Storm of arrows t-2

by Christian Cameron

  Kineas walked them up the snowdrifts to the walls. Troopers were punished with snow-clearing duty outside the walls, where a beaten zone was maintained. Inside, the snowdrifts sometimes added to the height of the fort.

  ‘You and Leon are competing for Mosva, Lot’s daughter,’ he said when they were out of the wind.

  Eumenes nodded.

  ‘I have sent her off east with the prodromoi. I suggest you apply yourself to your work as a professional soldier. Buy a girl if you feel the urge. That outburst in the meeting was ill-meant and bad for discipline. And you started it. I hope you understand me.’

  Eumenes flushed despite the bite of the cold. ‘It’s not fair. He called my father a traitor.’

  Kineas put his hands on the boy’s shoulders. ‘What you mean is that it’s not fair that your father was a traitor. He was. And Leon was a slave. And both of you are important officers in this company, and we need you to function as adults and not as brainless children.’

  ‘Not fair,’ muttered Eumenes. He was weeping.

  Kineas embraced the boy, who had suffered so much in the last year and was now weeping for the loss of a girl and some prestige. His embrace obviously comforted the young man, and Kineas thought of Mosva crying in his arms after the fight in the high ground to the west, and how useless he was at comforting anyone.

  He did his best.

  Without really intending it, Kineas didn’t climb the hill to the citadel that day, or the next. Ataelus’s twenty riders trotted out over the mud into a sunny morning and vanished into the eastern hills before the sun was a hand high in the sky. The mercenaries — new and old — drilled on the parade under Lycurgus’s eye, with Diodorus watching and Leon taking notes. Eumenes had the cavalry out all day, conditioning their horses, walking them up and down, riding for brief stints, and the young man was merciless in working himself and every trooper under him. Temerix’s men went out in twos and threes, unarmed, and began the long job of locating fodder. Kineas watched the Kaspian for ships from the north and the mountains to the east for a rider from Ataelus.

  Another day passed, and Kineas failed to climb the hill.

  Towards evening on the third day, Philokles joined him on the porch of the megaron. It was spring, unseasonably warm, in fact, and three days of sun had caused avalanches on the hillsides and probably opened the hill passes south. Crocuses pushed up through the rubbish and the tree bark that had accumulated along the foundation of the megaron, and Kineas marvelled at their colour as only a man who has survived a long winter can do. Outside the gate, he watched a mounted man gallop past his sentries, straight up the hill to the citadel.

  ‘There is much beauty in the world,’ Philokles said.

  Kineas grinned. He put a hand on Philokles’ shoulder; he loved it when the philosopher ruled and his friend made statements of this sort. ‘There is,’ Kineas said. And then more soberly, ‘And much cowardice.’

  Philokles sat on the step of the megaron. He stretched his long legs in front of him and took a sip of wine before handing the cup to Kineas. ‘The queen?’ he asked. His voice was carefully neutral.

  ‘I lust for her. I marshal a thousand arguments against her — all excellent, I might add. Srayanka. The men. Her own — bah. I lack words to express it. And yet I fly back to her like a moth to an oil lamp. And then I resist.’ He shrugged. ‘It is like a contest.’

  Philokles raised an eyebrow. ‘You do love a challenge,’ he said.

  ‘It’s more than that,’ Kineas said.

  Philokles rested on an elbow. ‘Do you think I might have a sip of the wine I brought out to us? Thanks. Is it? More than a challenge? The camp is full of whores — you could have any one you liked, and no diplomatic incident need follow. You could fuck ten of them and no one would tell Srayanka. Indeed, I wouldn’t think it Srayanka’s business. But instead of a little helpful penetration of a whore to work off your male humours, you wander off into a game with a queen. The game is being played about dominance and submission. Sex is just a piece on the board. Stop dramatizing. In a few weeks we’re riding away — fuck her and leave her, or don’t fuck her and leave her. Neither one of you will ever submit.’

  Kineas laughed ruefully. ‘When you came out with the wine, I was remarking to myself what a pleasure you are when you are in a philosophical frame of mind.’ He took the cup and drained it. ‘I forgot that your philosophy often kicks like an army mule.’ Kineas took the cup back and finished the wine. ‘She says all our philosophy is cowardice, and every man should do what he wills.’

  Philokles nodded. ‘That’s the philosophy of a despot — or a woman trying to seduce.’

  ‘She’s wrong, though.’ Kineas wasn’t sure whether that was a question or an answer.

  Philokles looked into the empty wine cup and frowned. ‘You drank all of my wine.’ He looked hurt. ‘The good wine that tastes like berries.’

  Kineas nodded. ‘And now I’m going to ride up the hill and see the queen.’

  Philokles nodded. ‘I find it very much in keeping with the way the gods drive men to action that I began this winter begging you to avoid her, and tonight I use my tongue as a lash to push you up the hill.’ He held out the cup. ‘Since you’ll go inside to change, bring me out another cup of wine? There’s a good fellow.’ He waited until Kineas was halfway in the door. ‘She’s not wrong. Nor right. This is not about her, but about you.’

  Kineas stopped for a moment and then nodded. When he returned in a fine woollen tunic and cloak with a bronze ewer of wine, Philokles had been joined by Nicanor and Diodorus. Nicanor served wine and took a cup for himself.

  ‘So you’re taking the bit between your teeth?’ Diodorus said. ‘Sappho says to take care.’

  Kineas curled one corner of his mouth. ‘I will,’ he said. He slammed back a second cup of wine, causing his friends to look at each other.

  Lycurgus raised an eyebrow. He was leaning against a column, watching the agora. ‘Lot of messengers moving around,’ he said.

  Sitalkes brought his horse, one of the royal stallions that he rode to rest Thalassa. Beyond the gate, the rest of his escort waited. The evening was calm and warm, and curiously quiet except for the messengers. Kineas listened for a moment and diagnosed the problem — it was warm like spring, but there weren’t any insects yet.

  In the west, the sun slid down towards the cold blue waters of the Kaspian.

  Kineas got a leg over his charger, settled himself and turned back to Lycurgus and Diodorus.

  ‘Double the watch and have the quarter guard stand to arms,’ he said. ‘I’m scared of shadows.’ He hated to be like that — in a sentence he’d condemned forty men to lose their evening of rest.

  Diodorus shook his head. ‘No — I feel it too. All the beggars are gone from the gate. Stay here.’

  Lycurgus nodded agreement. ‘Something has changed. I don’t like it.’

  Kineas shrugged. ‘After two days of screwing up my courage? To Hades with that.’

  Philokles came up beside Diodorus. ‘You’re both jumping at shadows. You’re going to give her good news.’ He shook his head. ‘I’m worried, too. My man in the palace hasn’t reported in three days.’

  Kineas nodded, but his mind wasn’t convinced.

  ‘You should take a sword,’ Diodorus shouted, as Kineas turned his horse.

  Kineas shook his head and rode for the gate.

  The gate to the citadel was heavily guarded. There were eight men on duty and every one of them was in full armour. They seemed surprised that Kineas had come and they sent for the captain of the guard rather than passing Kineas.

  First he fumed and then he worried. Behind him, he could hear Sitalkes speaking quietly to his men, all big Keltoi.

  ‘Don’t be separated from your weapons,’ Kineas said. ‘Something is wrong.’

  The captain of the guard came out in a polished iron helmet with a scale aventail and a scale shirt. He was armed for war. ‘Last person I expected to see,’ he said.

  �
�You are awaiting an attack,’ Kineas said flatly.

  The captain shrugged. ‘Not my place to say. The queen will receive you, if you are coming in. Your men must wait in the courtyard, disarmed. ’

  Kineas shook his head. ‘No. I’ve been in the citadel a dozen times and my men have never been disarmed.’

  The captain shrugged. ‘Then they wait out in the wind,’ he said.

  Kineas turned to Sitalkes. ‘I’m sorry,’ he said. ‘It’ll be cold. I’ll see to it as soon as I speak to her.’

  ‘Never mind us,’ Sitalkes said. ‘Take Carlus, at least.’ Carlus was the tallest man in the army, two hands taller than Kineas. He rode big horses and men got out of his way wherever he went.

  Kineas turned back to the captain. ‘One bodyguard,’ he said. ‘Armed.’ He handed the man a silver owl.

  The captain grunted and took the money. ‘Whatever the fuck. One man. It’s cold — let’s go.’

  Kineas gave his horse to Sitalkes, who threw a blanket over her. They waited in the icy wind on the gravel road under the walls and Kineas passed inside, into the sensuous warmth, led by one of her slaves.

  Carlus grunted twice — once when the warmth of the floors penetrated his sandals and again when he saw his first oiled slave girl. Other than that he was silent. Kineas left his cloak and his sandals in the outer rooms. Carlus followed him silently.

  Kineas could see the tension in every visible ligament on the slaves. He followed the slave into the throne room.

  It was much the same as his first visit, except that she was back to wearing the clothes of a Persian matron, and most of her male courtiers were in armour. They fell silent as he entered. There was a man in silvered scale mail standing at her shoulder, who looked like a prince. His face was covered by the nasal on his helmet. He looked familiar.

  ‘You are a fool to come here, Kineas of Athens,’ she said.

  Kineas agreed. The man at her shoulder was Darius. Kineas felt foolish — he’d seen all the signs that the Persian was changing sides, but he’d ignored them. ‘I come with an agreement about the spring campaign,’ he said, still thinking to buy her complacence. Perhaps it was just another round in their game. The fear round.

  ‘You are a fool, Kineas,’ she said, and this time she sounded sad. ‘The spring campaign is already over. I have need of your soldiers. And if I can’t have them, no one will.’ She looked to be on the verge of tears, but she steadied herself. She motioned at Darius. ‘Kill him.’

  Carlus gave his third grunt. Kineas whirled to see the giant Kelt with a dagger rammed through his cloak into the armour on his back. He was wearing a heavy cuirass made of layers of linen quilted together, half a finger thick, and the dagger skidded off the armour and ripped across his neck. The Kelt grunted a fourth time and ripped his heavy sword from its scabbard. He killed two men in as many blows and scattered the guardsmen, forcing their captain back as if he was a giant in a riot of children.

  Kineas was unarmed and unarmoured, but he knew where the alcove was. He leaped back from the first rush, grabbed a bronze platter and stopped a killing blow from the man concealed there and another from one of the courtiers nearest the throne. Darius was down from the dais and moving towards him.

  ‘Philokles!’ the Persian shouted, and ripped a sword from another courtier and threw it at Kineas.

  Kineas rammed the edge of the platter into a man’s nose. Then he took the man’s arm, whirled him and broke it, so that he screamed like a wounded horse. Kineas swept his feet and pushed him flailing into the line of guards, kicked with his bare feet, set his back against the wall and grabbed for the sword as it bounced off the wall. Philokles? he thought, and his right hand closed on the grip of the sword, a back-curved hanger like a small machaira, with a heavy guard that completely covered his hand. His left hand had the platter by one of its gryphon-head handles, and he hurled it like a discus at the crowd by the throne. The men facing him fell back a step.

  Carlus was bellowing like a bull. There were three men in the blood at his feet and two more clutching wounds and none of the guard would come near him.

  Darius dispatched one of the courtiers with a thrust to the chest — no wasted effort. The two survivors by the throne turned to look at him and Sartobases yelled ‘traitor!’ at him in outraged Persian.

  ‘Philokles!’ he shouted again.

  Women were screaming and the smell of death and offal carried across the warm, moist air. He glimpsed Banugul moving away from the throne, one hand pointing at Darius.

  Darius cut down another man and joined Kineas at the wall. ‘I work for Philokles!’ he said as if a battle cry, and the words penetrated Kineas’s brain. He laughed and attacked the men in front of him. They scattered and he cut one down in his retreat, but then the front of the hall began to fill with the queen’s guard.

  ‘Follow me!’ Darius called. He slipped behind a drapery.

  Kineas would not so lightly abandon his bodyguard. ‘Carlus!’ he yelled. ‘On me!’

  The Kelt swung his sword wide, so that the blade was a blur — back and forth — and then sprang away, the two great swings covering his retreat. He knocked a slave girl flat, smashed his fist into a man’s face, scattering teeth, and ran across the slick floor.

  A guardsman threw a javelin. His aim was true and it struck Carlus in the back, but it lacked power and the cuirass held it. Still, the giant stumbled a step. The guards gained heart and charged.

  Kineas ripped the hanging off the wall — a Persian procession of conquered peoples carrying gifts — and ducked through the concealed door. ‘Follow me!’ he shouted. He could feel Carlus pushing through the door behind him. They were in a dark corridor. Behind them, Therapon’s voice was calling for archers.

  They turned sharply right and the corridor climbed a flight of stairs, lit by pitch brands. ‘Hold them here,’ Kineas said to the big Kelt, who was panting with exertion, fear and pain. ‘Never let their archers get a shot at you. Use the curve of the wall. Understand? I’ll be back for you!’

  Carlus placed his back against the wall. He pushed himself to a full standing position. ‘Aye, lord,’ he said. He grinned. ‘Aye!’ His effort to push himself erect left a smear of wet blood on the plaster. The whole stairwell stank of burning pitch and the sweat of fear.

  Kineas turned and followed Darius again. ‘Where are we going?’ he asked.

  ‘Postern gate,’ Darius said. ‘Been trying to tell you for three days — she means to attack the camp. Tonight.’

  ‘She’s insane! We’d kill her!’

  Darius sagged against the landing and Kineas could see he was wounded, the flowing blood black in the fitful light. ‘You’d have killed her men — except that you came here. And she owns some of your new recruits. Or thinks she does.’ The man was pale with fatigue.

  ‘Let’s get to this gate!’ Kineas said.

  They went through a door, into a rich apartment and then down a long curve of steps set into the outer wall. The stairwell was pitch-black and cold as the outer wells of Hades, with a thin cold wind coming in through the arrow slits. Outside, Kineas could hear Greek voices — probably his bodyguard demanding news. The sounds of fighting could be heard right through the walls. Carlus was killing men, roaring his challenge.

  They went down, and down again, and through a door.

  There were a dozen men waiting for them.

  ‘Fuck!’ said Darius in Persian, and his sword flashed as he cut at a man. ‘Run, Kineas!’

  It was too late to run. Kineas pushed up beside the Persian and killed a man with an overarm thrust. The blade went right over his shield and into his eye — Kineas was using the bend in his own blade to baffle his opponent in the torch-lit dark. The man went down like a sacrifice and Kineas sank to one knee and swept his blade under the shield of Darius’s opponent. Even with his shorter, lighter blade, the cut severed the man’s ligaments just below the knee. He fell backwards, fouling his mates and buying Kineas a few seconds.

  Kineas was
already stripping the corpse of the man at his feet. He ripped the shield off the man’s arm, tearing at the straps, hacking with his blade at the dead man’s shield arm — the shield’s porpax caught on the dead man’s wrist and hand, a ring, a bracelet — Kineas pulled, shouting curses — the shield came free. Darius backed a step as an armoured man charged him. Kineas, uncovered, whirled, cutting with his sword, still trying to get the shield over his own arm. He cut low, cut high and met his opponent’s shield both times. Desperate, he tried a school dodge — he backed a step, placed a foot on his opponent’s shield and pushed.

  The man fell back. Not a gymnasium-trained man, or he’d have known the trick. Kineas pushed back through the door. Darius was above him on the stairs. The shield dropped on to his forearm, ripping flesh, and the grip came into his left hand.

  ‘When your Kelt goes down, we’re finished,’ Darius said. Carlus was three rooms behind them, his bellows audible even through the stone. Kineas heard the tense humour in the Persian’s voice. ‘I rather enjoy having you on my side, though.’

  Kineas had to laugh at that. ‘Stay on my shield side and get anyone who tries to pass me,’ he said. ‘None of them are your match. We’ll get through this.’ He turned his head and gave the younger man a broad smile.

  Darius straightened up. He met Kineas’s torch-lit glance. ‘I was tempted…’ he began.

  Kineas grunted and pushed forward through the door, ignoring whatever confession the younger man was considering. ‘Guard me!’ he called.

  The men on the other side didn’t expect him to attack. He pushed — shield in the face, cut low, push — and they fell back. His second back cut, luckier or more accurate than the others, cut a dactylos above a guardsman’s shield, the point slashing through his eyes and the bridge of his nose so that he fell dead between breaths, never seeing the blow that stole his life.

  ‘Athena!’ Kineas roared with the whole weight of his chest.

  Confused shouts beyond the wall.

  ‘Athena!’ He bellowed again, and cut, pushed, pushed again. Darius was covering his side along the wall, thrusting with reckless energy to force his shielded opponent back.