steering oars. We didn't need to stay up with the first line, or so I'd been told, but I was anxious to get forward and I wanted to go faster than Lord Achilles had ordered.
Speed changes require orders, and now I was amidships I couldn't see as well. I got Thetis to fast cruise and then ran to the bow.
The Samians were just putting their beaks into the enemy. You could hear the collisions clearly across the water.
I watched Archi's ship, but he was cut off from the first impacts by the rush of Samians, and he and the other exiles were rowing diagonally across the beach, going to seaward, north and east across the current, to try and find an opening.
Somewhere in the enemy line, some oily Phoenician made a decision and the battle changed in the twinkling of their oars. Their centre broke up like an egg under a hammer, and the bulk of the centre turned landward – into the flank of the Samians. Our very aggression would now count against us, and our vulnerable flanks would be open to the rams of the heavy Phoenician ships.
That's why you keep a second line, of course.
I ran back down the centre plank between the upper-deck benches. To the north and west, our front left, the Phoenician centre was turning south and Archi's exiles were all that stood in their way. The Milesians and Chians seemed paralysed – just as they had been at every other battle.
'We need to turn north!' I shouted across the strip of sea between our ships at Lord Achilles, ignoring his son by my side.
Either the lord didn't hear me or he chose to ignore me. If we held our course, we'd enter the winning part of the combat close to the beach, a position where even in the event of a disaster, the Cretans could beach their ships and escape. Lord Achilles was thinking like a king.
I was thinking like a nineteen-year-old with an oath to fulfil.
I turned to Nearchos. 'If those ships are crushed, we lose the battle,' I said, pointing to the north. And the gods sent me an inspiration, because ships were sprinting out of the centre to help the exiles – Lesbian ships. 'Epaphroditos is going too! We have to support him!'
Nearchos rose to the moment. 'Go!' he said. 'Let my father follow me!'
I was sure that I had been hired to prevent just this sort of incident.
'Troas! Take the oars!' I pushed him into the steering rig. 'Nearchos – get forward with the marines and be ready to lead the boarders.' Lord Achilles would have a fit, I knew – but I wasn't sending the boy anywhere I wasn't going myself.
Troas got between the steering oars, and we were turning even as I ordered the last increase in speed. All our decks were rowing now, and the oar masters were thumping the deck with their canes, so that the whole ship rang with the tempo.
We were turning out of the second line, heading across the bows of other Cretan lords. It was exhilarating. There is something to war at sea – the speed of a ramming ship, the brilliance of the sea, the wind, the oarsmen singing the Paean. I felt like a god come to Earth. My fear fell away, our bow swept north and then we slipped into our new course as if it was carved like a trough in the sea, and we were moving as fast as a galloping horse.
'You have it?' I asked Troas. My not-quite-father-in-law was, in effect, commanding the ship.
'Never done this before!' he said, but he laughed. Some men rise to their moment. Troas – a man who could bargain for his daughter's virtue – was ready for his, and we stooped on the Phoenicians like a hawk on doves.
I saw the first engagements in the centre. Archi got his ship turned in plenty of time and up to full speed. He had a light trireme and he turned like a cat, passing between the first Phoenicians he met. One ship got his oars in, but the other got oar-raked, the broken shafts of the oars ripping men's arms and the splinters flying like arrows. Men die when their oars are shattered.
It was a brilliant stroke, but Archi would have a professional helmsman, as good as any Phoenician – indeed, the man might be a Phoenician. He was through in five heartbeats, right through their first line.
'Follow that ship,' I said to Troas. 'At all costs. Ram what you have to.'
Troas grinned.
The faster of the two Phoenicians – the one that hadn't lost his oars – was now closing with us at a terrific rate. A sea-fight is a scary thing, friends. It starts very slowly, but once everyone decides to engage, the speed is bewildering. Two ships at full stretch come together as fast as two galloping horses. Imagine it in your head – we were ram to ram with this enemy, our ships the same weight.
I paused and turned back to Troas. 'Diekplous?' I asked. 'Ram to ram?'
He shook his head. 'At the last minute, I'll go left,' he said. 'A little flick to port and we're into his oars.'
'I'll warn the rowers!' I said, and ran to the command platform. 'On my command – all starboard-side oars inboard!' I roared.
The oar masters all raised hands, showing me they'd heard. Otherwise, their attention was on the stroke. One missed beat here and we were all drowned men.
Over my shoulder, the enemy trireme looked as big as a citadel. And fast as a porpoise.
And I had no one to help me. When exactly do you order your oars in? How long exactly does it take ninety men to drag their oars inboard?
I stood on the balls of my feet. I flicked a glance at the enemy – and saw that there was a second ship just abaft him.
Troas had seen it too – and it was too damned late to change our minds.
'Ready to ram!' I screamed.
Forward, the marines and Nearchos would be bracing against the bow.
The rowers would be praying.
Troas was grinning like a madman.
I wanted to shit myself.
I glanced at the enemy. So close it felt as if we should already have hit – I could see the face of their marine captain, and an arrow clanked against my helmet and flicked away. Good shooting.
'Starboard side!' I yelled. Wait for another stroke. Don't give the game away.
'Oars in!' I roared, blowing my voice for a day in one great shout, trying to use the strength of my lungs to get the oars in through the ports.
Whamm. We hit so hard that I fell and lost my helmet. It fell between the benches and vanished below.
The starboard-side rowers had their oars in, but it didn't matter.
Both ships had settled on the same tactics and jibed the same way, so we'd hit beak to beak – the hand of the gods. Our beak – a month out of the shop – held. Theirs broke off. Their ship was filling with water and my mouth was full of blood, Ares only knew why.
'Starboard oars – out!' I screeched. My voice was gone, but the petty-officers got the message.
'Back-water! Nearchos!' He was still stunned from the impact, but he came to me. His great helmet with bronze wings was a little flattened, and he had it buckled.
'Get that thing off and take command,' I said. 'My voice is gone!'
A sailor clambered up from inside the hull and handed me my helmet. I got it on my head.
Troas was on the ball, and he got the bulk of the sinking Phoenician between us and the next enemy by backing to starboard. The second Phoenician overshot and went past us. I looked back, and most of the right flank's second line was behind us, coming up fast.
By Poseidon, thugater, that was a fine moment. We'd sunk a Phoenician in one pass. Call it luck if you like. It was luck. Nike was with us and her handsomer sister Tyche, too!
And Troas, just by thinking fast and steering, got us around the wreck, our timbers creaking but our ship intact. There was water coming in – I can't imagine how hard those two ships must have hit – but the sailors were bailing and we weren't finished yet.
Archi's ship was gone into the maelstrom in the centre. There were a dozen Phoenicians coming our way.
I looked at Nearchos. 'Pick one and let's get it,' I said. My oath would have to wait. We were, in effect, alone against the Phoenician centre.
The trick to staying alive in a sea-fight is never to show the long side of your ship – the oar banks – to the enemy. If you keep your bow to their bows, there should be a limit to how much damage you can take. Despite
