Men cursed and fell away from us. I ignored them. I whirled to the side and he lurched forward, swung around, and threw the table. It was a bad throw, but I didn’t know that then and jumped clear anyway, giving Aristodicus plenty of time to draw his knife. I did too.
“I only want to talk!” I said, crouching into a defensive position.
He drawled in a low voice, “Sure you do! I was warned you were asking questions.” That made me blink.
Aristodicus was middle-aged, but looked the kind of man for whom knife fighting in the street was an occasional inconvenience. There wasn’t a trace of fear in him. A younger man like me should be faster, possibly stronger. But I was sweating.
Experience told. He made a sequence of feint, lunge, twist, and stab that left me with a bleeding wrist and my knife on the ground. Aristodicus stamped forward and left his foot firmly planted on my knife. He grinned.
It was clear how this would end unless I changed the rules quickly. Trying not to betray my move, I threw myself at my opponent, intending to wrestle him into submission.
My own incompetence saved me, because while I might be a neophyte, Aristodicus certainly wasn’t. He knew exactly what I was about to do even before I did, and stabbed at my chest as I pushed forward. His knife would have punctured my heart if I hadn’t tripped over my own torn chitoniskos and crashed to the ground.
I grabbed the only thing I could, his feet, and heaved upward, desperate to keep his knife out of my back. He fell backward and I crawled across him to grab his knife arm. He slipped the blade downward, aiming for my eyes. I had to grab the blade to save my sight. I shouted in pain but found a grip on his wrist and came level with him as he turned the blade upward to slit my stomach. Now it was a matter of main strength whether he could drive the blade home, or whether I could turn his blade against him. We were both gritting our teeth with the effort. I could smell his breath and hoped it wouldn’t be the last thing I remembered.
Aristodicus hooked a leg around me and rolled us both. With him on top, I couldn’t hope to keep the blade out of my belly. I tried the same trick.
Those backstreets are muddy due to the straightforward sanitary arrangements. Aristodicus and I rolled over and over, struggling for control of the knife, and covering ourselves in substances I didn’t want to contemplate.
Aristodicus stopped the roll and straddled me so he could put all his weight into the drive home. I felt a thud, something sharp pressed my stomach. I closed my eyes.
But Aristodicus didn’t finish me. He’d gone limp. It was a moment before I realized I could no longer smell his rancid breath. I pushed him away, astonished to see an arrow embedded in his back. I looked down, and saw the arrowhead protruding out of his belly. The point I’d felt had been the arrow, driven straight through him and cutting into me.
Pythax was standing in the street, slinging his bow.
“Thanks, Pythax,” I said, and meant it. But I couldn’t resist adding, “A little harder and you could have had two for the price of one.”
Pythax was having none of this jollity. “Where’s your backup, boy?” he demanded.
“My what?” I asked stupidly.
“Your backup! Your backup, you stupid son of a poxed Persian whore.” He reached down to his calf and pulled out a wicked-looking knife. “Listen to me, little boy. If you’re going to play with the grown-ups, then never walk the street without an extra blade hidden somewhere you can reach in a hurry. Think you’re the first man to lose his weapon in a fight? Hades is full of idiots like you. Learn, boy. Learn, or join them. Your choice.” Pythax grunted and looked me over with a hard eye. “Be at my barracks first light tomorrow for training, and every day from now on.”
“I finished ephebe training last year,” I objected.
Pythax spat into the mud. “Ephebe training is learning how to be a soldier, to fight in the ranks of a phalanx. You think that’s going to do you any good, boy? The way I see it, you’re the kind who’s going to be doing his fighting on your own, in the dark, or rolling in the mud in a disgusting street. I’m not going to teach you how to fight like a soldier, boy. I’m going to teach you how to kill like a man, any way you have to.” He eyed my dripping wrist. “To start with, you’ve got to learn to use your blade in either hand.”
“Okay, I’ve got the message. I’ll be there. Thanks, Pythax.”
He spat into the mud again. “Don’t thank me. I figure Athens is going to be a safer place if you stop blundering around.”
And with that warm vote of confidence, Pythax turned and sauntered away, leaving me with the body, and numerous questions I didn’t think of until he was gone.
“Who was he?” the innkeeper demanded.
“That man with the bow was Pythax, chief of the Scythians.”
The innkeeper nodded, and started up the stairs. “I’ll turf out Aristodicus’ things.”
I immediately turned to the body. I had to search it before the locals stripped him of everything of value. This was my fourth corpse examination of the day. I wondered if a priest would have predicted it if I’d asked for an augury that morning.
I picked up the dagger that had come so close to ending me. It seemed standard issue from any smithy. Next I put my hands down his tunic to see if he’d carried anything there. Men watched this from the inn and a few muttered, “Pervert…” I felt myself blushing but finished the job. I found a sweaty piece of papyrus lodged under his belt. It said, “Areopagus at dawn. Eastern edge.” I put it in my bag. There was a bag of coins tightly strapped round his waist. It felt heavy. I hesitated to bring it into the open for the same reason Aristodicus had strapped it down, but I had little choice. I cut the knot with his dagger and transferred the belt to me and retied it. At least twenty pairs of eyes followed this action.
I followed the innkeeper upstairs without waiting for an invitation. He glanced at me and continued stuffing clothing into a bag.
“So that was Pythax, was it?”
“Yes.”
“So I guess this was an official killing? It’s okay if he kills someone?”
“I guess so.”
“Good-oh then. So long as it’s official.”
“You have a relaxed attitude toward dead tenants,” I commented.
He grunted. “It happens from time to time, in this business. I just don’t want any of those officials from Athens wandering about the place, scaring off the customers. I know they’ve got all those riots keeping them busy, but that won’t go on forever.”
“I hope not. What do you do with the belongings?”
“Sell them for back rent, of course.”
“What about the body?”
“Nah. Can’t sell that.”
I wandered about the tiny room. The place was a pigsty. The innkeeper sighed. I quickly spied a scroll case that looked oddly familiar next to the bed, and hid it beneath my chitoniskos before the man could notice.
I looked around, with the quiet satisfaction of discovering someone untidier than me. I picked up a rag from the floor, realized it was a soiled loincloth, and quickly dropped it.
“I wonder he didn’t buy new ones when he was in Persia,” muttered the innkeeper.
“Say that again?” I asked.
“I said, he should have replaced his old clothes when he was in Persia,” the man said loudly. He must have thought I was hard of hearing, or an idiot.
“How do you know he was in Persia?” I asked.
“Simple. See these sandals?” He picked up one that was lying on the floor. “These straps are embossed with figures, right? When was the last time you saw a Hellene sandal embossed with figures of Persian soldiers? Never, right?”
I squinted, and saw that the innkeeper was probably right. The figures looked vaguely Persian to me.
“How did you spot that?” I asked him, intrigued.
“I’m an innkeeper, and this is Piraeus. We see all sorts shipping in, from all over the world. You get to know people by what they wear and the things they carry.”
I took the sandal from him, inspected it. The sandal was worn, but not so much that the sole had become
