Over the Wine-Dark Sea

by Harry Turtledove

  As he'd thought it would, that made his cousin splutter. "Don't talk to me of women, considering what you've been up to," Sostratos said. "We'd better be ready to sail at a moment's notice, in case Gylippos finds out for certain."

  "We are," Menedemos said complacently, always pleased to be one step ahead. "I've let Diokles know, so he always has men ready to pull the crew out of the dives. They can't do so much drinking and wenching on a drakhma and a half a day as they could when they had back pay coming to them, either."

  "True," Sostratos said. "Probably just as well, too. Men who roister like that often die young."

  "And men who don't roister like that also often die young, don't they?" Menedemos said with his most innocent smile. Sostratos gave him a sour look in return. Menedemos clapped his cousin on the back. "I'm going out for a while."

  "Not to Gylippos', I hope," Sostratos exclaimed.

  "No, no. I need to see a ropemaker. Diokles found some frayed lines on the ship, and I want to take care of that," Menedemos answered.

  "He's a solid man, Diokles," Sostratos said. "He'd make a good captain, and I'd tell my father the same thing."

  "We could do worse if we didn't have an owner aboard," Menedemos agreed. He headed for the door. "See you later. I shouldn't be too long."

  "All right," Sostratos replied in absent tones. He was already flicking beads up and down again. He paid as much attention to the counting board as he did to his precious books. When they engrossed him, Zeus might hurl a thunderbolt a cubit away without his noticing.

  Amused at his cousin's foibles, Menedemos hurried off toward the ropemaker's shop. It lay close to the lagoon whose splendid harbor gave Taras its reason for being, not far from the shipsheds of the Tarentine navy - and not far from the Aphrodite herself.

  And the haggle with the ropemaker turned out to be easier than Menedemos had expected. Cordage here cost only a little more than half as much as it did at Rhodes. The Tarentines made most of their rope from hemp rather than linen, but that didn't bother Menedemos; the two were of comparable strength and weight. He left the shop well pleased with himself.

  He was so well pleased with himself, in fact, that he didn't notice the four men following him quite so soon as he should have. They weren't doing anything in particular to keep him from noticing them. They came down the street after him shoulder to shoulder, and people walking in the other direction got out of their way in a hurry.

  It was, in fact, a squawk of protest from one of those people that made Menedemos look back and spot the four bruisers. When they saw he'd seen them, they walked faster, closing the gap between themselves and him and making it plain he was their target.

  Two of them wore knives on their belts. One carried a stick that would make an excellent bludgeon. The fourth had no immediately visible weapon, but that did little to reassure Menedemos.

  I'm only a stadion or so from the house, and I ran the sprint almost well enough to go to Olympos, he thought. If I can outrun them . . .

  He was about to flee when three other ruffians of similar sort came round a corner in front of him. One of them pointed his way. He'd been worried before. Now he was afraid. They weren't just toughs who'd chosen him at random, and might as easily have picked someone else. They wanted him in particular, which meant they were bound to want to do something especially dreadful to him in particular. What ran through his mind was, Sostratos was right. That bothered him almost as much as the ruffians did.

  He took a couple of quick steps toward the three in front of him. But even as they opened their arms to grab him, he whirled and dashed back at the four behind, shouting at the top of his lungs. They shouted, too, in surprise - whatever they'd looked for him to do, that wasn't it.

  One of them sprang at him. He dodged and kicked at the same time. The fellow went down with a groan. The tough with a stick swung. It struck Menedemos a stinging blow across the back, but then he was through and running like a man possessed back toward the harbor.

  "After him, you fools!" one of the bruisers said. "Don't let him get away!" another added. Their sandals flapped on their feet as they began to run. Then one of them proved he had wit as well as brawn, for he shouted, "Stop, thief!"

  Menedemos didn't stop. He did wiggle past a bystander who tried to stop him. His bare feet kicked up dust at every stride. He was glad sailing men seldom wore shoes even ashore - he'd always run races without them, and was convinced he ran faster that way. Now he wasn't running for his own pride or the glory of his polis. He was running for his life. His ankle screamed at him. He took no notice of it.

  "Stop, thief!" That shout rose again behind him. But people did more staring than grabbing. Menedemos ran on, breath sobbing in his throat. He couldn't look back to tell whether his pursuers were gaining. A heartbeat's inattention and he might run into somebody or stick his foot into a hole in the ground and sprawl headlong. If he did, it would be the end of him.

  There was the Little Sea, and there were the piers sticking out into the green-blue water of Taras' lagoon. A forest of masts sprouted from the ships tied up along those quays. Now Menedemos had to slow. Where was the Aphrodite? Right or left? If he went in the wrong direction, he would never get another chance to make a mistake.

  There! The shipsheds farther east gave him his bearings. And most of the craft in the harbor were either little fishing boats or tubby roundships. Not many had the merchant galley's size and sleek lines. It lay only a couple of quays over to the left. Menedemos started running again - and just in time, too, for the footsteps behind him were getting closer fast. Now he was limping, but he kept going as best he could.

  How many men would be aboard the akatos? Enough to keep off robbers, no doubt; Diokles was meticulous about such things. And they would be - Menedemos hoped they'd be - enough to stand off the ruffians on his tail.

  Roustabouts and the usual sprinkling of quayside loafers pointed and called out as Menedemos raced past them. They pointed and called out again a moment later when his pursuers pounded after him. Gulls screeched and flapped into the air. Starlings let out metallic cries of alarm and flew off straight as arrows, their wings beating rapidly, the sunlight glistening from their iridescent feathers.

  Menedemos' feet thudded on the planks of the pier that led out to the Aphrodite. He dashed down the gangplank and onto the poop deck. "By the gods, captain!" Diokles said. The oarmaster had been splicing a couple of lines. He and the double handful of sailors on the ship all gaped at Menedemos.

  Gasping to get air back into his lungs, Menedemos pointed toward the ruffians advancing on the merchant galley. "Those whipworthy rogues set on me in the street," he panted, not mentioning the most likely reason why they'd set on him. "I broke through 'em and made it here."

  "Oh, they did, did they?" Diokles got to his feet. He wore a knife on his belt. So did most of the other sailors aboard the Aphrodite. The ones who didn't were quick to grab belaying pins and other implements of mayhem. Diokles gave the local toughs a scowl that would have melted any of the akatos' rowers like beeswax in a fire. "Whatever you boys want, you'd better go find it somewhere else."

  The ruffians stopped eight or ten cubits from the Aphrodite's bow. They started arguing among themselves. "Well, to the crows with him!" one of them said loudly. "I didn't take this job to get my head broken. I took it to give the other guy some lumps. If he don't like it, he can go to Tartaros for all of me." He strode off.

  A couple of the others turned toward the akatos. One of the sailors smacked the length of wood he was holding into the palm of his other hand. The sound seemed to make the toughs thoughtful. They put their heads together again. Two more walked away. That left four. Four were not enough to go up against the men on the Aphrodite. They left, too, looking back over their shoulders as they went.

  "Somebody in Taras doesn't like you," Diokles remarked. Menedemos dipped his head. The oarmaster asked, "Any idea who?"

  "I've got some ideas, but nothing I could prove," Menedemos said. Diokles g
runted. Did he know? Some of the sailors who'd been at the house might have gossiped. For all Menedemos knew, the gossip might have got back to Gylippos. Or Gylippos might have drawn his own conclusions from Menedemos' limp, as Sostratos feared. It didn't really matter.

  Now that he wasn't running any more, he had time to notice his ankle again. He wished he didn't. When he looked down at it, he saw how swollen it was. It felt as bad as it looked, too. How did I run on it? he wondered. But the answer to that was simple. You could do anything, as long as the alternative was worse.

  Diokles asked, "You want a few of the boys to come along back to the house with you?"

  "Now that you mention it, yes," Menedemos answered, and the oarmaster chuckled. Menedemos tried to laugh, too. It wasn't easy, not with the fire in his ankle - and his back hurt, too, where the ruffian had hit him with the stick.

  He wished he had a stick of his own. On board ship, the sailors quickly found a length of wood that would do for one, at least long enough to let him get back to the rented house. He put as much weight as he could on it and as little as he could on his bad leg.

  As he made his slow way up the pier, he managed a grin and said, "Look at me. I'm the last part of the answer to the Sphinx's riddle."

  "Heh!" one of the sailors said. "That riddle's not so much. We see any of those scoundrels who set on you, skipper, we'll leave 'em on all fours even if they aren't babies." The other men with Menedemos dipped their heads. They all wore knives. They all had their right hands on their hilts - no, all but Didymos, who was lefthanded. He had a righthanded twin who was also a sailor, though not on the Aphrodite.

  Menedemos saw none of the ruffians on the way back to the house where he and Sostratos were staying. Someone he didn't recognize was standing not far from the door when he and his escort came round the corner, but that fellow turned and walked off before Menedemos could find out what, if anything, he had in mind.

  He brought the sailors in for a cup of wine. Sostratos, who was still muttering over the counting board, looked up in surprise. "What's all this in aid of?" he asked.

  Trying to keep his tone light, Menedemos answered, "I had a little trouble coming back from the ropemaker's."

  "Did you?" Sostratos raised an eyebrow, a characteristic gesture. He pointed to the sailors. "Looks as though you had more than a little."

  "Well, maybe," Menedemos allowed. He told the story in a few bald words, leaving out any mention of either Gylippos or Phyllis.

  "I'm glad you're all right," his cousin said when he finished. What Sostratos' eyes said was, I told you so. So he had, and he'd been right, too. That didn't make Menedemos any happier to be on the receiving end of his glare.

  Menedemos took a cup of wine for himself, too, and mixed very little water with it. It didn't make his ankle feel much better - only time would do that - but it made him feel better. He gave the sailors a drakhma apiece (which made Sostratos mutter afresh) and sent them back to the Aphrodite.

  Later, when he and Sostratos were both sitting in the house's cramped little andron, his cousin said, "You're lucky you're still breathing, you know."

  "That thought did cross my mind, yes," Menedemos admitted.

  "Then why did you do it?" Sostratos asked.

  "Why did I do what? Run? Because I wanted to keep on breathing, that's why," Menedemos answered.

  Sostratos let out an irritated snort. "Do you take me for a fool? You know perfectly well what I meant. Why did you go to Phyllis the second time? The first one doesn't count; you didn't know she wasn't a slave till afterwards."

  "Thank you so much," Menedemos said. Sostratos snorted again, and glowered so fiercely that Menedemos felt he had to answer him. He did his best: "Why? Because I felt like it, and it was fun, and I thought I could get away with it."

  "I'm sure you thought the same thing in Halikarnassos, too," Sostratos said. "How many lessons will you need before you realize that's a mistake? What will have to happen to you to get it through your head?"

  "I don't know," Menedemos said sullenly. His father would have done a better job of raking him over the coals, but not much. Philodemos had a sharper temper - one closer to Menedemos' - but Sostratos sounded more self-righteous.

  "One of these days, some husband will catch you in the act, and then . . ." Sostratos sliced a thumb across his throat. "Some would say you had it coming."

  "If I'd already had it, if I were coming, he wouldn't catch me in the act." Menedemos managed a grin no matter how much his ankle hurt.

  "You're impossible," Sostratos said, and Menedemos dipped his head, as if at a compliment. His cousin asked, "Are we ready to sail on short notice?"

  That was a business question, whatever had spawned it. Menedemos dipped his head again. "Yes."

  "Gods be praised," Sostratos said.

  * * *

  Lamakhos smirked as Sostratos walked into his establishment. "Shall I find out if Maibia wants to see you?" he asked.

  "Yes, if you'd be so kind." Sostratos did his best to ignore the brothelkeeper's scorn. Lamakhos gestured to a slave. She started back toward the Keltic girl's chamber. Sostratos called after her: "Tell Maibia we're sailing soon." The slave, an Italian, nodded to show she'd heard.

  Lamakhos set his hands on his hips. "I wondered if you might want to buy her to take with you," he said; by wondered he doubtless meant hoped. "Plainly, you're more than fond of her. I could give you a good price."

  "No, thank you." Sostratos tossed his head. "Taking her on board a merchant galley - that's just more trouble than it's worth."

  "A bargain - " Lamakhos began.

  Before he could launch into his sales pitch, the slave girl came back and told Menedemos, "She will see you." Her voice held faint contempt, too. Maibia was a slave in a brothel, but dictating terms to a free man. If that wasn't shameful, what was?

  "Think about it," Lamakhos said as Sostratos hurried off toward the Kelt's room. "Maybe you could get your sailors to chip in if you don't want her for yourself. They could share her out on the sea."

  "Bad for discipline," Sostratos said over his shoulder. The brothelkeeper, he thought, would make an excellent eunuch. If the fellow who did the cutting were to take his tongue, too . . .

  He opened the door to Maibia's chamber. Such bloodthirsty thoughts flew from his head. She wore the tunic of Koan silk, in which she looked even more alluring than she did naked. "Is it true what Fabia told me, that you'll be leaving before long?" she asked.

  "Yes, it's true." Sostratos closed the door behind him. "I'll miss you," he went on. "I'll miss you more than I thought I would."

  "But not enough to be after taking me with you." Maibia sighed. Through the thin silk, the sigh was worth watching. "In spite of what you said and all, I did hope you might. I'd be good to you, Sostratos; you know I would."

  She'd be good to him for as long as he kept her in the style she wanted, or until she found someone who'd keep her in higher style. He didn't blame her for wanting to escape from Lamakhos. Who wouldn't? But he tossed his head even so. "I'm sorry. I told you how things are. I didn't lie to you."

  "Truth that," she said, and Sostratos felt the snugness one feels for playing the game by the rules and winning anyhow. Maibia promptly punctured it: "Sure and it is a truth, but not one that does me any good at all, at all. I'm still stuck here, still here to be stuck by any spalpeen with the silver to pay for it. And why should you be caring? You've had your fun."

  How much did playing the game by the rules matter when those rules were stacked in your favor? She was only a woman, only a barbarian, only a slave; she had no business making him feel so guilty. But somehow she'd done it. "Here," he said roughly, and gave her his farewell gift: five heavy Tarentine tetradrakhms. "I hope this is better than nothing." He'd intended that for sarcasm; it come out sounding more like an apology.

  Maibia took the silver coins and made them disappear. With luck, they'd disappear from Lamakhos, too. "Better nor nothing?" she said. "Sure and it is. What I'd hoped for
?" She sighed and shook her head, then looked at him out of the corner of her eye. "And I suppose you'll be wanting it once more, for good-bye's sake?"

  "Well . . ." Sostratos hadn't been able to keep his eyes from traveling along her sweetly curved body. I could deny myself, he thought. That would make me feel virtuous. Then he laughed at the absurdity of virtue in a brothel. And he did want her, virtue or no. He compromised with himself: "However you please. The silver is yours either way."

  "What a strange man y'are, Sostratos," Maibia remarked. He couldn't tell whether that was meant for praise or curse. A moment later, she pulled the thin chiton off over her head, and he stopped caring one way or the other. "Why not?" she said as she stepped into his arms. "Better you nor plenty of others I can think of." Again, he wondered whether that was praise or something else. Again, he didn't worry about it for long.

  He thought he pleased her when they lay down together. Afterwards, though, she started to cry. Awkwardly, he stroked her. "I'm sorry," he said. "I do have to go."

  "I know," she wailed. "And I have to stay." Her tears splashed down on his bare shoulder. They felt hot as melted lead.

  "There's no help for it," Sostratos said. "Maybe it will be better from now on. We've tried to do things so it would be." Yes, I'm trying to salve my own conscience, too, he thought.

  "Maybe." But Maibia didn't sound as if she believed it, and Sostratos' conscience remained unsalved.

  8

  With the coast of Italy on his right hand, with the Aphrodite's steering oars firm in his grip, with the poop deck rolling gently beneath his bare feet, Menedemos felt at home once more. "By the gods, it's good to get back to sea."

  "I suppose so." Sostratos didn't sound convinced.

  "You've been sour ever since we left Taras yesterday morning." Menedemos eyed his cousin. "You're pining for that redhead girl. Foolish to get yourself in such an uproar over a slave."