Theron raised an eyebrow at the Spartan, and the two men glowered at each other for a bit. ‘Advice everyone could heed.’
A young male slave came in, sheathed in sweat, with a scroll. Kinon took it and opened it, his eyes scanning the page, and he frowned.
‘I asked our tyrant, Dionysius, to grant us all an audience.’ He rolled the scroll and scratched his chin with it. ‘He has declined the honour, saying that the time for meeting is inauspicious, which is a load of mule dung and no mistake.’ He handed the scroll to the same black slave who had waited on Satyrus after he awoke. ‘Zosimos, have this scraped clean and put in the stack.’
Zosimos took the scroll and vanished through the pillars of the colonnade.
Kinon glanced around, pulled out a gold toothpick and went to work on his teeth. Satyrus looked away. A female slave offered him wine, and he hastily put his hand over his cup. ‘Might I have some more water?’ he implored her.
She went to a sideboard and returned with a gleaming silver pitcher and a slight smile. He accepted both gratefully.
‘Something is amiss,’ Kinon said. ‘Nonetheless, I’m sending to Diodorus by courier so that he is warned of your circumstances. I’ll send a caravan with the armour – three days at the least, I’m afraid. What do you need?’
Philokles leaned forward. ‘Clothes, weapons, remounts. Some cash. Kinon, I am merely being candid – pardon my bluntness.’
Kinon shook his head. ‘No need to apologize. I am rich, and my friend Leon could buy and sell twenty of me, and together, your burden isn’t a flyspeck. Arms and armour are easy – we make them. Why don’t I have Zosimos take you to the shop? None of the gear will be silver chased or inlaid, but it is all solid and workmanlike. Take what you need or have Zosimos order it with our smith.’ He rubbed his chin. ‘I don’t like the fact that the tyrant won’t see you.’ He looked around. ‘Where is Tenedos?’
One of the female slaves darted into the colonnade and Tenedos, the steward, emerged, chewing on a stylus. ‘Master?’ he asked, very much in the tone of a man annoyed to be interrupted.
‘What shipping came in today, Tenedos?’ Kinon asked.
Tenedos took a breath and Satyrus thought that he hesitated. ‘Pentekonter from Tomis, laden with wine, property of Isokles of Tomis.
Merchantman from Athens, laden with pottery and fine woollens and some copper, property of a mixed cartel of Athenian merchants and some of our friends. The copper is ours. Military trireme, no lading.’
Kinon sat up and swung his legs over the side of his couch. ‘From Pantecapaeum?’ he asked.
‘By way of Gorgippia and Bata, if the oar master is to be believed.’ Tenedos tucked his stylus behind his ear.
Philokles swung his legs over the edge of his couch. ‘Ares!’ he said. He sounded tired.
Kinon shook his head. ‘This is Heraklea, not some grain town on the north shore of the Euxine. We have laws here, and a good ruler, even if he is a tyrant. But they’ve got to him. Tenedos, I should have told you – now I am telling you. I wish to know anything you learn of this ship, of its master and its navarch and who they visit. Understand?’ ‘Yes, master,’ Tenedos said, sounding both competent and long-suffering.
Philokles nodded. ‘If you will lend me young Zosimos, I will see to some armour. He looked at Satyrus. ‘Fancy some armour and a light sword, boy?’
Satyrus was off his couch, headache forgotten, before Philokles was done speaking.
‘As would I,’ Melitta said.
‘We’re not on the sea of grass now,’ Philokles said.
‘Will that render me safe from assault?’ she asked.
‘As a woman,’ Kinon started, and then reconsidered. The code of war said that women were exempt from the rigours and results, but no one fought by the code any more. The Spartans and the Athenians had killed the code in their thirty-year war, almost a hundred years before. Women caught with a defeated army were sold into slavery.
‘I’ll come with you,’ she insisted.
Theron rolled off his couch. ‘I’ll come too.’
Philokles raised an eyebrow. ‘We won’t be able to pay you for a long time, athlete. I honour you for your loyalty, but shouldn’t you be finding a new employer?’
Theron gave a wry smile. ‘So anxious to be rid of me? I thought that I’d get myself a free suit of bronze. That will pay my fees for some months.’
Kinon laughed. ‘I hadn’t thought what taking in a pair of princes would be like. Of course! Tutors and trainers! We’ll need a sophist!’
Philokles shook his head. ‘I’ve got that covered,’ he said.
Kinon laughed heartily. ‘Now I’ve seen everything!’ he said. ‘A Spartan sophist!’
Philokles returned a twisted smile. ‘Just so. When I can’t convince a man, I kill him.’
They had to walk all the way, through the landward gate, called the Sinope gate by the locals, from stone-cobbled streets to gravel roads and then to heavily rutted dirt and mud. The armour smith’s place was a dozen stades outside of town, and they went far enough to get a good picture of the life of the local helots.
Satyrus walked next to Philokles. ‘That ship from Tomis?’ he said.
Philokles’ eyes flickered over the fields and the bent figures working them. ‘I was thinking more of the trireme. What about it?’
Satyrus shrugged. ‘Wasn’t Isokles a good friend of my father’s?’ he asked. ‘We’d be safe there.’
Philokles nodded and tugged his beard. ‘I hadn’t given that thought. You may have a point. We could probably secure passage on his ship. But what then?’
‘Across Thrace to Athens,’ Satyrus said.
‘Right across Cassander’s territory?’ Philokles asked. ‘Does that seem wise?’
Satyrus let his shoulders droop. ‘Oh,’ he said.
The armour smith had a circle of houses, almost like a small village, and a dozen sheds, each more ill-built than the last, and a slave barracks in the middle surrounded by a fence. A stream flowed through the middle of the facility, and it stank of human waste and ash. The road outside the gate was a cratered ruin from heavy cartage, and there was a dead donkey at the bottom of one of the worst pits, its body bloated and stinking.
Satyrus was shocked, and he wrinkled his nose in disgust.
Theron smiled. ‘You thought that armour and weapons were made in forest glades by Hephaestos and his mortal helpers? Or inside volcanoes, perhaps?’
Melitta looked at the devastation of ten forges and all the support the forges required. As she watched, a string of donkeys, perhaps fifty of them, were driven past. Every donkey had a pair of woven basket panniers, and each one was full of charcoal. The drovers were careful to leave the road and get the whole string around the deep potholes where the dead donkey rotted. ‘By the lame smith!’ she said. ‘This is an assault on Gaia! This is like impiety!’
Theron shook his head. ‘This is a good-sized commercial forge, mistress. ’ He shrugged. ‘Over there,’ he said, pointing at the mountains that stood like a wall on the southern horizon, ‘is Bithynia and Paphlagonia. There is a war there. Armies of twenty thousand men, and every man must have a sword, a spear and a helmet – at least.’ He looked at the twins. ‘We have manufactories in Boeotia and in Corinth. This one isn’t bad. It’s just a dead animal.’
‘Wait until you see a battlefield,’ Philokles said.
The factor of the armour factory was a Chalcidian freedman. His face was red and his arms and legs and chiton were covered in burns, and he had no hair at all. ‘Zosimos!’ he said. ‘A pleasure.’ His voice belied his words, but he gave the black man a quick smile at the end to pull the barb.
Zosimos bowed and flashed a smile in return. ‘Eutropios, I greet you, and I bring you the greetings of my master, Kinon. He asks that these men, friends of his, and of Master Leon,’ Zosimos said this with a significant look, ‘receive whatever armour they might need, and weapons.’
Eutropios put his hands on his hips. He had the muscles of Herakles. In fact, his upper physique was a match for Theron’s. ‘I thought he was too well dressed to be a new smith for me,’ he said, looking at Theron. ‘I hoped, though. Listen, tell your master from me that if he wants this big order to go out before the Mounikhion, he had best not be sending me any new orders. If these gentlemen,’ and Eutropios bowed without much courtesy, ‘take armour from the order, I’m that much worse off.’