Storm of arrows

15

The first flowers bloomed through the last snow in Hyrkania, and the winds coming across the Kaspian were still cold enough for Hyperboreans and strong enough to discourage even the keenest bow-men.

Kineas felt fat. He’d eaten too well and exercised too little, although they’d built a gymnasium and used it, too. He’d never been so cold in his life as in the dead of winter in Hyrkania, when the snow hit like hard-blown sand and the wolves howled every night. And too often his exercise consisted of climbing the steep hill to the citadel, where the queen entertained him with stories in Greek and Persian, the questionable antics of her slaves and the sensuous pleasure of her heated floors and luxurious baths, as well as the more intellectual pleasures of scrolls and singers and poetry.

After Therapon had presented her with too many coloured versions of Kineas’s law court, she asked with a smile to come down the hill and see one — and to see his camp. He had no way to refuse her and so the next day her cavalcade wound its way down from the citadel, a dozen local gentlemen on horseback with some of her guards in hastily polished bronze. She wore a fur-lined cloak over a richly embroidered Scythian jacket and wool trousers tucked into small boots, with a tall Median cap and a veil that covered her eyes without disguising them.

And a sword.

The ground was frozen hard and Kineas’s men put on a display on horse and foot. The Olbian cavalry threw javelins, the prodromoi shot their bows, and the hoplites marched and counter-marched and demonstrated a change of front in the Spartan fashion, to her beaming approval. They shot arrows at targets and she insisted on having a turn, shooting competently, although Kineas allowed himself to note that Srayanka would have filled the targets with arrows while riding at a gallop.

She looked into the wine shops and the brothels of the camp’s marketplace. ‘Am I supplying all the women for your army, Kineas?’ she asked.

Kineas looked away. ‘We brought a few of our own,’ he said.

‘Yes, and a hetaira to manage them,’ Banugul said. She laughed. ‘So well organized. Do the men stand in line waiting their turn when they can’t get Hyrkanian farm girls? Or go without?’ Then she began to recite: Baulked in your amorous delight

How melancholy is your plight.

With sympathy your case I view;

For I am sure it’s hard on you.

What human being could sustain

This unforeseen domestic strain,

And not a single trace

Of willing women in the place!

As she spoke, she deepened her voice because it was the male chorus part in Lysistrata, and they all laughed with her.

Therapon glanced at Philokles. ‘Perhaps they have no need of women, my lady.’

‘If that were the case,’ she said with a twinkle, ‘“Then why do they hide those lances, that stick out under their tunics?”’ Her wicked paraphrase of Aristophanes made them all laugh again.

Philokles stepped closer to the queen. Looking up at her, he declaimed, ‘“She did it all, the harlot, she — with her atrocious harlotry.”’

Therapon whirled, his face red, but Banugul reached down from her horse and took the Spartan’s hand. ‘I love a man of education,’ she said. ‘You are Philokles the Sophist?’

He laughed, obviously flattered. ‘I am Philokles the Spartan, my lady. I can’t remember being called a sophist, except by Kineas here.’

She beamed. ‘If you can call me a harlot, I can call you a sophist.’

‘I will be more careful of my epigrams,’ Philokles said, clearly stung.

She blew him a kiss. ‘Why do you not come and visit my court, Spartan? All the others come — save Diodorus here, who has ceased to visit me. But you never come.’

‘Sophistry takes all my time,’ Philokles said, gravely.

Diodorus went so red that he turned away, and even Kineas had to stifle a guffaw, while Banugul blushed a little, but she didn’t flinch. ‘Implying that harlotry takes all my time?’

‘I said nothing of the sort,’ Philokles said, drawling the words.

‘Pederasty, more like,’ said Therapon quietly, but his voice carried.

Kineas stepped between them. ‘Philokles, the lady is not a target for your wit.’

‘I can protect myself, Kineas,’ Banugul said. ‘By all the gods, I see now what I missed by staying in my citadel. And I see now why Kineas can parry any little wit I may employ if this is his daily sparring.’

‘More than sparring,’ Therapon said broadly. ‘Perhaps they entertain each other exclusively.’ He leered.

Philokles seemed to ignore the Thessalian’s jibes until later, when the Olbians were showing the queen and her entourage around their log-built gymnasium. Philokles had the queen’s arm and her ear, and he spoke of Greek wrestling and of pankration, their unarmed combat sport, until she clapped her hands.

‘I would love to see that,’ she said. ‘I have read so much about it.’

Philokles smiled, and the warrior that lurked under the skin of the philosopher came to the surface. ‘I would be pleased to show you, my lady,’ he said. ‘I’m sure your Therapon would be delighted to fight me chest to chest.’

Therapon was not the kind of man to refuse a challenge, and he stripped. ‘I’m not likely to let you behind me,’ he mocked. ‘I know what naked Greeks do.’

‘We fight naked,’ Philokles said to the queen, by way of apology.

‘My harlotry extends to male nudity,’ Banugul replied.

Philokles dropped his heavy cloak and pulled his wool chiton over his head, exposing the body of a statue. Therapon was heavier and had the start of a gut, although his arms were longer and immensely strong. Kineas tried to catch his friend’s eye.

Banugul put a hand on Philokles’ naked shoulder. ‘I would take it amiss if you hurt my captain,’ she said. Her nails brushed Philokles’ chest as she withdrew her hand. Her smile was a private one, for Philokles alone, and Kineas was appalled to find within himself a tingle of jealousy at their intimacy.

Then the two men were circling on the sand, bent low, intent. They circled long enough for the queen to grow bored and smile self-consciously at her host, when suddenly some shift in posture or intent brought the two contestants together, arms locked high, feet well back as they heaved against each other’s strength. Muscles stood out in strain and, despite the cold, a sheen of sweat covered both men.

Banugul leaned forward, her hands on her hips. Kineas watched her as she watched the contestants.

Philokles changed his weight suddenly, as if surrendering to the Thessalian’s embrace, but he got his body turned as he stepped in. One arm moved and he struck the Thessalian in the head with his forearm and suddenly Therapon was on his back and Philokles landed on him, driving the air from his lungs.

‘He does that to me all the time,’ Kineas said ruefully.

Banugul turned to him, eyes alight with mischief. ‘The things I could imply,’ she said. But she reached out a hand to his chest and shook her head. ‘I am too crude for words. I mean no hurt.’

It was the first time she had touched him. The warmth of her palm on his chest seemed to light a small fire there. She withdrew the hand while he was still surprised by its presence.

Philokles swung to his feet and offered Therapon his hand, but the other man didn’t take it. Instead, he stood brushing sand off his sweat, glowering. Philokles held his eyes. ‘Another throw?’ he asked.

‘Perhaps another time,’ the Thessalian said, and reached for his chiton. Kineas disliked the look the Thessalian gave his friend. It boded ill.

The queen’s tour started a new round of visits between camp and citadel, and the new ties between them did not make Kineas entirely happy. The first thing that annoyed him was Darius, whose skill with the bow and willingness to learn had endeared him to the Olbians. Kineas was becoming used to seeing his officers in the corridors of the citadel from time to time — Banugul had made it clear that they were welcome. But Kineas saw Darius too often, almost every day, and Kineas worried, both for the Persian boy and for his loyalties.

‘You spend a great deal of time here,’ Kineas said, several weeks after the queen’s visit to the camp.

Embarrassed, the young Persian shrugged. He smelled of perfume. ‘I like to hear Persian spoken sometimes,’ he said. ‘They are not unlike my people,’ he went on in the tone of outraged adolescence. Despite his upright carriage, he had the whine of the young to him when he replied, and it annoyed Kineas still more.

‘You are on the duty roster today,’ Kineas said.

‘Only for the reserve,’ Darius said. He shrugged. ‘They won’t be called out. What, is Alexander coming through the snow?’

Kineas tried to decide whether what he felt was jealousy at the smell of her perfume or annoyance at the tone of bratty innocence and justification. ‘Why don’t you make your way down to camp and take a spell on the walls while you consider the difference between insolence and disobedience?’ Kineas said.

Darius was not a fool. He saluted and left. Later inquiry showed that he had spent the entire shift on the walls. Kineas dismissed the incident.

Four days later, Darius was in the citadel again on his duty day, and Kineas barely restrained his temper. He felt that his orders were being flouted — worse, he suspected that he was himself being unjust. He visited the citadel, and he was the commander, the most responsible man of all. A poor example.

However, despite his own transgressions — perhaps because of them — Kineas lost his temper. ‘March your arse down to the duty office and wait there!’ Kineas barked.

Later that evening, Kineas found Darius sitting in his megaron ‘You are banned from the citadel until further notice,’ Kineas said.

‘Oh, that’s fair,’ Darius said with fluent sarcasm.

‘One more word and you can shovel snow for the rest of the winter,’ Kineas said.

Darius looked as if he wanted to say more — a great deal more. When the Persian marched out, his silence made Kineas feel like a bully, the more so as Darius cast such a look of supplication at Philokles, who was just coming in, that Philokles put his arm around the young man’s shoulders and stepped out into the snow to talk to him. When Philokles came back in, he was shaking his head.

‘ You go to the palace, Strategos!’ Philokles said.

‘I am the commander, and responsible for our relations with the queen.’ Kineas offered the Spartan a cup of wine.

‘Ares and Aphrodite, and you call me a sophist?’ Philokles grinned. Then he stopped smiling. ‘Listen, I’m here for something serious. Have you watched Leon and Eumenes? Together?’

Kineas made a face and shook his head. ‘Should I? What, are they lovers?’

‘Ares, you’re blind as a bat. No, much the opposite. They’re facing each other like armed camps on a plain.’ Philokles drained his wine. ‘You need to keep them apart.’

‘What’s it about?’ Kineas asked.

Philokles narrowed his eyes and frowned. ‘I may spy for you from time to time, or for my homeland. I don’t carry tales about my comrades. ’ He turned the cup upside down and stomped out.

Alerted, Kineas couldn’t miss the growing competition between Eumenes and Leon. Kineas didn’t know where it had started or what it was about, but it was out of hand. The incident that brought their misdeeds to light for Kineas was a torch-lit horse race on the snow, where the riders competed to bring fire to the altar of Demeter at the spring equinox, a tradition that Olbia shared with Athens. The competitors raced around the circuit of the camp and finished at a gallop down the main street, riding flat out for the building that served as a temple for all their gods. Eumenes lost when his horse, tearing around the corner of one of the soldiers’ cabins, slipped and fell. The young man broke a rib and walked with a limp for two weeks, and his horse slid on the ice, limbs flailing, and ended up injuring a dozen bystanders. Kineas saw the turn and saw the rough play between Leon and Eumenes in the moments before the fall.

When Kineas inquired, he received the kind of knowing looks that told him that most of his commanders already knew that something lay between the young men, and weren’t going to inform on them. When Kineas confronted the two combatants, they glared at each other like a pair of fighting cocks. When he upbraided them in private, they wore looks of humiliation and apology.

It was a week later, when he saw Leon talking to Lot’s surviving daughter, Mosva, that Kineas began to see how the winter wind blew. Because even as he watched Leon, who lost all of his courtly polish in her presence and had the body language of a young dog, shifting, shrugging, rolling and hanging his head, he also saw Eumenes watching the two of them, his face a thundercloud.

Aha! he thought. But it didn’t resolve the issue.

It was about the same time that Kineas went up the hill to see Banugul about a matter of logistics and found she was not available to receive him. Darius’s pale roan horse was in the citadel stables. Kineas rode back down the hill in a foul temper. He called for Diodorus.

‘Have the fucking Persian dismissed. He has disobeyed me for the last time.’ Kineas was so angry he spilled wine.

Philokles came in through the multiple blankets that now made the doorway. ‘Problems?’

Kineas was silent. Diodorus raised an eyebrow. ‘Kineas’s Persian boy has become a little too popular in the palace,’ Diodorus said. He made a face.

‘Fuck you,’ Kineas said. ‘I gave him a direct order and he disobeyed. I am ordering him dismissed.’

‘You’re over-reacting,’ Diodorus said. ‘He’s an excellent horseman and a top-notch fighter. You’ve said yourself he’s a better swordsman than you, and you’re the best I know. I’m ready to put him up for phylarch.’

‘Dismiss him,’ Kineas said, voice hard.

‘Don’t be an ass,’ Diodorus said.

Philokles shook his head. ‘Probably better if you dismiss him,’ he said after a moment.

Diodorus looked hurt. ‘The strategos is thinking with his little head,’ he said.

Philokles raised an eyebrow. ‘I say that it is for the best.’

‘Fine!’ Diodorus said. ‘I’ll obey. I think you’re both idiots, though.’

Kineas didn’t see the Persian again, but the rumour mill said that the young man had immediately taken service in the citadel, with the queen’s guard.

Kineas felt like an idiot, but it didn’t cause him to apologize. Winter was taking its toll. And despite his best efforts, he wasn’t able to stop his own visits to the citadel. Kineas tried to limit them to matters of business, but he was aware that he stretched those boundaries to fit his needs. As winter howled outside his megaron he admitted to himself that, like a wine-bibber denied his tipple, four days of snow had denied him his addiction and he was growing fractious. He decided to punish himself for the dismissal of Darius by avoiding the citadel. He snapped at Philokles on the fifth day of imposed abstinence from Banugul’s charms and the Spartan grinned.

‘I can find you a nice clean Hyrkanian girl who’ll reduce that swelling in no time,’ he quipped.

‘Keep a civil tongue,’ Kineas barked.

‘“The situation swells to greater tension. Something will explode soon,”’ Philokles quoted, laughing. ‘Aristophanes covers almost every sexual situation, I find.’

‘Go fuck yourself, Spartan,’ Kineas said.

‘The same might be suggested to you, Strategos.’ Philokles ducked a blow and slipped out of the door.

Two days later, Leosthenes the Athenian paid another visit and Kineas felt himself excused to climb the hill. It was early evening by the time he was admitted and Banugul was reclining on a couch, alone, with a dozen guests on couches eating a banquet. Darius was nowhere to be seen.

‘Dear Kineas,’ she said. ‘I would have invited you, but I feared your rejection. Please join us.’

She was modestly dressed in an Ionic chiton that left her shoulders visible. The wool was fine and pure white, and her skin stood the comparison. She rolled from a reclining position to sitting and clapped her hands, and a pair of male slaves rushed from the room.

‘Sit by me, Strategos,’ she said, patting her couch. She waved a languid hand at her guests. ‘Do you all know Kineas of Athens?’ she asked. ‘Sartobases was a loyal officer of my mother’s family and has followed me here.’ The Persian, obviously uncomfortable on a couch, rose to a sitting position and bowed from the waist. ‘Philip serves in the household of my sister Barsine,’ she said, indicating a Macedonian just out of boyhood. Alone of the men in the room, he seemed comfortable on his couch.

‘I congratulate you on crossing the passes in this weather,’ Kineas said.

‘I had good guides, sir,’ the young man said with enthusiastic courtesy. ‘And every reason to reach my goal!’

Kineas smiled at the young man’s earnestness. ‘Well done,’ he said. ‘You came from Ecbatana?’ he asked, as if uninterested.

‘Oh, no,’ Philip said. ‘The king is at Kandahar, and so is my mistress. Parmenion holds Ecbatana.’

‘Kandahar in Sogdiana?’ Kineas said.

‘Perhaps you could show a little more interest in your hostess and a little less in spying on Alexander,’ Banugul said lazily. To Philip, she said, ‘My good strategos is taking a small army east to make war on your master.’

Philip looked as if a wasp had stung him. Then his face relaxed. ‘My lady is pleased to make light of my youth. No Greek would dare to make war on Alexander.’

The slaves returned with another couch and placed it by the queen’s. Kineas didn’t notice how close she had been until he was alone on his own couch and the distance seemed like a gulf of stars, but the analytical soldier in his head was already measuring the stades to Kandahar. ‘The king has made peace in Sogdiana, then?’ Kineas said, drawing a glare from Banugul.

Philip shook his head, making a face to indicate that he was a man of the world. ‘The rump of the Persian empire continues to rebel. Spitamenes — a rebel against Darius, and now against my lord — is in league with the Scythian barbarians on the sea of grass. My lord will punish them soon.’

None of the Persian men were pleased by this speech, and Sartobases, who had a strong face and might have played Old Nestor in a tragedy, made the motion of spitting. ‘Listen, boy,’ he said. ‘Your master may have won Syria and Palestine and Egypt by his spear, but the land of the Bactrians and the Medae is not conquered.’

‘Hush, uncle,’ Banugul said. ‘We are all friends here.’

Kineas didn’t think so. He looked at Banugul with new understanding. How many plots were in this mosaiced room tonight?

‘Do you wish to ask me about Leosthenes?’ Kineas said quietly.

‘Why, did he visit you again?’ she asked, her voice light. ‘Wait until we are private.’

They were educated men and they spoke of astrology, at her bidding, of signs that they had seen come to pass, portents and dreams. Kineas admitted to having god-sent dreams and Philip listened with wide eyes as the youngest Persian told a story of intrigue and murder based on predictions drawn from the stars. Then she had her Carian singer perform. He sang in his own language and then, with a bow to Kineas, he sang the Choice of Achilles from the Iliad, and Kineas applauded him. And then the Carian sang in Persian, a simple song of forbidden love. Kineas’s Persian was good enough to catch the illicit nature of the love but not the details. He was more interested in watching old Sartobases look disapprovingly at Banugul.

It was nothing like a symposium — no ceremony with the wine, which was served by slaves, no contests and no performances by the guests. Philip watched the dark-haired slave girl who poured his wine like a falcon with a piece of meat, and began to stroke her at every opportunity, until his hostess made a sign and she was replaced. Aside, she said to Kineas, ‘Do Greek men really allow themselves to be publicly pleasured at parties?’

Kineas felt himself flush. ‘Young men — hmm. Yes. Not at nice parties.’

Banugul laughed, her irritation banished by his embarrassment. ‘You’re blushing! You’ve done this yourself?’ She laughed aloud. ‘I can’t picture it.’

Kineas sat up.

‘Don’t be a prude. It’s quite a picture.’ Banugul shook her head. The other guests were disputing Bessus’s right to be King of Kings. ‘You are so reserved-’

‘I was young. It was all fascinating. And easy. And I was challenged-’

‘Is that what you require, Kineas?’ she asked, rolling closer to him. ‘A challenge?’ Her face was a hand’s span from his. ‘Shall I dare you to pleasure yourself on one of my maids?’ she asked, eyes sparkling.

‘I am out of practice at this sort of banter,’ he replied. He rolled on to his stomach for a variety of reasons.

‘I can tell,’ she answered, casting him a half-smile of challenge over her shoulder as she turned to address another guest.

She played the hostess perfectly, demure as a Persian maiden, witty as an Athenian hetaira. All things to all men, Kineas thought. He willed himself to make his report and go.

But he did not.

Her guests took themselves off one by one, and Kineas was conscious that he was not leaving and they were — but she had asked him to stay, and the matter of Leosthenes remained between them, or so he told himself.

Sartobases was the last to go, and he raised an elegant Persian eyebrow at Kineas.

‘We have unfinished business,’ Banugul said, indicating Kineas.

Sartobases shrugged. ‘I can well imagine,’ he said to her in Persian.

‘He speaks Persian,’ Banugul said, indicating Kineas.

Sartobases bowed deeply and flushed. ‘My apologies, lord.’

Kineas shook his head. ‘None required, lord. We are in the Land of Wolves.’

Sartobases nodded, his eyes narrow. Then he was gone, and they were alone, except for twenty slaves clearing away the food.

‘Come and lie by me,’ she said lightly, as if it were a matter of no importance. She patted her couch.

‘I think not,’ he said, hating the sound of weak prudery in his voice.

‘Who says you rise to a challenge? Then make your report and go back to your barracks.’ She sat up.

‘I am sorry. I mean only-’

‘Don’t be weak.’ She smiled dismissively.

‘I find you…’ he began, hoping to excuse his refusal.

‘Now you will make me angry, Kineas. Do as thou wilt, and only as thou wilt. That is the law of kings and queens. If thou wilt not, then so be it — it is not my fault that you have chosen so.’ She slipped between formal Persian and Greek in every sentence.

Stung, Kineas sat back down on his own couch. ‘There is more to virtue and vice than doing as I will,’ he said.

She smiled at him. ‘No,’ she said. ‘All your philosophy is merely to cover the weakness of those who cannot attain all the things they desire, or master them once attained. Your virtue is merely abstinence, and the avoidance of your vice is merely the cowardice of fear of consequence.’

‘Fear of consequence?’ he asked. She was angry. And she was no longer all things to all men.

‘Alexander has found the philosophy of kings. I learned it from him. Perhaps he learned it from your Aristotle? There is no law. That is the only law.’ She was serious.

‘You will not debate me into your arms,’ Kineas said, standing up.

‘Will I not? I get more response from you like this than with honey.’ She stood too, and walked straight to him.

‘Your philosophy-’

‘To Hades with philosophy, Kineas.’ She came up close, and he could see her, backlit by the torchlight from the room’s north wall from knee to shoulder through the thin stuff of her chiton. ‘I need you to protect my little kingdom in the spring.’ She came closer and raised her face, where flecks of gold sparkled in her mascara. Her voice was low, husky and tired, but she smelled like spring. ‘In the autumn I was willing to pay the price. Now I am eager to pay it.’

Somewhere beyond her in the torchlight, a slave dropped a heavy silver platter with a noise like a man beating a metal drum, or like a goddess clearing her throat. Kineas stepped back and kissed her hand, his resolve steadied.

‘Coward,’ she said. ‘I can feel your desire. And I am no painted harlot.’

He took a breath, and all he breathed was her. ‘I am a coward,’ he said. He couldn’t pull his eyes away from hers. ‘You are no painted harlot.’

She shrugged and moved away. ‘Go,’ she commanded.

Riding down the hill, he felt nothing but shame at his own indecision.

Kineas vowed not to return.

Again.

Because his horses were thin and he needed remounts, because Coenus was due with the bullion, because the passes had been closed by snow and they were all worried by the lack of news — and because the queen had abandoned modesty, Kineas felt the urge to act. So when he saw flowers coming through the snow, Kineas summoned his friends. He served the last of his good Chian wine.

‘I want to be ready to march,’ he said. He looked around.

Every man met his eye, and the grunts of agreement were clear. At his elbow, Philokles nodded. Niceas, who had grown a bushy beard, scratched at it.

‘Fodder,’ Niceas said.

Kineas agreed. ‘That’s the problem. We need fodder. The fodder has to come in from the queen’s peasants. They hate her, for starters, and she’s none too fond of us right now, because we’re marching away and leaving her to Parmenion’s vultures.’

‘That’s one reason,’ said Philokles, who missed nothing, when he was sober.

Diodorus rubbed his eyes. Smoke from the hearth was stinging them all, and every eye in camp was constantly red-rimmed. ‘Her own mercenaries are ready to sell her to Artabazus. That citadel won’t last a feast cycle when we march away. Everyone has their money on Parmenion.’

Kineas motioned to Nicanor, who signed to a slave, who poured wine in Kineas’s cup. Kineas stood. ‘She’s intelligent and resourceful and dangerous as a wolf. I want the guard led by someone in this room until we march. I want to set a date and publicize it. Then we’ll march two days early, in combat formation. And I want the prodromoi out as soon as Ataelus is willing to go, covering the route east all the way to the edge of the desert.’

No one disputed his ideas.

Diodorus held out his cup for wine. ‘We should be drilling the combat formation for marching. We should do it by sections, so that it’s not obvious to anyone watching.’

Kineas frowned. ‘That’s excellent. Draw up the plan and let’s give it to every officer by tomorrow. Nicanor, can you scribe for Diodorus?’

Nicanor nodded.

Heron had grown up again during the winter. Now he spoke out. ‘Two things, sir. First, do we need an operational plan in case we need to gather the forage ourselves? And second, if we leave,’ he coloured, ‘I hesitate to use the term hostile, but if the queen is not our friend when we march away, what becomes of Coenus and the bullion?’

Kineas, who had spent all winter worrying about Coenus, took a deep breath and released it. ‘We send a message to the fort at the top of the Kaspian, telling Coenus not to land here, and send guides to help him follow us.’

Heron jutted out his jaw insistently. ‘Easier to seize a town on the coast and hold it for him,’ he said. ‘With a garrison that can become his escort.’

That silenced the room. Kineas glanced at Philokles. ‘I had thought of leaving the infantry behind, or sending them home,’ he said.

Lycurgus, who had heard this idea all winter, shook his head. ‘We can keep up, if it comes to that. But Hades, Strategos, the boy’s plan isn’t a bad one. March up the coast and seize one of the wolf towns. It’d take us three or four days — there’s nothing up there to stop three hundred hoplites.’

Diodorus cut in. ‘I could go beyond that. Leosthenes says Hyrkania is full of Hellenes — deserters from one side or another. I’ve seen them — there are two groups of men who’ve sniffed around our camp, looking to be recruited. We could buy them.’

Kineas shook his head. ‘My goal is to strike a blow against Alexander with Srayanka. I’m not interested in the conquest of Hyrkania — which, let me tell you, would be a harder nut than you two seem to think.’

Leon shook his head. ‘Can’t we keep the queen sweet?’ Like Heron, Leon had grown over the winter. In his case, he was not just older but also more confident of his status as a free man. He frowned at Kineas. ‘I have money tied into this place, now. So do you. If the queen repudiates all the contracts I’ve made, I’ve wasted the winter.’

Kineas groaned.

‘Listen to me, Kineas,’ Leon insisted. ‘There’s more to the world than Herodotus thought. For two years I’ve heard rumours — Nicomedes heard them — of a great empire in the east, beyond the sea of grass. The place from which silk comes.’ He looked around at all of them, his eyes hot, and Kineas smiled inwardly, because Leon was no longer a slave. ‘It’s called Kwin, or Qu’in,’ he said, voice husky with passion. ‘I mean to go there!’

‘Good for you, lad,’ Niceas said with a smile.

The black man grinned. ‘I’m getting carried away. But I’m telling you, if we could open this route — if we could manage even a tithe of the trade across the old trade road — we’d be richer than Croesus.’

Eumenes frowned. ‘I think we need to discuss war, not trade. Trade is for merchants.’

Leon raised his chin. ‘Your father was a merchant.’

‘Shut your mouth!’ Eumenes said. He rose to his feet.

‘And a traitor,’ Leon said, conversationally.

Diodorus didn’t need a glance from Kineas to deal with adolescents. He put a hand on each combatant’s shoulder. ‘You are both rude and your comments have no place in a command conference. Apologize or suffer the consequence,’ he said. His words were spoken quietly, but they carried over every whispered side conversation and the room fell silent.

‘I apologize,’ Leon said. He was blushing so hard that his dark skin seemed to be engorged with blood.

‘I apologize for Leon’s bad manners as well as my own,’ Eumenes said. ‘He spent too much time as a slave and can’t help himself.’ Eumenes spoke rapidly, still enraged, and then looked stricken when he thought about what he had said aloud.

Kineas raised an eyebrow. ‘You may go to your quarters, Eumenes. Do not communicate with any other person. I will come and pay you a visit.’ He waited a moment, as the stunned young man stood frozen. ‘Now, Eumenes.’

Eumenes walked from the smoky hall in a daze.

When he was gone, Kineas found himself stroking his beard and made his fingers stop. He sipped his wine — excellent stuff, with a smell like wild berries, dark as ox blood — and nodded. ‘We’re not here to open a trade route,’ he said. He raised an eyebrow at Heron. ‘We’re not here to give you a base against Pantecapaeum, either. But if you lads can accomplish your dreams while obeying the orders of this council, I’m not against it.’

Heron’s family had provided generations of tyrants to Pantecapaeum, and he was currently in exile. Heron made no secret of his ambitions to be tyrant there — perhaps king of the Bosporus, as well. He gave a careful smile. ‘I appreciate your help. When I’m king-’

Niceas laughed. ‘Heron the first?’

Philokles laughed. ‘Eumeles, I suspect. The melodious one. Won’t that be your reigning name?’

Heron gave a wry smile. ‘You learn every secret.’

Philokles shook his head. ‘Not much of a secret. So we’re to be richer than Croesus?’

Niceas laughed. ‘Richer than Croesus is good,’ he said, giving Leon a smile. He winked at Heron. ‘Your parents actually called you Eumeles?’

‘They hadn’t heard my voice yet,’ Heron replied in his usual croak.

Diodorus leaned forward, cutting back to the matter at hand. ‘You really think we can live without the infantry?’ he asked. His face was burning — he was in the grip of a grand idea.

Kineas answered, ‘Yes.’ He tried to sound cautious.

Diodorus turned to the rest of them. ‘We leave Lycurgus. He starts recruiting tomorrow. He can keep the quality high, get a thousand hoplites and train them to our standard. The queen is saved — no force in Hyrkania can evict a thousand hoplites from this fort and the citadel. We’re saved — we have a secure town in our rear. Coenus can come here. Our contracts are safe.’

‘Until Artabazus sends the whole levy of the satrapy.’ Kineas glanced around and shrugged. ‘It’s not bad. Lycurgus?’

The old mercenary shrugged. ‘Big command. You’d have to leave me another officer.’ He shrugged. ‘I came out here to follow Kineas, not to garrison some barbarian hill town.’ He shrugged again. ‘But I obey orders.’ He grinned. ‘Make her pay through the nose.’

Heron stood. ‘I’ll stay,’ he said. It was clear to all the gentlemen present that Heron saw the town as a springboard to recruit mercenaries and go back to seize Pantecapaeum, just as Kineas had said. But being Heron, he didn’t hide his motivations. He just bulled towards them regardless of consequences. Kineas suspected that he shared Banugul’s philosophy. Do as you will. A suitable virtue for a tyrant.

Kineas was not slow to realize that many of them were not as keen to march away to fight Alexander as he was. They’d had a winter to hear tales of the eastern deserts and the impassable mountains that ran to the edge of the world.

But Diodorus’s plan was sound.

‘I’ll think on it,’ Kineas said.

‘Don’t forget the fodder,’ Niceas said, and coughed. Red sprayed his fist. He tried to hide it, and Diodorus and Kineas exchanged a look of shared concern.

The next day, the sun came up and stayed, and no rain fell on the fields of mud beyond the town and the citadel.

Diodorus, Leon and Nicanor were hard at work behind him, scratching out rows of Greek characters to represent every man in the line of march and to give the officers a manual on which to drill their men. Across the drill square, by the gate, Lycurgus was recruiting and drilling men that he had turned away all winter, wolfish Greeks and nondescript Persians. Beside him, Temerix the smith stood bundled in sheepskins, also recruiting from the brigands who came to the gate as soon as they heard that Kineas was paying silver for service.

He didn’t want to go to the palace. They had nothing to say to each other, except as a mercenary and his employer. He glanced around the smoky hall, looking for a man he could send in his stead.

Diodorus was busy, and besides, Sappho would not forgive him for sending her man.

Eumenes was under house arrest, and Kineas meant to let him stew.

Leon might do. Except that he was busy, and sending him would expose Kineas’s unwillingness to do what needed to be done.

Do the thing. Men said it when they asked for death, or when they sealed a deal in the Acropolis. He was evading responsibility. Facing the queen was his job.

He knew with the finality of oracular prophesy that if he climbed the hill again, he would fall into her arms, vulgarity or none. She would think that his offer of service by his infantry was a concession to her charms. And he was not made of wood, or stone.

Cowardice.

A gust of wind picked up dust and dry snow from under the eaves of the huts and brushed it across the parade ground in a long swirl of dirty white, and when it was gone, Nihmu’s slight figure could be seen riding across the drill field.

‘Do you never appear as other people do?’ Kineas asked, by way of greeting.

She laughed and lifted a leg over her horse’s head and slid to the ground all in one elastic motion. ‘The world is about to change,’ she said, her face suddenly serious. ‘I rode to tell you.’

Kineas nodded.

‘The woman in the palace — the sorceress. She is very dangerous to you — today and tomorrow and tomorrow again after that. Be on your guard.’ Nihmu’s odd eyes met his square on.

Kineas nodded again. ‘I was just thinking the very same thing as you rode up.’

Sometimes, when dealing with Nihmu, it was possible to forget that she was a child. At other times, it was painfully obvious. ‘I have not had as much time for you this winter as I ought.’

Nihmu nodded. ‘You are often at the palace. All the Sakje fear me. I long to talk to you. And my father orders it.’ She looked around. ‘I like your Nicanor. He is funny, and he makes good cakes.’

‘I’m sure that Nicanor doesn’t make cakes himself.’ Kineas couldn’t imagine the pompous and rather staid Nicanor amusing a child.

Nihmu made a face. ‘Fat lot you know, Strategos.’ She laughed.

Behind her in the drill square, Lycurgus dismissed the twenty files he was drilling and they broke up into knots of men talking and shouting. Another group, mostly Olbians, were heading out to the brothels of the agora, and they were shouting at a third party that was returning. The noise level swelled.

Suddenly all the voices in the drill square shaped themselves into one voice. ‘ Your blindness will kill as effectively as your sword, ’ it said in the tone of a god.

Kineas fell back a pace. Nihmu’s eyes were wide and her face was contorted, not the face of a child but that of a priestess. And then she grabbed at the bridle of her horse and ran away, crying.

He sent for Ataelus when he gathered the tangled skein of his thoughts. Ataelus rode up looking at the sky. ‘Sun again tomorrow,’ he said. ‘For drying earth.’

Kineas nodded. ‘I need you and the prodromoi to start making a fodder inventory,’ he said.

Ataelus shrugged. ‘Huh?’ he asked.

Kineas started again. ‘I need you and the scouts to go out every day and give me a report on the farms within a day’s ride — the number of wagons, the amount of fodder they have in their barns and stores.’

Ataelus grinned. ‘For counting wagons and for scouting trail to east. Anything else for scouts?’

Kineas spread his hands.

Ataelus leaned down from his horse. ‘Temerix for counting barns and wagons. Ataelus for scouting east.’

Ataelus never cut corners and he never feared to argue with his leader, which was welcome, even when the news was bad.

‘You are right.’

Ataelus nodded. ‘Yes,’ he said. ‘If sun is for shining, scouts ride tomorrow. Back when moon is full.’ He shrugged. ‘Unless for dead. Always unless.’

Kineas pointed at the throng of would-be warriors at the gate. ‘Anyone worth recruiting for the prodromoi?’

Ataelus didn’t turn his head. ‘No,’ he said.

Having dismissed centuries of Hyrkanian horsemanship in one word, Ataelus grinned. ‘Anything else, Strategos?’ It was a word Ataelus relished — he trotted it out too often.

‘You taking the girl — Lot’s daughter? Mosva?’

‘When for riding east? No. Stay with father. Last child. Not for scouting.’

Kineas rubbed his beard and then snatched his fingers away. ‘I’d rather she went,’ he said.

‘Oho!’ said the Scyth. He nodded and gave a big grin. ‘Good. I for talking Lot.’

‘Go with the gods, Ataelus.’

‘Go with horses. For coming back with gods.’ Ataelus grinned. Then he wheeled his horse and rode away.

Kineas went to finish some discipline.

He slipped through two layers of hanging cloaks and blankets to enter the hut that Eumenes shared with Andronicus and six other gentlemen-troopers. The hearth was cold and so was the room, and the whitewashed walls served only to make it colder. There was no table and no chairs and no couches, only a rack of beds made by local craftsmen and covered with piles of blankets and furs and sheepskins. At the far end of the dark hut, one of the troopers — a Kelt called Hama — was ploughing a local girl, moving slowly and rhythmically under a tent of blankets. They whispered to each other, moaned and giggled together. Eumenes sat in misery, trying to pretend he was not there.

‘Let’s walk,’ Kineas said to Eumenes.

Eumenes took his cloak from the doorway and followed Kineas into the sunshine.

Kineas walked them up the snowdrifts to the walls. Troopers were punished with snow-clearing duty outside the walls, where a beaten zone was maintained. Inside, the snowdrifts sometimes added to the height of the fort.

‘You and Leon are competing for Mosva, Lot’s daughter,’ he said when they were out of the wind.

Eumenes nodded.

‘I have sent her off east with the prodromoi. I suggest you apply yourself to your work as a professional soldier. Buy a girl if you feel the urge. That outburst in the meeting was ill-meant and bad for discipline. And you started it. I hope you understand me.’

Eumenes flushed despite the bite of the cold. ‘It’s not fair. He called my father a traitor.’

Kineas put his hands on the boy’s shoulders. ‘What you mean is that it’s not fair that your father was a traitor. He was. And Leon was a slave. And both of you are important officers in this company, and we need you to function as adults and not as brainless children.’

‘Not fair,’ muttered Eumenes. He was weeping.

Kineas embraced the boy, who had suffered so much in the last year and was now weeping for the loss of a girl and some prestige. His embrace obviously comforted the young man, and Kineas thought of Mosva crying in his arms after the fight in the high ground to the west, and how useless he was at comforting anyone.

He did his best.

Without really intending it, Kineas didn’t climb the hill to the citadel that day, or the next. Ataelus’s twenty riders trotted out over the mud into a sunny morning and vanished into the eastern hills before the sun was a hand high in the sky. The mercenaries — new and old — drilled on the parade under Lycurgus’s eye, with Diodorus watching and Leon taking notes. Eumenes had the cavalry out all day, conditioning their horses, walking them up and down, riding for brief stints, and the young man was merciless in working himself and every trooper under him. Temerix’s men went out in twos and threes, unarmed, and began the long job of locating fodder. Kineas watched the Kaspian for ships from the north and the mountains to the east for a rider from Ataelus.

Another day passed, and Kineas failed to climb the hill.

Towards evening on the third day, Philokles joined him on the porch of the megaron. It was spring, unseasonably warm, in fact, and three days of sun had caused avalanches on the hillsides and probably opened the hill passes south. Crocuses pushed up through the rubbish and the tree bark that had accumulated along the foundation of the megaron, and Kineas marvelled at their colour as only a man who has survived a long winter can do. Outside the gate, he watched a mounted man gallop past his sentries, straight up the hill to the citadel.

‘There is much beauty in the world,’ Philokles said.

Kineas grinned. He put a hand on Philokles’ shoulder; he loved it when the philosopher ruled and his friend made statements of this sort. ‘There is,’ Kineas said. And then more soberly, ‘And much cowardice.’

Philokles sat on the step of the megaron. He stretched his long legs in front of him and took a sip of wine before handing the cup to Kineas. ‘The queen?’ he asked. His voice was carefully neutral.

‘I lust for her. I marshal a thousand arguments against her — all excellent, I might add. Srayanka. The men. Her own — bah. I lack words to express it. And yet I fly back to her like a moth to an oil lamp. And then I resist.’ He shrugged. ‘It is like a contest.’

Philokles raised an eyebrow. ‘You do love a challenge,’ he said.

‘It’s more than that,’ Kineas said.

Philokles rested on an elbow. ‘Do you think I might have a sip of the wine I brought out to us? Thanks. Is it? More than a challenge? The camp is full of whores — you could have any one you liked, and no diplomatic incident need follow. You could fuck ten of them and no one would tell Srayanka. Indeed, I wouldn’t think it Srayanka’s business. But instead of a little helpful penetration of a whore to work off your male humours, you wander off into a game with a queen. The game is being played about dominance and submission. Sex is just a piece on the board. Stop dramatizing. In a few weeks we’re riding away — fuck her and leave her, or don’t fuck her and leave her. Neither one of you will ever submit.’

Kineas laughed ruefully. ‘When you came out with the wine, I was remarking to myself what a pleasure you are when you are in a philosophical frame of mind.’ He took the cup and drained it. ‘I forgot that your philosophy often kicks like an army mule.’ Kineas took the cup back and finished the wine. ‘She says all our philosophy is cowardice, and every man should do what he wills.’

Philokles nodded. ‘That’s the philosophy of a despot — or a woman trying to seduce.’

‘She’s wrong, though.’ Kineas wasn’t sure whether that was a question or an answer.

Philokles looked into the empty wine cup and frowned. ‘You drank all of my wine.’ He looked hurt. ‘The good wine that tastes like berries.’

Kineas nodded. ‘And now I’m going to ride up the hill and see the queen.’

Philokles nodded. ‘I find it very much in keeping with the way the gods drive men to action that I began this winter begging you to avoid her, and tonight I use my tongue as a lash to push you up the hill.’ He held out the cup. ‘Since you’ll go inside to change, bring me out another cup of wine? There’s a good fellow.’ He waited until Kineas was halfway in the door. ‘She’s not wrong. Nor right. This is not about her, but about you.’

Kineas stopped for a moment and then nodded. When he returned in a fine woollen tunic and cloak with a bronze ewer of wine, Philokles had been joined by Nicanor and Diodorus. Nicanor served wine and took a cup for himself.

‘So you’re taking the bit between your teeth?’ Diodorus said. ‘Sappho says to take care.’

Kineas curled one corner of his mouth. ‘I will,’ he said. He slammed back a second cup of wine, causing his friends to look at each other.

Lycurgus raised an eyebrow. He was leaning against a column, watching the agora. ‘Lot of messengers moving around,’ he said.

Sitalkes brought his horse, one of the royal stallions that he rode to rest Thalassa. Beyond the gate, the rest of his escort waited. The evening was calm and warm, and curiously quiet except for the messengers. Kineas listened for a moment and diagnosed the problem — it was warm like spring, but there weren’t any insects yet.

In the west, the sun slid down towards the cold blue waters of the Kaspian.

Kineas got a leg over his charger, settled himself and turned back to Lycurgus and Diodorus.

‘Double the watch and have the quarter guard stand to arms,’ he said. ‘I’m scared of shadows.’ He hated to be like that — in a sentence he’d condemned forty men to lose their evening of rest.

Diodorus shook his head. ‘No — I feel it too. All the beggars are gone from the gate. Stay here.’

Lycurgus nodded agreement. ‘Something has changed. I don’t like it.’

Kineas shrugged. ‘After two days of screwing up my courage? To Hades with that.’

Philokles came up beside Diodorus. ‘You’re both jumping at shadows. You’re going to give her good news.’ He shook his head. ‘I’m worried, too. My man in the palace hasn’t reported in three days.’

Kineas nodded, but his mind wasn’t convinced.

‘You should take a sword,’ Diodorus shouted, as Kineas turned his horse.

Kineas shook his head and rode for the gate.

The gate to the citadel was heavily guarded. There were eight men on duty and every one of them was in full armour. They seemed surprised that Kineas had come and they sent for the captain of the guard rather than passing Kineas.

First he fumed and then he worried. Behind him, he could hear Sitalkes speaking quietly to his men, all big Keltoi.

‘Don’t be separated from your weapons,’ Kineas said. ‘Something is wrong.’

The captain of the guard came out in a polished iron helmet with a scale aventail and a scale shirt. He was armed for war. ‘Last person I expected to see,’ he said.

‘You are awaiting an attack,’ Kineas said flatly.

The captain shrugged. ‘Not my place to say. The queen will receive you, if you are coming in. Your men must wait in the courtyard, disarmed. ’

Kineas shook his head. ‘No. I’ve been in the citadel a dozen times and my men have never been disarmed.’

The captain shrugged. ‘Then they wait out in the wind,’ he said.

Kineas turned to Sitalkes. ‘I’m sorry,’ he said. ‘It’ll be cold. I’ll see to it as soon as I speak to her.’

‘Never mind us,’ Sitalkes said. ‘Take Carlus, at least.’ Carlus was the tallest man in the army, two hands taller than Kineas. He rode big horses and men got out of his way wherever he went.

Kineas turned back to the captain. ‘One bodyguard,’ he said. ‘Armed.’ He handed the man a silver owl.

The captain grunted and took the money. ‘Whatever the fuck. One man. It’s cold — let’s go.’

Kineas gave his horse to Sitalkes, who threw a blanket over her. They waited in the icy wind on the gravel road under the walls and Kineas passed inside, into the sensuous warmth, led by one of her slaves.

Carlus grunted twice — once when the warmth of the floors penetrated his sandals and again when he saw his first oiled slave girl. Other than that he was silent. Kineas left his cloak and his sandals in the outer rooms. Carlus followed him silently.

Kineas could see the tension in every visible ligament on the slaves. He followed the slave into the throne room.

It was much the same as his first visit, except that she was back to wearing the clothes of a Persian matron, and most of her male courtiers were in armour. They fell silent as he entered. There was a man in silvered scale mail standing at her shoulder, who looked like a prince. His face was covered by the nasal on his helmet. He looked familiar.

‘You are a fool to come here, Kineas of Athens,’ she said.

Kineas agreed. The man at her shoulder was Darius. Kineas felt foolish — he’d seen all the signs that the Persian was changing sides, but he’d ignored them. ‘I come with an agreement about the spring campaign,’ he said, still thinking to buy her complacence. Perhaps it was just another round in their game. The fear round.

‘You are a fool, Kineas,’ she said, and this time she sounded sad. ‘The spring campaign is already over. I have need of your soldiers. And if I can’t have them, no one will.’ She looked to be on the verge of tears, but she steadied herself. She motioned at Darius. ‘Kill him.’

Carlus gave his third grunt. Kineas whirled to see the giant Kelt with a dagger rammed through his cloak into the armour on his back. He was wearing a heavy cuirass made of layers of linen quilted together, half a finger thick, and the dagger skidded off the armour and ripped across his neck. The Kelt grunted a fourth time and ripped his heavy sword from its scabbard. He killed two men in as many blows and scattered the guardsmen, forcing their captain back as if he was a giant in a riot of children.

Kineas was unarmed and unarmoured, but he knew where the alcove was. He leaped back from the first rush, grabbed a bronze platter and stopped a killing blow from the man concealed there and another from one of the courtiers nearest the throne. Darius was down from the dais and moving towards him.

‘Philokles!’ the Persian shouted, and ripped a sword from another courtier and threw it at Kineas.

Kineas rammed the edge of the platter into a man’s nose. Then he took the man’s arm, whirled him and broke it, so that he screamed like a wounded horse. Kineas swept his feet and pushed him flailing into the line of guards, kicked with his bare feet, set his back against the wall and grabbed for the sword as it bounced off the wall. Philokles? he thought, and his right hand closed on the grip of the sword, a back-curved hanger like a small machaira, with a heavy guard that completely covered his hand. His left hand had the platter by one of its gryphon-head handles, and he hurled it like a discus at the crowd by the throne. The men facing him fell back a step.

Carlus was bellowing like a bull. There were three men in the blood at his feet and two more clutching wounds and none of the guard would come near him.

Darius dispatched one of the courtiers with a thrust to the chest — no wasted effort. The two survivors by the throne turned to look at him and Sartobases yelled ‘traitor!’ at him in outraged Persian.

‘Philokles!’ he shouted again.

Women were screaming and the smell of death and offal carried across the warm, moist air. He glimpsed Banugul moving away from the throne, one hand pointing at Darius.

Darius cut down another man and joined Kineas at the wall. ‘I work for Philokles!’ he said as if a battle cry, and the words penetrated Kineas’s brain. He laughed and attacked the men in front of him. They scattered and he cut one down in his retreat, but then the front of the hall began to fill with the queen’s guard.

‘Follow me!’ Darius called. He slipped behind a drapery.

Kineas would not so lightly abandon his bodyguard. ‘Carlus!’ he yelled. ‘On me!’

The Kelt swung his sword wide, so that the blade was a blur — back and forth — and then sprang away, the two great swings covering his retreat. He knocked a slave girl flat, smashed his fist into a man’s face, scattering teeth, and ran across the slick floor.

A guardsman threw a javelin. His aim was true and it struck Carlus in the back, but it lacked power and the cuirass held it. Still, the giant stumbled a step. The guards gained heart and charged.

Kineas ripped the hanging off the wall — a Persian procession of conquered peoples carrying gifts — and ducked through the concealed door. ‘Follow me!’ he shouted. He could feel Carlus pushing through the door behind him. They were in a dark corridor. Behind them, Therapon’s voice was calling for archers.

They turned sharply right and the corridor climbed a flight of stairs, lit by pitch brands. ‘Hold them here,’ Kineas said to the big Kelt, who was panting with exertion, fear and pain. ‘Never let their archers get a shot at you. Use the curve of the wall. Understand? I’ll be back for you!’

Carlus placed his back against the wall. He pushed himself to a full standing position. ‘Aye, lord,’ he said. He grinned. ‘Aye!’ His effort to push himself erect left a smear of wet blood on the plaster. The whole stairwell stank of burning pitch and the sweat of fear.

Kineas turned and followed Darius again. ‘Where are we going?’ he asked.

‘Postern gate,’ Darius said. ‘Been trying to tell you for three days — she means to attack the camp. Tonight.’

‘She’s insane! We’d kill her!’

Darius sagged against the landing and Kineas could see he was wounded, the flowing blood black in the fitful light. ‘You’d have killed her men — except that you came here. And she owns some of your new recruits. Or thinks she does.’ The man was pale with fatigue.

‘Let’s get to this gate!’ Kineas said.

They went through a door, into a rich apartment and then down a long curve of steps set into the outer wall. The stairwell was pitch-black and cold as the outer wells of Hades, with a thin cold wind coming in through the arrow slits. Outside, Kineas could hear Greek voices — probably his bodyguard demanding news. The sounds of fighting could be heard right through the walls. Carlus was killing men, roaring his challenge.

They went down, and down again, and through a door.

There were a dozen men waiting for them.

‘Fuck!’ said Darius in Persian, and his sword flashed as he cut at a man. ‘Run, Kineas!’

It was too late to run. Kineas pushed up beside the Persian and killed a man with an overarm thrust. The blade went right over his shield and into his eye — Kineas was using the bend in his own blade to baffle his opponent in the torch-lit dark. The man went down like a sacrifice and Kineas sank to one knee and swept his blade under the shield of Darius’s opponent. Even with his shorter, lighter blade, the cut severed the man’s ligaments just below the knee. He fell backwards, fouling his mates and buying Kineas a few seconds.

Kineas was already stripping the corpse of the man at his feet. He ripped the shield off the man’s arm, tearing at the straps, hacking with his blade at the dead man’s shield arm — the shield’s porpax caught on the dead man’s wrist and hand, a ring, a bracelet — Kineas pulled, shouting curses — the shield came free. Darius backed a step as an armoured man charged him. Kineas, uncovered, whirled, cutting with his sword, still trying to get the shield over his own arm. He cut low, cut high and met his opponent’s shield both times. Desperate, he tried a school dodge — he backed a step, placed a foot on his opponent’s shield and pushed.

The man fell back. Not a gymnasium-trained man, or he’d have known the trick. Kineas pushed back through the door. Darius was above him on the stairs. The shield dropped on to his forearm, ripping flesh, and the grip came into his left hand.

‘When your Kelt goes down, we’re finished,’ Darius said. Carlus was three rooms behind them, his bellows audible even through the stone. Kineas heard the tense humour in the Persian’s voice. ‘I rather enjoy having you on my side, though.’

Kineas had to laugh at that. ‘Stay on my shield side and get anyone who tries to pass me,’ he said. ‘None of them are your match. We’ll get through this.’ He turned his head and gave the younger man a broad smile.

Darius straightened up. He met Kineas’s torch-lit glance. ‘I was tempted…’ he began.

Kineas grunted and pushed forward through the door, ignoring whatever confession the younger man was considering. ‘Guard me!’ he called.

The men on the other side didn’t expect him to attack. He pushed — shield in the face, cut low, push — and they fell back. His second back cut, luckier or more accurate than the others, cut a dactylos above a guardsman’s shield, the point slashing through his eyes and the bridge of his nose so that he fell dead between breaths, never seeing the blow that stole his life.

‘Athena!’ Kineas roared with the whole weight of his chest.

Confused shouts beyond the wall.

‘Athena!’ He bellowed again, and cut, pushed, pushed again. Darius was covering his side along the wall, thrusting with reckless energy to force his shielded opponent back.

Kineas flicked his shield out, caught another man’s shield with his own rim and pulled. Then his sword licked out, thrusting into the man’s chest. He thrust too hard and his borrowed sword fouled, caught on a rib. He kicked, pulled, pushed with his shield as the dying man screamed.

The sword broke at the hilt, leaving Kineas with a hand’s-breadth of iron.

Too late to hesitate.

He threw the hilt into his next opponent’s face. Then, using a pankration move learned from Phocion, he lunged, throwing his shield leg back, and his empty sword hand grasped the rim of the next man’s shield and used it as a lever, ripping the arm in a circle and breaking it. He hammered his shield into the man’s undefended face as he fell, grabbed for the man’s sword and missed. The man’s sword clattered against the cobbles of the floor, vanished in the darkness. A spear punched into his shield, penetrating the bronze surface and embedding in the wood lining. Kineas used his superior leverage to rip the shield free. Again the spear came at him, this time raking his shin because he couldn’t see it coming low. He stepped back and the spearman came forward, the point of a three-man wedge that filled the corridor.

Darius was still fighting a man from the last rush. He gave a shout and his opponent screeched as Darius cut off his hand. The man backed away, blood spurting from the stump, and the three spearmen lost several heartbeats as they tried to cover him.

‘Sword!’ Kineas said. He put his hand back.

Darius slapped his own sword into the open hand.

Just like that.

Kineas stepped forward, took the lead man’s spearhead on his shield where he could feel it and pushed, fouling the man’s weapon. The man set his feet and pushed back, his mates helping him. Kineas felt the strain and tilted his shield, bent his knees and rolled low, passing his shield under the lip of his opponent’s, kneeling on the damp flagstone. He cut low, felt an impact and stood up, pushing with his legs as Darius came up to guard his back, and the lead man staggered back, shouting that he was cut, and the rest broke, fleeing as best they could from the terror of the darkness and the blood.

Darius rose next to him, having found the sword of the man whose wrist he’d severed.

‘Thanks,’ Kineas said. The daimon of combat left him, and his knees began to shake. He was alive! He almost fell. His chiton was drenched in sweat.

‘Think nothing of it,’ Darius said in court Persian. He was grey, but he managed a smile. ‘Could I have my sword back, do you think?’

Kineas met his eye. They exchanged swords, and something more.

Between them, with shaking hands, they got the postern open. Instead of fleeing, they admitted Kineas’s guardsmen, who, drawn by his shouts, were already tearing at the door from the outside. And then, leaving four men under Sitalkes to hold the gate and sending a mounted man to the camp, Kineas led the rest of them back into the citadel for the Kelt.

They found him alive, cleared the corridor in front of him and retreated from a volley of arrows. Carlus was wounded in more places than Kineas could count in the dark, and he was no longer smiling.

‘You come!’ he said, six or seven times, before he passed out. He fell a few feet from the postern and no one could carry him, so they pulled him to one side and prepared to hold the corridor, piling tables and trunks against the walls as cover from arrows.

‘You should go, sir,’ Sitalkes said.

‘Yes,’ said Darius. He was still bleeding, despite a linen wrap, and his pallor had reached a dangerous level. He spoke as if sleepwalking.

Kineas longed to go, but his own sense of himself as a man wouldn’t permit it. ‘No,’ he said.

They waited for a rush of guardsmen. Twice, men peeked around the far corner of the corridor, bronze glinting in the fitful light of the cressets. The nearest one was burning down, past the pitch to the solid wood that burned faster but gave less light. Pine wood smoke and ordure scents mixed, and smoke began to fill the corridor.

An arrow whispered out of the dark. It glanced off Sitalkes’ cavalry breastplate and ripped across another man’s bridle hand before embedding itself in an upturned table.

They all crouched low, as much to get their heads out of the smoke as to avoid the arrows.

‘Get ready,’ Kineas said.

‘Listen!’ Darius said, and collapsed, his limbs loosening all at once so that he slumped forward and his head rang as it hit a table.

‘Shit,’ said Sitalkes. He and one of the Keltoi grabbed the Persian under the arms and pulled him out of the line and back to the relative safety of the door.

‘I hear it too,’ said another man. ‘Fighting!’

Now Kineas could hear it. There was fighting somewhere else — Ares! What in Hades was going on? He rose to his feet and leaned out of the postern gate. There was movement on the slope below him, a line of shapes climbing the hill. He watched them for a long moment — one of the longest of his life — and then he identified something about the set of the cloak and the particular movements of the lead man.

‘Diodorus!’ he called.

In moments, the postern was crowded with armoured men — dismounted cavalry. Andronicus took command of all the Keltoi. Diodorus embraced Kineas.

‘We heard you were dead!’ he said.

‘Not dead yet.’ A roar shook the rafters. ‘What in Hades?’

‘Before we got your message, Philokles and Niceas said that something was wrong. They’re rushing the main gate.’

‘Ares and Aphrodite! They’ll be slaughtered!’ Kineas looked around wildly, even as Nicanor pushed forward, almost devoid of breath from the exertion of climbing the steepest face of the hill, Kineas’s helmet and breastplate clasped against his paunch.

‘Right,’ said Diodorus. He looked up and down the smoky corridor. ‘Andronicus, take your troop and push down that corridor. Eumenes, take your troop with me. Kill everyone.’

Kineas got his head into his breastplate. ‘Diodorus-’

Diodorus pushed past him. ‘You’re done, Strategos. Let us do our jobs. Right, follow me!’

Kineas refused to be set aside. Still wearing his captured shield, he pushed in behind Diodorus. They shoved the makeshift barriers out of the way in one long push.

‘Don’t be a fool, Kineas,’ Diodorus said.

‘I know how to get to the gate!’ Kineas said.

An arrow came out of the dark.

‘Shit,’ Diodorus said. ‘Charge!’ he yelled, and he was off down the corridor.

Kineas struggled to keep up and a flood of men led by Eumenes pushed behind him. At the corner, Eumenes pushed his strategos out of the way and got ahead. Side by side with Diodorus, he cleared the corridor, killing an archer and wounding another before the mass of them broke, screaming in panic.

The Hellenes poured in behind them. More men were coming through the postern, and they followed their appointed leaders blindly into the smoke and the darkness. Leon pushed past Kineas without knowing him and raced down the corridor to Diodorus and Eumenes, who were ten strides ahead, and they went up an undefended flight of stairs. Kineas could barely make his legs push him up behind them. Two more men passed him. The sounds of fighting were closer.

‘We’re above the gate,’ Diodorus said, apparently to Eumenes.

In the distance, ‘ Apollo! Apollo! ’, and the screams of wounded men. That was Philokles’ roar. Kineas felt new strength from the gods flood into his legs, and he flew up the rest of the stairs and saw Eumenes’ silver-chased breastplate glitter coldly at the end of another passageway and Leon’s black legs shining in the torchlight. Kineas ran, his bare feet slapping on stone.

The stupid barbarian archers were running for their friends and leading Diodorus to the gate. Kineas understood that even as he leaped over another dead archer in the semi-darkness. There was more smoke than before — something was on fire.

‘Athena!’ Diodorus roared — difficult to believe that such a thin man could release such a war cry. ‘ Apollo! ’ Closer.

Kineas was right behind Eumenes and another trooper — Amyntas, one of Heron’s gentlemen — and Leon. Eumenes and Leon were shoulder to shoulder, looking like gods in the flickering light. Diodorus hammered his shoulder into a closed door and it gave. As Leon and Eumenes added their weight, the door blew open and all three stumbled. An archer shot. Panicked or not, his arrow flew over Leon’s bowed head and punched Amyntas off his feet. Kineas leaped over the falling man and cut the archer down. His own sword felt good in his hand. He raised his shield and took an arrow, and then another, and pushed forward.

A spearhead came past him: Eumenes, covering him. He roared his war cry — it came out thin and high, ‘Athena!’ — and then he felt resistance against his shield and Eumenes was shoving against his back and he cut low. The resistance gave way and he felt a rush of cold air.

There were stars overhead. He was standing at the entrance to a tower, up on the wall and close to the main gate.

Somehow, Philokles had opened the gate. He stood in the courtyard, killing, with bodies all around him and the whole mass of the garrison trying to evict him and the men with him. ‘Apollo!’ he roared, and Kineas answered ‘Athena!’ and the garrison soldiers looked up and saw their doom behind them on the wall.

With the unanimity of despair, they broke, and the Hellenes hunted them through the corridors and killed them where they found them. The citadel was stormed, and too many of the Olbians had fallen in the taking to allow for any human behaviour by the stormers. They were animals, and like animals they roared through the rooms and corridors, destroying, raping, killing.

Kineas made no attempt to stop it. He could not have stopped it had he wished — the law of war was strict and the citadel had been stormed. And he lacked any will to resist. He came down from the wall with an avenging rush and they cleared the courtyard in moments, but the Olbian dead were everywhere, some burned with hot sand and some stabbed with many spears, and between Philokles’ wide spread legs was the body of Niceas.

Kineas threw himself on the body of his boyhood friend. Niceas was burned with sand and had a great gash on his unhelmeted head and a spear in his side, but he still had breath in him.

‘He lives!’ Kineas proclaimed.

Niceas shook his head gently. ‘Saves you the price of a brothel,’ he said, and coughed blood.

‘No,’ Kineas said. ‘No — Niceas!’

‘Graccus is waiting for me,’ Niceas said. He smiled, like a man who sees home at the end of a long journey, and died.

And Kineas held him for a while, until the skin under his forearms started to cool.

‘Let’s kill every fucker in the castle,’ Philokles said. He didn’t sound like himself. But Kineas thought it sounded like a fine plan.

Dawn. Smoke from burning sheds and the remnants of fires. Olbians, their faces black with soot, huddled against the wind, their bodies slack from exhaustion and guilt. Beyond sated. No man can survive a storming action and ever forget what he did when he was a beast.

A carpet of bodies from the courtyard to the throne room.

The floors were cold.

Leon had saved many of the citadel’s slaves. He and Nicanor and Eumenes had pushed them into the queen’s bedchamber and held the door. So in the light of dawn, Eumenes brought Banugul to Kineas where he sat on her throne. The blade of his Egyptian sword was clean, because he had wiped it fastidiously on the cloak of Sartobases. Just beyond Sartobases was the corpse of Therapon, who had died in the guards’ last stand, cut down by Philokles.

Kineas and Eumenes and Banugul were the only living people in the room. The scenes of orgy and debauchery on the walls were sad and pathetic.

‘I found her among the slaves,’ Eumenes said.

Kineas nodded.

‘I heard that — that Niceas is dead.’

‘Niceas is dead,’ Kineas said, and tears flowed. Eumenes joined him.

Kineas rose from her throne and walked to them. ‘I came to offer you life,’ he said. ‘You stupid bitch.’ The anger in him was great enough to kill her, but her death was not enough.

She met his eye steadily. ‘I had no choice,’ she said. ‘Kill me if you must. Throw my body to your wolves to rape if that sates you.’ Her voice shook with terror, and yet through her terror she was in control of herself. ‘I did what I had to, and failed. I will not go down to hell with lies.’

Kineas punched her so hard that her head snapped back and she shot off her feet and fell in a heap. ‘What could possibly excuse this?’ Kineas bellowed. She had fallen across the bodies of several of her courtiers, and she was fouled with their blood and worse. She spat blood and rose on one arm.

‘Alexander has murdered Parmenion,’ she said through a split lip and bruised jaw.

Kineas stumbled back and sat on the throne as if Ares had cut the sinews of his legs. ‘Gods,’ he said.

‘My so-called father will be on me in a month with five thousand men, desperate to wipe me out before he too is attacked by Alexander.’ She held her bruised head high. ‘I am not a slave, to bow my head. Alexander is my lord, and I will fight.’

Kineas didn’t want to look at her. The urge to kill was not sated. Every time he thought of Niceas’s corpse in the courtyard, he was ready to send more souls to Hades. But another part of him cried for redemption — the part that had roamed the corridors, exterminating archers who would have surrendered and joined him, perhaps, had his sword let them live. Yet another part accused him of behaving badly — seeking revenge on her for her role in showing him weak.

‘I’m sorry that I hit you,’ he said.

She said nothing. Her eyes roamed the room, looking at the dead.

‘Go to him, then,’ he said. ‘Take your slaves and go.’

‘You were right,’ she said, her voice dead.

‘Right?’ he asked. What did he expect her to say?

‘My garrison wasn’t worth a crap,’ she said coldly. ‘I wish you had joined me.’

He shook his head. ‘Get you gone before I change my mind,’ he said.

In an hour, she was gone. And he was master of a citadel full of corpses.