‘You?’ Kineas asked. ‘Why do you remember it?’
Niceas rustled - he was changing position while trying to keep the warmth trapped under his cloak. ‘It was the last time I slept by Graccus,’ he said. Niceas and Graccus had been friends and lovers for years, and Graccus, of course, had died the next day.
‘I’m an idiot,’ Kineas said.
Niceas snuggled against his back. ‘Yes,’ he said. ‘Now go to sleep.’
When they mounted their horses the next morning, they could see that the ground rose on either side of them, and the river ran fast through a narrow channel, so that there was no longer any possibility of a ford or a crossing. Kineas killed another buck from horseback, a mounted throw that earned him a grin from Niceas.
‘Show-off !’ Niceas shook his head. ‘You could have lost your best spear!’
Kineas grinned back and they divided the meat and then bathed in the swift-flowing water to wash off the blood. It felt like ice.
That night was the coldest yet. Kineas was again feeling the weight of his responsibilities, and wondering if he could afford to ride off and leave them, and again he lay awake - still fearing his dreams, with the additional complication that he was sated with sleep. Niceas was already snoring beside him, and it was too cold to get out of his cloak and the heavy wool blanket that covered both of them. As it grew colder, he pushed in closer to Niceas, and then he worried about his army. Most of the hoplites in the vanguard wouldn’t have a spare blanket. He thought of Xenophon’s soldiers in the Anabasis, and he worried, and worrying, he fell asleep.
Ajax pushed him quickly to the tree, and his dead friends were fewer. Kleisthenes was gone. Kineas felt like a coward as he scrambled on to the tree and began to climb. It was easy to climb as high as he had gone before, and then . . .
Running through the fields north of his father’s farms, legs afire. Rabbit-hunting.
He was among the last men in the field, all the older men and the keener hunters stretched ahead in a long arc after the dogs. He could hear the dogs, their gross baying, their animal eagerness to kill, and it sickened him, and his legs slowed, unwillingness to see the result coinciding with his own fatigue. He fell further behind, so that even the slowest boys passed him.
The cry of the hounds changed, and their baying became a chorus of growls and then a ferocious roar that scared him. It always scared him. He slowed down further, hoping to avoid the end, but he could already smell it - the rich earth-and-copper smell of an animal wrenched apart by a dozen sets of jaws.
‘You are an embarrassment,’ his father said. ‘What did I tell you?’
Kineas cringed. ‘You said that I must not be last,’ Kineas said. ‘I tried!’ he whined.
His father’s fist caught him on the side of the head and knocked him flat. He could smell the dead rabbit and the sweat on his father and the other men. ‘Try harder,’ his father said . . .
He awoke exhausted, his bladder bursting. It was too early for the new light of day, and the cold was so deep that it was an effort of will to rise from the warmth of Niceas. The fire had sunk to mere embers, throwing little warmth and no light, and he tripped on their javelins before he found a place in the dark to relieve himself. A lifetime of camp discipline forced him to put the last of the wood on the fire but he couldn’t find the woodpile and he stumbled around, cursing the cold.
‘Piss for me, while you’re up,’ Niceas said.
Kineas found the firewood by tripping over it. He gathered it up, blind, and as he found the last decent stick he heard a horse. He put the firewood near the embers and felt for a javelin. He could barely stand with the fatigue of his dream.
‘You hear that?’ he asked.
‘Horse,’ Niceas said.
He heard Niceas dropping the blankets as he rose. It was that quiet. Kineas reached into the still-warm blankets and retrieved his sword. He put the baldric over his shoulder and felt for his sandals. He wasn’t sure he was awake - he could barely focus his attention.
Niceas bumped into him. ‘Two horses,’ he whispered, his mouth close.
Alert and ready, the two men crouched back to back. After a few minutes they retrieved their cloaks and donned them.
The sky began to show light - the first touch of the wolf’s tail.
‘If they’re coming, they’ll come now,’ Kineas said.
They didn’t.
When the sun was up, they found hoof prints in the stream bed that ran around the base of their hillside camp. A little further west, Niceas found the print of a shod horse, with a heavy toe iron like a Macedonian horse. He shook his head.
‘Could be anything,’ he said. ‘Might have been one of ours from yesterday. Ataelus, perhaps.’
Kineas couldn’t get over the notion that he was being watched. High ridges rose on either side of the river, and anything might be moving in the trees up there.
‘As soon as we ride out of the stream bed, we’re visible,’ he said.
‘So?’ asked Niceas.
‘Fair enough. Let’s get out of here.’ Kineas went back to their camp and finished the tea, then retied his cloak behind him.
They rode along the stream bed until it rejoined the road (such as it was) a couple of stades downstream, and then they rode quickly along the road, alternating trotting with short canters.
The Tanais was entering a great curve, and the valley broadened and deepened. The river was flowing almost due north. As the ground rose, Kineas watched for the path to fork east.
‘There’s a sight for sore eyes,’ said Niceas.
Kineas, intent on the trail, looked up to find a bare-chested Sauromatae girl sitting on a pony just half a stade away.
Ataelus met them at the top of the pass where the eastern road crossed the ridge before continuing east to the Rha and the Kaspian. He had half a dozen riders with him. Two of them were wounded.
‘For making happy!’ Ataelus proclaimed, and grasped his arm.
Kineas embraced the Sakje man. Then he pointed at one of the Sauromatae girls who was boiling a human skull in a pot. ‘What in Hades is that?’
‘Wedding present!’ Ataelus said, and laughed, slapping his knee with a calloused hand. He was so pleased with his retort that he translated it into Sakje and repeated it. All of his prodromoi howled.
Kineas shook his head. ‘Wedding present?’ he asked.
‘Sauromatae girl for needing to kill man before wedding,’ Ataelus said. ‘Clean skull for stinking less, yes?’ He grinned.
‘Who did she kill?’ Kineas asked.
‘Bandits,’ Ataelus said. ‘For finding bandits in hills. Farmers say “bandits kill us steal our grain” and I say “for finding bandits.”’
Niceas twisted his mouth and made a noise. ‘Macedonian-shod?’ he asked.
Ataelus looked at him without comprehending. Ataelus’s Greek was good enough, but it never seemed to get better than ‘good enough’ no matter how much time he spent with them.
Niceas got down and lifted a hoof of his Macedonian charger. He showed the shoe.
Ataelus nodded enthusiastically. ‘And Persian. And Sakje.’ He pointed to two small ponies with iron-grey hides and bloodstains.
‘What about Philokles?’ Kineas asked.
Ataelus shrugged. ‘Eight days ahead. More? For riding hard.’ Ataelus waved east.
Kineas nodded. ‘And Nihmu?’ he asked.
‘For child?’ Ataelus asked. ‘Nihmu yâtavu child? For being somewhere! For being under the foot of my pony when I fight, or for dropping rocks on bandits. Who knows where the child is for going?’ He grinned. ‘Her horses I am for having.’ Sure enough, the dozen royal chargers towered over the scout’s remounts like a separate genus.
Niceas explained that Diodorus was a day or two behind, and Lot a week behind him.
Ataelus watched the ridges behind them while Niceas spoke. When Niceas finished, Ataelus pulled at his nose and drooped an eyelid. ‘Time to find bandits,’ he said. ‘For taking their horses, bring t
hem fire. When Diodorus for coming, bandits scatter.’ He pointed down the other side of the ridge, towards the Kaspian and Hyrkania. ‘Bandits thick as rain, for fighting. Out on the high plains. All way to Rha. Lost two men getting Spartan to coast.’
Kineas rubbed his beard. ‘How many bandits, Ataelus?’
‘Many and many,’ Ataelus replied. ‘Kill bandits here, for making others feel fear. Yes?’
Kineas could see that Ataelus already had a plan. So he nodded.
Ataelus grinned. He motioned to one of the Sauromatae girls. She slipped off her mare, pulled her saddle blanket off her horse’s back and threw a double armful of dew-wet bracken on the fire. Thick grey-blue smoke pulsed into the sky. The Sauromatae girl put her blanket over the fire in one smooth motion, so that the smoke was cut off. Then she whipped it clear and another pulse of smoke shot upward.
She repeated this three times.
Ataelus grunted in satisfaction.
‘Neat trick,’ Kineas said.
‘Have we ever seen them do that before?’ Niceas asked.
‘No,’ Kineas answered.
Already there was a picket galloping up the ridge from the eastern road. He pulled on his reins in the camp and Samahe, Ataelus’s wife from the Cruel Hands, barked orders at him. He grinned, dismounted, cut another pony out of the herd, remounted and galloped away.
A pair of Sauromatae girls galloped in from another direction. Before the sun rose three fingers more, there were a dozen riders gathered, and they were riding hard along one of the many stream beds that criss-crossed the wooded ridges. A trickle of water flowed over rocks under their horse’s hooves, but the banks were clear of leaves or brush on either side up to the height of their horse’s withers, indicating how full these little valleys ran when the rains fell.
Ataelus seemed to know just where he was riding. Kineas was content to ride along.
The shadows stretched away when they stopped. All the Sakje and the Sauromatae dismounted and relieved themselves without letting go of their reins. Kineas and Niceas imitated them.
There was a hint of smoke on the cold wind over the strong smell of urine. A clear-eyed blonde woman handed him a gourd of water and he raised it in acknowledgement before he drank. She looked to be fourteen or perhaps fifteen. She had two skulls on the ornate saddle of her horse.
Kineas grinned at her and she returned the grin.
‘We for hitting them at dark,’ Ataelus said. ‘Understand for hitting?’ he smacked his right fist into his left hand.
‘I understand,’ Kineas said.
‘For watching two days, since girls get in fight and Samahe for finding camp.’ Ataelus shrugged.
There was something untold, some story that made Samahe wrinkle her nose and made one of the girls blush and wriggle in her saddle. A story he’d never know, Kineas thought.
‘You knew we were coming?’ Kineas said, suddenly making the connection.
‘Nihmu says for coming, says “protect him king”.’ Ataelus shrugged. ‘Not for needing child for telling for protecting.’
‘You watched us last night?’ Niceas asked.
‘No. For today since sun rose this way.’ Ataelus closed one eye and raised a hand, palm flat, just over the horizon.
Niceas shook his head. ‘They were on us last night. If they watched us meet . . .’
Kineas took a deep breath, suddenly eager to have it over with. ‘If they intended to ambush us, they’ve had all day to do it.’
The shadows lengthened across the meadows below them, and the air grew frostier as the sun’s rays fell further away. Niceas and Kineas had to work to curb the impatience of their horses. Kineas’s Getae horse was the worst, fretting constantly and jerking his head at any motion, so that Kineas had to dismount and hold his head.
The blonde woman gave him a glance of pity - pity that his horse was so ill-trained.
Twice they heard voices, both times Persian speakers getting water from the Tanais below them. Then, while the sun was just visible, they saw a pair of riders come out of the meadow and ride a short distance up the ridge, from where they had a good view of the eastern road at their feet.
Ataelus grunted in disgust, because by chance or purpose, the new pickets had a much better chance of warning the camp below of his approach than the pair they replaced. He clucked his tongue in his cheek as he watched them, and after a few minutes, he summoned one of the Standing Horse warriors in his band and the two of them rode off down the back of the ridge. Samahe dismounted and lay in the leaf mould, her hand shading her eyes.
Time dragged by. The Sauromatae women were as nervous as kittens, but their horses were calm, munching quietly on anything in reach and otherwise immobile. Niceas drew and resheathed his sword a dozen times. Kineas was busy keeping his under-trained horse from mischief.
He was amazed at their discipline. All over again. He couldn’t have kept a dozen Greek troopers so quiet without the hope of massive gain.
Even as he thought it, he wondered if he was making a poor assumption. Perhaps the Greeks could do as well. Perhaps with training, some rides out with Sakje patrols . . .
Samahe rose to a crouch and Kineas snapped from his reverie to watch the ground below him. The two mounted pickets were almost invisible, even from above, but little movements in the trees betrayed their position to a careful watcher. But unlike Samahe, Kineas couldn’t see Ataelus or his partner, so the first he knew of their movement was a pair of arrows appearing from the rocks to the right and falling silently on the pickets.
‘Now!’ Samahe said in Sakje, and she vaulted on to her mare and set off down the hillside at a speed that terrified Kineas, who was right behind her and couldn’t, for the sake of honour, go any slower. He reached the valley floor at a gallop, already past his fear because the ride had been so bad in itself, and he readied a javelin as the pair of them raced across the meadow. He could see the camp now, and it seemed to be full of men and horses - dozens of them. A few had bows. One raised his and loosed, but the arrow flew well over Kineas, who ducked down on his horse’s mane and galloped on, straight at the heart of the bandit camp.
Samahe’s horse sidestepped some obstruction in the meadow grass, and on her next rise she shot, her arrow licking across the flowers and the sweet grass to drop one of the few bandits to get mounted. Her second arrow was in the air.
The Sauromatae girls weren’t shooting. They were screaming with all the gusto of the young warrior, screaming away their terror and their exhilaration, and they bore straight at the bandits by the river.
Kineas went through the camp without touching his reins. No one opposed him and he rode past the huddle of bandits at the riverbank and then up a short rise to a clearing in the riverbank woods, where there was an abandoned farmstead and the bandit horse herd. There were ten men in the clearing and despite the screams from the riverside, they seemed surprised when he appeared in their midst, and two of them were down before any got weapons to hand.
Kineas wheeled his horse and extended his arm, using the momentum of the move to twirl the shaft in his fingers so that he changed grips in a single stride of his mount, and a circle of blood drops flew from the point of his rotating javelin.
He felt like a god, at least for a moment.
One of the men had a bow and shot his horse, who crashed to the ground in another stride, and he fell, getting a leg under him and then rolling, javelin lost. He came up against a tree and he rolled to put the bole between him and the archer.
The archer laughed. ‘Try this!’ he called, in Persian. He shot. The arrow hit the tree and shattered, and the man laughed again. He had a black beard and kohl-rimmed eyes like a Bactrian nobleman.
Down by the river, men were dying. Blackbeard drew another arrow. ‘Get horses,’ he called over his shoulder, and two boys sprang to do his bidding.
Kineas pulled his cloak off and whirled it around his arm, moving to his right to a larger tree.
‘Try this, Greek!’ Blackbeard shot again, a
nd his arrow hit the new tree.
Kineas jumped out and retrieved his javelin, avoiding the slashing hooves of his dying Getae mount and leaping behind another tree just as a third arrow skipped along the bark and slapped into the rolled cloak on his arm.
‘Try this, harlot!’ Kineas yelled, and threw his javelin. Then he charged, leaping a downed tree as he ran, heedless of the odds. It was better than letting a master archer take his time, and something had gone wrong in the fight by the river.
His javelin hit the man by the archer’s side, knocking him flat like the deer. The archer turned and ran, and Kineas ran after him. There were men in the clearing and they set themselves to stop him, but none put the archer’s life higher than his own, and Kineas ran through them, downing one with a sword cut as he ran by.
The two boys had grabbed a pair of horses apiece, and Blackbeard took the first he came to, tossed the boy clear of the saddlecloth and vaulted astride, pulling the horse’s head around. At the other side of the clearing, Samahe appeared, shooting as she came, and the other boy went down with an arrow in his guts, screaming. Kineas found himself crossing blades with yet another Persian - another nobleman, from the rags of purple on his cloak. The man had a good sword, and he was aggressive.
Blackbeard pulled his horse around and shot. So did Samahe. Neither hit. Both were moving fast, flat to their horse’s backs, and then Kineas had no attention to spare.
The Persian leaped in and cut hard at his head. Kineas parried and the blades rang together, and the Persian kicked at his shin under the locked iron. Kineas pushed his hooked blade up and over his opponent’s guard and then slipped a foot behind the man’s ankle and pushed, hoping for a throw, and the Persian jumped back, cutting high.
He was a swordsman.
Kineas parried and cut back, a short chop at his opponent’s hand, but the Persian had seen such a move before, and he made a hand-high parry that turned into an overhand cut to the head - and Kineas just managed a parry, taking a blow that was not quite a cut to the shoulder. His left hand closed on his Sakje whip in the sash at his back, and he pulled it clear and changed his stance to lead with his left foot, the whip out as a shield.
Tyrant: Storm of Arrows Page 14