head out across the desert. You said yourself that most of your damage was done and that Gabines was on to you.’
Stratokles stood still in the street, breathing hard. But then he shook his head. ‘No,’ he said. ‘No – we won’t cut and run. Not yet. I’m this close to burying Ptolemy for ever. I’ll stand my ground, for now.’
Lucius shook his head. ‘Well, I’m with you, then,’ he said. ‘Let’s get this done.’
When he was standing in the courtyard of his safe house, a shit-hole taverna he’d purchased in the unfashionable south-east quarter, he breathed easier despite the stink of the tannery next door.
Think it through, he said to himself.
Terrified slaves put bales of his goods down in the courtyard. Stratokles snapped his fingers, and two of his guards stepped forward.
‘Pay them well,’ Stratokles said. The expense was ruinous, but he couldn’t afford the betrayal of a slave at this point.
A young Gaulish woman with a yellow bruise that covered the left side of her face turned and bolted, fearing something in his voice and guessing incorrectly. She ran out of the courtyard, a six-year-old child at her side. Two of his best went off in pursuit.
‘Athena!’ Stratokles protested to the heavens. ‘Zeus Soter! I intended no impiety!’ He stopped imploring the heavens, as it scared the slaves. To Lucius, he said, ‘See to it we have no more runners.’
The rest of the slaves huddled together, as if by closeness they could achieve protection against the swords, like the sheep in the tannery. Lucius’s men herded them into their new quarters and put a bar across their door.
Before the shadows grew longer, the smaller of his guards returned from the chase with a smug look on his face and a head in a sack – a head with blond braids.
‘And the child?’ Stratokles asked.
The man looked around. ‘Never saw a child,’ he said.
Stratokles shook his head. ‘She had a child.’
The man blinked. ‘Never saw a child,’ he said. ‘Maybe Dolgu saw the brat.’
Stratokles stifled his annoyance. ‘Fine. Send Dolgu to me when he returns. In the meantime, go and buy me two new slaves in the market and get this courtyard cleaned. And arrange to send this note to the doctor. The usual way.’ The doctor was comfortably ensconced at the palace, and would only communicate via codes.
He had a new plan – it lacked the endless vistas of beauty of the former plan, but it would serve. Its simplicity was its beauty.
He would continue to foment the mutiny. That was too easy. Cassander wanted the Macedonians in Macedon, and they all wanted to go home. No need for deep planning there. The new wrinkle was that he would use his tools to kill Ptolemy. And then, when Antigonus strolled into the ensuing chaos, Stratokles would use him to free Athens.
‘You want me to take the boys and have a go at Leon’s men?’ Lucius asked. The big Italian was eating an apple.
‘No,’ Stratokles said. ‘No, Leon’s a sideshow. The children are a sideshow. If the doctor can get them, well and good, but I’m done with such stuff. We work the Macedonians, and then we decamp.’
Lucius finished his apple, right down to the seeds. ‘For what it’s worth, I agree. We can’t fight everyone.’
‘That’s just what I think,’ Stratokles said.
20
‘Y ou have a prisoner?’ Leon said. ‘Where?’
‘Welcome home,’ Nihmu said. She smiled sleepily.
Diodorus came through the adjoining house door with a sword in his hand. ‘In the name of all the gods,’ he said, and then he lowered the sword.
Coenus was right behind him. ‘Satyrus!’ He grinned. Then, carefully, like a man who fears to speak a bad thing lest it become true, ‘Is my – is everyone well?’
‘Xenophon is standing in the courtyard with a file of marines. And one of Stratokles’ people, wrapped in a rug.’ Satyrus grinned. He couldn’t help it. Then, sobered, he nodded to Leon. ‘Peleus is dead.’
Leon threw a chlamys over his naked shoulders while Sappho ordered torches and lamps lit. ‘I don’t suppose you could have warned us you were coming? And you’re still under exile, young man.’ He gave Satyrus a hug. ‘So – you’ve taken a ship on the sea and lost me the best helmsman on Poseidon’s blue waters. I assume there’s a story?’
Philokles appeared from the darkness of the doorway. ‘Coenus, your son is outside with a rug on his shoulder,’ he said.
Satyrus smiled at Philokles and then looked at the man again. The change was profound, for having been gone just a month. The Spartan had lost weight. He moved differently. He stepped up and put his arms around Satyrus. ‘I missed you, boy,’ he said.
Theron came in from Diodorus’s house, pulling a chiton over his head. ‘I should have known that it was you,’ he said by way of greeting. ‘Do you know what hour it is?’ But he, too, had to give Satyrus a crushing hug.
All together, they went out into Leon’s broad courtyard, where six marines stood easily with their shields resting on the ground and their spears planted, butt-spike first, in the gravel. When they saw Leon they all stood straighter.
Xenophon put his burden carefully on the ground and bowed. ‘Sir?’ he said.
Leon crossed his arms. ‘Let’s hear the story,’ he said.
Satyrus started telling it. Servants brought wine while he talked, and he was on his second cup by the time he got to the fight off Syria and the long night of the storm. ‘The next morning, Demetrios could have had us with ten children and a sling,’ he said. He shrugged and handed the wine cup to Xenophon, who took a slug and gave a belch. ‘We slept late and all the guards went to sleep – three hundred of us in a cave, with the ships out on the beach like a signal.’ He shrugged. ‘But the gods protected us, or Demetrios is a fool.’ He motioned at the rug. ‘None of the prisoners know much – they worked for this Athenian mercenary; they had orders to find us and take us. This one seemed to be in command. Kalos hit him hard, and he’s been comatose for days. He needs a doctor.’
Philokles motioned to Xenophon. ‘Rolling an injured man in a rug is not actually a way to heal him. Let’s see him.’
Xeno placed his burden on the ground. ‘He was a fine fighter. I’d like him to live.’ Together with Philokles, he unrolled the rug.
Philokles gazed at the unconscious man in the torchlight for a long moment. ‘Well, well,’ he said.
Diodorus stooped over the man and then stood up. ‘Look what the cat dragged in,’ he said.
‘I thought he was dead,’ Coenus added. ‘Hera protect us all. Put him in my room.’
‘We need a doctor,’ Philokles said. ‘This is beyond me.’
Leon looked puzzled. ‘I don’t know him.’ He turned to his steward. ‘Fetch us-’
Diodorus shook his head. ‘Wait. Clear the courtyard.’ He turned around. ‘Trust me. Get everyone out of here. Marines – to the kitchens. Get yourself some wine.’ He looked back at Leon and made a sign. ‘Friends only,’ he said.
‘Xeno can stay,’ Coenus said.
‘And the twins,’ Sappho said.
Satyrus thought that he was on the edge of some great secret. All his life he’d seen them act like this – as if some sacred bond called them all together.
‘Demetrios is in Nabataea,’ Melitta said, out of the air, ‘and none of his ship commanders had the balls to come out after us.’ She reached out and took the wine cup from Xenophon. They glanced at each other for a moment – too long a moment, as far as Satyrus was concerned. What in Hades? Then she looked at Diodorus. ‘Who is he?’
‘Nabataea?’ Leon asked. He was standing like a man about to run a race. ‘Let me make sure I understand
