308
As unobtrusively as you can you wander through the camp, casting around with your Psychic Awareness. You pick up a variety of the soldiers' thoughts; some are full of fear at the thought of assaulting the city, others are casting their minds back to their homes in Macedon, more are simply bored, a few look forward to pillage and plunder. Suddenly the mood changes. Alexander has had a priest take the omens and they are not good, but Alexander decides to attack in any case. Anxiety spreads and most are unwilling to attack. The king orders his men to prepare to storm the city and the army organises as if by magic. Siege ladders are brought forward on carts. There is still no sign of Speke and you are curtly ordered to join a phalanx of men near the city gates. Hoping not to be noticed you take your place in one of the columns. Sensing that his men, war weary and far from home, are reluctant to storm another city after the bad omens, Alexander exhorts them to attack. They hesitate and he grabs a ladder and thrusts it against the wall. He scales it quickly, followed by his shield bearer and a member of his bodyguard, and is soon atop the wall. Seeing this, the Macedonians bring up the ladders and crying, 'Iskander, Iskander!' for that is how they say his name, they rush up the ladders, which break in their eagerness. Alexander, an obvious target, is pelted with missiles and jumps down inside the city, almost alone. Turn to 273.