Destroyer of Cities t-5

by Christian Cameron

  And perhaps a few of his own. Perhaps the king. Perhaps Leon.

  Forward, by the mainmast, Jubal barked something and his few teeth glinted, and the men around him laughed.

  ‘Gaza,’ he said to Neiron.

  ‘Gaza,’ Neiron repeated.

  And behind his right shoulder, the pillars of cloud were still simmering and brewing over the African desert like something brewed up by the God of the Jews.

  15

  Last light off Gaza, and the beach was crawling with men — Antigonids — and there were almost a hundred ships beached there. Satyrus approached from the setting sun, all masts down, his ships in a close column behind him, under oars.

  ‘Must be Antigonus himself,’ Neiron said. He spat over the side, perhaps indicating what he thought of his king’s plan.

  ‘Seventy-five, seventy-six, seventy-seven,’ Satyrus counted.

  ‘Look at the grain ships,’ Jubal said.

  ‘Shut up and let me count,’ Satyrus said. He was standing on the forward marine tower. ‘Eighty-three, eighty-four. I make it eightyfour. And no ship larger than a trireme.’

  Neiron shrugged. ‘Just odds of eight to one, then. Easy as eating fish. Let’s get ’em.’

  Satyrus nodded. ‘Exactly.’

  The Alexandrian squadron manoeuvred from line ahead to line abreast with the elegance of a Nile hippo walking out of the river mud. Ramses responded late and turned the wrong way, and Satyrus could hear Dionysus’ rampage across the water; Amon Ra was so slow that he didn’t appear to be in line at all.

  It didn’t matter, because no one was watching. Plistias’ fleet thought that they had the seas off Gaza and Palestine to themselves, and they were still recovering from the worst sea storm in nautical memory. So when Satyrus’ ragged line swept in and began to grapple the empty hulls, the crews took long, long minutes to believe what they were seeing, and to react, and by the time armed men were at the shingle and archers were fitting arrows to their bows — mostly dry — the Alexandrians were away to sea, towing behind them a capture apiece, except Amon Ra, who’d come so late to the beach that he’d had to reverse oars and row away empty-handed.

  Satyrus’ squadron rowed into the darkness, laughing.

  ‘We have to burn them,’ Satyrus concluded after he’d examined every one of the captured hulls the following dawn.

  Neiron agreed. ‘It kills me,’ he admitted. ‘But if we have to crew them, we’ll be making men who were thranites on Arete in the spring into trierarchs. And we’ll all be equal — equally bad.’ He shrugged. ‘Even as it is, I think the quality’s spread too thin, lord.’

  Apollodorus nodded. ‘We’re like a slaves’ breakfast, lord — too little olive oil, too much dry bread.’

  Satyrus scratched his beard. ‘These two are particularly fine — these two long ships. Let’s call them Amon Ra and Wasp and burn the worn-out hulks you’ve rowed the last week.’

  Dionysus shook his head. ‘All that wasted work makes me want to cry.’

  ‘What waste?’ Satyrus said, relentlessly cheerful. ‘They got us here. Now we have better hulls. Get it done, gentlemen.’

  Followed by as much confusion as if they were under attack, hundreds of oarsmen moving their cushions and gear along the beach: fire pots, food, amphorae of wine, all the flotsam and jetsam of life at sea. But Wasp launched with the dawn and patrolled off the beach, and they made the transfer unmolested and got their sterns off, the shore party left behind to burn the ships that couldn’t be crewed swimming out, leaving nine columns of smoke rising to the heavens like funeral pyres for the heroes in the Iliad.

  Neiron was looking at Africa under his hand while Satyrus watched the last swimmers come up the side.

  ‘Poseidon’s throbbing member, I think we’re for it again,’ Neiron said.

  Jubal spat between his teeth. ‘Sand,’ he said. ‘I hate sand.’ Without his front teeth, his S’s sounded like th’s, and he said thand.

  Satyrus looked at Africa and then at Asia. ‘Are you sure?’ he asked.

  Neiron shrugged. ‘Nope,’ he said.

  ‘Very helpful,’ Satyrus murmured, and Jubal laughed.

  They sailed due west, towards Alexandria, until they’d sunk the land and were safely out in the day’s haze, a red-hot African breeze against their port sides, and then Satyrus ordered the sails up and turned to line abreast, the ships six stades apart so that his line covered an enormous distance. The sea was a muddy, shiny blue under a deadly white sky, and the sun beat down like a merciless foe, the heat like a living enemy — but the African wind filled their mainsails and kept them dead astern, sweeping the sea north along the coast so that Arete, the ship closest to Asia, could see land at the top of the swell, and Oinoe, seventy stades to the west, could see the towering pillars of cloud over the Nile Delta.

  They sailed north for an hour over a sea empty even of fishing boats. Alexandria’s fishing fleet was keel up on the beaches of Pharos, her fishermen pulling oars for Satyrus.

  It was almost noon when the lookouts shouted.

  ‘Amon Ra just made the signal — something to the east. She’s turning that way,’ came the shout. They had very simple signals — four manoeuvres and two sightings.

  Satyrus had just formed the words Let’s go and see what they’ve found in his mind when the lookout reported again.

  ‘Sail to landward.’

  The opposite direction, of course, and all his ships were now running down to look at the something to the east. If he went west — towards the enemy — he’d be alone.

  He clambered up onto the rail — the wound on his back had scarred over, but it still shouted its presence whenever he went to climb anything — and then he began to pull himself up the main brace, hand over hand, feet braced against the rope — slow, by sailor standards, but steady. At home, he’d have been on the sand of the palaestra three hours a day. Here, he climbed the rigging.

  Aloft, at the top of the foremast, he locked his legs around the trunk of the mast, rested his arms over the edge of the archer’s basket and looked across the sparkling sea, west, out of the eye of the sun.

  Two sails — big, square sails. Grain ships.

  ‘Keep an eye out for more. Tell me when you see sails — tell me whether they’re triangles or squares. Understood?’ Satyrus was pleased to find that he wasn’t even breathing hard.

  ‘Yes, lord,’ said the man in the basket.

  Satyrus got down the rope without burning his hands. The pitch and resin on the standing rigging was sticky in the blazing sun, and he had a line of sticky black like bad honey on his legs.

  Helios laughed aloud. ‘King of the Zebras!’ he proclaimed. He and Charmides laughed, and Satyrus decided that he could afford to be the butt of some humour. But to Neiron he said, ‘Grain ships for Antigonus. Take north by east — we’ll have them in an hour.’

  Like the men on the beach the day before, the crews of the two tall grain ships — round-hulled, high-sided cargo ships with eyes painted under their bows, both Athenians — were mortified to find that they had enemies in these waters.

  ‘We had an escort,’ said one captain bitterly. ‘He lost us last night.’

  Satyrus took the captains as hostages and sent the ships — with a dozen trusted marines in each, led by Draco and Amyntas, because he was out of other trusted men — sailing north by west for Rhodes. By this time he was all but in the surf of Antigonus’ beach at Gaza — and again, the men on the beach ignored him as if he weren’t there.

  Arete had to row into the wind to get back to the coast of Africa, and since the heat was so vicious, Satyrus ordered that they row soft and slow, creeping upwind with steerage way and no more.

  Late afternoon, and the lookout sighted something in the water ahead, and an hour’s rowing took them to a capsized trireme, floating upside down just at the surface of the water. Gulls were picking at corpses.

  ‘Not one of ours,’ Charmides said from the bow with the ruthlessness of a veteran. He limped bac
k to the sternward edge of the marine tower. ‘Just happened — there’s sharks still feeding.’

  On and on, into the blazing sun and dead into the wind. Satyrus had sweated through his lightest chiton during his turn at the steering oars. He couldn’t imagine what the thranites were going through, so he descended into the choking depths of his ship.

  The air was so close and hot in the bottom range that it was like coriander soup — except that it smelled much worse. Sweat and urine and faeces and old cheese.

  ‘Everyone here still alive?’ Satyrus asked.

  ‘Neh, we’s all dead men!’ called one old sweat.

  ‘Wish we’s dead,’ said another.

  ‘Is we there yet, Pater?’ called a third.

  Satyrus had to smile despite the stench. If the thranites were in such spirits, then he was in good shape.

  An hour later, and the clouds over Africa were unmistakable. Neiron pointed them out to Satyrus, who was standing with Idomeneus, the archer-captain. The Cretan didn’t know it, but he was slated as the next prize master. Satyrus was testing him on his navigation.

  ‘And Cyprus to Rhodes?’ Satyrus asked.

  ‘I’m from Gortyn!’ Idomeneus said with a rich chuckle. ‘I was at sea when I was born. Cyprus to Asia and due west along the coast — west by south to weather the cape at Cos, and then across the strait to Rhodes. A child could do it.’

  ‘If we take any more ships, Charmides will have a command,’ Satyrus said. ‘And that’s as close to a child as this ship holds.’

  Neiron pointed at the bronze sky to the south. ‘Wind’s growing stronger,’ he said. ‘Just like before.’

  ‘We should get on the beach,’ Jubal said.

  The edge of darkness, and they saw fires to the west along the coast, and Satyrus breathed a sigh of relief when he recognised Wasp and Ramses beached stern first. And Diokles was waiting — the whole squadron had already fed, and he lined them up on the beach, got ropes aboard the Arete in the rising surf and pulled the big ship right up the beach until the heavy bronze bow was on dry sand. Every ship in the squadron rested on the sand.

  ‘I count twelve,’ Satyrus said, when he had his back against a chest and a golden cup of wine in his fist.

  ‘Sank two, took one,’ Diokles said. ‘Ugliest action you ever saw — if you like to see a plan. But our ships kept coming up, and finally we swamped them. Your young Dionysus did very well — his men backed water almost like real oarsmen.’

  ‘Shut your gob, wide-arse,’ said Dionysus in mock sailor talk. ‘We’s as good as any man — better than some, aye.’ He growled low in his throat.

  Satyrus laughed with the others. ‘He’s not my Dionysus. It’s my sister’s breasts he wrote the poems to, after all.’

  Apollodorus laughed. ‘I’d wager he’s never touched a breast in his life.’

  Dionysus narrowed his eyes. ‘Better than raping corpses for a sex life, Corinthian.’

  Satyrus stepped in. ‘Are we pirates now, friends? This is pirate talk.’

  Diokles nodded. ‘Lads are excited. It was a good day. Let me tell it — and let’s not hear any more asides.’

  Apollodorus raised an eyebrow. ‘I apologise, Dionysus. I meant my comments as raillery — nothing more.’

  Dionysus grinned and lisped. ‘Apologies accepted, O Gift of Apollo. And returned. I’m sure some of your rape victims are alive.’

  Apollodorus didn’t explode. He smiled. ‘I might find the time to convince you otherwise, Child of the Wine God.’

  Satyrus put a kingly elbow into Dionysus’ ribs with all the energy of the gymnasium, and Dionysus spewed wine across the fire. ‘Apollodorus, you must forgive him. He’s always been like this — I think the technical term is insufferable prick. And you two will not fight. Save it for Demetrios.’

  Dionysus was laughing uncontrollably. ‘I miss this,’ he admitted, rubbing his ribs.

  Apollodorus gave the fop a hand to his feet. ‘Let the man tell his story.’

  Diokles spread his hands. ‘So Dionysus found two of them, and he went right at them. Then he backed away — took a light ram, got his oars in. And Amon Ra and Wasp came up and they all chased each other in circles-’

  Apollodorus laughed. ‘It was pitiful. My rowers made mistakes, I gave the wrong order-’

  Dionysus laughed. ‘I ordered my men to reverse benches, and only about a third of them did it, so that we turned broadside on to one of the enemy ships-’

  Satyrus winced.

  Diokles shook his head. ‘So I came up in Oinoe and it looks like a seaborne circus, with ships in what appears to be a circle, chasing their tails like kittens. And then the biggest enemy ship turns out of its circle to ram Ramses-’

  ‘And my lads all pull their arses out of the air and suddenly we’re like a ship — I put my ram into their ram,’ Dionysus said. ‘We aren’t moving as fast as an old man walks-’

  ‘And this big trireme impales himself on Ramses,’ Diokles said. ‘His bow must have either been rotten, or wormed, or the gods blessed Dionysus. But that ship just sank.’

  ‘And just like that, the other two lost all their spirit and we had them as fast as I can say it,’ Apollodorus said.

  ‘And my lads, who’ve been rowing in that infernal heat like heroes to save these fools, are left as the cheering section. By which time we could see the storm clouds over Africa and we ran for the beach.’ Diokles looked over his shoulder at the grey wall — almost black — shot through with lightning. ‘I pity any man at sea tonight. Friend or foe.’

  ‘You must have taken prisoners,’ Satyrus said.

  Apollodorus nodded. ‘Plenty. It’s not all wine and cheese for Demetrios. Half his fleet is here, and half is strung out between Cyprus and Alexandria. He set one rendezvous and Plistias, his admiral, set another. Antigonus needs food, right now — his men crossed the Sinai at midsummer and they need everything. That’s what they were saying five days ago at Tyre, anyway. That’s where these two rode out the last storm.’

  Neiron came and stood by his king. ‘You’re plotting in there,’ he said.

  A gust of wind scattered cinders and coals across the beach, and several stung Satyrus. ‘I’m always plotting. I’ll turn into Stratokles, eventually.’

  ‘Perish the thought,’ Diokles said.

  ‘Last storm blew three days,’ Satyrus said.

  Neiron nodded.

  ‘If we put to sea the moment the sand dies away-’ Satyrus said, and Neiron interrupted him.

  ‘You’ll be launching into the biggest seas of the summer.’ Neiron shook his head. ‘Day three was better, but only by comparison.’

  Satyrus shook his head. ‘It all depends,’ he said. He shrugged. ‘Ask me in a day or two.’

  Two days of sandstorm, lightning and rain.

  Mid-morning on the first day of the storm, and Satyrus was lying on his pile of skins, watching the sail over his head move and flap and wondering if it would tear its pegs out of the sand when Anaxagoras ducked under the heavy rugs blocking the open end of the tent and stepped in, streaming sand from his red chlamys.

  ‘Time for a music lesson,’ he said.

  Satyrus sat up with a laugh, boredom vanquished, and spent a difficult hour trying to make his calloused hands match the gestures of his master on the strings of the kithara — ten strings, all running from a fine ebony rod at the tips of the instrument’s hollow wooden horns, down across the belly of the instrument to lie across the sound box. Anaxagoras’ kithara was a beauty, as befitted a professional musician, all lemonwood and ebony inlaid with ivory.

  ‘Pluck the strings with the right,’ Anaxagoras said for the eighth or ninth time. ‘Calm them with the left hand.’

  Satyrus had no trouble using the plectrum to strum the strings with his right hand — it felt quite natural — but his teacher’s constant demand that he dampen the sound of some strings while allowing others to ring true puzzled him.

  ‘But you say you have studied the mathematics of Pythagoras,’ A
naxagoras said, clearly flustered and perhaps growing angry with a very stubborn student.

  Satyrus sighed. ‘When I see a ship running diagonally across my course, I see the mathematics of Pythagoras,’ he said. ‘You can tell me about the lengths of a chord until you are blue in the face, and it does nothing for me.’

  Anaxagoras took a deep breath and forced a smile — a very false smile. ‘I believe that you were ordered by the god to learn to play?’ Anaxagoras said.

  Satyrus was about to tell Anaxagoras exactly what he and the god could do with a kithara when there were shouts from outside.

  One of the captured triremes had blown over and the sides splintered as the ship rolled on her beam ends. The sea rose until Satyrus feared that Wasp would be pulled out into the water, and they got the men out in the lashing, sandy rain to pull the little ship higher on the beach — and then they endured two more hours of it to pull Oinoe and Arete higher up as well.

  ‘You bastards sailed through this?’ Dionysus asked on the evening of the second day. ‘It scares me on the beach.’

  Apollodorus and the Alexandrian had reached some sort of understanding.

  Apollodorus shot the younger man a smile. ‘I won’t say this storm isn’t worse, m’dear. But yes — we sailed in this for three days and three nights.’

  Dawn of the third day, and Satyrus rallied all his men — over two thousand, rowers and oarsmen and marines all told — on the beach. But the wind off Africa hadn’t blown out, and the sun didn’t come out from the clouds until noon.

  ‘Too late in the day,’ Satyrus said, as the wind began to fall away and the mosquitoes from the swamps to the east rose from their enforced rest to find a rich source of blood waiting on the beach. They made it the worst night of the three, their high-pitched whine eventually forming a terrible sound, like the distant breathing of a malignant insect god. They didn’t relent with full dark, and it was hot and airless.

  Satyrus launched his ships in the dawn on a sea that seemed to have been blown absolutely flat; but a stiff shore breeze sprang up, banished the evil insects and sent the squadron winging north over a sea so calm it looked like wet faience in the new sun.