Bronze Summer Read Online Free Page B

either side. They all wore their hair long and plaited so it hung down their backs, and Qirum, who had fought Hatti, knew that this thick tail afforded a little extra protection to the neck. The walk had clearly gone on for many days; the soldiers looked footsore, their pace a dull plod. But their officers looked reasonably alert. From horseback they scanned the country for bandits and robbers, and watched the column of marchers they shepherded.
    And that column was made up of ordinary folk, not soldiers, two or three or four abreast, men, women and children alike, shuffling in dull misery.
    Qirum stared curiously at the booty people. He had seen such columns before, but you never got used to the sight. Here was the population of a town, or maybe even a whole country, emptied out once the fighting was done, the warriors killed off, the buildings looted and torched, grain stores and farms picked over – and the people rounded up and driven out. Most of the captives had their hands tied up with rope. Some were hobbled, and walked with difficulty. Most were clothed, some in the ragged remains of what might have been fine clothes, but some went naked, perhaps after some act of spite or punishment by their guards, or even after being robbed by their fellow captives. And many walked barefoot, with splashes of dried blood about battered feet and legs. Qirum saw few old folk, and nobody obviously lame, and few little ones, toddlers too heavy to carry but too young to be able to sustain the pace. The marches were a great winnowing, and their trails were always littered with corpses. As always some of the more attractive women and girls had evidently been used by the soldiers; you could see it in the way they walked, the state of their clothes, the bruising and the blood. Was there a lack of young men? They were always the most trouble, but the most valuable on the slave markets.
    Most trudged in silence. Qirum realised now that the crowd murmur he had heard came mostly from the soldiers. This tremendous column was actually quiet, for its numbers.
    Praxo nudged Qirum, for coming past them now was a group of young women – six or seven of them, no more than girls really, it was difficult to tell their ages under matted hair and caked dirt. They wore similar clothes, or the remains of them, tunics of pale linen edged with what looked like gold thread. Most walked with their heads down, as if they neither knew nor cared where they were. One had a kind of bag over her head, obscuring her face. A taller, perhaps older woman walked behind them, her long robe a shapeless rag, her face hidden by a dusty hood.
    ‘Come on,’ Praxo murmured to Qirum. ‘Let’s do some shopping.’
    ‘I doubt you’re going to find many fresh apples in that barrel, friend.’
    ‘They always keep some whole to get a better price from the slavers.’ He nudged Qirum’s back. ‘Go on. Pick a couple for us. You do the talking . . .’
    They fell in pace with the column. Qirum nodded in a friendly fashion to the nearest soldier, a tough-looking veteran of maybe thirty who walked with a slight limp. He regarded Qirum and Praxo with blank contempt, as all soldiers regarded those who were not soldiers. But his interest quickened when Praxo dug a pouch out of his sack and threw it to him.
    ‘Wine and water,’ Qirum said, trying his Mycenaean Greek. ‘Keep it.’ The soldier took the pouch but looked blank. You never knew with Hatti soldiers; their empire was a conglomerate of many peoples, of vassal kingdoms and dependencies like Troy itself, all ruled by the kings at Hattusa. Qirum switched to the language the Hatti used themselves, which they called Nesili, supposedly the language of their old kings. ‘Wine and water,’ he repeated.
    This time the man nodded grudgingly. One-handed, holding his spear, the soldier flipped out the stopper and took a deep draught. ‘Thanks.’ He held out the pouch.
    Qirum waved it away. ‘I told you, keep it.’
    The soldier