of men having sex with other men, and into the receiving room. He was looking for something to take – something that would remind him of Kinon.
Draco was standing in front of a Persian wall-hanging. ‘What’d you take, boy?’ he asked.
‘Nothing yet,’ Satyrus said sheepishly.
‘You’ll never make a soldier if you can’t loot a house. What you looking for?’ the man asked.
‘He had a set of gold cups,’ Satyrus said. ‘He was proud of them. I thought I’d take one for each of us.’
‘I stand corrected, little prince. Looting comes naturally to you. Gold cups? How many?’ Draco winked.
‘Ought to be six,’ Satyrus said. ‘I’ll take five.’
Draco winked. ‘Glad to meet you,’ he said. ‘Let’s look.’
The gold cups were in the heavy chest in the pantry. It was sealed. Draco shrugged and smashed the seal, and there was a treasury of heavy plate, beautifully crafted drinking ware and wine equipment.
Draco counted out five gold cups. ‘Sure you don’t want the rest?’ he said.
Satyrus shook his head. ‘You keep it,’ he said.
Draco waved for another soldier. ‘Thanks, my lord.’ In seconds, the guardsmen were bundling the silver and gold into their cloaks.
Satyrus took the stack of cups – they nested – in the bosom of his chiton. He found Philokles loading the horses in the stable, and showed them to him.
‘One’s for you,’ Satyrus said. ‘One for Lita, one for Theron, and one for Kallista.’
‘That’s well thought, young man,’ Philokles said.
Satyrus put a hand on his arm. ‘Tenedos is not in the house,’ he said.
Philokles nodded. ‘I saw. Nor all the men I put down – just the marines, I’d say. It’s a mystery.’
‘Or this Stratokles has allies.’ Satyrus felt better for saying it. ‘We need to get free of this place.’
Philokles shrugged. ‘That convoy of armour? It won’t leave for days, now. Too many loose ends from the dead men.’ He turned to go back for another load. ‘I agree we need a way out of this,’ he added.
When he was alone in the stable, Satyrus wrapped the cups in a blood-soaked towel and put them in his shoulder bag.
They rode up to the back of the citadel, approaching by the military road that was used only by the guard and the palace servants, because only the guard kept horses. There was a jam at the lower gate, where a train of donkeys carried game – deer, mostly – for the evening’s feast.
His ankle was throbbing, and an odd depression had settled over him. There was a man right by the gate. His back was to Satyrus, and something about him was familiar.
‘We should go back to regular lessons tomorrow,’ Philokles said, out of nowhere.
‘Fine,’ Satyrus said. A black cloud of infinite dimensions had replaced the joy of being alive. Taking the gold cups made him feel like a thief.
Nestor was cursing the delay. ‘What’s going on at the gate? I’ll whip the fools.’ He turned back to them and his brow cleared. ‘You are the most militant tutor I’ve met, sir. What do you teach? The arts of war?’
The Spartan spat. ‘I’m no hoplomachos,’ he said derisively. ‘I teach philosophy. Politics.’
‘Swordsmanship,’ Satyrus said.
‘Well, you seem a good teacher to me,’ Nestor said. ‘Your student held his own in a fight against men in armour.’
Philokles gave Satyrus that look which he associated with his tutor’s gentle contempt.
‘All I did was lie on the floor,’ Satyrus said.
Nestor laughed. ‘Your sister has you pegged,’ he said.
Satyrus sat with his ankle throbbing for as long as it took to run a stade in armour, and then again. Somewhere in that time he had the nagging feeling that something had been forgotten. By the time the column finally shuffled forward, it had almost gone from his mind, and then, as he passed the gate, it hit him.
‘Philokles!’ he said. ‘I saw Tenedos! With the kitchen staff at the gate!’
‘Are you sure?’ Philokles asked.
Satyrus wished that his ankle didn’t hurt so much. ‘Pretty sure,’ he said.
‘Who is Tenedos?’ Nestor asked.
‘Kinon’s steward. The twins think he was involved in the attack.’ Philokles was giving Satyrus an appraising look.
‘Describe him,’ the black man demanded.
Satyrus did his best. ‘He’s balding, Thracian. I’d even say he was Getae – his head is round like that. He has a slight stoop and – wispy hair.’ How did I miss that? he asked himself.
‘There’s enough bald Thracian slaves in this building to glut the market,’ Nestor said. ‘I’ll put the word out.’
‘He can’t be operating alone,’ Philokles said. ‘No slave would do anything to endanger his skin.’
They went in under a fine marble arch and turned right across the courtyard for the stables. Satyrus rode in, but Philokles had to dismount to avoid hitting his head.
Satyrus looked at their train of animals. ‘Where do we put all this stuff? Will we still ride with the caravan?’
Philokles shook his head. ‘I don’t know, boy. I don’t know anything any more.’
Satyrus got up and gave his tutor a hug. Philokles stiffened for a moment and then squeezed back.
‘Sorry, boy. Things are – I need a drink. I don’t need a drink. I need to get on top of this, and I’m not.’
‘We need to get out of here,’ Satyrus said.
‘Agreed,’ Philokles said.
‘What if there’s somebody inside? Working with Stratokles?’ Satyrus said.
‘Then we ought to be dead already,’ Philokles said. He shook his head. ‘I thought that I’d left all this behind. I was good at this once.’
Satyrus hesitated. ‘What if there’s someone inside but waiting for orders?’
Philokles stopped moving and turned to Satyrus so sharply that the boy was afraid the Spartan meant to hit him. It had happened, at least in the distant past. But Philokles made an odd clucking noise instead. ‘That’s good thinking, lad,’ he said. ‘And now you’ve seen Tenedos, we need to be on our guard. All the time.’
Philokles hailed a soldier, who got them a file of slaves to carry their gear. It was odd to be bringing bags of armour into the palace, and the slaves didn’t like the weight of the loads.
Satyrus led the way, carrying his own pack and his satchel with the bloody towel full of gold cups. He was eager to give one to Melitta, and doubly eager to give one to Kallista. He climbed the steps from the working courtyard to the main floor and turned to the left, leaving the official precincts for the guest quarters and the tyrant’s family space. He led his caravan of slaves up the steps of the formal entrance to the palace and past a pair of sentries, one of whom shot him a wink. Satyrus grinned. Then he went in under the bust of Herakles and followed the colonnade towards his room. The scale of the citadel and the palace dwarfed anything in Pantecapaeum or Olbia, and was far larger than anything in little Tanais. He wondered what it would be like to live with this level of opulence. Just as an example, in Tanais, the only stables had been in the public hippodrome. The tyrant of Heraklea had his own stables for his private use, and they could accommodate more animals than Tanais’s public stables.
Satyrus tried to consider what this meant in terms of political power. It was the sort of thing that would please Philokles, and he began to compose a question – an intelligent question.
Then he heard his sister scream.
8
Satyrus dropped his pack and ran, despite the pain in his ankle, the shifting of his nose and the pounding of his heart. She screamed again.
He saw the Athenian doctor burst out of another curtain halfway around the courtyard and run towards his sister’s room.
He reached under his arm and drew his sword. The gesture was becoming natural.
