Pullo! Vorenus thought with a jolt. Where was Pullo? Not on the deck of the trireme with Antony. Vorenus would have been able to recognize his old friend even from the distance in a storm.
Vorenus started to look out to the bodies on the sea, to the few arms still waving for rescue, when the mast beneath him creaked and shook.
No, he thought, looking up. Not—
The strangely angled yard above him shuddered, rocking free of the mast. Lashings began to snap, one at a time, as if an invisible hand were counting them off: one, two, three …
Vorenus cursed. Half his mind told him to give up at last, but the other half insisted that he was going to make it through this, rescue Pullo from wherever he was hiding, and then explain to the sacrilegious old bastard that this was exactly why he believed in the gods. The possibility that Pullo might be dead was spared only the most passing thought before it was swept aside by the final crack. And then the wide beam, as wide as the great flagship itself, came loose and fell.
Vorenus scrambled his feet against the mast, searching for purchase even as he tried to tighten the tired grip of his right hand on the masthead line. He had time only to roll the rope once, twice, three times around his forearm—he’d have no skin at all on the inside of it before long, he thought—before the yard was bouncing and twisting down, crashing and catching through ropes, the sail unbound now and adding its own madness to the falling tumble. His feet caught on the wood an instant before it all struck and he kicked off, swinging out of the way and into the rain.
The world spun. The sailcloth slapped against his outstretched arm. But the yard missed him, coming down into the water with a splash and at last breaking the grappling lines that he’d only managed to half-sever.
Just reaching the end of his swing, Vorenus had time only to smile before the flagship, finally released of the weight of the drowned trireme, abruptly rocked back toward upright, whipping him up through the air.
Vorenus saw the flagship’s deck passing below him. Then he saw the storm-dark sky. Then he lost his grip entirely, the rope burning its way loose of his arm, and he fell, screaming obscenities at the gods, down into the frothing sea.
The cold water momentarily paralyzed him, squeezing the remaining wind out of his lungs and preventing him from taking in more even when he bobbed up to the surface amid the waves. He would not float long, he knew. His armor was weighing him down, and as its leathers soaked in the sea he could feel it all pulling him lower—like Neptune’s own hands. As soon as the frigid shock of the impact let go, Vorenus took a deep breath and frantically began trying to unfasten the straps and binds of the armor, even as the weight took him back under. When the last of them came loose, his lungs were burning. He kicked his legs wildly toward the light above, breaking the surface to gulp down the salty air, his teeth chattering and his eyes scanning for help.
The other trireme, he thought. It must be near. I must have landed—
He spun in the water, saw the boat not an oar’s length away. Glad for the numbing cold on his arm, he started swimming, screaming for Antony.
In response, a face—enemy? friend? did it matter?—appeared at the railing and saw him. Seconds later, a rope was flung over the railing, the frayed, chopped-off end landing only a few feet from him.
Grasping the line with shaking hands, Vorenus held on, his last ounce of strength threatening to fail him. “Just don’t let go,” he shouted, to both his savior and himself. “Don’t let go!”
Neither of them did. The man on the trireme pulled. Vorenus kicked. And then he was rising out of the bone-chilling water, the man gripping his soaked clothes and using them to pull him up and over the railing.
Vorenus fell to the blood-splattered deck, shivering violently. His rescuer stepped away, looking for a blanket, for something to put over his shoulders and his bleeding arm. Vorenus coughed and retched, his vision rattling along with his teeth, but then he looked up and saw—unmistakably, undeniably—the big shape of a man that could only be Pullo exiting the trap that led to the rowers’ hold.
“Vorenus!” Pullo shouted, seeing him at the same time and rushing forward. “Antony! It’s Vorenus!”
Vorenus could see blood smeared across his friend’s face and chest when he got close, but the big man looked happy enough. He was still alive, by the gods. And the fight on the trireme’s deck was over: Antony and his men had indeed somehow taken it.
“Pullo, dammit,” Vorenus muttered as Pullo helped him to his knees. “This is why I believe—”
“You need a surgeon,” Pullo said, frowning as he examined the rope-mauled arm. “Why do you always get hurt more than me?”
“Glad you made it,” Antony said, striding into Vorenus’ field of vision. The thick curls of the general’s hair were sodden with more than water, and his eyes were heavily dark with sorrow despite the confident smile on his face. “We’ve lost too many—though we’ve taken a ship, eh, lads?”
A faint, tired cheer went up on the deck.
Vorenus shook his head. “Go,” he said.
Antony’s face froze. “What?”
Pullo had his arm around his back now and lifted him to his feet. When Vorenus couldn’t seem able to stand, the big man just held him there. “Cleopatra,” Vorenus managed to say.
Antony’s face turned away, toward the south, as if he might see something in the storm. “Go send her a message? We’ve lost our signalman, Vorenus. But she knows to enter the fight late: the second wave.”
Vorenus shook his head, more vigorously for the sudden memory of the ungodly—or was it godly?—wave that had nearly killed them all. Octavian’s other ships, the ones he’d seen circling. They must have been driven back by the wave, but they’d return. Vultures always came back. They didn’t have time. “No,” he said, concentrating to keep his voice steady despite the cold. Someone threw a blanket over his shoulders—a good feeling despite the weight. “She won’t come.”
Antony’s face whipped around to face him again. “How do you—”
“I told her to run,” Vorenus said, knowing there was no time for pleasantries about it. “If things turned bad. Told her to run. Break free.”
Antony’s face grew red, a crimson of anger. “What?”
“The children,” Vorenus croaked. “Alexandria.”
“You told her to run? To leave me?”
“We need … catch up. Keep flying Octavian’s flag. Push hard for the south. There’s a chance—”
Antony recoiled as if he’d been slapped. “Flee the field?”
“Fight another day,” Vorenus said. “Get the children—”
“You coward,” Antony growled, his fist pulling back to strike.
Vorenus cringed at the impending blow, but he lacked the strength to move, only standing because Pullo’s big left arm supported him. So when Antony began to swing, it was Pullo who stopped it, his free right hand coming forward in a quick punch that caught Antony squarely on the cheek and spun him around and down to the deck like a dropped sack of wheat.
“Pullo!” Vorenus gasped. “You can’t … oh gods…”
Pullo hoisted Vorenus up a little straighter, moving some of the weight over his hip. “Bah!” he said. “I never really liked taking orders from him anyway. Let’s get back to Alexandria, shall we?”
Without waiting for a response from Vorenus, Pullo turned around to face the stunned squadron of fellow legionnaires gathered around them. “We’re going south,” he said. “You heard Vorenus: keep up the enemy’s colors. Keep up the appearance. We’re just a lowly trireme limping after the enemy, got it?”