Harry Turtledove - The Gryphon's Skull

He'd known visibility would shrink in case of rain. The islands ahead disappeared in the veils of masking water falling from the sky. So did Kos, to the south of them, and so did Naxos itself. Menedemos sent sharp-eyed Aristeidas up onto the foredeck to look out for unexpected trouble. In a while, I'll send a leadsman up there with him to take soundings, too, he thought.

He hadn't got round to giving the order for that before he found himself in unexpected trouble of his own. Polemaios made his ponderous way back to the poop deck and stomped up to Menedemos. “How dare you place a man up there to spy on my wife?” he demanded.

“What?” For a moment, Menedemos had no idea what the Macedonian was talking about. Then he did, and wished he hadn't. “Best one, I sent Aristeidas up there to look for rocks and islands, not for women. Visibility's gone to the crows, what with this rain. I want to see something before I run into it, thank you very much.”

“You should have spoken of this to me,” Polemaios said, looking down his long, bent nose at Menedemos. “One of my guards could do the job perfectly well.”

Menedemos tossed his head. “No. For one thing, Aristeidas has some of the sharpest eyes I've ever found in anyone. For another, he's a sailor. He knows what he's supposed to see on the water and what he's not. Your bodyguards are hoplites. They'd do fine on land, but not here. This isn't their place.”

A slow flush rose from Polemaios' neck all the way to his hairline. Menedemos wondered how long it had been since anyone told him no. Antigonos' nephew set a hand on the hilt of his sword. “Little man, you'll do as I say,” he growled. “Either that, or you'll feed the fish.”

Before Menedemos could lose his temper, Sostratos spoke in calm, reasonable tones: “Consider, best one. By rejecting the best lookout in dirty weather, you endanger the ship, your wife, and yourself. Is that a choice a man who loves wisdom would make?”

Polemaios turned red all over again. He said, “I'm going to tell that sharp-eyed son of a whore to keep his eyes on the sea and not on other men's wives,” and stormed back toward the foredeck.

“Thank you,” Menedemos said quietly.

“You're welcome,” his cousin replied. “If Polemaios endangers the ship, he endangers me, too, you know.” His shoulders shook; Menedemos realized he was fighting not to laugh out loud. “And if he's going to tell somebody not to look at another man's wife, he could do worse than to start with you.”

Menedemos glowered at him in mock—well, mostly mock—rage. “Furies take you, I knew you were going to say that.”

“Will you tell me I'm wrong?”

“I'll do worse than that. I'll tell you you're boring,” Menedemos said. But Sostratos hadn't been wrong, and he knew it. He couldn't help looking at Polemaios' wife, not when he faced forward from the steering oars all day. And she hadn't thought to bring along a pot; she had to hang her bare backside over the rail when she needed to relieve herself, the same as any sailor. Menedemos hadn't stared. That would have been rude, and might well have brought Polemaios' wrath down on his head. Polemaios was the worst sort of jealous husband: the large, violent, dangerous sort. Menedemos had no trouble seeing as much. But he hadn't looked away. You never could tell.

Sostratos did know him pretty well, for he said, “Do you recognize the notion of more trouble than it's worth?”

“Occasionally,” Menedemos said. “When I feel like it.” He grinned. Sostratos spluttered. That made his grin wider.

They scudded on, under sail and oars together. The wind whipped up the surface of the sea. The Aphrodite rolled as wave after wave slapped the planks of her port side. Menedemos adjusted to the motion as automatically as he breathed, and with as little notice on his part. So did most of the merchant galley's crew. Sostratos looked a trifle pale under his seaman's tan, but even he shifted his weight as the ship shifted beneath him.

Polemaios' wife hung over the rail again, giving back whatever she'd eaten. Menedemos noticed that, too, but it didn't stir him— not even to much sympathy, for she'd shown herself a bad-tempered woman. Polemaios had the sense to get out of his corselet before leaning out beside her. Menedemos wouldn't have minded seeing him go straight into the sea, except that that would have meant forty minai going in with him.

Then Aristeidas sang out, “Land! Land dead ahead!”

Menedemos couldn't see it. The rain chose that moment to start coming down harder. But, as he'd told Polemaios, he had Aristeidas up on the foredeck precisely because the sailor's sight was keen. “Back oars!” he shouted to the rowers. “Brail up the sail!” he called to other sailors, who hauled on the lines with all their strength, bringing the great square sail up to the yard and spilling wind out of it. “Leadsman forward!” Menedemos added, kicking himself because he'd thought of doing that and then forgotten about it. He pulled one steering oar in and pushed the other out, swinging the Aphrodite ’s bow away from the danger Aristeidas had seen.

As the ship came around, he did spy the little island—or maybe it was nothing more than a big rock: perhaps a plethron's worth of jaggedness jutting up above the waves. It would have been plenty to do in the merchant galley. No fresh water on it, of course, and nowhere to beach . . .

“Twelve cubits!” the leadsman called out, bringing up his line and tossing it into the sea again with a splash. He hauled it in again. “Ten cubits and a half!”

“Regular stroke!” Diokles bawled as soon as the akatos' bow pointed away from the islet. “Pull hard, you bastards! Rhyppa pai! Rhyppa pai!”

“Nine and a half cubits!” the leadsman yelled.

“Full crew to the oars,” Menedemos ordered. The sailors scrambled to obey. More oars jutted from each side of the ship with every stroke, till all forty were manned. No one fouled anybody else. They'd been beaten in well enough to perform in smooth unison even in an emergency. A trierarch aboard a Rhodian war galley might have found something about which to complain. Menedemos couldn't.

“Eleven cubits!” the leadsman called, and then, “Fourteen cubits!”

“We're going to get away,” Diokles said as the danger receded.

“Yes, it looks that way,” Menedemos agreed. “By the dog of Egypt, though, I'm glad I'm in an akatos and not a wallowing round ship. I wouldn't want to try to claw away from there without oars.”

“No, indeed, skipper.” The keleustes' scowl mirrored Menedemos'. “That wouldn't be any fun at all. A round ship might have been able to swing away to southward if somebody spotted that polluted thing soon enough. Might, I say.”

“I know.” Menedemos dipped his head. But the other side of might was might not, as sure as the other side of the image of Apollo on a Rhodian drakhma was a rose.

Polemaios and the other passengers stayed up near the bow. Menedemos had hoped Antigonos' nephew might come back to the stern and apologize for complaining about Ansteidas' placement. The big Macedonian did no such thing. Well, to the crows with him, then, Menedemos thought as he brought the merchant galley back toward the west. I know what an ass he made of himself, whether he does or not.

Two days after almost going aground in the Kyklades, the Aphrodite came back to Kos. Sostratos watched Polemaios staring north and east across the narrow channel that separated the island from Halikarnassos on the mainland of Anatolia. Had Antigonos' war galleys in Halikarnassos known who was aboard the Aphrodite , they surely would have swarmed out to try to seize the smaller ship. But, except for those on patrol in front of the city, they stayed quiet.