The Grass Crown Read online

  He found Mithridates the next day, encamped on the banks of the Halys River not far from Mazaca. And reported what Gaius Marius had said—but not word for word. Gordius limited his tale to cleaning up the battlefield—the rest, he had decided, was too risky to his own person to mention. The King was very angry, but made no comment, only stared with his eyes slightly bulging, his hands clenching and unclenching.

  "And have you cleaned up the battlefield?" the King demanded.

  Gordius swallowed, not knowing which answer the King wanted to hear, and so guessed wrongly. "Of course not, Great One."

  "Then what are you doing here? Clean it up!"

  "Great King, Divine Majesty—he called you a barbarian!"

  "According to his lights, I see that I am," said the King, voice hard. "He will not get the chance again. If it is the mark of civilized men to waste their energies on such things when the time of year does not make it necessary, then so be it. We too will waste our energies. No one deeming himself a civilized man will find anything in my conduct to deem me a barbarian!"

  Until your temper flies away with you, thought Gordius, but did not say it aloud; Gaius Marius is right, O Great One. You are a barbarian.

  And so the battlefield outside Eusebeia Mazaca was attended to, the piles of bodies burned, and the ashes buried beneath a huge tumulus mound which dwindled to insignificance when seen against the bulk of Mount Argaeus, its backdrop. But King Mithridates did not remain to see his orders carried out; he sent his army home to Pontus, while he himself set out for Armenia, traveling in unusual state. Almost the whole of his court went with him, including ten wives, thirty concubines, and half a dozen of his eldest children, and his entourage extended for a full mile of horses, ox-drawn wagons, litters, carriages and pack mules. He moved at a relative snail's pace, covering no more than ten or fifteen miles in a day, but he moved constantly, deaf to all the pleadings of some of his frailer women for a day or two of rest. A thousand picked cavalry troops escorted him, exactly the right number for a kingly embassage.

  For this was indeed an embassage; Armenia had a new king. The news had reached Mithridates just as he had begun his campaign in Cappadocia, and he responded quickly, sending to Dasteira for stipulated women and children, stipulated barons, stipulated gifts, stipulated clothing and baggage. It had taken almost two months for the caravan to reach the Halys near Mazaca, and it had arrived at almost the same moment as Gaius Marius; when Marius had found the King absent, the King was visiting his traveling court beside the Halys to make sure all had been done as he wanted it.

  As yet, Mithridates knew no more about the new King of Armenia than that he was young, a legitimate son of the old king, Artavasdes, that his name was Tigranes, and that he had been held as a hostage by the King of the Parthians since his early boyhood. A ruler of my own age! thought Mithridates exultantly, a ruler of a powerful eastern realm with no commitments whatsoever to Rome, a ruler who might join Pontus against Rome!

  Armenia lay amid the vast mountains around Ararat and stretched eastward to the Caspian or Hyrcanian Sea; it was closely bound by tradition and geography to the Kingdom of the Parthians, whose rulers had never evinced interest in what lay to the west of the Euphrates River.

  The easiest route lay along the Halys to its sources, then across the watershed to Mithridates's little realm called Lesser Armenia and the upper Euphrates, then across another watershed to the sources of the Araxes, and so down to Artaxata, the city on the Araxes serving as Armenia's capital. In winter, the journey would have been impossible, so high was the lowest land, but in early summer it could not have been more pleasant, the cavalcade trundling along through valleys filled with wildflowers—the blue of chicory, the yellow of primroses and buttercups, the stunning crimson of poppies. Forests did not exist, only carefully tended plantations of trees cultivated for firewood and to serve as windbreaks; so short was the growing season that the poplars and birches were still bare of leaves, though the month was June.

  There were no towns save Carana, and very few villages of any kind; even the brown tents of nomads were scanty. This meant the embassage had to carry grain with it, forage for fruit and vegetables, and rely upon encountering shepherds for meat. Mithridates, however, was wise, for he bought what he could not obtain by gathering it in the wild, and so lived in the dazzled memories of those simple people he came across as truly a god, scattering undreamed-of largesse.

  In Quinctilis they reached the Araxes River and wended their way through its frowning valley, Mithridates scrupulous in his compensations to farmers for whatever damage his caravan did, all such business conducted now in sign language, for those who knew a little Greek were left behind with the Euphrates. He had sent a party ahead to Artaxata to announce his coming, and approached the city wreathed in smiles, for in his heart he knew that this long and wearisome pilgrimage would not be wasted.

  Tigranes of Armenia came in person to greet Mithridates of Pontus on the road outside the walls, escorted by his guards, all clad in chain mail from head to foot and carrying long lances before them, their shields across their backs; fascinated, King Mithridates studied their big horses, which were also completely clad in chain mail. And what a sight was their King, riding standing up in a small-wheeled golden car drawn by six pairs of white oxen and shaded by a fringed parasol! A vision in tiered and tasseled skirt of embroidered flame and saffron, a short-sleeved coat upon his upper body, and on his head a towerlike tiara tied round with the white ribbon of the diadem.

  Clad in golden armor and his lion skin, with his Greek boots upon his feet and his jeweled sword on its jeweled baldric flashing in the sun, Mithridates slid off his big bay horse and walked down the road toward Tigranes, his hands held out. Tigranes descended from his four-wheeled car and held out his hands. And so their hands met; dark eyes looked into green eyes, and a friendship was formed that did not entirely depend upon liking. Each recognized in the other an ally, and each immediately began to assess his needs in relation to the other. They turned together and began to walk through the dust of the road toward the city.

  Tigranes was fair-skinned but dark of hair and eye, his hair and beard worn long and intricately curled, then entwined with golden threads. Mithridates had expected Tigranes to look like a Hellenized monarch; but Tigranes wasn't Hellenized at all, he was Parthianized, hence the hair, the beard, the long dress. Fortunately, however, he spoke excellent Greek, as did two or three of his most senior nobles. The rest of the court, like the populace, spoke a Median dialect.

  "Even in places as Parthian as Ecbatana and Susia, to speak Greek is the mark of a properly educated man," said King Tigranes when they settled in two kingly chairs to one side of the golden Armenian throne. "I will not insult you by taking a seat above yours," Tigranes had said.

  "I come to seek a treaty of friendship and alliance with Armenia," Mithridates explained.

  The discussion proceeded delicately for two such arrogant and autocratic men, an indication of how necessary both men viewed a comfortable concord. Mithridates of course was the more powerful ruler, for he owned no suzerain and ruled a far larger realm—and was a great deal wealthier besides.

  "My father was very like the King of the Parthians in many ways," said Tigranes. "The sons he kept with him in Armenia he killed one by one; that I escaped was because I had been sent as hostage to the King of the Parthians when eight years old. So when my father became ill, the only son he had left was I. The Armenian council negotiated with King Mithridates of Parthia to secure my release. But the price of my release was heavy. Seventy Armenian valleys, all seventy along the boundary between Armenia and Median Atropatene, which meant that my country lost some of its most fertile land. Also, the valleys contained gold-bearing rivers, fine lapis lazuli, turquoise, and black onyx. Now I have vowed that Armenia will recover those seventy valleys, and that I will find a better place to build a better capital than this cold hole of Artaxata."

  "Didn't Hannibal help to design Artaxata?" asked Mith
ridates.

  "So they say," said Tigranes shortly, and went back to his dreams of empire. "It is my ambition to extend Armenia southward to Egypt and westward to Cilicia. I want access to the Middle Sea, I want trade routes, I want warmer lands for growing grain, I want to hear every citizen of my kingdom speaking Greek." He stopped, wet his lips. "How does that sit with you, Mithridates?"

  "It sits well, Tigranes," said the King of Pontus easily. "I will guarantee to give you support and soldiers to achieve your aims—if you will support me when I move westward to take the Roman province of Asia Minor away from the Romans. You may have Syria, Commagene, Osrhoene, Sophene, Gordyene, Palestina, and Nabataea. I will take all Anatolia, including Cilicia."

  Tigranes didn't hesitate. "When?" he asked eagerly.

  Mithridates smiled, sat back in his chair. "When the Romans are too busy to take much notice of us," he said. "We're young, Tigranes, we can afford to wait. I know Rome. Sooner or later Rome will become embroiled in a western war, or in Africa. And then we will move."

  To seal their pact Mithridates produced his eldest daughter by his dead queen, Laodice, a fifteen-year-old child named Cleopatra, and offered her to Tigranes as his wife. As yet Armenia had no queen, so he seized upon the match avidly; Cleopatra would become Queen of Armenia, a pledge of great significance, as it meant a grandson of Mithridates would fall heir to the throne of Armenia. When the golden-haired, golden-eyed child set eyes upon her husband-to-be, she wept in terror at his alien appearance; Tigranes made an enormous concession for one brought up in a claustrophobic oriental court of beards—real and artificial—and of curls—real and artificial—by shaving off his beard and cutting his long hair. His bride discovered that he was after all a handsome fellow, and put her hand in his, and smiled. Dazzled by so much fairness, Tigranes thought himself very lucky; it was perhaps the last time in his life he was to feel anything akin to humility.

  8

  Gaius Marius was profoundly glad to find his wife and son and their little Tarsian escort safe and well, and happily espousing the life of nomad shepherds; Young Marius had even learned quite a few words of the strange-sounding tongue the nomads spoke, and had become very expert with his sheep.

  "Look, tata!" he said when he had brought his father to the place where his small collection of animals was grazing, close-fitting coats of kidskin covering the wool from the elements and burrs. Picking up a small stone, he threw it accurately just to one side of the leading beast; the whole flock stopped grazing at once, and obediently lay down. "See? They know that's the signal to lie down. Isn't it clever?"

  "It certainly is," said Marius, and looked down at his boy, so strong and attractive and brown. "Are you ready to go, my son?"

  Dismay filled the big grey eyes. "Go?"

  "We have to leave for Tarsus at once."

  Young Marius blinked to stem the tears, gazed adoringly at his sheep, sighed. "I'm ready, tata," he said.

  Julia edged her donkey alongside Marius's tall Cappadocian horse as soon as she could after they got under way. "Can you tell me yet what was worrying you so?" she asked. "And why have you sent Morsimus ahead of us now in such a hurry?''

  "Cappadocia has been the victim of a coup," said Marius. "King Mithridates has installed his own son on the throne, with his father-in-law as the boy's regent. The little Cappadocian lad who was the king is dead, I suspect killed by Mithridates. However, there's not much I or Rome can do about it, more's the pity."

  "Did you see the proper king before he died?"

  "No. I saw Mithridates."

  Julia shivered, glanced at her husband's set face. "He was there in Mazaca? How did you escape?"

  Marius's expression changed to surprise. "Escape? It wasn't necessary to escape, Julia. Mithridates might be the ruler of the whole of the eastern half of the Euxine Sea, but he'd never dare to harm Gaius Marius!"

  "Then why are we moving so fast?" asked Julia shrewdly.

  "To give him no opportunity to start haboring ideas of harming Gaius Marius," her husband said, grinning.

  "And Morsimus?"

  "Very prosaic, I'm afraid, meum mel. Tarsus will be even hotter now, so I've sent him to find us a ship. The moment we get to Tarsus we sail. But in a leisurely manner. We'll spend a lovely summer exploring the Cilician and Pamphylian coasts, take that trip up into the mountains to visit Olba. I know I hustled you past Seleuceia Trachea on our way to Tarsus, but there's no hurry now. As you're a descendant of Aeneas, it's fitting you should say hello to the descendants of Teucer. And they say there are several glorious lakes in the high Taurus above Attaleia, so we'll visit them too. Is that to your satisfaction?"

  "Oh, yes!"

  This program being faithfully carried out, Gaius Marius and his family did not reach Halicarnassus until January, having pottered happily along a coastline renowned for its beauty and isolation. Of pirates they saw none, even at Coracesium, where Marius had the pleasure of climbing the mountainous spur on which stood the old pirate fortress, and finally worked out how to take it.

  Halicarnassus seemed like home to Julia and Young Marius, who no sooner disembarked than were walking about the city reacquainting themselves with its delights. Marius himself sat down to decipher two letters, one from Lucius Cornelius Sulla in Nearer Spain, the other from Publius Rutilius Rufus in Rome.

  When Julia came into his study, she found Marius frowning direfully.

  "Bad news?" she asked.

  The frown was replaced by a slightly wicked twinkle, then Marius composed his face to an expression of bland innocence. "I wouldn't say bad news."

  "Is there any good news?"

  "Absolutely splendid tidings from Lucius Cornelius! Our lad Quintus Sertorius has won the Grass Crown."

  Julia gasped. "Oh, Gaius Marius, how wonderful!"

  "Twenty-eight years old . .. He's a Marian, of course."

  "How did he win it?" Julia asked, smiling.

  "By saving an army from annihilation, of course. That's the only way one can win the corona obsidionalis."

  "Don't be smart, Gaius Marius! You know what I mean."

  Marius relented. "Last winter he and the legion he commands were sent to Castulo to garrison the place, along with a legion seconded from Publius Licinius Crassus in Further Spain. Crassus's troops got out of hand, with the result that Celtiberian forces penetrated the city's defenses. And our dear lad covered himself in glory! Saved the city, saved both legions, won the Grass Crown."

  "I shall have to write him my congratulations. I wonder does his mother know? Do you think he would have told her?"

  "Probably not. He's too modest. You write to Ria."

  "I shall. What else does Lucius Cornelius have to say?"

  "Not much." A growl rumbled out of Marius. "He's not happy. But then, he never is! His praise of Quintus Sertorius is generous, yet I think he'd rather have won the Grass Crown himself. Titus Didius won't let him command in the field."

  "Oh, poor Lucius Cornelius! Whyever not?"

  "Too valuable," said Marius laconically. "He's a planner."

  "Does he say anything about Quintus Sertorius's German wife?"

  "He does, as a matter of fact. She and the child are living in a big Celtiberian fortress town called Osca.''

  "What about his own German wife, those twin boys she had?"

  Marius shrugged. "Who knows? He never speaks of them."

  A little silence fell; Julia gazed out the window. Then she said, "I wish he did speak of them. It isn't natural, somehow. I know they're not Roman, that he can't possibly bring them to Rome. And yet—surely he must have some feeling for them!"

  Marius chose not to comment. "Publius Rutilius's letter is very long and newsy," he said provocatively.

  "Is it fit for my ears to hear?"

  Marius chuckled. "Eminently! Especially the conclusion."

  "Then read, Gaius Marius, read!"

  "Greetings from Rome, Gaius Marius. I write this in the New Year, having been promised a very quick trip for my missi
ve by none other than Quintus Granius of Puteoli. Hopefully it will find you in Halicarnassus, but if it does not, it will find you sooner or later.

  "You will be pleased to know that Quintus Mucius staved off threat of prosecution, largely thanks to his eloquence in the Senate, and to supporting speeches by his cousin Crassus Orator and none other than Scaurus Princeps Senatus, who finds himself in agreement with everything Quintus Mucius and I did in Asia Province. As we expected, it was harder to deal with the Treasury than with the publicani; give a Roman businessman his due, he can always see commercial sense, and our new arrangements for Asia Province make sound commercial sense. It was chiefly the art collectors who wailed, Sextus Perquitienus in particular. The statue of Alexander he took from Pergamum has mysteriously disappeared from his peristyle, perhaps because Scaurus Princeps Senatus used his filching it as one of the most telling points in his address to the House. Anyway, the Treasury eventually subsided, muttering, and the censors recalled the Asian contracts. From now on, the taxes of Asia Province will be based upon the figures Quintus Mucius and I produced. However, I do not want to give you the impression that all is forgiven, even by the publicani. A well-regulated province is difficult to exploit, and there are plenty among the tax-farmers who would still like to exploit Asia Province. The Senate has agreed to send more distinguished men to govern there, which will help keep the publicani down.