Tyrant: Force of Kings

by Christian Cameron

  Fickle as the seasons, Demetrios was suddenly playful. ‘Is that what passes for rhetoric in the Euxine?’ he asked. ‘Perhaps if I married your sister, we might be allies?’

  Satyrus almost spluttered his juice.

  Demetrios slapped his thigh. ‘See? I am not a dull companion. Come and storm the breach with me tomorrow, and let us see what we can arrange.’

  Satyrus was on the point of blank refusal when Achilles leaned forward. Satyrus hadn’t even seen the man enter the room.

  ‘Do what he asks and then crave a boon,’ Achilles suggested. ‘Act as if he’s bigger than you.’ He was back in his place behind the couches in a wink.

  ‘Your bodyguard?’ Demetrios asked. ‘A noted ruffian.’

  ‘My only advisor, at the moment,’ Satyrus said. ‘Very well. I’ll go up the breach tomorrow.’

  Demetrios changed – again. He seemed to grow larger, and he rose to stand, cup in hand. ‘That,’ he said, ‘is wonderful. Let us make it – memorable!’

  7

  An hour before dawn. The air was lighter – warmer, the promise of a deadly hot day. In armour – borrowed armour, and not particularly well-fitted – Satyrus was already hot.

  ‘You need to pay me more,’ Achilles commented. He swung his arms again, annoyed by the shape of the shoulders on the yoke of his borrowed cuirass. ‘This is war – a breach assault? People die like sheep when a lion gets into the pen, in an assault.’

  ‘Done one before?’ Satyrus asked. Demetrios had been lavish in his offerings of weapons and armour – and since it was a matter of life and death, Satyrus was taking his time picking a sword.

  It’s odd, he thought, that in the inn, I took the only sword to hand and grew to like it, but offered all these beautiful blades, I’m unable to choose one, much less enjoy it. Socrates would have something to say – and Philokles, too, I imagine. He had a flash of Philokles, standing in the pre-dawn light at Gaza, silent in the face of coming battle. Satyrus had seen battles, now – on land and at sea, and a year of fighting at Rhodes that left him weary. The thrill – the simple, youthful rush of eudaimonia, a frisson of fear and lust for glory – it wasn’t there. Fine weapons and beautiful armour were expressions of his status, not tools of his trade. He smiled.

  He wasn’t even decently nervous.

  He picked up a magnificent sword, Chalkidian, with beautifully back-swept edges from a wicked, and very prosaic, armour-piercing point. The grip was ivory, the fittings gold-embellished bronze, and the scabbard would buy an inn in Attika, or a farm in Plataea. It was sharp as a barber’s razor, the lobes of the leaf thin and vicious, with a heavy spine that ran down into the point.

  Even through his lack of interest, the sword was good. It fitted his hand – the balance was better than his father’s long machaira, and that had always seemed to him the best sword he’d ever handled.

  He shrugged, pulled the sword belt over his right shoulder and drew the sword, wincing when his too-small armour pinched at his right bicep on the cross-draw. ‘Where’s the slave?’ he asked Achilles, who went out of their tent – an enormous tent of red linen, and Satyrus had to wonder what Macedonian officer was sleeping under his cloak and bitter about it – and Satyrus heard his voice.

  Two Persian slaves came in and bowed low.

  ‘I have chosen weapons,’ Satyrus said. He raised his arms. ‘All of the armour is too small. I need a bigger thorax, even if it is plain leather or undecorated linen.’

  The slaves helped him out of his armour. The older slave bowed again. ‘A thousand apologies, lord. We will return with better armour.’

  Achilles grinned and raised his arms, too. ‘I like this game. I want mine larger around, with a smaller yoke, and covered in gold. With jewels.’

  The Persian bowed. ‘Lord, it shall be as you wish.’ He looked weary. Who wouldn’t, in the semi-dark before dawn?

  Slaves came with torches, and set them in holders all around the portico in front of the tent, and more slaves came with a table, and they set it with gold and silver vessels – cups, ewers, plates, a huge platter. Wine appeared, and fruit, and good bread, fresh from the ovens, and olive oil, honey and milk and small onion sausages, and fresh grilled anchovies.

  The Persians returned, each like Thetis bringing the armour of Achilles from Hephaeston in their eagerness to satisfy him.

  Achilles laughed. ‘I think that Demetrios fancies you,’ he said.

  Satyrus chose an unadorned bronze thorax and tried it on. The fit was close – perhaps a little tight, but the armholes were large enough and he could move his arms freely. He raised his shoulders, thrust with his legs. His ribs hurt, but he could fight.

  ‘I’ll take this,’ he said.

  Achilles was a larger man yet, but they fitted him on the third try.

  ‘Had I known the kind of party I was going to, I’d have brought the right clothes,’ he said.

  Satyrus dipped fresh bread in olive oil and took a bite. He was finding it surprisingly easy to eat.

  ‘I’m usually far more … worried … before a fight,’ he confessed. ‘I feel odd. Unconcerned.’

  ‘You want to watch that,’ Achilles said. ‘Fear is what keeps a man alive.’

  Satyrus nodded. It was lighter outside, and a large body of men was moving through the half-light just beyond the ropes of his enormous tent. He walked around the end to get a better look, and found himself face to face with a file of heavily armoured men.

  ‘Make way for the king!’ one of the men said. When Satyrus did not hurry to obey, the man raised his spear and shoved …

  At air. Satyrus backed, swung aside on one foot, caught the spearhead, and pulled, disarming the man.

  ‘Stop!’ Demetrios ordered. ‘Satyrus – I’ve come to share your breakfast.’

  The soldier glared at Satyrus.

  Satyrus handed him his spear. ‘That sort of thing may work in Asia,’ he said, ‘but in Greece, someone might use your skin to keep crows off their crops.’

  Demetrios nodded. ‘I tell them all the time. I want the Greeks to love me, and my hypaspists want them to hate me.’

  ‘We protect you, lord!’ the man protested.

  Slaves appeared behind the king, bearing braziers on which they cooked more fish, there was fresher bread, and fruit juice.

  Satyrus ate a plate of anchovies and drank pomegranate juice, a luxury even by the standards of the King of the Bosporons. ‘I envy you this,’ he said.

  ‘I might be facile, and suggest that if we were allies you could share it every day,’ Demetrios said.

  ‘Is this how you wooed Amastris?’ Satyrus asked, only half joking.

  Demetrios shook his head. ‘A very attractive woman with a very attractive sea-port.’ He took a mouthful of olive paste. ‘I didn’t seduce her. Not for lack of trying. It was her damned spymaster – he apparently counselled her to keep me at arm’s length. Excellent advice. A very, very dangerous man.’

  Satyrus smiled. ‘Stratokles of Athens? Very dangerous indeed, lord. On that, we can agree.’

  Demetrios snapped his fingers. ‘Neron?’ he said.

  A tall, thin Syrian came forward. He was well-enough formed, but his limbs were long and they gave him a vaguely simian look. He had a bushy black beard and bleak eyes.

  Neron bowed. ‘Satyrus of Tanais,’ he said. ‘It is a great pleasure to see you in the flesh, after reading so many reports about you. My master here delights in stories about you. You keep me busy.’

  Against his inclinations, Satyrus liked the man – his wit spoke well for his mind. ‘A pleasure, sir,’ Satyrus said, taking his hand.

  ‘Does everyone like you, Satyrus?’ Demetrios asked. ‘How wearying it must be for your friends.’

  Satyrus didn’t have an answer for that. He shrugged.

  ‘Ask Neron your questions,’ Demetrios asked.

&nb
sp; ‘What difference will that make?’ Satyrus asked. ‘You might have told him to tell me anything.’

  Demetrios rolled his eyes and went on eating.

  ‘Who paid to have me taken at Athens?’ Satyrus asked.

  Neron bowed to Demetrios. ‘May I eat as well, lord?’ he asked, and when Demetrios inclined his head impatiently, the spy took a cup of wine and began to pile a silver plate with fresh fish.

  ‘You know Phiale of Alexandria?’ Neron asked.

  ‘Very well,’ Satyrus answered.

  Neron smiled unpleasantly. ‘Many do, to their regret.’ He shrugged. ‘Women who sell their bodies are seldom nice or comfortable people to know – and always bad agents.’

  Satyrus raised an eyebrow. ‘How very Socratean of you. But I knew that Phiale was an agent in my taking – I spoke to her.’

  ‘Ahh!’ Neron said. He glanced at his master with a certain weary tolerance. ‘Sometimes the most difficult source of information I have is my own lord, who does not always share everything he should.’

  Satyrus nodded.

  ‘Amastris of Heraklea was wedded some weeks ago,’ Neron said. ‘At her wedding, to the best of my information, Cassander arranged the murder of Stratokles of Athens. You know him? A gifted man in my line.’

  ‘Your rival, perhaps?’ Satyrus asked.

  ‘Hmm. Not, I think, a player at my level, my lord, but only because of his ridiculous loyalty to Athens – to an Athens which hasn’t existed for a hundred years. Perhaps I offend you with my frankness?’ Neron sipped his wine, added more water.

  ‘Far from it. And yet, I assume you are similarly loyal to your master?’ Satyrus asked. The discourse was barbed – he wanted to show his own teeth.

  ‘Loyal enough, in these dark times,’ Neron answered. ‘At any rate, the murder of Stratokles was botched.’

  ‘I am surprised at myself, but I’m glad to hear it.’ Satyrus had to laugh.

  Neron answered him with a gleam of teeth. ‘How remarkable, my lord, that those are my exact feelings. Stratokles has been a great help to me and a desperate enemy, and the world would seem emptier if he were to be swept from the board.’ He looked around. ‘So far, everything I’ve said is available information to any merchant. This is not. Lysimachos, Cassander, and envoys from Seleucus and Ptolemy met. They discussed things. Lysimachos met Cassander privately, as well. They discussed different things.’ Neron shrugged. ‘My master, as you call him, has told me to be direct with you, and I will be, as far as our interests converge – but you will pardon me if I note that you are not really our friend, and your friends are most definitely our enemies?’

  ‘And misleading me to sow confusion among your enemies is too tempting?’ Satyrus asked.

  Neron looked disappointed. ‘Amateurs play these pointless games. I’m sharing information.’

  Demetrios nodded from across the table. Slaves brought him a chair and he sat. ‘Satyrus, listen to me. I aim to be king – absolute king – of the world. I need men – men like you – to trust me. If you catch Neron in a lie today, tell me, and I will have him killed, despite all his service to me, because if men like you won’t trust me, my cause is doomed. Understand? And my cause – to which I seek to win you – is the cause of justice, good government, a single empire from world edge to world edge, with courts and city states and philosophers, where a merchant or a scholar can travel from India to the Gates of Herakles without fear of pirates or robbers or tolls.’

  Satyrus frowned – because Demetrios made a good argument. And because, unless Demetrios was a magnificent liar, he seemed utterly earnest – the way a man who wanted to be a god had to be. Single-minded to the point of … insanity, or godhood.

  ‘Ask your questions, and don’t be petty minded,’ Demetrios said.

  Satyrus drank a whole cup of fruit juice. ‘Cassander and Lysimachos,’ he prompted.

  Neron shook his head at Demetrios. ‘Suffice it to say that they discussed matters of strategy. My master makes no secret of his intention to drive Cassander first from mainland Greece, and then from Macedon. Cassander wants Lysimachos in Asia, against Antigonus. Lysimachos would prefer to stay in Thrace and tax his Thracians.’ Neron nodded. ‘For a minor player, Lysimachos is wise, cautious and able. He has survived two major military defeats – the mark of a truly able commander. He refused to allow your murder when Cassander proposed it – he said that he owed you for support in former years.’

  ‘While he married my Amastris,’ Satyrus said, with more bitterness than he had known he felt.

  ‘More an act of statecraft than lust, I suspect,’ Demetrios said. ‘But you understand, his possession of Heraklea – and he has possessed it, just as fully as he has no doubt possessed Amastris’s welcoming body – and your sister’s expulsion of my ships from the Pontus have placed me in an impossible position, as Lysimachos has moved almost half of his army across the Euxine into Asia, to the great discomfort of my father.’ Demetrios rose to his feet, resplendent in armour of gold. Behind his chair, the sun was ready to rise – Dawn was coming out of her bed over the ocean. ‘We have an assault to make. And afterwards – after we have swung our swords together – I hope that we can sit together as friends, and I can convince you that my side is the side of arete.’ He accepted a purple cloak from a slave and slung it around his shoulders.

  Neron leaned over. ‘But Cassander insisted, and in the end Lysimachos accepted your death in exchange for naval support from Cassander, which he has not received, and a free hand in the Euxine, where he intends to be king after you. These, lord, are your allies.’

  Satyrus raised an eyebrow. ‘You have given me much to think about while I kill men who have done nothing to offend me,’ he said. ‘Despite your protestations and those of the king, you’ll pardon me if I don’t automatically accept that my allies are hot to betray me.’

  Neron bowed. ‘You would be both naive and inhuman if you thought otherwise,’ Neron said. ‘But I have told you the truth as I know it.’

  Satyrus slung his sword over his shoulder and picked up the shield he’d chosen – not a real aspis, but a smaller Macedonian shield, a circle three spans and a little in diameter, with the star of Macedon in gold.

  He and Demetrios walked out from the tent lines, crossing the horse pickets and walking past thousands of waiting men, slaves bringing water, men currying horses, women washing. The hypaspists closed around them when the crowds were thick, but otherwise Demetrios appeared to stroll through his army with the freedom of a philosopher walking through the Athenian agora. No man approached him – there appeared to be some sort of rule – but he would stop to address soldiers, even slaves, and their obedience was as immediate as their bows were profound.

  It was all very un-Greek.

  ‘He’s very comfortable with slaves,’ Achilles murmured, at his shoulder.

  Satyrus thought that it was a very astute observation.

  Two long bowshots from the walls, the ramp to the outworks of the suburbs began. A battery of siege engines squatted behind elaborate mounds of earth, gravel, stone, and wood. Enormous wicker baskets, filled with loose stones and sand or earth, covered the batteries. Trenches were dug both in front of the walls and behind them. Newer works were narrow and low – older works were deep, with high walls and carefully terraced interiors reinforced with heavy wooden beams.

  Thousands – possibly tens of thousands – of slaves laboured like ants on the works. Men dug earth, women carried baskets of earth on their heads, children wove baskets to carry more earth or to act as forms for engineering. Everywhere that Satyrus looked – everywhere – the siege was prosecuted with a massive labour force.

  Demetrios smiled. ‘Have you ever seen the like?’ he asked.

  ‘Yes,’ Satyrus said. ‘At Rhodes. Or had you forgotten?’

  Demetrios was clearly put out. ‘Fine, then. But it’s different when you are the prime
mover. Who could prosecute a siege like this and not feel like a god? I snap my fingers, and this happens. I could order the very mountain reduced – and it would be done.’

  ‘Hmm,’ Satyrus said. He had been given a long spear, a heavy dory, and he didn’t like it – liked it less and less as he carried it. Still, Demetrios had one, and he supposed it was the rule. On ship, he carried a pair of longche, heavy javelins.

  The ramp stretched away in front of him, filling his vision, and his usual nerves had finally begun. His hands began to shake.

  ‘You are not impressed by my slave army?’ Demetrios asked.

  Satyrus rammed the saurauter of his spear into the earth, took a handful of sand, rubbed his hands to get the sweat off, and drew his sword.

  ‘I thank you for the sword. It is excellent,’ Satyrus said.

  Demetrios beamed. ‘Ahh! I can please you, then. Why do you like it?’

  Satyrus shrugged, caught himself grinning at the weapon. ‘It is superb,’ he said. ‘Beautiful to look at, perfectly balanced, and not too gaudy.’

  ‘It was made for me,’ Demetrios said. ‘Brought by an embassage, I think. Wear it in health. Are you ready?’

  Satyrus nodded.

  Demetrios motioned to the hypaspist commander. Satyrus noticed then that the commander had been in conversation with Neron – and that Neron slipped away quickly.

  The hypaspist officer walked over. At a sign from Demetrios, he signalled by raising his spear, and the engines began to launch their projectiles with a whip-crack as their casting arms struck the retaining beams and the long slings opened. They were five-talent engines, and Satyrus watched as they cast and saw their projectiles raise puffs of powdered stone when they struck the towers at the top of the breach. He had the strangest feeling, just for a moment – the feeling that this was predestined, that he had done this before or seen it in a dream, overlaid with the feeling that he was about to assault himself – that he would find himself standing with the defenders.