mercenaries they had discussed. Hasdrubal had reacted quickly and, within three weeks, as the walls of Panormus were falling, a fleet of twenty transport ships arrived in Lilybaeum carrying two thousand Greek mercenaries and a message from Hasdrubal that he was pursuing the second request.
Hamilcar had then turned his attention to the sea; before the Roman fleet had arrived, he had ordered his own Gadir fleet north to the port of Drepana to avoid the stranglehold of the blockade. There they remained, over one hundred and twenty galleys, poised in readiness and awaiting his arrival. He had wanted to sail with them, but he had remained in Lilybaeum to finalize the city’s defences and oversee the operation he had devised for the Greek mercenaries, an attack that would buy him time and allow him to complete his plan.
He looked to the setting sun, cursing the one missing piece that was vital if he was to overturn the blockade of the harbour and lift the siege. Eventually he would have to escape the encirclement of Lilybaeum to link up with his fleet in Drepana, and his escape depended on the second request he had made of his father. He had no way of knowing if Hasdrubal had been successful, if he had managed to contact the one man Hamilcar knew was capable of effecting his escape, who possessed the skills and local knowledge that none of the commanders in the Gadir fleet had, the one man who could carry him past the Roman blockade.
The Orcus moved slowly under a smooth press of canvas with the southwesterly wind off its port aft-quarter. The breeze had shifted hours before, allowing the squadron of ten galleys to ship their oars, and they sailed in near silence, with the noise of the water against the hull and the occasional shouted order being the only sounds heard in the absence of drums.
Atticus stood motionless and looked out over the side rail of the aft-deck, his thoughts given free rein in the silence, quickly becoming aimless after two monotonous weeks of manning the blockade. The sea around the Orcus was as smooth as polished marble but, only two hundred yards away, towards the harbour, the telltale ripples of troubled water were evidence of the treacherous shoals that bedevilled the inner approaches to Lilybaeum. Only a narrow channel on the northern end of the bay guaranteed safe access to the harbour, and it was here that the bulk of the Roman fleet lay under the command of a newly arrived Roman prefect, Ovidius. He had insisted on commanding this touch point, eager to attack any ship that dared to run the blockade, and Atticus had readily conceded the position, knowing that, unlike Panormus, there would be few who would try to escape such a tight noose.
Instead Atticus had ordered his ships to patrol the lagoon that ran the full width of the harbour between the inner and outer shoals of the bay. There were numerous other small channels that ran through both sets of shoals, known only to Poseidon and the locals, and if any Carthaginian were to attempt escape it would surely be through these straits. In the end, however, the efforts of both Atticus and the Roman prefect had counted for naught. No Carthaginian ship had run the blockade and the two weeks had passed slowly and without incident.
Atticus stared at the distant town of Lilybaeum, its whitewashed walls stained pink by the dying sun, the docks seemingly devoid of any activity. The sight sparked a memory of a similar scene and his forehead creased as he sought to capture it. Then, to his surprise, he realized that he was remembering his home city.
It was many years since he had last seen Locri, a place where he had grown up in squalor and poverty, a city on which he had turned his back at the age of fourteen to join the Roman coastal fleet. His only fond memories of Locri involved his grandfather, who took him fishing and enthralled him with stories of the ancient Greeks and their triumphs over the Persian Empire. For Atticus, that time had come to represent the old world, a world in which his grandfather had dwelt, when the Greeks were masters of Magna Graecia, Greater Greece, a network of colonized cities and states that included southern Italy, a period that the Romans had ended when they conquered the lands and imposed upon the people their own culture and laws.
That old world now existed only in memory, and to his shame Atticus could not remember the last time he had thought of Locri or his grandfather; when he had last rekindled the links within him to his ancestors. When he had captained the Aquila and hunted pirates in the Ionian Sea along the Calabrian coast, he had existed only on the fringes of the Roman Republic. Now he was immersed in it. Rome affected everything he did and everything he was, and Atticus realized he was glad his grandfather had not lived long enough to see how separated he had become from his own people.
‘Galley, off the port aft-quarter. One mile out, passing through the outer shoals!’
Atticus shot around to follow the call but he instantly shied away, the setting sun still too bright, although he did discern a darkened shape in the water. He looked instead to the masthead.
‘Identify,’ he called up, and Corin leaned forward slightly at the waist, his hand up to his eyes.
‘I can’t, Prefect. He’s approaching directly out of the sun,’ Corin replied in frustration. ‘Definitely a galley under sail though.’
Atticus didn’t hesitate.
‘Baro, take in the mainsail. Ready the oars. Gaius, come about, battle speed.’
The Orcus spun neatly at the head of the squadron and the other galleys followed her course, reacting quickly to the signals sent from the aft-deck of the command ship, their oars extending as the sails were furled.
‘She’s sailing under canvas and oars,’ Corin called out, and Atticus cursed as he confirmed the lookout’s call, the changing aspect of his own ship affording him a better view. It took a highly skilled crew to sail a galley under a full press of sail with the oars engaged. The advantage was additional speed without taxing the rowers, but it relied heavily on tight helm control and a disciplined rowing crew. She was a bireme, a galley with two rows of oars; whoever the captain was, he was a clever whoreson and he knew the approaches intimately. He had avoided detection until he was a mile out, using the glare of the sun as a cover and the trailing wind to give him speed and the advantage. The galley was sailing apace, on an oblique line to the centre of the harbour and, as Atticus calculated the angle of attack, his brow furrowed. Even taking the combination of sail and oars into account, the bireme was moving way too fast for a ship of its class.
‘Gaius, attack speed,’ Atticus ordered, already sensing that he was too late, his simple calculations confirming it.
The Orcus was beating across the wind under oar power only, and the unidentified galley was already halfway across the lagoon, her bow aimed at some invisible channel. Atticus slammed his fist on the side rail, his mind racing to find some way to reverse the inevitable.
‘She’s a quadrireme,’ Gaius realized.
Atticus studied the hull more closely, knowing now how it was able to achieve such speed. On a bireme, with two rows of oars, each oar was manned by one rower. On a quadrireme that number was doubled, with each oar manned by two men. The two galleys were similar in height and draught but the quadrireme was broader in the beam, a necessary increase to accommodate the additional rowers. It was a rare breed of galley, slower than a quinquereme but more manoeuvrable, quick to turn with a very shallow draught.
This realization did not assuage Atticus’s frustration, however, and he watched in silence as the quadrireme passed a half-mile ahead of the bow of the Orcus, her course changing slightly as she negotiated the inner shoals. The Orcus was as close as it was going to get, and Atticus turned to issue the order to withdraw when he noticed Gaius’s troubled expression.
‘What is it?’ he asked.
‘The captain had all the cards in his favour and his approach was flawless. There was no luck involved, none,’ Gaius replied intently. ‘And he sails a quadrireme.’
The helmsman let his thoughts hang in the air, his gaze still locked on the galley, and Atticus considered the implied question, one he had not considered in his frustration. The captain of the galley was highly skilled, knew the approaches intimately and his ship was a quadrireme. He looked to Gaius and nodded, agreeing with his deduction. It was the Rhodian.
CHAPTER TWELVE
The sentry pulled the rim of his helmet lower as he peered into the darkness, his head turned slightly to pick up any sounds of approach. Huge torches burned high on the walls of the city four hundred yards away, playing havoc with his night vision, but he kept his eyes to the ground and the black space that separated the enemy from the Roman lines.
He was an optio of the II maniple, the unit whose turn it was to post the vigilae, the night guard, and
