“We will attack,” he said crisply. “My brother has the high ground; he will not leave it, so we must go to him. Phiron, as you have suggested, your people will lead an echeloned advance into his right, and smash that wing. The Juthan have been told to hang back, and only follow on once you have engaged. Then the rest of the line will move up in turn from the right. That way we are less likely to be outflanked. My bodyguard and I will be in the centre. As soon as I mark out Ashurnan, we shall attack him. If the King dies, it is all over. Any questions?”
“When?” Phiron asked.
“I leave that to your discretion. But it should be soon. The heat will be punishing today.”
“Thank you, my lord.”
Arkamenes bent over in the saddle and pulled his komis aside a little. He smiled, his golden face disconcerting so close to theirs. “Good luck, General. If all goes well, when evening comes we shall be rulers of the world.” Then he straightened and kicked his horse, wheeling away to where his bodyguard awaited him in bright and gaudy ranks back at the centre of the army.
Phiron looked round at his fellow officers. “He’s leaving it to us to make the first dent in their line. We must hit them hard as we are able, then wheel left, towards their centre. There the battle will be decided. Arkamenes was right; if we kill their king, they’ll fold.”
“There was cavalry on the move before dawn, Phiron,” Pasion said. “Could be a flank move.”
Phiron nodded. “I’m sure it was. That’s why your Hounds are out on the far right. They’ll have to cover our arse. I need every spear up front if we’re to break these bastards before noon. Jason, your mora is right-handest. The Hounds will be under your orders. If they need help during the morning it is you who will be detailed to assist them. You lead off when you’re ready and we’ll follow on.”
Jason nodded, eyes bright within his helm. He had donned his party-chiton under his armour, and the gold embroidery of it gleamed out incongruously in that sombre gathering.
The twelve of them stood silent a moment, eyes flickering back and forth among themselves. Some of them were smiling.
“Brothers,” Phiron said simply, “let us start the Dance.”
Starting on the right, the Macht line began to move. The men kept the bowls of their shields on their left shoulders, to save their strength, and carried their spears down the length of their right arms, snug against the body. The mud sucked at their feet and broke up their step until they had marched clear of the last night’s ground and were on packed earth and pasture once more. File-leaders and file-closers barked out the time. The men began to march in step, and with that the ground began to echo under their feet, ominous thunder. Jason’s mora, close to a thousand men in eight ranks, led off. After it came Mynon’s, then Orsos’s, then Castus’s, then the morai of Pomero, Argus, Teremon, Durik, Gelipos, and Marios.
To their left the Juthan Legion stood watching as the Macht line moved up the slope towards the King’s army, close on two pasangs of tight-packed men marching in almost perfect time, and now in almost complete silence. Above their heads the centon banners hung heavy in the morning air. Hardly a breeze stirred about the plain, but the heat of the sun had already burned away the last of the mist. The men in the ranks had the sunlight in their eyes for the first few hundred paces, until the shadow of the heights above them cut it off.
The light troops kept pace with the phalanx, and in their midst Rictus strode easily along, his heart thumping so hard it seemed the beat of it would leap up his throat.
“We’ll fight like spearmen today, if we have to,” Agrimos, overall commander of the skirmishers had said. “There’s cavalry out on the right, and we’re to hold our ground against it. No retreating today, boys; no falling back. We fight where we stand.”
At long last, Rictus was to be part of a real battle, not some honourless skirmish fought with knives and javelins. Today would be a spear-fight, and he was wholly glad of it.
Look down on me today, father. Grant me your courage. Help me live or die well before the sun goes down.
Jason, in the midst of his thousand, struck up the Paean. It was taken up by the whole mora almost at once, and travelled down the line until the entire Ten Thousand were singing it, the slow mournful beat of the ancient song clenching their feet in time with one another. As always, Jason felt that cold thrill in his flesh at the sound. The Death hymn of the Macht. It had been millennia since a Great King had heard it, and now here in the heart of the Empire, ten thousand voices were rolling it out with a fine relish, their feet providing the beat. Ten thousand voices, the sound of them echoing off the heights of the hills to their front, the ground rising under them as they marched, and the ranks of the Great King’s army awaiting them at the crest.