Book IV: A Turn of Fate
Apollodotos was disgusted by
The poor treatment of his fellow soldiers
At the hands of the cruel Baktran ruler.
He begged the king to pardon the traitors,
But he refused to forgive the rebels.
“They are cowards, the whole lot of those pigs
Let them live alongside the barbaroi!”
Now, among the Yavanas of Baktra,
There were those from the land of Makedon,
Those who hailed from the faraway Hellas,
And the children of settlers and natives.
Those Baktrans are called Heterogenes
And Apollodotos was one of them.
He knew that most of the rebel Baktrans
Were either native or not of pure blood.
Indeed, he was looked down upon those
Who could claim pure Yavanas ancestry.
He was furious that the king could call
His very own countrymen barbaroi.
Apollodotos suddenly recalled
The words of the Makedon king known as
Megas Alexandros to the Baktrans,
The ruler that conquered the Chorsari:
“Every bad Yavanas is barbaroi;
Every good barbaroi is Yavanas.”
He went to the tent of Antigenes
And told him his dangerous intentions.
In the morning, they told their soldiers that
They would no longer serve their brutal king.
Instead of protecting Marakanda
From the reach of marauding Saka hordes
They marched on the city and laid a siege.
When it fell to the might of their swordsmen
They proclaimed allegiance to Aryandes.

Rebellious Baktrans plundered the farms
Of noblemen that supported the king.
The city of Baktra itself soon fell
To the Yavanas serving the Rrudi.
Soon, taxes on caravans filled coffers
Of the Saka with fine gold and silver.
The riches of the east flowed through their lands.
At the orders of Rrudi Aryandes
The emissary Shafar traveled west
Across the kingdoms of the Yavanas
To a nation set high in the mountains
Called by its hardy people Hayasdan.
An alliance was promptly formed
Between the wise Arkah and the Rrudi.
The latter, proud of his recent conquests
(Which were all earned by the blood of Baktrans)
Sought to subdue the tough Huwarazmish
But was pushed back in the western deserts.
Never did the head of the royal camp
Consider that he was no soldier king.
When Apollodotos, now bearing the
Banner of the Saka horde, assaulted
Oskobara, the last Baktran foothold,
Took the city and killed the evil king,
Aryandes claimed the hard work was all his.
He sneered at the foreign deities that
His new general thanked for his success
Saying, “Who is this most strange Artemis
Or Anahita, or Athena, or
Any other god you sacrifice to?”
From that day to the end of his days,
His wife would not carry another child.