Section 4: Shapur's Night Assault

When the sun raised its crown in the east, the earth's teak-dark color turned to yellow blossoms. He took the keys from the treasurer, keys to the kitchen and the jars of wine. To every notable inside the fortress, and to each battle-weary warrior chief there, he sent food and plenty of wine, along with fragrant narcissus and sweet-clover blooms. He called the wine-pourer before him and spoke to him at length, kindly. He told him: Tonight you will pour the wine; serve Tayer only the pure, strong wine. Keep the cups always in their hands, so they drink till they grow drunk and fall asleep. The cupbearer said: I am your servant; I live in this world only by your command. When the sun turned yellow in the west and dark night said, You are cleared from my path, Tayer called for royal wine in his goblet, and the first name he toasted was the Ghassanids. When the first watch of the dark night had passed, Tayer grew quiet from all his shouting and revelry. They all went at once toward the sleeping quarters, and the king gave his attendants an order: that no one should speak a word except in secret. Quietly they opened the fortress gate. King Shapur himself was watching for this, his heart full of anger at the drunkards' noise. When a candle glowed at the fortress gate, he said: Now fortune has joined me, wide awake. He ordered that the moon-faced girl be given a fine place inside the royal tent. He gathered all his troops together and chose out the men of honor and war. He sent a number of riders up onto the ramparts, every one of them a man fit for battle. He entered the fortress and began the killing, and seized all its ancient treasures. The army with Tayer was inside the stronghold, more than a thousand, all lying drunk asleep. The sleepers woke bewildered and dazed, and here and there they scrambled to fight. Not one of them turned his back in fear; the king of Iran killed many a famous man. When Tayer fell captive in his grip, he came running out, stripped bare, with no escape. The stronghold and its stores fell into his hands, and that evil-bodied man was taken prisoner. That night passed, and early in the morning, when the sun showed its golden helmet, they set up a turquoise throne in the fortress with due ceremony and held an audience. When the king had finished holding court, the girl, like a spring rose, came to him, a crown of red rubies on her head, dressed in dazzling Chinese cloth-of-gold. Tayer knew that this was the work of the sorceress, and that this ruin came upon him from his own deeds. He said: O noble king, look what my own child has done to me. Shapur said to that disgraced man: How could you drag Bahram's daughter from behind her veil, bring shame upon her family, and stir up that quarrel that had been laid to rest? He ordered the executioner to strike off his neck and burn his body in the fire. For his disgrace he had Tayer's head plunged in blood, and had both his shoulder blades wrenched out from behind. Every Arab he could find, he left none able to open his lips to anyone. He tore both shoulder blades from their arms; the world stood amazed at what he did. The Arabs named him Zul-Aktaf, 'Lord of the Shoulders,' since he pulled the Arabs' shoulders from their sockets. From there he went at once back to Pars, and a whole world came to bow before him. Some more of the heavens' turning passed over this as well, and then the sky showed a different face.