Force of Kings

10

Satyrus would have liked to have swept Miriam away — directly away, to a private bower with a couch, if the gods were in the mood to grant his wishes.

But command seldom functions to the satisfaction of the commander, and having seized Ephesus — the whole of the town except the citadel, and Antigonus’s commander had offered to surrender the citadel for a large enough bribe — Satyrus had time to kiss Miriam, apologise for getting blood on her chiton, share some babbled inanities, and then Charmides was peeling his thorax off his torso while Miriam and Stratokles — of all people — poured warm water on the chiton where, blood-soaked, it stuck to his body. The wound under his arm was less than a fingertip deep, but the pain was intense and the bleeding periodic.

Even while he stood, almost naked, on the tiled floor of the bathing room of the villa where the Rhodians had been held, officers came to him. First Nikephorus, reporting on the willingness of the citadel to surrender, and then a report from his sister via Coenus, and hard on his heels a delegation of Rhodian officers eager to see with their own eyes that their hostages were free.

About the time that the chiton came free of his skin, Satyrus received the surrender of the citadel and a scouting report from one of Stratokles’ hirelings, a Lesbian mercenary who had taken a party up the road to Magnesia the day before when Nikephorus landed his soldiers. The Lesbian’s mission had been to scout towards Antigonus to prevent surprise — coastal rumour placed One Eye close enough that Satyrus and his commanders wanted to be sure.

Satyrus stared at the man — covered in dust, and with circles under his eyes as if he, not Satyrus, had been fighting — and tried to remember his name. Lykeles? Polycrates? Named after some orator — Isokles?

‘Pericles,’ he said.

The Lesbian bowed — bowed again to Stratokles. ‘My lords,’ he said.

Stratokles was sitting on a stool, carefully washing Satyrus’s wound while Charmides poured wine over his washcloths and Miriam fetched honey. Stratokles looked up from his task.

‘Aren’t you supposed to be a hundred stades away and moving fast? I could swear you promised me that you and your men were the fastest riders in Asia.’ Stratokles raised an eyebrow.

‘Lords, we were sent to find Antigonus — what we found was the wreck of Lysimachos. He’s on the Magnesia road; he’s been defeated by Antigonus and his forces are in rout. He … begs you to receive him.’ Pericles shrugged. ‘His words, lord.’

‘How far behind is Antigonus?’ Satyrus asked.

‘His cavalry is right on Lysimachos,’ Pericles said. ‘I didn’t linger to see the truth of it, lord. I left my second with most of my men up the pass.’

Stratokles nodded. ‘You’ve done well,’ he said. ‘But now I need to know what you gave away.’

Pericles looked stricken. ‘Gave away?’

‘If Lysimachos is begging us for protection, you told him we were here, eh?’ Stratokles asked.

The man flushed. ‘I was picked up by a cavalry patrol,’ he said. He shrugged. ‘My own fault. All I said was that your fleet,’ he inclined his head to Satyrus, ‘was at Lesbos and might come to the coast of Asia.’

Stratokles nodded. ‘Well said. Very well, rest yourself.’ He pointed and Miriam ushered the man out.

‘Lysimachos?’ Satyrus asked. ‘Shouldn’t he be five hundred stades away?’

Stratokles shrugged. ‘He’s a damn good general, despite his behaviour to me. He saw what we saw — that Plistias’s fleet was the key. Hit the Asian cities from the landward side and draw the teeth of the Antigonids — I’ll wager that was his intention. But down here? He’s hopelessly over-committed.’

Satyrus turned, caught Anaxagoras’s eye. ‘I need you to run — run to Melitta. And bring her back. Bring Theron, get any other senior officer you can find. Charmides … Menedemos just passed through to see the hostages. My compliments, and would he please attend me within the hour. My best compliments, mind — we’re allies, not overlords.’ He turned to Miriam. ‘Despoina, some rough words are about to be exchanged.’

‘I’ve heard rough words,’ she said, and looked at him carefully, her eyes largely hidden under her brows.

‘Good, I would value your counsel. Right — Stratokles, if you have been in Lysimachos’s pay all along, now’s the time to tell me.’ Satyrus met the Athenian’s gaze, and their eyes locked.

Neither flinched.

Stratokles didn’t look away. ‘He tried to kill me.’

Satyrus nodded. ‘Perhaps. But just by chance, Melitta and I and all our ships and all our troops are here, on the coast of Asia, at just the right moment to save Lysimachos. You’ve served him for two years and you sold him Amastris. See a pattern?’

Stratokles shrugged. ‘I agree. I’ve served him well. But not by intention — by all the gods I swear it.’

‘Listen, Stratokles, in a moment my sister will arrive. Then it will be too late. If you made this happen, tell me. I won’t let anything happen to you.’ Satyrus noticed that he was standing with one arm raised, and this man he didn’t really trust was carefully wrapping a linen bandage around his torso. He felt very vulnerable.

‘Not guilty,’ Stratokles said quietly.

‘I’m having a hard time believing you,’ Satyrus said.

Miriam laughed. ‘How does it matter?’ she asked.

Satyrus looked at her and smiled. ‘Ahh,’ he said. ‘I knew you were more than a pretty face.’

Stratokles took a deep breath. ‘But-’

Miriam put a hand on his arm. ‘I happen to believe you, but in this case, I think your “true” allegiance is meaningless in solving the problem of Lysimachos — at least from Satyrus and Melitta’s point of view.’

‘You believe him?’ Satyrus asked.

‘If he served Lysimachos, he’d have made an excuse to ride with these scouts — and you’d have let him.’ Miriam crossed her arms, suddenly aware as soldiers began to enter that she was the only woman present, dressed in a single layer of linen, with no wrapping under it.

Satyrus examined Stratokles. ‘Well,’ he said. ‘So, give me your views.’

Stratokles nodded. ‘Let me ask — what do you want?’

Satyrus shrugged. ‘Miriam,’ he said. ‘My kingdom of the Bosporus, untrammelled by war.’

Stratokles nodded. ‘Then you should load your ships and sail away.’

Satyrus nodded.

‘Except …’ Stratokles smiled at his own sense of drama. ‘Except that if you play no part in the last act, you can’t expect to be included in the settlement — and they all covet your kingdom. Lysimachos, Antigonus, Cassander, Demetrios … all of them.’

Satyrus nodded. ‘I can defend my own,’ he said.

Stratokles shrugged. ‘Of course you can. But wouldn’t it be better if you didn’t have to? If you wait, war will come to you — your farmers and your vineyards. Or — you pick one to win. Now. And I think you’ve already made the choice by taking this city. You can save Lysimachos — save his army, save the allies. And name your price.’

Satyrus nodded. ‘I’ve thought this, too.’

‘Well, the time is now.’ Stratokles nodded. ‘If you decide to sail away, I’ll come with you. But to be honest’ — he gave a wry smile — ‘if you elect to save Lysimachos, please consider allowing me to be the bearer of the tidings. It would give me a great deal of pleasure to be the means of saving him.’

Satyrus exchanged a look with Miriam.

‘Stratokles is actually an honest man,’ Miriam said. ‘In a terribly bent way.’

Stratokles bowed to her. ‘I begin to understand your choice, Satyrus.’

Commotion in the gateway, and Melitta arrived with Scopasis at her side. She embraced her brother, and then Miriam. ‘So?’ she said. ‘You sent me a beautiful messenger, brother.’

Anaxagoras had stripped to run, and he stood there looking like a statue of Apollo.

‘Show off,’ Satyrus said.

Anaxagoras shrugged. ‘I really can’t help it,’ he said. ‘It’s hot, and you told me to run.’ He nodded at Satyrus. ‘What’s your excuse?’

Melitta laughed, passed a hand down her lover’s back, then stopped herself. ‘Tell me,’ she said to her brother.

Satyrus took her aside. ‘Lysimachos has lost a battle, perhaps just a skirmish, but his army is broken up and he’s coming this way over the pass from Magnesia. He asks us for rescue.’

Melitta looked steadily into her brother’s eyes. ‘Your choice, brother,’ she said. ‘I made this war for you. You said, “Rescue Miriam”.’ Melitta’s eyes flickered over the still figure of the brown-haired woman. ‘She appears rescued. Now you want to save Lysimachos?’ She shrugged.

Satyrus acknowledged her point of view with a shake of his head. ‘I begin to think it’s time to choose a side and see to it that they win.’

‘We chose a side in Aegypt.’ Melitta shrugged as if to indicate that it hadn’t done them any good. ‘My side rides the plains and cares nothing for this war. Eh?’

Satyrus nodded. ‘Demetrios means to conquer the whole world,’ he said.

Melitta smiled. ‘Much good it will do him. The world will swallow him. No one but the Sakje know how much world there is.’

Satyrus fingered his beard. In the doorway, Miriam slipped away, and Menedemos of Rhodes bowed to her, eyed her breasts, and then came in. Charmides appeared with plain wool chitons, gave one to Anaxagoras and held out another for Satyrus.

‘Satyrus!’ Menedemos called. ‘You’ve outdone yourself.’

Satyrus shrugged.

Melitta raised an eyebrow. ‘As far as I can tell, Stratokles planned the thing and I did all the fighting, ‘she said. She flashed Stratokles a smile. ‘I may have to think better of you, Athenian. At the very least, I’d rather you were at my side than on the enemy side.’

Stratokles flushed with obvious pleasure — so obvious that Melitta laughed.

‘Are you clay in the hands of every handsome woman?’ she asked him quietly, looking up at him.

He sighed. ‘Now my secrets are discovered.’

Across the room, Menedemos took Satyrus’s arm and Satyrus stopped trying to listen in. Instead, he explained about Lysimachos.

The Rhodian nodded. ‘And you?’ he asked.

Satyrus looked around. Nikephorus was just coming in with Theron. Abraham gave him a nod from the doorway.

Satyrus cleared his throat and clapped his hands, and the room quieted.

‘Friends,’ he said.

They all turned away from other conversations, and looked at him.

This is power, he thought to himself. I wonder if I will ever have more than I have today. He saw young Herakles at the back, and smiled. The boy looked … as if he’d done some growing up.

‘First — thanks!’ he said. ‘Well done, everyone. Diokles? Apollodorus? Casualties?’

Diokles had a wax tablet in his hand.

‘Marathon is a complete loss — hulled twice. Ephesian Artemis and Pantecapaeaum badly damaged. On the positive side, we captured sixteen useable hulls: fifteen triremes and a quadreme. Leaving the captures aside, we’re short about six hundred rowers from all causes — casualties, illness, desertion.’ He paused. ‘Sandokes died with Marathon.’

Satyrus glanced at Nikephorus — more to tell him he was next than anything else — and looked back at Diokles.

‘Please send my praise to every rower. That was a brilliant action, carried out at extreme risk and against odds. And tell them there’s loot from the city and shares in the value of the captures — and pay out a silver drachma per man tonight.’

Diokles grinned his old, piratical grin. ‘Better than your praises, I’m afraid, Lord.’

Satyrus returned it. ‘I remember. Apollodorus?’

The marine shrugged. ‘We lost one quarter to one third of our boys. Typical sea fight. I have five hundred marines fit to fight, and another hundred who need a week to recover — or die. If you choose to crew those ships you took, my boys’ll be spread thin.’

Satyrus nodded. ‘How soon could your fit men march?’

Apollodorus pursed his lips. ‘Tomorrow. Not sooner.’

Satyrus looked to Nikephorus. The Greek mercenary nodded. ‘Two dead, six wounded, and three thousand spears marching up from the ships now.’ He allowed himself a small smile. ‘Lord, you and yours did the hard fighting. My lads just held the gate.’

Satyrus flashed on Achilles with Memnon’s head in his lap. ‘Yes,’ he said. He sighed. ‘Menedemos?’

‘We barely fought. If I have five dead, I’ll be surprised. Summer Rose took a hit from one of their penteres but she’ll be right as rain by tonight.’ He shrugged. ‘My marines weren’t engaged.’

Satyrus glanced around. His fatigue was such that he thought that if he closed his eyes he’d go directly to sleep, and he had so many aches and pains they seemed like a chorus. He really didn’t want to make any decisions, and he didn’t want their admiration, either. He wanted to go and see Achilles, and he wanted to lie with Miriam … and sleep.

He looked at Melitta.

She gave him a slow nod.

‘Tomorrow at dawn we march east,’ Satyrus said. ‘It was not my initial plan but we will leave a skeleton guard in the citadel — Rhodian marines, if Menedemos will accept the command. I’ll take all my men — marines and phalanx — to rescue Lysimachos. Melitta will see to the fleet. We will send a messenger to Ptolemy — best done by ship. Find Leon. If we can link Lysimachos and Ptolemy …’ Satyrus paused. The die was cast. ‘Then we can end this war. And I have come to the decision that the war needs to end.’

The buzz of reaction told him he’d made a popular decision, if not the right one — except Apollodorus, who spat, and left the room; and Stratokles, who met his eye and shrugged.

‘Ready for a ride?’ Satyrus called to Stratokles. ‘Take your scout and … Charmides, are you fit to ride?’

The young man grinned. ‘For anything.’

Stratokles nodded. ‘I’d like a good bodyguard and Herakles.’ He smiled. ‘I’m going to make Lysimachos crawl.’

Satyrus grunted. ‘Not too much,’ he said. ‘I want him to love me.’

Miriam reappeared, dressed as a matron. She gave him a smile, and he treasured it, but he stood, his side screaming in pain, and forced his back straight. ‘I lost some men today,’ he said to no one in particular. ‘I want to see to them. Abraham, will you serve with me? I have ships that need captains.’

Abraham smiled. ‘I will serve until One-Eye is done — until there is peace. But then?’ He shrugged. Looked at Miriam. ‘My father is dead, Satyrus. I am the head of my house. My life is not with you.’

Satyrus smiled. ‘I might surprise you. Why not buy a nice house in Tanais? Run your empire from there?’

Abraham tilted his head to one side. ‘Planning for the future?’

Satyrus nodded. ‘I’d like to marry Miriam, if you’ll have me.’ He looked at her across the room. ‘And if she’ll have me, I suppose.’ He laughed.

Abraham took a deep breath. ‘If my father was alive …’ he said. ‘You will become a Jew?’ he asked.

Satyrus sighed. ‘I can’t do this now. I know nothing of being a Jew, Abraham. I say that without judgement. I am a servant of Herakles. I would never be a hollow worshipper of any god. But I would never interfere with your sister’s worship.’

Abraham frowned. ‘You are right — this is not the time or place. In our religion, she may not wed anyone … who is not of our kind.’

Satyrus found that his fists were clenched, and he unclenched them. ‘Well,’ he said. ‘I have business.’ He took the chlamys that Anaxagoras held out, slipped a sword belt over his shoulder, and made his way to the door, his side twingeing at every step.

‘Uh, oh,’ Anaxagoras said.

‘Herakles my ancestor, give me strength.’ Satyrus muttered. ‘He’s my friend.’

Anaxagoras put a hand on Satyrus’s shoulder. ‘He means to do good,’ he said. ‘You are a pious man who keeps the laws of the gods — would you have him different?’

Satyrus nodded. ‘I know what you say is true but that was not unease. That was intransigence.’ He shrugged. Apollodorus was leaning outside, drinking wine.

‘You don’t like my decision,’ he said.

Apollodorus shrugged. ‘I’m tired of it,’ he said. He took another drink.

Satyrus put an arm around the small marine. ‘Let’s get it over with — for everyone, then.’

Apollodorus nodded. ‘I’ll fight for that. About the only thing left I’ll fight for — except my friends.’

Satyrus looked around. ‘You’ll know where the wounded are,’ he said.

Apollodorus nodded, knocked back another cup of wine. ‘That’s right. Let’s go.’

The three of them made their way through the late afternoon sun, that threatened to grill them through their light wool chitons like herrings or anchovies fresh-caught and seared on an iron skillet.

They climbed to the temple centre. The wounded were in the Asklepion. Satyrus walked among them, trying to cast off the bone-deep fatigue. He let a pair of doctors look at the injury under his arm, and he clasped hands with fifty wounded men. And at last he found Achilles, sitting with Odysseus.

The smaller man had a heavy bandage wrapped around his abdomen and his eyes were the blank eyes of a man with a great deal of opium in him.

Achilles looked up. ‘King,’ he said.

‘Achilles,’ Satyrus said. ‘I’m sorry. I chose to open the gate.’

Achilles nodded — one short nod, with a variety of meanings. ‘Memnon’s dead,’ he said. ‘Ajax hasn’t come to. Might be dead, might be fine — no fucking clue. And Odysseus here … I saw his guts, and I ain’t never seen a man recover from that.’ He didn’t meet Satyrus’s eyes.

Apollodorus put a hand on the mercenary’s shoulder. ‘You don’t know me,’ he said. ‘I’m Apollodorus of Olbia. I’m a priest of the Hero Kineas. Let me help.’

‘There was just the four of us,’ Achilles said, as if it explained everything.

Apollodorus looked at Satyrus, and his look told Satyrus to walk away.

‘You and Memnon and Odysseus and Ajax — you saved us,’ Satyrus said.

Apollodorus nodded, as if to say, That’s good, now go away.

‘Who’s this Kineas, anyway?’ Achilles asked.

‘Kineas said that the nobility of the warrior lay in offering to do an ugly job so that other men would not have to,’ Apollodorus began. ‘He also said that in the eyes of the gods, he who does more is of more worth.’ He didn’t sound drunk now — his eyes were steady, and he had both of Achilles’ shoulders. ‘Your friends were men of worth.’

Achilles began to weep.

Satyrus walked away into the evening.

‘Don’t do something you’ll regret,’ Anaxagoras said behind him.

‘I liked those men, and they’re dead.’ Satyrus walked to the edge of the restraining wall. Above him was the Temple of Artemis, and the city of Ephesus fell away below his sandals.

‘They were professional soldiers,’ Anaxagoras said. ‘You told us the odds when you laid out who went where. They elected to come with you — for money.’

Satyrus shrugged. ‘At least one is dead, now.’

Anaxagoras looked out at the first stars. ‘I think you are more injured by Apollodorus than by their deaths,’ he said.

Satyrus turned and looked at the man. ‘You know, I don’t always need the whole fucking truth poured on me. Yes, watching Apollodorus drink himself to courage hurts me, and yes, hearing him be a priest of my father frightens me. But I don’t really need to talk about it.’ He looked out at the night. ‘They died so that I could have what I wanted — Miriam. What if that’s for nothing?’

‘Make it for something. Save Lysimachos, defeat Antigonus, end the war.’ Anaxagoras shrugged.

‘You make it sound simple,’ Satyrus said.

‘You know where we’re standing?’ Anaxagoras said. ‘The portico of the old Temple of Artemis. Where Heraklitus taught. “War is the king and father of all — some men become kings, and others are made slaves. All of creation is an exchange — fire for earth, and earth for fire.”’

Satyrus smiled. ‘You are a fucking pedant, anyone ever tell you that?’

Anaxagoras met his smile. ‘I’ll go a step further and say that if Abraham had guaranteed you your marriage, neither Achilles nor Apollodorus would have hurt you. I tell you this as your friend — she loves you. You love her. It will happen.’

Satyrus felt dirty — bitter, angry and dirty. And he knew that Anaxagoras was right. He took his friend’s hand. ‘Did I mention that you’re an annoying pedant?’ he said. He embraced him, and then, unseen by the army and his own increasing horde of sycophants, he slipped into the temple, made sacrifice to Artemis and to Herakles, to Athena and to Aphrodite, and then went down the hill, to the army, to his friends, to the war he had started.

Satyrus slipped into the house virtually unseen, by the simple expedient of walking confidently through his own guards and in through the slave’s quarters. The andron was full of officers — Charmides, holding forth on pleasure as a good unto itself, and Diokles, quietly enjoying a cup of wine, Scopasis, his eyes heavy on Melitta, and the queen of the Sakje herself, apparently unaware of how her presence in the andron might affect others, holding forth on naval tactics. At a glance, Satyrus took in that she was a little drunk, and bored — hectoring her audience rather than informing.

He kept going.

He didn’t know the house, but all Hellenic houses had a logic of their own, and somewhere behind the andron and near the kitchen would be a broad set of stairs going up to the women’s quarters. There was a stone tower, visible from outside — remnant of a pre-Hellenic past, perhaps.

The slaves in the kitchen were surprised at his arrival, but unlike the people in the andron, had no real idea who he was. They were, in the main, off duty. A tall, balding man rose from a cup of wine to bow.

‘Lord?’ he said, in Syriac-Greek. His accent wasn’t heavy, sounded educated.

Satyrus raised a hand in benison and managed a smile. ‘I think that the party in the andron needs more wine. Send a man, not a woman, eh?’ He smiled to show he was on their side.

The balding man nodded seriously. ‘There is a woman there, lord. I do not think she is lewd.’

Satyrus didn’t have to push the laugh that came to his throat. ‘Not lewd at all, sir,’ he said. ‘That’s the queen of the Assagetae.’ He laughed at the picture of what his sister would do to a man who thought she was a flute girl.

‘May I have a cup of wine?’ he asked; a young girl sprang to fetch one for him. Of course, he’d interrupted their late dinner — and the looks on every slave’s face showed him what a day they’d had. The city taken; for slaves, that could be a horror beyond the worst imaginings of a free person. The fact that horror hadn’t come to their house had yet to be … proven.

Satyrus took the time to sit with the balding man, who he had picked out as the major domo. ‘You are in charge of the house, I think,’ he said.

‘Yes, lord.’ He inclined his head. ‘I am Phoibos.’

‘Phoibos, I am Satyrus of Tanais. I will see to it that your oikia suffers no harm.’ He accepted a wooden cup of wine.

Phoibos eyed him hesitantly. ‘Yes, lord,’ he said, but his words suggested anything but certainty.

‘Whose house is this, Phoibos?’ he asked.

‘We serve the great Demetrios, son of Antigonus,’ Phoibos said with a certain pride.

Satyrus grinned. ‘Tell him, when you next see him, that I insisted that all his possessions be preserved. If anyone offends against you or any of your people, please inform me yourself. Demetrios and I …’ Satyrus struggled to name their relationship. ‘We are … hetairoi.’

Phoibos gave a sharp nod. ‘Of course, lord.’ He sounded as if he didn’t believe a word.

Satyrus got up. ‘Do you know where the Lady Miriam is?’ he asked. There was no keeping things from slaves, at any time.

Phoibos nodded. ‘She is in her room. Ash, is the Lady Miriam asleep?’

Another young woman came in. She shook her head. ‘Packing,’ she said. ‘In the middle of the sodding night- Oh … your pardon, lord.’ She bobbed a hasty bow.

Satyrus smiled as agreeably as he could manage to the room at large. ‘Please — eat your food. I have a few words to say to Lady Miriam.’

Carrying his wooden cup and led up the stairs by young Ash — Ashniburnipal? Ashlar? Ashnabul? It was a common enough Syria name-prefix — he sipped his wine and went to stand outside her door. His hands were shaking.

‘Thank you,’ he said to the maid, who bowed and hurried back to her dinner.

Satyrus didn’t know whether to knock or simply enter. So he paused, took three deep breaths, and rattled the beads that hung with the door curtain.

‘Come,’ Miriam said, more imperiously than he’d heard her speak to him.

Satyrus went in.

She was standing between two hampers; large wicker baskets — good, solid local work, available for a few obols in the market. One hamper was full.

She looked at him.

He looked at her.

‘I came here with nothing,’ she said, and shrugged. ‘I don’t know where all this came from.’

Satyrus smiled. ‘I don’t think of you as acquisitive,’ he said.

She smiled back. ‘You don’t know me at all,’ she said, and then her smile vanished. ‘Oh,’ she said.

‘Miriam,’ he said, and stopped. The silence between them went on and on … uncomfortable, almost unanswerable.

Where is my love of the siege? he asked. In his head.

‘You are leaving,’ he said, perhaps more harshly than he intended.

‘You might at least have brought me a cup of wine, too,’ she said. She took a deep breath. ‘Yes — yes, I am leaving. Before we do each other a mischief.’

‘I love you,’ Satyrus said. There it was: the wrong thing, said the wrong way, at the wrong time.

She threw a length of linen cloth into a hamper — somewhat at random, he thought. ‘And I love you,’ she said. She shrugged. ‘It is not … material … to the problem.’

Satyrus sighed. ‘The problem that you are a Jew and I a gentile?’

‘You are a king and I am a foreign merchant’s daughter. You are a Hellene and I am not. You are a warrior — I have no time for war. Our … feelings are nothing but the products of a year of siege.’ She sighed. ‘I meant to slip away and spare us both this scene.’

Satyrus sat on her bed. ‘Perhaps I don’t want to be spared,’ he said.

She shook her head. ‘I’m sorry, Satyrus. I have had time to think and …’

She had come close enough that all he had to do was stand and gather her in his arms.

So he did.

‘No!’ she said.

‘Really?’ he said. He let her go, so that they were standing, body to body, but he with his arms relaxed at his sides. ‘Really, no?’

She turned her head away, but her weight continued to rest against his hip.

He sighed. ‘Not only do I love you too much to allow you to slip away, but in addition, I will not allow you to pretend that this is my doing. If you say no again, I will walk away. And when I walk away — it will be away.’

‘Stop!’ she said.

‘No. I have come to say my piece, and I will say it. I, too, have had time to think. What I think is that in my kingdom, there are so many flavours of alien and barbarian that you can be whatever you like. Found a synagogue. Make me a Jew. So I say to you — stop making excuses. If you want me, you should have me. If you don’t want me — I will endure it. I will, almost without fail, find someone else to love — that is the way with men and women, as old Nestor says in the Iliad. But please don’t fool yourself with false piety. The gods do not expect us to sacrifice our transitory happiness for some artificial rule — I cannot believe it. What kind of god would make such a demand? I am sorry your father is dead, because alive, I might have brought him round, but dead, he is an insurmountable obstacle.’

Miriam nodded. She reached out and took the wine cup from his hand, and drank most of it. ‘When I left my husband,’ she said. Then she paused. ‘You know I had a husband,’ she said.

‘Yes,’ he said.

‘I hated him. Not for some major sin — oh, he was older, and full of himself, but he didn’t beat me. He didn’t sleep with my handmaidens. He gave me money.’ She laughed. ‘He was handsome enough,’ she said. ‘But the thought of spending my life with him chilled my blood. I felt as if I was growing … smaller … every day. Less of a person. I wasn’t a person to him — I was a chattel, like his best bronze lamp and his largest warehouse. He only spoke of me as a conduit to my father. He would introduce me as “Ben Israel’s daughter” as if that was a title. He treated me with a dismissive condescension.’ She was shaking, and Satyrus stepped forward again and took her hands.

She stepped away and withdrew her hands.

‘I left him and fled to my father’s house. Remarkably, my mother would have none of me. But my father: he was … not understanding, but yet … on my side.’ She turned away. ‘My father, whose law I was breaking. My mother, who had probably suffered the same at the hands of my father.’

She drank off the rest of the wine.

‘I prayed for him to die. He came to the house and took me back — with the same condescension, as if I had left because I had some female brain fever.’ She couldn’t meet Satyrus’s eyes. ‘I prayed for him to die. And he died.’

Satyrus wished that there was more wine. He couldn’t say anything — that much he knew. Neither to comfort nor remonstrate.

There was turmoil elsewhere in the house. He heard a voice calling his name — it sounded as if it was Apollodorus. Satyrus.

Satyrus stood. ‘I must be briefer than I intended. Miriam, I am going to make war — to an end. The end. I intend to go to Lysimachos this morning and make him an offer of alliance — and then to back him and Ptolemy until the Antigonids are broken. I have asked your brother to serve. I would ask you to consider either going with your brother, or going to Olbia or Tanais to await the outcome.’

She raised her face. ‘I will never wait again,’ she said. ‘I will be an actor, not the audience.’ She stared at her hands. ‘That much I have learned.’

In her words, Satyrus heard reason to hope. ‘I am a bad man, asking you to come with me to an army camp …’

She shrugged. ‘I will consider it, Satyrus. Go. And if I run to Alexandria … not everyone lives in a play by Menander. If I choose you … Oh, Satyrus, I must give up my whole life to have you. Or I can run back to Alexandria, and all I lose is you. Do you understand?’

Satyrus!

‘All too well, my dear,’ he said. He took her in his arms. ‘Cowardice is easy, is it not? I, too, think, let her go. The Euxine is full of beautiful young women who will lie in my bed and give me children and not force me to think about my religion — who will bring me land, cities, even. Dowry, soldiers, horses, grain, perhaps even fame. That is easy. But you … you are the thing that is excellent. You are not easy. Merely … better.’

She smiled. ‘Your flattery, sir, is going to be my undoing. And such a very Greek concept.’

Satyrus!

‘I think-’ Satyrus had another argument to make.

‘I think you should shut up,’ Miriam said. She put her mouth on his and breathed his breath, twice, a kiss that sent peals of Zeus-sent lightning through his body, and then she was gone. She pushed him sharply away, and was back at her hampers.

‘Take the cup,’ she said. Her eyes were bright. ‘Wine is not what I need.’

He walked into the kitchen to find Phoibos remonstrating with Charmides. Curious: the man had protected him, on no real information.

‘Here I am, Charmides,’ he said.

‘Stratokles needs you,’ the young man said.

Satyrus hurried down the main hall and past the andron. On the porch, Stratokles and his Latin lieutenant, Lucius, stood with a third man.

‘Sorry to wake you, lord,’ Stratokles said. He sounded so smug that Satyrus knew that he was not sorry, nor did he think that Satyrus had been asleep.

‘It is nothing. What’s happening?’ he asked.

‘I have the citadel. I need your say-so to put Apollodorus and your marines in it. Time is of the essence.’ Stratokles looked at Apollodorus, who emerged from the lighted corridor to the dark of the portico, his hair shining under the temple lamp that hung in the arch.

Satyrus nodded. ‘Apollodorus?’ he asked.

‘Ready,’ he said. He had drunk too much — that was obvious.

‘Charmides, go with Apollodorus. Help him.’ He put a hand on the marine’s shoulder.

Apollodorus shrugged. ‘I’m not drunk. Just pissed off. Thought we were done.’

Satyrus stayed close to him. ‘Last time pays for all, Apollodorus. We need to see this through — to finish.’

Apollodorus met his glance, and his eyes were hard — they sparkled in the lamplight, remarkably like Miriam’s a few minutes before. ‘A lot of good men will lie face down in the sand — for ever — so that this can finish.’ He belched, and the smell of fish sauce floated across the portico. ‘If we sail away to the Bosporus, these busy gentlemen will just have their war without us. Someone will win, and someone will lose. But we — this pretty boy here, you, me, Anaxagoras, Abraham, Diokles — we’ll all be alive. Draco will father some sons. Your Olbians and your men of Tanais — what do they care? And if the winner decides to come after us? So what?’ He looked at Satyrus, and his gaze was as heavy as a branch full of leaves falling in a forest. ‘Your sister? What if she dies? Will it be worth that?’

Satyrus didn’t have an answer. ‘Apollodorus,’ he began.

‘Girl turn you down?’ Apollodorus asked. ‘Nice war to make it all better, eh?’

Satyrus had held his temper a long time, and under a variety of situations, and all of Philokles’ instructions on the subject were starting to wear thin.

‘You are-’ he began.

He had pushed forward into his friend’s face, and the smaller marine didn’t budge by the width of a finger. ‘An arse? You bet, lord. I’m not a mutineer. I’ll go. I’ll fight. I might even die. But by all the gods and heroes, and especially by the memory of your father, I have the right to tell you when you are wrong.’ He shrugged. ‘I don’t know you are wrong. But I think we’re going a campaign too far.’ He stepped back. ‘Had my say. I’ll go to the citadel. Don’t fall in love with this bastard,’ he jerked his thumb at Stratokles, ‘just because you’ve lost the girl.’

He turned to Charmides. ‘Go down to the beach and find the quarter guard. Get them up here — right here in the street, and then wake the next watch and tell them to suck it up. You take command of that watch — understand?’

Charmides snapped a salute.

Apollodorus went back inside.

Lucius laughed. ‘Damn, I like him.’

Satyrus smiled. ‘Me, too. And I reckon I might have had that coming.’

Lucius pushed past. ‘Well, I know the details — I’ll go and brief him.’ He looked pointedly at Stratokles, as if to say ‘see what I do for you?’

Stratokles waited until Lucius was gone. ‘Is your strategos there going to be a problem?’

Satyrus gave a wry smile. ‘Only if he’s right.’ He looked at the cloaked figure beside Stratokles. ‘Am I going to get an introduction?’

The cloaked man threw the folds of his chlamys back from his head. He had curly black hair and extraordinary good looks — a sort of dark-haired Charmides.

‘I am Mithridates of Bithynia,’ he said.

Satyrus looked at Stratokles.

‘He was in the citadel with the special prisoners,’ Stratokles said.

‘They were supposed to kill me,’ Mithridates said. ‘I bought some men and bought a few days — and the gods have provided.’ He smiled, and the sharp whiteness of his teeth gleamed in the light of the multi-wicked lamp.

‘Bithynia,’ Satyrus said, looking at Stratokles.

‘His uncle, another Mithridates, is on the throne. Put there by Antigonus when this young sprig was kicked off it for flirting with Lysimachos.’ Stratokles grinned. ‘He is a major playing piece to fall into our hands. If we strike fast, we can topple his uncle and put him back — and we’ll own all the passes from here to Heraklea in one political change.’

‘I am not a playing piece,’ the young man said.

Satyrus rubbed his chin. ‘Stratokles, is there any hour at which you are not plotting? At some point, aren’t your hands too full of pieces — like a man winning at poleis? You have me, and Mithridates here, and Herakles, and Banugul, and Lysimachos — if you die, does the world end?’

Stratokles looked at him, and then laughed, a sudden, spontaneous laugh. He laughed a long time.

‘I need a cup of wine,’ he said. ‘I confess you may have a point. But we can’t stop now — and if we’re going to meet Lysimachos in the morning, it’s best to have a plan.’

Satyrus smiled at the young Persian. ‘I have a plan. Much of it is the same as your plan. Let’s get some sleep.’

Stratokles nodded. ‘I could help you with the Jew,’ he said, very quietly.

‘No,’ Satyrus said firmly.

Stratokles shrugged. ‘Wine, then,’ he said.

Satyrus smiled again at the Persian, and then made a beeline for Miriam. But when he got to her room, the hampers were gone, and so was she.

He stood staring at the empty room for as long as it took his heart to slow. He took a deep breath, and then another.

Done. He took a third, tried to imagine a future where Miriam wasn’t part of his life and where he cared nothing for where she was or what she thought. In a year, he’d share some other woman’s bed — he would, he was sure of it. In two years, he’d be in love.

He took another breath. What she had done was … well, right. She had done the noble thing.

No, fuck that, Satyrus thought. I don’t want to understand. I want Miriam!

His thoughts were interrupted by light footsteps on the stair, and his heart pounded again — she’d come back, she’d changed her mind-

‘Brother,’ Melitta said. She smiled and put a hand on his arm. ‘You don’t look well.’

‘You’re drunk,’ he said.

‘Quite possibly,’ she said with a smile, her eyes glittering. ‘But I’m not in love, so I’m clearer-headed than you.’

‘I’m not in love anymore,’ he said. He didn’t try and hide his hurt.

‘Really?’ she asked. She took his hand and led him down the corridor, down the servant’s stair and onto the exedra of the woman’s quarters. Satyrus caught up an amphora of Chian wine in the kitchen, and the major-domo, quick on his feet, grabbed cups and a mixing bowl and followed them.

The exedra had folding stools, the kind men used in a military camp. Satyrus unfolded a pair of them and sat. The butler poured wine and water, mixed it, and retired.

‘I’m tempted to take him with me to run my household,’ Satyrus said. ‘That man knows his business.’

‘I assume that Demetrios executes anyone who isn’t up to his standards,’ Melitta said.

‘Do you know where she is?’ Satyrus asked.

Melitta shrugged. ‘Yes, but I’m not telling you. Although I am on your side in this, and I will not let the advantages of … a relationship fade from her thoughts.’

‘So she’s on the ships,’ Satyrus said.

‘Excuse me, brother. I would like to speak to the King of the Bosporus, just for a moment. Not the love-sick Achilles.’ Melitta took a cup of wine, lifted it towards the star called Aphrodite, and said, ‘To love.’

Satyrus poured a libation and shook his head. ‘If I could just speak to her-’

‘You already spoke to her. Now speak to me. You are determined to meet with Lysimachos?’ She leaned back, her shoulders against the railing of the exedra.

‘Yes,’ he said.

‘Why?’ she asked. ‘Why not just load the fleet and sail away? I mean, leave Stratokles and his plots and his boy-king. They can have Ephesus. And he’s got a small army — more than two thousand mercenaries he raised in Lesbos.’

‘I am determined to put Antigonus down,’ he said. ‘And Demetrios.’

‘That’s good old-fashioned hubris, brother. You’re the petty king of a few cities on the Euxine, several thousand stades from here.’ She raised an eyebrow. ‘Am I going too fast?’

Satyrus drank some wine. ‘I know who I am. And what I am doing.’

Melitta shook her head. ‘No. I don’t think you do. You are playing as if you are a major player — as if you are Lysimachos or Demetrios. But you are not. And you are spending money like water. For what? You aren’t impressing Miriam. You aren’t impressing me. I don’t care a whit for Demetrios. You can make it personal — he kidnapped you, he tried to kill you — but Stratokles has tried to kill us a dozen times. And now he’s your ally. And while I admit that he did a fine job with your rescue, he’s not what anyone would call reliable.’

Satyrus tried to muster his arguments … and couldn’t. Not in the face of his sister’s scarred realism. Much like Apollodorus’s view.

‘It’s what I do,’ he said. ‘I am a soldier king. I like it.’

Melitta shook her head. ‘You are lying to yourself, there. You haven’t liked it since Rhodes. Rhodes sucked the glory right out. You want to do it so that you can avoid going home, so that you can avoid running the kingdom, which bores you. Why did we take the Bosporus, if neither of us wants it? Eh? Is it possible that Heron really was the better king?’

Satyrus glared at her. ‘No.’

‘Well, I admit, we haven’t started killing our own farmers yet. But the grain tax this year — so that I could send the fleet here — started some serious grumbling.’

Satyrus was smarting under the accuracy of her statements and the futility of life, as he saw it that moment. But he took a deep breath and faced it. ‘Right now, however trivial you and I are to the great game, we hold a mighty city and the balance of power between Antigonus and Lysimachos. If I walk away, Antigonus will triumph.’

Melitta nodded. ‘And if you stay, he will triumph just as surely. If you stay, I will not stay with you. My clans need me. There are, believe it or not, people on the plains who do not love me, and seek to make trouble for me, and I am here, rescuing you. Taking part in your ambitious schemes. For the second summer in a row. I will sail away, and take the fleet — at least, the part of the fleet that is paid for by my gold.’

‘Anaxagoras will be sad,’ Satyrus said.

‘And yet I will go.’ She shrugged.

‘Have you asked him to go with you?’ Satyrus asked.

‘He said that he would do as you do,’ she answered.

Satyrus sat, his back against the main wall of the house, and sipped wine, and watched the stars.

‘If you come with me, you will have time at Tanais to talk to Miriam — where we have a home, a palace, streams and mountains and places to make love. Come, brother. Come back to the real world. Leave the war to the men who want it.’ She finished her wine and stood, a trifle unsteady.

Satyrus was angry — a rare emotion for him. ‘What if I tell you that it is not your business?’ he asked. ‘I don’t need to be rescued. I don’t need your help with Miriam — who is done with me. Perhaps, in time, you can find me a nice Sakje lady with a thousand-horse dowry.’

Melitta shook her head. ‘I have made you angry.’

Satyrus took a breath. ‘No, I was angry before you started. I’m still angry. I agree, honey bee. In so many ways. But I’ll see this through, and our kingdom — and all the kingdoms — will be better for it. I listened to Apollodorus tonight; he spoke as a priest of the hero Kineas. You know that? And he quoted something our father said — that the only virtue in a soldier is that he does what he does so that others do not have to. I have thought of it all evening. I will help Lysimachos finish Antigonus — so that others do not have to. Keep the war here — let it never come to the north.’

She shrugged. ‘I thought you’d say that. Myself, I don’t think they’ll ever come to the north, either way. I think Demetrios lost his chance at Rhodes. You’ve done your part. I’ve done mine. Let’s get off the stage.’

Satyrus shrugged back. ‘Is that what we learned from Philokles and Mother? From Theron and Coenus? To walk away? Is that excellence, Melitta?’

Melitta crossed to the door. ‘Perhaps not, but you and I could grow old and die on our beds, surrounded by people who love us, having built something to last. Or you can die here, fighting Antigonus. Is that excellent?’

As soon as she spoke, Satyrus could tell she regretted it.

‘I didn’t mean to say that,’ she said. She shrugged once more. ‘Besides, what is that but the choice of Achilles?’

‘And look what it got him,’ Satyrus said. ‘Have you had dreams?’

She looked away. ‘Premonitions, yes.’

Satyrus nodded. ‘Then rule well when I am dead, sister. Make Anaxagoras king. He will be a good one. You have a son — he is my heir as well as yours. I will go and meet Lysimachos. If you say I will die, well, perhaps I will die. For, by Herakles my ancestor, I am determined to do this.’

Melitta stopped in the door. ‘You fool. You are the one breaking our oath. Our sacred oath! Given at Heraklea with the gods and furies all around us! You are allying yourself with Cassander and Stratokles — who killed our mother — against Antigonus and Demetrios. Of course you will die! You are fighting against the furies!’ She pushed through the curtain and was gone.

Satyrus stood staring out to sea for as long as it took to drink another cup of wine.