Tyrant: King of the Bosporus

by Christian Cameron

  Ataelus looked at her with a face almost alive, it was so full of grief. ‘But you and I know better, eh?’ He shook his head.

  ‘We’ll find her and build a kurgan,’ Melitta promised.

  Ataelus said nothing, and they rode west.

  She sent Coenus to find Urvara, or Eumenes, and bring her a report, and then they rode all day. The sun was low in the west, the rays direct in their faces, so that they could hear the fighting and yet not see it.

  Melitta found Thyrsis riding with her baqca, and she smiled at them. ‘I need a scout,’ she said to Thyrsis.

  Tameax frowned. ‘Why send him? He wants to fight and he can’t count above ten. Send me.’

  She frowned. ‘I need a good account of what is happening in the sun.’

  Thyrsis nodded. ‘I’ll find a dozen riders, and we’ll go together,’ he said. She was glad to see how much spirit he had. He was handsome like a Greek, and his armour was clean and neat – mended every day, the mark of a first-rate warrior. He had wounds, and he had killed – he was perhaps the best warrior of his generation. And yet nothing about him moved her in the way Scopasis moved her.

  ‘Keep my surly baqca alive,’ she joked, and rode away, leaving Tameax frowning at her back. How many army commanders have to worry about men competing for their affections? she asked herself. But in an odd way, she was happy. Today, she was in command. Not Coenus, not Ataelus and not Graethe, or even Tameax or Thyrsis. They obeyed.

  It was Scopasis who saw the beacon first. He scratched the scar on his face, and she looked at him, but he was looking south and west.

  ‘I think that the beacon is alight,’ he said. ‘The beacon on the fort.’

  ‘You can see a fire in the eye of the sun?’ she asked.

  He shrugged.

  Tameax galloped out of the falling darkness like a raven, all black wool on a black horse. ‘Urvara is on this side of the river,’ he said. ‘I saw her standard but didn’t ride in. She is fighting on foot.’

  Melitta felt a chill of fear. ‘Spear to spear with a phalanx?’

  ‘She has dismounted all her household,’ Thyrsis said. ‘They make a shield wall on the Hill of Ravens.’

  ‘The beacon on the fort is alight,’ Tameax said.

  ‘Read me this riddle,’ Melitta said. ‘Why is the beacon alight? Why does Urvara fight?’

  The other men were silent. Tameax scratched his beard. ‘I think that Eumenes must have come,’ he said. ‘He came and lit the beacon, so that Urvara knows he is here. Now Urvara fights to protect the lowest crossing, so that Eumenes comes behind her.’

  Ataelus spoke up, his voice rough. ‘He is a wise man. I think he has this right in his head.’

  Melitta gave Tameax a long look. ‘If you are right . . .’ she said.

  He nodded. ‘I am right,’ he said.

  Melitta looked around. She had about eight hundred riders left. They had been in action for seven days. ‘We must appear on Nikephoros’s flank and make him draw off,’ she said. ‘We may have to fight in the dark. Eumenes of Olbia must get across to the south bank and join us.’

  Up and down the column of Sakje, every warrior changed horses. The farmers, three hundred strong, had only one pony each. Melitta mounted Gryphon and rode to Temerix’s lieutenant, a big, ruddy smith named Maeton.

  ‘Follow at your best speed. When you come, look for my banner. Do you understand? If all else fails, kill as many enemy as you can.’ She took his hand, and he bowed his head. Behind him, she could see Gardan. She raised her voice. ‘By this time tomorrow, we will be done. Eumenes is here from Olbia. We can win now, and we will never face foreign taxes and raids from Upazan again.’

  They gave a cheer, and she waved and rode away.

  When she got to the head of her Sakje, she drew her axe. ‘Now we ride,’ she said.

  And they were off.

  Ten stades of open fields. Twice they crossed farm walls, following Thyrsis, who had left riders to guide them over, and then, faces to the setting sun, they came over a low ridge and they could see two full taxeis of enemy phalangites facing the last ford, and at the ford, Urvara’s knights, all wearing scale armour from throat to ankle, standing with their axes at the top of the riverbank. The ground in front of her household was littered with bodies.

  ‘Follow me!’ Melitta shouted. She bent low on Gryphon’s neck and kicked her heels, and he went from a canter to the gallop.

  Sakje needed no orders to form for battle. They were in a long column, and now they spread wide across the plain, drawing their bows from their gorytoi as they galloped and nocking the first arrows, the faster horses pulling ahead of the slower.

  Their hoof beats announced their arrival, and long before they neared Nikephoros, his pikes were changing direction, and they faced a wall of spear-points. Melitta was still a horse-length in advance of Scopasis and her knights. She didn’t slow the big horse, but leaned her weight to the right and he turned away from the spear-points and she passed an arm’s length from the glittering hedge, She shot her first arrow into the blur of faces and leather armour so close that her shaft was in a man’s gut before her galloping horse carried her past.

  As she nocked her second arrow, her thumb feeling for the burr on the nock, Scopasis buried his first in a man’s shield and cursed.

  ‘Lock your shields!’ a phylarch shouted.

  She she saw him, his mouth open for the next order, but Macedonian shields were small things compared to the great aspis that her brother carried, and she shot him over the rim of his shield – missing the open mark of his mouth, so that her shaft went in over his nose and right out again through his helmet.

  The pikemen could do nothing but bend their heads to put the peaks of their tall helmets into the arrow storm and pray to their gods. The Sakje were riding so close that they could choose where to shoot – above the shield or below – and men fell with arrows through their feet. Eight hundred Sakje thundered along the flank of the phalanx, and a hundred pikemen fell, wounded and screaming, or dead before their helmets hit the ground.

  Melitta released a third shaft, missed seeing the result, and then she was past the last man and in the open. She kept going until she pulled up by Urvara, who stood with a bloody sword between her banner and her tanist. The iron-haired woman pulled her helmet free and dropped her sword to catch at Melitta’s hand.

  ‘I knew you’d come,’ she said. ‘Between us, we might finish him.’

  Melitta held up her quiver. She had eight arrows left. ‘T hat was all bluff,’ she said.

  Urvara gave half a smile. ‘There he goes,’ she said. Even as she spoke, they saw a single figure on horseback arrive in the enemy phalanx.

  ‘Messenger from the fort?’ Melitta asked. ‘Shall we harry them once more?’ she asked.

  Urvara shook her head. ‘They’re going to retreat – you can see it in the front-rank men. I’ve lost a lot of people today – I’m not sure I can help you. Let him go.’

  There were dead pikemen and dead Sakje all the way across the plain – three stades of dead.

  Nikephoros was less than a stade away. It was somehow odd that Melitta knew the sound of his voice. He was shouting at someone. And then the pikemen began to march, their ranks closing up over the dead, and they formed even closer. The back ranks walked backwards as they withdrew, and the spearheads were still steady.

  ‘Good men,’ Coenus said. He was in armour again, and had a fine Attic helmet on his head with a red crest. ‘He’s going to ride over and ask for a truce.’

  ‘Give me all your arrows,’ Melitta called to her household, and in seconds, her quiver was full – forty arrows, all they had.

  She turned to Coenus. ‘You’re with me. The rest of you wait here. Scopasis – here!’ More kindly, ‘Coenus can protect me. And I want him to see a full quiver.’

  Sure enough, Nikephoros was riding towards them, mounted on an ugly bay. He seemed unconcerned to be alone in front of a host of enemies.

  ‘I wish that man
was mine,’ Melitta said.

  Coenus nodded. ‘If he lives, make him yours,’ he said.

  Nikephoros met them in a clear space among the dead. ‘I would like a day’s truce to collect and bury my dead,’ he said. ‘I concede that I was bested.’

  Melitta shook her head. ‘No, I’m sorry, Nikephoros. I like you, but no truce. We will finish you in the morning. Unless you’d like to ask for terms.’

  ‘My master’s ally Upazan is coming,’ he said. ‘You will not finish me in the morning.’

  Melitta shrugged. ‘I have no need to bluster or bargain. Begone.’

  She turned her horse, and as she turned, she saw the shock on Nikephoros’s face. Even as she saw it, she saw where his eyes were, and she followed them.

  The bay was full of ships.

  And closer, at the seaward edge of Nikephoros’s camp, there was fire.

  ‘No truce,’ she spat. To Coenus, she said, ‘Ride!’

  They left Nikephoros in a swirl of dust and galloped back across the dead to where her people had dismounted. Most were swilling wine. Tameax spat a mouthful and it was like blood from his mouth – a poor omen, she thought.

  ‘My brother is here,’ she shouted.

  Coenus pulled up behind her. ‘Of course!’ he said.

  ‘Satyrus is attacking Nikephoros’s camp,’ she said. ‘We need to harry him every step and slow his retreat, and we may yet have him in the last light of the sun.’

  It is a hard thing for a warrior to believe that he is done – that he has lived another day, that he can drink, sit on the ground, enjoy the small pleasures that make life worth living even in the middle of the unbelievable tension of daily war – and then be summoned back to the risk of imminent death. It is a hard thing, and it is only the best who can rise to meet it.

  ‘Now for revenge!’ Thyrsis said, leaping to his feet as if he’d never shot his bow or ridden a stade all day.

  ‘One more ride,’ Scopasis shouted, and then they were all on their feet. Many changed horses. Many cursed.

  Urvara leaned on her sword hilt and drove the point into the grass. ‘We’re done.’

  Melitta was sorry, but she forced a smile. ‘I can see Eumenes,’ she said, pointing across the river, where a long column of horsemen were splashing into the river. ‘Send him to me.’

  Then she took her warriors and went back to the pikemen.

  Nikephoros had plenty of time to see her coming, and at her orders all the Sakje shot carefully and slowly, riding close to be sure of every shaft, and the pikemen halted and closed even tighter. Melitta rode to Graethe. ‘Take your Standing Horses and get arrows from the Grass Cats,’ she said. ‘Then come back.’

  He waved his axe in acknowledgement and rode away.

  Her numbers halved, she led her people past the phalanx again. Only fifty or so arrows flew, but men fell.

  The phalanx shuffled into motion again.

  She cursed the lack of arrows and rode past a third time. This time, pikemen leaped out of the spear wall and killed Sakje, dragging the victims down with charging thrusts of their spears – but every brave pikeman died, spitted or shot by the following riders.

  And again the phalanx retreated, opening a gap.

  She rode by a fourth time but scarcely a dozen arrows flew, and the phalanx didn’t even stop. Nikephoros was on to her. He was going to march away.

  But Graethe returned and led his men straight to the attack, and his first run blocked out the first stars with arrow shafts, and fifty more pikemen fell. Again they halted and closed up.

  ‘They may be the best infantry I’ve ever seen,’ Coenus said. ‘They won’t break. By the gods, they’re good.’

  Graethe rode back. ‘Now what?’

  ‘Give every warrior one arrow,’ she said. ‘We’ll hit both of their flanks together and try to make them fold.’

  Graethe agreed, and they rode out to the flanks. On the left, where Melitta rode, she could see horsemen crossing the last ridge. She had no idea who they were, but they were clear in the last light of the sun.

  ‘Rally at the ford if we do not break the Greeks!’ she shouted.

  There was no answering shout. Her people had no life in them – they rode, and obeyed. That was all. Every face had the lines of exhaustion.

  She led them wide to the left and the Greeks began to march, and then she turned inward, just as Graethe’s men did the same on the right. This time they would go straight at the Greeks instead of riding along the face of their formation. If men flinched, if the arrow storm took enough lives, a rider might slip into the ranks, and then another behind, and then . . .

  The Cruel Hands were across the ford. She could see Parshtaevalt leading his warriors forward – a thousand fresh Sakje with full quivers.

  But the sun was gone, and the last light was augmented by the beacon on the fort and the line of fires burning on the beach. They had a few minutes of ruddy light, and then it would be dark.

  Nikephoros had halted and was again closing his files.

  Melitta put her heels to Gryphon and they went forward.

  And the infantry held them. Not a Sakje died, but they were tired. A young warrior who might, in the morning, have risked his life to thread the little gap where the phylarch died with a barb in his throat reined up and turned away instead. And as the very last light died, the Sakje rode away.

  It was not for nothing. All along the beach, Eumeles’ second squadron lit the night sky with the fires in their hulls. And Nikephoros, driven from his camp without a fight, turned his still unbeaten phalanx from the burning gates and marched away north and east. A rider joined the phalanx, a lone man in a purple cloak. Melitta was watching him as his cloak turned from purple to black in the failing light.

  ‘Eumeles!’ a voice by her elbow called. The man turned his head and then rode on, joining the retreat of the phalanx. She turned to see who had shouted.

  ‘To Tartarus with him,’ Satyrus said, and threw his arms around his sister.

  25

  They camped on the field with the dead. Temerix came in an hour after dark with all his men and reported that Upazan had crossed the river to the north and was coming up fast.

  Satyrus was bigger than she remembered. He seemed to have swollen to fill the role of king. She let him do it. Men called him Wanax, the old title, and Basileus, and he was like a demi-god. She felt tired and dirty next to his magnificent armour, his perfect physique and his unscarred face.

  Before the night was an hour old, he had set the camp and together, the two of them walked from fire to fire, visiting Sakje and Olbians, farmers and sailors.

  ‘My men are annoyed that they have to put out the fires they started,’ Satyrus joked. His ships were still working, transporting the Olbian infantry over the river after disgorging all the Macedonians who had served as marines. ‘We could have had all Eumeles’ ships. But we didn’t know you and Urvara could hold so many men for so long.’

  Melitta smiled. ‘We did it with our teeth,’ she said. ‘Don’t you sleep?’

  ‘We’re going to fight in the morning,’ he said. ‘I don’t want any mistakes. Most of our people fought today, Lita. If we don’t put spirit in them—’

  ‘You could start by putting some of that spirit in me, brother,’ she said. ‘If I thought I could, I’d desert. I’m done.’

  He put his arms around her, and she stayed there. ‘You are superb,’ he said. ‘You were going to do it all without me, weren’t you?’

  ‘We thought that you were dead, until we landed and heard the news,’ she said.

  He smiled. ‘Listen, honey bee. We’ve got them. We’ve got them.’ He pulled his shoulder blades back sharply and flexed his arms. ‘Their fleet is gone. Upazan is nothing – a horse lord with his power base a thousand stades away, deep in our territory.’

  She shook her head. ‘Spirit is all, Satyrus. If we lose tomorrow, we are the ones who are finished.’ She paused. ‘I wish Diodorus were here.’

  They were between
fires. Behind them, Olbians shouted and poured libations. They were fresh men, and their father’s friend Memnon, hoary with age and still hard as a rock, led them in the hymn to Ares.

  Memnon came and embraced them both. ‘Tomorrow, we will put Eumeles in the dust, where he belongs, the cur,’ he said.

  ‘May Ares protect you, Memnon,’ Melitta said. ‘You have grown old in his service – and few of his servants grow old!’

  Memnon looked around. ‘I had to come,’ he said. ‘I couldn’t miss this. My last fight, I suspect – some kid will put a spear in my throat and I’ll curse the dark when it falls.’ He thumped his chest. ‘I was at Issus with the Great King. This will be my tenth battle in the front rank.’

  Satyrus was moved by the old man. He put a gentle hand on Memnon’s back. ‘May Herakles protect you. You deserve better than a death in battle.’

  Memnon laughed and went back to his men. ‘Better a spear to the throat in the storm of bronze than dying of the shits in painful old age, lad,’ he called.

  At the north end of the camp, Ataelus’s clan was a silent, mournful knot – those who were awake. As they walked there, Satyrus stopped, looking out over the sea in the moonlight. He could hear the sound of wild beasts rooting in the bodies.

  Satyrus set his face. ‘About Diodorus – you are right – and right to remind me.’ He shook his head. ‘I left the horse transports to catch Eumeles at sea. I had to do it – but a thousand professional cavalry would be the balance of this battle.’

  Melitta had to smile at her brother. ‘People and spirit,’ she said. ‘With or without Diodorus, what will win tomorrow is spirit. So let us talk to every man and every woman, even if we get no sleep.’

  At Ataelus’s fire, Ataelus was awake, with his son by his side. The little man embraced Satyrus. ‘You look for your father,’ he said, enigmatically.

  Satyrus nodded. ‘I look like him?’ he asked.

  ‘For him,’ Ataelus said. ‘You have looks for him.’