‘Will we win tomorrow?’ Satyrus asked Coenus.
Coenus shrugged. ‘I am not a commander,’ he said. ‘But these men are in high heart.’
Stratokles, who had been talking to Antiochus — plotting, Satyrus suspected, and plotting without conscious thought — stopped talking. He came and offered his horn cup full of wine to Coenus. ‘I feel that we will win,’ he said.
Seleucus extricated himself from Prepalaus, who had drunk too much. ‘We will not lose,’ he said. ‘We have a good army and a safe retreat, and this evening has done much to bind our army together.’
Satyrus made a wry face. ‘I’m not satisfied to avoid defeat,’ he said. ‘Wine has made me over-bold, perhaps, but I am not in this war to avoid defeat. I’m in this war to see it over. I am twenty-eight-’
‘Not for nearly a month,’ said his twin.
‘I am nearly twenty-eight, and I have been at war since I was twelve. The men around these fires know no other life. They deserve an end.’ Satyrus crossed his arms, having said more than he intended.
Anaxagoras smiled. He took the cup and drank deeply. ‘Playing that long is like an athletic competition,’ he said. ‘Listen, Satyrus, I agree that this war should end. But consider, if you will — there are fifty thousand men around these fires, and the enemy has the same again. And the last thirty years — by the gods, Satyrus, the last fifty years — have given men the habit of war. Hellenes have lost the habit of peace. They settle everything by war. One battle will not fix that. The losers will creep away to rebuild, the winners will squabble among themselves.’
Stratokles nodded. ‘How will these men make their livings, Satyrus? War is an honourable profession — should they be bandits? The gentlemen — where will they go? Back to the cities that exiled them, back to ruined farms and dead families? The smaller men — to what shall they return? The cowards who stayed at home — the young men who stayed with the loom and the potter’s wheel and the blacksmith’s shop — they have all the jobs. They rise in the trades. What, exactly, is a man who has been the file leader of a file of hoplites for twenty years to do, back in Corinth? Go back to his dye vat? Serve as an apprentice under a man ten years younger?’
Satyrus took the wine cup — freshly filled by Phoibos himself — and drank. Pure water with a little vinegar; Phoibos was telling them all it was time for bed. He nodded.
Melitta agreed. ‘I wouldn’t be here at all but my brother insisted we tip the scales so that the allies could end this stupid dream of a universal empire and everyone can return to their own grass.’
Anaxagoras smiled at her, but he shook his head. ‘It has become fashionable to blame King Alexander for everything,’ he said. ‘But I am a student of history, and I say that Ashniburnipal and Darius and Xerxes — and Agamemnon and Priam — Sargon — the dream of universal conquest is everywhere. Alexander didn’t start it.’
Seleucus nodded. ‘I know those names from Babylon,’ he said. ‘Sargon — you are an educated man. But Alexander did more than any man before him.’
Anaxagoras nodded. ‘Perhaps. But smashing Antigonus will not smash the restless urge to conquer. Nor will you, Lord King, give up your spear-won lands — nor Ptolemy, nor Lysimachos, nor Cassander.’
Seleucus nodded. ‘It is true.’
‘War is the king and father of all,’ Anaxagoras said. He shrugged. ‘I do not know how to make men make peace. To be honest, I’m not even sure it would be a good idea.’
Satyrus handed the vinegar water on. ‘I’m sure that it is a good idea for me,’ he said.
Water was sent out to the revellers. And Satyrus walked from group to group as they dispersed, with his sister and his friends, clasping hands and wishing men good fortune. He found Draco regaling a crowd of Macedonians with some tale.
‘Bed,’ Satyrus said. Draco was so drunk that his face was flushed bright red — so flushed that it was visible by the flicker of firelight.
‘Killed that fucking doctor!’ Draco said, throwing his arms around Satyrus.
Satyrus’s thoughts were far away — he had no idea what the drunk veteran was saying. ‘Who?’ he asked.
Draco had a cloak rolled under his arm, and he laughed. ‘Wait a mo,’ he said, and howled with laughter. He unrolled the cloak with a practised flick, and the Macedonians cursed when they saw what was wrapped in the folds — but they laughed.
Melitta didn’t flinch. She picked the head up by the hair. ‘Sophokles,’ she said with satisfaction.
Satyrus spat to avoid retching. ‘Where’d you find him?’
Draco guffawed. ‘Wandering about the camp like the fucking spy he was.’
Satyrus shook his head. ‘I hate to think how many other spies Antigonus has with us,’ he said. ‘Stratokles, have you seen this?’
The Athenian looked at the head for a long time. Then he took it from Melitta. ‘I knew him,’ he said, with unusual candour. ‘Sometimes we were comrades. May I take this for burial?’
Draco nodded. ‘Sure. Listen, I could take you to his body. I left it in his tent.’ He laughed.
Anaxagoras watched the two of them go off into the darkness together. ‘What does peace hold for them?’ he asked.
Satyrus shook his head. ‘I take your meaning,’ he said, ‘but there must be something. Draco is more like the ruin of a man than a man.’
‘I do not speak this way because I love war,’ Anaxagoras said, ‘although I confess that it does have sharp joys, like love. But merely because of what I observe. Draco lives here, the way a farmer lives on his farm. And he killed that assassin. Without him …’
Satyrus nodded. And sighed, and clasped his sister’s hand. They walked to the fire, and poured libations — one for their father, and another for their mother, and a last for Philokles. He could feel them, right there in the darkness.
An hour later, Draco and Stratokles came to the fires. They had burned well down, but the piles of embers were as high as a man’s thighs, and Draco went off into the dark and returned with Phoibos and a file of slaves, and they piled one fire high with fresh logs — old cedar, from a fence up the valley. And then the Macedonian picked up the corpse of the Athenian doctor and hoisted it onto the fire, burning his leg in the process. And Stratokles put the head with the corpse, and poured wine and oil on the fire. Stratokles went to put oil on the Macedonian’s burns, but the man stumbled away into the dark.
Lucius found Stratokles sitting alone, wrapped in his chlamys, watching the fire burn down.
‘He was no friend of yours,’ Lucius said.
Stratokles nodded.
‘By the gods — he wasn’t working for you?’ Lucius demanded. ‘We are … I thought you’d chosen a side.’ He spoke with sudden suspicion.
‘I have,’ Stratokles said. He sounded tired. ‘I’ve chosen a side, and tomorrow, I will stand in the front rank of my own phalanx and do my best to see Antigonus defeated. But Sophokles and I…’ He looked away. ‘We started together. We ended differently. But I wonder, sitting here, if tomorrow my body will go in a pit — a life of scheming, and a few moments of brutality.’ He shook his head and reached out for Lucius’s canteen, which was handed to him, full of heavy, sweet wine. ‘We started together. I don’t think it’s too late for us to end together.’ He drank.
Lucius took the canteen back and took a drink. ‘Stratokles, you’ve been a good boss. And I’ve made money … piles of money. But win or lose, tomorrow is the end. I’ve had enough for a couple of years … to go back and buy my exile off.’ He shrugged, sat back. ‘So let’s stop being so fucking maudlin and enjoy tomorrow.’
‘One more time?’ Stratokles said. ‘You’ll keep me alive?’
‘Have I ever let you down?’ Lucius asked. ‘You’re alive, aren’t you, you thankless Greek?’
They laughed.
23
Seleucus assumed that he was the commander, and neither Lysimachos nor Prepalaus gainsaid him, so when he summoned the strategoi at dawn, they came, still full of the good fellowship of the night before.