Menon faltered. A haunting whisper worried at his ears:
"Let Ninus die! Wherefore should a mortal shield an enemy who houndeth him in a cause of cruelty? Leave him to his fate! Race back to Nineveh and the goal of a heart's desire!"
'Twas sweet, this haunting whisper, yet another voice within him cried aloud--cried for the glory of Assyria and the lives of those who rode into a snare. Should he soil a warrior's after-memory with the murder of his friends--those who had charged with him in Syria against the Kurds? By the breath of Ishtar, no! Semiramis would scorn him as the weakness of a craven merited!
In a moment Menon's tent was thronged with officers and under-chiefs to whom he issued swift commands. The camp in the valley woke to sudden life. Slumbering warriors roused to cast their cloaks aside and form in silent, eager bands, their heavier armor left behind, their backs untrammeled by any weight save their arms alone, their pouches for food, and leathern flasks for water and for wine.
In the valley, carts and wagons were set in one vast oval barricade, while oxen and the burden-beasts were roped within. Beneath the wheels lay a force of men who slept upon their arms, and treble sentries paced the outposts and lined the cliffs above. The baggage train was a fortress now which well might hold its own till Menon could reach his threatened King, strike at the enemy, and hasten back again.
And now the force was on the move, Menon in the van, while at his side strode the faithful Kedah, he who had served in Syria, and at his master's lightest nod would charge across the lip of a precipice. Three spears' lengths in advance went the Bactrian spy who, choosing between the torture-iron and a sack of gold, had promised to lead the Assyrians by a shorter route to where King Oxyartes lay concealed; yet, lest he betray his trust, a noose was knotted about his neck and Huzim followed close upon his heels.
To those who raced with the coming dawn on slippery mountain paths, circling deep chasms, leaping from stone to stone where torrents cut their way, the ceaseless trainings of Menon's camp now stood them in good stead. The chill of the altitude was felt no more, for the soldiers' blood ran bubbling through their veins as their limbs grew damp with the sweat of toil. Upward they clambered, swinging westward in a wide detour, in the hope of taking Oxyartes in his rear, now running swiftly down some gentle slope, now clinging like flies to the face of a dizzy cliff, then up again on narrow, tortuous ways.