Empire Rising Read Free

the Land Between the Rivers, as the inhabitants called the farmlands they occupied.
    Afterward, Korthac rode for two hours, hardening his thighs and back as he forced the village’s only horse up and down the steep and rocky hills until his mastery of the animal had returned. While he rode, his subcommanders kept Ariamus busy; they took charge of their newest recruit, forcing him to learn the dialect of northern Egypt. Their wooden swords served another function: to make sure their pupil applied himself diligently.
    When darkness approached, Korthac returned to his language les-Empire Rising
    7
    sons with Ariamus. They talked long into the night. Korthac learned not only the language and its nuances, but also the customs and beliefs of the people in this new land. This night, an hour before sunset, Korthac relaxed on a small mat under a poplar tree, his back leaning against the slim trunk.
    Six feet away, Ariamus sat cross-legged in the dirt. Two of Korthac’s men squatted a few paces behind Ariamus.
    Korthac had learned much from Ariamus, far more than the man intended to reveal. It hadn’t taken long to discover his weaknesses—his lust for gold, women, and power. But Korthac trusted no one, and so his men remained nearby. He didn’t want Ariamus to have any sudden change of heart, at least not until the man had given up every bit of useful information he possessed.
    “So, Ariamus, tell me again about this great village of Orak.”
    “I’ve already told you everything I know, lord. My head aches trying to remember more to tell you.” He looked up at Korthac, noted the frown that had suddenly formed, and quickly went on. “Lord, Orak is about two hundred miles from this place, across both the Euphrates and the Tigris rivers. A few weeks ago they drove off a mighty barbarian horde. Now Orak is the most powerful village in the land. They say that soon all villages in the countryside will defer to Orak.”
    “And their leader, this . . . Eskkar?”
    “An ignorant barbarian, lord. A stupid lout driven out by his own kind, no doubt for good reason. He could barely speak our language when he came to Orak, and he drank his pay as soon as he earned it. He was my least subcommander when I led Orak’s guard. If it wasn’t for his skill with a horse, he’d have been nothing more than a common soldier.”
    “Yet now you say he commands three thousand people in Orak while you nearly died here in the dirt. Doesn’t that seem . . . strange to you?”
    Ariamus squirmed and clenched his fist, uncomfortable at being reminded how far he’d fallen. “Eskkar took a witch for a wife. Some slave girl from the south who belonged to one of Orak’s ruling families. She bewitched him. They say she rules Orak through him.”
    Korthac didn’t believe in enchantments, but most of his men did, so he let the comment pass. The superstitions of Egypt had helped him there, and whatever foolish beliefs held sway in this land would do the same.
    “Did she also put a spell on the men of Orak, to turn them into warriors? Or perhaps these barbarians you feared so much were such puny fighters they let a village of farmers and shopkeepers defeat them?”
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    SAM BARONE
    “The barbarians are ferocious fighters, lord, and none can stand against them. But the villagers built a mud wall around Orak, and the barbarians could not overwhelm it. The wall saved them, not Eskkar.”
    Korthac noted the flush that came over Ariamus’s face at the mention of barbarians, apparently wild tribes of nomadic horsemen from the distant steppes. Though Korthac had coaxed the whole story out of him more than a week ago, he kept probing Ariamus’s memory, searching for more details or any hint of deception. Each retelling yielded some new fact for Korthac to ponder.
    Once again, Ariamus related how a small raiding party of these wandering horsemen had ambushed him and his band of rogues, killing most of them and seizing all their accumulated loot and horses.