Barbad sat back, let the curtain fall on the window of the cart. The cold cut into his aged skin, made his old bones ache. He looked across at Prince Sasan. The boy sat upright and still. His dark eyes betrayed no emotion. Barbad was proud of him. The boy had been raised to ride and shoot and abhor the dark Lie of faithlessness. Nothing had prepared the boy for this. It was not his fault. No blame should have attached to his father. Prince Papak had not been faithless. Barbad knew the truth. Barbad had been there, seen everything with his own eyes.

*

The hunt had been far to the south, on the borders of the great marsh by the Persian Gulf. The court had been staying in Babylon. When Shapur the King of Kings went hunting it demanded the preparations of a military expedition. Thousands accompanied his progress. There were kinsmen and dignitaries, courtiers, priests, the royal harem, scribes and entertainers, foreign envoys, soldiers, innumerable servants and an army of huntsmen.

The hunting ground was spacious and well stocked. It teemed with geese and ducks. Wild boars rootled in its thickets. But the Master of the Royal Hunt had promised Shapur a lion – the king of beasts for the King of Kings. Not just any lion, but a huge, scarred and wily old male. The beast was said to have killed two royal slaves.

Barbad did not hunt, not since he was cut all those years before. His place was with the other eunuchs and the women. As Chief Scribe to Prince Papak, a brother of the King of Kings, Barbad had joined the royal harem. They were stationed on a low rise. It was shaded by trees, but commanded a fine view. Shapur, flanked by his brothers and some of his many sons, had taken his stance just below them.

The King of Kings was gorgeous in purple and gold. As he had laughed and drunk with the princes, his kohl-lined eyes and very white teeth gleamed. Only slightly less elegant, his kinsmen, Papak among them, had shared his good humour. Their cup-bearers and fan-bearers and those soldiers carrying their weapons had waited with silent deference.

From far off came the sounds of the beaters working their way through the undergrowth in a great semi circle, driving the game towards the royal party.

Even in the shade, it had been hot. There was no wind, and the air was close. Spring came early this far south. Barbad had seated himself on a folding stool. At his age, it was a trial to get up from a rug spread on the ground. Around him the eunuchs and concubines drank cool wine drawn from great barrels packed with snow transported from the distant mountains. They ate sweetmeats, and chattered. Clad in bright silks, they resembled a flock of exotic yet domesticated birds.

Barbad had watched his master Prince Papak for a time, then he had dozed.