There were dead pikemen and dead Sakje all the way across the plain – three stades of dead.
Nikephoros was less than a stade away. It was somehow odd that Melitta knew the sound of his voice. He was shouting at someone. And then the pikemen began to march, their ranks closing up over the dead, and they formed even closer. The back ranks walked backwards as they withdrew, and the spearheads were still steady.
'Good men,' Coenus said. He was in armour again, and had a fine Attic helmet on his head with a red crest. 'He's going to ride over and ask for a truce.'
'Give me all your arrows,' Melitta called to her household, and in seconds, her quiver was full – forty arrows, all they had.
She turned to Coenus. 'You're with me. The rest of you wait here. Scopasis – here!' More kindly, 'Coenus can protect me. And I want him to see a full quiver.'
Sure enough, Nikephoros was riding towards them, mounted on an ugly bay. He seemed unconcerned to be alone in front of a host of enemies.
'I wish that man was mine,' Melitta said.
Coenus nodded. 'If he lives, make him yours,' he said.
Nikephoros met them in a clear space among the dead. 'I would like a day's truce to collect and bury my dead,' he said. 'I concede that I was bested.'
Melitta shook her head. 'No, I'm sorry, Nikephoros. I like you, but no truce. We will finish you in the morning. Unless you'd like to ask for terms.'
'My master's ally Upazan is coming,' he said. 'You will not finish me in the morning.'
Melitta shrugged. 'I have no need to bluster or bargain. Begone.'
She turned her horse, and as she turned, she saw the shock on Nikephoros's face. Even as she saw it, she saw where his eyes were, and she followed them.
The bay was full of ships.
And closer, at the seaward edge of Nikephoros's camp, there was fire.
'No truce,' she spat. To Coenus, she said, 'Ride!'
They left Nikephoros in a swirl of dust and galloped back across the dead to where her people had dismounted. Most were swilling wine. Tameax spat a mouthful and it was like blood from his mouth – a poor omen, she thought.
'My brother is here,' she shouted.
Coenus pulled up behind her. 'Of course!' he said.
'Satyrus is attacking Nikephoros's camp,' she said. 'We need to harry him every step and slow his retreat, and we may yet have him in the last light of the sun.'
It is a hard thing for a warrior to believe that he is done – that he has lived another day, that he can drink, sit on the ground, enjoy the small pleasures that make life worth living even in the middle of the unbelievable tension of daily war – and then be summoned back to the risk of imminent death. It is a hard thing, and it is only the best who can rise to meet it.
'Now for revenge!' Thyrsis said, leaping to his feet as if he'd never shot his bow or ridden a stade all day.
'One more ride,' Scopasis shouted, and then they were all on their feet. Many changed horses. Many cursed.
Urvara leaned on her sword hilt and drove the point into the grass. 'We're done.'
Melitta was sorry, but she forced a smile. 'I can see Eumenes,' she said, pointing across the river, where a long column of horsemen were splashing into the river. 'Send him to me.'
Then she took her warriors and went back to the pikemen.
Nikephoros had plenty of time to see her coming, and at her orders all the Sakje shot carefully and slowly, riding close to be sure of every shaft, and the pikemen halted and closed even tighter. Melitta rode to Graethe. 'Take your Standing Horses and get arrows from the Grass Cats,' she said. 'Then come back.'
He waved his axe in acknowledgement and rode away.
Her numbers halved, she led her people past the phalanx again. Only fifty or so arrows flew, but men fell.
The phalanx shuffled into motion again.
She cursed the lack of arrows and rode past a third time. This time, pikemen leaped out of the spear wall and killed Sakje, dragging the victims down with charging thrusts of their spears – but every brave pikeman died, spitted or shot by the following riders.
And again the phalanx retreated, opening a gap.
She rode by a fourth time but scarcely a dozen arrows flew, and the phalanx didn't even stop. Nikephoros was on to her. He was going to march away.
But Graethe returned and led his men straight to the attack, and his first run blocked out the first stars with arrow shafts, and fifty more pikemen fell. Again they halted and closed up.
'They may be the best infantry I've ever seen,' Coenus said. 'They won't break. By the gods, they're good.'
Graethe rode back. 'Now what?'
'Give every warrior one arrow,' she said. 'We'll hit both of their flanks together and try to make them fold.'
Graethe agreed, and they rode out to the flanks. On the left, where Melitta rode, she could see horsemen crossing the last ridge. She had no idea who they were, but they were clear in the last light of the sun.
'Rally at the ford if we do not break the Greeks!' she shouted.
There was no answering shout. Her people had no life in them – they rode, and obeyed. That was all. Every face had the lines of exhaustion.
She led them wide to the left and the Greeks began to march, and then she turned inward, just as Graethe's men did the same on the right. This time they would go straight at the Greeks instead of riding along the face of their formation. If men flinched, if the arrow storm took enough lives, a rider might slip into the ranks, and then another behind, and then…
The Cruel Hands were across the ford. She could see Parshtaevalt leading his warriors forward – a thousand fresh Sakje with full quivers.
But the sun was gone, and the last light was augmented by the beacon on the fort and the line of fires burning on the beach. They had a few minutes of ruddy light, and then it would be dark.
Nikephoros had halted and was again closing his files.
Melitta put her heels to Gryphon and they went forward.
And the infantry held them. Not a Sakje died, but they were tired. A young warrior who might, in the morning, have risked his life to thread the little gap where the phylarch died with a barb in his throat reined up and turned away instead. And as the very last light died, the Sakje rode away.
It was not for nothing. All along the beach, Eumeles' second squadron lit the night sky with the fires in their hulls. And Nikephoros, driven from his camp without a fight, turned his still unbeaten phalanx from the burning gates and marched away north and east. A rider joined the phalanx, a lone man in a purple cloak. Melitta was watching him as his cloak turned from purple to black in the failing light.
'Eumeles!' a voice by her elbow called. The man turned his head and then rode on, joining the retreat of the phalanx. She turned to see who had shouted.
'To Tartarus with him,' Satyrus said, and threw his arms around his sister.
25
They camped on the field with the dead. Temerix came in an hour after dark with all his men and reported that Upazan had crossed the river to the north and was coming up fast.
Satyrus was bigger than she remembered. He seemed to have swollen to fill the role of king. She let him do it. Men called him Wanax, the old title, and Basileus, and he was like a demi-god. She felt tired and dirty next to his magnificent armour, his perfect physique and his unscarred face.
Before the night was an hour old, he had set the camp and together, the two of them walked from fire to fire, visiting Sakje and Olbians, farmers and sailors.
'My men are annoyed that they have to put out the fires they started,' Satyrus joked. His ships were still working, transporting the Olbian infantry over the river after disgorging all the Macedonians who had served as marines. 'We could have had all Eumeles' ships. But we didn't know you and Urvara could hold so many men for so long.'