Tyrant

19

The next day dawned red, with a promise of heavy weather later in the day. Kineas gathered all the men of Olbia in a great half-circle, a conscious recreation of the place of assembly in the city. Kineas and Nicomedes had worked to make the assembly ground as familiar as possible.

It was an odd assembly, because, for whatever reason, all the men, hoplites and hippeis, brought their spears, and stood leaning on them, so that the assembly was a forest of bright spear points in the red morning light.

First came Helladius, a priest of Apollo, who made a sacrifice in the name of the god and declared the day favourable, just as he would have in Olbia. He was solemn, and the steam that rose from the blood of his slaughtered lamb in the red light of dawn seemed to waft the sacrifice straight to the gods.

After Helladius, Nicomedes strode to the centre of the assembly and spoke. He stood in the centre of the half-circle, holding his spear like every other man present. He didn’t look like a fop this morning.

‘Men of Olbia,’ he said. ‘Fellow citizens!’ He proceeded to tell the story of the war, from its inception to the demands made by Zopryon. He rehearsed for them every vote they had made — the grants of citizenship to the mercenaries, the subsidies of money to the archon for more men, more arms, armour, horses, more mercenaries. The treaty with the king of the Sakje, and the treaty with the city of Pantecapaeum. If it was dry, or boring, no one showed it. They stood leaning on their spears, grumbling when they didn’t like his point, or speaking up with shouts of ‘That’s right’, and ‘There’s the thing!’ when they felt that Nicomedes had the right of it.

Nicomedes took them right through to the end. When he came to the presence of the new garrison in the citadel, they groaned, and the spear points moved as if they were blades of grass in the wind. And then he spoke to them of the proclamation, and the threat of exile, and their voices rose around him until he could not make himself heard. He glanced at Kineas, shrugged, and stepped down.

Kineas motioned to Niceas, and the hyperetes drew a breath and blew a single note on his cavalry trumpet. Then he walked forward into the empty ground at the centre of the crowd.

His appearance was greeted with a grumble. Nicomedes was what they were used to; Nicomedes addressed the assembly on every issue that appeared. Kineas was a mercenary whom they had voted to citizenship. A foreigner from Athens. And, as hipparch, the captain of the city’s financial and social elite. But his military reputation stood him in good stead, and he received a silence punctuated only by a handful of complaints, imprecations and conversations.

‘Men of Olbia,’ he began. ‘I stand before you, almost a stranger, and yet your captain in war. I have appeared in your assembly only a handful of times, and yet I will dare to address this one as if I were an old citizen — as if I were Cleitus, or Nicomedes or some other voice to whom you are accustomed. According to the tyrant of Olbia, whoever that is today, I am no longer a citizen.’

Kineas gestured at the camp, the horses and wagons and herds of the Sakje. ‘Learn the lesson of Anarchises the Scyth,’ Kineas said. ‘You are the city. You, the citizens, are the city. The walls and the citadel are nothing. They hold no vote in the assembly. Not one stone will speak to defend the archon or Cleomenes. Not one house will proclaim him as king, or as tyrant. No roof will speak to vote a law in his favour. No statue will rise to defend the archon. Do not be slaves to your walls, men of Olbia. You are the city. Will you vote to continue what you have started?

‘You, not the archon, hold the city in your hands — you have the power to make war, or peace. The presence of a garrison in our citadel is of as much moment to you, men of Olbia, as would the presence this moment of a thief in your shop, or rats in your granary. It is something we will have to deal with when we return from this war.’

Silence. The hillside was quiet enough that horses in the king’s herds could be heard whickering to one another.

‘Nicomedes has related how this assembly voted on each step of this war. You are not the aggressors. You have not marched with fire and spear to burn the lands of Macedon, or sent mighty fleets to raid their shores and take their women!’ His mock-Homeric language and the absurdity of the image — Olbia launching aggressive war against Macedon — got him a laugh. ‘You sought peace, and only sanctioned war when Zopryon made clear that he would not accept peace.’

Kineas paused, took a breath, and when he spoke, his voice was level, quiet, but assured. ‘Zopryon is losing this war,’ he said.

A hundred voices — the men who had ridden north and west to fight the Getae — were raised. Kineas lifted a hand.

‘Enough of you rode north to speak here, or anywhere, of how badly we defeated Zopryon’s barbarian allies. But there have been other conflicts. The men of Pantecapaeum met the Macedonian squadron and destroyed it. Even now, they cruise the Hellespont, taking a toll from any Macedonian ship bold enough to venture north of Byzantium. Even now, our allies, the Sakje, are harrying Zopryon’s advance, killing his foragers, riding in close at night and shooting arrows into their campfires, or killing men who go beyond the circle of fires to have a piss.

‘Zopryon has garrisoned a dozen forts between here and Tomis. He has divided his force and divided it again to force a passage over the sea of grass, and now, when his doom is close and the hooves of the Sakje echo in his dreams, the Tyrant of Olbia declares that we should put our spears on our shoulders and slink home or face exile. The Tyrant has betrayed us. Like tyrants everywhere, he thinks that his word can order the will of all men, and like a tyrant, he gives orders without consulting you.’

Kineas found it difficult to decide how this was going down. His eyes strayed to familiar faces — Ajax and Leucon, and the young men of their generation, who stood closest to him, were already in full agreement — but what of the older men who stood farther back? And Eumenes stood alone, his eyes red. Today, for all his beauty and his heroism, he had no friends.

Too late to worry over it. ‘Today, we, here, are the city of Olbia. The archon, or Cleomenes, or whoever holds power today in the city has revealed by his proclamation that he is a tyrant.’ Kineas raised an arm and shouted, ‘He is a tyrant!’ and the assembly responded with shouts and calls. He began to feel that he had them. ‘His laws are not valid! His proclamation is worthless! The Tyrant of Olbia can sit in his citadel with his Macedonian garrison and proclaim himself the Great King of the Medes and the absolute Lord of the Moon. Here, right here, are the bones and sinews of Olbia! If we stand with the Sakje, we can destroy Zopryon — and then we can march home and deal with the rats in our manger at leisure. Or we can tuck our spears between our legs and drag our asses home to Olbia and proclaim ourselves slaves. Have it as you will — you are free men.’

There was a silence, and then Eumenes came forward, leaning on his spear like an older man. The crowd parted for him as if he had a disease. Kineas stepped aside for him, and the young man raised his voice.

‘My father,’ he said, ‘is a traitor. The archon is a traitor. And I will remain to fight beside the Sakje, whatever you vote.’

He turned away. Kineas reached out to him, but he turned his face away and walked through the crowd. Kineas was glad when he saw that Ajax was following him.

Other men spoke. No man spoke directly for the archon, but there were those who questioned their right to assemble and vote, barracks lawyers of the commonest sort, and more who wanted to march on the city immediately and seize it back from the archon.

Kineas stood with his hand clenched on the bronze socket of his spear. He could smell the rain in the air and feel the throb of distant summer lightning. He ceased to listen to the men who spoke, because… he was an owl, flying out over the sea of grass, flying out of the sun towards the clouds that rose like pillars over the advancing Macedonian host, and their dust rose like another pillar, an ugly brown one.

At the feet of the monster of dust and men, the Sakje toiled, knots and bunches of them riding close and then riding away. He looked for Srayanka, but from this height, the riders were dots in the sea of green.

They were close, though. Close, and the storm was getting ready to break.

Cheers brought him back. Nicomedes greeted Kineas by clasping his hands — both of them — and embracing him. Leucon and Ajax, and men he didn’t know as well crowded around. Many of them were deeply moved — one tall man wept openly, and others were close to tears, or hoarse from shouting. Even Memnon was moved. He grunted and smiled before he caught himself.

Kineas and Nicomedes were in the middle of more than a thousand men, buffeted to and fro by the storm of congratulations.

‘I take it we carried the day,’ Kineas said. As he looked about, he felt that the emotion of these men was affecting him — his throat was closing, his eyes hot.

Nicomedes rolled his eyes. ‘My dear Hipparch,’ he said. ‘You may be the man for an ambush or a cavalry charge — but you don’t know much about managing an assembly. If you had spoken last, you might have seen — but you didn’t. As it was,’ Nicomedes shrugged, ‘I was only worried once.’

‘When was that?’ Kineas asked, shouting.

‘The sacrifice,’ Nicomedes shouted. ‘Helladius cannot be bribed, the old fool. A bad omen might have sunk us. Other than that — you were right, Hipparch, to tell them early and often. Had this treason taken us by surprise — suddenly — I shudder to think. But prepared, with time to grumble and drink some wine — they never hesitated.’

‘Thank the gods,’ Kineas said. ‘I must go to the king.’

Nicomedes nodded. ‘Certainly. But Kineas — may I advise you? When this war is over, our world will change. The Tyrant will have to be deposed. And we will have to have new ways of doing things. The way you act with the king — all of our relations — will set the path for the next generation of men who rule in the Euxine cities. Don’t rush to him as if he was our patron. Act his equal. Don’t appear like an eager supplicant to him — send him a message declaring our whole support — tell him that we carried the assembly without a count — put his mind at ease. But do it with a message, so that the Olbians see that we don’t dance to their tune — we are allies, not subjects.’

Kineas gave Nicomedes a hard look — thinking that way could sink an alliance.

The man shook his head. ‘Glare at me all you like. An empowered assembly — an assembly that has just rejected tyranny — is a dangerous, powerful animal.’

Kineas made a face. ‘I don’t like it,’ he said. There is already too much between me and the king. But he waved to Ajax.

Ajax went to the king and returned. A band of Patient Wolves came into camp with empty saddles and many wounded. A troop of Sauromatae nobles, armoured from head to foot, rode off to the west in close order.

Kineas found that he was standing in the flap of his wagon, watching the king’s laager and trying to will the man to send for him. He was starved for news. And his dream — his waking dream — told him that the danger was close.

Philokles came up, rubbing his hands on a piece of linen. His hair was clean and his skin newly oiled. ‘I have made sacrifice to all the gods,’ Philokles said.

Kineas nodded. ‘It is a good day to greet the gods,’ he said, his eyes still on the king’s camp. ‘I believe Diodorus is doing the same?’

Philokles sat on the wagon step, using a small knife to get sacrificial blood out from under his nails. He nodded absently at the mention of Diodorus, and said, ‘When we get to this battle?’

‘Yes?’ Kineas asked. He misunderstood Philokles’ purpose. ‘It’ll be different in battle. The Sakje have some heavy cavalry — I was surprised by how well armoured the nobles are, and you saw the Sauromatae — they’re like brick ovens on horses. But they can’t manoeuvre like us.’ He glanced at Philokles and saw that he had missed his mark. ‘That’s not what you wanted to know, is it?’ he said with some embarrassment.

Philokles shook his head. ‘No. Interesting enough, but no. Where do you die? Do you mind if I do something to prevent it?’

Kineas frowned, then smiled. ‘I think I’m too used to it. It has become the central fact of my existence, and yet it is like a burden released. I know the hour of my death — I know we will triumph. It seems almost a fair exchange.’ He shrugged, because there was no explaining how he felt about it — the fatalism. ‘I don’t worry as much as I used to,’ he said, hoping that this would sound like a joke.

Philokles’ face grew red, and his eyes sparkled, and he smacked the wagon bed with his fist so that the whole wagon moved. ‘Bullshit! Bullshit, Hipparch! You do not need to die. I have great respect for Kam Baqca. But her trances come from drugs — from the seeds they all carry. I say it again — she has foreseen her death, and it colours all her dreams.’ He paused, took a breath. ‘Tell me where you die?’

Kineas sighed. He pointed out at the ford. ‘It is not here — but it is very like. There should be a huge tree on the far bank, and driftwood on a beach — also on the far side. Big driftwood — whole tree trunks. That’s what I remember.’ He shrugged. ‘I haven’t really looked.’

Philokles stood like a bull, breathing through his nose — angry, or frustrated, or both. ‘You haven’t looked. Do you think the battle will be here?’

Looking out the flap in the wagon tent, Kineas could see Eumenes and Niceas standing with a third man — a big man. Niceas gestured toward Kineas. Kineas saw that the third man was the Sindi smith. He poured himself a cup of wine. He gestured silently at Philokles, who nodded, and he poured wine for the Spartan while he responded.

‘I think it will be here — yes. The road runs to this ford, and this is the best ford for stades — dozens, even hundreds of stades. The king assures me this is true.’ Even as Kineas said this, he considered the assertion. It was untested. He should be exploring himself. The Sakje were superb horsemen, but they were not professional soldiers, and he’d already seen the difference between their observational skills — excellent, and their scouting reports — pitiful. His own sense of fatalism was sapping his professional competence.

Philokles took the wine. ‘So what — Zopryon will just march up to the river, see our camp, and force a crossing?’

Kineas could see Niceas and the smith walking up the hill toward the wagon. ‘It will depend on how badly the next week hurts him. On the spirit that motivates his army. I think he will march up to the ford, and camp, leaving a strong force to block the ford. This will free him from night raids and allow his men to sleep — and if the Sakje have harassed him for a week, that sleep will be valuable. After he’s rested his men and horses for a day — perhaps two — he’ll make his move.’

‘Straight across the ford?’ Philokles asked.

‘Alexander — or rather Parmenion — had two ways to deal with this. One was to force a crossing with the cavalry, and then use them to cover the taxeis when they cross.’ Kineas smiled wolfishly. ‘That would not work against the Sakje. If Zopryon attempts it, he will be beaten swiftly. So rather, the second method — to send the taxeis across with shields locked, push up our bank, and then move cavalry across under cover of the pikes.’ Kineas nodded to himself. ‘I’ve seen it done. It has the added charm of demoralizing the foe — every unit you get across and formed in line seems like another stitch in his winding sheet.’

Philokles finished his wine. ‘So, it will all hinge on Memnon holding the taxeis at the river?’

Kineas shook his head. ‘No. If I have my way, we’ll let him cross unopposed. We’ll let him have our camp.’

Philokles nodded slowly. ‘Are you perhaps more Sakje in your heart than Greek? Is not the loss of your camp the ultimate humiliation?’

Kineas shook his head. ‘Slavery and defeat are the ultimate humiliation. But yes, in this, I am more Sakje than Greek.’

Philokles watched the three men coming. ‘They want to speak to you. Listen, then — I want to fight on foot, with the phalanx. I’m wasted in the saddle, and if you are going to sacrifice yourself for glory, I refuse to watch it.’ His voice was tight with emotion. He looked away, steadied himself, and his voice became lighter. ‘Memnon seems to feel that he could use me to keep some youngsters in line.’

Kineas suspected it was all pre-battle jitters. Even Spartans succumbed. He rested a hand on the iron muscles of Philokles’ shoulder. ‘Fight where you will. I swear I intend no sacrifice. I would rather live.’ He thought of the iron-coloured horse, and the dreams, which grew more frequent. They were true dreams. But he wouldn’t tell Philokles the details.

‘It is almost hubris, this assumption of doom.’ Philokles put his cup down carefully. ‘I tell you, if I can break this — this dream of ill omen, break it I will.’ He grabbed the rib of the wagon tent and swung himself to the ground, brushing by Niceas, and walked off into the evening.

‘You remember Hephaestes, here?’ Niceas asked, jerking his thumb at the Sindi blacksmith.

Kineas swung down with the pitcher of wine. He glanced automatically at the king’s laager and saw a man dismounting, his arms moving feverishly. Kineas made himself turn away and offered watered wine to Niceas, then to Eumenes, whose face had aged ten years in the last day, and finally to the smith.

The smith took the wine cup and set it carefully on the ground. ‘I become man of you,’ he said without preamble.

Kineas pursed his lips and shook his head. ‘Say again,’ he said in Sakje.

The smith nodded. ‘My village is destroyed. I have no family. I will swear gutyramas to you.’

Kineas looked at Eumenes. ‘I don’t know that word.’

Eumenes shook his head. ‘Some of our farmers hold land by gutyramas. It is more than tenancy — almost like joining a family. A loyalty bond, not just a deal for cash.’ Eumenes shrugged. ‘Farmers bound that way are better workers — and more demanding. Lawsuits, dowries — like I say, they feel they have become family, like being adopted as a cousin.’

Kineas spread his hands. ‘I have no land to give you, smith. I hold no land.’

The smith rubbed the back of his neck. ‘We broke men,’ he said, and he pointed down the hill at the other Sindi refugees from the north. ‘Some of us, the Cruel Hands accept — others, no man’s man are. No family, no farm. Gone, in the smoke.’ He looked up, met Kineas’s eye. ‘They take me for leading. Yes? I have nothing. I offer it, and them, of you. Me, I seek death, but for them, I seek life. Am I speaking so that you hear?’

Kineas nodded, wishing he had Ataelus, but Ataelus was pursuing his dream of a horse herd with Srayanka and the Cruel Hands. To Niceas, he said, ‘Can we feed them?’

‘Fifty men? I expect we can. What would we do with them? Camp servants? We have enough.’ Niceas raised an eyebrow.

Kineas nodded. He gestured to the smith. ‘What’s your name?’ he asked.

‘Temerix,’ he said, then frowned.

‘The Sindi form of Hephaestes,’ Eumenes put in.

‘Come with me, then,’ he said. Finally, an excuse to go to the king.

He walked up the hill to the king’s laager, followed by Temerix and Niceas. Nobody challenged them at the gate of the laager, and the king sat on the tongue of his wagon, straightening arrows with Marthax. Kam Baqca sat on the grass, her leather skirts gathered around her, sipping tea.

‘Kineas!’ the king said, getting to his feet. His pleasure was unfeigned.

Kineas stopped and gave a military salute, and then led the smith forward. He explained the situation in a few words, and the king watched him carefully, and then asked the smith sharp questions in unaccented Sindi.

The smith answered in single words.

The king turned to Kineas. ‘If you do this thing, you may create tension with the Cruel Hands — these are their people. It seems to me that they’ve been allowed to fall through the cracks in the pot while we carried on the war. This man says you rescued his band, and he wants to swear his oath to you.’ The king’s displeasure was obvious. ‘If I let him swear to you, I make you a lord,’ he said. ‘I am not sure that I am prepared to make you a lord — and I suspect I would insult my cousin. Srayanka will not forgive either of us. Knowing that, will you accept his oath, and be his lord?’

Kineas shook his head. ‘I do not desire to be any man’s lord.’

The king was visibly taken aback. Then he said, ‘Just when I think I know you Greeks, you shock me again. That you must vote to make a war that is already upon you — that you will own a slave but will not take a man’s oath of service.’

Kineas held the king’s eye. ‘I will not be his lord,’ he said. ‘I will take him and all his men in service, as psiloi, and I will pay them a wage and see that they are fed. And when Srayanka returns, I will see that those who wish her lordship receive it.’

The king nodded and rubbed his chin. He spoke again in Sindi, and after a while the smith nodded. He offered Kineas his hand, and they shook. And then Niceas took the smith away, to find him and his band a place to camp, instead of the wet river bank where they had been in hiding for days.

‘What news?’ Kineas asked, when they were gone.

The king glanced at Marthax, and then at Kam Baqca. The three held each other’s eyes, excluding Kineas. Then they all turned to Kineas together. ‘We wondered how long you could remain absent,’ the king said.

Kineas took an arrow from the king’s pile and held it up to the sun. The arrowhead had three blades, each wickedly barbed on the back, cast in bronze. ‘I have to act the hipparch,’ he said finally. ‘What we did in the assembly — the effects will linger a long time. In effect, we deposed the archon.’

‘Who may already be dead,’ Kam Baqca said in her odd, Ionic Greek.

‘You have seen it?’

‘I see nothing but the monster on the sea of grass. But people tell me tales.’

The king nodded, and the distance Kineas had felt on the ride back from the Getae campaign was there, and deeper, too. There was pain in the king’s eyes. ‘I, too, have to act. I have dead this day, Kineas — too many dead. Because, as you said, Zopryon learned quickly. Thessalian cavalry smashed the Patient Wolves — a simple trap. A hundred empty saddles, and an angry clan.’

Kineas bent his head.

The king went on. ‘Your tyrant killed those men. If you had been here to advise, they would not have ridden off so eagerly, so blindly, the second time.’

‘Or they would have,’ Marthax said with a harsh shrug. ‘Don’t make too much of it, Lord. We have dealt raking wounds and taken a bee sting in return.’

The king swung to Kineas. ‘Just as you predicted, he learns quickly. Now the boat is fully in current, is it not? And I must ride it until it washes up at my destination or smashes on the rocks. This battle — it is close now, is it not?’ He glared at both of them. ‘I am now committed to the battle you wanted.’

Kineas stood still. He looked at Kam Baqca, and she swirled the tea in her cup and looked at the last leaves there. He could smell the resin and pine odour of her drug on the wind — there was a brazier lit at her feet. She raised her head and their eyes met. Her eyes were huge, deep, and brown, and in them… he could see the column moving across the sea of grass, as he swooped lower and lower, and he could see the bands of Sakje spread around the column for stades in all directions. The Macedonian column came on like a man’s boot kicking an anthill, but the ants rode in closer, bolder than real ants, and every ant dealt a wound. But the seeing faded into another seeing, and the Macedonian column became a snake with a huge head, or a giant maggot, eating everything in its path and spewing wreckage out the tail — chewing on Sakje and Olbians, on triremes and city walls, exuding the excrement of burned homes and fields of stubble, fresh graves and unburied corpses.

And she grimaced at him, a very male look on her made-up face. ‘It is all I can see,’ she said. There was pain in her voice. ‘You too?’

‘Yes,’ said Kineas. ‘It comes to me awake, now.’

She nodded. ‘It will come more and more often. You are a strong dreamer.’ She looked at her tea leaves. ‘For the first time, I begin to hope for death, because I cannot bear to watch the monster cross the plains — the defiler, the tyrant. Everything it touches is polluted, stripped, killed. It will take me, soon enough.’ She narrowed her eyes. ‘My body will be dung for the monster,’ she whispered.

Kineas glanced at the king, and Marthax. Marthax seemed to pretend he had heard nothing. The king turned away, embarrassed or saddened.

‘It is all I can see,’ she said again. ‘I am no use to the king, and I fear to tell him anything lest I rush him to this battle. I have raised the spirits that will fight — I have done what I can. Now I just sit and drink tea and wait for doom.’

Kineas nodded. ‘It is close,’ he said. He found that, despite everything, he wanted to comfort her.

She looked at him across her teacup, and her eyes drew him again. He looked away rather than fall back into the dream. The smell of her drug was powerful. She said, ‘Kineas — it is all balanced on a knife edge.’

The king ignored her and waved at the plains. ‘We haven’t slowed him as much as we hoped. His vanguard will be here tomorrow — or the next day at the latest.’

Kineas nodded.

The king gave a small shrug. ‘Since we began to harass him, he has pressed harder. His army is wounded — as Marthax says, we have hit hard. The faster he moves, the more stragglers he has — and no straggler lives to see another dawn. But he is moving fast, now. Another day — perhaps two. He’s leaving everything behind to make speed.’

Kineas nodded. ‘Best recall the clans. We want the army on this side before Zopryon closes the ford.’

The king gave him an angry glance. ‘I’m doing my best, Hipparch.’

Kineas leaned forward. ‘Let me help.’

The battle was closer — closer by a week than he had expected. A week less of life. When he allowed himself to think about it, he was neither completely committed to the idea of death, nor had he thought through all of the ramifications of his dream. The battlefield, for instance. If his death dream was accurate, the battle would not be fought at the Great Bend. This thought had tripped across the stage of his mind before, but this time, fresh from the king and riding a surge of excitement and worry, Kineas elected to do something about it.

And the time was now. His battle was upon him — no more than two days away. He’d spent an hour thinking just how the battle would happen. Philokles had challenged his assumptions — Philokles was right.

He hailed Niceas, and ordered him to fetch Heron, the hipparch of Pantecapaeum. Heron had learned quite a few lessons at Cleitus’s knee. If three weeks had not transformed him into the image of Hektor, if he had not yet learned to be courteous, professional, or polite, he had learned to be silent. He stood at every command meeting among the Greeks, a little distant from the others, a little hesitant to join in comment or laughter. He was a tall man, and he loomed over them, silent, and at times, sullen.

Kineas wanted to give the man a new start, and raise him in his own estimation.

‘Heron,’ he said, as the man came up.

‘Hipparch,’ Heron replied, with a civil salute. He was so tall that he appeared clumsy, and his legs were too long to look good on a horse. And he was dour — perhaps a reaction to being born ugly. He crossed his arms, not from nerves, but because they were so long that he had to do something with them. Kineas, who was too short to be accounted really handsome, felt some fellow feeling for the boy due to his ungainliness. Heron had something about him that suggested that when he was tested, he would not be found wanting — despite his attitude.

After offering him wine, Kineas went straight to business. ‘I need the river scouted, north and south. The Sakje tell me there are no fords for a hundred stades — I’d like to know that myself. I’m going to give you the picked scouts of all the troops. Go south first — the greatest calamity, at this point, would be if Zopryon got between us and Olbia.’ Kineas winced even as he made the comment. With the archon’s treason, if Zopryon could slip past them to the south, he could rest his army at Olbia, receive supplies, and march up the river at his leisure. It had occurred to him that Zopryon might march straight to Olbia, trusting to the ferry at the river mouth to get his army across and into the city.

That was a possibility against which Kineas and the king had no plan. Kineas rubbed his right hand over his forehead and down his nose, sighed, and looked up at Heron, who stood silently.

‘I need the river scouted, as far south as the bend of trees. Have your men test the water — really look at it. We can’t afford a surprise. As soon as you have swept the south, come back here and go north.’

Heron straightened. ‘Very well.’ He saluted with ill grace. ‘I perceive that you send me from the camp. Where do I find these picked scouts?’

Kineas gestured to Niceas. ‘Crax, Sitalkes, Antigonus, and twenty more of your choice, Niceas. And Lykeles — with Laertes as acting hyperetes.’

Niceas’s eyebrows twitched. ‘Yes, Hipparch,’ he said, with a shade of edge to his voice.

‘Heron — this is a vital task. Do it well. Listen to Lykeles and Laertes. Ride like the wind. I need to know my flank is secure by nightfall tomorrow.’

Heron saluted. Nothing about the man suggested that he was pleased to be given an important mission — nor did he offer any hint of insubordination. He walked off, back stiff, and Niceas shook his head. ‘Diodorus would have been more the mark, if you don’t mind my saying.’

Kineas picked his cloak off his equipment pile by the fire and threw it over his shoulders. ‘I need Diodorus. We may be fighting by tomorrow night.’ He shrugged. ‘Call me a fool — something tells me that young Heron will do well — and he’s the man I can spare.’ He shivered. Darkness was falling, and the weight of all his responsibilities was pressing rational thought from his mind. Zopryon — where would he try to cross? Would he march to Olbia? The Olbians — would they fight? Would their newfound attempt at democracy last through a cold night before battle, or would they melt away? Food, firewood, fodder for horses, the number of lame mounts. Srayanka was still across the ford — so were half the Sakje horse and most of the clan leaders. Srayanka — he clamped down on those thoughts. ‘Zeus guide me,’ he muttered.

Niceas pressed a cup of warm tea into his hands, and he drank, and shivered when the warmth surged down his throat. ‘Thanks,’ he said. ‘Now get me all the Greek officers — Memnon included. It’s time to talk through how we will fight.’

Diodorus was the first in. Despite his worries, Kineas was pleased to see how naturally Diodorus had taken to command. Indeed, it was now hard to imagine that the man had been a gentleman trooper for four years of campaigning, grumbling about taking his shift on guard, complaining about the weight of his javelins. He appeared taller, and his splendid breastplate and crested helm, even his stance, with his legs a little spread and his hand on his hip, spoke of a commander — as did the slight hollows under his eyes.

‘I’ve barely seen you,’ Kineas said, taking his hand.

Diodorus had taken command of the pickets around the camp as soon as Kineas took command of the Olbians. He returned the pressure and took a cup of hot wine from one of the Sindi men around the fire. ‘Cleomenes,’ he said quietly. ‘Bastard. Worse than home.’

Kineas raised an eyebrow, knowing that Diodorus meant the thirty tyrants in Athens. ‘The vote wasn’t even close. The men will be fine.’

Diodorus shook his head. ‘I saw it coming. Philokles saw it coming — we all saw it, and we couldn’t prevent it.’ He took a drink of wine and glanced at Eumenes who stood with Ajax at the next fire. ‘And that boy’s father killed old Cleitus. It’s worse than fucking Athens!’ He glared. ‘And now the bastard can swing south and have a base.’

Kineas nodded, watching Memnon’s black cloak coming towards the fire. ‘I’m taking precautions.’

‘If he knows — he can cut straight south, march right past us, and cross at the ferry.’ Diodorus drew a rough map in the scorched soil at the edge of the fire pit.

Kineas raised his hands to the gods. ‘I don’t think he will. I think his own image — his idea of who he is — will require him to come right up to our army and fight it.’ He frowned. ‘Cleomenes — I’m assuming he’s in charge in the city — has raised the stakes. In exchange for personal power, he has traded our futures. Now, if we lose, Zopryon really will get the city. And if Zopryon knows that, all the more reason to fight a battle. He must think that one big fight and the whole sea of grass is his — the Euxine cities, the gold of the Scyths, everything.’

While they talked, the others had gathered, and the last light was gone from the sky, so that a ring of faces, pale and dark, listened intently as Diodorus and Kineas discussed the campaign. Memnon stood with his lieutenant, Licurgus, and the commander of the phalanx of Pantecapaeum, Kleisthenes. Nicomedes stood with Ajax, and Leucon with Eumenes and Niceas.

Kineas turned from Diodorus to face all of them. ‘The waiting is over. Zopryon has made good time. He has, according to the king, abandoned his weak and his wounded to move faster in the last week, and he is almost upon us. Tomorrow the king will recall the clans who have harassed Zopryon’s march. We will stand to from the rise of the sun. The phalanx of Olbia will draw up to the north of the ford, right here at the base of our hill. The Phalanx of Pantecapaeum will draw up to the south of the ford. As soon as you are in place, you will drill in closing the ford.’ Kineas drew in the black earth. ‘The phalanx of Olbia will practise closing files and marching by ranks to the left — the phalanx of Pantecapaeum will practise marching by ranks to the right. You see how this will allow us to close the ford — quickly, without panic.’

All the officers nodded. Memnon snorted. ‘We don’t need to practise marching by ranks, Hipparch.’ Kineas looked at Memnon. Memnon met his eye but shifted. ‘Oh, all right. We’ll march up and down a little.’

Kineas relented. ‘Even if the men don’t need the practice, it will help show the Sakje what we’re about.’

‘Fair enough,’ Memnon said. ‘What’re you fancy horse boys doing while we pound the dirt?’

Kineas pointed off into the gloom to the west. ‘Diodorus and Nicomedes will take their men across the ford at first light. They will establish a line of pickets five stades out from the ford. Diodorus will have the command. He will make sure that the ford is not surprised. He will pass every returning clan and provide them with a herald to pass the ford. Leucon will keep his men right here — as a reserve, and as messengers for me, and for the king, should he need them. Leucon will take the men of Pantecapaeum under his command until their hipparch returns. Everyone understand? We’re going to provide security at the ford until the king’s army has returned. The loss of the ford to a surprise would be a catastrophe.’

Ajax raised a hand. ‘Are there other fords?’

Kineas rubbed his beard with his right hand. ‘The Sakje say not. I have Heron of Pantecapaeum scouting the river for a hundred stades either way to make sure.’ He made a sour face. ‘I should have been scouting them three days ago. Now we’re pressed for time. Any other questions?’

Memnon grunted. ‘If they do come for the ford? What then?’

Kineas raised his voice. ‘Tomorrow — and until I say different — if they make a dash for the ford, we close our ranks and stop them. It’s not the battle I want — but we can’t give up the ford until our army is back. So we have no plan for tomorrow beyond this — hold your ground.’

Memnon nodded. ‘I like a simple plan. How big a fight will this be? As big as Issus?’

Kineas thought over what the king had said, and what he had seen in Kam Baqca’s fire. ‘Yes. As big as Issus.’

Memnon jerked his thumb at the huddle of Sindi men at the next fire. ‘Where do you plan to put them?’

Kineas shook his head. ‘I hadn’t given it any thought,’ he said, feeling foolish. Memnon had the ability to get straight under his professional skin.

Memnon grinned. ‘Psiloi can’t win a fight, but they can change one. I’ll put them in the trees right by the ford, where they’ll have a clear shot with their bows — right into the unshielded side of the taxeis. Leave it to me.’

Kineas agreed. ‘So muster them with the hoplites,’ he said. ‘Anything else?’

Nicomedes leaned forward. ‘What are the odds?’ he asked.

Kineas gave the man a thin smile. ‘Ask me tomorrow. Ask me after I lay eyes on his vanguard. Right now, we’re all starting at shadows. My stomach is flipping like a flute girl in the last hour of a symposium, and every time I glance at the rising moon I think of ten more things I ought to have done.’ He hoped it was the time for such frankness. ‘If Zopryon will cooperate by coming here and camping across the river and offering the battle we’ve prepared for all summer — then, with the aid of the gods, I would say we were worth a sizeable bet.’ He shrugged, thinking again that the Great Bend was not the site of his dream battle.

Eumenes’ eyes brimmed with pain and hero worship. ‘You will beat them,’ he said.

‘From your lips to the ears of the gods,’ Kineas replied, flinching from Eumenes’ obvious passion. He poured wine from his cup as a libation, and his hand shook, and the wine flowed over his hand like dark blood.