Pride of Carthage (25 page)

In keeping with her people's customs, the bride entered surrounded by her female relatives and went veiled throughout the ceremony. Try as he might, Hasdrubal could get no idea of either her features or the shape of her body. The women around her varied in appearance, from young to old, dark-haired mostly and no less attractive than normal, but he took no comfort in this. Just what did that veil hide? It might conceal any manner of disease or disfigurement. For all he knew his new wife had the face of a hairless dog, of a cow, or of her father. She could be pockmarked, pimply, toothless. She might have ringworm or diarrhea, a body rash or—as he had discovered once in a prospective partner—she could well have insect larvae growing in her gums. The possibilities were endlessly gruesome.

The bride and groom sat on opposite sides of the room. They did not share a word, but instead listened as one man and then another rose to give the union their blessing. The Celtiberians spoke with bellicosity. They stressed the significance of the bond between the two peoples. Some suggested that with this union Andobales' people should find themselves favored above other tribes and should have some measure of autonomy in subjugating their neighbors. One man mentioned an aged dispute with the Betisians that Hasdrubal had been trying to ignore, having no wish to open debate about such matters.

Andobales, who sat just beside Hasdrubal, stood to make a toast of his own. First he praised the hereditary line of the Barcas, naming, randomly and with little attention to chronology, their accomplishments and virtues. He lingered somewhat longer than appropriate on Hannibal himself, as if he were actually the prospective son-in-law. Following fast on all of this, however, he detailed his own lineage, which he claimed went directly back to a union between an Iberian princess and the Greek god of war, Mars. He recounted the deeds of his grandfather, and of his father after him. Nor did he fail to mention his own exploits, everything from feats of warcraft to abundance in the distribution of his seed through many wives and more beyond that.

This last point drew Hasdrubal's attention, but then the chieftain surprised him by barking out, “Bayala! Bayala! Come over here, girl.”

The veiled form rose and wove toward them through the crowded banquet hall. She knelt before them, close enough to touch. Still the fabric of her veil revealed nothing. Hasdrubal barely heard the transaction that followed but understood enough of such moments to know that the Iberian was giving him the girl formally. Andobales grasped each of them by the hand. Serving as a connection between them, he named them wed, declared the two families and the two nations joined for eternity.

And that was all there was to it. The shawled form nodded and withdrew to the nuptial chambers, Hasdrubal's eyes following until she had exited the room. The chieftain crashed down onto the cushion beside him. He lost his balance for a moment, and strained to pull himself upright, clenching his massive fingers around Hasdrubal's arm to do so. As he was so near him, Andobales took advantage of the moment to whisper to his new son-in-law. His breath was like liquid wine itself, mixed with the fouler scent that marked some decay in his teeth. “My daughter has been kept pure. Pure! She is yours to pierce for the first time. Enjoy her, my new son, and fill her with many young. Make her the womb of a new army. The mother of men to slay Romans!”

Hasdrubal did not hear the news of his wife's purity with eagerness: He preferred his women soiled and debauched. But he kept this information to himself. Nor did the notion of merging sex with his wife and Roman conquest sit right with him either. He was sure he would never rid himself of the image of tiny, fully formed, armored soldiers stepping out from between the girl's legs, swords in hand, evil expressions on their faces. He tried to follow Andobales' example and drink himself toward oblivion.

Later that evening Hasdrubal stood in the hall beside the curtain that hung between him and his wife, leaning hard against the wall. The wine had been savage to his body, but seemed to have had little impact upon the clarity of his thoughts. He stared at the thick purple fabric, utterly powerless to push it out of the way and stride through. It was silly, childish, shameful even, but he was terrified to enter his bedchamber. He imagined turning and slipping away to the company of familiar women, of the young officers he was so comfortable with. He might say he had fulfilled his husbandly duties already and was out for further leisure. But he did not welcome the questions his comrades would pose, the jokes they would make, the way his lovers would sniff his groin for a scent of his wife. No, he could not bear that. Strange that he had ultimate power over so many, and yet now he felt suspended from a spider's web, stuck fast, afraid to flinch for awareness that his movement would be translated out through a hundred invisible threads, bringing untold horrors . . .

He paused in mid-thought. A feminine hand pushed through the curtain and drew it slowly to one side. There stood his wife, still hooded, though she had changed her garments to a thinner gown, a weave so loose it was nearly transparent. She had, he was pleased to note, breasts, a flat belly, hips with something of a curve. But still he could see nothing of her face, and something in this felt ominous indeed.

“Come, husband,” she said in a quiet voice, soft and young. She grasped the fabric of his tunic and drew him into the room, letting the curtain fall closed behind him. Then, to his surprise, she dropped to her knees, slipped her hand up under his tunic, and grasped his flaccid sex.

“Forgive me,” she said, “but I've heard such tales. I must see this tool for myself.”

So saying, she lifted his tunic up and tucked it out of the way. She leaned close and adjusted her veil. After a moment of silent examination, she said, “The gods have blessed you. And me as well.”

Hasdrubal had as yet found nothing exciting in this examination, but that changed quickly enough. Bayala began to knead his soft member, pulling on it and drawing it out, squeezing it between her fingers. She dipped her hands in a fragrant oil and the warm moisture of this did much to stiffen him. Hasdrubal looked down on her, amazed. There was a skill in her fingers that surpassed any former lover's. She worked him to full length, moving one hand and then the other in a choreographed, twisting, sliding dance.

Pinned as he was to the new center of his being, Hasdrubal was at a loss for what to do with the rest of his body. He reached out to either side as if to grab hold of something, but his hands just hung there, twitching. Even his toes flexed and strained and seemed to cry out. His breaths came sporadically, in gasps that corresponded with the touch of the young woman's hand. It seemed that she had taken complete control of him, even of his capacity to inhale and exhale. He could not deny that the fact that he had yet to see her face added to his excitement, but neither could he resist the need to set eyes on her. With great effort he lowered one arm and got a fold of the veil in his fingers. After waiting for a spasm to pass, he yanked the fabric back.

The subtle hands paused in their work. Bayala looked up. Her face was not beautiful. Her nose drew a thin line, just off-center. Her lips, likewise, were not as full as he usually favored. The bones of her cheeks sat high, giving a gaunt aspect to her face. But she was young, her eyes were gray and devious, her teeth reasonably straight, and her gums, presumably, larvae-free. Inadvertently, Hasdrubal raised his eyebrows and pursed his lips.

“Hello, wife,” he said.

Bayala grinned wider, seeming to find the greeting perfectly appropriate to the situation. “Greetings, husband. Forgive my boldness, but I've never seen a monument like this one,” she said, squeezing the feature in question. “I have heard tales, but now I know them to be true. I could hang on this pole and exercise my arms by lifting my weight.”

Hasdrubal, unnerved by the suggestion and the seeming possibility that she might just attempt it, said, “True enough. But do not try that just now.”

Bayala fluttered her eyelids. “Why do you look so surprised, husband?”

“Your father . . .”

“Does not know me as well as he thinks. I would not have arranged this wedding had my own tastes not matched yours.” Saying this, Bayala set her upper teeth on the tip of his penis and slid her tongue out against his foreskin.

Hasdrubal knew then that he had much to learn about marriage. He realized that there was a suggestion of feminine hubris in her statement that he should treat firmly. But he forgot this as the suction of her lips drew him. Marriage, despite his reservations, suddenly seemed to be an institution blessed by the gods.

On learning that Hannibal was attempting an inland crossing of the Alps, Cornelius Scipio acted quickly. He sent a dispatch to Gnaeus, ordering him to carry on with the attack on Carthaginian Iberia. He and Publius, on the other hand, would return to Italy and take control of the army in Gaul. A consul deserting his army, leaving an unelected relative to a command in the pursuit of battle, and then heading off to raise a new army of his own accord was an unprecedented moment in Roman history. But so, it appeared, was the conflict facing them. Cornelius already knew that he had underestimated Hannibal. He was intent that the damage should go no further.

As father and son traveled—first by warship, then by foot and horseback, then by river barge—news reached them piece by troubling piece. Hannibal had descended from the heights into lands dominated by the Gauls of northern Italy. His army was half starved and ragged and weak, but this gave Cornelius comfort for only a few days, until he learned that Hannibal had attacked the capital of the Taurini. It was into their territory that his descent had brought him; as the Taurini were at war with the Insubres, and the Insubres were known to have allied with Hannibal, they refused the Carthaginians' requests for help. The African took the town in three days. He put every adult male to death and enslaved the entire population of women and children.

His Numidian horsemen rode on wide-ranging raids of other Gallic settlements—even settlements of the Insubres, his erstwhile allies—killing many and robbing them of winter supplies and showing their superiority in each encounter. They even went so far as to taunt the Roman garrison at Placentia, one of the few centers of Roman control in the area. The Numidians rode close to the soldiers, singly or in small groups, challenging them to battle. Inspired by this bravery and losing faith in their Roman overseers, five hundred Gallic allies rose in the night and deserted to Hannibal's cause. Many of them carried the heads of their Roman camp mates as a token of their sincerity.

Though the men around him cited this as proof of the Carthaginian's simple avarice and unreasoning cruelty, the consul recognized a deadly logic that chilled him. This was not simply a barbarian grasping for quick riches. Each thrust had a dual purpose. In one stroke, the capture of Taurin had replenished his depleted supplies, renewed his men's confidence, and rewarded them with food, treasure, sex, new clothes and weapons, and even slaves to serve them. The capture also made it plain to every other Gallic tribe that Hannibal's power could not be ignored. And it had robbed Cornelius of a potential base. The attacks on the Insubres? Cornelius knew this tribe would have intelligence of the Roman approach. With their fickle nature they had probably reneged on promises they had made to Hannibal. They would have preferred to wait a few weeks and side with the victor after the two forces had met. Hannibal's punishment of them may have come from anger, but, too, he was defining them as reliable allies or beaten foes, either being preferable to simple bystanders. There was no madness in this, only cold logic.

They disembarked from a river barge near Placentia, mounted the horses awaiting them, and rode with haste. They dismounted in the late afternoon at the edge of the field stretching to the outpost. Cornelius wanted to walk into the fort, to greet his troops and be greeted by them, to make immediate contact and win them to him. The sight from a distance was actually heartening: the fort perched high and solid-looking, the tents pitched about the fields near it, abutting the bustle of the late harvest. It was comforting to note that the crops had not been destroyed, for they would need these supplies in the coming weeks.

But as he strode nearer to the soldiers' tents a dread crept up into him. It grew even before he realized what had prompted it. There was nothing peculiar in the things he saw, but something in the quality of dejection betrayed by them. The fires burned low and smoky. The men huddled near the warmth, heads low and shoulders hunched forward, gathered as if in mourning. There was little conversation, no laughter; none were engaged in vigorous exercise. Even the fabric of the tents hung limp, as if the tents, too, had been emaciated by the difficult summer. He knew these soldiers were the last battered remnants of an army who had experienced a series of near-defeats at Gallic hands. Now, at the end of the warring season, they were exhausted and war-weary. They would have been made fearful by the news of Hannibal's doings. But what Cornelius saw on the soldiers' faces was an emotion surpassing even this. They wore the expressions of men who had just learned the prophecy of their deaths.

The consul might have proceeded straight through the grounds without making himself known, but before he could, an observant centurion recognized him. He shouted the consul's presence to the others. Men glanced up and took him in skeptically. They rose to their feet, but not smartly, not with the spirit and discipline he would have liked.

“Be at ease, men,” Cornelius said. “Rest now. We will soon need your strong arms.”

That evening the consul wrote new letters. Of the Senate, he asked that the other consul, Sempronius Longus, be recalled and at once. The army here was not adequate to the task before it. He had nothing to rely upon but battered and fatigued veterans and a host of raw recruits barely able to march in unison. They were no match for Hannibal, especially not if he could muster the Gauls into mischief. The plan to send Sempronius to attack Carthage was no longer tenable, not with a foreign invader already on Italian soil.

He sent a letter to Sempronius, too. He began it: “Dear Comrade, read this and fly to me. The thunder of Baal has descended upon us.”

Inside the thick fabric of the tent was a world viewed through weak tea. A small fire burned in a pit in the earthen floor. The melancholy quality of the room reflected the heavy skies and the inactivity of the past week. The struggles of the crossing were forgotten, followed as they had been by the quick moves that introduced Hannibal's army to the people of this region. But even the capture of Taurin and the Gallic raids now seemed old memories. The foe they wanted was Roman, and him they had yet to lure into confrontation. Hannibal had even assembled the entire army near Placentia and offered battle formally, but they had stood in the field unanswered all afternoon. Now Scipio was a short ride away, camped on the far bank of the river Ticinus. But his proximity only increased his caution. He would have to be caught off guard. In the meantime, Hannibal stayed focused on the larger battles to come.

“Let us go over it again,” Hannibal said. He tossed a dried fig into his mouth and chewed it viciously, as was necessary to soften the shriveled stone into something edible. The sound of Hannibal's jaw abusing the fig brought up Mago and Carthalo's gazes from their study of the diagram the commander had carved into the tabletop with a dagger. It was a surprisingly precise sketch, illustrating the makeup and usual deployment of the Roman army. Bostar stood a little distance away, preoccupied, while Bomilcar lay on the couch, his large frame cast as if at ease, although somehow betraying a tight-wound annoyance.

Hannibal had incubated a vicious cough for several days now, and with it a sore throat so painful that each time he swallowed, a dull, rusty dagger pierced his larynx. He felt alternately hot and then cold; his vision was sensitive to light; when he rose, the world shifted like a vessel at sea. His frailty disturbed his mind almost more than his body. Physical pains were nothing new; and these hardly deserved comment compared to the injuries of war. But the very fact that he had succumbed to this illness seemed a defeat, a refutation of his discipline. Throughout the mountain journey and in the days since, he had recalled his father's training, the wisdom he, in turn, had learned from Xanthippus, the Spartan who for a time commanded the Carthaginian army in the earlier war with Rome. Xanthippus taught that a soldier only needed to ignore the bitter weather to defeat it. It was a man's acknowledgment of discomfort that allowed malignant humors to enter his body. The gods looked favorably on the Stoic; likewise, they disdained the weak-willed. Such thinking had seemed right enough and had served Hannibal thus far. He had rarely been ill in his adult life and had never been bed-bound by fever. He had been uncomfortable before, but he had beaten back the elements, fatigue, and pain. He wielded a stick inside his mind and struck at any part of him that suggested weakness as one strikes at a rabid dog. And yet the creature had somehow found a soft spot and sunk its teeth in deep. He had a strange, unmanly wish for Imilce's company, but he pushed the image of her away each time it appeared.