'You look like a young god,' Leon said.
Satyrus bowed at the compliment. 'It is so good to have you back among us, Uncle,' he said.
'I do not look like a young god, do I?' Leon shook his head. 'They didn't feed me for – some time. I wasn't tortured, but suddenly the treatment went from ransom captivity to something worse. Later I found out that Melitta had landed and raised the Sakje, and suddenly I was a liability.' He coughed into his hand.
Darius put a hand on the Numidian's shoulder. 'We got to you as soon as we could organize,' he said.
Satyrus shook his head. 'I feel guilt, Uncle. I left you at the battle, and then I left your rescue to others.'
Leon smiled. 'Lad, you lived, and I lived, and now…' He grinned, and some of the wrinkles fell from his face. 'And now, we'll have our revenge.'
The story of the rescue came out over two days – how Darius recruited Persian slaves inside the palace, then insinuated himself among them, armed a dozen, massacred the guards and opened the cells.
'I suspect that some truly bad men are now free,' Darius said. 'I can't really bring myself to care. But I do have half a dozen Persian gentlemen who have come with me, and would expect a reward.'
'Can they ride?' Satyrus asked.
'I did say they were Persians,' Darius said.
'I'll take them,' Diodorus said, coming out of the darkness with a wineskin over his shoulder. 'Leon, you bastard, you made a lot of work for us!'
Satyrus was one of them, but in a way, he was not. He sat with his knees drawn up to his chin, his back against Abraham's back, and he listened to them – Leon and Crax, Diodorus, Nihmu, Darius and all the men who had ridden with Kineas. He listened to them tell stories far into the night.
Abraham laughed. 'Is this what we'll become?'
Satyrus shook his head. 'Only if we're lucky,' he said.
'Listen to them brag!' Abraham shot back. 'They sound like pirates!'
Satyrus reached over and took the wine his friend was hoarding. 'Darius walked into Eumeles' palace and rescued Leon. Leon survived without food for a month. Nihmu found Darius disguised as a slave and then joined him. These people are larger than mere mortals, Abraham. They are like the men of former days, or so they have always seemed to me.'
Abraham grunted. 'Like Philokles, then,' he said.
Satyrus was silent for a while. 'Yes,' he said. 'They are all like Philokles.'
'Makes you wonder what your father was like,' Abraham said.
'Yes,' Satyrus said. 'Yes.'
'I think I have a pretty good idea,' Abraham said. He took a breath and got up. 'Where do you think your father found these demi-gods?'
Satyrus used his friend's hand to get to his feet. 'They find you,' he said. In the morning, Diodorus asked to land the horses. 'The Exiles can ride from here,' he said. 'Our horses will be fat and happy in three days. But if we sail another day, we'll have nothing but rotting horse meat.'
All the Exiles nodded.
Satyrus shrugged. 'Can you get to Tanais?'
Diodorus scratched his head. 'I think I can puzzle it out,' he said.
Crax laughed aloud.
Diokles cut in. 'If we get under way immediately, we might yet catch him today. Wind's against us, now. Against Eumeles, too. So we row – and our rowers are better.'
'If we don't fight today, we'll raise Tanais tomorrow,' Satyrus said. 'I dislike dividing my forces.'
'Tomorrow, really?' Diodorus asked. He looked at Crax.
'Transports only slow us down,' Diokles observed. 'Leave 'em here and we'll double our chances of catching that bastard.'
'Try the Coracanda,' Leon said.
'That's it!' Satyrus said. 'I need – one of the fishermen. Darius? Are they gone?'
'Stayed for the wine. And the reward.' Darius was chewing bread, uncharacteristically human. 'I'll fetch them.'
The fishermen were delighted to receive a silver mina each for their part in the rescue.
'And the same again if you'll pilot us around the island and through the Coracanda.' He looked at them expectantly. Leon spoke to them in Maeotian, and they shrugged.
Phanagoreia island filled the north end of the strait. The main channel ran north and west, away from Tanais. Satyrus knew from childhood that there was a much narrower channel east around the island, a channel that ran all the way up to the mouth of the Hypanis. The enemy fleet knew these waters, too – or had pilots who would – but they'd taken the safe channel.
'What's the Coracanda?' Diokles asked.
The fishermen all shuffled their feet.
'It's an old channel through sandbanks. It runs east of the island and it'll cut hours off our time.' Satyrus was emphatic.
Diodorus nodded. 'It won't save you that much time,' he said, 'but it'll save us three hundred stades. We'll be at the Hypanis by tonight.' He'd marched and sailed here before.
The lead fisherman scratched his beard. 'She's shallow, lord. Many places no deeper than a man is high, or even a child. And if a ship touches, she never comes off.'
'Can you get us through? Lotus has the deepest draught.' Satyrus spoke to the fishermen, but he sent Helios for the Rhodians and the pirates.
The fishermen talked among themselves in their own tongue. By the time the leader spoke, Panther was there, and Demostrate.
Satyrus was amused to see the pirate king and the Rhodian approach together, laughing. And relieved.
He saluted both, and then the fisherman spoke. 'I can but try, lord. I can put a fisher-boat through the gullet in the dark. But these here monsters are another thing. I can't say. I don't think she's ever been done.'
Leon shook his head. 'I've done it,' he said softly, and the other men quieted for him, even Demostrate. Leon was a man who explored, who had walked and sailed everywhere he could go. 'I took a trireme up the gullet – ten years back. And again in the Olympic year.' He nodded to Satyrus. 'We can do it.'
Diokles made a face. 'Is it needful?'
Satyrus nodded. 'I need those horses. One day of bad weather and they'd be dead.'
Diokles looked at the sky and the sun, and was silent.
An hour later, the Lotus turned out of her column, heading east up a channel that seemed from a distance to be narrower than the hull of the ship. And behind them, all sixty-five ships sorted themselves into a single column with the horse transports in the lead, each one reinforced with oarsmen from the lighter ships.
Neiron shook his head. 'You put the heaviest draughts in front? They'll ground and plug the channel.'
'Then we push the horses over the side and float them,' Satyrus said. 'Leon is the greatest sailor I have ever known. Let him lead.'
Before the sun was a hand's breadth up in the sky, the line was threading its way through the channel. Satyrus looked back and there were ships as far as his eyes could see – a single line, like dancers at a festival, each ship copying the motions of the Lotus in the lead.
'This is – mad,' Neiron complained.
Satyrus felt the wind change on his cheek, a gentle breeze that ruffled his hair and breathed on their sterns.
'I don't believe it,' Neiron said.
The fisherman coughed in his hand and spat over the side for luck.
Helios came up behind his master. 'Why are they so happy?' he asked.
Satyrus grinned. 'The gods send us a wind,' he said, pouring a libation over the side. 'It is against our enemy, who must go north and west. And it is gentle, so that we can use it as we coast east.' He laughed. 'May it blow all day.'
Helios made a sign, and the fleet stood on.
22
Upazan followed them down the Tanais, and every step of his advance was contested, and men died.
Archers shot from woods and from barns. The woods were burned, the barns stormed. And men died.