what had just happened to the ship we'd killed.
Troas played safe and Nearchos didn't interfere. We bumped hulls with the second Phoenician ship in line, cathead to cathead, and we damaged his oars a little, but he got most of them inboard. We lost two men – one oar fouled in the port and the loose end killed the rower who should have had it in and knocked the man above him in the oar loft unconscious, and just that small error left us vulnerable, because when the rowers were ordered to put their oars back in the water on the next stroke the whole port bank faltered and we turned to port, losing way and turning across the path of another enemy.
But the gods were with us and he passed us just a spear's length astern, and then we had our stroke back and we were alive.
But our rowers were tired. I could feel it. Tension is its own fatigue, thugater – the more you are afraid, the more tired you feel. And the more tired you are, the easier it is to feel fear.
I looked around, because suddenly we were between the fights. To the north, Archilogos and Epaphroditos and their allies were engaged with the second line of the Phoenician centre. Behind us, the Cretans were overwhelming the first line by weight of numbers, and the Samians had already polished off the enemy Greeks.
Even Aristagoras could scent victory. He released the centre and left, and the Milesians and the Chians went forward.
In fact, we had won the battle. I knew it and, more important, the Phoenician navarch knew it. His right flank declined the engagement and began to row backwards again. I never saw their signal, but all at once, enemy ships began to flee.
Not the ships around Archi, though. They were locked together with grapples and marines, spear to spear.
I pointed to the fight in the centre.
Nearchos's fears were gone. He grinned.
'Now we make you a name,' I said. Not the words Achilles paid me to say.
But we were young. Troas put us in well. We actually rowed a little past the melee and turned south, taking our first Phoenician in the flank. I was in the bow, my helmet down over my eyes, arms braced against the bulkhead, when we hit, and I could see the upper-deck oarsmen and their round mouths and terrified eyes as our damaged ram broke open their long side. We'd had a full stade to turn and race at our target; the men had the heart for one more burst and we were a heavy ship.
The enemy keel snapped under our ram and the ship broke in half. It was a spectacular kill and every ship in the centre of our line saw us do it. That's how you make a reputation, honey.
We probably also killed our own ship with that impact. The bow seams probably gave way right there.
We were too wild with the daimon of combat to care. Our beak went home into another enemy lashed alongside the one we'd broken like an old toy, and we spent our remaining momentum scraping down his side and coming to a rest broadside to broadside, oar bank to oar bank.
I leaped up on our ship's side and Nearchos was beside me, Idomeneus and Lekthes at my back, and the oar benches were emptying.
I balanced on the rail and waved down on to the Phoenician's deck. 'After you, my lord!' I said.
He grinned and we all leaped.
That was a great day, and a great hour. The enemy already knew they were doomed and doomed men seldom fight well. We cleared that first ship faster than it takes to tell it, killing their sailors – all their marines were elsewhere, boarding the Lesbian ships. I cut the captain down by his helmsman and Nearchos gutted the helmsman, and then we went over the side and down into the next ship – another trireme, and now we were coming up behind the Phoenician marines as they fought shield to shield against Lesbians and Chians and Ephesian exiles.
Behind me, the Cretans were clearing the Phoenician decks, tripping from bench to bench. A Cretan ship is a fearsome thing because every bench has another warrior. We were worth five ships' worth of marines.
My spears were gone and my good sword was in my hand. I was standing on the rail of a Lesbian ship – there were twenty ships all locked together in a single mass of death – and I balanced there for three heartbeats while I looked for Archilogos.
Then I saw him, a flash of blue and gold, still on his feet, his right arm covered in blood and his aspis a flapping mass of splintered wood and collapsed bronze. Some men fight better when they are doomed.
And I blessed the gods that they had given me the moment to redeem my oath.
Hah! I killed like the scythe of Hades. I won't bore you with the tale – oh, you want me to bore you?
It was one of my finest days.
All the doubt left me. I cared nothing for their wives and their children and their petty lives. As fast as my arm moved, they died. If they turned, I cut them down, and if they didn't turn, I put my sword into their throats and thighs. I could have cleared a ship by myself, but I had Nearchos by my side, and his blade was as fast as mine, and Lekthe's spear flashed over my head from time to time when I was pressed, and they died. The four of us were the cutting edge of a living axe of Cretans, and we flowed over their decks as fast as men can clamber from bench to bench. My right arm was red to the shoulder with the blood of lesser men, dripping down my chest inside my armour, and there was the smell of copper in my nose like an offering to the god of smiths, and still I killed them.
After we cleared our second ship, I got my voice back and called 'Archilogos!', and he turned. Because if he died without me, I would never forgive myself. He had to know I was coming.
Another ship, the last before Archi's, and I was suddenly blade to blade with a giant. To make it worse, he was standing on the command platform and I was in the benches. He was an officer of some sort, because he'd gathered a dozen marines and turned them to face our rush.
I paused. He was huge, and I felt the blood and the fire in my muscles.
'Spear,' I said, reaching back, and Lekthes put his in my hand.
That's right, honey. And he eventually died a lord, and his daughters play with you. I thought you'd recognize the name – I've mentioned it a dozen times.
The giant raised his shield, ready for me to throw the spear.
Instead, I charged him. Raising the shield cost him a second, and I got a foot on the platform and my shield went against his, and before I got the other foot up, I slammed my spear point into the side of his helmet, a broad bowl with cheek pieces, riveted in the middle. Phoenicians are masters of many things, but bronze-work is not one of them.
He stumbled back. I'd rung his bell. Then he cut low at my legs, but I dipped the Boeotian and put the bronze-bound base into his sword. Then I slammed my spear into his helmet – again.
In the same place.
He stumbled back, and I roared. I remember that moment best of all, because this giant of a man was afraid and that fear was like the scent of blood to a shark.
He cut at my legs again, but I blocked it, stepped in and put my spear point into his helmet a third time, where the brow-ridge met the bowl, and the third time, the rivet popped and the point went under the bad weld, right through the top of his skull.
I stepped over him and a spear punched into my side. By Ares, that was pain – the scales held, but the rib broke, and I was knocked to my knees.
Never saw the blow that got me. There's a lesson there.
Nearchos got him.
I knelt there, almost dead, unable to raise my head – Ares, the pain; I hurt even thinking about it! And Lekthes and Idomeneus stepped past me, dancing the dance, and men fell back before them. They cleared the platform and I could breathe, although it wasn't good, and I got a leg under me and then another.
Then the rest of them dropped their weapons.
Cretans were flooding aboard from all directions. I'd taken Achilles' heir into the heart of the chaos and his father had come with all his warriors to save him.
Nearchos was as tall as a titan in that moment.
I managed to walk forward.
Achilles glared at me but embraced his son. I passed behind him and led my men across to Archi's trireme.
