurry to Colonel Chen's chariot. Kang brings Marcus over. The commander of the beacon tower is summoned.

“Commander,” Chen says, “Which direction did the signal that set your's off come from?”

“Due west, sir.”

“That settles it. Other Hsiung-nu tribes have heard what happened at the Talass River. They're probably heading to Gaochang. With us away, the fortress is weakly defended. The dogs have always wanted to eliminate that thorn in their side. If we have to we'll send the cavalry on ahead but we'll need the infantry if we're going to chase them off.”

Order a march at the quickest pace,” he says to his second in command.

“They'll be a lot faster than us, probably ride all night. At least we're ahead, impossible to know by how much. And they'll have to go out of their way to pass us by – won't want to run into us. If we make good time we have a chance of getting there soon enough. The fortress should be able to hold out for at least ten days.”

Gan is horrified. “My wife and daughter are there. We must make it.”

Despite the arguments in the past and their contrasting personalities, he's relieved that Colonel Chen is here. There's a time when aggressiveness is worth more than his kind of mildness and it's now. But he's still hideously worried, struck silent by the enormity of the peril. He always knew the dangers of the West but until now they were not as immediate, or personal. All he can do is remain silent, leaving everything to Chen, and hope. It's hard to keep his apprehension under control, especially as he has no role to play in the drama to distract him.

Gan is not the only one worried; most of the army have families at the threatened outpost. The anxiety pushes everyone to a heart-thumping focus on getting there before it's too late. The foot soldiers pick up pace, more than they, even the officers, think possible. Although they're not particularly concerned, the Romans have to keep up. Fortunately their condition allows it, uncomfortable though it is.

Marcus wonders if they'll they meet any familiar Hsiung-nu faces, any of the old crowd. There was never a lot in common – but they were the ones who provided that first taste of freedom. Odd, this life as a mercenary, switching sides. Not like being in a national army. Anyway the remnants of Jir-Jir's force may not be part of this group. He hopes so. A soldier working for hire doesn't have a choice but he has a preference.

Chen demands an even faster march. Without demur, the men push their speed past what they've ever dreamed of, like athletes in the finals of the games at Olympia where pride of city state rests on their performance – only more so, as the lives of their loved ones are at stake. Determination is overcoming pain, leaving it behind without a thought. It's still a race they can win; they just have to arrive before the fortress is overwhelmed. Much depends on the tenacity of the small force there, but, as everyone knows, it can't hold out for long. Each beacon tower they pass has a black plume. Thoughts of the savagery that'll take place if they're late scream in their brains. Although Kang has no family in the West, his natural empathy shines through. It's reflected in his subdued demeanour, quiet and tense, facial muscles unmoving.

While Marcus and his cohort are understandably disengaged from the anxiety, they can't help but notice the grimness in the faces of their new comrades. They too feel the tension in the air as the march quickens.

❧

The army descends into a widespread depression that concentrates the heat like the pit ovens people use out here. But the pace doesn't slacken. On the left, the Flaming Mountains appear. Anxiety linked to hope rises like an ocean swell as the rammed earth walls of Gaochang come into view. Yak tail banners are moving jerkily on the horizon. The Hsiung-nu are surrounding the town; they're probing to find a weakness to breach. But they haven't found one yet, although the battering rams have partly dislodged sections of the wall. The garrison is holding out, but under extreme duress.

Marcus can see Han soldiers on the top of the walls pouring hot oil and boulders onto the attackers and shooting them with crossbows, but they're being thinned out with salvos of arrows shot from below. Men are tumbling down in clusters. The reinforcements have arrived in time, but only just.

Chen has decided on a plan of attack while they marched, mounted scouts having gone ahead and reported on the disposition of the enemy. He orders a halt and calls the commanders together. Marcus is required to attend. The Romans are to support the Han infantry on the right wing. There's to be no retreat under any circumstances. Every man must fight to the death.

As the relief army approaches, some of the Hsiung-nu react, but the main force is slow to abandon the siege. They're like flies feeding off a carcass, reluctant to leave even in the face of danger. Eventually though, they turn away from the town and confront the Han as their cavalry charges towards them across the hot plain. Most have already discharged their arrows so only a small hail of missiles descends on the Han. The besiegers draw their swords and a melee of slashing and shouting erupts across the plain.

The allied infantry begins its attack, swarming across the stony sand into the oasis. Marcus leads his men in the Testudo formation, a battering ram smashing into the enemy cavalry. Arrows bounce off the scales like hail. The horses shy away from what seems to them a giant monster. Nearby Han soldiers are amazed by the sight. So are the Hsiung-nu, who fall back momentarily. They think something supernatural is attacking them, a colossal monster with a hundred feet. They recover though as soon as they make out the individual soldiers, but still retreat.