when you didn’t show, people started to talk. Trouble that will be solved the hour you ride in the gate. A lot of rich fathers are missing their sons — led by Cleomenes. So Diodorus and I decided we’d send out patrols to look for you. That was three days back.’ Niceas looked like a man ridding himself of the weight of the world. ‘Why are you so late? There’s men in the city saying you were killed by the barbarians. And others saying the archon won’t let you bring back the boys until the taxes are voted.’
‘What men?’ asked Kineas. ‘Who said so?’
‘Coenus was off to find that out when I took the patrol out.’ Niceas shrugged. ‘Even money says it’s the archon.’
‘Did you have his permission to look for me?’ Kineas waved to get the king’s attention.
‘Somehow, that slipped my mind.’ Niceas pantomimed repentance.
Kineas sighed. He had enjoyed days on the plains without any burden of command beyond his handful of promising boys. He felt as if all of Niceas’s burdens had shifted squarely on to his own shoulders. He kicked his heels and his sturdy pony, one of the king’s gifts, trotted back down the hill towards the column.
‘How are the rest?’ Kineas asked.
‘Pretty fair. Bored. This patrol had everyone volunteering. Diodorus put everything off limits except the gymnasium and the hippodrome until your return.’ Niceas chuckled. ‘We’ve acquired some whores. Diodorus bought the services of a hetaera.’
Kineas congratulated Diodorus in his mind. ‘Where’d they come from?’ he asked. They were approaching the king and Marthax, who were laughing with Ajax and Eumenes.
Niceas glanced away. ‘Oh — here and there, I guess,’ he said evasively.
Kineas made a note to himself to find out, and then saluted the king. ‘O King — I am required in the city.’ Ajax made room, and Kineas brought his horse alongside the king’s.
Satrax nodded. ‘Then let us go faster,’ he said, and set his horse to a gallop. Every Sakje in the party did the same, and the Greeks had to scramble to keep up.
For the first time, Kineas saw the full measure of the Sakje as horsemen. They galloped their horses for an hour, halted, and every man switched horses, and they were off again. It was a pace that would have broken a troop of Greek cavalry in two hours, but with their herd of remounts and their unflagging energy, the Sakje rode at a gallop for three hours, pausing once to drink unwatered wine and piss in the snow. They left their wagons and half their party to come along at the pace of the oxen. Before the sun was three fists from the horizon, the whole party was passing over the city’s boundary ditch and through the outer fields of the Greek and Sindi farmers.
‘Fast enough for you, Kineas?’ asked the king, reining in. ‘I’d prefer to arrive without all my horses blown.’
Kineas’s legs felt like hot lead had been poured down his thighs. His Olbian boys were all still with them, but the moment the cavalcade stopped, every one of them dismounted and began to rub his thighs. The horses steamed.
The Sakje merely pulled out their wineskins and drank. Next to the king, Marthax opened his barbarian trousers and pissed in the snow without dismounting. His horse did the same.
Kineas rode back to his own men. ‘Ten stades, my friends. Let’s finish with the same spirit we had at the start. Backs straight, good seat, and a javelin in your fist. Niceas?’
Even the hyperetes looked tired from the last three hours. ‘Sir?’
‘Check their gear. Helmets, I think. Look sharp!’ Kineas rode back to the horses and exchanged his pony for his warhorse, who seemed happy to see him. He didn’t feel too sharp himself, but as he rode he pulled his freezing helmet off his pack and pushed it on to the back of his head. Eumenes rode up and handed him a javelin.
Marthax rode up beside him. ‘King says — fear what?’
Kineas had gotten to know a little of Marthax on the ride. He was a relation to Srayanka, and he had a little Greek. He seemed to be the king’s steward, or his closest companion, despite the age difference. Marthax was a warrior in his prime, or perhaps past it. Kineas suspected he was the King’s warlord.
‘I’ll tell the king. Let’s go.’ Kineas hadn’t mastered much of the Sakje tongue beyond simple congnates of Persian he already knew, but he had gotten the knack of speaking simple Greek to the Greek speakers and to Hades with subtlety.
Ataelus was sitting on his horse beside the king. ‘I have for the town gate. And back,’ he said. He held up an arrow. ‘Got this for greeting.’
Kineas pushed his horse into the king’s group. ‘I can explain, O King. The town is in some turmoil. I am overdue, and Niceas had told me a rumour was spread that — that we were killed. On the plain.’
Satrax gave him a level look. ‘But all of your men are arming.’
‘For show, sir. Only for the show.’
Marthax spoke quickly in Sakje, and there were grunts from the other warriors. Ataelus pushed his horse to Kineas’s side. ‘For going home. For not trust city. Trust you, he says, trust not city. For telling king he told all this before.’
Kineas raised his voice over the murmurs of the Sakje nobles. ‘If we move now, Satrax, we will be in the city before dark and we’ll quell these rumors. If we wait a day…’ He shrugged.
Satrax nodded. He spoke in Sakje, and Dikarxes, a noble of the king’s age, spoke, and then Marthax spoke, clearly in agreement. The king nodded, and turned to Kineas. ‘We’ll wait here for the wagons. If you’ll be so kind as to send one of your men to get permission from the farmer. We’ll make our camp by the first bend in the river — where the horse market is held.’
Kineas glanced at the rapidly setting sun. ‘I had thought to take you to the city.’
‘Best you go ahead. Dikarxes and Marthax agree — a horde of bandits like ourselves might get a grim reception.’ He extended his hand and clasped Kineas’s hand. ‘You look worried, my friend. Go attend to this, and come fetch us in the morning. In truth, your city makes us nervous. I think we will be happier to camp in the snow.’
Kineas shook his head. ‘You shame me, O King. And yet I fear that your decision is a wise one. Look for me in the morning.’ He rode back to his own men. ‘Gather round,’ he said, and they pressed close. ‘The king will camp here. The city is nervous — some fool has spread a rumour we’re all dead. We’ll go to the city, but the king needs a man to guarantee the good behaviour of the farmers. Remember that to them, he’s a dangerous bandit.’
He could see at a glance that they’d taken it in. They were good boys, and every one of them had matured in two weeks on the plains. He went on, ‘I need a volunteer to spend another night in the snow with them.’ Ataelus immediately waved his hand, but Kineas continued, ‘I’d prefer one of the citizens.’
They all clamoured to volunteer. He was impressed. ‘Eumenes. And Clio. My thanks to both of you. I want you to ride around to every farmer in ten stades, tell them who is camping at the bend in the river, and why. Take all your slaves — make a show, and don’t take any crap from the farmers.’
Eumenes seemed to grow a hand span. ‘Yes, sir. Clio’s father owns this farm and the next. I don’t expect we’ll have much trouble.’
Clio, who had matured the most of all the boys, saluted. ‘No problem at all, sir. Please tell my father I’m at Gade’s Farm.’
Kineas pointed his heavy whip at Ataelus. ‘You stay with them. Help them translate. Make sure anything taken is paid for. And stay sober. If I don’t come back in the morning, stay sharp. I’ll return as soon as I can.’ He shook hands with all three of them. Finally he said to Eumenes, ‘You are in charge.’
Eumenes glowed. ‘Thank you, sir.’
‘Thank me when you see me again.’
Behind him, Ajax was forming the rest of the Greeks. Niceas formed as a simple trooper, allowing Ajax to be the hyperetes, just as the younger man had done for the past two weeks. The two Syracusans, Antigonus and Andronicus, had come out with Niceas, and they formed the next file, equally willing to allow Ajax to command.
Kineas pulled up beside Philokles while Ajax checked equipment and inspected.
‘You’re leaving the two boys as hostages,’ Philokles said.
‘Nothing so brutal,’ Kineas said. ‘They’ll have a fine time, and the king and his men won’t feel that we abandoned them amidst a horde of terrified Sindi farmers.’
The Spartan shrugged. ‘You are worried about what the archon intends. ’ Kineas nodded. Philokles spat in the snow. ‘Ajax makes a good hyperetes.’
