Time’s Eye

Then Alexander rode to the small section of British. Holding his horse steady with his hand wrapped in its mane, he spoke again—but in English. His voice was heavily accented, but his words were easily comprehensible. He talked of Ahmed Khel and Maiwand, battles of the British Empire’s Second Afghan War that loomed large in the barrack-room mythology of these troops, and the memory of some of them. And Alexander said: “From this day to the ending of the world, but in it we shall be remembered; we few, we happy few, we band of brothers; for he today that sheds his blood with me shall be my brother …”

The Europeans and sepoys alike cheered as loud as any Macedonian. Casey Othic bellowed, “Heard! Acknowledged! Understood!”

When the parade broke up Bisesa sought out Ruddy. He was standing on the platform of the Ishtar gate, looking out over the plain, where the fires of the soldiers’ camp were already alight under a darkling slate-gray sky. He was smoking, one of his last Turkish cigarettes—saved for the occasion, he said.

“Shakespeare, Ruddy?”

“ Henry V, to be exact.” He was puffed up, visibly proud of himself. “Alexander heard I was something of a wordsmith. So he called me to the palace to concoct a short address for him to deliver to our Tommies. Rather than something of my own, I turned to the Bard—and what could be more fitting? And besides,” he said, “as the old boy probably never even existed in this new universe he can hardly sue for plagiarism!”

“You’re quite a package, Ruddy.”

As the light faded, the soldiers had begun singing. The Macedonian songs were the usual mournful dirges about home and lost loved ones. But tonight Bisesa heard English words, an oddly familiar refrain.

Ruddy smiled. “Do you recognize it? It’s a hymn—‘Praise, My Soul, the King of Heaven.’ Given our situation, I think one of those Tommies has a sense of humor! Listen to the last verse …”

“Angels, help us to adore Him / Ye behold Him face to face; / Sun and Moon, bow down before Him / Dwellers all in Time and Space. / Praise Him! Praise Him! Praise Him! Praise Him! / Praise with us the God of grace …”

As they sang, the accents of London, Newcastle, Glasgow, Liverpool and the Punjab merged into one.

But a soft wind blew from the east, wafting the smoke of the fires over the walls of the city. When Bisesa looked that way she saw that the Eyes had returned, dozens of them, hovering expectantly over the fields of Babylonia.

35. Confluence

The dust: that was what Josh saw first, a great cloud of it kicked up by racing hooves.

It was about midday. For once it was a clear, bright day, and the rolling bank of dust, perhaps half a kilometer wide, was filled with smoky light, elusive shapes. Then, in Josh’s clear view, they emerged from the dusty glow, shadows at first, coalescing into figures of stocky menace. They were Mongol warriors, identifiable at a glance.

Despite all that had happened to him Josh had found it hard to believe that a Mongol horde, under the control of Genghis Khan himself, was really and truly approaching, intent on killing him. And yet it was so; he could see it with his own eyes. He felt his heart beat faster.

He was sitting in a cramped guard position on the Ishtar gate, looking out over the plain to the east, toward the Mongol advance. With him were Macedonians and a couple of British. The British had decent pairs of binoculars, Swiss-made. Grove had impressed on them the importance of keeping the lenses shielded: they had no idea how much information Genghis Khan had about their situation here in Babylon, but Sable Jones would surely understand the significance of a glinting reflection. The best-equipped of all was Josh, though, for Abdikadir—who had gone off to fight—had bequeathed him his precious NODs, the farsighted night-vision glasses that one wore like goggles.

At the first glimpse of the Mongols, among Macedonians and British observers alike there was an air of tension, and yet of excitement, a palpable thrill. On the next gate, Josh thought he saw the brightly colored chestplate of Alexander himself, come to view this first clash.

The Mongols came in a long line, and seemed to be grouped into units of ten or so. Josh counted the units quickly; the Mongol line was perhaps twenty men deep but two hundred wide—a force of four or five thousand men, just in this first approach.

But Alexander had drawn up ten thousand of his own men on the plain before Babylon. Their long scarlet cloaks billowed in the breeze, and their bronze helmets were painted sky blue, the spines of their crests marked with the insignia of rank.

It started.

The first assault was with arrows. The front ranks of the advancing Mongols lifted complicated-looking compound bows, and fired into the air. The bows were of laminated horn, and could strike accurately over hundreds of yards, as fast as a warrior could pull arrows from his quiver.