‘The Goths have a few boats.’ Maximus laughed. ‘Well, that is grand. As Calgacus would say, we are all going to die.’
‘The men of Miletus are not what they were,’ said Hippothous. ‘By the time of the Romans, the Milesians had sunk so low that their island of Pharmakousa was overrun with pirates. Notoriously, they held the young Julius Caesar for ransom.’
‘Although,’ countered Ballista, ‘in the story, once released, Caesar raised boats from Miletus, returned and crucified his captors.’
‘That would be more down to him than the men of Miletus.’
Ballista shrugged. ‘All stories change in the telling.’
The boat drove easily through the slight swell. They were getting close. Moving to the stern, Ballista stood by the fisherman. He studied the city of Miletus. Here, in the north-west, the peninsula sloped steeply down to the sea. In the moonlight he could make out the walls. They appeared sound. So far, so good.
The fisherman tacked to bring the boat around into the narrow mouth of the Lion Harbour. On either side, crouching in the gloom, the large statues which gave the haven its name. By them were winches and chains. Once, they would have closed the entrance; now they lay in sad disrepair. The city walls continued into the harbour but ran out before the quays at the far end. To the left were ship sheds to house war galleys. They were derelict.
Ballista thought back to another arrival at another town, years earlier. He had been sent to defend Arete on the Euphrates. He had told the Boule what had to be done, told them of the necessary destruction and impositions as sympathetically as he could. They had not liked it. Cries of outrage – some of them shouting that it would be no worse being captured. Maybe in some ways they were right. Had he thought that then, or was it something fitting he now added? Memory was a slippery thing.
As the boat glided in, there was a stir on the quayside. A telones – something about them always betrayed them as customs officials – led a group of auxiliary soldiers to the edge of the water. There were no more than half a dozen soldiers; useful for arresting smugglers, less good for a hansa of Goths.
The old man docked the boat. The telones shouted – something peremptory befitting the nature of his calling. Ballista ignored him, let Hippothous browbeat the official with the sonorous titles of Ballista’s exalted Roman status. The soldiers saluted smartly enough. The telones managed to appear both fawning and vaguely aggrieved.
Ballista stepped ashore. As the others tied up the boat, he asked the telones to summon the Boule of Miletus.
The official bridled. ‘ Kyrios, it is late. The councillors will be asleep.’
‘Then wake them.’
‘They are men of influence.’ The telones sounded outraged. ‘It would be unseemly.’
Ballista turned and spoke in Latin to one of the soldiers. ‘Go to the curia. There should be public slaves in the council house.’
‘ Kyrios, the councillors must not be disturbed,’ the telones interrupted, still in Greek. ‘They will be angry.’
Ballista continued addressing the soldier. ‘Send the public slaves to rouse the councillors.’
‘No, Kyrios, you must leave this until tomorrow. You have no authority over these troops.’
Ballista looked at Maximus, nodded his head at the telones, and continued giving orders. ‘If there are no slaves in the curia, find out where a prominent councillor lives.’
Maximus approached the telones, put a fraternal arm around his shoulders and, pulling him close, drove his knee into the man’s crotch. The official crumpled, clutching his balls. Maximus took a step back and effortlessly kicked him to the ground.
‘Hammer on the councillor’s door until someone answers.’
Maximus had lined up to bring the heel of his boot down on the telones’ ear, when Hippothous restrained him. The accensus handed over his walking stick. Maximus thanked him.
‘When you have woken the councillor’s familia, send his slaves to summon the rest of the curia.’
There was a swish as Maximus swung the walking stick through the air, a solid crunch as it landed. The telones yelped.
‘Is that clear, Miles?’
‘Perfectly, Dominus.’
Swish – crunch, swish – crunch; Maximus was going about his work with skill and commitment.
‘Take two of your boys with you.’
‘We will do what is ordered, and at every command we will be ready.’
The soldiers had done well: barely a smile. There were few things soldiers enjoyed as much as watching a civilian getting a good beating.
‘Enough,’ Ballista said. Maximus handed the stick back to Hippothous.
‘Thank you,’ said Hippothous. ‘Done most philosophically. One day, when we have time, I will tell you how the great doctor Galen recommends one beats people.’
The three remaining soldiers began to help unload the baggage from the boat. The telones got to his feet and limped off. Maximus sang as he caught and stacked things. Hippothous, such manual labour being beneath a free- born accensus, polished his walking stick.
Ballista set his back to the sea and surveyed the harbour. Off to the right was a large monument on a stepped circular base. It boasted several ships’ rams in marble. There was a colonnade behind it that turned and ran across in front of him. Its shops and warehouses were all shuttered bar one – probably a drinking den. Where the colonnade stopped to the left was a tall gate, the sort of elaborate, impractical thing commissioned in civic pride in the days when peace seemed immutable. Beyond that, running back towards the water, was the plain wall of a sacred enclosure. It was pierced by just one ornamental gateway. Behind it rose the round roof of the actual temple. It had to be the home of Apollo Delphinios, the patron god of sailors.
Ballista strolled over to the monument on the round base. An inscription recorded its erection to honour Pompey the Great for ridding the sea of pirates.
‘All done,’ Hippothous said.
Maximus, the slave and one of the soldiers shouldered the various bags and shields. The mail coats and everything else were both bulky and heavy.
Through the Harbour Gate was a broad paved road, now empty. The men’s footsteps echoed back from the colonnades on both sides. There was always something unnatural about a city at night.
A walk of a few moments and the roadway opened out into an agora. The soldier pointed to an imposing building to the right. Miletus was, and had always been, a more important polis than Priene. Its Bouleuterion was correspondingly grander. The outer gate through the propylon was open.
Inside was a wide courtyard, porticos with Doric columns on three sides, a tomb or shrine in the middle. On the fourth side the several doors of the actual council house were hermetically shut, although lights could be seen through the high windows. The soldiers who had gone ahead sauntered out of the shadows under the columns. Public slaves had been sent to find the councillors. There was nothing to do but wait.
Overhead, the moon rode across the sky, putting the stars to shame. In the mundane sphere, ox skulls sculpted on the tomb threw back its light. Ballista slipped into an elegiac mood. He thought about defending Miletus, his reasons for coming to this polis, about the Goths. It would not be the first time he had faced them. That had been many years before. He had been a Roman officer when the general Gallus had thrown the Goths back from the walls of Novae up near the Danube. Gaius Vibius Trebonianus Gallus – what a general he had been; what an emperor he would have made, if the fates had not struck him down so soon after he reached the purple.
The night was not having such a melancholy effect on the others. ‘You may well like this town,’ Hippothous said to Maximus. ‘It is a sink of depravity.’
‘I can but hope.’
‘And your hopes may be rewarded. The divine philosopher Apollonius of Tyana tried to bring the Milesians to virtue. He sent them a letter: “Your children lack fathers, your youths old men, your wives husbands, your…”’
‘Well, if their wives are lacking husbands, I am their man.’
‘“… husbands rulers, your rulers laws, your…”’
‘And I am sure you will be looking after the youths.’
Hippothous sighed an exaggerated sigh. ‘I am far from sure Thales was right. It might be better to be born an animal rather than a barbarian.’
