lubber in the fog. Where did Eumeles get these captains?' The old man drank off a cup of neat wine and threw it against the wall, where it smashed. 'But the worst of it is that the Athenian squadron got past us. Ten triremes and four troop ships, and all the cash.'
Satyrus felt the prickle of disaster – and suspicion. 'You had thirty ships!' he said, and regretted the words.
'Oh, if only you'd been there yourself, I'm sure you'd have done better!' Demostrate said. He stormed out of the door.
Coenus slipped away after him and brought him back. Demostrate's bad temper seemed dispelled by the Megaran, and they embraced warmly. Then the pirate admiral apologized.
'I'm a fool when angry, and no mistake,' he said. 'Coenus says your sister is up on the Tanais with an army,' he went on.
Satyrus nodded.
Demostrate looked around. 'Then we've got Eumeles,' he said.
Satyrus shook his head. 'We need Diodorus,' he said.
'Your sister is waiting for you,' Coenus reminded him.
Satyrus looked around. They were all there – his own captains, and Demostrate, and all the Rhodian officers. Nestor stood alone, representing Heraklea. Satyrus rose to his feet and they grew quiet.
'My sister isn't waiting,' he said. 'She has an army and she's on the move, skirmishing with the Sauromatae who are just as much my enemies as Eumeles and his ships. She can't wait for me. Her fort at the Tanais may be besieged by Eumeles at any time, for all that she left it provisioned and garrisoned.' He looked around. 'If we strike now, we show Eumeles our strength and he no longer has to guess. Without Diodorus, we are weak. Weaker than Eumeles. And if we lose at sea, we're finished – the whole war comes apart like scale armour when the cord breaks. Right?'
Even Coenus nodded.
'We wait,' Satyrus said. Seventeen days after Darius sailed away, and a Rhodian officer killed one of Manes' oarsmen in a brawl on the waterfront. Manes led his men on a riot of destruction, killing a local man and two Rhodians and burning a warehouse.
Satyrus summoned the officers, but of the pirates, only Demostrate came.
Telereus, Lysimachos's navarch, began by suggesting that he'd had enough. 'This sitting in port accomplishes nothing,' he said. 'I will go to Tomis, and watch the coast.'
Panther shook his head. 'Any day now, if Satyrus is to be believed, we'll get our marines – and then we're off to find Eumeles.'
'This mercenary might never come. He could be forty days away. How long do we wait?' Telereus asked.
Satyrus held his temper. 'I ask you to wait five more days,' he said. 'In the meantime, I need your crews and my crews to share the duty of patrolling the wharves, and I'd like the navarchs to work out districts of the waterfront, so that I can confine the Rhodians and the pirates to their own neighbourhoods. Panther, I must inform you that Nestor, the tyrant's right hand, says that he must take your helmsman into custody.'
Panther shook his head. 'No,' he said. 'No man of mine goes to the axe for killing a pirate.'
'Let me be clear,' Satyrus said. 'You gave orders that this sort of thing be avoided. This man disobeyed you, and now you treat him as a hero?'
Panther pointed at Diokles. 'If Diokles there had done it, would you hand him over to this Nestor?'
Satyrus nodded. 'Yes,' he said.
'Not a helmsman,' Diokles offered. 'Lead oar, port side, on the Lord of the Silver Bow. And the other fool drew first.' He shrugged. 'And Manes killed two of theirs. He's the bugger that needs killing.'
Nestor pushed forward. Even among hard men like these, his size imposed. 'That is for me to decide,' he said. 'You are allies here, not conquerors. If your man is not given up, you are no longer welcome here.' Nestor didn't bluff, and he was looking at Satyrus. Satyrus knew that the killing was merely the last straw, after a week of theft, some armed robbery and scuffles in every market.
Satyrus spread his arms. 'Must I beg you, Panther? All my hopes come down to this. I sent them to sea to prevent this – but I cannot make Diodorus arrive on time. I know that your men and the pirates are oil and water. Help me here. I will offer private surety…' He looked at Nestor to gauge his reaction. 'That the man will not be found guilty.'
Nestor offered the smallest fraction of a nod.
'Your word?' Panther asked.
And Satyrus knew he had kept the Rhodians. For a day or two. He turned to the pirate king. 'And you?'
Demostrate shrugged. 'Manes is his own law,' he said. 'He's worse every day. He wants to kill me – he certainly doesn't take my orders.'
And he commands five ships – ships that I need, Satyrus thought.
In private, he asked Nestor to ignore Manes. He sent his own marines to watch Manes, but the monster seemed glutted with his latest rampage, and sat in his ships. Satyrus paid restitution to the merchant whose warehouse burned and tried to think of a way to make this all better.
He tried to get the whole fleet to practise rowing, to practise the complex battle tactics that professional captains and crews used to win battles. The Rhodians were at sea every day, rowing up and down, and his own ships emulated them. But Demostrate laughed. 'We don't need any schoolbook tactics,' he said, and walked away, leaving Satyrus fuming.
According to rumour, Manes had farted when told of the orders.
Satyrus planned to dine that night with his own captains. He felt besieged – Amastris would not meet with him, and Dionysius the tyrant was daily less receptive to him as Diodorus failed to appear. Without marines, he had little chance of striking a firm blow, as his ships were outnumbered. Panther was too angry to be supportive, and Demostrate wouldn't meet his eyes. His fleet was divided and untrained. He wondered what Eumeles' fleet was doing. Drilling, no doubt.
Satyrus was in his room at what had been Kinon's, brooding, when there was a knock.
'Lord Satyrus?' Helios came in. 'Visitors, my lord.'
Out in the main room, Satyrus could hear the tone change – men were speaking happily.
He heard a man's voice, and then a woman's, and then he was there, embracing Crax and then Nihmu.
'By the gods!' he said.
In two hours he had the situation in his head, and when he was done drawing maps on the floor, he turned to them. Diokles and Abraham were on the floor with him, following the new campaign, and Theron lay above them on his couch. The other captains and some of his ship's officers ringed them.
'We'll have our marines in two days,' he said.
Coenus shook his head. 'Well done, Nihmu,' he said.
'I can still ride,' she said. 'Even if other things have left me.' She turned to Satyrus. 'As soon as we landed and Coenus told me, I rode for the hills. I took six horses and I rode them hard.' She motioned to Crax.
Crax gave his golden laugh. 'We've had the very Furies dogging us, Satyrus,' he said. 'Phrygia is full of soldiers. Half serve Demetrios and the other half are masterless men. Either way, they prey on each other.' He shrugged. 'There's no food and no maintenance for the roads. The peasants are gone or dead. The weather has been – brutal.' He looked around, acknowledging men he knew with a wave or a wink. 'But Lord Diodorus is over the mountains at Bithynia.'
'But Eumeles has his reinforcements and his money,' Satyrus said. 'We've missed one opportunity, or possibly two. I need to strike quickly.'
'Pshaw, lad,' Crax said. Then he smiled. 'You are no lad. Listen then. Diodorus is coming. And from what Coenus says, your sister is fine. She's every bit the soldier you are. She'll keep ten days – maybe more.'
'Darius won't keep,' Satyrus said. 'He expects me in seven days. I can't see being there.'
Nihmu raised her head. 'I can be there in seven days,' she said. 'One barbarian woman – no one will notice me.'
Satyrus turned. 'How will you find Darius?' he asked.
Nihmu laughed. 'We are Pythagoreans,' she said. 'Even a barbarian like me. Trust me, Satyrus – I will find him.'
