Shadows of Athens

by J M Alvey

  ‘Thanks to you sending Kadous,’ I told him.

  ‘Barely,’ Zosime snorted.

  Menkaure and I exchanged a glance, silently agreeing to drop the subject.

  I left Zosime to find her father some breakfast while I fetched a barley meal sack from the storeroom. That hid Tur’s knife from our curious neighbours, along with the attackers’ masks that Kadous and I had retrieved. Once Menkaure had eaten, we all set out. We barely spoke a word until our paths divided inside the city.

  ‘Have a good day.’ I kissed Zosime, still trying to convey my apologies. ‘I wish I could come with you—’

  ‘Be careful.’ She gave me a gentle hug.

  I decided to take that for a good omen. ‘Believe me, I will,’ I promised her.

  Such relief was fleeting. As the others headed for the theatre, I went on my way to face my day’s second daunting challenge.

  *

  Mus opened Aristarchos’s gate with a broad smile cracking his stern face. ‘I am glad to see you safe.’

  ‘Thank you. Is your master at home?’ Some treacherous part of me wished he’d say Aristarchos had left for the theatre.

  Mus crushed that frail hope with a clap of his massive hands. ‘Of course.’

  Lydis appeared so quickly that I guessed he’d been waiting for my arrival. ‘This way, if you please.’

  I followed him through the archway to the inner courtyard. The family accommodation overhead was noisy with activity and an upper shutter slammed on girlish laughter. That made me even more uneasy about what I had come here to do.

  ‘Please take a seat.’ Lydis indicated a table beneath a portico surrounded by cushioned stools. ‘The master will be with you shortly. Can I fetch you something to eat or to drink?’

  ‘No, thank you.’ My mouth was so dry that anything I tried to swallow would choke me.

  Aristarchos wasn’t long. He looked searchingly at my bruised face before contemplating my bandaged arm. ‘How bad’s the rest of you?’

  I shrugged. ‘I’ll live.’

  He grunted and moved on. ‘Sarkuk said you were following this man Archilochos? He’s the one who’s stirring up trouble in Caria?’

  Cowardly, I seized on that. ‘Where is Sarkuk? And Azamis?’

  ‘They’ve gone to see the Polemarch to discuss what’s to be done with Xandyberis’s body. The man must be buried or cremated, and soon.’ Grimacing at the thought of a five-day-old corpse, Aristarchos took a seat. ‘So, what happened to you last night?’

  I took a deep breath and related the afternoon and evening’s events as steadily as I could.

  Aristarchos considered what I told him for a long, silent moment. ‘You’re sure it was Tur’s knife?’

  ‘I have it here.’ I took it out of the barley sack. ‘It looks exactly the same to me. I’m sure he’ll know it for his own. If not, it’s still a Carian weapon. Someone wanted Ionians blamed for my death.’

  ‘There can be no doubt that they knew who you were.’ He wasn’t asking a question.

  I nodded, chagrined. ‘One of them must have seen me following. Or perhaps someone else in the theatre saw me dogging their trail and sent a message on ahead. Maybe that house has a back gate or someone climbed in over a wall. Who knows? Once they got word that their trap was set, four of them set out to lead me into that ambush.’

  I shivered, thanking every god and goddess on Olympos that Kadous had found his way to my side in time. Sometimes real life does enjoy a drama’s conveniences.

  Aristarchos nodded at the sack. ‘What else have you got in there?’

  I took out the battered chorus masks and laid them on the table. Flakes crumbling from the coloured plaster littered the stone paving.

  ‘This one is from Strato’s play three years ago, The Washerwomen. If I remember rightly, this is one of The Discus Throwers, from the year before, by Ephialtes. Pheidestratos was that play’s paymaster. I can’t identify that one but it’s a comedy mask as well.’ I pointed to the one which I’d mangled by ripping it off an attacker’s head.

  ‘The Discus Throwers and The Washerwomen were both winning plays,’ Aristarchos observed. ‘Those masks will have been dedicated in a temple. Anyone could have stolen them.’

  ‘True enough.’ I wouldn’t want to be writing the speech for someone standing before a jury and hoping to condemn such an influential man on this flimsy evidence.

  ‘And you didn’t see where those men were headed, before you were attacked.’

  Once again, he wasn’t asking a question. I nodded confirmation.

  ‘We must find out who owns that house.’ Aristarchos turned to his slave sitting quietly on a stool by the arch. ‘Lydis—’

  I knotted my fingers together to stop my hands shaking. ‘We may be able to do that more quickly.’

  ‘What do you mean?’ Aristarchos frowned as he heard the tightness in my voice.

  I cleared my throat. ‘I recognised one of my attackers’ voices.’

  ‘Go on.’ Aristarchos prompted.

  My nerve failed me. ‘I’m sure it was one of the young men who were in the procession with your son on the festival eve.’

  ‘Indeed?’ He gave me a thoughtful look before turning to Lydis again. ‘Ask Hipparchos to join us.’

  Clearly that wasn’t a request that his son could refuse.

  We sat in tense silence, waiting. After a few moments, I reached out to put the masks back in the sack.

  ‘Leave them,’ Aristarchos said curtly.

  I folded my hands in my lap and contemplated the Carian knife. ‘How is Tur recovering?’

  Before Aristarchos could answer, Hipparchos strolled into the courtyard. He looked as though he’d just rolled out of bed, hair tousled and a stray linen thread caught in his beard. He’d dragged on a clean tunic, still belting it as he arrived. His face was flushed and puffy and his eyes were red-veined. Too much wine the night before.

  ‘Father?’ He was clearly annoyed at being rousted so early. ‘You wanted—’ Then he saw the masks on the table and paled.

  ‘So.’ Aristarchos was as coldly furious as any marble statue of Zeus the Thunderer. ‘You do know what this is about.’

  ‘I—’ Hipparchos gulped, ashen. I thought he was going to be sick on the pristine paving.

  ‘Philocles was attacked last night, by men wearing these masks. They were intent on killing him. He says he recognised a voice.’ Aristarchos’s gaze flickered to me, swift as lightning. I saw that he knew that I knew exactly whose voice I had heard.

  ‘He says he remembers this voice from the night before the festival, when we all met in the theatre. Though he cannot, or will not, put a name to the villain.’ Aristarchos stared unblinking at his son.

  Hipparchos licked dry lips. ‘I—’

  ‘Think very carefully before you speak,’ Aristarchos continued as though this were any ordinary conversation. ‘Lie to me and I will see you exiled. Not just ostracised for ten years, exiled. For the rest of your life.’

  Hipparchos was horrified. ‘Mother—’

  ‘Your mother will have no say in this,’ his father assured him, ‘whether I send you to Massilia or to the furthest shores of the Chersonese. She will have no say as to whether I send silver to support you or if I have you thrown onto some distant street to beg for your bread and shelter.’

  My father would have been shouting by now, scarlet-faced and with his calloused hands furiously waving. Aristarchos’s icy composure was even more terrifying.

  ‘You tried to kill a man. If this comes before the courts you will be stripped of your citizen’s rights and exiled. Since I can see the guilt in your eyes, I will save our city and its people such time and trouble. I will also shield your brothers and sisters from the spreading stain of your crime. What do you have to tell me to mitigate your offence, to deserve my mercy?’

&n
bsp; To my astonishment, Hipparchos’s lip curled in a sneer. ‘He can’t be certain whose voice he heard and there are no witnesses. It would be my word against his.’ A hiss of contempt made it plain what he thought of my social standing.

  ‘There was a witness,’ his father countered.

  Hipparchos was still defiant. ‘A slave?’ He looked at me, smug. ‘His evidence will have to be tested under torture. When do you want to deliver him up to the public executioner?’

  The Furies hound him to Hades. He knew I’d never hand Kadous over to suffer such agonies, just because the law insists that’s the only way to prove a slave isn’t his owner’s mouthpiece.

  ‘How do you know this witness could be a slave?’ Aristarchos enquired calmly. ‘If you weren’t even there?’

  He cut his son off with a sharp gesture. ‘No, don’t lie to me. Not if you want any chance of remaining within this household. Don’t threaten Philocles either. No one will lay a hand on him or his slave because this will never come before the courts. I will see justice done as is my right and duty as the head of this family. Your only hope of mercy is to tell me the truth, and all of the truth, here and without delay.’

  Hipparchos looked at the masks. I saw his fists clenching. Then he looked at the knife on the table and visibly came to a decision. He moved towards a stool, about to sit down. ‘I never sought to kill anyone—’

  ‘You will stand,’ ordered Aristarchos. ‘Continue.’

  ‘I wasn’t carrying the blade,’ Hipparchos protested, plaintive.

  I struck at that first chink in his arrogance. ‘No, but you were carrying a spear shaft.’

  I hadn’t been going to mention that, to leave Aristarchos with at least the pretence of doubt over Hipparchos’s involvement. But the little shit had threatened Kadous.

  ‘I took it off you,’ I reminded him. ‘Hoplites learn how to do that, as well as to keep hold of their own weapons.’ Evidently no one bothered teaching the cavalry such skills.

  ‘But that much is true.’ I turned to Aristarchos. ‘I used the spear shaft on the man with the blade. Hard enough to bruise his arm, maybe even break a bone.’

  We could all see there was no mark on Hipparchos’s arms, bare to the shoulder in his embroidered sleeveless tunic.

  The boy looked surprised to think I was showing him some support. I strove to keep my face as impassive as Aristarchos’s. He was the one I owed the truth to, not his fool of a son. Though it couldn’t hurt to give Hipparchos a reason to be grudgingly grateful to me, to counter any urge to seek revenge, once this was all over.

  ‘So you didn’t set out intent on murder. What a relief.’ Aristarchos’s sarcasm echoed around the courtyard. ‘What were you doing and with whom?’

  Hipparchos capitulated. ‘We went to a tavern after the satyr play. Nikandros came to find us. He said a friend of his had a sister pursued by an unsuitable suitor. The man had taken to lurking in the alleys around their house. A good beating should scare him off, that’s what Nikandros said. That’s all I was there to do.’

  His pleading eyes slid from his father to me and back again. I guessed that was as much of an apology as I was going to get.

  ‘The name of Nikandros’s friend?’ Aristarchos demanded. ‘His father and his voting district?’

  ‘I don’t know,’ Hipparchos muttered.

  He looked shamefaced enough to convince me that was the truth.

  ‘So you simply took Nikandros’s word?’ Aristarchos shook his head with disgust. ‘When you know full well he’s dragged you into utter folly more than once, and lied about it afterwards, just to save his own worthless skin?’

  I wondered what that was about but it was hardly the moment to ask.

  ‘Whose idea was it to wear masks?’ Aristarchos snapped. ‘Where did you steal them from?’

  ‘One of the other men brought them.’ Now the youth was growing sullen. ‘I don’t know where he got them.’

  ‘So you’re a fool and a brute, but not a would-be murderer nor yet a despoiler of temples,’ Aristarchos observed. ‘Your mother will be so relieved.’

  Hipparchos reddened. ‘I can ask Nikandros—’

  ‘No.’ Aristarchos forbade that notion. ‘You will go nowhere and speak to no one until I have got to the bottom of whatever crimes you have committed. Lydis!’ He didn’t look at the slave, his gaze still levelled at Hipparchos, as piercing and as menacing as the point of a javelin. ‘Make sure that the entire household knows my will on this matter. Tell Mus first of all. Tell him he may accept any letters delivered for Hipparchos but they are to be brought straight to me. No one is to carry any messages for my son, written or repeated.’

  ‘Of course, Master.’

  Aristarchos flicked a hand at Hipparchos. ‘You may go.’

  The boy took a step, then hesitated. ‘What . . . ?’

  Aristarchos raised an eyebrow. ‘What will happen to you now? That will entirely depend on what I discover. Go to your rooms. I don’t want to see you until I send for you. If you remember something else that I may need to know, ask to see Lydis and he will bring me word.’

  Hipparchos retreated, his head hanging like a whipped dog.

  I took a deep breath once the boy had gone. ‘I am so sorry—’

  Aristarchos silenced me with the same sharp gesture he’d used towards his son as he turned to his slave once again. ‘You know as well as I do which young fools he goes drinking with. Draft letters to their fathers from me. Warn them that Nikandros Kerykes has been sucked into some rabble-rousing plot against our Ionian allies. If they don’t want to see their sons face charges of stirring up civil strife, they had better rein them in hard and quickly. With my compliments, naturally.’

  ‘And Nikandros Kerykes?’ Lydis ventured.

  ‘I will call on his father myself.’ Aristarchos’s expression was ominous.

  ‘I’m sorry.’ Too late, I realised I’d repeated myself.

  Aristarchos dismissed Lydis with a flick of his hand. ‘Don’t apologise to me,’ he said when we were alone. ‘You’ve done my family a significant service.’

  ‘Really?’ I allowed myself a little sarcasm.

  ‘I don’t mean to undervalue your injuries, I can see you’re in pain, but let’s be grateful that no one died,’ Aristarchos said frankly. ‘My situation – this whole household’s situation – would be far worse if you had been killed. You can’t imagine you were the only target here.’

  I glanced at the knife. ‘I’m sure they were out to implicate Tur.’

  ‘Then I would have had to vouch for him, to insist that he couldn’t have left his bed. My slaves would be put to the torture, to swear that the boy was laid up and being cared for, throughout yesterday and last night.’ Aristarchos shook his head. ‘I could no more allow my household to be abused like that than you would see your man Kadous suffer. So our enemies would be free to whisper and murmur all around the agora. What disgraceful secrets could I possibly be hiding, if I refused to let my slaves testify? What’s my real connection with these ungrateful Ionians? If they’re not paying the tribute they owe to Athena, whose strongbox is their silver filling?

  ‘As for Hipparchos . . . ’ He shook his head again, eyes shadowed. ‘I don’t suppose he would have been openly accused of your murder, not at first. I imagine someone would have visited me discreetly, to let me know that he’d been involved. Of course, they’d have witnesses to your death. Hades, depending on what they wanted from me, they’d probably have ten men ready to swear that he’d held the knife that killed you.’

  He startled me with a growl of wordless fury.

  ‘I don’t know what their price would have been to save my son from public trial, exile or execution and my other children from disgrace. Perhaps it would just be my silence while they set Athens and Ionia at each other’s throats. Or if they were bold enough, they might have demanded tha
t I do something to promote their cause. You have saved me from those particular dangers.’ He brushed plaster flakes from the table onto the paving. ‘As for Hipparchos, he was always going to get into serious trouble, sooner or later. All things considered, I’m glad it was sooner and no worse than this. The boy has been spoiled and sheltered all his life. That’s as much my fault as his mother’s,’ he admitted, his voice tight. ‘After his brother was killed in Egypt . . .’ He closed his eyes.

  ‘I know.’ I didn’t need him to say any more.

  After a moment, Aristarchos regained his composure and looked steadily at me. ‘He’s run wild ever since he came back to the city, him and his idiot friends. They’re so certain that their names and their families’ money will shield them from any follies they fall into. But now he has stepped into this swamp, he realises he needs me to drag him clear of it. He’s had a glimpse of just how easily he could have sunk and drowned.’

  He sighed. ‘That’s a lesson I was able to teach his brothers before they risked their necks. If Hipparchos has chosen to learn this the hard way, that’s between him and Athena. You have nothing to apologise for. If anything, I owe you my thanks.’

  ‘We both owe whoever’s behind all this a hard and painful reckoning,’ I retorted.

  ‘That is very true,’ he agreed.

  ‘But we’re no closer to finding them.’ I let my exasperation show.

  Aristarchos’s sigh betrayed his own frustration. ‘Perhaps we’ll get some indication when I speak to Megakles Kerykes.’

  ‘Nikandros’s father?’

  He nodded. ‘He won’t want his son’s involvement in some attempted murder made public, nor several other things that I could let slip about his business dealings.’

  I rose cautiously to my feet. Even sitting for a short time meant I’d stiffened up horribly. ‘Let me know as soon as you hear anything.’

  ‘Go home,’ Aristarchos advised. ‘Go to bed and rest until I learn something useful and we can plan our next steps in this campaign.’

  That was tempting, but my day’s labours weren’t over yet. ‘I have to go to my brothers’ house. I owe my mother a visit. That’s not too far, and I can’t believe these people are so bold that they’ll murder me in broad daylight inside the walls.’ Though it was unnerving to feel that my own city’s streets weren’t safe. ‘When I’m ready to leave, someone there can walk back to Alopeke with me.’