‘My Lord, the gods will decide,’ Huy tried to soothe him.
‘We have hunted every covert where the gry-lion has been seen in the last 200 years. Five full legions have swept the swamps in the north, three more along the great river.’ He broke off and began pacing the deck, pausing to look down into the hull where the tiers of naked slaves slept chained upon their benches, leaning on the mighty oars in the position in which they would die. The stench of the rowing decks came up to him as a solid thing in the humid night. He turned back to Huy.
‘This reach of the swamps is the last place in the whole of my kingdoms which might hide a gry-lion. If it does not, then what will happen, Huy? Is there no other way in which I might prove my right? Is there no escape in the scrolls?’
‘None, my lord.’ Huy shook his head with regret.
‘The kingship must fall?’
‘Unless there is a gry-lion taken then Opet will have no king.’
‘Who will rule without a king?’
‘The Council of Nine, alone.’
‘And the royal house? What will become of house Barca?’
‘Let us not talk of it,’ Huy suggested softly. ‘Come, my lord. A slave is preparing a jug of hot spiced wine and a stew of fish. The wine will help you to sleep.’
‘Will you make an oracle for tomorrow, my priest of Baal?’ Lannon asked suddenly.
‘If the oracle is unfavourable, will it help you sleep?’ asked Huy, and Lannon stared at him a moment before barking with harsh laughter.
‘You are right, as always. Come then, I am hungry.’
Lannon ate with vast appetite from the bowl of fish, sitting naked on his fur-covered bed. He had let his hair loose and it hung to his shoulders, curling and gleaming strangely golden in the light of the hanging lamp. He was a god-like figure among his dark-haired people.
The leather awnings were opened, and a light breeze came tip from the south-east to cool the cabin and blow out the galley stench. The ship moved to the breeze and the light chop of the surface, her timber popped and creaked softly, a slave cried out in nightmare, and from the deck above came the steps of the night guard - all the familiar comforting sounds of the flagship at sea.
Lannon wiped out the bowl with a piece of millet bread, popped it into his mouth, and washed it down with the last of the wine. He sighed with content, and smiled at Huy.
‘Sing for me, my bird of the sun.’
Huy Ben-Amon squatted on the deck at the foot of the prince’s bed. He held his lute in his lap, and crouched over it.
The curve of his back exaggerated the attitude, the long tar-black tresses of hair hung forward to hide his face, his massively developed arms seemed too powerful for the long delicate fingers that held the lute. He struck a note, and a listening hush fell upon the night. The footsteps overhead ceased, two slave girls ceased their work and came to kneel beside Lannon’s bed, the arguing voices from the ship anchored alongside quieted, and Huy sang.
His voice rang sweetly across the dark waters, and the prince and the fleet listened. Dark shapes moved to the rails; of the nearest ships and stood quietly there looking across at the flagship. On the cheeks of one of the pretty slave girls stood tear-drops that glistened in the lamp light, when Huy sang of a lost love. Then she smiled through her tears when Huy changed the song to one of the bawdy marching tunes of the Sixth Legion.
‘Enough. Huy looked up from his lute at last, ’There will be work tomorrow, my lord.‘
Lannon nodded and touched one of the slave girls on the cheek. Immediately she stood up and loosed the shoulder strap of her linen tunic, letting it fall from her body. She was young and lithe, her body almost boyishly slim in the lamp light. She stooped and gathered her robe, dropped it across the bench beside the door and stepped naked into Lannon’s bed. The other girl went to snuff the lamp, and Huy rose from the deck with his lute slung on his shoulder.
A voice hailed from the darkness, a great bull bellow from the edge of the papyrus beds that carried across the water to the flagship.
‘Open your lines for a friend!’
‘Who calls himself friend?’ One of the guards shouted a challenge, and the reply was bellowed hoarsely.
‘Mursil, huntmaster of house Barca.’ And Lannon was out of his bed in one bound.
‘He has come!’ he exclaimed, flinging his cloak over his shoulders and hurrying to the companion ladder with Huy scampering beside him.
A small canoe bumped alongside and Mursil came up through the entry-port as Lannon and Huy reached the deck, a huge figure, gross and apelike with his big beefy round face ruddy from sun and wine.
The ship was awake now. Her officers swarming up onto the deck, new torches flaring to light the scene as day, the bustle and hum of excitement affecting them all.
Mursil saw Lannon and hurried to him down the aisle which opened for him across the crowded deck. He was followed closely by a pygmy figure, a tiny brown naked manikin that looked about him from slanted eyes in obvious terror at these unfamiliar surroundings.
‘My lord.’ Mursil opened his cloak and dropped heavily to one knee in front of Lannon. ‘I bring good news.’
‘Then you are welcome.’
‘This one,’ Mursil reached behind him and dragged the little bushman forward, ‘this one has found what we seek.’
‘You have seen it?’ Lannon demanded.
