'You have the lord's blessing to take the Euxine – if you can,' Gabines said. His eyes flicked to the slaves. 'But our hand cannot be seen in it. We cannot spare you any ships.'
'Really?' Satyrus asked. 'I thought that you might lend me-'
Gabines shook his head. 'Lord Ptolemy needs every oar in the water for his expedition to Cyprus,' he said.
Satyrus looked at Ptolemy, not his steward. 'Is this true, lord? I had counted on ten or fifteen triremes from here.'
Ptolemy leaned forward. 'You failed,' he said bluntly. 'You had a go at Eumeles, and failed. He captured two of my ships and the repercussions were annoying. I can't afford to go through that again – with Cassander.'
Satyrus nodded. 'I need ships,' he said. Then he shrugged. 'Very well,' he said. 'But I have your permission to proceed?'
Ptolemy shook his head. 'I give no permission,' he said. He shrugged as broadly as an actor. 'I can't control you!'
Satyrus couldnt help but laugh. 'My lord, it seems to me that if I succeed, you'll claim to have been my benefactor, and if I fail, you'll disown me and show how you offered me no aid.'
Gabines nodded. 'Precisely, young man. What we will do,' Gabines said, 'is to cover your back. We were,' he cleared his throat, 'embarrassed by the attacks on your sister. Nothing like that will happen again.'
Ptolemy nodded.
Gabines leaned forward like a conspirator. 'But I will keep a man on this Sophokles. And I will ensure that no agent of Eumeles can communicate from here – for ten days after you sail.'
Satyrus nodded. 'That is worth some ships,' he said. 'May I ask how you can do that?'
Gabines shrugged. 'We are ready to send our first scouts to look at the coast of Cyprus – and a diversion up the coast of Syria. We will stop all shipping for ten days.'
Satyrus whistled and shook his head. 'The blessings of my patron, Herakles, attend you in every endeavour,' he said.
Ptolemy grinned. 'My patron as well, lad.'
Satyrus nodded. 'I still need the ships. I believe that my uncle Leon would say that promises are easy.'
'When you are a king, you'll quickly get the hang of this posturing,' Ptolemy said. He rose and clasped hands with Satyrus like an equal. Then he leaned forward and whispered into Satyrus's ear. 'May Tyche bless you,' he whispered. 'I have two ships – good ships, quadriremes with heavy hulls – going at auction later today. And a pair of triremes that my architects have condemned as too small for modern war.' He stepped back and winked. 'They will all four be sold at salvage rates.' He held Satyrus's hand in his. 'It's the best I can do.'
Satyrus grinned. 'Bless you, lord,' he said.
Ships sold for their wood are rarely auctioned off with all their rigging and oars – nor do their crews ordinarily stand by the auction, waiting to be hired by the new owners – yet these things happened. Satyrus and Isaac Ben Zion were the only buyers at the auction.
'Don't bid against me on the big quadrireme with the engine in the bow,' Ben Zion said. 'It's for Abraham.'
Satyrus stripped Leon's establishment of officers without hesitation, taking the cream of his merchant captains, helmsmen and oar masters for the new ships. He was delighted to find a captured trireme, the Wasp, lying on the beach.
'How'd he come here?' Satyrus asked, and sailors scrambled to tell him how Sarpax had taken him with a pentekonter at the mouth of the Euxine. Satyrus tracked Sarpax to a brothel and recruited him to command the Wasp for the summer, against Eumeles.
'Can you shoot as well as your sister?' Sarpax asked. He laughed, and the pearl in his ear glowed. 'Will it bring Master Leon back?'
'Yes,' Satyrus said, and they clasped hands, and the thing was done.
Satyrus also took the Hyacinth, sister ship to the Golden Lotus, another triemiolia out of Rhodos, the flag of Leon's Massalia squadron, bringing his squadron to seven.
He had dinner with his officers – all men he knew from Sappho's table. 'Oinoe? Plataea?' Sappho asked from her couch. 'T hose are the names of nymphs.'
'No – battles at which Athens did well.' Satyrus raised a cup of wine. 'Here's to the Painted Stoa, friends. And to Philokles' friend Zeno. He gave me the idea for the names. Oinoe and Plataea are the fours. Marathon and Troy are the threes.'
Sandokes, the new navarch of the Oinoe, was an Ionian from Samothrace. He had beautifully curled black hair, a pair of gold chariots hung from his ears, and his body showed the muscles of a man who took special care at the gymnasium – despite which, he was one of Leon's favourite captains, a man who had made the run to Massalia four times and had once taken a merchanter outside the Pillars of Herakles. He knew Sarpax of old, and the two shared a couch.
Aekes, who also had the reputation of being Sandokes' friend, was of an opposite temperament. He had salt-washed hair and wore a simple leather chiton made of two deer skins sewn together, like a farmer. He was clean enough, and his arms and legs showed the muscle of a working seaman, but no earrings graced his ears, nor did he appear to have any special clothes to wear to a symposium. What he did have was a long Celtic sword in a bronze scabbard that rested against his couch, and a reputation as a successful pirate-hunter. He commanded the Hyacinth. He was said to have been born a Spartan helot, but no one ever questioned him about it. Satyrus knew that he had been close to Philokles, and had donated a hefty sum for the Spartan's statue in the library – as yet uncast.
Dionysius – one of dozens of men in Alexandria to bear that name, or perhaps hundreds – was one of Satyrus's childhood friends. He lay near Sandokes, whom he idolized. He was taking the Marathon. Satyrus had hesitated to take him again – Dionysius had almost lost his ship at the battle off Olbia, and he'd spread the rumour of Satyrus's death. But Dionysius had paid the cost of the ship and the rowers from his father's fortune, in hard cash – and the truth was that Satyrus's fleet was beginning to cost so much that he could see the bottom of Uncle Leon's coffers.
Anaxilaus was a scientific captain, a friend of many of the philosophers at the library, a man of education who nonetheless followed the sea. He had red hair, which alone enabled him to stand out among guests, and his excellent manners betrayed his Sicilian origins. His father and grandfather had both been tyrants in Italy, and Anaxilaus often joked that he'd gone to sea because it was safer than staying at home. He had Troy. His younger and much handsomer brother Gelon would have the Plataea until he got him to Byzantium for Abraham. He'd been promised a trireme there. He lay opposite Apollodorus, who fancied himself a gentleman and insisted on naming his pedigree to the Sicilians – in detail.
They were social men – sailors are social by nature – and if the conversation was loud and nautical, it was also well-bred. Sappho was still smiling at Anaxilaus's gallantry as she escorted the last of the guests to the door. 'Sicilians have the very best manners,' she said, as her steward closed the garden door.
'I think Philokles would have argued that Spartans have the very best manners,' Satyrus said. They walked back to the main room together and lay on adjacent couches.
'Are you still angry with me?' she asked.
'No,' Satyrus said. 'No. You were right, of course. I miss Philokles. He used to say that it is sometimes easy to mistake the hard thing for the easy thing.' Satyrus could feel the wine in his brain. His aunt was really quite beautiful – not the first time he'd noticed. He banished the thought as unworthy. 'It is easy to kill, and difficult to find another way – but it is difficult to make myself kill, and that clouds the issue.' Satyrus took a long drink of wine. 'I think I killed two men in the Euxine to show myself that I could.'
Sappho rolled on to her stomach – not the posture of a well-bred woman of Thebes, but of a hetaira. 'Dear nephew, we all do things we regret – often merely to prove things to ourselves. May I say that I think you are lucky in your captains?'