King of the Bosphorus t-4

by Christian Cameron

  King of the Bosphorus

  ( Tyrant - 4 )

  Christian Cameron

  Christian Cameron

  King of the Bosphorus

  311 BC

  Eumeles sat at a plain table on a stool made of forged iron, his long back as straight as the legs on his stool and his stylus moving quickly over a clean tablet. He pursed his lips when he inscribed a sloppy sigma in the red wax, and he rubbed it out fastidiously and went back to writing his list of requirements.

  Most of his requirements had to do with money.

  'The farmers are not used to a direct tax,' Idomenes, his secretary, said.

  Eumeles glared at him. 'They'd best get used to it. This fleet is costing me everything in the treasury.'

  Idomenes was afraid of his master, but he set his hip as if he was wrestling. 'Many won't pay.'

  'Put soldiers to collecting,' Eumeles said.

  'Men will call you a tyrant.'

  'Men already call me a tyrant. I am a tyrant. I need that money. See that it is collected. These small farmers need some of the independence crushed out of them. We would grow more grain if we pushed out the Maeotae and used big estates – like Aegypt.'

  Idomenes shrugged. 'Traditionally, my lord, we have taxed the grain as it went on the ships.'

  'I did that, as you well know. That money was spent immediately. I need more.' Eumeles looked up from his tablet. 'I've really had enough of this. Simply obey.'

  Idomenes shrugged. 'As you wish, lord. But there will be trouble.' The secretary opened the bag at his hip and withdrew a pair of scrolls tied with cord and sealed with wax. 'The reports from Alexandria. Do you want them today?'

  Eumeles pursed his lips again. 'Read them and give me a precis. Neither of our people there ever seems to report anything I can use. I sometimes wonder if Stratokles didn't recruit mere gossips.'

  Idomenes cracked the wax, unwound the cord and rolled his eyes. 'Cheap papyrus!' he commented angrily, as the scroll fragmented under his fingers into long, narrow strips.

  Eumeles grunted. He went back to his lists – headed by his need to hire competent helmsmen to man his new fleet. He needed a fleet to complete the conquest of the Euxine – a set of conquests that would soon leave the easy pickings behind and start on the naval powers, like Heraklea and Sinope, across the sea. And the west coast, which would bring him into conflict with Lysimachos. He feared the wily Macedonian, but Eumeles was himself part of a larger alliance, with Antigonus One-Eye and his son Demetrios. His new fleet had been built with subsidies from One-Eye. And the man expected results.

  'Ooi!' Idomenes shouted, leaping to his feet. 'The woman actually has something of value. Goodness – the gods smile on us! Listen: "After the feast of Apollo, Leon the merchant summoned his captains and announced to them that he planned to use his fleet to topple Eumeles, with the approval of the lord of Aegypt. He further announced that he would finance a taxeis of Macedonians and a squadron of mercenary warships." Blah, blah – she names every man at the meeting. Goodness, my lord, she's quite the worthy agent. There's a note in the margin – "Diodorus…" That name means something? "… has the Exiles… with Seleucus"?'

  Eumeles nodded. He found his fists were clenched. 'Diodorus is the most dangerous of the lot. Damn it! I thought Stratokles was going to rid me of these impudent brats and their wealthy supporters. It's like a plague of head lice defeating Achilles. Hardly worthy opponents. So – they're coming?'

  Idomenes checked the scroll, running his fingers down the papyrus. 'Ares, Lord of War – they may already have sailed!'

  'Why haven't we read this scroll before?' Eumeles asked.

  'I see – no – they'll sail next week. He's buying a squadron of mercenary captains – Ptolemy's offcasts.' Idomenes smiled.

  'Ptolemy will never win this war if he keeps shedding his soldiers as soon as he wins a victory,' Eumeles commented. 'He's the richest contender. Why doesn't he keep his fleet together?'

  Idomenes considered telling his master the truth – that Ptolemy was rich because he didn't overspend on military waste. But he kept reading. 'This is their scout. They're coming before the autumn rains – to raise the coastal cities against you and sink your fleet. The army will come in the spring.'

  Eumeles got to his feet and smiled. He was very tall and too thin, almost cadaverous, and his smile was cold. 'A scout? How nice. Kineas the strategos used to say that if you wanted something done well, you had to do it yourself. Send for Telemon.'

  Telemon was one of the tyrant's senior captains. Idomenes passed the time reading aloud the list of ships from the marginal notes and their captains. 'Satyrus will command Black Falcon.'

  'Some professional helmsman will command. He's just a boy. Well, may he enjoy the adventure, for he won't survive it,' Eumeles said. He called a slave and ordered that his armour be packed for sea.

  Telemon swaggered in, announced by another slave. He was a tall man with ruddy cheeks and fair hair.

  'You took your time,' Eumeles said.

  Telemon shrugged. When he spoke, his voice was curiously high-pitched, like a temple singer – or a god in a machine. 'I'm here,' he said.

  'Cancel the expedition to Heraklea,' Eumeles said. 'Get the fleet ready to sail south.'

  'We're ready now,' Telemon intoned. His voice implied that his master wasn't very bright.

  'Good.' Eumeles ignored other men's tones, or had never understood them. Idomenes wondered if his master's ignorance of other men's feelings towards him was the secret of his power. He didn't seem to care that he was ugly, ungainly, single-minded, unsocial and unloved. He cared only for the exercise of power. 'They'll come up the west coast. We'll await them west of Olbia, so that they don't raise the malcontents in that city.' The tyrant turned to Idomenes. 'Contact our people in Olbia and tell them that it is time to be rid of our opponents there.'

  'The assembly?' Idomenes asked.

  'Simple murder, I think. Get rid of that old lack-wit Lykeles. People associate him too much with Kineas. As if Kineas was such a great king. Pshaw. The fool. Anyway, rid us of Lykeles, Petrocolus and his son, Cliomenedes. Especially the son.'

  Idomenes looked at his master as if he'd lost his mind. 'Our hand will show,' he said. 'That city is already close to open war with us.'

  'That city can be treated as a conquered province,' Eumeles said. 'Kill the opposition. The assembly will fear us.'

  'Kill them and some new leader might arise,' Idomenes said firmly. 'What if a knife miscarries? Then we have one of them screaming for your head.'

  'When Satyrus's head leaves his body, all the fight will go out of the cities. And we own the Sakje – Olbia needs their grain. Stop fighting shadows and obey me.' Eumeles gave his cold smile. 'What you really mean is that I'm about to go beyond the law – even the law of tyrants. And you don't like it. Tough. You are welcome to board a ship and sail back to Halicarnassus whenever you wish.'

  Once again, Idomenes was amazed at how his master cared nothing for the feelings of other men, and yet could read them like scrolls.

  'And you got me out of my slave's open legs for a reason?' Telemon sang.

  'Spare me,' Eumeles said. He didn't even like to listen to bawdy songs, his secretary reflected. 'Await my pleasure.'

  Telemon turned on his heel.

  'Isn't it enough for you that my enemy is about to put his head on the block?' Eumeles called, 'And that after he goes down, I will release you and your wolves to burn the seaboard?'

  Telemon stopped. He turned back. 'Yes,' he said. 'Yes, that is news indeed, lord.' He grinned. 'What ship will your enemy be in?'

  Idomenes was always happy to have information to share. 'Black Falcon, Navarch,' he said.

  'Bl
ack Falcon,' Telemon sang. 'Stratokles' ship. I'll know him,' he said.

  PART I

  THE SMELL OF DEATH

  1

  NORTH EUXINE SEA, AUTUMN, 311 BC

  Satyrus leaned against the rail of the Black Falcon and watched his uncle, Leon the Numidian, arguing with his helmsman, just a boat's length away. Satyrus waited, looking for a signal, a wave, an invitation – anything to suggest that his uncle had a plan.

  Next to him, on his own deck, Abraham Ben Zion shook his head.

  'Where did a pissant tyrant like Eumeles get so many ships?'

  Satyrus didn't turn his head. He was still waiting for the signal. 'I don't know,' he said. His dreams of being king of the Bosporus this autumn were fading rapidly, rowed into froth by the sixty or seventy triremes that Eumeles of Pantecapaeum, his mother's murderer, had somehow mustered.

  Leon had stopped talking to his helmsman. He came to his rail and put his hands to his mouth. 'Lay alongside me!' he called.

  Satyrus turned and nodded to his own helmsman, Diokles, a burly man whose curling dark hair showed more Phoenician than Greek.

  'Alongside the Lotus,' Satyrus said.

  Diokles nodded. 'Alongside it is, sir.'

  Satyrus owned only one ship, and that by the laws of war. The year before, he had taken the Black Falcon in a sea fight off the coast of the Levant in a rising storm. Falcon was lighter and smaller and far less robust than Leon's Golden Lotus or the other four triemioliai of Leon's squadron – all his own ships, for Leon the Numidian was one of the richest men in Alexandria, one of the richest cities on the curve of the world.

  Falcon was a small, old-style trireme, built light and fast the Athenian way. He had good points and bad points, but Satyrus loved him fiercely – all the more as he suspected he was about to lose the ship.

  Falcon turned to port and 'folded his wings', all the oars coming inboard together to the call of Neiron, the oar master amidships, so that he slowed into a long curve. Diokles' broad face was a study in concentration, a hard frown creasing the corners of his mouth as he leaned on his oars.

  Lotus closed on the reciprocal course. The two ships had been side by side, each leading a column of ten warships eastward along the north coast of the Euxine. They didn't have far to close, and the rowers on both ships pulled their oars in well before their blades might foul, and the helmsmen steered small, guiding the hulls together as they coasted along.

  Leon stepped up on the rail, holding one of the white-linen shrouds that held the mast. He leaned out, and just before the sides of the ships touched, he leaped – easily crossing the distance between ships, his left foot on the Falcon's rail, his right foot stepping down on to the deck of Satyrus's ship just forward of where the bulwark rose in the sharp curve of the stem.

  'We'll have to fight through them,' Leon said, as soon as he was aboard. He nodded to the statue of Poseidon on the mast. 'No other choice, I'm afraid – unless you want to beach and burn the ships. And I don't think we'll survive that.'

  'Twenty ships should have been enough,' Satyrus said.

  'Somebody gave Eumeles plenty of warning,' Leon said. 'Listen up, lad. I'm going to put my ships in line and you'll form line behind me. My ships will bite into his line and you punch straight through. Don't stop to fight. Just keep going.'

  Leon's plan was practical – if the goal was to save Satyrus's life. Eumeles would execute him without a thought – or worse.

  'Don't be a fool, boy!' Leon said. 'If I fall, you avenge me another time.' His dark skin glowed with vitality, and it didn't seem possible that Leon could speak so blithely of his own death. 'If Eumeles captures me, he'll ransom me. I'm worth too much to kill. You – you'd be dead by nightfall. Don't be a fool. Do as I order.'

  Abraham nodded soberly. 'He is correct, Satyrus. You can try again next year. Dead, we have all lost our wagers, eh?'

  Satyrus bowed his head. 'Very well. We will form the second line and go straight through.'

  Leon put his arms around his adoptive nephew, and they hugged, their armour grinding and preventing the embrace from carrying any real warmth. 'See you in Alexandria,' he said.

  'In Olbia!' Satyrus said, his voice full of tears. The Alexandrians formed their two lines as they advanced. They had practised formations all the way out from Rhodos, three weeks of sailing and rowing, and their rowers were in top shape. Leon's ships in the first line were as good as Rhodians – highly trained, with professional helmsmen and standing officers who had been at sea their whole lives – indeed, many of them were Rhodians, because Leon paid the best wages in the east.

  Satyrus had the mercenaries. They weren't bad – again, they were professional seamen. Few of them had the quality of ships that Leon had, although Daedalus of Halicarnassus had a mighty penteres, a 'five-er' that stood a man's height further out of the water than a trireme and mounted a pair of heavy scorpions. The Glory of Demeter was in the centre of the second line.

  None of Leon's captains needed special orders. They could all see the direction of the wind and the might of the opposing armament. The choices were narrow and they were professionals.

  Satyrus was on the right of the line, and the next ship over was a former Alexandrian naval vessel, hastily built and hastily sold after last year's campaign, called Fennel Stalk, with his flamboyant friend Dionysius in command. 'Bit off more than we can chew, eh?' he called across the water.

  'Break through, get your sail up and head for home,' Satyrus called back.

  The enemy fleet was just a couple of stades ahead, the eyes painted above the beaks of their rams clear in the golden light. Despite everything, the fact that Leon's ships were coming straight at them seemed to have thrown them into confusion.

  'Ten more ships,' Satyrus said.

  Diokles nodded, but Abraham shook his head. 'What?'

  'He means that they look so bad that if we had ten more ships we could take them – or make a fight of it.' Diokles spat over the side, apparently unconcerned by the odds.

  Satyrus ran down the centre catwalk. 'Kalos! Deck master, there! Any man who has a helmet needs to get it on. Oar master, relieve the benches in shifts.' If they actually broke the enemy line, their whole length would be vulnerable to enemy archers. He went back and put a hand on the steering oars. 'That means you, Diokles. Armour up.'

  'You have the helm,' Diokles said.

  'I have the helm,' Satyrus replied, and the dark-haired man ran off down the deck.

  The Alexandrians were closing under a steady stroke, saving energy. The enemy columns – all six of them – were still deploying. The two centre columns had fallen afoul of each other and were delaying the formation, but the consequence was that as the centre fell behind, the flanks reached well out on either side – the worst thing that could happen to the smaller fleet, whether by intention or by accident.

  'Leon's signalling,' Abraham called. He had his helmet on, and his voice had a strange resonance.

  Satyrus had his own helmet in his hand, but he swung up on a shroud to watch the bright bronze shield flash aboard Golden Lotus.

  'Arrowhead,' he said. But the flashes went on, and on.

  'By the hidden name!' Abraham muttered.

  Diokles came back, buckling his scale breastplate. 'Of course, wearing this fucker, I drown if I go over the side.' He looked up. 'Poseidon's watery dick, that's a long signal.'

  Satyrus saw that it was in repeat and jumped down from the rail.

  'Arrowhead – we're to be the point of the second line. He's not going to engage the centre – he's going to go for the southern edge of the line. At least, I think that's what he means. Prepare to turn to starboard!' Satyrus called the last in a command voice.

  Diokles got his last buckle done. He tugged the scale shirt down on his hips so that the pteruges sat right, and then put his hands on the steering oars. 'Got him!' he said.

  Satyrus shook his head. 'After the turn,' he said. 'Find me my greaves, will you?'

  Diokles ducked his head and sta
rted to root through the leather bags stuffed under the helmsman's bench.

  Satyrus watched the shield. There. The command ship gave a single flash and all down the line, ships turned to starboard, so that the two lines of ten ships heading east were once again two columns of ten ships heading due south.

  The shield flashed again, repeating the next order. In the column next to them, Theron's Labours of Herakles was slow to turn and almost fouled the Glory of Demeter. The two ships brushed past each other, oar-tips entangled, but momentum saved them and Theron's rowers had the stroke back.

  Abraham shook his head. 'I can't watch!' he said. 'This is not like fighting elephants!' Abraham had proved his courage at Gaza the year before, capturing Demetrios the Golden's elephants and winning a place on the list of Alexandria's heroes.

  The shield flashed on, now repeating the order. Then the flashes stopped.

  'Any time,' Diokles said.

  'Take the helm,' Satyrus said.

  'I have it,' Diokles said, suiting action to word.

  'You have it!' Satyrus said, and ran for the command spot amidships. 'Watch for the signal! Neiron, the next signal will require us to slow.'

  'Aye aye!' Neiron, the oar master, was Cardian – a prisoner of war who'd chosen to remain with his captors. He seldom wore hat or helmet, and had the habit of rubbing the back of his head. He did so now.

  The bronze shield gave a single flash.

  'Got it!' Neiron called. 'All banks! Cease rowing!'

  Behind them, Fennel Stalk made a quarter-turn out of line to the north and the ship behind Fennel made a quarter-turn south, so that in a few heartbeats they were ranging almost alongside, just a few oar-lengths behind. The next two ships came up on their flanks, so that Satyrus's second line was shaped like a wedge.

  Whatever the odds, it was well carried out, and despite some spacing issues created by the size of the Glory of Demeter, they were formed in a wedge before the enemy could react. Ahead, Leon's better-trained column had angled in to cover them and then formed a wedge themselves, so that Golden Lotus was the centre of the first line and Black Falcon was the centre of the second wedge, all rowing east against the flank of the enemy line.