Stratokles grinned. ‘Best she not know that we share … anything.’
‘I still think you were her lover.’ Banugul flicked a finger into his side and made him jump.
‘She’s too young for me, and besides, not every woman can see through my ugliness to the worthy philosopher inside.’ He laughed.
She tickled him. ‘You are a fool.’
‘Would you marry me, if we live through the year?’ Stratokles asked.
Sophokles knew that Satyrus of Tanais was on Rhodes as soon as he landed. It wasn’t exactly a secret, but the news was new enough not to have made it across the straits to Miletus.
He had gone to Alexandria on her orders and found no quarry at all. Her information was wrong. Sophokles, released from the spell of her presence, had a profound and abiding temptation to ride away into Asia and be shot of the whole thing. He had no interest whatsoever in killing the Jewish girl. No challenge — and as like as not, Phiale was wrong about the whole thing. She was — he allowed himself to think it — cursed. Perhaps mad.
Sophokles also suspected that she was working for Neron, Demetrios’s spymaster. A double or even triple agent. And that made her tasks too dangerous even to contemplate, because he wouldn’t know the consequences.
But Satyrus of Tanais — that was a worthy target. Beloved of the gods, or so men said. And as Phiale, Cassander, and Antigonus all offered substantial rewards for his death, he was the most valuable contract Sophokles had ever had. That anyone had ever had.
Balanced against that, Sophokles had only failed a dozen times in his life, and most of them had involved Satyrus to one extent or another.
The memory of the twelve-year-old boy’s searing contempt was burned into his head.
Sophokles took rooms in a house that rented to merchants, and began to make his plans. He had four men, and he used them carefully — the agora, the warehouses. It took him three days to establish for a fact that Satyrus was living with Abraham the Jew. Was surrounded by well-armed friends. Was deeply in love with the Jew’s sister — no secret here on Rhodes.
‘Miriam?’ Satyrus came into the garden with three big men — big even by the standards of a tall woman with a tall warrior brother.
She rose, and they touched hands. They had reached a stage where they couldn’t help but touch each other in public — the tension was a delight and a temptation and a deep frustration. Satyrus suspected that the slaves were laughing at them. He knew Anaxagoras was laughing.
‘These are friends of yours?’ Miriam asked. They were a frightful trio — like Titans come to life. Easily the grimmest men Miriam had ever been confronted with.
‘These three are Achilles, Odysseus and Ajax,’ Satyrus said, and grinned.
Miriam smiled. ‘I can believe it,’ she said.
‘They have served me well. And deserve better than being dragged through a war.’ Satyrus shook his head — just being with her clouded his wits.
Achilles laughed. ‘You two’re a picture, you know that, eh?’ He stuck out a great hand to Miriam. ‘Satyrus wants us to be your guards.’
She looked at them. ‘I will be the envy of every matron in Rhodes.’
Odysseus leered at her. ‘Yep,’ he said.
Ajax stroked his beard, looking at the house. ‘I could learn to like it here.’
Achilles looked at Satyrus. ‘No strings? This is it — look after this woman?’ He nodded. ‘I’d think you’d done right by us, and more.’
‘Until the horde of barbarians attacks,’ Ajax said.
Miriam put her hands on her hips. ‘You know what I see? Three agora toughs who are going to make all my slaves pregnant and drink all my wine. Why do I need guards?’
Anaxagoras came in with her brother. He saluted her on the cheek, clasped hands with Achilles. ‘Ask that again, despoina?’
‘Why do I need guards?’ Miriam asked.
‘Satyrus is here because we convinced him that there were so many different people trying to kill him that he should evade the net, do something unexpected, and vanish.’ Anaxagoras put a hand on Satyrus’s shoulder. ‘Satyrus thinks that everyone in the world knows … well, that you and he are close.’
Miriam flushed.
Abraham raised an eyebrow. ‘Everyone on Rhodes, anyway.’
Anaxagoras nodded. ‘My point exactly. So Satyrus has brought these three fine men, ‘ he aimed a little bow at Achilles, who grinned, ‘to protect you.’
Miriam raised an eyebrow. ‘And you? Are leaving?’ The slightest tremor touched her voice.
Satyrus shook his head. ‘I’m a fool, Miriam. I should have started with this. Yes — I won’t wait for Leon, much as I want to see him. I’m going by sea to Aigai, then overland to Seleucus. I have the plan of the summer campaign. And I’ll deliver it in person. It seems unlikely to me that anyone will manage to assassinate me on the Euphrates — indeed, no one will even know who I am.’ He took a breath. ‘But you will be a target. And if you are not then these three n’er-do-wells will have a place to have a well-earned rest.’
‘Well,’ Miriam said. ‘I see. No need for me to complain, then.’
Satyrus, it turned out, was a hero of epic proportions to the Rhodians.
Sophokles hadn’t lived so long in his business by being a fool. No murder on Rhodes — an island — would be survivable. The Rhodians would torture the man who killed their hero. He could see ways to make the kill and escape but the risk was enormous.
Worse, the Jew girl suddenly had three very dangerous-looking bodyguards — huge, showy men who had the eyes of the real thing. Sophokles saw those eyes in the mirror. He knew the type.
His men were scared of the new bodyguards.
Best, he thought, to bide his time.
Sophokles liked Rhodes, and he was in no hurry. He felt as if he was at the hub of the world. He lay on his hard linen mattress and listened to the world turn. All news came to Rhodes; that Seleucus had marched from Babylon, that Antigonus was marching to meet him. That the allies had signed a compact at Heraklea, and that Stratokles had directed it. Sophokles raised a cup of wine to his former … comrade? Co-contractor? The man had turned the tables on Cassander — widely held the wiliest of the Diadochoi.
Demetrios had an army and a fleet in the Dardanelles, and was marching east to oppose Lysimachos. His fleet was waiting at Abydos to face the combined fleets of Rhodes, Aegypt, and Cassander.
And Satyrus of Tanais was lying on a couch on Rhodes, apparently taking no part.
Sophokles took a week to develop his informants. Abraham’s house was virtually impossible to penetrate, he found; instead of slaves, the man had Jews, and they were immune to bribes. Or rather, as Sophokles found to his cost, they took the bribes and reported them.
The next thing he knew, one of his local thugs was bleeding to death in the street, and one of the big bodyguards was pounding on the door of his rooming house, and the other two were watching the back of the building.
Sophokles had not stayed alive by being a fool. He was off across the roofs in a moment. In an hour, he was back on a ship for Miletus, a step ahead of the men who had started watching him.
He was sitting in a wine shop on the old harbour in Miletus, watching fish rise to his breadcrumbs and considering, once again, the possibility of giving up the whole thing and riding away, when he saw a triakonter come into the harbour like a racing boat — oars flowing like the legs on a water bug, flashing in the watery spring sun. And then the boat turned end for end, slowed in the chops of its own turn, and backed stern first onto the beach, almost at Sophokles’ feet. The men took a meal, and hired a pilot for the Cilician coast. And Satyrus of Tanais leaped into the shallow surf. Several of his friends leaped after him, calling for wine.
Satyrus of Tanais was ashore in enemy-held Asia, with a handful of friends and no escort.
Sophokles was so tempted by the immediacy of it that he strung his bow and put an arrow to it before he reconsidered. He couldn’t guarantee a kill at this range.