Waiting for the Barbarians

The Magistrate manages an outpost on the desert frontiers of an unnamed Empire. His careful management has kept the peace for many years and there are only minor misunderstandings. All that changes with the arrival of Colonel Joll, who is acting as part of a mysterious plan set in motion by the centre of the empire. The Magistrate tries his best, but Colonel Joll remains antagonistic. Colonel Joll insists on interrogating an innocent man and his nephew for sheep rustling. Colonel Joll is determined to follow his process for getting the truth, which requires brutal torture. The Magistrate does not understand Joll, or his methods, or his goals. Colonel Joll then forces the tortured nephew to escort him and a detachment of soldiers to his tribe, where numerous women and elderly men are taken into custody as “prisoners of war”.

Colonel Joll departs the next day, prompting the Magistrate to immediately release the prisoners and send them home. A few months later, a former prisoner with two broken ankles is seen panhandling in the streets. The Magistrate gives her food and shelter, and attempts to heal her broken ankles. Some of the soldiers mistake this act of kindness for an act of lust, believing that the Magistrate intends to keep the girl as a concubine. The Magistrate learns of all the tortures and hardships the girl has gone through, including the death of her father. He asks her to stay at the fort, but promises to return her to her people if she does not wish to stay. The girl chooses the latter.

After a long and arduous journey through the desert, the Magistrate approaches the nomads in the mountains hoping to restore relations with them, but the nomads are upset and only the Magistrate’s reputation and the knowledge that he helped one of their own keeps the tribesmen from butchering him and his escorts. The Magistrate returns to find Officer Mandel, Colonel Joll’s underling, has been assigned to command the fort. Officer Mandel immediately takes the Magistrate into custody, accuses him of treachery, and strips him of his office.

The Magistrate is eventually released, but when he tries to help “prisoners of war” being mistreated by Mandel’s soldiers, the soldiers beat and abuse him. He is then brought in for questioning and accused of consorting with the enemy for helping the nomad girl. The Magistrate is publicly shamed and has his home and possessions confiscated, while Colonel Joll departs with a large force to wipe out the mountain nomads. The Magistrate, now disheveled, poor, homeless, and ostracized by his countrymen, is taken in by one of his former servants, who feeds and clothes him.

Colonel Joll’s military campaign has resulted in the unification of the dispersed nomadic tribes into a single “barbarian” army. A horse carrying the mutilated corpse of one of Colonel Joll’s men walks into the fort. Officer Mandel quickly leaves with some of his men. Those left behind soon decide to flee as well but not before looting, raping and murdering the townpeople. Later Colonel Joll returns with only a handful of survivors. The Magistrate finds him sitting in his coach completely detached from reality. With no supplies or horses, they leave while being pelted by rocks.

The Magistrate walks through the town where boys play-pretend to stand guard next to scarecrows dressed as soldiers at the gates of the fort. While he thinks of the nomad girl living in the desert, a shadow approaches the Magistrate, who is standing alone in the courtyard, and a cloud of dust appears on the horizon thrown up by an immense army of nomadic warriors heading towards the town.

Last Updated: November 25, 2025 at 11:29