Christian Cameron: Tyrant

‘Gods on Olympus, look at her side!’ said the first as the sun crossed the horizon. The pentekonter was well in with the land, her bow only a dozen lengths from the mole. Her side was fothered with a length of linen and roughly painted in tar, a pitiful sight. ‘Them’s lucky to be alive.’

His companion had a pull at the nearly empty wineskin they shared, gave his cousin a black look, and wiped his mouth. ‘Pity the poor sailors, mate.’

‘Truer words never spoke,’ said his cousin.

The pentekonter pushed her bow in past the mole before full dark, her deck silent as a warship’s except for the call of the oar beat. The strokes were short and weak, and discerning eyes all over the port could see he’d pulled long past the ability of his oarsmen to look sharp or keep up speed. The pentekonter passed the long wharf where the traders usually berthed and ran her bow well up the pebble beach that fringed the river’s mouth. Only then did the crew give a cheer, a sound that told the town all they needed to know about the last four days.

Tomis was a large town by the standards of the Euxine, but the number of her citizens was small and news travelled fast. By the time Kineas had his baggage over the side, the only man he knew in the town was standing with a torchbearer on the pebbles under the bow and calling his name.

‘Calchus, by the gods,’ he shouted, and dropped on to the shingle to give the man an embrace.

Calchus gripped him back, first hugging him, then grasping for a wrestling hold so that both men were grappling, down on the gravel in the beat of a seagull’s wing, Calchus reaching around Kineas’s knees to bring him down, Kineas grappling the bigger man’s neck like a farmer wrestles a calf. And then they were both standing, laughing, Calchus adjusting his tunic over his muscled chest and Kineas rubbing the sand off his hands.

‘Ten years,’ said Calchus.

‘Exile seems to suit you,’ responded Kineas.

‘It does, too. I wouldn’t go back.’ Calchus’s tone implied that he would go back if he could, but that he was too proud to say it.

‘You got my letter.’ Kineas hated demanding hospitality, the lot of every exile.

‘Don’t be an idiot. Of course I had your letter. I have your letter, a string of your horses, and your hyperetes and his little gang of louts. I’ve fed them for a month. Something tells me you don’t have a pot to piss in.’

Kineas bridled. ‘I will repay you…’ he began.

‘Of course you will. Kineas — I’ve been where you are.’ He indicated Kineas’s baggage with a negligent hand to his torchbearer, who lifted the bag with a heavy grunt and a long sigh. ‘Don’t get proud, Kineas. Your father kept mine alive. We were sorry to hear that he died — and you exiled, of course. Athens is a city ruled by ingrates. But we haven’t forgotten you. Besides, the helmsman says you helped save the ship — that’s my cargo. I probably owe you.’ He looked past Kineas in the dim torchlight as another man leaped over the side to the beach.

The Spartan bent, his locks swinging to hide his face and loudly kissed the rocks of the beach. Then he came up behind Kineas and stood hesitantly at his shoulder.

Kineas gestured to him. ‘Philokles, a gentleman of — Mytilene.’ His pause was deliberate; he could see the confusion — even the anger — on Calchus’s face.

‘He’s a Spartan.’

Kineas shrugged.

‘I’m an exile,’ said Philokles. ‘I find that exile has this virtue; that no exile can be held responsible for the actions of his city.’

‘He’s with you?’ Calchus asked. His sense of hospitality and etiquette had eroded in the Euxine, Kineas could see. Calchus was used to being in charge.

‘The Athenian gentleman saved my life, pulling me from the sea when my last strength was nigh spent.’ The Spartan was plump. Kineas had never seen a plump Spartan before, hadn’t remarked it when they were at sea, but here in the torchlight it was obvious.

Calchus turned on his heel — a rude gesture at the best of times, a calculated insult now — and waved up the beach. ‘Fine. He can stay with me, too. It’s late to be out, Kineas. I’ll save all my “whatever happened to so-and-so” questions for the new day.’

If the Spartan was offended, he didn’t show it. ‘Very kind, sir.’

Despite days of physical labour and several restless nights, Kineas woke with the last of the night and walked outdoors to find the first sleepy slaves carrying water from a well into the kitchen. Philokles had spent the night on the porch, like a servant, but it didn’t seem to have affected him much, since he was still asleep, snoring loudly. Kineas watched the dawn, and when there was light enough to see, he walked down the lane behind the house to the paddock. The pasture beyond had two dozen horses, most of which he was pleased to see were his own. He walked along the paddock until he saw what he had expected to find, a small fire burning in the distance and a man standing near it with a short spear in his hand. Kineas walked over the broken ground until the sentry recognized him, and then all the men were awake, nine men with heavy beards and equally bandy legs.

Kineas greeted each in turn. They were professional soldiers, cavalrymen with dozens of years of war and accumulated scars and none of them had the money or the friends to aspire to the status of the cavalry class in a city — Antigonus, the Gaul, was more likely to be enslaved than made a citizen in any city, and he, like his friend Andronicus, had started with some other mercenaries sent out by Syracuse. The rest of them had once been men of property in cities that either no longer wanted them or no longer existed. Lykeles was from Thebes, which Alexander had destroyed. Coenus was Corinthian, a lover of literature, an educated man with a secret past — a rich man apparently unable to return home. Agis was Megaran and Athenian, a well-born pauper who knew no other life but war. Graccus, Diodorus and Laertes were the last of the Athenian citizens — the last of the men who had followed Kineas to Asia. They were penniless exiles.

Niceas, his hyperetes for six years, came up last and they embraced. Niceas was the oldest of them, at forty-some years. He had grey in his thick black hair and a scar across his face from a Persian sword. He’d been born to a slave in an Athenian brothel.

‘All the lads who are left. And all the horses.’

Kineas nodded, spotting his favourite pale grey charger out in the paddock. ‘All the best of both. You all know where we’re going?’

Most of them were still half asleep. Antigonus was already stretching his calf muscles like an athlete. They all shook their heads with little interest.

‘The Archon of Olbia has offered me a fortune to raise and train his hippeis — his cavalry bodyguard. If he is satisfied with us, we’ll be made citizens.’ Kineas smiled.

If he expected them to be moved, he was disappointed. Coenus waved a hand and spoke with the contempt of the true aristocrat. ‘Citizens of the most barbaric city in the Euxine? At the whim of some petty tyrant? I’ll just have mine in silver owls.’

Kineas shrugged. ‘We’re not getting younger, friends,’ he said. ‘Don’t spurn the citizenship until you see the city.’

‘Who’s the enemy, then?’ asked Niceas, absently fingering the amulet around his neck. He’d never been a citizen anywhere — the whole idea was a fantasy to him.

‘I don’t know — yet. His own people, I think. Not much up here to fight.’

‘Macedon, maybe.’ Diodorus spoke quietly, but with great authority.

Diodorus knew more about politics than the others. Kineas turned to him. ‘You know something?’

‘Just rumour. The boy king is off conquering Asia and Antipater is thinking of conquering the Euxine. We heard it in the Bosporus.’ He grinned. ‘Remember Phillip Kontos? He’s commanding Antipater’s Companions, now. We saw him. He tried to hire us.’