Scorpions in Corinth

by J M Alvey

  ‘And anyone who says different gets a smack in the mouth?’ guessed Menekles.

  ‘At the very least,’ Hyanthidas confirmed.

  Lysicrates and Apollonides started to protest that hero cults were peace-loving associations, but Menekles told them about our encounter outside Perantas Bacchiad’s gate.

  ‘He’s a prominent member of the Brotherhood,’ Hyanthidas explained. ‘They’ll be in favour of Perantas sponsoring our play.’

  ‘Who won’t like the idea?’ Menekles asked.

  Hyanthidas hesitated. ‘Hard to say. I’ve been away too long to know all the agora gossip. There have always been factions opposed to Corinth making any alliance with Athens. They think that weakens Corinth’s claim to pre-eminence within the Peloponnesian League—’

  Lysicrates let slip a derisive murmur.

  ‘What?’ Hyanthidas demanded, annoyed.

  ‘Well, the Peloponnesian League—’ Lysicrates coloured slightly. I could see he hadn’t meant to provoke the musician, but equally, he wasn’t about to back down. ‘It’s just an excuse for the Spartans to bully their neighbours whenever something puts their nose out of joint. It’s not like the Delian League—’

  ‘You mean it doesn’t demand money, year on year, even in peace time?’ Hyanthidas retorted.

  Lysicrates wasn’t having that. ‘The Delian League defends all Hellenes with ships and hoplites in time of war, and by supporting the rule of law and democracy.’

  ‘And who do you have to thank for that?’ Hyanthidas challenged him. ‘The Peloponnesian League, who drove the tyrants out of Athens—’

  ‘Enough!’ I said loudly. ‘We’re getting off the point.’

  The last thing I needed, or expected, was to see my two friends falling out. To my relief, Lysicrates subsided. I got to my feet. ‘Let’s go and see this rehearsal space.’

  Menekles and Apollonides instantly agreed, equally dismayed by this quarrel.

  While everyone found their sandals, I seized the chance to have a quick word with Kadous, telling him to go to Eumelos’ house to give Zosime any help she might need.

  ‘Ask his slaves where they think Dardanis might be. When you get back, see what Tromes and these Bacchiad slaves think of these hero-worship associations.’

  We set out for the Acrocorinth. Well before we reached the Sanctuary of Demeter and Persephone, I was glad I’d left my cloak behind. Even with the heat of summer behind us, the day was warming up, and that first stretch of the road below the great grey cliffs was one of those long, gradual slopes that you don’t realise is rising quite so high until your legs and lungs protest. When you’re forced to take a breather, you’re surprised to see how far you’ve come.

  When we drew to a halt by mutual, unspoken consent, I could see the city spread out below us. Red-tiled roofs were sparsely scattered on the dry, rocky slope we had climbed, while down where water was plentiful, houses were tight-packed around the agora, overlooked by the Temple of Apollo. Beyond that cluster of fountains and shrines, the city spread northwards into a sprawl of workshops and smallholdings. Here and there, plumes of smoke indicated kilns baking the pottery and tiles that Corinth was famous for.

  Further still, I could see olive groves, fields of grain, vineyards, fruit orchards and patches of scrubby pasture, all defended by the city’s long walls running down to the sea.

  I could see clear across the fertile plain to the coast, with the high ground of Megara a dark shadow along the horizon. Once we reached the summit I’d bet we would see the Isthmus, separating Corinthia from Attica, as clearly as any bird flying over it.

  ‘I never thought I’d be seeing those hills from this side. Not without a spear in my hand.’ Lysicrates scowled as he stared northwards.

  I saw that he was looking back across the years as well as the distance. ‘You were in those battles?’

  It wasn’t quite twenty years since Athenians and Corinthians had first gone to war over Megara. The Corinthians had objected to the Megarans growing ever closer to Athens. That friendship enabled us and our allies to hold the Isthmus against any Peloponnesian threat. I suddenly realised that Lysicrates would have just done his hoplite training and been in the front rank of those sent to fight.

  Like the tumbling pebble that starts a landslide, that quarrel had precipitated over a decade of bloodshed as allied cities on both sides fought to settle old scores. I’d marched and shared in Athens’ victories under General Tolmides before barely escaping death when he led us to defeat at Coronea. Fighting for Megara hadn’t even been worth it. A few years ago, an uprising had massacred the Athenian soldiers garrisoned there.

  ‘Good friends of mine died on those fucking hills. Corinthian spears spilled their life blood on the black earth, and it was all for nothing.’ Lysicrates had tears in his eyes.

  ‘I’m so sorry.’ I prayed silently to Apollo and to Athena, asking their forgiveness for not asking my friend why he didn’t want to come here. ‘Let make a sacrifice together at the Sanctuary, for the sake of every mother’s son lost in battle. Let’s pray that our performance fosters goodwill and preserves the peace, for the sake of our young soldiers at home and lads like Nados here.’

  Before Lysicrates could answer, Hyanthidas decided we’d had enough rest and set off, striding up the hill. ‘Come on.’

  Menekles and Lysicrates followed. I laid a hand on Apollonides’ arm, holding him back a few paces. ‘Did Hyanthidas hear what Lysicrates just said?’

  ‘I don’t know, but apparently Lysicrates said something last night at the Asklepion, about there being scorpions under every stone here? Hyanthidas really didn’t like that.’ Apollonides sighed. ‘This morning, before you got back, they had another falling out. Lysicrates was talking about Iktinos. You remember him?’

  ‘Of course.’ I was hardly about to forget the murderous brute. He’d used his knife to deadly effect, serving rich men in Athens conspiring to provoke unrest for their own profit.

  ‘Lysicrates mentioned that you thought he was Peloponnesian, and Hyanthidas took that to mean Corinthian. Things went downhill from there.’ Apollonides wiped sweat from his forehead. ‘It’ll blow over. They’re just wound as taut as lyre strings after seeing Eumelos struck down.’

  ‘They’ll have plenty of other things to think about as soon as we start rehearsals.’ Meantime, I hoped for swift answers to the mystery of Eumelos’ death.

  Especially now that Apollonides had given me something else to worry about: we never had discovered where Iktinos had come from. Aristarchos and I were convinced he’d been in the pay of someone outside Attica keen to stir up strife in Athens. Some enemy of our democracy. Someone who had reason to hate me and Aristarchos for foiling their plot to discredit us both. Could that unknown foe have followed us and killed Eumelos to stop our play? But then, why kill the fixer, when attacking me or one of the other Athenians would make far more certain of that?

  I was still fretting when we reached the Sanctuary, high on the Acrocorinth’s slopes. Broad steps on one side of the road led up to a spacious courtyard with a little temple at one end and a sacrificial altar raised up on a terrace at the other. Dining suites had been built all around the sacred precinct, on both sides of the road.

  Some were simple dining rooms for private family celebrations. Others were larger halls for feasting, flanked by rooms where guests could wash, slaves could cook, and people could find space for sitting and enjoying quieter conversation when the music and dancing started.

  Temples in Athens offer such facilities and I’d attended lively gatherings when the Alopeke district’s men honour the gods with rites and sacrifices to celebrate their sons’ citizenship rites. I’d never seen anything on this scale though. The midden pit was heaped high with the ashes from sacrifices, when Demeter’s share was dedicated on the flames of her altar, as well as with other debris from feasting.

  A priestess
was coming down the steps from the temple precinct, wearing the long yellow gown of her office and with a finely embroidered veil draped over her high-piled hair. She paused halfway, her hands folded at her waist. We hurried up to meet her.

  ‘Good day.’ As serene in her authority as the goddess she served, she might have been ten years my elder, or twenty, it was impossible to tell.

  Hyanthidas and the actors all looked at me. Naturally, we have priestesses in Athens, but their duties are purely ceremonial. We’re used to dealing with men managing a temple’s day-to-day affairs.

  ‘Good day. I’m Philocles Hestaiou of Athens.’ I really would have to get used to these self-confident Corinthian women. ‘We’re here at Perantas Bacchiad’s invitation, to perform in your city’s theatre. His man Eumelos made arrangements for us to hold our chorus auditions here, and to rehearse.’

  She smiled briefly. ‘Indeed. Follow me.’

  She led us along a narrow alley cutting between two long buildings. Turning a corner, we found a sort of courtyard bounded by blank walls and with two dining rooms opening off one side. The far end was open to the hillside and a soft breeze brought us the scent of wild herbs.

  The priestess gestured at the two dining room doors. ‘Both of those are at your disposal.’

  ‘Many thanks.’ I hesitated, wondering if I should tell her that Eumelos was dead, but she left before I could decide.

  The others were pacing out the courtyard. Over by the wall opposite the doors to the dining rooms, Apollonides scored a line in the well-trodden earth with the toe of his sandal. ‘If we call this the edge of the stage, that leaves enough room for a dancing floor.’

  Menekles was peering into the closest dining room ‘Swept clean, and quite empty,’ he pronounced. ‘Plenty of storage space.’

  ‘Let’s get everything up here as soon as possible.’ Apollonides rubbed his hands together briskly. ‘Along with some wine. If Corinth’s finest singers make that climb to audition, we owe them a drink for their trouble.’

  ‘A decent vintage.’ Lysicrates looked at me. ‘There’ll be more singers than we can use and if the ones we disappoint leave pissed off, they’ll just come to the theatre to boo.’

  Menekles glanced up the slope towards the temple precinct. ‘I take it we can use the springs here for fresh water?’

  ‘I imagine so.’ Eumelos would have known. I was realising how much we would have relied on the Corinthian.

  ‘I’ll ask the priestess while you three head back down to the house. Get Tromes to round up some slaves to carry all the baskets up here.’ I turned to Hyanthidas. ‘Meantime, why don’t you and I go and see what we can learn in that brothel?’

  I was hoping he’d make a joke out of that, but the piper just shrugged. ‘We’re already halfway there.’

  ‘Sort out some wine for tomorrow when you’ve done that.’ Apollonides was already on his way out of the courtyard.

  Menekles let Lysicrates go on ahead. ‘The sooner we have our new lines to learn, the better, Philocles.’

  ‘Of course.’ I did my best to keep my face expressionless. I hadn’t had a moment to think about the rewrites, and I couldn’t see young Nados advising me on jokes that would raise a laugh in Corinth without insulting the rich and powerful.

  Hyanthidas and I followed the actors out to the broad steps leading to the road. Encountering a temple slave, we were able to confirm we had permission to get water from the Sanctuary’s springs. Then we resumed the climb to the Acrocorinth. The road grew considerably steeper, leaving neither of us with breath to spare for conversation.

  I stopped looking back, because that meant looking down and words like ‘precipitous’ were taking on a whole new meaning. When I realised I wasn’t looking at bushes at the base of those cliffs, but was gazing down the length of fully-grown pine trees, I felt so dizzy that I stumbled. Moving on, I kept my eyes firmly forwards.

  Fortifications ringed the vast summit. The walls were truly imposing, built on foundations of massive stones that surely only the titans could have wrestled into place, back in the days when gods and heroes walked these lands. The guards on the gates were much less impressive, waving us through with barely a glance. Still, I reckoned few enemies would arrive in any fit state to fight after this climb.

  Plenty of visitors were making their way up here, regardless. The Temple of Aphrodite was a fitting vision of beauty on the summit’s highest point, with its pillars and pediments of gleaming white marble. As well as all the brothels, which housed the goddess’ handmaidens, these heights boasted other shrines and sacred springs. We made our way through enough taverns and peddlers to satisfy any pilgrim’s every need.

  ‘This way.’ Hyanthidas clearly knew where he was going. I wondered what Telesilla thought about that.

  Courtyard gates stood hospitably open and I caught glimpses of girls with inviting smiles lounging in pillared porches. They were sipping from pottery goblets and dressed in seductively short dresses. I tried not to think how thirsty I was.

  I wasn’t tempted by anything else. Even if I didn’t love Zosime to the exclusion of all others, I knew the hazards of visiting whores. I wasn’t going to risk having a doctor searing an outbreak of blisters on my cock with a hot blade.

  ‘Here we are.’ Hyanthidas knocked on a gatepost as we entered a clean-swept courtyard.

  ‘Good day. My name is Eirene, and you are most welcome to my house.’ A woman in a long, pleated gown appeared from a doorway, looking much the same age as my mother. ‘How do you wish to worship Aphrodite?’

  As she spoke, I caught a glimpse of a heavy-set man, sitting in the shadows of the porch inside the gate. He looked considerably more alert than the guards who had let us enter the Acrocorinth’s citadel.

  ‘Good day.’ I thought quickly. ‘My friend Eumelos speaks very highly of your house.’

  The whore mistress smiled. ‘And we are always glad to welcome his friends.’

  Clearly she didn’t know he was dead.

  ‘Does he have a favourite girl? Could she spare me a few moments?’ This didn’t look like the sort of place where a man wipes himself off and leaves once he’s spent his seed. Eumelos might have confided something in the drowsy languor that follows such pleasure, something the girl didn’t even realise was important.

  The brothel-keeper gave me a measuring look. ‘If you’re willing to pay for her time.’

  ‘Of course.’ I should have expected that.

  ‘Eight obols.’ Mistress Eirene held out her palm. ‘And your friend?’

  ‘I’ll wait out here,’ Hyanthidas said hastily.

  That was a relief at these prices.

  ‘Sekis, wine for our guests.’ Eirene glanced at her henchman before turning to me. ‘This way.’

  I followed her into the house and along a corridor of curtain-hung doorways. I couldn’t hear any sounds of commerce but then, we had reached the heat of the day. Business around Athenian brothels usually only picks up as the sun starts to sink.

  ‘Arete.’ The whore-mistress tugged a curtain aside, startling a round-faced girl sitting on a bed sorting ribbons. ‘Make our guest welcome while I fetch some wine.’

  ‘Of course.’ The girl crossed the room to a water clock, filling the upper pot from a waiting jug. Drops from the spout at the bottom began measuring my time here into the lower vessel.

  She untied the woven belt that held her draped dress demurely closed. Once she unpinned the silver brooches at her shoulders, the flimsy linen would fall away to leave her alluring curves naked as the day she was born.

  ‘I’m in no hurry,’ I said quickly. ‘We can wait for the wine.’

  I was glad to think I’d be getting a drink. Though, on my oath to Dionysos, I should at this price. Still, Mistress Eirene seemed generous with her girls. The room was clean and furnished with an expensive bedstead, an elegant ebony table and bronze
lamps for the evening trade.

  ‘What’s your pleasure?’ Arete twirled a seductive finger in a dangling ribbon woven through her intricately plaited hair. As she stepped close enough for her generous breasts to brush my arm, I smelled floral perfume. I could see her dark nipples through the sheer cloth.

  I took a step away. ‘Some wine, and conversation.’

  To my relief, the slave Sekis arrived with a jug and cups decorated with naked couples enjoying athletic amusements. He set them on the table and departed without a word. I offered a sip of wine to Dionysos and downed the rest in one parched breath. That was my thirst dealt with. Now for the real business at hand.

  ‘Tell me,’ I asked as casually as I could. ‘Did Eumelos have any particular cares when you last saw him?’

  ‘No.’ The girl looked at me blankly.

  ‘Do you know anyone he was at odds with?’ I persisted. ‘Anyone who wished him ill?’

  ‘No.’ She shrugged, unconcerned.

  I couldn’t decide if she was truly witless or playing the pretty fool, used to men who only value what’s between a woman’s legs. I decided to break the bad news and see how she reacted.

  ‘I have to tell you that Eumelos is dead.’

  The girl couldn’t have been more shocked if I’d slapped her. Scarlet-faced, she burst into noisy tears.

  ‘Hush, hush.’ I hastily ushered her to the bed and sat her down.

  ‘We were going to be married,’ she sobbed.

  Whatever she said next was strangled by cataclysmic weeping. I went and poured more wine, coming back to sit beside her, putting one arm around her shaking shoulders.

  ‘Just a sip,’ I coaxed her. ‘Who knew what you planned?’

  This was the last thing I expected to hear. As soon as I got back to Eumelos’ house, I would ask Nados what he knew about it.