Satyrus nodded. ‘I know that Eumenes is one of the contenders for Alexander’s empire, and Antigonus One-Eye is another. I know that Ptolemy is backing Eumenes because Antigonus is a bigger danger to Aegypt.’
‘Then you know more than most of my cavalrymen,’ Diodorus said. ‘We’re fighting for the treasury at Persepolis and the allegiance of the Persian nobles – winner take all. This is the Olympics, boy – the winner of this battle should be able to reconquer all Alexander took. Unless-’
‘Unless?’ Melitta asked.
‘What am I, your war tutor? Unless the price is too high, and the battle wrecks both armies.’ Diodorus squinted south, into the dust. ‘Eumenes and Antigonus have each beaten the other. Eumenes is a superb general, but he forgets he’s not a Homeric hero. Antigonus is not a superb general, but he tends to get the job done and his preparations are always excellent. Now – is that enough? I have several thousand men to see to.’
‘Of course!’ Melitta shot back. ‘Do you think we’re foolish?’
‘I’ll see to them,’ a handsome blond man said. He made a barbarian bow from his saddle. He had a pair of gold lion fibulae and gold embroidery on his cloak and a sword that seemed to be made from a sheet of beaten gold. He was covered in dust.
‘Crax!’ Philokles said. ‘It has been a long time!’
Crax bowed again, a broad smile dimpling his round Getae face.
‘You look prosperous,’ Philokles said.
‘I like gold,’ Crax said. He drew his sword and presented the hilt to Melitta. ‘I was sword-sworn to your mother. Now I will swear to you – both of you.’
‘That is a beautiful sword,’ Satyrus said.
‘You like it, lord? It is yours,’ Crax said.
Philokles laid a hand on Satyrus’s shoulder. ‘Gift it back to him,’ he whispered. ‘If you are his lord, he must give you anything you ask.’
Melitta put her hands on either side of the sword hilt. ‘You are our man and our knight,’ she said, using the Sakje words.
Satyrus reversed the sword and handed it back. ‘It pleases me for you to have this,’ he said. ‘It is one of the finest swords I’ve seen. As fine as Papa’s.’
Crax took the sword back with pleasure. He turned to Diodorus. ‘We waited all night, Strategos. We were not discovered – neither did the gods give us a challenge. We collected a dozen prisoners and returned by the secret way.’
Diodorus nodded. ‘Get some rest. Crax commands my scouts.’
Melitta leaned forward. ‘May I ask a question, Uncle?’
Diodorus nodded, although there were other men waiting for him under the awning of a striped tent. ‘Go ahead,’ he said.
‘Where is Ataelus?’ she asked.
‘Off with Leon, searching the oceans for lost money. Perhaps in the Hesperides fetching golden apples. Not here, where I need him.’ Diodorus slipped off his big charger, and a swarm of slaves took his horse and began to take off the tack. As soon as his feet hit the ground, men fighting for his attention surrounded him.
‘Take them to Sappho,’ Diodorus ordered. Then he was lost in his staff.
Crax kept them mounted with the wave of a hand. ‘This is his command tent,’ he said. ‘He sleeps in our camp. Come!’
They rode off, unnoticed in the masses of soldiers, servants and slaves who filled the camp. They passed wide streets and narrow streets, stalls selling produce and wine and a hide-covered brothel whose occupants were as noisy as the animals in the street outside, much to Satyrus’s embarrassment and his sister’s amusement.
The camp was larger – and better populated – than most of the towns that passed for cities on the Euxine. Satyrus tried not to stare as they rode, although there was more to contemplate than you’d ever see in a town – there were no walls and no courtyards, so that every business was plied in the open. Boys squatted in front of tents, polishing bronze helmets or putting white clay on leather corslets to make them whiter. A sword-sharpener hawked his talents to a pair of Argyraspids, men in their fifties with shields faced in solid silver and inlaid with amber and ivory. Phrygian infantrymen stood in groups having just left an inspection, and a squadron of Lydian lancers cantered by, shouting and laughing. Their officer wore a garland of roses and he bowed to Melitta and then blew her a kiss. A porne knelt in the mud of a street, servicing a client while he dictated orders. A pair of dirty children sold sweets off a broad leaf.
The twins drank it in as if they had been starved. Philokles told an abbreviated version of their adventures to Crax, and introduced Theron, who seemed as stunned as the children at the spectacle around him.
The Getae man pointed to a magnificent pavilion in scarlet and yellow that towered over every other tent in the central area. ‘Banugul,’ Crax said. ‘Remember her?’
Philokles laughed. ‘It’s rather like muster day for old friends,’ he said. Satyrus couldn’t tell whether he was joking or not. But his attention drifted when Kallista threw back the shawl on her hair and immediately drew whistles and more vocal attention. She smiled on every admirer.
Theron watched her. ‘Going into business?’ he asked, his voice tense.
She pouted and flipped her shawl back over her head.
Philokles shook his head. ‘You can’t transform a porne into a wife overnight,’ he said. ‘And I believe that she is the slave of my mistress.’
Theron glared at the Spartan. ‘Ahh, the philosopher is back,’ he said. ‘Perhaps you would like to give me some sage advice?’
‘I would,’ Philokles said. ‘But you wouldn’t take it. I scarcely ever take my advice myself – but that doesn’t mean it isn’t good.’
‘Did you find all this wisdom in your amphora of wine?’ Theron spat.
‘There, and elsewhere,’ Philokles returned, but the comment hurt him, Satyrus could tell. ‘She will not do well with jealousy,’ Philokles said.
‘And you are an expert with women, I find!’ Theron said. ‘Really, it is a pleasure to have you sober!’
‘Theron, shut up,’ Melitta said. ‘Philokles, please don’t be offended. Theron is as happy to find you returned without your ill-daimon as we are. He has forgotten his place and will apologize. Theron, if you ever wish to lie with my serving maid again, you’ll apologize.’
Theron shook his head. ‘You are going to be a formidable woman, Melitta. Mistress. Philokles, I’m sorry.’ He extended his hand.
The Spartan took it. ‘As am I.’
Kallista glared at all of them from under her shawl. ‘I was only playing, ’ she said.
Melitta nodded. ‘Ask my permission next time,’ she said. ‘Your actions reflect on me.’
Satyrus watched it all with admiration, but while they were dismounting, he said, ‘I thought that you were against slavery.’
‘I am,’ his sister agreed. ‘But if you are going to do a thing, do it well. Kallista needs a mother. Since she doesn’t have anyone but me, I’ll do it as her owner.’
And then they were led into a tent with cool, dark panels of blue-green canvas.
Sappho – a family friend since they were born – reclined on a couch, fanned by a pair of children. She sat up as soon as they were escorted in.
‘Children! I have wine and cakes for you. I heard that Srayanka is – dead. I’m sorry to be so blunt – my wits are astray and I’m an old woman.’ She spoke at random, her arms wrapped around both of them.
Satyrus had forgotten her smell – a wonderful smell of incense and musk and flowers. No one in the world smelled like Sappho, and she was as beautiful at forty-five as she had been at twenty-five, her beauty the outward form of a hard-won happiness. Her shoulders were held high and her skin soft, her face lined with both laughter and pain, but more enhanced by the lines than aged, especially when she smiled. Her eyes were unchanged, large and liquid.
They both kissed her and allowed themselves to be held while slaves bustled around them, and then they were taken away to another tent to be bathed. Satyrus was mortified to be bathed by women, as if he was a child, but he was clean for the first time in thirty days. He found his riding boots and a fresh chiton on a stool and he put them on.