‘Why not now?’ Anaxagoras said.
‘Shade,’ Apollodorus and Satyrus said together.
Two hours, and the sun was high, stark, and hot. Satyrus and his twenty men were huddled in the shade. There was a good breeze, and all of them had drunk their fill of water.
A loose stone wall covered most of the road over the pass. There were shallow pits on the flanks, but the ground was so stony that none of them had managed to get any of their carefully sharpened stakes to sit in the holes, and when they put them in the ground in front of their wall, Satyrus could knock them down with the flat of his hand.
Satyrus looked at the rocks above them — the flanks of the ridge, which towered over his head by a stade, at least. ‘We can hold a casual attempt,’ he said. ‘If they put archers or slingers up there, we’re done.’
‘I feel like a child playing soldier,’ Anaxagoras said. ‘We’ve built our fort and we have a pile of rocks to throw — didn’t my father forbid this?’ He chuckled.
‘Your father forbid this? Mine beat us if we didn’t come home with blood under our nails,’ Apollodorus said.
‘I can see our troops,’ Anaxagoras said, and sure enough, there they were — a hundred marines, all mounted on donkeys, and another hundred archers.
The Antigonid cavalry arrived an hour later, and they didn’t even try the wall, being dissuaded by the first volley of arrows. The archers rose from cover, but these cavalrymen were professionals, and they’d smelled a rat.
Satyrus watched them under his hand. ‘Real troops,’ he said.
Achilles nodded. ‘Aegema,’ he said. ‘Or Companions. One of the elite regiments,’ he continued. ‘Look at their armour.’
Satyrus wasn’t minded to allow them to block the pass, either. An hour after their arrival, he estimated there were about two hundred of them. He formed a neat line across the pass — his men in open order, archers in front, ready to form close at a trumpet blast — and moved swiftly down the top of the valley.
The Antigonid officer had never been attacked by infantry, and he hesitated … and lost men as the archers found their range. But he didn’t waste any more testing Satyrus’s skirmish line — that much he understood. Satyrus reoccupied his initial position without the loss of a man.
Satyrus had his men collect the enemy wounded and all their horses.
Another hour and the Apobatai, Nikephoros’s elite, came over the top of the pass, jogging, and came down to form behind his line. Nikephoros was with them, and Delios, their commander.
‘You made good time,’ Satyrus said. He embraced the mercenary. ‘Good thinking, with the donkeys.’
‘Eh? That was Charmides,’ Nikephoros said. ‘I made him stay with the garrison, though.’ He looked down the valley. ‘Ah, the Aegema. That’s old Coenus, ain’t it? He’s got no chance with us now.’
‘I’m going to push them right down past the trees,’ Satyrus said. ‘But I thought your boys needed a breather first.’
Nikephoros smiled. ‘It’s the young,’ he said. ‘Old men like me can run for ever — it’s tomorrow I’ll pay, and the next day.’
Satyrus rode up and down his line, briefing his men. They were eager — there was something personal about war at this level that was like a tonic, and Satyrus could lead his men in person. He could tell that they liked to have him so close — he called out names, told individuals he was watching their prowess, slapped shoulders, and he fed in return on their admiration.
Apollodorus gave him a sour smile and tipped his helmet back. ‘It’s fun when you’re winning, isn’t it?’ he asked.
Then they were loping down the hill, the Apobatai all closed up in the centre, the rest of the marines spread across the hillside. This time the Aegema retired as soon as they saw movement. Like good cavalrymen, they stayed just a little more than a bowshot in front, but when they reached the valley floor, they made a dive for Satyrus’s flanks, splitting neatly and rolling outwards, only to find that he’d doubled his archers at the flanks and after they lost two men, they retired.
Satyrus pressed them remorselessly after that. ‘I’d give anything for twenty Sakje,’ he said to Achilles. He remounted his escort — some of them on better horses — but they weren’t good enough horsemen to give him the advantage he needed to press his pursuit. The Aegema couldn’t close with his line, and he couldn’t break them.
Early evening, and the sun ceased to be the enemy. They were ten stades down the road to Magnesia, now. The enemy cavalry had reinforcements, and they’d tried his flanks again, but the Apobatai trained against Sakje — practised charging cavalry, like Alexander’s hypaspists had — and they saw the Antigonid cavalry off with a flashing counter-charge.
‘If only war were like this all the time,’ Satyrus said. ‘It’s like a good day on the palaestra.’
‘Except for the dead men,’ Apollodorus said.
Full evening, and the men ate olives and onions and cheese out of their bags and Satyrus watched the enemy command group, about two stades away. He could tell they were the command group — messengers rode in and out.
His own phalanx was over the top of the pass, a dark mass moving down the road behind him. New messengers were coming in across the way, as well.
Nikephorus had picked up a horse. ‘He’s got some satrapal cavalry, I’d guess — see the men in burnooses?’ he asked.
‘Persians,’ Achilles said. ‘Persian nobles. Look at how they ride.’
Anaxagoras was exercising — not because he needed it, he had assured them, but to stretch his riding muscles. ‘We will face the Mede? How noble!’
‘Only if that man is a fool,’ Apollodorus allowed. ‘They can’t face us without some infantry. We have way too many archers, and as long as this ground is rocky and broken, our marines are their equals.’
‘More messengers,’ Satyrus said. A dozen men rode up — big men in armour — and suddenly, Satyrus knew he was looking at One-Eye himself.
Antigonus One-Eye was smaller than a mountain, but not much smaller. His armour seemed solid silver, and his white hair flowed under his helmet.
‘Uh-oh,’ Satyrus said, and smiled. The Aegema commander was getting a piece of his master’s mind.
‘They’re going to break contact,’ Apollodorus said.
‘Going to attack, you mean,’ Anaxagoras said.
Apollodorus nodded. ‘When you speak of music, or philosophy, you are the master,’ he said. ‘Watch those phylarchs. Which way are they looking?’
Before the sun sank another finger’s breadth, a herald rode out from the enemy command group.
Satyrus received him just as his phalanx came up, the men panting with the effort after weeks on ships.
‘The King of Asia requests your leave to collect his dead,’ he said. ‘He has some of your men he’ll happily trade for ours.’
Satyrus looked at Apollodorus for confirmation. ‘We have … sixteen?’ he said.
Apollodorus nodded.
Antigonus turned his horse and cantered away in the distance.
‘I had hoped to meet your master,’ Satyrus said. ‘I am Satyrus of Tanais.’
‘So we surmised,’ the herald said. ‘May we assume that you have taken Ephesus? In defiance of the treaty, of gods and men?’
Satyrus smiled. ‘I rather think I’ve taken it with the help of gods and men. But yes, the city and the citadel. In return, may I assume you are breaking contact because Lysimachos is right behind you?’
The herald accepted a cup of water from Anaxagoras and nodded. ‘Blast you, yes. We were so close — we had him.’
‘Well, now you don’t. Nor Ephesus nor a fleet.’ Satyrus looked away from the herald to watch Antigonus cantering away. ‘I reckon that the King of Asia will find it a whole new war now.’
Antigonus handed a cup of wine to the phylarch. The man had two wounds — in the thigh and neck — so there was no question but that the man had done his job.
‘We were never close to breaking them,’ the phylarch said. ‘Their king was with them, all day — right in the front. They fought like heroes.’