Funeral Games t-3

by Christian Cameron

  ‘Ten gold darics on the Spartan,’ Philip said.

  ‘Shouldn’t somebody stop this?’ Sophokles asked. The doctor was amused.

  The Macedonians ignored him. ‘Done. You’re an idiot.’ Draco turned to Satyrus. ‘Here – you’re a prince. You hold the money.’

  Theron was on his feet with the Spartan’s hair in one hand. He’d taken three heavy blows and his face registered pain, but now he stepped in, grabbed a hand and suddenly, as if by magic, he had Philokles kneeling in the dust, one arm behind his back.

  ‘Submit!’ he ordered.

  ‘Fuck yourself!’ the Spartan spat.

  ‘I’ll break your arm,’ Theron said, and put some pressure on the joint.

  Philokles roared with rage and kicked back with his right foot. For all that he was off balance and in pain, it was a shrewd blow, but Theron had not competed at the Olympics for nothing – he loosed his hold, rotated his hip and avoided the blow and then replaced his hold, all as if giving a lesson. This time he jerked the Spartan’s head up and his right arm down.

  ‘Submit,’ he said.

  ‘Or what?’ Philokles said. Despite the pain in his arm socket, he managed to roll his own hip and land an elbow in Theron’s gut. He broke the hold and rolled away. When he rose, he could barely raise his right arm.

  Melitta slipped off her horse. ‘If you two don’t stop, one of you will be too injured to fight bandits.’ She planted her hands on her hips.

  ‘If he will not submit, his drunken foolishness will kill all of us,’ Theron said. ‘Act like a man, Spartan. I’m not going all out, you fool of a Spartan. I could pull your arm right out. Shall I? Or do you have to pretend that you can take me?’

  ‘All I hear is talk,’ Philokles spat, and came forward.

  There was a flash and a sound like a tree branch snapping in the wind, and then only Theron was standing. He was shaking his right hand back and forth. ‘Apollo, lord of games!’ he said. ‘Fucking Spartans!’

  Philokles lay unconscious in the dust. Sophokles dismounted in weary disgust and went to look at him, glaring at Theron all the while.

  Locris and Glaucus had eyes as round as kraters.

  The last guards from the caravan hurried away, exchanging money as they went and laughing nervously. Satyrus handed Draco all the money he had put in his hat.

  It took both Macedonians and Theron to get the Spartan over his horse, and they made poor time until Philokles recovered consciousness. Satyrus watched him, and met his eye, and smiled.

  Philokles winked.

  Satyrus suppressed his urge to say something. Instead, after ten minutes had gone by, he raised a hand. ‘Halt!’ he said. He slipped down from his horse and, with some help from Philip, they got Philokles on his feet. He walked his horse for some time, without speaking, and then he climbed painfully on to the beast’s back without using his right arm, and then he rode with his face in his horse’s mane.

  They were a silent crew until they made camp.

  ‘Can you manage a watch?’ Theron asked Philokles. Every head in the camp turned.

  ‘Why don’t you stand it with me?’ Philokles asked.

  ‘I will,’ Theron responded.

  Philokles looked around. ‘I want the doctor on my watch,’ he said. His tone said that he was looking for trouble.

  ‘I don’t stand watches,’ Sophokles said. ‘I need a clear head.’

  ‘Fine,’ Philokles said. ‘I’ll just kick you every few minutes.’

  Satyrus wondered why Theron did nothing to interfere, but he didn’t.

  ‘I want to say something,’ Satyrus said to his sister.

  She shook her head emphatically. ‘Theron has some idea of what he’s doing. Let him do it.’ She rubbed her chin. ‘There’s something going on – Philokles and Theron. And the doctor. I don’t get it.’

  ‘Philokles is up to something, and Theron is in on it,’ Satyrus said. He didn’t get it, either, and he went to sleep thinking about it.

  It was Philokles who woke Satyrus for his watch. His blankets were warm, and his sister had been pressed comfortably against his back, and the mountain air, even in summer, had a bite to it. But he rose, took the offered spear and sat by the fire with Draco.

  Draco nodded. ‘You’ve done this before, lad?’ he said.

  ‘My mother made us stand watches on the sea of grass,’ he said. ‘I’ll go and look at the horses.’

  ‘Good lad,’ the Macedonian said.

  Three or four similar exchanges passed the whole of the watch, and then Satyrus was in his cloaks again, and asleep.

  The next day they awoke to find that both of the guides were gone – fled or deserted, it was hard to know. They’d taken the javelins they’d been given and nothing else.

  The two Macedonians were for riding after them. Philokles shook his head.

  ‘How would we find them?’ he asked. ‘They were our guides. They’ll know the tracks and the hillsides. We’ll stick to the path.’

  They rode down and down into a deep valley, where they halted for lunch. The two Macedonians were hyper alert, but nothing came at them. They ate standing by their horses, and after they had all switched to fresh, they rode on. Kallista moaned quietly. She was on her own pony now, and she looked so miserable that no one would mistake her for a beauty. The doctor watched the hillsides endlessly.

  An hour from the valley, Draco rode up past Satyrus and pushed his horse close to Theron’s. ‘I just saw the flash of metal on the hillside,’ he said. ‘Right up above us.’

  ‘I saw it too,’ Philokles said. He turned to Theron. ‘Since you’re in charge, Corinthian, you can tell us – what are we doing?’

  Theron looked at them. ‘We’re four competent fighting men and a boy who knows which end of the blade to hold – and a girl who can kill if she has to. If they’re foolish enough to attack us, we kill them. Bandits are all cowards.’

  Draco grunted. ‘Not here they ain’t, athlete. Here, they’re like as not veterans of Arbela and Issus, or the fight between Athens and Macedon.’

  ‘The one Macedon lost?’ Sophokles asked. ‘We call it the Lamian War.’

  Even Melitta, who didn’t like the doctor, was surprised by the venom in his voice.

  Philokles tried to rotate his right arm in its socket and his face clouded with pain. ‘Any more good ideas, Corinthian?’

  Theron smiled at him. ‘Since you’re sober, why don’t you tell us how to proceed, Philokles?’

  Philokles was still. He held Theron’s eye steadily, and after a pause that went on too long, he said, ‘I would rather not.’

  Theron looked around. ‘I’ll go first. As soon as they start shooting, we ride for it. We have fresh beasts and we can outdistance pursuit. If the twins would care to give us some archery, we’d be the better for it.’

  Melitta grinned. ‘I thought that you’d forgotten me.’ She took her bow out of her gorytos.

  ‘Put that away,’ Philokles said. ‘Don’t let them know we’re on to them. Draw when they come for us, not before. And Melitta – don’t let yourself be taken. Understand? I’ve been pig-headed – I should have turned us back when we met the caravan.’ He looked at the ground and then at Theron. ‘Don’t let the children be taken.’

  ‘Speak for yourself,’ Philip said. He sat straighter. ‘Let’s see how many we can put in the earth, eh?’

  Draco nodded, but his lips were pursed.

  Theron shook his head. ‘If we go back, we’re certain to die,’ he said. ‘If we get through the bandits-’

  The doctor spoke up. His face was white. ‘I don’t think that this is well thought. What if there are very many of them? Let us go back. We can still take ship from Heraklea-’

  Theron didn’t even turn his head. ‘We’re not going back.’

  ‘This is foolishness!’ the Athenian said. ‘Are you insane? We can ride back up the trail a day and go down the Gordian passes with a real caravan! Just turn back!’ Spittle flew when he spoke.

  ‘E
nough talk.’ Philokles looked at Theron.

  Satyrus was sure that there was some exchange in that look.

  Then the Spartan tucked his heels into his girth and prodded his gelding forward. ‘I’ll go first. My arm isn’t worth a crap and I might as well eat the first spear.’ He had the set look of a man committed to a course of action.

  ‘We have armour,’ Satyrus said.

  Draco was dismissive. ‘If we put it on they’ll know we know they’re there.’

  Satyrus shook his head. ‘We stop, and Melitta sneaks away to have a piss – in a way that can be seen from above. Get your cuirass on under your chlamys while you pretend to have a dump.’

  Philip laughed and looked at Satyrus as if reappraising him. ‘You may make a general yet, boy.’ He ruffled Satyrus’s hair.

  Theron nodded. ‘Halt!’ he said. He turned to Melitta. A little too loudly, he said, ‘Very well, princess. Go and relieve yourself.’

  With a credible imitation of a shame-faced girl, Melitta climbed behind a rock to their left and they could hear her muttering to herself as she fumbled with her multiple chitons.

  Satyrus had a small thorax of scales from the armour shop. He got off his horse on the downhill side, his heart pounding, and got to his pack animal with a minimum of fuss. His thorax was wrapped in goatskin. He unrolled it on the ground, put the skin back in the basket and pulled the thorax on. He laced it up the side himself, annoyed at the sound he made. Then he slipped his sword belt over the whole and pulled his cloak over it.

  ‘This is insanity, boy.’ Sophokles scrambled up. ‘Call your sister over and we’ll slip away. That Spartan is going to his death and taking us all with him.’

  Satyrus shrugged twice under his armour, trying to get the chest to fit. It felt tight. He unwound one of the laces and redid it. He didn’t know what to say to the older man, so he ignored him. He was afraid enough without help.

  The man walked away.

  The two Macedonians made a pretty good show of wagering on which of them could piss the farthest. Then they complained about how long women took, and then they argued over their wager until Philip threatened to piss on his partner.

  Satyrus’s brain finally realized that they were going to fight. It hit him between breaths, and his chest grew tighter, as if the armour was still laced too hard.

  He met Philokles’ eye.

  ‘Scared, boy?’ Philokles asked.

  Satyrus chose nodding, as being better than squeaking.

  ‘Me too,’ Philokles said. He flashed a grin. ‘Still, I won’t kill anyone this way.’ He winced as he got his left arm into the armour he had picked up. ‘Pull it tight, boy,’ he asked.

  ‘That doctor is scared worse than me,’ Satyrus said.

  ‘Hmm,’ Philokles answered.

  Satyrus got Philokles into his armour while Kallista complained about her thighs, horses and the world. Satyrus didn’t think it was an act. The doctor sat on his gelding, glaring around him as if every rock could vomit bandits.

  And then Theron yelled at Melitta for being a weak-livered bitch, and she came out from behind her rock, and they were up and moving.

  Satyrus could scarcely breathe. He tried to keep his right hand off his sword hilt and his left hand off his bow. The trail was steeper here and the sharp bends were so numerous that sightlines were less than a stade on each turn. There were no trees at all, just scrub and rock and summer meadow grass and more rock.

  ‘Any time now,’ Philip said, about one breath before an arrow hit Philokles between the shoulders.

  The arrow didn’t penetrate the bronze scale, and Philokles gave a shout and pressed his gelding into rapid motion.

  Behind Satyrus, the doctor’s horse panicked and he tried to turn the beast on the narrow road, blocking the track.

  Satyrus looked all around him, saw an arrow coming in and flinched away, drawing his own bow. His horse leaped forward and he gave it its head, and the beast pushed right past Philokles and he was in the lead – not a position he wanted. Two arrows hit his horse – thump-crump – and the beast’s legs collapsed, spilling Satyrus on to the scree of the trail so that he rolled clear of his dying horse and fell over the edge. He fell the length of his own body and all the wind was driven from his lungs as he hit. His head rang.

  Time passed as he tried to focus his eyes. He could hear shouts on the trail above him, and then a clash of iron, or bronze. And then he had control of his lungs – and then, a few seconds later, control of his limbs. He was lying on a rock shelf a little wider than his body. He got to his feet and started collecting arrow shafts, as his fall had dumped the contents of his quiver. He grabbed ten or twelve and thrust them back into his gorytos, feeling the press of the fighting above him.

  Melitta shouted something and he heard the buzz of an arrow.

  He went to the end of the shelf and got a foot up on a projecting boulder, his head throbbing. As soon as he could look over the trail, he saw Theron standing over Philokles. He had his cloak over his arm and his sword in his fist, and a man lay in the trail. Philokles was clutching his knee in the gravel. Draco and Philip were back to back down the trail, with a knot of men around them, and Melitta sat between them, still mounted, shooting arrows.

  Satyrus didn’t think anyone had seen him. He pushed himself over the edge of the trail and stood up, just a few horse-lengths from Theron. Then he nocked an arrow, forcing himself to go slowly, to get the nock on the string. He breathed in deeply, raised his bow, only then letting himself look at the desperate fight twenty feet away.

  He chose one of Theron’s opponents. The men were in armour, but Satyrus had all the time in the world to aim at the back of the man’s thigh – an easy shot at twenty feet. The man’s leg went out from under him immediately, and he rolled and fell.

  They all had armour – Satyrus was just taking that in when Theron, freed from one opponent, feinted a cut and kicked his other opponent in the shield, so that the man went over backwards. Theron kicked the man between the legs and then finished him with a short thrust to his neck, already looking around.

  Theron’s other opponent made the mistake of thinking that Philokles was out of action. When he stepped across the Spartan to attack Theron’s rear, Philokles’ left hand locked on his ankle like a vice and Philokles scissored his feet up and grabbed the man’s waist and pulled him down. Theron stepped back over the Spartan as if they had designed the whole move as a dance and cut the man’s throat.

  Satyrus had another arrow on his string. His sister shot and missed – an archer standing on the hillside. He ducked. But he didn’t see Satyrus, and Satyrus could still see him. He shot on instinct, a little high, a little wide to the right for the breeze.

  He watched his arrow fly, thrilled as it arced and vanished into the bandit’s side. Satyrus saw it all, but he didn’t see the archer who shot him. There was a blast of pain, like falling into cold water, and then he was out.

  There was a slave market in Krateai, but it wasn’t much, just a red mud-walled barrack with a heavy wooden door. The town only existed because the mountain roads divided here, the northern road going down the valleys to Gordia, while the southern road went past Manteneaon and then turned through the great pass into the plains of Anatolia, roasting in heat at this time of year. A small parcel of slaves – probably taken by thieves, claimed by no lesser being than the tyrant of Heraklea, or so the Macedonian factor said – was bound for Gordia.

  Satyrus had a bruise on his side as big as his head, and the centre of it was livid and leaked pus where the scale armour had deflected the arrow’s point – mostly. His ears still rang from time to time and twice he put down his heavy load to vomit, and the guards hit him with their canes and laughed at his feeble attempts to puke.

  Melitta wanted to kill them – both of them. She was carrying the heaviest load of her life, a basket full of grain purchased with threats in a village lower down the pass. It was, in fact, about half the food that their little caravan had. And the water
was running out. Springs were zealously guarded in these steep defiles, and the petty lords and bandit kings who ruled from their eyries charged heavily for each beaker of water.

  But their new owner apparently had a soft heart. He stopped to get them water and a night’s sleep, and bought a quantity of food. Then he offered his whole parcel for sale – Satyrus and Melitta, brother and sister, right on the edge of adulthood, and both startlingly attractive, both virgins – to a pair of Greek merchants. They also offered the other girl – also a beauty, you could tell, despite her pale face and her complaining. Satyrus was naked and had a bad bruise on his side and the girls were clothed, and men in the crowd shouted for both of the girls to be stripped. One of the soldiers in the caravan’s escort used the stock of his riding whip to knock a heckler unconscious, and that was the end of the salacious catcalls.

  Men bid – some bid high, for the twins – but the Greek merchants had cash and a seal from some great power down in the green valleys, and the men of the town glared lustfully at the girls – and the boy – as they were shackled and led away.

  One of the two merchants was a Spartan by his way of talking. He was the worse for wine, even at the height of the sun, and he probably paid too much for the children, for his partner, a Boeotian, glared at him until their little cavalcade rode off down the south fork. No one thought to ask how the Greeks had happened to have so many horses, or why the merchant’s caravan guards went with the Greeks.

  ‘Was that necessary?’ Melitta asked Theron after they had cleared all possible onlookers.

  Theron was still calming Kallista. At some point she had gone from his enemy to his lover, and she had shared his blankets almost every night on the road since the fight with the bandits. She seemed as infatuated with him as he was with her – but even the pretence of a slave auction had driven her into a state not far from madness.